['The ills of bourgeois oppression'.... yes, so maybe it's not the ideal time to mention in passing that his Parisian boyfriend is a baron, or that he himself was a very privileged doctor of the administration back home. His own smile thins to something slightly wincing and wary at Grantaire's bitterness.]

Missionworth was... interesting, if a bit more primitive with technologies than I'm used to. [Daedalus frowns, folding his hands carefully at the edge of the tabletop] I think it's a shame that history seems doomed to repeat itself, with SERO and AGI's bickering about what we ought to do about the Core.

I'm glad to be back in a proofed apartment, though. We were woefully unprepared for the Darkness Decay Effect running unchecked. But if witnessing the birth of such an oppressive phenomenon can be made useful, I intend to do something with it. I've half a mind to inform SERO's research program about its beginnings myself, if they'd listen, because it might be able to prove or disprove some of the standing theories about how to dissolve it.

Since I've been here, nearly three years now, it's been nothing but a continual exercise in adaptation. And just when you think all is right, this place pulls the rug out from under you and scatters all your progress to the winds.

It's very tiresome. Particularly when one hopes to advance their career.