147. Dissonance (Patreon)

I wake up with an annoying crick in my back, my face resting on the foot of a medical cot soaked with my own drool. It takes a moment to blink the incomprehensible mess of dreams I was having out of my eyes before I can remember how I got here and what I was doing yesterday. Oh, fuck, that's right. I was fighting that big battle against Vita-Templars with-against Lark and my-her team and—

I jerk upright, but not in time to stop the bile from rising up my throat and ending up all over the foot of Bently's cot, the memories in my head warring for dominance as my parasite of a soul clashes with my stolen brain. That monster, Vita, hides inside me, having burrowed into my soul to use the husk as camouflage. Except I am Vita, hooked up to a body and a mind that isn't my own and struggling to deal with the second person that's now leaking inside me. This isn't fun for either of us, I try to think to myself, except I'm not sure which 'me' is doing the thinking and there's no answer because there's only one of us in here.

I've already gone insane.

"Melik!" someone shouts with surprise, and I instinctively recognize it as my name but it's not my name but it is, I'm not her, I have always been her this is my body now!

"S-sorry," I choke out. "Nightmare."

"It's not normal to vomit after a nightmare!" the woman continues and it's Lark, she killed-saved me. "Are you feeling nauseous?"

"Yes," I admit. "Very."

"I'll get new blankets for Bently," Jelisa says, sounding exhausted. What? How does she sound exhausted? I just know she's exhausted, I can feel that. "Let's get you into bed as well, okay Melik?"

"Okay," I allow easily since she's my Captain. Since she's my enemy and I need to hide. Since she's right and I need rest. Oh Watcher, what am I? Did I just think 'oh Watcher?' Fuck, I'm a tool. Didn't you not like the Templars anyway, Melik? Why do you pray?

There's no answer, but I know I pray because sometimes I need all the help I can get. How foolish. The Watcher will never help me.

I need to get this under control. I need to get her out of my soul. I need to accept that my soul is gone. I need to get his brain to stop influencing me. Help. Someone help. Can Penelope fix this? Wait, Lady Vesuvius is an animancer? Penelope is my girlfriend!?

I let myself be guided to a bed, too busy falling apart to do anything but obey. My body is shivering, sweating, and I feel it like I used to feel it, like I've always felt it, without threads of soul dominating my perceptions and making everything numb by comparison. I don't have to claw at the insides, feel the blood pulse inside me, or think about every wet breath. My real soul, the parasite controlling me, is once again squeezed into an eggshell far too small for it, but thankfully I have a new trick to keep it hidden. Vita has some sort of extradimensional tunnel connecting her soul to a pool of mana, and I can wedge myself partially inside that, alleviating the pressure of being inside Melik's now-hollow, too-small shell. Hey, I never wanted to be a shell. I never wanted to be a parasite. I never wanted your memories. At least I can agree with myself on that.

I realize, dimly, that I'm being led away from the rest of my squad. I mean his squad. No, I mean… fucking whatever. Ugh. Everything feels wrong. This body is even worse than my last one, all stocky and lumpy and still goddamn short. Except that I also feel somewhat defensive about that, because it's my body, and I've had it for seventeen years now, and I've been working hard to get it in the best shape it can be, thank me very much. Who cares how short I am when I can almost fight toe-to-toe with a vrothizo by myself? Ha. Except I'm weak. I'm slow. I'm pathetically human. Which is better than being a monster, weakness and all.

Jelisa guides me out of the medical ward and into another room—my room, this is my dorm room—and helps me onto my bed, fetching a bowl for me to vomit in as she regards me with… a blank expression that's difficult to interpret. Except all expressions are difficult to interpret and it's pointless to try because I can sense she's suspicious. She's seen something. She's onto me. How the shit is she onto me? Oh fuck, can she save me? Can she free me? Will she kill me? Will she tell others about me?

"Do you think you're sick, Melik?" she asks me simply. "Or just stress and exertion?"

"I think I just need rest," I answer her. "The biomancers said my head was fine."

