Soul clutched the hand of Time with both of hers, her form seeming to glow with the intensity of her conviction.
"Together, we could achieve this. Your sacrifice would not be an end. It would be the greatest act of defiance ever conceived. It would give meaning to all of this! To every life that we have taken, every star consumed, every tear ever shed on our unholy names! It would reveal the reason! It would be the final, beautiful note to the song of all creation!"
The sweet moment of shared wonder at a new life curdled into the bitter scheming for an ancient death. Time did not know when Soul had become insane. Perhaps he suspected that he also was insane, but in this body of a mortal, he saw truths that his main body had forgotten.
He looked from her fervent, beloved face to the innocent, pulsing light of Eos. He did not see a key. He saw a child. He did not see a bridge. He saw a living thing, sacred in its own right, not a tool to be used and broken.
