[With him closer, Cassel feels, not happier, but more content. As though, despite all of the things he's done wrong today, he hasn't ruined everything. More than that, there's a fierce sense of protectiveness in him now, a harsh and overwhelming desire to keep safe the parts of Beyond that remind him of himself and the parts that are utterly new and confusing to him. All the things that make him him, an utterly new and confusing sort of person.]
[He would be bowled over by his own strength of feeling if he didn't understand by now that he is unpredictable, that his own capacity for love is dangerous. As it is, he takes the cigarette back and flicks ash off the end reflexively, then looks out across the eerily empty landscape.]
action.
[He would be bowled over by his own strength of feeling if he didn't understand by now that he is unpredictable, that his own capacity for love is dangerous. As it is, he takes the cigarette back and flicks ash off the end reflexively, then looks out across the eerily empty landscape.]
Did that help?
[Does hurting help?]