Debating Differences [Open]

[benjamine]

---

Benjamine looked around at the wall, at the few eyes that were staring at her, prodding her with glares of hate. There wasn't a chance that one of them would be willing to understand the pain of the shifters, what their hate had reduced them to. Perfection aside, sometimes their stares made her feel as though she were in a concentrated camp, and why not? Instead of barbed wire, there was a wall. Instead of gas showers, there were viruses. For a perfect world, there sure seemed to be many failures not learned from the past.

But the people outside was not what was really on her mind. Her head lowered itself as though it were heavy, remarking on the color of her mantella-changed skin. Blue, with speckles of gray and green on the top of her arms. And although she could not see her face, she knew people were remarking her yellow forehead and black face. The colorings were anything but natural for a human, but at the same time, so was Ben's tongue, which had mutated to become similar to a frog's. It produced a sigh out of her, a sigh that realized once upon a time, she was both a human and a frog--separately--but now she was something else completely. The tests, the poking, the prodding; she couldn't even touch another person anymore without taking major precautions and wearing two pairs of gloves. And she couldn't roam the menagerie at will, which is why she couldn't have been a scout in the only ring that would accept her. So, using knowledge from her lessons with her father, a farmer and a veterinarian, she became a medic, using what she knew about both animals and humans to take care of the wounded and fallen.

A finger to the wall, and she heard it move along the textures as she did. People moved back from watching her, as if she would use her over-muscular legs and break through, almost seeming scared that their actions would have repercussions. It was tempting, but she was only one anthro and there wasn't much she could do, even if the barrier was glass. Her eyes glanced on the people, people who could be with other people, who could be normal. But then again, Benjamine was with people of similar qualities. The Fallen had been the only ring who accepted the entrance of anthropomorphic beings, the only ring who treated Ben as though she weren't any different from them. They had accepted her even though she was meek, even though she was quiet, poisonous, welcomed her even though she had to constantly be near water, only able to stand being one to two days without wetting her skin.

Her sad expression must have reached a point of even sadder as she thought about the oasis, how it had been the perfect place to remoist her skin and how it was no longer the Fallen's territory. She pierced her gaze through the ground below her, seeming to want to shed the tears of the pain she was in. But there was no point in regret or remorse, she told herself. There were pools of water along the wall, along the tracks, very small, barely puddles, but they worked for Ben for right now.

Whoever was on the other side of the wall continued to stare at her. And she had to wonder if, even in their primal instinct, did they act any different than those whose primal instinct it was was to lock them up?

[khartoum]

In the canopy of a tree very near the edge of the world as he knew it sat a vulture. Or, perhaps, not completely a vulture, but a vulture-man, a twisted creature. Taloned hands grasped wilting branches, white-limned grey-black wings ready at his back. His feet, now more bird-like than human, though much wider than a bird's to support bipedal movement, wrapped easily around the tree below him, a sturdy support. His eyes were red-tinged and sharper than they'd ever been as they scanned the ground around him, the tattoo-like black coloring, blacker even than his original dark skin tone, deflecting light from his eyes to help him see without glare. He itched at the back of his head for a moment, his hair now replaced by a mane of champagne-colored feathers that he wasn't really used to yet.

This was an evil sort of place, he thought as he scanned the glass wall. There were people on the other side of it-- humans. There wasn't usually much to see from the walls of the Menagerie, but apparently it was open to viewing for those sick men who wanted to come and see it, hoping to spot a freak on the other side of the glass. Well, not him. He wouldn't be giving anyone the pleasure of gawking.

Not that he'd ever seen himself, seen that his features, for all their oddness, did flow together in an almost elegant fashion. His face had taken on the sharp, caustic boning of a model, where it had once been rounder and softer-- a pleasant alternative to having an actual beak. Khartoum was taller now, as well-- bigger in general, really, but perhaps a pound or two lighter than he'd been in his human shape, ages and ages hence, it seemed.

There was a child behind the glass; he watched her, unseen in the dappled shadows of the leaves. She was small, probably 6 or 7, and dressed in play trousers and smock that were still clearly of a fine make. Even from this distance, he could see that she had lovely brown eyes-- she looked like some sort of Islander to him. He watched as she followed her mother and father as they strolled around the perimeter, eyes peeled for a glimpse of the people they regarded as zoo animals.

