On the Eve of the Endtimes, before the bombs launch and the sky tumbles, the world braces for the final impact.

As a young woman awaits Armageddon, she basks in the peace before death, the calm before the storm. She dies with that she loved— her friend, the flowers, and the sky above.

In the distant clouds half a world away, a man watches as a lone Guardian defies the wrath of gods. The sun groans. A great tree blooms. Death yields.

On the plains of a motherland, a young man witnesses the collapse of a shell empire, its people finally killing their masters upon the day of their demise. He clasps his hands together and he calls upon the spirits, and the gods, and the good men born holy, pleading they birth the world anew.

To the seas and riverbanks in the southeastern orient, a woman wades in the tides. She sets herself in tune with the waves that claimed her mother, her family, her people. She too becomes at peace with the Deep.

Thunder cracks. They wait for the world to end. Death does not come.

Night falls.