Book 3: The Encounter

AKA “The first named character attempts suicide and suffers the first breakdown regarding humanity”

• This is going to be messy because 98% of my thoughts on this are PLEASE LET MY BOY REST.

• The scene in the mall almost made me cry, oh my God.

• I am now older and have had more therapy and have come into my own personality, and I now understand much more fully why I always connected the most with Tobias the broken boy and Rachel the war machine and….um, yeah.

• His family doesn’t care enough to realize that he’s gone.  I’m fine.  *holds organs into body*  I’m fine.

• The scene where they all almost get stuck as half-wolves is SOME SHIT.

• I worry about Tobias so much.

• Is he okay.

• Is he cold.

• Is it raining, does he hide out at Rachel’s when it’s pouring and he doesn’t want to deal with it, does she conveniently acquire a knickknack to keep on her desk (Rachel’s desk is usually pristine) that works as a perch so that he can read over her shoulder and listen to her complain about the Grapes of Wrath and help her with geometry (Tobias is brilliant and you can fight me) and crack horrible unfunny jokes about Romeo and Juliet.

• Rachel and Tobias weren’t QUITE my first ship. But they were close.  And I was committed.  I loved that ship.  I still love that ship.  Someone link me to art, I need to cry over birds and warriors and people who matter.

• Don’t talk to me about the scene where Rachel calls out to say goodbye to him from inside the tank ship because they’ve all decided to go down fighting and she expects to die before she sees him again. I have.  Some trauma regarding Rachel saying goodbye to Tobias, it happens one too many times for my liking.

• SOMEONE HUG TOBIAS???  OR SOMETHING????  DO SOMETHING FOR HIM???  TELL HIM HE’S USEFUL????  THAT HE MATTERS????  THAT THE OTHERS CARE WHETHER HE LIVES OR DIES????

• Rachel is the best thing that happens to him in this book to be honest, she’s the one he goes to after he kills, who tells him he’s still a person, that he’s not evil or cruel for killing to eat.  I think this is a glimpse of the Rachel we see later in the war: Tobias needs to live and that means he needs to eat.  To Rachel it’s that simple.  It doesn’t make him anything except Tobias.  He thinks she’s bothered that he’s killed, but I’d bet anything that she’s bothered because he’s upset and she wants him to be okay.

• The others were there.  Cassie gets to be the hero, talk the others out of the wolf morph, and that’s awesome.  Marco…poor kid’s just so terrified and it manifests as being an asshole, I get that, and I think it makes Tobias feel better to be mocked by Marco.  Jake tries so hard to take good care of his people, someone kill me.