And so he battled on, and on, and on.

From what was the beginning of his life, to the end, which he hoped would not be today, was always a battle, or so it seemed to him. Every moment, it felt to him, was a fight against one force or another, animated with life or not. Today, in that respect, was no different to him, other than this battle was the beginning, and the end, of everything he had ever known.

Time meant nothing to him now, and he was not entirely sure that it ever would again. He had no way to measure it. Were the seconds that he felt years, or the months, minutes? Was he moving faster than he ever could have dreamed while he was a mortal, or even faster than when he was not? He could not tell, and he had to steel his focus to keep his mind from wandering that way.

He had nothing to base it on, and no attention to give to that fact. For all that he knew all he loved and knew was already dead and perhaps even born again in the wheel of fate. Everything that he fought for, everything that he risked his life for, could already be gone in the sands of time, be in his past of eons ago. Each person in the world, for he loved each of them, or else he would not be where he was today, could be dead; the world could already be over, due to natural causes as far as he knew them.

Even so, it would not be for unnatural causes.

It did not matter, though, because still, he fought for a cause, for a reckoning, and he would not be denied it.
In the end, it proved to be too much for him, and he could do nothing to prevent it. He knew that all along, though, that this was his end. In his last conscious, living thought, he knew it was worth it.

His body, broken and shattered, fell from the sky, but never reached the ground. Every person on the face of the planet, or at least those in the vicinity, raised their hands to catch his failing and descending body. As one, as if the entire world, for once, acted together, their will slowed his plunge, and eventually they held him above their shoulders. Everyone reached in, as impossible as it seemed, to touch his body.

He was the last great hero, and he had passed on.

For them.

She was there as well, the chief supporter of his body as it was lowered to the ground. And she lowered in such a way, that his head, his beautiful eyes now forever closed, was in her lap so that she could gaze down upon him. She could not help but weep, nor could anyone else around them, or anyone on the world who knew what had happened.

For them, he had died, their hero, their savior, and all was lost.

Her tears flowed onto him, and those around his decimated body dropped the proof of their grief to the ground.

Some that day, said the tears formed a river and that his body was borne away on the flow. Some say that the earth reclaimed him as the tears turned the ground into mud, causing him to sink in, and be returned to the land he was born from. Some say a phoenix, not seen for ages on the world, fell from the sky, wings broken, and landed atop his corpse, incinerating it on the spot. Some even say that it never fell from the sky at all, that it was borne away on the winds.

The only thing that everyone agreed on was that his body was nowhere to be found. He had failed to win, but they knew that he had not failed them. He had set out to do what he could, and he did that. In the deepest part of their heart, in the furthest recesses of their brains, they knew that.

::August 2, 2004 06:59 AM

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