What is this? New chapter finally out? Why yes it is! Dropping it like a hot potato with minimal editing before I get in my head about it again!
Thanks everyone for the patience 💖
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Masterpost (with drawings!)
CW: Hospitals (not whump related), hypervigilance, referenced Shitty Living Weapon Life
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Kev could always tell a potential danger approaching, awake or asleep. Focused intent had a sort of charge, an almost tactile sensation prickling through the air, whispering against his skin. He was well trained at picking it up.
He knew, even before seeing or feeling it: someone was reaching to touch him. As he jolted awake, gaze locked on the target- ready to dart, to hit, ready to fight for his life-…said target flinched back with a startled shriek, fumbling with the object in her hand.
Erein, the apprentice.
The device clattered to the floor. Kev aborted all motion, willed coiled muscles to relax, reeled in the intensity of his involuntary murderous glare.
"Ah, you're back with us." Nanke greeted from behind the girl, patient file in hand. "We were just about to put you on fluids…"
Erein hastily picked up the fallen IV bracelet, blushing at the light reprimand in the doctor's voice. Looked to him, a question on pursed lips, to which he sternly gestured no. She scurried out.
"Can't say you didn't take my advice to heart, eh kiso?" The doctor went on, paying her no mind. "Over sixteen straight hours of sleep. Wish my other patients would be half as diligent." He smiled at his own joke. "How is the head?"
Kev blinked away the grogginess threatening to set back in. As the rush of danger washed away, he felt weary. Dull. Leftover pain pulsed in the background. Aside from that, nothing of note.
"No changes," he replied.
"Any dizziness? Throbbing?" Nanke filled a plastic glass from the dispenser embedded in the wall next to his bed. "Nausea or vertigo?"
He shook his head, accepting the water. Sipped carefully.
"Hm." Nanke nodded in approval, scribbling on his files. "You skipped dinner yesterday," he remarked. "While we can agree you sorely needed rest, this better not happen again. You skip a few more meals, I'll have to prescribe you the black lunches. You don't want to deal with that, I assure you."
Kev's thoughts immediately went to a wide array of unpleasant options, before remembering he was in a hospital. None of the things that came to mind would be allowed in a hospital.
No-nonsense as always, Nanke asked a bunch of questions, which Kev pretended to have no answer for, checked his pupils, took note of his vitals. Satisfied, he strode out the room, already busy with other patient files.
A second glass of water in hand, Kev found himself fighting a new wave of fatigue. The heaviness in his limbs, in his mind, spoke of months of continuous strain. He numbly realized he'd gone through NR three times in the last half year only. Still hadn't fully recovered from the brutal struggle with death from poison damage, either.
Even accounting for that, this was absurd. Sixteen hours? And still feeling the tug of sleep? If he weren't under the care of an expert neurosurgeon, he'd suspect his cover concussion might be actually killing him. He waived the thought. No way Vekta's best could be that incompetent.
Time for a shower. That would wake him up, shock his body right back on task. He might have some leeway with Leska off his back, but this was still a test.
---
As expected, the bathroom was as pristine as everything else, shower a lot more polished than the rusty one stuffed in a corner at base. Transparent sliding doors enclosed an ample box lined with fake-marble tiles, the shower head in shiny steel.
Stepping in on autopilot, he initially did not notice anything unusual. Turned the water knob.
Nothing came out.
He did a double take. That was not a knob, but a lever. Why did it turn, then?
Perplexed, he flicked it open. Braced and hissed through a splash of cold. Then, before he could even fully resign himself to it, it started warming up.
The realization hit together with the stream raining down on him - warm, hot, hotter. Of course the hospital would have hot water.
Soon, steam filled the shower box. The scalding liquid ran down his neck, shoulders, back and chest. It felt pleasant. No, it felt amazing. He allowed himself a small sigh, one split second before hastily bracing against the wall as his muscles had the bright idea to go slack. He narrowly avoided stumbling face first into the glass-like doors.
The fuck? Get a grip.
He took a deep breath, warmth filling his lungs. Slowly, a rush of strenght peeked through the shroud of pleasant relaxation, pulsing in his veins. Building, building, building until it felt like he could take on the world. He didn't immediately clock it, caught off guard by how quickly it had ramped up, but the heady mix of pleasant calm and thrumming energy was unmistakable. Ghostfever.
