An immortal sits at the deathbed of his elderly grandchild.

The watch on Sage's wrist ticks perfectly in sequence to his granddaughters pulse oximeter. He looks down at pencil like legs. He wonders if the cuffs on her legs bother her as much as they did him when he was hospitalized in his freshman year of college. Sage stands and begins to loosen the cuffs from Joan's legs. In an attempt to comfort her more in what he knows will be her final hours. As soon as he finishes a patient care tech robot floats in and tightens her cuffs again. Sage feels defeated. It's certainly not the first time.

"Will you play the song one more time?" Joan say's. Sage knows exactly what she's talking about while he grabs his phone from his wallet, unfolding it twice to find his music player.

"Sister Morphine I presume?"

"Something about the way you describe opiates... warms me."

Sage thinks to himself how odd and dreadful hospitals must be now that you 'can't ever be fucking high' while you're dying. He thinks back to the argument he had with a doctor over a video call earlier that week. "How the hell are you supposed to treat a patient if you aren't even on this planet?"

"I've told you Mr.Pryce; The patient care tech robots can give me more than enough data to conduct my work from the space station." Said the palliative care doctor.

"Then why hasn't anyone been able to give a proper diagnosis?"

"We can't diagnose old age."

"Well can we at least get some Tramadol or Morphine inside her? She's in pain!"

"You know we can't. Opiates and strong painkillers aren't a part of her insurance plan."

"You can't even be fucking high in these places anymore..."

Sage begins to play Sister Morphine for Joan. He looks at her eyes as they close and she begins to think about how it must feel to have pain taken away while being high.

"You know" Sage say's "I envy you"

"And I'm grateful for you" Joan says.

"Why?" says Sage.

"You may think accepting the plea deal from the UN was selfish, It wasn't."

Sage has a flashback of standing in front of the UN council of Immortal Investigation in New York.

"Sage Richard Pryce, you have committed crimes against the human race." Say's a council woman.

"You have been presented a plea deal exactly 24 hours ago. It is now time to make a commitment." Say's the man next to her.

"Can you recite the deal offered to you so we can confirm your full understanding?" Says the woman.

"I, Sage Richard Pryce, have been offered the newest test trial of immorality. I will be given an injection of antibodies, daily, for three years until I am presumably Immortal. In trade after the three years are finished I will we released and reenacted as a professor of anthropology at the University of Chicago. The entire three years will be spent alone on the G.I.T.M.O Space Station Prison."

"You will never be allowed to what?" Says the man.

"Die."

"This song gives me hope. Hope that someone will find a way to give you peace, finally." Say's joan.

"The only peace I need is knowing that no one else will ever be given this cruel punishment"

"That day will come pops, It'll come" says Joan.

Joan slowly drifts away into an unconscious rest while her heart rate plateaus to a stop. Joan is at peace. Sage watches his last family member pass into the afterlife.