Beautifully Broken: Chapter One
Title: Beautifully Broken
Author: E.E. Kelley
Summary: Without Christopher to keep him hidden, Wikus was quickly found by the MNU and forced back into captivity. The transformation too far along, there was little the officers could do but allow it to complete itself. Yet, even after he has become fully Prawn, they keep him around, determined to use his existence to find a way to use the alien weaponry. When Christopher returns in three years time, he returns to find the shell of the man he left. Will he be able to fix him before leaving with his people once more or will he have to take the broken soul with him?
Rating: R+
A/N: As well, I'm also working on a D9 Fic, Metamorphosis, that deals more with Wikus' relationship with the Poleepkwa (and their alien culture) that find him after the events of the movie -- and how he functions in the time before (and then after) Christopher leaves. In comparison, this fic is more Prawn Pr0n than the other I am working on.
This chapter is written to be broken and segmented on purpose, the rest of the fic will not have this format.
Chapter One
i
He wanted his quiet, ordered, suburban life: the one with a desk job and house and his sweet angel waiting when he got back from one to the other.
When the MNU has first found him, curled up in a dark corner of the District a good month after the mother ship had vanished, he was still more or less completely human. He had changed a fair bit in the last month, the transformation extending up his one arm and down the other, breaking through the skin along his chest and back to reveal a near-black shell that shone green in the light. Antenna had broken free of his skull as it altered painfully slow, along with his eyes. The skin along his thighs was beginning to split as it had along his arms and chest, but that too was moving at a near standstill, drawing out the agony.
The had found him like that, curled in dirty newspaper, starving, and forced him into one of the government vans with little care. The MNU officers had done more damage to his humanity that Wikus could have expected. As one fo the guards threw him into a temporary cell , the skin along his upper arm which clung desperately gave way, tearing off with a sound like ripped meat. It was all he could do not to cry out. Not for the pain it brought, but a sensation of loss and the sight itself. He still expected pain even though the nerve endings had died away long ago.
As the officers processed him, it was as though they had taken a good deal of effort to scrub, prying with harsh hands at the remainder of his hair and forcing it to fall, peeling the skin along the back of his cranium so that the sharp points of spikes emerged. The contrast between his skin and shell was sickening and if he had anything in his stomach to empty, he would have. They had done all of this in the comfort of a mirrored room, giving him the privilege to watch his own destruction.
He settled for a dry wretch as one of officers peeled soft tissue away and began to pry at the split skin along his upper leg. The skin had broken enough to allow for shell to show. It had intrigued the man, who had taken his good time peeling his leg like an orange. The nerves had yet to fade away and Wikus had to bite his tongue from screaming.
Lucky for him, he had not had to go through the ordeal again. The man had finished with his left leg and left Wikus to hobble down the white corridor of the lab, one leg human, one mostly not.
When they finally dumped him into his cell, a room so white it gave the impression of ironically sterile, he had pounded on the clear wall, made of plastic with a slight electric current run through it. He banged on its surface until his fist bled, yelled until black blood dribbled down his chin. The soldiers and scientists -- those who had paid enough attention to notice his pain -- only laughed.
He hadn't bothered with the wall since then, only huddled in the corner watching his skin peel.
That lasted a good few days, until a gut wrenching pain ran through him entirely, forcing him to scream once more, flailing on the ground, seizing with each limb splayed. The pain was intensifying, tearing through him in one, final finale. The guards crowded around his little cage, soon to be pushed away by the scientists and MNU higher-ups. Wikus didn't care, though. All he cared about was getting away from the pain.
In his menial efforts, he began to claw at the remainder of his skin, at his skull, trying to tear past the searing sensation. It didn't work, only created ribbons of skin he had torn in neat rows like a cheese grater. He screamed, cried out to those who watched with their clipboards and eyes full of objective interest. Hobbling over to the glass wall once more, leaving a smear of black on perfect white tiles, Wikus began to pound once more, using not only clawed fists, but entire arms, and when the pain swelled within him, his entire form -- as though he were trying to break down a door.
The shock emitted by the clear wall meant nothing to him now; it meant nothing compared to the horror that radiated through his entire being.
He cried out, screamed at the men in their white coats, at the men in their neatly pressed soldier uniforms, but mostly at the men in their suits, at the men that he knew. He screamed until it was as though the words were being stolen from him, drowned. One moment he was cursing the entirety of the MNU out, the next he couldn't seem to move his mouth.