I wonder if I wouldn't be having this problem if he'd gotten concussed badly enough. Maybe I should have smashed him into the ground a little harder. Except… fuck, I remember that. I was so terrified. She was split in half from head to breast, half of her body drooping down as bits of her brain leaked out of the wound. Yet still, she saw us, knew us, hated us. I hated him and he knew it. And then I just moved, and I felt her hand on my helmet, her fingers crushing the chitin like paper, my face flying towards the ground…

I shudder, making a grab for the vomit bowl, as I empty more bile brought up by the mixed memory. Holy shit, I'm fucking horrifying, aren't I?

"I'm going to get you some water," my captain-captor tells me, and I nod in confirmation as I try to spit the taste of vomit out of my mouth. It's weird that I can taste this. Now I really want one of those scones from the stall on fifth street, they're my favorite. Wait, I have a favorite food? Ugh, what kind of picky, rich-ass moron did I possess? Food is food!

…I can't deny I really want a scone, though. It's easy to see why they're my favorite, even if I disagree with having a favorite. Fuck, I mean it's easy to see why they're Melik's favorite!

Why is this even happening? Melik's soul is dead. It's gone. I ate most of it, just leaving the outside so I could hide within. It wasn't a conscious plan, either; I pretty much did it entirely on instinct. So I suppose I have another soul-shell, just like I used to before I hatched during the perception event. …Holy fuck I'm weird.

No. Stop freaking out about Vita hollowing out my soul and focus. Melik is still influencing me, and his soul isn't functional anymore, which means the problem must be his brain. I'm attached to his brain, and his brain is the thing currently thinking my thoughts. My brain doesn't match my new soul—I mean, my soul doesn't match my new brain. The memories are mixing up. My soul and my brain are each trying to do exactly what happens when there's a mismatch due to animancy: they're trying to correct each other. But rather than making a few small changes or a series of big changes over a large period of time, my soul and brain are two completely different people.

Yet there's still only one me. Time will tell if that me ends up Vita, Melik, or something in between. Though to my simultaneous horror and relief, I have a sinking suspicion that Vita is… bigger than Melik. More. Whatever I am, it's something closer to the Mistwatcher than it is to human. I can turn this body into anything I want. I can function without a body. But I can't function without a soul.

After all, I am my soul. Always have been.

Captain Jelisaveta returns, handing me the promised water which I gratefully start to sip. She sits down on the kynamancer's bed (Harvey's bed, his name is Harvey and he is my roommate and he's more than just his fucking talent) and gives me a serious look. Oh shit, here it comes I suppose.

"So… the surviving Inquisitors aren't decontamination-specialized, which means we're falling back on mundane anti-animancy protocols," Jelisa tells me. "I've just got to ask you a few questions and whatnot. Don't worry, we're doing this with everyone."

Hmm… there's an element of untruth to that. Jelisa isn't doing this to everyone, she explicitly isolated me because she thinks I'm Vita. Which I am. But of course, I can't call her out on that without admitting I'm Vita, because Melik wouldn't be able to tell she's lying. Do I want to admit I'm Vita? Can she even help? Would she want to?

"Okay, ask away," I tell her.

"What's the name of the trainee that was slated to be part of our squad but didn't graduate?" she asks.

"Gina," I answer immediately, even though I never knew her. She was my friend, after all.

"What element of your talent is classified?"

"Long-range metal detection," I answer. "Though if these questions are to determine if I have knowledge Vita doesn't, it's worth noting that she's aware of that aspect of my talent."

Wait, do I even still have my talent? I reach out for the familiar extra sense I've had for years, finding that while I can still feel souls from within my dead shell I have not retained my ability to feel or control metal. I suppose that's to be expected… but boy is it inconvenient. I liked my talent quite a bit, and I also need to be able to pretend I have it or I'll be found out in a heartbeat. I might still be able to tentacle-cast by squirming around while in my hidey-hole, and I know a lot of spellcasting theory so I should be able to whip up a 'manipulate target dust' kineticism spell. And while I don't have anywhere near the range on it that I used to, I can sense delicious metal by just feeling out mana flows. The issue is that, unknown to everyone but myself and Theodora, my talent isn't actually kineticism. We don't actually know what it is; she said it looked like a completely uncategorized form of magic, and I unfortunately never memorized the spell formula she derived from it. Why would I? It's stronger when just used as a talent and I was trying to keep it a secret anyway. Hopefully whatever spell I invent to spoof it won't give me away.

