A taloned hand, at the end of a half-skeletal, half-feathered arm, holds a skull. Its jaws swing open, worms writhing from its eyes and between its teeth. Worms crawl out from the braincase and wriggle down the arm, burying themselves in the feathery flesh of the arm.
Cheline: A dead face is unrecognizable in a cosmically short time. The eyes go first. Soft, easily digested. Food for maggots. The cheeks sink, and the mouth fills with worms. A face rots quickly. But a NAME? I WISH a name could rot.
A crowd of faces watches this scene with wide eyes. Some among them begin whispering to each other, looking worried, angry, shocked. A chain of conversation makes its way through the crowd.
Cheline: A name lasts as long as one mind knows it. As long as it can slip from behind teeth, it hops from mouth to ear, brain to brain. As eternal as the long chain of flesh memory that carries it.
A woman speaks to a small circle of peers, gesturing, with tears welling in her eyes.
Cheline: The gods are BORN immortal. Humans make their OWN immortality, and they give it to those they LOVE.