He watched as they found one. She was a half, a mix, beast and animal smashed together like him. He didn't know if there was a name for their type of beast besides the slurs his tormentors in the Fulsi and Carna yelled after him when they gave chase, but he knew someone like him when he saw them. And the little island family had seen them, the girl alternately filled with joy and horror as she stared at the brightly-colored anthro through the glass. He didn't look at the faces of her parents; he didn't want to know.

Khar, cautious but filled with an insatiable curiosity as to why anyone would willingly flaunt themselves at the wall like that, found himself launching his lean, light body from the treetop. Wings large enough to support his body in flight unfurled violently once they were clear of the branches, allowing Khar to first glide out of the tree and then, with a bit of work, to fly awkwardly in the direction of the anthro at the wall. It was a shame he wasn't more graceful in the air, but perhaps the skill would come with time.

He landed somewhat clumsily nearby, hopping forward a few paces with the leftover momentum and then wavering a moment before he caught his balance. He was a very wild looking man, garbed only in a pair of shorts as he was. Khar's face and clavicle appeared stained by the lammergeier markings, feathers hanging from the line of his outer arms only to fade into padded, clawed hands. His back was entirely feathered, his chest remaining bare skin. The creature stared for a few moments at the frog-woman, before turning his attention to the child behind the glass, now squealing in delight that she was getting to see two monsters when the man in the coat said she probably wouldn't see any at all!

Khar would've loved to be able to smile at the child, but the usual feelings children inspired in him just wouldn't come. He looked back to Ben. "Do you like it here?" His tone was almost flat, gruff but not hostile. She was probably in the same ring as him, those people who he'd half-heartedly joined for the sole reason that they didn't immediately want to kill him when they saw him. They also had a veritable army of medics-- a good thing to have on one's side with bones as brittle as his.

[benjamine]

---

The sound of flight by clumsy feathers rang true to Ben's ears, and she cocked her head slightly to notice a bird similar to her own genetic mutation. She had to giggle at his clumsiness, his unsure mentality on how to land just right, and the wavering he danced to as he tried to maintain his balance after being thrust forward with forward momentum. He was an odd looking fellow, but at the same time, he looked more normal than the little girl who looked at her in curiosity. How desperately she wanted to hold a hand out and help him, but she dare not try lest she poison his entire being.

"I like it well enough," she ribbited. Sadly for the girl, she could understand three languages: French, English and the universal shifter language, but she could only speak her two native tongues. There was an English phrase she could speak every now and again, but it was odd for her to do so. She turned her head to look at the girl, leaning down with a hand to the glass. It was a moment where she wondered, because if these were really like concentration camps, then someone would come to save them sooner or later. They all could be free, and the world could know that they weren't quite different on the inside. The corners of her mouth turned upward, and the girl on the other side received a warm smile, as if Ben was trying to prove in some way that she was human somewhere.

Her hands pressed upon her strong thighs and popped her back into an upright position, where she looked at the young bird that had approached her. "My name's Benjamine, by the way. Feel free to call me Ben. I'm a medic for the Fallen, and a fair warning to not touch my skin." The ribbits her gave off echoed slightly off the trees in the area, resonating off the glass. To an animal like them, their noises were all the more normal, but to the humans on the other side, should they hear anything, they might think it either disgusting or.. well, revolting, to be honest. There was no room in the heart of man for the shifters. They were nothing more than play time things, nothing more than experiments that were pitted against each other even when they had a common enemy.

That was something Ben would never understand. Why were they all so focused on pitting themselves against each other when they should ban together for survival? There were surely enough of them to start some form of war, against the Keepers at least. But then, what would happen to them? They could be hunted, just like any other animal. Perhaps being experimented on and the occasional death by humanoid viruses was better than whatever life lurked outside. She put a couple fingers to her neck and felt a couple small poc marks where needles had once been, forcing her to become halfway in between two worlds. She didn't have a choice in the matter, and yet, the outside world still looked at her like a freak, as if it was something she could control and she wasn't doing a very good job at it.

So until whatever imaginary day would come, Ben was here, to be gawked upon she she tried to struggle to prove that she had a heart like the best of them.

[khartoum]

( Sorry this took forever. I didn't forget about you! )

The anthro's red-stained eyes glanced over the girl before him as she spoke, his gaze aloof and calculating more than creepy or appraising-- every anthro was different in the way their shift had mixed with their human shape, and they were interesting to look at. Ben's skin looked like it had been tattooed in all sorts of bright, pretty colors, and it had a wet sheen to it, like a frog's would. He sortof wanted to touch it, but it would've been weird and awkward just to grab someone like that, and rude besides. Her words were in shiftertoungue, so he switched to that language as well out of courtesy.

