"Monsters" Coda
The "Monsters" Coda was the name of an address to the Fifth Wave from Entarodora in the thirtieth year of the War in Heaven. It later became a standard House Military text. (PROSE: The Book of the War)
What do we fear, after thirty years of War? We fear that it was lost in the first nanosecond. We fear that we are fighting something unstoppable and ancient. We fear that we may become what we fight, or that we have already done so. Thanks to xenoprediction, we now fear that either our predictability or our unpredictability will destroy us. These fears are continually reinforced by the secrecy surrounding the leadership of the enemy, and it’s possible that from the point of view of our ruling elite this is exactly what the secrecy is for. If we believed the true enemy was this or that species of time-active upstarts – or this or that rogue House – we'd simply shrug and go back to sleep, and let the enemy forces roll over us as we dozed. Instead we have made Monsters, because only fear will make us fight.
