Quoted By:
>LMAO. no
Real Ellery is your sworn nemesis: there's almost nothing good about him. He's cowardly, weak-minded, sad, self-centered, smug, reckless, and obnoxious. He has an annoying voice. He wears annoying clothes. He's old. He keeps threatening to kill you but never going through with it, or even showing you his incredible powers at all. Except for Anthea, nobody seems to like him. He made a stupid choice that led to hundreds (thousands?) of innocent people getting mind-tortured. Then he made another stupid choice that led to the suffering of his own unwitting clone, not to mention of everybody else he knew. Then that stupid choice drove him literally insane (what a shocker), forcing <span class="mu-i">another</span> person to come in and rescue him, and baby him for years, all while his stupid rotted-out brain thought she was his ex-girlfriend, all while his <span class="mu-i">actual</span> ex-girlfriend was tearing her hair out. Then, when he finally realized what was up, he started going around and invading people's minds to kill them. Then he obstructed your investigation of all this, for weeks and weeks, and when he finally admitted it it was all one big pity party, and then he shot his unwitting clone right in front of you, and it's all pity party, all Ellery, Ellery, Ellery, all so sad he got himself smack into this mess and can't get himself out. And now he wants to explode.
You could let him. It wouldn't even be wrong. He wants to. He's asking to. He'd be doing a really good thing for the world, blowing Headspace up. It probably wouldn't even hurt him, since he can't feel pain. If he fixed Fake Ellery, he wouldn't even die, practically. There'd still be an Ellery kicking around just find, and you could find him annoying instead, right? And Madrigal could do disgusting things to him instead, like she clearly wants to. It's a win-win. A win-win-win-win-win-win-win. Everybody wins.
You can't do it.
You can't. You can lay it out like that and you still can't. It's just not— it's not right! It's not right to be so sad you want to blow yourself up! And it takes all the fun out of having a nemesis if your nemesis just gives up. If Real Ellery wants to die, he should face you in single combat. Then you'll cross blades, or... whatever he wants to use, and engage in an epic battle, culminating in the realization that the two of you are <span class="mu-i">perfectly matched,</span> and thus victory and defeat are impossible. Having no choice, you would part, humbled, and gain a new understanding and appreciation for one another, and then Real Ellery would be less of an annoying whiny bastard all of the time. You see? That's how it works. Not this. This is sad, and weird, and wrong.
"No," you say, disgustedly. "I'm not doing that. Do you have any advice for how to make my bomb better?"
Real Ellery laughs roughly. (Maybe you spoke too soon, calling him not crazy.) "Sure. It's called—"
(1/3)
