The Artifact

(Image Description: The image depicts a desolate, post-apocalyptic landscape under an alien sky. In the foreground, a barren, rocky terrain stretches out in muted blue-gray tones, scattered with debris. The ground is uneven and crater-like, suggesting devastation. Dominating the left side of the image is a dark stone monolith. Carved or glowing within this stone is a bright, luminous runic symbol that acts as the focal point of the scene. The sky above is dramatic - painted in warm amber and orange hues that fade to darker tones.)

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The Artifact

It’s cold here on this rocky, dead world once known as Earth. For centuries, I’ve walked here, witnessing the wars, the famine, the eventual decay. I watched the extinction of the human race - and the race that came after.

I look down at the Artifact. It’s a seemingly innocent, crystalline stone piece carved with runes and symbols that pre-date the existence of mankind as we know it.

I’ve died a thousand deaths in its service.

I found the thing eons ago, on a dig in South America. I was just a grad student; still a dumb kid, really. I’ve forgotten so many things, but that day changed everything.

I’d done a little too much celebrating when I walked into that little tattoo shop. Encouraged by my friends, I had the Artifact’s most prominent symbol inked onto my left forearm. In that moment, I became its servant.

I could feel it instantly - a great power that needed protecting and I had been made its guardian.

I’ve sacrificed myself to would-be thieves and hostile governments. I’ve protected the Artifact in natural disasters and nuclear holocaust. Unspeakable acts have been performed in attempts to obtain this mysterious item and I’ve stopped them all – suffered them all.

Immortality sounds fun at first, until, time after time, you lose the people you love. It wears you down. You stop forming relationships, no friends, no acquaintances, no more falling in love. At first, you tell yourself that people are worth it, but eventually you just can’t do it anymore.

And time passes and passes and passes.

Over time, even the thrill of duty to protect the Artifact has faded. Death and war and disaster never stop being painful and scary, even if you always find yourself waking up afterward with barely a scratch.

So now here I am, sitting on this rock in the cold darkness, the only thing left alive on this barren rock that was once the cradle of humanity. The tattoo on my arm is nearly gone now and I know what I have to do. I don’t know how I know, but I do.

It’s time.

Slowly, carefully, I reach down with my left hand and trace the rune that will activate the Artifact. At least, I think to myself, I can rest.