[ the flower falls. he looks at her, and his heart aches — she reminds him of yonah, a white flower in bloom despite the carnage and chaos that surrounds her.

she is unlike him. pure and untouched. weathered, but untouched at her core.

he was neither of those things.

wordlessly, he turns back around, approaching her only to then crouch and delicately take the fallen zinnia into his hand.

he rises, eyes flickering over its petals. ]

He wasn't the only one who...

There are bad people in this universe. People who will want to hurt you for their own benefit...I don't always understand why. I used to wish I did. I wanted to believe that people were good, even if they had hurt me, and I wanted to help them no matter what.

[ he hates them — humans. humanity. the people who had attempted to rob him blind of everything, including his own existence. he's dead. everything has already come to an end.

but for some reason, somehow, she makes him want to try. try to hope the way he once did.

so in this moment, he does. ]

...But there were many people...who gave up their lives to see me safe. I was an orphan who could do so little in a dying world, but the people of my village still tried to help me in their own ways. My comrades did everything they could to ensure that I'd know peace again...

And my sister...even when she was in pain, she couldn't ignore someone else's suffering.

Human beings are worth believing in. Even if they're cruel sometimes, even if they hurt you...they still love, and they still try to live in a world that doesn't want them to.

[ he motions the zinnia towards her. ]

White zinnias remind me of that truth...and that's why they remind me of you, too.