♠10: let's stop a riot

[sword_boy]

[Tsurugi is seen disabling a rioter, and placing them softly on the ground, before moving on]

This is worse....

[Tsurugi stops to knock back another rioter from attacking him]

...than when the Worm were at the worst. I can't hurt any of them... this is a curse I think and that would be wrong.

[Tsurugi moves towards the fallen rioter, and knocks

Comments

[citadelspirit]

You have sheep all around you.

[sword_boy]

Wrong type of sheep. Vicious man-eating sheep.

[citadelspirit]

These are simply window-breaking, property-destroying sheep, then.

I prefer hooligans to ravenous beasts.

[sword_boy]

Still wrong type of sheep. I mean "Mary Bo-Peep" type of sheep.

I rather have the ravenous beasts. I know how to handle those, since I'm technically one of those.

[citadelspirit]

I understood that.

Then you are another of the City's non-humans?

[sword_boy]

...I am formerly human. I died once as a human, and again in the form that I am now. My kind is called the Worm.

[citadelspirit]

An immortal...?

[sword_boy]

No, not an immortal. This body would be considered... extraterrestrial. They killed me in order to take my appearance and my consciousness, so they could hide in plain sight... but nobody else can stand on top of being me.

[citadelspirit]

Humans are persistent, if nothing else...their main advantages are their opposable thumbs and their stubbornness.

There seem to be many extraterrestrials here. Given my new data, it seems that the human race will find other sentients if they expand their search. The probability has always been nontrivial, but I have never seen evidence of such creatures until now.

[sword_boy]

Humanity has it's tenacity... if they put their mind to it, they seem to be able to beat any challenge.

I've only noticed a few... and the majority of them appear to be human.

[citadelspirit]

It would seem so, somehow. Still, the human form seems to be a popular disguise, and I too wear it against my will. It would be worthwhile, however, if my new form outstripped my old -- but that is impossible. Perhaps yours does?

[sword_boy]

This is a facsimile of my original body... a mimicry. My "actual" body while humanoid, is much more "scorpion"-like. My kind can practically mimic anything... although I much prefer my original form.

[citadelspirit]

Sentimentality. Something that the human race can do without.

[sword_boy]

Sentimentality, as you put it, is the only thing keeping me from becoming what I've denied this body. Sentimentality is the only preventing a massacre from going on courtesy of this very body. I am human first, despite what my body may be.

[citadelspirit]

And I am an immortal machine first, despite what my body may be. I do not understand the chemical mess that is the human brain and its emotional chaos.

You hinder yourself when you could become something greater. You are given the chance to ascend, and you step away. But why? Humans are like any other animal species: whether you believe it to be evolution, or predestination, or simple luck -- one day all living creatures must die. Every living species must fade -- usually to another, more superior species.

Why do you resist?

[sword_boy]

Death here and death back in our own worlds are two very much different things. Here, I am waiting. I accepted my own final death back in my own world... I chose to put myself in a position which would lead to my own death, and helped to end the war in my world by leading the armies of the Worm to a slaughter. Humanity was the better race.

I resist because I am human, not Worm. I may have "transcended" into a new form, but it hasn't changed me. I resist because it is my nature, much like it is yours to question humanity.