James could feel himself falling, falling farther and farther downward. Far beyond the cage which held captive Finality’s Reaper. Eventually he hit terminal velocity yet still he continued to fall ever downward. The world went from black to white to red as his frame crashed through pane upon pane of glass. How dead was he exactly, or was he even dead to begin with?

”How exactly am I going to come back from this?” He asked himself.

The answer was simple, he wasn’t, he couldn’t. He already had his chance, and he blew it. This was just the end credits for him, nothing more than an afterthought. Still, he continued to fall, past towering skyscrapers and endless trees. Just what was going on here?

James looked around him and saw nothing but a shifting blur around him. Changing from deep reds to pastel blues and lightly colored greens. Was this to be his fate, to fall forever, left only to think about what could have been? James shrugged and blinked again. Nothing changed, the world around him only got worse as the colors smeared over one another.

This time he could make out a single unblinking eye somewhere out there. The mess of his surroundings veiled the true shape of the eye from him. Yet he could see clearly that something was staring back at him. He stared back at the eye, and it fixed itself on him. James’s pupils widened as adrenaline shot through him. He reached for his sword but found nothing expect… solid ground?

How exactly could he have touched solid ground already? James looked down at the floor which he found himself on. An endless ocean of, judging by the burgundy color it had, what could possibly be blood. James looked up at the eye which stared down at him. It almost seemed to smile back at him, or at least it looked like it was. James awkwardly smiled and waved back at it.

He looked up at the sky and saw yet another eye staring down at him. James then looked ahead of him only to be met with a wall of eyes in front of him. He blinked yet the eyes did not go away, they just stayed there and stared at him. James sighed and went to lie down on the ground for a moment, yet something stopped him from doing so. He shrugged and thought nothing of it.

He took a few steps forward and the world warped around him. The eyes changed to trees as the sky opened up above him. The ground below him slowly turned to dirt as he walked. James looked around himself and noticed the changes in his environment. Maybe he was dreaming, but if he was, then why did it all seem so real?

James reached into his pocket and pulled out his pistol. He pressed it to his forehead only for it to completely phase through him. No, that couldn’t possibly be right, could it? James touched his forehead with his right hand only to be met with a gaping hole at its center. He moved his hand around and felt the back, the hole went all the way through his skull.

How then was he still breathing? If a hole had been torn through his skull then surely, he should be dead by now. Yet here he stood in this “hellscape” if he could even call it that. Alive and well by all accounts, that’s what he was in this moment. James looked up at the sky and noticed the moon above him. The longer he stared at it, the less it looked like a moon. Frankly it seemed to be some sort of hole leading back upwards. James blinked and the hole vanished. He blinked again and the world returned to its original state.

Still, he was somehow alive in this moment. Whatever Cassius, as James had called his humanity, had done didn’t kill him. James went to sit down again, and this time nothing stopped him. He gazed into the eye above him and felt something, something that wanted to speak with him. James simply smiled and waited for whatever was behind the eye to speak to him. After hours of waiting, he finally heard a voice call out to him.

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”How does a man such as you still walk amongst the living?” It asked.

”How thin is the line?” James responded.

”Thin, but not thin enough for a man to walk on. So how then do you still count yourself among the living?” It repeated.

”Cut a man open and you’ll see what makes him tick. Kill a man and you’ll see just how desperate he truly is. See how closely he clings to life. How desperately he begs you for mercy. Do not relent, take his life, see what his soul does. Only then will you know just what he is truly worth.” James answered.

”Mehdiyr, what kind of an answer is that! I would expect a creature like yourself to be wholly capable of a true answer. So, please, tell me then how you ended up here? Here where men fear to tread. Here where no one remembers who you are.” It replied.

”Well, would you believe what I’m about to tell you? I was slain by my own humanity! That bastard which wears my skin and uses my name! My own humanity has betrayed me! To it, my very existence is a threat to all it holds dear. Yet if that bastard which I call my humanity has truly killed me, how then am I still alive?” James responded.

”So, you are both the betrayer and the betrayed? How interesting it is to see the chase turned inside out like this! However, that still doesn’t explain how you are still alive. Though your form denotes that of a litch, one who refuses to truly die. Where then have you sealed away your soul, O visitor mine?” It asked.

”You’re asking if I even have a phylactery then? Well, the answer to that question is a rather odd one. I am my own phylactery, yes that doesn’t make any sense now does it? A better answer, and frankly the right one, would be that I don’t have one at all. How then does my immortal body come back from death? Memory, as long as I am remembered, I shall still be alive in this world.” James answered.

”You still do not answer my question, yet perhaps there is no answer for you to give? You really are a confused little speck if I do say so myself. You are a flawed infinity, someone who can return from death without consequence or meaning. Yet here you are conversing with some thing that cannot die to begin with.” The creature chuckled.

”What exactly are you?” James asked.

”An ouroboros, that which devours itself for all time. I cannot die for I have no end. I cannot live for I have no beginning. So, what then am I, you may ask? Perfect infinity, that is the simplest definition of me. You who sit before me, you have no idea what you are getting yourself into. So, turn back now while you still have time.” The ouroboros answered.

James scowled and wanted to tell it that he had already passed the point of no return. Yet he was unable to as water seemed to fill his lungs. He could feel himself floating towards the surface. But how, there was no real surface, there was no up or down here. Nothing truly mattered when it came down to it. For he sat here at the end of time, did he not? So how then could anything possibly make sense?

Well it couldn’t, as there was no sense to be made to begin with. There was just nonsense, which still made sense. If that made sense, then everything else made sense. There was still order even in all of this formlessness, all of this nothing, constants still existed. He laughed at the pure insanity of the situation which he was in. The world around him ceased to exist as nothing but darkness surrounded him. All was darkness, all was nothing, all was empty, all was.

James’s head had breached the surface of the water. He could see the sun setting on the horizon. He looked around him and saw the spire to his right. Then James looked to his left and saw the water falling downwards into the endless void. James looked behind him and saw his sister’s island, only she wasn’t there. Franky he was all alone in this place, here at what was possibly the end. James smiled and thought to himself, just what was truly going on. He swam towards the island, yet it seemed to be getting farther away from him. James continued to swim for a little while before his arms grew tired. He fell under the waves and his feet found purchase on the underside of the water.

“Up is down and down is up.” James thought to himself.

So, he walked along the ocean towards the island. The moon rose in the sky below him as the sun set in the one above. Once James reached the island he swam down so as to put his head above the water. He was on the island now, overlooking the endless void below him. He looked out at the mismatched chaos of the world in front of him.

For all was nothing, and nothing was all…