History Quotes / TimeAbyss

-->-- '''[[AnthropomorphicPersonification Wisdom]]''', [[Literature/BookOfProverbs Proverbs 8:22]]

->A thousand years in your sight\\
are like a day that has just gone by,\\
or like a watch in the night.
-->-- Psalm 904:4, ''Literature/TheBible''

->The LORD brought me forth as the first of his works, before his deeds of old;\\
I was formed long ages ago, at the very beginning, when the world came to be.\\
When there were no watery depths, I was given birth, when there were no springs overflowing with water;\\
before the mountains were settled in place, before the hills, I was given birth,\\
before He made the world or its fields or any of the dust of the earth.\\
I was there when He set the heavens in place, when He marked out the horizon on the face of the deep,\\
when He established the clouds above and fixed securely the fountains of the deep,\\
when He gave the sea its boundary so the waters would not overstep his command,\\
and when He marked out the foundations of the earth.\\
Then I was constantly at His side.\\
I was filled with delight day after day,\\
rejoicing always in His presence,\\
rejoicing in His whole world\\
and delighting in mankind.
-->-- '''[[AnthropomorphicPersonification Wisdom]]''', [[Literature/TheBible Proverbs 8:22]]

->''Even with the finest life-extending, mindframe-uploading]], and memory-sideboarding technology, seventy-three million years is a ''very'' long time for a sapient creature.\\

e saw the first oar break or bend,\\

->Before the gods that made the gods \\

Was cut out of the grass

->''So many lives, it's become a blur. I don't know who I am anymore, [[TheSlowPath only that I must sail onward; ever-onward down the river of time.]] Never resting, always moving, further draining my Nanite reserves beyond my ability to replenish. At each re-emergence [[SuperPersistentPredator I am pursued by the nameless force...]] '''I now know it's personal.''' I am a virus; an'' infection ''of Space-Time. [[ClockRoach Call it what you like, this is Times' Antibody!]] And whether I am borne home or drowned in its' currents: this is my final journey...''

'''[[spoiler:Sauron]]:''' I have been awake since the breaking of the first silence. In that time... I have had many names.\\

-->-- '''[[OurVampiresAreDifferent The Alpha Vampire]]''', from ''Series/{{Supernatural}}''

'''[[HorsemenOfTheApocalypse Death]]:''' You have an inflated sense of your importance. To a thing like me, a thing like you, well... Think how you would feel if a bacterium sat at your table and started to get [[DeadpanSnarker snarky.]] This is [[InsignificantLittleBluePlanet one little planet]] in one tiny solar system, in a galaxy that is barely out of its diapers. I'm old, Dean. ''Very old.'' So I invite you to contemplate how insignificant I find you. (''forks over some pizza'') Eat.\\

-->-- '''[[spoiler: The Ogdru Jahad]]''', ''{{Comicbook/Hellboy}}''

-->-- ''ComicBook/TheSandman''

->Not all races have {{creation myth}}s. The [[EldritchAbomination aboleths]] do not share myth stories for a simple reason: they believe it is an indisputable fact that they were the first, the primal race that existed before nearly all else, second only to the [[CosmicHorrorStory unknowable Elder Evils]] that spawned them. They know this because they [[PhotographicMemory remember the ancient world with crystal clarity.]] All else in the world is a pale imitation of their primal perfection. Even the deities themselves are subject to derision, for the aboleths know that they predate the gods. They have seen the world destroyed countless times by apocalypses both natural and artificial, yet each time the world remade itself and the aboleths survived. They are truly nightmares out of time.

->Before Shinka's walls were built, before the torii at Okina stood, she was there, tall and proud against the sky, and she will be there long after they have fallen into dust.

->It is said that the mysterious Old One Tepok taught Kroak how to draw upon the winds of magic, and that the serene Potec how to unravel those same threads. It is even written that it was Kroak and his peers who [[TrainingTheGiftOfMagic taught the ancestors of the High Elves]] [[BeenThereShapedHistory the magic they wield to this day]], in the golden age of Ulthuan before the Elves wrote down their histories. In his lifetime, Kroak witnessed the rise and fall of civilizations, entire races blooming and fading into extinction. Lord Kroak was present at the birth of the world as it is seen today, and it is said that he is fated to endure until the last moment of time itself, [[ApocalypseHow when the continents will burn and the world is consumed]].

