Soren sat down in the comfortable looking chair, avoiding eye contact as I sat down across from him. The chair didn’t have a space in the back of it for my tail, so I uncomfortably sat with it curled around my side tightly. My ears hadn’t moved from where they were pinned back against my skull.

“Look… Myles…” Soren started out, but frowned when he saw the look on my face.

“It’s Kaela.” I replied softly, feeling on the edge of tears. There was that mess of feelings again, boiling up at the mention of my real name.

“Kaela.” Soren corrected, a strange look on his face as he watched the wave of emotions cross my face. He didn’t remark on it, continuing on, “I’m sorry for my comment earlier. I didn’t mean to insult you, or what you… Picked as your character. I honestly didn’t even really think through what I was saying, or consider you were there.”

He sighed, a hand rubbing over his mouth as he looked away. He then turned his attention back, taking a deep breath. “And I’m sorry you got hurt by my dumb boasting. I’m going to try to keep myself in check from now on. I really hope you can forgive me, because I really value you as a friend and I want to keep being close.”

My ears relaxed, flicking up slightly at the apology. Soren seemed genuine, though it was clear he had practised what he was going to say. I didn’t blame him for that, considering running his mouth was what upset me to begin with.

“It’s…” I paused, taking a breath of my own. “I forgive you. I’m not going to say that was okay, but… There is some stuff I’m working through right now, and that caused what you said to really dig under my skin.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” Soren asked gently, leaning forwards in his chair.

I just shook my head softly. “I’m… Not in the mood right now, Soren. I think I’m going to go get some actual sleep now.”

“Yeah, go log off. Have a shower, do something in real life while you refresh your suspension gel.” The captain nodded, getting up from his seat. “And… Kaela? Despite my overeager mouth, I am here for you. I haven’t really shown it well the last little bit, but… I want you to be happy. And I’ll do whatever I can to help you, even if that’s learning how to just shut up.”

I got up too, nodding softly. We looked at each other for a moment, before I wrapped my arms around him and pulled him into a tight hug. “Thank you, Ren.”

“I told you I didn’t like that nickname.” Soren grumbled, as he hugged me back. “Makes me sound like a gir- Oh. Oh I see what you did.”

I let out a small giggle, before sighing softly. “I get the one, since you called me disgusting.”

“Yeah yeah.” My friend rolled his eyes as he let go of me, and gestured to the door. “Now git. Go sleep or something, you oversized puppy.”

I started to make my way out, but turned to face him at the door. “Thanks Soren. I’ll let you know if there’s anything you can help me with. I just need time right now.”

Soren nodded. “When you figure it out, you know me and Lea have your back. No matter what.”

I stepped out, and headed towards the elevator. He was right, I needed to get some sleep.

The next day was quiet. Alex and the two Delanno employees had to log out for some real life events taking place, and so the skeleton crew of myself, Soren and Lea kept the ship running on our own for the most part. Granted, that meant we were in different parts of the ship working alone, but I didn’t mind.

It gave me lots of time to think, to start sorting through the emotional knot that just kept getting more complicated every day. However, I didn’t get much time even for that as a message from Syl popped up in its own window.

I sighed softly, looking over the name in the text. I’d changed it the day before, after my talk with Soren. I’d been going through all my messages from him, and the emotional dagger of my real name kept bothering me. I wasn’t expecting Syl to change pronouns for me, but… It felt weirdly comforting. I mean, I was a girl in this character right? So using ma’am was just natural when addressing me?

I shook my head and typed out a quick explanation to Soren and Lea that I’d be logging out for a few minutes to deal with something that popped up, and then exited the game.

As I opened my eyes to the beautiful lake of my homepage, something felt… Off. I was back in my scanned replica of my real body, and… Everything just felt grey. The soft breeze coming through the cottage, the smells of freshly baked bread sitting on the counter, all of it which had brought me comfort whenever I jumped into VR now just felt… Stale.

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I tried to centre myself with a slow deep breath, keeping myself calm as I moved over and sat down on the couch in the center of the room. It was the divider between the living area and the dining area, but I just waited there. I closed my eyes, focusing on the plans I had when I got back into the game. Back when I could go be Kaela again.

“Doctor Yvea has logged in.” Syl announced softly.

The doctor materialised out of the air in the middle of the cottage, her avatar appearing the same as her real body. I gave her a welcome from where I was sitting, and soon she sat across from me in one of the armchairs.

“So, how has your experience been so far these last four days?” Yvea asked as she pulled up a menu window. It was likely connected to her virtual workstation to make notes about my time.

“So far, no different to my normal experience in VR.” I replied, trying to keep as casual as I could. I was keeping my facade in place, the one that hid my emotions and kept me as the stable young man everyone knew I was. But… The mask didn’t fit right. It felt too big, the edges no longer lining up where they had to hide all the emotional turmoil I felt.

“Alright. Well… We have some bad news on our end.” The doctor said, looking over her notes. “We’re noticing some concerning… Anomalies.”

