I was sent away for my protection, and I became their protector.
They can be a great people. I was sent to them to protect them from their own. I can walk among them as an equal, hiding as one of them- watching over their mundane existence like a Sheppard. They do not always know where I am, but they know that I am there.
I am celebrated for the ordinary feats that my strength allows me to do. They are only ordinary to me, in many cases, extra-ordinary. My greatest accomplishments go unheralded, though I am not interested in their praise. I am, in most respects, just a man with the same insecurities that many of them have about their daily lives. They just take on different forms. I desire love. I desire companionship. I desire to be human, and I now understand that being human is not just about being part of a species. I do not believe they are weak or feeble. I understand that the very things that make them vulnerable have nothing to do with their strength – and I am just as susceptible to them.
I stand over the bed of the only person left who knows my secret. She is dying a slow and painful death. A death I cannot stop, but a death which I have caused. She is dying of cancer.
For other reasons, I am, and always will be, dangerous to those around me, but she is dying because she cared for me. The cancer that grows inside of her is a result of being close to me. I have saved her life before, I have saved the planet before, and yet I am powerless to help her. Her physician wondered what could have caused this in an otherwise healthy woman- but lamented to us that cancer is unlike any other disease on earth. Sometimes, the cell growth just happens. Different people react differently to their environments – some people stave off otherwise carcinogenic variables. Environmental or genetic- there isn’t always an explanation, is what he said to my dying friend.
I know better. I am made strong by the very sun which gives their planet life. My body absorbs its radiation and increases my strength. I have known this for as long as I have been aware of my strength. The power coursing through me does not stay inside me. Like the source of my power, my body radiates that energy outwardly – and that energy does not have the same effect on others as it has on me. Prolonged exposure to any significant power source, unprotected, will lead to the inevitable result.
The very power that drew her close to me will be the cause of her death. My body is bursting with the sun’s radiation. My desire to spend time with her is what is killing her. My need to be close to her, her need to be held by me, our short time together has hastened our eternity apart.
This is the last time I will let myself grow close to anyone of them. The sorrow I have for her impending death is matched only by the knowledge that I will never grow old with them. While loving her, I have watched her gracefully blossom from a young flashy reporter to a middle aged woman. My appearance has not changed in years. I am trapped in a temporal immorality. I do not age. Anyone else I will ever draw close to will eventually die, leaving me alone. Her death will be premature, but was inevitable. My sorrow only arrived ahead of schedule – because of me.
For this to change, only I can elect to change the course of my history. Only I can make the decision to escape the trap of mortality. I can do so by leaving. I can escape the sun that gives me my strength. I can journey away, a cowardly act to avoid an endless loneliness on this earth. A selfish act to ease my pain.
I can’t leave them yet. I am their protector, and it is protecting me.
They can be a great people. I was sent to them to protect them from their own. I can walk among them as an equal, hiding as one of them- watching over their mundane existence like a Sheppard. They do not always know where I am, but they know that I am there.
I am celebrated for the ordinary feats that my strength allows me to do. They are only ordinary to me, in many cases, extra-ordinary. My greatest accomplishments go unheralded, though I am not interested in their praise. I am, in most respects, just a man with the same insecurities that many of them have about their daily lives. They just take on different forms. I desire love. I desire companionship. I desire to be human, and I now understand that being human is not just about being part of a species. I do not believe they are weak or feeble. I understand that the very things that make them vulnerable have nothing to do with their strength – and I am just as susceptible to them.
I stand over the bed of the only person left who knows my secret. She is dying a slow and painful death. A death I cannot stop, but a death which I have caused. She is dying of cancer.
For other reasons, I am, and always will be, dangerous to those around me, but she is dying because she cared for me. The cancer that grows inside of her is a result of being close to me. I have saved her life before, I have saved the planet before, and yet I am powerless to help her. Her physician wondered what could have caused this in an otherwise healthy woman- but lamented to us that cancer is unlike any other disease on earth. Sometimes, the cell growth just happens. Different people react differently to their environments – some people stave off otherwise carcinogenic variables. Environmental or genetic- there isn’t always an explanation, is what he said to my dying friend.
I know better. I am made strong by the very sun which gives their planet life. My body absorbs its radiation and increases my strength. I have known this for as long as I have been aware of my strength. The power coursing through me does not stay inside me. Like the source of my power, my body radiates that energy outwardly – and that energy does not have the same effect on others as it has on me. Prolonged exposure to any significant power source, unprotected, will lead to the inevitable result.
The very power that drew her close to me will be the cause of her death. My body is bursting with the sun’s radiation. My desire to spend time with her is what is killing her. My need to be close to her, her need to be held by me, our short time together has hastened our eternity apart.
This is the last time I will let myself grow close to anyone of them. The sorrow I have for her impending death is matched only by the knowledge that I will never grow old with them. While loving her, I have watched her gracefully blossom from a young flashy reporter to a middle aged woman. My appearance has not changed in years. I am trapped in a temporal immorality. I do not age. Anyone else I will ever draw close to will eventually die, leaving me alone. Her death will be premature, but was inevitable. My sorrow only arrived ahead of schedule – because of me.
For this to change, only I can elect to change the course of my history. Only I can make the decision to escape the trap of mortality. I can do so by leaving. I can escape the sun that gives me my strength. I can journey away, a cowardly act to avoid an endless loneliness on this earth. A selfish act to ease my pain.
I can’t leave them yet. I am their protector, and it is protecting me.
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