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[hacker]

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[scission]

The training simulations are quite safe.

[hacker]

From agents maybe.

[scission]

And all other threats. No one can die in the sims, agents or otherwise.

[hacker]

There's more to danger than death.

[scission]

[There's a pause as he stops, steps back enough to pick up on the signs here.]

I deal with rehabilitation and training of new unplugs. I've no interest in pushing you into something you're inclined against, but if you tell me what it is you're afraid of, I could perhaps be of some help.

[hacker]

Not every superpower is body hair and full moons.
I leveled part of San Juan. People died. Maybe to everyone here they were just naked babies in pods but to me they were people.

[scission]

I very much doubt that everyone here will consider them just naked babies in pods. Nor are you the only one with deaths on your conscience, superpower related or not.

[hacker]

Wow.
"Other people have feelings too."
All that professional training for rehab and helping people adjust and that's what you've got. I feel much better thanks.

[scission]

Well, I am rather limited by the medium. And a lack of involvement in your extraction.

Why did you take the red pill?

[hacker]

I found what I spent my whole life looking for, and I didn't like what I found. Hoping that there was some possibility that none of it was real was
A relief.

[scission]

And has it remained a relief? Being unplugged?

[hacker]

In some ways.
Not in others.

[scission]

A sentiment I think we all share.

[hacker]

Not everyone's dad dragged them down into an alien city to give them earthquake powers.

[scission]

Do you think I'm trying to belittle your pain, Skye?

[hacker]

No. I just think you don't understand it.

[scission]

I understand betrayal. I understand helplessness. I understand remembering all the lives you destroyed, and knowing that the potential for that destruction still remains inside you.

Your pain is your own, and if you need to be alone with it to heal then that is what you need. But you aren't as alone as you feel.

[hacker]

It was an earthquake. That's why I'm not going back in. Because I couldn't stop it, and there's no telling it wouldn't start up all over again the minute I was inside. I unplugged to get rid of it.

[scission]

That is a terrifying amount of power to have forced upon you. And never plugging back in is as valid a path as any other. I'm sure you've met some freeborn already.

[There are other things he could say, other options, and how living in fear could lead to it consuming you. But it's taken a lot for her to tell him this, so right now, he doesn't think she needs to hear them.]

[hacker]

Some. There are some unplugged living in Zion too who aren't with the ZDG.

[scission]

A city populated entirely by military wouldn't be much of a city at all. Though even in the ZDG, there are roles for those who cannot or prefer not to plug in, if your interest ever turned that way.

[hacker]

Pretty sure that'd require trusting the Council further than I can throw them.

[scission]

Not necessarily.

[hacker]

How do you figure?

[scission]

It requires trusting your crew. Anything beyond that, well.

[Just leaving it hanging like that because he's not going to spell it out over a feed.]