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You open your eyes. It’s bright. You hear an alarm going off and instinctively reach over to pick up your terminal. You silence the noise. There’s no way you’ll go back to sleep with the bright sunlight shining through your window. You check the time. 2024-12-16 07:45:15, your terminal’s screen says. A tinge of panic strikes you--you almost slept through your alarm again, it’s been 15 minutes. You realize you’d better hurry or you’ll be late for class again.

You roll out of bed, landing on your feet, and rush across the wooden floor to the closet. Inside you find your uniform--you pull on the cute plaid skirt, in shades of blue--you fasten your bra, and over top you pull on your white uniform shirt and tie the big blue ribbon around its collar.

Finally after months of estrogen injections, the academy gave you permission to wear the girls’ uniform. Everything changed for you after that, you remember. You finally started feeling like yourself. Finishing with your tall striped blue socks, and taking just a second to halfway straighten out your shoulder-length hair, you throw your schoolbag over your shoulder and head out.

You run down the stairs, taking heavy steps. Something about moving feels so unnatural today.

“There’s my sleepy girl,” Ælita says, ambushing you around the corner at the bottom of the stairs.

“Mooom, I told you I’m a femboy!” you say, with a frustrated stim.

“Wasn’t it an ‘enby’ last week?” she says. “I can hardly keep up.”

“Ugh.” Rolling your eyes, you stim with the Mars symbol necklace under your ribbon.

“I made breakfast, hurry and eat,” she says.

You look into the kitchen, seeing a full meal set out before you. “No time! I’m late!” Taking only a piece of bread, you head for the door.

“You know you have to eat for the hormones to work, right?” she says.

“Whtvr,” you say with a slice of bread halfway in your mouth. Slipping on your shoes, you run out into the bright morning.

A gentle breeze brushes against you as you step outside. You look up at the wide blue sky, with a few fluffy white clouds scattered about it, a beautiful summer day here on the planet Earth. You pass by the old tree in front of your house and reach the gate. You run down the sidewalk. Luckily you don’t live far from school.

The huge old trees along your street give you lots of shade from the morning sun. The songs of birds overhead cheer you on as you make your desperate rush. You stop at an intersection, letting some land vehicles pass by until the sign indicates you can walk.

Just a few blocks, and you come to the bridge. The Luna river flows gently underneath as you hurry across. It’s almost like crossing into another world every time you traverse this bridge. Then, on the far side, just ahead you come to the long fence of wrought iron woven in an intricate pattern. Once you pass by the tall shrubs you can see your familiar campus--a few large buildings, but the most prominent stands before you, two floors lined with glass windows reflecting the bright sun. Up above, the sign over the gate welcomes you to the place of dreams and nightmares, of the autistic joy of learning and the autistic despair of classes--for better or worse, your home away from home: Translunar Academy.

You pass through the gate just as you hear the bell from inside. Fuck, you’ll definitely be late.