Getting ready for the day as a girl is so much more involved than getting ready as a guy. For one, this stupid forest green hair is a nightmare. I don’t know how girls do it - the best I can pull off is the “stylized bedhead” look. Then there’s all this makeup that I apparently own but have no idea how to put on without looking like a clown. Not to even mention that half my closet is now comprised of skirts and dresses, and there was no world in which I was ready to put those on. This unfortunate series of events is what led to me being stuck in the bathroom, attempting to wrangle the tangle of undergrowth that decided to take place on my head.

There was a knock on the bathroom door. “Almost done, Morgan? I gotta pee,” Shauna called.

I put down the hairbrush with a sigh and opened the door. “Yeah, I’m done. I’m just gonna put my hair up in a ponytail, I guess.” 

My jaw dropped as I made eye contact with my roommate. Shauna had decided to embrace the frills, wearing a white blouse and plaid skirt underneath a Lolita-style cardigan. Her tiny frame let her rock the fit, too. Meanwhile, I was over here in the same jeans and T-shirt as yesterday.

“Morgan?”

“Huh?”

“I said, your hair looks fine. The wild look suits you.”

I felt my cheeks begin to warm. “What? It’s half-tamed bedhead.”

“And that’s a look!” Shauna grinned. “It fits your whole ‘tomboy because I’m actually a boy’ aesthetic.”

Ack. She got me in one. I was sure I was blushing now. “Well, you look nice too,” I countered. “Going full fem today?”

Shauna paused mid-step. “Uh- yeah. I wanted to see how it looked. And I liked it, so, nyeh.” She slammed the door to the bathroom.

Well then.

I sighed, sitting back down on my bed. Our only lead was a bundle of Silverbelle flowers from SSO and the ability to analyze anything we pointed at. Maybe we had other interface abilities too?

“Friends List!” I said, hoping something would happen. “Uh… Inventory! Backpack! Menu!” Nothing.

“You sound ridiculous,” Shauna said as she exited the bathroom.

“You got any better ideas?”

“Just watch and learn,” Shauna made a downward swipe in the air with her hand. “Open Quest Log.”

Bling! A screen popped up in front of my roommate, who quietly fistpumped. 

I rolled my eyes. “Lucky guess.” I copied her movements, opening the quest log for myself.

Available Quests:

1. [Silverbelle Summons] - Visit the Silverbelle woods and meet with the witch. (0/1)

“I’ve got a quest to meet with a catgirl apprentice in the Silverbelle woods,” Shauna reported. “What about you?”

“I’ve got one to meet with a witch in the same place. Great, but how do we get there?”

Shauna shrugged her shoulders, trying another command. “Track quest?” Sure enough, a little line of tiny yellow lights lit up, leading from Shauna’s feet and out of our dorm room.

“Ha! I’m so good at this.”

“I think you just watch too much anime, weeb.”

The catgirl hissed at me. “Whatever,” she pouted. “You coming or not?”

 

Our quest marker led us just a little ways off campus, to a cafe of all places. A sign in front proudly proclaimed it was called “Cafe Starlight.” True to its name, the cafe was only open in the evenings.

“Well, hell,” I said, putting my hands on my hips. Now what?”

“The door’s unlocked. Why don’t we just go in?” Shauna suggested.

“Shauna, girl. That’s illegal.”

“There’s probably someone in there getting the store ready to open. I’ll come up with an excuse and see if they’ll let us poke around.” Before I could protest, Shauna did just that, barging her way in.

“Excuse me?” she called out to the empty space. Not about to let my best friend get arrested without me, I hurried in after her.

To my delight, it was actually pretty cozy in here. An electric fireplace was running, and beanbags were set around it with stacks of books on the shelves and desks. There were traditional chairs and tables too, which had been holiday-ifed with green and red tablecloths. I even spotted a little loft on the second floor, behind garland-decked banisters.

“Hi, sorry!” came a voice from the kitchen. A foxgirl with blue hair done up in big twin tails scurried out of the kitchen, wearing a gold shrine maiden’s outfit. “We’re actually not open until…” she trailed off as she took in our appearances. I stared back, equally dumbfounded. Was this girl at the gaming cafe?

My catgirl friend piped up. “Oh, that makes this a lot easier. My friend and I are investigating the weird stuff that happened on campus. Is it alright if we took a look around?”

“Weird stuff on campus? Wait, Tsukiyomi targeted a bunch of college students?”

I exchanged a look with Shauna before responding. “Um, yes. There was a whole cutscene from SSO playing on the monitors at the gaming cafe on campus, and then this really creepy black fog, and then we all woke up looking like this.”

“We were looking for someone who might know what was going on, and that led us to this cafe,” Shauna added.

The foxgirl took a second to process. “You’re in luck then. I’m Nina, and I serve as one of Amaterasu’s shrine maidens on the Soulseeker side of reality.” Nina made a gesturing motion with her hands, and a screen similar to the ones we’d seen popped up in front of her. “You two are… Morgan and Shauna, right?”

“Yeah. How did-”

“I checked your statuses. Sorry, I’d love to have a chat and explain everything to you two, but I need to find the other affected people as soon as possible before Tsukiyomi does.”

