The next week passed without much incident. Mark mostly just stayed in, watched Netflix and played video games as he counted down the days till his appointment. The only thing of note was when about four days in he noticed that his beard and body hair had gotten long again. He debated whether or not to shave it again, but ultimately decided that he wanted to look as feminine and therefore as convincing as possible for the appointment, and so he did another full body shave, which was followed by another long session of experimenting with how different things felt on his smooth skin.

But eventually the fateful day came, and with it a phone call from Stone.

"You ready for this, kid?" Stone asked as Mark got ready to head out.

"Ready as I can be." Mark said.

"Ok, now here's the deal," Stone said, "The clinic doesn't allow any cameras inside to protect people's privacy, so we're gonna have to be stealthy with this. I'm sending Abigail over with some gear that'll help you out. Now remember, you have to act like you actually want those hormones so they don't think there's anything up."

"Yeah, yeah, I know, just act like I'm any old trans women, coming in for girl pills."

"That's the ticket." Stone said. "I got a meeting with Nathan, so just call me back in a few hours."

Mark's eye twitched at the mention of his arch-rival. "Yup, you got it chief."

"Oh by the way," Stone said, "I saw the footage of you after your little Abigail session. I'm sorry to see that beard go."

"Well, you got to do what you got to do."

"Amen, Owens. Talk to you later."

Stone hung up on him. Mark checked the time: his appointment was in about two hours, and the clinic was at least a half hour drive. Abigail had better arrive--

There was a knock at his door. He went over and opened it, revealing Abigail wearing black leggings under a blue skirt, with a black blouse as her top. She was also wearing a stylish pair of sunglasses.

"Hey, Marky-Mark." Abigail said.

Mark shuddered. "Don't call me that."

"What, heard that one too many times?"

"No, it's just that...he calls me that."

"Who?"

"Nathan. Nathan Emerson."

"Oooooh, that guy." Abigail said as she stepped into the apartment. "Number one at Muckraker, right?"

"Yeah, we got a bit of a rivalry thing going." Mark said. "I'm hoping this project will put my sub count over his."

Abigail raised an eyebrow. "Isn't this whole thing a bit...much for something like that? Like, there are other ways to get subs."

"Maybe, but once this documentary comes out it'll put me so far ahead of him that he'll never be number one again."

"If you say so." Abigail said, clearly doubtful.

"Hey, Stone said you had some gear for me."

"Oh, right!" Abigail said. She took off her sunglasses and held them out to Mark. "Notice anything...different about these?"

Mark took the sunglasses and turned them over in his hand. They looked expensive; the frame was made of a polished dark wood with gold trim. But other than that he couldn't notice anything out of the ordinary.

Abigail pointed to a black spot on the edge of the frame, right next to the left eye lens. "Camera." she said, grinning.

Mark's eyes went wide.

"I know, right?" Abigail said. "Just wear these during the appointment and they'll record everything."

"Where did Stone even get these?" Mark said, trying on the glasses for himself.

"They're easier to get than you think." Abigail said. "Point is, this is gonna get us a direct POV on the whole hormone process."

Mark took off the glasses and examined them again. "Man, this is some James Bond stuff."

"I know, right?" Abigail said. "So what do you say, wanna head over right now?"

"I would," Mark said, "but the appointment isn't for like, and hour and a half and it's thirty minutes away."

"Oh, ok then." Abigail said. She walked over to his couch and flopped onto it. "Guess we can just hang until then."

Mark sat next to her, and the two of them browsed Netflix for a while before landing on some disaster movie from a decade ago about the moon crashing into Earth. As they watched the mind-numbingly stiff performances and the ludicrous special effects, there was a thought in the back of Mark's brain that refused to go away.

"Hey Abigail, can I ask you something?" Mark said.

"Yeah, what's up?"

"Why are you at Muckraker?"

"What do you mean?" Abigail said. Mark couldn't place his finger on how he knew, but he could tell that the question had put her on edge.

"I dunno, it just feels like...you know, we're mostly out there trying to promote like, traditional womanhood, and you don't really seem like, the best model of that." Mark said. God, he felt so weird saying stuff like that to an actual human being. It was one thing to monologue about this sort of thing into a camera, but it was another thing entirely to tell a woman this sort of thing face-to-face.

Abigail for her part just chuckled. "What, because I speak my mind?"

"...kind of?"

Abigail rested her head in one of her hands at looked at the TV. "Well...I was just one in a million makeup and beauty girls on the internet, you know?" She said. "Hard to stand out in that crowd. So when I heard Micheal Stone was sniffing around for ladies to join his enterprise, I figured 'hey, might as well.'"

