I found this in the archives of my personal journals. It was originally written for an audience, but somehow, I didn't think it was appropriate for the eyes of others. Now don't be salacious, I don't mean it was inappropriate in that way. I mean, at the time there was something about it that just felt too sacred to deface by showing it to the public eye. I am giving this to you now, reader, because I think it is important that, if you are going to join the ship and become involved with humans, you need to understand what you are in for, and there is soemthing about this experience that explains something fundamental I simply cannot quantify.

Forgive this story, as it was written when I was still new to the ship and had a fundamental misunderstanding of humans in many ways. I don't claim to know much more now that I did then, but at least now I fake it better than I did before.

This episode happened shortly after I gave up a promising career to go galivanting off into the galaxy riding in the wake of a storm that was named the UNSC Harbinger. A few years, a few disasters, and a new ship have taught me a lot of things, but there was something abut this that struck me to my core.

I will enclose with this memory the report that I would have attached if I had not decided to omit this piece from my written communications. If you are going to have the full story you might as well see everything that was going through my head at once.

Report: Unnumbered

Have you ever experienced emotional pain? The Vrul council says that, unlike other species, we Vrul have no concept of emotional and physical linkage like other species, and I tend to agree with that statement. The Vrul are far to rational to fall into such behavioral patterns. However, I have come to determine that the mind body link, as some call it, can have a profound impact on the psychology of other beings. Specifically humans.

Humans are known for many things, and one of those lesser attributes just happens to be the extreme mind body connection humans experience on a daily basis. For the rest of us the emotions work independently from the body except for in extreme cases like fear. However, for a human mind and body are so interconnected that emotional stimuli can cause reactions in the body. Nervousness can cause indigestion and insomnia, anger might cause headaches and heart palpitations, and grief and sadness is often described by humans as sharp and stabbing or a deep throbbing ache.

Take a moment to speak with a human, and ask them about emotions. I doubt any of them will be able to explain how they feel without including at least one physical symptom, a tingling in the face, nausea, a tightness in the chest, a crushing sensation, burning or otherwise.

I personally have a theory that the linkage between the human mind and body has something to do with their extreme social nature. Physical symptoms are often taken more seriously than emotional symptoms within many human societies. Pain gains sympathy and physical experiences create situations with which others can empathize. If a human experiences sadness that appears as pain, other humans will be alerted to that distress, and they will come over to check on their counterpart offering the empathy and support 'most' humans either need or desire to recover from the emotional pain. Happy humans may experience excitement so intense that they cry. Despite being happy the tears trigger reactions in other humans generally amounting to physical touch, and even causing similar tears in others.

The mind body link in humans facilitates social interaction, which is required for developing humans, and even those past development. The mind behaves one way, and the body gives signals to alert other humans to the state of their counterparts.

There is one downside of course.

A downside I am not sure I can speak of, and even now I recoil from the idea of sharing such an experience for fear of breaching privacy.

***

The humans were doing soemthing strange again, and Dr. krill was watching with great interest. They were all clustered in a great bunch around a table in the "mess hall" their voices clamoring towards the ceiling in a rush of rolling hums and rising growls. Their hands flicked forward and back with quick dexterous movements belied by their large hulking bodies. The way their fingers moved was almost delicate as they passed the small colorful cards between each other.

At the center of the table one of the humans had compiled a large heaping pot of colorfully wrapped food items Krill had come to learn were high in one of the human's favorite ingredients: glucose. As he watched the humans pushed the glucose squares into the center of the table, hiding their cards from each other and tapping the table with their fingers.

"I call."

"I raise."

There was some grumbling.

"Never mind, I fold."

"Let me see your hand."

"No, It wasn't any good anyway."

The captain grinned past his eyepatch one good eye crinkling at the corner, "Fake It tell you make it is what I always say."

"Too bad you aren't very good at faking it." One of the other humans teases, his white teeth flashing in the light.

It was hard keeping track of all of their names, but he swore he had seen this human before. Then again all humans looked the same to him, like they were stamped from the exact same cookie cutter mold.

"Yeah, captain, you are a terrible bluff." Said another human this one small and light haired, he thought this one was female, but even between the genders it was hard to tell which human was what.

"Maybe I am just bluffing that I am terrible, so that it will create an expectation which I might use to my advantage later?"

"You aren't nearly smart enough for that." Someone said as they tossed another glucose square into the circle.

The captain was about to do the same when the implant on his left arm lit up bathing the table below him with a delicate blue light. He frowned and reached down turning his head to take the call through his subdermal implants eyes still on his cards, but his mind away from the game.

The table's conversation dulled to a low roar as the man took his call.

