He sat in the cave with his rocks and his fire, and was not content.

Over the last few weeks or so the dust within the cave, after being stirred up by wind and weather, had settled on his stone skin, and he had decided that he was quite bored of dust, amongst other things.

He was a troll you see, and if there're a few things you ought to know about trolls, the first is that they are perpetually made of stone.

There is - as one who may have heard tell of fictional trolls may hold - the incorrect assumption that they turn to stone only when met by direct sunlight, which is not the case. Considering this, the second thing one ought to know about trolls is that upon the rising and setting of the sun, they die, and then come back to life again, respectively. Trolls are always made of stone, you see, it's just that when touched by sunlight they turn into a "troll-shaped rock" as most folk would call it - that is to say they petrify.

This particular troll went by the name of "Tim" - an odd name for a troll, one may think, and would in said action be thinking correctly. His original name, or rather the beginning of his original name in addition to the additions he liked to make concerning the various deeds achieved over his long life, is far too long to fit on a single page, but his original name, when carefully revised to include only his greatest achievements as described by men, was "Timbalur Wasteburner Bricklayer Flowerpurchaser Weddingattender Barmaid Chariotpuller Coatrack Butterflyrescuer Wallpainter Carnivalride footmassager Holidayplanner Coasterprovider." A good name, thought he.

Obviously, there are few with the patience to use or hear the entire name of a troll upon every meeting, and so it was necessary to have a more appropriate name, that name here being "Tim".
Although it could be said that his name is full of mystery and much that shouldn't always be explained, regarding his last name of "coasterprovider" many of those who had the patience to listen, have asked. In answer - Tim makes clear that his original intent was to publish the twelve-thousand books he had written, hopefully to great success, but that unfortunately the receiving of the books by the general public was without fail, entirely negative. Trolls were generally considered poor authors, there being only one known troll author - that one being Tim.

The second most important thing having now been said, if there is a third thing to know about trolls, it's that they are quite immortal. This is not to say they can die by any means save for age, but rather that they simply cannot die, which may seem in direct contradiction with the previous thing, regarding the regular death of trolls when touched by the light of day.

Let it be here clarified: When shattered and cracked, the troll lives. When ground into dust, the troll lives. Perhaps without a mouth or eyes, a troll cannot speak or see, but his mind is always present in the tiniest grain of stone, provided it came from the head. It is as a result of this that the phrase "there's troll on the wind" is often said in reference to a given unintelligent conclusion, or upon the witnessing of an act in which thought was not a primary ingredient.

The above things considered, despite being unable to die, trolls die every night - or so it is said by trolls themselves. Upon petrification, a troll hardens and stiffens, then with a shake any sentience vanishes, and they are just a statue until such time as they are relieved of the sunlight. It is oft' thought that in this lies the source of the troll's immortality, and that perhaps the regular revival resets the clocks of life, and the troll starts from the beginning.

Perhaps this is the case, though it's quite unlikely.

Trolls have been around for a good long while you see, and most have in fact been weathered and worn to the point where they are indistinguishable from the terrain in which they are located.

Some have been found by humans, these being entire heads who speak and look about, and with patience end up doing almost as much traveling as a limbed troll by way of rolling down hills or being kicked along roads by bored children. But others have been discovered by other trolls to be nought but a pebble in a field, falling in and out of consciousness every night and day, with nothing to do but think. But trolls think little, and care for little. They are all nought but silent watchers of the world, save for Tim.

In this regard Tim was unique. He was almost complete in his makeup save for a good deal of chips and cracks, and lacked only a few fingers. He was a home for seven different species of weed, along with an ant's nest which lived amongst the cracks of his stony back, and a bird's nest that was tucked neatly on the flat of his shoulders behind his neck, and that had seen a thousand different owners.

It could also be said of Tim that he was growing, or had grown weary. Of everything. Not from lack of sleep, but from an overabundance of experience. He was the only troll who bothered with much of anything, and so here - early in the tale - let the lesson be learned that immortality in a present mind is a tortuous thing.
Perhaps he had seen all there was to see too many times. Commonly trolls did not discontinue their appreciation for all there is to see, doing little conscious traveling themselves, and instead wandering mindlessly, their ancient purpose forgotten, paying attention to nothing.

But Tim was not alike to them, and was never likely to like that way of being.

Anyway - to summarize the things one ought to know about trolls: we remember the first being that trolls don't turn to stone in the sun, but rather that they are always stone, and instead petrify upon contact with the light of day.

Leading neatly into the second thing, we remember that every time this occurs, they die, but it ought also be known that as a rule they cannot die, and that a secondary and less important piece of information regarding trolls and relating to their regular death, is that their regular death is questionable in it's being a "death" and that while the term "death" should always be used when conversing with or about a troll, the concept is - scientifically speaking - quite absurd, and is likely meant in the spiritual sense, as from a logical standpoint dying when unable to die presents somewhat of a contradiction.

Here amongst the summarization should be thrown once more the fact that trolls, on a whole and excluding one individual, are of a dull mind.

With these things carefully considered, but mostly the thing concerning petrification, the vacation on which Tim the troll had now decided to embark should make more sense than it would have otherwise made, when you eventually discover it's purpose.

Now, such is the way of many things, especially trolls, the time in which said things do other things, and in which those other things occur is often inconsistent with the time in which further other things occur, despite relation, and so it shall be here noted that the tale of Tim the troll is very near it's end.

This may come as a shock considering the long and wearisome introduction, but Tim was all for elaborate descriptions of folk, and would have wanted it that way.

Here is where Tim would have wished that the story become hasty, and so it shall.

After packing nothing, Tim set out on a long journey to the great desert that lay at the top of the planet. Many tales had been told of the place, but few lived there due no doubt to a single fact: the rotation of the earth, in addition to the position of the planet relative to the sun meant simply that a thing occurred here, or rather didn't occur, that didn't not occur anywhere else.

After a march of over three years, one of them taking place entirely beneath the ocean, he arrived at his destination. To get to it's center, he burrowed deep, and tunneled for six months, before erupting from the surface into the sun. As he began to petrify, he assumed a standing position that was not very spectacular, and remained in that fashion - frozen by the never setting sun - for six million years, bringing his total life-span to just over a considerable five billion years. Though a troll would subtract the final years, of which there were six million, and half the original number of years prior to the arrival at the desert, so as to arrive at the number of nearly two and a half billion years - that being the cumulated time that he was not petrified.

In any case, he came to be at peace.

But alas, there came a large hunk of rock out of the far reaches of space, that sought to hit the planet on which tim the troll was now at peace. It came in front of the sun, and for the first time in it's history, the desert was dark, and Tim awoke. As a rule, most inhabitants of a planet bound for abuse by way of large space bodies are not at all pleased by the fact, but tim the troll, being annoyed, deduced through his unusual and rather un-troll-like proficiency at mathematics that he could position himself so that upon the striking of the planet by the meteor, he would be propelled into space to orbit the sun, or better yet fall into it and be obliterated when all other things became lost amid the blackness of infinity, or remained on scattered chunks of the earth.

And so it was that Tim the troll was reduced to a rocky, upward traveling hail, and catapulted through space where he immediately turned to stonier stone and was that way for all his time, until after many millions of years, his inward spiraling orbit threw him into the sun, and it came to be that the first troll to truly die was named "Tim", and that nothing greater had ever been achieved by any troll.
But as Tim understood, it didn't really matter, because nobody would know it anyway. Not that they needed to.