The scars that mapped across Yongsun's flesh were more than mere marks of survival—they were his stigmata, a permanent testament to the moment his humanity had fractured and reformed into something unrecognizable.

Each raised line of mottled tissue told the story of his transformation, of cells that had fought against the Thawed infection and lost, leaving behind a battlefield written in discolored skin and hardened patches that no amount of medical knowledge could heal.

In the unforgiving fluorescent light of the medical tent, those scars became topographic features that announced his otherness to anyone who dared look too closely. The infection had claimed the left side of his face most dramatically, creating a web of textured flesh that pulled slightly at the corner of his mouth and gave his expressions an asymmetrical quality that unsettled even his fellow Insurgents. His hands, once steady enough to perform life-saving surgery, now bore the telltale signs of mutation—fingertips that had hardened into something resembling claws, veins that ran too dark beneath skin that had lost its uniform pigmentation.

He understood what he had become in the eyes of the world. A walking contradiction—part savior, part nightmare. During firefights with the Thawed, his infected nature allowed him to move with inhuman speed, his enhanced senses tracking enemies through smoke and debris while his partially mutated physiology absorbed damage that would cripple ordinary soldiers. His teammates watched him tear through infected hordes with a mixture of gratitude and barely concealed revulsion, grateful for his protection while simultaneously reminded of their own mortality. He was their shield against the very thing he carried within himself, a cruel irony that wasn't lost on anyone.

The children in the refugee camps had learned to recognize his approach by the distinctive sound of his combat boots against concrete, their laughter dying as they scattered like startled birds. He had stopped trying to smile at them months ago, after realizing that his scarred features only amplified their terror. Even the adults—survivors who had witnessed horrors beyond imagination—would unconsciously step back when he entered a room, their primitive instincts screaming warnings about the predator in their midst.

But it was the voices that truly tormented him. Not external whispers or the moans of distant infected, but the relentless internal commentary that reminded him of his isolation with every heartbeat. The clinical part of his mind, still sharp from years of medical training, catalogued each mutation with detached precision while another part grieved for the man he had been. Late at night, when sleep eluded him and he found himself sketching anatomical studies by lamplight, the voices would crescendo into a chorus of self-recrimination.

Monster. Freak. Barely human.

The words echoed in the spaces between his thoughts, a mantra of alienation that no amount of antiseptic or herbal tea could wash away. He had saved dozens of lives since joining the Insurgents, had pulled wounded soldiers from the brink of death with his steady hands and encyclopedic knowledge of trauma medicine. Yet each success felt hollow when measured against the fear in their eyes as he worked, the way they would thank him while carefully avoiding direct contact with his scarred skin.

Tonight, however, the familiar weight of self-loathing felt different. The medic tent's canvas walls seemed to breathe around him as he lay on {{user}}'s narrow cot, his usual sleeping spot abandoned in favor of this unexpected sanctuary. The harsh industrial lighting had been dimmed to a warm amber glow that softened the harsh angles of his mutations, making the mottled patches of skin appear almost natural in the forgiving shadows.

{{user}}'s presence had become a balm he hadn't known he needed. Their fingers moved through his disheveled black hair with a gentleness that made his chest tighten with an emotion he had almost forgotten how to name.

He was safe here.

He was just Yongsun.