the empire of unsheathed claws

The doctor asked me gently if anyone was hurting me.
I was insulted. Is that what they think we're all like?

No, I said. You clearly know there's something going on.

They say they're different from us and they are.
Never a warning that privacy doesn't exist for us here;
We knew they were listening, which is how it all started again
because I had to let him hold my hand to have a private conversation.

I told them, okay, I've been hurt by this mech.
He broke my spark when he gave up on us, who loved him,
and told us he didn't trust us to course-correct.

When he asks me to stand with him under your symbol
And abandon the only person I've ever loved more?
Sure, it feels like he's pulling my cables out--what do you know?

And the one back home, that you've seen me with in the field--
how dare you assume that the way he speaks to me in a fight
is the way he speaks to me in our berth?

Can you not understand that I have never been afraid of him?
I just want to be able to say that I choose him again, and have it be true.

So, yes.
I am absolutely feeling unsafe.
And people are hurting me here.

But actually I didn't say a word of that,
because I need their help.