->[[DraconicHumanoid We]] ruled this domain before [[PunyHumans your race]] was born, we shall rule it when you are but a distant memory.

->When the Old Ones first crafted their Gates from the substance of stars, I was there to assist their labour. Down the long ages I have come, watching the rise and fall of you lesser races and your civilizations. I’ve laid waste to knights and cities, burned fields and routed armies in my years. I could tell you much of the world that you have forgotten and more that you never knew, but I think not. You and yours are suited for nothing more than to provide me with amusement and [[DragonHoard the occasional graceful bauble]] for my lair. [[PunyHumans I see little else worthwhile about you]].
-->--'''[[OurDragonsAreDifferent Brinrairdih]], oft-called "[[RedBaron The Storm that Roars]],"''' ''TabletopGame/WarhammerFantasyRoleplay: Old World Bestiary -- A Compendium of Creatures Fair and Foul''

->Asuka's brain was still refusing to process that number. He was 452,388 years old?! Stone tools weren't that old! Fire wasn't that old!

-> My baseline for 'older than dirt' was anything from before the Titans, and I hadn't met many beings that qualified. [[Myth/EgyptianMythology Nekhbet, the Egyptian vulture goddess]]. A lady in a brief encounter in Iran. That was pretty much it, and [[Myth/AboriginalAustralianMyths the snake]] had been much, ''much'' older than either of them. Their trip across the continent had happened tens of thousands of years ago. It was, somehow, ''still happening'', and it would be for as long as the traces of the snake were carved into the land.

->Eons past, Shazam himself had wielded the power of the ancient gods, as a super-hero--the first such being on Earth. Then he had asked for the gift of aging, and been given it, though he aged at a much reduced rate compared to normal men.

[[folder:Film - Animation]]

[[folder:Film - Live-Action]]

->Don't quote the old magic to me, witch. I was there when it was written.

->I suspect I saw the British Isles from what is now the French coast. Huge mountains on the other side of an enormous deep valley that was shadowed by the setting sun. This was before they were separated from the continent by the rising seas as the glacier was melting.

->Eldest, that's what I am. Mark my words, my friends: [[ThirdPersonPerson Tom]] was here before the river and the trees; Tom remembers the first raindrop and the first acorn. He made paths before the Big People, and saw the Little People arriving. He was here before the Kings and the graves and the Barrow-wights. When the Elves passed westward, Tom was here already, [[FlatWorld before the seas were bent]]. He knew the [[DarkIsNotEvil dark under the stars when it was fearless]] - before the [[EvilOverlord Dark Lord]] came from Outside.

'''[[AnthropomorphicPersonification Death]]:''' As old as {{God}}, maybe older. [[TheFogOfAges Neither of us can remember anymore]]. Life/Death, Chicken/Egg - regardless: at the end, I reap him too.\\

->You know, I've been here for a very long time. I remember many things. I remember being on a shore-line, watching a little grey fish heave itself up on the beach. And an older brother saying "Don't step on that fish, Castiel. Big plans for that fish." I remember the Tower of Babel - all 37 feet of it, which I suppose was impressive at the time. And when it fell, they howled "Divine wrath!" But come on, dried dung can only be stacked so high. I remember Cain and Abel, David and Goliath, Sodom and Gomorrah.

->I see in Your universal body many forms - expanded without limit, timeless. In You, there is no end, there is no beginning, and there is no middle.

-->-- ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons - Lords of Madness: The Book of Aberrations''

->When the Old Ones first crafted their Gates]from the substance of stars, I was there to assist their labour. Down the long ages I have come, watching the rise and fall of you lesser races and your civilizations. I’ve laid waste to knights and cities, burned fields and routed armies in my years. I could tell you much of the world that you have forgotten and more that you never knew, but I think not. You and yours are suited for nothing more than to provide me with amusement and [[DragonHoard the occasional graceful bauble]] for my lair. [[PunyHumans I see little else worthwhile about you]].
-->--'''[[OurDragonsAreDifferent Brinrairdih]], oft-called "[[RedBaron The Storm that Roars]],"''' ''TabletopGame/WarhammerFantasyRoleplay: Old World Bestiary - A Compendium Of Creatures Fair And Foul''

->What do humans know of our pain? [[SpaceElves We]] have sung songs of lament since before your ancestors crawled on their bellies from the sea.
-->-- '''Farseer Eldrad Ulthran''', ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}''

->Some were old even before the Fall of the Eldar, wizened creatures that have engineered the death of suns just as they have given life to thousands of monstrous forms. Many of their number [[BeenThereShapedHistory are the selfsame hedonists that led the ancient Eldar empire]] to [[AndManGrewProud utter catastrophe]]. Yet they regret not a single moment of their depraved existences. So steeped are these [[MadScientist Haemonculi]] in matters arcane that they see even death [[DeathIsASlapOnTheWrist as no more than an interesting curio]].