"So do you like, agree with him, or..."

"Hey, isn't about time for us to go?" Abigail said. Mark was about to accuse her of dodging the question, but then he glanced at his phone and realized they were gonna have to fly if they wanted to get to the appointment on time.

 

***

 

Several traffic violations later the two of them had pulled into the parking lot of the gender clinic. It was a small cubic building with floor to ceiling windows in the front wall, in which hung various pride flags, some of which Mark recognized and some of which he didn't. A sign above the door said that this was the 'Everhope Gender Clinic'. Through the window he could see a few people milling about in the lobby, which some sitting in chairs as they waited for appointments. Some guys and gals were dressed totally normally, but others were dressed in punk clothing with dyed hair, one lady was dressed in a hyper-feminine outfit that consisted of a pink tank top and hot pink short shorts, and there were quite a few folks that Mark couldn't peg as either gender on account of their style of dress.

He checked the clock on his phone. One minute left till the appointment.

"Ok, gimme the glasses, I'm going in." Mark said. Abigail handed him said glasses wordlessly. He put them on, stepped out of his car, and walked as confidently as he could into the lion's den.

What surprised him the most when he walked in was the volume. It wasn't loud like how an ER is loud, with the sounds of patients suffering or doctors yelling, it was loud like how a party was loud, with excited and happy conversations overlapping with each other to form a din of happiness. It was clear from how the patients in the waiting room were acting around each other that some had been coming for a long time, and that a sort of brother-in-arms friendship had formed between most of the regulars.

Mark couldn't spend too long focusing on details like that though, not when he had a job to do. He walked up to the front desk, which was attended to by a woman wearing a dress shirt, a pencil skirt and who had her black hair tied back in a messy bun. She wore a pin on her shirt with the trans pride flag and 'she/her' written on it. She looked up from her computer as he approached and smiled.

"Hi there hun, how can I help you?" She said.

"Uh, hi, my name is Mark, Mark Owens, I have the 3:30 appointment." He said, doing his best to ignore the fact he was wearing a camera pointed straight at her.

"Ok, one second please." She said, typing at her computer. As she did so, Mark subtly looked her over. He was surprised by just how...womanly she looked. If not for the pin he'd never be able to tell that she was trans.

"Oh, wait a minute..." She said.

"What, is something wrong?" Mark said.

"No, I just realized something." She said. She looked up from her computer and smiled at him. "We spoke over the phone last week!"

Mark blinked as he realized who he was speaking to. "Steph?" he asked.

"The one and only." She said, spreading out her arms as if to say 'here I am'. "Now, I just have a few documents I need you to fill out; insurance stuff, medical history, that sort of thing." She held out a clipboard with several documents. "Once you get these done you can see the doc."

Mark took the clipboard and grabbed a pen from a cup on the counter.

"Oh, and a word of advice:" Steph said. "You can lose the shades while you're in here. No one is gonna judge."

"Oh, thank you," Mark said, "but I'm still feeling a little...y'know..."

Steph nodded. "I get it. I was nervous my first time in here too." She waved her hand. "We all develop our confidence at different speeds. But if it makes you feel better, by the time I came in here for my first blood test after getting on hormones, I felt like I could take on the world."

"Thanks, Steph." Mark said.

Steph just smiled. "Anytime."

With that, Mark took a seat and began filling out his paperwork. He did his best to treat it like any other visit to the doctor: he verified his insurance and ID information, detailed his family history (which was really only marred by a tendency to develop melanoma later in life), then he handed the documents back to Steph and waited.

As he waited, he looked around the waiting room and noticed that there was a pharmacy attached to the lobby. It looked like any other pharmacy that'd you'd find in a supermarket or something; pharmacists in white lab coats walked through high shelves of pill bottles and paper bags, and he watched as a girl in a goth outfit walked up to the desk, handed a slip of paper over to a pharmacist, and received a plain white paper bag.

Oh my god, Mark thought, they really are handing out pills! This is huge!

Mark tried not to blow his cover as he processed what he was seeing, and eventually a nurse emerged from a nearby door and called his name. He was led into the back of the building through a series a maze-like windowless hallways lined with wooden doors. Occasionally they would pass a door that was partially open, and he'd sneak a peek at whatever was going on. He spotted some doctors demonstrating how patients could give themselves shots, one doctor showing some sort of diagram of body changes, and another drawing blood from an anxious looking man.

