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Jeongin isn’t the best with the math part of his job, the part where all the incoming and outgoing crates are weighed and measured. He usually just posts up near the loading doors until Seungmin yells at him to actually help load the goods, because the tedious adding and multiplying and double checking isn’t fast paced enough. Jeongin can try for a few minutes, it’s not like he’s actually bad at math , no, he’s bad at being still - At paying attention to things he doesn’t really care for. It’s Seungmin who takes care of the calculations. While Jeongin plays at being the ships muscle, Seungmin does all of the actual important work of adding everything up and putting it into the ships overly complicated spreadsheet algorithm, a relic of Terran past but like Chan says; “If something isn’t broke, i’m not paying 1200 units to install another stupid machine” So when Jeongin is finished hauling the last crate into the bay he’s not expecting the flashing red (+277) to show up next to the ship’s total cargo weight. Mostly because this hasn’t ever happened before, with Seungmin’s paranoid inspection of each crate and Jeongin’s heightened senses it’s nearly impossible for something to be on the ship without them catching it. The thought of someone having snuck past Jeongin while he was working is frightening, they would have to have been smart to do it, smarter than Seungmin at least, smarter than JYP even. Because there’s no way in hell that jealous bitch would let anyone else near Changbin if it could help itself. It only takes a moment for Jeongin to figure out what he needs to do in order to find the stowaway, it’s honestly not that hard, each crate is left on a pressurized plate and that plate sends the weight to the ship. All Jeongin has to do is find the crate that reads as being more than what Seungmin said it should be.When he finds the box it doesn’t look all that special, it has air holes but that’s not really uncommon given the nature of Chan’s actual job here. Jeongin expects that the smugglers that passed the box off didn’t report the correct weight of whatever strange animal they have Chan transporting or, at the worst, they are trying to sneak one over on the Captain by having him transport more animals for a cheaper price. Either way Jeongin isn’t exactly prepared when he pops the crate open and gets a hissing human . The shock has Jeongin stepping back from the container and flailing (only for a moment) as he tries to keep balance on the elevated plate. It’s a funny enough moment to have him let out a startled laugh, in any other circumstance Jeongin might have acted more aggressively. In most other situations Jeongin would’ve attacked first and apologized for the mess later. But the sight of a human boy curled up in his cargo hold hissing at him is laughable. The boy in the box apparently takes offense to Jeongin's amusement as he keeps hissing. The sound is grating on Jeongin’s ears and he doesn’t doubt that it's just as bad for the stranger's throat. As far as he knows humans do not hiss. They don’t growl or snarl or lunge like dogs the way people on Jeongin’s planet do, he knows this because when he does those things Chan loses his shit. It’s always, ”Don’t hiss at guest’s Jeongin”, “Don’t growl at the president Jeongin”, “Stop trying to eat people, Jeongin” . And Jeongin’s least favorite, ”Don’t bite me when i’m fingering you, Jeongin” Curiosity overtakes any of Jeongin’s self preservation and he dares another look into the crate. The boy in the box (Jeongin is already hoping to learn his name, if for nothing more than convenience sake) is taller than he had originally thought. His legs are long and covered in nothing but dirty latex stockings, and now that Jeongin has a moment to look at him he can see that maybe this human isn’t all that human. At least, Jeongin hasn’t met many (any) Terran humans with tails. The fur is matted with mud but he can still tell that the poor thing is trying to puff his fur, attempting to make himself look bigger to the predator he suspects is in front of him. He’s not wrong to do so, to most other creatures Jeongin is nothing but a thing to be afraid of, He’s a citizen of a planet known for unmitigated violence and genetic advancements so successful that it's expected before birth to be made into something more . In Jeongin’s case, more aggressive.But despite everything that normally makes Jeongin the scariest thing in the room, he doesn’t want to hurt the strange thing in the cargo bay. It doesn’t know that though, so when Jeongin peeks over the edge that second time the creature's steady hiss turns into a low and honestly quite intimidating growl. Jeongin watches as it curls in tighter around itself and he starts to try and comfort it when he realizes the boy isn’t curling up for warmth or self comfort, he’s tucked up against a body . The smallest sliver of sickly pale skin is visible under what Jeongin had previously thought was a blanket, though now he sees it’s more like a cloak you’d wear in the heavy rains on Hades. A thick brown material meant to keep the wearer warm and dry in the torrential downpours the planet is plagued with year round, though it doesn’t seem like it’s done much for the poor person wearing it. Jeongin can smell them, the scent of sick and dirt thick now that the lid of the crate has been discarded and his normally very quick senses have recovered from his earlier shock. It’s no wonder now why the human creature had been so hostile even when presented with Jeongin, it is protecting something. For a moment Jeongin worries that the other person is dead. They’re laying very still under the human and while he can't actually see much of them, The little that he can see is pale and in some places turning blue. It crosses his mind to call for Seungmin, but he doesn’t actually love being scolded by the older man and Seungmin has told him not to open strange cargo by himself. So really it’s up to him to get these stowaways out of the bay and into the med station as soon as possible.He takes another second or two just to think of how to approach this situation. He’s hoping that the human speaks common because otherwise this is going to be a much harder job than Jeongin is getting paid for. What should he even say? It's not like he can reach out and say “just trust me, I know i'm bigger than you and my teeth are very sharp and you're here illegally but I promise it’s fine”. Nobody in their right mind takes people at their word these days.But there’s not much else he can do either. So Jeongin sucks it the fuck up and clears his throat.