Content Warnings:

  SpoilerTransphobia (including misgendering, references to violence); Gender dysphoria; Body horror / gore; Child abuse.

  [colpse]III. Deyed ArrivalI spent an hour before work trying to figure out who my TERFsona is.

  At first, I think it’ll be easy - just sp on a wrinkled old face, a short mop of grey hair, and voi! I’m a bitter, middle-aged lesbian who has had enough of these darn transgenders trying to force us to have sex with them.

  At a gnce, it works. But there are some issues I’d like to optimise out of the equation.

  First - pying an older TERF means pying a role I’m not used to. And that makes it easier for me to slip up.

  Have you ever seen Inglourious Basterds? Doesn’t matter if you have, because you’ve definitely seen the meme - the Nazi soldier giving that knowing smile when the undercover operative doesn’t realise that Germans count to three using their thumb, while Americans use their ring finger. That is the kind of mistake that gets you caught, without you even realising you’ve made it. If I try to py the role of an elder TERF, I’ll slip up eventually. I’ll use words that only the pro-trans side uses. I’ll miss some quintessential reference that every boomer worth their salt knows.

  And second, I am creating a person out of thin air. The older they are, the more history I have to build. A 50-year-old transphobe needs half a century of backstory. A fully fleshed-out life. And I have to be so well-versed in it that I never contradict myself. Not to mention - what if my fabricated history coincidentally overps with someone I cross paths with?

  With enough time and some clever thinking, I could probably make it work. But why expend effort when I can just work around the problem?

  Enter Holly. Cis woman. 25 years old. A former hard-line trans activist. She was a true believer - until she started dating a trans-identifying male.

  They got along great at first. Until she caught her girlfriend - quotation marks implied - wanking in Holly’s knickers and watching sissy hypno porn. And just like that, the truth clicked into pce. It was always a fetish. The liberal feminists lied to her. They told her that trans women were safe and that they weren’t perverts. But they were wrong.

  It will take some time to deprogram her, of course. She might slip into some trans-friendly nguage now and then - might accidentally say trans woman instead of biological male because it’s hard to unlearn the lies. She doesn’t have deep roots in TERF spaces. That just makes her more compelling. Yeah, they’ll eat that shit up.

  I grin to myself as I start crafting Holly’s face. This part is artistry. I want her to read as a butch lesbian, but not too butch. Transphobes can’t handle too butch. They’ll cast her aside, thinking she’s a man in disguise. Short, messy bck hair. Small, delicate features - unquestionably feminine.

  I tilt my head to admire my own work. It’s disgusting. But a masterpiece.

  I’m still pying around with Holly’s facial bones when my phone pings. I gnce down, expecting to see Lexi, Rico - somebody I know. But it’s an unknown number. And there’s only one person who has my number and doesn’t know me as Cassie.

  Jamie: Hey, Niamh. I’m sorry about st night. I don’t know if you left your number out of pity or if you were just extremely drunk as well - but figured I’d reach out.Jamie: I don’t really know what happened, but I think I’d like to talk about it if you’re still willing to listen.Jamie: Coffee tomorrow? Not a date. Just a talk.

  I stare at the words. My phone auto-locks, and for a brief second, Holly’s reflection stares back at me.

  The smart thing to do is ghost him. I’m already juggling Maisie, Cassie, and now Holly - adding Niamh to the mix is going to complicate things even further. And yet. Jamie was a better person than me st night. And I made a promise. Guilt festers at the edges of my mind as I type back.

  Niamh: sure. do you know marcos? noon works for me.Jamie: Sounds good! :)

  Niamh doesn’t use capital letters. That much was clear just by looking at her.

  I stare at my response for a moment, trying to convince myself that this won’t be complicated. Lexi’s also going on a coffee date tomorrow. She never specified a venue. If, by some terrible luck, our times and locations align - she won’t recognise me. She’ll look at me and see a total stranger.

  Also, let’s be honest here. Jamie is totally an egg, right? Transtion: he’s repressing some gender feelings. His macho performance st night, only to break down because it wasn’t really him?

  Yeah. If that’s the case, he’s lucky he ran into me. I can fix that pretty easily. The repressed part, at least.

  As I arrived at work - as Maisie, and on time - I was immediately ambushed by Sadie Cross. "Ambushed" might sound dramatic. We sit next to each other. There’s no need for a sneak attack. But anything with Sadie feels intense.

  The way she stares at people reduces them to nothing - just something that squirms and does what she says. At first, I thought that was just a me thing. It’s not. She’s just a cold bitch to everyone.

  "I really need you to look into Scotnd today," she says as I pass by, spinning in her chair to fix me with those venomous eyes.

  For a moment, my body tenses on instinct. The Sadie effect. But maybe it’s the morning spent practising being evil, because I feel remarkably capable of standing up for myself today.

