"Now this," Gabriel said, "this is an interesting situation."

Death, who had expected to grab Gabriel around the metaphorical neck and slam him down into nothing, blinked at the controller in his hand. He craned his neck to stare at the grinning ex-angel.

"Mario Kart!" Gabriel said. "Come on, even you've played Mario Kart before. Aren't you good at fiery crashes? You'll beat me, I'm sure."

Death glared at him. His voice was more of a hollow wind; the words echoed in the empty rattle of it. "This isn't your popular mythology, little man. You don't get to play a game of your choice with me and walk free if you win."

Gabriel rolled his eyes. "I know that. This is more of a friendly icebreaker sort of thing. Since I'm gonna be the star of your collection and all. Oh, how did I know you were gonna choose Bowser?"

Death snarled at him. Gabriel picked Princess Peach.

"So what happens, anyway? To your collection? Do you keep all the frozen souls on display?"

A shrug of bony shoulders. "They're in storage."

"In storage? Really? So I'm going to end up on the floor of your basement?"

Death launched a turtle shell at him. Gabriel dodged. "What's the big draw? What happens with them?"

"It's a bit of fishing, really," Death said. "I throw them back eventually. Sometimes in another body, for a reincarnation. Most of them I just wait for your father to come around and tell me it's time to go home for the millennium."

"You know," Gabriel said, finishing the first lap with a triumphant cackle, "there are those who say Dad's not coming back this time."

Death shuddered. "Please, no."

"Oh?" Gabriel's eyebrows rose.

"They stink." Death's nose wrinkled. "Humans. They stink so badly. They're a little better when they're dead, but if I can't clear the room every few thousand years, it's like living in an ocean of horse manure."

Gabriel put on his best you must be stupid voice. "Then why do you collect them?"

"We've all got our roles to play," Death said calmly. "Or do you think your boyfriends down there are the only folks who are fighting it?"

"You know, for a force of nature you're remarkably reasonable," Gabriel noted as Princess Peach sailed past Bowser, lapping him in a grand, pixelated fuck-you to chauvinism. "So here's the deal, OK? I'm the first of us to die. Archangels. Do you know how much that upsets the existing balance? I mean, even Luci didn't die. Fell, yes, but this is the first time someone this powerful is gonna be sitting in your closet. So the way I figure it--" he dodged a poison mushroom -- "you've got two choices. Stick to the role you've been playing, pass go and collect me and keep playing the game, or accept that everything's up in the air now. Show some guts there." He glanced down at the awful rack of Death's ribs, poking through the shrunken, pale skin. "If there are any to show."

When Death smiled, it wasn't a pretty sight. "You're a tricky one."

Peach crossed the finish line. "Funny, that."

Death put down his controller. "Changing fate," he said. "Well, there's a first time for everything."

The ugly grin came one more time, and then Gabriel awoke in a warehouse that had once been a hotel.