calliecwrites

[calliecwrites]

Flying Lesson

It’s difficult, I get it, Though it’s pretty clear to see, That no matter how you practise, You’ll never be as good as me; But there’s mastery and there’s basics, And some things just aren’t that tough, And all your clawing at the air Won’t ever be enough; So before your crash and clatter Sets off all of the alarms, You’re supposed to be flying with your mind, Not flying with your arms.

In straight lines you’ve got it, I’ll give you that, you do, But sometimes a corner’s handy, Or going up a little too; Not everything’s as spry as me, Can’t rely on that to stay— Rocks and trees and houses Won’t be jumping out your way; So clear your mind and focus, Where you will, you’ll go, Up and down, it’s all the same, That’s it, take it slow— Oh I pity any passengers You might decide to take— Watch out! Don’t you see it? Stop! Stop! Brake!

All that wild flapping Won’t get you anywhere; It’s magic, not aerodynamics, That keeps you in the air— You’re a witch and not a pilot, And it wouldn’t do you any harms, To remember you’re flying with your mind And not your goddamn arms!

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[calliecwrites]

Breakthrough

In the morning, everyone in my building is dead.

It takes me a while to notice. I live alone, and don’t see my neighbours often. But there are always little noises through the walls – doors closing, toilets flushing, voices – and now there aren’t any. By lunchtime, the shutters are still all closed. I knock on the doors, get no response, and call the police.

My neighbours have all died in their sleep.

Now I’m at the police station, waiting to be seen. My friend Ellen sits with me, holding my hand. As the only survivor, the police want to know if I heard or saw anything. Maybe I’m even a suspect. But they’re still rushing around, bringing in the bodies, contacting the families, doing autopsies – it could be a while before they’re ready for me.

And yet: I’m happy. I feel great. And my mind is going a hundred miles an hour because this is absolutely not how I should be feeling right now.

Ellen can tell something’s up. She always can. Well of course something’s up – we’re sitting in a police station and all my neighbours are dead. But there’s more than that, and she sees it. What do I tell her?

She leans in close. “What is it?”

“I dreamt I ate their souls,” I say eventually, and glance at her. We talk about my dreams all the time, and have a good laugh at how weird they are. But this time, she’s looking at me like, you want to talk about dreams, now?

“Were you lucid?” she says eventually. I nod.

“Because it’s Halloween,” I say, as if that explains it. “I wanted to do something spooky. For fun.” So I’d thought, let’s try eating souls. It’s all just pretend, of course, it’s all just a game in my head – but it’s in all the stories, so why not? All kinds of monsters and demons eat them, but what’s that like? What do they taste like? I’d always wondered. I thought it would be fun to see what my dreams came up with. Something surprising, for sure, something we could laugh about afterwards – but when I’d summoned some characters in the dream, it was my neighbours who’d turned up, and that made me pause. I don’t ever dream about them. But I’d gone through with it anyway – I’d phased my hands into their chests, pulled out the glowing masses of their souls, and slurped them down. I can’t even begin to describe the taste.

And in the morning, my neighbours were all dead.

I do weird stuff like this in my dreams all the time. That’s half the fun of being a lucid dreamer, right? I can do anything I like in there – or, well, anything I can persuade the dream to let me do; I’m not good enough yet to do anything anything – but I’m getting there. I can try out powers I’ve seen in films, play a part in stories I like, fight monsters, destroy planets – and all with zero consequences, because:

“And, what, you think you actually ate their souls? It’s a dream, Sue, it’s not real. You tell me that all the time.”

I nod. “Then how am I still alive? If it was something in the water, or a gas leak, or I don’t know – I’d be dead too. How can I be the only one still alive?”

“Maybe it was something they all ate?” she says.

“And this morning,” I go on, “I felt great, like really great. Full of energy, full of ideas – like I could do anything. I still do. Even here.” In fact I’ve been trying to stop myself grinning the whole time. This is not the place for that.

Ellen gives me a long, hard look, and squeezes my hand. “Stop tormenting yourself. Survivors’ guilt is a thing, you know that. You didn’t eat their souls. You don’t even believe in souls.”

I nod again. She’s right, of course.

A policewoman comes over. She’s wearing a black coat.

“Ms Tanner?” she says. “Come with me, please.”

Ellen gives me another look, gentler this time, and then we’re apart. The policewoman takes me to the far corner of the room.

“That was quite a feast you had,” she says.

This is so not what I’m expecting, it takes me a moment to respond.

“You mean my dreams? Did you hear us?”

She gives me a grim smile. “No – but you dream so loudly, half the city would know if I wasn’t shielding you.”

“Is this a joke?” I say. That conversation was between me and Ellen! “What’s this got to do with anything?”

“Everything,” she says. “There’s power in your dreams.”

“Look, I know I’m weird,” I say, “but… it’s just lucid dreaming. It’s all in my head.”

“For most people that’s true. But you aren’t most people, are you? You’ve made quite the mess. We knew you’d break through on your own sooner or later, but we didn’t expect it to happen like this…”

But I’m not listening. The people around me have caught my attention. There’s something moving inside them. I can’t see it, but I can tell it’s there. When I focus, it starts moving towards me—

She snaps her fingers in my face. “Stop that! What, do you want to kill everyone here, too?” She glares, and almost to herself, “You’ve broken through hard if you can already do that awake.”

I stare at her, and at the people. “Were those souls?” She nods. “But I don’t even believe in souls,” I say, weakly, while in my head is: oh shit. Worse, knowing they’re there is making me hungry. Susan Tanner, devourer of souls – that has quite the ring to it.

But I glance around, and say, quietly, “You’re saying I did kill them? What if someone hears—”

She shakes her head. “No one will. I’m taking care of that.”

No one is looking at us. In fact, no one has looked our way the whole time, like they’ve forgotten we’re even here.

“You’ve broken through the barriers,” she says. “Everything you can do in the dream, you’ll eventually be able to do out here – and you’re nowhere near your full potential, even in the dream.”

I’m still at: I killed them? Eventually I catch up. “That’s impossible,” I say. All of this is impossible. Those can’t have been souls, I just imagined it. But I can still feel them there, and if I just focus—

“Hey, stay with me,” she says. Oh. Right. “You don’t believe me? Change something.”

“What?”

“Change something, like you would in the dream.”

I stare at her black coat, and will it to be green – and it is. For a moment I wonder if I’m still dreaming. I do half a dozen reality checks, and they all fail. Which means either I’m still in the dream, and my mind is really messing with me – or I’m awake. Something people often don’t understand about learning to lucid dream is that the whole practice is based on being able to tell dreams from reality. We get really good at telling which state we’re in. And everything here is telling me this is not a dream.

I still feel completely, unreasonably great, despite everything, even though she’s just told me I’m, what? A murderer? Or at the very least, that I killed a bunch of people by accident.

“Feels good, doesn’t it?” she says. “Soul euphoria’s quite the thing. There’s nothing quite like digesting the essence of another person to cheer you up. Just don’t go making a habit of it, OK?”

Has she just read my mind?

“I’ve been reading your mind for years, Ms Tanner, watching you learn in your dreams. It’s lucky I found you first – you’d have made a tasty morsel for someone, with potential like that.”

I flip the colour of the lights on the roof from white to red to blue. I make a potted plant on the other side of the room rise a few centimetres off the ground. It’s easy. Telekinesis, too? Shit. That grin has broken through, now, and I can’t help it.

“You’re not with the police, are you?” I say at last.

“Smart one.”

“So what happens now?”

“You come with me,” she says. “It’s time for your training to really begin.”

“But what about the police? The… deaths? What about Ellen?”

“Don’t worry,” she says, “I’ve taken care of that. They won’t remember you were ever here.”

There’s something in the way she says it: she doesn’t mean here, in the police station, she means here, at all. That I ever existed. I glance at Ellen. This woman has just taken away my best friend. She’s taken away my whole life. But because of those souls I ate, I still feel totally, overwhelmingly great. I can’t wipe the smile off my face. Turns out you can feel wonderful and horrified at the same time – but the horror is such a small part of it that I can’t keep my mind on it for long. I just feel too damn good.

How long will this euphoria last? And how hard will I crash when it goes away?

