Crossed Wires

It started as a rumor. As whispers among friends. Then came the moral panic. Forumnet threads tens of thousands of posts long, countless headlines, web specials, all decrying the specter of "diveshock", of children playing dive games and getting hurt or traumatized.

It was all nonsense, of course. Studies found that in almost all cases the trauma was caused by the parents and not the media fad of the hour. Within a couple years, the scare faded and dive games rose to greater popularity than ever before. But even then, there were whispers.

Hardcore gamers reaching for a potion when they get a paper cut. MMO tanks trying to use skills in gym and getting clocked with a volleyball. Social site regulars getting upset when they can't block a jerk in person. Diveshock may have been fake, but dive bleed certainly isn't.

At least, according to your friends. You still don't know whether you believe the stories or not. They remind you a bit too much of chain letters, and they certainly haven't stopped you from buying a Leftrix Neuron diveset while they were on sale this week.

One calibration and five license agreements later, and it's time to lie down and dive. You nervously press the power button sitting above your left temple, and a pulse of electricity zaps through your consciousness as the device connects to your brain and your senses fade.

You feel your eyes close, the pressure from your too-hard mattress vanish, the cold breeze from your fan turn to nothing. Your brain is fed visual data, even though you can't truly see it. A figure appears before you. A phrase, a command, enters your mind: Design your avatar.

A pang of anxiety shoots through you. You've never really thought much about your appearance, but that means that you have no idea what you want to look like. Appearances flash through your mind, characters from shows you like, but you can't use those. You aren't a girl!

The avatar in front of you shimmers with almost-blinding light until it settles into a new form: tall, chubby, side-shaved, and unmistakably feminine. You try to ask the system to try again, but to no avail. Oh, well. You can deal with this until you figure out how to change it.

In a blink, you're now inside of the avatar. No, not inside. You are the avatar. You can feel your hands resting against your hips, a fuzzy sweater draping over your chest and belly, your hair gently tickling your ears.

It feels...warm.
And safe.
And...right?
No, it can't be.

It's probably just because you're diving. It's gotta use some reinforcement to not make people feel weird when they enter an avatar, right? It's probably just that. Nothing to worry about. You sigh, swipe open the menu, and browse to the clubnet your friends have been using.

After a few hours of hanging out and familiarizing yourself with divespace, you decide to resurface. As your senses gently shift from your avatar to your physical body, you feel a slight itchiness. You check the clock; it's only been half an hour in Earth time. Huh. Neat.

Diving with your friends was...really fun. Everyone had a laugh about the avatar mix-up, then mostly just chilled, playing the arcade cabinets in the corner or drinking virtual booze. You can't wait to hang out with them tomorrow! For now, you should make something to eat.

As you stand up, you find yourself stumbling - after being in a different body for what felt like so long, you must have to get familiar with your real body again. You find yourself cooking a little bit more than usual. It has been a few hours since you last ate, after all!

After dinner, you lie down to get ready for bed. You scribble a note to yourself to fix the avatar issue and leave it stuck to the diveset. You still have that itchiness, like your skin doesn't fit quite right. After a while of tossing and turning, you finally drift to sleep.

It's been a couple weeks of Earth time since you bought your Neuron, and you've been getting plenty of use out of it. Clubnets, MMOs, even a few single-player dive games. You haven't been able to get your avatar fixed, but it doesn't really matter at this point. It feels safe.

There's a new face in your clubnet tonight. Her avatar's head only barely reaches your chest height, but she has this air of confidence that she carries around with her. You've been too intimidated by her coolness to strike up a conversation, so you just sit and look at her.

Eventually, she catches you staring and flashes you a friendly smirk before hopping on over to your table.
"Something catch your eye, cutie?~"
Blood rushes to your face. "No! I just-uh-"
She giggles softly. "All good, all good~ It just looked like you want to say something."

You nod quickly. "I-It's just that I really like your avatar, a-and I think it looks really cool!"
Another giggle, the crystals on her cloak shimmering. "Aww, thank you, hun! Yours is super adorable~"
"I-It wasn't meant to look like this. Out of dive, I'm actually...a guy."

The girl raises an eyebrow, but doesn't press further. "The name's Lynn. How'd you like to be friends?"
"I-I'd really like that. Thank you!"
Lynn smiles, flicking her menu open and shooting you a friend request. "If you have any dive questions, let me know, okay?"
"Got it!"

