[The mention of death drags Paul down from the sky and the patterns he sees in it. He guards his apprehension carefully. It's not his place to know what's been said between Viktor and Palamedes, or to talk about his friend like that without knowing what's already been shared.

(The month where Palamedes was gone had been a bad one. Paul doesn't let himself think about it, the bleak and bitter dregs of it behind him.)]

I think so. Others, or their own. [A quirk of a smile, not entirely warm, but not false.] Perhaps that's one of the reasons I'm invested. This is a chance so many people couldn't have imagined they'd have.

[Is that true of Viktor? He seems on the less physically robust side, but appearances mean less here than what little they did in his own universe.]

You picked the pattern up faster than I did. I thought, for a long time, that what I wanted was to make the changes stop. What I want now...if we can make coming back from a mistake or misjudgment in the trials safer, more sure - how much less terrible they might seem?

But here I am, making a party about 'nerd talk' again. I'm sorry. Shared bad habits.