  I put a hand on my hip. "Why? What’s going on?"

  Her stare sharpens, a warning. A silent shut up and do your job. I suppress the urge to flinch. You cannot show weakness in the presence of a predator. (Unless it’s a grizzly bear. Different rules there.) I hold firm, and something shifts. Her muscles loosen, and she answers me.

  "Just a hunch at the moment," she says, still looking at me like I’m something to scrape off her shoe. "But fertility rates in Scotnd have declined by a significant margin - and none of the expnations for it make sense."

  I frown. She’s told me this already, and it’s not much to go on. Sadie sees my scepticism and sighs. "Okay, but here’s the weird part - I’ve been checking the internal data of maternity wards around the country, and the number of appointments hasn’t declined."

  I raise an eyebrow, sparking her to correct herself. "Well, they have declined - but not as much as the falling fertility rate would suggest."

  My arms cross. "So people are still having babies, but they aren’t being reported?"

  "That’s the innocent expnation," she says. "Somebody’s fucked up the statistics, but I just can’t help but wonder if something else is going on. What if the babies are still being born, but something happens to them?"

  A chill runs through me at the thought. "We’d know if there were an epidemic of missing babies, wouldn’t we?"

  Sadie nods, exhaling an exhausted breath - though, thankfully, it’s frustration at the situation, not me.

  "Yes. Which is why Graham’s blocking any sort of field investigation," she says, voice tight. "I’ve got nothing but a hunch, so any data that you can find would be..." she sighs, "...greatly appreciated."

  If I’m being totally honest? I’m not convinced.

  There are missing pieces in her theory that don’t add up, and the most logical expnation - assuming everything she’s saying is true - is that somebody’s just done a really bad job at counting newborns. But then I remember how it felt yesterday, to be dismissed. And I decide to be the better person (kinda).

  "It’s a lot of data, Sadie," I say, watching her tense up before I raise a hand.

  "But," I continue smoothly, "I’ll see what I can get done today. If" - I pause for dramatic effect - "you do something for me."

  She blinks, slow and deliberate, like Chilli Con Carnage giving attitude on stage.

  "MH, if this is about your trans-"

  I hold up both hands. "Yes, it is - but I don’t want a lot. I just want to know what the rgest anti-trans groups in our local area are. Ones that actually meet up."

  Her gre sharpens. She looks like she wants to kill me. But I keep going.

  "You’re much better at researching than me, and I’m much better at reading RED data - so you do the research for me, and I’ll do the numbers for you. Deal?"

  "What do you even want this information for?" she says, not blinking.

  "George asked me for a full report to send to Graham," the lie slides out smoothly, effortlessly. "I’m seeing what I can get."

  She sighs, weighing her options. Just as I think she’s about to tell me to fuck off, she replies.

  "Fine. Find me a breach in Scotnd, and I’ll send you what I can find."

  I grin.

  I keep to my word and dedicate most of my morning to combing through Scotnd’s RED data from the past year. It wasn’t a lie when I said this was a ridiculously broad task - there are a lot of charts to look through. Thousands of files. Most of them have already been catalogued and annotated - by yours truly - which makes them easier to skim, but still. There’s no clear signpost. No blinking red light screaming about babies. Just endless, mind-numbing dots and bars.

  I try to focus, but it feels impossible. There are plenty of smudges, little anomalies that might be worth looking into - simir in size to the ones I’ve tched on to in my vampire investigation - but this case is bigger than two women. It’s big enough to warp national statistics. If something is happening, it’s massive.

  And yet, nothing I see is clicking into pce. Frustration builds under my skin as I scroll, skim, and scan. And underneath it all, my phone won’t stop buzzing. I don’t need to check - I know what it is.

  Holly’s Twitter account - @AdultHumanTweeter99 - came to life, earlier this morning. The foolish thing to do would be to start tweeting constantly about how much I hate trannies, and how much I want to shag the personification of an X chromosome. But I’m no amateur. Instead, I follow the big accounts - the notorious ones, the ones that get quoted in every news article about trans people. I retweet a few of their fgship posts. Then, I go to their list of followers and start following them. Smaller accounts. People who will see my profile, my little wall of retweets, and instantly follow back.

  In a few days, once I’ve built up a follower base and a backlog of performative bigotry, I’ll start posting my own takes. Then, Holly’s name will spread like wildfire. The buzzing in my pocket is from the suckers following me back. Too fucking easy. It’s almost funny. Almost. The fact that it’s this easy is concerning.

  I’m so numb to the constant barrage of notifications that I nearly miss the Bckline message.

  JordanB: heyy! (: sorry for Tommy yday I know that this trans thing is important to u

  I gnce over at Jordan’s desk. She’s typing away, eyes locked on the screen, not looking at me. I turn back to mine, a small smile tugging at my lips.

