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He feels vulnerable and stupid.
Anytime he stands next to his siblings he feels like a child's drawing being compared to elegant Liyuean ink wash paintings. Nobody seems to notice him, with his siblings in constant spotlight. He likes it that way, but sometimes he wishes someone would pay attention to him, to the things he enjoys doing too.
All curled up around the seaweed and ocean debris, he’d clutch at his mother's pendant. Sobbing and calling out at the bottom of the ocean for no one to hear. He truly doesn't feel like a person anymore. How he now blends in amongst the machinery components and meka strewn about his room.
He wishes that he could dive to the deepest seabed, burrow himself into the sand and driftwood, and dissolve into the water like salt. To disappear like in a magic act, to be forgotten by everyone and everything. He wants to never be seen by anyone again.
At times when he goes diving, he'll lose his footing on loose sand and trip in the water. His hands would fling out, seeking something for leverage to catch himself from uncomfortably sinking. They would either meet the cold grit of sand swallowing up between his fingers, or a sharp edge to a broken shell or stray beryl conch. With the blood mixing in with the seawater, it gave a wispy green cloud floating from his skin.
This feeling wasn't parallel to any other, the singing as his nerves registered the water inflaming the cut and irritating his nerves. He'd clench his jaw and finally smile up at the sun peeking through the waves. It felt like he was becoming one with the water, freely able to flow in the currents and let himself go. He’d wish he could remove his diving helmet and allow the water to fill his lungs, just to sink away to be with the coral and lumitoile and clams.
He feels so tired and heavy, like he'd put on wooly, thick clothing before a dive. It's so numbing, when you're surrounded by people but still feel lonely. Maybe if he was someone important he wouldn't feel this way. He deserves it, he thinks, why would he not? He hasn't done anything to deserve the love of his siblings, let alone Father’s approval.
When he's alone in his room, not at home; just in his room, he'd imagine how it'd be like to slide something sharp across his skin. To see blood’s red sheen soak away into his clothes, or run across his arms or legs, and have it not anymore be a semi-accident. He wonders if it would give the same tingling relief, the same searing pain that’d made him shiver like before.
He can't help but think he deserves that too, that biting which he longs for. It silently calls out for him, in the back of his mind; it’s always thrashing around, ready to act. When his head and heart go blank and he can't think of anything but static, it will always be there, a comfortable invasion of some parasite.
He opens his eyes sometime after dusk. He knows because the ghouly hands that are at his skin are barely visible in the room. The metal held shines in the moonlight's gap through the curtains, pressed into an upper part of thigh. It barely applied a pressure that still hurt even without breaking skin. Pulling, and with a strange tautness that would soon separate skin from wound, it dug into his thigh harsh.
It hurt for a second, when he could feel it drag through the thick texture of his skin. If he focused enough, he thought he might even be able to hear it rip through and draw blood. Somebody was pushing that blade into his skin, it wasn't him, he's not in that body right now. He finds himself somewhere hiding around, floating in what rush of water was taking over his corpse. Whatever he had left was watching through wide eyes, and the tight, ugly form of a smile.
He didn't know what to do or how to feel. He couldn't know, because he didn't have a brain anymore. That was taken over, kidnapped from him when he’d let himself shut his eyes. That giddy parasite was in control now, reaping the body's blood and skin, and letting it mix and drip. He wants the body to be cold, he tries to conject, because he can discern that this parasite is far too warm. But he already is dipped into a chill, his spirit is at least, with a heavy numbing sense that plows and burrows deep.
He isn’t even him, he isn’t his body, he isn’t his brain either. He doesn't know what he is, but it can’t be human. Maybe something that would fit in better with the blade in that thing's hand, maybe a meka, or something smaller and insignificant to anyone not looking. He came to the conclusion he was meant to be a piece of stray scrap metal, lodged in the crevices of dull hued rock and sand, scratching at what would pass and standing out brightly in that scene.
Only when the parasite finally reveres its work and reverts back into a budding hibernation does he realize how strongly his legs sting. They're his now at least, mutilated with puffy cuts that scatter all across his thighs, whatever had done it must've been in a hurry. He rubs his fingertips along them, feeling the raised flesh burn, and if he pushes hard enough, he can feel the congealed blood peel off. He doesn't know how long he’d been kneeling there, but his back aches from where it was pressed into the edge of his bed frame; and when he glances out the window behind him, his neck creaks and the moon is no longer visible from where he sits.
His eyes ache with a heavy feeling, his waterline hurts when he blinks, and he can't help but think that maybe that parasite is lapping at his water supply, dehydrating him with every move. He rises from the floor, the pins and needles in his shins and feet leave a feeling that runs through his spine, the rush of it is almost painful. His head lurches with a dizzy feeling, like his brain isn't even there, and he's soon to be seeing nothing but the backs of his eyelids and the colorful spots that frolic across them. His next breath shudders his torso, a soft one full of disappointment and agony, that shakes his ribs and makes his eyes go prickly.
Tears. He can feel them flow over and run to his lips, wetting the chapped skin there, before soaking into his mouth. Why? Why are there tears there, when he isn't feeling anything? When he isn't allowed to feel anything. What even is sadness? How do normal people feel it? The hollow pain in his chest is dulled, replacing itself with a sharp one that stretches down to his stomach, right where his hands cup and dig into it like a hug. His body is his now, even if that thing writhes out around his brain stem, he is the one in control of his limbs.
He clenches his teeth together, and the ache it makes is something similar to when one eats too much sorbet in a sitting. They don’t mean anything, tears. Only a product of weakness, an attempt to garner sympathy for idiotic action. It’s what he’s always been told anyway, though often his thoughts contradict said teachings.
A sob lashes itself through his body, and his torso shakes with breaths. Never has he felt so guilty over something that wasn’t his doing. Before, when a child would bump into him on the street, or a waiter would accidentally knock over his glass—he would always feel uncomfortably liable. Like he should be put on trial, to atone for some undeserved sin, and hurdle towards unserved punishment.
His hands tremble and he takes a moment to wipe the tears away, leaving his face sticky. He sniffles the snot back into his nose, and feels it slide down his throat when he swallows. Gross, he’s so disgusting. Filthy, ungrateful, little boy. To not appreciate what he has, a roof over his head, warm meals. To mutilate away concern for himself, when others have it so much worse. Lyney, Lynette, what is he compared to them?
He doesn't like anything about himself, nobody cares about him. So why should he care about himself? He's so obviously useless, frail, weak. When he wakes in the middle of the night, layered in sweat and goosebumps, he feels unwelcome in his own bed. Like even the sheets and pillows are rejecting him. Laying there, itchy and hot, the bed is too warm.
His body is too cold.