The Departed (Working Title)

Chapter Four

To say I was overwhelmed at this point would be an understatement. There was so much to learn, and quite frankly, I didn't feel like I was getting any better. Each morning we ran, had breakfast, and read through our text. We had completely finished going over the Rules of Reaper, and now had heavily dove into the section on the different creatures, some of which were friendly and others not so much.

We reviewed each creature in alphabetical order, but within the week we were still on the letter A. How many creatures started with the letter A?!

Every afternoon was also the same - combat, combat, combat. I was really good at getting my ass handed to me by everyone, including Les. This wasn't something I did in my previous life, and it didn't seem like something I was going to do in my current one. Luckily, it was all becoming a part of the routine, so I was getting used to it.

By the end of my week spent with this group, Les, Miles, Wren, and Kyle had already gone on their first Shadow rounds. Each person seemed changed in some way. I couldn't tell if it was good or bad but had a pretty good guess considering what the job of a reaper entails.

I was the last one standing, and it did not feel good. I felt like everyone could sense a weakness in me, and it was only a matter of time before Jax noticed it too and decided I was no longer cut out for this sort of afterlife. Not that I thought he could actually do anything about my lack of skill. And don't get me wrong, I wasn't all "Woe is me" about this either. No, I was putting it all out on the line. Giving my one hundred percent best effort, and by god, I was going to keep trying until someone told me to stop. I wanted to start going on shadow rounds.

We were running on one of Jax's crazy trails, and I was keeping close at the back of the pack. I was getting better with my running, when we stopped at a clump at the bottom of a small cliff. All of us craned our necks, shading our eyes from the sun as we peered up at where Jax was.... At the top of the damn cliff.

"How are we supposed to get up there?!" Reach shouted.

As if in answer, Jax chucked a rope down to us at the bottom. "Gotta climb the rope!" He yelled back.

Reach didn't even hesitate. He just started climbing up the robe, first jumping and gripping with his hands, then scrunching his legs up entangling his feet in the rope, and hoisting himself up. Kyle followed Reach next, then Miles, then Les, then me. Some decided to follow in Reach's strategies, others tried to use the wall of the cliff to help stabilize them as they just used their hands to climb.

By the time it was my turn, Reach was almost to the top. That kid was fast. I gave myself a running start and grabbed for the rope, trying to grab as high up as I could. Then I tried scrunching my body up the way I saw Reach do it, tangling the rope in my feet and trying to lift myself up. I used every ounce of energy I had in me to repeat this process over and over again. My hands were beginning to burn and so were my arms. After I hoisted myself up a couple times, I looked down at the ground. The height made me woozy, and my head began to spin. Okay, so I wouldn't do that again. I glanced back up, and Les was now almost to the top as well.

I just kept with the pattern. Grab rope, scrunch up, lift body, don't look down, repeat. Grab rope, scrunch up, lift body, don't look down, repeat.

"Come on Shawn! You're halfway there!" I heard Les yell.

Bless that girl and her positivity, but I did not need the added attention on the fact that I was the last one and the slowest one. I loosed a shaky breath, and leaned my head against the rope. Beads of sweat slowly trailed down my forehead and into my eyes. My hands were slipping on the rope, making it harder to gain progress on my way up.

I scrunched up my body, linked my feet into the rope, and started lifting my body up but my arms were starting to give out. There was just nothing there to help me up. I had emptied the tank and now it was sputtering to a stop. My grip was loosening, and my fingers aching. I was pretty sure they were going to stay in the same gripping position so long as I existed. I started slipping down the rope further, and couldn't get a good grasp on the rope. It was blistering my skin and the sweat was getting to be excessive.