Meanwhile, in the present

The Overlord hired me as his chronicler... after killing my predecessor.

"This? This is the way you represent me? After everything I've done, everything I've said... what the hell makes you think this is even close to the job you were hired to do?"

"B-but... sir? I... I played up all your triumphs... all-"

"And where do you talk about the issue in Turkey? Or the Chinese war?"

"W-well... you won... eventually." I'd never before seen a man actually snivel. I wanted badly to walk into the room and slap him. Perhaps it would save his life, but... I didn't.

The Overlord slammed the manuscript to the floor before the nearly prostrate biographer. From a gloved hand, a wash of energy pulsed, and the stack of paper blackened, caught fire, and then exploded with a blast of ash. The biographer winced, and threw himself prostrate.

The Overlord continued, "I gave you a task. You were to write a book that would last the ages. To give an honest chronicling of my work... good, and bad. You swore that you could do this. You swore an oath to me that you would do your utmost." The look of contempt on his face would have, if the snivelling fool on the floor had dared to look upon it, shredded hope itself.

"I... I... I feared your displeasure, my lord... I thought... I..."

"Bullshit. You took pay, and you tried to kiss my ass, in spite of being commanded to be honest." He gestured towards the fresh carbon-scoring left by the manuscript. "What are you worth now?"

The biographer looked around, and I could finally see his face again. The panic, the fear. His eyes scanning the room for exits, but... even if he managed the miracle of getting out of the room, where can you run from the man who runs the planet?

"S-sir... I." He starts to try the one thing that might have saved him earlier. He displays, if not backbone, at least some firm cartiledge. "I can edit this. I... I just need some time. I... I was afraid, sir. I was afraid if I d-did as you asked, you would strike me down." His face contorted as though admitting the fear that I could smell from here gave him the flavor experience of lemons dipped in ass.

The Overlord exhaled... a sigh, tinged with frustration. "There are only two things that could have explained that pile of shit you handed me. Either you were thoroughly incompetant in your research or you were perverting your purpose intentionally. So you admit that fear has caused you to dishonor yourself."

The man blanched. "I... No! S-sir... I could n-never..." At this point, I found it hard to watch.

"Ah." Spoke the Overlord, that gloved hand's fingers flexing slightly. "So, you call me a liar. If you act with honor, and try to fulfill your obligation with drivel, then you simply do not trust that I would ask you for what I want you to provide. And I would have to be lying when I said I wanted you to be honest. Is that what you are trying to say?"

I found myself looking at the shoes of the biographer. They looked almost new. I wondered if he'd bought them for this interview, or if he simply never walked much in them. I knew that I didn't really want to see his face after his next response.

"Sir, I would n-never call you a liar."

"In word or in deed?"

"No, no, I-" and there was another pulse of energy. The shoes were marred with ash, and were another blast pattern on the ground a moment later.

I sighed, and self-consciously straightened my suit, before approaching the Overlord.

The Overlord dresses himself like a b-movie villain. Boots, gauntlets, a robe... it works, but mostly because he can personally kill with a mere gesture. On anyone else, it would be a costume. For him, it serves a purpose akin to the standard radiation symbol. A warning... to watch your ass.

He stood facing away from me, I knew he was trying to compose himself... to give a proper impression. Not a good sign, but then, what had him shaken wasn't the killing he'd just done... it was that he'd been betrayed, his ideology denied by someone tasked with studying him.

"Sir?" I spoke, and stood next to the latest burn mark... trying very hard not to tremble.

The Overlord turned, poise restored, ready to act in his chosen role once more. "Alright, you actually witnessed this. What are your thoughts, John Reynolds?"

I closed my eyes. I won't deny I was afraid. It did help to close out the sight of the killer before me. That and the acrid scent of swift death, certain to haunt me every time I burn food cooking from that day on... I didn't really need the extra dramatics to say what I thought of what I'd just seen, but... maybe I did.