But I can’t think about that now – literally can’t, my soul-drunk emotions are too overpowering – can’t think about what I’ve lost, or the implications of what I’ve done. All I can think about is power, and dreams, and adventure. So when she gestures and opens a portal, I grin harder, and don’t look back, and follow her through.

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[calliecwrites]

Pretending

Sometimes pretending to be a person is easy. Sometimes it isn’t. On the bad days, numbers start crawling on the page, straight lines curl, and I’ve got to remind myself to keep my face on. I want to stretch my other limbs, but the world down here is so thin, and so easy to tear. I have to be careful not to think too hard about anything, or it might start seeping through. You have no idea how much power you have, someone told me once, being able to create with a thought. And the children of my mind look too much like madness to humans.

Cases of madness worldwide are 1.3% higher on days like that.

But I don’t want to drive them mad. I’m here to protect them, not devour them. Not this time. So I have to pretend. Though with some of them practically throwing themselves at me, that isn’t always easy.

Writers are the worst. I let my ‘pretending to be a person is hard’ line slip into the coffee I’m nursing while my head pounds with the effort of keeping it all together, and her only response is, “Yeah, I know.”

“‘A writer is a world pretending to be a person’,” she quotes at me, and then, “That’s a deliberate misquote of something Victor Hugo said: ‘A writer is a world trapped in a person’. But I like my version better. If my soul wasn’t in a human-shaped body, sometimes I think I’d turn into a galaxy or something. Or maybe more than that. A multiverse.”

Humans are famously good at detecting things that don’t quite look human. I’m not doing a particularly good job of staying out of the uncanny valley today, but she doesn’t seem to have noticed. Or, worse, she’s noticed and likes it. Writers are like that sometimes. But I’ve been deliberately staying out of her mind. I can tell it’s twisty and complex, and I’m afraid the slightest touch from me would tip her over into madness. Or, who knows, maybe she’s right, and it would trigger her transformation into some kind of eldritch goddess that would put even me to shame. I don’t want to think about what that would do to the paper-thin world down here.

I’ve been so focused on my coffee, I’ve accidentally created another one. She hasn’t noticed.

“I do wonder what being a person is actually like, though,” she goes on. “You know, actually fitting in with all the weird rules humans have. Actually feeling at home here. And most of them only get to live one life, not all the fragments of all the lives we get to. Imagine that. They’ll never know what it’s like, being able to create with a thought.”

That last part hits too close to home, and I can’t resist taking just one quick peek into her mind.

“Oh, hello,” she says, and looks me in the eye.

I withdraw. No way she should have been able to feel that. And what I saw there – she’s practically a multiverse already, all jammed up there somehow into that tiny human brain.

“I always wondered if telepathy’s real,” she’s saying, “and now you’ve gone and proven it. Do that again, so I can see how you did it.”

No way, I’m not risking that – but she fumbles around and somehow does it anyway.

“There you are!” she says. I twitch back into my defences – why does this have to be happening on a day like this, when I’m barely holding it together anyway? The writing on the menu twists and curls, and customers start walking in circles. This time she notices.

“Ooh, eldritch abomination, is it?” she says. “Here, let me try.”

She squints, and now she’s holding another coffee, too. She takes a sip. “Mmm, just like in my dreams.”

Then she’s looking at me. Not just at my rapidly-slipping human disguise, but really looking at me, all the parts that no human should ever be able to see. But I don’t think she’s human anymore – I think she’s been right at that boundary for a while.

“You know, you really should pay more attention to that,” she says. “I find pretending is much easier if I do something like this—” and she does something, and my own human form snaps back into clarity. “There you go. Get those few things right and most people won’t even notice.”

Meanwhile, her own form is becoming more solid. That’s the only way I can describe it. Soon she’ll be so solid that her slightest movement will tear right through reality like tissue paper.

“Be careful,” I say, “you’re new to this, and this world is fragile—”

But it’s too late. She twitches in just the wrong way, and something tears.

Now everything is inverting. Everything that was packed up tightly inside her brain is becoming outside. The whole world is reforming around us, into one she considers home. I’m unaffected, but the humans are being completely rewritten.

“Hmm,” she muses, observing all the worlds at once. “Looks like I was right about myself.”

And she sees my dismayed expression. Avoiding something like this is exactly why I was being so careful down here. So much for that.

“Don’t worry,” she says, and gives me a reassuring pat somewhere in the fourth dimension. “There’s more than enough room in me for everyone.”

I really like that quote she uses, and use it myself. This story came from thinking - what if it was literally true, and not just a metaphor?

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@zzzestyy

[calliecwrites]

Writing Shifter HRT has been a bit of an experiment. I'd never serialised a story before, so I decided to post weekly, with a two-week backlog, to see what it's like writing that way. I did it for six weeks.

The hardest part was not getting distracted - either by other story ideas, or other things altogether. I'm used to writing when I feel like it - sticking to a schedule was very different. I had a few weeks where I didn't feel like writing at all, and that used up the backlog. Part 6 took longer to write, because it was going deep into old pain and dysphoria - which I felt was important to get right, even if it hurt - and left me not wanting to write for another few weeks, which broke the schedule completely. Staying on track is hard.

I've been taking a break since then, but I'm glad I tried it - I've often wanted to see if this kind of writing would suit me. I'm not sure if I'd want to do it for longer. I was already impressed by people who write long serials with consistent schedules - presumably they're facing similar obstacles on a bigger scale - and now I'm even more impressed.

And my story? Let's say we're at the end of an arc. Sad chapter with a hopeful ending feels like a good place to pause. Maybe I'll start the next arc soon - but probably not on the same schedule 😅.

[calliecwrites]

Shifter HRT, part 6 – The Other City (7 Months)

Of course I’d heard of Hyper City. It’s where almost everyone gets their species HRT. The clinic there has versions for almost every species (though not for shifters). But I’d always assumed Hyper City was a codename, to hide the real location of the clinic, for security or something. And the things people say about it are pretty unbelievable. If you know about the city and want to find it, you will – go twenty minutes outside town, wherever you are in the world, and it’ll be there. That sounds like magic – or a convoluted way of saying ‘if you know, you know – and if you don’t, tough’.

Except everyone talks about it like it’s real. Enough people are on species HRT that someone would leak the real location if it was just a codename. People report following the weird instructions, like it’s the most normal thing in the world. Though when changing species is a thing I’m actually doing, who am I to say this is any less believable?

Well, it turns out it is real. I’ve been there now.

* * *

I find a bus stop the right distance out of town, and go for a ride. I hold my intention in mind the whole way. Then there I am, in some faded little village I’ve only ever known as a name on a map. I wander around, and sure enough, there’s a path between two houses that doesn’t fit in. It’s paved and clean, while everything else here is dusty and overgrown. And it’s somehow hard to look at, like my fixed intent is the only thing letting me see it at all.

I’m used to being in a mind-responsive world in my dreams. Intent is one of the tools in a lucid dreamer’s toolkit – expecting things to change, knowing they’ll change, making them change. But it isn’t something I ever expected to use in the real world. I do a quick reality check – try to push my finger through my palm, and can’t – and that, along with everything else, tells me I’m awake. I don’t think I could be wrong about that when I’m paying this much attention. I shake my head. This is weird.

On the path I catch glimpses of buildings in the distance, where there shouldn’t be any – skyscrapers glinting in the sun. They come and go, like something keeps passing between them and me – like I’m seeing them through swaying trees – but there’s nothing there. Not even heat haze – it’s a cool day. And my own city has a grand total of one skyscraper, so it definitely isn’t that I’m seeing.

Eventually I pass under an arch, and I’m there. Welcome to Hyper City, the arch says. There’s a sign listing the local laws – and one catches my eye: shapeshifters have to be registered. That’s… surprising. I’d heard this place was much more accepting than back home. It’s better than being banned, but… Well, it’s not my problem. I still can’t shapeshift at all – which is exactly why I’m here – so I decide I can ignore it.

I wander the streets. This place – it’s normal – and that’s strange. Where am I? The map on my phone works, as long as I stay zoomed in. If I zoom out, it loses track completely. Is the light here the same? Is the sky the same? Am I in another country – or another world? What would other people see, if they watched me step onto the path that led me here? Where would I end up, if I left the city by another arch, or just walked out the edge?