  It’s... surprising. But nice.

  I’m about to type a response when she surprises me again.

  JordanB: I did a lil bit of poking around and managed to get hold of theseJordanB: not sure if helpful but idk thought worth sharing

  A PDF appears. I open it, and the words "Coroner’s Report" stare back at me.

  My eyes go wide. A lump rises in my throat. I feel like I might cry.

  Maisie: Holy shit, JordanMaisie: Thank you so much!!!Maisie: This is really helpful.JordanB: np!! <3

  I stare at the document, Scotnd momentarily forgotten. I skim past the deadname, the sex marked as "M". I don’t have the energy for that outrage now.

  The location matches the news report I’ve already read. Estimated time of death: Somewhere between 11 p.m. and 3 a.m. A homicide investigation is ongoing, though I doubt it’ll yield much.

  Cause of death: Exsanguination. Sharp-force trauma to the neck. Deep ceration across the throat - consistent with a rge knife. The report notes irregur edges, suggesting forceful execution.

  No signs of restraint from the victim. No blood at the crime scene. No blood left in the body. No foreign substances in tissue samples.

  I exhale slowly. It’s not that useful - not in the way I’d hoped. I don’t know what I was expecting - maybe two neat, fang-sized puncture wounds to make my life easier. But even the most stoic coroner would’ve batted an eyesh at that.

  Still - this is insane. How do you drain an entire body of blood without any resistance? Without spilling a drop? I don’t care if the perpetrator was smart enough to ssh away bite marks after the fact. They’re still a fucking vampire.

  I fire off another thank you to Jordan, but when I gnce back at her desk - it’s empty. I blink, noticing the shift in the office for the first time. Several desks around me are also vacant, and across the room, a crowd has gathered near the far wall. They’re clustered around Graham, listening intently.

  The field agents - including Jordan and Tommy - have been summoned. Which means something is happening.

  Sadie catches my eye and shrugs. She doesn’t know either. Then, they all leave.

  I spin around to George. "What’s going on?"

  He picks at a nail, shaking his head. "Something’s happened on a train. I don’t have all the details, but apparently it’s big." His posture stiffens. "Reckon you can pull up any RED data for Westmornd and Furness, Maisie?"

  I nod immediately. "I absolutely can."

  I’ve got a few people from other pods gathered behind me as I scan through the data. It’s the least exciting spectator sport in the world, but I can feel them hanging on for dear life. Because nobody knows what the hell has happened. And the data isn’t helping.

  There’s a slight dey to it - since RED deals with the residual energy of a breach rather than the breach itself - and it’s still pulling through now. But one thing is clear. It’s big. We’ve had bigger breaches before, but that doesn’t make them less terrifying. Because anything from anywhere could be coming through. And if that doesn’t make you shit yourself at least a little, then you do not understand the extent of what anything could be.

  I should be scared. And I am. But I’m also fascinated.

  It’s not the rgest data point we’ve recorded, but something about it is wrong. Most breaches follow a pattern - a massive spike, followed by a steady decline as the energy disperses. This one spiked... and then stayed there. For half an hour, and counting.

  Which means one of two things. Either the breach is still open. Or whatever came through is so massive that it’s continuing to extrude energy into our world.

  I try to come up with an expnation that isn’t terrifying. I fail.

  "Tommy’s messaged me." Sadie’s voice cuts through the room, snapping every head towards her. She’s still reading from her phone as she speaks. "A train went into Helm Tunnel and didn’t come out the other side. It’s just vanished. They’re en route now - should arrive in about twenty minutes - to hopefully find out what’s going on."

  I exhale. Something in me rexes. Not because it’s great news - a whole train disappearing is very bad - but because it’s not an apocalyptic event. We haven’t had a fire-breathing skyscraper lizard emerge in the Lake District. That’s something worth celebrating.

  Still, I frown at the graphs. If a train was just unlucky enough to tumble into an active breach, then the readings should show a peak and a tapering off. But they don’t. Something else is happening.

  A low buzz shakes me from my thoughts. Not the rapid chime of Holly’s Twitter notifications - a different sound.

  Lexi: Have u heard about this train thing??

  I groan. Not even half an hour and we’ve already broken containment. If Lexi Fontaine has heard about it, then the entire world is watching.

  Cassie: Yeah!! Crazy stuff

  The response comes naturally. No hesitation. No panic. But this is going to be a problem.

  After another half-hour of the data refusing to budge, something finally happens. It drops. Not a slow, steady decline like a standard breach. It just tanks. One second, spiking - the next, it’s back to baseline. No tapering. No fade. Just gone.

  My stomach lurches, but before I can even open my mouth to announce it - Sadie steals my thunder.

