"What's the worst she can do?" Sakura said it calmly, examining the area with a critical eye of her own. "Lock us in an unending cycle of our own inescapable torture? Please."

She moved toward one of the panels, setting Simon down in order to feel along the edge of the paneling. "If that's the fear we're living under from Mother, Dearest, then she's already being resource stupid by making any of the tortures public or literally physical. Or maybe smart, if that's the grand punishment we're most afraid of."

Not that Sakura wasn't. She'd forced herself to watch Punishment more than once, to stomach the torture Stacy had tossed around under her Warden persona. (It was all personas to Sakura.) She wanted nothing to do with it, but...

But...