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Thinking about it, that’s probably the same reason why they can still get injured. They won’t die, of course, but it will hurt a lot until it heals. Fortunately for reapers, they have accelerated healing.

Aiden continues talking, breaking my train of thought, “This is my office that you happen to share with me for a short period of time. It will remain exactly how it looks. Got it?”

I sigh deeply and concede. Obviously, trying to negotiate with him will get me nowhere.

“I guess,” I begrudgingly reply. He rolls his eyes and starts looking through papers. I glance down at my desk and get to work. I begin by writing some questions I have for Aiden. I need to get his perspective of the events and then make sure we are on the same page for his first court appearance.

In Reaper’s Court, this first appearance is where we will hear the exact charges being presented against Aiden and the potential punishment if he is found guilty. Which I refuse to allow happen again. I cannot take the consequences of losing this case.

The hardest part of this is the fact that while Reaper’s Court is similar to the United States judicial system, it is still a relatively new concept here. There are no precedents, which means I am going into this with one hand tied behind my back.

After I get the facts from Aiden, I will use them to give me a starting point for investigating. I look up to Aiden and see he is typing on his desktop. I wave at him, and he looks up at me with an eyebrow arched.

“Can you tell me what happened?”

“It’s in the file I gave you,” he replies.

“I understand that, but I need you to just walk me through it.”

It’s important for him to tell me what happened, from when he woke up, to when he closed his eyes that day. I have to make a timeline of the events in order to properly investigate. From there, I will build a defense case. But, of course, he has to be difficult. Which doesn’t make any sense, since he asked me to be his lawyer.

“Fine,” he replies as he drags his hand over his face. “I got an email with—”

I cut him off. “Start from when you woke up that morning.”

He gives me an annoyed look. “I woke up like I do every morning and got dressed for work. I stopped by the lounge to get coffee and a bagel. Then, I went to Director Taevian’s office for our department's weekly meeting. Once the meeting finished, I was talking with Joey about some of the difficult collections we’ve had. As we were walking towards our office, Joey logged onto his email using my phone to ask IT to send him a new phone. When I got to my office, I got an email with a list of death assignments and collections.”

“Who’s Joey, exactly?”

“He is another reaper in the Collection department. I’m his supervisor, but we are close friends. He is taking over my supervisory role until my trial is over.”

“Explain the structure of the department. Like who reports to who?” I’m still trying to figure out the big picture of how Eden runs. It seems so intricate.

He explains, “Each department has a director. But, the directors can’t handle everything, so they have supervisors. The Collection department has about thirty supervisors with over a hundred reapers to manage. Each supervisor has a region of the world they manage with their reapers.”

I write that down in my notebook. “So, Director Taevian is the big honcho for this department.”

An irritable breath escapes his lips. “Yes.” I can tell he is tired of retelling this story, but I’m his lawyer, so he has to suck it up.

“Let’s move on. What happened after you got the email?” I ask.

“I reviewed it, then I completed the first death assignment.”

“What is a death assignment?”

“In our department, we receive an updated list of recent choices made by people. With these choices, we type them into our system, which gives us a predicted time of death for them. People aren’t born with a death date; it is determined by the flow of events in their life. Every choice they make and every choice someone else makes can affect a person’s death. When all the choices and events solidify, we get notification of it. We type it into that person’s soul profile and then it’s finalized. We then go to collect the soul when the time comes.”

“That is so interesting.” I guess that’s why some people say they can feel when something bad is going to happen. I tap my pen on the desk. “Let me ask you an off-topic question. What was the choice that solidified my death?”

His eyes soften. This is the first time I’ve seen him look at me with anything besides annoyance. “It was when your boss assigned you the case.”

I think about this for a second. If my boss hadn’t forced me to take that case, maybe I would have lived a longer life. Or if I had tried just a little harder on that case. But I really did the best I could, given all the evidence against him. If I had not messed up when I was a prosecutor, I wouldn’t even have been a defense attorney. All the bad things in my life always come back to that one crucial case I lost. That one person. If I had just—

“Sitting there, mulling over your choices and other people’s choices will not make a difference. You could have very well died the next day because someone decided to drink and drive. You could have tripped and hit your head. Anything is possible.” His voice is gentle.

I nod in agreement with him, but I’m not actually listening. He wouldn’t understand why I can’t let it go.

“So, it’s kind of like free will versus fate,” I theorize.