Tessa had not understood the gravity of the bargain until she felt the endured suffering lifted. Everything she felt had melted away, as though it had all just been a hallucination. her suffering had been very real, but only within the confines of her thoughts. That induced fear. For a moment, she found herself staring into the void, waiting, watching for any disturbance. It never came, her surroundings remaining pristine. Then, the echo:
Youchoosewisely'Shadowbearer'
The scape around her dissolved, becoming the moderately-lit room around her. She had awoken in time to see someone stood over her, too close to make out any features, planting a kiss on her lips. An attempted recoil from the contact, but there was nowhere to recoil to. She was trapped, and there was nothing she could do. Then she felt it. Something slithered into her mouth, something slick and long. at first she thought it was their tongue, but it was far too thick for that. She gagged, as whatever it was slid down her throat, worming its way inside her.
Struggling to breathe, she convulsed a little as it made its way inside. They pulled away from the kiss, and she caught a glimpse of something blueish disappearing into her mouth while she fought for air. It settled inside her, allowing her to catch her breath before it sought out her spine. It almost surgically cut through her stomach lining, seeking the point it could integrate itself to her. The intense pain of it burrowing inside her caused a primal scream to echo across Kaarst. As her eyed focused on the shadow in front of her, she noticed it was Heimirich, whispering something that she didn't quite hear over her own wailing. Alls that existed was the pain from this creature.
She blacked out from the intensity of the pain, entering a semi-coma state.
As she laid there, in a pit of darkness from the pain, something brushed against her mind. A presence. Her thoughts wondered at it, while its physical form connected itself to her nervous system. It felt the pain and the presence recoiled slightly from what she felt, but it did not stop on its mission.
It sifted through her thoughts, deeming most unworthy of its attention, before discarding the motion. It learnt enough from her thoughts to facilitate effective integration into her mind and body, needing little more. As it attached itself, a gasp escaped. An echo of a multitude of voices within her own mind, coupled with the distant hum of others was overwhelming. So many thoughts, so many harmonious echoes. She had become one with them.
She attempted to communicate with the presence, the many minds, but it chose to ignore her. She could feel it entwining with her spine, inserting itself into her central nervous system through many points of contact, and integrating itself inside to take control as necessary. For the moment, it simply kept her in the state she was in, letting her thoughts go unanswered. She tried over and over again, each time bearing the same results: silence. It did not even seem mildly annoyed by the distractions, almost as if it knew what to expect from a new ‘Lightbearer’, which was the only word that seemed to be present in the resonance of the others that she could discern.
Eventually she gave up, wishing the pain to subside.
It took time, but it did. The reduced overload allowed her to slip back into consciousness and realise she was no longer restrained. Opening her eyes also showed her surroundings to have changed. The room was gone, replaced with a large hangar space reaching further than she could see. Despite it being fairly dim, only illuminated by the pulsar of the system, it was enough to make out the silhouette of her ship. Weiss' Engel Four. An "Engel" no more, and most definitely no longer in service to Imperial Shipping.
She couldn't see the others working in the hangar, but she could sense them. Their minds, their thoughts. They worked in harmony. None of them were carriers of Light, but still they did what needed to be done as it was needed. Almost like a rehearsed dance. Her gaze drifted over to her ship again, feeling as though something was different about it. Approaching slowly, her right hand reached up and touched the underneath of the lower fin. It took a moment to sink in.
Warmth. Her ship was warm to the touch, not the normal chilly hull plating feeling that accompanied alloy, but the radiating warmth of almost being alive. She gazed at the hull, noticing the usual yellowish plating had become more of a greyish blue material. One she didn't yet know the origins of. She made her way around to the front of the vessel, climbing up into the cockpit through the open hatch. One look around gave her slight pause. There was a control panel, but no manual flight inputs. A quizzical thought towards the presence returned her slight mockery from it.
Guidancebythoughtwithin;'Lightbearer'
In response, she sat down in the ship. Almost immediately upon willing it to start up, the hum of the reactor greeted her ears.
She remained there, still. Little thought of her own, a calm acceptance of the changes. Closing her eyes, she let her mind drift onto the ship itself, pondering how it had been transformed. In that same moment, a memory was shared from the form inside. A melody, stripping apart the material, guiding each molecule into a different form. As the song progressed, the vessel itself warped and shifted, the components degrading. The alloy was torn apart piece by piece, reducing its mix into an almost liquid state, it barely holding its shape. Two infiltrators strode in, carrying a container of some sort. The box radiated energy, as bright as any beacon of light, a source immeasurable in power. The minds in the memory instructed them, indicating they place it within the hull of the ship.
