potential 2.10 spoilers in comments.

[burninhale]

It'll be interesting. "Met my match"? I don't know about that. I wonder what happens when he doesn't have those pills.

Don't pat yourself on the back so much, it was hardly a difficult prediction. I could see it coming together and I was technically dead. And it's true, Argent must have seen it, too. But you know, there's someone else who probably saw it, and he's the one advising Derek not to listen to me.

The thing about Derek, though, is that he's practical. I think he'll come around. I hope he does. He's a good kid. Maybe now he understands a little better about hard choices. It's kind of a shame that he has to — that they all have to. But c'est la vie, right? We've got a lot of people to kill.

Also, doesn't Lydia deserve a fruit basket? What a trooper.

Comments

[stregare]

I'm pretty sure there are actually a lot of stories with that premise, but I did drop out of college.

Yes, I hear murder tends to fill up one's schedule.

[burninhale]

"Good" is, admittedly, a subjective matter in literature.

You only hear?

[stregare]

No! Well, a little. But some things are set in stone.

Seen, too, I suppose. But I don't presently collect murderers; I wouldn't dare be presumptuous around an apparent expert.

[burninhale]

Such as?

I'm an enthusiastic amateur at best, really. It's funny, you get out into the field and suddenly, you can't leave until everyone else is dead. You do your best with what you have, you plan as much as you can and you improvise when necessary, you try to recruit the right players... I understand why sports take the place of warfare, I really do. And if only this could be solved with lacrosse, I'm sure at least one person would be happier.

[stregare]

Dickens is a hack. Doris Lessing is a genius. Sacred cows are meant to be slaughtered. And Joyce's love letters should be required reading material for every adolescent who has only recently stepped his suburban pretension game up from Palahniuk.

Sports metaphor. Interesting choice. Anyway, certainly more of an expert than I am. Answer me something, though, if you don't mind: is it all about survival, or satisfaction? Maybe both?

[burninhale]

Dickens was a successful hack, Lessing I couldn't comment on, cows are delicious whether sacred or profane, and whatever god there is, save us from lovers who write, but also from Palahniuk. Though I appreciate the tips on motivating our disaffected young men into terrorism.

Anything that's only about survival isn't really living. And I do intend to live, not just survive.

[stregare]

Oh, we are not measuring by success. As for Joyce's love letters: more likely to break their spirits. Also, why do you need terrorists.

Given the large quantity of things in this multiverse that want to kill--well--both of us, frankly, sometimes survival's as good as it gets for a while. At least as far as I know.

[burninhale]

It wasn't really an argument in his favor. Given the choice between Joyce and Palahniuk, my spirit is already broken. And I don't, really, but it's still interesting.

Oh, you do whatever you have to. But that's not how it is for me right now. It could change, certainly. Everything does, sooner or later.

[stregare]

Well, which one would you choose?

I don't understand how, when you have to live on the fringes. That's what not being human tends to be about, or so I am learning.

[burninhale]

[He just shakes his head. HE'S AN ADULT HE REFUSES TO PLAY LITERARY FUCK/MARRY/KILL.]

I don't know what to tell you except that in my part of the world, both werewolves and hunters are in decline. There was a code, once. It allowed us both some measure of normalcy, on and off. We had families, and it become more than survival in that way. When the children died, well, that all went away. But it can come back, once the hunters are dead. I'm sure they feel the same about us.

[stregare]

[ Merciless and mild, simultaneously: ] That one was a little bit set up for me.

What's to stop new hunters from appearing? --I don't disdain the idea, but it seems fragile. The ones who know would have to be just afraid enough not to fall prey to their instincts to fight back, but not so afraid they rebel.

Which isn't to say I advocate...doing that, but it doesn't really matter here.

[burninhale]

Nothing at all. That's how it's come to this. Of course the code was a ridiculous sham, but wars that last centuries don't do so without periods of recuperation for both sides.

Not that I'd call what's happening right now a war. It involves less than a dozen people, some of whom have been trying very hard up until now to cooperate. Sometimes they may not see us as human, but they do see us as people. Some of us used to be human. It's all very dramatic.

[stregare]

Social contracts, 'codes', they're all pretty easily broken. People don't realize that until they do it.

It sounds like some of those people are about to lose all sense of cooperation.

[burninhale]

People who live by their honor usually die by their honor, I find. If that's the way they want to go, it's their choice.

A slight reconfiguration of alliances is about to take place. No one is going to like it.

[stregare]

Some people might say it's one of those things that elevates 'survival' to 'living'.

Including you?

[burninhale]

If that's what it takes, so be it.

I'm a little more philosophical about these things.

[stregare]

And what is your current philosophy? Is it really just "whatever it takes"?

[burninhale]

That what I've got now is better than what I had twenty-four hours ago. I hadn't quite hit rock bottom. You have to dig a lot deeper than that in Beacon Hill.

I'll have to win people over to "whatever it takes," though.