Aaaaand now we have Patrick spiraling, poor guy.
On the one hand, he had a psychic line directly into Cohen’s desires, so he can make a lot of deeply insightful statements with perfect accuracy! On the other…he’s not capable of separating “Cohen didn’t want to be my Master” with “I was a failure as a Being.” Which is throwing a huge wrench into a major subset of his deductions.
Which brings us to the end of the chapter! And instead of taking a short inter-chapter break, to start regular posting again right at Peak Vacation Time, I’m going to do the whole end-of-year break here.
Check in Mondays & Thursdays for bonuses/omake, then come back in 2023 for Annotated Chapter 15!
Bianca: Well, Patrick, I want you to talk about Cohen now. What can you tell us that’s relevant?
Patrick: I — I don’t know. I know so many things. What are you defining as “relevant “? He does magic. He researches old languages. He loves his daughter, but doesn’t know how to show it.
I loved him. I don’t now. Because you don’t want me to. Right? I tried to be good for him. I thought I was . . .
Bianca: Okay, okay, shh, calm down! This is why I don’t want to make you think about it too much! I’m sure you were very good for him. You’re definitely very good now.
(PAT PAT)
Patrick: Really?
Bianca: Really!
And, Sparrow, you know what you have to do.
Sparrow: . . . Put on some nice, mood-lifting episodes of Inspector Spacetime?
Bianca: No, I mean about what to tell Jany!
Woking, England: apartment of Naresh Balachandran.
Jany: All right, Kara Lynn . . . help me figure out what to say when I write to Ann Walker.
Another wrench in his deductions: Did Cohen really not want to be his master? I was under the impression it was just another experiment that Cohen did. It just didn’t come out the way Cohen hoped because hadn’t really bothered to fully consider how it would probably turn out. He was too focused on wondering if he could do the thing and not nearly enough on whether he should.
I think Cohen didn’t felt like being up to the responsibility, like feeling that Patrik was TOO GOOD for him. Also, that he was drunk when he did it.
His feelings were likely different when sober.
Of course Patrick was too good for him. All the beings are too good for their masters. They’re like living unobtainium.
To repeat what I wrote four page earlier: Of course, in hindsight, it would be safer for her to go to Cohen. On the other hand, they would then miss the opportunity to disable Walker …