I waited a few days before visiting Silaqui again; during that time, I attended my classes and went to work as I used to, though this time with much more caution. I dressed warmly, though this new body felt neither warmth nor cold, an immunity that brought as much comfort as it did unease. I wore gloves as a safety measure, a thin cotton barrier between me and a repeat of the incident with the man I beat in the alley; speaking of which, I spent some time around the building where he worked, and did not detect him there, so I assume I put him in the hospital for an extended period of time or he simply does not want to come in to work out of fear. Either way, I couldn’t help but feel a small sense of accomplishment, and a shame for feeling that accomplishment. I socialized with the folks that I had identified as safe, but I tried to keep a further distance from them; to be honest, I was afraid of myself and what I was capable of, and I didn’t want to ensnare them in the trap that was knowing me.

  One person kept trying to bridge that gap though, an Othersider named Kall. They were intimidating on the surface too, long black hair that covered a face that supposedly cursed those who looked upon it. To save their classmates, they wore a mask underneath to obscure themselves. Their expression was beautiful, always wearing these flowing dresses from many different cultures, each of them suiting their slender frame and angelic features perfectly. I really liked them, and if it were any other circumstance, I think I’d want to get closer to them. But I was afraid that I would accidentally brush their exposed hands with my own, and discover something horrible and hidden about them, and the illusion would be ruined. Or even worse, they might discover that I was rotten to my core, and this beautiful, fragile thing we had would shatter just like that. So I kept my distance, even though they were so kind to me, and empathized with the feeling of looking scary but wanting nothing more than to be kind and to know others.

  My job was easy enough, with me being delegated to background duties so as to not scare customers. I resigned myself to my new position, and was starting to get comfortable with it, when someone I worked with often as a barista spoke up for me, a woman named Aisha. I didn’t speak with her often, but she was quiet and kind, and I helped her reach things she couldn’t, and when customers berated her, I would always step between and try to assuage the situation. I’d never once heard her raise her voice, but as I walked past the management office one day, I heard her yell, advocating for me.

  “Why did you put Avery on cleaning and stocking duty!? They were our best barista!” she exclaimed with a panache I didn’t know she had. They. The organ in my chest fluttered at being referred to as such, and I could feel whatever magics now comprised my heart and body shift in response, like a dog wagging its tail.

  “You know we can’t have something like that as the face of our business, Aisha,” said Ms. Plantera, with a resigned tone to her voice. “I agree, Avery was extremely good at his job, but he can’t show his face now like that. To be honest, looking at him scares me a bit; imagine how much it’d scare customers.”

  I decided this conversation might make me feel something I’d rather not, and so I left to continue my duties. Later that day, when I was ready to leave for home, I stopped by Aisha, who was taking a break from her shift.

  “Hey, Aisha. I just wanted to say… I didn’t mean to, but I overheard a bit of your conversation with Ms. Plantera, and I wanted to say thank you for thinking of me. I don’t mind my new position, and I understand why I was put here, but your thoughts make me feel safer here. Please let me know if you need anything and I’ll be there,” I told her, a soft smile on my face.

  She paused for a moment, thinking, before looking up at me from her seat. “Could I get your number?” she asked.

  “Oh… Yeah, sure. Yeah. Sorry, I’ve… Uh… I… Yeah,” I replied, choking on my words. I remembered Aera, and how she would feel knowing I had another girl’s number in my phone.

  “You don’t have to if you don’t want to,” she clarified, an understanding and friendly smile on her face.

  “No, no, I want to. I just… I’m really awkward, and this is the first time anyone’s asked me since the change. Thank you,” I said, feeling a lump form in my throat. We exchanged numbers, and I made my way home, feeling like I had made connections that would’ve been impossible to me if I had stayed in that other ill-fitting form.

