When Finn stopped walking, we were standing in a park overlooking the ocean. It was sunset, and the crimson orb had shattered where it hit the water, casting scattered reflections across the waves. I could hear the gulls calling and smell the salt on the air. This was the sharpest, the most real things had felt since I had died. It was beautiful, but painful, too, because I could still feel that this was a world I didn’t belong to. Not anymore. Finn sat down on a bench and motioned for me to join him. I crossed my arms, refusing to sit.

“You knew that would happen, didn’t you? You son-of-a-bitch,” I accused. “You knew I’d want to do it, need to.”

“Well, yes,” he tilted his head, confused. “Of course I did. I told you as much, didn’t I?”

“Not in so many words,” I frowned.

“Alright, fair enough,” he shrugged. “I was, perhaps, a bit more curt with you the other day than I should have been. I apologize, but I hadn’t eaten in a while, and as I am sure you have noticed, that can make it very difficult to care about… anything. That’s why I was so close by, in fact, you were supposed to be my next meal. It’s just a shame that Henry got to you first.”

“Yeah, it really is,” I sighed, finally dropping down on to the bench. “Alright, you want to explain to me how that whole thing works, now? Why I wanted it so badly? Why, before I found that man, I had just sat down on a curb content to wait for the end, however long it took?”

“Sure, it’s easy enough to understand. We’re dead.”

“Gee, thanks for clearing that up,” I deadpanned.

“Let me finish,” he raised a hand. “All the things that motivate living people, the need to eat, to sleep, to earn money, to be with the people we love, to make our mark on the world in any of a hundred ways, all of that is gone. We don’t really have anything to drive us forward, do we? No needs, no goals, no consequences for anything we do, really. At least, not for ourselves. There is nothing we do that can change our fate in any real way. In short: nothing matters. All we have is the memory of how we used to feel. The memory of life. But that doesn’t last forever. In this place the memory fades quickly, and we lose the will to do much of anything at all. Like a wind-up toy running down, until we just stop. However, there is one thing that can still get us going, as you probably noticed, and that is the remnants of life left on the recently dead. They stink of it, and even the smell is enough to remind us of what it was like to be alive, to care about things. And as such, we all do the job, we all become sin eaters, because it is the only thing that brings color and feeling back, even if just for a short time. None of us can resist it. It’s like a drug, an addiction. The only thing that gets us to normal, or at least close.”

“You’re saying we’re addicted to life?” I asked.

“Everyone is addicted to life,” Finn replied. “We’re just the only ones who’ve had our supply cut off. So, you’ll be a sin eater no matter what you say, or I say, because it is quite literally the only thing that matters here. You’ll go to every new soul to get your fix of life. Just enough to keep you coming back for more.”

“And that isn’t… a problem for them?” I asked. “For the people we are stealing from?”

“Stealing isn’t really the right word,” Finn corrected. “Think of it as payment for our services. We take their sins, and as a byproduct, we get a little bit of their leftover life. They won’t be using it where they are going, anyway. Really, they should be thanking us.”

“Do they?”

“No, not usually,” he chuckled. “In fact, often they are downright irritable about it. You got lucky with your first. Your client was quite willing to accept their death. That is often the case after a long illness. But people who die suddenly resist it more, take more convincing. They have a tendency to… shoot the messenger, so to speak. They can be a real pain in the ass, honestly. You’ll see. But they are still better than the Lost Souls.”

“Lost Souls?”

Finn sighed, seemingly regretting that he had even brought that up,

“They are the opposite to the typical souls we encounter; they remember only their deaths and have forgotten everything about their lives. We can’t really get a meal out of them, because we can’t eat sins they don’t remember. If you encounter one of them, better to just leave them alone. A demon will handle them, eventually.”

“There’s no way to help them?”

“You can sometimes get them to remember their lives, if you guide them through familiar places, but it really isn’t worth the trouble. People die all the time, there are easier meals out there. Better not to waste your time on them.”

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

That seemed a little cruel, but I knew so little of this place that it didn’t seem fair for me to judge. I decided to let that pass, for now.

“Speaking of which,” I changed the subject. “How long do I have until I need to… eat again?”

“It varies. Time passes strangely, here, and different people provide different amounts of remnant life energy. I recommend you just eat whenever you get the chance. It’s not like there is much else to keep us busy, is there? And then you just keep doing it until it no longer helps, and you lose the ability to feel altogether.”

“And then when that happens, I end up like…”

“Henry? Yes.”

“That’s… grim,” I replied.

“I suppose. But don’t worry, by the time you get to that point, you won’t mind so much. You might even be looking forward to it.”

