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<B> In Memoriam. Everything is dark. Then.. in a young woman's palm, a light flickers into existence. The glow wavers in her hands' cupped protection; struggles against a wind born in some long forgotten fraction of an eternity passed. Always the wind carried the cold, and from cold's embrace, always did snow endeavor escape and so to each side of the woman stretches untold fields of snow, mute and lifeless, broken only by hill and valley's curve. Light dances out from between the woman's parted fingers; painting slivers of twisting gold that hungrily lick the bleak landscape, as if wanting to ignite it. Then with a flick of its ravenous tongue the light reveals footsteps in the snow; a shadow clings feebly to the small dent before the approaching woman's glow chases it away. Kneeling down beside the footstep, she brushes it gently with her fingertips. <B> "I remember you." Slowly she started to walk, following tracks left behind. There is no visible time in this place, there is nothing to rise from the horizon and travel the sky; there are no plants to sprout, bloom and wilt. Both second and lifetime she walked and then, she was not alone. They were not born of her fluttering light, nor were they drawn by it. They, too, were following the footsteps left in this world which had ended. <B> "These were all people you knew. <b> People whose lives you touched <b> somehow." A man closed up on her side, holding out his hand to offer her the warmth from his light. Close together against the howling wind and sharing what little heat there was in the world they kept walking; light would fan out around them like the petals of a rare blazing flower. They stopped as they reached the foot of a steep hill; it towered above them like a giant, struck down and frozen in his attempt to touch the sky. <B> "This is where you left us, isn't it?" A thousand perfect snow crystals glittered at her from every direction; each one a tiny unique work of art whose intricate pattern gave no peace to her mind. <B> "At the top of this hill.. <B> will there even be anything for us to see?" She looked over to where the man was watching her with his serious eyes. Even in this world without saturation, his hair was a pale purple; as timid irises hiding in a tree's shadow. She took his free hand and they climbed. They had a sudden end, those footprints; a few steps from the summit they abruptly stopped. As more people spilled over the hilltop to see where the steps of their friend had come to a close, the crest of the hill was flooded in warm, dancing lights. She could do nothing but stare. The hand holding hers tightened its grip gently and she came to. They were alone; the snow around them was filled with new footprints in all directions and she could still see the faint flickering lights of people spread out in the distances. The young man lead her to a side of the hill where the slope laid untouched before them, full of its own secrets about the sights it had witnessed; together they started their descent. <B> "Someday, after we have walked countless hills, <B> our feet shall, too, take flight <B> and carry us to another world." She looked back on the hill they had descended, its white, velvet-like beauty marred by two pair of footprints. <B> "..Until then, we will keep making our own <B> tracks in the snow." - Eriel. <B> ----------- <B> In Memory of PlagueS , vita mutatur, non tollitur ` | |