"One of the truest things about me is that I can put myself back together after anything. That's part of the reason I couldn't tolerate being the sort of thing that could make unbreakable oaths, particularly not mind-altering ones. A form of harm it's not possible to outlast puts an infinitely tall mountain on the landscape of risk. Loki being able to hand out free will cuts it back down to size, of course. So, the first reason is that even if going back turned out to be the wrong decision, there's no chance I'd be permanently damaged finding that out. The second reason is... I have an unusual approach to risk and harm and wanting things in general. If I say that what I want is to go seduce my rapist and have a comfortable life together, that really is what I want, I'm not fooling myself or letting bad habits get the better of me; I might be mistaken but I'm making a valid choice. If that's not something you're sure of about yourself, then deciding what to do next is more complicated than 'this is what I want, now how do I get it'."

"I don't think I'm fooling myself but I am not as sure about it as you sound about yourself. Being - being the sort of person who'd come back to Maitimo is part of being good at manipulating Maitimo. And it's not as if I've given this a very fair try; I dislike running away from things, and I dislike the company of Maitimos who are horrified at my existence, and I might be perfectly happy mucking around on this planet trying to stop them from having a pointless civil war but I'd be better at it if I could actually bring my primary skillset to bear -

- I might have left him anyway, but it would have been because I felt like doing that -

- being very sure of what you want sounds nice."

"I'd teach you the trick if I knew how. The company of people who are horrified at your existence does sound like it would be very wearing. What would a fair try look like, then?"

"They want me to give it a century."

"What would you spend that century doing? Preventing civil wars, horrifying the Maitimos with your existence?"

"I think that's the idea, yeah. When I got upset at the local Maitimo about this he offered to take me to a galactic gay bar, which is really not the point..."

"What is the point?"

"A century of doing chores I'm not particularly well-suited to because everyone feels sorry for me and wants to keep me busy is not made more appealing by the prospect of occasional hookups with people who I shouldn't tell that I'm waiting out the century to see if 'fix, and then subsequently forgive, Maitimo' is still what I'll want at the end... also, it's very deeply ingrained habit, being exactly what Maitimo wants..."

"Then it sounds the century as described wouldn't be a fair try of the concept of life without Maitimo," Sigyn observes. "If I were faced with this set of options I'd pick 'find a farther-off world to wander, learn a new skillset somewhere outside even the faintest shadow of any of these people', but that might not suit you either."

"Crossed my mind. I - have family back home. The best thing to do is probably to make it clear that I won't get any communications about what happens to them, then Maitimo won't have reason to try anything, but wandering off to have no effect on the world I've spent my life trying to protect seems. A little hard."

"There is that. Though it doesn't seem like the society of powerful meddlers - is there a name for the whole collection of Loki and her alts and all their powerful meddlesome friends, I haven't heard one - anyway, it doesn't seem like they're much inclined to let you go have effects on your world anytime soon."

"They are not. For my own good, you know.

And they call themselves the 'peal', apparently there's a language in which it's a pun."

"Well. So it's a century of having no effect on your world from within their orbit and having to deal with all the horrified Maitimos and so forth, or a century of having no effect on your world from outside their orbit and being far away from all this nonsense, or convincing them that going home to your Maitimo really is exactly what you want and you don't need their meddlesome rescues, or some clever fourth option we haven't thought of. Which of these seem more and less appealing?"

"Far away. I guess. If I could be sure I wouldn't come home to 'oh, yes, we had him executed - I don't want that -"

"Well, I can put in my recommendation that they not do that. Can't say how much weight it'll carry. Plenty with Loki, she did after all specifically bring me in as an expert - although I think she was imagining I'd do a little more commiserating and a little less seriously considering whether or not you'd be best served by going back..."

"I realize it's awful that I want to. Might want to."

"It doesn't strike me that way," says Sigyn. "It is what it is. If you go have your century and learn new skills and make your own way and then come back and say you really do want to go back to your Maitimo, I'll argue for it with the peal and I won't be horrified and I won't feel like I'm doing you a disservice. In fact I think the real disservice would be meeting that request with 'oh, clearly you weren't out there for long enough, go live your life some more and come back when you want the right things'."

"Do you know a good place to go? Somewhere far from here - though I guess Loki can find us instantly - "

"Not if we put a few worlds behind us on the way out. I don't have the means to do that, but I could ask Loki and I wouldn't expect her to refuse. I'll scout you somewhere nice if you like. What sort of place do you want?"

"Don't know. One with problems we can actually help with? And flight, maybe, and dinosaurs, I miss those..."

"Flight, dinosaurs, solvable problems. I'll see what I can do."

"Thank you." 

"Anytime."

He waits warily. "Is there anything else?"

"From me? No. I came here because Loki thought I could help; I helped; now I'm off to scout you a world, that being the next step in helping. Enjoy your civil war prevention."

And he teleports away.