I frowned, thinking back to Henry’s final word: Finally. Would it be a relief, when that eventually happened to me? I shuddered at the thought.

“No, no. I won’t except that that is all there is. There has to be something I can do. How do you even know that no psychopomp has ever found a way out of here? Is anyone even keeping track?” I asked.

“Not as such,” he admitted. “But I’ve never heard of it happening, and I have been here a long time.”

“How long?”

“Hard to say. Long enough I don’t remember when I died. Long enough I have seen many, many psychopomps turn into demons. I’ve never seen a single one ascend, though.”

“That doesn’t mean it has never happened, does it?”

“I suppose not. But I still think you are wasting your time.”

“Wasting? Like you just said, what else am I doing with it?”

“Fair enough. Hey, if that’s how you want to occupy yourself, I won’t stop you. There are no rules or hierarchies in this place. There is only what is inevitable. And everyone needs a hobby.”

“What’s your hobby?”

“You haven’t figured it out, yet?” Finn smirked. “This is my hobby.”

“What?”

“Think about it. It is unlikely that I was the only psychopomp nearby when Henry turned. None of them bothered to approach you, to explain anything. See, there are no supervisors or job training programs here. Nothing compels me to spend time explaining these things to you, I simply do it when the mood strikes me.”

I paused at that, considering. I supposed it truly was a kindness that he hadn’t just left me to figure out everything on my own. I tried to picture how confusing that would have been, how lost I would have felt with even the rudimentary guidance I was given. I shuddered, it wasn’t worth considering.

“I suppose I should thank you, then,” I said at last.

“Don’t thank me,” Finn waved away the idea. “As I said, I didn’t do it for you, it’s simply a hobby of mine.”

“A hobby? You have others?”

“Sure,” Finn shrugged. “I also like to travel.”

“Travel? Here?”

“Of course. You haven’t figured it out yet? Travelling is very easy in this place. As long as you walk with a destination in mind, with intention, that is where you end up.”

“And if you don’t have a destination in mind?”

“Well, in that case, you wander in the grey fog, forever,” he shrugged. “Or at least until you finally decide on someplace you’d rather be.”

“So, I can just think of anywhere and I’ll be there?”

“Yes, as long as it is somewhere you had been when you were alive. If it is somewhere new, like this park, I imagine, then you need a guide. Another soul or psychopomp who has been there before.”

“Souls can guide you?” I asked.

“Sure, it’s all about asking them the right questions. On that note, I generally don’t recommend leading with asking about the worst thing they have ever done. I know that your only example so far is Henry, but you should know that he didn’t have the… deftest touch.”

“Wait,” I held up a finger. “So, I don’t have to ask them that, before I consume their sins?”

“Of course not. It will happen regardless, once you make contact. Henry always said that ‘prompting’ them made the process more efficient, but I think he just really didn’t like small talk. He was sort of a shy guy, didn’t much like having to approach strangers. He preferred to just get it over with. And nothing shuts a person up faster than asking them that.”

I nodded, thoughtfully.

“Ok, that makes sense. So, what do you ask them?”

“I ask them to focus on their favorite place. I get to learn a new location and they get a peaceful spot to spend their final moments. Win-win. Although, you would be surprised how often we materialize in a strip club or a bar,” he shrugged. “Still, I’ve seen a lot of the world, over the years.”

“Do you learn from other psychopomps, as well? Are you looking for a location from me?”

“Sure, eventually. There is no need to rush, though. We are both going to be here for a long time. I am sure you’ll show me more than a few places to add to my collection. Especially if you also ask any new souls you meet to…”

Finn paused and sniffed the air tentatively. He rose from the bench,

“Speak of the devil,” he laughed. “I believe there is someone nearby in need of my services. So, I think that is a good time to stop, for now. Wouldn’t want to overwhelm you.”

“Odd. I don’t smell anything,” I sniffed the air experimentally.

“You just ate. It gets stronger when you are hungry. Don’t worry, we’ll talk again soon.”

He bowed politely to me, then vanished into the fog. I sat for a moment, gazing out at the ocean. The stars now glittered on the black waves below, which crashed against the shore with a steady roar. But even as I watched, I could already tell that the sound was beginning to fade, the stars dimming behind the mists. Things wouldn’t stay this vivid for very long. Which reminded me that there was no time to waste. If I still wanted to figure out how I died, I needed to do it while I had the motivation to act. I rose from the bench. Fortunately, all Finn’s talk about favorite places had jogged my memory and I now knew where I had to go next. That night, wandering the streets in the dark, I had realized I needed a safe place to go, somewhere I could regroup, decide what to do next. And there was only one person I would have reached out to, only one place I would go. And now I knew just how to get back there.