I felt the watcher’s will fail, I felt the void rush in to claim him.

I was severely wounded, overdrawn, and struggling to stay conscious. Yet I could not just let him destroy all of existence. I could let him not slay my people. So with the last of my will, I reached out.

Wait.

I knew he heard me

Don’t do this.

I was too overdrawn, too wounded to format arguments. So I did the only thing I could. O begged.

Please. We can rebuild. We can do better. I will do better.

The response came in a voice like the crack of thunder.

Why should I? Humanity has failed enough.

Because we are your children. And we are begging you.

I felt him hover at the turning point and desperation surging through me, I tried one last plea.

Please.

I felt him decide, and knowing its futility, I prepared to ignite the last of my path. I would not die cowering. I would fight to the end.

Then the watcher's own power bound him in strings of immutable law. I felt his rage, but more clearly, I felt his love. It was a speck in the face of the void, yet it didn’t hesitate as It struggled to buy me time.

It reached out to me, voice gentle, loving.

Hurry, child. I can only hold him for so long.

Indeed I sensed the binding would only hold for a few years or so.

But even that was a relief as I drifted off.

—----------------------------------------

I dreamt.

A realm of gold stretched out before me, a sea of soul and power beyond my comprehension. I had seen things that appeared infinite, things that appeared eternal, yet at the moment, I knew the truth.

Only this sea was eternal.

Only this sea was endless.

It felt familiar, and following that feeling, I found a few loose threads of memory, or more accurately, a few missing threads of memory. I traced them, bracing myself against the flashes of noise and remembrance.

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A body hitting the floor. My body.

Panicked voices, steadily growing further.

Then the sea, the endless sea.

The sea of pure being.

I had reached out and touched it, feeling the power, the clarity, the purity rush through me, remaking me in the image of pure state of being.

The sea had no name, no thoughts, no purpose. I simply was. And yet, as I touched it I knew. It was knowledge I had always known, just never recognized.

It was not my time.

So, basking in the sea of being, I wove a set of golden stairs.

I rose higher and higher, reborn in infinity.

I never looked back.

Now I was back, stuck with that same awareness. It was not my time.

I wondered how to escape this time. I could weave that same set of stairs, but It didn’t feel right. The stairs already existed within me.

No, I needed something new.

I looked down on myself, taking in my wretched state. I was nothing more than a golden outline here, and yet I was covered in gaping wounds. I reached down, and cupping my hands, scooped up a portion of the golden sea.

I brought it to my lips and drank, comforted by its warmth and stability.

My wounds healed before my eyes, knitting my golden flesh back together into an unblemished whole.

It was so peaceful here, so quiet. I could stay here forever–.

I shook off the sweet siren's call. I had a job to do, and a path to walk. I would not be tempted.

I contemplated my escape, agonizing over every possible action. When it finally came to me, I was shocked I hadn't thought of it before.

What I needed wasn’t a weapon nor a tool.

It was a Heart.

The soul is a thing of immense emotion. Yet the human mind is not capable of processing such depth. Passion is my power, and not even I can fully control it, once unleashed. Not even I can grasp its truth depth, not with a mere mind.

Some things can only be felt.

I got to work, spinning threads of being in the image of my path, in the image of myself. In a way, I was completing myself, creating the bridge between my soul and mind. I know not how long the work took, lost in it as I was. It could have been an instant or an eternity, but when I was done, I stood in front of my Heart.

A true Heart, not the lump of flesh in my chest, a spiritual-physical gestalt, that would tie my twin natures into one.

It was beautiful, a ball of golden light, flickering with the essence of my path.

I took one last look around the sea of being, basking in its golden glow, before seizing the Heart and plunging it into my golden chest.

For a second, nothing happened.

Then my new Heart beat, and the resulting pulse ripped the realm around me asunder.