( there's a thoughtful wait, eunyu sucking contemplatively on her fork while she considers the question. there's nothing about hyunsu's tone that suggests it's a particularly pointed question, but she feels the importance of it regardless, the weight that it holds. eventually, she leans back on her palms, eyes going up to the ceiling, pulling her words right out of the fluorescence. )

Yeah. ( she can't deny that. ) Ah. Well.

( but it's not the full truth of it. she thinks about the paper eunhyuk wrote when he started having symptoms, and thinks about what she would've done if he went through them with her. she wouldn't have been reasonable about it — she wouldn't have killed him, not in a million years. the monster still would've been eunhyuk, the way hyunsu is still hyunsu. )

They say monsterization is a curse. You're not a parasite or an infection, or anything new. There isn't anything in you that wasn't already there to begin with. Isn't that the truth? ( the science of it is all a little over her head and out of her expertise, if she's honest. but the point, ) I think ... all I want is Hyunsu. And I think you're a part of that. You're just — repressing the softer half of you, maybe. I don't know how it works. ( with a huff of a breath. ) I'd be happy if I could have both. I won't stop fighting for that.