Wikus was suffocating, white spots swimming in front of his eyes as he tried desperately for air. It was that which finally knocked him into blackness. And as he lost consciousness, all Wikus could think of was how much he hoped not to wake up again.
ii
Wikus had gotten used to the soldiers ignoring him, to the MNU agents -- many of which he knew from his time working in the government offices -- walking right past him. They all understood full well who he was; their clipboards said it all and if that wasn't enough, a more than noticeably sized (sign) had been erected next to his little cage. Wikus was on display. They knew it; he knew it. With little else to do, Wikus curled into the furthest corner of the cell and tried not to remember where he was.
It was strange, but he missed the District. He missed CJ and didn't want to think about how far away the child and his farther were now, or whether or not they could even find him now that he was no long among the refugees. That thought had to be shaken away quickly: he couldn't bear to dwell on the subject, to wonder how long the MNU would draw his torture out before they finally brought it all to an end. There was no doubt that it would be before Christopher returned with his armada -- if he even did return.
It was only when his father in law moved past the cage did Wikus' blood run cold. Striding with a purpose and confidence Wikus had always dreamed of having himself, Piet Smit moved past his Son in Law's cell with not so much as a quick look to the sign as if reorient himself within the military facility. He didn't care; he never cared.
A growl rose in Wikus' throat, bitter and feral. The sound vibrated through him, putting him on edge. Antenna twitching, eyes glowing with rage, Wikus threw himself once more at the glass wall, pounding on the surface, barely feeling the sharp echos of pain as electricity coursed through him. Only when his Father in Law turned did he notice streaks of black marring his shell and softer lines of liquid seeping between the cracked plates of his arms.
The old man stared at him, eyes empty. Smit turned from Wikus, speaking briskly to a scientist who had been passing in the opposite direction before leaving himself.
As Wikus watched someone he had so recently considered family stride down the hall, he let himself fall away. The scientist had moved up next to his cell and was intently taking notes, looking up every so often to survey the damage Wikus had done to himself.
Wikus thought that was all the scientist was planning on doing until one of the two, a middle-aged man with a blotchy complexion, motion across the corridor toward three guards who had been lounging as if on break. The three soldiers moved towards Wikus' cell and, after listening to what the scientist had to say, hoisted their guns up, pointing them at the exhausted alien even through glass. Before Wikus had time to wonder why, the first scientist punched at a hand held keypad and the glass that had separated the cell from the hallway vanished.
Wikus wanted to run, wanted to get up and at least cause a scene, but he could barely move anymore. Yesterday his body had gone through the final alterations, using up any stored energy he had to transform completely. It was a wonder he had the strength to rage at his father in law. They hadn't bothered to feed him since being in the MNU facility and Wikus wasn't sure they meant to.
"Come on," one of the soldiers, a lanky twenty-something, demanded, moving in front of the second scientist and his clipboard, "Don't got all day. Get up!"
He jammed the butt of his rifle against Wikus' head, catching an antenna and sending little shards of discomfort through the alien skull.
"Get up already, damn bug!" the soldier hit him harder, slamming the body of his gun to the side of Wikus face. The blow sent Wikus down, sprawled out on the white floor. He heard the man stepping towards him and wanted to get up, wanted to do what the teenage soldier said, but his body would listen. Limbs were distant and remote, not quite cooperating as if he were still half-asleep.
The soldier made a move to kick him, but was stopped by one of the scientists.
"It's consumed too many calories recently, so we might as well get a gurney down here so we don't have to deal with the thing staggering about at a standstill." the man said in a voice set a pitch too high for someone of his girth, "Radio for one of the doctors to bring a gurney down from the medical sector and we can get this down fast."
Grumbling, the soldier did as he was told, speaking to static in a harsh tone.
Wikus listened to the men all speak, the soldiers joking with one another, the scientist ushering another white-coated man over to discuss something in lowered voices. He didn't hear anything they said, didn't care anymore.
The gurney came faster than Wikus had expected it to, followed by a young woman with slightly too many freckles and ears a size too big. She maneuvered the bed so that it was directly in front of Wikus cell and stood there, as if waiting for something to happen.
The scientist spoke in his squeaky voice, "Thing's still too weak from what happened yesterday. We're going to have to heft it up onto the gurney."
Wikus wondered when exactly he became an "it" and "thing" to these people, but then again it's not as though they were too off the mark. He looked down at his bleeding arms. The shell was a deep green, shining almost black beneath the florescent bulbs. Spikes tapered off, looking dangerously sharp along the outer part of his arms. Cracks marred the surface, oozing dark blood, staining the shell even darker.
