Disclaimer: Beauty and the Beast and the characters belong to Republic. The words are mine. And the loss is all of ours.

I wrote this hoping that some time in the distant future we can look back not in anger but from another place.

Vincent's life was divided into Befores and Afters. Before Love and After Love. Before Catherine, his memories were like faded photographs of somebody else's dream. After Catherine, everything became Real. He became Real.

Looking backward from advanced old age, he could see that there was truly only one line of demarcation -- an event by which all were defined. So many lives... They never did count them all. Only "guestimates" of the numbers lost.

The toll in the tunnels alone had been dire.

Entire worlds gone, vaporized, crushed, destroyed in a hateful instant.

Small heroes.

Sweet moments.

The ones who shone.

The ones who gave all they had.

Images, like photographs of other people's dreams.

Deep below the mourning city, Vincent found bodies wrapped together in death. Forever together. Forever not alone. Bodies that no longer were human but more than that. Heroes.

The little corpse sniffing dog lying still beside the mangled pile. Catherine's friend Joe brought him down. Terriers dig. Terriers find rats. Terriers look at at you through crying eyes. The dog lay down as though he was sitting by the Rivers of Babylon. People there. Find them. My job is done.

Pascal in the decimated pipe chamber relaying messages only the dying heard. Words of comfort. The Lord's Prayer. He refused to leave. They cannot die in silence. They must have a Voice.

Mary and Father working tirelessly to ease the suffering of people they never knew -- or recognized. They cannot be left.

Catherine, Above, in pictures on the news. Beautiful. Alive. Working tirelessly. This cannot happen again.

Devin. My Brother. Invisible in blue.

Jamie, exhausted, crying, looking for Mouse.

The little dog by the pile.

Vincent's mind returned to the little dog more and more these last few days.

"I am lucky," Vincent thought. "I am old."

The ones who survived that day he could count on two hands.

So many went missing. Unfound. They were the true heroes. The smallest of the small.

They carried the light.

They died together. Not Alone. Named and Unnamed. Counted and uncounted. There were so many left-behinds...

Vincent looked up from his thoughts to see one of his grandchildren scurry past, Mouse-like. He smiled.

The Wells were known to be long lived.

There is such thing, Vincent thought, as living *too* long.

"When a world can no longer love, it can no longer live," Pascal said, softly, in his gentle way. "Please, Vincent. Justice will come one way or another. We must go forward. Love is all we have now."

In the end, on That Day, the worlds Above and Below became One.

Vincent went on with his life. He rebuilt. He Loved.

The little dog came and laid beside Vincent. He looked up at him with sad eyes.

"You cannot help it, my friend," Vincent told him. "It's your Job."

Devin waiting in the doorway for him, smiling and looking dashing in that damned blue uniform.

"In the end, you were a good cop," Vincent said, smiling.

"Yes, I was," Devin replied. "Man, you got old."

Vincent laughed. "Can I go Above now, and walk in the sun?"

Devin patted the wee dog and then reached out and took Vincent's hand. "Sure," he said. "You can do anything you want to now."

Vincent found he did not want for a great many things. In fact he wanted nothing at all -- save one...

The world as it was Before.

"I know, I know," Devin said, kindly. "But it had to be." He reached down and picked up the dog.

"Where are we going?" Vincent asked.

"You know..."

Vincent looked up into a clear daylight sky. The towers shone like diamonds. Or maybe prophets.

He heard the rumble of jet engines. They sounded small.

Like Redemption Songs.

Above and Below. One.

In life and in death.

In their pointless sacrifice, the Towers had given his melded world the gift of Choice.

"I chose to Love."

The tunnels went forward in Love. So many did...

Vincent turned his eyes from the city he knew so well and began the long journey toward the light he called freedom.

And from somewhere faraway, somewhere deep within the Tunnels a familiar voice sang:

* Redemption Songs words and music by the late Bob Marley.