“You really aren’t supposed to be here.”The boy’s ears (oh shit. Jeongin thinks. he has cat ears) flick at the sound of Jeongin’s voice but otherwise stay pinned back, it’s clear he doesn’t trust him, and Jeongin is going to go right on ignoring the way pride fills his chest at the thought. “I mean you could’ve been hurt during loading,” he continues, trying to act as if this is just another completely normal conversation, “I’m not exactly known for being careful with this shit. Half of it is illegal anyway so it’s not like the smugglers can charge us for damage.”The comment’s don’t seem to put the stranger at ease but he doesn’t lunge at Jeongin either so he’s counting it as a win.“Okay well. Even if you didn’t get hurt when I brought you in, you’ll definitely get hurt during transport, we don’t move living creatures down here so it’s not fitted for passengers.” It’s definitely a lie but it’s not like this person knows that, most ships aren’t made to carry living cargo in the cargo bay, so during jumps or anysort of hyperdrive the bay is cleared of organic organisms to prevent, well, death.Chan, of course, spent a shit ton of money to get JYPE upgraded so it was usable in his very lucrative pirating side hustle, but the human likely didn’t even know that was possible and Jeongin really needs him and his possibly dead friend out of the bay before Seungmin comes looking for him.“Seriously, if you don’t come out of there you and your friend are going to die. Probably.” Jeongin doesn’t know if it’s the mention of the second stowaway or the threat of death but the low rumbling growl gives way to a whine and the boy slowly begins to untangle himself from the unconscious person below him. As he moves, Jeongin is able to see more of the second person in the crate. With the ‘human’ now fully revealed Jeongin is made even more aware how strange he is. In comparison to each other Jeongin can see that the second boy is very much a normal Terran, his body is long but proportional, he’s pale due to the cold but there aren’t any strange imperfections to be seen. This is unlike the boy Jeongin had been trying to communicate with. He had legs that were long but in a way clearly unnatural. The stretch of his calves and the arch of his socked feet would match that of someone from Jeongin’s home rather than the very Terran features of the boy's face. He wonders briefly just how strange and wonderful the rest of the stranger looks, before he continues trying to get them out of the box.“I’m going to help you and your friend out, if you bite me I'll bite you back. And I know my teeth are bigger than yours.” It’s not an empty threat necessarily, but something about the way the boy is still whining tells Jeongin he doesn’t really need to worry about it. When he leans forward to help lift the fully conscious person out first he’s met with refusal, and instead the cat eared boy bends to lift his limp friend from the ground, holding him close for a moment as he stares hard at Jeongin’s face. This must be someone very close to him, and Jeongin thinks of what he might do if the situation was reversed, If he had been trying to escape something with Seungmin as these two clearly were, would he even be able to let Seungmin go into the arms of a stranger, He honestly doesn’t think he’d be brave enough. “I won’t steal him.” He finds himself speaking without having meant to, “I would offer to lift you both at once, but I don't know what's wrong with your friend, I'm afraid that would only hurt him.”The apprehension doesn’t leave the boy’s face but he does move to hand the sick one over to Jeongin. Once he has his arms full of sickly human Jeongin feels stumped. It’s clear now that he doesn’t really have any way to help the other guest out of the crate unless he drops the sick one. As quickly as he has the thought he feels the solid thud of feet on the ground beside him.“What the actual fuck did you do, Jeongin.”Seungmin had found them. It’s not a surprise so much as a disappointment, Jeongin had known that once he didn’t show up after loading the last crate Seungmin would be looking for him. It was Seungmin’s algorithm that Jeongin had used to find the overweight cargo in the first place so it's really a no brainer that the older man would’ve used it to find him too. How he was going to get out of the upcoming scolding is what Jeongin should be worried about now.“Is that a person?” Seungmin’s question cuts off any excuse Jeongin could’ve been trying to make as he leans closer and raises his voice. “Jeongin, is that a dead person?” Before the younger can attempt a stubborn ”No Seungmin obviously not.” a weak but again very deep rumble comes from the box. It takes a bit of effort not to laugh at Seungmin’s face when he whips around to stare at the source of the sound.Just barely peeking over the wall of the box are two dark brown eyes and a mop of bright blue hair, the ears that Jeongin knows rest on the top of the boy's head are pinned so far back that they might as well be stapled down. “I don’t think he likes when you call his friend dead.”Seungmin doesn’t laugh at Jeongin’s insightful knowledge but he does shoot a look in the younger’s direction that he’s come to know means “No Shit.”