All three soldiers had moved up next to him and began to manhandle him, lifting his body roughly off the ground and onto the rolling bed. He didn't bother to struggle, there really wasn't a point to it, only closed his eyes and tried not to be. A sharp crack echoed through the white halls as one of the young soldiers dropped his right arm and let it slam against the ground. Wikus winced pushing back a yelp as tendrils of pain wound through his arm. He didn't want to give the damn guard anything to work with in making his life as a captive pure hell.
Hefting him onto the gurney, the soldiers proceeded to strap Wikus' limbs and neck down as they might with a mental patient. Nodding to the blotchy scientist, Wikus felt the bed begin to roll. He closed his eyes, trying to focus on nothing, pretending that he was in a normal hospital getting a broken bone set. That only brought back thoughts of the last time he had seen a doctor -- just after being sprayed by the alien capsule.
iii
"Well, from what we can deduce, there is no remainder of human DNA. We had planned to continue with the previous experiments on weaponry while simultaneous working on a way to halt the prawn transformation, but something spurred on the mutation." said a far-off voice. Wikus realized he must have fallen asleep or been sedated by the MNU operatives...the latter was more likely. "We have found a new use for the alien, though. While the changes were complete, it seems that there are some dysfunction's relating to the specimens reproductive organs. What exactly, we're not certain of, but this poses some very interesting questions."
Opening his eyes, Wikus saw darkness without shadows, as though he were confined in something very small. He tried to lift his arms, to reach out and find a way to escape, but they were still tied down. Even the secondary set of arms on his abdomen were belted down.
In desperation, he moved his antenna, trying to feel out if he truly was, and when he did, his fears were confirmed: he was in a small, metal tube.
Wikus heard the far-off voice continue, and tried to call out. His cries came out strange and garbled -- the clicking of a prawn, though he was barely able to maneuver his new mouth parts. Now words, only insect sounds.
Wikus felt a prick between one of his leg plates as if a needle had come out of the darkness. Soon, consciousness faded. When he woke again, he was back in his cell. Bandages covered his upper arms and soft neck-parts. When he unraveled them, he found the peppered marks of needles and clotted blood.
It seems they weren't going to let Wikus die just yet.
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Author: E.E. Kelley
Summary: Without Christopher to keep him hidden, Wikus was quickly found by the MNU and forced back into captivity. The transformation too far along, there was little the officers could do but allow it to complete itself. Yet, even after he has become fully Prawn, they keep him around, determined to use his existence to find a way to use the alien weaponry. When Christopher returns in three years time, he returns to find the shell of the man he left. Will he be able to fix him before leaving with his people once more or will he have to take the broken soul with him?
Rating: R+
A/N: As well, I'm also working on a D9 Fic, Metamorphosis, that deals more with Wikus' relationship with the Poleepkwa (and their alien culture) that find him after the events of the movie -- and how he functions in the time before (and then after) Christopher leaves. In comparison, this fic is more Prawn Pr0n than the other I am working on.
This chapter is written to be broken and segmented on purpose, the rest of the fic will not have this format.
Chapter One
i
He wanted his quiet, ordered, suburban life: the one with a desk job and house and his sweet angel waiting when he got back from one to the other.
When the MNU has first found him, curled up in a dark corner of the District a good month after the mother ship had vanished, he was still more or less completely human. He had changed a fair bit in the last month, the transformation extending up his one arm and down the other, breaking through the skin along his chest and back to reveal a near-black shell that shone green in the light. Antenna had broken free of his skull as it altered painfully slow, along with his eyes. The skin along his thighs was beginning to split as it had along his arms and chest, but that too was moving at a near standstill, drawing out the agony.
The had found him like that, curled in dirty newspaper, starving, and forced him into one of the government vans with little care. The MNU officers had done more damage to his humanity that Wikus could have expected. As one fo the guards threw him into a temporary cell , the skin along his upper arm which clung desperately gave way, tearing off with a sound like ripped meat. It was all he could do not to cry out. Not for the pain it brought, but a sensation of loss and the sight itself. He still expected pain even though the nerve endings had died away long ago.
As the officers processed him, it was as though they had taken a good deal of effort to scrub, prying with harsh hands at the remainder of his hair and forcing it to fall, peeling the skin along the back of his cranium so that the sharp points of spikes emerged. The contrast between his skin and shell was sickening and if he had anything in his stomach to empty, he would have. They had done all of this in the comfort of a mirrored room, giving him the privilege to watch his own destruction.
