"What do you think would be the worst way to kill someone?"
"Worst how? Like, the way you're most likely going to be caught, the least efficient one, the way you're going to hurt them the most? Which one?"
"Right. Which way do you think would feel the worst for them? Off the top of my head I was thinking burning but there's probably a better alternative."
"Hmm. You take them somewhere really high. And I'm talking really high, up in the sky, not just a tall building or a cliff or something. And then you drop them."
"Huh. That doesn't really sound all that painful. I mean yeah it's going to hurt a lot but it doesn't sound like it's going to last that long, they're going to die the moment they hit the ground. Probably turn into a stain or something, what's the terminal velocity of a body anyway?"
"No it's not just about the dying. Hear me out on this. You shoot someone, they're not going to have the time to really process that they're about to die. Even if they don't die on the spot, they're gonna be in pain after that, maybe pass out from blood loss before dying, maybe they'll be in denial because they're not dead yet. Same with something like a wound. You set someone on fire, choke them or drown them, they'll have other things filling their head."
"Your point?"
"The moment you drop someone from that height, they're dead. Case closed, fate sealed, literally nothing you can do about it. Even if something suddenly grabbed them whiplash would still do it. But they are not in pain, or under physical stress like not being able to breathe. It's all mental. They are completely, undeniably already dead, and their mind is totally unobstructed and free to contemplate that fact, and they have the whole length of the drop to think about it knowing there's nothing they can do. That's the stuff that breaks someone."
"Yeah. I guess I see the point. Are you sure it's worse than burning someone alive though?"
"No. And, you know, I'm never going to find out, hopefully. Not like I could, it's not exactly the kind of thing you can compare, you don't live through more than one of those things that's kind of the starting point of the whole argument. Why did you bring it up, anyway?"
"It occurred to me."
"You worry me sometimes. Couldn't you have normal thoughts? You know, happy cool thoughts that don't involve death?"
"You're one to talk."
"Mine's called an aesthetic."
"Sure. Least painful way to die?"
"Oh that's easy. Progressive oxygen deprivation is literally just falling asleep as your brain starts to die, it's the comfiest death there is."
"I'm not sure I'd describe any death as comfy, honestly."
"Well yeah but relatively speaking one's still gotta be the comfiest. Fire's warm but you'll still have a colder fire and a coldest fire."
"Eh. I suppose you've got a point, yeah."