I watched them leech away his own self, as his body was unaware of what these souls were doing. Everyone was on Earth, apart for me and a few others around this planet. The Soul Keepers, the Council called us. The one's who watched and identified every human's soul and soul intensions, who was safe and who would not live another life. Oh how I wished I could just be the real me, Alice Rosemary Constantine, but for my last life on Earth I would be Stacie Lanker. I have lived a few lives too many to see to loving a true someone in the world. Not since my true birth in 1506 have I found a real love. But I have been with a man every life I've held in my palm. Ten husbands, with 23 children in all. A soul's gender stays with you for every life. The only past life I've had where I never married was my first, when I died of the Plague when it met up with the 16th century London, England. Seeing how the world evolved, however, was amazement in itself. From being in rages and poor hygiene and dying of Influenza at thirty to living until you are one-hundred and two and being able to take a photograph instead of waiting for the painting to be done.

As I stared at Darren Whittaker, his most pure independent soul being corrupted by the inferiors of the blue souls, he still seemed helpless, even as strong as he was to my eyes. If he only knew that he contained the soul that would take my place after my last breath had been breathed, then he wouldn't feel so powerless. As this is his first life, his soul is still able to become one of the Soul Keepers, and as my dying souls wish, he would take my place. To make this happen, we would have to die on the same day, year, and month. We would, as I have been informed, but the Council saw little interest in the young soul, and insisted on another soul, who embodied a woman who lived in the Netherlands at this very moment, but she won't be my choice. She has just another light soul.

There were four main souls, which were more than the majority of the soul population on Earth, leaving only about eighty million to the independents. The most common, the blue soul, is the soul who steals another soul's 'type', as well as the soul's intensions. The light souls were the optimistic good-doers for the world, and the dark souls were pessimistic evils of the world. The romantic soul is the one that loves, but with love comes pain, which makes this the bipolar soul, so to speak. The independents, however, are souls that do not fit into any label such as that, like Darren. Darren, however, had the purest independent soul I had ever seen in my five hundred years.

I would tell him someday. However, I cannot ever see a person again intentionally if they ever find out about my gift, the souls, and the Council. I would tell him on graduation, but that was a far away time from now. Then I would never see him again. Still, at this very moment, I would still loathe the blue and dark souls for bringing him into a world he shouldn't be in, and he would learn that. I still wish I could teach him how to be better than what he was becoming. An independent soul can be changed if a blue soul takes all of them away, unlike any other soul. And I was worried I was losing him to another world to which he did not belong.