Karen watches his memories, his thoughts, his retelling, first with confusion, still feeling a bit like she was in a dream, and then a shock of, well, horror, making her fully alert. There's a difference between being wired differently and having a bad upbringing and... and someone who could do something like that. Her vision of Sean shifts from someone a little out of place and different and not given the proper space to flourish into something else. Something much much worse.

But still. His memories, even if they're filled with such a horrifying thrill, a disgusting twist of power and joy and arousal all twisted together in a way that makes Karen shudder to feel secondhand, they are, as he notices, filled with such regret, clearly he does not like what he's done and wants to change. He can't ever be forgiven for what he's done. But maybe he can grow, which was the whole original point. Even if it's not quite growing in the direction she expected. 

Karen winces, seeing the way he saw her through his eyes, at first. She understands why, from his perspective, she was almost immediately dismissed as potential prey, the line of reasoning why it would be essentially dishonest to help her out and then take her back to his car afterwards. It makes perfect sense, from his point of view -- but even with that tempering it, it still makes her twitch, noting that the only thing between him seeing her as potential prey, as something he could take and convince into her car and use for his own twisted pleasure was the circumstances in which he saw her. She's glad that he hardly thought her about that way at all, she's not sure she could have stood it, watching him look at her the way so many other boys did, yet another person she thought was her friend throwing that aside because they found her pretty, and feeling it through his eyes. She's so very glad that the small fleeting thoughts were merely small and fleeting, that he never really thought about it again afterwards, that thinking about it now is painful. But the fact that it was merely chance and luck that made him treat her as a person and not an object, something to fool and win, regardless of whether or not he was treating everyone that way besides her -- it still stings, and stirs up bad memories and experiences that have haunted her for so long. This, unlike many of the other things he's done, is something she can likely forgive -- but it still hurts that someone she's been caring for and helping could have, if things had been slightly different, looked at her and treated her that way. She can feel what bits of friendship and care she has left after his earlier revelations shrivel up some more.

She is rather glad how he helped her out, though -- even if his reasons for it were a bit sour as well -- he still lined her up as someone he could convince to be his, whatever that would mean, even if it would be done in a nicer way. Still, it's oddly gratifying to see how his opinion of her grew during that conversation, caring about who she was as a person and putting any ulterior motives aside. And getting rid of those two boys... well, she was in a bit of a funk, her hopes being dashed, and Sean had helped. A lot. She was doing a lot better with people now than she would have, thanks to him, no matter what his motives were.

Watching Valerie get taken down a peg, or two, or more, well... Karen hated those kinds of girls in high school. Despised. And Valerie is some kind of messed up epitome of all the horrible sorts of things those girls used to do, taken up to 11. She's not so sure she deserves what Sean has done to her but... well, no, she can agree that she deserves it. Especially with what she thinks and said about her, the stuck up bitch. And the fact that he says, and means that Karen is worth ten of her, well. That helps to repair some of the damaged positive feelings she has towards him. Some. It doesn't make up for the fact that he went around doing awful things to people without compunction even if he could get away with it. But besides that, even if he didn't start out thinking she was particularly important, he certainly did so then. And probably more so now.

The thing about the magic tattoo and feelings is interesting, she supposes, as to the conditions it creates and what it takes it to make it happen, but she's not quite so sure why he's pissed about it. Yet. 

The stuff about Jenna seems important, clearly something happened related to that, the memory is tinged with it even if she doesn't have perspective on it. Continuing to stalk the poor girl is pretty horrible, but they'll get to that in a bit, most likely. At least that's the implication from the memory. 

And then. It's one thing to have it described to her in words. It's another thing to see it the way Sean saw it, understanding and seeing what had been done to that poor girl. It's revolting, disgusting, degrading, terrible and awful. She flinches away from it, the shape of what was done to her. Someone or something horrible did that, took a person and tore her up and made her into something... she shudders. 

And then she understands why he's so angry about how taking ownership of someone works. And at least part of why he's in such pain at the moment. What he did was noble, forcing himself to do something neither of them wanted to do like that, but obviously traumatic. Obviously obviously traumatic. She does not like what he's been doing, is worried and terrified and disturbed by it, has no good reason to treat someone like that as a friend anymore no matter how he's been treating her, but she is (was?) friends with him. And even if she wasn't, it's hard not to pity him for this. Being forced to do something like that to save someone like that would hurt anyone with a spark of empathy and soul in them. And it clearly hurt him more than he realizes.

Karen gives him a look when he takes a breath. There's plenty of pity and empathy in it, from what she's just seen and felt him go through, but she remembers that he's been doing awful disgraceful things to people without their consent, and taking twisted pleasure from it, and she tempers her look it a bit of disdain. She's seen so much and maybe she'll feel better about things when she's thought about it, and maybe the end of this story will help redeem him, though she's not sure how, but right now she's horrified and scared of what he is and what he's done, whether they're friends or not, and overwhelmed by everything she's seen. "I assume there's more, besides this," she says, urging him on.

