17th February

00:57 GMT -5

Ah, man.

It's like I've tripped and fallen into the sixties.

Naturally, any piece of supervillain paraphernalia that's simply a weapon has to be decommissioned. But now that they're actually doing their jobs the police have to be able to train new recruits on the sorts of things that the mad men, mad women and mad others who inhabit Gotham might use, and since they don't actually want to kill the rookies...

Novelty vehicles from brightly painted cars to parade floats and a couple of aircraft, example costumes and mundane devices with cunningly concealed secret compartments and enough ridiculous costumes to make Elton John have a heart attack.

"So… Like…" The night custodian looks like someone who thought that this job wasn't going to actually involve much actual work. "What are you actually looking for?"

"Honestly? An excuse to go home for the night." I take out a rune stone and walk towards the nearest pile of… Junk? No, the vehicles are still as roadworthy as they were when they were first built. Stuff. Yes, pile of stuff. The products of deranged but surprisingly functional minds. Unsurprisingly, the stone doesn't glow. "This is one of those things where you don't actually expect to find anything out, but you have to check anyway just in case."

"You want me to do anything?"

"Yes please." I use a construct filament to pass him a rune stone. "Hold that near each pile. If it glows, call me."

He takes it and looks at it wearily for a moment. "I need t'..? Rub it or something?"

"No, it comes pre-rubbed. It's not dangerous-" It turns out that the Elvis-Joker costume isn't actually magical. "-at all. Glowing is all that it can do."

"You're the boss." He runs it over the body of Mr Cobblepot's… Aviarymobile. "You know, people always wondered if Scarface was possessed. You know, like Chucky in the Child's Play."

"I don't think Chucky would tolerate someone's hand up his bottom."

Not that I've actually watched Child's Play. For all I know Chucky was into that.

"Batman has destroyed several iterations of the Scarface puppet. None have demonstrated any sort of otherworldly effect. And the magic systems which handle the transmigration of human souls are generally quite reliable."

"Transmawhat?"

"Transmigration. The process of what's left of you after your body shuts down going elsewhere."

"Oh, your soul going to Heaven."

"Or somewhere else. Honestly, at the moment I'd pick Purgatory over either."

"Over Heaven?"

"Dad is the gardener in my family. From what I saw of Heaven, you get either 'pastoral' or 'progress towards full unity with the Source'. I like the world, and Purgatory is the place most like the material world. Also, I know the guy who runs it."

"Conversations like this-" He lumbers over to a rack of Mr Cobblepot's gadget umbrellas. "-make me wish I hadn't skipped catechism class. I just know what you're saying is important, but it's all over my head."

"It's never too late to start worrying about your immortal soul." I frown at myself as I come to the end of a rack. "Until you die. Then it generally is."

"I like to think I've lived an okay life."

"Well…"

"What?"

"Okay, look, I've had an unproductive and frustrating evening, but… So that you don't end up with the default afterlife services provider rather than the one you actually want… As I understand it, it takes a little more than living an 'okay' life."

Another row of clothes, another disappointment. And not all of these people were insane!

"So, what, I gotta start going to church again?"

"Assuming that you want to go to Heaven..?"

"Well… Yeah?"

"You don't sound too sure, there."

"I didn’t expect to hear a superhero talking up Purgatory."

"The fact that supernatural things exist doesn't mean that what popular mythology says about them is true. For example, Purgatory isn't where you go while you reflect on your vices on the way to Heaven. Vampires don't stop and count seeds if you throw them at them."

"How about garlic? And.. stakes?"

"The one vampire I've spoken to says that she doesn't like the smell of either the bulbs or the flowers, but she can soldier through it. Stakes through the heart wreck the blood magics which keep vampires functioning, but stakes through the heart generally kill humans too. As well, it isn't any easier to stake a vampire than it is a human, so any film you've seen of a human hitting a vampire in the chest and killing it? Probably not accurate. You either hit a rib, or it gets embedded in the muscle and doesn't punch through."

"Huh. Ah, nothing over here."

"Next pile, then. Honestly, with most vampires, a handgun is a better bet."

"I thought guns didn't work on vampires."

"Why wouldn't they? I mean, they're not as effective as they are against humans, but that's because vampires are tougher and heal faster, not because they're immune to bullets. If you shoot a vampire through the brain or the heart that'll stop it, even if it won't necessarily kill it."

"I guess… Yeah, it makes sense." He moves his rune stone around some sort of giant marble run. "I guess it's like you said: movies and whatever just don't show it how it is. So… Ah, going back to the whole 'Heaven' thing? How do you get in?"

"I'm not an expert. I was extradited there. But… The basic Christian ethos is well known. You know what you have to do to get into Heaven. You're not expected to be perfect, but you are expected to be trying to become a more moral man and ask for God's help when you fall short."

"That's it?"

"Yeah. It's not a secret. Getting into Heaven is simple but that doesn't mean that it's easy. Assuming that you want to."

"And you wanna go to Purgatory?"

"No, I'm going to Erebos. Erebos is perfect for me because I'll be able to stay in contact with the world, have a productive post-life existence and if I for some reason get bored of it I can opt for reincarnation without any of that Hindu karma levels business. For someone like me with no interest in reconciling with the Source, it's perfect."

He chuckles a little nervously.

"You get commission on that?"

"Not these days, though I imagine Lord Hades will shuffle me to the head of the queue when it finally happens."

I look out across the warehouse at all of the exhibits still to go, and inwardly sag.