Mark was so busy sneaking glimpses at other patients that he nearly bumped into the nurse leading him when they stopped.

"Ok, just step in here and the doctor will be with you in just a bit." The nurse said. Mark nodded and stepped into the room.

It looked like a typical examination room. There was a large leather chair  against one wall, a counter and cabinets (presumably filled with medical supplies), and a small screen set into the wall opposite from the examination chair. The nurse closed the door, leaving Mark alone in the room. He paced nervously for a minute or two before settling into the chair, which was surprisingly comfy.

He was about to start rifling through the cabinets when the door opened, and a short man in a lab coat walked in. He had a short scruffy brown beard that seemed to flow seamlessly into his mop of short brown hair. He reached out a hand towards Mark.

"Hi there, I'm Dr. Daniels, he/him pronouns. I'll be your physician today."

"Uh, Mark, he/him, I guess." Mark said, taking Daniels' hand. He was still getting used to the idea of everyone including their pronouns when they introduce themselves.

Daniels pulled out a clipboard and flipped through some documents. "Says here you want to get on feminizing hormone therapy, is that correct?"

"Uh, yes sir."

"Alright, well we offered informed consent HRT here, which mean we're just gonna run through all the effects HRT is gonna have, you'll sign some papers, we'll do some quick bloodwork, and if everything looks green then you'll walk out of here with a prescription."

Mark nodded along, gripping the edge of the chair tightly. This was it.

Daniels took a small remote out of the pocket of his lab coat and pointed it at the screen. He turned it on, and a PowerPoint appeared onscreen.

"So, you said you wanted to go through accelerated HRT, so let's just run you through a timeline of expected changes." Daniels said.  "The first changes aren't going to be very visible. Over the course of the first week you'll notice your skin getting softer and your body odor change, and those changes shouldn't be too intense on the body. After that, though, you'll start seeing some breast growth at either the week 2 or week 3 mark. Normally breast growth stabilizes or stops at the five year mark, but for you the process is gonna take about nine months. My advice: invest in sports bras."

"At the same time you should also notice fat redistributing to your hips, giving you a more feminine silhouette, along with decreased muscle mass. Now, both the breast growth and hip growth are going to require a LOT of nutrients, especially since you're accelerated. You're probably going to be need to eat twice as much as you normally do in order to fuel the changes." This change was represented on the screen by a masculine silhouette slowly filling out until it had distinctly feminine curves.

Mark nodded. Staying in and eating a whole lot for six months didn't sound so bad.

"Now there are a lot of other changes where your mileage may vary." Daniels said. Onscreen appeared a bullet point list of various changes. "Mainly anything related to hair. Some people on HRT see hair loss completely stop or reverse, and some get thinner and slower body hair growth, but there's plenty of people who don't, so it's important to know going in that you might not get all the changes you've heard HRT can give you."

"Well, are there like, any other treatments I could use if I don't get some of those changes?" Mark asked. He was really starting to like not having body hair, and not having to shave so much sounded pretty sweet.

"Oh of course," Daniels said, "With your hair color and skin you could probably get some laser hair removal done really easily, or electrolysis if you want that stuff gone forever. There's also medication like finasteride if you find yourself experiencing hair loss. But there's one other part of the changes that we should probably discuss..."

Mark cocked his head.

"Well, first I should ask...how far do you currently plan to take your transition?" Daniels said.

Mark thought about it for a moment. The whole point was to be like, as convincing as possible, so he supposed he should try and act like as much of a woman as possible. "I guess I'm gonna go all the way." Mark said. "Like, sex change and everything."

"OK then, then we'll need to discuss your sexual health really quick." Daniels said. "So, basically, the hormones are gonna make getting it up VERY difficult. It won't be impossible, but you can probably look forward to no more random erections. Furthermore, you'll probably notice your libido drop significantly. However, if you plan on getting SRS, it'll be best to not let it atrophy, because the surgeon is going to need as much material as possible to work with. So you're gonna need to use it if you want to lose it."

"Wait, so like...how does the surgery work?"

Daniels looked surprised that he didn't know. "Oh, well, you see, the most common method involves....inverting it."

Mark must have looked absolutely shocked, because Daniels said "I know that sounds scary, but the surgery has come a long way the last two decades. Most people aren't even able to tell the difference, and the recovery period is much less intense than it used to be."