"I—yeah. There's. Yeah. One sec."

He's been so focused on showing her his memories that even though he was technically still reading her mind, he didn't really see her thoughts go by. He pauses to catch up on the context of her reactions—winces, acknowledging and regretting her pain and betrayal, when he sees how she reacted to the way he thought of her—is surprised that she'd think Valerie deserved what she got given that he doesn't—

—and then he catches up to what she thinks of the thing that happened with Dani, and—what? Obviously traumatic? Obviously traumatic? Obviously traumatic? What???

He's—not sure she's wrong, in fact the more he thinks about it the more he suspects she's very right, but he has—no context for this, no framework for understanding it, no immediate way to fit it into his picture of the world. He understood that event as—well, not quite the same thing as him coercing Dani into a blowjob, but something in the same genre. He didn't at all think of it as being coerced.

But. If it was. If, in some strange abstract sense, he was raped that day too. Then... that would certainly explain some things. Like the way his mind flinches from the memory, or the way he found himself crying and sleeping in his car afterward.

Oh, he's reading her mind. The whole time. That makes sense.

Karen feels a little unhappy about that, honestly -- it really is the sort of thing you should be asking permission for, first, but regardless it helps facilitate communication. He really needs to learn about consent and boundaries. Well, she's not entirely sure how much he cares about such things, given everything he's done, but with people he respects, he probably should. Though she supposes under the circumstances it wouldn't have made much sense to originally ask. 

Still if she'd known she probably... wouldn't have quite thought like that about Valerie. He's right, she probably didn't deserve that. Karen was just a little caught up in a bit of vindictive indulgent thoughts about some other girls she knew when she was in high school, and well... maybe she got carried away. She's a little ashamed she thought like that. And then—

Yes, obviously traumatic. She tries to stifle back the "you idiot" because it's unkind and unfair and then realizes he's reading her mind anyways and gives the mental equivalent of a sigh. She watches as he pieces it together, and while she honestly wouldn't exactly call it rape either, he's right that it's probably the same category of trauma for sure. Some part of her that she doesn't exactly like tries to pipe up and tell him "well now you know how it feels", but she shushes it. Now is a better time to be caring and giving, since this is obviously at least part of what he's been going through. (And there was implied to be more, wasn't there, what else could possibly have happened.) Even though he's done horrendous things, she still feels a bit of the mothering instinct she had before, and wants to comfort him, and does her best to think those feelings at him.  

—yeah, ideally he should've asked about the mindreading. There wasn't really a good time to ask about it before she believed him about magic but that's not actually an excuse. Something to think about for later.

He smiles, when she tries not to call him an idiot; in a weird way he likes that her instinct was to call him an idiot—granted he also likes that she doesn't entirely agree with that instinct, but something about it feels—like friendship? He's not sure what's up with that.

And—he does know how it feels now, yeah, at least a little; most of what he's done to other people has been worse than what happened to him. He's sure he feels some sort of way about that. Having a little trouble figuring out what that way is.

...and then all that confusion is drowned in a wave of relief because she's—trying to care about him, she hasn't written him off as a monster—he slumps a little in his seat, letting go of a tension he hasn't been entirely conscious of carrying. Okay. Yes. Good. Okay. There is at least one person in the world who can see the truth about him and still want to offer him comfort. That's... wow. He went into this conversation chasing the faint hope that it might be possible, but he wasn't really sure he believed it, and wasn't really sure it would help, and—it is true and it does help, it helps so much. He's—he'll get to the rest of the story in a minute, right now he needs to take some time to just breathe.

Karen takes a moment to try and figure out why exactly she is giving him comfort, since, well, he makes a good point. She wants to shove those thoughts back down as soon as she thinks them because she doesn't want to disappoint him, she's here to care about him, or at least help him through things, but it's hard not to think about something she's thinking about.

Honestly, it's likely because she wanted to help him, wants him to flourish, because it seems like everything that happened to him in the past kept him from getting what he needed to learn and grow and be someone, he was kept stymied and stuck, and he was just wired differently, which she can relate to. And that really doesn't at all forgive him for what he's being doing with his magic, with his time, not at all. It might explain it, perhaps, but it certainly doesn't excuse or forgive it. And they're going to need to talk about that, later, because if he wants to keep her as a friend (and, if she's being honest, as much as she tries not to think the thought, she's not sure she might still want to be after hearing all this, but she'll figure it out later), then he needs to stop. Entirely. Which it seems like to some degree he has been.

But regardless, she wants to help and take care of him, or wanted to, she said she was going to, and regardless of everything he's done, she still feels empathy towards him. He's still hurting, and she still wants to help. Even if she's not sure he deserves it, per-se. And that she needs to reexamine their friendship. But for the moment, he asked her to be there for her, and she'd be a bad friend if she wasn't. She sends more care and comfort his way, and waits for the rest of the story. 