. It’s not Jeongin’s fault that Seungmin doesn't understand how delicate this is, not everyone is gifted with Jeongin’s ability to communicate.“Why are there people in our cargo bay?” Seungmin continues asking dumb questions, “And why did you open cargo by yourself?”Jeongin answers as best as he can given the limited information he’s been given.“I don’t know Hyung, the weight was off, I found a creature and a body.” he means it as a joke, a way to maybe get the pressure off himself. He feels an unfamiliar ping of guilt at the vicious growl that tears the air in front of him. “He is not dead, he isn’t a body, his name is Hyunjin and if you won’t help him then give him back .” It should make Jeongin think he’s pathetic, the way the boy struggles to scale that crate wall. it's not actually all that tall, the boy is definitely more than a head taller but it seems like he's hurt too. He might've been hiding it earlier, or Jeongin had been too distracted by the sudden appearance of two strangers chilling in a box in his cargo bay, but as he attempts to climb Jeongin can see that it hurts him. Every attempt to pull himself over ends in a grunt and a scowl as his shoulder gives out under his own weight, with the way it seems to hurt it’s a wonder he had been able to lift his friend's dead weight.“No you’re right,” Jeongin’s mouth is making a habit of speaking without permission. He doesn’t remember deciding to say anything, but now that he’s talking he feels the need to keep comforting the boy. “I know he isn’t dead, I'm holding him now and yes. He’s very cold; but I can feel him shivering.” Seungmin thankfully chooses this moment to actually help rather than stand there watching the chaos. He does the smart thing and slowly approaches the crate, keeping his hands visible to the stowaway, and introducing himself.“I don’t know what’s got you stuck in our cargo hold but I'd love to get you both out as soon as possible. Can you tell me your name so I don’t have to call you ‘strange boy from the box’ when I explain this to my boss.”“Ew, don’t call Chan your boss. He regularly cries on your dick Seungmin.” The look of disgust and resentment on Seungmin almost makes the trouble Jeongin is going to be in worth it. The look of shock and amusement on the stranger’s definitely makes it worthwhile. “Please tell me your name so I can move on with my day and get you out of the box without feeling like I'm smuggling you with the other cargo.”“You can call me Felix,” even without the growling in his tone Felix’s voice is deeper than one would expect when looking at him. He’s standing full height now, and Jeongin has the sense that he was made to be perfect. He’s so artistically sculpted even with matted hair and dirt on his face. His eyes have softened in the few moments since he protested against their words, and Jeongin can tell that this is much more natural for him, wide soft eyes reflecting the lights around him. A perfect mirror as he scans the bay, taking in what Jeongin assumes he couldn’t before. The cargo bay isn’t much to behold, it's mostly metallic grays and bright hazard orange, yellow lines show where it’s generally safe to walk on the main floor, with ladders leading up to heightened platforms like the one they stand on now. Jeongin thinks it’s largely boring, just a bunch of boxes and barrels in the cavernous stomach of a bitchy semi sentient spaceship. He wonders if maybe he’s just become desensitized to the scene as he watches Felix marvel at his surroundings. He doesn’t move more than a few centimeters at most, but Jeongin can see the awe in the way petal soft lips have fallen open and his ears, the fluffy pair, have perked up from their previously pinned position. Jeongin wants to touch so bad he almost laughs again. Chan would be upset if Jeongin went around petting people just because he thought they were pretty.“Okay, Felix. I’m going to help you out of the crate now and we’ll go down to the med bay with your friend.”With that Seungmin closes the gap between himself and the box, helping Felix out gently and gawking as he realizes the boy is actually taller than them both. Thankfully Felix doesn’t seem to notice the shock, but Jeongin plans to tease Seungmin about it later. *********Yunho didn’t want to be a flight surgeon, he wanted to be a dentist. But when you’re running for your life from a theocracy over a trillion years old well… you take any job that pays you enough to get the fuck out of dodge. Technically Yunho is fully qualified for the position, back on Prispare he studied for over 12 years in the medical track. Dentistry schooling wasn't difficult and he finished it in the first 4, but due to the nature of his parent’s ambassadorship, he needed something else to fill the time until he would be able to travel back to the place he’d really be needed. Prispare didn’t need any more dentists, they had plenty, in fact Yunho is sure they had a whole machine who could do the jobs of 80 percent of a normal dental clinic; the existence of which left Yunho’s dream career a dead end on this planet. But Prispare wasn’t ever the reason he aspired for this position anyway. On Arkias your teeth aren’t just cosmetic luxuries or even bothersome necessities, they are tools. Teeth are the first thing you learn to use as a weapon on Arkias, they’re the first things you use to show power or pride. You take care of your teeth because they take care of you and of your families. On a planet like Arkias, which has little to no funding to help with schooling, being a dentist is a great and rare honor. So, for years, Yunho occupied his hands and mind with General Surgery and hospital residencies; Taking only a few days here and there to spend with his friends and family. It wasn’t bad or lonely. Or even boring, it was just waiting. The agreement between his parents and the Prisparian Empire was meant to keep Yunho on Prispare Prime until he’d reached 40 years