Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Kim Pine opened up her eyes and felt more shit than usual. That was the first thing she noticed. Then she felt the covers of her bed, soft, softer than usual. They were usually so uninviting that even when she had just woken up she was itching to get out of bed. This was by design of course. But these sheets felt way better than what she was used to. “ Damn I must really be feeling like crap if I don’t want to get out of bed ” she thought. She rolled over and opened her eyes. Lying right next to her was Scott fucking Pilgrim.

Kim screamed, then Scott woke up and also started screaming. They screamed at each other, staring into each other’s eyes the whole time while doing it. Ramona ran in from the bathroom attached to the room, her room. Kim was in her room, in her bed. Along with Scott Pilgrim. Kim started to remember last night.

“The hell is going on with you two?!” Ramona asked “I thought you two were dying or something!”

“I- Kim just started screaming, so I screamed too!” replied Scott in confusion. Kim put her face into her hands. Kim continued to remember details about the night before, her face turned a pale red.

“Kim??” asked a concerned Ramona. 

“I don’t know whether to hate you, Scott or myself for this.”

Kim took a deep sip of vanilla walnut tea, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. Ramona’s kitchen was surprisingly nice looking, spacious and clean. Scott rocked back and forth in his chair, staring around at nothing in particular as Ramona ate her croissant.  

“Alright so I’m still trying to get my head around it; what the hell happened last night?” asked Kim, trying to fill the silence with confusion.

“It’s pretty simple: we went to Julie's party together, we talked, Scott fought a bunch of robots, we all got drunk, we drunk cuddled, then we all went to my house and slept in my bed” said Ramona with her mouth half full, recounting the events partially for herself.

“Yeah!! That’s what I remember” said Scott, mouth completely full.

“But- I’m not a cuddle drunk, I never have been.” Said Kim, “I’m more of a ‘confessing my deepest crimes’ type of drunk.” 

“I don’t know what kind of drunk I am, I’ve never been drunk before!” Scott laughed, his bright brown eyes shimmering “It was crazyyyyy”

“Thanks for the contribution Scott.” Sneered Kim sarcastically

“No problem!” Scott said with an earnest smile. Ramona giggled a bit then recomposed herself.

“Listen Kim.” said Ramona softly, “Everything is going to be fine, we can just forget this night ever happened and move on with our lives. Maybe tell it as a funny story over Thanksgiving. Nothing about our relationship has to change”

“It can change!” Inputted Scott hopefully.

“Don’t even try it, Pilgrim,” Kim said.

“I can get you home using a subspace highway, it’ll be much faster.” offered Ramona motioning to a suspicious door with a star on it at the back of her house.

Kim thought about just walking home herself. As per usual she didn’t want to talk to anyone ever. Especially not with a hangover still bouncing around her head. So walking home would be ideal if it wasn’t an unmitigated disaster out there. Kim glanced at the cold then turned back to Ramona

“You know what, fuck it. Take me through subspace Rammy. Thanks for the offer” Kim said gloomily but genuinely. Ramona took her hand. 

“Alright, follow me and you’ll be fine.” Ramona told Kim. Kim felt… something. Was she really that damn sensitive to handholding?? Ramona yanked her off her feet before she could compartmentalize and without a second thought dove through the door into the snowy black abyss. 

They were at Kim’s flat, bursting through the door with the wind of subspace rushing in from behind them.

“Damn, thanks. That was pretty spot on.” Kim said

“No problem” replied Ramona, “honestly I impress myself with these jumps sometimes. I guess doing it for work has made me pretty good at them.” 

Kim looked down and realized that they were still holding hands. She thought about letting go but for some reason she hesitated. Ramona let go of her hand. 

“Well, go ahead with whatever you do during the day. It was chill getting to know you better.” said Ramona

“Video store.” Kim shared awkwardly, “I work at a video store. No Account Video.” They both looked at each other in silence for a horrible couple of seconds.

“Cool.” said Ramona “Well I’ll see you around.” She gave Kim a two fingered salute and fell backwards into subspace. The door closed by itself. “ Why did I say that? Why did I say that? Why did I say that?” Kim thought repeatedly as she dwelled on the botched social interaction. She looked at the clock, it was 08:45. Her shift was in 15 minutes. The commute took 30 minutes. Kim let out a deep and regretful sigh. “I should’ve just told her to take me to work…” she bemoaned to the empty flat. 

Kim walked through the doors of No Account Video as they jangled behind her. Hollie Hawks was sitting at the desk as per usual. “Hey Kim.” she said before getting back to work tapping away at her computer.

“I’m sorry I’m late Hollie, stuff has been dumb” said Kim as she got behind the desk. 

“No prob, honestly I was kinda expecting you to just not even come to work from what happened last night with the whole robot thing. How’s the hangover?” she asked jovially.

“Wait- how the hell do you-” said Kim, clutching her head. That hangover was going to kill her at this rate. “Wait, you were at the party?!”

“Hah, yeah! I go to all of Julie’s parties. How could I not? She's my roommate’s boyfriend’s ex-girlfriend!” Hollie said. Kim blinked twice groggily. Her brain was way too foggy to this. 

“Your roommate has a boyfriend?” she asked, that being the only thing she could take away from Hollie’s statement.

“Yeah actually, though I don’t think he’s out yet- the boyfriend I mean.” Hollie stared at Kim in deep thought, considering her next move. “Yeah, I won’t tell you who he is. But when you figure it out you’ll be soooo surprised”

“I’m sure I will. Now can we stop gossiping and get the hell to work?” Kim said grumpily, she didn’t intend her rage towards everything that’s been happening in the last 24 hours to be thrown at Hollie but she barely could muster the urge to apologize. Hollie’s dealt with her bullshit before, she can take it.

Kim sat stone still at the counter, barely functioning. The sunlight coming from the store’s front windows was the only thing keeping her slightly upright. Hollie returned to the desk. “You good Kim?” she asked. Kim stared blankly, thinking. Scott and Ramona… those two. Why did she do that last night, with them of all people? She’s never done that while drunk! What was so damn special about them? Special isn’t the right word, at least not for Scott. He’s the lamest guy in Toronto, a complete failure, he doesn’t even know how to tie his shoes. He sleeps for most of the day when Ramona’s not there to keep him in check, just sleeping peacefully, maybe even snoring. He’s just completely obnoxious, the scum of the Earth. She didn’t know why she still stuck around him with all of that obnoxious shit going on. He’s not important and she’s completely over him. She should stop focusing on him. She needs to stop focusing on him. Right now. 

She finally stopped focusing on him; him and his dorky smile and puffy brown hair and doughy, doggish, brown eyes were as far out of her head as they could go. While he wasn’t special, Ramona was… a different story. Something about her was undeniably noticeable. She wasn’t lying last night when she wished that she was her. God what was she thinking- even if she did like girls, Ramona is way out of her league. She had everything, she was hot, clever, and level headed; everything that Kim wasn’t. That conversation they had last night, it felt so peaceful, almost like Ramona understood her despite them both being from completely different worlds. “ How the hell does she always know what to say? Even if I was drunk last night, taming me when I’m drunk is more of an accomplishment than getting me to cuddle when I’m awake. Wait- No, I need to stop. I shouldn’t be thinking this I shouldn’t do this. She’s already got Scott and I shouldn’t open myself up to her ruining my life like Scott did. If I keep my distance I’ll be able to protect her and myself, just like everyone else I love. ” Kim thought, “ Wait shit did I imply that I love her?! Shit I- ”

“KIM!” hollered Hollie, shaking her “Are. You. There?” Kim snapped out of her stupor and returned to the musty video shop in a cold sweat.

“Sorry-” Kim said, “Mondays am I right?” she forced out the fakest laugh ever chuckled. Hollie tilted her head at her

“You know it’s Wednesday right?” Hollie asked sassily.

“Ah, cool” Kim said with a grimace on her face, her head fell to the desk with a pathetic thump.

“Kim are you… alright?” Hollie asked, she put a gentle hand on her shoulder. Kim felt the warmth of the hand and shivered a bit. The touch, as meager as it was, made her feel a bit better about her crappy little life. She decided to do something she’d never done, say no to someone asking if she was okay.

“No- god no” Kim said, slightly muffled with her head in her arms.

“You wanna talk about it?”

“Hell. No.” Kim said sharply.

“Alright,” said Hollie, sighing at what she was about to do “Head on out.”

“Huh?” Kim took her head out of her arms and looked up at Hollie

“You heard what I said, scram” she said with a smile “I’ll cover your shift. I can’t work while seeing you like this, so get outa here until you get better. Got it?”

The doors of No Account Video jangled behind her as she left the shop, the cold Toronto air nipped at her once again. She gazed around, not exactly sure what to do with herself now. Hollie’s offer was both a blessing and a curse. She looked to her left and found a dainty door with a star on it. She walked to the door and put her hand on its handle. She pondered the door. “ God am I really gonna do this? ” she thought, feeling the cold metal of the door handle on her ungloved fingers. “Fuck it” she said as she tore open the door and dove into subspace once again.

She freefell through the familiar void that she had traversed with Ramona and Scott only a night before. As she continued falling, an odd speck in the distance grew bigger and bigger. She thought it was just a piece of snow that made it in with her through the door, but it looked like… a desert? She kept falling and falling until she smacked face first onto this unfamiliar ground. She got up and brushed off the sand.

“What the hell…” she said to herself out loud. She looked around, nothing but sand for kilometers, or sub kilometers, or whatever measuring system you use for subspace. She heard a voice in the distance, it was male but… oddly feminine.

“So… Scared.” she ran towards it

“So… afraid” the voice said, wait was that Scott’s voice?! Kim ran faster towards it. As subspace shifted around her, she saw a haze of greenery in the distance. An oasis. She ran as fast as she could, kicking up sand from beneath her. She finally arrived and brushed away the greenery. Scott was in a fetal position in the oasis’s shallow pool of water. It was Scott but something was different. Scott’s hair fell all the way down to the shoulder blades, way longer than it even was back when Scott was with Envy. His physique was off as well, in a way that was impossible to place. Kim crept over to him and hesitated. She slowly took her hand and placed it onto his shoulder. She suddenly felt a feeling of unease rushing into her body from the contact. He looked straight up at her, directly into her eyes.

“Kim???” Scott gasped as it felt like subspace unraveled around them. The ground shook, the plants around them withered and died, Scott turned to water and splashed into the pool, then it all drained. Sand fell out from beneath Kim and she tumbled deep into the void as Scott’s subconscious dreamscape evaporated. Kim felt herself disappear into the pitch black of subspace.

***

Scott awesomely woke up on Young Neil’s couch, breathing quickly. It was supposed to be a one on one practice sesh with Stephen but he fell asleep on the couch before he could play a single note on his bass. Could you blame him? Last night was craaazzzyyyyyy. He got to sleep next to Ramona AND Kim at the same time!! Honestly it’s surprising that Stephen DIDN’T need a nap.

“You’re up.” Stephen said while tuning his guitar for the whateverth time “are you ready to play now? I’m getting antsy.”

Scott rubbed his head with his hand. “I just had the craziest dream” he said in a daze.

“Oh god not this again…” Stephen said as he put his head in his hands. 

“Like, it wasn’t like the other ones, well it was really similar.” Scott explained. “But- I saw Kim!” Stephen took his head from his hands and look at Scott weirdly

“Wait- Kim?” Stephen asked wearily, “what was she doing there?”

“Yeah I thought it was only Ramona that could come up in your dreams.” Neil said as he played his really-really-cool clear-case Gameboy on the couch, as always. 

“Also something else was super weird about it,” continued Scott awesomely, “Kim just being there kinda makes sense… She knows about subspace too. But her being there made my dream… different.” Scott pondered this as the three guys sat in silence.

“Why don’t you play bass about it?” Stephen said with a smile, handing Scott his bass. Scott nodded as he grabbed the bass awesomely as he got to practice. 

***

Kim kept falling through subspace without any ground in sight. Random objects hurtled through the air around her; she twisted and turned to dodge as much of the debris as she could. A lamp post, a big block of bricks reminiscent of one of Neil’s stupid games, random lost socks, they all whooshed past her in a blur. She careened into a massive piggy bank, smashing it on impact and sending the coins inside flying in all directions. She oriented her body downwards and through the whooshing, stale air she managed to pry open her eyes. A rectangular light, a doorway, her way out. She darted through the air, tilting left and right, aiming for the opening. Air flew past her, her hair flew backwards as the wind pushed against it. It would be close but she was going to make it. The light got closer and closer to her and she soared through the doorway like a thread going through a needle.

She was thrown out of the end of the highway forcefully, tumbling across the old snow. She managed to stop rolling and right herself, staring around at where she was. Where she was… Wait- where was she?

Chapter Text

Scott pilgrim opened the door to Ramona’s house awesomely. It was kinda dark inside but in a cool way, which fit Ramona’s very cool and awesome vibe very well. 

“Ramonnnnaaaaaa I’m backkkkkkkk” he shouted to the empty house.

“Oh, hey” Ramona said, sitting on the couch right next to him, reading a book that Scott had to read (but didn’t) in high school. 

“Ramona!!!” he said with joy, having fun just noticing her. He turned over to the couch and kissed her on the forehead. She looked up from her book at him.

“So how was practice?” She asked cooly (she’s so darn cool). 

“Great!” Scott scratched the back of his head awesomely, “well I slept for most of it but other than that it was pretty good” Ramona chuckled at him.

“Yeah that scans- I hope Stephen wasn’t too angry about it.” She said in that way which always kept Scott entranced by her words. 

“Nah he was chill.” replied Scott. “Oh! Also, something else weird happened”

“Do tell” said Ramona, she was so good at listening to him.

“When I was asleep,” Scott said, “I saw Kim in my dream.” Ramona put down her book and sat up on the couch in attention. She started bobbing her right leg up and down.

“Wait-  what?!” asked a shocked Ramona.

“Yeah it was crazyyyy” said Scott, laughing to himself, “I guess she uses subspace too huh? Great now I gotta deal with two girls walking around in my brain regularly” 

“If that really was her I’d be very concerned” said Ramona seriously, her anxiety growing

“Huh?” said Scott, he was starting to notice that something was worrying her.

“Scott, subspace isn’t all fun and fast-travel, it can be really dangerous if you don’t use it right.” She put her hand on her forehead and sighed, “I’m technically breaking the law whenever I take you through it. You need a license and training in order to actually use it to travel any distance more than a few feet.”

“Woah! I’m a criminal! And you didn’t even tell me.” said Scott, invigorated by the rebellion he had been unknowingly doing this whole time.

 “Yes, technically, I guess,” Ramona said, exasperated at Scott’s shock at this minor crime, “-wait don’t you pirate movies? Why are you so shocked at this, you’re already a criminal.”

“I don’t pirate movies, Wallace does. I just watch them with him” Scott said confidently and awesomely.

“Whatever, just-” Ramona took a moment to recollect her thoughts. “I’ve mostly been taking you through the dreamscapes of people who are already awake, so they couldn’t be too much of a threat. If she was in your dream then that means that she was inside of your dreamscape while you were unconscious. This is a serious issue Scott, going through a dreamscape without a rulebook on hand could be a serious danger to-” Ramona kept talking. Scott started to space out, awesomely of course. He was thinking of Neil’s really cool see-through Gameboy. Where did he get it? Scott didn’t ever remember seeing a see-through version on any of the ads he watched. It must’ve been a special edition or something. Maybe he won it in a contest! Nah, if he won it he wouldn’t have stopped talking about it. He’d have to ask Neil about-

“-which could lead to further abstraction from your own subconscious which could lead to you flying further off course and maybe even just landing in the middle of the pacific! Scott, are you listening?” Ramona asked.

“Huh?” said Scott, trying to say it awesomely. But even Scott can’t say “huh” awesomely. Ramona sighed.

“Just know that going through someone's dream in subspace is super dangerous and should only be done if you have a license.”

“Got it.” Scott said, regaining his awesomeness. Ramona paused for a bit, thinking. 

“I need to go find Kim.” she said boldly.

“Huh?” Scott gasped, losing his awesomeness again.

