"Look at you," Eva whispered excitedly, having dragged me up to my room in like two seconds flat. She'd been my friend since forever, she knew where it was.
“Look at you,” I replied, my eyes darting all over her new features.
I could see now that the feathers were almost-vestigial wings, and there were like, three sets of them that would pop up like mohawks when she was staring at something really intensely. Like right now.
“Your feathers are getting caught in your hair,” I frowned, reaching out to fix it.
I aborted the motion as soon as it began, but she didn't really notice. She was too busy devouring the sight of my new form like a scientist seeing a rare creature.
"Eva?" I asked, scratching awkwardly behind one of my long ears. "Hello?"
"The world has gone crazy," she muttered, wandering over to sit on my bed. "This year is just… so much."
I followed her, hopping up onto the bed to sit cross legged. My friend looked a little more done up than usual — probably her Mum's doing. Her blonde hair did look good up in that fancy crown braid, though. Wait, was it so her feathers didn't get caught as easily? That clearly wasn't working.
Turning to watch me as I sat, she stared down at my tail for a moment, then back up at me. "Are you happy like this?" she asked, her gaze roaming my face as she waited for my answer.
I wiggled my hand in a so-so gesture. "It's more like I hated my old body. I don't really appreciate the lack of choice I had, either. Mum is pushing me to just accept it and be a girl. The rest? I love the tail and ears. I think in the end, it was a trade-up."
“Yeah, that sounds like your mum,” she sighed. Her feathers shifted slightly in her hair, and she winced.
Her hands went up and with a frown of increasing frustration, began undoing the crown. “Sorry. They keep getting caught and tangled, and then when they do the whole expressions thing it pulls on my hair.”
I smiled, watching as her deft fingers picked the hairstyle apart. “I get it. If I'm laying down and I don't roll over onto my side the right way, my ear gets bent in really uncomfortable ways.”
Gosh, speaking of ears… her new ones were fascinating. I could now see they were about three inches long. The tops had this gentle downwards curve that ended at the pointed tip. The undersides, though, I swear as the black ink-like patterns began, the skin tone parts got more and more transparent.
She finally caught me staring when I tipped slightly to the side for a better look. Her hand covered the ear in embarrassment, and she looked away. “Seriously though… the body thing…”
Oh, now who was changing the subject, huh?
“It's fine. Like I said, it's a better body than my old one,” I shrugged. Then, I shook my head and looked her directly in the eye. “No, that's… not true. I do like this body.”
"That's good," she said, giving me a cheeky, shy smile. "You do seem, like… happier. And since you’re okay with it, that means I can go back to being excited… right?”
That made me laugh, and I nodded. “Yeah, I mean I was excited just to see you, your ears—“
Eva lunged forward, tackling me into a hug that was very uh… contact heavy. “Good, because you’re so cute!”
I found myself without any breath in my lungs as she crushed me. Batting feebly at her with my tail and hands, I wheezed, “Get off me Eva! I’m small and breakable!”
“Sorry, sorry,” she giggled happily, fumbling her way off of me. I tried to ignore the surge of odd feelings I experienced when her hand briefly grasped at my small waist.
“You are though,” she insisted once she was sitting opposite me. “You’re adorable, and really pretty, and also blushing, apparently.”
“I’m still thinking of myself as a guy in my head and you just jumped on me, of course I’m blushing!” I exclaimed in embarrassment, covering my cheeks with my hands.
“O-oh, crap! Sorry!” Her eyes widened as she seemed to realise how… intense she'd just been, and then her face flamed up as she joined me in the blush club. “I’m just excited to like, have another girl in our group, I wasn’t… you know, coming onto you or anything.”
“It’s fine, it’s fine… just remember that nothing changed inside, okay?” I grumbled, feeling so very very strange.
