Theseus

Fear. Anxiety. Helplessness. Noise. So much noise. I couldn't remember ever feeling this... wrong. A fog hung over me and clouded my every thought with terror. And pain. Unbound to any physical sensation, I felt profound, all-consuming pain. Nothing made sense. Everything felt distant and unsure, like I couldn't trust my own senses. I needed comfort. I needed relief. I needed to escape. I needed anything to make the pain within stop, even if only for a moment. Anything.

What was happening to me? This was wrong. This was so wrong. Don't cry. Whatever happens. Do. Not. Cry. You can't let her see you cry! That will only make it worse. The pain will be so much worse if she finds out. Wait, what did that mean?

"Meryll?" a young girl's voice called through the haze. Something soothing. Something good. Something I could latch onto. Something that made sense.

My eyes burned with red-hot tears trapped behind my eyelids and I felt a single whimpering sob escape my lips. I couldn't control myself. I felt so scared. So lost. So tired, even though I'd just woken up. An irresistible alien urge overcame me, and I hurriedly pulled my forearm up to my face, my mouth opening wide and then closing down hard on my limb, full intent to chomp down as hard as I could into my skin. Into my bone. I needed to feel something real! Bodily pain was relief from the inner pain!

I tasted rough cloth, and I despaired that I felt no pain. Finally managing to force my eyes open and let the ghosts of suppressed tears rush down my cheeks, I looked down to see a thick wrap bound tightly around my forearm, too bulky for me to penetrate, too soft to chip my teeth, but not restricting my joint. I stared at the limb in dazed confusion for only a moment before I heard the voice again. "Meryll?" And my senses flooded back to me. The pain remained.

I felt soft padding at my back and beneath me. White cushioned walls surrounded me on both sides, and I knew intuitively that the one behind me was identical. A bright light hovered somewhere impossibly high above me, bathing the room in sterile brightness. Lifting my head, I could see another girl standing past the far end of the room.

She had dark brown hair, neatly shaved down near to her scalp. The girl stared in at me through a semi-transparent door with tired blue eyes. She wore a slightly jaundiced white canvas outfit. Though her hands were free, I could see the straps and partially detached oversized sleeves hanging down lazily around her arms, ready to restrain her the moment she became unruly. A strait jacket. I briefly lifted my other arm again to feel the same weight on my own jacket's sleeves.

Behind the girl stood an adult figure. I couldn't make anything of that person out, though. They were a blurry silhouette behind the clear image of the girl. An indistinct monster hovering over her.

I opened my mouth and prepared to ask who they were. Instead, I heard an unfamiliar voice. "Lily...?" asked a hoarse young girl, her voice shaking in fear through the edge of a protected arm. It took me a moment to realize it was my own voice. I returned to trying to gnaw through my arm's prison.

"See? She's calm now. She recognizes me. She's okay. C-Can I talk with her?" Lily asked nervously.

A haunting noise echoed from the figure standing behind her. It made my head hurt. I reached up with my free hand to cover my ear and experienced a sudden moment of clarity as I felt the side of my head.

No neural implant. Refusing to let go of the limb in my mouth, that other hand dropped to my side and checked my hip. No hardware case. And I already knew my forearm wasn't hiding a terminal beneath its wrappings. I was not augmented.

Clarity slipped away again as I fell back into my role, and the figure droned on. That wasn’t what happened. I wasn't really here. Not like that. My hand was over my ear.

"But... I-I can help. Come on, please? I-I need to. My vision... I have to." Lily begged, staring up at the discordant ghost at her side. There was a long silence before the door slowly slid open of its own volition and the figure disappeared, dispersing as if a cloud of smoke in the wind. Lily still took the time to give a quiet "Thank you," before she stepped into my room with nervous apprehension.

Reflex guided my body as I curled up and tried to make myself small, shame and confusion assaulting my already confused thoughts, but I refused to drop my arm. "Lily." I briefly parted from it to croak out again quietly.