“I can’t leave this be, she’s in danger I know it” Ramona said, it was clearly getting dark.

“Wait! But-” Scott stuttered, brown eyes shining in the moonlight “Can I at least come with you?” Ramona was preparing herself to go.

“Can’t. It’s too dangerous for you.” She said while taking Scott’s coat and putting it on, “I have to do this alone.”

“Wait!” Scott said as Ramona slammed the door behind her. Scott was now alone, so alone. “She took my coaaaattttt” he moaned to himself.

***

Ramona skated through the new snow, it melted as her skates cut through it. The harsh winds blew at her face, she shivered. “Now… where would Kim have gone where she encountered a way into subspace.” She asked herself uselessly, why was she talking to herself? It only served the purpose of annoying the people around her. She thought to herself. “ What the hell does Kim do during the day… ” She remembered their awkward talk from earlier that day (the awkwardness was her fault) “ Video store! She works at No Account Video! ” She skated over to the doors of No Account Video, it was closed, obviously. Ramona sighed and then remembered something that she should’ve remembered the moment she went out of the door. “ Wait! I know her address! What am I doing- I can just head over and ask Hollie for some leads ” she looked to her side and found a subspace door. “ Bingo.” she thought, why the hell did she think that? Who the hell says ‘bingo’ anymore?

She jumped into the door and flew through subspace. Planning to just take a quick trip to Kim’s house. Then she noticed something odd floating in the void. Was that… a strand of red hair? It was! Right next to No Account too. That had to be her. She dove deeper, the clutter got more frequent and more broken. A few shards of a piggy bank and a bunch of loose cash, more red hairs, a ton of scattered sand. She was on the right track. She dove further. She felt the air get thinner and thinner, she was nearing the end of this bubble of subspace. She still saw signs of Kim though, how bad did things get? 

She left subspace, landing on old snow as it scattered all around her. She got up from her landing pose and started looking around the area. It seemed to be a fairly rural part of Canada; sunlight bathed the snow and hurt her eyes a bit. As she squinted through the haze, she saw footprints in the snow. It had to be Kim. The prints seemed scattered, hasty almost, they scarred the snow. Ramona followed them, they got hastier, heavier. They went into the nearby woodlands, which despite having their leaves ripped off in the fall before, still were inexplicably dark. Ramona trudged into the woods, shuffling through her purse to find anything that she could use as a light source. A flashlight, a box of matches, anything. “Ahah-” Ramona vocalized as she found what seemed to be some sort of old lantern. She forgot where she got this, but she’s not looking a gift horse in the mouth. She cleared out the snow from beneath her and set the lantern down on the dead brown grass. She placed a bit of the grass into the lantern and found a fallen stick. She snapped it in half and rubbed the two sticks together as fast as she could. Eventually they yielded a spark that landed on the lantern’s fuel line just right and the lantern lit up. “ Thank god for those boy scouts lessons ” Ramona thought to herself, remembering those cringy pre-transition days. She picked up the lantern and held it out to the woods, even with the light the thicket still seemed to go on for sub-miles. Ramona followed the footprints as they spiraled around the woods; going left, then right, then left, then doubling back on themselves. What the hell was she doing? She got more tired as she went on, the footprints unwinding and scattering further. Then she heard a scream echo through the woods, Kim’s scream. She picked up pace and started running, creating footprints like the ones she saw in the snow before. She was barely looking where she was running, holstering the lantern on her hip so she could run faster. She wished she could skate but the woods were far too cramped to do it safely. She did it unsafely. Ramona’s heels clicked together as she jumped off the ground and activated her skates. She bobbed and weaved through the trees, the friction of her skates on the dry grass below the snow created sparks and lit fires in the wake of her path. She didn’t care, she didn’t look back, she sped towards the source of the scream. 

“Help! God, somebody help! Is there anybody out here?! I need fucking rescue!!!” The voice continued, it was clearly Kim. She continued shouting indiscriminately, barely forming words. Ramona picked up the pace even more, the fires behind her raged on. She put on her goggles, the cold was so harsh that her vision was starting to freeze up. The goggles fogged heavily, she could barely see but she kept moving. Her determination overtook her, she let go of everything other than saving Kim. She kept going, her skates starting to get damaged as the constant friction got to them. The fires behind her burned fiercely, licking her back with heat. The cold in front of her didn’t even phase her anymore. She kept going and kept going and kept going and- SLAM! 

She felt the force of an impact, at first it felt like a tree. But it was way softer than any of those dead oaks and she felt what she impacted fall to the ground along with her. Ramona took off her goggles and blinked twice, unlatching the still burning lantern from her side and held it up. She saw Kim reeling on the ground, trying to get up.

“Kim!!” Ramona gasped as she ran over to the shivering Kim “I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry!” she held out a hand for Kim to take. Kim looked up at her and took her hand.

“We need to get moving.” Kim said direly as she climbed to her wobbling feet. “Now!” She took Ramona’s hand and started dashing further into the forest. Ramona looked behind them and saw a figure lit by the raging fire she left in her wake. It was covered in a kind of spine-like fluff, the dim gloom of the fire couldn’t quite bring out any details other than the creature's burning brown eyes. The two kept running through the woods, creating smudgy footprints in the old snow.

“Get me into your purse, we need to go faster.” Kim suggested, Ramona clutched her purse close to herself.

“No!” She exclaimed, “We’re already way too deep into subspace, I can’t shove you deeper”

“We’re still in subspace?!” said Kim looking around. Ramona felt a looming presence in the distance, the burning brown eyes glimmered from deep in the woods. “God damn it Ramona where the hell are we?”

“Still working on it,” said Ramona, she could see that Kim’s anxiety was growing. “Get onto my back, I think that my skates are strong enough to support both of us” Kim wordlessly shuffled onto Ramona’s back like a crazed animal, desperately trying to get a foothold.

“Jeez! Ow- Kim!” Ramona yelled as Kim found her bearings

“GO!!” Kim shouted fearfully, shaking slightly. Ramona took off, gliding through the snow on her skates, the ensuing fire created a smokescreen and stopped the creature in its tracks, its brown eyes still glowed through the smoke. Ramona kept skating, determination in her eyes.

“Holy shit Ramona!” Kim said as she saw the fire burning from beneath Ramona’s skates. “You’re gonna burn the whole forest down!” 

“It’ll grow back.” Ramona said stoically. Her skates continued to pop and shudder, the severity of stress not dissimilar to Kim’s. Clearly not built to hold this much weight, they scratched violently against the ground; stalling and starting again. The stack shaked, they both screamed as one of the skate’s wheels popped off and flew into the woods sending the duo flying. Ramona closed her eyes as they crashed through tree branches whilst holding each other, and suddenly she felt a bright searing light on her eyelids. She opened them, they were out of the forest. They tumbled through the snow as they clutched each other, eventually they landed on top of one another. Safe. They were finally safe. They held each other as they shivered and tried to calm the hell down; tightly holding each other like their life depended on it. 

“Wait- is this Scotts coat?” Kim asked and started laughing, Ramona laughed along with her.

“My coat was upstairs, walking all the way to my room then walking back wasn’t exactly conducive to storming out in a hurry to find you.” Ramona said with a smile, aware of how silly she sounded. Kim laughed again.

“Holy shit we really made it out of there” Kim said. The two girls got up and looked back at the woods, it was completely engulfed in fire. They stared at the flames together. Kim turned her face to Ramona

“The fire was a nice touch.” She said, 

“Thanks,” said Ramona. “It was unintentional.” They watched the forest fire together in silence. Kim’s hand idly moved around, as if it was grabbing for something. Ramona took it. Kim squeezed Ramona’s hand tightly as they watched the fire rage.

***

Kim crumbled to her knees as the two entered Ramona's house. It’s lucky subspace spat them out here, or was it Ramona’s skill with it? Who knows. She was absolutely done, almost shaking on the floor. Ramona got down onto her knees as well, “It’s alright now, we’re safe.” She said, tilting Kim’s head up and looking into her eyes, “I’m certain that we’re out of subspace.” Kim stared at her, almost snapping out of her fearful trance. She looked around at the warm house bathed in moonlight, then outside at the harsh Toronto snow.

“Can I stay here?” Kim asked weakly

“Sure you can.” Said Ramona with a smile. Even after all of that trouble Kim got her in she was still smiling and being nice to her. Why was she so damn nice to her?! Ramona held out her hand and hoisted Kim onto her feet, Kim kept Ramona’s hand in her’s. “You can sleep on the cou-“ Ramona tried to say, looking at the couch. It seemed that currently Scott Fucking Pilgrim was sleeping on it peacefully, snoring (she knew it!). The couch was covered in loose food containers, old, grubby comics, and an ad for a see-through game thing printed presumably from Ramona’s computer. 

“I see you left someone behind while looking for me?” Kim deduced, nothing like Scott being Scott to jolt her back to her old self.

“Oh Scott…” Ramona said to herself caringly. She got closer to him and ruffled through his containers and found a note. “Huh” she vocalized. “A note.”

“How many spelling errors you bet there’ll be?” Kim asked snarkily. Ramona rolled her eyes adoringly. She unfolded it and read it out loud.

“‘Dear Ramona,

I’m very very sorry for eating your pack of pomegranate seeds even though it had your name on it and everything. If I had money I’d buy you another one but I don’t so can we please have an IOU. I’m also sorry that I ate a lot of the other stuff in the kitchen as well including a sack of salt and vinegar chips, the popsicles that were left in the freezer—‘ okay a lot of this letter is just a list of foods.”

“I feel like we coulda made it ourselves by searching through the pile.” Kim said 

“‘—and I’m also kinda sorry for eating all of those foods as well. I was really really worried about you and Kim too and I wanted to go out and follow you but I thought that would be too creepy and also you’d get mad about it and also your skates are way too fast for me to follow and I don’t know how to use the skateboard I have so I just kinda sat here.” Ramona took a breath from the run-on sentence and then continued, “I hope you found Kim and I really hope she’s okay, I dunno what we’d all do without her. Also I hope it wasn’t too cold for you and I don’t mind you taking my coat, I know it’s warmer.’” The handwriting visibly started to deteriorate, Ramona squinted and started speaking a bit slower. “‘I love you a lot a lot… a lot a lot and you’re really damn cool for going to subspace and doing stuff like that and also breaking the law so I can get around faster. You’re also really really pretty and I’m sorry I don’t tell you that enough. Okay I’m getting really tired now ok goodbye.

-Scott’”

“Endearing.” Kim said flatly. She had her sarcastic facade back up and running but she was still clearly shaking. Ramona was getting tired.

“You wanna just sleep on my bed? I could probably sneak you out of the house before he wakes up.” Offered Ramona. Kim felt extremely compelled towards this offer. Her walls were completely down. She took Ramona’s hand as they walked upstairs, letting Scott sleep. He seemed peaceful enough over on the couch. 

The two made it up to Ramona’s room, it looked cleaner than it did earlier that day. The entire room was bathed in a dark moonlight that almost shimmered in Ramona’s eyes. 

“I have some spare night clothes if you need them.” She said motioning to the dresser, “they’re in the top drawer.” 

“Yeah- sure.” Kim said hesitantly, “hey so, can we not make this like… weird?”

“Only if you don’t!” replied Ramona with a perfect smile; lit by the moonlight. They both got changed into Ramona’s night outfits, respectfully looking away from the other while they did it of course. They looked back at each other.

“How cute, we match.” Kim said. Both hers and Ramona’s outfits were of the same composition but Ramona’s was blue and Kim’s was maroon. Ramona laughed at this banal remark and ruffled Kim’s hair affectionately.

“It looks better on you, honestly.” Ramona said sweetly. Kim put her hand behind her neck without even noticing, reeling a bit from the compliment from Ramona. 

“Eh, whatever.” Kim said, “it's not like we’re going out or anything.” Ramona got into the bed, and Kim carefully went in with her. She made it absolutely essential that they didn’t touch, she didn’t want to make it weird after all. She didn’t even have the excuse that she was drunk! They sat there in the bed, far apart from each other. They both were trying to sleep individually, they just happened in the same bed. Yeah, that’s what’s happening. It was just so damn cold, Ramona’s heating wasn’t quite as amazing as she was. “ Okay stop it, stop thinking about how amazing Ramona is and just… just ignore her!” Kim thought to herself. But it was so damn cold, and Ramona had an extra blanket over herself. If Kim could just sneak under that blanket without touching Ramona, she might be able to get the warmth without needing to confront her or… touch her. She moved herself over a bit, closer to Ramona. She did it carefully and slowly so Ramona didn’t get the wrong idea. This was purely for warmth. She moved a bit closer and got a leg under Ramona’s extra layer. So close, and she was still keeping her distance! This would be fine, everything would be fine. She moved herself further and got herself under the blanket. She took it in, still cold. She groaned and fidgeted around a bit in frustration. In her fidgeting she accidentally rolled herself over and came eye to eye with a sleepy Ramona. She didn’t want this to be weird, that was absolutely the last thing she wanted, but somehow Ramona kept her attention. It felt like Ramona’s focus was on her right now as well somehow. Even though she was almost halfway asleep. They were close to each other, way closer than Kim thought they would be when she tried to pull the blanket maneuver.

“Hey… Ramona?” Kim said sleepily, she thought to ask: “ I am still a bit cold. Are there blankets inside of your closet that I can use to warm myself up? ” But it came out as a very sleepy “... colddd.” Kim was planning to clarify her statement heavily but before she could think of the words Ramona wrapped her arms around her. Kim felt her temperature increase heavily, the cold was retreating from her body. 

“Warm?” Ramona asked. 

“Warm.” Kim replied. Ramona was just sharing her body heat with her, it was that simple and easy. Far far more convenient than getting a blanket from her closet, how practical of her. This was all extremely normal platonic friend behavior and not weird at all. 

“ Who am I kidding?” Kim thought to herself  “ Things are already weird.” She hugged Ramona back and felt an immense warmth. Things felt so weird but so right . She decided to embrace it all, nothing mattered right now except Ramona’s embrace. It felt like she was being fed after years and years of starvation. She got in closer to accept her embrace further, she felt positively addicted. Kim was as close to Ramona as she could be; feeling her softness overtake her. Ramona’s chest felt so comfortable for her to hide in, something that was missing from basically every guy she had ever dated. She hugged Ramona tighter, feeling herself need her more and more. Ramona reciprocated, taking Kim further into her arms. They were inseparable. Kim smiled.

A rustle came from the stairs. Was that- no it couldn’t be. Kim was just hearing things. The stairs creaked, progressively going upwards. Oh god. Scott’s awake. Fuck. Kim wanted to let go of Ramona, to hide under the bed, to disappear forever, whatever she needed to do to avoid this. She’d rather be back in the woods than here in what was happening right now. But she also didn’t want to leave Ramona’s embrace, she didn’t want it to end. The creaks reached the top of the stairs and a tee shirt in the middle of winter wearing, messy, unkempt boy appeared in the hallway. He looked extremely tired, almost sleep walking. Kim hid under the covers, trying to disappear, to do anything to prolong this interaction. Scott groggily looked around the room and then flopped into the blank space in the bed right next to Kim. What?! Why wasn’t he saying anything or doing anything? He rolled over and hugged Kim. She panicked silently. He barely opened his eyes to reexamine the unexpectedly not ramona shaped girl he was holding.

“Woagh… Kim you’re here too. That's cool.”  he said sleepily before dropping his head as his eyes fluttered shut. Now both Ramona AND Scott were hugging her. Kim’s brain was filled with so much. The warmth of the cuddle, the panic of almost having to explain whatever this was to Scott, Scott joining in, Scott cuddling her in the same way he did seven years ago and her still liking it, her cuddling with Ramona and also liking it, the two cuddling her at the same time, in Ramona’s bed, what the hell. Her brain was full and working harder and faster than it ever had needed to in order to rationalize all of this. Eventually all of the panicking tired her out so much that she just passed out from all of it, taking in the feelings. She felt Scott hug her deeply, peacefully sleeping. He rested his cheek on her back. Kim started to tear up, remembering so much emotion that she once wanted to forget. She scooted towards Scott, dragging a sleepy Ramona along with her. The cuddle pile condensed further; any cold that may have resided in Kim’s body was long gone. She felt the warmth and the love of the two coming at her from all sides. She felt calm for the first time that day. She fell into sleep as any conceptions of  “normal” and “weird” completely faded away from her. 

