[ whatever ness was expecting to come out of that jar, a caterpillar certainly was not it. she pauses, blinking at the critter with her hands halfway to putting her note paper on the desk and her brain still trying to keep up with what isaac's saying about the circles. it takes some effort to spin together all three disparate elements of her situation into a cohesive whole she can make sense of, but after a moment she sets down the papers and inkwell and reaches for a leaf. ]

I've read some to that effect, [ as she watches the caterpillar munch happily on the offered leaf. it's hard not to smile, watching a happy little insect, and ness doesn't bother pretending that she isn't delighted by the thing. ] And it makes sense, after all, Circles might as well have been their own little cities. All cities have different cultures, even if the laws are more or less the same. Some stricter or more permissive than others, some one way or the other on paper but different in fact.

[ the leaf disappears in the caterpillar's tiny jaws, and ness holds out a finger to encourage it to crawl onto. ]

A negative extreme, I take from your tone. In what ways?