I was spacing out again, staring at the college website portal for students. My account was open, and I gazed at the option to change my major. It was too easy, surely. How was it as simple as a bunch of clicks to change papers around and apply for a new major? The internet age was truly a strange place. Surely I couldn’t just do this? No, I couldn’t.

I closed the tab with a cry of pain from my heart. It wouldn’t be that easy. My parents would find out, and then I’d be screwed. They would kick me out, leaving me with nothing but my abilities and whatever I could grab on the way out. I was just about to boot my computer up for the night when I got a text from Brook.

Brook: So, are you going to your first day as Elsie or Coby?

Elsie: Uh, Coby?

Brook: Lame. Let me know when your lunch is?

Elsie: Sure.

I sighed and got out of my computer chair. It’s not like I had clothes that would fit me as Elsie anyway. I was just picking up my bag when I checked the time and saw how late I was. Shit! I’d spent so long messing around on the college website that I was going to be like, ten minutes late! I rushed to the door, then slowed. What if… surely that would be fine?

I turned and looked under my bed, where my skateboard hung out like a neglected cat. I could practically see it pouting. Screw it, if I fell over or anything I’d just end up turning into a girl and avoiding all harm! Scrambling over there on all fours, I fished the board out from its hole and spun each of the wheels to see if they were functional. Solid no on that one. One was sticking really bad and the other three were sluggish. A spray of WD-40 later and that would have to do.

I burst out of the door to my house and put board to pavement as I raced for the bus stop. I really couldn’t miss even a few minutes of this first day of school. Wobbling all the way there, I made it with barely any time to spare and clambered onto the bus in a wheezing mess.

The first bus would take me into White Plains, where I would have to walk to another stop and hop on the bus that would take me to my college. When we arrived in town, things seemed to have calmed down in the two weeks it had been since the third Emergence and I breathed a sigh of relief. That had been a point of anxiety for me coming up to the start of college. Would I be safe commuting through town?

More than safe as it turned out, when I started skating towards the next stop... or rather, safe from everyone else, but not myself. I don’t know what I hit, but I went forward while my board stayed stationary, and suddenly I was about to go on a hot date with the hard pavement. I hadn’t thought about it, but my powers had other ideas regarding this date. Acting like the true friend that it was, it saw the fundamental incompatibility between our personalities and intervened.

I did a clean combat roll, and came out the other side with a flick of my now very long black hair. A pair of students about my age that I had been skating past stopped and stared at me in shock.

“Dude, you just turned into… into not a dude,” one guy said.

“A hot not-dude,” the other one agreed.

I blushed, dropping my arms and retrieving my skateboard that was slowly making its escape. Shit, what was I going to do now? I should swap back. I couldn’t go to uni in these clothes as a girl, I’d be laughed at for my awful taste in clothing as well as my lack of bra. I started to think about changing back, when my eyes drifted to a store on the other side of the street. In the window was a mannequin wearing black jeans, a long flowing tank top and a sports bra.

I wanted it. I wanted that whole outfit. I was drawn to it like a frat boy to a keg. I rushed across the road like the Kiwi I was at heart. Jaywalking laws? What jaywalking laws? Entering the store, I stared aimlessly around, suddenly very self conscious about my previous plans. This was dumb right? I should leave-

“Hello there! Can I help you?” a girl asked with a nametag on that said her name was Harriet.

I gulped, looking down at my shoes and trying hard to think of a way to run away without embarrassing myself further.

“Saw her looking at that mannequin you got on display there,” a second voice said as a girl stepped from behind a rack.

She was… absolutely gorgeous. Like, a single look at her face made my breathing stop. She was taller than me, but only a little. Her hair was a shoulder length mess of ringlets that ended in dyed purple tips. Her face was painted with cracks and lines that made it look like her face was made of broken ceramic. She wore black jeans and a tank top that did nothing to hide her absolutely perfect body. I’d thought I was pretty hot in my new form, but she blew me out of the water.

“Oh? She was?” asked the attendant who also seemed to be struggling in the presence of this utter goddess.

I tried to open my mouth, tried to just excuse myself and make a break for it, but it was impossible. I was rooted to the spot.

“Yeah. The one with the grey tank top, the rainbow vans and the super tight skinny jeans,” the almost angelic girl said casually, her curly dark hair bouncing as she looked down at my chest, “Probably the sports bra too.”

“O-oh, yes! I’ll fetch some sizes that might work,” stammered the attendant, then rushed off to do just that.

The goddess stepped up next to me and flicked her phone into her hand seemingly from midair, “You know, funny thing about the Emergence. As someone who Emerged during the first one, something I’ve noticed is that it gives us what we need the most.”

“W-what d-do yo-u mean?” I stammered out with the worlds steamiest blush.

She placed a hand on my shoulder with a kind smile, “Be yourself girl, be yourself.”

“Hey, here’s the jeans! I’ll bring the rest to you while you’re trying them on?” the attendant said, arriving back.

“Hey um, Harriet is it? Put her outfit on the same account I used. I have to go and find someone before she gets into more trouble than I told her to, so I’ll catch you two cuties later,” she said with a wink, turning to stride out the front door.

