[It's difficult to pin down which piece of information is more arresting — the question of just what she's envisioning when she rebuts his assertion of a lack of greenery, or the fact that she claims not to know what would begin to make up for the ways she was wronged. Neither one seems to fit with his conception of Midgar, the former in a physical sense and the latter in a philosophical one. How does one endure being Shinra property without dreaming of all the ways one intends to be compensated for the experience someday? What even kept her going, if not the ambitious thirst for how it would someday all be different?]

I don't like unbalanced ledgers. [And then, after another drink:] Why can't you take this seriously?

[It's an odd thing to say — definitely a remark he would've known better than to let escape if he weren't preoccupied with the hit of the alcohol on his back palate and the fact that it's definitely warmer in the room now than it'd been even just minutes ago, not unpleasantly so but disarmingly so. He thinks about how her eyes are astonishingly green, and how he doesn't usually bother to notice the color of someone's eyes unless he's looking for a mako glow.]

I don't care about my father's bullshit. His so-called Promised Land. We're nothing alike.

[They are, at times, quite a bit alike, but it feels particularly important at this point to maintain the contrary.]

Doesn't mean I won't settle his debts. It's mine now. My Shinra. My responsibility.