Chapter Text

The forest, that forest, she was back somehow. There was nothing but burnt stumps for miles and miles, Ramona really dealt a number on it. But this didn’t make her feel safe, she felt trapped and exposed at the same time. She still felt those eyes looming over her, though somehow they felt weaker, yet they were still very strong. She entered a fetal position, shivering. She looked around and saw an odd speck in the distance that was coming closer. Was that creature going to finally stop torturing her and just do it? Wait- no. That’s Ramona! She was gonna save her again! Ramona weaved through the stumps and when she got to Kim she started circling around her, kicking up snow as she did so. Was- was she holding an Amazon package?!

“Don’t worry Kim,” she said as she circled around her, “you’re just having a dumb dream.” 

“Why am I back here?!” Kim asked in frustration, looking for someone to blame for all of this.

“This is your mind Kim, you were trapped in your own subconscious yesterday. Now it's time to wake up.” The flurry of snow she was kicking up was starting to get really big.

“Could you stop rotating around me like that?” Kim asked in annoyance, “you’re kicking up a bunch of snow, I can’t see crap!” 

“Sorry,” Ramona said as she broke the circle and started skating off into the distance. “Rule 6 of subspace travel, never stop moving.” Kim tried to reach for Ramona, but she still felt petrified. 

“Wait- but how am I supposed to-”

Kim jolted awake in a sweat, gripping onto the covers of Ramona’s bed. Her room was empty. Ramona must be at her job delivering books to people who have never heard of a library before and Scott was who knows where doing whatever the hell he does during the day. She got out of bed one leg at a time and trudged over to the bathroom. She needed a warm shower. Hair dye products were strewn across the bathroom sink and she could see Ramona’s previous hair color circling the shower drain. She stepped into the shower and cranked the handle- okay she first needed to figure out how Ramona’s shower worked. It seemed like there was some sort of handle that you could pull left and right but also up and down, there were a few buttons to the right of the nozzle with strange runes on them, and it seemed like a keypad embedded into the shower wall? Kim fiddled with the controls until she could find a series of button and lever flicking patterns that correlated to making the shower hotter. She made it as hot as she could, she wanted to see how far she could go. Pretty decent. 

Last night… last night. That- why. She didn’t have the excuse of being drunk anymore, the one lifeline she was hanging onto for explaining all of this. God and Ramona saved her, how did she let all of that happen, why was her own mind like that to her?! Shouldn’t she have control of it? And that monster, what was it? It died in the fire didn’t it? Why could she still feel it? The shower was starting to run out of hot water as Kim felt her mind get hotter. She turned off the shower. The girl stormed past the product filled sink and dried herself off as fast as she could.

“I need to drum.” She said to herself as she put on her outfit from yesterday, it still worked. She didn’t care about that stuff right now. She went down the stairs and on the doorside table she saw a key and a note. “ Key to the house in case you need to come over again. -Ramona ” Huh. Kim took it and put it on her keyring as she went outside and caught the nearest bus to Young Neil’s house. She was not going to use subspace, that was for sure. 

***

Scott Pilgrim sat on a bench right in the middle of Bickford park, fiddling with his coat and rocking back and forth awesomely. Ramona was gonna get her break eventually, he could wait. Probably. He was debating over whether to bring up the whole “Kim thing”. Sure she had already explained the basics that morning but he was still incredibly anxious about it. Scott still wasn’t exactly sure what was going on but it had only been resulting in good things for him so he didn’t need to. He hadn’t gotten that close to her since all the way back then. Well, it went well back then. It went great! What reason is there for things to not work themselves out perfectly for everyone again? Yeah, this’ll be chill. He was Scott Pilgrim! His awesomeness would get everyone where they need to be in a jiff. 

He heard a familiar pair of inline skates tearing down the park path, it was her! Scott ruffled with his hair in order to make it look… better? Okay, he didn’t know what he was trying to do but it's the kinda thing you do when a pretty girl is skating towards you. She came to a perfect stop right in front of the bench and plopped right down next to him, taking a tired sigh. 

“Hii!” Scott blurted joyfully, hands in his lap.

“Hey.” Ramona said cooly, “what was it that you wanted to talk about? I’m kinda using my mandated break for this. If it’s about the Kim thing then I-”

“Nonononono not that.” Scott very much was afraid of talking about that, just thinking of it made him anxious.“I wanted to talk about um…” Scott started to trail off; he put his hand on his chin “that thing that you use to go around really really fast and also appear in my dreams.” 

“Subspace.” Ramona said helpfully.

“Subspace! Yeah!” exclaimed Scott, she was so good at remembering things. “I still feel kinda weird about that time Kim went into my dream.”

“Don’t tell me you’re obsessed with her now.” Ramona joked.

“No no no. At least I don’t think so” Scott said, “It just seems a bit different than the last time I remember it.” Ramona tilted her head at him.

“How so?” she asked, taking on that same anxiety she got when he told her about Kim being in his dream the first time. 

“I don’t know- it was just weird!” Scott asserted, “It was all covered in plants and stuff.” Ramona was in deep thought. She was already clearly sick of subspace, but one more adventure through it couldn’t hurt her right? 

“I can give it a check later tonight.” She decided, “If there’s anything worth mentioning I’ll tell you.” There we go, problem solved, or it is gonna be solved soon. That was easy! Hopefully this decision to examine himself further wouldn’t lead to unforeseen consequences. 

“Sooooo,” Scott kicked his legs up and down over the edge of the bench, “if you have any more time in your break… maybe we could talk some more?”

“Sure sweetie.” Ramona said with a smile, she chuckled at him in that way she always did.

“Nice!” Scott pumped his fists into the air. He started talking enthusiastically about the first thing that came into his mind, Ramona listened with a smile.

***

Agent #029 sat at her desk in her gloomy corner of the hideout, a bag of cat-shaped Japanese crackers sat on the right side of her desk. On her computer screen was a scruffy brown-haired guy and a currently blue and teal haired girl talking on a bench. She shoved one of the crackers into her mouth and crunched on it. They weren’t escaping her sights.

“Twenty-nine!” barked her handler, appearing out of nowhere as per usual “do you have eyes on the preservation target?” 

“Yes.” Replied #029, her handler peered at her screen. “I also have eyes on a possible disruptor. Target is already in phase one and slowly gaining awareness. Target is also telling her about their knowledge. It's only a matter of time before she figures it out and breaks the prime directive. She’s not shown much of an intent to preserve it in the past.” 

“I see…” said her handler, scratching her chin. “Be prepared for deployment onto the field if the disruptor makes further progress. This could be a serious threat to the directive.” 029 was pleasantly surprised by this new order. She smiled slyly. 

“Affirmative.” She said with a smile. Her handler walked off to bark orders at some other poor girl. 029 had just hit big, it looked like she just got a second chance.

***

“Ergh- Stephen could you help me with the bass drum?” Kim asked, she had gotten most of the set into his car but the bass was absolutely a two person operation. 

“Sure!” Stephen answered from the driver's seat of his car. He got out and ran back to give Kim some extra support. “Do you know where you’re gonna set this up?” He grunted as they got the bass off the ground.

“I’ll probably get it set up in Rammy’s basement.” Kim answered, hoisting her arms along with Stephen’s in order to shove the big Sex Bob-Omb emblazoned bass drum into the car’s bonnet [Author’s note: Bonnet is Canadian slang for the back compartment of a car for all of my American readers]. Stephen jumped upwards to grab the bonnet door and slammed it down. 

“Sorry again that you couldn’t play here Kim, we just gotta put on a really good front for Neil’s folks ya know?” apologized Stephen. 

Thanks to Stephen’s hyper-cautious driving, they made it to Ramona’s house and got the drum’s set up in the basement without them having taken too much of a beating during the drive. Stephen said his goodbyes and got back to his and Neil’s house to get the table all set up for Neil’s parents. Now Kim was alone in her basement with her drumset, she knew exactly what to do as she pulled over a stool and started playing. The sound of a steady rhythm filled the musty underground room, Kim picked up the tempo. She needed to be faster and louder if she was going to drum these anxieties away. 

***

Ramona slotted her key into the house’s door, with a tight click it opened up. The cold air flooded into the cozy abode, combated by the warmer air. Scott waddled into the house and she closed the door. She looked down at the cabinet next to the door, it looked like Kim had accepted her gift. She honestly wasn’t sure what made her want to give her those, she has her own home. She just wanted Kim around more often, that was all. The pair heard a thumping from the basement. Thump, crash. Thump, crash. Cracka, cracka thump! It was rhythmic and unyielding. Ramona checked downstairs and saw Kim attacking the drums with a methodic fervor. Her eyes were closed, she was in a complete trance. While it was cute that Kim brought her drums all the way to her house, it might interfere with her plans with Scott. She came back upstairs.

“Are you going to be fine trying to sleep with that downstairs?” She asked

“Sure!” replied Scott, “I’ve slept through worse back when I was roomed with Wallace.” Ramona tried to imagine what he meant by “worse” in relation to Wallace and then she very quickly wanted to stop imagining it.

“I’ll get you some sleep aids just to be sure.” Ramona said, tapping her foot to Kim’s rhythm subconsciously. That girl sure could throw out a beat. 

Ramona popped out some sleep pills as Scott rocked back and forth on her bed. He took a sip from his warm cup of sleepytime tea.

“I don’t know Ramona, sleepy stuff never really works on me.” Scott said between sips.

“These’ll work,” Ramona stated reassuringly, “I got them from a forestside gnome.”

“Oh wow, those are real?!” Asked Scott, how much did this guy not know about the world?

“Have you ever been on a deep forest hike? Gnome pharmacists are everywhere if you know where to look.” Ramona said in disbelief as she walked over to Scott, “here.” She dropped them into his hand. Scott gulped them down without hesitation and washed it down with some more tea. 

“Hmm, honestly I don’t feel any different…” Scott commented, “Maybe if I-” Scott fell unconscious, snoring immediately. Ramona sighed lovingly and tucked him in. She had a job to do. She hopped into their closet door, using it to double as an entrance to subspace.

The first thing she noticed about Scott’s dreamscape is that her skates felt heavy, bumpy almost. She looked down. Was that grass? That’s not how his subspace was like just a few days ago. She deactivated her inlines, they retracted back into her shoes. Walking would be faster. The grass got longer and thicker beneath her feet as she went deeper in. Foliage filled her view, she took out her hammer and battered them relentlessly into mulch. Scott wasn’t lying, things had changed around here. She could barely see the sky above her as it was covered by ceaseless leafage. As plants brushed against her ankles and she hacked away at the ecosystem that blocked her way, she felt a deep sense of dreadful familiarity in her chest. It was like she was being dragged back into a part of her life that she once thought escaped. Everything was pulling on her, begging her to go back. But she had to keep going, for Scott. 

She got to the core of whatever this was; the dread had only gotten stronger. Scott, or something that used to be him, was writhing in the center of a clear pool of water. Vines burst from his back and connected him to the wildlife surrounding him. Life was flowing between them. Constant change, constant flux, they fed each other, slowly becoming the whole they always were. Ramona was almost hypnotized by this, she fell into a fearful trance as she stared. Her body tensed up, her breathing sped up, she couldn’t stop shaking, her teeth chattered even though she wasn’t cold. The change, the pain, the feeding of one into another to one to all, the horrible reconnaissance only got louder.

***

Kim kept drumming away in the basement, the rhythm keeping her arms moving. At this point the drumset felt as if it was an extension of her as she slammed away at it. Forget flow state, this was something far, far more powerful. Her thoughts came at her quickly, almost synced to the bpm of the drum. What the hell did she think she was doing was Ramona? What was this cutesy cuddling and being all soft bullshit? Basically taking up residence in her house and moving her damn set there?? She really was so desperate to escape everything that she was becoming a fucking dyke to do it?! Her heart rate accelerated to the bpm of the drum, her body was completely gone, a servant to the set. Kim’s mind was left to run on itself. What had Ramona done to her, this must have been her doing. She wasn’t the first person to fall for her shtick, why didn’t she ever find it suspicious she had that many exes who followed her? She was a manipulator, she made Kim like this. She had to have done it. Kim hated her. She hated her! She hated her! 

Ramona’s smile flew into her head. She broke out into a sweat, her drumming got off kilter. She was clearly still in a deep flow but what she was using it to create got stranger, more off putting. Ramona’s sweet embrace filled her mind. The way she saved her so impossibly well, leaving a badass fire in her mind at the end. She was just so… The beat skipped, had odd pauses, morphed into an odd time signature. It was unraveling, a deep agony built up inside her. She tried to push Ramona away from her mind, she would do anything to just build that contempt again. The thoughts of Ramona only came back to her stronger and more passionate. Tears flew from Kim’s cheeks as her head moved in rhythm with her playing. She loved her, she fucking loved her. She opened up her mouth and let out a deep guttural cry. A deep scream that carried as much weight as a sound could hold. It quaked, it crackled, but most of all it projected. Even in the grounded walls of the basement, it made it out of Ramona’s floorboards and out into the world. It was unending, she screamed as hard and as emotionally as she could. Kim couldn’t stop it, the cry got louder as she slammed harder onto her drums. She dropped any semblance of rhythm that she may have held up earlier. It sounded like a wounded animal, doing anything it could to try and fill the silence of their impending doom. All of her wounds, everything that she had needed to carry, her self-hatred, everything that everyone had just taken for granted, it all crashed down on her into one great wail. The house shuddered, Scott tossed and turned in the bed that he, Ramona, and Kim had slept so peacefully the night before. 

***

A din echoed through Scott’s subspace; Ramona felt the entire thing unraveling. She broke out of her trance as she felt this pocket of subspace start to tighten on her. What the hell was happening out there? What was that damn noise?! The plants seemed to somehow age, turning brown and shriveling up like the beginning of autumn had just arrived. She activated her skates and went as fast as she could, now piercing through the dying grass. Scott was waking up. If she could hear whatever was happening out there inside of subspace, he wouldn’t be staying down for longer. Luckily she was an expert at exiting unstable subspaces, she wouldn’t experience the same fate as Kim. She weaved through the tears in the fabric of nothing, the scream got louder. She was closer to the exit. Just a little further and…

Ramona Flowers burst out of her closet as Scott jolted awake on her bed. The scream continued through the house. It was coming from her basement. Scott came to the same realization as her, it was Kim. The scream slowly faded into silence as the two jolted down both flights of stairs. Kim’s drum set was empty, it was almost smoking from how intensely it had been played. Next to it was Kim lying in a pile and crying on the floor. The two ran up to her and crouched down. Kim attempted to form words between sobs. Ramona took Kim’s hands in hers; Kim tilted her head up and blushed slightly with her eyes full of tears.

“Ramona…?” She gasped softly between sobs, “I think I’m a lesbian…” She broke into tears at this. Ramona took her up in her arms, placing one hand on her head and rubbing slowly. Kim squeezed her back hard. Scott lifted himself to move, but hesitated. He freezed in the middle of the basement. His eyes welled with tears, his mouth was held agape. He stared at the two embracing each other, petrified. He ran away crying as the two continued to hug. 

Chapter Text

Scott Pilgrim ran through the quiet streets of Toronto as fast as he could. His feet bolted against the snow as he tried to get as far away as possible. Tears froze to his cheeks. This couldn’t be happening, this could not be happening. What was he going to do?! Everything was over just like that. He saw the damn writing on the wall, Kim comes out as a lesbian and Ramona’s first impulse is to embrace her?! That cuddling they were doing made so much more sense, did she even care about him at all?! 

Scott pulled out his flip-phone and dialed aggressively on it, there was only one person left in his life that he could talk to about this. Wallace. Wallace would know what to do. He was the only person Scott could imagine talking to.

