My nostrils aflame from what now lay as mere resonance left upon the angel's halo, I took her against the first stroke to the canvas -- the one of pure water -- the one to set the stage. Then, somewhere in the meshing of glass shards and whipping winds, I stole glimpses of Pandora's heaven like the plucking of angels' feathers therein. This theft lasted exactly thirty stories long, and bred only more of the same.

Close your eyes.

One morbid epilogue awaited thirty stories' end: the sordid intercourse of flesh and tar; our futile mortality realized. Somehow, my eyes could only focus on our brilliant fall of the rain, and how within the striking match upon enemy lines, our fire could burn the brightest. Immortality only one heartbeat away, and I could only drink of present tense. I felt no pain here, as the brush began to grow restless.

Pull the cord.

Her lips were sulfuric and bloodied from the initial step, but she lent them to me all the same. I fought winds for wings, begging for merciful moments inside only one. Her tongue wove thirty poems of landscapes defied and colors divine. This was my greatest theft, and it lasted thirty stories long. Pandora's promise immobilized, I indulged my inner most fears, coming alive in the last brief moment with open eyes and a smile.

Finally, I was alive again.

Thud.

Heh. And we didn't even have to sign our names...