He settled for a dry wretch as one of officers peeled soft tissue away and began to pry at the split skin along his upper leg. The skin had broken enough to allow for shell to show. It had intrigued the man, who had taken his good time peeling his leg like an orange. The nerves had yet to fade away and Wikus had to bite his tongue from screaming.
Lucky for him, he had not had to go through the ordeal again. The man had finished with his left leg and left Wikus to hobble down the white corridor of the lab, one leg human, one mostly not.
When they finally dumped him into his cell, a room so white it gave the impression of ironically sterile, he had pounded on the clear wall, made of plastic with a slight electric current run through it. He banged on its surface until his fist bled, yelled until black blood dribbled down his chin. The soldiers and scientists -- those who had paid enough attention to notice his pain -- only laughed.
He hadn't bothered with the wall since then, only huddled in the corner watching his skin peel.
That lasted a good few days, until a gut wrenching pain ran through him entirely, forcing him to scream once more, flailing on the ground, seizing with each limb splayed. The pain was intensifying, tearing through him in one, final finale. The guards crowded around his little cage, soon to be pushed away by the scientists and MNU higher-ups. Wikus didn't care, though. All he cared about was getting away from the pain.
In his menial efforts, he began to claw at the remainder of his skin, at his skull, trying to tear past the searing sensation. It didn't work, only created ribbons of skin he had torn in neat rows like a cheese grater. He screamed, cried out to those who watched with their clipboards and eyes full of objective interest. Hobbling over to the glass wall once more, leaving a smear of black on perfect white tiles, Wikus began to pound once more, using not only clawed fists, but entire arms, and when the pain swelled within him, his entire form -- as though he were trying to break down a door.
The shock emitted by the clear wall meant nothing to him now; it meant nothing compared to the horror that radiated through his entire being.
He cried out, screamed at the men in their white coats, at the men in their neatly pressed soldier uniforms, but mostly at the men in their suits, at the men that he knew. He screamed until it was as though the words were being stolen from him, drowned. One moment he was cursing the entirety of the MNU out, the next he couldn't seem to move his mouth.
Wikus was suffocating, white spots swimming in front of his eyes as he tried desperately for air. It was that which finally knocked him into blackness. And as he lost consciousness, all Wikus could think of was how much he hoped not to wake up again.
ii
Wikus had gotten used to the soldiers ignoring him, to the MNU agents -- many of which he knew from his time working in the government offices -- walking right past him. They all understood full well who he was; their clipboards said it all and if that wasn't enough, a more than noticeably sized (sign) had been erected next to his little cage. Wikus was on display. They knew it; he knew it. With little else to do, Wikus curled into the furthest corner of the cell and tried not to remember where he was.
It was strange, but he missed the District. He missed CJ and didn't want to think about how far away the child and his farther were now, or whether or not they could even find him now that he was no long among the refugees. That thought had to be shaken away quickly: he couldn't bear to dwell on the subject, to wonder how long the MNU would draw his torture out before they finally brought it all to an end. There was no doubt that it would be before Christopher returned with his armada -- if he even did return.
It was only when his father in law moved past the cage did Wikus' blood run cold. Striding with a purpose and confidence Wikus had always dreamed of having himself, Piet Smit moved past his Son in Law's cell with not so much as a quick look to the sign as if reorient himself within the military facility. He didn't care; he never cared.
A growl rose in Wikus' throat, bitter and feral. The sound vibrated through him, putting him on edge. Antenna twitching, eyes glowing with rage, Wikus threw himself once more at the glass wall, pounding on the surface, barely feeling the sharp echos of pain as electricity coursed through him. Only when his Father in Law turned did he notice streaks of black marring his shell and softer lines of liquid seeping between the cracked plates of his arms.
The old man stared at him, eyes empty. Smit turned from Wikus, speaking briskly to a scientist who had been passing in the opposite direction before leaving himself.
As Wikus watched someone he had so recently considered family stride down the hall, he let himself fall away. The scientist had moved up next to his cell and was intently taking notes, looking up every so often to survey the damage Wikus had done to himself.
Wikus thought that was all the scientist was planning on doing until one of the two, a middle-aged man with a blotchy complexion, motion across the corridor toward three guards who had been lounging as if on break. The three soldiers moved towards Wikus' cell and, after listening to what the scientist had to say, hoisted their guns up, pointing them at the exhausted alien even through glass. Before Wikus had time to wonder why, the first scientist punched at a hand held keypad and the glass that had separated the cell from the hallway vanished.
