First there was Edmund, begging for his freedom.<\/p>\n
Then there is Emily.<\/p>\n
They pass in the halls. Tom sees her eyes. He shudders at what he sees in them.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can\u2019t help you!\u201d Tom snaps. He flails a hand in her direction. He dismisses her.<\/p>\n
He is angry because he feels guilty.<\/p>\n
He stalks away.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll of them,\u201d he mutters. \u201cEveryone. Why? Why can\u2019t people just be happy being what my hat turns them into? Why must everything be so complex?<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n Tom stalks into Saul.<\/p>\n \u201cYou!\u201d he says.<\/p>\n St. Saul hangs his head.<\/p>\n \u201cYou want to be re-hatted,\u201d he says, \u201cDon\u2019t you.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cUm,\u201d says Saul.<\/p>\n \u201cYou are not satisfied with being one thing,\u201d says Tom. \u201cYou would rather be no things, maybe. Or 1*i things. You cannot appreciate what it is that you have.\u201d<\/p>\n Cheryl stops in the halls. She looks at them.<\/p>\n \u201cStop it,\u201d she says. \u201cTom, you are having a terrible idea.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBah!\u201d he says. \u201cI can recognize my own bad ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBut you still do them \u2014\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI am a prisoner of my circumstances,\u201d Tom concedes. He glares at Saul. \u201cAm I correct? This is why you have come to me?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI bumped into you,\u201d says Saul.<\/p>\n \u201cI see,\u201d says Tom. He turns away.<\/p>\n \u201cBut,\u201d says Saul.<\/p>\n \u201cAha!\u201d howls Tom. \u201cIt is everywhere! Insurgents! Traitors! Ingrates! I have given my soul for you and how do you repay me? By sacrificing your sainthood and groveling in the slime.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t actually \u2014\u201d starts Saul.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you don\u2019t like being a saint,\u201d says Tom, gesturing to Saul and using his body language to drag Saul back towards his room with him, \u201cthen why were you such a person as to become a saint in the first place? Why am I surrounded by such fools? I had such hopes<\/em> for you, Saul.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI was a druggie musician!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cExactly,\u201d says Tom.<\/p>\n \u201cExactly?\u201d says Saul.<\/p>\n \u201cIxnay on the arcasmsay,\u201d whispers Cheryl.<\/p>\n \u201cExactly,\u201d says Tom. \u201cYou were alive.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t mean to \u2014\u201d says Saul.<\/p>\n Tom has reached his room. He snaps his fingers. Thunder booms. The door creaks wide.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat can you possibly hope to gain?\u201d he says.<\/p>\n Saul hesitates.<\/p>\n \u201cYour hat made me one thing, and one thing exactly,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n \u201cYes,\u201d Tom confirms.<\/p>\n \u201cI want to become a different<\/em> one thing,\u201d proposes Saul, \u201cexactly, with all of the advantages of sainthood, but none of its manifold flaws.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHahaha!\u201d laughs Cheryl.<\/p>\n Tom peers at them.<\/p>\n \u201cIxnay on the encouraging himay,\u201d Tom says, revealing his poor grasp of the romance languages. Then he flings the door open \u2014 it\u2019s designed so that it can be flung even when it is already open, and in fact this helps determine which version of his room one enters \u2014 and he leads them in. He gestures broadly at the giant robotic spear he is building in the back of his room.<\/p>\n \u201cBehold!\u201d he says. \u201cThe hammer of science!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a robotic stick!\u201d exclaims Saul, startled.<\/p>\n \u201cObserve how pointless your archaic saint-hopes shall be in my glorious new age,\u201d says Tom. \u201cAs you can see, while I have yet to construct a suitable head for it, I have already made great progress towards a hammer shaft to smash away your crazy world of saints and antichrists and beasts. I will smash this world flat, only, rounder, and make it a shining science-topia \u2014 of dreams!\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" First there was Edmund, begging for his freedom. Then there is Emily. They pass in the halls. Tom sees her eyes. He shudders at what he sees in them. \u201cI can\u2019t help you!\u201d Tom snaps. He flails a hand in her direction. He dismisses her. He is angry because he feels guilty. He stalks away. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3399,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"series":[50],"class_list":["post-5491","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chapter-0-6-occasions-for-some-concern","series-vidars-boot"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/Hat_1_blankbg.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5491","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5491"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5491\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6109,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5491\/revisions\/6109"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3399"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5491"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5491"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5491"},{"taxonomy":"series","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fseries&post=5491"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}