Mark cleared his throat. "Uh, so should I like...download Tinder, or--"

"No no no, you don't need to be sexually active if you don't want to." Daniels said. "Just try to get it up once a day or so for a few minutes and you should be fine. One last thing," Daniels said, changing slides on the screen once more, "HRT may slightly elevate your risk for blood clot, breast cancer, high blood pressure and heart disease, but HRT basically just make the likelihood of getting any of those conditions the same as a cis woman, and the blood test will help us determine any contraindications you may have,  so as long as you maintain a healthy lifestyle you should be fine. Any questions?"

Mark felt like he should have been more concerned about those side effects, but the more he thought about it the more they didn't really seem to matter in the face of the transformation he was about to undergo. He knew plenty of cis woman who must spend their time walking around living their lives day to day not even knowing the likelihood of getting those conditions, so why should he be any more scared than they are?

"No, I think I'm ready." Mark said.

"Great!" Daniels said. "Now, I just need you to sign this paperwork saying you understand everything I've told you regarding the effects of HRT, and then we'll run a quick blood panel."

Daniels held out his clipboard and Mark took it. Everything seemed above board; the documents laid out a timeline of changes just like the one Daniels had just described, along with info about the need for extra nutrients, and some disclaimers about HRT not being able to change things like bone structure and vocal cords.

"Wait, my voice won't get higher on estrogen?" Mark asked.

"Unfortunately, no." Daniels said. "The vocal cords get permanently thickened during a testosterone driven puberty, so if you want a higher voice you will need to train your voice. If you want you can email a request to the clinic and we can provide you with information about vocal coaches and online resources."

Mark nodded, noting that he should probably send that email once he got back home. The idea of having a totally female body and his current voice at the same time just felt...wrong. Also he should probably do it for the documentary.

Mark signed the paperwork and handed it back to Daniels, who signed his name next to Mark's.

"Alright, let me go get the phlebotomist." Daniels said. He walked out, leaving Mark alone in the room again. He pulled out his phone and decided to check the Muckraker YouTube channel. He hadn't felt the need to check it during his week of preparation, but now that he was really doing this he wanted to keep an eye on the competition.

He saw that Nathan had uploaded a new episode of his show. The title said "WOKE GENDER RADICALS ARE CUTTING UP KIDS".

Oh that prick! Mark thought. He's trying to dogpile on trans people before I can! He pulled out his earbuds and started watching.

There Nathan was in all his smug glory. Look at him, with his cheeky grin revealing just a bit of his whitened teeth, leaning just so slightly over his desk like he was about to tell you some sort of joke, with a freshly pressed suit and a neon sign on a brick wall behind him that read A Conversation with Nathan in swooping red letters.

"Folks," he began, "we got a lot to get to this week, but first we need to tackle an absolutely tragic story a mother sent in to our email." He reached under his desk and pulled out an email that had been printed out. "She said that she signed a permission slip for her daughter to go on a field trip over the weekend with her school, right? Everything looked legit. He daughter comes back from this field trip and tells her "Mom, I'm a boy now, and I got top surgery." Turns out she'd 'come out' to her guidance counselor, who printed out a FAKE field trip form so that she could go to a hospital and get the surgery done. Folks, this is where everything's headed, and it just break my heart to see it. Ten year old girls getting top surgery, my god. The mother has started a Gofundme to get restorative surgery for her daughter, and I have linked that in the description below."

The story got Mark's blood pumping. This was exactly the type of thing that he was hoping to stop with this documentary, but here Nathan was trying to get ahead of him with it! If he wanted the glory then he should have taken Stone's offer!

But.....something was bothering Mark. A thought kept nagging at the back of his brain.

Why no photos?

Mark knew that any self-respecting conservative mother would post something like this to her socials immediately, and from there outlets like Muckraker would have taken the story and showed it to the world. But if she'd done that, she'd have posted photos, and if there were photos out there than Nathan was missing out on a golden opportunity for maximum shock value.

Mark scrolled down to the description and clicked on the Gofundme. He'd probably give this poor mother a few dollars, make things a little easier for her.

Yet the Gofundme page was strangely bare. No photos, no identifying information of any kind. It was just a blank page with a five thousand dollar goal with a short paragraph describing the same story Nathan had just told.

Now why, Mark thought, would this distraught mom not have photos of what these radicals did to her kid, and not call out the specific counselor or hospital that did it? That's what we've always done in the past.

The whole thing felt off to Mark. Something was wrong here, but he couldn't place his finger on what.

His musings were interrupted by the phlebotomist entering the room. She was a tall woman with short bright blue hair, wearing scrubs and tennis shoes.

"Hi there Mark." She said. She smiled, revealing a pair of vampire fangs. "I'm Amy, and I'll be sucking your blood today."