  "The train’s back," she says, hand over her mouth in shock. "Tommy says the train’s come back."

  A faint cheer ripples through the office - people celebrating a near miss. But I can’t focus. Because it doesn’t make any sense. Unfortunately, to expin why, I need to give you a crash course in complex inter-dimensional physics.

  I’m sorry in advance.

  We don’t know a lot about the worlds beyond our own. But we do know they exist. The prevailing theory is the Great Ball of Yarn. Imagine that our world is a single thread in a massive, tangled ball of yarn. Billions of other threads surround us, pulling in every direction, at every second. The threads around us are constantly shifting - one moment, we’re next to a blue thread and a green thread, the next, we’re pulled away and now a yellow thread is touching us instead.

  It’s chaos.

  Some versions of the theory say there’s only one thread, and its configuration determines what parts of itself touch. But that’s not relevant here.

  The important part is this: if something leaves our world through a breach, it’s extremely unlikely to return to our world through that same breach. The threads will have moved.

  So you might be asking: Maisie, what do you think happened then? Reader, I have no fucking idea.

  I hear Sadie groan beside me. She rubs her forehead, already exhausted. "This is going to be a nightmare to cover up. Nobody talk to me for the rest of the month."

  I don’t need telling twice. I’m already on my feet. Already heading to Margaret. Because I need a second brain. Something to hold onto. Because this doesn’t make sense, and I hate it.

  "Well, you’re certainly right about it being weird," Margaret says, staring at my ptop screen, shaking her head in disbelief.

  I knew I was right, but it’s still reassuring to have someone else confirm I’m not losing my mind.

  Edgar sits next to her, looking at the ptop as if simply gncing at the data was a crime - and he was about to be caught. He’s a few years older than me - or at least, Maisie - but he radiates the energy of a deceased Victorian child who has fully internalised the idea that he is to be seen and never heard.

  I sigh. "We might have more information when we hear back about the train’s passengers." My voice is ced with defeat. "I’m sure they’re all being brought in for questioning."

  Margaret ughs, nodding. "I have a very busy afternoon ahead of me, Maisie."

  I don’t doubt it. Every single surviving passenger is going to be debriefed by a field agent, under the supervision of a senior researcher. I don’t know how many people were on that train, but even a handful is going to be a logistical nightmare.

  And selfishly, my fingers are crossed behind my back. Praying there’s no reason to drag me into it. No suspects that need to be modelled. No interviewees that need to be deceived.

  Edgar is squinting at the screen, and when I gnce at him, his pale face flushes red. But - to my surprise - he actually speaks up. "May I?"

  I nod, scooting the ptop over to Edgar. I try not to ugh at how he feels that he needs permission to breathe. "Go ahead."

  I watch closely, unsure what he’s up to. He pinches the touchpad, zooming in on the graph. I’ve already tried that. But he keeps going. And keeps going. Until we’re looking at a fraction of a microsecond. And that’s when all three of us see it.

  I had assumed it was one huge spike of energy. But that wasn’t true. It wasn’t one spike at all. It was billions of massive spikes and massive falls, happening in such quick succession that they blended into one mass. A shuddering, flickering, unstable presence in the data. That’s certainly never happened before.

  Edgar slides the ptop back towards me, and when I look at him, I catch the smug look on his face. I should be grateful. But I’m mostly annoyed that I didn’t think of it first. Apparently, I have a new rival when it comes to RED analysis. Better keep an eye on him.

  Margaret studies the screen in silence, her fingers steepled together in thought.

  I don’t do quiet thinking. "So... it’s less a case that the train vanished from our world," I say slowly, "and more that it... juddered between this world and another. Like a coin in a washing machine."

  Margaret nods, her expression pin. "They will have juddered through the Interstice."

  My blood runs cold, unable to process that fully.

  "Can people even survive that?"

  Margaret shrugs. Far too casual for a conversation about the fate of an entire train full of people. "Nobody knows," she says. "I guess we’ll find out. There will be plenty to learn either way."

  I swallow hard, trying not to look as disturbed as I feel. I’ve spent my whole life surrounded by scientists. I know how their brains work. I know how easily they can forget that not everyone is so enchanted by the pursuit of knowledge that they can detach from human life entirely. And I hate that I understand that to the extent that I don’t even react.

  I hate that it’s easier to do so when it’s not my life being disregarded.

  When I return to my desk, the office is quiet - the temporary era of gossip and comradeship having faded in my absence.

  But there’s a sheet of paper on my desk. I gnce at Sadie. She turns just enough to give me a small nod before going back to her screen. I sit down, fingers brushing over the stack of notes. Impressive.

