"I'll take that as a yes."

"Oh, I don't want you to die," he half-giggles, half-sobs. "I like you too much."

...that, that is an unexpected turn. Miles's heart hurts.

He wipes his eyes and asks breathlessly, "When your wife picked me up, I - how do you live through it? Or do you not know what I'm talking about? Maybe you don't. If everyone felt like that when things like that happened, I - I can't conceive of how society would work."

"I'm tempted to say Linya just has that effect on people," says Miles. "The first time I met her, I literally fell to my knees. It's kind of embarrassing in retrospect."

"You're tempted, but you don't actually think that's it," says Mark, watching his face. "What do you think? I want to know."

"I'm... not sure I have enough data to comment," says Miles.

"First guess."

"...Are you so horrifyingly deprived of positive touch that being picked up and kissed by someone who thinks you're her husband nearly gives you a heart attack?"

"...I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but the more I hear about your life, the more it sounds like the most depressing thing I've ever heard."

"It probably is," he says merrily.

"...Well, I suppose being proud of that is more fun than many other options..."

"You are starting to understand me."

"To my partial regret, yes."

Mark giggles some more.

"I don't suppose I could convince you to, say, untie me and give me a weapon," says Miles hopefully.

"What the hell are you?" says Miles helplessly. "Talking to you is like - like a funhouse mirror for the soul. I can never tell where you're going to jump next. What do you mean by afraid...?"

"I don't think you can know. I think you're too - Miles. Too Naismith. You don't know how to not win."

"I'm unsettled by your accuracy. Again. That seems to be a theme."

"In retrospect, it's so obvious that Naismith had to exist, I wonder how I missed it. There had to be somewhere for all that to go, somewhere besides whatever you did to gain a haut-wife."

"My turn to non sequitur," says Miles. "Lay my mind to rest about something - do your bones break like mine?"

"No," he says, and instead of merely leaving it at that, he makes a fist and punches his other palm, bringing his hands together with sharp and sudden force.

Miles winces - he can almost hear the crack that would result if he tried such a thing. "Point proven. Um... thank you. I think."