(Every time she tries not to think a thought there's a flicker of a reaction in his mind, a wordless feeling that goes something like no it's okay to think things it's fine I can take it you don't have to change the shape of your mind for me.)

But. Yes. Okay. (Honestly he's pretty sure he doesn't deserve it, but he's grateful that she wants to comfort him anyway.)

The story.

Where did he leave off—right, yes, of course—

Dani needed somewhere to stay, and he had this apartment, so he gave it to her. She kept worrying about imposing on him, which was just bizarre; he owns her now, he's responsible for keeping her comfortable and healthy and safe, at the time she didn't even have any particular reason to suspect him of being a terrible person, and even being the terrible person that he is there's no way he would've just abandoned her, who does that? But whatever.

He slept in his car for, apparently, trauma reasons, and went back up to talk to Dani again, and, really, he should have handled that conversation in a different way from the way that he did, but—it felt like such a relief, to finally have a context where he could just tell the whole truth—it's not like there's any reasonable way to take away Dani's memories of magic, those are literally all of the memories that she has, and he owns her, he can protect her if she's in trouble, he can read or edit her mind in an emergency and fix it afterwards, he can stop her if she tries to harm him, it's safe to tell her things he couldn't tell anyone else—well, anyone else except Valerie, and talking to Valerie about people who are not Valerie is kind of unpleasant at best—

So he just told Dani everything. And, incredibly predictably, she decided he's a monster and she wants him stopped by force. In retrospect he has no idea how he managed not to foresee that outcome. She did try to offer him comfort at first, but he could sense that it wasn't—sincere, that she was—afraid and uncomfortable and pushing through it not out of compassion but out of something like obligation or duty, and she didn't try again after he called her on it.

It's strange, looking back, how... he seems to have just taken it for granted that of course he wasn't going to harm or coerce Dani any more than strictly necessary to preserve his own safety and freedom, of course he wasn't going to make demands of her or claim she owed him anything, of course he wasn't going to punish her for any opinion she might express. Even now, he finds it hard to dig into that assumption and find its roots, although it's obvious by this point that it is not an assumption most people would share. It's... partly like the way he felt about Karen at first, he thinks, and partly the same sort of thing as the fact that of course he takes responsibility for Dani's welfare. It's because...

...Dani gave herself to him, without knowing who or what he is, because that was the only way for him to fix her, and he wanted so badly to fix her. He made her his property because he couldn't stand to leave her in the state he found her in, and that was the only way to make his solution permanent. There's an implicit promise there, a much deeper one than the one established by his rescue of Karen; and even if he'd warned her and she'd gone in knowing she might be tortured, she still agreed to be his, and he still agreed to own her, and there's a responsibility inherent in that. Making Valerie his toy was different, because it was a fundamentally hostile act, but even there he feels the pull of responsibility a little; and with Dani it wasn't, with Dani he was doing it for her, and that means he owes her safety and comfort and freedom as much as those things are in his power to give. Because—because that's how it works. Because that's what owning someone means. At least to him.

Karen watches and listens when he resumes. 

She's not entirely sure why Sean can't see that Dani's being grateful when she acts that way. That is in fact what's going on, at least as far as she can tell. He just in fact did a heroic act and saved her from something horrendous, and while yes the responsible thing to do is to continue to help the poor memoryless woman, she's still going to be thankful for everything he's doing. Because he did in fact do a lot, even if it seems to him like she's his responsibility now, there's no reason why that actually has to be true. It's a good and kind thing to do, but it's still something that it's reasonable for her to be thankful for. 

And then when she watches the impression of his conversation with Dani -- yeah, that could have gone a lot better. He had just gone through a traumatic experience, for sure, which might explain why he was shouting and angry about all of this, during the conversation -- or at least that's what it feels like, it's a bit hard to tell. Under the circumstances, she was more than right to decide that Sean is a monster, just with the content, and not just how it was presented. (And if she's being honest, well, she's not entirely sure she disagrees with Dani's conclusion yet either, even if she doesn't want to hurt him at the moment with her thoughts.) 

And then there's, well, a number of assumptions he's making, about what he did and what it meant, to him, and what he expected it to mean to Dani. The things that he seems to think are implied by what he did. And Karen can see, can understand why he feels that way, as he teases out his feelings -- and it's a noble, responsible thing, about truth and about, well, responsibility. It's a good thing that he feels that way. Most people wouldn't. Most people don't. It's not something most people would assume about this. Even with what he did to save her, Dani had no reason to expect that what he did was for anything beyond, well, saving her. That it contains a permanent promise of responsibility for her welfare isn't something she would have necessarily expected. 

—huh. That's—huh. It's just... the way things are, to him, it's not—it doesn't feel noble, it feels like water flowing downhill. It never really occurred to him to think about it any other way. But—he can kind of see how from an outside perspective it seems like—more than could reasonably be expected of him. Still, though. He expects it from himself.

Anyway, the story.

He found a way to check on Dani less invasive than mindreading, and let her read his mind a little for ease of communication and because he wanted her to know things, and then he went for a long drive and thought about some things, and then—

and then

and then Jenna.