  I’d half-expected her to dey this, but she actually came through. Which is good - because if she hadn’t, I’d be waiting a long time. Sadie’s job includes working with our media contacts to suppress narratives we want buried - and to push our version of events. Unfortunately for her, the national broadcaster pushed a breaking news alert an hour ago. A train has derailed on the Settle-Carlisle line. Which means it can’t be buried. It’s already out there. That’s obnoxiously quick for journalists, and it means that some of the facts are already circuting offices. Somebody high up in The Coalition will have already figured out a story, and now people like Sadie work to disseminate it. It’s not a job I envy.

  I should wait until ter to look at her notes. I should focus. But curiosity has always been a bitch. I flick through the pages - scanning for something useful - and find exactly what I wanted. Sadie’s pulled a blinder.

  A local chapter of a national group who call themselves Mother’s Day. I’ve never heard of them before, but based on her notes? They’re radical. Politically connected. And - judging from the nguage used on social media - potentially violent.

  They’re exactly the kind of group that the press likes to pretend doesn’t exist - because it makes transphobia look (gasp) bad. Despite the name, it doesn’t actually seem to be a group for mothers. It’s a group for "any biological woman looking to defend their right to exist". I roll my eyes.

  But my irritation flickers into intrigue as I scan further. Meetings are invite-only. A problem. But a workable one. I tap my fingers on my desk, already sifting through possibilities.

  The leader of the group calls herself simply "Dr M" - as if she’s a supervilin. On second thought, that’s probably hypocritical of me to judge. Her social media presence is almost bare. No personal photos. No real identifying markers. Just a green, white, and purple fg - a colonised relic of old-school feminism. A few quote-tweets of controversial articles, adding little more than a clipped "Exactly" or "This". No endless threading, no rants, no hours-long arguments with teenagers.

  I don’t have to scroll far to travel back months in her timeline. A TERF who isn’t terminally online? Colour me shocked.

  I don’t follow her - that would be too obvious - but I follow a few of the accounts that appear to be her mutuals. Hopefully, that gets me on their radar. If not, I’ll follow the big dog in a few days, when it feels more natural.

  I flick back to Bckline.

  Maisie: ThanksSadieC: Scotnd pls

  I gnce over at her. Not even a crack of a smile. No acknowledgement at all. Just watching her screen bnkly. I shouldn’t be surprised.

  I shrug and do the same - turning back to the Scotnd data.

  Okay, I can’t lie - Edgar’s little zoom trick is still eating at me. How didn’t I think of that? Probably because I’ve been so consumed by the monotonous patterns, day in and day out, that I’ve stopped looking at the graphs with any sort of creativity. I don’t think to change the way that I analyse them - because I’m already the best at it.

  I clench my fists. Toxic mentality. I shake it off. Fine. Let’s look at Scotnd differently.

  I pretend I’m somebody who has never looked at RED data before - someone new, flicking through it with fresh eyes, trying to make sense of it all.

  I zoom in. I zoom out. I yer charts on top of each other. I invert the colours. Nothing new reveals itself - but it feels good. Fun, even. For the first time in ages, I’m engaging with the data - not just processing it.

  I flick through the graphs fast, barely looking, skimming through them like a kid flipping through pages in a book. Only stopping when something catches my eye. And then - I see it. A tiny peak. Smaller than the smudge reted to my vampire issue. So small that I don’t even bme my past self for missing it.

  But as I keep flicking, my pulse kicks up. Because it’s there. Every single day. The exact same shape. It’s not random. It’s not noise.

  My fingers fly over the keyboard.

  Maisie: I might have something. Do you have a sec?

  The second I hit send, Sadie wheels her chair over, pnting both hands on my desk and leaning forward, eyes fixed on the screen. I circle the small peak with my cursor.

  "See this?" I say. "This is weird, right?"

  A frown creases her face as she watches me flick through the dataset - showing her the same peak, day after day.

  "Is it that weird?" she asks. "I don’t see many of these. Could it just be an equipment malfunction?"

  I nod. "It’s possible. But I’d have to physically travel there to check."

  Sadie tilts her head. "Would you be able to do that?"

  I gnce at George, sitting across from us with chunky headphones over his ears, oblivious to the conversation. "I’d need to clear it with George..."

  Sadie breathes a heavy sigh, already seeing the problem. "He’s not going to permit it, is he?"

  No. If Graham weren’t policing the budget like a dictator, and if the office weren’t in DEFCON 1 mode over the train incident, maybe I could argue for it.

  But asking to send me to Scotnd over a tiny blip in the data? Not happening.

  Sadie answers her own question. She crosses her arms. "What are you doing Sunday?"

  Oh, for fuck’s sake.

  I groan. "I’m working."

  She squints. "You work Sundays?"

  "A different job."

  Her eyebrows lift. "You have a different job?" She snorts. "Jesus, is Graham not paying you at all?"

  I just shrug, not in the mood to expin the benefits of community to Sadie Cross.