old, an unfortunate side effect of being an Animus with an elongated lifespan. They didn't trust that he would be “developed” enough to leave before then, and even though they never actually shared any particularly sacred technology with him they were afraid letting him off planet before he was “fully grown” would run the risk of their sacred knowledge being shared to the “unworthy”. Yunho doesn’t know whether or not to consider himself lucky that he got off Prime well before the 40 year mark. He certainly doesn’t feel lucky now that his relatively small office is crowded with 3 people and a body.The man who he doesn’t recognise can apparently read minds because before Yunho can even ask he’s being interrupted with a sharp, “He’s not dead, so stop looking at him like that.” Maybe if it was another day Yunho would laugh, but it's the first day of a month long cruise and if this is at all a prediction of how that’s going to go Yunho might as well quit now and hole up in Hongjoong’s quarters until Chan is no longer ‘ concerned ’ about him. Even in the hypothetical Yunho can’t conjure the image of an angry Chan. At least not a Chan who is angry at the crew. “Please follow me, this is not the infirmary.” Yunho really shouldn’t be this tired already, he’s contemplating messaging Hongjoong to schedule an appointment but it’s going to have to wait until he figures out the non body situation. “If you need medical attention do not come all the way to my office, Jeongin you know this. There are assistants in the Med bay for a reason.” He doesn’t need to be looking at Jeongin to know that his face is twisted in an indignant frown.“The Med Bay isn’t for us though Hyung.” Of course Yunho doesn’t usually make the crew go to the actual infirmary if Yunho’s office is closer, but he’s not really sure why that is being brought up right now. “Jeongin, The Med Bay is a quicker and more sanitary area for guests to be treated, assistants are here to see them while I am away and can keep people stable while I make my way to the bay. Now tell me why you have an unconscious Guest with you before I have to call Chan and hopefully ward off a lawsuit.”Luckily the way to the Infirmary isn’t as obstructed by guests or luggage as it would be once they leave port, and it's a relatively brisk walk there as Yunho sends a message to have an exam bed ready. A quick look at the patient tells him that the boy is alive, Yunho can see him shivering now and the warmth of the ship is turning his fingers and cheeks a bright red. He’s glad he can at least rule out frostbite, the brief glances he’d gotten of the patient had him worried about it at first, with how pale blue his skin looked in places. “He’s not a Guest.” Seungmin’s words come out as blunt as Seungmin’s jokes usually do, and Yunho is again left to be confused. That’s not even a funny joke. “Seungmin I won’t even pretend to understand the humor in this, please don’t bring guests to my office unless they are conscious and have a complaint.”“Hyung. He’s not a guest .” the younger reiterates, his tone doesn’t do much to change, but the nervous shifting of the second guest catches Yunho’s attention. Enough so that he pauses and turns to really look at the boys for the first time, they’ve stopped just outside of the Med Bay but Yunho is suddenly more concerned in the implications of what Seungmin is saying.“You are telling me that the patient is in fact NOT a Guest on this cruise? Is that correct?” He asks, just to be sure. It’s not usually his normal, being so severe. Especially not with either of Chan’s Maknaes; But this is his job, and bringing someone onto the ship who is already injured, to be cared for by Yunho instead of a fully operational hospital, is incredibly reckless. It’s uncharacteristic of them as well and that almost worries Yunho more.“They aren’t Guest’s, but they’re in the custody of the ship now. I can explain more after you examine him.” Seungmin, to his credit, does sound sorry when he says it. Yunho can hear the resigned determination in his voice though and decides it’s better to trust him than it is to stay here questioning. The doctor nods and his lips thin as he turns to enter the infirmary, this isn’t ideal but he never did want to be a flight surgeon in the first place. Too bad he’s so good at it.“Jongwoo, I have the emergency patient, have you prepared the bed?” As Jongwoo gives Yunho affirmation, he lets the assistants take over; moving the patient from Jeongins arms onto the Exam bed. It’s a truly wonderful piece of technology, a state of the art model that is able to scan most Humanoid and Animus beings in a fraction of the time it would take Yunho to do manually. He could do it, but when technology lets you take minutes off of the life saving process he doesn’t really see the need for showing off how well you paid attention during anatomy class. As soon as the patient is laid on the bed its sanitary shield goes up and Yunho is happy to be able to take a step back and assess the situation outside of the rush. He can’t say he was too worried in the moment, when Jeongin showed up with someone unconscious in his arms he’d mostly just been bothered at the waste of time. If they had come from the cargo bay, which he assumes they did, then they had taken a longer route in order to reach Yunho personally rather than the assistants here in the Med Bay. Now that he has a moment to actually process the events that have happened, Yunho is just confused and a little disappointed. “Your friend is being taken care of now, but I need to know exactly what's going on before I can treat him any further.”He doesn’t bother looking away from the patient, instead focused on the holoscreen projecting stats and recordings onto the sanitary shield. Taking notes as they come up. Weight is low for a boy of his height but not enough to worry, at least not at the moment. Low blood pressure, a thankfully rising heart rate. Yunho can