Verde: What are your thoughts on locker rooms?

…I get the context for the question— as I am about to begin regaling you with my time in P.E. while in Shiaka’s body— but that’s still a weird question.

Verde: How so?

Well, I figure that the answer would be pretty uniform for most people. They are public changing rooms. Unless you are a massive perv who is also attracted to the same sex, or a perv who snuck into the opposite sex’s locker room, then there is no reason to stay in there longer than you need to. They also reek of body odor and farts… which I guess would classify as a bodily odor in and of themselves.

Verde: Or in other words, an asexual youth such as yourself has little reason to gain in the thrills of seeing glimpses of your female peers in their underwear. Or if there is a slip-up whilst changing for swimming, then perhaps you could see a bit more… 

Look, Shiaka gave me no notes on changing, and really, there is not much to tell. I simply went to the designated locker, entered the combination, took off my top and skirt, and put on a violet tracksuit with my “Oransen High” written on the back. Although, during the changing process, I brushed a hand against my breasts. It was… intentional, as I was curious about what it would feel like. I was never going to do anything beyond that, and I barely even felt my hand past my bra.

Anyhow, Shiaka’s teacher for Strength and Conditioning was pretty lax and gave us permission to do anything so long as we were moving around. Whether that be going to the cardio room or the weight room. We just had to do stuff for half an hour, then go change for the next period. 

For whatever reason, I decided that I should try to see how much upper body strength Shiaka’s original body had. Surprise, surprise, it had next to none. After two sets of arm curls, I abandoned the weight room and headed to do some cardio. I hopped on an elliptical in a room with three other people, none of whom I recognized or knew the names of, and worked out for about 25 minutes.

While on the elliptical, my mind decided to wander. To ruminate over the fact that I was presenting myself as someone else. I tried really placing myself in Shiaka’s shoes, guessing what she would be thinking about at this very moment, and, well, I assumed that she would have thought of fear. The room was unsupervised for whatever reason, and the group of three people was conversing amongst themselves, occasionally glancing over at me or letting out a very audible string of laughter. I’d assume that Shiaka would be intimidated by this and would probably leave the classroom. Just to be safe.

‘Why would she feel that way?’ I can practically hear you asking, Verde. Well, I’ll give you the full version. …As in, all the important details. Not the three-hour-long rundown that Zoe, Maxxie, and I got during the summer of 2012 when Maxxie happened to see Shiaka’s torso scars. Yeah, so, where to begin… 

Shiaka has an older sister, Haruki Kurokawa. I like her, she’s a really fun and creative person, but she unintentionally made Shiaka’s childhood a certain flavor of hell. Haruki was pretty much a child prodigy, a brilliant little girl who wanted to go out to see the world, gain skills, and learn everything there was to learn. This was all before she started attending school, where she was quickly taken out of her public school and brought into a fancy private school. Around the time when Haruki was accepted, when she was six, Shiaka was born and was generally ignored by her parents in favor of their firstborn.

The Kurokawas were not spiteful of Shiaka. It’s just that with Haruki eating up their weekends, and as both parents were working hard to support Haruki, it was easy for them to forget about Shiaka. She was an incredibly quiet baby, and as a toddler, she was perfectly content with staying in a room all day. She never caused any trouble, rarely asked for things, and was so passive that her parents would actually forget to feed her at times. When it came time for her to go to school, her parents had her attend a local public school and based on what she said, that place was a total shithole.

…For clarity’s purpose, Shiaka did not live in Oransen or Illinois at the time. She lived in southern California.

At elementary school, Shiaka was typically ignored by her peers and teachers. She did the work promptly, retained information well, but was quiet, kept to herself, and, well… her school was also racist as shit. It was 90% White, and she was a biracial Asian and Hispanic girl with blonde hair and blue eyes. The White faculty and students viewed her as an ‘other’ and those who weren’t White othered her because of her ‘White’ features. You know, despite the fact that she wasn’t White. Like, at all. 

For first and second grade, things were… horrible for her there. She was learning and did everything that was asked of her, but she was never treated with the respect that her White peers received. It was a stable kind of horrible… and it got infinitely worse shortly after the start of third grade. When Shiaka was placed in a class with two new kids named Izak and Olive. 

On Friday, October 14th, 2005, when Shiaka was 8-years-old, these two… monsters targeted her and changed her life forever. School was let out for the day, everybody was rushing out of the building to enjoy the weekend. During this chaos, Izak and Olive dragged Shiaka into a supply room and bashed her head with a brick, knocking her unconscious. Once the lights were out, the two children dragged Shiaka to one of the school’s disgusting restrooms. There, she was propped onto a toilet, stripped of her clothes, and… tortured.

They mangled her torso using a kitchen knife they heated with a lighter. They took a pair of pliers to her hair, tearing at her scalp until she was half-bald and blood was dripping onto her face. They bashed her body with a wrench, causing unsightly welts to form all across her body. 