"Y-yeah, it's me. Don't be scared, Meryll." She stepped up close to me and we stared into each other's haunted eyes for a long moment before she sat down in front of me. She understood. She felt it too. But she was stronger, somehow. "I know it's scary... and this world hurts. It really does..." I nodded slowly and sniffled as I impotently bit at the wrapping once more. Just the action gave me some comfort, even if I was spared the much-needed external pain.

"But you just need to-to cooperate with them. Just for a little while. They're... going to put us back. Back into our good lives." She explained. I whimpered and pulled myself into a tighter ball, turning slightly away from her.

I couldn't go back. Not after all of this. I couldn't imagine being able to live as I once did, knowing what I knew now. It felt insulting to hear. I tightened my jaw, trying in vain to bite down harder and break through the protective cloth. Through my skin and bone. How could I go back to my family? My job? After what I knew. After what I felt. "They just need to do a few things. Ask us some questions. All of us. Then we can go back. That's all. Just a few things, then we can forget."

Forget? They can make us forget? I loosened my grip on my protected limb. It wasn't satisfying the way it should have been; the way it was when I could reach my flesh. And that I could forget. That this pain could go away. It called to me. Enough to distract me from the rough cloth.

She reached to my arm and pulled it gently away from my face, a thin trail of spittle hanging between my two parts until I let her put it down to my side.

I avoided her gaze. I already felt uncomfortable letting go of my teething implement, but if it would let me forget everything, then I would endure. At least, I would try.

"Okay. Good. That's good. You don't need to hurt yourself. This is just... temporary. Okay?" Lily kept a gentle hold of my arm, and I gave her an uncertain nod. I began grinding my teeth, already feeling an urge building up within me. I was on the verge of doing something, but I wasn't sure what yet. I had to do something to quiet the noise.

"Do you understand what's happening? A-are you thinking clearly now?" She asked.

I shook my head. I was more confused than ever. I tried to look her in the eyes again, but discomfort deflected my every attempt. I fidgeted with my fingers. I had to do something. I had to. I couldn't just let my mind wander. That let the pain sneak in. The noise grew louder.

"Can you tell me what you need?"

I shook my head again and muttered out, "Anything else. Anything else." I tried to raise my arm again, but she gently insisted it not lift up to my face. That was irritating. Distressing.

"They don't want you to bite yourself. It's not good for you. They just want to keep you safe, okay?"

Safe? Safe?! There was no safe. Not like this. I could only draw my thoughts away from the pain within. That damned noise. I needed the piercing of skin. I needed to hear that gentle snap of my bones. I needed to feel. I needed something to happen on the outside to make the pain on the inside fade, and they were keeping that from me. She was keeping that from me!

She leaned in close when I tried harder to break her grip. Curiosity and desperation set in. I needed my blood. I needed that pain. I knew that.

But what if it didn't have to be me?

The world became a blur of motion, and I heard a confused scream cry out from Lily. She still sat over me after I lunged into her, but she let out ragged breaths as I felt that familiar wet iron taste on my tongue. I crunched down and felt bone give just as it had for mine. She let out a weaker cry of shock and disbelief, her breath hitching as her eyes went wide with pain and fear.

I was wrong.

It didn't feel good at all. There was no relief to be found here. While she reflexively tried to wrench her arm away from me, I reluctantly unlocked my jaw from the other girl and she let out a whimper, frantically crawling back away from me in fear, a thin splash of red marring the pristine white beneath her. The look of terror on her face was hurtful, and the taste of blood on my lips did nothing for me. It didn't help. It wasn't the same. It didn't mute the pain. Hurting her did nothing for me.

The terrible monstrous sound that made my head hurt returned in a cacophonous chorus of lost voices, shadows gathering in a rush around me, and in a few moments, I was lost in their drone, reality falling apart around me.

—

I stirred once more into unbearable consciousness. The first thing I noticed was the straps of my jacket, bound tight against my waist. I'd lost my arm privileges entirely, now. Not that it mattered. They'd kept me from the related escape, anyway. Losing mobility meant nothing to me. What felt so much more torturous was the device now strapped to my head. A rigid metal cage strapped inches from my mouth. A muzzle with a clear implied message: no biting.

