Bobby paused with his hand on the shovel and took a deep breath, this was definitely one of those activities he hadn’t really thought he would ever be doing. As much as he had joked with Gary about it, he still had some reservations about the whole thing, and those reservations had made themselves known at the sight of all the souls trying to escape the graveyard.

“You coming?” Gary half yelled, half whispered across the street to him.

Gary and Mcgunkin were already standing near the yard gate in their wellies and facemasks, wielding brightly painted tools. They looked more like gardeners than about-to-be criminals.

He let out his breath, “Yes”.

Bobby joined them, keeping an eye on all the ghosts loitering in the graveyard, most hadn't noticed them in their delirium, but one or two of the quiet more deranged looking ones were quietly observing the group with unblinking stares. As a counter to Bobby’s expectations none of the souls seemed to approach them and even the desperate ones seemed to hold back as if they were wary. It’s like they are scared of the living.

As Bobby passed through the rusty iron gate that penned in the graveyard he could make out far more souls than he had seen from outside. The effect was comparable to the transition from looking through the rippling surface of water to immersing your head in the water and it made the vision of his third eye sharpen, like this energy that permeated the graveyard was something it was designed to operate in.

Unlike most of the ghosts who kept their distance or carried on their attempts to leave the graveyard undisturbed, one of the ghosts calmly sat upon the path directly in front of the group, looking slightly like a monk immersed in meditation. Bobby focused on the ghost, realising it had a bit of a cloudy visage. Are these ghosts disembodied souls? There were a lot of similarities, but unlike the turbulence of normal souls it seemed sluggish, as if the separation from a human body had taken away some sort of energy that it needed to thrive.

Bobby reached out hesitantly to touch the figure and to his surprise it opened his eyes and reached out an immaterial hand, grabbing him before he could pull back. Unbidden a soul swam into his perception.

The soul looked weak and faded, missing most of the sparking activity he was used to seeing in souls, of course there was still some, but it was heavily reduced. Out of curiosity Bobby pushed his view through the layers of the soul to look at the ego. To his surprise the ego seemed fine despite the weakness of the rest of the soul. The outer layers must protect it.

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He pushed some magic into the soul like what he had done to repair the damage of turning someone into a thrall and then withdrew himself. The ghost in front of him’s eyes cleared and it looked at him, he knew they were a piercing blue somehow despite not being able to see colours properly with his third eye. The incorporeal being blinked and stood, gesturing to him to follow it.

Out of curiosity Bobby tailed it to a particularly well preserved granite headstone, scrawled across it in elegantly carved calligraphy were the words:

‘Michaela Rabbitston, 1980 - 2025, Icarus laughed as he fell.’

Bobby blinked at them, that was almost two hundred years ago, and the final part he guessed was some sort of quote, Damn, that would make for a good tattoo. He pointed at the grave and the ghostly figure nodded at him.

“GARRY, I’ve found a good one.” He yelled, prompting the older man to come over.

“Hmm, yes, it should be old enough that the bones are pretty clean by now, this may take a while if the body is buried six feet deep though.” Gary planted his shovel and chucked the dirt into a small pile.

Bobby joined and their first crime began.

About two hours in they were about a third the way there. Bobby tossed his shovel aside and sat down in the hole, covered in dirt. “This is taking forever.”

Gary didn’t reply, either because he had got into a concentrated rhythm or because he had gotten used to Bobby’s streams of consciousness and no longer felt the need to interject.

“Like I get the need to bury the grave deep to stop robbers getting to it, but they never needed to be this deep, it’s kind of extra. I mean in the middle ages how did they have the time to spend so long digging when they struggled enough to find food?”

Bobby pondered for a while. “Actually it was probably good for society, because if they couldn’t afford coffins and bodies were buried too close to the surface, it would contaminate the soil and water. Interesting how traditions like this continue for thousands of years unchanged though.”

He scratched his head and realised there weren't really any issues he could complain about, besides his own impatience. Sighing, he picked up his shovel again and continued digging.

After about five more hours there was a thud as Mcguckin who had recently swapped out for Bobby hit something solid. For a moment everyone was silent, too engrossed in their routine to realise that it was almost done, then Bobby grabbed the spare digging tool, which was actually one of those tiny garden trowels and there was a mad rush as the coffin was finally uncovered.

Gary produced a crowbar from somewhere and they all held their breaths as a miraculously well preserved skeleton was revealed, slightly dull with age, but pretty clean overall.

Everyone stared silently until Gary spoke, “Well aren’t you going to resurrect it or whatever?”

“Oh, yeah I forgot.” Bobby replied with a nervous laugh.

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