Anatomy modules did say it could be triggered by intense heat, even if he'd always resorted to arousal to induce it. It must have been… around two years now, since he'd learned to manage bouts of dumb teenage anger without its help, and stopped seeking it. He'd missed this.
A familiar urge flickered in his mind, to push through, to curb the pleasant feelings and stay sharp, fully aware, ready for… for what? He was in a hospital bathroom, during an infiltration mission. No one else was in here. And if, for some weird improbable reason, vultures had orders to keep watch while he washed, lucky them. They could enjoy the show and go report back to Leska how fuckable he was on a scale of one to ten. Picturing the look of disgust on Leska's face at that kind of intel proved amusing enough to successfully dismantle the unnecessary tension.
Shifting right under the jet, he tilted his head down to let it envelop him completely. The whole world seemed to disappear, drowned out by the roar of water in his ears, the hot liquid soaking his hair and caressing his skin, the intense rush of blood and chemicals in his veins. A quiet, pleased hum rumbled in his throat as his eyes fluttered close.
For a few minutes, he just let himself be.
—-
A childish chuckle greeted him when he walked out the bathroom wearing a fresh set of hospital clothes. Leki was sitting on his bed, right at the center. "Your hair is a mess!" the boy proclaimed, "You need a trim, bet it gets all in your eyes."
He wasn't wrong. It had been a while since Kev last hacked away the excess. It was still not much of a nuisance, but became obvious when it got wet.
"You got a knife?" he asked, approaching.
"We're not allowed weapons in the hospital" Leki drawled out the words, rolling his eyes. "Why?"
"There wasn't one in the kit."
That got the boy chuckling again. "Is that why your haircut is so bad? Maybe you were out on a long term operation before you scrambled your brains" he grinned cheekily. "There's autocasks on ground floor, I can show you later."
Leki shuffled to the side to make space for him, balancing a hefty packaged tray on his knees. The metal box, lined in light blue, bore the number 223 impressed in a corner. It had an industrial look, very different from standard market meals in Regell, with their cheap plastic and colorful, misleading pictures of freshly cooked food plastered all over.
"The smartcart should be here soon. I passed it just at the end of the hallwa- oh, there!"
Announcing itself with a soft chime, the blocky contraption did indeed slide past the door and approach, a similar sealed tray emerging from the top. Just to stop in the middle of the room, where a sharp blade of light from the window, apparently, read as an obstacle. It beeped pitifully, calling for attention.
That did nothing to discourage Kev's hatred for supposedly intelligent machinery.
Leki snorted. "They always do that! Uncle's been complaining since these new models arrived. It's so funny!"
The not so smart smartcart beeped again, a red light blinking insistently. Kev resolved to walk past the insurmountable line of light himself. As he lifted the meal box, the bulky device chimed in confirmation, light turning blue, and glided away.
"No way! You get the read meals?" Leki stared affronted at the red lines on his box, "That's not fair! I want the reds too, all I get here is stupid bird meat and tasteless fish…" As he grumbled, he pressed the buttons on the sides of his own tray. The lid unlatched releasing a cloud of vapor. "Ugh! Not whitefin again!" He lifted the top layer, revealing a second one underneath. "No, come on! I hate agre sprouts…"
Sitting next to him, Kev opened his own. Inside was a compact block of soft brown rice filling a whole half, same as Leki. Instead of fish, however, the other side was stuffed with four thick cuts of seared red meat. It took him a moment to find the notches and pull up the inner tray, to find hard boiled eggs, a side of leafy greens, one of thin white roots and one of round mushrooms, plus a thick milky cream resembling soft cheese. And cutlery.
Leki watched with the wide eyes of a starving man. Which he most certainly wasn't. "Do you wanna trade?" he shoved his top tray in Kev's lap, "At least some! Pleaaase, I never get the good stuff in here…"
Kev took in his expectant expression. This boy was begging to be manipulated. With a half smirk, he passed a slice of meat.
"Yes!" Leki curled excitedly on his tray to hide the unauthorized goods. "Thanks! You can eat my sprouts." Judging from the mischievous little smile, that was actually going to benefit him, too. Kev got the feeling Nanke was not a fan of picky eating. He graciously offered his tray for the boy to dump the generous serving of purple wiry veggies in.
