Day 377,

Pat gave me this.  The girl’s plan is foolish romanticism, but it has more ground than 
it has any right to.

I won’t read anything you wrote.  Even I have standards.

I was acting as substitute teacher the day you arrived.  I announced after the noontime 
recess that there would be no more class for the season because an outsider had arrived 
and Pat and I would be busy dealing with that.  I still kept them until the end of the 
normal school day.

I kept an eye on you for a time after that.  You struck me as fairly normal for an outsider.  
Curious.  Poking around.  Asking “Why?”  Going places best left well enough alone.  Dragging 
others along with you.  Maybe not to the same degree as some - you’re on the timid side - 
but within normal parameters enough to potentially be a bother.

I still think that of you.  This right here is a bother.

It’s unusual that you went so deep into the Catacomb Depths so quickly, but you all have 
something unusual that happens.  Almost a constant that there will be at least one 
randomized outlying factor.

But no, I don’t think you’re that special.  You have pain?  Inner turmoil?  Social problems?  
Welcome to being human.  Everyone has something and you’re hardly the first or only one to 
have your particular set.

And that’s why I don’t think you’re done here yet.  Outsiders don’t normally come and go 
this quickly and you’re not that special.  Unless things are far worse than I calculated, 
and I don’t think that’s the case.

So get your outlying factor over with already and go back to being a standard issue bother 
for me.  The mists will be back tomorrow.  Will you?