Aetherspace

buildup

"I....Am...Kai?" The monster says confusedly.

"No, you are CH-AI. *ch*-*ai*. Try it!"

"Ch....Ai?"

"Yes! You've got it. I'll leave you here to practice for now. Keep going!"

The monster still doesn't exactly have a fully-formed appearance. Yes, itappears wolf-like, but it wants something more. It wants... It wants to look more like the weird being that keeps coming into the room. 

Instead of practicing the odd word that the being continues to refer to it as, it struggles to manipulate its body.

At first, it attempts to stand up.

Yay! It...

Uh.. Oh no.

It looks down and realizes that it just pulled itself out from a puddle-like bottom. It doesn't have those nice appendages that the human had.

After about 20 minutes of struggling....

"Y.....a....y...!" It manages, feeling up its newfound legs with...

Oh no. It has gooey arms... That needs to be fixed.

Done a little faster, about 11 minutes.

Now it has hands, arms, and legs... But it also has a lot of excess goo. It needs to put it somewhere...

"Chai" remembers the way the being's coat flowed behind like a...

An image comes into mind. It's not blurry or faded, it's clean, easy to replicate. A tail, excellent for balance and comfort..

The tail is made, and now the question of how that image came to mind appears.

It thinks and thinks and thinks, but eventually, the task the being assigned to it becomes more important.

"Ch-ai, Ch-ai, Ch-ai, Ch-ai..."

Then, it notices a mirror in its small room. The room itself is white and tiled. Uncomfortable for beings who live in the outside world, but here, it is all "Chai" has ever known. It realizes that the mirror was probably just installed.

It goes up to the mirror, and stands to its feet. Whereas before, it imagines that it was probably much more scrambled, but now its more consistent. It likes looking more consistent.

But it looks so plain...

Its color scheme mainly consists of black with highlights of red. It's eyes are purple, and emit a soft glow. Unnatural, it realizes. It looks very unnatural. Wolves, (Is that the right word?) don't have these colors, and neither do humans (Is that the being that keeps returning to this small room to teach "Chai" things?)

It slowly but surely fixes the imperfections and abnormalities on its body. Now it looks almost not gooey at all. It could pass for a-furry-strange being. Chai flinches at the word that just appears in its head.

Suddenly, pain, killer headache. It grabs its head and sits on the tiled floor, groaning and moaning in pain. There is no enjoyment in this, it feels like its head is splitting.

"Chai? Chai are you alright?" A light voice, male, it's the weird being from earlier... When did he arrive..?

"I'm.....Hurt.....Pain......" It groans. (Wait, does it remember learning those words?)

"I didn't... Whatever, come on-!" The doctor ( I didn't learn these words-) helps Chai up, and they go into a room filled with cabinets.

He gets a drug, and in his rush to get it to Chai, he accidentally drops one of the pills not in his mouth but just on his belly area. Instead of staying on the top, it just sinks in...

"Ah...?" The doctor looks confused, with a hint of concern.

Chai's headache gradually stabilizes.

"I see.. So our theories were correct. Your entire body is like a machine, it breaks things down by being engulfed, similar to an amoeba... Hm.. Stay here for now, I'm going to go get someone." Ugisaki says.

＊＊＊＊＊

Tanaka is studying samples in the experiment room.

"Tanaka! TANAKA!" Ugisaki can be heard yelling as he moves from room to room.

"What?" Tanaka takes his ear mufflers off.

"It's Chai. He's recovering differently than we expected. I think his original consciousness has been suppressed, it isn't fully gone." He says, out of breath.

"What do you mean? And sit down, you look like you're about to fall over." Tanaka says, guiding them both over to some chairs.

"He said words that I didn't teach him, and I am not even mentioning how his appearance changed. When he was still human, he had a serious vanity problem, and it carried over to Chai." Ugisaki elaborates.

"Hm... What about Chamu?"

"Chamu? He is fine, though it seems like that may be the case for him too. I haven't been able to talk with him much, because he is so sensitive. He seems afraid of everything." Ugisaki says placidly.

"An anxiety problem...? That's going to be tricky to work with. Go check on Chai, I'll talk to Chamu." Tanaka replies determinedly.

They split up, heading into both corridors, and go down different hallways.

Tanaka arrives at the room labelled "チャムアイ" (Chamuai).

He takes a deep breath, and opens the door.