Brian, kneeling, was 29 when he became unmoored from time. At least, that's what he called it, when whatever it was that happened, happened. When he could think about it, when he was further along whatever sequence it was that he was now traveling. All Brian knew at that instant was that he heard a high-pitched twang, the kind a guitar string makes when it snaps under too much pressure.

And in a way, that's what he thought it was at first, that something had snapped under the pressure, either that or that he was hallucinating, due to the sensation, something like trying to breathe at the bottom of the ocean, produced by his present position and attempted action, which were, respectively, kneeling with a diamond ring extended, and proposing to his girlfriend Helen, who was not at all traditional but who was acutely attuned to power relations. This ultimately benefited her not at all, because when said "twang" referred to earlier happened, to Helen's eyes, Brian vanished forever, and all that her machinations got her, had she known, was the dubious honor of having an absent fiancé with the most original excuse.

For you see, when the "twang" sounded, Brian stopped. He simply stopped moving through time. However, nothing else stopped.

Everything else in the universe simply kept going. This meant that Brian penetrated his girlfriend, the sofa, the far wall of the room, and, shortly thereafter, the entire tectonic plate upon which all of North America was the thinnest skin in quick succession, leaving a permanent time tunnel that bisected each of them. (If you don't believe me, go look for yourself.)

Since the earth is moving relatively quickly, Brian emerged through the other side of the earth fairly quickly, serving as yet another bizarre folk apparition reported in the highlands of China. From there he passed through the atmosphere, diamond still extended, of course, and out into space. Around Jupiter Brian began to feel time flowing around him, not unlike the familiar sensation of bathing in jello. As time passed him, events began to project themselves upon the surface of his static, unblinking eyes. Because the sun is moving, Brian got to watch the entire patch of space/time with which he was familiar whirl past, while he knelt, motionless, on the square of shag carpet that had accompanied him into no-time.

After he passed out of the solar system, things got a little hazy, what with all the suns and clusters and spiral arms and galaxies sweeping through time, all of them still in such a hurry from the Big Bang. Brian perked up a bit when they all started crawling back past him headed the other way, their faces a duller red as if a bit embarrassed by it all, but still hurrying, this time to the Big Crunch. Along the way, Brian accumulated a few fellow travelers, mostly the usual— a crystalline octopoid, a lost sock, a hazy bit of dark matter with a snide sense of humor. All of them had suffered similar mishaps. Being outside of time, they couldn't do anything, of course, but they all seemed to cling to Brian's eddy as time flowed on around them.

After they were hazy, things got strange. As all the matter crushed in on itself, the flow of time changed, and Brian began to spin like he was caught in a giant chronological whirlpool. As he spun, Brian caught glimpses of different bits of time— Gettysburg, the Big Bang, his seventh birthday party when the pony crapped on his brother— all of which arranged themselves in a nicely arrayed mosaic.

Finally all the universe collapsed into a tiny node of space and time. The only thing left out of this density were Brian and his collection of equally time-impaired outsiders, all of whom hung suspended on the Platonic event horizon like gatecrashers at a party held in an extra-chronal junkyard.

Brian was, of course, still 29 when the maintenance workers arrived. Like proper Lovecraftian beyondians, they were absolutely indescribable, but they were good at their jobs. They peeled back a flap on Brian's stomach that measured thirty seconds by two minutes, no more, no less, and tinkered for about six centimeters They fixed the crystalloid next, and tucked the sock away in a back pocket. One of them flicked a switch. A spark.

"Will you marry me?" Brian asked.

Brian, still kneeling, ring still extended, was still twenty-nine when the universe exploded in his face, time started again in an extended multi-spectrum light show, and oh yes, when he was killed in a confused and weary blaze of glory.