same world, different life

Chapter 8. holding onto an old life

After that talk, it seemed that every person I ran into with a problem knew what to expect when meeting me. I had made something of myself that was better than what I would have expected, but while I accepted my new body, I kept getting reminders to remember who I came from.

"Remember, try, try to remember, try to remember where you came from as I can tell your memory of them is fading," I heard the hive queen say to me.

"What, what do you need this time?" I asked her.

"What I need you to do is get whatever Machiavelli's using out of you. From what I can tell, it's under your nose," she replied.

"Under my nose? so that would be..." I stopped there as I felt the underside of my jaw, and sure enough, there was something there. "Ok, got it," I told her.

"Good now, get it out," she replied.

It was applied with just adhesive, but while I did pull it off, it hurt like heck to the point that I screamed in pain into her brain telepathically. "Well, if that prevents you from waking him up, that works, I guess," she told me.

"What's next?" I asked her. "Good thing, I didn't sleep in her mouth."

"Can you find his tablet? I have a plan for you to make his favorite drink," she told me.

"Good thing I had a taste of it, and he told me the recipe," I replied.

"Just get a look after you make it, You've got an hour and a half before he wakes up," she told me.

I first carved out the middle of fruit with thick inner walls, leaving the walls of the fruit. I then cut up the three fruits he told me his son used. One was tomato like but was blue, the second one was an elongated strawberry, and the third was like grapes but wasn't any color I recognized. He said his son put about 10 of them in the blender.

"Ok, it's blended, I got it in the fruit, and it only took 10 minutes. I'll put it in the fridge and now to look at the tablet," I thought to myself.

"Machiavelli usually keeps it unlocked, and I heard him thinking about the password to the journal on it," she said. She told me the password, and then I read through the entries.

"Today, I got evidence that my son is still alive. I just hope the implant in the underside of Nathan's jaw can help me tame him. He needs to forget his family until they can remember; he needs to enjoy life," one entry read.

Another one read: "I'm more than certain that Nathan is succumbing to his trance. Once he embraces his new life as the new him, I'll have it removed and let him enjoy his time here because I know his family would want him to."

"At this point, I wouldn't be surprised if you raised Cain with him," she told me.

"Hold on. There's still another entry. It was written yesterday," I told her.

"After a long talk with Dante, I realized where I went wrong. I was doing the exact opposite of what I was trying to do. While trying to find his potential, I've actually hidden it with my mind trickery. His empathy, his emotion is a key part that I missed, and it's all because I'd programmed it for him to try to please me in my grief, but I've also dampened an already cloudy spirit because I never simply asked if he'd take scales on his body. Nathan, as you're reading this now, please forgive me and know that what you once were was never lost, to begin with, because now that it's gone, you can turn back and forth at will what I wrongfully have done to you."

"He... he asked for forgiveness but how'd he know I would read this," I asked the hive queen.

"Would it matter, turn back what he'd done," she replied. I thought about my human form for just a second before I felt my scales soften into human skin, and my skull reverts to normal.