->How many years... how many years? Oh, how many years I've waited. [[GroundhogDayLoop How many times has this been repeated]]? How many ''hundreds'' of times? How many THOUSANDS? ONE HUNDRED THOUSANDS? MILLIONS? ''TRILLIONS?!'' I've repeated this worthless comedy show more times than I can ''count!''

->[[AC:[[EldritchAbomination We]] have no beginning. We have no end. We are infinite. Millions of years after your civilization has been eradicated and forgotten, we will endure.]]
-->-- '''Sovereign''', ''VideoGame/{{Mass Effect|1}}''

->[[AC:Organic life is nothing more than a genetic mutation. An accident. Your lives are measured in years and decades. You wither and die. We are eternal, the pinnacle of evolution and existence. Before us, you are nothing.]]
-->-- '''Sovereign''', ''VideoGame/{{Mass Effect|1}}''

->I have been a facilitator of your kind's boundless desire to destroy itself... since [[CreationMyth the beginning]]. [[TheTimeOfMyths Since iron cathedrals stained the moon red with sacrificial pyres. Since machined cities crossed the sea upon gears and gossamer sail]]. Even in [[TimeDissonance the hummingbird heartbeat of your recorded time]]. You are an [[DamnedByFaintPraise exceptional footnote]] in a text one could not even leaf through in a star's life cycle, so I invite you to contemplate how quickly my eyes gloss over you. Don't take it personally.

->Huh, what a brat. Little children like you have no way to stand a chance against me, an eternal being. Your history of scarlet... Divided by my history, the result is zero. To an eternal one, your existence is but an instant.

->It is indeed true that the world will die soon. However, it is mistaken to speak of our temporal lengths in terms of human senses. Terms such as 'just a bit' or 'a little more' can easily mean a millennium to us.

->[[OurDragonsAreDifferent I]] can remember when your language was nothing but quaint little grunts and sneezes. That you will be slaughtered at my leisure is a foregone conclusion. So, go ahead and run your chubby little heart out.

->A stone is a part of the earth. It may be shaped into human form but, like me, it is not alive. [[EmotionlessGirl A stone does not desire anything. It has no dreams or feelings of any kind.]] Along with myself, the rocks and stones have been the only constant on this planet [...] Of course, it is not a perfect definition. For example... [[NighInvulnerability a stone can be broken.]]

->Even with the finest life-extending, mindframe-uploading]], and memory-sideboarding technology, seventy-three million years is a ''very'' long time for a sapient creature.\\

Back then, when Earth was busy being all hot and patient, life elsewhere was already old...

-->-- ''TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering'', "Ayumi, the Last Visitor"

-->-- ''ComicBook/SevenSoldiers of Victory''

->There are not many of them, all things considered: the truly old. Even on this planet, in this age, when people consider a mere hundred years, or a thousand, to be an unusual span. There are, for example, less than ten thousand humanoid individuals alive today who have personal memories of the saber-toothed tiger[[note]]saber-toothed ''cats'' are not closely related to tigers[[/note]], the megatherium, the cave bear. There are today less than a thousand who walked the streets of Atlantis. (The first Atlantis. The other lands that bore that name were shadows, echo-Atlantises, and they came later.) There are less than five hundred living humans who remember the human civilizations that pre-dated the great lizards. (There were a few; fossil records are unreliable. Several of them lasted for millions of years.) There are roughly seventy people walking the Earth, human to all appearances (and in some cases, to all medical tests currently available) who were alive before the Earth had begun to congeal from gas and dust. How well do you know your friends, your neighbours, your lovers? Walk the streets of any city and stare carefully at the people who pass you, and know this: They are there too. The old ones.