As the forms gaze fell upon the floor of the hangar bay, the memory showed herself there. She shuddered from the image, seeing the scars along her body, injuries inflicted and healed repeatedly, taking her flesh and repairing her wounds enough to let them scar. The song changed from the minds, one of destruction to one of healing. Other samples were scattered throughout the hangar, almost ritualistic in their placement around the vessel. Each and every pile of biomass was accompanied with more alien material, blending them together into a mix of human and nomad mass. A tendril of thought reached out towards the power cell, released from its containment field to aid in the process for the form's attention.
Songs became a chorus as it tapped into the enormous energy source, utilising it to fuel the transformation. the matter began to be reshaped, reformed into the liquid hull. The reaction was immediate, an alloy mix between metal, human and alien matter. The previous yellowish hue of the alloy combined with the blue nomad matter became a pale green when coupled with the inclusion of her DNA samples. The Nomad mind continued to work, weaving the previously destroyed substances together into one more formidable machine.
The memory dissolved, to be replaced with the next.
The cockpit of the Roc was dimly lit by the control panels, it throwing up alerts from the changed hull of the vessel. A crackly laugh echoed, a blend between one from a human and something quite alien.Technologyunabletounderstandtheenduredchanges,the form's song broke out again, the remaining matter from the outer hull transformation being brought into the cargo bay of the ship. The control panel and its manual control inputs almost boiled away, conforming to the shape of the cockpit rather than protruding out for human input. The same shift in song from before, unintelligible to the human ear yet shaping a single control panel for some essential inputs through the pilot, though far more responsive to touch and thought.
The previously artificial light inside the ship was replaced with a naturally emitted blue from the nomad material. Everything had changed inside it, including the power relays. What was once a useful bomber had become a formidable tool against Humanity. The lightbearer stepped out of the Roc, striding purposefully over towards Tessa, standing over her as she lay there through her integration. As it was her DNA woven into the hull, only she could make use of its full potential, being the most compatible to connect both mind and body to it. The second vision faded, returning her to her own thoughts inside the pilots seat.
As she sat there, the realisation sunk in. The 'Engel' had become a part of her as much as she was a part of it. With such a change, she knew the ship would need to take on a new name, carve a new legacy out of the seas, light a new path between them. A secondary thought for the moment, as she laid back a little. It took a moment to figure out that it had moulded to her figure perfectly, applying pressure only exactly where needed. It was almost as though it was made for her to be there.
A growing desire to fly once more arose inside. whisking away all others.
"Weareready..."Her call went out in both voice and thought, reverberating within and without. In answer, the hangar bay opened, giving her access to see Omega Fifty-eight for the first time. Dark matter swirled around, catching and absorbing the dim glow of the Pulsar. A sight that before would have induced terror inside, gave her only a familial sense of being home. Somewhere her new life could belong. Somewhere to return to when her tasks were complete and to receive new purpose. She willed the vessel to life, lifting up off the bay floor after the engines powered up. Not even they had remained unchanged, the HNP exhaust fumes non-existent, replaced with the blueish glow of more alien origins. Their output was far more efficient too, coping well under the ionised atmosphere within the system that would cause most vessels to falter without proper shielding.
She took some time to glance around and get a feel for her new home, the looming structure of Kaarst and some of the surrounding fragments providing some shelter from the glare of the system's star."Home."Content rose up from the nomad, it only interfering to correct her flight as she adapted to the new responsiveness of the Roc. It took some time, but she got used to it. Soon, she would become a weapon to be directed as necessary, to wreak havoc on those who deserved nothing more than to suffer and perish by the Light.
On one particular loop, she saw a 'Heimdall'-class gunboat emerge from a particularly dense patch of dark matter, and the way the substance clung to its hull while dissipating into a cloak of shadows gave her pause to a story her Ma told her when she was young. A single word rose up from within. "Schattenjaegerin". This was to be her new legacy, a Huntress from the Shadows against bearers of darkness, against those who oppose the Light and its allies.
Humanity would learn to fear her and her vessel. She would become an instrument of their demise.
