conversations.from: human
conversations.value: the first three paragraphs for a book with the title 'Odd Apocalypse'
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: Odd Apocalypse
  And here, beyond the limits of Pico Mundo, I must consider the police and the courts, where I would not likely find a sympathetic ear for my story of another world within the world they know, of a more complex reality within the reality of all things material. I would be called guilty, and the guilty on whom I turned my wrath in defense of the innocent would be declared innocent victims. My best hope would be prison, my likely destination a madhouse, and during the years that I waited for that decision, I would not be able to use my gift to help anyone because I would be woven immobile in a web of lawyers.
  At the stairs, I registered something that I had seen before but not considered: a door in the farther wall. From here the stairs went up to rooms I'd already visited, but the door led to something new.
  New isn't always better. iPhones are better than rotary-dial models, but not so many years ago, some maniacs had a big new idea that they should announce their grievances by flying airliners into skyscrapers.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: five more paragraphs
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The DVDs were evidence. Until they would not be needed in order for justice to be done, I could not destroy them.
  As I accepted the fact of that, I knew what it meant: To ensure that there would be no need for the filmed evidence, I would have to deliver ultimate justice to everyone in Roseland except the boy, to the women as well as to the men. Seven deaths were warranted.
  Subconsciously, I must have known what would be required of me the moment that I'd seen the preserved corpses in the subcellar of the mausoleum. But now I could no longer repress the awareness that my role here was to be a scourge, that I could not merely free the boy and leave with him. I could not restrict my killing to self-defense or to the defense of the child.
  Who scourges will be scourged. In fulfilling this dark role in Roseland, I would bring about my own death.
  I got up and went on. The last of Constantine Cloyce's private quarters was the bedroom with en-suite bath.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: the last five paragraphs
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The best part of a Mr. Goodbar is not the wrapper, is it? No, and the best part of a Coke is not the can. On those nights when you lie awake, either man or boy, wondering about yourself, peeling away one layer of oddness after another, you should remember and always be grateful that the woefully imperfect person that you are, with all your contradictions and unworthy desires, is not the best of you, any more than the wrapper is the best part of a Mr. Goodbar.
  Tim said he didn't understand me any more than I understand Annamaria, but he felt better. That's all that matters, really: that we can make each other feel better.
  This morning, however, as I sat on the front porch drinking coffee, he strolled by on the beach in a three-piece suit and black wingtips. He waved at me and kept walking, but I suspect that any day now, when I come out for coffee on the porch, he'll be there.
  And so I wait for the bell to ring in the night. I dream of Stormy, I walk in search of Annamaria's mysterious tree, I go down to the sea to swim in the shallows with Tim, and I wait for the bell to ring.
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