[The Boy is renowned at home for his indifference to pain. He's no sadist, he doesn't enjoy others' suffering; but he has never been swayed by it or sympathetic to it, either. That's probably something that should have been shared beforehand, because he waits maybe a beat longer than another person would have, before he pulls the Chair's orders away from Scorpius's mind.

He watches Scorpius carefully, and all the while he can't stop wondering what colors were there in space. Surely they weren't all black and white the way he remembers stars seeming as a child. Surely the light Scorpius saw had to have some hue besides 'snow'? He had always thought that space must be beautiful. He remembers being a very small child and hearing man's first steps on the moon. It seems like child's play next to the things he just saw.]

Are you still with me?