And death? I don’t fear death. I dread the absence of it. - Robert Charles Wilson

What is inevitable is not death but change. Change is the only abiding reality. The metaverse evolves, fractally and forever. Saints become sinners, sinners become saints. Dust becomes men, men become gods, gods become dust.

Lada saw me as a diamond-in-the-rough, begging for her lapidary attention. While I saw her as an ultimately inscrutable amalgam of love, sex, and money.
It worked out about as well as you’d expect.

He’s exactly what she wants. He’s the last thing she needs.