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  Soon enough, the day came where I met with Silaqui; we chose to meet at the diner where she first saw me, to mark the occasion. As I sat there, having arrived ten minutes early, drinking milquetoast diner coffee, I could feel the organ in my chest fluttering. I wasn’t sure how today was going to go, but I knew that Silaqui was a being that deserved my honesty and my trust. She had given me something that I could never be apart from, something that in only a few short days had completely revolutionized my little life, and turned it into something precious and worthwhile. Sure, there were things about it that seemed to be awful, but when I thought of the suffering I felt daily in my old body, with my old abilities, I knew that I wouldn’t go back for any reason. This is something I wanted to keep with me, even if it meant I couldn’t touch another person for the rest of my life.

  I watched Silaqui elegantly walk through the entrance, and without looking anywhere else in the diner, she locked eyes with me and made her way to my booth. Her outfit was more casual than normal, a dark hooded sweatshirt with an elegant design of some tree from the Otherside formed into ribs, and red plaid slacks. I thought it strange that I noticed her outfit, as fashion typically slipped outside the purview of my mind; maybe it was because her ethereal beauty seemed to starkly contrast the mundanity of her street clothes. Or maybe it was because I was beginning to feel a strong attachment to her. I shook the thought from my head as she sat down, ordering herself some pancakes and a coffee.

  “So, Avery, any new developments since our call last night? I know you’ve been making friends and getting people’s numbers, but nothing abnormal, right?”

  “No,” I replied softly, sipping from my mug. “Just friends. I wear gloves, and take precautions to touch no one.”

  “That’s good,” she replied, pouring an obscene amount of cream and sugar into her own coffee. “I can tell just from sensing and looking at you that your psionic and thaumaturgic levels are back to their normal, so I don’t think I need to take any samples… What do you think? Have you been having any thoughts that aren’t your own since the incident?”

  “No,” I said again, looking outside at the cars on the street, tightly packed in lines. “Ever since you gave me that drink, my thoughts have been my own. My strength and ability has been back to baseline, as far as I can tell. I feel… well, normal.”

  “So we have something that is able to reliably calm you down. Excellent,” she says, finishing her pancakes. “So, I want to talk to you Avery. I need to, actually. You’ve been doing an amazing job being honest with me, and so I thought it was time I was honest with you.” She sips her drink, and locks eyes with me, her piercing draconic gaze threatening to shred my soul. “As you might know by now, turning a human into an Othersider is possible, but the procedure is extremely rare, and can take years and a lot of magic, and often results in a very specific Othersider being created. What I created with you is something that no one has ever done before, Avery. I need you to know that; no one can know how you were made. If someone asks, just say you were a botched job, okay?”

  I swallowed hard. I had no idea that what I am was so complicated and unique. I nodded in response, unable to find words in the moment.

  “As you might've guessed from the orange dragon eyes, I'm a dragon; however, in terms of ranking, I'd say I'm close to the top of the charts. On top of that, I am a scary fucking good wizard.” She stretched in her seat, as if what she just said wasn’t something that would fill a normal person with awe and terror. “If the world found out that someone like me existed, the restrictions placed on me would be horrific, and I would never see freedom again. But I look out at the world and I see it suffering; I see so many things going wrong, and I can’t do anything about it myself, or else I would be locked away for the rest of this world’s existence. So I started trying to make things that could help people for me… Champions that could help the world and make things better. I only made one other before you Avery, one being of exceptional power that I hoped would change things. But they… uh… died…”

  I could see the sadness in her face, hear the sorrow in her voice, and I knew she had been close to this Champion of hers. Without thinking, I reached across the table and held her hand, giving her a reassuring smile. “I’m not going anywhere,” I said, smiling at her. “Keep going.”

  “They died 17 years ago… It took me that long to recover. I only resolved to try again in the last year, but couldn’t find anyone that I trusted; mostly because I didn’t trust anyone. But then I saw you, and decided to gamble. I don’t know why exactly, but I did; something in me told me you were the one who would fix things. You’ve done nothing but assure me that my gamble was a winning hand, and so I have to ask you, Avery Grey: will you help me fix things?”