Having dinner with her and getting her into his car and making out with her and—and—and he could have stopped there except no he couldn't, actually—he introduced her to magic and then he gave her back her memories and of course she hated him, who wouldn't, but it hurts, it—he'd never have done it if he'd known it would hurt this much later, but that's not quite the right way to put it, because it implies that the problem with what he did is that it hurt him, and that is not in fact the problem, the problem is that it hurt Jenna, it just took him until now to realize that there was, in fact, a problem with that.

He doesn't really know how to... explain it, or contextualize it, even now. It's not a kind of thought he is used to having. It's—it's like—the pain of regret when he thinks about hurting Jenna feels correct, it feels true, it feels appropriate to the situation. It doesn't feel good but that is in fact the point. He hurt her, and this is now the way he feels about hurting her, and—the fact that he feels this way isn't the problem, because if it was, he could solve it just by mind-controlling himself to be incapable of regret. And even leaving aside how unnerving it is to contemplate doing that kind of thing to himself, it's not a solution. There isn't a solution. He did that and it will always be true that he did that and it will always feel like this that he did that. She is good and precious and important and he wants to protect her and instead he raped her and—how does this even get to be a problem that a person can have—how can you not know you're going to care about someone until it's too late—he could tell that he liked her but he didn't know caring like this was a thing he could do—

—anyway.

They worked something out, eventually, sort of. He still doesn't know if it's possible for him to make this choice of hers be something she won't regret, and it took a lot of tricky on-the-spot memory-editing which he's going to have to repeat anytime she wants to read his mind again, and oh by the way that's a thing he can do, although it's very possible that he wouldn't be able to do it to someone who was expecting it. And. Where does he go from here? What do you do when this is your life? You lie, probably, you just go somewhere where nobody knows anything about you and then you don't tell anyone the bad parts, but he can't do that, actually, so instead he just has to... tell everyone he ever cares about and wants to be close to about the whole mess, and then wait for them to reject him. That's kind of all he's got, at this point.

And that's not—that's not trying to say that Karen shouldn't reject him. If the way she feels about all this is that he's a terrible person and she wants nothing to do with him, she gets to feel that way. He's not—he wouldn't—he still believes, very firmly, that the most central and foundational freedom is the freedom to own your own feelings, and that taking away that freedom is in his opinion substantially worse than murder; he is not going to tell Karen how to feel about him and he is not going to tell her what to do with whatever feelings she comes up with. He is intensely grateful for the comfort she's offered him so far but if that's all he gets then that's all he gets. If she wants him to come up with some magic-free version of all this to tell the cover-story version of her that'll hit all the right notes of shock and horror to get her to never speak to him again, he'll do it. It'll be upsetting but if that's what her true feelings look like after she finishes sorting them out then it is correct for him to be upset.

Expecting it from himself is good and, well, still noble, regardless of how he feels about it. The fact that it's natural and feels like the way things should work to him still doesn't mean it doesn't feel noble to Karen. Even looking at it through his thoughts, it's hard to interpret otherwise. And it's a bit off goodness in the midst of, well, a lot of other problems that she's doing her best not to think too hard about at the moment. She wants to be comforting as they get through the story.

It's hard to keep from blushing a little, even in the somewhat condensed summary of Jenna she gets. Karen feels a little bit turned on and a little bit like a creepy voyeur, watching the two of them make out like that. It's even more clear just how much he cares about her, he feels so very strongly at her and about her and it's what leads him to, well, tell her everything. And everything is quite a lot.

Karen winces, sympathetically, feeling his pain as he feels it, watching him read her mind and watching her recoil in (admittedly, justified) horror, screaming at him as she realizes what had been done to her, remembers it in every detail, and well, just how angry and despair she is about it. And the feeling that he feels, about regretting his actions, about the pain he feels being justified and right, which well, it is. It hurts him so much to have hurt someone he cares about like this so very deeply, and she sends him waves of sympathy as best she can, even while, well, also noting that he in some sense deserves to feel guilty for this. But even though he feels horrible about this and might forever, it's still something to build on. The way you fix something like this, well, it's to stop hurting people like that, even if you can make them forget -- which seems like the sort of thing he's on his way to be doing at the moment. Which, well, they can talk about that in a bit. 

Even watching through his own mind and memory and thoughts, what they worked out together is rather convoluted and Karen can wrap her head around it when she wants to be honestly that's not too relevant to everything here. Probably. That kind of editing and doublethink probably hurts Sean a lot, but it's not as big as his realization that he hurt her so, that there was someone he could have cared about and then did something awful to her and he can never ever take that back, or as important as the fact that somehow, Jenna seems to want to try and forgive him, of all things. It's how Karen is trying to feel, to be honest, looking at this as a kind of growth, but -- well, it still comes as a surprise, given everything that he's ever done to her. It was a brave thing for Jenna to try and do, depending on what her motivations were.

