The frown doesn’t go unnoticed. He built his protections to be untouchable, but even then it wasn’t enough. He recognizes it in Inej, built from ashes of her own, but of what he has yet to learn. Perhaps one day they can exchange, but for now he can get the wide strokes of painted grief from their shadowed pasts. Sometimes it’s simply knowing.

“I have begun to believe in it again, or at least I’d like to think.” How many decades did he feel empty, a shell of his former self? It was different, but maybe he needed it to become what he had been trying for the interview. A metamorphosis. He’s still trying to figure it out, and the flick of his nail digging into the bark tree is enough for him to pause.

“You have people to go back to. When I was young, I was told of a diaspora, told to be proud, and it transformed over time. I found others to fill it, and lost them. I hope to not be alone again.” If he deserves it is another matter of internal struggle. He’s still trying to figure out his hope.