You chat with Lynn for a little longer before you decide to log out. The body shift is almost instant now, but the itch and hunger feel like they're getting stronger over time. You dump a box of pasta into a pot of water and check your phone while you wait for it to cook.

You got a message from an old friend of yours. You haven't seen him in a few years, and he's asking if you two can meet up next week. You tell him you'd love to right as the timer for your dinner goes off. Once you've eaten your fill, you take some melatonin and head to bed.

You're having trouble figuring out what to wear. You changed your laundry detergent recently, and it seems to have made all your clothes shrink some. You have a pair of jeans that fits, but you still need a top. Your eyes flit around the room before noticing a fuzzy sweater.

...When did you get that? You think you might remember ordering it, but diving so much messes with your sense of Earth time. Oh, well. You throw it on over a slightly-too-small T-shirt and text your friend that you're ready to meet up before heading out the door.

It only takes a couple minutes to reach the park you two agreed to meet at, so you decide to sit down until he arrives. Almost as soon as you find a bench, a person wearing a black hoodie and a face mask walks up to you. "Hey! Good to see you again, dude! It's been forever!"

You instinctively flinch, then relax and wave.
"It's nice to see you too! How have you been?"
"Pretty good! Got a diveset recently but haven't really done anything with it yet."
"Oh, wow! I've been using mine all the time. I love it so much!"
Your friend raises an eyebrow.

"Have you now? I should add you once I get it up and running."
"Sounds wonderful!"
You talk with your friend for a while longer, sharing stories from the few years you two have been separate. Eventually, he pauses for a second.
"You've really changed a lot, y'know?"
"Have I?"

"Definitely! I haven't seen that hairstyle on you before, and you were always a bit on the plain side, but now you look...really soft."
You run your hand across your side-shave. "Oh, yeah! I got this cut a couple days ago, and diving makes me eat a lot for some reason, hehe~"

"Huh, I'll keep that in mind. You also just act a lot more...girly now? Not in a bad way, you're just...cute."
You feel warmth rising up your face and you move your arms behind your back. "C-Cute? I...gosh..."
He cocks his eyebrow again. You swear that expression is familiar...

Your friend's watch buzzes. "Oh shoot, I've gotta run for now. I'll hit you up again later, ok?"
"Y-Yeah! I'd really love that. See you soon!"
"Yeah, see you around."
You sigh softly as you watch him walk off. Since when did he become so cute too?

"Wow, he called you cute?" Your clubnet's host smirks at you. "You sure he wasn't talking about your avatar?"
You sigh. "He hasn't dived yet. He doesn't know that I look like...this in here!"
He laughs softly. "Just kidding, don't worry. Anything else you want advice for?"

You think for a second, then realize there is something you've been worrying about for a while. "How do you deal with the itchiness?"
The host's face grows confused. "Itchiness?"
"Yeah, the itchy feeling after you resurface. How do you handle that?"
"I've...never felt that."

"...What?"
"Yeah, I don't feel itchy or weird or anything after a dive. I've never heard anyone else mention it either."
Anxiety shoots through you. "T-Then, what's going on with me?"
"I've got no idea, buddy. Might be an issue with your set."
"Mmh, I hope it'll be okay..."

"Hey, everything alright?"
The voice from behind makes you jump. You turn and see Lynn. "O-Oh, yeah. Just...something weird going on with my diveset, we think."
"Oh, no! I might be able to help? I tinker with Leftrix sets a lot, so I know my way around them pretty well."

You breathe a sigh of relief. "Thank you so much! Mine's the second-gen Neuron, if that makes things easier."
"Oh, yeah, that helps a ton. Come over here and we can figure out what's going on." Lynn leads you to a table in the corner of the room. "So, what's the problem?"

"So, every time I resurface, I have this weird itchy feeling, like my skin doesn't fit right. I always feel really hungry too. Do you know what could be wrong?"
She cocks her eyebrow. That expression again. "I've heard of something like that before. Sounds like dive bleed."

"Wait, dive bleed is real?"
"Why wouldn't it be? If you're spending a bunch of your life somewhere, that's gonna affect how you act everywhere. This level of bleed is a bit out of the ordinary, though. Would it be okay if I came and visited you to see your diveset sometime?"

"I-uh...yeah. That'd be alright. Let me get you my address."
You text it to Lynn and she smiles. "Thank you! I'll see you soon, okay?"
"Yeah. I can't wait." You smile back at her, a bit of warmth rising up to your cheeks. Thank goodness you're finally gonna figure this out.

