Elza

This & That

'What are you' has to be the worst question. It's even worse when you don't actually know the answer. Elza used to try to explain her early memories were a jumble. Then she tried out a few labels to see if they fit, the last attempt being 'chimera'. Now, she's done with the question so responses range from the literal('Today, package delivery') to the sarcastic('Super excited to be here'). The past isn't really what's important anymore. It's the future she's looking to explore.

Home is an affordable flat with neighbors who don't ask questions. Work is wherever she can find it. Fun tends to be a little more varied. Elza enjoys Parkour as a chance to put her body's shape to the test. Reading is a random collection of books, though more than half count as manga. She also makes forays to some of the kinkier underground clubs. There she can be her strange self because everyone else has their own brand of weirdness to work out.

History

The first thing Elza remembers about her life is confusion. Jumbled bits and sensations tell a story of someone living inside a cage wearing only a metal bracelet. People in tidy clothing might have been there. Sometimes in her dreams she relives the memories, then wakes in a cold sweat. Whatever happened, whatever they had been trying to do, it came to an end. People with swords and magic of their own ran through the building and opened cages. Creatures of mismatched traits and obvious augmentations turned their savagery on anything in reach. Elza scampered for her life until she found her way out into the city proper.

Life on the streets actually might have been worse. She got soaked in the rain, felt the night's chill, and no one brought her food anymore. Freedom only went as far as the street gangs permitted. Very quickly Elza learned to scavange, run, and hide to survive. Eventually she learned to talk. Words like 'feral' aptly descriped this nameless creature. In other circumstances this story would have been much shorter. Instead, someone offered her a place to stay.

Alien Anatomy

The tailmouth gets attention the most. No, it doesn't talk. No, it doesn't go up to her stomach. No, she's not eating with her butt. It's understandable people have questions but the first thing she warns people about is that her tail is carnivorous. The second is that sometimes it has a mind of its own. In truth, her subconcious seems to get an equal say in what the tail does and sometimes she gets hungry. The tail itself holds a stretchable digestion chamber. Whatever is edible becomes directly absorbed and the rest is pushed back out later, a bit like a shark.

Elza's muzzle holds all the herbivore teeth, and a smart tongue. This mouth does connect to the usual organs, though Elza seems to be a ruminant. Her two-chambered stomach handles all manner of nuts, vegitation, and a few other things just fine. Other things tend to be indigestible or can even make her sick. For this reason you can see each mouth favoring certain kinds of food, and she seems to need both. Sticking to anything other than an omnivorous diet ends in malnutrition. For the first year of her life after the cage Elza had to learn the hard way how to eat.

Across her stomach is a fleshy, marsupial pouch. The interior is lined with soft fuzz and warm. It's also lined with muscles that can stretch quite a bit or contract to seal itself shut. While she could in theory keep things inside the pouch, Elza usually doesn't. Being poked with your house keys isn't comfortable, and even less so when the pouch houses a set of small teats. She considers hands in her pouch akin to stuffing that hand down her pants.

Her feet feature talons at the end of digigrade paws. Her long legs help for running and jumping certainly. Her toes though are prehensile. Their dexterity isn't that fine, just enough to function like crude hands. She can pick up objects or grab onto rough surfaces. Some people think Elza climbs like a gecko. This knack has made parkour her favorite exercise.