“Wallace we need to get something to eat right now and talk this is serious” Scott texted as his shoes crunched through the snow.

“you’re a bit late scott. i already have a boyfriend :P” Wallace replied.

“You better get your ass into Muchos Pizza as soon as you can I swear to god Wallace” Scott typed furiously

“im actually hanging with mobes right now, can i bring him too?” typed Wallace.

“Sure. As long as you get there.” Scott replied as he closed his phone.

Scott was twiddling his thumbs in front of his untouched glass of water. The staff were starting to eye him up. It wasn’t too long until they kicked him out. Where the hell was he?

Not a second too soon, Wallace Wells burst through the doors of Muchos Pizza with Mobile trailing behind him casually. Wallace plopped down at the table, resting his elbows on it as he spread himself out. Mobile scooted next to him.

“Hey Scott.” Wallace said as if Scott wasn’t having the worst night of his life, “What is it that’s got you texting me in the middle of the evening right in the middle of my loving dinner with Mobile. We were partaking in fine dining!” 

“We were eating pizza rolls I put in the microwave.” Mobile muttered reservedly.

“So I-” Scott tried to get out words, so many were battering him at once, he couldn’t keep focused, “So like Ramona and Kim were talking for a bit and then there was this one night where we got really really drunk and cuddled and stuff and I was fine with that cause like it was just a fun drunk thing but then the next day Kim went missing and like Ramona went out and she saved her and stuff and then like they came home and Kim slept in Ramona’s bed and like that was chill too because like she needed the rest from being saved and stuff but like she's still in our house and she came out as lesbian in our house and Ramona hugged her in a really lesbian wayyyy” Scott rambled, breaking into tears.

“Oh jeez,” said Wallace with a genuine concern, “I- Honestly I didn’t understand any of that but yeah it's definitely over. I can tell.” Scott started crying harder, “before you ask you can’t crash at my place, it's already packed. Isn’t that right Mobile?” Wallace said with a sly smirk, nudging Mobile on the shoulder.

“It isn’t over.” Mobile mumbled while typing something on his phone, “I heard what you said Scott, it doesn’t sound that terrible. She’s probably not cheating on you if that’s what you were worrying about.” He looked up from his phone, glasses sparkling a bit as the new light shone over them, “like sure the cuddling is a bit weird but like coming out is scary. Sometimes you just need a friend-hug to get through it.” Wallace chuckled at Mobile, admiring his glasses as the cheap pizzeria light bounced off of them. 

“Oh Moby… you’re such an optimist- '' Wallace said adoringly, rubbing Mobile on the head, “but you gotta see Ramona: she was a walking red flag from the start. Didn’t she also cheat on Lucas L-”

“Shut your mouth about her!” Scott yelled impulsively in the middle of the desolate restaurant, “You’re one to talk considering your own personal streak!” Wallace readied a response but Mobile’s piercing stare at him from Scott’s comment made him back down. His eyes darted toward the floor. Scott glared at him and stormed out of the building.

“Oh Scott… you got your heart broken by another dangerous girl. Why don’t you learn…” Wallace said aloud to himself, “Why don’t I learn?”   

“Wallace, what did he mean by ‘your streak’?” Mobile asked.

***

Ramona lay awake as Kim happily slept next to her. Scott still wasn’t coming home. This was it wasn’t it. She really really thought she had broken out of that cycle, that there was just a sliver of a chance of her becoming a better person through all of this. How was she so stupid? Scott was just gonna become another evil ex, then Kim after him, then on and on. She really had committed; there was no going back. She bathed in the degeneracy that she was spiraling into, it felt good in a way. No more responsibility to get better. She hugged Kim tightly, it was her new favorite way to run away. 

Kim hugged her back in her sleep; Ramona disassociated further. It became easier and easier to just slot him into her past, a fun fling that didn’t really amount to anything. It felt good, too good. She hugged Kim tighter and kissed her on the forehead. 

Kim and Ramona woke up next to each other, only inches apart. The morning felt quiet, a feeling of tension hung over everything. What had been lost was obvious. Some of Scott’s clothes were still hanging around, they felt lonely without him. 

“Ramona…” Kim said sleepily, still getting herself to wake up.

“Hey Kim,” Ramona said heartily.

“That wasn’t a dream right?” asked Kim, “I’m a lesbian.” Ramona smiled at this, Kim was adorably klutzy too. She hadn’t lost anything in the switch, nothing at all.

“Yes.” Said Ramona joyfully, it was sinking in that she was in a lesbian relationship again, it reminded her of the old days.

“And none of this was a dream.” Kim continued.

“Not that I know of!” Replied Ramona

“And what happened to Scott?” Asked Kim, a jolt of fear panged through Ramona’s system.

“I-” Stuttered Ramona, “I gotta go to work now, sorry tight schedule.” Kim squinted at her suspiciously. 

“‘Kay” Kim said as she broke her squint and flopped even further into the bed, “I’m not gonna question this. I don’t wanna think about it.” Ramona got herself together as fast as she could before any more thoughts of Scott started to plague her or Kim. She had to leave the past behind, she would be able to do that this time. She put on her skates and rode into the Toronto snow. 

***

Scott slowly rose to consciousness on Neil’s couch, the must of morning air still filled Stephen and Neil’s house. Stephen was sitting on a stool in a notably drumsetless living room. She really was keeping them at her house. This really was it. 

“Morning Scott, glad to see you getting up early.” Stephen said, looking up at him. His stubble was a bit more jagged looking than usual. 

“Oh I was actually planning to just go back to sleep.” Scott said while attempting to forge a smile.

“Nope!” Stephen said as he yanked the covers off of Scott, inadvertently sending him rolling onto the floor.

“Hey! What the hell man?!” Scott complained from the floor.

“I am not letting you slump into a depression again just cause a bad girl broke up with you. Go outside Scott.” Stephen scolded sternly. 

“Uggghhhhhh” groaned Scott as he snatched up his coat fairly awesomely. He had lost a bit of his touch. 

“And don’t come back till you’ve walked all the way around the block!” Stephen yelled.

Scott trudged through the new snow, cold air whipped away at him from all directions. He tried to keep his mind clear but Wallace’s words returned to him. “It’s definitely over”, “a red flag from the start”, it couldn’t stop repeating. Like an old game struggling to run on even older hardware and crashing. It skipped and looped over itself as it crumbled apart. More tears started to shatter from Scott’s eyes, he put up his hood to hide them. He glanced at the “X” patch on his shoulder, he tore his eyes away. He hated the feelings looking at it invoked in him. 

Days passed, nothing happened. Everything in Scott’s life felt like it had come to a halt. His routine consisted mostly of Stephen mandated morning walks and maybe some solemn bass playing if he was feeling good enough for it. At least he still was okay enough to go to his job consistently, at this point it was just a good way to pass the time. Scott was just preparing to go to bed as Stephen walked through the front door, looking a bit happier than usual. 

“Evening Stephen” greeted Scott.

“Night” Stephen said as he switched off the light. Scott put his head on the couch cushion and started to fade into sleep.

Scott felt himself in that oasis again, at this point it was barely an oasis compared to its surroundings. Plants stretched on for kilometers, they felt almost connected to him. A perfect ecosystem. It was painful but worth it. He heard something, something outside of his typical system. Or more accurately he sensed something across his unwinding network. It couldn’t be. The sound of inline skates scraped across the ground, somehow cutting through the greenery. He couldn’t sit still; he mustered up all of his energy and grabbed at the plants connecting him to the system by his back. He tore them out, pain seared through his body. He started running towards her as fast as he could, the ecosystem cleared out a path for him, it knew where he needed to go. He saw her, skating through a clearing. 

“Ramona!!!” He shouted, she heard his voice and stumbled over a bit. She looked at him, she turned pale. She put on her goggles and started skating away even faster. “Ramona please!” Scott yelled futilely, she disappeared into the greenery. 

He woke up in a cold sweat, the light of morning beamed into his eyes. Ramona, she was in his dream again. “Morning Scott,” greeted Stephen, he was tuning his guitar again.

***

Ramona popped out of subspace and dropped off her package. She collapsed onto the ground in a panic and started hyperventilating. What the hell what the hell what the hell. God damn it, why was his head so damn convenient? She was so stupid. His face flashed through her mind, she tried to flush it out but couldn’t. She felt a deep pang of guilt. What had she done? What had she just done to him? What had she been doing to him? Scott, images of her best memories with him bounced through her head. Why was she remembering them the best now, out of all times?! Her head started glowing fiercely. He didn’t deserve any of this. This was all her fault, this shouldn’t have happened. None of this was meant to happen. Ramona’s stomach started to ache, her vision was getting hazy. Trying to run away by going on a lesbian love affair, she was so stupid. He could’ve helped her, he was helping her! Kim was helping her too, but it wouldn’t be a lie to say that her help wasn’t exactly what she needed right now. She didn’t deserve this either, to be the rebound, the tail end of the affair. To harbor the guilt of taking a relationship away from a close friend.

No. She needed to stop this as fast as she could. While she still had the will within her to do it.  This wasn’t healthy for anyone. She needed to put things back exactly where they were, that was the only way to fix this mess. She loved Scott, she loved being with him, she couldn’t leave him like this. He wasn’t going to become one of her evil exes. Neither was Kim, she needed to cut all of this off before it got worse.

Ramona closed the door to her house as she went inside, the cold of the evening was starting to fall over Toronto. Kim was reading Ramona’s copy of The Cat’s Cradle. The two greeted each other as Ramona dropped onto the couch. Kim clinged to her shoulder, she had been completely comfortable being physically intimate with her for a while. Ramona felt stilted, she tensed up as still as a statue.

“God, Ramona” Kim said, she was sounding really really sappy, oh no. “Thanks for everything. I love you so so much” The word love came from Kim’s mouth like a thick cloud of smoke. Ramona felt herself choking on its earnest sweetness and sincerity. She hated herself for what she was about to do, but she also hated herself for what she had done and what she was already doing.

“Hey Kim I- I don’t know about this relationship.” Ramona said shakily, each word requiring intense willpower to get out of her head.

“What?-” Kim said fearfully, her sappy demeanor had completely faded. Ramona hated herself. 

“This- it isn’t right” Ramona muttered.

“What do you mean? This is the most ‘right’ things have felt in my life!” Kim argued, tears already forming in her eyes. She was doing everything she could to hold them back. 

“Yes but Scott-” Ramona tried to say

“Uggh god damn it” Kim said, holding her head in her hands, “He’s just gonna to get some guts and deal with it. He’s not your responsibility!” 

“You don’t get it! None of this is working! He got me to better myself!” Ramona shouted, anger rising “You just-” Ramona stuttered “You’re just making me worse. You’re making this all worse!” Kim reeled at this.

“You realize you fucking did this right?! This was all your idea from the start! You made me stick with you!” Kim stood up from the couch in rage

“Leave.” Ramona said, standing up to meet Kim. She towered over her. Kim started backing away. 

“I-” Kim’s eyes quivered with fear, Ramona could see the reflection of her glow in them. Ramona started walking forward, Kim stumbled back. Ramona shoved Kim out of the front door and slammed it behind her. She put her back to the door and leaned on it. She felt as Kim slammed on the door, the vibrations sent chills through her body. The slams got weaker and weaker until they eventually stopped. Ramona slumped to the floor; she had gotten Kim out of her life for good. She was going to rendezvous with Scott or die trying, there was no going back.

Chapter Text

Another daily walk, another 20 minutes of consistent cold beating away at him. The winter wasn’t getting any kinder, that was for sure. He looked up at the leafless trees as they rustled in the wind. 

“Wait- there’s no wind right now-” Scott observed awesomely, most people probably wouldn’t have noticed that. The trees rustled more, Scott took a sturdier stance. “HEY! You! I know you’re up there!” He shouted. The tree rustled thoughtfully, whatever was in there was clearly planning their next move. A figure dropped down from the tree and did several backflips as she made it to the ground, landing gracefully and kicking up powdered snow as she did so. She was completely covered from head to toe in a black garb that had an odd, pastel rectangular patch plastered all over it. Scott couldn’t quite recognize it but whatever that patch meant, it seemed very important.

“Scott Pilgrim!” she said as she pointed her gloved finger at him, he got into a fighting stance and put up his fists. “I am not here to fight you, I am here to protect you. Under the Society of the Colon 3 I am sworn to defend your mind from what it is not ready to receive.” Scott grabbed his head, feeling around the sturdy borders of his skull. 

“My… mind?” He pondered, “I don’t think you gotta worry about protecting that! I’ve always been told that I’ve got a thick skull so that must mean my brain is pretty safe!” He exclaimed, winking, giving a smile and confident thumbs up. The figure facepalmed.

“I- ugh. I’m starting to regret taking this assignment.” She was clearly going off-script now, “Just know R-” she cut herself off and thought a bit more carefully about what she was about to say, “a very dangerous disruptor is in your midst, run away from her while you can.”

“Huh?” stuttered Scott, “Disrupto-who??” She put her hand onto her wreathed face.

“Ramona Flowers, thick-skull!” She shouted in frustration, “great, now I’m falling behind my mystery quota. Damn it!” She turned around, tilting her head back at Scott. “Stay the hell away from Ramona Flowers, else dire consequences will occur” A cute retro ping sounded as a pixelated “+10 mystery” appeared above the figure’s head. “Nice! I’m back on quota!” She celebrated before disappearing into a cloud of dust. 

“I’m not even with Ramona anymore!” Scott yelled at the cloud of nothing. He shrugged annoyedly and continued on with his walk. 

The air was resonating with the sound of chirping birds, hiding up in the bare winter trees. It wasn’t too terrible today, at least in Scott’s opinion. He closed his eyes and just took in the vibes; he didn’t really see where he was going but vibes were more important than direction anyway. As he was breathing in the air he heard an odd scratching sound in the distance. Like old ice scraping against wheels. It reminded him of someone. 

“ Don’t think about it Scott- We’re having a good day ” He thought to himself, the scratching sound got closer and closer. 

“Scott!!!” It yelled- wait. Scott jolted open his eyes, Ramona! She was skating straight at him. 

“Aaaugh!” Scott screamed as he ducked into the snow to dodge her. Ramona came to a perfect stop right in front of where he was standing before he jumped into the new snow. He looked up at her as she leaned down to meet him. “I- Wha???” She leaped down on him, hugging him as she pressed him against the snow. It was so cold yet so warm. 

“I’m sorry for everything Scott-” She said in haze of joy and regret, “Things are all fixed now, we can get back together I-”

“What about Kim?!” Scott asked perplexedly, scrambling to put any of this together.

“I-” Ramona stuttered and tried to collect her words. Scott dreaded what she was about to say. “I broke up with her.” 

“Badly?”

“Yeah. There was a pretty nasty fight.” Ramona replied, barely looking him in the eye

“Was it alike… a fight fight?” Scott asked excitedly, his eyes sparkled. He imagined Kim and Ramona throwing fists at each other, it was so hot. “With punches and stuff??” 

“Wha- no” Ramona snapped out of her guilt in pure confusion. “It was like, super real.” 

“Damn. You really did leave her for me?” He sighed in deep thought, Ramona’s actions starting to set in. 

“Yeah.” Ramona said with an unsure smile, her eyes wide, “I’m sorry about everything… again… if you don’t wanna be with me again I get it I can just-” Scott interrupted her with a kiss on the lips. Ramona blushed in surprise then reciprocated, closing her eyes to go deeper into the kiss. In the icy Toronto cold, made worse by the snow on Scott’s back, the kiss completely warmed the two up. Sparks rippled through the air, reflecting off the icy snow.  

“Still sparks…” Ramona said dreamily, breaking away from the kiss.

“Still sparks” Scott confirmed awesomely.

***

Kim Pine was lounging on Hollie’s couch, covered in shitty blankets and food wrappers like the piece of garbage she was. This was all her fault. She did this. This is what she got for loving anyone. Joseph Anderson was reading an old book on a stool in the corner. He was judging her, she knew it. Hollie walked out of the kitchen, bowl of spicy chips in one hand, phone in the other. She sat down at the end of the couch, just squeezing around the edge of Kim’s pathetic body. 

