"But I do hate him. I hate that I pity him still, I hate that because of everything he's been through I pity him more than I ever did before."

It sounds stupid, and he knows it sounds stupid, but he also knows she knows him well enough to understand his awful inability to not blend every quadrant possible. He presses his face more firmly into her shoulder.

"It's unbearable here, sometimes. And I can't even hope that maybe one day I'll be able to return to Alternia, because nothing I do there will matter."