Michael would've welcomed the touch, but he didn't feel like he could reach out for it himself. Instead, he unconsciously wrapped his arms back around his body, mentally girding himself to talk about the beginning, which was pretty horrible, no matter how you cut it.
"I don't know the real beginning. The ship crashed, and we were in these pods, I guess. I don't know if we were already born, or cloned, or hatched, or whatever the process is and in stasis, or if we were grown in the pods. Stasis was involved, obviously, in some way, unless alien gestation is fifty years." It was a flat attempt at a joke. "But we didn't know any of that, then. We just...woke up, and we clawed our way out and then went looking. For our family. For help. I don't really remember. We were mute, because we didn't have language at the time. I remember it in pictures, but I can't remember what I was thinking. I was scared. We were scared. There were bright lights--probably the headlights, and sounds--horns, maybe--and people. So many very loud people, making noises at us that we didn't understand."
Maybe it was the earlier panic attack, but he felt the fear again now, like it was yesterday, and he tightened his arms.
"We ended up in a group home. I don't remember a whole lot from then, except when they took Max and Isobel away, left me there. I remember screaming, then, but it might've been just in my head. And, then...they were gone. And I didn't see them again for a long time. It's all fragments, y'know? Emotion. I was terrified, and alone, and someone...the people who took me..." He shook his head, exhaled a shaky breath. "I learned to talk, eventually. I don't remember how or when." Of course, a lot of what he'd learned had been the names they'd called him for being too stupid to talk, for being defective, and worse.
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momijizukamori
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Date: 2019-03-22 02:55 am (UTC)"I don't know the real beginning. The ship crashed, and we were in these pods, I guess. I don't know if we were already born, or cloned, or hatched, or whatever the process is and in stasis, or if we were grown in the pods. Stasis was involved, obviously, in some way, unless alien gestation is fifty years." It was a flat attempt at a joke. "But we didn't know any of that, then. We just...woke up, and we clawed our way out and then went looking. For our family. For help. I don't really remember. We were mute, because we didn't have language at the time. I remember it in pictures, but I can't remember what I was thinking. I was scared. We were scared. There were bright lights--probably the headlights, and sounds--horns, maybe--and people. So many very loud people, making noises at us that we didn't understand."
Maybe it was the earlier panic attack, but he felt the fear again now, like it was yesterday, and he tightened his arms.
"We ended up in a group home. I don't remember a whole lot from then, except when they took Max and Isobel away, left me there. I remember screaming, then, but it might've been just in my head. And, then...they were gone. And I didn't see them again for a long time. It's all fragments, y'know? Emotion. I was terrified, and alone, and someone...the people who took me..." He shook his head, exhaled a shaky breath. "I learned to talk, eventually. I don't remember how or when." Of course, a lot of what he'd learned had been the names they'd called him for being too stupid to talk, for being defective, and worse.