Northern Ireland spent the last 10 years making history. Did anti-Belfast Agreement unionists start unmaking history yesterday?
It will take time to answer that question but what is certain is that Sinn Fein is now the largest nationalist party in Northern Ireland.
Republicans at the beginning of this campaign talked about the "greening of the west" of the Bann. And that's what happened. The North is green to the west, and predominantly orange in the eastern corner of the map.
Before the election one Sinn Fein figure said his dream was to see Mr Pat Doherty, Mr Martin McGuinness and Ms Michelle Gildernew win all three seats at the counts in Omagh.
Before Thursday that seemed like an unrealisable dream. Last night it came true, and then some. Mr McGuinness won Mid-Ulster. Mr Pat Doherty captured West Tyrone, comprehensively seeing off the challenge of the UUP and the SDLP's main hope for an extra seat, Ms Brid Rodgers. And Ms Gildernew caused the biggest shock of the night, taking Fermanagh-South Tyrone from the Ulster Unionist Party by 53 votes.
That result might be challenged by the UUP because scores of people were allowed vote at least one polling station in the constituency after polls should have officially closed on Thursday night.
The SDLP took it in the solar plexus. It will be winded for some time, perhaps permanently.
In terms of Ulster Unionism and Mr Trimble, it was not meltdown, but it was close. There is no denying the DUP dented not only the UUP but put it up to the British and Irish governments. If Mr Blair tried to exclude the DUP from the negotiations then he was a "fascist", said the DUP leader, the Rev Ian Paisley.
Napoleon said a good general needed luck. Mr Trimble had some good and bad luck yesterday. The DUP's Mr Sammy Wilson made if difficult for Mr Roy Beggs, but the UUP man won out in the end. In North Down and South Antrim respectively, Lady Sylvia Hermon and Mr David Burnside saw off Mr Robert McCartney and the Rev William McCrea. Very valuable prizes, although Mr Burnside could be a dangerous Westminster colleague of Mr Trimble's.
But against what was happening elsewhere, those victories lost some of their lustre.
In Strangford, Mr Trimble's man got close enough to the DUP, but not close enough. The DUP's Mr Gregory Campbell captured East Derry from Mr William Ross of the UUP. Mr William Thompson and Mr Cecil Walker, both of the UUP, were always in trouble in West Tyrone and North Belfast, but Mr James Cooper's loss in Fermanagh-South Tyrone was the biggest shock for Mr Trimble's party. Had he held this seat Mr Trimble could have argued that to drop from nine seats to seven was hardly unexpected and was quite a reasonable result, given the pressures he was under.
Bad as it was, it could have been worse for Mr Trimble. The DUP hoped to win six seats but Mr Burnside punctured that ambition. The UUP is still the largest Northern Ireland party at Westminster. Furthermore, compared to the Assembly election results, in percentage terms, the UUP's vote went up by more than five points.
The headline in the Belfast Telegraph before counting began was "Will Ulster spoil his party?" Mr Tony Blair enjoyed his landslide in Britain but Northern Ireland did indeed spoil the party.
Mr Blair and the Taoiseach Mr Ahern want the agreement to work. For that to happen they needed Mr Trimble to be secure in his leadership. He was badly wounded. Whether it is a fatal injury we should know in the weeks ahead.
The DUP talked of the need for a unionist realignment, but it won't want to realign with any party led by Mr Trimble.
Just in simple emotional and psychological terms, Mr Trimble must be saying to himself, "What's the point?" It will take great courage and will for him to carry on. His closing line last night however was: "I am not a quitter."
The DUP, through the ballot box, strengthened its argument that it should have a place in the forthcoming negotiations on decommissioning, policing and other issues. Mr Peter Robinson, whose wife Iris will join him at Westminster, concentrated throughout the campaign on depicting Mr Trimble as a weak and untrustworthy leader. That tactic worked.
On the nationalist side Mr Gerry Adams, Mr Martin McGuinness and Mr Pat Doherty and the broad republican movement must decide what it will do with its increasing mandate. It's a tactical call now for the IRA. It can continue to stretch out the arms issue so that politics remains unstable and uncertain.
Or it can decide this is a watershed period and it's time to leave the republican project solely to the Sinn Fein politicians. That would necessitate a move on weapons, assuming that the policing and demilitarisation issues can be resolved.
After this election there is an obvious danger of old-style political and sectarian polarisation. The great imponderable is whether Yes and No unionists, the SDLP and Sinn Fein can treat together.
The Northern electorate has handed the British and Irish governments the mother of all dilemmas.
