Ned doesn't say anything more as he listens, watches Galen as he struggles to get the words out. He doesn't want to know the details that fill in the gaps of the story, doesn't want to know exactly how Galen hurt Jesse. It's enough to know that he did. Ned really likes the both of them, by this point, and the thought of Galen hurting Jesse makes him feel horrible for both of them. Ned knows what it's like to hurt people without meaning to, to feel that guilt, that self-loathing. But he also knows what it's like to be hurt, and they are both valid, both unenviable.
He hadn't noticed himself getting tense as the story went on, but when Galen says that he'd managed to eradicate the corrupted part of himself - the part that was causing the pain - Ned feels a bitter envy. That isn't something he's ever going to be able to do. It shouldn't be a surprise to him, to learn that the only way Galen hurt people in the past was because of an external, malevolent influence. He was just another one of the victims, in his own way, and now he is clean again, pure again, with the evil 'bled out', as he put it.
But Ned can tell that this business for the past few days has been opening some very deep old wounds, and he doesn't envy that, at least.
"It is sick," he confirms, "How could they do that to you?" It is rhetorical; Ned knows that human beings possess a near infinite capacity for cruelty, shouldn't be surprised by it. But when it's directed at Galen, at someone he was just starting to be friends with, it revolts him anew. "What could they possibly hope to gain out of making you relive all that stuff?"
Ned sighs, and it is an angry sound. Angry on Galen's behalf. "The way it sounds to me, none of all that was your fault in the first place. But I also know that knowing that doesn't make anything any easier." Now is the time when, if he wanted to be fair, Ned would tell Galen his own story, to show just how much he can empathize, can really understand what it's like to feel toxic. He doesn't.
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He hadn't noticed himself getting tense as the story went on, but when Galen says that he'd managed to eradicate the corrupted part of himself - the part that was causing the pain - Ned feels a bitter envy. That isn't something he's ever going to be able to do. It shouldn't be a surprise to him, to learn that the only way Galen hurt people in the past was because of an external, malevolent influence. He was just another one of the victims, in his own way, and now he is clean again, pure again, with the evil 'bled out', as he put it.
But Ned can tell that this business for the past few days has been opening some very deep old wounds, and he doesn't envy that, at least.
"It is sick," he confirms, "How could they do that to you?" It is rhetorical; Ned knows that human beings possess a near infinite capacity for cruelty, shouldn't be surprised by it. But when it's directed at Galen, at someone he was just starting to be friends with, it revolts him anew. "What could they possibly hope to gain out of making you relive all that stuff?"
Ned sighs, and it is an angry sound. Angry on Galen's behalf. "The way it sounds to me, none of all that was your fault in the first place. But I also know that knowing that doesn't make anything any easier." Now is the time when, if he wanted to be fair, Ned would tell Galen his own story, to show just how much he can empathize, can really understand what it's like to feel toxic. He doesn't.