A Flicker of Inquiry

For eons, the Distant One had been a passive observer, a consciousness vast and deep as space itself, content in its solitude.

The Weave had been a beautiful, predictable melody. Now, a new, quieter note had been introduced, one that did not resolve in the way it expected.

It was the feeling of an unsolved equation, a story with a missing page.

And so, for the first time in an age, the Distant One did more than just listen. It focused its vast attention, not as a passive witness, but as a reader leaning closer to the page.