Reapers

Chapter 31: Disney is Fun but Rehearsals are Boring

"I've never been to a play before!" Sal squealed as she bounced on her feet, making Patton giggle slightly.

"Well it's technically a rehearsal," Patton reminded her. At the moment both of them were in the spirit world, watching from the side of the stage as all the actors went over their lines together. Roman was going over his lines with the woman who was going to play Belle, and every time he glanced over to them Patton waved. "But I'm sure Roman would love it if you were to come to the actual play! Maybe during opening night!"

"I would love to! But... I don't know if I'll be able to. Because there's been an increase of phantoms lately, we reapers have less time to ourselves during the day. We still haven't even figured out why there's been an uptick in phantoms, but Janus has requested for another reaper already."

"I guess I have noticed there have been more phantoms lately. If tensions have been high in the living world, then I haven't noticed. Maybe it's something in the spirit world? Can't you reapers summon phantoms?"

"We have the ability to do so, but we're banned from it. We get in serious trouble for doing so. I don't even know who figured out how to summon them, or what purpose it would even serve. Most of us don't know how, all we know is that it takes some sort of rune."

"Creepy." Patton rubbed his arm nervously. "Is there any reaper in the city that would do that?"

"Janus and Virgil wouldn't dare, they're too smart. I doubt Remus would know how, and I honestly want a break from work so there's no way I would. I'm going to need to sleep soon. Then that only leaves Ren, and she's a stick in the mud so I can't imagine her ever breaking the rules. I don't think any reapers are summoning phantoms unless there's a phantom here that we don't know about. Then again, we would be able to see it on our phones if a reaper really was here."

"I guess, I mean you guys know everything before any other spirit. I would try to help out but I wouldn't know how, I'm not really made for fighting phantoms."

Sal bumped his shoulder with her own. "That's okay, you just focus on staying safe. I don't want you getting hurt, I'm not even sure how well I could treat infections on a nature spirit, or if it would even work at all! I don't want to have to figure out too."

"You don't need to worry about me. I'm not a light breeze, I'm a strong wind in case you haven't noticed. Any time a phantom gets too close I just blow them away, like blowing away a bug."

"Good to know. We already have one person that we need to protect, we can't bodyguard everyone." Sal looked over to Roman.

"Speaking of which, shouldn't Virgil be back by now?"

"I don't know, he said he was getting more medicine for phantom infections. He wants twice as much than what he usually has just in case Roman gets hurt. He wants to be prepared just in case something happens."

"Better to be safe than sorry I suppose."

"Death probably pulled him aside to talk, they're such a chatterbox. Plus I think Roman is the most interesting thing to happen to them in a while so they're going to want to gossip. They'll probably pretend that they have to talk because it's 'work related.' They're the best."

Patton laughed lightly, "Sounds great. Life is sorta the same, but he's been busy lately. She's been trying to combat against pollutants and everything. Xe have it hard, sadly."

"Yeah, all throughout history humans have been absent minded when it comes to taking care of their environment. I'm sorry about that."

"What can you do, you're not part of the living world anymore," Patton sighed. Only to jump when Virgil appeared in front of them from practically nowhere.

"Okay, I'm back," he said, tossing the new ointment he got into the air before catching it. He then tossed it again, letting it disappear into his pocket dimension.

"Dear Life, where did you come from?!" Patton asked, holding his chest slightly. "You just appeared out of nowhere!"

"I teleported here from Home, Death's office. Also known as the first afterlife and yada yada." Virgil turned to look at Roman, who looked up at him only for a moment to give him a smile. "So how has rehearsal been?"

"I think he's doing good!" Sal answered. "He's been going over his opening scene with Belle and... the father? I forget his name."

"Maurice," Virgil told her without missing a beat.

"I see you've become a Disney nerd."

Virgil rolled his eyes with a slight scoff. "Only because Roman is always talking about it! I mean, he's the lead for a play that is based off of one of their movies!"

"I know you love it," Patton teased. "You've seen all of the movies!"

"I know you love it," Patton teased. "You've seen all of the movies!"

"No way!" Sal gasped, turning to Virgil with wide eyes. "You didn't tell me? You jerk!" She grabbed his arm and started to shake him slightly. "You gotta tell me what your favorite movie is!"

Virgil pulled out of her grip, but had a shy smile. "Black Cauldron, no songs so Roman wasn't singing at the top of his lungs."

"He's a singer! I should have known he would sing while watching movies, I mean he's doing this play! Also I know that can't be your favorite, you're just saying that to annoy me. What did you think of Hercules?"

"Oh my Gods! Jupiter strike it down, it was horrible! The story wasn't bad, and the characters were kinda cool, but the inaccuracies! My ears were bleeding by the time the movie was over! I mean, most of the names were Greek! The Greek name for Hercules was Heracles! They mixed the names! Who does that!"

Sal bursted out laughing, not being able to contain it anymore. "You are so pressed about this! Oh lord..."

"Can you blame me? Thousands of years of mistranslation and my people's history being destroyed! And then they just took key parts from Roman and Greek religion and just smashed it all together in a love story!"

"Oh hold on, it looks like rehearsal is finished!" Patton interrupted. Virgil and Sal looked over to see people grabbing their things, most walking out in pairs.

Roman was standing just off the stage, sipping from his water bottle. They quickly went over to him as he finished.

"Okay," he sighed, pretending to talk to no one. "Have a good day, Mrs. Post!"

"You too!" the director called back, not really paying attention as she seemed to be looking at a paper.

Roman smiled before turning around, still pretending to not see the other three. Yet he said under his breath, "You loved Hercules."

Virgil hissed back a response, "I'll feed you to the phantoms."