Everything in the trays looked a lot simpler than boxed meals in Regell. No mixed ingredients, no sauces or added gravy. Still, the meat tasted quite strong, like wild game, the roots bitter and the mushrooms a weird mix of sweet and savory. Leki's sprouts were crunchy with an aggressive earthy flavor. Only the leafy veggies were quite mild, on the sweet side when coupled with the sour milky cream. All in all, he didn't mind any of it.
Leki hummed, happily chewing the forbidden meat, before tearing through the rest of his meal without much of a complain. In fact, he was enthusiastic about the mushrooms they both got. Between mouthfuls, he shared more information of dubious value about favorite meal combos, a trip he had with his fellow trainees and related shenanigans. The only relevant fact was his younger age compared to the rest of the squad, already stated in the intel files.
Kev took his time, methodically emptying everything. His red box was easily twice the calories of the blue one, which already looked more filling than Regell's market meals. By the time he swallowed the last mouthful, he didn't feel like having any more.
That was new. He rarely was still hungry after a meal, but not wanting extra food? At all? Weird.
—-
At first glance, Kev would have clocked the so called autocasks as torture devices.
A line of padded seats against the wall, seemingly comfortable, if not for the suspicious oversized helmets hanging over, which seemed to have some kind of restraining feature. On the wall was a control display, which did not help the electric chair look.
The two patients using them didn't seem to be in pain, however: an older man on the second seat was skimming through a big tome mumbling to himself, and a young girl far in the corner swung her legs in boredom.
Leki went straight for the monitor next to the fourth seat.
"Do you want a short cut or to keep it longer?"
Kev sat and warily rested his forehead against the support, eyeing the screen. There were only four options: a buzz cut, the classic crew cut with wild hair on top that seemed most common in Vekta (same as Leki had), one with the same top and side hair tied in a ponytail instead, and finally a simple longer cut, like he'd seen mostly women wear in Regell. He had no time to think before Leki tapped the third one for him.
"Let's keep it long for now, you can always change it later."
The helmet descended and locked his head in place. Suddenly his hair was wet, and his every nerve tensed to the sound of snipping and the feeling of scissors pulling on strands here and there.
"It'll take ten minutes" Leki announced, "I'm getting a snack."
Despite being hyper aware of every time a blade or buzzing razor got anywhere close to his neck, it was a very uneventful ten minutes. Both other occupants finished and walked away before him, a fine mist of pungent disinfectant enveloping the chairs as they left. Finally, after getting blasted with hot hair a couple minutes, the helmet chimed and let go of his head.
In the mirror lining the opposite wall, he could see his haircut was mostly the same, a touch shorter and much neater. Still spiky but less chaotic, no bangs falling on his forehead except for a couple well trimmed locks. The only real change was a competent (automated) hand took care of it, instead of him with a knife and zero shits given. Surprising, how much of a difference that made.
Leki was there just as he was about to stand, carrying a small pack of nuts and dried fruit. He grinned like he'd just accomplished a feat. Kev got the feeling he had a habit of showing up last minute, but still irreproachably on time. A careful balance of small acts of rebellion within the confines of a good soldier and son.
—-
They weren't alone on the rooftop this time.
Leki stopped his brisk walk around the perimeter to respectfully salute a tall woman with a broken arm sitting on one of the benches. Legs hip-distance apart, the boy firmly hit his chest with the side a fist, straight to the heart. She nodded back. Kev got a very sharp look for not doing the same. As Leki lifted his foot with the clear intention of kicking his ankle, he imitated the fist-to-heart motion.
"That was late, and sloppy" the woman chastised, "You better not be in training."
"I don't know."
"He has amnesia, Sir!" Leki explained, standing up straight for the first time since Kev met him. "Forgot even his name. He probably forgot salutes too."
"Is that so." The woman searched Kev's expression, eyes sharp and jaw set.
"Yes."
She raised an eyebrow.
"…Sir."
"I do not like your tone, youngling. Nor the way you stand in front of an official."
"Yes, Sir" Kev repeated, in the exact same tone and posture. The flat affect of his voice did not fully mask the hint of defiance beneath.
"Apologies, Sir" Leki quickly grabbed his arm, flushing red. "He's still out of it, his brain is slow. May we resume exercising?"
"By all means." The woman stood up, "I do not appreciate the view as much when it's crowded. Do not exert yourself, young Kin."