"Hello, this is Captain Vir speaking."

The other humans were busy watching their cards, but Krill kept his eyes on the human's face, which he watched with some interest. It was likely because of this that he was the only one to see the change in the man's face as unheard words were spoken through a neural connection. His bright eye darkened, his lips parted slightly, the furry line of his eyebrow jumped sharply in the middle of his forehead which had now creased and wrinkled with the expression on his face.

Krill didn't know how to read human facial expressions very well, but he had come to learn that the human forehead was a good indicator of genuine strong emotion. Forehead activation was always a signal of authenticity in humans.

The man stood abruptly causing the others to look up at him in surprise.

He gave them a rather weak smile, which none of them seemed to pick up on, "Gotta take this call" his voice was chipper, though with his observation, Krill could detect it's brittleness. The captain hurried from the room, and Krill couldn't help but follow, scrambling after him in curiosity, which was too extreme to overcome the guilt of following someone who clearly intended to have a private conversation.

They hurried into one of the service tunnels in the ship, which krill thought was odd, and he poked his head around the corner watching as the human stopped and restarted the call.

"Are you sure...." His voice was even more brittle now.

"What happened."

The other side of the conversation was impossible for him to hear with just sound waves. A part of him knew he shouldn't even be here, and he warred with himself for a moment before curiosity finally got the better of him, and he activated the radio receptors in his antennae adjusting the frequency until.

"I'm sorry, Adam, but... her father checked on her last night. He said that she seemed fine, and then when the next morning came around, they found her...."

The captain was leaning heavily against the wall now as if he couldn't find support from his own legs. One arm was wrapped tightly around his middle.

"But why..." His voice was barely a squeak over a whisper.

"There was... no note, but we knew she had been having a rough time."

The human shook his head refusing to accept the words that he was hearing.

"But she was doing better." He said as if his argument could convince reality of its wrongness.

There was a pause on the other end of the line, "Sometimes..... sometimes people seem to get better when things like this happen. Making a solid decision makes them feel better about themselves. Gives them an end to..... an end to look forward to."

The human was still shaking his head, but this time when he opened his mouth no words came out. Krill watched as his lips moved though his power of speech seemed completely robbed from him. Krill watched in silent horror as the human continued trying to speak but nothing came out. He reached up clutching his other hand to his throat.

"I'm sorry, Adam. The funeral is on Saturday.... They know you can't be there, but they thought it would only be right if I let you know. I'm very sorry."

There wasn't much else to say of course, and the other man eventually hung up when the captain could not force out a response. He stood there in complete darkness for a long while before sliding heavily down the wall and onto one knee, where his spine bent him forward in a rictus of agony that Krill had never seen before and rarely since.

***

I will stop here as I am not comfortable telling the tale beyond that moment for what I saw afterwards is simply too.... Private.... Or too painful to report without it seeming profane somehow. Have you ever seen someone brought to their knees by sadness?

I have.

More than once.

But that was the first time I ever witnessed something like it. The first time I ever saw something as intangible as an emotion take a human off their feat. To me they were the most powerful creatures in the galaxy. I had seen them stand against fire, and weapons and war while laughing, but it took a single phone call to bring that man to his knees in agony.

I had seen this human converse civilly with an eight inch rod through his brain, without so much as flinching, but there he was on the floor with his arms around himself fingers white and tucked into claws, face white, and the expression.....

Sanctum's rings that expression.

It will haunt me till the day of my Termination.

A silent scream frozen in ice and trapped behind glass. An expression that was not meant for the eyes of others, and yet I had witnessed it.

That kind of pain shouldn't be possible.

Not from an emotion.

It is unfair, and uncivil for life to have handed that to humans. To give them emotions so raw and so powerful that they can bring you to your knees with physical agony..... I cannot imagine what that would feel like. To feel grief and have your body crushed by it.

What is worse, if no one sees it initially a human will likely try to hide these symptoms, and since there is no physical wound they will be expected to walk around for the rest of the day or weak like that bent under the crushing weight of grief, forced to fake their way out of it like its nothing. Imagine being stabbed and then walking around as if nothing had happened.

Impossible?

No, Ive seen humans do it.

That was the first time I ever saw a human cry.

I've seen it plenty of times since, but it has never impacted me like it did that time.

When writing about grief, some humans like to speak of a quiet dignity in pain.

I am here to call that out as lies.

There is no quiet dignity in suffering,

Its not a crystal pillar on which to sit and be cheered on by others for strength. Greif is a base thing that will tear you down and leave you choking in the mud of a ditch after it robs you.

That was the first time I saw grief experienced.

But I have lived long enough with the humans to have felt grief, and I am here to say.

What you know is lies.