“W-wait! I can pay!” I called after her.

“Pay it forward sister!” she called back with a wave.

“B-but!” I mumbled, watching her disappear down the street.

“Wow,” the attendant breathed.

I nodded wordlessly, then took the jeans and scrambled over to the room fitting room in an attempt to hide just how red I was. Over the next few minutes, I hastily tried on the clothing until I came out with the ones that fit. The full outfit stunned me in the mirror. I looked like someone who didn’t blush constantly and stammer wordlessly for hours. I looked… hot? Cool? Confident? All of the above?

The attendant took the tags I’d pulled off the clothes and shoes, then scanned them through the register while I stuffed my old clothes into my satchel, which seemed a bit full now.

“Who was she?” I asked quietly.

“Dunno. She said her name was Laithe, but she paid for her stuff and yours using an account by the name of Kalia Vulpelli,” she shrugged.

“She was…” I started, then trailed off.

“Girl, I’m straight and I was thinking it,” the attendant laughed, “Alright, you’re all good to go.”

“Thank you!” I smiled, my heart fluttering with a light pleased feeling that was almost new to me.

I left the shop not ten minutes later wearing entirely girl clothing, and feeling… amazing? I loved these clothes. I needed to put it all away carefully at home so my mother didn’t find any of it, but I didn’t care. I was happy.

Of course, I missed the bus so I had to wait for another one, which meant I sitting at the bus stop and waiting. I opted to lean against a power pole and check my phone, since the seat had another student sitting on it, and I didn’t feel like awkwardly sitting next to him. Flicking through the discord servers I was on proved to pass the time reasonably well. Only problem was that the guy sitting on the seat kept shuffling around and staring at me. I could see it in my peripheral vision.

I glanced over at him, and saw a guy my own age, about average height with dark brown hair and brown eyes. He was boring really, a typical student wearing jeans and a hoodie while carrying a satchel like mine. Yup, he was staring at me. I anxiously jerked my gaze back to my phone, doing my best to ignore his frequent looks over at me.

The bus came shortly after, and I hopped on behind him. He sat down as I was paying and stared at me as I walked down the aisle. I chose to sit in a seat behind him so that I wouldn’t have to feel his eyes on the back of my head.

The bus made good time, and I thought if I made a break for it, skating all the way to my sophomore orientation meetup I might get there in time. Why they did these fuck around weeks at the start of each semester was beyond me, but that was fine with me.

When we got to the stop for my college, I hopped off the bus to find staring boy waiting for me.

“H-hi, uh. Are you going to Shasterton College too?” he stuttered.

I felt my anxiety lift its head with blinking eyes inside me. He was a guy, so I wasn’t attracted to him, which made speaking to him at least something I could viably do.

“Um. Yes,” I said quietly.

“Uh-hh I’m a freshman and I don’t know how to get to the… H block and I was just…” he said in a rush.

“Yep. It’s that one,” I said pointing at one of the larger tower blocks.

Thinking that was all, I moved to start skating away.

“What does um, what does H-C-4 mean?” he blurted, trying to stand in front of me slightly.

“H is the block, C is the floor. So C floor is the third floor. Four is the room number,” I explained, cringing to the side and avoiding eye contact.

“Th-hank you I um, my name is Blake,” he told me haltingly.

“Cool dude, I gotta skate to class before I’m late,” I said, dropping my board to the pavement and weaving around him.

“O-oh! Sorry!” he called after me as I made my escape.

I allowed the moderate exercise of skating to ease the tension that the encounter had spawned within me. Talking to strangers was the worst. Being talked to by strangers wasn’t fun either. I felt for the dude, but I wish he’d picked anyone but me to talk to.

I was paying far too much attention to my thoughts as I let myself glide on autopilot through the various paths that snaked across the campus. Having gotten distracted, I forgot about a set of stairs that came up, and before I could even begin to panic my body had taken over, doing a kickflip into the air. I felt my adrenaline surge as I looked down and saw the board spinning beneath me.

That wasn’t the end of it though, because my feet touched the board in just the right way to grind down the rail. This was the first time I’d done anything like this, and panic welled up within me as the board connected with the cold steel of the bar. Please crazy powers, don’t fuck this up. They lived up to my hopes, and the dismount went off without any hitch. I hit the pavement cleanly and allowed myself to roll to a stop.

I looked back at the stairs in awe. I’d just done the coolest grind of my life. No wait, the coolest thing of my life. Holy shit these powers were so cool! I couldn’t shoot flame from my hands or anything, but I could do some crazy stunts! Still staring at the stairs, I couldn’t hold back a broad grin from spreading over my face. The grin faltered when I noticed a trio of girls staring at me. They’d been walking towards the stairs when I’d done my acrobatics.

All three of them were very pretty and amazingly well dressed, looking like they knew their way around the inside of a mall and a club in equal measure. I awkwardly dropped my gaze to the pavement and tried to walk around them, when one of them spoke.

“That was something,” she said.

“So-sorry,” I mumbled.

