I don't have any kind of Nomad higher than morph status. My second-largest story was dedicated to it, which is currently lost on the Mindshare forum. Until I get it back, I WRITE MOAR!
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"...And do you, Kai Gutmann, take Sonja Spielgern to be your lawfully wedded wife?" Asked the preacher. Kai grinned through the faint red haze blurring his vision. His heart was hammering, This was IT. This was the culmination of nearly three years of loving Sonja, and he felt light. Mainly because all the blood was flowing to his head, and the audience chuckled as they watched the thirty year old turn constantly redder, and grin all the broader.
"Yes." He said, just over a whisper. Sonja took a small hop for joy, her own stunning smile turning all of the normally smooth angles on her small face sharp. The jump allowed her veil to slide back down over her face, and she hastily brushed it back as the preacher continued, "And do you, Sonja Spielgern, take Kai Gutmann to be your lawfully wedded husband?" Sonja yelped with glee and leaped forward, clinging to Kai's neck, her feet off the ground, covering his face with kisses. "You may kiss the groom." The preacher mused, and the crowd laughed and cheered as Kai battled her embrace, sought her finger and slipped her ring on, all with one hand.
With the ring on, she clamped her arms securely around his neck, calming down enough for him to cradle her in his arms, tucking an elbow around her back, another under her leg. Kai practically ran back down the steps, and almost slipped on the rice as he did so.
When he looked back on this moment, moments before the tentacle slithered down his throat, he assumed that it was this moment of extreme emotional strength that brought them to him.
They took their honeymoon in space, as Kai's occupation as a Daumann worker granted him one spacebound vacation a year, and they boarded a shuttle to the planet Baden Baden for a week of relaxation, enjoyment, and sexual escape. Kai was sterile, due to a bad blast of solar radiation, but Sonja was determined to find "Just one little kicker", as she said it.
The shuttle ride passed in sections, according to where you sat. You could help but feel happy, amused, or entertained when you sat near the newly weds. Their soft cooing, their loving eye contact seemed to create this soothing aura around them. Immediately past that were the annoyed passengers who had hoped for a silent ride. Past them still were the sour, jealous ones who had yet to either find a lover or find a more entertaining one.
The whispers began to touch his mind while he was caressing Sonja's thigh and softly talking about mishaps on the job. He couldn't make them out, and figured they belonged to the jealous outer ring. He was interrupted mid-sentence by Sonja, who touched his jawline and tugged his chin down so he could stare into her sharp blue eyes. "Kai, you're freezing. Are you okay?"
The question shocked Kai. He felt- oh, god. He felt COLD. He gasped at the sudden sensation. His bones were frozen to their joints. Sonja's eyes flashed alarm. "Are you alright, Kai? Your face is so pale!" Kai couldn't help but laugh- he could swear his lungs fractured at the sudden exertion. "All the adrenaline from the wedding. It's alright, just some Anaphylactic shock. Don't worry." Sonja narrowed her eyes. She worked for a health firm on Berlin, and could tell when he fed her medical garbage.
"You're not allergic to adrenaline, Kai. I'll be checking out out as soon as we land." Her eyes softened a little, and got the foxish gleam that had pulled him in the first time they met. "And I'll do it alone, in a hot bath, with as little clothes as possible." Her hands slid inside his shirt, and he could her her hiss as her hands touched deathly cold flesh. "Good god.." She muttered just below her breath. Her hands were warm- too warm, but their heat sunk in, and seemed to wake a part of him up.
"Sonja, did you say something?" Kai asked as the whispers grew steadily louder. Something seemed to clunk inside his head. Something had made enough room to settle down, and Kai could feel a second heartbeat inside his mind.
Sonja smiled up sweetly. "No, Kai. Let's just keep each other warm until we get to that hot bath. She curled up against him, her small body fitting almost perfectly onto Kai's lap and chest. He slid forward, and let her keep him warm and awake as he wondered what the hell just crawled into his brain.
While Sonja slept, her constant weight and warmth kept him awake. His goal was to talk to these things in his head and get them to go away.
Who are you, and what the hell are you doing in my mind?
What came back made him shiver. It wasn't his own thoughts, but he could 'hear' them as if they were.
***-We-..Touch..Darkmind***
No, you're not.. You can't be..
***(Distantly)..Come..'To'..-Us-***
Kai felt a pang of grief as the weight began to slip away.
No! Don't go! Not yet!
***Come..'To'..-Us-***
Where are you!?
***Stars***
And with that, the presence was gone.
When the presence left, Kai felt like doing many things. Laughing, Crying, Screaming in anger, all these emotions ran through his mind. He had not noticed how long this mental exchange had taken place, as the shuttle was nearing the Baden-Baden orbital shuttledock. Kai adjusted Sonja, who muttered something in Rheinlandish before settling back to sleep.
The shuttle rattled slightly as the mooring lines attached. The bridge extended, pressurized, and the door slid open as passengers began to gather their things. Kai and Sonja had had everything delivered ahead of them, which was really only money used to pay for the room. Kai instead carried Sonja as she dozed, with affectionate gazes from the other passengers as he did. "Lucky guy.." Someone muttered, followed by a smacking noise and an "Ow! What?"
