Exit, pursued by a trilobite.

Here are the originals too:

we know Aral's "green silk rooms" line, of course, excellent paragraph:

"The really unforgivable acts are committed by calm men in beautiful green silk rooms, who deal death wholesale, by the shipload, without lust, or anger, or desire, or any redeeming emotion to excuse them but cold fear of some pretended future. But the crimes they hope to prevent in that future are imaginary. The ones they commit in the present--they are real."

on the one hand, yeah, very true observation, but I think given the context of what else is going on at that point (that Cordelia and by extension the reader don't find out about until later), I think there's another layer to it.

because that describes the whole Escobar war pretty much exactly. Death wholesale, by the shipload, all for the sake of killing Serg before he can become a nightmare of an emperor and destroying his political allies' popularity so they don't become a problem afterward. sound familiar?

And at the time he says this line, making sure all that happens according to plan is Aral's job. Because Ezar ordered it, and (more importantly) because Ezar convinced him it was necessary. He phrases this in general terms, but I don't think he's actually talking abstractly here, and I don't think he's being a hypocrite given everything else we see of him as a character. He seems to believe - after trying to exhaust other options - that the Escobar plan is necessary, but given how he handles it afterward (drinking, downward spiral, basically suicidal), I don't think he views it as forgivable.

Because there were a lot of orphans in the Wild West! People died like, all the time, of a lot of shit. And when you found a kid with no parents you generally had three options:

1. Find the kid a place to stay.

2. Take care of the kid yourself.

3. Leave the kid to probably fucking die on its own.

And that’s kind of the options the Armourer presents to Din! He’s told to return the kid to his people or take care of the kid, because leaving him to die isn’t a moral options and won’t be presented as one.

But like… how many Mandos out on jobs are just running into a fuck load of orphans all the time because the brutality of the Outer Rim - where slavers, pirates, and the universe at large seem keen on killing people - not because they killed the kid’s parents but because circumstances in the Outer Rim are brutal and a lot of kids are left to grow up alone?