“Oh dearest nephew?” Gaia’s voice echoed in Ever’s mind.

  “Hello dearest aunt,” Death said begrudgingly. “You called?”

  Gaia giggled deep and low.

  “You can take your student now, I’m done with him.” Her wink belied the dismissiveness of her sentence. “Could you find a soul that wants to repent for sins he has committed against me?”

  “Against you? Do you want them in alphabetical order or by order of severity?”

  “Hmmmm…” Gaia looked up, as if scrying the canopy for an answer. “Let’s go with severity.”

  “Let me see here…” Death mumbled under his breath; there was the occasional sheet of parchment turning over. Gaia caught Ever looking at her. She dipped her face downwards, dragonfly eyelashes coquettish. The young soul’s breath tripped over in his throat, tumbling out in a splutter. “Here’s one. Spencer Dragomov?”

  “Ah yes, he’s a perfect specimen.”

  “Perfect for what?” Ever asked, finding his voice again.

  “I have faith that you’ll know,” Gaia said. Without another word, she got up, walked towards the wall of trees and faded, the park immediately returning to normal.

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  —--

  Death dropped Ever off somewhere deep. Not six feet deep, but hundreds of feet deep. He swivelled around, taking the sight in. It was a hole like none he had ever seen before: while he was at the bottom, there were segments that wound up and around, as if a titan had a giant shovel and was carefully creating a staircase... except the stairs led to nowhere. There were five, maybe six steps in total and the earth was simply… dug up.

  Ever floated straight up. In his left hand, he clutched the scythe. With his right, he held the vase with dirt and grass in it. This physical object somehow also was in ‘ghost’ form, though Ever knew not how. Perhaps it was Gaia’s touch that made it possible?

  As he rose higher and higher like a dragonfly hovering upward, he became aware of hulking, metallic monstrosities scattered around the ground, many with single, claw-like arms that looked capable of digging into mountains. He froze: were there creatures that could consume ghosts here on Earth? His mentor’s readings hadn’t mentioned any. None of them stirred; it seemed they all were all slumbering, comfortable in this giant pit.

  Someone was floating near one of these straight-edged, steel creatures. They were some distance away, but he couldn’t mistaken the plasma that licked the periphery of the ghost. Ever made a beeline towards them. The moment they saw him, they started flying away from the machine towards the apprentice reaper.

  “Hi,” the ghost greeted. He wore a hard hat and high visibility vest not dissimilar to those worn by the tradesmen who sometimes came into Pagoto’s. Of course, they were translucent shades of gray on this man.

  “You work here?” Ever asked casually. He suddenly became aware of how high he was. If he were to drop the vase of dirt now, would it just… disappear? He clutched it closer to his body.

  “Worked,” the ghost said. “G’day, I’m Spencer.” He talked like a tradesman too. “You here to take me away, are ya?” He seemed impressed with the scythe.

  “My name’s Ever. Maybe I am,” Ever said. “But let’s talk first.”