feel the nonexistent worry lines on his forehead deepening as he furrows his brow, this man is too close to dead for his liking and he wants to get to the bottom of why .He’s not used to having to be this serious, not usually having to borderline scold anyone who isn’t Wooyoung. That’s more Hongjoong and Seonghwa’s job. Regardless, the one thing Yunho doesn’t compromise on is the health and safety of his patients, and going out of your way to elongate the amount of time before someone receives life saving care is just plain dumb on a good day. He doesn’t know what happened before they came to get him but his new patient is hypothermic and, with the way he’s absolutely soaking wet and starting to cough up a lung, it’s likely he has Pneumonia or some other virus that’s taken advantage of his weakened immune system. It’s the puddles of water trailing down the boy’s neck that reminds him, the patient's friend is likely in a similar condition; but when he finally turns from the exam bed to look at him he forgets to even ask about any injuries. “You’re not Animus.”He means it as a question, he really does, but it comes as a statement. A fact. Like he’s reciting from a textbook. The blue haired Terran boy in front of him is decidedly not Animus, there’s not any physical characteristics that could prove the doctor right really. He has Animus traits, the Cat ears and Tail, but it's something Yunho feels in his gut. He knows, by the smell maybe, there isn’t anything extra to the boy. Arkias isn't as old as Prispare, but it's old enough that any true Arkian has years of Animus genealogy built up in their blood. Generations upon Generations of genetic alterations that are given to their offspring, whether they want it or not. On Arkias,Yunho wouldn't be considered as Animus by most, the only evolutionary modifications he has are the ones his parents and grandparents passed down to him through raw DNA. He was on Prispare when he was born, and the terms of his parents ambassadorship kept them from leaving to have Yunho modified in the womb. This person, This Terran, smells new. There are pheromones present that should be, he definitely looks and smells and moves like a cat. but it's only cat there, no combination of predator and prey, no strange bone structures in the face or body apart from his legs; and now that he's looking closer, Yunho can see, the legs are the strangest part of him.He's been on his toes this whole time, the guest. At first Yunho had thought it was a stimulating behavior, the body's subconscious effort at comforting itself, but he sees now. Someone has forced this boy's feet into a tiptoed stance. it's clear in the way his toes and the arch of his feet are stretched, elongated to support the unnatural pose. it took him longer than he liked to notice because in some way the boy is proportional. Not by human standards, of course not, but on Arkias digitigrade legs aren't an uncommon aesthetic choice for parents. even if all that could've been excused away, the scars circling the boys upper thighs are unmistakable. “Seungmin, I think it’s time we call Chan. I think he’ll need to be here when our friend tells us why he's decided to board our ship.” Yunho doesn’t want to be a flight surgeon, if he had been a dentist he wouldn’t have noticed the skin grafts at all. He would’ve never looked closer at the thin white scars that connect each graft together. The stitching of large swaths of synthetic flesh that, if he had just been a dentist, he wouldn’t have recognized at all.Yunho hopes that tomorrow he’ll be normal again, he’ll smile easily and laugh with Wooyoung as he causes problems for their other crew members. Maybe if he’s lucky, he’ll get the fearful and defeated look of the strange human out of his head come morning. *********It all started when he was born again.Dirt under nails and the smell of ozone as he breached the surface of his shallow grave. The first rattling breath gasped into the evening air drowned out by rolling thunder. He doesn't remember anything from before the grave, just the grit of soil in his throat and the clinging of fabric to his back as he choked and gasped in the rain. Even the days after are a blur. He remembers crawling from the field and Carrion– a red light district on the outskirts of Greater Cronus, with all its loud music and screaming light, had been like a dancing flame to the soaked and shaking moth that had emerged only minutes before from its cocoon.He must have looked a mess, walking like he’d never used his legs, shivering body covered in only a muddy hospital gown. But this is Carrion, while it brings many Hedonistic and somewhat carnivorous socialites, it also boasts a fair share of poorer and sullied patrons. The unlucky many who live and work in Carrion are no stranger to the rough and mangy few who try their hand at the pleasures the district offers before crashing hard and winding up in circumstances just like his.It was a rare strike of luck that Edith had been the one to see him first, struggling through the back alley of her shop before falling front first to the ground. Anyone else might have left him to drown in the shallow water of the drainless street, some might have tried to rob him while he lay there dying. But it was Edith who had seen him and she isn’t one to leave the hopeless to rot. So it was by her kindness that he had made it into the warmth of a bed. Waking up a full day later to a faint but unending pinging in his ear and the burly, bear of a man named Matthew puttering around the sunlit attic room humming a lullaby and placing a wooden serving tray gently over the foot of the bed. Matthew was tall and built like a brute (towering almost a better word to describe him, a truly herculean being), but his mannerisms were strange. He wasn’t clambering about and clumsily breaking the smaller more fragile things surrounding him, or throwing his weight in a way which might unbalance him, but instead he stepped quite carefully and seemed acutely aware of just how gentle he needed to be as he turned and grabbed a small wooden stool from next to a dresser on the edge of the room. It was when he turned back around that they made eye contact, and Matthew recognized he was awake.