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Dimension Clash
Chapter 8 – Hard Boiled

Chapter 8 – Hard Boiled

The trail systems here aren’t as good as Belwood, so our run mostly consisted of neighborhoods, small parks, and the occasional main road. I received an accusation of cheating when Serena learned that breathing and talking were semi-independent for me as I gave her a bit of a rundown on other details about me, otherwise we mostly just discussed frivolous things about the places we passed through when we weren’t going too fast for them to talk.

As we turned onto one of those mixed residential and commercial roads, I got a shock.

Person, two firearms under jacket.

Fucking what.

Down the street walking the opposite way to us amongst the handful of other people was some guy in business casual with a briefcase and an open winter jacket. There wasn’t anything obvious, but my brain was screaming at small details under his shoulders, so I was certain he had a pair of pistols holstered there.

I pulled my gaze away, as I really didn’t want him to realize I was looking.

“What’s up Sam?” Kat asked back at me as I realized I had fallen behind.

“Can we cross the street?”

She blinked at me and then checked the traffic. “Sure, but why?”

“I will explain later.” I hissed back, the description a little more literal than I was used to.

She seemed startled, then looked at Serena who shrugged before we crossed over. I kept flicking my eyes back to track the armed man, but he didn’t seem to react to us at any point. I lost track of him when I was reluctant to turn my head to track him, as that seemed way too risky. After a couple of minutes when there was enough stuff between us, I chanced to look over my shoulder.

Still walking away from us, I started to relax a smidgen.

“Ok Sam, what was that?” Kat asked having noticed.

“Uh well, there was a guy with a couple of guns back there.” I said with another glance behind.

“What? No way, wouldn’t people have been freaking out?” Scoffed Serena.

“They weren’t out or anything, but it was that guy with an open jacket and a briefcase, they were under his shoulders.” I clarified.

There was a pause.

“I guess I saw someone with that description, but I didn’t see something obvious.” Kat pointed out.

“Oh, right you weren’t at my place last night,” I said rubbing a hand on my face. “Quick version, my brain seems to be hyper-aware of weapons and it was fucking with my ability to play games with the guys.”

“And you think this guy had guns because you played a game and your brain flipped out?” Serena scoffed again.

“I have had to trust all my other instincts,” I said uncomfortably. “I might be wrong, but I am reluctant to discount them yet as it would call other actions of mine into question.”

“Like?” She asked the hostility fading away.

“Feeling OK with being a girl and wearing these clothes.” I mumbled out, I was still justifying using the question chains after all.

“Oh, sorry…” She said with a grimace.

“I mean it is an insane thing for me to suggest, why would someone be walking around here with guns?” I admitted. “I have seen news articles about gun crimes here once or twice, but that guy looked professional not like a petty crook but what do I know.”

“I’m not big on cops, but should we call them anyway? They are supposed to handle shit like that.” Serena asked.

“I dunno, I don’t really have great evidence besides saying, ‘hey my weird changed brain said a dude had guns’ and I am not sure they would take that.” I grimaced at how cringy it sounded to say.

“May as well try.” Kat said with a shrug.

“Once we are off this street then.” I said feeling a bit uncomfortable.

The call was a bit awkward as I first gave a description of what I saw to the responder, then she said to hold. After a few moments, I was passed to a separate guy who started by confirming where I had seen him, then he paused and then continued with another question.

“Could you describe them specifically?”

“Uh sure, white average height-“

“What would you call average?”

“5’ 10” or like 180cm?”

“Continue”

“Brown hair, probably blue eyes, sharp face, clean-shaven, no obvious scars or anything.”

“His clothes?”

“White dress shirt, grey slacks, a blue coat. Oh, and a black leather briefcase.”

“You thought he had guns?”

“Yeah, two in shoulder holsters, no idea what they were though.”

“Ok, anything else?”

“No sorry.”

“Thank you for calling us, have a good day.”

He hung up.

“Well, I have no idea if that went well or not.” I said glancing up at them from the bench I was sitting on.

“They didn’t brush you off, so that’s something.” Kat said.

“Should we continue the run or…” Serena asked trailing off.

“May as well,” I said with a shrug and stood. “He wasn’t going for us and there isn’t anything I can see us doing about him either way.”

The rest of the run was a bit tense, and I kept glancing around wondering if there would be something else around a random corner. When we arrived back at their apartment without incident I apologized for the scare, but they waved me off and invited me to join them again. After some goodbyes, I started back in the direction of my place.

I was pretty much relaxed again by the time I was back, the pleasant weather and quiet neighborhoods being sufficient to sate my fears.