I couldn't help myself this time. I sobbed and broke down into tears. There was no comfort in this world. No respite. Not even for a moment. I dropped down onto my side and tried to slam my head into the padded floor, but I could barely bring myself to mild discomfort against the firm cushions, never mind genuine pain.

Why did I have to try that? That girl was nice. She was company. She was something I couldn't name, something I’d forgotten, but she pulled me up from the pain, just a little. Her presence quieted the noise. Why did I have to screw that up? Now I would probably never see her again. I'd never hear that soothing voice.

I sobbed and let my tears soak into the soft floor, whimpering my regrets and wishing I could just feel... something. Anything but what I felt now. Terrible, helpless fear. Certainty of the cruelty I knew. Drowning in the din of this world. Pain. The inside kind of pain that didn't feel like relief the way tearing my flesh did.

Nothing made sense.

I don't know how long i laid on that floor in catatonic dissociation, trying in vain to focus on the numbness of empty routine behind the agony, but eventually I heard a noise. A figure approaching.

I slowly turned my head toward the door to focus on the sound. I only heard the sound of the hazy giants. Go away. You don't help. You never help. You caused this, didn't you? I can't understand you, but I can tell this is your fault. You made it happen. You took my life away. My happiness. My normalcy. My safety. Leave me alone. If you won't let me relieve myself, then at least just let me wallow in my misery.

"I can't believe they haven't just dumped you in the trash yet," came a voice, recognizable and bitter. I sat up straight in a hurry, my eyes widening in terror as I tried to force my tears back down. No. Not her.

She stepped in front of the transparent door, flanked by two of the larger fuzzy figures. She was indistinct, almost like the monsters, but I could still identify her. Still hear her. And she stopped and turned to look in on me. Just like Lily, but her opposite. A bitter heart that only made the inside pain worse. She amplified the worst of my feelings.

"Hmph... crying again. You're pathetic." She sounded satisfied, like my weakness reassured her. "All they would have to do is loosen a sleeve, and you'd do the job for them, wouldn't you?"

The figures towering over her nudged the girl forward and took her by the shoulder to push her along past me, but she continued speaking as she left my sight. "We'll be fine with six. You're not even really one of us, anyway. You're not good enough. Just a matter of time before they realize it." They pushed her along the corridor out of the hall connected to my cell with the sound of the indistinct groans of our captors. And then it was silent again.

Those words branded me deep. You're not good enough. You're not good enough. I couldn't hold myself back. I sobbed loud and hard. I fell to my side, burying my head into the floor again. I pressed my muzzle against my face and hoped I could dig the metal deep into my skin, but the base of it was padded as well, so it gave no relief, only a gentle pressure.

What was this hell? She was right. I wasn't good enough. I didn’t even want to be good enough. I just wanted out. I couldn't stand to exist unlike her and Lily and the others. They didn't need to be restrained. They didn't need to be kept from tearing themselves apart. They didn't cry. They didn't disappoint the captors that could apparently give me my old life back if only I did things right and behaved. Their talents were celebrated while I had nothing. They could face this world. But I wasn't good enough.

I cried until I couldn't cry anymore. When I ran out of tears, it was a welcome reprieve. I was too tired. The pain numbed. Good enough. I closed my eyes and managed to slip into fitful sleep, the girl's words drilling deep into my psyche.

—

"I'm sorry." I called out hoarsely every time I saw Lily pass my cell. My voice rarely called for anyone else. She was almost always unrestrained and walking alongside a single handler, usually clear-minded though occasionally in a quiet dissociative fog. And for a long time after our encounter, she had clean bandages wrapped over her left forearm; a reminder of a poignant moment in a short lifetime of weakness.

She turned to look when I called, but the one accompanying her always hurried her along before she could say anything.

I deserved that neglect. But I still cried when she left me alone again. I couldn't hold it back anymore. Even when that other girl came by, she saw me in the deepest pits of despair and relentlessly berated me for my powerlessness. Why wouldn't she? I was pathetic, and I was wasting her and everyone else's time. Part of me began looking forward to her fast cutting words. Relief from my inside pain by piling on a different kind of inside pain. A distraction of some manner, at least. That's what I needed. Even if I did start to believe her, deep down. It was worth it for those moments of relief.