“Hey Kim-” She asked, Kim could not handle a conversation right now.

“What.” Kim responded sharply, irritation and anger bleeding out of her words. 

“I well-” Hollie stuttered, thrown off by Kim’s malice, not even she could handle her anymore, “there’s this party…” 

“Really?” Kim hissed, she didn’t care about preserving people’s feelings anymore. The world fucking sucked and it deserved everything that she was going to throw at it. “You’re trying to drag me to one of Julie’s parties.” 

“I well-” Hollie embarrassingly tripped over her own words, it was almost fun to watch, “it- I feel like you need to go out more, to get yourself… better” Kim glared daggers into her, she tried to shrug them off but she was clearly still hurt by them.

“I don’t wanna feel better.” Kim murmured, “No one’s ever gonna love me like that again.” 

“I- jeez Kim” Hollie sputtered, taking a gulp as she decided to try a different, more bitchy approach. “Kim. You are going to this party’ I am making you do it.” Hollie stated sternly. Kim felt like screaming, like letting all of her rage out at this bitch, thinking she could just drag her around. How dare she. But, Kim did not scream, instead she sunk further into the couch, feeling herself die inside. 

“Yeah. Sure.” Kim replied, defeated. 

***

Ramona Flowers and Scott Pilgrim were just hanging out for the first time in a while in her house. Scott took a deep, lovable sigh. 

“It’s so good to be back.” He said cheerfully. “Actually while you were gone I actually read like- a ton of interesting gaming magazines that Neil had. They actually had some really interesting stuff in them like-” Scott continued on, talking about all of the interesting facts she learned.  Ramona smiled, she made the right choice, she knew it. She took a sip of her tea as Scott kept rambling adorably. “-and like did you know that with the Pokemon games they actually designed the girl player character first, then they base the boy character off of it. No wonder the girls are so well designed.” Ramona squinted slightly.

“Well designed?” She asked. What the hell could he mean by well designed, she hoped it wasn’t what she thought it meant. 

“Yeah! I don’t know how to explain it but the girls are always better you know?” Scott rambled.

“Better? They’re just a bundle of squares and stuff. How can one be better than the other?” Ramona took a deep sip of her tea as she squinted at him.

“I don’t know! Better! I always play better when I choose the girl.” Scott said, Ramona almost choked on her tea. 

“I- that’s interesting-” Ramona said as she got herself back together. “You always play as the girl?” 

“Yeah! I mean, why wouldn’t you? As I said, it’s just a better design.” Scott said cheerfully, Ramona squinted her eyes further. He couldn’t be… absolutely not. 

“But… isn’t it weird being called a girl a bunch by all of the other characters?” Ramona prodded, she was going to figure this out. 

“I- hm” Scott went into deep thought about this. He pondered it for what seemed like forever. “I mean I don’t mind it too much. Like, it’s cool being called a girl in my games, I don’t know.” Ramona was starting to get increasingly frustrated and anxious at this; her foot bounced against the floor like a jackhammer. He couldn’t be- no way, she was just projecting… “Like… it's really cool, you know? To be called a girl and play as a girl, it's how I wanna play. I dunno why you’re being so… weird about it. He stared at her with a confused, oblivious smile. 

This… she might just be jumping to conclusions but this was all starting to make sense. The subspace dreams, they were still an odd detail. From what she had seen of him the other day, the overgrowth had only been getting worse and worse. For that drastic change to happen, there needed to be a massive shift in Scott’s self image, something far more central to his being than what could be shaken by a shitty breakup or an odd afterparty. But Scott seemed fairly normal, right? If that massive ego shift was happening, she’d expect something of him to change  anything. But no, he just seems to be the same ol’ Scott he’s always been. There had to be something that was preventing that change from externalizing itself into a cool cape or magical non-vegan plant powers or something . 

This had to be it, it all lined up. Scott was weirdly afraid of haircuts, always fretted and talked a tad too much about “being the girl in the relationship”, he always wore that big puffy coat around that hid 80% of his body, he hated taking showers, and now he just had that weird thing about playing as a girl and basically admitted to liking having feminine pronouns used for him! God she was so stupid for not figuring it all out sooner! She needed to tell him right now: while the moment still lasted, while his shell was brittle. 

“Scott,” she said as softly as she could, attempting to put him at ease before she delivered the biggest truth bomb of his life, “That kind of thing, it isn’t really- how do I say this… normal.” 

“ Great start Ramona ” She thought to herself, “ You just implied that being trans isn’t normal. What next? Are you gonna tell him that it’s probably a fetish too? ” She pressed on, disregarding the negative thoughts. They weren’t going to stop her now.

“Those thoughts, I had them too, it’s okay.” She comforted Scott, putting her arms around him. Scott reeled back a bit, eyes wide and confused. 

“I- Ramona?” He stuttered, “what are you talking about…” She was on the home stretch, so so so close. She just has to tell him that trans people exist, that she is one, and that he can be a girl if he wants to. It was so clear to her. He probably wouldn’t completely come out all at once, but this would be the start, it was so clear. She considered her words and opened her mouth to say them, her perfectly trained vocal chords resonating as the sound made it to her lips, words just about to escape. 

Then Roxie Richter, clad in a trans flag laden ninja outfit, burst through the walls of the Flowers domicile, screaming. 

Chapter Text

Roxie Richter stood in the middle of Ramona’s house, the living room wall had been smashed into pieces. The ninja stood amongst the wreckage as cold air rushed in from the crumbling breach. “RAMONA FLOWERS!” Roxie shouted, putting extra emphasis on the “R” at the start of her name. “You. are. Done for!”

“Wha I-” Scott sputtered, eyes wide in shock. “You’re alive??” Without another word Roxie pulled out a pair of cat-eared headphones, a pink and blue rope, and threw them directly at Scott. Miraculously the headphones spun around her head like a boomerang before landing on her ears.

“What is this music…” Scott said slowly, dazed by the new sound coming into his ears, “Wait- is this just Black Sheep at really fast speed?” Before he could move his hands to take the headphones off, the rope glowed a harsh white and tied itself perfectly around him, constricting his arms and tying him to the couch. 

“It’s called ‘nightcore’ ” Roxie sneered, pointing upwards dramatically for no reason in particular, “If you had any taste you’d know that.” 

“Huh- wha?” Scott asked loudly, “I can’t hear you! Music too loud!!”  

“What the hell Roxie?” Shouted Ramona as she burst up from the couch, hammer in hand. “The Order- Really? That’s what you’ve been reduced to? Did you really not have any other elite club to join?” Roxie’s face grew red with anger, she drew out her sword. 

“I’ve been with the order farrrrrr longer than that league of stupid loser boys.” Roxie shouted in rage. What the hell did she want? Scott and her had already won. Was she really this invested in following orders? 

“Nice one.” Snarked Ramona sarcastically. Roxie aggressively shrugged her off and pulled out a ragged scroll. She tore off the bow on it with her teeth and unrolled it, reading it in her best official voice. 

“Under the command of the Order of the Colon 3, I sentence you, Ramona Flowers, to death for wanton violation of the Prime Directive.” Roxie declared. “You pushed one Scott Pilgrim into trans ideation, years before the scheduled time of cracking.”

“What was I supposed to do??” Ramona argued, “Just leave her there to languish in questions?! That’s cruel!” 

“It’s a canon event Ramona,” Roxie said, not reading from the scroll but clearly saying something else she rehearsed, “You cannot subvert it, lest dire consequences come to the fabric of trans-femininity.” Roxie pulled out a notepad and a pen, “I should also note that you are using she/her pronouns for Scott even though he has not come out to you and asked for them at this point in the timeline. Tsk tsk tsk.” Roxie’s use of Scott’s name and “he” rubbed Ramona the wrong way, she felt Roxie drag her down to her level, into her rage. Her feet started to move as she ran towards Roxie who was still writing on her little notepad. She wasn’t letting this slide, her girlfriend did not deserve to be trapped in a closet for any more years, that prime directive the order always blabbed about was a sham and she knew it.

She readied a charging swing aimed directly for Roxie’s face. Right before she could land the blow, Roxie moved in a blur, blocking the brunt of Ramona’s attack. Her notepad was tossed to the side and bounced off Scott’s face. 

“Owieee” she groaned as it bounced down onto the floor, out of his sight. 

  “Oh you BITCH” Screamed Roxie as she looked Ramona dead in the eye, keeping the block up with an iron grip and a steel sword. She used her sword to throw Ramona off of her, sending the blue and pink haired girl flying across the room. She slammed against the stairs.

 “Is this how we’re gonna play? You’re betraying me again .” Roxie taunted, she let out a pained laugh. “I was right. You never change.”

“I never betrayed you…” Ramona sputtered as she clambered onto her feet.

“Really now?!” Roxie said angrily as she dashed at Ramona, katana in hand. “You have stabbed me in the back-” Roxie jumped at her with Ramona barely blocking her attack with the handle of her hammer. “-Multiple times” Roxie put more weight behind her sword, Ramona felt herself press further into the wall of her stairwell. “For a MAN.” Ramona’s grip tightened, she could barely look Roxie in the eye. “You moved out of college, away from me. Just so you could canoodle with those twins. You just fucking let me get slashed to bits by that bonehead while you just watched!”

***

The bonehead in question was currently struggling against his ropes, the sound of hyper, high-pitched singing filled his ears. He felt his right arm get a bit more free, if he could get it loose then he could probably take off those headphones and at least hear what they were saying.

***

Ramona felt the handle of her hammer start to splinter, it couldn’t handle the amount of pure rage that was radiating from Roxie’s attack. “I guess I was right,” Roxie muttered somberly. “You really are a hasbian. ” 

Thoughts of Kim flashed through Ramona’s mind, her embrace, her wit, her face, the adorably monotone way she talked, everything. Sure she just used her to run away, but that was her fault, not Kim’s. Was Roxie insinuating that none of that was real? That her love wasn’t real?!

 “I know why you’re trying to rush the transition to the point of breaking Order code, it’ll let you run away faster. If he becomes a she then you can leave him without regrets.” Roxie accused, attempting to rationalize her own claim. Ramona felt a new vigor course through her, a righteous rage to match Roxie’s. It overpowered the guilt and gave her just enough clarity to shift her hammer and redirect Roxie’s strength straight towards the floor. 

“You idiot!” Ramona shouted, “Just cause I don’t want to screw you doesn’t mean I don’t like women!” Roxie crashed to the ground, Ramona raised her hammer into the air. “You were always so self centered!” She brought down her hammer to flatten Roxie against the floor, Roxie rolled out of the way just in time. 

“You’re one to complain about being self centered!” barked the half-ninja, “You’re rushing his transition just so you can feel less guilty about keeping it from him!” She slashed at Ramona’s feet, she jumped over it, leaning onto her hammer to stall herself in the air. “He doesn’t know shit! Just let him live in ignorance and figure the hell out himself!” Ramona swung her hammer at her, she ducked under it. 

“She knows way more than you think.” Ramona said sharply, “You can’t just leave her in the dark! It’s inhumane! I always hated what you all did at the Order.” 

***

Scott currently did not know shit about what was going on. How the hell was Roxie alive? He could’ve sworn he killed her, really awesomely too. He needed to escape his snare. That notepad totally had the answers and it would probably be good to hear what the girls were shouting about too. He struggled his right arm more from within the ropes. It was almost free, he just had to try a bit more…

***

Roxie and Ramona continued to throw attacks at each other, barely ever hitting each other. What was hit was blocked outright. They were at a standstill, in more of a screaming match than a fight to the death. 

“It’s a necessary evil, okay?!” Roxie shouted, still defending the reputation of that damn Order for some reason. Was there a chip in the back of her neck or something? Why the hell was she giving them so much of a ride?

“Ah, so it’s an upgrade from your usual unnecessary evils” Ramona replied snidely, she was done being emotionally raw. The comment only made Roxie attack faster and with less grace. 

The girls continued fighting. Ramona swung her hammer at Roxie. She ducked under it once again, making it stagger clumsily in the air as Ramona tried to reorient its weight. The half-ninja took advantage of this stunned state and went for a hit with her katana. Ramona tried to move her body out of the way of the swing but the continued momentum of her missed hammer swing rooted her to the ground, the swing made a cut into her cheek then followed it up by kicking her to the ground. It stung, a perfect cut made by a perfect blade wielded by an imperfect user. She moved her hand swiftly and wiped away the blood trailing from the cut with a flourish. She gave Roxie a death glare, Roxie glared back. 

***

Scott was almost there, he had almost made it. His arm was barely in the ropes anymore, the friction bit at his bare arms as he struggled against the rope. He felt himself taking minor laceration damage, he didn’t care.  

“C’mon Scott-” He said to himself, self motivation had always worked in the past. He felt his GUTS meter rise. “We’re almost… there…” He grunted as his arm escaped from the ropes, luckily without a sound. Thank god for his points in stealth. He felt around the couch and watched the girls fight. The way they jumped and backflipped past each other; it was mesmerizing. Ramona was still holding her own but it was clear that she was wearing down while Roxie only got more and more enraged. Knowing he had no time to lose, he clambered off the couch and snatched the notepad off the floor. The sound of high speed pop jingles were still being blasted through his head, but he didn’t care. He was actually kinda into it, maybe he could ask Roxie for recommendations before Ramona kicked her teeth in. Or- slammed her teeth in, with a hammer. He cleared his mind as he clumsily flipped open Roxie’s notebook.

“Alright Roxie, what are you hiding?” He said awesomely, squinting at the notebook. His eyes darted around as he read the scribbles that Roxie had written about him. 

“Case 22: ‘Scott’ Pilgrim” Why was his first name in quotes? He… was a case? He continued reading. “The guy is on stage one and his egg shell is as hard as rocks. Nobody suspects shit. Perfect way to get to Ramona, I just have to push to get this case.” What was this about him not knowing stuff?? Why wouldn’t anyone just tell him what the hell was going on once in a while?! He flipped through the pages, skipping over info about his schedule, his day, routine, favorite food, and weaknesses. It wasn’t too important; he already knew all of this stuff! He got to the good stuff. His eyes darted across the page as he read something unbelievable, something life changing, something that just could not be. 

“Through my continued observation, additional peer review from the Order, as well as analyzation of his unconscious subspace dreamscape’s continued floral growth: I have determined without a doubt that Scott Pilgrim is a triple verified closeted transgender woman”

***

Ramona felt tired, she couldn’t do this forever. Roxie was a torrent of spite, rage, loss, and contractual obligation that just could not be stopped. She dug her boots into the ground as she held the head of her hammer against Roxie’s blade. Roxie grunted as she dug her katana deeper into Ramona’s hammer. She was attempting to split it in two, taking Ramona along with it. The purple haired girl’s eyes darted around the room for something- anything that she could use to her advantage. As she looked for something she could cleverly use to save the day, she saw Scott on the floor reading Roxie’s notepad, eyes wide. Ramona thought of many ways she could use this to her advantage, she could silently signal to Scott to do a sneak attack using eye movements, she could mouth “run” silently and let her get out of there while she stalled Roxie, hell, she could even just yell “GO! GET HER!” at Scott and hope that her brawn was faster than Roxie’s refined reflexes. Instead of all of those very valid plans, her stupid stupid brain decided to make the worst decision she could. 

“Look!” Ramona shouted at Roxie, staring directly at Scott, eyes wide.

“Oh you are not going to get me with that-” Roxie replied, almost offended at Ramona, “do you think I was born yesterday? Of course you fucking underestimate me, everyone always-”

“My god, get the hell over yourself!” Ramona shouted in annoyance. She was doubling down on her own moronic idea just out of pure exhaustion towards Roxie’s bullshit. “I’m not trying to trick you! Scott!! She’s-” She used Roxie’s sword’s wedge into her hammer to her own advantage, harnessing the leverage of the embedded blade to hurl Roxie to the side, then grabbing her by the arms and tugging them behind her back, forcing her to look at now completely freed Scott Pilgrim. Scott held the notepad by her side, with an odd expression on her face. One that seemed to be experiencing a completely new emotion.