“Wait! Let us come with you?” I asked. “I can message the people we’ve talked to already.”

“We know where all the good hang-out spots are, too,” Shauna added. “Besides, we still have questions.”

Nina bit her lip. “Look, I appreciate the help, but this could be dangerous. I can’t involve you in this. It wouldn’t be right.”

Sensing her indecisiveness, Shauna made a push. “You do realize we’re going to keep poking our noses around with or without your help, right? Like it or not, we’re already involved in whatever’s going on. If you leave without us, we’re following our quest line into the kitchen.”

“Don’t you dare, you little…” Nina groaned. “You remind me of my little sister. Fine. I’ll answer your questions while you help me round everyone up, but don’t do anything stupid.”

Shauna purred and skipped after the foxgirl. “Yay! Thanks so much, Nina onee-san ~!”

“You’re on thin ice, Shauna.”

“Hehe~”

I jogged a little to catch up to them as we made our way back to campus. “Sorry about her. She’s always been a force of sass, even before the transformations.”

The catgirl in question gasped dramatically “Am not! How dare you, Morgan! I’ll have your head!”

“Case and point. Getting back on topic… you said you were from SSO?”

Nina nodded. “Yeah, I’m… an NPC, I guess. As you’ve learned, that world is real, and that ‘cutscene’ you saw was a real battle that happened a few days ago. Tsukiyomi-sama took advantage of a bug in the code and caused a memory leak that targeted civilians on Earth. Lady Amaterasu said she managed to protect most of you, but Tsukiyomi went missing in the chaos. She sent me to check up on what happened on the Earth side of things, and to see if there were any hints on where he might’ve gone. Shauna, you said you two have been investigating. Did you two happen to see anything suspicious?”

Shauna shook her head no. “We found a bundle of silverbelles on the floor of the gaming cafe yesterday, but nothing related to Tsukiyomi.”

“That’s probably just somebody who had their gathering interrupted,” Nina concluded. “The Silverbelle Woods are Lady Amaterasu’s territory after all. I have some friends there who should be able to undo the changes Tsukiyomi tried to force on you.”

“O-Oh, that’s good,” Shauna said, unconvincingly cheery. “I sure can’t wait to be my old male self again.”

Nina rolled her eyes. “Okay, now you really remind me of my little sister. We’ll figure out something for all the people who don’t want to change back, egg.”

“Hey! I’m nyot a…” Shauna snapped, before cutting herself off. “Oh my god, I totally am.”

“You’re just now realizing? What is with you college kids and being emotionally blind to your own feelings? If I had a nickel…” The foxgirl shook her head in disbelief. Seemed like she was speaking from experience.

“What about you, Morgan?” Nina asked me.

“What about me?” I answered. Like an idiot.

“How’s the transformation affecting you? Doing okay with the whole gender bender shenanigans?”

I paused mid-step. Was I okay? How was I feeling about all of this?

“I haven’t given it much thought, I guess,” I said honestly. “My name is gender-neutral, so it’s not like things have really changed in that regard.”

“That’s fair! You’re in a pretty good position to explore that part of yourself right now, even if the cause of it was against your will.”

Nina made a pretty good point. If things were going back to normal in a few days, why not take the chance to explore my feminine side? I mean, Shauna’s been practically glowing the whole day. Maybe I’m missing out by treating this whole thing as a problem to solve rather than a chance to explore.

“Okay, here’s the student center,” Shauna announced. “The gaming cafe is over there if you want to check it out for yourself. There’s a good chance we can find some people at the food court since it's around dinnertime… and I’m kinda hungry. Should we split up?” 

Nina giggled. “You’re a pretty carefree catgirl, aren’t you? Sure, I’ll go see what I can find while you two do some people-watching. I’ll find you when I’m done.”

“Kay~” Shauna took my hand and dragged me towards the food court. “What’re you feeling for dinner, Morgan? Cheap Chinese food? Tacos? Pasta?”

“Hey-! Shauna, hold on a-”

An unfortunately familiar buff shirtless figure cut off our route through the sea of public seating.“Well, well, well. Look what the catgirl dragged in.”

In the time it took for me to process that it was Seth who was blocking our path, Shauna had gone from dragging me along to hiding behind me, gripping my arm tightly. Not that I blamed her, after our last encounter with him. Between then and now, his regular ears had become tiger ears, and a striped tail lashed out angrily from behind him. His canines had extended too, now looking like a pair of sharp fangs.

“Hey, Seth…” I began timidly. “We were looking for you. Good timing.”

He huffed in response. “I have nothing to say to you, whore. I thought I told you to stay away from my girlfriend!”

Okay, first of all, excuse me? Second of all, girlfriend? I looked back at Shauna, who was recoiling from the mere thought.

“Uh, we are not dating,” Shauna said flatly. “What happened to Mr. ‘I’m gonna go pick up some real chicks?’”

“Oho? My kitten’s being bratty today, aren’t we? No matter, I’ll knock some sense into you as soon as I get my hands on you.”

Nope. That was one step too far, dude. You do not threaten my best friend in front of me and get away with it. 

