“Just hang loose,” Bab said, but the waves were gnarly compared to what my life had been up to that point, mostly just wading through ankle slappers and chunder. Was it fresh? Hell no. But it had been safe.

The party was held in the brimstone canyons of the underworld, just beyond the pit of despair. I was stoked to be there after the seemingly unending fields of nihilism, but the sense of imminent doom was still clinging to me like a lonely face hugger.

“You can worry about grubbing, or you can choose not to, either way, eventually, you will burn out, no matter how bitching your skills are. So, do we do this the horrible way or do you want to enjoy the ride? You decide.” And then Bab just stood there, waiting, scraping off spark barnacles with their hooves from the underside of an asbestos twin fin as I hesitated, mulling over my options and fears on the beach of annihilation.

“Is it gonna hurt?” I asked. “If it does, that too shall pass,” Bab answered. And there, at the end of things, I had to face that there was no turning back now, not after what I had witnessed, but against all that I had come to expect, there was a party here for crying out loud. Fresh? Hell yeah.

And so, as the sulfur wind dried the farewell tears for what once was, we paddled into the heart of the crucible, where the blastwaves began to break, and we carved out a magnificent run.