“I- YOU!” Roxie was flush with a deep insatiable rage, struggling at Ramona’s hold like a wildcat caught in a snare. Ramona didn’t even flinch, she had been filled with a new determination at Scott’s discovery. Scott bolted towards Roxie, readied her fist, and in a deafening “WOPOW” she delivered a perfectly inputted B-reverse right hand uppercut.

PLAYER 2: SCOTT PILGRIM HAS ENTERED THE GAME  

The two got into formation as they readied to double team the good-as-gone half-ninja. “I thought you said you didn’t hit girls!” Roxie shouted angrily, trying to grasp what the hell was going on. She shuffled across the floor but was cornered by the two girls.

“That was before I knew I was one.” Scott quipped before jumping into the air and readying her fists. Roxie gritted her teeth. 

“If that’s what you wanna play-” She kicked her newly transed attacker in the stomach mid-air, throwing the girl back but causing herself to lose balance a bit. In response Ramona ran restlessly towards Roxie’s back and retaliated while she was weak. The hammer slammed into her back with a piercing “THWACK”, sending Roxie directly to the floor. Ramona raised her hammer into the air for another hit. Before it hit the ground Roxie disappeared into a cloud of smoke, leaving a log behind to be smashed into splinters by Ramona’s hammer. She reappeared right above Scott’s head and dove down at her. Scott reacted, countering and pulling a Reversal. “Happy feet!” she exclaimed to Ramona, indicating it was now her time to shine. Roxie hurtled through the air straight towards Ramona. 

Taking the cue, she replied to Scott’s call with a hearty “Wombo Combo!” and smacked Roxie out of the air, sending her straight to the ground. Once she landed she skipped across the floor like a stone, straight into Scott’s rising kick attack. It sent the bruised ninja flying straight upwards and bounced her off the ceiling, throwing her into the floor, ending it.

Roxie writhed on the cratered plank flooring, smoke rising from her landing spot. “You- you really figured it out didn’t you, you bitch.” She scolded, “Looking in my notepad, really?”

“Yes really” Scott responded, fists still raised. “I still don’t know what any of this means so you better tell me what the hell is going on.”

“Like I’d do that.” Snarked Roxie.

“I think I can explain.” Ramona interjected, sighing. “The Order of the Colon 3 is an elite society of trans girls who never grew out of their ‘cat girls and knee high socks’ phase with the goal of preserving the Prime Directive.”

“Hey!” Shouted Roxie, not exactly having much of a defense. 

“Prime directive?” Scott questioned.

“It's this whole thing.” replied Ramona, “but it involves keeping closeted trans women, or ‘eggs’ out of the know until a specific time.” 

“It’s important!!!!” Protesting Roxie from the floor, Ramona picked her up by the collar and looked her straight in the eyes. Roxie blushed slightly then put on her best death glare. It barely affected Ramona. 

“Roxie, cut the bullshit,” Ramona interrogated, “I know you don’t care about the Prime Directive, what’s your game here?” Roxie stuttered as orphaned syllables fell out of her mouth meaninglessly. She let out a grimace; the girl was cornered. 

“When-” stuttered Roxie, eyes shut tight, “when I died against your new girlfriend and respawned in my home, I knew the league wouldn’t accept me back. I knew that I had lost everything; all of my critters of fortune were gone.”

“Oh- so that’s what those weird animals that popped out of you were.” Scott recalled, “I was wondering why there wasn’t any cash.

“Because I didn’t have shit!” Roxie yelled, “ I gave everything to the league and now they wouldn't even look me in the eye! My only choice was to go back to the Order. Those girls helped me back onto my feet after I lost everything. Their solidarity was unlike any other I had felt. And when I saw Scott on the target list, I wasn’t going to miss the opportunity.” Roxie looked Ramona into the eyes, “what better way to finally get back at Scott and finally ditch my past than to kill Ramona Flowers, the source of all of my problems.” Ramona dropped her to the ground, she fell to her knees. 

“Roxie, I don’t know how to explain this but you don’t have to kill me to get over me.” Ramona explained harshly.

“It’s different for lesbians!” Roxie barked from the ground. 

“Really?” Asked Scott, commandeering Roxie’s notepad to take her own notes, “I think I’m a lesbian now so I gotta learn the rules.”

“Oh shut up.” Roxie barked at her, completely defeated. 

“I’m not going to hurt you Roxie.” Ramona said

“What?” Roxie sputtered, surprised at Ramona’s mercy. 

“We are done with acting evil. We will lay our weapons down.” Ramona asserted. “Since the Order is probably gonna kick you out or cancel you or whatever, how about I help you up?”

“You mean it?” Roxie asked with hesitation.

“Yes.” Ramona affirmed, “I don’t want you getting all evil again.” She held out her hand and helped Roxie up onto her feet. 

“That ship has long since sailed…” said Roxie, “but thanks.” She seemed annoyed at Ramona’s kindness, but she had nowhere else to go.

“So…” Scott pondered. “What do we do now?” 

“You wanna be a girl right?” Asked Ramona with a smile.

“Yeah!!” Scott responded with an even bigger smile. “That sounds really really awesomesauce! What do we do first??” 

“Well I mean, we can start with brushing your hair…” Ramona considered. She was starting to realize the gigantic task that was laying before her. “I mean- it’s a whole journey and stuff.” 

“Can I try on some of your clothes??” Scott asked with a glimmer in her eyes. Ramona imagined Scott in her clothes and tried to hold back a giggle. It wasn’t exactly her style. 

“I mean, sure.” Responded Ramona. Scott beamed.

***

The kitchen lights flickered as Ramona brushed Scott's hair. Scott was wearing one of Ramona’s old skirts from her pastel-goth phase. She was bursting with excitement, positively bouncing on the stool. She was gonna look so good!! Roxie sat to the side and drank some tea on her own as she read one of Ramona’s old books. 

“Sit still,” Ramona scolded, “I can’t brush your hair if you keep wriggling around.”  

“How could I not??” Scott responded, wriggling around faster, “this is all so exciting!!” 

“Scott,” Roxie interjected from across the room. “With all due respect, this is the most boring shit I have ever seen.” 

Just after Roxie finished her remark, Ramona’s phone began ringing on the kitchen counter.

“Hello?” She asked the receiver, “This is Ramona Flowers speaking.” Mumbling came from the other side of the phone, Scott couldn’t quite hear what it was saying but the voice sounded familiar. “It’s for you.” Ramona said as she handed Scott the phone. 

“Yeeellow?” Scott asked cheerfully into the phone, she wanted to try saying “yellow” on phone calls more. It’s what they always do in the movies. Stephen's gruff voice came from the other end.

“Yeah- okay. Scott? We kinda have something that you probably want to see.” Said Stephen over the phone. 

“Want to see…?” Scott pondered awesomely, “what is it?” She asked.

“Well it's kind of a-”

“-A large door with my face on it...” Observed Scott in front of the door in question. They made it to Stephen’s house as fast as they could when they heard about this suspicious door over the call. It was quiet. Scott could see the couch that he slept on just days before. It was currently being used by Young Neil to play on his Gameboy Advance. From the sounds coming from it Scott could approximate that he was playing Earthworm Jim. 

“Listen, this seems like more of you guys' thing, so I’m just gonna… go.” Stephen remarked as he backed out of the room and up the stairs. 

Scott walked up to the door, putting her hand against it. It was a stark white with a wooden exterior. Stephen was right, it sure had her face on it. A pixelated rendering of her head sat on the top of the door where the star would usually be on a subspace door. 

“This is borinnnggggg” Roxie bemoaned as she flopped onto the couch next to Young Neil. “I don’t even know why I came along.” She rolled her eyes at the ceiling and then looked at Neil’s Gameboy Advance. “Damn, that looks sick. Could I have a go?”

Ramona walked up to the door next to Scott, observing it very carefully, then looking back at her. “It’s a character customization door.” She concluded, “you’re lucky. I didn’t get one of these ‘till my second year.” 

“Wait- customization?” Scott muttered, she opened her eyes wide, full of hope. “Awesome! That’s- that’s actually very convenient!” Without hesitation Scott threw open the door and jumped inside, falling into the void that laid within. 

“Woahuh- AAAHhhhhh!” Scott screamed as she hurtled through the void, searching for solid ground. She didn’t have much experience of interacting with subspace alone. “I thought this was a customizer, where’s the customization?!” she shouted as she fell. As if the universe heard her, she finally landed on an inky black that wasn’t too different to the inky black that surrounded her but seemed solid enough. She pulled herself up and brushed herself off. It was really just for show; it’s not like there was anything to brush off. By the time she looked up an interface had materialized before her, it had an array of options all flashing for Scott’s attention. Head, body, hair, this was it! This was her shot at being a girl. Being a girl. The thought of it rushed through her body, almost creating sparks in it of itself. This was so hype, to her at least. She flipped through all of the different options, pondering what she should choose first, hopping up and down the whole time. 

“Would you just do something already?!” Roxie yelled. Scott jumped and looked around, noticing a hole that had been poked into the fabric of subspace, a window into the real world. Roxie was using it to shout angrily at her. 

“Roxie- did you want me to punch this hole in subspace just to yell at her??” Ramona asked, poking her head into frame. 

“No!!” Roxie argued, “I wanted it to be able to see what she chose!” She took a hand and pointed it at Scott. “But she’s not doing anything!” 

“I’d start doing stuff if you were less mean about it!” Scott bickered back. She turned back to the customization menu. “I guess I’ll start with… the head?” She tapped the menu and an array of differently shaped heads appeared before her. 

“Eh, I’d say your head shape is pretty cute already. I say we skip this one.” Ramona said. 

“Ramona!!” Roxie interjected, “We aren’t trying to go for ‘cute’ we’re trying to go for ‘girly’ and her current head is not girly.” 

“I think it’s pretty okay…” Scott whimpered, holding her head with her hands.

“Go for the one with the funny ears.” hollered Neil from the couch. 

They continued like this, arguing over each other on what to choose while Neil advocated for the goofiest options from the couch. “Make the eyes thinner!!!”, “No! Don’t pick those arms, anything but those arms!”, “we are not adding cat ears.”, etcetera etcetera. Scott mostly ignored them and chose what she wanted. This was for her after all and she thought that it was turning out pretty well. With each option she felt more and more like herself. She gave herself hair down to her shoulders that was slightly curvy at the ends, a slightly more feminine frame, and some cute boobs of course. “Where’s the option for long eyelashes?” Scott asked to the window in subspace. 

“Honey, you need makeup for that.” Ramona said softly, Roxie started laughing her ass off even though it wasn’t funny at all. 

“Well, I think that’s it.” Scott remarked, taking in her new form. It felt comfortable, insanely comfortable in fact. It felt like she had been asleep her whole life and was finally waking up. 

“You aren’t even gonna-” Roxie began to tease.

“No!” Scott interrupted, putting a finger up. “I’m happy with this and that’s final.” She pressed the confirm button and a new interface popped up before her. 

PLEASE INPUT YOUR NAME AND PRONOUNS: _____________

“Huh. That’s progressive.” Remarked Ramona, “last time I was here they didn’t have the pronoun bit.” 

“Shit! A name!” Scott swore, “I didn’t think about names and stuff!” 

“It’s fine- we can come up with one.” Reassured Ramona. The gang brainstormed names together: Scottie, Sarah, Lilly, Willow, Amy, and a bunch of other ones that Scott barely remembers. None of them seemed quite right. 

“Whatda bout Winona?” Uttered Young Neil from the couch, barely looking up from his game. 

“...Winona?” Scott muttered, tossing the name around in her mind. She squinted at Neil trying to recall where she knew that name from. “Like that actor from Mean Girls?” She asked. Neil lowered his eyes at her in disappointment. 

“No.” Neil said flatly, “Winona Ryder, the actor in Heathers , not Mean Girls.”

“Eh, both are films where girls are evil about stuff.” Scott commented irreverently. “But Winona… I like it.” 

“Yeah…” Pondered Ramona along with her, “it’s cute, definitely feminine, and it kinda keeps that folksy charm of your original name.”

“‘Scott’ is folksy?” Asked Scott hesitantly. 

“Whatever.” Shrugged Ramona. “Winona is a good name is what I’m saying.”

“Alright!” Celebrated Scott awesomely, pumping a fist into the air. She turned to the input window. “Winona Pilgrim! My name is Winona Pilgrim! And she/her for the pronouns please.”

WINONA PILGRIM HAS JOINED THE GAME!

Winona felt herself tugged upwards by a feeling of weightlessness. It was like gravity just turned off and decided to fling her upwards. “Woah- Woah!” She yelled as she was whooshed around at the mercy of subspace. She felt herself rise through the void further and was thrown back into the real world. 

***

Ramona Flowers saw Winona Pilgrim stumble out of the character customizer door as it poofed into thin air behind her. She… she was something. It has been one thing seeing her incrementally change within the hypothetical void of a character customization screen, but seeing her in the real world was a whole different thing. Her messy brown hair made it down to her shoulders, now lengthy with a purpose instead of being shaggy and unmaintained. Her boobs were cute: fairly rounded, perky, and middled between a B cup and a C cup in size. She didn’t have a bra on so they were very conspicuously poking out of her shirt. Thank god that she didn’t try to make them massive, that would’ve been a disaster. She still maintained her own height which was a fair choice, her hands were a bit daintier, though it was hard to tell since she was flapping them around so much in excitement, her thighs were now thicker, rendering her jeans woefully undersized, and her general face shape was far more feminine than before. Ramona felt both a pang of attraction and a sudden pit in her stomach at the same time. While she looked… fairly stunning, Ramona was kind of scared. Was this still the same Pilgrim that she fell in love with?

“Hey, I got an invitation to a party tomorrow, do y’all wanna go?” Roxie interrupted with a smile, barely phased by Winona’s transformation.

“Yeah! Sure!” Accepted Winona, pumping her fists in the air. “Who’s the host?”

“Julie powers.” Roxie answered. 

“Woah-ho, Julie Powers?” Asked Winona, “I didn’t know you knew her!” 

“I mean…” Roxie responded, taking a slight pause. “I would like to know her a bit more deeply if ya know what I mean.” She looked up at Winona and gave a smug, catlike smile. 

“More… deeply?” Asked Winona obliviously. Roxie continued to stare up at her in silence with that knowing catlike smile; Winona grew even more confused and turned to Ramona in distress. “Ramona, what does she mean by that?! She’s not answering meeee!” 

Yup. Still her Pilgrim. She made out with her new girlfriend in celebration. Her lips were softer now. 

Chapter Text

Kim felt herself sink further into the couch; she was so completely done. The sheets were starting to get more and more uncomfortable on her skin and generally just more grimy, her piles of wrappers and trash sat next to her on the floor barely moving, just like her. The time for the party approached closer and closer, a dread filled her stomach. Hollie burst into the apartment boisterously, keeping her coat on as she walked over to Kim. 

“Hey, Kimmy. C’mon, let’s go.” She said, looking down at Kim, eyes full of determination. 

“Wha- no. Party’s not until eight!” Protested Kim. The dread was rapidly making its way up her throat, causing it to ache like there was a rock inside it. 

“Yeah- are you going to it in that?” Hollie asked sarcastically. Kim’s grimey nightwear pressed against her skin. The once comfy cotton was starting to mess with her. The far too familiar feeling scrapped against her flesh, it didn’t feel quite right anymore. It all made her feel far too icky in her own skin.

“Alright fine I’ll get dressed, duh.” Kim replied. Even the idea of getting dressed sounded daunting. 

“No. You’re coming shopping for party clothes with me.” Hollie asserted. 

“Joy.” Kim groaned.

The girls made it to the thrift shop; Hollie was practically dragging Kim there at the latter part of the journey. The bright fluorescent lights of the shop seared at her eyes. They perused around the store and Kim selected the least tacky looking dress she could find so she could at least say she bought something . Hollie seemed satisfied. The two sat in the changing room as Kim made sure the dress fit her.

“You know Julie doesn’t accept plus ones right?” Kim said. This was the only time she was going to respect her “invites only” rule; she needed to get out of this. 