->There are not many of them, all things considered: the truly old. Even on this planet, in this age, when people consider a mere hundred years, or a thousand, to be an unusual span. There are, for example, less than ten thousand humanoid individuals alive today who have personal memories of the saber-toothed tiger[[note]]saber-toothed ''cats'' are not closely related to tigers[[note]], the megatherium, the cave bear. There are today less than a thousand who walked the streets of Atlantis. (The first Atlantis. The other lands that bore that name were shadows, echo-Atlantises, and they came later.) There are less than five hundred living humans who remember the human civilizations that pre-dated the great lizards. (There were a few; fossil records are unreliable. Several of them lasted for millions of years.) There are roughly seventy people walking the Earth, human to all appearances (and in some cases, to all medical tests currently available) who were alive before the Earth had begun to congeal from gas and dust. How well do you know your friends, your neighbours, your lovers? Walk the streets of any city and stare carefully at the people who pass you, and know this: They are there too. The old ones.

->It is said that the mysterious [[{{Precursors}} Old One]] Tepok taught [[TheArchmage Kroak]] how to draw upon [[BackgroundMagicField the winds of magic]], and that the serene Potec how to unravel those same threads. It is even written that it was Kroak and his peers who [[TrainingTheGiftOfMagic taught the ancestors of the High Elves]] [[BeenThereShapedHistory the magic they wield to this day]], in the golden age of Ulthuan before the Elves wrote down their histories. In his lifetime, Kroak witnessed the rise and fall of civilizations, entire races blooming and fading into extinction. Lord Kroak was present at the birth of the world as it is seen today, and it is said that he is fated to endure until the last moment of time itself, [[ApocalypseHow when the continents will burn and the world is consumed]].

->When the [[{{Precursors}} Old Ones]] first crafted their [[CoolGate Gates]] from the substance of stars, I was there to assist their labour. Down the long ages I have come, watching the rise and fall of you lesser races and your civilizations. I’ve laid waste to knights and cities, burned fields and routed armies in my years. I could tell you much of the world that you have forgotten and more that you never knew, but I think not. You and yours are suited for nothing more than to provide me with amusement and [[DragonHoard the occasional graceful bauble]] for my lair. [[PunyHumans I see little else worthwhile about you]].

->[[AC:[[EldritchAbomination We]] have no beginning. We have no end. We are infinite. [[AbusivePrecursors Millions of years after your civilization has been eradicated and forgotten]], we will endure.]]

->There are not many of them, all things considered: the truly old. Even on this planet, in this age, when people consider a mere hundred years, or a thousand, to be an unusual span. There are, for example, less than ten thousand humanoid individuals alive today who have personal memories of the saber-toothed tiger, the megatherium, the cave bear. There are today less than a thousand who walked the streets of Atlantis. (The first Atlantis. The other lands that bore that name were shadows, echo-Atlantises, and they came later.) There are less than five hundred living humans who remember the human civilizations that pre-dated the great lizards. (There were a few; fossil records are unreliable. Several of them lasted for millions of years.) There are roughly seventy people walking the Earth, human to all appearances (and in some cases, to all medical tests currently available) who were alive before the Earth had begun to congeal from gas and dust. How well do you know your friends, your neighbours, your lovers? Walk the streets of any city and stare carefully at the people who pass you, and know this: They are there too. The old ones.

->'''Shallan:''' You're... old, aren't you? Not a [[TimeAbyss Herald]], but as old as they are?\\
'''Hoid:''' Child, when they were but babes, [[TheOlderImmortal I had already lived dozens of lifetimes]]. 'Old' is a word you use for worn shoes. I'm something else entirely.

->You know, I've been here for a very long time. I remember many things. I remember being on a shore-line, watching a little grey fish heave itself up on the beach. And an older brother saying "Don't step on that fish, Castiel. Big plans for that fish." I remember the Tower of Babel - all 37 feet of it, [[TechnologyMarchesOn which I suppose was impressive at the time.]] And when it fell, they howled "Divine wrath!" But come on, dried dung can only be stacked so high. I remember Cain and Abel, David and Goliath, Sodom and Gomorrah.

->Even with the finest [[{{Immortality}} life-extending]], [[BrainUploading mindframe-uploading]], and memory-sideboarding technology, seventy-three million years is a ''very'' long time for a sapient creature.\\

'''Coaxmetal:'''[[AC:Entropy has unmade them.]] \\

'''Coaxmetal:'''[[AC:Entropy has unmade them.]] \\