I liked girls, I knew that for certain, and I still liked them. Which, I guess… made me gay now? Right? I hadn’t just rolled over and accepted the gender change in my head, but that didn’t seem to matter to a whole lot of people, including my own mother. Did I still just keep liking girls but call myself straight?
“So you’re still… like, Itias? You’re still gonna be a boy?” she asked softly, deflating a little.
“Oh my god,” I groaned, flicking my tail around and dumping it in her lap — a lame attempt to comfort her. “I didn’t say that. I’m not Itias anymore, I’m Tia… and as for like, if I’m a boy or not… I don’t know. I look like a girl, it’s just that I’ve thought of myself as a guy for my entire life and now it’s suddenly just changed without me even having a say? It’s a bit lame.”
She stared down at my tail for a few seconds, her fledgeling frown replaced by curiosity. “Okay, so it’s like, a big change, and you have to get used to it, figure out if it’s you? Like a haircut or something, you need to let it grow a bit before you judge if it was really right for you.”
“Yeah, I guess,” I agreed, although the analogy didn’t totally match up. “Look… I'm not sure if I'm just being stubborn, or if I really don't like it. Plus, mum is getting pushy about just accepting it. She wants me to just flip a switch and be a girl. If… if I'm going to be a girl, it has to be my own damn choice.”
She let out a long, serious sigh. “Right. Sorry, I think I was a bit pushy just now, too.”
“Yeah… kinda,” I mumbled. Agreeing with her didn't feel good, because I didn't want to blame her for it. I didn't want to upset her by insinuating that she'd done something I didn't like… even though she had.
She sighed again. “Okay. So… you're Tia?”
I nodded.
“You're not a girl… but not a boy.”
I didn't react. I didn't know. I didn't have an answer to that question.
“They/them?” Eva asked tentatively.
Oh… huh. That was an option. I shook my head.
Eva groaned and flopped backwards dramatically. “Come on, Tia. Give me something to work with here!”
“Just… just use she, I guess,” I said quietly. “It'll be easier that way.”
Eva lifted her head and frowned at me.
I looked down and started twitching my tail around. “I'm just not going to be a girly she. I'll be a… a… I don't know…”
Bouncing back up so she was sitting, she stared down at it. Her bright blue eyes lifted to watch me while she slowly began to brush my tail with the tips of her fingers. When I didn't stop her, she started playing with my fur in earnest.
We were silent for several seconds as her fingers worked. It felt funny and kinda nice, especially when she scratched at it gently.
"So soft," she said with a shy, blissful smile. "I'm kinda jealous. My feathers aren't that soft unless you brush them the right way."
I really wanted to touch her feathers and ears. That seemed a lot more intimate than my tail, though, so I didn't.
"You can play with my tail whenever you want," I said with a smile of my own. She really seemed to be enjoying it.
"That's a dangerous promise," she replied with a sly look, eyes locking with mine.
Something about that look caused my heart to speed up, and words to fail me. Wait, was that innuendo? Was she flirting with me again?
“I know,” I smiled, trying to hide my nervousness. “But hey, you seem to be having fun so, whatever.”
She opened her mouth to reply, sly smirk still held by her lips. Then she appeared to reconsider, and simply shrugged. “Yeah, it’s so nice and soft.”
Deciding to change the subject, I flopped down onto my back and heaved out a long sigh. “I hope everyone isn’t a dick about our changes.”
“I’ll fight them if they are,” she told me adamantly, letting my tail go so she could wiggle around until she was laying on her side and facing me.
I couldn’t help but smile at the warmth our camaraderie brought to my heart. It felt nice to be in this together with someone. “Thanks. I'll definitely hurt anyone who even thinks about giving you shit for your feathers and ears. So… we can fight them together. Although, I’m tiny now, and you're only a few inches taller. We’re both pipsqueaks compared to even the other girls in our year.”
“Everyone knows the small ones are the angriest!” she exclaimed dramatically, punching the air without any consideration for technique.