“You’re not a plus one.” Hollie corrected. Damn, she thought of everything. “I asked Julie and she said that she’d be perfectly happy to have you.” 

“Pfffftttt” Kim snorted, “Yeah sure she did. I’m sure she also said ‘oh Hollie I love you and I hope everyone can forgive me for being such a massive bitch’” Kim said in a mocking tone.

“I’m telling the truth!” Said Hollie. “She actually does tolerate you.”

“I’m so honored.” Snarked Kim. She continued to change into the surprisingly annoying-to-put-on dress in silence. She really did know how to pick ‘em didn’t she.

“I heard Roxie Richter is coming.” Hollie commented, trying to make small talk. She really did love that small talk didn’t she, which in Kim’s opinion, was very annoying.

“Roxie?” Kim asked, trying to recall where she heard that name from. “Isn’t that one of Ramona’s exes?” Hollie started cackling.

“She is? That’s some good tea Kim. You’ve been holding out!” Hollie giggled. 

“Where do you know you know her from?” Kim asked, she was starting to wonder how insulated her friend group was. 

“She’s one of our best customers!” Hollie gasped, putting her hand on her chest dramatically. “It’s frankly incompetent of you that you don’t know her.” She sneered pompously. 

“Really.” Kim said flatly. “Why do you care if she’s going to be at the party? Are you gonna try to sell her another video?” 

“Well-” Hollie looked off into the middle distance idly. “I would say that our relationship is a tad more complex than vendor and customer.” Kim squinted her eyes at Hollie and let out a devilishly curious smile.

“Do tell.” Kim offered. Hollie blushed a bit.

“Well-” Hollie started, “She was in here like any other day, renting Brokeback Mountain.”

“The gay movie?” Asked Kim.

“Yes, the gay movie,” Hollie answered irritably. “She only rents gay movies actually: Brokeback Mountain, But I’m a Cheerleader, Better than Chocolate, all that stuff.”

“We have Better than Chocolate??” Kim asked, it didn’t seem like something they’d have in stock.

“Apparently!” Uttered Hollie. “Anyway she was renting this and like I made a comment that this was the fifth gay movie that she had rented this week, cause it was funny. Anyway, she looked me straight in the eye and said that she was having a hard time and needed these movies. I was like 'yeah totally I get it' and then she started ranting about like- dating troubles and this weird ass ‘order’ that she was in and the next thing I knew I was making out with her in the alley behind the video shop.” Hollie said casually. Kim’s eyes opened wide. 

“I’m SORRY?!” Kim called out. Hollie chuckled. “You made out with a customer?!” 

“That’s the part that you’re shocked about??” Asked Hollie incredulously. 

“Yeah- I’m a lesbian of course I don’t give a shit about you making out with girls.” Kim blurted, quickly covering her mouth after she realized what she said.

“You’re a lesbian?!” Blurted Hollie back. “But like- Jason!!!”

“What about him?” Kim turned up her nose. “I barely dated that dude for a week. He didn’t do shit for me.”

“Scott??” Hollie asked. A silence filled the changing booth.

“...I don’t know about him,” Kim muttered. “He’s an odd case. I don’t want to talk about it.”

“But have you kissed a girl yet?” Pried Hollie. Kim winced.

“... better than kissed,” Kim muttered.

“SEX??!” Shouted Hollie, the entire store must have heard her. 

“What- no.” Kim shot that rumor down quickly. She put her head in her palms “Dated- I fucking dated one.” Kim was growing more and more unstable; she could feel it. A dreadful silence drifted through the changing booth once again. Kim got into her normal clothes and handed the dress to Hollie. “We’re buying this dress and we are leaving.” 

***

Ramona was rooting through her drawers, rapidly assembling an outfit as the clock ticked down. “How do you feel about wearing some of my old clothes to it? I don’t think we really have time to shop around.” Ramona said to Winona as she continued rifling through her old clothes. 

“Yeah I mean that’s cool.” Confirmed Winona, “your style is awesome, I trust you!” She searched through the clothes that Ramona tossed to the side, looking for anything that caught her eye. Through some heavy trial and error as well as a lot of help from Ramona, Winona had assembled an outfit that didn’t look like a complete disaster. She wore a magenta band tee shirt with black trims; sorta gothic, frilly black skirt; booty shorts (her request); and leather boots. Winona was hopping up and down with excitement. “Aaaaaa!” She squealed, “I look so cute!!” She looked like a “goffic” kid that just found a hot topic for the first time, but Ramona didn’t wanna break it to her.

Roxie popped out of the shadows on the ceiling casually and hung upside down, looking at Winona through the mirror. “Hey! Winny!” She called. “I got something for you!” She flipped down from the ceiling and onto the ground. 

“Woahh… for me??” Winona asked, a spark in her eyes. 

“Yes. For you. I literally already said it was for you I-” Roxie stuttered awkwardly. “Here, take it.” She took out a large box from behind her and held it in both hands as she offered it to Winona. “I’m technically only supposed to give this to you on August 13th, 2010 but I barely give a shit about the whole prime directive thing anymore.” Damn. She wasn’t supposed to know for six more whole years, thank god they didn’t have to go through all of that. 

Roxie cracked open the box slowly: a holy, incandescent light flew out of it. Winona looked like she was about to burst from excitement. She was bouncing up and down so fast that her boobs were thrashing around like crazy beneath her vintage tee shirt, Ramona really needed to get her that bra. The light dissipated from the box as it escaped and flew through the rest of the room. Some stripy socks long enough to go to Winona’s thighs lay inside. She grabbed them immediately. 

“No wayyy!” She exclaimed, she was somehow bouncing faster now. She immediately yanked them on, almost throwing herself over as she did so. Ramona had to admit, they really did complete the outfit. “I look SO GOOD!” Winona celebrated as she checked herself out in the mirror. Ramona pondered to herself: how would people react to her? It’s not like Winona’s friends were the most perfect non-problematic people. She made a promise to herself that if Winona was met with anything other than support from someone she would break their kneecaps immediately. 

A good thirty minutes later, they made it to the party. It was in another one of Julie’s friend’s houses: two floors, open floor plan, horrible concoctions strewn about tables, the usual. If this wasn’t a really convenient place for Winona to come out in bulk, they probably would’ve skipped. At this point, Julie’s parties were barely worth attending to even complain about anymore. The second they entered the party, Roxie ditched them in search of Julie. Ramona took a deep sigh and followed Winona to the kitchen. It would probably be good to chill for a bit before sending Winona in for a re-meet and greet. Ramona took a cup and poured some of the horrid brew into it; it tasted like the bottom of a dumpster soaked in Dr. Pepper. She noticed Winona’s eyes dart around as she took in all of the people that she would need to tell about this, swaying from side to side with stress. Ramona put a hand on her shoulder and caught the attention of her rapidly moving eyes.

“It’ll be okay. We don’t have to do this all at once, one at a time.” Ramona reassured. Winona gave a quiet nod back. Over Winona’s shoulder, she saw a very familiar Stephen Stills stumble towards them, or more accurately: towards her. 

“Hey!! Ramona! How’re you doing?”  He greeted, Winona completely froze. The brown-haired girl looked away from Stephen’s rounded face. “You’re back with Scott right, you know where the guy is? He better not be skipping on this party, he’ll be breaking his streak!” Stephen joked. With every gendered pronoun, noun, and proper noun that came out of his mouth, Winona flinched. Ramona knew that she was the one tasked with ripping off the bandaid, here and now. She put her arms around Winona’s shoulders and rotated her around so that she was facing Stephen. 

“Don’t worry, she is here actually. Though I don’t blame you for not recognizing her .” Ramona answered with a smile. 

“Wait- what do you mean…?” Stephen asked confusedly. Then, as if a gauge in his head flipped from “doesn’t get it” to “gets it”, he suddenly went silent. “Oh. That’s- wow…” He switched his gaze to Winona. “Holy shit.”

“Yeah…” Winona said softly, her eyes were focussed on her cup. “I know it’s a lot to take in… I’m sorry I-” Stephen interrupted her anxious rambling with a bear hug. 

“Congratulations man!!” Stephen cheered. “Shit- er- I mean woman- sorry” He broke the hug when it was clear that Winona’s back was starting to get crushed by the hug. “You’re like- a chick now!” Winona was still dazed by Stephen’s very loud reaction to her transition, but her eyes slowly lit up once as she started to comprehend his support. Ramona took a sigh of relief at Stephen’s allyship. 

“I mean- yeah!! I am a chick!!” Winona cheered back at Stephen. 

“You’re a chick!!!!” Stephen cheered back even louder.

“How many drinks did you have?” Asked Ramona, not even knowing that Stephen’s voice could go that loud. Stephen leaned over to her clumsily.

“Many.” He replied, and then he got back to his cheering match with Winona. As Ramona watched the spectacle, she noticed a black mop of very gay black hair navigate its way through the swath of people and into the kitchen. 

“Stephen, where the hell are you?” Wallace called out from the crowd, “We were having a conversation ” He shouted, with extra gay emphasis being put on the word “conversation”. His eyes widened as he ran over to a still-shouting Stephen Stills. 

“Please don’t tell me you were trying to flirt with him.” Ramona snarked to Wallace. 

“Nah- bears aren’t super my type.” He commented back. Ramona looked at him distrustingly. “Okay- maybe I was flirting with him a little.” Wallace clarified.

“But check it out!!” Stephen interjected, getting drunker by the second. “Scott’s a chick!” 

“Scott’s a what now-” Wallace started to ask before his eyes got caught on Winona. He came to a standstill as he looked at her. “Oh.” He speed walked over to her and gazed into her eyes. Then he started looking all around her. “Huh. Wow. Honestly didn’t really expect that…” he muttered to himself, “that… that actually makes things far less complicated.” Wallace smiled at Winona, a deep relief washing over him. “Thanks a ton, S- what’s the name now?” 

“Winona.” She replied. 

“Welp. Thanks a ton, Winona.” He continued, “I owe ya one.” He said as he led Stephen out back to the crowd and started to dance with him, completely out of sync with the music. 

“Wha?” Winona stuttered in a daze, clueless to anything that Wallace said.

“That went well.” Ramona observed, “Now, who else can we tell…” 

***

Kim made it to the party, she felt herself battered by the loud, annoying music; the overwhelming chatter of all of the people there; and the horrendous lights. She ditched Hollie as soon as she could (she didn’t seem to mind it too much) and went into survival mode. She just needed to endure until someone or something crashed the party, then she could resolutely say that it sucks and leave. As she lurked through the house, she looked for any familiar face to just chill with. Then she started to realize that she was starting to run out of familiar faces in her life. She darted over to a fairly quiet corner and took a sigh as she leaned against the wall.

Her eyes fell onto the well-lit kitchen; it was surprisingly empty. The horrid brew in it must’ve been scaring the rest of the party off, not a great sign. There were only two people in the kitchen; although they looked familiar, she could barely see them through the blaring lights. The redhead squinted as she attempted to focus through the cornucopia of overstimulation that laid before her. Her eyes widened as she saw the dyed hair, it was Ramona. Oh god. Kim felt herself almost need to throw up out of stress, then her eye got caught on the girl next to her. Did- did she really just leave her for some random chick?! That information made Kim’s stomach drop… she couldn’t even excuse their failure of a relationship with Ramona not being into women. But what about Scott? Didn’t Ramona leave her to be with Scott? Did Scott reject her? Kim giggled a bit at the thought: the schadenfreude of it amused her, as well as the irony of the baddest bitch to ever live being rejected by turbo loser failure-boy being very sharply funny. But… who was that new girl that she was with? Julie was chatting with her at the moment so she could only see the back of her head and eavesdrop.

“Sooo… this is how it is now? Honestly couldn’t have expected it.” Julie said with a smirk. She was inspecting the new girl… oddly. 

“Yeah!” The girl replied. The voice felt familiar yet was almost impossible to place. “I know it’s a bit weird but… it’s who I am!” She giggled. It was a… dorky laugh. Julie frowned a bit at her. Julie’s face turned a bit sour for some reason.

“Damn… kinda sad really.” She said thoughtfully, “I’d feel worse about insulting you now… it’s a bit less satisfying.” She pondered at the girl’s face and then cracked a huge grin. “Wait- there’s so many more things I can call you now!!” She celebrated. “Alright you h■■bag sk■■■ b■■■■, I support ya. You fuckin w■■■■.” 

“Yayy…?” the girl celebrated confusedly. Julie adjusted to whatever she was thinking about and then suddenly squinted at the two girls. 

“Wait a tick. Don’t you dare try to ■■■■ with me, you b■■■■” She was getting back into her mean self. “No matter what gender you are, I didn’t ■■■■ing invite you. Who did you tag along with you ■■■■” 

“I… Well…” the girl stuttered. Another familiar face popped out of the crowd, saving her. It was Roxie. 

“Hey! Oi! Julie! It’s me! I’m over here!” The pigtailed girl beckoned Julie. The irritated girl looked back at the mystery girl and rolled her eyes. Julie turned her head to Roxie, then back at the girl, then over to Roxie, and sighed angrily.

“Alright… I’m way too tired to give a shit… you ■■■■s win.” Julie groaned. “We’ll meet again… ■■■■■ Pilgrim.” She stomped into the crowd, ready to have a damn fucking good time.

“Actually it’s Winona!!!” The mystery girl, Winona, called back to Julie as the bespectacled girl huffed into the crowd, out of sight. Winona turned around and their eyes locked for a split second. They were doggish, brown, and soul-rattlingly familiar. She retreated behind a corner before Winona would catch on to her spying.

She pressed herself against the wall, breathing heavily for reasons she couldn’t even begin to figure out. Things were starting to connect… ■■■■■ Pilgrim? Did she…

“Yooooggghhhh Kim!!!” Slurred a hammered Stephen as he clutzed his way into the hallway. 

“Ah. Stephen…” Kim commented as she snapped out of her thoughts. “I- how are you doing?” She tried to ask as politely as she could. 

“Have you… seen Winona?” Stephen asked. “Like woahh holy shit…” 

“What- the new girl?” Kim responded, in denial, “Yeah I guess she’s pretty…” Kim remembered that she was supposed to be straight right now “...good at making outfits! Yeah. She’s got a good sense of style.” That was a blatant lie, Winona looked like a teenager who just discovered what “scene culture” was and bought the nearest, most corporate, alternative-looking shit she could find.

“Pffffffpfpffftttt” Stephen snorted, accidentally blowing a raspberry straight into her face. She was going to have his hung-over ass in the morning for this shit. “Yeah… ‘New’” He joked, “Kim, that’s Scott! But like, she’s a girl now. It’s really cool.” Kim’s stomach dropped. Was that… that was, wasn’t it. She was… yeah. Holy shit.

“Hey!! Stevie! Up for another round?” Wallace called from the crowd. 

“You bet!!” Stephen shouted back as he stumbled over to Wallace. Kim looked away before she could see what “another round” meant. 

Winona Pilgrim… Winona. Pilgrim. Each mention of the name made Kim feel dizzy. That- wow. She did not expect that. That complicates things, significantly . So Ramona wasn’t only totally into women, but she was also totally into Sc- Winona, at the exact same time. And Winona looked pretty damn good. Like… really good. “ God damn it. ” Kim thought to herself, “ I thought that being a lesbian could help me escape from longing for hi- her. ” Kim corrected herself. Winona was a her. That explained a lot of things. Of course, she was “the exception”; she was never an exception to begin with! But- that meant there was no way no how she could get over that relationship by saying that it wasn’t real. Shit.

 “Win- Winona Pilgrim…” She said to herself, letting it all sink in. Suddenly, she felt a cold hand creep onto her shoulder. 

“Winona… Pilgrim ?” A voice from behind her asked: the very sound of it lurked in the darkness. A second hand sank into her other shoulder. She felt a devilish grin form from the darkness at her back. 

“We’re actually looking for a Pilgrim …” A second voice said, the owner of the smile and the second hand. The two hands grabbed her shoulders forcefully and two more clutched around her waist. She struggled and screamed but it was no use as she was dragged into the darkness of the unoccupied corridor. 

