I look up, and stop breathing. Eyes glitter in the darkness. Dark shapes sit in the car, more numerous than we are. The factionless.

A lot can happen to a person's appearance in three months.

Sometimes drastic change requires drastic measures.

Sometimes I forget that I can hurt you. That you are capable of being hurt

Those who seek peace above all else, they say, will always deceive to keep the water calm.

I see a kind of thirst in her expression, the same one I saw when she told me about her brother in the back room of the tattoo parlor. Before the attack simulation I might have called it a thirst for justice, or even revenge, but now I am able to identify it as a thirst for blood. And even as it frightens me, I understand it. Which should probably frighten me even more.

Yesterday he told me he thought I would have to pretend to be weak, but he was wrong. I am weak already. I brace myself against the wall and press my forehead to my hands. It’s difficult to take deep breaths, so I take short, shallow ones. I can’t let this happen. They attacked me to make me feel weak. I can pretend they succeeded to protect myself, but I can’t let it become true.