Given the number of planets he'd deemed significant enough to revisit, Favuxo calculated that he could spend just under six hours on each planet. With this in mind he set out to fulfill his final pre Inabilin obligation.
Each moment passed so slowly that Favuxo came to feel he would never be able to reach the end of his hundred and fifty year journey. He found that he was unsure exactly what it was that he was expected to be observing. He felt a sense of loss as he saw each planet for the last time, but not loss in the sense of missing the planet... the loss he felt was the loss of his opportunity to find the unknown something he sought which he felt that planet might have been able to tell him if only he knew how to listen.
One hundred planets had passed before him when Favuxo realized that he found his journey not only boring, but also entirely pointless. Looking around, Favuxo saw a planet that he had visited slightly more than a billion years earlier. The beings scurrying about the city were the descendants of the single cell life forms he had observed then. Despite this, he found that he did not care about their lives. He felt no deeply binding connection between himself and these people. What he sought had nothing to do with them, he was sure.
Etched into his memory was what the Elder had so many times recited to favuxians in his situation: "One must give life a final inspection before departing," the Elder would say, "in order to reassure one's self that one has lived life to the fullest." Favuxo's journey was not reassuring him of the grandeur of his life, but rather was causing him to experience a sense of regret. Surveying the city around him, Favuxo wondered if his life had been no more than a series of observations. He wondered if he himself was no more than a collection of facts.
Favuxo paused and contemplated a particular thought which had been bothering him, a question he was unable to answer. He knew how the Elder created him out of the nothingness, and he knew that after ten billion years he was to be returned to it. His unanswered question was simple, and he spoke it aloud: "What do I gain from the long wait?"
For many years the thought that his life was without a true and guiding purpose had been buried deep in Favuxo's mind. Only the daily rigors of collecting knowledge for the benefit of the favuxian species had separated him from such thoughts. He'd pushed them out of his way by telling himself that favuxian meaning is inherent in the collection of knowledge. He told himself, as so many others had told him, that knowledge is by its very nature desirable... knowledge compels its own worth. Now Favuxo asked himself how or why this can be true, and if the collection of knowledge might not be such a meaningful activity as he'd thought.
Hundreds of favuxian voices echoed inside of Favuxo's mind. They repeated their message to him over and over again: "The Elder gives meaning to whatever he wishes. He has deemed knowledge as the favuxian goal. His wisdom is unquestionable." The explanation no longer satisfied Favuxo.
Frustrated, Favuxo projected a strong thought outward, towards the rest of his species: "What is the meaning of the Elder, and what is it about his nature that makes it wrong to question him?"
Fringend, the favuxian to whom the Elder had designated the responsibility of watching over Favuxo until the Inabilin, halted the question before it could reach any others. He joined Favuxo, in physical form, on the planet that he was observing. "It seems that everyone asks the same sort of questions as he approaches the Inabilin. No one ever seems to realize what dangerous questions they are to ask."
Fringend's sudden appearance startled Favuxo, as he had forgotten that someone was observing him. He collected himself quickly, and responded. "Isn't it more dangerous to live a lie?"
Standing motionless a few feet above the ground, Fringend stared curiously down at Favuxo. "Why do you think the inferior life forms came into existence, when perfection had already been achieved?"
Not expecting the question, Favuxo tried to remember what the Elder had told him on the subject. "It has always been the way of things, to move away from the perfect and towards the chaos that will culminate with the end of this universe -- and the end of all favuxian life. You know this as well as I do."
"Indeed I do. The Elder was the first, and so the most perfect. He arranged matters so that every favuxian has a purpose, as a small but significant part of a greater continuum. He is that continuum. We cannot entirely rid ourselves of chaos, but the Elder uses the Inabilin to put the chaos to good use. Through the Inabilin, the Elder uses mortal life to declare the meaningfulness of favuxian life. The gift of the Inabilin is freedom from time, and thus from the imperfections associated with time." Fringend paused. He knew Favuxo had already heard talks very similar to this one, and had even given such talks to other favuxians, but he felt it his duty to remind Favuxo by repeating it at this difficult time. And yet he wished to be brief, for he didn't consider himself up to the task of defending it as well as the Elder might. After a few moments of consideration he continued. "For a life to be meaningful, it of course must have a meaningful conclusion. The Elder can arrange this because he is a point unto himself... he is a meaning no one can question, from which there is no outside. Anyone who tries to question this does not understand it."
Fringend disappeared, leaving Favuxo again alone with his thoughts. Favuxo continued to observe various planets, indifferent to what he saw. As the planets and the years paraded by, Favuxo wondered if he had long ago sealed his fate, via the very lack of realization that he was sealing it.