"You said I was incredible. Before you knew you had to kill me, but - you said I was incredible, and then you sounded really worried, and then you asked about how to save the city after I was dead. Nothing happened to make me feel like I was really stupid for getting killed. If you had really been evil then it would even have been sort of cool, dying to try to save the world and all, and I didn't know you weren't. I do totally worry about trusting the wrong people and ending up getting myself or other people hurt because of it, so for a while after I woke up I didn't know whose it was, but - you said I was incredible. And I think in my nightmares you laugh."

Anxiety stomachache is back. Why did she say all of that.

"Anyway. I think it was just yours."

"And Cáno's." He was, at least partly, saying nice things so she'd give him the Silmaril but he can't figure out how much even in retrospect and he doesn't want to admit it at all, it feels like admitting that nothing he says can ever be trusted. "I am confused about how you came back to life, was that more divine intervention?"

And now the notebook corner also contains "Cáno = Michael". She'll have to figure out what was up with the other two name syllables later.

"Naw, I got bitten by a vampire. That's why you didn't see me coming."

"That - what - right, nightmares. Nightmares." He shakes his head.

"It didn't make a ton of sense. I would go over the mechanics anyway but I was sort of dead at the time."

"Yeah. Uh, we went after Zeke at that point. I think if we'd successfully thought of 'most of this nonsense is because of the nightmares and if the Silmaril is relevantly real we will have a better time fetching it once the nightmares are done' we could've gone after Billy instead but I'm not sure, and we didn't."

"Yeah. I - oh, this is the dumbest part, even dumber than the talent show. I was trying to figure out whether I needed to go after Billy or go stop you guys first, and, uh, I passed this window full of televisions, with the news on and stuff? And the news anchors were all discussing whether I was the worst slayer in history, and whether I was intentionally being evil or 'manifestly just an idiot' by going after Billy instead of stopping you from destroying the world. Those people laughed."

" - wow."

"Now, and this is very important, the thing to do when that happens is to open fire with my stolen semiautomatics on them."

She can't really laugh right now, but she smiles pretty big despite herself. "I'll try to remember that. So, uh - at that point it was really hard to think, but I wanted to - I didn't want to let the world end, and stuff, if the TV people were right, so I stole a gun and I went after you guys."

"You did a great job. Like, not the highest priority, but if you're gonna do something do it right, you know? And you did."

She nods seriously. "I should have gone after Billy. But if I had been thinking, uh, at all, I would probably have been able to realize that the TV people were.... not a good source of information. Dying might be bad for being able to think about things. But I did get you guys. And then I was able to focus on finding Billy."

"He's doing okay. I checked. Released from the hospital soon."

"That's good. It was just - such a mundane normal thing for everything to blow up over. Well, not the coach, I have no idea what the coach was thinking, but - he pinned so much on missing that ball."

"I mean, sometimes it's just really obvious that everyone else is perfect, in all the ways that matter, and that they're all bending over themselves to forgive you for being such a disappointment, and that's tough when you're little, you know?"

"...yeah. I guess I get that."

"I don't think I'd have thought of, uh, talking him into waking up, I think 'this comatose kid's nightmares are ripping apart the city' would've probably looked like 'kill the kid' territory."

"...that makes sense. I'm not entirely sure it would have worked? Or it might have ended the sequence but not reset anything. And you might have had to stab his body and not his spirit. But it makes sense. I think by the time I found him it was just really obvious what needed to be done, somehow? There was some stuff from one of the dreams I'd had before there, and - helping him just seemed like the thing to do."

"It was obviously the better option, just one I think we needed you to get."

"Ohh. ...yeah, that makes sense."

"I'm not - I'm never gonna try to talk you into killing more people, killing people is bad enough when you weren't talked into it."

"...OK. Thank you. I just, uh, I worry about someday being the only person who can do an awful thing that has to be done, and not being able to see that it's necessary, and then maybe something even more awful ends up happening, and - I hadn't really thought about how maybe being the other way might make you better at some things, too. Even the big important things, sometimes."

"People, uh, specialize, when they want to get stuff done. And ruthlessness is a useful specialization but you don't want it for the whole party."

"That makes sense. I'll... try not to feel bad about wanting to not kill anyone, then."

"I think it's conventionally considered virtuous, not wanting to kill people."