I stop at wondering how they get internet in a city that exists outside normal space – and possibly also outside normal time. Because, yeah, that would be what I’m thinking about, when I’ve just stepped through a possibly-literally-magic portal to a place that shouldn’t exist. But those are questions for another day. That’s not why I’m here. One impossible thing at a time, please. And today’s is me, mid-transition, and anyone else like me I can find.

My whole body aches – but still doesn’t do anything. I’m taking in so much detail, and can’t use any of it. Phantom limbs come and go all the time, at the slightest thought. Dysphoria is getting worse – it’s the worst it’s ever been. Every time I move, the solidity of my limbs, and how constrained they are, clashes in my head – then for a moment my arms are (mentally) twice as long, and I’ve got three legs and can’t tell how many I’m supposed to have, and I’m stumbling. My mind is so ready for this, but my body is still taking its own sweet time. Surely this can’t get worse. I have to be near the tipping point.

I came here because – I need to know this is real. That it isn’t just me, it isn’t just… delusions. I need to know I’m not losing it. Is that weird? I can feel the changes inside me, I know they’re happening. But I’ve been doing so much of this alone, I need something outside myself, something physical, to connect it back to reality. I need to talk to other people like me – not just online, but in person, where I can see them, see the changes. There is no one like me back home. Even just seeing them might be enough, to know I’m not the only one.

And – there they are, just walking down the street, minding their own business. Even here there aren’t many – but they exist. There’s someone partly-transformed into a bird. Across the street there’s a slime – and my heart sings at this one; surely they’re one of the shifters’ closest relatives. Around a corner, and there’s someone with blue skin and four arms. I’m smiling. I can’t help it. And every time I see someone nonhuman, the phantom limbs come on in a flash, how it might feel to be in that form.

Further into the city, and I’m standing outside the famous clinic, where all of this started. I catch a glimpse of the infamous doctor – lab coat, glasses, balding grey hair. There are more nonhumans here, more of us, than anywhere else – us! I’m trying not to stare, and suppress a wild grin.

Except – I realise – I still look completely human. And, suddenly, I feel like an idiot. The others can’t even tell what I am. I’m just another human to them. My mood plummets. The smile vanishes. A pit opens inside me.

What was I thinking, coming here? Did I really think this would help? Instead, here I am, on the outside looking in, as always. The perpetual outsider, even among my own. I’m used to that. It always hurts, but it’s not surprising, not anymore. Why did I think this would be any different?

Standing here, I’d give anything to have some visible change, something other people could see, instead of it all being on the inside. Any sign at all of what I am. I could have worn my ‘be goo, do crimes’ shirt – that so far I haven’t dared wear outside the house – since that, at least, would have been something. Instead, I’ve got nothing.

The phantom sensations are so strong. I can almost feel them – and I try, desperately, to make them real, by will alone, like I would in a dream. The fluid in me strains – but nothing happens. At last the changed patches on my skin bulge slightly. It’s the most I’ve ever managed to do, and at any other time I’d be delighted, but here, now, it feels so underwhelming. Is this all I’ve got to show for all these months? No one even looks my way.

I want to say something to them – anything – but I freeze. Will I ever have the confidence they have, wearing my inhumanity openly? Will there ever be anything there to see? What kind of fool am I? I take the safe way out – I walk away.

I sit down in a cafe – and instantly regret it. A dragon and a mermaid are arguing at another table, and I try not to stare. Just seeing them, the phantom limbs are back in full force, and I’m almost overwhelmed by the phantom claws and wings and tails flicking in and out of my awareness. If I move now, I think I’ll fall.

In the end I can’t eat anything. I blurt out an apology and a thank you to the staff, and almost run for it. The familiar sensations are there already: clenched eyebrows and jaw, shoulders wanting to hunch over, and the bottomless pit in my stomach – loneliness that would devour everything. Except now, with my sense of form, I’m so much more aware of it than usual. I know exactly which muscles and nerves are involved, and for once, I wish I didn’t.

I stumble back the way I came. I barely notice where I am. There’s the arch – Thank you for visiting Hyper City, it says on this side – and then I’m on the same path, to the same dusty village. At the bus stop, I look back, and there’s no sign now of the city, or the path. The bus comes.

I’m holding back tears all the way home, but manage not to break down till I’m in the door. Then the tears come – and I can feel exactly how my body does it – and for a while I can’t do anything. Eventually I drag myself into the kitchen. I reach for biscuits, tea, anything that might help – and realise, too late, that was a phantom limb, not a physical one, and now I’ve knocked things everywhere, and it’s all too much.

I lie on the sofa and curl up.

And I’m back, here. I’ve been here before. I’ll be here again. Loneliness is the flavour of my life, after all. And what’s the point in doing anything, if, at the end of the day, I’m still always lonely? All connection is ephemeral and fragile – always having to hold back, in case I overstay my welcome – never knowing if I’m too much, or not enough. I always end up here, time after time – desperate, and alone.

I don’t think about it – if I did, I’d stop – I just do it, in the pain of the moment: I call my friend. The one I think is most likely to understand. I tell them everything. What I am, what I’ve been doing, what happened today. I’ve put this off far too long. Our last few calls, it’s been so hard to talk, it’s felt like we’ve been drifting apart, because I couldn’t tell them anything. Not this time. I break into tears again as I pour it all out. They listen. Afterwards, they say, in something like wonder, that there was always so much they didn’t understand about me, about why I did and didn’t do the things I did, and now it all makes sense. I say, deadpan, that there was method in my madness – and then all the tension is gone, and we’re crying and laughing together.

I feel a weight lifting.

Eventually I fall asleep on the sofa. Later in the night, when I realise I’m dreaming, my dream guide is there, waiting. She hugs me. She doesn’t often turn up on her own, but when I need her most, she’s there. She says a few words of reassurance. Would you regret it if you weren’t? And she’s right. She always gets to the heart of it. I’m doing the right thing. She, at least, understands. We both want the best for me – she’s part of me, after all – and though I already know what she’s telling me, sometimes hearing it from another perspective makes all the difference.

I’m crying again, in the dream. I wake up with the tears spilling over into my physical eyes – but the worst is already past. The rest of my dreams are better, the most relaxed they’ve been in weeks. In the morning, I feel almost OK.

I’ll go back to Hyper City. Not right away, but I’ll go back. And next time will be better.

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I won't be posting for a few weeks, but I'll be back at some point with Part 7 – Tipping Point.

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[calliecwrites]

Shifter HRT, part 5 – Mind Before Matter (6 Months)

I’ve been on shifter HRT for half a year now. Half a year! The physical changes are still going slowly, but the mental changes are really speeding up. My mind is getting ready for the kind of body I’ll have. I’d say that’s a sign the big physical changes are coming soon.

I’m fully aware of my body now. Not in the vague way humans are – I mean everything. I know my shape, how it’s all laid out on the inside, and how everything connects. I’m aware of things stretching and twisting as I move. And all this knowledge is just there, like how I know whether I’m hot or cold.

It’s my sense of form coming in. It’s like proprioception – how you know where your limbs are, how you can touch your nose with your eyes shut – combined with whatever it is I tweak when I want to feel phantom arms or wings, but turned way, way up. I can’t change anything – at the moment it’s read-only – but I have a feeling this is going to be a big part of how shapeshifting works. It doesn’t feel detailed enough, yet, for what I’ll be able to do – I think it’s going to get a lot stronger – but even this would already overwhelm a human. If anyone needs proof that I’m not human anymore, here it is.

I know the shape of things, but not necessarily what they do. So, uh, I’ve become just a bit obsessed with anatomy in the last few weeks… OK, so I’ve been reading about it in every spare moment. It’s kind of a big deal, suddenly being aware of all this stuff inside you and not knowing what most of it does! And, who’da thought, we know quite a bit about how humans work.

Though it’s funny I only take an interest in this when I’m well on the way to becoming something else.

I’ve counted all my bones, and learned the names for them. I’ve found organs I never knew existed (thymus? mesentery?). And I’ve come across the weirdest names for things. In your ears there’s a goat and an anti-goat (or the words for those in Ancient Greek), and in your eyes are the zonules of Zinn – and those sound so much like aliens in some low-budget sci-fi film that I couldn’t stop laughing. We are the Zonules of Zinn, take us to your leaders—

But – I should stop. You’re not here for a three-hour lecture on anatomy. Especially when all of that is going away! Being made of homogenous goo seems way more sensible than all that muddle.