  She takes the hint and moves on. "What time?"

  I sigh. "I start at 2."

  "I can have you back for then."

  There’s something different in her voice. Something that almost - almost - sounds like vulnerability.

  I let out the biggest sigh of my life. "Fine."

  Sadie replies with the smallest smile ever conceived and nods. "I know it’s a lot to ask. Thank you, MH."

  My muscles tense. The moment of human decency instantly erased.

  "Maisie," I correct, voice tight.

  She just shrugs, already rolling back to her desk. "Whatever."

  About half an hour before the end of the day, the field operatives return in stunned silence. Not all of them - most aren’t back yet - but the first few drift in, looking shaken, like ghosts walking amongst the living. It’s the first sign they made it back alive. Though, judging by the tears in Jordan’s eyes as she slinks into her desk - it wasn’t a total success.

  I should just keep tapping away at my graphs. That’s the easiest option. But Jordan is sitting there, staring into space with the kind of look people get when they’ve seen something they can’t unsee. She helped me today, for no reason. So I don’t get the luxury of being emotionally distant.

  Maisie: Hey. You want to talk?

  She doesn’t type back. Just turns, nods, and motions towards the gss-walled meeting room at the end of the office. A private space. I hesitate - but only for a second - before pushing back my chair and following her through the now chatty office.

  The second the door closes behind us, the dam breaks. Jordan rips into full-on streams of tears, barely managing to stay upright before she pulls me into a bone-crushing hug.

  "Oh, Maisie, it was dreadful," she says, choking on tears and mucus.

  My arms hover for a beat before I awkwardly pat her back, trying to keep access to my lungs. "I’m sorry. It must’ve been hard."

  She nods - her chin knocking against my shoulder as she sniffles, breath hitching.

  "I don’t know how much you’ve heard," she says, choking on her words, "but the people in the train, they... they..."

  A frustrated, strangled sound leaves her throat. She can’t find the words.

  So I wait. I let her breathe, let her collect herself.

  Then she swallows hard. "They were in that tunnel for ten years."

  My breath catches. "What?"

  My whole body chills over. We had never considered that. But as the words sink in, my brain starts working. The worst part is that it makes sense. The train had been stalling in and out of the Interstice - a seam between worlds. We had no reason to believe time functioned there the same way it functioned here.

  "There were twenty people on the train," Jordan says, staring at the floor. "It was quiet. It’s the off-season."

  She swallows hard, voice barely above a whisper. "Only four got off."

  A jolt of shock runs through me, followed by a flood of relief. Four made it out. But that means sixteen didn’t. And if the four survivors are anything to go by - then whatever happened to them must have been hell on earth.

  "What did they eat?" I ask.

  Jordan’s head snaps up, eyes wide with shock, and I immediately realise that was one of Margaret’s science-brained questions. The kind of thought that should’ve stayed in my head.

  I hold a hand up, mortified. "Sorry, not the time."

  Still, I can’t help but be fascinated by the idea. Presuming they didn’t eat each other, then their bodies must’ve remained on our dimensional clock, even if their minds didn’t. But I’m better than the white coats, so I keep it to myself.

  Jordan rubs her eyes with clenched fists, still sniffling as she pulls back from the hug. Then she says something worse.

  "There’s a little girl." Her voice cracks. "She was born on the train. She’s four years old."

  A cold hand wraps around my lungs, and I let out an involuntary, "Fuck."

  A child born in the Interstice. As far as The Coalition knows, that has never happened before. A lump rises in my throat, dragging sharp spikes down my trachea.

  That child is never going to live a normal life. She’ll be belled a potential threat. She’ll be studied, tested, contained for research purposes. And her parents - assuming they’re among the three survivors - will never see her again.

  Jordan’s already thought through all of this. I can see in her eyes that she knows exactly what’s coming. Knows that she’s just spent her afternoon on a mission that will end in the torture of a small child, justified in the pursuit of knowledge.

  Her next words are barely louder than a breath. "What are we going to do?"

  I wish I had an answer. I wish I had something better to say. But I don’t.

  So I say the truth. "I’m not sure that there’s anything we can do."

  I hate myself for saying it, wondering how many people once said the same thing about me. But I know I’m right.

  Jordan nods slowly, her ponytail bouncing with the movement. But I see it in her eyes. She’s not convinced.

  I’m walking to The Drowned Duck as Cassie when my phone buzzes. The follow-back notifications have finally died down, so I’ve gone back to actually checking them. I expect a cat video from Lexi or a shady comment from Rico - but it’s neither.

  It’s a message on Holly’s Twitter account.

  @GetJobsNotPronouns: Hello, Holly. It’s always a pleasure to see somebody so young join our community.

  A thrill shoots through me. A pasty - my hasty girl dinner - is half-hanging from my mouth as I scramble to check their account.

