In the end, death is the only rest a man can receive. For no man that breathes can never purge away the urge for a higher purpose, the urge to be superior. But in the end, all men will die and only the [Final Hall] will remain.
Only an ideal, a belief is immortal.
So dance O' final one, laugh o' final one, only you remain, only you remember, only you witnessed all that ever was, and only you can make immortal that which is dead. For what lies in your memory is immortal.
Those were the final sentences of my book, written long before I knew what was going to happen.
10th of January, 2102.
I woke up to pain all over my body, a gift from my aging body. as I sat up on the bed a reflection came to mind.
"…it's my 100th birthday today isn't it?...perfect. it's also the day I finish this book…" I thought as I felt the aching of my back.
I noticed a cabinet half-opened in the room.
"hmm? right! It's time I opened that old bottle before it rots away"
I left the bed using my cane and slowly opened the cabinet, inside it was a champagne bottle with an old dusty letter below it.
I picked up both and opened the letter.
"Let's see if I can read this, *Cough* 'hello, me some amount of years in the future, I'm proud of you!, I'm sure that by now you'll have married Elena and achieved world renown with your writing! I'm also sure that you've made a lot of money and live in a big mansion, so from me, your 20-year-old self, I'm proud of you!'" I read through the letter slowly.
I finished reading and I couldn't help but laugh at the letter as I took a seat at my writing station, the only place I found peace. Writing had long become a routine for me, every day I woke up only to write, eat, and then sleep, a more monotone life than even the monks could bear, yet I had lived such a life for countless years.
"I wonder how disappointed my younger self would be by my current position, I'm a 100 year old writer who has only written one book. Its been 70 years since Elena left me, I'm living on welfare, and all I do everyday is write, I have failed to even leave behind a legacy to prove I once lived, other than this damned book.... *Sigh*let's just....finish it." I said as I gazed at the ceiling.
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I opened the champagne bottle and poured a glass out for myself, and then I wrote the final words of my twenty-thousand chapter book [Tale Of A Man].
"As the last sentence I'll write down something special, let's see, 'Thank You and happy birthday, Julius', others might think thanking myself is strange but I'm the only one who wrote everyday for countless years, through pain and joy, through sickness and health, who else is to be thanked?." I wrote down.
"oh right!, I should also thank them! thank you, William for suffering through my whims and feelings, and thank you to every character I wrote into that awful world! I hope all of you like the ending I wrote." I continued.
With my masterpiece finally done I drank the champagne glass and clapped for myself. A sad display but the loneliness and the occasion forced it.
"Now what? Should I find a publisher? Or should I post it somehwere but kids these days are playing vr games that are more real than reality, books and even movies are too boring for them. What should I do with what little time I have left?" I pondered.
The next moment, my eyes started to close on themselves. Not out of fatigue but a different form of weakness.
"Huh? What's….going o-"
As my eyes shut, my body fell to the floor and I blacked out, I could I feel it at that moment, death had finally caught me…
In those last moments I could only regret the things I had done and the things I hadn't.
"…..What have I even done with my life? To die a 100 yr old man after almost 70 years without love, without adventures, without children, without happiness and without pride, I have truly failed as a man and I have left no mark on the world!..," I wanted to shout.
"…I FUCKING REGRET IT!…I REGRET EVERYTHING!, EVERY TERRIBLE DECISION I EVER MADE!!! I REGRET EVERY GAMBLE!! I REGRET NOT LOVING MY BROTHER ENOUGH! I REGRET IT ALL FROM THE DAY I WAS BORN!!! BUT MOST OF ALL! I REGRET NEVER RELEASING MY BOOK!" When my mouth did not work, I shouted with my soul.
Suddenly I lost my senses and I could no longer regret it. Darkness devoured me and I knew in that moment that I, Julius Gray had died…....
.....
.....
....
"AHHHHHH! What happened?! Where am I?, Who am I?!!Didn't I Die?!!" Consciousness suddenly struck me after falling in an endless void for an eternity of suffocation.
My eyes opened and I found myself in front of a mirror, I first noticed that my body felt different, nothing hurt and I felt full of energy, I looked into the mirror and couldn't believe it.
"This…this is me!, I'm young again?, what does this mean?, did god pity me and send me back in time?, wait what day is it?, Where am I? is this heaven?! no there's no way I would go to heaven, right?.." I asked and asked and asked.
I looked around and found that I was in my first apartment that I shared with my first girlfriend, Elene, and so I checked the date quickly hoping that it was before she had left me.
"Today is the 10th of January, before I made the biggest mistake of my life and the day after I was fired. So I went back 80 years in time!, which means tha-"
Suddenly the door opened and I almost swallowed my tongue from shock….