“Well, it seems you’re back with us.” He spoke in a gruff rumble of a voice, sounding reminiscent of a time worn cowboy from the old terran films. “You gave Edith a scare the last time you woke, screaming and crying as you were, nice to see you’re much calmer this time around.”He moved back toward the bed, setting the stool closer to the footboard before sitting on it. How it held the giant man's weight is still a wonder to him.“Now, I believe you might be a bit hungry so Edith and I whipped you up some nice broth and tea,” He gestures toward the tray, “but first I’m needing to ask you just a couple of questions. First of which, do you remember your name?”It had taken him by surprise that he did remember a name of sorts. A name in the very loose sense of it being a string of alphanumeric characters that he is identified with and responded to, but he reasoned it was a good enough thing to be called a name.Minutes passed as he tried to get his throat to work, it was so scratchy and dry it hurt. But eventually he was able to grind out a rusty “FLX001.” The look of resigned defeat that took over the man’s face was familiar, which is strange for an amnesiac. “That’s what we were afraid of.” he sighed before reaching forward and pulling a tablet from the side compartment of the serving tray. “This here is what we saw when we picked you up, we were hoping it was an unfortunate tattoo, but it seems to be much worse than that.” On the screen that the man turned toward him was a photo of his body face down on the very same bed he was laying in, the back of the hospital gown gaping open to reveal a series of characters printed vertically down his spine. Starting with a capital F written in stark black ink in between his shoulder blades and ending with the 1 on the low of his back right above his tailbone, a serial number had been tattooed into his skin, and from the looks of it, the ink is long healed. This is something he’s had for years, even if he doesn’t remember it.Of course, the tattoo wasn’t the strangest thing about him. Felix (as they soon took to calling him) hadn’t noticed at time. With all the disoriented shambling through city streets and ending up here beneath about 4 different quilts, He hadn’t thought to look at his legs. In the photo he could see clearly where two different synthetic skins stitch together across his back, starting just above the jut of his hip bones and creating a clean circular seam around his torso before dipping to meet at the base of his tailbone. The scars look less like scars and more like fine white tattoos, the wonders of modern bio-engineering creating the elegant pattern, and the fur that it leads to. Whoever it was that stitched him together had decided to create him a little more feline than his human companions. A long sprawling tail lays against his thighs, though the fur is matted with mud and dark with rain, he could still tell that it matches the pale blonde hair on his head. The strangeness continues, with his legs segmented again in the medical stitching of synth skin. More fine lines, two right below the curve of his bottom, then two more isolating the joint of each knee, and lastly around his ankles. Matthew had to explain to him that the forced tip toe of his feet and elongated line of his calves were unusual. “Humans– and I'm going out on a limb here to say that you are at the very least modeled to be human– don’t have semi digitigrade feet, son.” he had said, watching as Felix flexed his toes and poked his seams. “From the waist up, you’ve got the look of a Human boy. But whoever made you decided to be creative with the rest of ya.”And there it was, for the first few days it was fuzzy, he was so tired he slept for most of that week; But when he was awake, Matthew had tried his best to jog Felix’s memory. It worked whether Felix wanted it to or not.The older man had found fliers. Ads had been posted in the few 'high profile' clubs in the district some time ago, touting an auction that would be held for EvoTech's newest piece.Sometime before he’d been buried, Felix had been the markets greatest new thing . A one of a kind, fully anatomically functional, self aware, sex doll. With that revelation Felix realized what the incessant pinging had been. While easily ignored, the electronic tone had been a constant background noise that whole week, He figured he should’ve been happy to know. Knowing what causes a problem is more than halfway to knowing how to fix it, but this isn’t a leaky pipe. It turns out it’s caused by system updates . On him. A person.It wasn’t easy waking up with no memory and immediately being told you aren’t even a person. If Edith or Matthew hadn't been the ones to find him Felix probably wouldn’t have lived past the first few hours after he crawled from his grave. He’s grateful to them now, even as he sits waiting in the infirmary of a Spaceship modeled after a sex club from Earth’s late 20th century. It’s a large ship. And despite the fear coursing through him he’s still amazed at the sights it beholds. The technology here is nothing even close to the clinics back in Carrion, or even Greater Cronus. The giant room holds 6 of these “Examination Beds”, big and fancy and scary. Hyunjin is lying in one and Felix tries desperately not to get teary eyed over the way he looks. He’d hate it. The way the soaking clothes stick to him, the unkempt state of his hair and the smear of his makeup. He looks a mess and Felix is heartbroken.Hyunjin only has so much in this world, and above all else he values his appearance. Well, not his looks so much as his image. In a world where your only asset is your