Morgrim played:

Sethiss

Knowing and accepting are two different things. Far, far too true. Why else were they still struggling to find the elusive link out, when such things rarely existed in servers because they weren't needed? Because to stop seeking wasn't an option. Was an option, was instantly discarded as an option, if the others had even stopped to think about it.

Nice was a fuzzy term. Emotions generally were. Had he ever been purely, conventionally nice? Not hating it wasn't the same as being nice. Neither was piquing curiousity, no matter how much she learned. Forcing yourself to admit that an out of body experience was fascinating didn't eliminate the fear of seeing flesh disolve or the pain that wasn't quite pain from whatever that rending false step was. Tea came closest, but it had still involved prodding at uncomfortable thoughts and offering veiled threats.

Was the offer to leave Anna alone a veiled threat? It hadn't seemed so at the time, but that didn't stop it becoming one in a different mood. At the moment she was apparently being left alone, or at least nothing too terrible; Anna was a terrible liar and couldn't conceal that amount of distress. To agree and then fail? Things might change.

In that case leaving well alone should be the best, at least for now. On that angle. On a purely selfish one... curiousity killed the cat. But was proving impossible to quell. Someone who committed such acts had no right to be so compelling. Was she fighting to get rid of him or to stop him hurting her? The alignment wasn't perfect any more. He could be less cruel in ways that weren't always completely repellent, at times. Anything shared with others was horrific. Some unshared were only slightly better. The rest... perhaps that was his definition of nice. It was preferable. And loath as she was to admit it, despite rending her world views and threatening to drive her insane it was sometimes illuminating in its own twisted way.

Acceptance was like trust: it couldn't be forced. And yet she trusted her professors without a second thought. Doctors, pilots, chefs, all automatically trusted to not harm in their interactions with her until they did something to breach it. She accepted so many things about the world because there was no reason to doubt them. Both forms shallow in comparison to what they could be, not the soul deep trust forged over years of knowing someone, not the acceptance that came from testing every nut and bolt and gear until she knew it was real, but still offered and able to be built into such.

That still didn't help. Accept him? How could she offer when she didn't know the answer? To let go. Could she do that? Not if he was forcing her into torture with others. Not if he was torturing her at all. What of the things that weren't quite torture? It wasn't clear if betrayal by one's body fit there, but even if it didn't there were other things. To stop fighting quite so hard, to ease up a little on resistance and try to keep an open mind...

...maybe, just maybe, it wouldn't hurt too much to try.