So: goo.

Tiny filaments of fluid are growing all through my body like a second nervous system. Unlike my gooey blood, I’m pretty sure this is the real thing – the stuff I’ll eventually be made of. I also think this is what’s giving me my sense of form. It’s what’s letting me watch the changes from the inside. More of the flexible patches of skin are appearing, and they line up with where the filaments are densest. They’re really starting to ache now, but still don’t do much yet – though my sense of touch is sharpest there.

The goo is also filling all the spaces in my brain and spinal column. I’d bet that’s happening right down to the cellular level – though I can’t feel that much detail. My old cerebrospinal fluid is completely gone. And, yes, it’s weird being able to feel my brain, knowing that this thing is somehow where all my thinking happens. Except now it’s not the only part doing that. Shifters don’t have brains – or even cores, like some kinds of slimes do. Our minds are spread out through the whole of our bodies. We’re thinking with goo, not meat. But right now, I’ve got both, and that’s got to be why the fluid is so tightly packed around my brain – so the two of them can talk to each other. Somehow, this process has to change the way my mind works right down to the atomic level, while still keeping me as one coherent person the whole time. Hearing what some of the people on slime HRT are going through as their brains dissolve, I can only hope the shifter version isn’t going to be like that.

My eye for detail is stronger and more consistent now. Sometimes I realise I’ve been staring at things for hours, taking in everything. And it’s not just sight. I want to touch things, feel all the textures, turn them every way, trace everything with my fingers. Sometimes I want to taste things too, though I’ve been resisting that one – my body is still human enough that I don’t think that would be a good idea. Germs, and all that. Is this how babies feel, exploring with all their new senses? I’ve got to wonder. It’s like my mind wants to relearn everything, now that so much extra detail is available.

I’ve found I really like meshes and grids, and things with lots of little holes in them, especially if they have multiple layers, and even better if they’re irregular. They’re fascinating. I want to stick my hands in there and be whatever weird irregular shape would fill all the spaces – though of course I can’t, because my body is still solid.

And sometimes I want to absorb things, too. That’s the only way I can explain what I’m feeling – wanting to take things apart layer by layer and… know them completely? Not with my hands or teeth, but with something I don’t even have yet. Absorption isn’t just a way to eat, but a way to learn forms more accurately than through observation.

But I can’t do it yet, so when the feeling comes on, dysphoria gets bad. Having new instincts that I can’t act on is horrible. My mind wants it, and my body just can’t. Imagine being hungry and having no mouth. Now it really feels like being stuck. When it happens, I curl up, hold things tightly, and press them against the changed parts of my skin, hard as I can. That helps a little bit. But until my body catches up with my mind, I’m just going to have to put up with it.

These senses are still intermittent, though now they’re there more often than not – and I’ve got a theory why. My fluid and brain are constantly changing and learning to communicate, so it’s no surprise if the signals don’t all match up sometimes. And when they’re fuzzy or missing, I miss them. I feel like I’m walking around blindfold. The old human default is starting to feel like nothing more than a bad dream, one I’ll be glad to forget.

Still, I don’t know how permanent any of this is, not yet. If I lost access to my medication, would anything stay? Would it all go back to the way it was before? Would this be the dream, that I’d never recapture?

My actual dreams are changing, too. I’ve been a shifter in dreams for years – or at least the approximate version my human brain could handle. That’s changing. Now if I decide to have wings or extra arms, they don’t just appear, like before – now, they grow, and my sense of form grows with them. There’s no internal detail, but I know exactly what shape they are, without having to touch them with my hands or look. And they’re much more stable – they don’t disappear halfway through the dream if I get distracted. I don’t know how realistic any of this is, but it’s the most I’ve ever been able to do. Imaginary shifter becomes shifter-in-training! And soon – soon! – I’ll be able to do this for real.

And one last thing: I made a few comments online, on posts by people like me. Anonymously, of course – hiding is a hard habit to break, and it took a long time to work up the courage even for that. It’s one thing going through all this in private – it’s quite another telling someone else. But I’m glad I did. Just those one or two replies saying I’m valid mean so much. There are other people who get it. Maybe over the next few months I’ll be able to do more. Maybe I’ll make some new friends. Maybe it’s time to tell my existing friends, and my family. I’ll think about it.

Like I said at the start, I’m hoping the physical changes are going to really take off soon. Which means – the goo'd times are coming! And I’ll see you there!

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[calliecwrites]

Shifter HRT, part 4 – First Changes (2 Months)

It’s happening! Slowly – but surely. I noticed the first small changes over the last few weeks. And, despite obsessively checking myself for changes every day, I found the first thing completely by accident.

I don’t bleed anymore. I nicked my finger while cooking, and nothing happened. Eventually there was a little blob of red goo there, but it wasn’t watery like blood, and after a while it seeped back into the wound. That’s what my blood is like now. It kinda makes sense that it would be the first thing to change, since it’s already liquid, and it’s what’s carrying the shifterising hormone around my body. I can’t feel it, I can’t control it, but knowing that I’ve got goo in my veins (what a thing to say) is weirdly validating. All those pills I’ve been taking are actually doing something! And I’d swear the cut healed faster than usual – though that might just be me seeing things where there aren’t any.

Speaking of seeing, my eyesight is changing. Or, maybe not the sight itself, but what my brain is doing with it. I’m noticing details more. It’s like how, sometimes, after meditation, I feel like I’m seeing things more as they are, rather than seeing what I expect to see. I imagine it’s what it’s like for an artist studying something they want to draw. Except now it’s happening spontaneously, and more intensely. For a moment, I can look at a tree and take in the whole thing at once, every leaf and branch, and remember it. It’s intermittent – more often than not I’m still seeing things the old human way – but it’s happening enough to notice.

Everyone always says shifters have a really good eye for detail. In all the human stories where shifters are monsters, that’s how they’re able to imitate and replace people so easily (assuming they don’t just absorb them, which also often ends up happening in those stories). I think this must be the start of it.

Some patches of skin feel different, too. There’s one on my leg, one on my stomach, and another on my back. They look the same, but the texture is slightly different, and I can tell where they are even without touching them. If I really focus, I can make them feel just a bit softer and squishier than normal flesh. Not quite like goo, not yet, but definitely different. I’m thinking these will be the first parts to turn fluid, eventually.

And one more thing: I bought one of those shifter art things. Maybe you’ve seen them? – a little bowl full of goo, with a button on the side that you twiddle to change the goo into different shapes. Or, maybe ‘putty’ is a better word – it’s a bit like wet clay that doesn’t dry. It’s a sculpting toy, basically – that shifters invented. I’ve wanted one for years, but never dared, because someone might see it and… guess what was going on in my head? Who am I kidding? – no one is going to see that and think maybe you want to be a shifter! If they even noticed it, they’d take one look, think that’s a funny little thing, and move on. Paranoia is… well. I don’t think paranoia is too strong a word for it. Everything I did had to be checked against would this make people suspect?, and that overrode everything else. Any sign had to be hidden at all costs. I still didn’t dare buy it in a shop – I ordered it online – but now it’s here, sitting on my shelf, and so far no one has called me a monster. I don’t think anyone’s even noticed.

Right now it’s in the very rough shape of a dragon. Well, OK, so it’s basically a blob with two little blobs that kinda maybe could be wings… and looks more like a mushroom… what you can do with the button is very limited! But the real appeal of these is that once I can turn fluid, I’ll be able to flow into it, mix with the putty, and sculpt it from the inside using my own shapeshifting ability. It’s no wonder shifters love these things. Some of the pictures I’ve seen online are amazing – almost as amazing as what they can do with their own bodies. What I’ll be able to do, eventually.

And so that’s it! Two months, and things changing already! I’m still taking my human hormones – I’ll have to keep doing that for a while – and I still haven’t told anyone (ugh, don’t want to think about that), but for only having been on this for such a short time, things couldn’t be better!

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[calliecwrites]

Shifter HRT, part 3 – Rebirthday

I had the appointment. I passed the test. I’ve got the little package that will change everything.