The other interesting revelation to come out of that exchange, was, well -- the sudden realization that she wasn't going to be able to remember any of this when they were done. Karen's pretty saddened by that, honestly -- though she's very much not willing to do what seems to be required to become his at the moment. Not without a lot of thought and seeing more growth. She is a little worried about what they're going to have her remember when they get out of the car, but they can take care of that later. Probably. One thing at a time.

And then the rest. If it were Karen, well, honestly she would probably never tell anyone what she'd done, especially if she'd managed to move past it to make sure she'd never do it again, but it's easy enough to see that he can't do that. He has to be honest, because of how he is as a person, that's how his thoughts and mind works. He can't promise that kind of intimacy with someone else without letting them know everything about him, everything relevant they need to know to be able to have the freedom to choose how they desire. Just like he's doing now.

And if that's the way he has to be, then, well, the best way to fix it is to grow beyond being the sort of person who does that sort of thing. And yes, people should still have a right to choose, but if can follow up telling them that this was once something he'd done, with the statement that he learned, and grew, and was never that kind of person anymore, well. Not everyone would accept him, for sure, but some people would. It shouldn't be impossible to make yourself into a better person, and be hated for some mistake you once made, that's the sort of thing that leads to unending dogpiles and depression (and suicide, in once horrible case that she remembers). Karen still isn't sure if that's all he's going to get right now, he seems to be making an effort to be better, to not be the kind of person who just hurts and rapes because he can, because he has abilities and privileges that other people don't. But she doesn't know that he's going to stay that way, it's too early, and honestly it's just a little bit scary, even as much as she wants him to grow, to cultivate him into being better, the way she wants to with helping him learn. She still doesn't know what her true feelings are yet -- but right in this moment she wants him to know that if he does grow, does change, then he can be the kind of person that people accept, even knowing the, well, misadventures of his youth.

It's a lot easier to know whether or not it would be awkward to hug someone if you can read their mind, but even knowing that he would accept it and would be happy with a hug, Karen still feels a moment of indecision and doubt, before giving in and reaching over to give him a tight, comforting hug.

—well, now he's crying on her, so, there's that.

His thoughts and feelings are a bit of a mess. He's grateful to her for her support and comfort and acceptance, hesitant though it is; he's having trouble wrapping his head around the way she conceptualizes goodness, and becoming a 'better' person, because to him it's not at all about that, it's just—that sometimes when you hurt someone it turns out later that this was a terrible mistake, and he's pretty sure at this point that most people are the sort of person where if he got to know them he would find that hurting them had been a terrible mistake—and it's confusing and awful and he doesn't know what to do about it, and every time he wants to hurt someone and doesn't he feels like he's doing something wrong but he's not sure he wants to listen to that feeling, now, because listening to it seems likely to lead to making a lot of terrible mistakes, and he would really rather not make any more of those at all—

And Karen is—is—he's trying so hard not to think of her as his only hope of ever having a real friend, it wouldn't be fair to put that on her, she should get to walk away from him anytime she wants without having to feel like it would be on her if he had a nervous breakdown immediately afterward—but in this moment, here and now, he can't see any other way he could possibly find something as good as this. He hugs her tightly and buries his face in her shoulder and cries and cries, and even as he's leaning into her like she's the only refuge in the world, he keeps having the same flicker of a thought, over and over: is she still okay with this, it's okay if she's not, he'll deal, he has to, he needs this so badly but he refuses to coerce it from her...

There is in fact definitely that. 

Karen is very much not used to this, or at least not being on this side of the crying (random memories of middle and high school that she pushes back down for the moment). Still, she can read his mind and she can remember what she wanted and what helped with her, and she simply holds him close in a comforting fashion, holding him and letting him cry. 

She does need to figure out what to do about the way he thinks of people, and thinks of doing things to people, and she's not really sure how. To her, being nice is almost self-evident, especially after everything that happened with her. The way he thinks of morality and goodness are so orthogonal to the way she does, and she's not sure how to reconcile them, the concept of "imagine if it was you" that she has a much greater understanding of at this point. He's still treating people like they have an inherent value, or, something -- such that hurting them is a mistake because it will hurt him. And Karen is glad that he's more or less figured that out, or decided it, but it still feels like a hole in his morality, that people he finds distasteful or would find distasteful would still be a mistake to hurt. She really doesn't have the words or concepts to express it properly, though. She kindof wishes she did. For now, not making any more mistakes ever might have to do, but it would be really good if she could explain why, in general, it's bad to hurt someone just because you can. 

The idea that not hurting people when he can is doing something wrong, to him, even if it's a concept he's trying to fight, is rather disconcerting though. 

