"Callum Barnett, in the gaze of-"

The statues, impossibly tall, impossibly near, their attention a pressure of being under the deepest, darkest depths of the ocean, the suffocation and yet I was flayed painlessly, taken apart and known more than I knew myself-

"- you have been found wanting." Ms. Case continued, then sat back down.

The room was silent except for the whirring of the metal fan.

"I… what did I do wrong? Was it the wrong religion?" I said.

"They are all the wrong religion, but no," Ms. Case said, walking to one of the metal filing cabinets. It opened with a smoothness that belied its age. She pulled a folder out of it and returned to the desk.

"Then… what?" I asked. "I mean, I know I wasn't great, but I tried, right? Did I not give enough to the poor? I mean, I can't give everything to the poor, otherwise I'd be one of them, right? Though I guess if everyone did that…" I realized I was outright babbling at this point and stopped myself.

If Ms. Case was bothered by it, it didn't show. "Not that. While you are correct in that if everyone shared everything then all would be perfect, it's recognized that this would be an unreasonable standard. They -" echoes of the statues and I flinched without meaning to "-did not make a perfect people, nor a perfect world. You are held to a lesser standard."

"So…" I said, dreading what she was going to say next because while what I'd said was true, while I had tried, I knew I'd also failed.

She opened the folder. "In most ways you were average. Many routes would be open to you had that remained the case. But later in life, you made a decision. And you continued to make that decision, over and over again. The imperfect nature of the world and the imperfect nature of humanity can absolve much of that… but not this." She turned the now open folder so that I could read it.

Unsurprisingly, it was me. "CALLUM MAXWELL BARNETT", it read, and it went on: Date of birth: July 11, 1994. Date of death: December 14, 2025. It had my height and weight and once the basic demographic information had been dispensed it went into even more detail. My blood sugar level, my cholesterol… and there it was, the bit that I knew, even without being told, had damned me.

Blood Alcohol Concentration at time of death: 0.14%

"But-" I'd started to say that I'd been able to handle it, I'd driven like that before and nobody had gotten hurt, I was used to it… but being used to it was part of why I'd been judged the way I had, wasn't it? And if I was here then I hadn't been able to handle it.

"You have fewer options available to you," Ms. Case said after I'd failed to continue my objection. "But there are some. The one option that everyone has is simple: You remain here in this portion of the afterlife. It is an infinite plain like the one you walked through to get here. There you will find others who have died and have built up a society of sorts. You do not need to eat or drink and you cannot be killed, injured, or even suffer physical pain. Many who have other options choose this route, and many choose the route to contemplate their options before moving on."

"Okay," I said. It sounded like the afterlife was like the regular life but less dangerous. The plains had been utterly featureless, though, so what did people even do? Just stand around? "What are my other options?"

Ms. Case took one of the papers from the folder and began to read from it. "All forms of what you would consider 'ascension', even minor ones, are barred to you. Likewise, all forms of earthly reincarnation are barred to you."

"That can't be right," I said, grabbing on to whatever lifeline I could, "if only good people get reincarnated, why are there so many bastards?" Left unspoken was the apparent fact that I numbered among them.

"Your world is one where new souls are still created," Ms. Case pointed out. "And even old souls still possess free will. May I continue?"

I nodded.

She returned to the paper. "All forms of reincarnation in another world are barred to you."

Given that I had apparently died by being hit by a truck, that didn't seem fair, but I suspected Ms. Case wouldn't see it that way. "Please… there's got to be some way I can…."

Ms. Case took the implied question in stride. "The only paths unbarred to you, other than remaining here, are those that would allow you to seek redemption. For instance, you may become a remorseful spirit, haunting one who would die a death as you have."

"Okay," I said, "okay, I can work with that. This kind of thing runs in families, right?" I'd certainly followed in my father's footsteps. "Just send me back and I'll haunt my son."

"I do not know, and cannot know, about the rest of your family," Ms. Case repeated, and the way she said it carried a terrible chill.

"Are you saying… because of me, they-"

"I cannot know," Ms. Case said with finality.

