Rand: Power that is used irresponsibly, or that cannot be controlled is worse than no power. It should not be used.
Egwene: But...but... it's power! You can't get rid of it! That would be like killing children, only worse! My personal version of "My Favorite Things" goes -
"Power, power, power, power, power, power, power, power/
Power, power, power, power/
Power, power, power, power/
Power, power, power, power, power."
How can you possibly get rid of power? Foreswear power? Bleh. It even leaves a bad taste in your mouth!


Rand: I shall...oh, f*** it. Sidious and co are just going to have me say I am doing things I have not actually done, so why bother.
Egwene: Too bad! They present what I am doing, presented in the best possible light, while ignoring the fact that we both prefer to prioritize our relationships somewhere below saving the world. Which I shall do with my POWER.
Rand: You know that's not actually your job, and neither you, nor that power are strictly necessary, right?
Egwene: Why thank you, Rand. That was surprisingly nice of you to agree that I should be in charge of the Tower and rationing out its resources and information to you based on what I think you need to know, said need defined based on an algorithm that is affected by my teenaged opinion of how arrogant the sole indispensible man in history is acting.
Rand: But I didn't actually... Forget it. My new strategy is for you to argue with the Dark One that breaking out of his prison will be a stupid way for him to conquer the world and achieve his goals.


Rand: I don't know what kind of experiences you have had with masseuses, but most people don't consider them as falling in the category of murder attempts. Why don't you name ONE Forsaken who wants you dead, as opposed to planning your rescue?


Egwene: My father never shows up to tell me that he is working for my enemy and spoiling the last precious thing I hoped to preserve. But I still believe I am qualified to talk smack to Rand because I share all his sufferings. I should make a note of how we are just the same on the back of my left hand, and talk to my Trakand lover about it, because politics, or anything other than my own whims do not prevent me from spending all the time with him that I wish, and enjoy the One Power I have never had to fear going mad from channeling, and issues orders to my channeling organization, for which I am given all the credit for its future accomplishments, rather than solely pre-emptively blamed for its future crimes, because I founded it when it was absolutely necessary.

Egwene:Fortunately, I can make that statement having never in my life had to confront a life and death situation that was not simple and cut-and-dried like a battlefield where facelss strangers are trying to kill me from a distance, or when obvious proof of the guilt of a bunch of Darkfriends is handed to me on a silver platter and the sentence for their crimes set in stone for over three thousand years, leaving me no real necessity for making choices or taking responsibility beyond assenting to common practice. Not that that will EVER stop me from questioning and holding the mere fact that Rand promises to deliver capital justice as proof of his overweening arrogance.


Egwene: Seriously Rand, why didn't you seize on your captivity to convince the sisters to vote YOU Amyrlin! What the hell is wrong with you that you hasn't received months of training of the best way to present yourself to Aes Sedai as Amyrlin, until you are ready to do so, even when it runs counter to your natural inclinations to act like an emotional girl in front of the Hall! Why didn't you have the good sense to sign up for that class? And why didn't you have the sense to see that a fortuitous attack on your captors would permit you to gain the upper hand in time to make a difference, rather than languishing in captivity until the Last Battle?, If you only had that much common sense, you'd have been able to relax and enjoy your captivity with your Aiel pain management techniques that make their punishments ineffective!
Rand: .... Um, what Aiel pain management techniques? Is this limited to special students of the Wise Ones, who are boarded for free in luxury tents while whining about how the Maidens serve me?
Egwene: Oh, no. It's something Aviendha taught me.
Rand: Well, she mostly just yelled at me for something I had not yet done, and never had any intention of doing, and did not want to happen anymore than she did. There wasn't time for her to teach me anything practical.
Egwene: That BITCH! I can't believe it!
Rand: You took her side at the time!!!
Egwene: Hmph. You should have complained to the Wise Ones. They are wonderful, magnificent women with superb senses of priorities and what is important, which is why I fawned all over them, took their side against you and told them everything I know about you, including secrets you clearly wished to keep from them. They'd have straightened her out.
Rand: They were annoyed that she did not explain an uncommon and irrelevant as well as perverted sexual practice, and sarcastically speculated that she might have been wasting time teaching me practical skills instead of their assinine superstitions and honor codes. Somehow I can't think why it did not occur to me to ask them for help with her choice of curriculum.