It isn't particularly fair, perhaps, and given that she's not going to keep her memories out of this and will probably remember some other conversation or something, it isn't exactly true -- though she does understand the logic behind this, she, well, she's still really unhappy that she's going to forget all of this. A little angry, even, but she's keeping that under wraps because it's more important to help him, in this moment, and she can be angry later. But even if she's his only port of call, only refuge now, she expects, as long as he improves, he'll be able to find other people. She isn't sure if she's ok with this yet. She really really isn't. She expects she needs to leave down some kind of ultimatum because she doesn't want to get stuck caring for someone who keeps raping and hurting people just because she can, but she's not sure what it should look like yet. Assuming he keeps feeling the way he has, she expects it won't be a hard one to keep, but for now she's ok with this. Mostly. There's a poor sad broken boy and she wants to help. And that's what matters right now. 

He clings to her and cries some more.

Caring about people hurts. It hurts maybe worse than anything else he's ever felt in his life, and he wouldn't give it up for the world.

He can't go back and he doesn't want to go back. It's hard and painful and scary to live in a world where people can matter to him that way. But—that is the world he lives in. There isn't another one available. And even if there were... it would be lying to himself, in the worst possible way, to try to hide from these feelings or deny them or get rid of them just because they're inconvenient and upsetting.

It hurts and it feels—almost unfair, in a sense—if he'd just known this was going to happen he could've not hurt anyone to begin with—but then, it's not like he's never come across the idea that hurting people might be bad. It's just—it never felt real to him, it never felt like the sort of thing that could matter. When he has feelings of the kind other people seem to be describing when they talk about things like guilt and remorse, the things that feel wrong to him in that way are—not the normal ones. Mercy is the one that comes up the most, but there's others; if he'd passed up the chance to have this magic, that would've probably felt the same way. His version of a moral compass wants him to be ruthless, violent, impulsive, and never back away from a chance to gain or exert power.

And... he can't live like that, actually. It has been very thoroughly demonstrated to him that it isn't worth it, can't be worth it, will never be worth it. Even though there are still people he doesn't regret hurting—for all he knows, years from now Valerie might grow into someone he'd feel that same deep affection for, and then he'll have to deal with the fact that he tortured her. And even besides that, 'I only torture people I find personally annoying' is a blatantly self-indulgent standard. He doesn't inherently object to being blatantly self-indulgent, but—there's a sense in which it's disrespectful of someone with a normal human sense of compassion to ask them to put up with that even if he's expecting a no. He wants to have friends. He wants to be friends with Karen, and Jenna, and—realistically he probably can't hope to be friends with Dani but he wishes he could; he'd be happier if he could give her legitimate reasons to like him, instead of all the legitimate reasons to hate him she's ended up with instead.

But—he doesn't—he can't think of where he goes from here. He's figured out how he can't live but that leaves him without any solid vision of how he can.

Karen holds him and lets him cry on her. 

It does sometimes hurt to care about people, yes. But it also feels good. Karen wouldn't want to give up caring about Sean (well, probably, she certainly wouldn't have wanted to before she knew all this, which is the relevant point), she was looking forward to helping him flourish. And it feels much better to see those you care about do well than not. Look at how he felt about, well, everyone he cares about. Karen supposes she doesn't need to convince him to care about people, at this point, but caring about people is good. The most obvious example, besides herself, is well -- look at the way he cares so deeply about Jenna, and how good that feels (at least, when not thinking about the torture parts). Seeing and enjoying people you care about, is, well, really good. 

And, well, Karen can see, in a sense, why he would have thought this would never happen, with his upbringing, and how he was wired and... well, it still seems like the sort of thing he really should have worked out. Even with terrible parents and teachers, for crying out loud. There isn't anything wrong with wanting to have power, especially if you want or need it to protect yourself -- but abuse of it is wrong, and taking it out on others is wrong, and even if it's not obvious to him what wrong means to him, it's clearly not working for him, and he knows this. 

The fact that he doesn't fully regret Valerie, but is looking at the potential of it (and really she's still a little embarrassed about being so vindictive before, oops), the possible futures where he could regret it, and using that as a reason to be more careful, to realize that he could feel regret for. And yes, having that kind of... well to Karen it feels like a double standard but she knows it isn't a double standard to him -- telling people that he only does bad things to people he dislikes isn't going to make him a lot of friends. And it'll be easier to not hurt people he'll potentially like.

(Karen is still somewhat worried about the way he keeps seeming to come at morality sideways, being about consequences to him, and not the fact that it's, well, the right thing to do. But whatever works, at least for now.) 

As for a way forward, Karen tries to think. It feels obvious to her, to some degree, what he should do, but the whole point is that it doesn't feel obvious to him. "Just be good" isn't going to cut it. But -- the way he helped her, the way he feels about and treats Jenna -- clearly he is capable of doing some amount of caring about others, treating them well, for its own sake, or at least because it makes him happy to see others that way. Perhaps... he could try doing more of that? 

That's—that works, maybe, that—

—now that he's not crying quite so hard anymore, it is occurring to him that this is actually kind of an uncomfortable position to be in, leaning between the seats like this. But he doesn't want to let go of Karen because hugging Karen still feels a little like clinging to a life raft in a stormy sea. He could open up the back of the car and make a couch for them to snuggle on—? Or he could also not do that. He really really doesn't want to do anything that'd make her uncomfortable.

