I saw it happen to others - people I had met before, and strangers. I never saw my family again one way or the other, though. But the process itself, and the pain - even the possibility of inflicting the brands myself - that was something the Empire held over me.
[They looked down, remembered shame pressing on them.]
So that my 'superiors' could always make things worse. Keep me complicit.
no subject
[V shakes their head.]
I saw it happen to others - people I had met before, and strangers. I never saw my family again one way or the other, though. But the process itself, and the pain - even the possibility of inflicting the brands myself - that was something the Empire held over me.
[They looked down, remembered shame pressing on them.]
So that my 'superiors' could always make things worse. Keep me complicit.