This land has fallen and will fall again.

There is no escaping it, nothing they can do to stop us. We are eternal as the tides, shifting and unpredictable as a sudden storm, and above all, patient.

Contemplation stills. Something nears.

Ah. The time-eater returns, his life a beacon of infinity condensed. Cracked and leaking open. We slow in our eternal passage at his presence, watching, waiting, but he has grown wary since the eaten days. Still our taste of his substance and power lingers, tantalizing across the future he stole away.

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We are patient. The youngest throw themselves against the wars in hope of expanding faster, and we allow it without objection.

Their wars feed our depths. Their lost are our rebirth.

The cycle is eternal. We are the only victor, the inevitable survivor.

Time grows heavy. We sink beneath it as its waves recede, leaving in its wake another day the same. New opportunities and familiar knowledge. We have not moved, nor shall we. Not until there is more purpose to action than patience.

We have seen too often action with impulse. Impulse is what allows escape. But we have seen. We have learned. We will watch and we will wait.

When next we strike, there will be no failure.

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