"Ugh!" Thump. Thump. Thump thump thump thump thump.

"Rough day at work, brother?"

"What gave it away?"

"Mmm, the head to desk lovefest. What's up?"

"Ugh, I swear, I don't know how much more of this job I can take."

"Hmm."

"I mean, come on! How many times does the world need saving? In a single century? These bloody idiots nowadays have too much damn time on their hands to keep messing around with world domination/destruction plans."

"Ah."

"It's all the television shows, I tell you. And the ta weeting. And the blogging. And the sugar. Too much sugar."

"Mmm."

"And the heroes, nowadays! Used to be all I got to do was send them some bright flash and big voice and boom! Message from the Gods! Your destiny awaits! Eternal glory--dead or alive!"

"Uhuh."

"But now. Now! They need more convincing. No more flash or dry cotton wads on a wet field. Oh noooooo. They need to see some mysterious dude that keeps appearing a gazillion times in funky cloaks and fedoras. And the Big Voice doesn't work anymore. No. It's the Creepy Mysterious Guy Voice.

Pause.

"Dammit. I liked the Big Voice."

"There there, brother."

Sigh. "Sometimes I feel like just fucking it all and letting the world go to rot."

"Heck no! Don't you dare!"

"Scribe?"

"Do you know what would happen if you did? The majority of monkeys would die! And they'd overrun the afterlife!"

"Uh..."

"And then the afterlife wouldn't be the afterlife anymore, would it? No! It'd be the Norm! And we'd have to make a new After-afterlife. And that means PAPERWORK!"

"Um..."

Do you know how much paperwork that means?! A tonne! A flashflood! A tide! A disaster! It means I'd have to do all that scribing and writing and since there're no runners anymore, I'd have to do the running myself!" Grab!

"Ack!" Flail.

"Scribes don't run! And do you know how hard it is to deal with all the different departments when it comes to making a new realm?"

Shake, shake, flail.

"It's Hard! You have to document, prove, notify, request, beg, plead, blackmail, bribe, and shove God damn common sense down idiotic throats."

Gurgle.

"And don't get me started on those old geezers in charge! Do you know how hard it is to deal with bloody geezers who've been around since forever? Seriously! They're so damn irritating. Just because they've been around since the beginning of time doesn't mean they should wait until the end of time to get their paperwork sorted and approved!"

""Ngrk!"

Shake, shake, shake. "So don't you dare let the damn world rot! I don't care if you have to shove the blasted hero into a blast furnace to make him work, but you'll freaking do what you need to! Understand?

Violent nodding.

"Good.... Glad we had this talk."

Whimper.

"Now why don't you go get something to eat brother. I need to finish scribing the events from last Spring's Equinox."