Wikus wanted to run, wanted to get up and at least cause a scene, but he could barely move anymore. Yesterday his body had gone through the final alterations, using up any stored energy he had to transform completely. It was a wonder he had the strength to rage at his father in law. They hadn't bothered to feed him since being in the MNU facility and Wikus wasn't sure they meant to.
"Come on," one of the soldiers, a lanky twenty-something, demanded, moving in front of the second scientist and his clipboard, "Don't got all day. Get up!"
He jammed the butt of his rifle against Wikus' head, catching an antenna and sending little shards of discomfort through the alien skull.
"Get up already, damn bug!" the soldier hit him harder, slamming the body of his gun to the side of Wikus face. The blow sent Wikus down, sprawled out on the white floor. He heard the man stepping towards him and wanted to get up, wanted to do what the teenage soldier said, but his body would listen. Limbs were distant and remote, not quite cooperating as if he were still half-asleep.
The soldier made a move to kick him, but was stopped by one of the scientists.
"It's consumed too many calories recently, so we might as well get a gurney down here so we don't have to deal with the thing staggering about at a standstill." the man said in a voice set a pitch too high for someone of his girth, "Radio for one of the doctors to bring a gurney down from the medical sector and we can get this down fast."
Grumbling, the soldier did as he was told, speaking to static in a harsh tone.
Wikus listened to the men all speak, the soldiers joking with one another, the scientist ushering another white-coated man over to discuss something in lowered voices. He didn't hear anything they said, didn't care anymore.
The gurney came faster than Wikus had expected it to, followed by a young woman with slightly too many freckles and ears a size too big. She maneuvered the bed so that it was directly in front of Wikus cell and stood there, as if waiting for something to happen.
The scientist spoke in his squeaky voice, "Thing's still too weak from what happened yesterday. We're going to have to heft it up onto the gurney."
Wikus wondered when exactly he became an "it" and "thing" to these people, but then again it's not as though they were too off the mark. He looked down at his bleeding arms. The shell was a deep green, shining almost black beneath the florescent bulbs. Spikes tapered off, looking dangerously sharp along the outer part of his arms. Cracks marred the surface, oozing dark blood, staining the shell even darker.
All three soldiers had moved up next to him and began to manhandle him, lifting his body roughly off the ground and onto the rolling bed. He didn't bother to struggle, there really wasn't a point to it, only closed his eyes and tried not to be. A sharp crack echoed through the white halls as one of the young soldiers dropped his right arm and let it slam against the ground. Wikus winced pushing back a yelp as tendrils of pain wound through his arm. He didn't want to give the damn guard anything to work with in making his life as a captive pure hell.
Hefting him onto the gurney, the soldiers proceeded to strap Wikus' limbs and neck down as they might with a mental patient. Nodding to the blotchy scientist, Wikus felt the bed begin to roll. He closed his eyes, trying to focus on nothing, pretending that he was in a normal hospital getting a broken bone set. That only brought back thoughts of the last time he had seen a doctor -- just after being sprayed by the alien capsule.
iii
"Well, from what we can deduce, there is no remainder of human DNA. We had planned to continue with the previous experiments on weaponry while simultaneous working on a way to halt the prawn transformation, but something spurred on the mutation." said a far-off voice. Wikus realized he must have fallen asleep or been sedated by the MNU operatives...the latter was more likely. "We have found a new use for the alien, though. While the changes were complete, it seems that there are some dysfunction's relating to the specimens reproductive organs. What exactly, we're not certain of, but this poses some very interesting questions."
Opening his eyes, Wikus saw darkness without shadows, as though he were confined in something very small. He tried to lift his arms, to reach out and find a way to escape, but they were still tied down. Even the secondary set of arms on his abdomen were belted down.
In desperation, he moved his antenna, trying to feel out if he truly was, and when he did, his fears were confirmed: he was in a small, metal tube.
Wikus heard the far-off voice continue, and tried to call out. His cries came out strange and garbled -- the clicking of a prawn, though he was barely able to maneuver his new mouth parts. Now words, only insect sounds.
Wikus felt a prick between one of his leg plates as if a needle had come out of the darkness. Soon, consciousness faded. When he woke again, he was back in his cell. Bandages covered his upper arms and soft neck-parts. When he unraveled them, he found the peppered marks of needles and clotted blood.
It seems they weren't going to let Wikus die just yet.
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