A darkened room. No sight but the vague black outlines. Then a sound. The most beautiful sound. A light, musical sound. I have never heard it before, but I know it is beautiful.

I hover near the sound. The outlined figure becomes a small girl She is sitting in her bed, the darkened room being hers.

"Girl," I whispered. She looked up at me with big blue eyes. Innocent eyes. Eyes that have never seen the horrors. Horrors like mine had.

"Hello," she said happily. "How are you doing that?"

"What?" I asked her.

"Floating."

I looked down, and indeed I was floating three feet above the floor. It all came back to me then. The horrors, the terrors I had witnessed in my young life. I saw the death and destruction caused by a bloody war. A war that seemed to chase me and never let me go. I was Death's Harbinger. No. I was Death.

"What's your name?" The small child asked, oblivious to the tear crawling down my cheek.

"My name is Death," I replied sadly.

"Really?" she asked, "Does that mean I'm to die?"

"I don't know," I answered. I then turned to the nightstand, where a picture frame rested. I looked at it closer. The girl was there, with an older woman who was holding her close.

"Hilde..." I breathed.

Then, the man standing behind her.

"You look like him," the girl commented. Then, I put it all together.

"Child," I asked, "What is your name?"

She smiled softly.

"My name is Duet. My mommy named me after my daddy. He died in the war. I never knew him."

I nodded my head in understanding now why I was here.

"Come, my child," I whispered, taking her small hand in mine. She put up no resistance as we floated away into the sky. The last thing she heard was her mother's terrified scream.

"She'll be okay," I assured the worried looking child. "She made the same sound when I died."

Owari