“Ha ha. Seriously,” Tristan said, without much humor. “We were—I was emotional, rushed, teamwork fell apart. He got away and he went on to hurt others. We didn’t get access to him again for a little while after that. Second fight…”

He sighed.

“Tragedy,” Tristan said, dropping his eyes. He looked at Natalie, “The day I tried to murder my brother. Spur of the moment call I’ve regretted every hour of every day since.”

“Is that why you’re… entangled?” she asked. “With your brother?”

“No. I tried to murder him because we were entangled. But also because all of that energy and rawness from the first time was exactly what we were lacking the second time around. I was burned out. I felt like I had no freedom, I didn’t have as much I was passionate about in life. Family was distant, Byron had his own thing, and my boyfriend…”

A pause, a moment of reflection.

I glanced at Sveta, hoping for a hint as to what was discussed in the conversation I’d missed. Nothing in her expression.

“…If I were a different person, what we had would have been perfect. Now I’m a bit of that different person. Part of what I took away from it was that fighting when you’re low and when you don’t feel you have as much to lose is… really fucking dangerous. Not just for yourself.”

I could, through the ‘sling’ of tendrils that held my foot up, feel Sveta tense and adjust internally.

“Would it have been better to let Paris go?” I asked.

“Considering what I ended up doing? Yeah,” Tristan said.

“He would have hurt others. He’s a violent bigot. He might have taken lives.”

“I know,” Tristan said. “And people might have stopped him.”

“I was saying something similar to Victoria earlier,” Natalie said. “The onus isn’t on this particular group to handle the crisis. It’s okay to back down and let others be the heroes and heroines.”

“What if the only way forward is if everyone is striving to be the heroes and heroines?” I asked. I wanted to lean forward like Tristan was doing, to punctuate my statement instead of leaning back in my seat, but Sveta had my foot. “It’s like playing the lottery. Buying one ticket is insanity, but buying a thousand tickets gives you a thousand chances.”

“Buying lottery tickets is still dumb,” Natalie said.

“That’s not my point. My point is that each group that’s digging deep to try and find the resources, ideas, or possible solutions is one ticket. I don’t feel like we can relax like that.”

“Not relax,” Natalie said. “Just… instead of hurting yourself to buy the lottery tickets, spend what you can, trust that others will do the same.”