Guilt and rage, hatred and fear were pathways to weakness and clumsy choices.

Is he nuts?" "I think the expression used to be 'touched by God'." "So that would be a yes.

...but it was death that changed. People are still people. Some good, some bad. Death changed, and we don't know what death really means anymore. Maybe that was the point. Maybe this is an object lesson about the arrogance of our assumptions. Hard to say. But the world? She didn't change. She healed. We stopped hurting her and she began to heal. You can see it all around. The whole world is a forest now. The air is fresher. More trees, more oxygen.

They held each other and wept as the night closed its fist around their tiny shelter, and the world below them seethed with killers both living and dead.

Rage was sometimes a useful ally in the heat of a fight, but it was a trickster. It made everything seem possible.

Sometimes people say terrible things when they're scared. They don't mean to, but they can't help it. They lash out because if they can see that their words hurt someone else, it makes them feel as if they aren't completely powerless.

Often it was the most unlikely people who found within themselves a spark of something greater. It was probably always there, but most people are never tested, and they go through their whole lives without ever knowing that when things are at their worst, they are at their best.