come out of hiding, i'm right here beside you

[barehands]

[A while after the execution has ended, everyone will find a simple note slipped under their door.]

If you don't want to be alone after everything that's happening, some of us will be in the dining room. Even if you decide not to come, please remember that you aren't alone here.

[The note isn't signed, but the handwriting is feminine and neat.

For anyone who decides to come, there's a good array of food laid out on the table. There are some small and simple cakes, cookies, and pastries, a healthy amount of okonomiyaki, okayu, and other Japanese dishes (with a focus on rice and eggs), along with curry. In addition, there are pancakes, and a large pot of soup. It looks like a few people collaborated to make enough food for everyone here.

Just like the meal they shared together earlier in the week, the candles from the storage room lend a more peaceful light than the fluorescent lights above.]

Comments

[carnivorously]

It's just how it is. I can't tell you how many people I've killed at the discretion of Sibyl.

[So much so that he's used to killing just as much as he's used to inspecting dead bodies.]

[halleberry]

[ That answer again... ]

Just because they were determined to be "unnecessary"? Is that the difference between a latent criminal and a criminal, in your society? The latent criminal has "potential"?

[carnivorously]

Precisely. We've thought about doing crimes. Some more minor than others, but as soon as that's detected, we're flagged. Some are flagged as children, some are flagged after a major event happens to them. Everyone's different.

[halleberry]

So it's like 1984, then. "Big Brother is watching". But to think even children aren't safe...to think about a crime is to be guilty, even though you haven't even had the time to act on it.

...How long has it been that way, for you?

[carnivorously]

It's almost exactly like that. George Orwell may as well have been a prophet.

[The book is over 150 years old by his time and while Orwell may have been off by quite a few years, that doesn't mean his setting wasn't.]

As for how long it's been that way, it was implemented when I was a child, so almost my entire life. I don't know a society without it.

[halleberry]

...And since criminals are off the streets, everyone is safer, so no one complains. Is that it? Of course, even if they thought of complaining, that's probably treason, a crime against the state...

[ It's a self-fulfilling prophecy. ]

It sounds like something out of a dystopia.

[carnivorously]

Sibyl's priority is making sure its citizens are happy. The ones who shine the brightest and have the healthiest minds, that is. The rest of us are locked away.

Well, unless you get lucky and get a job hunting criminals. After all, we can't let healthy people contaminate their Psycho-Pass. The color their mind is. Those with healthy minds have bright clear colors. Those like mine are more muddied-- ugly.

[halleberry]

...Does a person with a muddier color ever turn bright again? It seems like something that would be determined by your circumstances...

[carnivorously]

With therapy, yes. It's not a death sentence if your Psycho-Pass becomes muddy and unclear. However, if you simply allow it to stay that way without medical attention, there's little to no chance of recovery.

[halleberry]

And yours had no chance of that, Kogami-san? What color is yours considered?

[carnivorously]

It's less considered a color and more considered 'clouded'. Like someone put a few drops of a darker food coloring into a lighter colored mix. I haven't even checked in a long time since it doesn't even matter to keep up with that anymore.

[halleberry]

So you've been hired, then, by the police force, as a latent criminal, because if a regular police officer were to think about how a criminal were to act and put themselves in their shoes, it would affect their psychology in such a way that they would be at risk of becoming latent criminals themselves? Since, to think like a criminal is basically the same as to be a criminal...

[carnivorously]

I think you summed it up perfectly.

[Well, that takes out that explanation. He's glad to hear she gets it.]

And I need to work hard, or I could just be put back in isolation. I get a paycheck, but sometimes the other incentives are more worth it.

[halleberry]

Other incentives? Like what? Are you treated particularly well by the other police members? I can imagine they would have their fair share of trepidation, considering they're interacting with these "latent criminals"...

[ She still finds the term a bit sickening. ]

[carnivorously]

We're treated somewhat well and it's easy to ask for cigarettes. [He lets out a laugh.] I have my own room and I can decorate it as a please even if it's a little drab. Another guy who is a latent criminal has an arcade in his room. So if you think about it, we really don't have it half bad other than we can't go outside.

[Though he knows Kagari resents it-- that he hates that he can't leave and never had that choice his entire life.]

[halleberry]

[ ...Small blessings, for the price of your freedom. A cell that you can decorate as you wish is still a cell. ]

...It sounds as though you're making the most out of an unfortunate circumstance.

[carnivorously]

It's all I can do. All we can do.

[Instead of wallowing in what kind of situation they're in. Then again, Kogami has other things he can focus on than lamenting his mental health.]