"I would insist on being there if you did," Hakkai says at once. "For my own peace of mind. Because... I believe that you have good intentions, but I don't want to find, later, that something went wrong and he was hurt again."
He falls silent, looking away, and considering the rest of what Neal had said. At last, quietly, he says, "I don't think you can apologize without... understanding a little more. Mind control is common in the world Jedao comes from: they call it psych surgery. Anyone can be changed in almost any way. Sometimes they know what they have lost. Sometimes they don't. He has seen people he cared for driven to suicide because they were made to be -- compliant. To him, Eiffel changed like that, Eiffel made over in the way his superiors wanted... what he saw was Eiffel suffering to the point of death.
"He's telekinetic. He could sense the device completely and disable it using his powers without, he thought, risking Eiffel in any way. No surgery, no injury, no letting Eiffel continue to suffer.
"Imagine if you saw Eiffel shackled to a torture-machine. Screaming, convulsing, bleeding, with the key on a table right in front of him. You picked up the key, you unlocked the shackle, and the machine shot him through the head so that he fell dead into your arms.
"And then," he adds, "I showed up and said, how dare you murder my best friend, take this gun and shoot yourself just like you shot him. And you hated yourself so much for killing him that you believed I had the right to ask that, so you did. But we're on the Barge, so he came back, and you came back, and I was sorry because I understood later you didn't mean for him to die....
"What could I say to you if that happened? What would make you hear and understand my apology?"
He shakes his head, a tiny terse little gesture, still avoiding meeting Neal's gaze. "I can't speak for Jedao, only for myself. For myself, I believe you want to do better and that you're sorry. I forgive you. For Jedao, you'll have to talk to him about whether he's ready to hear you, but if not... what mostly hurt him is what happened to Eiffel. You encouraged him to hate and hurt himself about it, but he wouldn't have done what you told him to if he didn't already believe you were right.
"So if he's not yet ready to hear you say you were wrong to ask that, and you're sorry, it might be because he's not ready to believe you were wrong. Not because he doesn't believe you're sorry."
cw discussion of suicide
He falls silent, looking away, and considering the rest of what Neal had said. At last, quietly, he says, "I don't think you can apologize without... understanding a little more. Mind control is common in the world Jedao comes from: they call it psych surgery. Anyone can be changed in almost any way. Sometimes they know what they have lost. Sometimes they don't. He has seen people he cared for driven to suicide because they were made to be -- compliant. To him, Eiffel changed like that, Eiffel made over in the way his superiors wanted... what he saw was Eiffel suffering to the point of death.
"He's telekinetic. He could sense the device completely and disable it using his powers without, he thought, risking Eiffel in any way. No surgery, no injury, no letting Eiffel continue to suffer.
"Imagine if you saw Eiffel shackled to a torture-machine. Screaming, convulsing, bleeding, with the key on a table right in front of him. You picked up the key, you unlocked the shackle, and the machine shot him through the head so that he fell dead into your arms.
"And then," he adds, "I showed up and said, how dare you murder my best friend, take this gun and shoot yourself just like you shot him. And you hated yourself so much for killing him that you believed I had the right to ask that, so you did. But we're on the Barge, so he came back, and you came back, and I was sorry because I understood later you didn't mean for him to die....
"What could I say to you if that happened? What would make you hear and understand my apology?"
He shakes his head, a tiny terse little gesture, still avoiding meeting Neal's gaze. "I can't speak for Jedao, only for myself. For myself, I believe you want to do better and that you're sorry. I forgive you. For Jedao, you'll have to talk to him about whether he's ready to hear you, but if not... what mostly hurt him is what happened to Eiffel. You encouraged him to hate and hurt himself about it, but he wouldn't have done what you told him to if he didn't already believe you were right.
"So if he's not yet ready to hear you say you were wrong to ask that, and you're sorry, it might be because he's not ready to believe you were wrong. Not because he doesn't believe you're sorry."