I have to peel my thoughts away from that topic, though, because remembering Theodora nearly causes me to vomit again. What the fuck did I do to Theodora!? Oh Watcher, oh fuck, she was so… so defiant. She knew I was evil but I just kept pushing her until she broke. How do I help her? How do I fix her? Couldn't Penelope fix her?

…She could. She absolutely could, with what she did with Nugas. She just never did, because she'd lose her valuable research tool. Wasn't Penelope the one who convinced me to revive her in the first place rather than just keep her soul safe? This is Lady Vesuvius' fault!

I'm a monster dating a worse monster. How was that not obvious before? But she wasn't always this bad, was she? I wasn't always this bad.

"Melik?" Jelisaveta says, and I realize she's been trying to get my attention for a while.

"Huh?" I sputter back. "S-sorry, I just got distracted. What was the question?"

"How does Vita know you can sense metal?" she asks.

"Uh… it just kind of came up while she was freeing my village from mind control slimes," I admit, shrugging.

Which was… an insane situation all around. My mother told me that she was someone else now, but she still loved me, and she was going to protect me from people that wanted to imprison me in my own body even though that's what she was doing to my family, and then… Vita just shows up. Tells me she can solve things. Frees Seong just by looking at them. I thought she was a savior, even after the tragedy of Theodora's death. What bitter irony that Penta was there the whole time. That she turned into a monster I had to try and kill. That I am her, rolling my inner eye at these very thoughts.

"Right, the Litia village incident," Jelisa nods. "In that case, I'll ask questions from before then. When did you first move to Litia village?"

The interrogation continues, my Captain asking questions from my past that Vita couldn't know, assessing my memory and trying to figure out who I am. Well, joke's on her, I'm still not certain of the answer to that question myself. But I can easily supply the answers thanks to Melik and Vita's combined memories. The only tricky part is keeping them straight, and not giving Jelisa too much information.

She's not trying to figure out if I'm Vita, after all. She knows I am, somehow, or at least she knows that something Vita-related happened to me. But I think showing that I'm also still Melik is the right play here. She cares about us. Her squad. She'd sacrifice a lot for us. And while I doubt she'd be the ally of Vita-that-murdered-Melik-and-stole-his-body, she'd certainly be the ally of Melik-but-possibly-also-Vita's-host. She'd want to try to save me. To save him. I want to try to save him, too. I am him. So I should tell her. But what if she betrays me again? Or what if someone overhears? Do I have the time to care? Will either half of me like what we become?

Fear of death. That's the problem here. On one hand, I might die, to some degree, if I stay this way. On the other hand… I'll certainly die if the Templars find out about me, as well. And then I'll be stuck in this situation all over again, but worse. I don't know what to do.

"So…" I ask after Jelisa seems to be done with her questions. "Did I pass? Am I the real Melik?"

"Yes," my captain lies. "No worries, it's just procedure."

"Of course," I say, swallowing back my desire to spill and tell her everything. I have no idea what she knows or what she suspects, but everything I just told her made her feel better. There's hope in her. I don't think she's going to voice her suspicions, so I don't think I should risk it.

Of course, I'm unfortunately now left alone with my thoughts, and that means it's not long before I have to bring the vomit bowl up to my face again. Everything is such a confusing mess. I just slaughtered hundreds of people, terrified myself, nearly died trying to kill myself, actually died trying to fight Galdra the fucking Annihilator, and now I'm just sitting in my bed regretting it all. How did my life—either of my lives—reach this shitty new low? I'm a Templar now, for fuck's sake. My own eternal enemy. Except… I have good memories here too.

