"Hey." I met eyes with Aster. "Are there any female Reapers?" So far, I'd only seen guys.
Aster shook his head. "No, this is an all male squad. But it's not by choice, and I'm sure there are female Reapers out there somewhere."
"Why aren't there any here?" I asked.
Aster shrugged. "Well. This is all speculation, to be clear." I nodded. "An interesting fact to note here, is while there are no female Reapers, every current Guardian and every one since the beginning of time have been females in this world."
"That is interesting." I said. I ignored the sounds of Vito and Nico bickering, and Banks egging them both on. Aster always had the most informative things to say. I find talking to him to be the most productive use of my breath. "Why do you think that is?" I prodded.
"As you know, to be a Reaper, you must sacrifice your life for someone else. But you also must regret it before you even have time to die. With a Guardian, you can never regret it. You die happy, knowing you made the right choice, and with no doubts about if it was worth it. Because of the high traffic of male Reapers, I think it's safe to say in this world at least, men are usually the ones sacrificing their lives."
"But we're kind of slimy about it." I said.
"Unfortunately. Because though there are only three current Guardians, those women died for someone else, and never once thought twice about it. They died ready and welcome to whatever was next."
"I see you've thought a lot about this." I nodded my head a little, rolling his words around in my head.
He chuckled a little. "I'll be honest, I keep waiting for one to pop up. I'm beginning to wonder if there's some unwritten rule none of us know that says women actually can't be Reapers."
I shrugged. "I mean, they are kind of the creators of life, if you think about it. Maybe someone thought it'd be too weird to have them taking lives as well." Aster laughed at this, shaking his head.
"I doubt we'll ever know for sure, but it's nice to see I'm not the only one who thinks about these kinds of things." I flashed Aster a lopsided grin.
"So hey, Zero, now that you've figured out your name, you need to think of what weapon you'll want." I turned my attention to Jaskier, who was looking at me from across our loose arrangement of chairs.
"A weapon, huh." I leaned back and rubbed at my eyes a little. I was actually kind of getting a headache, maybe from the blood? Or maybe I just wasn't used to my new eyes yet. It was kind of like I was wearing too strong contacts. I needed more time to adjust, I think.
"Are you feeling okay?" I jumped when I opened my eyes, and Aster had moved to crouch in front of me. He looked very worried about me, an emotion I wasn't used to seeing on someone.
"Oh." I blinked a couple times, startled by his concern for me. "My head hurts." Aster hummed and put his fingers on the sides of my head, right on my temples. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. I wondered what he was doing.
"Your eyes are just strained, maybe you should return to my room." He said after a moment. He dropped his hands and turned to the group. "Zero is going to bed now. He needs his rest for tomorrow, anyway."
"Aw, can't he play with us more?" Vito said dryly, clapping his hands together and making a fake pouty face. He turned to me then. "You'll figure it out soon enough, but we don't' see each other often. Our work keeps us busy. So next time I see you, I expect you to be ten times cooler than you are now, cause it very well may be a while." I felt a little sad that I wouldn't get to see him again for a while. He was kind of annoying, but I liked him well enough.
"See you around." I said simply as I stood up. He grinned at me, and nodded before I turned to follow Aster back to his room.
I rubbed at my temples as we headed down the hallway.
"You were up and moving quite a lot for only having a few days to recover. You don't have to start your training tomorrow, you know." He said. I shook my head, even though he's got his back to me.
"I just need to close my eyes for a while." Aster hummed but doesn't say anything else.
He held the giant wooden door open for me once we reached the end of the hallway and walked around blowing out the candles on the walls. I fell into the bed that still sat in the middle of the room. I buried my face in the cool pillow, letting out a deep sigh.
"Do you need anything before I leave?" I heard Aster ask from the doorway. I was quiet, and I could hear him turning to leave. It may not have been a healthy thing to do, but I could feel myself starting to get attached to Aster in particular. In a weird way, he was kind of giving me what I had always wanted from my parents.
"Hey." I said before he could go. He stopped, and I lifted my head a little so he could hear me. "Thank you. Becoming a Reaper was never in my life plan, but something tells me you've made this as good an experience as it can be on purpose. I'm glad you were here at the same time as me."
He's quiet for a long time before he muttered a quiet, "you're welcome." And shut the door.
So far, I hadn't regretted my decision.