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[Hope's voice is clear and clipped.]

If you would like to leave a message, you may do so here. I can't promise to respond. I have many demands on my time, and this sort of thing is far down the list. Still, if you would like to, you may.

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Me either.

( Admittedly, Kate is not the go to person for creative solutions in making a hive-mind of murderous robots back off. The pragmatic answer is easier, and it's hardly as though the Null have given her (or any of the city, if you asked her) a reason to try and keep them alive. )

Not sure how we destroy all of them.

( Sorrow's words of just how far the Null empire stretches still comes to mind. It's one thing to defend the city, to destroy the immediate forces coming for them, but there's a whole world of difference between that and destroying the source.

Maybe that isn't possible either.

... Well. She'll have to shelve that worry, leave it at the back of her mind. That's the kind of cynical, paralysing thought which spirals into what's the point arguments and stops action. And she doesn't want to go back to that, not now of all times. )

But we'll try.

( Before, the gods had each other and their people. Now they have... well. These people. These people from such vastly different universes that Kate can't even begin to count them, with powers and ideas at their fingertips that no one else has. Who knows what ideas may lurk in the minds of the other residents of the city? And, well, Kate has to believe they can do more than simply be food for the gods, that there's some sort of difference they can make in this fight, or every bit of effort they've exerted in these last few years would be pointless. )

I don't know either.

[If Hope were anyone else, he might admit that the idea of their small band of allies defeating the seemingly endless Null forces might be hopeless. But he would never say that - indeed, he'd never even think it.]

But we have some power, at least, and for now we are safely hidden. We have time to plan and prepare.

We will try.

( A small band, but there are people here who have destroyed whole armies, rescued cities by themselves. People who have been fighting for as long as they've had the ability to throw a punch or pick up a sword.

So, yes, they'll try. And Kate? Right now, she'll let thoughts circulate in her mind, lapsing into silence until — with no seeming explanation — she snorts and shakes her head. )

... I was wrong about you, back then.

( So very wrong. And if you'd told the her who first arrived in Hadriel that she'd eventually be sitting here, wanting to make sure Hope and the others all made it out alive, she'd have told you to pull the other one. )

At the beginning, I think we all had a great deal of incorrect assumptions about each other.

[But Hope, standoffish as he might seem, has always been a bit of a soft touch. The people the Door brought here grew on him quickly, despite their continual dislike. Otherwise he wouldn't have gone to the lengths he has.]

I have learned a lot.

( Well, who can blame them, given the circumstances? No one asked for this, not even the gods. There was simply no other option. Something which happens all too often in people's lives. )

Like what?

( That humans have a serious coffee problem? )

I have learned that you are capable of both great kindness and great cruelty towards each other. Towards those who are not like you, cruelty is more likely, but kindness is still possible. You make decisions based mainly on your feelings, and will choose obviously bad options because of it, no matter how clearly foolish the choice is.

But you love deeply and you fight hard for the things that you love. That is admirable.

( You know, all of that is... absolutely, 100% fair. She can't even argue the bad decisions, even Kate can recognise how hypocritical she'd sound. )

Heard it said that people are scared of things that are different. ( A shrug. ) Never seen anything to disprove that.

( Back home, there's countless ways to see that in action. Ask a human what they think of superhumans, ask a superhuman what they think of creatures... Here? Here it was everything, when they first arrived. The gods, their surroundings. It was all different and wrong. )

Especially when you feel helpless.

That is an explanation, but it does not make it right. However, I suppose if we had been more like you, we would have been much more careful with the Null.

Didn't say it did.

( If anything, she's seen all the reasons it very much isn't right, but Kate bites her tongue on the cynical comment about how — if the gods had been more like humans — they'd probably try and subjugate the Null instead. No matter how true it is. )

Multiverse doesn't need more humans.

( Or superhumans. She can't be so sure whether it needs more of the non-humanoid ones, though. )

You aren't so terrible. What do you think it needs more of, then?

( Isn't that the question. A hum of thought leaves Kate's lips as she mulls it over. )

... Understandin'. People who can meet new things and not try to kill 'em.

( People who are better at dealing with both the new and their emotions better than humans are. )

That, I would agree with wholeheartedly.

[He sighs, quietly. An attempt to seem more human, perhaps, because of course this body doesn't need to breathe.]

Perhaps it is foolish to believe we can manage that, but I would like to.

( Maybe just too much time spent around humans. And maybe she's spent a bit too much time in this temple.

... There are worse places to be. )

Guess we'll try.

( If they make it out of here alive. )

We will try. If nothing else, it seems that we are all good at that.

( Kate hums in response, rocking back and using the momentum to let herself spring back to her feet.

That's all they have. But, hey, that's all anyone has ever had. The desire to try, the passion and need propelling them forwards in anything they do. )

Better see you when this is done.

( In other words: don't die, jerk, you're her favourite god. )

I intend to be here when it's all over.

[One way or another.]

We both will be. You are a survivor - it seems I am, as well.

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