It took him a second, but Mark eventually got the joke and chuckled.

"Well I'm glad someone around here appreciates my sense of humor." Amy said, taking the teeth out of her mouth. She walked back out of the room and wheeled in a hand cart that had a small black box with a screen on top. The machine reminded Mark of a coffee maker, but without the space for the pot.

"Ok, this is gonna be nice and simple." Amy said. She pressed a button on the screen, and a panel on the side of the box slid open, revealing a needle connected to the machine by a tube. "We're gonna just take some blood until HAL here is full," she said while patting the machine like a pet, "then we'll let him analyze it, and Daniels will write up a prescription based on your current hormone levels. You ready?"

Mark nodded and held out his arm. Amy pulled out some surgical tubing from her pocket and tied it around his arm, found a vein, and then stuck the needle into it. Mark watched as the blood slowly flowed through the tube and into the mysterious black box.

"So how does that thing work, exactly?" Mark asked.

"Well, you know that Theranos thing that Silicon Valley lady tried to invent like, fifteen years ago?"

"Yeah, I saw a documentary about that once."

"Well, HAL here is that, but real. He can do more in thirty minutes than the old machines could do in five days."

Mark nodded, turning his attention back to the blood. "Tech sure has come far, huh?"

"You bet." Amy said. "Gosh, I wish I could have had this type of thing when I transitioned."

"You mean you're..."

"Yup!" Amy said.

"Is everyone except Daniels who works here trans?"

Amy blinked at him and then grinned. "Ok, brace yourself..."

Mark was able to pick up on the subtext pretty quick. "Him too?"

Amy nodded. "Wow." Mark said. "I haven't been able to tell any of y'all apart from...well..."

"I know you mean that as a compliment," Amy said, "but just know that some trans people don't like the whole 'I never would have guessed' type of compliment."

"Oh, sorry." Mark said. "I'm still new to all this."

"Hey don't sweat it." Amy said. "Trans folks don't start out knowing how to do this whole gender thing perfectly."

"Ok, so lemme rephrase my question: Is everyone here including Daniels trans?"

Amy laughed at that. "Well, no, but it helps." She said. "Most of us had to transition the old fashioned way, and those of us going into medicine decided to try to make things better for people like us. This place was actually started by a bunch of trans doctors who wanted to just make thing more convenient. And then trans people all over the world started doing research into how to make the whole process better, more efficient, more personalized, and now you get to enjoy stuff like accelerated HRT and HAL here."

Mark shook his head. Barring his own personal opinion on people like Steph and Amy and Daniels, he couldn't deny that the process had done good work. And none of them felt like the kind of radicals he had railed against on his show. Granted, he'd never actually met trans people before, but he'd expected them to be more dogmatic,  more pushy,  demanding special treatment and that they were always right no matter what. But talking to them just felt so...normal. Comfortable, even. He just couldn't connect these nice people who had done so much to make him feel at ease, who were so professional, who had been so thorough in making sure that this was something he wanted with the type of people who would do top surgery on a young girl.

Well, perhaps this clinic isn't that bad, Mark reasoned, but that doesn't let other clinics and hospitals off the hook. Nathan should really get that mother onto his show or something.

The machine that Amy called HAL (presumably as a reference to something Mark was unfamiliar with) beeped as it drained the last bit of blood that it needed. "Alright,  results will be ready in thirty." Amy said. "Daniels will be back in soon." With that, she took the needle out of Mark's arm, slapped a band-aid on it and wheeled the machine out of the room. Mark pulled out his phone and opened his text messages.

Mark: So far, so good

Abigail: They give you the 'mones yet?

Mark: No, they're testing my blood

Mark: It's all very professional

Mark: Pretty surprising tbh

Mark: Nathan just posted an episode about a ten year old who got top surgery

Mark: Thought this place would be like that.

Abigail: hold on

Abigail: back up

Abigail: top surgery is when they cut the boobs off right?

Mark: Yes

Abigail: Ok

Abigail: hear me out

Abigail: realistically speaking

Abigail: how much top would a ten year old have to do surgery on?

Mark: Well

Mark: I mean

Mark: Early puberty is a thing

Abigail: yeah but they give you meds for that tho???

Mark: I though puberty blockers were just for 'trans' kids though?

Abigail: Nah

Abigail: I had a friend who got her period at like, 7, so they gave her blockers

Abigail: Something doesn't sound right about this

Abigail: You sure this is legit

Mark: What are you saying

Mark: That Nathan faked it?

