A/N: Author's note instead of warning. I want to talk about this here, loud and clear because this is a crossposted fic. This is an ABO AU. I repeat. This is an ABO AU. That said, there will be no sexual content as of this posting. For one thing at this point in the story they're kids. For another, I'm not interested in it and everyone has covered that part of the story to death in other fandoms. This is about everything else. There will be discussions of puberty and sexual topic eventually I think, hence the rating of M at this point. If people think this fic's rating needs to be changed, please let me know.

Warnings: gender dysphoria, trans female character, ABO, eventual discussions of child abuse and malnourishment.

arc one

Prologue – Countdown (Age Eight)

Classifications don't matter when you're young. At least, they shouldn't.

It really shouldn't mean anything, it shouldn't be true ever, but eight year old Hikari is only that by name and spirit, she can change nothing about herself.

To the world, she is eight year old Yagami Hikaru and it burns her, burns her and her brother in turns because if she doesn't get the right mark, nothing will change, nothing will grow, nothing will get better and damn that, damn that so much the sky feels it.

Only now does she hate human conventions, human feelings, human everything.

Maybe her father was right and the human world was worth abandoning. They demanded everything of her, bright shorts, quick runs and she could do none of it. None. Well, not true, she could do some of it. Not enough and it wouldn't matter soon.

So she stays as eight year old Yagami Hikaru and only responds to her dead name when she has to and when she hears her brother call her name ignores every scowl and sneer and derisive look that she can.

It shouldn't even matter, really. She hasn't presented and she wouldn't for a few more years. It was how her mother had been. She had presented at the reasonable age and as a reasonable type and no matter how much was blocked from her she continues to move forward in a way that makes their dad absolutely crazy. With love.

They think.

Hikari wants to be like her. Wants her classification to poof up and become a weapon that lets her cleave doors open and make every moment count.

She's young enough to believe that's going to happen and she needs it to happen as soon as possible.

She ought to be careful what she wishes for.

…

Everyone is classified as something.

Everyone. Like the outdated pack hierarchies thought of wolves and the old societal norms of the present, everyone presented by the latest twenty-five, when a person's growth completed. Of course no one wanted to present that late, everything in life was wrapped up in neat little bows by then, but it had happened.

Some people called it a secondary gender or class, some called it "the inner beast".

Her brother would call it a pain in the ass. Publicly. Loudly. He had gotten kicked off of soccer practice for it once. (And behind his back called an alpha through and through.)

Hikari keeps her nose in a book and learns every name for it, every possibility. She had once heard one of her brother's friend say that knowledge was power and Hikari desperately needed power.

Before the revelation of classifications, society had focused on the primary gender, the race and ethnicity and the class of an individual.

Despite the importance still placed on these primary details, even more hinged on the presentation of the secondary class. Every rank had their niche, their selectable careers, their choices in life. That was what made presenting by high school so essential, every book said. What if you had gotten a job in one ranking area and you presented as something else? It was a whole government fiasco trying to "correct the mistake" and get them a job better suited to temperament.

Alphas thrived on competition.

Betas belonged in communication.

Omegas loved to nurture..

There were simple, fine lines, no in-betweens, no concerns. And in the end that was why Hikari would either get what she wanted or have to hide what she was for the rest of her life.

Or move, but she doesn't particularly want to do that either. That cost money.

So she had to live on like this, hoping for a part of her body to make sense one day. Being a beta would be nice. They could communicate and educate and grow. They didn't have the natural (was it really natural? Was it really?) urge to take and make and pursue the way alphas and omegas did. The two, in the end, were more alike than any of the research wanted to admit. The only difference was who did what in the end.

But Hikari doubted that was enough. There were always more fine print details.

Did they apply to her? She didn't know.

She was not a person of knowledge. She was rarely curious. She was instinctive.

Looking back, she should have known what that would mean for her. She'd read enough books after all.

…

In the weeks leading up to that special summer day, a thrumming sensation built underneath her skin. It was nothing like what her parents said would happen to her when she… changed. And Taichi hadn't had his. It was much, much too young! So it probably wasn't that. She hoped it wasn't. Hikari had no idea what she wanted to do when she grew up, but she didn't want to have no choice at all right now!

