Again, maybe this ought to be a cause for worry, something that rightly should make Souji pull away before it's too late, not get tangled up with this broken being, caught between scalpels and discarded needles. Maybe it's something that would repulse someone else, or scare them, or simply feel nothing at all, as if it had been wiped away with a sterile cloth, leaving only evaporating alcohol and coldness behind.

Instead, he feels relieved. He even feels a small portion of entirely inappropriate happiness, as something Yamato says rings so very true within him, it's just not possible not to allow himself just a little bit of joy. They're probably both irreparably messed up, that's what it is, and maybe they'll only help destroy each other a little faster together. Alone they are dangerous, but they're mostly weird and lonely little things, more tragic than anything else. Together, they might just make up all the components for something much more destructive.

But Souji doesn't care. Destruction is in his lungs; he breathes it every day, and sometimes each breath sounds like a shortening fuse.

His whole hand squeezes Yamato's harder, not afraid at all to break their transient frailty beneath the life that is slowly coming back to his fingers. "Sometimes- Sometimes, when something bad happens to people I love, it's as if..." He shakes his head, momentarily mute as he tries to find the words. "It's like a monster waking up. The world just becomes really simple and... I know how to put everything right." He breathes out sharply, and then has to spend a little while fighting back another coughing fit. Still, his eyes are unnaturally bright when he opens them again. "I don't like hurting people. But sometimes, you have to. Sometimes there's no other choice. And I can't see what's so wrong about that - I can't feel sorry about it."