Cloud looks over to him, grateful to be worried about, but glum. He has no idea if Shin knows the truth yet, and right now he's doing all he can to avoid the truth anyway. The feeling he remembered of his real life of being a puppet, absolutely nothing, with no will on his own, was more awful than any other feeling he'd ever had. Occasionally it would pop back into his mind when he wasn't thinking about it and he'd have to force himself to forget about it again. Better to stick with the life he could remember, of bedroom production and band arguments. (Though he can't remember the faces of any of the other members of his band, or the way they moved and talked. He can't even remember their names.)

"It really isn't..." he starts, then trails off, letting the poster go. "No, it's just that I'm trying to understand something I'm doing because it feels right, no higher reason." He shakes his head. "But I still don't get it. Do you know anything about the Tree of Life?"

He'll call it by that name - it doesn't make knives twist in his gut like when he thinks of the name S********h.