"Such creatures do tend to be very long lived, at least, according to all the old tales." Roland looks ahead toward the rumbling, still unable to see too far ahead, still alert. Though the words themselves, AI, computer, have been made artificially familiar to him, he doesn't have quite enough of a sense for what they mean. What he does have a sense of is that this is not important; maybe it will be later, but it isn't now. What matters here is more the memories, less the nature of the being having them.

"And that disaster. The one which fell on the humanity of your universe? Is that what shaped whatever's up ahead?"