I sat up a little straighter at that. She put her hand up, and I waited for her to continue.

“We thought that there was a problem with our biomedical scanners at first,” Doctor Yvea explained slowly, “So we did a small blood draw just to be sure. Your… Body is producing different levels of hormones than it was when you went in. Your estrogen has risen while your testosterone has fallen.”

“What… does that mean?” I asked, blinking in confusion. My hormone balance? Did she mean…

“Your body is starting to produce more estrogen on its own than it should, Myles. Enough that it’d be at a healthy level, if you were female.” She said, the doctor having a serious look on her face as she looked closer at me. “Have you been doing anything in a game that is different from normal? Anything that might explain that?”

“Well… I started playing a new character in Stellara Nova,” I said slowly, looking away as I felt the blush crawl up my face. Do I tell her? It probably wouldn’t hurt, right? “A female character, this time. That’s a new thing for me.”

“I see.” The young doctor turned back to her notes and quickly typed something out quickly. She glanced back up at me, “And how is that making you feel? Any body dysmorphia while playing as a female character?”

I shook my head, a little too eagerly I realised a moment too late. I cleared my throat, before replying. “No, nothing like that. It’s normal right? For guys to play as girls?”

“Not really…” Yvea replied, taking a moment to pause and put her thoughts together, “It’s not uncommon, but… It’s not something your average male would do. Given the current quality of most VR experiences, the majority of people tend to have issues using forms too different from their norm for extended periods. It's the reason everything defaults to a real-scan," She said, gesturing to my current avatar.

The doctor continued, “As per the rules of any medical treatment relating to the Behemoth coffin, you don’t need to disclose any personal information you don’t want to. But are you transgender?” she asked, looking up from her screen briefly to gauge my response.

“I, what? No! I’m not…” My voice trailed off as I started to think. Was I…? No, I was a guy who just liked to play as a girl. Even if playing as a girl felt so much more correct than any moment I’d spent in my real body, that didn’t really mean anything. I just really liked how cute I was!

The doctor picked up on the clear conflict of emotions I was feeling at that suggestion. “Hey, that’s okay. I’m not trying to force any labels onto you. I just wanted to ask, in case this was important to you.”

I nodded slowly, but I was far too lost in thought to really reply as I tried to justify to myself why being Kaela felt so different.

“Alright, well… So long as you aren’t concerned about the hormone changes, that’s really all I needed to address with you today.” Doctor Yvea gave me another odd look, much like the one Soren did earlier, “I’d recommend taking some time to yourself more frequently, and don’t stay logged into any game for more than a few days at a time. People might get suspicious if you are always logged in.”

“I… Right. No, I’m not really concerned…” I nodded slowly in reply as she stood up. She logged out, vanishing into a pixelated cloud that quickly dispersed and left me alone.

I… I needed to learn more, and the doctor was right. I needed to take more time out of the game to keep up my appearances of being in a normal coffin. I didn’t think I was transgender at all, but to be honest I really had no idea what that even meant beyond someone who used to be a girl becoming a boy and vice versa. I’d never really paid much mind to any of those social issues, mostly because my parents had shut down most of the conversations we might have had about them with corporate speak. I’d never brought it up with my Aunt either, because we’d had no reason to talk about them. To be honest I never really cared what people did with their own bodies or lives, nor really who wanted to love who.

I swiped open my menu screen with my left hand, and opened the search bar before freezing. Where do I even start? I knew nothing about any of this, and… Honestly, it was scary. What if I was a transgender…?

“Miss Kaela,” Syl’s synthesised voice spoke up, interrupting my thoughts. “Would you like some assistance in your research? I have some good articles available here if you would like.”

Something caught my attention about her comment. It was the second time now she’d intentionally used female titles for me, and that stuck out. I hadn’t asked her to do that, I realised.

“I… Syl, why are you calling me miss?” I asked the AI, turning my gaze up at the speaker in the center of the ceiling where her voice came from.

“You set your default system name to match that of your in-game character. I interpreted this to mean you wished to use female pronouns.” Syl explained, “I can return to using male pronouns, should you wish?”

“No… No, please keep using the female ones.” I replied back, looking down at my body. It looked nothing feminine, being that of a boringly handsome young man.

“Very well.” The voice paused for a moment, and I thought for a second I heard her voice shift tones slightly from her normally flat, emotionless way of speaking. “Would you like me to load your character template from Stellara Nova as your homepage avatar?”

I hesitated for a moment. What would it hurt, right? Playing as Kaela was fun, even if it had been extremely emotional the last few days. “Yes, please Syl. Load the template please.”

She didn’t reply as my body shimmered and my height shifted. After a few moments, I was Kaela again. The pretty little wolf girl with white hair. All I could do was smile as the comfort of being this character washed over me. I turned my attention to the web articles Syl had pulled up and as I folded my tail into my lap to pet it, I began to read.