  Anonymous. No name. No location. No pronouns, obviously. But I spot a critical detail. On their Followers list sits Dr M. Which means this is somebody I need to impress.

  @AdultHumanTweeter99: Thank you. I figured I’d make an account on here, since I apparently don’t get to have real-life friends anymore.

  The second I hit send, doubt creeps in. Too much? Too fast? Or just right? I get no indication from their response.

  @GetJobsNotPronouns: I must say, I’m surprised to see you using your real face on here. You should be careful - TRAs will try to doxx you.

  Bingo. This is a test. I lean into the perfect mix of naivety and resentment.

  @AdultHumanTweeter99: I know, but I don’t have much of an online presence. My mother never let me use social media. This is my first account ever lol!@GetJobsNotPronouns: Clearly a smart woman. She raised you well.

  A ugh bubbles up in my throat.

  @AdultHumanTweeter99: Well, almost.@GetJobsNotPronouns: Hm?@GetJobsNotPronouns: Oh, she’s indoctrinated in the gender cult, isn’t she?@AdultHumanTweeter99: Mhm.@GetJobsNotPronouns: I’m sorry. But don’t worry, we are turning the tide.@GetJobsNotPronouns: If you’d like, I can send over some resources designed to peak people.@AdultHumanTweeter99: Peak?

  I know what "peaking" means. It’s TERF lingo for "converting somebody into being an obsessed bigot".

  However, I figure that with Holly’s unfamiliarity with social media, it would be realistic for her not to know.

  I don’t know who @GetJobsNotPronouns (FYI, I have two - bitch) is. If this is a test, I can’t fail it.

  @GetJobsNotPronouns: To reveal the truth to them.@AdultHumanTweeter99: Ah. Yeah, that would be really helpful! I’ve tried a lot already, and she’s very stubborn, but anything you have would be appreciated.?@GetJobsNotPronouns: :)

  The response is almost cartoonishly sinister. They send me a list of tweets, and I thank them.

  But this isn’t the cult gatekeeper that I’m looking for. No invitations, no veiled sign of something bigger, no official documents stamped with a logo. Just some ckey giving out off-the-shelf propaganda.

  Still, it’s progress.

  I exchange a few pleasantries before closing out. I don’t tell them I’m leaving to go serve pints with my trans friends at our othering micro-pub. That’s between Holly and me.

  There’s a vegan burger truck in our car park tonight, which means it’s already an action-packed Friday when I rock up, ten minutes te, thanks to my TERFscapade (booo!). Normally, no one would notice. But Friday nights mean I have to endure the dreaded hands-on-hips stance of 56-year-old Eleanor Whitman.

  "Where’ve you been, Cass?" she says, her voice tilting higher. "Lexi’s sweating her tits off out there."

  I fsh my biggest, cheesiest grin. "Figured I’d keep you on your toes."

  Then I grab her into a hug before she can swat me away. She lets out a throaty ugh, pushing me off. "You girls are going to be the death of me."

  But instead of more scolding, she cracks open the till, pulling out a small stack of bills - my week’s pay. Before I can take it, she lifts it over her head, fanning herself dramatically. "First, I need to know about Lexi’s date tomorrow. She hasn’t told me a thing."

  I gasp in mock outrage, jumping for the cash and missing by a mile. "You can’t not pay me, Eleanor! I have worker’s rights!"

  She scoffs, still waving the money over her short, grey head. She doesn’t care that there are so many watching eyes in the room. "Not while I’m paying you cash-in-hand, you don’t!"

  I roll my eyes, but can’t help ughing. "She hasn’t told me anything. I just know he’s a cis guy. They’re going for coffee. That’s literally all I know, I swear!"

  Eleanor narrows her eyes, assessing me for lies - then sighs, defeated, and shoves the cash into my hands. "Don’t spend it all at once." The same thing she says every single time.

  "Of course not," I say, stuffing it into my bag. "I need my hardcore drugs to st all week."

  She rolls her eyes, giving me a light smack on the back before pointing towards the back door. Time to go help Lexi before she melts into a puddle.

  Outside, Lexi is glowing with sweat, her face flushed, but when she sees me, she throws her arms around me like I’ve just returned from war. I freeze slightly, overwhelmed by how much touching I’ve endured today.

  "What’s this for?" I say, ughing as she refuses to let go.

  Lexi lets out a dramatic whimper, muffled against my shoulder. "Eleanor’s torturing me for information, Cass." She tightens the hug. "Please save me."

  I grin. Absolutely not.

  When the vegan burger truck finally packs up, the bar quietens down - the drunkards migrating to rowdier pastures for the rest of the night. It’s nice to return to the stability of just the four of us (no Rico today) and a small group of unwelcome customers sulking in the far corner.

