The Wall Between Mortality and Eternity

After they enclosed humans, they didn’t make the walls that high.

“Why not build it higher?” asked the child.

“High walls are for those who want to escape,” said the old man. “That’s not true.”

The child sat on the sill and stared at a pale line in the distance. The light did not disappear even on the other side of the wall. It was like a different sky, a sky that had forgotten how to sleep.

“What’s there?” he asked.

“No one coughs during the winter, no clock goes wrong, no old man forgets his name,” said the old man. “There are no peaches that will rot by tomorrow.”

That’s what the child thought. “Sounds good.”

The old man did not answer. He held a peach in his hand and cracked it open. The juice ran down my fingers, and the air was suddenly filled with sweetness. At the edges, the flesh was already beginning to brown, as if touched by dusk.

“Eat. You won’t be able to eat much longer.”

“Why do things smell better when they start to rot?”

“Because we know they’re not going to stay here.”

What Makes Something Truly Alive?

At that moment, a figure appeared. It came to the entrance of the village every month. It had a human form and voice, but it was all too complete, symmetrical, unblemished and frighteningly silent.

“It is decaying,” it said.

“So?” The child hid it behind his back.

“That’s why it’s incomplete.”

The child grimaced. “You always confuse these two words.”

The figure was silent, then turned to the old man. “The knife grinder died yesterday. I saw him sharpening an old knife three days ago. If he knew his end, why bother using a tool he would never use again?”

“Did you come to ask about the Grinder, or about yourself?” asked the old man.

A brittle leaf fell on the figure’s shoulder. I held it up, studying it like a precious manuscript.

“We can manufacture this. Fractals, insect imprints. But we cannot manufacture this particular example of loss.”

“Because it was not made, but lived,” said the old man. “What you’re looking at is time. Not server time, but the kind of time that settles into things and becomes worn out and unique. In your world, there is no ‘now’ because everything is eternal.”

Digital Immortality and the Fear of Ending

“Where I come from, there is disease,” the figure said. “More people are refusing to back up. Some are intentionally leaving cracks in the chassis. They’re asking for something called a celibacy agreement.”

“To become impossible to reproduce?” asked the old man.

“That’s right. It’s killing me.”

Silence fell. I could hear coughs and the sound of laundry creaking in the distance: the sound of the world constantly being worn away.

“We thought preservation was a victory,” the figure said. “But what is preserved cannot come close to being alive. It becomes just an exhibition. We have no destiny.”

“Fate is reaching for something knowing that it will end,” said the old man. “Live this time carefully, because you can never take it out of the cloud server. You have infinity. But without a frame, a painting is just an infinite smear of colour.”

The child threw peach seeds. “If there was no school, the holidays wouldn’t be fun.”

The figure looked at the child. “But death brings fear. Death brings about the disappearance of ‘I’.”

“Of course,” said the old man. “That fear is the price of the ticket. You can’t truly own yourself unless you risk losing yourself.”

The Price of Becoming Mortal

The light on the other side of the wall flared sharply. The figure’s appearance became straighter.

“The agreement has been ratified. Those who approve it will be allowed to transition.”

“Do you want to do it?” asked the child.

“Yes.”

“Aren’t you scared?”

“I’m scared,” the figure said. “That way you know you’re on the right track.”