“No problem girl, that was impressive,” the middle one said, her blue eyes flicking down to my rainbow vans and up again, “Interesting. What’s your name?”

I tried to tell her, but my throat was too dry. I tried to wet it and said, “E-elsie.”

“Cute name,” she said, trying to smile. It looked like a genuine attempt, but I don’t think her face worked like that.

“I have to go,” I squeaked, my face flushing at her compliment regardless of how it may have been intended.

I didn’t wait for a reply, taking a run up and hopping onto my board. I heard no reply, and a glance backward showed the three girls continuing on their way without a similar backward glance. Why was everyone suddenly trying to talk to me? Did I have a sign on my back or something? This was turning into a seriously nerve wracking morning. Leave me alone people!

Eventually, I made it to the lecture theatre where the program lead was just getting up to address the whole of our year group. I saw a lot of faces that I recognised from my freshman year in finance, and a lot of missing faces. It seemed like half of our year group had dropped out. They were also all staring at me. My mind stumbled as the eyes all looked at me with a mix of bored and interested reactions.

Rushing up the steps, I all but dove into the nearest seat, not caring who I’d sat next to. I just needed to get away from all the eyes.

The lecture began, and my god was I bored almost instantly. The lead of the finance program was about as interesting as you’d expect. He wore a tired old suit that looked like it was a mild jog away from falling apart, and his voice matched it perfectly. He droned on about random topics that were both necessary admin bullshit and utterly uninteresting. Blah blah blah, health and safety, blah blah blah choosing electives.

Looking around, I realised that I no longer fit in with the crowd in my course. They were all either nerds like I was on the inside, or the cool types who were smart and socially savvy. There were a few obviously Emerged people like myself, but the majority were not. Out of all of these, there was only one girl dressed like a lesbian skater, and that was me.

I dawned on me then that I had wandered into my lecture as Elsie, not as Coby. I hadn’t even thought of changing back. Which meant that things would probably get awkward as soon as I needed to talk to someone. Maybe I could just talk to the tutor without having everyone else overhear. Wait, something else I needed to unpack… Lesbian skater? That was me? No, no way. I was just a weird anxious nerd.

I curled in on myself for the rest of the lecture, trying to escape from my own self hatred by slowly imploding. Except, there was one problem with this plan. Hugging myself the way I was, I couldn’t help but feel my rather ample chest. The overwhelmingly feminine feeling of my hand against my breast seemed to calm me. I wasn’t groping myself, but rather I had a hand placed between them. It was strange to watch the emotion that had been my constant companion since childhood ended just fade away.

I was jolted from my thoughts by everyone around me beginning to shuffle around the way students do when they know it’s time to leave. I looked up at the lecturer who had replaced the weird program lead at some point, a tall no-nonsense woman in dress pants and a flowing white blouse.

“Please, settle down, I have more to say,” she called loudly with a frown.

There was a stilling across the students, as well as a grumbling.

“Now, you’ll be split into different tutorial times based on which ones you think you can attend. You’ll find a link on the course page in the student portal of the website. For now though, I’ll get you all to follow the tutors to a tutorial you’ve been assigned for this day only,” she told us, then directed us to a whiteboard with a bunch of print outs on it.

I moved down towards the whiteboard, and stood well back from the scrum that was forming around it. Just looking at that press of bodies made me anxious.

“I don’t believe I’ve seen you before young lady, what’s your name?” I heard a voice ask from behind me, and I turned and looked directly into the piercing gaze of the professor who had been speaking to us.

“U-uhhhh, C-Elsie!” I squeaked.

“Kelsie hmm?” she asked, a raised eyebrow adding extra pierce to the pierciness of her gaze.

“N-no, Uh, Elsie. I mean… I have, I have two names,” I said, taking the time now to warn the faculty of my new status as Emerged.

She’d known me before, as Coby. She’d been my professor for one of my classes last year, and she was no less intimidating this time around, although she’d given me good grades. I think she might have liked me, in whatever way an ice cold money-math demon could like somebody.

“Y-yes ma’am,” I mumbled, then stepped closer to tell her quietly, “I Emerged, on the um, on the third Emergence. My old name was Coby Hartley.”

The ice of her gaze cracked, and her eyes widened ever so slightly, “I see… that is rather complicated. Would you like me to inform the professor you’ve been assigned today?”

Looking down at my feet shyly, I nodded.

“Alright. I’ll go do that now. Thank you for letting me know, that must have been hard… and welcome to the club,” she said, with a wink that sent pulses of crackling energy dancing in her eyes.

Whoa. That was cool. She was Emerged! Somehow, the knowledge that my professor was like me was a supremely comforting thing.

“Thank you!” I smiled, looking down at my feet.

“I believe, if I remember rightly, that your tutorial is over in D-3-1,” she told me.

“You’re not my professor?” I asked in disappointment.

“I’m afraid not. I only teach a single paper to the freshman. I am from a different department normally,” she said apologetically.

“Oh,” I mumbled.

She snorted quietly, “Have a good day Elsie, I’ll go let your professor know.”

I watched her go with a grin. She was awesome.