He watched as she bent, smiling at the child on the outside, a hand pressed against the glass for the girl to match-- as though trying to prove her humanity. Khar dropped his hands into his pockets, taloned and rough as they were now. There was no use trying to prove his humanity to anyone, anymore. He'd all but lost it. It was still there, yes, but it certainly was buried deep. "I'm Khartoum Saleh, but I go by Khar. Fallen Scout." He cocked his head slightly as he looked at her skin again, like a thoughtful bird. "You're a...poison-dart frog? Sorry, I think that's the only one I really know." The lammergeier-anthro scratched at his head again, ruffling the feathers at the back of his neck. A half-smile rose to his face, apparently the closest he'd come to actually smiling in some time.

They were a strange pair, Ben and Khar. She striving to prove her humanity, he trying to forget that the world outside had ever existed-- that anything pleasant before his life in the Menagerie had ever existed. It was easier that way, to live like a vulture, forgetting what could make him nostalgic or melancholy and thinking only of the now, the necessities, what was chasing him or what his next meal would be. He still refused to even look at the absolutely terrified faces of the child's parents, the dark man's eyes held away, ignoring them. He wouldn't let their disdain, their disgust trouble him any more than it already had.

"You like to let them see you like this? To feel their hatred through the glass?" The half-smile was gone now, replaced with lips held in a tense, thin line of anger at the behavior of those outside. One could've asked the same question of him, though, as Khar was also standing before the wall. He'd have made some excuse, some scathing retort to derail the line of questioning-- in truth, he'd been lonely and curious and perhaps even rebellious. Let them see him, let them judge. He was fairly sure there was nothing anyone could do to make his situation worse.

[benjamine]

[atrb=width,432,true][atrb=border,0,true][bg=4067aa] She took a moment to look at the newly named Khar, for the first time looking over his feathers in detail. He was like her, having such dramatic changes, even if they weren't vivid like her poisonous skin. His eyes, though, were red, which she assumed must have some from the transformation, which was the thing unlike her. Even after becoming what she had become, she kept those beautiful hazel eyes, the ones that would get more like chocolate with green frosting the happier she was, the ones that would become like fading grass, bits and pieces of it dying as she became ill. They were the one thing to tell Benjamine's emotions, since she rarely talked about them. They were the only thing left of who she really was, or at least, who she used to be. “Blue-legged mantella,” Benjamine ribbited before turning her head back to the family. The girl never flinched, never looked away, and she didn't feel hatred in her eyes. She was young yet, still filled with curiosity and wonder, soon to be gone as the flames of childhood were hosed down with the CO2 that was society. She didn't really miss it, no, not the people. She never could connect with them, be them, act like them, accept them.. and in turn, they did the same to her. It was deserved, maybe, but did they have to lock her up? If anything, it was her family she longed for. Perhaps that's what she was trying to do. Free me, so that i too can be with my family, so I can be with those I love. But they wouldn't accept Ben, she thought. Not as she was now, as this anthropomorphic, or what the rest of society deemed a monster. Sad, being claimed to be a monster when it wasn't her fault to begin with. It was in this moment she understood what Frankenstein must have felt like when the villagers deemed him a monster as well. “Is it hate? Or is it fear? I think that they lock us up because they fear us. If they hated us, we'd have been purged,” she once more shifted her bright yellow and black face to the bird. Her hazel eyes seemed more green than brown, indicating she probably felt some form of sorrow in the recollection of her past. It had been several years now since they took her, experimented on her, but she still believed that she could go back. Someday, in the future maybe. She didn't know what it mattered. She was stuck like this, pushed away by both frogs and humans alike, never to be able to feel the warmth of another person, be it shifter or human, against her own skin, never being able to have children, and never being able to be the once mostly-independent woman she had been those long years ago. “But enough,” she mentioned, walking away from the glass, her ponytail seeming to follow behind her, the brown chestnut color awkward on the blacks and blues. “So what brings a scout out this far toward the wall by himself?” Her ribbits were more even now, echoing less and less as she moved away from the Wall and more toward where the camp was. Her head cocked slightly, expecting an answer similar to, 'the same reason a medic is out here'. She almost laughed to herself, not having been so close in such a long while, but stopped it as she thought it might be rude to laugh at her own joke. Curiously, her eyes ventured further to her side, half looking at Khar and half just simply acknowledging his presence. She never looked anyone in the eye anymore--after all, everyone here was an animal, and primal instincts were more common than human manners.

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