It was a familiar sight. You would often see this in movies starring that one crackhead conspiracy theorist with the drive to solve a mystery no matter what. The important difference was that I wasn’t crazy or obsessed. Indeed, I had a perfectly good reason for all of this.

The corkboard was very convenient as the base since I could pin things on it with relative ease; the printed out photos and articles allowed me to put all of the info I’d gathered in front of me; and the threads going from one element to another helped visualize all the connections. All of it combined created the perfect mental map, the guide to figuring out Iron Pack’s location so I could go and meet her.

I was proud of myself. I’d only begun on Sunday, and now it was Thursday, and I already felt like I was this close to a breakthrough. I just needed one little piece of the puzzle to make it all fit together.

Naturally, that’s when a knock on the door interrupted my thoughts.

“I’m busy!” I shouted without even looking back.

“Come on, dude! Open the door!”

I grunted and dragged myself to the door before unlocking it.

“What?”

The image of a stunned Troy greeted me. His eyes scanned all over me.

“You’re still wearing that?” He pointed at the top of my head.

“Hmm? Oh, this?” I raised my hand and grabbed the fox ear of the white hoodie. “Yeah, it’s actually pretty comfy. And it’s not like anyone can see me wearing this when I’m locked in my room.”

He gulped as he continued to stare at me. “Uh, right. Anyway, I ordered some pizza. Wanna eat it and chat for a bit?”

“Nah, I’m not hungry.”

For some reason, my stomach decided to betray me at that moment and gave us a very convincing impression of a lion’s growl.

I cleared my throat while doing my best not to blush. “Y-you know, sometimes… one second you’re not hungry at all, and the next, you’re just starving.” I looked my roomie in the eye. He seemed unsure whether to laugh or not.

“So what kind of pizza did you order?” I pushed him out of the way and entered the living room.

“Uh, one anchovy and one ham pizza.”

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“Cool. Let’s dig in then.”

I opened the pizza box and smiled at the future tenant of my stomach. Troy opened his box as well and we began eating and chatting.

“So… what are you up to these days? You always lock yourself in your room after you come back from work.”

There came the interrogation. I had to do my best to hide the fact that I’d been researching Iron Pack and make-up.

“Nothing much. Just playing video games mostly,” I said offhandedly and bit into the piece of pizza.

“Right…” A few seconds of silence passed as we ate the pizza before he spoke up again. “So, have you given Miranda’s invitation any thought yet?”

I grunted. “I still don’t get why she invited me to a queer group meetup. I’m not gay! And no, I’m not repressing my feelings or anything! Guys are gross!”

Troy winced. Oops, I’d just called my friend gross.

“Uh, I didn’t mean it like that…” I awkwardly scratched my head and avoided his eyes.

“I mean… I get it, I wouldn’t want to date a guy either.” He shook his head and then took a deep breath. “But if you say that, does that mean that you find yourself gross as well?”

I stopped for a second. “Well… yeah. I mean girls are just more pleasant to look at than guys, right?.”

“So… do you want to be a girl?”

“That question again? Come on, Troy!” I chomped off another piece of pizza with a grunt.

Troy remained silent though, so I expanded on the thought. “I mean, you ask as if I have a choice! It would probably be way better to be a girl, sure, but I’m not a girl, I’m a guy, and there’s nothing I can do about it, so why waste time thinking about it?”

Troy gave me a splendid blank stare. It seemed like the programming the aliens had left him with had run into some kind of error.

“Why do you think it would be better to be a girl, anyway?” he asked cautiously.

“What are you talking about? There are so many advantages! People would be nicer to me, I would get to look beautiful… yeah, the only downside I can think of would be having to marry a guy.”

Troy dumbly nodded before opening his mouth, hesitating, and then finally speaking. “I mean… you wouldn’t have to marry a guy. You could be a lesbian.”

“Huh… Right, that makes sense. I guess there aren’t any disadvantages to being a girl then. But like I said, I’m a guy, I lost the coinflip, so there is no point in debating this what if.”

He closed his eyes and nodded, looking completely defeated. “Alright… look, I don’t think I can really help you with this, but please think about going to that meetup. I think it would do you a lot of good.”

“But why?!”

“Just… please…”

I did a double take. That Troy said the word please? There was something really wrong here. Maybe the aliens weren’t a joke, after all?

“Alright… I’ll think about it, jeez.”

I quickly stuffed the remainder of my pizza into my stomach and escaped out of the awkward atmosphere into the safety of my room again.

Luckily, my research quickly made me forget that whole ordeal and focus on what was truly important. And in about an hour, I found the one piece of the puzzle I was looking for.

I jumped out of my chair, reading and rereading the article, going to my corkboard and fitting the new piece of information into the map, and just as expected, it all fit.

I’d done it. With this information, I could easily narrow down the location of her base. It would require me to actually go out and scout in person, but it could be done.

“Yes, yes, yeeeeees!” I pumped my fists and let out a very loud laugh.

Later that day, Troy asked me whether I was alright again. Jeez, that had been the only thing he’d asked since my encounter with Iron Pack! Couldn’t he see that I was fine?!