farewells...

"Anyway: I'm not blessed, or merciful. I'm just me. I've got a job to do, and I do it. Listen: even as we're talking, I'm there for old and young, innocent and guilty, those who die together and those who die alone. I'm in cars and boats and planes; in hospitals and forests and abbatoirs. For some folks death is a release, and for others death is an abomination, a terrible thing. But in the end, I'm there for all of them..."

When the first living thing existed, I was there waiting.
When the last living thing dies, my job will be finished.
I'll put the chairs on the tables, turn out the lights, and lock the universe behind me as I leave...

-Death in "The Sandman Volume 3: Dream Country" by Neil Gaiman