There's a knock on my door, so I croak out a quick "come in" in order to be greeted by Lark, here with a water refill and some dry biscuits, the really bland kind that my mom always fed me when I had an upset stomach. Ugh. …Wait a minute, what do I mean 'ugh?' I swear to fuck, Melik-memories, I'll find something worse to do to you than hollow out your soul and wear it if you don't stop having incorrect opinions on food. It's food! All of it is good!

"Hey Melik," she says, flashing me a closed-lipped smile. One of her ears flicks, shaking her poofy hair in a funny way I can't help but smile back at. "The Captain says that you're being quarantined in your room in case you actually have a stomach bug. We don't want anyone sick near the critical-condition patients."

"Makes sense," I mutter, accepting a biscuit. "But I don't think the quarantine will work very well if you and the Captain keep coming in here."

"Well, the Captain is in the bath washing up for exactly that reason, and… uh, I can't actually catch or carry disease. As long as I don't touch you, I should be fine."

Really? Totally immune? Man, vrothizo are such bullshit. Though I guess Liches are too, so I probably shouldn't throw stones. A bit of a shame she's not going to touch me, though.

…

I'm sorry, the fuck did I just think!? Am I… am I attracted to Lark? Oh, fuck no. That is a giant-ass dragon-sized fuck no on so many levels! What the shit, me? I literally knew her when she was a child! Commit these images to memory, you stupid fucking teenage boy brain: tiny baby murder Lark. That was barely two years ago! Ugh, so gross. At least both halves of me have the decency to be embarrassed about it.

"Well, I'm fine," I insist a bit more forcefully than I intended, because apparently this body also responds to attraction the same way Penelope does: by being a grumpy asshole. …Wait a minute, is this body attracted to Penelope? I can't stop myself from thinking about my experiences in the public bathhouses and uncomfortably confirming that yes, this body is definitely attracted to women, and especially to Penelope.

She must never know.

"Fine or not, you're still stuck here, so make sure you ask me if you need anything, okay?" Lark insists.

"I will," I sigh. "Thank you."

"You're welcome."

Huh. She's a lot nicer when she's not trying to kill me, isn't she? None of that 'this is my purpose' crap that she doesn't even believe. It's kinda funny. I spent so much effort convincing myself she's a monster when she's the person that wanted to fight me less than anyone. I mean… Melik did that, when she didn't want to fight Vita, and… aaaagh. Being a Lich is so fucking weird. The point is, she's nice, and I made a great fucking decision when I decided to spare her life.

…Wait. Wait a minute. Everything I did during the whole life-sparing event was kind of fucked up, now that I think about it. Watcher's eyes, I physically tortured her before making her eat her dad's soul!? Then I kinda taunted her about it? I mean, that wasn't my intention, but I kinda did. Shit, no wonder she's traumatized.

"Melik?" Lark asks, snapping me out of my thoughts. "You okay? You look kinda freaked out."

"Uh… yeah, sorry," I sputter. "Just thinking about… everything that happened. Sorry."

"Yeah," Lark agrees, sitting down on Harvey's bed across from me. "Yeah, that was… a lot, huh? A lot of death."

"Well, sure, there was that," I agree. "But I just mean that I was a huge asshole to you at a point where you really didn't deserve it. I'm sorry."

The best part of this apology is the fact that all of me owes her one; Vita for her bullshit, of course, but also Melik for being a grumpy dick and trying to kill her that one time. Which I failed miserably at. So embarrassing. I have a bit of morbid curiosity about whether Melik was attracted to her before, after, or because of that… but ultimately no part of me wants to know the answer. I'm still very uninterested in being attracted to anyone, my dick be damned.

Hmm. I do have one of those. All glory to the ability to pee while standing, I guess, but that's not worth having an easy-to-hit weak point, in my book. Although not having boobs is nice. Either way, this body is much less comfortable than my brief stint as a Revenant inside my own corpse, but that seemed to make me go a little berserk for whatever reason. Unfortunate.

…Maybe if I keep pretending to be a Templar, I'll have enough time without anyone out to kill me to try and figure out a better body. Downside: I'll have to help out the Templars, who I hate. It's a legitimately tough decision. Although I could just play along and do Templar work in order to get into a position from which to assassinate Galdra. That's not a bad plan.