  Elias taps out an idle rhythm on the wooden bar top, background noise as he turns to Lexi. "Can you at least tell us his name, so that we can find him if he kills you?"

  She shrugs. "It’s the apps - you don’t get a full name. All I know is that he’s a cis guy called Thomas who works in some tech start-up. He seems sweet. He’s not going to kill me!"

  "Do you have a picture?" Elias leans in to peek at her phone - only to immediately back down when he sees zero effort being made to show him anything.

  Lexi smirks, slipping her phone into her safest, impenetrable pocket. "Nice try, but he’s straight, so don’t even bother."

  Elias shrugs, completely unbothered. "You doing anything tomorrow, Cass? Before work, I mean."

  I barely register the question, still keeping an eye on one of the customers who looks seconds away from climbing onto a table - which would mean immediate death-by-Eleanor.

  "I have my own coffee date to attend," I say distractedly.

  It’s only when Lexi lets out a high-pitched shriek that I realise my fuck-up.

  "WHAT!?"

  I barely process the squeal before she grabs my shoulders, vibrating with excitement. "Oh my goodness, my little Cassie’s all grown up!"

  My face goes scarlet. "No, no! I misspoke. It’s not a date!"

  Elias grins. "The dy doth protest too much, methinks."

  Lexi shakes me so fast I genuinely worry I might start involuntarily shifting. "Cassie! You need to tell us everything!"

  I push her off, holding up both hands in surrender, backing away like they’re a pair of feral animals. "Guys, it’s really nothing. He’s just some guy I met, whose egg I’m trying to crack."

  I think this will diffuse things. I’ve never been more wrong.

  Lexi jumps up and down like an overexcited dog, hands clenched like she’s trying to physically contain herself. And then, somebody cracks open the Lexi soda - and she explodes.

  "Tag me in! Tag me in!"

  She grabs me again, screaming directly into my face. "Please, you KNOW how much I love cracking them! You can have my date, I’ll take yours. PLEASE, CASSIE, I’M BEGGING."

  I ugh and shake my head, still feeling the echoes of mild panic, but thankfully, Elias pces a steady hand on Lexi’s back - a silent calm down, before you shake her unconscious. The whole room is watching us.

  Obviously, I can’t involve Lexi in this - because Jamie has never met Cassie, and Lexi has never met Niamh. Thankfully, I think the disaster can be contained.

  I smirk and brush her off. "I’m trying to crack an egg, not scramble one."

  She’s joking anyway. She’s spent all week bragging about her cis man - she’s not giving that up for anything.

  Just when I finally start breathing again, and the conversation moves on to safer, sillier things, the universe decides Cassandra Vale’s life isn’t nearly interesting enough. Because TERF infiltration, Scottish babies, and time-travelling trains aren’t enough for one day.

  I turn around and see Jamie Fuckegg (never got his st name, and "fuckboy" felt inappropriately gendered) standing at the bar. Talking to Elias. But looking straight at me.

  For a second, my brain fully malfunctions. Horror. Disbelief. An internal scream. There’s no way he recognises me - I look completely different. So why is he staring?

  What are the odds? No, seriously - what are the odds? Of all the bars in the city, he chooses this one. Nobody chooses this one. Why the fuck is he here?

  Before I can even think about making a swift escape, he moves closer down the bar, gaze still locked on me.

  "Excuse me," he says.

  My heart drops. I try to force the colour back into my face, but my voice still stammers when I answer. "Um, yes?"

  Jamie hesitates. "Sorry, I know this is a rude question."

  Always a fantastic start.

  "But, um... are you trans?"

  I want to ugh. Because I’ve done it again. My trans-detector (transceiver?) is more advanced than anything The Coalition could dream of building, and once again, it hasn’t failed me.

  But I keep my face neutral, allowing myself a mild scowl, as if resenting the fact that I’ve been clocked. "Yeah," I say evenly. "Why?"

  His face turns bright red. "Um, it’s nothing. Sorry, I just thought... I just wanted to say that you look beautiful."

  I need to ask Margaret to study my pheromones, because this is getting ridiculous. How has the same boy, twice in two days, unknowingly fallen for two versions of me?

  Elias, sensing my genuine confusion, steps in like my personal bodyguard. "Okay, Casanova, you can go now."

  He waves Jamie on, trying to defend my honour, but only flusters him further. "I wasn’t trying to-"

  "It’s okay, Elias," I interrupt, nodding at him - a silent I’ve got this.

  Then I turn back to the red face on the other side of the bar. "It’s okay, I know you didn’t mean anything wrong by it. Thank you, Jamie."

  He smiles, looking relieved, and walks away to join his friends. And that’s when my words hit me. My second major fuck-up of the night. You dumb cunt.

  LilAgarwal