Let it be a perfect iron loop around the hemisphere of the world. A testament to a good deed done well, well enough to keep the magicks of the world together. At least, for a short period of time. The cycles of time do not know where they start or stop, so why should humanity? They search for the end times, the beginning times, the what-happens-in-present times. There is no need to follow the sun so closely, when time will shun us when it is ready. The sounds of the passing of life are echoing between the bars, and the tightened rings of time squeeze our arms like a bear hug that will poison you if you squeeze back.

The undead don’t linger, do they? They lose themselves to time, become the coordinates that we bind ourselves to. And we let them. We do not stop them, but we pine for them. We pine for the way they let go and forget what it means to be a tick on their cell wall, and hope they cannot find their way home. There is no stopping time or its wanting hands, but it will show you that while it can kill or erase, it can also heal, erode, and rebuild if given the chance. There is nothing sacred to time, and the only thing that is worth looking into when exploring immortality and divinity is how well you can get along with the passing of it.

The way we shift to hold it between our hands? It’s a plot. A way for us to let go and let ourselves think ourselves dead and insurmountable, but it is a lie, as we know. There is no way to close the windowsill, we must sit and watch it turn on the street lamps and shut the cat away while it prowls the dark streets for loose change and dead cigar butts. It will strangle you in your doorway and do not let it convince you that living is a wild temptation. It is not. It is not worth crying over, but it is worth living and it is worth living all the way to a natural end; or as natural as time will allow you to go through with.

We think the Reaper is a killer, but he is an Agent of Time, and he is here to collect the hardiest of minutes and the softest of hours and the wildest of seconds between the slowest of eternities. Do not take it for granted. Time will catch up, always.