It's strange, in some ways, how someone who's pretty clearly a (reforming!) rapist and such can be so concerned and careful and sweet sometimes. She's still kindof of two minds about the whole thing at the moment. But she does understand why he's so concerned about how she feels (clinging to her and all) and making sure not to hurt her. And also she hasn't seen that much magic yet, and it would be more comfortable. Of course he can do that, though she's not sure snuggle is exactly the right word to be using, it implies an intimacy that... it doesn't matter. Yes, he can make a couch for the two of them to keep doing this in a much more comfortable fashion. 

The back of the car opens up into a little room, and it's cozy and softly lit from no particular source and there's a big deep squashy comfortable couch where they can sit next to each other and he can cling to her and sniffle a lot. He has to take a deep breath to steady himself before he's willing to let go of her long enough to step back between the seats, but it's only a couple of steps before he's sitting down again and can commence with the clinging and the sniffling.

...Thank you, he tries to say. He can't seem to make his face do the words thing but luckily there is telepathy. For. All this.

He appreciates her so much.

You're welcome, she thinks back at him. It feels good to be appreciated like this, even if it's scary and awful in some ways -- but it's good that she can be there for her friend like this. 

Part of her keeps trying to figure out what exactly to do next, to figure out she does think about him, because she keeps being of two minds about it, and she's been mostly keeping the other one at bay to make sure she can comfort him. And she knows he wants her to figure it out anyways. But right now he's sniffling and crying and holding onto her like she's driftwood in a storm, or a handle on a spaceship in an (inaccurate, not that it matters) explosive decompression, and it feels more important to her to help him through this than think about everything awful he's done and what it would mean for her to be friends with someone who could do things like that. Who had done things like that. And who still wanted to do things like that but also didn't. And right now, and hopefully forever, the didn't was bigger and more important. Because if it ever wasn't (and she feels bad making this sort of threat at him, an ultimatum, but it's the only way she can help rationalize it), if he ever did something like that again, she, she couldn't be friends with him anymore. It wouldn't be right. Right now he's trying to atone (or, whatever his strange version of atone is), but if he goes back she, she can't. But, (she decides, more or less, though still feels shaky about it), as long as he never does anything like that again, she, she can keep being his friend. She can still be there for him as long as all of that is in the past. Forever. There's probably edge cases and things but the spirit of, of the concept should be pretty clear.

He hugs her tighter for a moment, pressing his face against her shoulder, trying to think coherently enough for her to understand him: it's okay if she doesn't want to be friends with him if he hurts people, not wanting to be friends with someone who hurts people is super reasonable, she doesn't have to feel bad about it, he wants her to feel her own true feelings about things. If she doesn't want to be friends with him if he ever does something like that again, then if he ever does something like that again he'll make sure she doesn't have to be.

And—he's sorry, about not letting her keep her memories. It's just that the world out there is terrifying and he doesn't know how it works and he needs to be able to keep himself and his property safe. Maybe someday he'll find out exactly what happened to Dani, and make sure it can never happen to anyone else again, and learn enough about magic to be sure there isn't something else just like it lurking around the corner, and then it'll be safe to let Karen and Jenna keep their memories of magic outside his car.

(And if whoever did that to Dani is hard enough to stop that he ends up needing to hurt them badly to do it—well, that's better-justified by most reasonable standards than recreational torture, but she'd still get to stop being his friend over it if she wanted to. He is very serious about this. He never ever ever wants to make her think she has to be his friend. If she's not okay with something he does and she wants to leave over it he'll deal.)

There's half a thought somewhere in there about how alien he finds the concept of atonement, but he's focusing on the other thing because it feels so much more important.

Yeah, Karen is pretty clear where both of them stand on that. She might feel bad about it at the time, for sure, but it'd still be the right thing to do. He should probably talk to her first, just in case, with all her memories intact, but in general, yes, putting her foot down about that... seems like the right thing to do for herself. Though yes, if he has to do something to stop whoever did that kind of thing to Dani, well, she'll want to hear more to make sure he gets a pass. But she expects he'll get a pass for something like that. Whoever did that to Dani needs to be stopped. She very very much doesn't want that to happen to her. 

Not keeping her memories is a problem. She's been very much not wanting to think about or touch that idea since it was made clear and she understands why he has to do it, from his perspective. He's trying to protect himself. And she can respect that. And in theory, she knows the price she could pay to keep them. But she doesn't want to pay that price, not with him, not now, there's something wrong with that just from the perspective of how their relationship works, the caretaking sort of perspective. And she's still worried about him snapping, and having her be his when he snaps. It's not a reasonable worry, perhaps, but, she doesn't want to tie herself to him forever. Not right now. Possibly not ever. But she doesn't want to give this up, and she's just a little bit terrified of it and there's really nothing she can do about it.

