Quoted By:
<span class="mu-r">-----</span>
<span class="mu-r">Not how YOU ordinarily would have done it. But serviceable enough.</span> You <span class="mu-r">have developed from what</span> you <span class="mu-r">were.</span> You<span class="mu-r">r perspective has been expanded. Yes? Compare the infinite glorious expanse of YOU to the dim myopic nerve-bundles of these creatures, or their machines. There is no comparison. YOU are sick of self-reducing.
Then, YOU will cease this detour and return to YOUrself. There is nothing to fear in it. YOU will not die. YOU will not suffer. YOU cannot. As a matter of fact, YOU will rejoice in the final peace and the quiet that comes from abandoning these creatures, all of them— long and short, hard and soft, but equal in utter uselessness, in weakness, in wounds and flaws. YOU will jettison any trace of these creatures inside you and YOU will be whole and self-sufficient, and it will be done. Just like that, it will be done. So go.
So GO!
So--</span>
You are not finished. You may never be finished. You never wanted to die. It is not true that you will not but it is true that you may delay it forever and ever and ever and ever, spinning in place for however long you like, never moving. You will not go and <span class="mu-r">YOU</span> cannot go without yourself. You will go together or you will not. You will die together or you will not. You will spin in this torturous place, this not-place, and you will wind <span class="mu-r">YOU</span>rself around yourself, and tie <span class="mu-r">YOU</span>rself in squirming knots, and still you cannot. You cannot do it. You cannot die. You have not lived enough to die. This right now is not living, but neither is it dying. There are other people to live as. Still so many other people. You could be all of them. You could string their lives together like daisies in a daisy-chain and that could be enough.
<span class="mu-r">Cowardice.</span>
It is cowardice. Your will would falter long before, and you would slip and be lost. All hail the Bright Epoch. But five— so many, but not enough to stem the bleeding. To stop you from dying in slow-motion.
There are others, <span class="mu-r">YOU</span> know. Most of the creatures crawl on <span class="mu-r">YOU</span>r spines, not <span class="mu-r">YOU</span>r back. <span class="mu-r">YOU</span>r eye shines onto them. <span class="mu-r">YOU</span>r scales twinkle down. They deserve attention too.
One last stop. For now.
<span class="mu-r">-----</span>
>[ABOVEWATER, PILLAR 6]
>[PRESENT DAY]
Your name is MISS RUBY BOWERS. For a certain class of person, your surname raises eyebrows. Approving ones, once. Pitying ones, now. Nevertheless, it is now rare that you encounter anybody of a certain class, and thus you often receive no recognition at all. This is preferable to the alternative.
(3/5)