Also the monsters appearing in the background were coming out more and more. They hardly did anything, but you were much more likely to need to change your clothes after one appeared. Not that anyone noticed. Not even her brother noticed and bringing it up always left that worried crease in his brow. So Hikari took the hint and stopped talking about it.

She managed to keep this up until right around June. That was when, if her brother had watched enough anime with her, would have said she stepped right into the first episode of one with the mysterious transfer student that caught the main character's eye and changed the world by breathing.

Because a girl and a boy stepped into their classroom one day, holding hands. The girl took the lead, thin shoulders up straight. The boy didn't seem to care for the state of his shoulders or his hands, regarding them all with dark eyes like coal and stars. He shamelessly looked about the room, leveling his eyes on every single one of them.

Everyone in her class was staring at them, the teacher included. People did not hold hands in their home unless they were mated. It was just rude, insulting, demeaning. There were other words people used, but Hikari wasn't sure how to say them.

And she didn't care to. She liked these two at the sight alone.

"Everyone," she heard the teacher say and reluctantly turned to look at him instead. "We have some students transferring in today. This is Tsukino Sayo and Kamishiro Yuugo."

Both children bowed a little, barely enough to not get whispers. Of course whispers broke out anyway. But it couldn't mean much. Papa always said children didn't have much to offer anyone with information unless they searched really hard for it. So Hikari tuned them out as people shifted and the two of them were directed to their seats. They were right next to each other. Their hands separated and though it was silent, Hikari felt like she could hear it.

And something, something like yearning, built up in her stomach.

She ignored it. She wanted too many things anyway. Instead she focused on passing up her homework and the newest math problems on the board. She didn't even know what that feeling meant.

But the class didn't forget them. Lunch rolled around and the class proceeded to rush the boy's desk. To his credit he seemed to not mind as they sent question after question at him and ignored the girl on the other side. She also didn't seem to mind. Her eyes were squinted with focus as she read her book. The hat on her head drooped and slipped off of her head. Hikari moved from her chair and snatched it from the air. The girl twitched and looked over at her. Not startled, but slowly, the girl moved her head to look at her. And Hikari's vision was full of purple.

Bright purple, solemn purple, soft and puzzled and cored with something chilly. The eyes just kept looking right as hers as if they were going to go through her and down to the heart beating in her chest. As if on cue, it started to thump louder.

"You." Hikari swallowed. "Your hat was falling off."

The girl blinked, like an owl. Then a small smile blossomed over her face, soft and warm and happy. "Thank you," she said. She took the hat gently, noting each frayed thread and running her thumb over the brim. "I'm Sayo. Who're you?"

For a moment, Hikari hesitated. She could hear the whispers around her, see the eyes. One pair was the teacher passing by, which could not mean much of anything and at the same time mean everything.

She remembers Taichi's voice that day on the soccer field, when he invited Izumi Koushiro from the bleachers and from the book and the insistent tapping of his laptop. "All you haveta do is try once with someone. Trying a second time is optional."

So she would try once. "I'm Yagami Hikari."

There's a scoffing snort from behind her, but Sayo looks at her with some sort of wonder. "Hikari-chan," she says and her name, her real name feels warm in her ears. "Nice to meet you. Yuugo, we have a friend! A new, shiny friend."

There was a shuffling all around them, all pleased with them as the boy moved and settled next to them. "Anyone who holds the sacred hat without flinching is a friend," he tells her.

And Hikari's chest warms again.

"What'd you bring for lunch?" she asks, and it's over, for a moment, as the other children come around and cluster their desks together. But all the same, there are extra little smiles from the two of them and her comfortably squashed in the middle. As if she is somehow home away from home.

A/N: So, if you're still here, thank you for sticking through it. If you work with me, I hope this will be a wonderful slow burn of "how many ways can I make this trope a little less cringey for myself. Happy belated birthday Verse! I hope this was what you were hoping for! Also a ginormous thank you to verse themselves, who was willing to put up with me ranting and raving about this trope and the many world building bits I came up with to try and tune it differently.

Challenges: Mega Prompts Quote Prompt 217, halloween advent day 3,