"I'm not sure," Azzie confessed. "I'm new in this sector. In fact, I shouldn't be here at all."

"Just like me," Scrivener said. "Just because I fall into a corpselike coma from time to time is no reason for your Grim Reaper fellow to grab me up without making proper tests. It was slipshod, I tell you. Why shouldn't you be here?"

"I was intended for better things," Azzie said. "I got good grades in Thaumaturgy College. Finished in the top three in my class."

He failed to tell Scrivener that all of his class except three had wiped out when a sudden infestation of good blew in from the south, freak metaphysical weather that killed all but Azzie and two others, who seemed to have a natural immunity against good halations. And then there had been the poker game.

"So why are you here?" Scrivener asked.

"I'm working off a gambling debt," Azzie said. "I couldn't pay up, so I had to serve time." He hesitated, then said, "I like to gamble."

"Me too," Scrivener said, with what sounded like an air of regret.

They walked for a while in silence. Then Scrivener said, "What's going to happen to me now?"

"We're going to insert you back into your body."

"Will I be all right? Some people wake up from the dead and are all funny, so I've heard."

"I'll be around to look out for you. I'll stay until I'm sure you're all right."

"That's good to hear," Scrivener said. He walked for a while in silence, then said, "But of course, when I wake up I won't know you're there, will I?"

"Of course not."

"Then I won't be reassured."

Azzie said testily, "When you're alive, nothing can reassure you. I'm just telling you this now. It's only when you're dead you can appreciate it."

They walked on. After a ways more, Scrivener said, "You know, I can't remember a thing about my life back on Earth."