"Yes Sir!"
The boy stood firm and nervous until the official closed the door of the stairwell behind her. The second its clack rose in the air, he melted into a chuckle.
"Ancients, what was that? You can't do that!" Still, his eyes were sparkling with the thrill of the forbidden. "Are you an anarchist or something?" he whispered, "I won't tell anyone, on my ancestors' memory."
"Not that I know of." Kev tilted his head, putting on the ghost of a smirk. Leki definitely had a rebel side, one he could leverage to get into his good graces. "If I was, wouldn't I have to kill you now?"
"Hah! I'd like to see you try. I'm the best of my generation!"
He was, Kev knew that for a fact. Unfortunately, he was also twelve, and no more special than the handful of best elites in every generation. The ones Kev had to worry about were his age and older - a Leki, he could smoke on a sick day.
Of course, the boy had no way of knowing that. Not yet.
I've been playing with this some time ago and it's finally time to show the kind of clothes these people wear.
Kev is volunteering as a model, thank you Kev!
Vektian clothing is fully unisex and uses simple cuts and colors, favoring practical clothing. Modern clothing especially is very streamlined, with no frills and very few buttons used.
You'll see a lot of black skintight clothing under the rest: that's their world famous cloth armor!
Sleeves and shirts are often open at the side to allow better air circulation. Pants are sometimes lined with protective patches similar to the ones featuring in their armor (but in less costly materials).
Shoes always have ankle protection - boots are the most common. They usually feature inserts used to adjust the size for best fit, visible on the toe and sometimes the back or ankle.
Here's more iterations with Khore, including a typical training outfit (1, 2) and home wear (4)
And here's a peek at cuts closer to a more traditional style!
Full on traditional clothes are worn on specific festivities and ceremonies, but that's for another time!
In today's episode: neat tricks that are surely totally fine and a clear sign of mental health :3
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Masterpost (with drawings!)
CW: living weapon whump, mention of past child torture, a weird flavor of dissociation, poisoning, emeto, near death. Very unadvisable hygienic conditions?
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Kev had a secret weapon. A last resort that kept him alive through many desperate circumstances. He called it trance.
Trance was a very handy state of mind. One he was fairly sure people couldn’t usually access. It was different than letting his mind drift away during boring punishments. In fact, it was the opposite.
It did start the same way, at first. When he was small and not yet well trained, when many trivial things seemed to be unbearable. Most of the times, he'd just black out and jump ahead to the end of the ordeal, unmoving. Now and then, though, he’d come back shaky and woozy to a task accomplished. He'd have no memory of it: nothing but lost time, the ache of strained limbs, and the heavy lull of exhaustion.
It was confusing. It wasn’t always worth it. Still, things got done. With time, he learned to harness it into the powerful tool it was now.
Kev walked past Leska, reached for the small bottle. Rapidly uncorked it and let two pills of Lysoxadyne fall into his hand. Paused.
At its core, trance was a limit remover. It lifted all safeguards the human brain carried to avoid reckless self-inflicted disaster. Anything at all that wasn’t mechanically impossible, he could force with ease. Any last drop of energy buried in the deep, he could put to use.
It was extraordinarily useful. It was inherently dangerous.
Too bad he had a physical assessment to ace on 10 mg of deadly poison. Not much of a choice.
From the center of the room, Leska set up the movement tracking assessment module with a couple brusque gestures. It always started with the standard 10k run. Training grounds in this makeshift base didn’t have a proper track, but the distance conveniently was a neat 50 laps around the perimeter. The module chimed, an arbitrary starting line lighting up on the floor right below the projected screen on the wall.
Kev swallowed the pills dry. Inhaled deeply. Focused. Exhaled.
Entering trance was like breaking the surface of muddy waters. As if taking the first breath out in the crisp air, a rush of clarity washed over him, senses turning sharper. The world felt more vivid, and so did the blood coursing through his veins, the shift and pulse of every muscle, the prickling charge of taut nerves.
His mind switched gears, locking into pure task oriented mode. It gave him the most complete, precise understanding of his physical state, the full extent of his capabilities, and how to maximize them.
While sensations streamed forward with heightened awareness, feelings and all other inconsequential burdens receded into nothing. He was at once intensely alive, yet entirely detached.
Kev enjoyed this state. Well, not really, it rendered him incapable of enjoyment or suffering. But he did appreciate its efficiency.