That had me grinning even more and I rolled over to match her position. “Okay, so I’ll do the thing where I get behind them and stick a leg out, you push them?”
“Yeah!” she agreed, eyes bright with mirth. “I’ll push them so good.”
“The pushiest push,” I nodded, caught up in her enthusiasm all over again. She was always so full of energy…
She gave a giggle, shoving at my shoulder with two fingers. “They won’t even know, they’ll be so pushed.”
“This pushed, no lie,” I giggled happily, throwing myself onto my back again in response to her shove — like I’d just been thrown by a champion wrestler or something.
Looking back at her, our eyes met for just a second before we both cracked up laughing.
“Oh my god, we’re so lame,” she giggled, unconsciously wrapping her hand around my arm.
“Don’t tell the boys, they’ll disown us,” I whispered with false urgency. “Can’t be seen hanging out with weirdos!”
“I think they’re the weirdos, personally,” she smiled, shuffling closer. Her expression went serious for a moment as she murmured, “I’m really happy you’re okay, and like, that we both had changes. It's nice not to be alone in this.”
“I was worried for you at that protest,” I blurted, curling my tail protectively over her. “It looked so scary, there was shooting and… so much.”
“We were lucky that a literal superhero was there — a strong one, not one of the usual C-tier guys who are kinda meh.” She sighed. Yeah, lucky… definitely not because the hero was worried about you or anything.
Also, I was definitely still C-tier. Superheroes weren't too common, mainly thanks to the APA and their hunters, but people using their magic to help wasn't totally uncommon. I even had suspicions that some of the more one-trick heroes were witches — Spiritborn, rather.
“They’re blaming her, you know — Gauntlette?” I murmured, side eyeing her in an attempt to gauge her thoughts on the matter. “For all of the crazy stuff that’s happening.”
“Only the crazy people on Fox News. They hate superheroes,” she laughed, rolling her eyes. “For all we know, it was the APA. Those stuck-up rich snobs probably saw a way to capitalise on some opportunity and set the whole thing off.”
I kept my face as impassive as possible. She was sorta right, but she was pointing her finger at the wrong group. The gods of old were the ones who took hold of the opportunity… a gullible, stupid, vulpine opportunity.
At least nobody really knew, except for the Hunters, and they weren't going to say anything. They collected secrets almost as much as they collected the heads of Spiritborn.
So, in the absence of anything resembling the truth, and with media speculation all over the place, public opinion was undecided on the matter. Obviously some were hailing me as a superhero doing what heroes do, while others were calling me an ‘irresponsible vigilante’. Then, of course, there was the likes of Fox News, who had been hating on me since they had footage of me. I didn’t really mind that — Fox hated a lot of things that were obviously, objectively good. Hopefully history would put me in that category too.
I wonder, would I go back out as my alter ego? Being Lette, or Gauntlette… it had been fun, exhilarating even. I could actually legit help people too, or even… even hunt the Hunters.
“I thought she was really cool,” Eva said stubbornly. “I talked to her, you know? She was amazing, looking so badass out there stopping bullets and stuff. She punched this one guy so hard that he went to hospital, did you know that? Had to get his face reconstructed or something.”
With a wince, I remembered the feeling of his face breaking under the impact of my fist, cartilage cracking and blood spraying everywhere.
“Ouch,” I laughed, covering for my reaction. “Serves him right though.”
“It was scary, before she showed up,” Eva nodded enthusiastically. “They had us, uh… I think ‘kettled’ is the word they use. They had us boxed in — nowhere to go. She punched a hole for us to escape out of, like, literally.”
“I’m glad,” I said, looking into her bright blue eyes, a sudden wave of caring for my friend hitting me in the heart. “I was so worried that night. Which uh, reminds me… did the guys get out okay too? I haven’t spoken to them since.”
“Ah yeah, they were fine,” she smiled, waving me off. “They had fun, apparently.”
