Quoted By:
"I-I wasn't done." You are twisting into yourself, rising and falling and rising and falling. "That's only half of it. People are shit. People are monsters. But they're not— they're not animals, you know? I-I-It's also human nature to... to throw big stupid parties. And to rescue people who need rescuing, even i-if they hardly know them. And to— to help people in general, even if it's dangerous, and that person didn't do anything to earn it, and that person's an ungrateful dick in return all the time..." You trail off. "And I-I-I-I guess it has to be human nature, to love something that doesn't love you back."
LIKE WHAT
"Like a worm!" you say. "Like a— like a stupid worm— loving a worm— that's what I-I-I-I-I meant! Like a... I don't think one worm could love a— a— I-I don't think a worm can love anything, but I don't know, ask Lottie, <span class="mu-i">she's</span> the worm expert—"
WE SEE
IT IS A NICE SENTIMENT
THAT AT LEAST HALF OF US IS GOOD
"No!" you say. "That's not what I... I-I-I meant that everybody's good. At least a little bit. And everybody's the worst fucking person you've ever met, or one bad day away from being that. Most people are more one than the other... I-I-I-I'm probably more shit than good. Probably way more. But I-I-I'm not perfectly shit, any more than anybody could ever be perfect the other way around. I-I don't think you'd be human anymore, if you were perfect. You'd be... some other kind of thing."
WE ARE SOME OTHER KIND OF THING
AS ARE YOU, NO OFFENSE MEANT
"I-I'm human," you say possessively. "And if I am, you are— you're more than most people are, really. You've got a couple thousand people tangled up in there, from the sound of it, so really you're... you're human on scale. Most people only get little swirls of pure good and pure shittiness, probably, while you've got wholeass murderers and saints and whatever else all running together. I-I-It probably all balances out in the end. Do you feel evil, or whatever?"
WE FEEL...
...COMPLICATED
"Okay, then. That's life." You hesitate. "Though... I-I-I do think things are going worse than usual. I-I am surprised someone got shanked, actually, I don't know why I said I wasn't. Um. I-I-I think that's probably our fault."
WE SEE
"Not on purpose," you add hastily. "Just that, um, I-I-I think maybe we've tipped the scales just by being here. You had things set up real nice, then we came in and— I mean— I-I don't think you can judge based on this. Maybe we brought in diseases or something."
WE SUPPOSE THIS IS A POSSIBILITY
"It definitely is. And, um, I-I think..." You're not sure how to phrase it delicately. "...I think one of us was definitely infected with something before she got in here. Not that she meant to spread anything, or— but i-i-it's really fucking her up. I-I mean at the moment, it's... and if we don't do anything about it, she could really hurt herself. And you."
(4/6)
