"Does being a Sith typically... takes caring about the costs away from people?"

"More or less. They end up with impulse control problems, a lot of them, from Force feedback. She did, too, for a while, but she worked through it."

"This magic system is... I almost want to describe it as inherently tragic."

She pauses, but then nods. "Don't say that to her, but - yes, I agree. At least how it's handled now."

Slow nod.

Shrug. "Being a Sith is important to her. And she does okay with it."

Felix thinks and then nods. "Thank you, that sounds useful to know."

Nod.

"Have you found the Sith code, yet?"

"I'm pretty sure I have it somewhere, but haven't got around to it."

Nod. "It explains, more or less. It's -

Peace is a lie, there is only passion.
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken.
The Force shall free me."

"Yeah, that puts things into perspective."

"Yeah. It's going to change things, the Force not being the only source of serious personal power any more, but I doubt it'll change it that much for her."

"Yeah. And dreamshaping is high-variance enough to make things a bit too unpredictable unless we are very careful."

Nod. "That's not really what I meant, but yes."

"Sorry, I went on a tangent. I suppose it doesn't matter to her, because it isn't about being a Sith? Not directly, at least?"

"That, and - people are born Force-sensitive or not. There's a blood test, even, to detect it in babies. She was never going to be Forceblind, and she wouldn't've made it as a Jedi - have you seen their code? - so - there couldn't be a Dusk who wasn't a Sith."

"I actually have read it," Felix says,

"There is no emotion, there is peace.

There is no ignorance, there is knowledge.

There is no passion, there is serenity.

There is no chaos, there is harmony.

There is no death, there is the Force."

Pause.

"...I honestly find it unpersuasive."

"And if you know how the Force works, it's -" she shudders. "Dusk objects to slavery. Even the self-inflicted sort."

Nod. "I don't even know how I would even begin to address that situation."

"Yeah. She's thought about it, some, but they'd kill us before we got anywhere close to anyplace useful, even if we had a plan."

"Yeah. Currently, I don't have anything better than, wait-and-see-even-if-takes-centuries. And it's not like the galaxy is lacking easier problems."

"Mhm. Well, maybe someone will come up with a useful dimension for it."

"Well, there is hope. Yeah."

"Mmhmm. One problem at a time, though."

"Of course."