As the torture continued, Shiaka eventually passed out, unable to withstand the pain. After damaging her so severely, Izak and Olive assumed she was dead and left her as she was. Her battered naked body on the toilet seat and her tattered clothes scattered on the floor. 

Hours later, Shiaka woke up to the darkness of the school washroom and escaped to the halls outside. Her body was bloodied, her legs were bruised, and she could barely stand. Still, she moved forward, crawling and pushing herself through the halls until she got to the entrance, until freedom was a few feet away. She looked longingly at the glass doors, at the sun setting on the horizon, but she lacked the strength to carry on and, with a final gasp, she passed out yet again.

She would have died there if not for a night jogger who happened to take a glance at the school, and saw Shiaka’s body. The jogger immediately called the police, an ambulance, and the school board. Shiaka was minutes away from death, and the fact that she was able to live through something like that is… miraculous. 

As part of a legal settlement, the school board compensated Shiaka’s family with millions of dollars. Izak and Olive were expelled, forced out of the state, and were eventually murdered by the police after they set fire to an elementary school in an attempt to ‘cleanse the world.’ Shiaka was in intensive therapy for years. The therapy helped but, much like the scars on her body, the ones on her psyche will never fully heal. 

From the ages of 8 to 14, she was homeschooled by her father, and grew closer to her family than ever before. Things were going well for her. So well that her therapist decided that it would be best if Shiaka started attending high school. Shiaka and her family moved to Oransen back in 2006, when she was 9, so she attended Oransen High. A place where she was able to make friends, true friends, for the first time in her life.

I thought about this story extensively, recounting the details and just trying to comprehend the trauma that Shiaka must feel so often. Hell, during my fourth period, Psychology, I couldn’t help but use what little I knew about the subject from a few months of class to try to examine Shiaka’s mental state. I mean, using Erik Erikson’s stages of Psychological development, I’d say that she more or less failed to get every virtue she should have gotten within the first decade of her life. Fuck, the fact that she even is somewhat functional in society, and never seriously thought about suicide or anything of the sort, it’s nothing short of amazing to me. She is such a strong and brave young woman…

She is timid, but the fact that she is even willing to do this sort of thing with us, that she volunteered to swap bodies with Zoe today and Terra tomorrow… it really speaks to her resolve. To her desire to improve herself and grow stronger despite her deep wounds. I admire her resolve and, if I was in a similar situation, I doubt I would be able to ever recover as well as she has.

Verde: … 

… 

Verde: … 

I’ll just move along and say that Psychology was uneventful. I just scribbled down some notes and looked at the teacher while pondering Shiaka’s past. 

Fifth period was my lunch period, and I quickly made my way through the hallways of people who towered over me and to room number 1337. Yes, really. It’s just the numbering scheme our school has, I guess.

It was a far better environment to eat lunch than the cafeteria, where you have over a hundred kids talking over each other in a big echoey room. Normally, rooms like this would be off-limits to students outside of class time. However, Maxxie was buddy-bud with the teacher who normally used this room, and they had no problem letting us four honor roll kids use it for our lunch periods. Well, so long as we cleaned up afterwards. Which we always did.

I slyly opened the door to room 1337 and was met with Maxxie(J), Zoe(M), and Shiaka(Z), already immersed in a typical lunchtime conversation. It was a mostly familiar sight, but there was still something surreal about seeing my friends all shuffled around like this. Seeing my original body talk with such enthusiasm. Seeing Zoe’s original body look so passive. And seeing Maxxie’s original body act in such a regimented manner.

“—Nah, I don’t feel winded or anything,” Maxxie(J) said, in the middle of a conversation. “I’m just a bit upset at how… meh I feel. I mean, I guess I shouldn’t expect Jady-poo’s bod to be a ten on ten, but… I just really like the idea of working my ass off and then rubbing one out.”

“Were you seriously going to masturbate in the little boy’s room?” I asked Maxxie(J) with a sigh.

“I would have asked for your permission first,” Maxxie(J) clarified. “And I’d be secretive about it, using one of the little veggie baggies you bring with you for lunch as a semen receptacle. I mean, that’s what I used for the first couple faps.”

“Wait, are boys supposed to masturbate in plastic bags? I thought they used lotion to hide away the… stuff and then clean it with tissues.” Shiaka(Z) asked, visually regretting her choice of words.

“If we are starting this conversation with such a lowly subject matter, let’s start with a baseline question. How often do you masturbate, Maxxie?” Zoe(M) asked, abandoning his impersonation as nobody ever bothered us in this room.