Jake seemed to be doing dinner tonight, Mike had been held up working on some assignment with a friend but would probably still be back in time. He offered to set something out for me, but I admitted to having had a snack recently and I would probably just augment it a bit with a liquid fuel when they ate.

I hung around a bit not quite sure if I should scare him with what I saw, I sighed and decided it probably would be the best to get it out.

“Hey Jake, remember how I was having trouble with games last night?”

“Yep.” He said while looking through the spice cupboard for something.

“Well, I got freaked out by it on the run today.”

“What? You saw someone with a weapon or something?” He asked in a shocked tone.

“Yep, couple of pistols on a dude.”

“No shit? Here? Why?” He asked incredulously.

“Not a clue, we called the cops about him once we were well passed but nothing actually happened.” I said doing a wide handed shrug

“That’s wild.”

We stood in relative silence for a bit, with only my sounds and him stirring to fill the air.

“How did the math go? Any issues?” He asked while stopping to scrape the bottom.

“It was kinda awkward, I am noisy when thinking of math it turns out.” He winced as I spoke. “Uh, I can probably demonstrate, ask me some operation to do.”

“Like how complex? Five plus five or something?” He asked turning away from the frypan.

Clack, clack, chunk, veee, ding

“Ten.”

“Yikes, that’s loud. Wait did it actually take that long just for that?” He said with a grimace.

“Yeeeeeep, can’t do any math outside of that either so I just gotta twiddle my thumbs while it runs.” I said with a shrug.

“Fuck.”

“Could be worse, and I don’t make calculation errors anymore.” I said trying to give a positive spin.

He didn’t look convinced, but let it go anyway and I excused myself to change and work on assignments until dinner. Mike turned up roughly on time, but River was still out, and it ended up being a quieter meal mostly just talking about the day. The other two decided to spend the evening on more fighting games, and I decided to join them.

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Aw come on, I thought I got it that time!” I said in exasperation as I failed to do a combo again.

“Almost!” Mike said cheerfully, I think he was going to say something else but then the front door opened.

“Hey River!” He switched to shouting over his shoulder, somehow still blocking my attack.

“Hello!” They responded.

“Hi, guys!” Came Leah’s voice behind them.

I was too focused to respond, finally getting some good hits in on Mike.

His bar was inching down but then he broke free and knocked my character in the air.

“Don’t you do it, Mike, I’m telling you…” I growled at him as I see him going for a finisher. “Oh come on!”

He’s roaring with laughter now.

“Uh, hello voice I don’t recognize.” Leah said presumably while poking her head around the wall from the proximity.

“I was so close, next time!” I declared while tossing the controller to Jake.

“Hey, Leah,” I said turning on the couch to look behind it, my mind still distracted by the game. “How’s it going?”

“Sam?” She asked tentatively.

Ah, fuck right.

“Um, yeah, hi.” I said awkwardly with a raised hand in not quite a wave.

She stared at me for a few seconds, then pulled back behind the wall and I could hear a quiet exchange.

“You told me he-they changed; you didn’t say how much!” I heard her say flustered.

“Yeah, she wasn’t sure how much I should say.” Was River’s response.

“OK, it’s she then, right, fuck, now I gotta apologize to hi-her.”

I had been awkwardly changing glances with Mike while their conversation went on. This might have become the most uncomfortable encounter so far since besides my roommates and family I hadn’t seen anyone who knew me in anything but passing.

She stepped around the corner looking sheepish.

“Uh hi Sam, sorry for um…” She cleared her throat. “Not reacting that well.”

“Thanks? It’s ok, I’m a bit… different now.” I said trying to give a smile, but I don’t think it quite looked right.

She had been studying my face while I was responding.

“Huh, OK I see the resemblance to the before you, but um do you look like your sister now? I haven’t met her before, but I know you have one.” She asked before looking guilty. “Sorry, you don’t have to answer.”

“Nah, it’s fine. Yeah, I look a lot like her now, other than you know the other stuff.” I said while standing up and straightening my skirt. I could hear Jake and Mike start a round behind me. Evidently, the situation had defused enough for them.

She blinked at at what I was wearing a couple of times but bit down a question, River passed by in the background bringing their backpacks upstairs. As my eyes came back down from the distraction I had a petty realization. Hey, I’m not the shortest person in the room again!

Not by much, maybe by like 1-2cm but it’s a thing.

I think I hadn’t said anything for too long, as she looked a bit worried.

“Is something wrong?” She asked.

“Uh no, sorry, I was just realizing that you are like the first person I have talked to in days who isn’t appreciably taller than me.” I said, my turn to be sheepish.

She looked surprised and then started giggling.