You hear your doorbell ring as you finish shaving your arms. You throw on your now-favorite sweater and check the peephole. It's your old friend. They're not wearing the hoodie or mask, and they look...really cute. Almost like...a girl. Why are they here?

You open the door, and their eyes widen.
"U-Uh, hey," they stammer.
"Hey! I was actually expecting to see someo-"
"You were expecting Lynn, right?"
You blink. "Uh...yeah? How do-"
"Hi. T-That's me. It's...good to see you again."
Your brain takes a minute to process everything.

"I guess that's why you felt so familiar, huh? It's good to see you too. Are you still up to helping me figure out what's up with my diveset?"
"Y-Yeah. Just give me a minute." Lynn takes a deep breath, then steps inside, smiling at you. "You really are a cutie, huh~"

You blush and try to stammer out a response. She giggles, grabbing onto your hand. "So where's your set? I need to take a peek at it."
Your blush grows stronger. "I-In my bedroom. On...the left."
"Sounds good! I'll want you there while I take a look at it, okay?"
"...Got it."

As soon as you two enter your room, Lynn pulls her laptop out of her bag and plugs a cable into it and your diveset. "Let's see what we've got here..." The set emits a happy chime as a config window appears on Lynn's screen. She quickly starts a sysdiagnose and pulls up logs.

Over the next few minutes, Lynn's face shifts through a myriad of expressions - confusion, frustration, surprise, more confusion, and finally settling on a determined confidence. She turns to you. "Alright. I think I see what's going on here."
"Yeah? What is it?"

"You're a girl."
You blink, flabbergasted. "I-wh-how is THAT your conclusion from all of this?!"
"Let me explain. Do you remember what happened when you designed your avatar?"
"Yeah, it just...made one for me."
"A girl one."
"Mhmm. I couldn't get it to undo, so I just kept it."

"The logs say that you got distressed over trying to design an avatar, so the system did a scan to figure out what you might want, then set up a positive feedback system to help you feel more comfortable in it."
You nod. "So that's why it felt so safe the first time..."

"Well, it looks like your mind might have taken to that feedback so well that it started self-replicating it. Rewarding you for making yourself feel like your avatar. Do you realize how identical you two are now?" You think about it. The sweater. The side-shave. All the food.

It all suddenly clicks in your head. Where the itchiness comes from. Why you spend so much time diving. Why you're always so hungry now. Why the set made your avatar look like that. It's what you've always wanted to look like. You look at yourself.
"...Oh my god, I'm a girl."

Tears start flowing out of your eyes. Anxious, relieved, scared, happy tears. You fall to your knees, and Lynn hugs you close. "I'm here for you, hun. I went through this too. That euphoria, that itch, all of it. You're not alone, okay? I'll always be here for you."

You look up at Lynn, shorter than her for the first time in your life. You smile weakly. She smiles back. You've found who you are. Lynn accepts you.
You feel warm.
And safe.
And right.
You pull her close to you, happily giving her your first kiss.

It's been a few months since the evening when you and Lynn started dating. She gave you a bottle of little teal pills before she left, telling you she'd had a feeling that you'd need them as soon as you described the itch. After looking them up, you decided to take the plunge.

Now, almost half a year, in, the effects are really starting to show. Your body is now softer than ever, and a bit more sensitive too. Everyone's been super sweet to you as you've made your way through the messy landscape of gender, and you've made plenty of new friends too.

You lie back in bed and power on your diveset, logging into your clubnet as usual. It seems like you're the first one here tonight. You flick the lights in the scene on just as someone spawns in behind you. You turn just as Lynn leaps at you, giving you a joyful, energetic hug.

"Hi, darling!~" She plants a kiss on your lips as you twirl around in the air.
You pull her in and giggle. "How're you, sweetheart?"
"I'm doing spectacular! I've got a special surprise for you, come check it out!" Your girlfriend grabs your hand and pulls you into another room.

Lynn places a table, two chairs, and a couple candles in the room, then places a box in the middle of the table. "Go on, open it, cutie!" You step forward and break the seal, carefully unfolding it to reveal a cake with your new name on it. You almost squeal in delight.

Lynn beams. "Happy birthday, darling! I love you so much!"
You pull her up against you and hug her tightly. You couldn't have imagined a year ago that you'd be here today, happily a girl, celebrating with your girlfriend. You give her another kiss. "Here's to many more together."