Robyn Locklyn

A reaper is not death itself, but death’s agent. A guide, collector, and enforcer who ensures the balance between the living and the dead. Their work is not about choice or cruelty, but necessity. Without them, the boundary between life and death would collapse, and unclaimed souls would linger long enough to twist into something monstrous, bleeding unrest into the world of the living.

Reapers serve three main purposes. They are collectors, tracking and claiming souls at the moment of death or when those souls resist crossing over. They are guides, escorting the departed into whatever afterlife awaits them, whether peaceful or punishing. And they are enforcers, the ones who must step in when a soul refuses to go willingly, using force, persuasion, or binding to restore balance.

They exist in the in-between, often tethered to both the living world and the unseen. Some reapers are remnants of the dead, given a second existence only to serve. Others are chosen from the living, snatched from death at the moment of their passing and bound by contract, like her. Every reaper’s tools and methods reflect who they were in life, shaping how they carry out their duties.

But for all their power, reapers are limited. They cannot control when someone dies. That belongs to fate alone. They cannot resurrect the dead or alter destiny. Their task is only to collect, never to judge. Judgment lies elsewhere. A reaper is, at its core, an executor of balance, ensuring that what begins in life ends where it is meant to.

Soul-Sense
She has a built-in sensitivity to death itself. When someone is close to dying, she feels it like a pressure in the air or a pull in her chest, a quiet certainty she can’t ignore. That same sense lets her follow the “trail” of a soul that refuses to move on, a lingering echo that only a reaper can track.

Truth-Seeker
Souls can’t lie to her, not completely. Even when they try, their words carry a resonance she can read—truth vibrating beneath deception. It makes her a natural interrogator, able to cut through denial and dodge until only the raw truth remains.

Shroud-Walking
She can slip into the liminal space between life and death, a shadow-layer of reality where lost souls linger. But the longer she stays, the more it drains her, and risks tethering her too loosely to her living body and leaving her weakened when she returns.

Death’s Mark
With a single touch, she can mark a soul, binding it to eventually cross over. But the stronger the soul’s will, the harder the struggle. Sometimes it takes everything she has just to guide it where it belongs.

Borrowed Tools
Her reaper tool mirrors the life she once lived as a journalist. A simple pen can transform into a blade of shadow, a recorder captures the final words of souls, and her notebook fills itself with the truths she extracts, with evidence no living paper could ever hold.

Double Life Strain
Juggling her duties as both journalist and reaper keeps her constantly stretched thin. If she misses a reap, it sends ripples through the balance between life and death, and the consequences can reach far beyond what she can control.

Living Body Vulnerability
Though she wields the power of a reaper, her body remains mortal. She still bleeds, still feels pain. If she were to be killed again, there would be no second chance; her death would be final.

Truth Addiction
Her need to uncover the truth is relentless, driving her to dig too deep into the confessions of souls. Sometimes that compulsion pulls her too close, leaving her emotionally entangled with those she’s meant to guide.

Tether Limitations
Her powers are at their strongest in places thick with death (graveyards, hospitals, crime scenes) where the air itself hums with lingering souls. In bright, bustling areas full of life, her abilities are dulled, and she must rely more on skill than supernatural edge.

Blind Spot
No matter how far her abilities reach, she cannot see her own fate. The future remains shrouded, hidden even from her, leaving her to walk forward blind to what awaits.

Robyn doesn’t just hunt the criminals; she hunts for the children they’ve stolen, the little lives cut short or shattered by greed and violence. She can feel them. They are small, frightened echoes clinging to the shadows, unable to find their way home. When she reaches them, she doesn’t rush. She kneels in the quiet, letting them see her, letting them know she is not here to hurt, only to guide. Her presence is soft but certain, a tether they can trust.

Some of them cry, some cling, some don’t speak at all, but she waits, and she watches, and she listens. When the moment is right, she leads them across the boundary she alone can navigate, the liminal space where life and death brush against each other. She holds their hands through it, whispers words they might never understand but somehow feel in their bones.

In those moments, Robyn’s sharp instincts and hardened edges fade. She becomes nothing but a protector, a witness to lives that were lost too soon. And even if the world never knows what she’s done, even if no paper ever prints her story, she carries each child safely across, and lets them rest, or begin anew, on the other side.