“Don’t worry you get used to it.” She said with a smile after recovering.

“Did you want to join us or were you gonna spend the evening with River? No pressure though.” Jake interjected.

“Oh? Scared to get your ass beat again?” She said the smile turning to a grin as she leaned towards him.

“Yes, frankly.” He said after a pause to counter something Mike was doing. “You’ve actually won tournaments.”

“I can probably do a few rounds, let me talk to River a bit first though.”

Once Leah and River rejoined us, I ended up answering an increasingly familiar set of questions amongst rounds. Right now, it’s fine because I have new answers about myself from even earlier in the same day and I needed to catch River up anyway, but I can see how it might get old fast.

We did discover an amusing characteristic of my math unit being semi-independent though, despite working on potentially extensive operations it doesn’t take away my attention from other stuff. So, we got a mini-game going of getting me to calculate some time-consuming calculations and guessing if it took more or less time than my game round.

I didn’t have a great track record I will admit.

Eventually, I bowed out to get a bit more work done.

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It’s funny how little this feels any different from any other Tuesday this semester. I had an awkward conversation with the TA for my math tutorial to confirm yes, I was who I claimed to be. Otherwise, besides the odd curious glances nothing particularly notable happened, it looks like Anna is uniquely curious or just bold as no one approached me in the web dev class.

I guess four years really is enough for people to be used to changees in their life despite how rare we are.

At the break, I glanced around the hall a few times, but I couldn’t see anyone else that stuck out. There might be someone with one of the far more common changes, but those aren’t exactly obvious. Although, I thought of a question I wasn’t aware of the answer off the top of my head. How common is it for people’s physical gender to be changed?

Presumably, it should be about as common a change as hair color or something, as the combination during conception that decided one of the other common changes should be similarly likely as for gender. I couldn’t find any articles on it though, the only exception being one on cases where the individual became a member of a species that didn’t seem to be a direct analogy.

Is it possible that’s what I fall under too? I look female but there’s nothing except the superficial structure from what I can tell. Maybe that’s part of why I am finding it ‘easy’ to identify as female, there’s nothing besides surface level distinction. I think. Still don’t really know for sure.

Well, I guess I can ask Summers when I see him next on… Thursday according to the schedule I had entered on my phone. The prof returned at about that point so I didn’t have the time to putter around anymore. Unfortunately, my mind latched onto something I hadn’t considered, have I thought about anything sexual at all since I changed? I might have been a lonely fella before, but the internet provides um company, Yet I can’t say I have even thought of anything like that since the change.

I mostly managed to drag my attention back once the prof started talking again but it was a bit hard to concentrate.

My thoughts returned to the subject while I was on the bus ride back, staring out the window at nothing in particular as I tried to consider my memories. I can remember the taste and smells of food and flowers, but any memories of anything to do with um physical pleasure were just empty.

Like I don’t even have the ability for those feelings to exist.

Errrgh.

That’s some bad feels, I am missing something I can no longer even imagine.

Hmm. Wait somethings not lining up.

Didn’t I feel attracted to Anna yesterday?

If so, why?

If it’s not a sexual thing, what is my brain interested in?

I don’t think I have known them enough to say anything about their personality besides being assertive and friendly towards me.

Is it that?

I don’t think it’s that exclusively, I am pretty sure I thought their appearance was cute too.

I tried to think of what my reactions to different people had been when I realized I don’t think I have actually ‘checked out’ unconsciously since the change. I have looked at people to understand their appearance and how they relate to me, but that’s it.

However, I have thought of someone I talked to as cute.

Am I attracted by personality and appearance together?

Huh.

Maybe?

Once I got back to my room, I spent a while reading Wikipedia articles on sexuality, which didn’t leave me any more certain but gave me something I could maybe work off. I seem to be attracted to girls so homoromantic seems to be in there at least but I seem to entirely lack a sexual anything. Maybe I’m asexual in a more literal meaning then?

This is making my brain hurt, I should probably talk to the others to try and see what they think.

That’s gonna be awkward.

Checking the time, I saw it was just past five. I have the changee meeting at eight, so I still had a bunch of time to kill.

Hmm.

I haven’t heard anyone come in yet, maybe I should do them dinner or something.

What do they even have in the fridge?

A quick scouting expedition revealed not much, leftover rice, vegetables, eggs, milk, lettuce, and some random other stuff. I thought they went for groceries on Sunday, must not have gotten enough or something.

I guess stir fry and salads are an option, maybe a custard or something as a simple dessert. None of it really fits together but whatever, not as if they will complain. Fortunately, I hadn’t deleted any of the recipes I had bookmarked, so even if I couldn’t taste or smell I can probably just go off what they describe.