I hold it tight all the way home. Part of me is still angry at my contact for messing with me like that – and the rest is in something like stunned amazement that I actually have it.

Now I’m home. I open it up.

There are two kinds of pills. First there’s antihominidone. That’s the humanity blocker, the one that lets my body change and stops it trying to change back. People transitioning to lots of different species take this one.

Then there’s the other one, the one that does the hard work of actually changing me. ‘Shifterising hormone’, it says on the label – they don’t even have a scientific name for it. There’s a little instruction book with doses – one of each a day – but it doesn’t say a lot about side effects or timelines. Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised, going DIY – this isn’t stuff you’d get from a doctor, after all. Almost no one’s been through this before. It’s super experimental, and I’m the experiment. The whole process takes two to three years, but what to expect when is pretty vague.

This is when my anxiety kicks in. Experimental treatment? Becoming another species? What am I doing?

I take one of the hormone pills out. It’s a clear capsule full of liquid. I turn it over, and the liquid slowly drops from one end to the other. It’s thick and gooey, which makes sense, since I’m going to be gooey. It looks a bit like the fluid shifters are made of, but without the life of the real thing. How do they make this stuff? Do they distil it from their own bodies or something? It’s not made of dead shifters, is it? Geez, I hope it’s not made of dead shifters. —Nope, nope, not thinking that way. Lots of other things are gooey. It could be anything. It could be literal magic, for all I know.

They’re so secretive, since they don’t want anyone else figuring out how to make it. Maybe I should save some and smuggle it to the other groups who are trying to? No, who am I kidding, this is for me – I’m not wasting a single drop.

Stop. Focus.

Changing species is much bigger than changing gender, but somehow it doesn’t feel quite as scary as that did – because this time, I’ve been through something like this before. I’ve sat here, scared and desperate, staring at pills that might as well be magic, before. Looking back, it doesn’t feel like I ‘changed’ gender at all – I just stopped pretending to be something I wasn’t. Sounds easy. Sounds obvious. Hopefully, one day, I’ll look back and this will feel the same.

I trust myself so much more than I did back then. I was right the first time, and that makes me confident I’m right this time, too.

And my friends and family? We’ve been through the fire together once. The ones who would leave left then – that’s what I tell myself. But I don’t really know how anyone will react to this. That’s a problem for another day.

The first two pills are on the table in front of me. Here goes.

* * *

It’s done. I’ve taken it. I feel all tingly, though surely it can’t be having an effect already. I think that’s just the excitement and the fear and everything.

I call the day I started estrogen ‘Rebirthday’, because that’s how it felt. I never thought I’d have another day like that. Now I have one birthday and two rebirthdays. I am a shifter. Even through all my doubts and fears, I can truly say that now, for the first time. I want to laugh. I want to cry.

I am a shifter. I am me. I know the next few years will be hard, I know there will be pain, but I can’t wait.

This is what I am.

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[calliecwrites]

Shifter HRT, part 2 – The Appointment

I’m there. The appointment that determines everything. The first time I’ve knowingly met a shifter face-to-face – even if she is a notorious gatekeeper.

She’s been questioning me for a while already. But her latest question just makes me grimace. I don’t think she’s taking me seriously.

“I already have to put up with prejudice,” I say. “I’m trans.”

“This isn’t the same,” she says. “You think this is the same? Do you have any idea how humans treat us?”

“Yes,” I say, “and it is the same.”

Her cables twitch, like a cat’s tail when it’s agitated. She’s in robot form, all sharp edges and wires, and her voice is tinny. I’d heard she doesn’t like being humanoid, and this is as close as she’ll go, but did she have to make herself look so intimidating? Unless she’s doing it on purpose—

“I think you just want to solve your gender problems,” she declares. “I’ve seen it all before. There are human ways to do that. Get hormones. Get surgery.”

“I’m already doing all that,” I say. “This is more—”

She cuts me off. “You’d stay in human form most of the time anyway, wouldn’t you? – I know your type. Why waste our gifts on you? You’re just a desperate human trying to solve your human problems. You demean us by being here.”

“No!” I say. “I think about this all the time. I dream about it—”

“Not good enough.”

“It hurts so much, knowing there are people like this and I’m not—”

“Not good enough!”

“I need this – I’ve always needed this—”

“Not good enough! Not good enough! Not good enough!”

She’s risen up on her cables, filling the room. I back away. If she would just give me a chance to explain!

“Why would you want to be like us at all?” she roars. “Why would you give up your humanity? Why should I give you anything, you disgusting bag of meat?”

“Because it’s what I am!” I yell. “In here!” I point at my heart. “I’m not giving up anything! Fluidity – change – the ability to be anything— One fixed form isn’t enough. It could never be enough. You don’t know what it’s like, being stuck— You can give me what I need. What right do you have to say no? You want to know why? – there is no why! This is what I am!”

* * *

Silence. After a while, she nods.

“And so we get to the truth of it,” she says, all the anger gone. She smiles. I blink away tears. She sinks back down, and somehow all the lines of her body soften. “Maybe you aren’t so human after all. Not in any way that matters.”

She twines her cables together into a hand, and holds it out to me.

“We can work with that,” she says.

She’s saying yes?

I take her hand. But I’m still reeling. If it’s truth she wants: “You did this on purpose!” I accuse. “You were trying to make me angry. You didn’t have to say those horrible things.”

She only shrugs. “Would we have got to the core of it if I was being nice?”

Then, on a flash of intuition: “You’d already decided, hadn’t you? This was just one more test.”

“We know what to look for,” she admits. “You would never have got this far if we weren’t confident, based on what you’d already said. But we had to know how you would react under pressure. If you had backed down, what would that say?”

I shake my head. What if I’d been having a bad day, and hadn’t had the energy to argue?

But she just smiles again. “My colleague outside will give you your medication. Next time we meet, I hope, will be on better terms. Sister.”

I leave. I did it! But when I’m a shifter – and I get to say that now, I really get to say that! – I promise myself I won’t hoard what we have. I won’t be as callous as her.

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This is the part that inspired the entire story. I had a dream like this, once, where I had to defend my right to be a shifter from someone horrible. Yes, it was a trans allegory, yes, I was imagining having to defend myself from terfs – but I was surprised by just how strongly I felt what I was saying. I yelled that last 'this is what I am' so hard I woke myself up...

...and the rest of the story grew from there!

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[calliecwrites]

Shifter HRT, part 1 – Egg, Cracked

So you want to be a shifter? You’ve read about humanity replacement therapy, or species HRT, but can’t find anything about the shifter version? You’re scared, you’re worried this isn’t the path for you, but part of you wants it more than anything?

You’re not alone. I’ve been there. I’m still there. And I’ve taken the first steps. Tomorrow I have my first appointment, though not with a doctor, and if all goes well, by this time tomorrow, I’ll have taken my first dose.

I’m writing this so you’ll have it easier than I did. Also, I want there to be a record, in case something happens to me. I’m not exactly doing this the traditional way.

* * *

I’ve known what I wanted to be since I knew shifters existed. Everything I heard about them – being fluid, shapeshifting – felt right. I started imagining myself as one. If you’re reading this, you probably know how that feels.

I hid it. Even as a kid, I knew people wouldn’t react well to what went on in my head. You’re not supposed to relate to monsters.

Then things got complicated when I realised I was trans. I told myself that wanting to be a shifter was all about wanting to fix my body, since being able to shapeshift would make that easy. I certainly did want that – but I’d imagined myself as a shifter since long before then. I’d imagined being able to change myself in many other ways, before transition became the most important thing. And after transition, so much was better, but that longing didn’t go away.

This isn’t a contradiction. Fixing one thing, even the most urgent thing, like I did, doesn’t automatically fix everything. But I was in denial. I’d transitioned (once); everything was supposed to be fine, now. I told myself the rest was a fantasy.

Then I heard about species HRT. I read about someone becoming a slime – and that did something to me. Slimes are fluid, and so are shifters. Shifters are slime-adjacent, for sure. Maybe this wasn’t just a fantasy. Maybe it could be real.

I’m not in denial anymore. Egg cracked. Time to transition again.

* * *

Were there signs? Oh yes, there were signs.

Nimona. Mystique. Slime girls. The Changelings. And when a character says no solid could ever understand, feeling it like a punch to the gut. Wanting to understand.

