“He was a dying man looking down on the surgeons trying to save him.”

“Is the labyrinth living or dying? Which is he trying to escape—the world or the end of it?”

“Right, well, he'd been sick for a while and his nurse said to him, 'You seem to be feeling better this morning,' and Isben looked at her and said, 'On the contrary,' and then he died.”

“I couldn't be mad at him for even a moment, and only now that I loved a grenade did I understand the foolishness of trying to save others from my own impending fragmentation...”

“That's the mystery, isn't it? Is the labyrinth living or dying? Which is he trying to escape---the world or the end of it?”

“I nudged my head into his shoulder. "Thanks for offering to come over.""you realize that trying to keep your distance from me will not lessen my affection for you," he said."i guess?" i said."all efforts to save me from you will fail," he said.”

“He wasn’t perfect or anything. He wasn’t your fairy-tale Prince Charming or whatever. He tried to be like that sometimes, but I liked him best when that stuff fell away.”