The custard was simple but would need a while to cook so I started with it. It didn’t take too much time either as it’s just eggs, milk, sugar, and vanilla mixed up then dusted with some nutmeg for appearance.

The salads weren’t something I needed a recipe for and given our lack of supplies I didn’t see much point in doing anything fancy. Just greens with some feta, tomatoes, and thin slivers of carrot. There are some dressings in the fridge if they want something more.

I took a bit to set out an assortment of stuff for myself and then it was on to the stir-fry.

I seem to have better hand-eye coordination than before, it’s easy to just buzz saw down a carrot with a knife and get nice even circles. Mike keeps the knives sharp too, between that and my higher than human strength, it’s like there’s no resistance at all.

It’s rad not to give a shit about onions either, can’t make glass eyes water!

I could occasionally hear one of them arrive and then vanish upstairs, I am sorta surprised no one popped in to help but I haven’t exactly been helping with meals either.

Not like it’s particularly much effort to do what I am doing.

The stir-fry is mostly just frying everything in a sequence, fry rice set it aside, do the vegetables return rice, and add the eggs. There was the snag that I usually did the soy sauce and sesame oil by taste, I know how much the recipe suggests by weight of rice, but I didn’t measure it either. I kind of guessed at it, but it didn’t seem like too much compared to what I remember doing before and the color looked right. Really weird to not really smell any of it but hopefully, it’s alright taste-wise as well as looks.

I deposited the wok on the table so it would keep the stir-fry warm and then pulled the custard out to join it.

“Hey, dinners ready!” I shouted up the stairs while taking the apron I had been wearing off. There seemed to be some confused conversation going on upstairs, but I couldn’t quite make it out.

Ah shit, I forgot to warn them it was almost done. That’s probably it. Shrugging, I walked back and hung up the apron before making my way to my chair to wait for them.

For some reason, they all looked sheepish as they shuffled into the dining room. There seems to be some mutual surprise at something to do with it too, did it smell funny or something?

“Did I miss something?” I asked.

“Uh, I don’t think any of us realized it was you working on it.” Mike said.

“This is like a three-course meal!“ River said incredulously. “You could have asked us for help.”

“Eh, it wasn’t much work and I needed to kill some time anyway.” I said with a shrug.

“I call bullshit on ’Not much work’.” Mike commented as he settled in.

“It really wasn’t, although the fridge is pretty much empty which is why it’s a bit of a mix of things.” I admitted.

“Works for me.” Jake said.

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“So how was your day.” River asked me as they were cleaning up. I was banned from helping since I did the meal, so I was just chilling on a dining chair. Jake had to go off early and meet up for a group project, he promised to pick up some groceries on the way back in exchange for skipping out on clean up.

“Not bad, had some awkward moments. Explaining who I was to a TA sucked once and is probably gonna suck again later this week.“

“Urgh.” They groaned.

“Had a really weird realization though,” I said, not quite sure If I wanted to elaborate. “I don’t think I can actually conceptualize sexual pleasure anymore.”

Mike choked on a drink from over my shoulder.

“Don’t die Mike.” I said without turning to look.

“You can’t just pull that shit on us buddy.” He said after coughing for a second.

“What do you mean?” River asked while drying their hands with a frown on their face.

“Like my memories of er, certain actions have no association of pleasure to them anymore.” I paused trying to think of how to explain. “Like I can intellectually conceptualize a human deriving pleasure from a sexual act, and I can apply that to the memory to understand why I was doing what I was but there’s none of the emotion remaining.”

“While I haven’t exactly gone to watch porn, I don’t believe there’s anything there for me.” I finished with a shrug.

“Fuck.” Said Mike. “That kinda sucks, not gonna lie.”

“Mike, please. What brought that to your attention, Sam?” River asked.

“Uh, that might be a depressing topic.”

“Sam.”

“Uh well, I am not sure what I have said of it before, but I am kinda a Barbie doll down there.” I admitted.

“Really?” They asked quietly.

“Yep.”

The silence stretched out for a bit.

“Er, for what it’s worth I literally can’t imagine what I don’t have anymore” I said with a shrug trying to break the silence.

“I think that makes it worse Sam.” River said with an expression of pain.

Well shit.

“Why aren’t you upset about this?” Asked Mike without a hint of his usual cheer.

“It’s just another thing about being me now, I guess. I am so far from human in other aspects that not being a sexual being makes s-sense, I don’t know how that w-would even work for m-me...” I am pretty sure my eyes were wet enough to say I wasn’t being completely honest.

“Oh Sam.” River said while crouching down to give me a hug on the chair