Immortality

"So, what's the catch?"

"The catch?"

"You're offering me immortality. There's got to be a catch."

"Oh, you sweet summer child. Of course there's a catch. I'm offering you immortality. "

A beat passes. "Well?"

"Well, what?"

"What's the catch?"

"Immortality."

"...Wut."

The cloaked figure leaned forward. "Dear one...you still don't understand, do you? I'm not offering you a gift."

"But…you're not asking for payment. I was expecting like, my firstborn, or my eyes, or whatever soul I have. You're not asking me to kill anyone or manipulate something, or like, build you an empire or something. Don't deals like this usually have a monkey's paw or some binding contract?"

"Perhaps the fly in the ointment, so to speak, and the satisfaction that I could derive from this deal, could simply be watching you read all the consequences of your actions. For that, I do not need a binding deal or a 'monkey's paw.'"

"You wanna run that one by me again, chief?"

The figure sighed. "For one so eager, so spirited, and so highly spoken of by their peers, you're not too terribly bright, are you?"

"Hey! Just because I'm questioning the fact that there's no catch doesn't make me dumb!"

"I informed you of the catch. It is no fault of mine you bear no capability of understanding."

"Why I outta-!"

"Shush shush shush. I'm speaking. Tell me, and yes, that question is rhetorical, do you honestly believe outliving everyone and everything is a blessing? You entered this deal with the mindset of so many others. 'If I live long enough, I'll find something worth living for.' A common mindset. A stupid one as well. When you're standing on the graves of your enemies, your only accomplishment being to outlive them, do you think you'll feel satisfaction when the holes in which your loved ones lie are a stone's throw away? When the buildings you watch constructed crumble and disintegrate beneath your feet, will you feel elation, or a sense of emptiness? If humanity ascends to the stars instead of the world being ripped apart by their capacity for destruction, will you feel overjoyed, or will you simply feel out of place? Will the weight of the feeling that you are a relic who has lasted far beyond your time bear down upon you and crush you? When technology advances beyond your comprehension and language evolves past your ability to speak, when you're looked down upon as you now look down at those you dub lower life forms, how will the realization that the universe itself has outgrown you affect you? As the days blend into weeks, the weeks into months, the months into years, the years into decades which turn into centuries and then millenia, how will you escape the nostalgia that will drag you down into an ocean of darkness? As those who you give your heart to age before your eyes, taken by the gentle hand of time into that which comes after, how will you deal with each stab into your soul? Will you suffer the agony of loss over and over again, or will you withdraw away from all, sequestered yourself in a sanctuary that would better be described as a tomb, praying never to hear another voice again? As time itself ends and you are left alone among the void, how will you beg and plead and scream to the uncaring husks of the stars for your time to end as well, finally the realization dawning, as you exist past the end of all things, that time is only valuable due to it being brief, love that much sweeter due to the sting of loss, life only dear due to the fragility of existence? When your victory turns to ash in your mouth as you realize death is not an adversary to best on the field of battle, but a welcoming friend that comes to you when you have earned your rest, will you weep bitter tears as it dawns on you that even the briefest life has more worth than you and all your countless years?"

A chuckle, given by one amused at the lack of wisdom displayed by the hasty, sounded in the throat of the one offering the contract. 

"Have you given thought of your final end? Will your quest for the stars find you floating among them, eyes glued open as your frozen but immortal body drifts among the currents of space? Will you be blasted into the unknown by our sun going supernova and scattering our solar system across the galaxy? Will you be pulled into a black hole, or fall into a star to burn forever like the fallacy of Hell? Perhaps you'll never escape the confines of this planet, bound to wander the world as it turns grey and dies around you, society and then nature crumbling to the slow but inescapable decay of time, plunged into darkness by the dying stars, will your tears be frozen to your cheeks, or will they even be brought forth at all? Will you fall afoul of simple bad luck, falling from a boat to find your final fate at the deepest depths of the ocean, crushed beneath the waves, unable to move. Unable to die. Will you be crushed underneath a mountain in an earthquake, your endless tomb sealed by the weight of the world bearing down on top of you? Will you be foolish enough to be swallowed up by magma, molten earth filling every crack and crevice, your soundless screams being sealed on top of your burning body? That is the meaning of immortality. When life is endless, so too is the suffering one can experience."

The contract was hidden once again in dark robes as the one who had wished for it so simply sat in stunned silence, suffering spared by the one who had seen and survived, still holding enough sanity to provide salvation.

"Next time, young one, understand what you wish for before you utter the words. Farewell."