Faking your own death is actually a surprisingly easy thing to do. All you really need to keep in mind is the golden rules, and you should be on the way to your proverbial heaven, no pun intented.
GOLDEN RULES OF FAKING YOUR DEATH:
- Always leave your city of 'death'
- Keep your existence a secret
- If discovered, seek plastic surgery
PROS:
- You can get away with murder
- You can get away with adultery
- You can get away with your mates catching you with a fat chick
- You can get away with sleeping with the town slut
- You can get away with insulting a gang of bikers
- You can get away with burning down the local church and crucifying the nuns
- You can get away with hijacking a submarine and crashing it into the base of the statue of liberty
- You can get away with... ok, you get the point
CONS:
- You won't be able to talk to anyone who thinks you're dead, or the whole thing will be ruined
- If you fail, you will fail miserably and be ridiculed for the rest of your (probably short) life
- If you do succeed, you have to make new friends unless they're in on it
STEP 1: SETTING UP
Your first method of preperation should be to acquire a death certificate and, if necessary, scan it, and edit it so that it has all blank fields but still has the coroner's signature. If you're worried about being caught stealing one, you can pay a street urchin to do it. A better alternative is to visit a relative with a dead spouse and steal theirs, you're more likely to be trusted in a relative's house, and thus, less likely to be watched.
Fill the fields according to the death scenario you've dreamed up, or leave them as they originally were if it fits. The purchase of a small medical booklet might be necessary in order to look up professional-sounding terms, such as "slight abnormalities within the lower thorax". The more medically obscure it sounds, the better.
Alternatively, you could kidnap / pay off a coroner and get them to do it.
STEP 2: THE PLAN UNFOLDS
The place of your death needs to look like there's been a death there. If you claim to have been savagely burnt by a coffee machine at your local diner, it's going to be mighty unbelievable if there's people happily muching on their food right next to the spot where your charred carcass allegedly fell. You will need to pick somewhere that you can set up with police tape (stolen of course, once again a street urchin could come in handy), and somewhere unlikely to be stumbled upon by a member of the police force. A place such as around your private residence or usual parking spot. Be sure to draw the sinister chalk outline of a person in a believable posture depending on your type of death. If it's death by falling, a chalk outline of someone crossing their legs and their hands on their arse probably won't fit well.
Once you've made it look like something's happened, it's time for the finishing touches. You're going to have to start the rumours and make them sound believable. It's always advisable to think up a story before you prepare for faking your own death, because if you have the added stress of a time limit to come up with your scenario, it will have too many plot holes. You might be able to produce a movie starring The Rock, but you won't get away with faking your own death.
Popular scenarios, their good points, and their bad points are listed below.
- Eaten by a shark
=) Lack of remains can be blamed on shark's hunger
=( Unbelievable if you don't live / go somewhere near the ocean
- Car bomb
=) You get to blow up a car
=( You need to find something to serve as your body
- Shot by a sniper
=) Sends the nation into panic
=( Hard to pull off
- Electrocuted in bathtub
=) Believable, unless you use a toaster (unless you pass it off as suicide)
=( Once again, something needs to act as your remains
=( Requires you to destroy an electrical appliance, probably an expensive one.
- Murdered at home
=) Easy to believe
=) All the time you need to set it up
=( The police will get involved, big time
- Mauled by a badger
=) Animal deaths are nasty and warrant mislead sympathy
=) If you pull it off, you're a genius
=( As unbelievable as being eaten by a tadpole
STEP 3: THE FINAL ACTIONS
Ok, so you've got your death certificate, your place of death and your scenario all done. Now all that's left is throwing it out to the public. You probably won't be able to do it all alone, you'll need to have a mate who's a coroner or you'll have to pay off an ambulance driver to take your 'remains' and dump them instead of taking them to a morgue. If you used your coroner friend as your remains, this is probably not a good idea.
Once you have everyone believing your story, it's time to pack up and go, or you could leave first then trigger your death's publicity with a phone call. Whether it's a new city, a new country, or a new planet, just make sure it's not where anyone who knew you can find you.
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