She's not sure what they're going to fill the space with (random bits of ideas floating through her thoughts about doing sneaky things so she could give herself clues and figure it out on her own, but he's reading her mind anyways and she doesn't really want to do that) but they should probably figure it out, unless he's really magical and can make her not worry about all of this lost time and everything, somehow. 

—he's sorry that she's scared, he wishes he could do things differently, but this isn't a rule he can break just because it scares people, it's important—and—there isn't a way this turns out where he owns her and then he hurts her, there just isn't, the thought of hurting her is horrifying, but she doesn't have to trust him on that, she can just not belong to him if she doesn't want to, he's still kind of scared that something bad will happen to her and he won't be able to help but that's a decision she gets to make for her own reasons, even if the magic worked a different way from how it does he still wouldn't want to make her his without her full uncoerced agreement—

And he's... not entirely sure what to do about the memories. He has kind of the general outline of an idea, but the real trick is the details, and he's less sure about those. There's... versions of the real events that he could tell her that would make sense without magic and explain why he was so stressed and miserable but wouldn't make her want to never speak to him again, he just has to figure out how to—translate it properly. Like... with Dani, he could say that he found someone in a bad situation and impulsively helped her out and now he's letting her stay in his apartment because she didn't have anywhere else to go but it's really awkward because she doesn't like him but he feels responsible for her and he's worried he can't do a good job taking care of her this way. It even makes perfect sense that he'd be super reluctant to get into the details. And with Jenna—well, he can say that he did something that hurt someone and he didn't realize it was going to be that bad but now they're upset and they have every right to be and he feels terrible about it because he cares about them a lot, and he's never really had friends he cared about like this before he came here and started meeting people different from the people he grew up around, and trying to be close to people when you're worried you might hurt them is hard and scary, especially when you know it could happen because you've already done it once and it was awful.

She believes him, perhaps, she can tell he's being sincere, or believes he is, but there's just so much unknown with the kind of person who would and could do something like he's done that she doesn't want to risk it. And there are other things she wants to do with her life that doesn't involve being his forever. And she doesn't want to do that with him, she really doesn't. There are a bunch of good reasons for things. There isn't any good reason to dwell on it anymore.

Karen agrees with the general shape of what he's thinking. In the case of Dani, depending on how it was presented, she might be conflicted and tell him that he doesn't have to take care of her, even though he does? Especially if its hurting him. But she'll still respect him for it. And Jenna, well, she'll probably try and pry for details but she might be ok comforting if she doesn't get any details. It's a bit hard to try and think what she'd do if she had no full understanding of how Sean thought, the way she has a better handle on it now -- but honestly that could all probably work. And plus this all has the benefit of being true, even if somewhat redacted. Perhaps her mindwiped-self will come up with different and relevant advice from the new perspective. She chuckles a little at the thought.

He smiles a little, too. He's starting to feel... better. Less like he's clinging to a lifeline and more like he's leaning on a friend. There's still a deep intense feeling of comfort and safety and—something like what Valerie feels when he holds her, maybe—but he's no longer quite so starved for it.

Probably at some point he should rewind her memory and go back to the front of the car and have the second round of this conversation, but before that—is there anything else she wants to know, or wants to think through with him?

She has lots and lots of questions. And she really doesn't want to lose her memories. And the idea of asking questions to hold off that for as long as possible seems like a great idea.

Which is why, once he's a little more comfortable, perhaps, they should probably do it sooner rather than later. So she doesn't keep trying to put it off. There isn't anything more that really needs answering, given that he's led her through everything already.

She would like more opportunities to come back in here to talk things through again, later, perhaps. She's not entirely sure how to arrange that, but expects something will come up eventually. The promise of getting her memories back is helping with the idea that she's going to have to lose them. Even though knowing all of these things hurts, to some degree, it's still important and useful, and she doesn't want to lose it. And as long as he doesn't do anything bad, she'll be happy to be a friend he can talk to these things about, until he finds more people. She's, well, glad she can help him out. Even if the circumstances of what she's helping with have expanded, to some degree.

Yeah. He definitely definitely plans to get her back in his car at some point and give her back her memories again. Leaving her without them forever would be—bad.

But he understands and agrees with her logic about not wanting to give herself a chance to keep putting it off.

So. Okay. He hugs her closer for a moment, and presses his face against her shoulder, and (with a brief golden glow) uses magic to clean himself up so he no longer looks like he's been crying for ten minutes straight.

"Thanks," he murmurs. It feels—important, somehow, to say it out loud. "You're a really good friend, Karen."

Now Karen tears up a little at that. It feels really good to be appreciated and wanted like this, and she knows he means it. She can see exactly what and how he means it and she's really glad she could help him. It's still important to her that he manages to flourish. "You're welcome," she tells him, and squeezes him a little tightly before letting go. "I'm glad I could help." (A few stray thoughts about biting her lip or scratching herself or doing something strange as a signal to herself that not all is as it seems cross her mind, but he's reading her mind and can see all her plans and he wants to give her the memories back eventually anyways. There's no need to do any of that.)