Because he said so. Is that it? Because he's older and smarter than them, and he said so. That's always the rationale. Because that's simply how it is with him, and everyone like him; lever an absolutism across the weight in their chest, in their SOUL, burn it into the back of their eyelids, suffuse the decision with a sickening guilt. You're taking advantage. You're being bad, by refusing him. By fighting it, every inch, with tooth and nail, with a stinging backhand across the skin of every Because I said so spat at your feet.

Their feet.

The words emerge with an excruciating abruptness, almost strangled, as though it physically pains him to speak them. They are fine, and they are smiling, and they are in control. They are in control.

And the words someone else's puppet whip-crack across their ears and

They are in control.

And his voice has pitched in the way that indicates a sense of desperation as he frantically gives that up.

Someone else's puppet.

They are

They are in control.

They are smiling, and

Someone else's

And they are in control.

They have gone still, stiller than is typical for them, eyes locked on his, smile frozen, seizing it, holding it, determined not to let it slip. Do not slip. Do not slip. They are in control. They are smiling. They are in control.

They speak. Slowly, deliberately. Draw the words out with the gravitas they deserve.

"What," says Chara, closing the "t" with cold snap of teeth, "do you mean by puppet. Exactly."

It is not a question.