Wanting to fly, wanting to swim. Wondering what it’s like to be huge, or tiny, or a tree, or a rock. Wanting to be everything. Fluidity. Freedom. Flowing and pooling, wanting to be a blob of goo with no form at all.

Learning to phantom-sense extra limbs. Being a shifter in daydreams. Learning to lucid dream so I could learn to shapeshift in there. Still being sad because it could only ever be an approximation.

Sitting by the lake, longing to merge with the water and lose myself for a while. Wishing it wasn’t water, but other shifters, welcoming.

Sometimes want isn’t the word at all, but need.

And there are people who can actually do these things, and I can’t? How is that fair? What sort of world has shifters in it and I’m not one?

Sound familiar?

I read everything I can find about them. Not stories written by humans – those aren’t accurate. Most are just sex, or all about fear and hunger and absorption. Shifters don’t absorb people! – it’s their biggest taboo. I read stories shifters write for themselves – and I can’t get enough. Just don’t look in the comments: you’ve got humans calling them monsters, telling them what they should go do to themselves – and a few brave shifters saying how much the stories mean to them. Sometimes the stories disappear, but they always come back.

‘Fluid as the ocean, wild as the wind, and cannot be contained.’ That’s a thing they say about themselves. That should be me.

I don’t comment, don’t interact – hiding, remember? But the stories mean so much to me, too. They’re a window onto how my life could be. I tried to tell myself this was just a sex thing for a while – more denial. There are plenty other stories I could read, if that was all I wanted. But that isn’t what I imagine when I imagine shifters, or even shifter sex. I imagine being one.

Haters would call me a traitor to my own species. They’d call me sick, mentally ill, monsterfucker, monster. Like I haven’t heard all that before for being trans. I want to tell them I’m nothing like them, that they can keep their precious humanity if this is what it looks like – but I don’t dare. I’m too afraid: what if they’re right? I know what I want to be, I know what I should be, but I look at my body and think: this is what I am, fixed, solid, human. I can’t do anything about it, no matter what I am on the inside, no matter how much I hate it. And this is familiar, too – I felt the same way before my first transition. Trapped as something I hated being. Powerless.

* * *

Except, now, there is something I can do about it.

No doctors prescribe shifter HRT – unlike for other species. The only source is the few shifters who figured out how to make it. They keep it tightly controlled, so they can control who gets it. They want to make sure we meet their standards – that we’re shifter enough. I don’t like that. But other people, who want to make it freely available, haven’t figured out how to make it yet.

I’m not waiting for them, not now that I’ve decided. I couldn’t. I could die – accidents happen, after all. How would I feel, knowing I was dying human, still wondering what it would have been like? Never really having been me? No. I’m not waiting.

So I got in touch, and I spoke to one of them online. She arranged the appointment, and now she’s flying in – and I’m pretty sure that means as a bird, not on a plane. All I have to do is convince her. Tomorrow determines everything. If it goes well, I’ll be starting right away.

I still can’t quite believe it. It feels too good to be true. But it is. It really is. It was the same before – I couldn’t believe anything would change till I took my first dose of estrogen. Sometimes reason isn’t enough, planning isn’t enough, sometimes it takes direct contradiction to break the hold a belief like that can have on me. I’ll never take hormones, meet I am now taking hormones. Suddenly I see I was wrong, and there is hope again.

And tomorrow it’s going to happen again. Hopefully. Finally.

And then I really won’t be human.

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I'm doing one of these now too! Inspired by the many other animal HRT stories, especially the two slime HRT series by @sandyca5tle and @scrubbinn. In the beginning it's drawing a lot on my own transition, but will be going very different places.

If you want to read more without waiting for the rest of the series, take a look at my other stories – shifters turn up in lots of them.

Oh and that list of signs? They're all real :)

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[calliecwrites]

Something different today! I've been learning to draw, and although stick figures are kinda my limit so far (that hand was hard), they're more than enough to have fun with.

(Something similar happened in The Stuff of Nightmares, though there it was an alien, not a demon.)

And yes, the art style is inspired by xkcd, because it's the easiest to draw.

[calliecwrites]

Tentacle Monster

What is it with people and tentacles? Either they love them or hate them, but they’ve always got an opinion. The older I get, the harder it is staying in human form all day, and, frankly, I don’t see why I should have to. Tentacles are useful! Look how many things I can hold at once! More than you humans with your silly little hands. I can drive this bus and write and knit all at the same time! I can multitask like you wouldn’t believe!

What? An old demon like me needs a job too, you know. Or two, or three. With Satan dead and Hell ‘liberated’, there isn’t much work of the traditional kind going around, if you know what I mean. I’m down on my luck and stuck in the same mess you humans are.

Actually, I have it worse. Rent is a nightmare. You wouldn’t believe how much more I have to pay – oh, they say it’s to cover the cost of cleaning all the slime when I move out, but I tell you, it’s discrimination, plain and simple. Slime? That’s not slime, it’s a highly-developed immunological fluid that kills 99.999% of all bacteria and keeps minor spiritual ailments away. They should be paying me for that stuff! I’d tear out their souls and roast them alive if that… was still a thing I could do. Oh for the good old days, when being a demon meant something.

So here I am, driving this wreck of a bus, in this rotten neighbourhood, for barely enough to live. Half the people who see me in my true form run away, and the other half want to do weird things to me that no demon should ever have to think about. Tentacles aren’t weird – humans are weird. I just have to bear it and grin, with all of my mouths, and keep my tentacles to myself. For all the talk of liberating our Hell, humans have done a pretty good job of creating their own.

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[calliecwrites]

Gagh

Quark’s Bar on DS9, sometime after the end of the Dominion War.

“So let me get this straight.” Quark stares across the bar at me. “You’re a shapeshifter and a human?”

I wince only slightly. Am I human? My people’s history with that word is complicated. Sometimes we’ve claimed it, sometimes we’ve rejected it, but we’ve always had to exist in relation to it. And right now I look pretty human. That’s a thing we’ve always had to be good at. I turn my skin blue to make the point.

“You’re sure you’re not a Changeling?” he says.

“I told you, I’m a shifter,” I say. I point at the bottle of Romulan ale. “Give me that and I’ll prove it.”

He watches me closely as I down it in one.

“You drink. He never did.”

Quark means Odo, of course. Everyone here compares me to him, though he’s long gone. Some people leave a lasting impression.

He sets down my plate of gagh and watches as I eat. It’s alive and wriggling, as it should be.

“So how come no one’s ever heard of you?” he says.

“Ever heard any human myths?” I say. “Then maybe you have.” I shrug. “We kept to ourselves. Things were bad before the Federation, and old habits die hard. But we’ve always been there. There were never many of us. Things were too close during the war, and we decided it was time to come out into the light.”

Earth hadn’t been under that much scrutiny in a long time. After the bombing, people were looking for Changelings everywhere. Troops in the streets, blood tests, then the power outage – it was only a matter of time before they found us instead. Better to come out on our own terms. Show we stood with the Federation, not against it. That we wanted to help. The vampires and the werewolves and all the rest did the same, but they had an easier time of it. After all, the Federation wasn’t at war with people like them.

Quark hears the strain in my voice and changes the subject. “And I hear you’re doing well for yourself – a lieutenant on the Enterprise!”

I shrug again. “Think of us as another species, and it’s not that different.”

“So, uh…” I can guess what question is coming next, and he doesn’t disappoint. “Tell me about this absorption thing?”

“You mean this?” I take a handful of gagh, and pull. Doesn’t taste as good this way, but what the hell. Best to get the staring over early. And now I have an intimate understanding of the structure of live serpent worms, just in case I ever need to be one.

Quark’s eyes almost pop out of his head. No Changeling can do what I’ve just done. And the next question is going to be could you do that to a person—

Instead he grabs a passing dabo girl, not taking his eyes off my hand.

“Get the lady more gagh. I’m gonna need to see that again.”

The shifters' abilities were originally inspired by the Changelings, so doing a Star Trek crossover makes perfect sense! The 'troops in the streets' part is a reference to DS9 4x11 "Homefront" - not a good time to be a shifter on Earth.