Without wasting a second, he reached the glowing mark on the floor, waited for the acoustic cue. Started running.
There was no protest from the husk his body was reduced to. Run, he demanded, and it complied readily. Pliant. He easily fell into the rhythm that would allow him to match his score from last time, with a handful of seconds to spare.
As he breezed through the exercises, every single movement measured to reach the desired outcome with no excess effort, he started feeling the effects of Lysoxadyne.
Not quite feeling. Acknowledging. The signal that would have been acute pain, from his abdomen and chest. The subdued burn of poison in his bloodstream. The vague impression that would have been nausea. Blood pooling in the back of his mouth, in his stomach, filtering through organs that were not supposed to bleed.
He did not allow any symptom to hinder his performance. Not his stomach quivering, skirting a retching fit, not his lungs hitching in an attempt to seize, not muscles threatening to contract and stiffen, not limbs begging to fold nor vision starting to pull out of focus.
No, he commanded. Body and mind yielded to his will, and his pace never faltered.
Each test, he completed right on the line of the required results. He knew without needing to look at the screen on the wall.
Through it all, he was intensely aware of the damage festering, the poison slowly eating through tissue and burdening organs. It would not kill him, not on that dose. But fighting it siphoned away his strength, leaving sickly weakness to spread from his core. Cold started taking hold. He had no energy to spare on body temperature.
As Leska ended the physical assessment section and set up the combat simulation module, he recognized the dry, chilling feeling creeping to his very marrow. Claws tickling at the edge of his consciousness, the cold caress of blades posed to strike. You’re going to die, it was telling him. If you don’t stop, you’re going to die.
It was lying. He still had some leeway. And he used it with inhuman efficiency to face the high intensity fight against fierce projected-light opponents, darting arrows of glimmering nothing, environmental obstacles blinking in and out of existence. He crushed it.
He stopped. Strode back to the bright starting mark on the ground with mechanical precision, steps feather light.
Leska stared him down. Took in his even breath, firm stance and relaxed limbs. Lingered on the drip of blood slowly leaking out of his left eye. That was out of his control.
Many things were out of his control, inside. Slowly caving in, clenching and quivering in the iron grip he imposed. His heartbeat thrummed, forcibly calm but still unquiet. You’re dying. You’re dying, right now. Again, it was lying.
With a dismissive wave of the arm, the General confirmed the result and archived it. The module chimed and reset to its start screen.
Kev had around twelve minutes left standing. The ticking clock quietly whispered its ineluctable march, unintrusive but ever present. Once he dropped, he’d be dead before hitting the floor. He needed to lie down and rest in time to avoid it.
Blood started spilling from his other eye, too. The corners of his vision faded into a red tint as it slipped down fast, mingling with a thin layer of sweat. His chilled skin prickled. His mouth tasted of bile and iron, every forced breath leaving behind the smell of rot. He was impervious to the discomfort of it all, merely registering it.
Leska took his sweet time, piercing gaze raking all over his form from above. In the heightened state of trance, Kev had the impression he could physically feel it: a dense, simmering cold liquid slowly slipping all over his exposed skin, scouring, seeking the smallest hint of weakness. Devouring him. Even now, completely immune to emotions, he could feel the sheer pressure of it.
With absolute mental clarity, he called upon reserves of strength that self-preservation would normally render inaccessible. Not a twitch betrayed the sorry state of his innards to probing eyes.
The General could do nothing but concede.
“You have one week to fix that mess,” he dryly announced. “You’d better make use of it to devise an infiltration strategy. This is to be a long term operation, recklessness and amateur mistakes will not be tolerated.”
---
Kev made a beeline for the stairs. Economy of movement was crucial, now. Nine minutes left – seven, factoring the physical effort required to reach his room. He was cutting it close.
He allowed a single deviation from the shortest possible path from training grounds to this room's bathroom: a slightly wider angle to grab the trash can in the corner. He emptied it on the tile floor, placed it under the shower. Flipped the water open.
Lying on his side, with six minutes to spare, he let trance go.
It hit him like smacking into the ground from a 20 feet free fall. His brain recoiled from the merciless barrage of sensations. Vision giving out, ears ringing, stomach contorting in searing pain, the violent retching as his chest seized, everything burning, straining, cramping form the poison, so spent and drained he could barely parse it all happening. And the dread, the dread of being right at death’s door, defenseless.
