/December 13th, 2025, 14:00

When you log into GGO the first thing you notice is the weight. It's a familiar weight that you haven't felt in half a year and you can't help but look.

The walls around you are mirror smooth and you almost know the person staring back at you. Long black hair, crisp white clothes, soft eyes on soft cheeks.

A hand on your shoulder and you spin into the cold wall behind you. He towers over you and asks about your rare "F-1300" avatar and you can't bring yourself to object. Does it matter if you're a guy here? Did it ever matter?

You run.

The floor isn't granite and the tap of shoes to ground isn't the slap of bare feet, but the whistles and calls all come in the same tones and you can't breathe.

You slam into hard muscle hidden under green cotton and you crash to the ground in a tangle of limbs and hair. Weight presses down on you, hair in your mouth, cold floor beneath you. Metal clinks above your head and you can't see anything but green. You can't move.

"Are you alright?"

That...isn't Oberon.

"Do you need anything?"

Soft knit brushes against your skin, the winter sky above you now choppy bangs framing chips of sea ice with cat-slits of pupil.

"I..." You had needed things, hadn't you? "I need. Gear. And the G...Governor's Office."

Your voice is all wrong and you almost fall apart again but her eyes are slit like a cat's and you cling to that. It's not the same. You're not trapped. You can leave.