On Baden Baden, now that they had taken a short repulsorlift ride, Kai checked into the hospital, with Sonja's sleeping weight still in her arms. She was sleeping remarkably peacefully, and as he laid her out on the bed-
She was dead. He just stared at her body, unmoving. He hadn't noticed her stillness as he walked. But now, as she lay splayed out on the bed, he noticed his pallid she was in the face, and as he groped for her hand, how red it was underneath. No pulse. He could feel it again- that shuffling in his mind- the presence was coming back. This time he didn't hold back.
He yelled and wailed and screamed, smashed bloody fists into the wall, and when people came to investigate the noise- he killed them. Tore them apart. A human with a lightfire device approached, and my shell charged him, ignoring the sizzling pain in it's side. The human fell, screaming in horror as his face was caved in.
Kai blinked, and took a gasp on air. He was still standing over Sonja- hands intact, nobody was yelling. His mouth was open, but his throat was not raw from screaming. The image had been so vivid- he could feel the hot tears splashing down his face. The image was burned there-
...Bloody fists into the wall- No! Just an image. An image from.. It.
He was referring to the presence that had taken residence inside his mind again.
***-We-...Hold...Power***
Power to do what? Murder and destroy? What are you?
***Wild Ones***
D.. Das Wilde..? No.. NO! NONONONONONONONONO!
***(Images of corpses splayed out before you, with you laughing and holding bloody fists to the sky)***
I don't want that! I don't want- Sonja! YOU ****ING KILLED MY SONJA!
***Darkminds...Die***
NOT MY SONJA! YOU SON OF A BITCH! BRING HER BACK!
Kai heard himself yelling the last part of the exchange, as he buried his face in the dead bosom of his wife. The voice waited a moment before continuing.
***Come.. 'To'.. -Us-***
... What do you want from me? Why me? Who am I to you?
***-"You"-..Possess..'Strength'***
No.. No, I don't want anything to do with you! GET OUT OF MY HEAD!
***(Horrifying images of death and gore flood your senses. You smell them, see them, feel them, hear them crunch and squish under your touch-***
STOP! STOP IT! PLEASE!
***(A light shines above you, banishing the corpses, flushing the area with light. Sonja's face rests in the light. Her arm reaches down to you.)***
***(In Sonja's voice: "Come with us, Kai. Please. I love you..." She begins to float up)***
Sonja! I.. I'm coming with you!
***(You grasp her hand, and she pulls you into the light...)***
Kai's vision faded to black, as he heard the sound of rumbling and explosions around him...
Kai was remarkably peaceful as he awoke, bound to a rectangular table just large enough for his body. He was upright, so his hands tingled with numbness. His eyes adjusted slowly to the dark light, but he cloud smell- sharp, yet muggy smells. The most pervading one was sweat- he noticed several other people- vague, blotchy shaped in the darkness- bound the same way as him, all along the wall. Some were grimacing, and writhing, as if in pain. Others hung limply. One was staring at him, though. As Kai brushed eye contact, the other human's irises flashed a brilliant purple, his face cracked into a grin. "Soon." The other one said. "Soon you will be at peace. And you will help us in taking back what was stolen from us."
Kai was lost for words. When a woman- naked, strode into the room and scanned it. She noticed he was awake, and moved over to him. Her eyes glowed a faint purple as she held his face still. "I am going to pass onto you a gift. Make what you will of this gift, for today marks the start of your new life. We will take back what is ours." Her lips pressed to his, and he felt something slide past her jaws into his mouth- it had a bulging head and rested briefly on his pallet before it shoved down deeper. He gagged on the tentacle, but could not pull away.
He lost consciousness just after he felt something exit the tentacle in his throat- a small, round object. He blacked out as the seed began to work.
The small consciousness awoke, small and lost. As it's parent soothed it's mind, it told the formling what to do.
The human's spine, young one. You must find and adhere to it, and the puppet will be yours to control. With these directions, the youngling set off, phasing through organs and pushing through tissue until it found a long cord- and the energy running though it was redoubtably what connected all of the other lines of energy in this shell's body. It clung to this cord, and begin to spread and connect with it, working it's way up, where the energy grew stronger and brighter- and then it touched the brain, and the formling opened it's eyes.
The room was dark and silent. The formling tested it's new senses. So odd. One eyelid dragged open, revealing a lazy eye that stared at the floor. It used the brain's informational bank to figure out how to move the other eyelid up. Both eyes swiveled around the room. But- pain. This new sensation almost set the formling into shock. Breathe! Said the elder's voice. But how? Back to the information bank!
The formling extended the muscles in the lower lungs, drawing in air for the first time. Contracting those muscles sent it whooshing out. It took a while to get the breathing thing down, it went on to controlling the other senses. His ears twitched as he detected light shuffling noises from the other people shackled to the wall. The naked woman returned, her shoulder-length black hair complimented her purple, glowing eyes. "I am ready." Kai said, but was no longer Kai. The woman nodded to the Wilde next to him, dressed in a space suit. He strode over to Kai-but-not-Kai and released him. The light gravity allowed him to float gently to the ground, and give his new muscles time to coordinate. He tested his new limbs with experimental stretches, punches and kicks. He spent some time with his hand on the wall.
Kai-but-not-Kai needed a name. "Who am I?" He said, his rough, unmastered speech rolling off his tongue like a log. The woman coldly appraised him. "Unschuld. Innocent. Virgin." His name washed over him. "Unschuld." He repeated. Memories floated back to him that would have refuted his name, but he ignored them. He was no longer Kai the Daumann worker. He was Unschuld das Wilde.