I took a step forward, putting myself between my friend and my ex-roommate. “Dude, Seth, back off. Come on, are you seriously threatening her over a relationship that you know never existed?”

“I’m gonna be honest, I’m gettin’ real tired of this game, Shauna. I know you’ve been two-timing me with this lesbian bitch. Why don’t you tell her how much better my-”

“Just shut up, Seth!” Shauna shouted. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, so just leave us alone!”

The chatter around us quieted down as people started to watch this confrontation unfold. To the surprise of nobody, several phones were already out recording us. Gee, thanks, strangers. Having video evidence is great and all, but if somebody would be willing to jump in and help the two disadvantaged girls right now, I’d really appreciate it.

Seth, meanwhile, had turned some new shade of angry red. “Leave you alone? Hah, no way. This charade ends today.” His eyes looked completely bloodshot as he raised his hand and red claws formed where his nails should be. That can’t be good. Anything involving magic is automatically not good, especially when it's pointed in our general direction.

A few bystanders screamed and started to flee. “He’s got a knife!” they said. Yep. Definitely not good.

“I’ve always hated you, Morgan,” Seth continued. “You and Shay always had it out for me. What’d I ever do to you guys? I’m a nice guy, aren’t I?”

“Seth, don’t do this,” Shauna pleaded, making a weird gesture with her hands that vaguely represented a surrender. “We can have an ‘open chat’ about this, right?” 

Shauna stepped a little further behind me as she obscured the little chat log that popped up. Great, now we just had to stall until Nina could make it to us.

“Quiet, kitten. This is between Morgan and me. I won’t stand for this any longer!” A dark red bolt of energy went flying towards Shauna, shattering her console screen like a pane of glass. The catgirl eeped, going stiff on the spot. 

Shit. I needed to regain control of this conversation, fast. “I know we haven’t always seen eye-to-eye, Seth, but this isn’t like you! Don’t you think it’s a little extreme to jump straight to stabbing me?”

“No, I don’t,” He replied, swinging his blood-red claws at me. I flinched, fully expecting to be sliced in two, but a blur of blue grabbed Seth’s arm before it could connect.

“I thought I said not to do anything stupid!” Nina grimaced, delivering a quick kick into Seth’s chest, sending him flying back into the tables like a ragdoll.

I exhaled loudly. That was way too close for comfort. “Nina! Thank god.”

“Morgan, you and Shauna get away from here. I’ll keep this guy busy.”

“But-”

“No buts! This guy is seriously dangerous. I’ll find you when it’s safe, now move!”

I bit my lip, nodding. “Come on, Shauna.” I grabbed my friend’s hand, but she didn’t budge. 

“I… I can’t move…!” She struggled. Her arms and legs were trembling with fear, and she was looking at me with a desperate plea for help.

“Oh, you’re in for it now, sun shit…” Seth growled from the wreckage. A loud clattering of debris warned us his regained mobility.

“Bring it, moon freak,” Nina replied, taking up a martial arts stance. Crap. If I didn’t get a move on, we were gonna get caught in the crossfire.

“Sorry about this, Shauna!”

“Sorry about- wahhh!” The catgirl squealed as I scooped her up in a princess carry and booked it out of the student center. I didn’t stop running until we were back in our dorm room and I’d locked every door between here and there.

“Okay, hopefully he can’t get us in here,” I said, placing Shauna down on her bed. “How are you holding up?”

The poor girl was still bright red from fear. “Y-Yeah. Thanks, Morgan. You saved me.”

“Of course. Sorry for grabbing you like that.”

“It’s fine. I kinda liked it, actually.”

“Huh?”

“We needed to go, so it’s fine!” she quickly amended. “I don’t know what happened to me back there. I sent a message to Nina while we were in a standoff, but I was literally frozen in fear when he swiped at you. I… he was really trying to kill you, Morgan!”

I ran a hand through my hair as the adrenaline finally started to fade. “Yeah… if Nina hadn’t come when she did, then…”

My musings were interrupted by a catgirl pouncing on me, wrapping me in a tight hug. “Don’t say that so casually! You’re the only one keeping me sane with all this crazy stuff going on. I don’t know what I’d have done if Seth had really got you!”

“Shauna, I…”

“We’re learning how to fight SSO style tomorrow, got it? Like hell I’m gonna let that asshole kill you while I stand there and do nothing! I’m sorry, I’m sorry…” Shauna squeezed me even tighter as she began to cry into my chest. I froze, unsure how to respond as my brain short-circuited slightly.

The conclusion I eventually came to? When in doubt, headpat it out. Slowly, I began gently rubbing my friend’s head. “It’s okay. We’re safe now,” I soothed. “I’m with you all the way. Tomorrow, we get to the bottom of this and knock some sense back into Seth.”

“Yeah,” she replied, half purring into my chest. “Thanks, Morgan.” She mumbled something else, but it was too muffled by her positioning for me to make out.

“You’re welcome. What was that last thing you said?” I asked softly, but I got no response. Shauna had fallen asleep in my arms. Could this girl be any more precious? Ah well, it is a very comforting hug, and I’m pretty worn out too after all that running. Maybe I’ll just rest my eyes for a little bit…