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[weaponwithoutpurpose]

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[weaponwithoutpurpose]

But you don't have to graduate me. So why the offer?

[He sniffs.]

What do you want in return?

[pharadyne]

I've been an inmate and it costs me nothing to help make you more comfortable. All I want in return is no murders on my watch.

And even if it's highly unlikely that I'll manage to graduate you in the next month, I do want you to graduate. You're important to someone who's important to me. That makes you important to me, too.

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

[Jacob tenses.]

The only one I might kill is that skinny bastard. Arthur, maybe?

But he's fine as long as he keeps his mouth shut.

[pharadyne]

If that’s the requirement he’s definitely going to get murdered. We’ll have to do better than that.

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

[He sits forward.]

I won't tolerate him slandering Joseph.

[pharadyne]

Why?

And I mean that as a genuine question. Joseph's not here to care what anyone says about him.

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

But I am.

[He tilts his head.]

That's enough, isn't it?

[pharadyne]

To murder someone over? I'd say...no.

To be honest, even if he were here, I think assaulting Arthur over merely smartmouthing about him would be a bit much.

I know what John thought of Joseph. What do you think of him?

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

I'm the Head of Security. Assaulting people for slandering the Father is exactly what I do.

[He sighs.]

I was - Joseph's sacrifice. I'm meant to protect them. John and Joseph.

[pharadyne]

That's who you are to your brothers. Doesn't answer what you think of them or what they are to you.

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

[He laughs.]

I think John has you all fooled because he's never had a genuine moment in his life. Not since he was five years old, at least. And I think Joseph's right about the Collapse and that what he's doing is the right thing.

What answer are you looking for here?

[pharadyne]

My understanding is you weren't there for a significant part of John's life so how would you know? [Norton's voice has a hint of chill in it. He takes another sip of tea to settle his thoughts.]

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

[He eyes him warily.]

He was scared of me. Jealous, because Joseph approved of me more.

But I did what I could to protect them both. All the times Dad wanted to go after John, I took those for him. The family that made us sleep in the barn? I took care of them.

Don't sit there and tell me I don't know my own family just because you let him suck you off and tell you everything you wanted to hear.

[pharadyne]

Protecting someone doesn't mean you know them. John could be very cunning, very careful about the masks he showed to the world, doesn't mean he never had a genuine moment. Maybe he didn't around you, but maybe that was because he was too scared to.

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

[Jacob shrugs, but he looks more troubled than he did when he first arrived.]

Well, he's off living a new life and you're here defending him.

But he has nothing to do with me being here.

[pharadyne]

No, I imagine Old Man Seed is more at the root of things. Not everything, of course, but I sometimes ponder how different our choices would be if we were born in different times or to different families.

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

[The fact that he calls him that, that he knows to call him that, strikes Jacob quiet for a moment. He eventually picks up his glass and gets up to refill it on his own.]

Why? We weren't.

John got new parents. Joseph lived in the system. I was raised in juvie.

We had all the second chances we could stomach and it all led us to the place we needed to be.

[pharadyne]

Those three separate paths were because of him. If you'd all been born to some pacifist Quaker whose idea of punishment was to have you all sit around a table and discuss your concerns with tedious sincerity, and had never been separated, I imagine you'd have all ended up rather differently.

Not that it matters in the end, since that's not what happened, I just wonder sometimes to what extent the differences between warden and inmate comes down to luck.

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

Born to anyone else means I wouldn't be me. And so it's a moot point. You take my body and my mind and everything about me and give me two parents who weren't fuck ups...I wouldn't be the same person and I wouldn't be me.

[He fills his glass and shakes his head.]

So it doesn't matter for a lot of reasons.

[pharadyne]

I find it reassuring that we're not intrinsically wrong. And that wardens aren't intrinsically better.

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

No. But everyone has to make choices.

[He sits back down with his glass.]

But when push comes to shove, people will either die with their ideals or sacrifice them to survive. And what's the point in dying for something so stupid?

[pharadyne]

Most people die for much sillier reasons than ideals. Like old age. Old age is ridiculous and I refuse to participate in it.

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

Well - [And Jacob laughs at that, tired.]

You certainly accomplished that. And that's something you and I have in common.

[pharadyne]

That's the problem with surviving. You get punished for it with old age.

[Norton has a sip of tea and abruptly switches topic.]

John remembers what you did for him when you were children. I think...he's scared of you, but he loves you. If that matters to you.

[weaponwithoutpurpose]

[Jacob stares off to the opposite wall.]

It does, in a way.

I thought I was helping him. Helping both of them. It just got us separated.