Servant of Shai-Hulud
The ground sounds, slow and listless;
it is not my might growing loud and restless,
but a dream of much deeper water finally bubbling to the surface.
I don't think I ever did anything in my past lives to deserve this
and still the universe chose me, to witness
you at last coming up to breathe.
They wanted you to be my nemesis.
And I have always wanted you
to be free.
Couldn't life be a little better?
We'd just have to wait and see.
Two thousand fears of prophecy later
and what am I. No greater
than any other person alive.
No greater student of what lies beneath.
No one else who strives
to be both scholar and chief
of himself, and the world inside.
What do you leave
behind?
Reverberations in the dirt.
A closer encounter than ever before
between the stars, the dearth, and whatever is left of humankind.