"The future is not what it used to be", Theming thought to himself as he woke up and beheld the sea of gold beyond him. Nor was he. Like the sand, he had once again taken on a new shape without changing at all. He called it camel, because when he removed the middle syllable of a certain type of sustenance he once made, it sounded just like he looked. "What a bizarre idea", he thought to himself. But then, wasn't it all? So he did the best he could, which was to simply put one wobbly leg in front of the other.

Hills, hills, hills, hills, hills, more hills, another one there, another one here, and what did this world have to offer? Ah, yes: more hills. It took him quite some time to gauge his surroundings properly, and very little to lose proper sight of direction. "Oh well. Direction is not for me", he thought, quite satisfied with the sudden realization. Best not to think about it, because that is not how one shapes feathers, or wings, or flight, or even the polar bear that he granted them to in the end. Maybe he shouldn't dwell on that whole string of events either, because, well, thinking about it is what got him to suffer in the first place.

Or maybe it was the other way around? He'd never quite solved the puzzle of all that. Chiefly because he didn't quite wish to know what it was that he wished. Nor did his subjects. Right? As long as they made him smile, existence proved to be exactly the fleeting sleep the Gods were meant to dream in. Smiles would suffice. Yes.

How long had he been out on this long haul through the seas of sand? Well, who can rightly say? Gods can last quite a long time when they wish to. And thus they sometimes forget even themselves.

Suddenly, a glint caught the camel's eye. Sand should not outshine itself. No... because there, past shimmering heat, past searing electric blue skies, past peach-coloured mornings and nights doused in violet starlight, past the bones of discarded creatures he once delighted in creating, smack dab in the middle of a desert shifting and unchanging as the stars, was a little house. A little house with a tiny piece of bone on top of it. A miniscule type of bone, with teeth, and eye sockets, but no eyes. Right on top of a clay house, one such as men made out of the earth.

It was, to say the least, all a little bit strange. But Theming, by this point, figured that he and his camel eyes had seen everything there was to see, and that he was not just at his wits' but even his very own end. And so, as best as a camel could shrug, he did. And then he walked right up to the front door, with his wobbly legs and his banana-shaped camel neck.

The detachment of the recently traumatized often proves no match for the bizarre. There, upon a piece of wood sticking out of the building, sat two more of the skeletons Theming had been trying this entire eternity to avoid. They were wearing robes that covered some of their rib cages, obscuring one clavicle, and part of their former legs. They didn't seem to notice this camel with its dry sacky mouth, gnashing teeth intently like sixteen pairs of mating boulders. These eyeless former Men didn't even see the eyes of the camel, bulging out of their sockets from sheer stupefied shock. These things were right in the middle of heated discussion. Discussion!

The one on the left, with the bones of his left feet resting on the wooden stump he sat on, and his back bent against the wall in an angle as if ravished by a lavish meal, seemed to be waving the other one away. It was difficult to tell, but he would surely have raised his eyebrows indifferently if he'd still had them. The other, holding a stone tablet full of tiny indents neatly arranged in rows and columns, was bending ever forward, as if he was about to climb his conversational partner. The bones of his other former hand were opening and closing so as to punctuate every verbal point as intently as he could.

And the camel once again heard words spoken by those he had not made. This time, they sounded faintly like hollow blocks of dried wood through which sand was being blown. But the words were animated! Musical! Precisely in the manner in which Theming had once created the first of the things he called Life.

"Clearly the Beginning of thy argument spells out the End! Thou speaketh nothing but tautologies, Brother!", urged the one on the right.

"Bah, then the Universe is naught but Tautology. Reductio ad absurdum, Mexar."

"But 'tis sure that the Skeleton Skinbeater didst not intend to do aught but beat the Drums as he sees fit, Shamuin!"

"Aye, 'tis true, Brother. Alas, no Tide doth ever be allowed to advance Unchecked. Yogung is the Tide, ergo, Time has a Beginning and End."

"But what of Basheesh? Is it Time, or its Idea that propels the worlds?"

"Tis naught but needless complication, Brother! Yogung drummeth and the worlds didst shape! Thou speaketh of movement yet dost not see the Idea made Manifest!"

At which point the camel's woolly ears perked up. Creation?

Theming did his best to interject. "Excuse me!"

As usual, no response. The robed skeleton on the right had, in fact, only just begun. He stood up, and waved the stone tablet through the air.

"The Idea made MANIFEST! HA! SURELY that be what these 'manifest' ABOMINATIONS now crawling all over the multiple 'MANIFEST' worlds represent!"

"There is no reason to get thy bones in a knot again, Mexar. Clearly, those lesser forms of Gods simply form another iteration of the Ideas of Yogung. Wherefore? None knoweth. Why vex thyself over the wherefore? Best to stick to the how."

Brother Mexar buried his right bony fist in his side and replied sarcastically. "Oh, yes, that be the reason Yogung and Basheesh didst stilt all Movement of Worlds on the Right Side of Time for ten instants after their recent Conclave. And that must be why Basheesh fashioned the Six Black Strings and bequeathed them to some ill-fated Manfool in some Gods-forsaken HUT on the LEFT SIDE of TIME, because The LEFT, CLEARLY, had nothing better to do but be REVELLING in the GLORY of YOGUNG'S NEWEST FANCY!"

The jawbone of the robed Brother Shamuin was now lowered down to his sternum. Then he spoke, in a low, deep, sandy voice.

"Tis heresy, Brother. Yogung spake, and Basheesh agreed. Thou knowest this as well as any of us."

This seemed to calm Brother Mexar, and he sat down again. "Aye. Agreed. But this does not solve the conundrum of Yogung's intent- nor that of Basheesh."

"Tis quite clear that the problems of the Third had to be solved by the ingenuity of the First Two."

"Ha! Then thou hast corrected thyself! Clearly Yogung didst not intend for the Ideas to multiply infinitely, ergo, not All is Yogung's Idea made Manifest."

Shamuin sighed, the sound of which was unlike anything ever heard by Theming's ears.

"Mexar- 'tis pointless. Thou knoweth as well as I that the Third didst not come from the Mist as Yogung's manifest Idea. This dost prove nothing but thy misguided over-reverence for our Lord."

"EXCUSE ME! I AM THE THIRD!"

So ended the excess existential thoughts of two Brothers in the middle of the Sands of Nowhere, which the Monks of Yogung call Sidareptana. Shamuin and Mexar looked up at the camel whose eyes had now worked themselves up to nothing but bulging veins, ready to explode.

"Oh, wonderful. Now the Manifest Nonsense is here. It's even got a respiratory system."

"Well, clearly that is how Theming hast, ahum, 'designed' these things. Quite ingenious. This one stores viscous substances on its back."

"I AM Theming!", cried the camel.

And that is how Theming first heard the sound of skeletons nearly laughing their bones off.