“Um… hehehe, didn’t we go over this before?” Maxxie(J) asked with a giggle. “I mean, I don’t have a schedule, but I do it a couple of times a week, maybe a couple times every day if I’m in a mood. It depends on what I feel like then and there and if I wanna fap then what do I fap to? It could be dudes, ladies, futanari, anthros, banging, fapping, transformation, or sometimes no nudes at all. I am an equal opportunity smut consumer and peddler. ‘Cept for bindings, pee, poop, farts, squid tits, spiders, red candle wax, binder clips, and rape, in general. They’re all kinda wack, so I uncheck those boxes. And in case you’re worried by this answer, I’ve gone on a couple of dry seasons. It’s refreshing to get away from it all, and it always feels real nice to return to the fap factory. So, do any of you fellas have half as much to say about your masturbation times?” Maxxie(J) answered, tossing the question back at us.

“Over the course of four years, I’ve done it about five times.” I answered, stretching three and a half years to four.

“Once. I made a mess when I was twelve and… that was about it.” Shiaka(Z) responded, painting a less than vivid picture.

“I have had—” Zoe(M) began.

“No, no, no, add in some of your trademark Maxxisaurus Omega flair. C’mon, you do me super well! Let yourself loose, you silly goose!” Maxxie(J) instructed Zoe(M)

“My history of fap-it-tude is un-four-chan-eight-lee super tiny. I only ever got meself a single ejaculate and that was just my dumb brain being a dumb idiot and deciding to have my schlong go squirt while taking a sleep. These hands have never been consumed by the thing that there brobble said was sin for some stupid raisin.” Zoe(M) answered, going along with the bit.

“Nice!” Maxxie(J) shouted. “You fall down that well quite well, just be sure to keep a rope with you or else you will be stuck there until a pillar man falls in and dies. Or maybe a flood will bring you to a water-some grave of cold algies…”

“…Oh goodness, there are two of them now,” I said, jokingly. “Before we all become infected by your Maxxie-isms, let’s switch topics and talk about our days.”

“Okie doke!” Maxxie(J) said as she slammed her hands against the table. “Lemme start with the good parts. Gotta say, I’m digging the boosted height and trim waistline. It makes me feel like I’m skidding the rim of a whole new kind of sexy! It’s pretty cool that I can jog a couple of laps with relative ease. And dicks… dicks are just really cool, and they absolutely lived up to my expectations. They’re not better, not worse, they are exactly as good as I thought they would be! Alas, for as much as I wanna go wild with this body, I gotta keep up appearances. No shade on you Jad, but your day to day is sorta dull. I gotta stay quiet, keep a serious face, and act like I am doing something important when really, I’m just thinking of how cool dicks are and how much I miss my mystical drink!”

“Wowzers, that there was awfully punctual all things considered,” Zoe(M) began, preparing to go on a tirade about his new body. “As for me, I’m also experiencing a new kind of sexy, I think it’s good, nice, cool, tight, great, radical, awesome, extreme, and all those other words Sonic Adventure 2 gave you when you styled on some fools. I feel like I can really do whatever I feel like, and don’t need to keep up much of an appearance, you know, let my hair down and stuff.”

“I think the worst, or at least weirdest, thing about all of this is the height changes,” Zoe(M) continued. “When I was Shiaka yesterday, I could feel my mind adjusting to my new proportions. I felt phantom pains all over the darn place as I tried to get used to being such a shorty. And there was this… wack-ass dissonance going through my head as I looked around, as everything looked just uncannily bigger. When in reality, I’m just smaller. I’d say I was not a fan, but it’s actually pretty cool seeing the world at different scales. It makes the mundane sixty percent cooler!”

“Oh my gush!” Zoe(M) shouted, “then there’s this delicious energetic feeling coursing through my veins! I know you like to claim it’s because of that Charm Tea of yours, Maxxie, but this stems far deeper. I lack much evidence to prove it, but I believe that your body produces more ‘energy’ than a normal person. With this amount of adrenaline coursing through my person, I feel as if I could take on the world, crush all who oppose me and build the empire that I have been dreaming of for a decade… Just kidding, hehe.”

Zoe ended his spiel by bonking himself on his head with a light tap, winking, and poking out his tongue. 

“Um, if we are following a pattern, I guess I should go next,” Shiaka(Z) muttered. “I am not particularly comfortable in your body, Zoe. I feel so big, so strong, so tall that it feels strange doing just about anything. I try to open a door and feel like I’m about to yank it off. I walk through the halls and look over everybody, even the teachers and most male athletes. This all feels like a big, weird dream that I am not waking up from, and I… kinda want to.”

“Ah, Shit Shi-Shi, I never thought you would be that uncomfortable in Zoe.” Maxxie(J) muttered.

“No, no. I agreed to this, and I guess it is nice to know these things.” Shiaka(Z) meekly replied, looking toward the floor.

“We could switch back, you know. We already experienced a sizeable chunk of one another’s daily life, and have gathered enough information for a more structured discussion on a later date.” Zoe(M) explained.