"Do you cry like this every time?" I heard a gentle voice ask, and my eyes went wide to see Lily standing in front of my door. Alone. She gripped a small plastic badge in her hand. I wasn't sure how I recognized it as something belonging to one of the indistinct figures, but I did. "After I leave?"

I stared bleary-eyed at the girl for a moment, wondering if she was real. I nodded slowly and tried to make myself sit up, stumbling over myself for a moment in my armless clumsiness before succeeding. "I-I'm sorry." I stammered out again.

"I know." She mumbled, her free hand wandering across to the arm holding the badge. It was still bandaged, but much more lightly than I saw it in the aftermath of our last encounter. "That day... did you mean to hurt me?"

As much as I wanted to say no, I knew that was a lie, and she didn't deserve a lie. She deserved to know what a shitty, worthless thing I was. I nodded.

She looked worried, but continued with another question. "Why did you bite me?"

"I thought it might help." I sniffled. "Like... when I bite myself."

"Did it?" She asked, her tone turning curious.

I couldn't help but let out a sob. "No. Nothing helps. Nothing makes me feel right."

"But you know now... hurting other people doesn't help?" She asked.

"I know hurting you doesn't help." I blubbered out, feeling myself on the verge of returning to tears. I whined, "I'm sorry."

There was a long pause where she looked down on me and fidgeted with the badge in her hand while I tried to pull myself together.

Then the door made a distinctive click and slowly slid open. I stared, partly in wonder, partly in horror, at the girl holding the badge up to something just out of view, releasing the seal on my cell.

I sat back straight against the wall, not sure what to do. I didn't trust myself. Not with her. She was too nice. Too fragile. I didn't want to break her. Not again. But at the same time...

Her mere presence offered the promise of comfort.

I stared at her, deeply conflicted as she approached me one cautious footstep at a time.

"... You look so scared." She commented while she walked.

"I am scared." I whimpered, trying my best to curl up tight again, but the strait jacket severely hampered my flexibility.

"Of me?" Lily asked, confused amusement in her tone.

"Of hurting you." I tried to push myself flat against the wall again instead.

She stopped approaching, finally hesitating. "Do you think you can't control yourself?"

I nodded, managing to keep myself from breaking down with that admission of weakness.

I noticed her swallow, fear in her eyes as she took another step forward, almost at my foot now. "Well... they made it so you can't now. So it'll be okay, right?"

I... supposed that was true. I couldn't bite her. I couldn't claw her with my nails. The worst I could do would maybe be to throw my whole body into her, or stand up and kick her. Not only was I too tired to try that, I also certainly didn't want to. I never wanted to hurt her again. It didn’t help. It made things worse.

She sat down in front of me just like on that day. Then she stopped to think about something and instead shuffled up against the wall just like I was, sitting at my side, shoulder to shoulder, facing the still-open door. I sat stock still for a long time as we both wallowed in silence in each other's company. I couldn't take the quiet anymore after a few minutes. "Aren't you scared of me?" I asked.

She thought about it for a moment. "Do you think I should be?"

"I-I don't know." I mumbled back. With all my restraints, I guess I wasn't much of a threat anymore. "Why did you come back? I hurt you."

"Yeah..." She trailed off after a moment, and I thought we were going to descend back into uncomfortable silence. Did she even know why she came? Was she following some kind of instinct she didn’t understand, too? "Because you need someone. And I want to help. And the sooner you feel better, maybe the sooner we can all get back to the lives we're supposed to have."

Was it really that simple? Was this truly just some purgatory we would wake up from one day? "Am I holding you back?" I grumbled sadly. "Am I holding everyone back?"

"I-I didn't mean it like that." She backpedaled, her voice growing nervous. "Umm... You know we all have talents, right? We can do special things with our minds."

I shook my head. "No. I can't. I'm not special."

She shifted uncomfortably, trying to position herself to lean into me slightly. "Maybe you just haven't figured out what you're good at yet. I think you will. I think you'll get a lot better, eventually. Maybe even soon."

