"Time," he echoed, and for a second, with that word, there was something beyond pain in his eyes. A flicker of bitterness. Of rage. It didn't last long, gone near as soon as it sprang to life, but it was there, nevertheless.

He wasn't sure what he'd been looking for, from Adam, but that wasn't it. Time didn't heal, it killed. It was a predatory. It had been his master, his teacher, with its chiming bells and ticking fingers, forever pointing him towards his next victim. Marking them for him in low, intimate whispers whenever he looked too long at someone special. It counted out time for him, helped him mark the passage of it in death, and then he'd forgotten it.

He gained immortality, forgotten it - her because time had to be a woman for how cruel it was - and she had exacted her revenge. She'd stripped everything he'd ever know away from him. Everything he'd loved or hated or lusted after. Everything but Adam. She couldn't touch that, because he was like him. Timeless. Turned away from her.

And as comforting as that was, he still couldn't help but snarl, "Time's a bitch."