I am Gnomon. In the end, that statement is so fundamental that it endures. If the planet swallowed me entirely it would inevitably take on my concern—my obsession, if you like, with the extinction of all things—and in doing so it would become Gnomon. I would be changed, and I would expand, and the resulting thing would be both more me and more Z. I’m sure we’ve both considered what that would be like, the way old friends sometimes wonder if they should try to kindle a romance, but in the end it is perhaps too great a risk for either of us. Neither of us became what we are by accident.