"It's hard." I sniffled. "I don't get it. Everything hurts. It hurts inside and I don't know what to do. It hurts, and it's like no one understands. I-I can tell you do, but you're so much stronger. I can't take it. I can't. Everything is too... too much." I sobbed, putting my head down and wishing I could wipe away the tears. "How do I feel better? It's impossible. I'm trapped like this. It's never going to get better. I'm just going to hurt more people I like."

Lily hummed quietly, almost like she was agreeing with me on something. She knew my pain. But then she continued. "What I was trying to say is... I can see the future."

I opened my eyes in surprise at that statement. "The future?" I asked.

She nodded. "It's not always clear. But I can see stuff before it happens. It's how I got here alone. I knew that orderly would doze off at his post today, and I could take his badge. And I knew if I did that, we could talk alone." She turned to look at me in the eyes and gave a gentle smile. "It's how I know you're not always going to be like this."

I turned to look back at her myself. "R-Really?" I asked hopefully. I'd be free from this someday? Really? This wasn't forever? For certain?

She nodded. "I've seen you gathered around with the rest of us for lessons. I've seen you with this off." She gestured to my face and the metal cage over it. "I've seen you smiling. Sort of. I haven't seen your talent yet, but maybe I will if I spend more time with you."

"You... want to spend time with me?" I asked sheepishly, feeling my face heat up slightly.

She nodded. "I don't get much context from my visions... but I think you're a good person, Meryll. You're just hurting. And confused. And you just need some help."

I sobbed again. What I needed was to feel something. Physical pain seemed obvious. Sorrow hurt more, but was followed by a comfortable numbness. But there was something else here, with Lily. Maybe this was good, too. "Can you help me?" I managed to ask before I broke down into tears once more.

I felt her put her arm over mine, and she pulled me into her. She wrapped her arms around me, and I felt a dam break in my heart. I let out a loud wail and leaned into her, wanting desperately to hold her back as well, but this comfort would do. I cried and cried, all my pain rushing out of me and spilling onto her shoulder, desperately trying to fill the momentary gap in my soul with whatever hope I could manage, trust in this girl who accepted me even though I hurt her, and this foreign sense of comfort that felt like the polar opposite to the pain that plagued me this whole time. Lily was exactly what I needed. She could save me. I could believe in her.

"I... I know it's not completely selfless. I really want to get us back to the lives we should have. I want to forget, too." Lily explained. I didn't want her to downplay her kindness, but I was in no position to voice my objection. "And I know we’ll forget each other, too. But while we're here, we can help each other get there sooner, right? And maybe make the time between less painful? We can be friends."

Friends. I needed a friend. But even that felt too shallow for what she gave me. I needed more than that. "Sisters...?" I tried through blubbering tears.

She stiffened slightly. I wasn't sure why, but she seemed surprised by that word, but then she relaxed again. "Yeah. We're sisters." She said in a comforting, enthusiastic voice as she held me tighter than before.

My sister, Lily. My family. I tried to smile at that. I wasn't sure if it came off as a smile, because her words renewed my tears as well. I buried my head into her, not to desperately claw for whatever comfort I could try to manage through misguided violence this time, but because I had someone warm and nice who listened to me and let me cry my tears into her instead of berating me for them.

I still hurt, deep inside. Something was terribly wrong with me. The noise crackled away at the back of my thoughts, but it was quieter at that moment. At last, I found this feeling that was more than a distraction. It was a soothing balm to my tortured soul.

Love.

We stayed like that, with me wrapped in her comforting embrace for what must have been hours. Several times, I broke into tears again when the noise threatened to eke back into the forefront of my mind, and she reminded me of her presence by stroking my back and renewing her grip on me. She offered me comforting words and her understanding acknowledgements of my suffering. I grew scared when I heard the groaning voices of the others in the hall outside. I didn't dare look toward them, but they didn't interrupt us. They didn't take my Lily away from me. Not until my tears had run dry, and I had slipped back into unconsciousness, for once in my life outside of that comforting world I left, sliding peacefully into a comforting dream. And I knew, even if she wasn't there when I woke up, that I could feel better so long as she was near. As long as I could be with her, even in passing, everything would be okay.