Alternatively:
Egwene: I have been a captive! They hurt me! Even though my friends are in danger of joining me in that captivity or dying, I will use the opportunity of my liberation to have a good cry. And never mind that my companions who are running the rescue have managed to elude captivity in the first place, penetrate my captor's security and devise a way to release my shackles despite a crippling channeling handicap & minimal training, I see no reason to trust their ability to finish the job of getting me free, and instead I will fling the Power about in the middle of a town full of channelers with decades and centuries of experience in One Power combat!
Rand: My brain hurts trying to imagine a scenario where I fuck up Dumai's Wells as badly as Egwene did Falme. I suppose I should have had companions to comfort me every single time I have been a captive.


Rand: I cannot afford to blindly trust a woman whose only strategies so far have been variations or combinations of "Run" and "Hide" until I get assurances she won't screw with me, which she resists giving out of arrogance.
Egwene: I can't believe the crap Moiraine is saying to Rand. It sounds worse than underhanded.
Moiraine: This is my very worldly knowledge gained from my extensive experience around the wetlands and in the Tower...are you listening Egwene?
Egwene: Hmmm? I'm sorry. I was paying more attention to a pack of parochial savages who have not yet worked out the importance of fathers in biological heredity, or the notion that other cultures might have good ideas too. Why aren't you spying on Rand for them, Moiraine?


Cadsuane: Rand, Egwene is dead.
Rand: That's very sad, and I will add her to my list, but I still have a world to save from the Shadow. I wasn't exactly counting on the Aes Sedai being a help anyway. On second thought, I'm going to keep her off the list, since I did offer her escape and refuge, despite her refusal to trust our friendship enough to ask. I've done her more than enough favors, and never received one from her that did not have an ulterior motive, like making her rival look bad, or setting me up with her friend.
Siuan: Egwene, Rand is still alive.
Egwene: Oh, good. That makes all my self-important little games might still have some meaning next year. Hell, it means there might actually BE a next year.


Romanda: Mother, we must purge ourselves of Darkfriends!
Egwene: Are you nuts? The sisters won't like that, and we'll lose our power if people get mad at us!
Saerin: We have captured a traitor, and have had no authorities from her traitor faction to order her to obey us of her own free will, so we had to constrain her against betraying us and getting us murdered by the dozens of enemies who can strike first against us and whose faces we don't even know. WE don't have fairy god-Forsaken watching over us and planning our rescues, after all.
Egwene: There is no possible reason you can be doing this aside from an unwarranted desire for power! When someone takes power, that is obviously their only motivation, because power is everything! The idea that basic survival and accomplishing a mission sometime soon might trump the possession of power is something I just cannot accept. You power-seekers should all be ashamed of yourselves! I will use a laughably faulty syllogism to prove you are bad for doing this, and hunting the Black Ajah is NO excuse for violating the sacrosanct rights of confessed traitors. I should have my blackmailed-into-swearing-fealty-vassals punish you when I am finally Amyrlin for real!


Rand: What an excellent idea! If only I had access to a nice safe Power like saidar! How very f***ing helpful, you stupid c**t! When your only choices are Crazy-making Power that was touched by the Dark One, and Crazier-making Power that is drawn FROM the Dark One directly, let's see you be all sanguine about using the Power for every little defensive task! See, some of us value the survival of our companions, and living to fight the Dark One at the Last Battle, which we might not have the luxury of doing if a crazy man who wants to kill himself takes control of my ability to channel! Since we're on the subject how'd that deflection trick work against Lanfear? Let's compare recuperation times of your headaches to my f***ing hand getting cut off, when we discuss how we got ambushed by female Forsaken.


Egwene: Power, power, power! More followers, more! I must have more power! Get out of my way Gawyn! I can't have you jogging my elbow when I have POWER to weild!
Rand: Hey, lay off him. It's not like he promised to secure a weapon that was then turned against you to make you do the one thing you have feared the most since the day you learned to channel. And it's not like the most serious failure of one of your subordinates and self-appointed guardians and caretakers came after weeks of rubbing his unproven superiority in your face.



Rand: ...doing every little thing my self! Can't you Aiel, who have not actually HELPED with anything aside from ameliorating the harm done by your own kinfolk, just PLEASE do something useful without bringing up your absurd honor? Or you Aes Sedai do something when I ask instead of making a point that you don't ACTUALLY have to obey me? I have entire countries to repair and the lives of hundreds of thousands of people hanging in the balance. Napoleon used to say "Ask me for anything but time" and he had functioning governments and one of the most admired collections of military talent in history serving under him. I have a bunch of spoiled elitists and primitive savages, all of whom had their common sense surgically removed at birth.
Egwene:...the sanitation conditions of Tar Valon, which I have been obsessing about for two books now, quite clearly take precedence over the Last Battle. I cannot possibly make common cause and share power with a woman who would neglect the sewers!