body, you need to take care of it, and if Hyunjin could see himself now Felix knows he’d only feel ashamed. Regardless of how beautiful he looks to Felix, the Android is happy that Hyunjin won’t be awake for a good while. It will hopefully give Felix time to clean him up. So long as this “Chan” doesn’t kick him off the ship.The Doctor hadn’t been mean, though he had been a little rude when he decided to comment on his ears. Felix quite likes his cat parts. He knows that objectively they are strange, and almost nobody knows that he’s a bot, so there’s plenty of reasons why Felix shouldn’t like his ears or tail; But they just feel like him. He likes the way Hyunjin knows when he’s happy or sad or scared, and Jinnie would probably be able to tell whether or not Felix had these ears but he likes the way Hyunjin strokes his ears when they end up pinned back. He loves the way it feels when he and Jinnie are lying in bed after a shift, and Felix is so sleepy and happy to be held as the older man rubs the tip of an ear between his fingers as he tells Felix about all the stupid customers he had that day. Hyunjin never looks at his animal parts like they’re weird, he just accepts them as part of Felix.The tail and ears aren’t the only thing that makes Felix more animal that most, he has these urges, it’s part of his programming. Things that he assumes were meant to make him more interesting for buyers. He purrs when he’s comfortable, like really comfortable; And he can’t really control it. He hisses and growls and can see in the dark better than others can, his human ears don’t really hear all that much, most of that sense is attributed to the cat pair. On top of all of that he’s been told he’s agile the way a cat is, that he moves like one. Is curious like one. He’d never be able to confirm all this really, he’s never met a cat in person. Real cats are luxuries, pets only the people on Olympus or Gaia can afford. Felix has only ever seen creatures native to Hades, and those aren’t usually very agile or curious at all. Mangy dog-like creatures he never bothered to learn the name of live in the desert outside the cities and the only animals found in any regularity are large rats, called Cans by locals on Hades. They’re called that because most often that's where you’ll find them. Scuttling to and fro, in and out of garbage cans and making off with peoples rations. Felix prefers calling them babies. Cause they’re about the size of one and he happens to think they're kind of cute.“-Lix are you listening?” Seungmin’s voice is jarring against the smooth teasing of the Hyunjin in his memory “don’t call them babies, Angel. ” he could hear him saying “ one tried to bite you last week and you just cooed at it, I think those builders of yours should’ve programmed some survival instincts in there.”If it had been said by anyone else Felix would’ve felt small in a bad way. Stupid.But it was Hyunjin and he said it with that voice only Felix ever hears, tapping his forehead as he laughed. Topping it off with a hug and giving him a kiss on the cheek. Felix wants him to be okay so desperately he’s afraid the others must be able to feel it.“Sorry Seungmin-ssi, what were you asking?”Much like when the doctor had been examining Hyunjin earlier, Felix doesn’t turn to the rest of the gathering crowd. If he’s about to be thrown off the ship he wants his last moments to be with his best friend. That’s why he’s taken by surprise when a new voice is the one to answer him.“Felix-ssi, my name is Bang Chan, I’m the captain of the ship and I’d like to speak with you about why my crew found you stowed away in a cargo crate.” the man doesn’t sound angry. Serious? Yes. He is firm and speaks with authority, but he doesn’t curse or grab at Felix to turn him around. The Android didn’t realize how much he’d expected that, a firm hand grabbing him wasn’t new, he was roughed around at the club all the time. There he had Hyunjin to back him up, or at least a bartender or two who’d step in if they thought the patron was going after Felix’s face.Here he only had himself and it was his turn to make sure Hyunjin was taken care of.“I really didn’t mean any trouble Captain, I was just hoping to get Hyunjin and I off Hades.” It’s mostly true, that was the first goal in a sadly short list of plans. Get off the planet, get Hyunjin help, Figure out how to not be murdered.“I think I understand that but I need to know why;” The voice is closer now and the realization that Chan is coming closer, has his throat closing up as a low rumble makes its way from his lips. He’d done this earlier too, when Jeongin had approached their hiding spot. He hadn’t really known he could growl like this until today, the growling noises he’d made before sounded like an imitation. Somewhat shallow in his throat and much more like when Hyunjin tries to sound grumpy at something Felix had done. This new noise is deep, really deep, in his chest radiating out and shaking his whole body. It hurt but he didn’t want to stop until the Captain got the hint. The doctor, Yunho, is here to help Hyunjin. He can't trust that this new man is here to do the same.He hears the man's footsteps stutter as he stops moving, and is relieved to know he at least won’t need to fight to keep Hyunjin safe. Felix hasn’t been much of a fighter since he woke up, if he ever was.