Ashras spends the day rotating between sleep, academics, and magic weapon design, while thinking about that infamous report in the back of his mind.

In the afternoon there's a knock.

He answers it.

"Hey! Got your forms," he says, handing them over to Ashras. "You have to fill them out and give them to the Director and then schedule a bunch of evaluations and training sessions."

"Thanks, I'll do that."

Off he goes!

He fills out the forms and then goes right back to what he was doing.

No one bothers him before the evening, but then:

Hello! You know, it occurs to me that we're using email for communication and that is rather silly.

Silly compared to what?

Other, more instantaneous forms of communication, like -

And she suggests a couple of instant messengers as well as links to them and their mobile versions.

Slightly less amenable to multitasking but I do see the appeal.

You can multitask while you do it, conversation needn't necessarily be synchronous but it's more optimized for actual conversation rather than sending long, formal letters.

Yes, yes.

Hi.
This is still going to sink more of my attention than email did, but I'm sure I'll live.

I can promise not to bother you too much?

If I find you too much of a distraction I'll just go back to email.
You're a nice distraction as distractions go, anyway.

I aim to be.
How'd your day go?

Went all right.
Still not sure what I'm doing about that damn report.

What do you mean?

I know what I'd write if my father wanted to know how I'd ended up nearly killing someone and what I was going to do to make sure it didn't happen again.
Pretty sure the person reading it won't be my father.

We can start from that. What would that be?

All right, maybe I don't know exactly
But it would sound very much like the tactical analysis I gave Director Piggot
And Director Piggot did not receive that analysis like my father would have
She received that analysis like...
I'm struggling to find the words for the attitude that is the problem here

Would "acting like you're not actually capable of changing or doing better so just punishing you in order to drive a point home and condition you" be an approximately accurate description?

Yes
Sort of
But it's not just that
It's like...
It's like the fact that I nearly killed someone isn't even the real problem
The real problem is that I see myself as a person engaged in the business of saving the world and working with these people toward that end, and not as...
Not as some kind of domesticated animal belonging to this institution and subject to their authority on an intrinsic level
This is an incredibly uncharitable reading on my part but I'm not sure it's actually wrong

I'm sorry.
I... sort of expected something like that, though?
It's why I decided not to be a Ward.

Good decision.
So. I want to approach this with honesty and integrity, the way I would at home, and...
I'm not sure I can
Well, no
It would be really satisfying to write the report I'd write for my father and dare them to take issue with it.
And it would be soul-destroying to back down and pretend I'm a goat.
But if I don't act goatlike enough, I might lose access to important world-saving resources.