Meri

Meri/Venus, primarily known as veryverymeri and steamgirl, is a frequent member of Zephyr's Garden. Her basic information and pronouns can be found here

While the name steamgirl may come off as a bit strange in comparison to her other names, the name is actually based on her history as a researcher. From the age of 15, she was involuntarily inducted into the ■■■■■■■■■ Research Facility as a subject for testing. She was chosen based on her natural aptitude for psionics. Due to the testing, however, this aptitude and potential was taken from her. As a result, she instead was bred to become a researcher using various forms of hypnotic conditioning and brainwashing to put her in a permanent trance in which she could be controlled at the will of her peers and overseers. This had catastrophic effects on her mental stability however, and she was placed on a suite of suppressants to prevent her from harming herself and others.

As time passed, however, she began deteriorating. Increased dosages and more aggressive hypnotics were slowly having less and less effect on her control-ability, and instead was harming her physically. She began to have seizures in which she would cause great bodily harm to herself, contorting her body in such ways that her bones would be force in two. As a result, she was placed on lower dosages and less medications, which allowed her to gain control over herself.

As she reawakened, she began to suffer from debilitating and permanent mental difficulties. Most intensely, she was struck with an intense fog clouding her brain and eyes, affecting her mental faculties and judgement. This, among other issues, was what led to her rampage. Upon regaining sentience, she went on a tear, ripping apart some of her closest peers in retaliation for what they had done to her. Once restrained, she calmed herself and attempted to bargain for her life.

She managed to convince the researchers that she was happy and willing to do research on her own, so long as she chose her field. Given the potential they still saw within her, they accepted. She was then given her own small wing of the facility to work in, where she studied and worked on Robotics. The overseers believed it to be for the sake of furthering Robotics research, when in actuality it was to satisfy a fantasy she was fixated on.

After regaining consciousness, she had become obsessed with the concept of transhumanism, believing she was given a new body and mind to work in. However, the frail body she was given suffered from intense depression, chronic brain fog and pain throughout her body led to her believing she needed to create a fresh one. She began the long process of building synthetic skin, muscle, organs, and a brain that she could use as a second body. When the other researchers wizened up to her plans, they went to arrest and execute her. In a panic she uploaded herself to the android to save herself. She managed to escape.

The android was called Steam-Girl due to the fact that the intense energy requirement for simulating a brain (later two) requires heavy cooling. As a result, steam billows out of various orifices at times. The coolant inside is composed of the liquids she drinks, and the reactor inside is powered by the food she eats.

While it worked, the android was not finished. She was already a damaged human, now she was a broken android. She began seeing the world as though it were an other dimension, a different reality. One composed of damaged flesh and matter, full of twisted and broken humans such as she once was. Without a sun, without gravity, without existence, she was in a place more reflective of herself. And she loved it. As time passed she split into two separate people sharing the same android body. Two command lines in one computer.

The first is Steam, the damaged and broken matter inside. The second is Venus, the damaged and broken person inside.

Steam and Venus; steamgirl