The justifications of men who kill should always be heard with skepticism, said the monster.

The only crime, the only crime is to take a life. There is nothing else.' 'And that's why you don't fight,'I say. She turns to me sharply. 'To preserve life is to fight everything that man stands for.

Sometimes people need to lie to themselves most of all.

I do what I have to do," I say. I do what I have to do to save him. I do what I have to do to save Todd.

She looks at me. She does. She.

Ah, well, then you've never stood on a beach as the waves came crashing in, the water stretching out from you until it's beyond sight, moving and blue and alive and so much bigger than even the black beyond seems because the ocean hides what it contains.

Things change, but they stay the same.