(no subject)

[alpha_theta]

[How can he reconcile memories like this?

How can he deal with knowing what was done to him and what he was turned into?

How can he cope with looking at himself and not seeing a human, a real human, looking back at him?

He knows what he should look like, and this is not his face.

What did he do to deserve to be a monster?]

Comments

[psimera]

[Well that's certainly an interesting construct.]

...
Are you a robot or chimera? Or just a being in a suit?

[alpha_theta]

[With a low groan of a sound, Theta reached up to remove his helmet, and there he was - a man, or what had once been a man, with skin that looked like bruises over grey, eyes that glowed as yellow as his helmet's viewport. He was almost in the same shape as the helmet as well with muscles bulking up around his neck to the point of obscuring it, veiny and unnatural, and his hair laid lank against his head, stringy and black.

A man. He had once been a man.]

[psimera]

[Luckily for the Commander, he's seen quite a few... mistakes of science, and it's made him relatively immune to odd sights. The inside of a Big Daddy isn't something that will intensely disgust him or make him run screaming, though it's still probably among most of the worse things he has seen.]

...
A chimera, then.
...if you don't mind me saying so, your reconstructors were not very... neat.

[alpha_theta]

[The answer was unintelligible, but the narrowing of his eyes told its own story - he knew just what had been done to him. He also wasn't pleased. He had been, once, but now that he knew, there was anger.]

[psimera]

...
Is that another language, or is it simply that your vocal cords have been damaged?
...
No, it is too much of a coincidence that you responded to my first question if you could not understand me.

[He is very unimpressed with this shoddy reconstruction work. Shoddy.]

[alpha_theta]

[With a groan, Theta lifted a hand, motioning to the extensive scarring at his throat. There was the evidence.

This was no reconstruction. Oh, no. This had been full-out experimentation that changed him into a monster.]

[psimera]

Why have your scientists not attempted a repair? Or at least a cybernetic replacement? Surely at least some of them must be competent.

[As far as the Commander knows, though, it was a reconstruction. Generally outright experiments in his world didn't end up walking around by themselves, if they survived at all, while chimeras could be assigned jobs and sent out alone. He also can't imagine a voice being purposefully removed - that would be stupid, chimeras that have the intelligence to communicate need to be able to report back.]

[On second thought...] Can you write? It may be difficult to communicate otherwise, unless you know a form of sign language that I have in my database.