[ More smiles softly, a little forlorn but still very much genuine in sentiment. ]

It does not. I admit that it was a shock, finding out that I was not the fully realized person I had believed - or maybe merely hoped - myself to be... but it was my place here that kept me from despairing fully.

[ Sometimes you only stay alive because you owe a debt to Sonic the Hedgehog. Sometimes that's how it is. ]

I... like the way you phrased that as well. "Someone who could have been me." It hangs heavy over me that I have that potential, that that weakness of character is inherent to myself, but the actual memories of it feel distant, not quite mine.