—

My eyes shot open, spilling trapped tears down onto the medical bed as I sat paralyzed within my heart. Noise. There was so much noise. I closed my eyes again and quieted the numerous logs and reports and queries that had somehow evaded my filters while I was asleep, and in a heartbeat, my mind was calm again and I opened my eyes to assess reality. The soft hum of Theseus's systems both within and around me anchored me to the real world again, and I took stock of where I was. My heart. I was at the center of Theseus. I was a sapient starship core aboard the pirate vessel Theseus, and I was also Theseus itself.

The previous night, I was overcoming sensory shock so I could keep talking to Isabelle and learn how to communicate with her better. Checking my health logs, I groaned when I realized I hadn't slept for five days when I’d left the core module, and that was probably nearing my limit. I must have passed out during recovery. That all made sense to me again. I was of sound mind. There was no mysterious ethereal aching pain in my heart and head, driving me mad. I was not a lost child in some kind of psychiatric prison. I was free. If I had my way, I would always be free.

That dream. That was too real to just be a dream. It wasn't like my nightmares before it. It was almost lucid. Like I'd actually been there. A memory, clear as day. Still abstract in some ways, but that was the confusion of what I had become for the dream, not the dream itself.

Was that what I was like before I lost my memory? Was I a scared, insane waif trying to make sense of a world I couldn't process? I closed my eyes and tried to think back, but the dream was all I had. It didn't fade like dreams usually do, instead finding its way into my memory like a lost puzzle piece. But it fit nowhere in what I knew. The other pieces were nowhere to be found.

Lily.

No wonder Lily was so insistently trying to help me. I had assumed from the way she acted now that I had to have been some kind of guardian to her. That I must have protected her poor naïve soul from Foundation's dirty tricks, and without me, she was goaded into trying to retrieve me for their uses. But I had it backwards. Foundation were barely bad guys to us back then. We were too consumed by our internal suffering to even register the injustice of our place related to the company. We were so far below even being able to worry about the politics of Foundation's actions. Not only that, but I was the helpless one. Addled and confused by reality, I needed someone to show me love and pull me from the brink of madness. I almost wished I could have kept dreaming; that I could see where I went from there. Did I start to get better after that day? How had I overcome that oppressive pain that was nowhere to be found today? What happened in that research facility that led me to where I am now? I could guess, but the actual memories were all out of reach.

I raised my arm up slightly. Did I dare? I lifted it up toward my mouth and gently bit down on my forearm. I didn't want to and didn't dare to break flesh and bone, as I must have done to myself before the time of that dream, but I felt a certain comfort in gnawing on my limb like a wounded animal. I dropped my head back down onto my pillow, closed my eyes and simply basked in the strange primal comfort I derived from the simple, mildly self-destructive action.

"Meryll?"

My eyes shot open again. I sat up quickly and blearily called out with my arm still up near my face, "Lily?"

When I turned my head, I only saw Doc staring at me from behind his biometrics terminal with a raised eyebrow. "Doc. Are you alright?" He asked gently.

I stared back for a few moments, then glanced down at my arm, then back up to him again. "I d... d-don't know." I admitted. My stutter. I stumbled over the word more than I usually would have. I'd momentarily forgotten about my speech impediment. I didn't have it in those memories, after all.

"You were crying in your sleep." He noted, standing up to step around his desk and approach me. "Did you have another nightmare?"

I reached up and felt around my eyes. Still damp, and the skin around them felt raw. I guess my body was reacting to the memories. "Maybe." I looked down at the deep indentations of my teeth in my forearm and briefly considered losing myself in that habit again. Then I saw a thin speckle of red seeping through the deepest mark. Nope. No, that is not for me. That was a different me, and I was not okay with that. I hadn't even meant to bite that hard, but there it was, something I apparently lacked the restraint for. It's definitely not an urge I should indulge. "M-Memories, actually. Clear me... memories."

Doc's eyes went wide. "You remembered something? Really?" He stepped close and looked down at my forearm with befuddled concern.

"I-I remembered a little bit of me." I gave him a sad smile. "And I r-remember Lily."