[ The specificity of his workings in human affairs might be honoured by a documentarian of the supernatural, someone content to observe the uncanny at remove, but the collision of their respective worlds is also an epistemological unification, that is to say, he is initiated into the knowledge of Christmasland and she into his inhumanity. His newly acquired insight imperils her mission because, unlike the everyman, he actually possesses the facility to act on that insight. She cannot admit neutrality from such a force: an attitude that Millie inherited from her father. There is a reason that the supernaturally-inclined scatter upon sighting the awful figure of Charlie Manx.

She roosts on his chest with such outrageous ease not from a place of insolence alone. In Millie's afflicted mind no personal boundary is breached. Spontaneous roughhousing, mindless brawls, are all too common in Christmasland. Habit compels her to treat him like a fellow child, albeit a big one, although she knows he is not.

His request for civility meets a saw-toothed smile. ]

I saw it clear, in the well of your eye. The fury. Did you want to play?

[ Millie rises and takes his hand. She pulls the man upright, a whole ninety degrees from a lying position to a standing one in a motion. ]

"Our kind" is a menagerie. Some of us are sworn enemies. You can't protect me and be a friend of the Walking Backwards Man.