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The first time Amon’s back split open, a gaping maw ripping into existence between his shoulder blades, he wasn’t allowed to pass out. He couldn’t remember the cause of it (though now he knew fear was his main trigger - hunger and anger had nothing on fear), but he certainly remembered the aftermath (cold water falling over his face, down his nose, into his lungs, over and over and over as pain crashed over him like an avalanche).
The first time, he wondered “how do children survive this?”.
Afterwards, he realized that many don’t. Those that do eventually learn that life is pain (that thought, that regret, eats at him like the emptiness in his stomach cannot). They got used to it.
Amon never got used to it.
The slick feeling of his own blood sliding down his spine never changed, however everything else did. The…mass that slid free warped further with every mouthful of (rotting fish guts, grave dirt, mustard left in his fridge for far too long right after he lost-) they shoved down his throat. It’s shape tore him open in new ways every time.
The doctor had found that fascinating. Had talked about RC cells gathering around injuries, how it let ghouls free their kagune painlessly with time, and how Amon didn’t heal right. Didn’t work right. Wasn’t right.
He’d always be in pain (he was thankful).
Soon enough, his blood would spatter like a fountain with the force of the kagune’s release. The entire structure would flow over the droplets dotting his skin, wrapping him up, sliding between the joints of the Arata armor pieces that couldn’t be pried from his skin.
Then they would drug him (a white-hot needle sliding into his tear ducts, a thousand fires in his veins, like his insides were melting into n o t h i n g). All he could feel at those times was rage and fear. A potent heady combination that made his situation worse (causing his kagune to flex and grow and dissolve and grow and-). Afterwards, all he would feel was disgust.
Disgust at the fact that his kakuja armor made him feel safe (even as it seemed to spread like spider veins into his brain and make him think…bad thoughts).
Later, when he was free (would he ever actually be free?), releasing his kagune still hurt. It hurt like the burn of an overused muscle though - it was almost nostalgic. His armor, while it still looked like armor (not the one that stretched his bones and…he didn’t remember those times. They were short blackouts that he would not allow to last), made him feel…
Nothing.
Like the noise-cancelling technology they’d taught him about in the academy, his positive and negative memories of armor (of safety, of distress, of being a ghoul or a CCG agent) were overwhelming until they collided. Then, they were nothing.
Just like him, it would serve its purpose and then cease to exist. Then it would be resurrected again…and again…and again…until he could make some sense out of the world around him. Or until this world eliminated him.
Whichever came first.