“Boys,” I groaned, rolling my eyes dramatically.
“Boys,” she agreed with a giggle, nudging me pointedly with a hand. “I thought you were one of them?”
Biting my lip for a moment, I stared at her and contemplated talking about my secret, the one that up until two days ago had been my biggest secret ever. It’s not like it even mattered anymore, so why not tell her? I’d never told anyone before, to the point where I’d carefully avoided any blood tests and stuff, even enduring sicknesses that I knew would accidentally expose me.
“Okay, I want to tell you something about my old body, something you can’t tell anyone else, okay?” I asked seriously, shuffling closer to her and dropping my voice to a whisper.
“What is it?” she prompted, her tone a mix of interest and worry.
I took a deep breath, thinking over how I would word this. “So… when I was twelve, do you remember that night that uh… they found me in the park?”
“Yes?” she nodded, expression falling further into worry. “I remember it pretty fucking well, actually.”
I cringed a little, recalling how worried she’d been. That was like, the only time she’d ever really hit me in anger.
“I wasn’t unhurt, like they said,” I mumbled, cheeks reddening with the shame I felt for having worried her so much. “I um… I smashed my, you know… balls. With a pipe. I’ve stayed short and andro looking because… well, I wasn’t going through puberty, I had no testosterone to signal the changes.”
“Holy shit,” she breathed, staring at me in wide eyed horror. “Holy fucking shit, you… did that? Why?”
I shrugged, feeling awkward. Boys weren’t meant to talk about their emotions, Dad had made sure I knew that much. “I was sad… and I knew that hitting them would hurt, and I knew that physical pain would, um… distract me from the mental stuff.”
Her hand fluttered over to land tentatively on my shoulder, while the other tangled with the fur of my tail, almost painfully so. “Itia— I mean, Tia… why were you sad?”
God, this visit had been a roller coaster of emotions. One moment we were joking around, the next I was close to tears, recalling the darkest moment of my life. Not even my own death had come close to the mental anguish I’d experienced that night. The worst part? I had no real idea why I’d felt like that.
All I could do was shrug, avoiding her piercing blue eyes as she tried to pin me down with them. “I don’t know, truth. I just… I was just really sad. Everything felt awful and pointless.”
“Okay well, you’re okay now, right?” she asked quietly, thumb massaging at the soft skin of my exposed shoulder.
I gave her a wobbly smile and a nod. “Yeah. Especially now.”
“Okay, good,” she said with a long, drawn out sigh. “Can we hug now? Please? I really want to hug you.”
I blinked, that actually sounded really good right about then. “Um, sure…”
That was all the permission she needed. Suddenly, I found myself pulled over to her, my slightly bigger friend pulling me into a hug where I was very much the little spoon. That was okay though. With my body the way it was now, I could be little and no one would laugh at me for it.
“Instead of the park — if there’s a next time, you come to me, okay?” she murmured into my big, fluffy ear. “Promise, okay?”
“Yeah, I promise,” I mumbled into her shoulder, where my face had been involuntarily smooshed. “I feel happy now though, I really do.”
“Good,” she grumbled, squeezing me tight for a moment. “Don’t scare me again like that, either. I still haven’t totally forgiven you for how worried that made me. You’re my oldest friend, you’re not allowed to get hurt.”
“Okay, okay,” I replied theatrically, trying to lighten the mood. This was supposed to be a happy visit.
Well, it still kinda was… I mean, this hug was pretty nice, even if it made me feel a little pervy for enjoying it. I didn’t want to be a creep to my friend, but she was cute. Really cute.
Disregarding that though, this was the most emotionally transparent I’d been with her. We always had fun together, and we did occasionally talk about like, our feelings and stuff but… there had always been that gender divide. I was a boy, she was a girl. That divide seemed like it had just vanished? I could already tell my life was going to get mega-complicated… but hey, the whole world was getting mega-complicated, I’m sure it would be fine. Right?