Abigail: No, I'm asking if you think Nathan faked it

Abigail: You're the journalist here

Mark:...

Mark: I'm not too sure now

Mark: Nathan's a douche, but he's never faked a story before

Abigail: You mean he's never been *caught* faking a story before

Mark: Hmmmmm

Mark: Ok, I'll admit

Mark: This thing is starting to seem suspect

Mark: But you can't just come out and accuse of coworker of faking a story

Abigail: fair

Abigail: want me to do some digging around HQ?

Mark: I won't confirm or deny my desire for you to go poking around in Nathan's business

Mark: But here's some advice that's always useful

Mark: Be careful

Abigail: ;)

Mark: Oh doc's back gotta go

Mark tucked his phone back into his pocket as the door opened and Daniels walked back in with yet more documents.

"Ok, good news," Daniels said. "Blood panel came back looking good. No contraindications, and it looks like your hormones are in the normal range, which makes my job a whole lot easier." Daniels said. He pulled out a notepad and began writing out a prescription. "I'm putting on you on 25mg of Hyper-Spiro, which will be the only pill you'll take for the first three days, and 0.25mg of Hyper-Estrogen, which you'll take with the spiro each day after that. You'll take one of each pill in the morning; you can swallow the spiro like any other pill, but you'll want to let the estrogen dissolve under your tongue to get the maximum effect." Daniels ripped out the page he'd been writing on and held it out to Mark. "There's a pharmacy attached to the lobby that can give you your medication on your way out. You'll need to come back for a blood test in a month to make sure your hormones are desirable ranges. Any questions?"

Mark took the prescription. "Can I take the spiro stuff as soon as I get it, and then take it next morning like normal?"

Daniels considered the question for a moment, stroking his beard. "I don't see why not. Just be sure to start taking the estrogen after the third dose of spiro and you should be on track."

Mark stood up from the chair. "Then I guess it's time for me to go."

Daniels smiled and held out his hand. "Good luck with your transition."

Mark took his hand and shook it. "Thanks, Doc." He turned around and walked out of the examination room, following the signs till he made it to the lobby. He nervously walked up to the desk of the pharmacy, where a burly man was standing, wearing a lab coat that barely seemed to fit his huge masculine frame. "Hi there," the man said, "Got a prescription?"

Mark held out the slip Daniels had given him. The man gave it a quick once-over.

"Wow, you're going for accelerated?" the man said.

"Uh, yeah, why?"

"Well, A, it's pretty pricey, so you don't usually see people around her go for it, and B, it's pretty intense. Doc told you about the nutrient stuff?"

Mark nodded. "Good," the man said, "Just keep that in mind and you should be fine."

The man turned around, looking through the shelves until he found two pill bottles and brought them to Mark.

"Ok, one bottle of Hyper-Spiro, and one bottle of Hyper-E." The man said. "Each of these should last you three months." The man packed the bottles into a paper bag and held it out to Mark, who took it in one hand. "Good luck!" the man said.

Mark just nodded and headed for the door. He couldn't help but be impressed by the clinic as a whole; it hadn't really felt that different from any other doctor's visit, and everyone had done so much to make sure he understood what he was getting himself into and that he was comfortable with every step of the process. It was a better experience than many hospital visits that Mark had. Even the pharmacy, which Mark had first seen as just giving pills away, made sure he had a prescription and had even given him some advice on his transition.

Mark shook his head. Snap out of it, Mark! He thought. This is probably how they get poor confused people into hormones, Mark thought, they show you all this TLC and professionalism and scientific know-how and then before you know it, boom, you're growing tits. I mean, I was planning on doing that in the first place, but still!

When he walked out, he saw Abigail leaning against the car, scrolling through her phone. She looked up as Mark walked out and put her phone away.

"You got em?" she asked. Mark held up the bag in response.

They both climbed into the car, Mark in the driver's seat and Abigail in the passenger's seat. She pulled out her phone and held it up to him as he strapped in his seat-belt.

"What're you doing?" Mark asked.

"Documenting." Abigail said. "Aren't you going to take them?"

The question made Mark freeze up a little. "Well," he said, rubbing the back of his neck, "the doc said that I could, but-"

"Then let's get this party started!" Abigail said.

Mark sighed and opened up the bag. He pulled out the bottle labeled Hyper-Spiro, opened it, and took out a pill. It was a small circular beige tablet. He held up between his finger and his thumb and examined it. Could something so small really change so much?

I hope so. he thought as he put it in his mouth and swallowed.