"Just what kind of noose are you offering to put round my neck, here? Is this treason?" "Worse," Cazaril sighed. "Theology." - Lois McMaster Bujold

My brother has this bad little habit of editing his version of reality to fit his audience.

On the thought a blessed silence came, an empty clarity. He took it a first for utter desolation, but desolation was a type of free fall, perpetual and without ground below. This was stillness: balanced, solid, weirdly serene. No momentum to it at all, forward or backwards or sideways.

He lay drained of tension, not moving, and content to be so. The oddly stretched moment was like a bite of eternity, eaten on the run. Was this quiet place inside something new-grown, or had he just never stumbled upon it before? How could so vast a thing lay undiscovered for so long? His breathing slowed and deepened.

Yes, well…actual combat…is a lot stupider than I’d imagined. If two groups can cooperate to the incredible extent it takes to meet in battle, why not put in a tenth that effort to talk?