"I don't agree that I didn't deserve it," Lark says quietly, snapping me back to the conversation. "So it's fine. As far as I'm concerned, you have nothing to apologize for."

"Well yeah," I agree. "I guess what you did to Claretta and Fulvia was pretty fucked up."

She stiffens, her eyes going wide as she stares at me. Oh, shoot, right. I'm trying to not traumatize her.

"We can be friends anyway, though," I continue. "If you want."

"I… sure," she says quietly. "Okay. But… how did you know their names?"

Son of a… did I fuck this up already? No, wait, Melik actually knew about this. Phew.

"Gina told me," I answer, happy to not have to lie.

"Oh," she says, relaxing slightly. "Of course. Gina."

"Yeah," I confirm. "She was kind of a bitch."

Lark seems caught off-guard by that, breaking into an unexpected chuckle.

"I suppose… she was, wasn't she? Yeah. You're right."

Then she starts laughing again. I grin, not quite sure what's so funny, even with the slightly improved social competency I have compared to being just Vita. But Lark doesn't laugh much, so I find myself enjoying it too.

The rest of my day is similarly surreal. I lie in a comfortable bed, occasionally having food and water delivered to me. Sometimes I need to get up to pee, which is in some ways extremely awkward but in some ways so normal I don't even think about it. I practice the spell I'm designing to spoof my old talent when I'm alone, breaking each element of it into tiny, minimally powered chunks for testing just like Theodora taught me. Spell design is actually pretty captivating, and before I know it the penumbra of the island above hits us and night starts soon afterwards. My body and soul are both exhausted, and I pass easily into sleep.

I wake up not knowing who I am again, the chaos of multiple clashing memories pounding along the inside of my skull. But I vomit less than I did before, more easily settling into my new situation. I have to accept the reality of what I am, now. Vita needs a brain. Melik needs a soul. Framing things as a cooperation with myself helps avoid the dissonance that just leaves me a confused mess… even if I know there's really just one me.

Harvey returns on the second day of my quarantine, apparently in good enough health to handle being in the same room as me while I'm 'sick.' He's as stoic as always, taking over the duties to keep me fed and hydrated from Lark, much to my disappointment. Still, whenever he does speak to me it's from the perspective of an old friend. It's nice.

My soul aches, trapped as it is within Melik's shell, clogging my own passageway to my mana with its excess mass. I'm far weaker, hiding like this. No tentacle-yoinks, far less mana access, and the shell blocks off vision from my eye, greatly reducing my sensory detail. But I can hatch at any time I choose, and then I'll be back to full strength in moments. …Well, full spiritual strength. Melik's body is far weaker than Vita's old one, and the optimization process for it has yet to begin. Perhaps my soul is waiting to be fed, still recovering from whatever damage death and repossession did to me. Of course, I'm in no hurry to let my soul start altering my body again; after all, growing a physical tentacle or new eyeball will be a literal dead giveaway. At least I don't think I lost any memories, on either end. I only gained new ones.

My third day of quarantine passes much the same as the last. My fourth day has me not vomit at all, even on awakening. Rest and introspection has done me some good, I suppose. Either that or my brain and soul have simply finished attacking each other in an attempt to normalize and are just going through the standard updates. Who knows! Either way I'm a shell of my former self trying to spoof my old life in order to survive and while that's abjectly terrifying… it's also kind of nice.

Vita had a horrible life. It started horrible and firmly stayed horrible until it started getting worse. The opportunity to be someone else instead is somewhat refreshing, in a way. Melik has friends. Teammates he can count on. Skills that aren't animancy, allowing me to avoid its use and still contribute. The Templars might not be the good guys, not really. But everyone thinks they're the good guys, and to someone that's been oppressed and hated her whole life that means a lot more than it maybe should. Sure, Melik has problems. Melik has trauma. But Melik doesn't have a whole fucking country trying to kill him, so… maybe I'll be Melik for a while.

I'm sure it will go wrong sooner or later, but I don't want to give up my life so easily. And besides… it'll be nice while it lasts.