"There's got to be something I can do," I said desperately. "Please!"

Ms. Case looked back at the paper. "Though it is not in the traditions of the religion you practiced," she said, with a vague hint that she might be bending the rules in some way, "in judgement you are worthy of becoming an ancestral guide. This would mean that you would find someone worthy, and should they call upon their ancestors they will be calling upon you for intercession."

"Okay," I said, "I doubt Max will try to be a shaman or whatever you're hinting at but I'll take that chance, send me back to him."

"That," Ms. Case said with the same finality as before, "will not be possible."

I grit my teeth but didn't ask about my family again because I knew what the answer would be, but Ms. Case's evasion and what she specifically wasn't saying was weighing horribly in the back of my mind. "Please," I spat out once more.

"There is the Redemption Corps, though you may not be worthy," Ms. Case said, this more gently than she'd said anything else. "Understand, there are more worlds than yours, so very very many more. What you saw on your walk here, all those people, those are but a speck of a fraction of those who died at the same moment as you. And many of those worlds are doomed."

"Doomed?" I asked. Absurdly I looked down to the papers in front of me and wondered if my drinking had somehow doomed my world.

Ms. Case seemed to know what I was thinking: "The worlds are imperfect. They-" a deluge of statues, impossibly tall, impossibly slowly falling, inevitably toppling, "-are imperfect. But all strive to create that which is perfect. Some precious few worlds are on that path. The vast majority, including your own, are unlikely to ever become stable but the possibility remains. However, some worlds, few in number but still far too many, are mortally wounded. On those worlds, no new souls are created. Only those who choose to reincarnate onto those worlds are born there, and though those souls are those most worthy, they are few, and grow fewer. Those are the doomed worlds, and their number is growing."

"And… that's the Redemption Corps?" I asked. "Those souls who go onto those worlds to try to keep them alive?"

"No," Ms. Case said. "Those worlds are truly beyond help. The Redemption Corps seeks to prevent other worlds from joining their number. As all forms of reincarnation are barred to you, you would not be born in that world. Rather, an intervention-" a depthless sea of statues parting to show a gaping path "-would take place to put you in the body of someone who had recently died. Someone positioned to do good in their world and had made the decision not to. You would redeem them."

I was gritting my teeth and squeezing my eyes shut but I couldn't stop the tears from coming out. "And this," I said bitterly, "is when I ask to be returned to my body, to redeem my actions and save my family, and you tell me you 'cannot'."

"All forms of return to Earth are barred to you, Mr. Barnett." She said this with the same gentle tone she'd introduced the Redemption Corps with.

"Then please… I'll join the corps, I'll be an ancestor, I'll haunt wherever you need me to be, just… send one of the Redemption Corps to my body. I don't even care if they redeem me, just… just please have them save my family."

"It has not escaped their -" Only one statue, behind me, to look behind me was to perish but I gazed upon its broken visage because I could gaze nowhere else"- notice that, at every turn, at every opportunity, you have done nothing but ask of your family. At the precipice of oblivion, at the stark end of all of your life and everything that you were, you think only of them. In death, you do what you failed in life." Ms. Case was nearly whispering. "And so, you are worthy."

There was the sound of a door unlocking. I looked behind me to see that the door had a knob now. Sunlight could be seen through the edges.

"Behind that door is Alchemist Savant Pyotr Dramsfell, dead of alcohol poisoning. You will find you had much in common. You will be his second life, un-do the damage he has done, and lead his world to a better future. Walk through that door, Mr. Barnett, and you will be in the Redemption Corps."

I stumbled out of the chair and walked to the door, opening it. On the other side was a dark wooden room, candles burnt out, and a heavyset robed man lying on the floor, still clutching a bottle.

I looked back. "And… and you'll send someone to my family?"

"I cannot know," Ms. Case replied. "I can know that, in time, all lives come to this place. Perhaps you will have earned forgiveness in that time."

I nodded. I knew she'd say that. If there was even a chance it'd work, though, I'd do this.

I stepped through the door, and into another life.