It will take them whether or not they are looking. They will not be asked as if they mattered. By the whim of the unseen, unsubtle hand, their hopes come and go. For her thrill, they may die every night, only to awake each morning. Only the vaguest unease will remain, gnawing away as the changes mount; a feeling that they are not themselves.

They cannot be, when every dream and memory can be whited out. They cannot be. They know that there is some injustice at work. They petition God for answers.

But she will never have to say sorry.