“I… I can do this. I— I simply needed to vent to someone about my frustrations and uncertainties. Now that my grievances have been aired, you do not need to worry about me. …You don’t need to worry about me so much.” Shiaka(Z) said, easing back into a Zoe impersonation.

“I, um… moving on,” I began, desperate for a transition, “building off of what Zoe said, the one thing that got to me was just how short I was. I know I’ve been this short in the past, but it’s been so long, and the last time I was Shiaka’s height was back in middle school. Back when there weren’t these 6 foot tall giants roaming the halls, towering over me as I tried making my way to class. It’s all so bizarre… wouldn’t you agree, Zoe?”

“Oh, absolutely. The length of my limbs, the size of the world, it all vaguely reminded me of my childhood. However, when compared to my usual perspective of the world, the contrast was rather extreme.” Zoe(M) added.

“There is a certain joy to being so small and light, but I also feel very dainty and… weak,” I added. “I just got back from Strength and Conditioning and… just using the elliptical took quite a lot out of me. I kind of wish you worked out a little more.”

“Sorry,” Shiaka(Z) began. “It… has never been a goal of mine to get strong, and I guess I never really have been a fan of the feeling of fatigue. It… it reminds me of my scars.

“Oh… I’m sorry Shiaka, I didn’t mean to blame you or anything, I was just—”

“It’s okay, Jad. I understand your frustration. I… think I might feel the same way after I spend enough time in other people’s bodies. This is all so much for me to take in but… maybe this can help me get over some of my trauma. Just maybe…”

AS an awkward silence gathered in this room, Maxxie(J) clapped her hands and posed a critical question.

“Did y’all piss yet?”

We all answered with some variation of no, causing Maxxie(J) to shake her head while going tsk-tsk.

“Well then, I say we should remedy that, and, you know, maybe we can even try—”

“Hahaha, no! We are not masturbating in a school restroom, Maxxie. Stop asking!” Zoe(M) replied with a stern tone.

After one plan got the boot, Maxxie began leading the four of us to the nearby restrooms. I already talked about what it felt like peeing as Maxxie, it was pretty much no different in this body. I just sat, calmed myself, and winced a little as I heard the spraying sound escape my crotch. It sounded… strange. I guess I always assumed that girls were silent when they peed. Or, at the very least, it wasn’t louder than when I sat down to pee.

Regardless, the only difference between peeing as Maxxie and peeing as Shiaka is that Maxxie’s rear snugly fit over the toilet seat. With Shiaka’s tiny heiny, I was lowkey worried that I would fall through the seat. Fortunately, that did not happen, allowing Zoe(M) and I to do our business in relative peace.

“So, how was it?” I asked him while we washed our hands.

“I already peed as Shiaka yesterday, and… it really is just urinating with a shorter urethra. Nothing that special,” Zoe(M) said with a shrug.

We then left the restrooms and waited for Maxxie(J) and Shiaka(Z) to finish up. A minute later, I saw Shiaka(Z) shuffle out of the restroom, a look of horror on her face, and a… sizable hard-on pressing against her pants.

“Yeah, she didn’t even pee like a man, she went sitting down.” Maxxie(J) said as she left the restroom. “C’mon, girl. Don’t waste opportunities like this.”

“I didn’t want to make a mess, so I sat down, but… it didn’t go. I began poking it and… it got bigger. It hasn’t gone down yet…” Shiaka(Z) whispered.

We then made our way back to Classroom 1337, where Maxxie regaled us with an idea she thought up: The Crotch Scooper. An ice cream scooper that could be used to replace genitalia. That led to a monster of a lunchtime conversation involving futanari fetishists, the appeal of male pregnancy fetishes, the logistics of pushing a child out of one’s penis, and the ‘null sexers’.

…You have this really smug look on your face, Verde. 

Verde: Oh, I know. I’m just pleased with my decision.

Your decision to do what?

Verde: Explanations will come at a later time, but for now, I am very pleased that I chose to conduct this experiment with you and your friends. So thank you.

Um… no problem?

Verde: Oh, so is that the new way of saying you’re welcome?

I… I really do hate that phrase, as I do not get why it exists other than expressing that you acknowledged that somebody thanked you. I normally just say no problem instead, but that has this snarky undercurrent to it as well. I guess it is better than the alternative but— ugh! English is such a stupid language… Actually, where you the-

Verde: Oh, I did not create English, it was in existence before I gained my abilities, and I simply had a fondness for the language, as it is my native tongue.

…I take it the question that popped into my head will also be answered at the end of this whole thing, right?

Verde: Most certainly Mx Novus.

…What?

Verde: It is a gender neutral version of miss and mister.

Oh… and why did you use it to address me?

Verde: I felt like it, simple as that.

…You’re lucky you’re cute, you know that?