“Yes. But it was worse than that. I learned that the cutters had been our tech to start with. The Outsiders had just stolen the idea before we could complete it. They had only done to us what we had planned to do to them. That was the moment in which I no longer knew who the animals were. I no longer wanted to mend our soldiers so that they could go use cutters and…” He searched for serviceable words. “Sticky-fire and germ bombs. I wanted to heal them. Actually heal them. Sometimes I’d see a body added to the pile, someone I had just put back on her feet a few days earlier. It made me wonder what the point of it all was.” He stopped, and rumbled in thought for a long, long time.

“We cannot blame ourselves for the wars our parents start. Sometimes the very best thing we can do is walk away.”

“As you said, he had everything. That made him feel safe and powerful. Your father had probably gotten his way for so long that he thought he was untouchable, and that is a dangerous way for a person to feel. I don’t think anyone on this ship blames you for wanting to get as far away as you could from a person like that.”