PSA

To whoever reads these words, remember them. Read them silently, read them aloud, repeat them until you can see them permanently burned into the backs of your eyelids and they become your mantra:

There is always hope.

In the worst places and the darkest times, there is still hope. No storm cloud on the planet is immune to stars or sunlight peeking through. Every cave has an exit, every night gives way to daybreak, and every demon can be beaten down.

As the roaring wildfire must always give way to the gentle rain, so too does despair inevitably sputter and die in the face of hope. Until its cataclysmic dying day, this world will always contain hope. As long as you are alive, there is hope aplenty for tomorrow and all the days after it.

Do not forget my words. Do not ignore them, laugh them bitterly away, or let your fear overcome them. I speak of a simple truth that should never be forgotten.

The one thing all our heroes have in common is that when everything falls apart and the world shatters at their feet, they look to the beacon of hope. They see it, they cling to it, and they fight their way out alive to save mankind. For the sake of all that is good, for the sake of light and life and the smell of clean earth after the rain, fight to the death, fight tooth and nail, bleed and sweat and scream your pain to the sky and the ground, but do not give up. If you keep nothing else, maintain your hope at all costs.

Above all, hope.