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@leahnardo-da-veggie @sandyca5tle @scrubbinn

[calliecwrites]

Zero Time

From the prompt 'count the days' from @flashfictionfridayofficial. It's a Doctor Who story. I've gone a bit over the word limit here, at 1100 words, but posting it anyway.

‘Thirty days hath September’, but when I count them there are only twenty seven. Three whole days are missing.

I flip through my calendar, but there are no obvious gaps where the missing days would go. I run back over my memories – I've trained to remember each day, and especially the transitions between them – but everything fits cleanly. Twenty seven days in September, and then it's October. Those three days are gone.

Or, not gone: taken. That's what the Doctor said. He was barely coherent by the end. He looked like Eleven, but now I know forms can recur, who knows what number he actually was. He looked old. He could barely stand. He said he was dying, and couldn't regenerate. I scanned him, and it was true. Even I couldn't heal this. I'm used to healing damage in space. This was damage in time. Whatever had happened, it was bad. He said he wanted me to take over, be the next Doctor, when he was gone. He never says things like that.

He said bits of time were disappearing. He said it was all being caused by one person – his death, the gaps in time, the chaos on Earth. He was taking those stolen days and cracking them open, so he could use whatever was inside. He had stolen a year of the Doctor's life and a year of mine. I hadn't noticed – apparently I'm not as sensitive to timey-wimey stuff as the Doctor is – but he insisted it was true. He was setting himself up as a sort of Dark Doctor – like a Dark Lord. Like the Master? I asked, but, no – worse, because he had parts of my powers, too. The Master never had anything like that.

It was too much. The Doctor had hours, maybe minutes, left to live. I timestopped him, wrapped him up in forcefields, and stowed him somewhere safe. Don't want him dying on me while I'm finding a way to fix this.

Because that's what I'm going to do. I promise him that.

So I go looking for the gaps in time. What I did on those missing days really matters, because that determines which parts of my powers the Dark Doctor can use. Hopefully not any of the worst parts. Hopefully not the creating-and-destroying-stars kind of parts. Even if he only has a fraction of that, it could be devastating.

And those missing days might show me what he did to the Doctor, too.

I didn't expect to find any so close to the present. Three days in the last month. But all records of them are gone, and my memories are gone. My time travel ability doesn't get me there. I go back and forth a dozen times, but I can't find the gaps. Even on the days around them, everything fits. Still, my time travel is intuitive and not always the most accurate, so I'm not surprised. What I need is a machine designed to analyse all this.

And I know just the one. The Doctor gave me the key and told me to look after her when he’s gone.

The TARDIS rumbles as I examine the console. I've secured the Doctor’s timestopped body nearby.

“We'll get him back,” I say, “don't you worry. I promised him.” Flick this, adjust that. How hard can this be? “Besides, we've gotten out of worse,” I say, knowing that isn't true. Who am I trying to comfort here? Her? Or me? “Every time I run into him, I end up having to save him from something. He should have learned not to travel without a companion by now. Remember the time Davros took you over and I had to clear out all the Daleks? Or the time I stole the Master's TARDIS? Or the time I had to show him the extra functions on the sonic? – can you believe he still hadn't figured it out after all those years? OK, let's have a look—”

I throw the last lever and pull up the screen. It's focused on September. The numbers are running, narrowing in on the possibilities. There! – three days.

“I knew you could do it,” I say.

They are – would have been – the fourth, fifth and… eighth. I rub my eyes. It's hard to focus on, hard to even think about. The Dark Doctor really did a number on this one.

Now we just have to get there.

“Think we can do it?” I say.

We can't get a lock, of course. Those days don't exist in the normal timestream. They aren't coordinates, they're the gaps in between. I ramp up the chroniton compensator. The lights dim.

“I know – this isn't going to feel good. But if we want him back, we need to know what happened. Ready?”

I pull the lever.

Then we're moving. The lights are flashing, and the whooshy bit’s doing its thing. But who am I kidding – I don't know how to fly this thing. The Master's TARDIS that I stole was broken, and the repair manual was in Gallifreyan. Which I don't read. I'm going by the principles of time travel, and all the times I've watched the Doctor do this. Flip this thing. Pull that one. But oooh I know that grinding noise is definitely not how this should be sounding right about now.

I toggle the polaron inverter. The floor bucks, and sparks fly. A momentary drop in mavity— and I grab the screen as I bump back down. We're homing in on the gap between the third and the fourth/sixth, but we're slipping back and forth and can't get close enough. The vortex is too turbulent here. There isn't enough power.

Sometimes even a tame black hole isn't enough.

I glance over the console. I could flip that, or crank up that, or, or… It's too much. I don't know what to do. At least, not with this interface.

“You're not going to like this,” I say. “But we've got to work together on this one.”

I phase my hands into the console, and pour my own power into the system. The noise changes, a high-pitched whirr like nothing I've ever heard before. I could fry half the circuits this way, or worse. But for a moment we're in sync, and we punch through the tiniest of flaws, there—

And we stop.

The lights go out. The TARDIS is silent. Absolutely silent. No living thing should be this quiet. There's no noise from outside. Through the windows there's only black.

I light up my own hand and look around. On the console, the chronometer is jammed hard at zero. There's only one thing that can mean. Zero time. The time outside time. The time where no one's ever meant to go.

Is this our destination? Is this what the Dark Doctor’s left us? Only one way to find out.

I take the sonic, and step outside.

This one is partly based on a dream, as usual. The narrator is basically dream me. The Doctor explaining things actually happened there, up to the part where I realise he only has minutes to live. This story seems like the obvious next step. The old adventures I remind the TARDIS of happened too, in other dreams. And yup, I do end up having to save him every time we meet - he's always in way over his head.

Unfortunately I have no idea what happens next! But maybe I'll continue some day, if I figure it out.

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@leahnardo-da-veggie @sandyca5tle @scrubbinn

[calliecwrites]

Silence

When I relax my body – when the fizzing of nervous energy dies down – when the monologue slows – when even the music in my head finally stops – I can hear the silence.

The silence isn’t empty. There’s the hiss of traffic in the distance, the fridge in another room, and the hum of electricity, right on the edge of hearing. I cling to the silence like a lifeline. Whatever anxiety has been rattling around in my head, the silence is always there, not affected by any of it. The silence is always quiet and calm. Like I want to be.

I do this exercise more often, and the silence becomes familiar. But when I listen too long, I start to hear patterns in the little noises. Once I’ve noticed them, I can’t stop. It starts to sound like whispering.

“We’ve been waiting for you,” I imagine they whisper. “Join us. Let us show you.”

I’m mesmerised. I lie there for hours, listening to the whispers.

I go to bed with a fever, and wake with a massive swelling on my back. It’s red and crusted and hurts like hell when I poke it. I swear I can feel something moving inside. I’m delirious. I don’t dare move. All through the day it grows.

Then the swelling bursts, and tentacles writhe out. I freak out. I’m in a daze. But once I stop hyperventilating, I see that it’s not some alien parasite, it’s just – me. I have twelve limbs now. I’m feeling things with parts of my body that weren’t there before. Moving them is natural and easy. My tentacles have suckers, and when I press down on the bed – whoa, they’re strong. I can lift myself up easily. I’m like an octopus. Or a dodecapus, since my arms and legs are still there.

There’s blood and shredded skin everywhere. I can’t stop myself licking it all up. And where I can’t reach with my tongue, I wipe it up with my tentacles and lick them clean.

I want to vomit, and at the same time, want more.

That brings me back to my senses. What the fuck?! What am I doing?

But my skin starts flaking off, like when I’m sunburned, and it itches like hell. I scratch and scratch till it’s coming off altogether. I eat every last scrap. I can’t bear to let it go to waste. What’s underneath isn’t like my old skin. It’s thicker, tougher, but no less sensitive.

I see a bug moving on the floor, and want to chomp it down. I grab it with a tentacle, not even thinking, and stuff it in my mouth. It’s crunchy and delicious. I’m looking for more. I’m glad I don’t have a pet – a cat or a dog would look just as tasty. My mouth waters at the thought. Then exhaustion hits me, and I lie back down.

