Back when Nico had been in group therapy, between the first and second times she'd run away with her friends, she'd been frustrated by the other kids. Their problems had just seemed so...small compared to hers. It sucks your mother never attends your recitals, can we get back to how mine embedded a magic weapon in my soul?
This guy's problems? Way beyond hers. As far out of her frame of reference as hers had been to the other, normal kids. She thought hard -- what had she always wanted from them? Sympathy? An answer, any answer at all?
"Look. I can't--" Nico shook her head, started over. "I can't offer you forgiveness. I can't judge you. I can't tell you how to fix what's already happened. I can't give you back your innocence, I can't give you your life from before back because its gone; it's gone and no one can ever give it back to you. But I don't think what they made you do is your fault. And I can pull that thing out of you so that you don't have to choose between three or three hundred."
She paused, biting her lip. "And you can choose from there how you make them pay."
no subject
This guy's problems? Way beyond hers. As far out of her frame of reference as hers had been to the other, normal kids. She thought hard -- what had she always wanted from them? Sympathy? An answer, any answer at all?
"Look. I can't--" Nico shook her head, started over. "I can't offer you forgiveness. I can't judge you. I can't tell you how to fix what's already happened. I can't give you back your innocence, I can't give you your life from before back because its gone; it's gone and no one can ever give it back to you. But I don't think what they made you do is your fault. And I can pull that thing out of you so that you don't have to choose between three or three hundred."
She paused, biting her lip. "And you can choose from there how you make them pay."