Violence. It was part of him. He could feel it there at the tips of his fingers. And on an unconscious level he noticed when it rose to the surface.

Ram broke things. It wasn’t something he could help. Steel was soft as plastic. Stone as soft as sand. Every time he picked something it was in danger of tearing under his fingers. The book he held for example. Paper was nothing but wood and he could sunder a trunk like it was mulch. What did that make the thin cardboard pressed lightly in his fingers? When wood was paper, paper might as well be less than tissue.

And the tissue explained on those pages? Film and mucus.

He’d read somewhere about a woman taking contraceptives. About how his fingers passed through her organs like they were jelly. Ram couldn’t remember where but the image stayed with him. He could see himself trying to pass a needle from finger to calloused finger. Yet with each stitch he only tore more flesh. Like wet sand passing through his fingers when it should have the constancy of stone.

The siege engine slammed the book shut. There was a loud crack as the table cracked easily under his touch. Ram shoved off and the chair clattered away to a safe distance.

Ram left those few left in the library in stunned silence. Along with the doctor's text book.