I’m in bed most of the day, and every time I feel something new coming on, when I’m close to panic again, I wrap my tentacles around the bedposts and hold on so hard the wood almost cracks. My hair is falling out. Somewhere along the way I lose my nails, and now I have claws. I spit blood over the side of the bed, and my teeth go with it. New, pointed ones grow in. No I will not eat my old teeth – though for a moment, I’m tempted. I roll back onto the bed. I’m weak and shaking. I’m covered in sweat. Sometimes it’s blood leaking out of my pores instead. Sometimes I feel my bones snap into a new configuration. I’m afraid that if I stand up, they won’t hold together at all.

I don’t know what’s happening. But, somehow, none of this feels wrong. Freaky, unexpected – terrifying – but not wrong. Like child to adult – it’s like I’m growing from adult to whatever comes next. That first change was slow. This one – the speed of it – it’s like all those years of change compressed into a few days.

I feel the next convulsion starting.

Once I’m able to move again, I drag myself out of bed and collapse onto the sofa. My new skin is leaving a layer of slime on everything. To my surprise, I like it. I’m marking this place as mine.

The whispers are still there. They purr with appreciation.

I don’t know how many days it’s been. I don’t dare go out looking like this, but really, I have no inclination to. I’m still incomplete. I can tell I’m still growing. My house is my cocoon.

But I’m hungry. I’ve never felt so hungry. I manage to order food online, and when it’s delivered I peer round the door, wearing a mask and an oversized hoodie, pretending I’m sick, hiding my tentacles, hoping my slime isn’t soaking through the fabric. The delivery man doesn’t come too close. Pandemic habits die hard. And I’m glad, because I notice all the muscle moving under his skin, and it looks so juicy. If he comes closer, I’m not sure I’ll be able to hold back.

Then he’s gone. Door safely locked, I eat everything. I don’t bother cooking. After gorging myself, I collapse back into bed. When I wake up, I’m as hungry again. I’m always hungry. I clear out the fridge and the cupboards every day, and order more. As soon as food arrives, I tear through the packaging with my tentacles. The suckers have teeth in them now – I can eat through those things, lots of things at once. Raw meat is the best. I slurp up the blood and crack the bones.

I start ordering from different places, so none of them get suspicious at how much I’m buying every day. I know I can’t afford to keep this up for long, not when I haven’t been to work since this started. But I get the feeling I won’t be needing money when this is over.

Tiny spikes start growing through my skin. At first I wonder if it’s more tentacles, because the feeling is similar, but no – it’s thousands of tendrils, almost as fine as hair, growing longer by the hour. There’s a halo of them all around my body. These are for sensing, not manipulation. I taste whatever I touch with them.

Then my hunger changes. It isn’t meat I want anymore. In the kitchen, I wrap a tentacle around the tap, and, against everything I ever learned about safety, jam the end of another into a socket. My instincts know what I need. I guzzle down water and energy, far more than a body this size should ever be able to hold. I think deeper changes are happening, now.

My bed is soaked through with slime and sweat and blood, but I don’t mind. I lie down and curl my tentacles and tendrils around myself. The slime has been keeping it all preserved for me, and I lick idly at the blood. I can feel everything nearby, even with my eyes closed. I’m starting to sense vibrations of a different kind, as if there’s another layer of the world underneath this one. The frantic pace of the changes is slowing, and for the first time since this started, I feel calm.

In the morning, the whispers are expectant. For the first time, I’m able to reply in the same way.

They welcome me. The first stage of my growth is complete, they say. It’s time to emerge, and meet others of my kind. I look forward to it.

I look at my new body in the mirror. I rub all the slime off my skin, and it takes the dirt with it, leaving me clean. A new, fresh layer starts to form. My skin has a slight greenish tinge. My eyes have changed, too – all black, with a pinprick of red. My whole skeleton has elongated. I stretch my claws, and hold my tentacles and tendrils out at full extent. I laugh.

I’m something inhuman – something that would have terrified me, before. But now, after all that, I love what I see.

This one's another experiment - body horror! I write about transformation a lot, but it's usually voluntary shapeshifting, e.g. with the shifters, where it's under their control, it doesn't hurt, and it's a core part of who they are. For them, changing form feels good. This character isn't so lucky. And even though she likes the end result, doesn't mean she's going to like the process.

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@leahnardo-da-veggie @sandyca5tle

[calliecwrites]

The Hug

“You're tense,” she says. “What is it?”

We're lying on the sofa, side by side. She's really good at reading me like this.

“Don't freak out,” I say. “I, uh, I want to turn fluid, flow all over you, and envelop you. Like a whole-body hug. It's something we do to show how much we care about each other.”

She’s silent. I'm used to this. Sometimes our differences take a while to process. “Isn't that scary?” she says after a while.

“Maybe if you're human,” I say. “I… don't know.”

She turns to look at me. “It's also the best position for absorbing someone, isn't it?”

“...yes,” I say, quietly. Already fluid, fully enveloping, no way for them to escape. “But I want to make you feel good, not… eat you. I've had other shifters do it for me. It feels good.”

“I'm not a shifter,” she says. I can hear the regret.

“And if we figure out how to change that, you'll be the first to know. You know that.”

She's silent again.

“OK, let's try,” she says. “I trust you.”

Those three words fill me with warmth. So many humans can't get over the absorption thing, even though it's our biggest taboo. We do not absorb people. But we can, and they never forget it.

Yet she trusts me. It's more than I deserve, more than I ever hoped for. I want to give her what I can. I'm smiling.

“I'll go slowly,” I say. “If it's too much, tell me, OK?”

She nods.

I turn my hand fluid first, and flow over hers. We've done this much before – she wanted to know how it felt. Then more – her arm, the whole side where we're touching. I stay in partly-human form, so I can watch for any sign of discomfort – though I'd feel as much through her muscles and skin. I make myself as warm and gentle as I can.

“Keep going,” she says, quietly.

I let go of my form altogether, and keep flowing till I'm covering every part of her body. Except the awkwardly-sensitive parts (human bodies are weird). I have to leave gaps for her to breathe. I keep only the thinnest layer on her face, and when she closes her eyes, I cover those, too.

She lets out the breath she was holding, and gradually relaxes. We can't mindspeak – humans can't do that – but silence is just as good. I hold her tight like she's one of the most precious things in the world. Because in my world, she is.

Does this work? It's straying closer to uncomfortable territory (i.e. anything romantic or sexual) than I'd usually go. But I can't stay in my comfort zone all the time.

And I've experienced this in dreams - where I'm a shifter - and it does feel good. It makes me feel warm, comfortable and safe. Being among my own kind always does.

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[calliecwrites]

Mistaken Divinity

Being mistaken for a goddess is awkward. Especially when you can do – and have been seen doing – what they believe their goddess can.

How do you prove you can’t do something, anyway? If I say I can’t, if I show I can’t, they’d say I’m pretending – and they’d be right. Once the idea’s in their heads, it sticks.

No, I wasn’t answering your prayers. Yes, I modified all your tribes’ bodies so they’re immune to the pollution that’s been poisoning you. Yes, that 10x’d your lifespan. This is your natural lifespan when you’re not being poisoned. I found you by accident and saw you were suffering, what else was I going to do? I didn’t even know you existed!

And, uh, yes, I was messing with the weather and playing with volcanoes. Doesn’t everyone?

You know I can’t actually hear your prayers. I mean, technically I can read your minds, but it’s something I’d have to actively do, and I’d have to stay in the village to be in range, but… You don’t actually want me snooping on everything you think all the time, do you? Uh, maybe don’t answer that.

I don’t think your goddess exists. Or if she does, she isn’t here. I would know.

If you try worshipping me, I will be very angry.

—Of course, I could just edit their minds and make them stop believing. I could make them forget I ever existed. But that wouldn’t be helping my case, would it? That’s exactly the sort of thing a goddess would do.

Why do you find it so hard to believe there are people more powerful than you, that don’t want you fawning over them, that don’t want to meddle in every aspect of your lives? Oh, there are plenty that do. I’m not one of them. I helped you for free. I don’t want anything in return.

Be your own people! Live your own lives!

No I will absolutely not allow human sacrifice.

—In the end, I left. Ran away, more like. And – they’re doing fine. No temples, no rituals, just one little statue that doesn’t look entirely unlike the form I was in that day. Still, I check up on them sometimes, without them knowing. Just in case there is a meddling goddess lurking somewhere.

If there is, she’ll find I’m no friend of hers.

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