This was what made trance truly dangerous. The aftermath.
Pushing limits was never the problem - he could tell how much he could afford, even more so with the precise control of trance. What he struggled to deal with was having nothing left to push.
He was used to wrangling weary limbs into cooperating, dragging out embers of energy buried deep to move just enough to get some water, to roll over and avoid choking on his own blood. It was necessary so often, it had become an afterthought. Mundane. Expected. But trance was too efficient. When he wrung out all he had with trance, it was all he had. After that, when his body said I can’t, it actually couldn’t.
So, there he was on the floor, unable to muster a single voluntary movement. Not a twitch. He was lucky he could still swallow. Barely.
He’d lied on his side for a reason.
Shuddering from an unreal chill, Kev managed to half gulp down, half weakly cough out a clot of condensed blood. It was the last thing he consciously did for a while.
---
A soft breeze blew between the tall white buildings, rising and falling with a distant, subdued howl. The hot summer sun baked his skin. Hair tickled his face, strands flickering in his vision. Standing on the railing of a flat rooftop, Kev looked down.
His small blue boots were the only spot of color against the view of the walls underneath and all around, the shimmering black of the glass windows and the asphalt down below.
Balancing on still short legs, Kev watched unblinking the complete stillness of the road. Not a soul seemed to wander those forgotten streets on the outskirts of the northern capital.
Slowly, unthinking, he bent a leg. The blue boot inched forward, suspended in the void.
---
Kev startled awake, coughing out muddy, reddish blobs of, hopefully, just clotted blood. It tasted like taking a hefty bite of overripe garbage and corroded scrap metal. He retched again, producing more dark clumps of whatever that was, and a sour yellowish liquid streaked in browns and reds.
A thrumming ache flared though his entire body at the smallest motion. His stomach felt like it had been stabbed through - probably an ulcer - and that was nothing compared to the piercing throb in his kidneys.
Outside, he was damp form head to toe. From sweat, from blood leaked out of any hole he had, from a whole collection of sticky bodily fluids, and water gathering in the shower base before slipping down the rusty drain. Inside, he was dryer than ash.
Nothing new. He'd been through this all many times. Well, except for the lying halfway inside the shower part.
He blinked, pawing clumps of soggy hair out of his face. Through the dazing throbbing in his brain, he managed to lift his arm, grasped the trashcan overflowing with water, pulled it closer. Took several breaths. Lifted his torso just enough to reach the rim of it and carefully take several gulps of liquid.
It did not taste good. He couldn't care less.
His stomach protested, a sharp sting that shoot to his very core.
Don't throw up. Don't. Throw up.
He kept sipping between deep, heavy breaths.
Leaving the shower open might have been a life-saving intuition. To reach the sink, he would have needed trance again, meaning he'd pass out for an unknowable amount of hours more. Experience taught him that recovering from Lysoxadyne, once it failed at killing you, mostly meant flushing it all out over time, drinking an almost concerning amount of water over a few days. Couldn't do that while unconscious.
It would still leave damage. Not as much as it did when he was building up resistance to it, but while under his threshold, 10 mg were double the dose necessary to kill a man. He'd need a shot of NR to fix it all.
He groaned, resting his forehead against the tile floor. Recovering from this already was fucking annoying, recovering enough for NR to repair organs on top of his freshly scarred arms, without killing him off in the process… he was gonna spend a lot of time plastered on the ground.
---
A whistle of wind. One foot out of the railing, Kev was looking down, down below from the rooftop.
He tilted his head, observing his boot suspended 30 feet above the ground.
“Careful there!”
Kev whipped around, both feet firmly back down, arms half raised in guard.
A girl entered his vision, peeking out of the spiral staircase that led to the center of the roof. About his age, she wore a dirty yellow shirt scribbled in black marker, red hair long and wild.
“It’s slippery! I almost fell last week”.
She was not supposed to be here. No one was supposed to be here.
Still she approached. Her smile was missing a tooth.
“I’m Hyta! What’s your name?”
Kev looked at her, disoriented. He was not supposed to be seen. He was not supposed to talk to people.
The wind picked up, loud in his ears. Insistent.
A weird feeling twisted his gut, a lurching sensation. Something unexpected. Something new.