"I saw a man commit suicide. I saw a man murdered. I saw a dozen errors of judgement." I opened my eyes. "And I participated... I could have stepped from the entryway at any point. I wanted to slap the man, and tell him what he was doing wrong. Tell him to apologize. To say that he lacked the courage to act with honor..."

"You did not."

"Nor did you. But you were wrong on one point, Overlord."

The ghost of a smile touched the mouth in the middle of the goatee. "Oh? And how is that?"

"He was incompetant as well as dishonorable."

An eyebrow arched in response.

I continued. "It's simple, really. If he were any good at research, or reading people, he would have known the proper ettiquette, and could have figured out the danger. As it stood, the only way that could have gone worse would be if he pulled a blade and screamed 'sic temper tyrannus'."

That got a chuckle from the killer before me. "True... alright, and how could that be worse?"

"That's an insultingly simple question. He's just as dead, but everyone who helped him get here would be under suspicion. As it stands, they just showed bad judgement recommending a sycophant."

"You can do better."

"Probably, sir. Well, no. I know I can acquit myself more honorably, and while I'm scared shitless being in your presence like this," I gestured to the mark of my predecessor, not even smoke signalling it as any different from the one representing the death of his work. "I know my best course of action is to grit my teeth, look death in the face, and speak clearly. I am not, however, as gifted in prose as that fellow once was."

The Overlord nods. "Fair enough. Know that I do not expect you to work alone on this. For one, you will be stuck going through his original research. Had you stepped forward to intervene, you could have used him. He might even have been grateful enough to be properly managed. Why didn't you act to preserve him as a resource? You're going to be going through a dead man's notes now."

I sighed. "I didn't... I..." I closed my eyes again. I must not falter. "He should have known better. If he didn't by this point in his studies, after a decade of your rule, I couldn't believe he'd be worth keeping. His style isn't irreplacible. His research isn't irreplacible, most of it's a matter of record. The work itself was incinerated, suggesting it wasn't really salvagable." I pulled myself upright in the chair that I didn't remember sitting in, let alone slouching. "I didn't like him, in that moment, and I didn't want to take care of someone who... who obviously couldn't be made to learn."

As I wiped my eyes with a tissue I found in my hand... I felt a pat of reassurance on my shoulder. I trembled... and hated myself for it at the time.

The Overlord looked at me with... sympathy. I felt sick. He spoke, "Yes. It's... hard, the first time you make a decision like that. There is always regret. The life and death decisions... you cannot take back. There are no halfway measures of restitution. Otherwise, it is like any other choice... there are regrets on all paths. There is never a perfect choice."

I shook my head. "You said that before... an early interview." I blew my nose and the tissue... vanished. I think that was very nearly as disconcerting as the death I'd witnessed.

"What, you think such a simple truth changes much over time?"

"Right. There was... one other thing. I didn't... look at his face, at the end. I'd already decided I wouldn't stop him from digging his grave, but... I couldn't look at his face while he committed suicide in front of me."

"Makes sense. I'm not sure it works. The sound, the smell... something will bother you no matter what."

"Ash on the shoes... for a brief moment."

"If you'll pardon the humor then, you may have given yourself a morbid fear of tap-dancing."

I stared at the bad movie villain crouched next to me as though he'd just spat a dead puppy at my grandmother. He shrugged. "Don't worry. If you recover from this, and retain interest in the job, it is open to you." He patted the back of my hand then. "You need to go now." And pointed me towards the door.

I walked out... the secretary directed me to a cot in an infirmary. I guess I was a bit shell-shocked. I cried myself to sleep. I don't know if it was because of the man who died... whose name I didn't really know... or that I'd gotten through the interview... or even just the fact that I survived.

A cab took me to my hotel, where I spent most of the day in a total daze. I knew I was going to go back, and work for that man. I couldn't hate him... he was a monster, but... gut-clenchingly fair about how he... he murdered a man. Right in front of me. I was going to take a job that had killed the man before me.

I grew very familiar with the toilet as I threw up when I dreamed of the dead man... as I write this, I want to remember forever... that two days ago, this is exactly what I wanted.