“I understand you probably have some things you'd like to keep to yourself, Trust me I get it; But i need you to understand the way this all looks to me now.”He chances a glance away from Hyunjin’s face and catches the reflections on the glass of the shielded bed, behind him he can see that Jeongin and Seungmin are milling around the other beds nearest the doors. It looks like they keep adjusting sheets and moving small bits of equipment back and forth, trying to appear busy so they don’t get kicked out, he guesses. Closer, much closer, is the man he’s not seen before. He has a very kind face, large lips and a prominent nose that might have looked odd on someone else, though he can’t help but to acknowledge that they fit very well on the captain. He’s definitely shorter than Felix is but he can't call this man small, his size should intimidate him to be honest. Even just viewing the semi transparent image he can still see that the man’s biceps are more than twice the size of Felix’s. It’s the way he holds himself that put’s Felix at ease. He was right in his assumption that Chan had paused rather than continue toward Hyunjin, he stands with one hand on his hip and it's reminiscent of how Edith would stand when she was just too tired to deal with Hyunjin’s whining. The other hand is at rest, not flexing or reaching for anything. He’s waiting for Felix to make the first move. “I’m just running from someone. Not the law or anything if that’s what you’re worried about.” He sighs and clears his throat, trying to rid the horrible scratchy feeling left after all that growling “Your doctor is right that I'm not Animus, but I’m not really Terran either.”Spinning to look at Chan doesn’t feel as scary as he’d been expecting but that’s probably because he doesn’t feel much of anything right now. Maybe it's his system overloading, or something wrong with his code after the “system update” he’d finally installed, but he just feels numb. He wonders if he looks as dead eyed as he feels.Chan gives no indication of whether he does or not, the Captain actually relaxing further at Felix’s decision to face him. The way his shoulders drop and his eyes soften tells Felix that he really had been worried Felix was some sort of criminal. He supposes it’s not the dumbest thing to assume when you find a robot and a near dead sex worker in your cargo bay.“I’m an android.” He pauses for a moment; Waiting for a reaction maybe, a gasp or a laugh he doesn’t know which, but nothing ever comes so he steadies on.“EvoTech Dynamics, the biggest tech manufacturer on Olympus, announced a new AI droid a year or so ago. ‘A toy who talks when you want, and shuts up when you don’t’ ” His fingers feel raw, he can’t stop picking at them, pulling at the skin, tearing at the scabs. It’s incredible how convincing they made him, he’d be in awe if only it wasn’t for this one thought; who wanted their toy to bleed so realistically. “I'm sure you’ve seen the ads.”EvoTech had been flooding the market as of late with servant bots, employee replacements, and security droids. All growing more and more realistic as the tech advanced, EvoTech has so many patents that it’s a wonder that anyone else ever gets to invent anything at all. Felix had been the first, and last, in a line of high performance entertainment droids. There isn’t much he can remember or deduce about the time before his reawakening in Carrion. Only vague thoughts of cold rooms and the innate memory of how his programming worked. Every so often a flash will speed across the memory center of his brain, or whatever complicated synthetic circuit board he has in place of one, and Felix would remember something new. Yesterday he had dreamt of a man in white, a robe. In the dream the man had poked at Felix’s feet, and had asked him to curl his toes. Such a small request. He kept making small requests, the man. Curl your toes. Stretch your legs. Lift them as far as you can. Move your ears. Move your tail. Then a question with no request.
“Does this hurt?”
Felix wishes they didn’t let him dream.“I don’t know why they threw me away. Maybe I’m broken.” He can hear how self critical it sounds, if Hyunjin ever said something like this Felix wouldn’t be able to stand it. But he’s not really being self critical.He can practically see the code behind his eyelids. The way he had when he realized what he was, back in Edith’s attic.The flashing syntax error : Unknown Command whenever he tries to dig into the memories. Into that file or program or whatever the fuck is up there. That’s really the worst part of all this. Felix knows what he’s programmed for , he knows what he’s good at. He’s flexible, dexterous, a dancer. But why would they make him fucking clueless? Hide the memories so well that he barely knows how to access his own code?Hyunjin has already told him why, right before Felix had downloaded that ‘system update’ he’d detected way back on that first day awake in Edith’s. “Why would they care whether you're actually good at being a robot? They left you buried and dead , Felix.”EvoTech had realized that Felix was faulty. His AI isn’t well trained, he can’t even access his code without fucking shit up, they must’ve known he’d never perform well. So they threw him away. And in the end he couldn’t even manage to die the right way.“You’re the FLX model.” A new voice startles Felix out of his self pity. The man is dirty. His overalls hang undone around his waist and a name tag hangs from his neck on a chain, “H.Engineer Han Jisung”. He’s sure there's something important about that name but all Felix can see and think is ArmsArmsArms. The plains and dips of his biceps and shoulders are covered in lines of deep blue ink, it takes Felix a moment but after a long second of staring he’s able to make out lines of code. Tucked between elaborate blueprints and schematics it’s code A scruffy haired, sweaty, cute man is standing in the med-bay door and Felix is shocked to be making eye contact with another android. One hand holds a small toolkit while the other is wiping at the oil smeared across his cheek, and Felix is suddenly embarrassed by the urge to clean him.“You were all the rage in the Terran colonies. My family was very disappointed when they discontinued your manufacturing.”The way he says it sounds bad. Like Felix was a toy he narrowly missed out on, in a way he supposes it’s the truth. The tone doesn’t quite match the words though, the man sounds excited, like he’s discovered something new. “They didn’t discontinue you, You ran away .”