It must have hurt.
Standing there, letting them go. Your people, your home...
For the first time you felt like you belonged. These people were like you. They understood you. They could teach you things you didn't even know you had always longed for. Yet you could never be one with them.
You were damaged.
Heroics are easy enough, faced with a choice. Let them go, you said. I'm leaving with them, you insisted. They listened, they were generous. They treated you like a child, but you held to your convictions. I am so proud of you.
But standing here, on the edge of the lake, hard doesn't begin to describe the pain. Everything you could have had; everything you lost.
Alone.
Outcast.
Even though you know this is the right thing to do, it's hard to give up. But you don't hesitate. I marvel at your strength in the face of such desperate longing and desire.
It has to hurt. Tearing, like a part of you has been ripped out and tossed aside like a piece of garbage. Like you can never belong again. You've just abandoned the only thing that can ever make you happy.
For a belief. An ideal. Something they say is wrong, but you know to be right. Something you can't give up, any more than you can deny that this is where you belong. Something that you believe in with so much strength and conviction that it is defines you more than even your own race can.
Justice.