Nai sighs (and also cuts himself a piece of cake, vexed), then looks at the camera and squints. "Hey, Rem, the recording light is off."

Zash blinks and looks at the camera, too. "Oh, it is."

"Wait, it is???" She turns the camera to look at the light.

(It's not.)

"...wait a minute!"

Both of the twins start giggling at her.

"Oh, you two."

He runs.

He runs and runs and runs and runs until he can't run anymore. He runs until he can't see the fire and the broken cryonics pods with the dead humans in them and he runs until his feet are bleeding and he runs until he feels like his legs are going to give out and the last thought he has as he passes out on the sand is that he hopes this time he'll manage to die.

("...hey, is that a kid over there? Holy fuck he's alive! Come over here, we need to help him!")

"Why do you always walk?"

"...mm?"

[we can float. we don't need to walk like humans. it's so wasteful.]

Nai himself is floating, lying horizontally in the air reading a book about the Hundred Years' War.

[the humans don't like it. it scares them a little bit.]

"Scares" is the wrong word, but Nai will know what he means. Humans don't like things that are different, and even though right now they're used to the twins it's still a bit unsettling.

[so?]

[it's not nice to scare people, Nai]

But they're plants. That's what they are. Why are the humans scared of them? And besides, Nai doesn't really like having to pretend he isn't what he is just because people are irrationally scared of it.

Zash... understands that, but people aren't always able to control what they feel. Nai is familiar with that, right? And since it doesn't bother Zash to walk, he walks.

He doesn't think Nai should walk if Nai doesn't want to. It's just that Zash doesn't mind.

...okay. He guesses.

Anyway, what's this book Nai is reading about?

A war.

(He loves it when his brother asks. He knows Zash isn't as interested, but he's interested in Nai's interest and he likes hearing Nai talk about it because it makes Nai happy and that, also, makes Nai happy.)

Grim topic but you can't argue with taste. Can Nai tell Zash about it?

He can.

Why won't Zash understand? It's not just one person. There was the whole team, William Conrad and lots of other people, and he saw what they did to Tesla. What they do to each other! Zash was there! Even back then, on Earth. The wars, they killed each other so much, hurt each other. All those books Nai read. Humans never change. They'll never change! That's what humans are! He'd hoped they were better, hoped it was all in the past, but it was thousands of years of them being like that, until they completely drained their planet dry, and even on that ship where they wanted for nothing they still did what they did to Tesla.

And what about Rem?! Nai knows not all humans are like that! It's not just that!!

If Rem hadn't interfered, all ships would've crashed, and they'd be able to live with their sisters. So no one would ever hurt anyone else, ever again.