***

“Heyyyy, Julie-” Greeted Roxie. She was off to a great start. “It’s me! You know- Rox you like a hurricane!” She gave a sly smile. 

“Yeah, yeah I know. You could’ve picked a better time…” Julie said, taking up her offer of conversation. She had no idea. “I was just busy kicking out some ■■■■ing plus-oners...” She grumbled.

“Plus… oners?” Asked Roxie hesitantly. 

“Yeah you know,” sneered Julie. It was clear even the thought of whatever she was talking about was making her angry. Her face was flat but extremely sour. “This was explicitly an invite only party. I do not allow plus ones, despite what SOME ■■■■s think they can pull.” Roxie’s face turned a pale tone, remembering her plus one and plus two that she had brung along.

“Oh- yeah, that sucks. Totally.” She affirmed. There we go. She was playing it super cool, Julie didn’t have to know about all of the plussing she was doing. Besides, she’d rather multiply. “So why do you throw so many parties anyway? They seem to stress you out a bunch.” Roxie said casually, small talk was essential for flirting with girls. She had learned that. 

“I mean- it’s a way to socialize that lets me ditch any annoying ■■■■s that try to ■■■■ with me pretty easily.” Julie spat, she was doing that really hot thing with her mouth again. Roxie wondered what it would feel like on her pu- “And honestly I’d rather attend a party than host, managing these things is hell… But nobody in god damn ■■■■ing Toronto has any social life apparently, so here we ■■■■ing are!” She waved her hands in the air, face scrunched up. Roxie wondered whether it was Toronto just not having that much of a nightlife, or if there was a reason people maybe hid the fact they were having a party from her.

“Damn, that sounds tricky,” Roxie affirmed again. She was stuck in the smile and nod zone and she needed to get out fast. She started walking towards Julie, who backed away from her to keep her distance without even noticing they were moving. Roxie expected that; they were heading towards a corner. Roxie now needed to put down her pitch, charm her, and get into a good position in the conversation before they reached the corner. 

“I like your glasses.” Roxie flirted. She was starting small but it seems the compliment had more of an impact on the girl than she expected. Julie adjusted her glasses as her expression changed slightly. 

“Ah- thanks. It’s nice to get some recognition for them. I think they’re quite ■■■■ing nice but nobody else notices.” Julie said, that probably means she took it well? 

“Well, I think that they’re quite cute on you.” Roxie pushed further. She used the C word. While it would not be impossible for her to retreat now, (straight girls call each other cute all the time) she was definitely going a level deeper.

“I mean… thanks,” Julie muttered. She was getting a bit confused about the status of the conversation. “I think your pigtails are really pretty as well- I guess.” A compliment back! While she was still hesitant, this was even more progress. Roxie pushed further.

“Though… the make-up beneath them is a bit more interesting to me.” Roxie continued, they were nearing the wall so she had to pick up the pace. 

“Wow- I mean I-” Julie stuttered, there was clearly something happening behind those eyes. “I actually don’t really wear that much makeup. There aren’t exactly many ■■■■s in my life that I wanna be ■■■■ing pretty for.” 

“I mean- I’m a ▣▣▣▣ in your life, and I think you’re pretty.” Roxie tried mimicking her mouth thing but it didn’t sound quite as good as how it was when she did it. Julie blushed a bit, then laughed.

“Heh, you’re doing it wrong. If you want to actually do it, you-” Julie paused for a bit, thinking about how to criticize her technique. “You kinda need to curl your tongue upwards a bit and…” They finally hit the corner. Roxie knew exactly what to say.

“Huh, maybe you could move my tongue up for me?” Roxie asked. Julie turned a deep red as her glasses started to fog up. She was stricken by a rush of emotions flowing through her all at once. Roxie played it cool; gay panic wasn’t a too uncommon sight for her. 

“I mean- well…” She stuttered as she rapidly shuffled her glasses. Roxie looked at her softly.

“Hey don’t be shy…” Roxie comforted, she was experienced with getting girls out of gay panics. “Don’t worry, I’ll make this one easy for you.” Julie was so red that she was practically glowing, her face was a mix of anger, embarrassment, and “into this” all at once. “Though you ain’t getting any freebies like this again… probably” Roxie snarked. Whether she would get a freebie again depended on how the next few minutes went. Roxie used her ninja-like abilities to climb herself onto the wall and wrap Julie in a leg lock. Her feet were pressed against either wall and holding her up; Julie’s chest lay between Roxie’s legs as the two girls were eye to eye. Julie gave her a death glare that pushed through all of her gay panic and other emotions. It was impressive, hot even. Roxie gave her a smug look back as she stared longingly into her eyes.

The two girls started kissing immediately and ravenously. It was hard to tell who went in for it first; it seemed that they just smashed their faces together at the exact same moment. It was a mess, a hot mess. Julie slid to the ground as her legs fell out from under her, Roxie slid down with her. Julie’s cold glasses pressed against Roxie’s warm face, cooling her down and keeping her going. Julie was really enjoying it, moving her hands behind Roxie’s back and up her shirt. Roxie followed, reaching up to her hair and yanking out the hairband from her ponytail. Julie’s hair flew loose and messy, Roxie shoved a hand into it and grabbed it lightly, and Julie pressed her closer. They entered a cycle of making out, stopping to breathe and panting with their faces just inches apart, and then going back in for another round, they were unstoppable. Score.

***

Winona beamed as she mingled her way through the party, she was pretty damn lucky. Basically, everyone she came out to was awesomely supportive, or at least wasn’t outwardly bigoted. Things had been going surprisingly well; those socks that Roxie gave her must’ve had some good luck in them, maybe they were a special item that made everyone you met an ally and stuff. This was all so so cool. However, there was one person she was trying to find that she didn’t exactly know how to come out to. However, right now, she was having a tough time even finding her. She scanned the crowd for her familiar puff of red hair, but while she was searching, something else caught her eye. Two identical mops of black and blonde hair stood above the crowd… the twins! They locked eyes and the twins jumped several feet straight into the air and landed straight in front of Winona. The partygoers cleared out to allow for a fairly well-sized arena for the three of them. The twins both pointed at her menacingly. 

“Pilgrim!!!!” Kyle announced, “You’re…” He looked Winona up and down for a second. “... gayer looking than the last time we fought.” 

“It’s probably the estrogen, bitch” Winona snapped awesomely, getting into a fighting stance. 

“Regardless!” Ken continued. “You will be pulverized!!!” 

“What are you gonna throw some wimpy little robots at me and then run away like cowards?” Winona taunted with a smirk. 

“Wha- they aren’t wimpy!!! They’re our special guys!” Ken whimpered pathetically. “Besides… we have a different deck of cyber-cards in hand!” 

“Hell yeah, cyber cards! Sick, man!” Kyle complimented. The twins high-fived each other. “How long have you been cooking that one up?” 

“Too long…” Ken said with a grin. Kyle handed him a little disc from his shirt pocket and Ken tossed it to the floor. “Now behold, Pilgrim!” The disc blinked to life and displayed a hologram to the entire party, like in Star Wars. It was Kim, she was banging on some doors somewhere. 

“We have your little friend, Cameroon Pine captured.” Kyle continued. “Now your bitch ass is going down.”

“Shit!” Winona gasped, “...how did you get her name that wrong??” 

“Huh?” Uttered Kyle. Ken leaned over to him and whispered into his ear. 

“It’s-” He said softly, “I think it’s ‘Kim’, not ‘Cameroon’” 

“Shit!” Exclaimed Kyle way too loudly as he stomped his foot. “You’re going down just for that, Winnipeg Pilgrim. You all and your impossible-to-remember names…” They both jumped at her and raised their fists. 

“You’re the guys named Kyle and Ken Kataclungeyogi!” Winona shouted back as she readied a block.

“It’s Katayanagi!!” The two shouted in unison as their fists slammed into Winona’s block. 

WINONA PILGRIM 

VS.

THE Kataclungeyogi KATAYANAGI TWINS

FIGHT!

Winona timed her A press pretty well, but the hit still hurt way more than she expected. Maybe the two of them hitting at the same time caused a synergy combo? Whatever. Winona moved her block down to catch them stunned in the air, readied her punch, and… she whiffed the Reversal. 

“What the hell…” Winona stuttered as she was taken aback. She felt way clumsier than usual. Her dexterity stat was supposed to make her completely immune to misses. Was this a 1/256 glitch? But the double-hit Reversal she was setting up was so cool! What happened? The twins fell to the ground and rushed towards her. Ken went in for a linebacker tackle and completely rammed Winona and threw her into the wall. “ What the hell is going on?? ” She thought to herself. She repelled herself from the wall with her foot, and went in for a punch on Ken. He blocked with his cyber-shield as Winona’s fists squished against it pathetically. 

“Your fists are no match for the power of my digital protection!!” Ken shouted evilly. “My face is blocked by the cybernetic guard of The Devil’s VPN!!! (Go to “DevilsVPN.evil/special-little-guy” to get 666% off on your next few months. Disclaimer: Devil’s VPN is run by actual real ass Satan.)” After his shill, Ken dropped his shield and pulled a Reversal back on Winona, hitting her with his cybernetic Hackertech Sword and sending her hurtling through the air. Kyle caught her midair and held her by the collar like a cat. 

“What the hell is going on?!” Shouted Winona in frustration. It’s like all of her stuff was completely off-limits to her. 

“Your skills!” Ramona called from the crowd as she finally noticed the fight. “When you recustomized your character, all of your skills were reset !” Winona gulped: she had nothing to thrash these guys with. Her status as “best fighter in the province” was about to go straight into the dumpster, along with her soon-to-be-dead corpse... probably. 

“Wombo combo!” Kyle snarked as he drop-kicked her to Ken. He was standing just near the dark hallway that every good party has. 

“Hey!” Winona shouted as she hurdled through the air, “that’s my thing!” 

“Cyber-feet!” Ken hollered as he kicked Winona like a soccer ball straight down the dark hallway.

“You guys can’t even get it right!” Winona protested as she slid down the hallway into darkness. Kyle scooped her up, Ken opened a door for him graciously, and Kyle tossed Winona through it: straight into the cellar. 

“Nice try, Pilgrim. But it’s game over.” Kyle taunted. “Ramona is ours.” They chuckled to each other dickishly as they slammed the cellar door behind them. Winona dashed up and tried to blast through it. Her punch slammed into the door, it sent rattles through her body but the door didn’t even move.

“Wait- why didn’t we just kill her?” Ken asked, Winona could hear them from behind the door.

“Why bother?” Kyle replied, “She probably isn’t worth the cash and Ramona is already ours!”

“Yooo! So true!” Ken cheered. “Let’s go get her!!” The two ran away from the door to claim their reward. Winona felt sick to her stomach. 

“Hey.” Winona heard a voice from the corner of the basement. She turned around and saw that it was Kim! She was slumped over in a ball, arms around her knees, sitting next to the boiler. “Welcome to the party.”

“Hey!!” Called Winona with a grin. It was Kim! She could finally tell her! “Okokokokok so like it’s me Scott but it’s not actually me Scott because I’m a girl but also-” 

“I know.” Kim interrupted bitterly. “How’s it feel for the world to be yours, Mrs. Pilgrim?” Winona got a slight pang of euphoria from being called “Mrs” but it was quickly tainted by her confusion. 

“Huh- wha?” She asked dazedly. 

“Everything turns out sunny for good ol’ Winona,” Kim said condescendingly. “She gets the girl, gets to be a girl, goes on all of these cool fights, and alllll of her friends are even supportive when she comes out! What a life.” She winced, “And what do I get? Jack shit. No closure, no fulfillment, no validation, and a dank cold cellar.”

“I mean, we’re kinda both in the cellar now…” Winona muttered.

“God damn it- you idiot.” Kim hissed. She stood up. “You think you can do whatever the hell you want- and nobody will ever get hurt from it, don’t you?!” 

“Hey, woah- Kim-” Winona stuttered.

“Listen to me for fucking once! Cause I’m done with just holding it in and being quiet for the rest of fucking time!” Kim was full on shouting now. Sweat was forming on her forehead, she was completely tensed up, and her eyes were dilated and angry . “You think that you’re the fucking shit- don’t you?! You think that the rest of the world revolves around you and you never have to be accountable! Well, guess what? High School ended six years ago, and my patience has run the hell out.” Tears were starting to form in her eyes. Her voice scraped through the air.

“Listen- I’m sorry if I hurt you by leaving. It was high school! I didn’t have a choice-” Winona pleaded. It wasn’t ever her choice to move out!

“You don’t even know how god damn reckless you are don’t you...” Kim said quietly, processing. “Answer me, when did we ever truly break up, when did we ever talk to each other on what the move meant?”

“I- I mean like I kinda- when I told you…?” Winona muttered.

“When you what ?” Kim stared at her. “I don’t ever remember you telling me! That sounds like something that would be important, don’t you agree?”

“I- I didn’t?” Winona asked- confused. The memories all came flooding back, correcting themselves. The wishful fantasy of what should’ve been washed out into reality. Kim was right, she didn’t tell her. Guilt oozed through her body as it made its home on her. 

“You don’t even care enough to remember who did what!!” Kim shouted. “You never gave a shit about me, did you?! Only caring about yourself and your own fucking dick.” Ouch. That one hurt. “And if that wasn’t enough, you decided to run away that one night melodramatically because… what? Me and Ramona were hugging after an emotional moment?! Did you not feel you had enough attention on yourself?! Well, guess what Winona, now you have the whole world’s attention, everyone is so hyped about you and your transition! Are you happy??” Tears were streaming down her face. “You want everyone’s eyes on you, yet you don’t even give a damn about anybody. How beautifully fucking poetic.” Her voice was shaking and cracking all over the place, she was fully crying now. “You… you prick!” She dashed at Winona and swiped at her, barely missing. 

“Kim- I-” Winona stumbled backward, “I don’t want to fight you!” 

WINONA PILGRIM

VS.

KIM… PINE??

“I hate you!” Kim screamed, “You loser, asshat, scum of the fucking Earth, wannabe lady-killer!” She kicked at Winona and hit her straight in the stomach. “Well here’s the lady you killed! Killing you the hell back!” The kick stunned Winona, making her hold her stomach. Kim tried to place a falling kick on her but she caught it with her hand and threw her back. While she may have lost her Skill Points she still had muscle memory and technical skill. She stood up, recovering from the stomach kick. “Do you ever think about anything you’ve fucking done?! Do you even realize how much harm you’ve caused… what you’ve done to me?!” Kim cried as she rushed towards Winona and started wailing on her. Winona held her block as the hits pounded against her, the physical damage was minimal but the emotional damage took its toll. 

“I’m sorry!” Winona shouted through the block, “I never wanted to hurt you.. I never thought I could hurt you. I didn’t think I mattered that much.” Kim’s attacks only got more dangerous, to Winona and herself. 

“Well I’m SORRY that you have low self-esteem.” Even in her rage, her sarcasm kept up, “But you did hurt me! You destroyed me!” Winona felt herself weaken out of the shock; the guilt was completely wrecking her system. “You didn’t even look back when you left! When I came back you didn’t even fucking care.” Winona remembered when Kim first met with her after she made it to Toronto… it was a bit terrifying due to their- unsolved past, but looking back it was probably the highlight of her crappy year. She had so much else going on with Envy and the breakup and her rise to stardom after the breakup, Kim was just something else on top of all of that. She couldn’t have appreciated her in the moment. “You think you can just become another person so you can escape?! Now that ‘Scott’ is gone I have nobody to blame but myself for all of this! I’m even more alone than before!” 

“Wha- what do you mean?” Winona asked, “I’m right here.”

“I know, I just-” Kim stuttered, “I just can’t see you the same way I used to! I’m completely alone! Now it's only me and my baggage…” Winona shook, her block barely held. “You somehow left me again. You’ve left me with NOTHING!” She cried, “I HATE YOU!! I HATE YOU SO MUCH!” Her punches only grew weaker and less focused, Winona could barely think. Kim was losing stamina, her attacks ceased and she clinged onto Winona’s block to keep from collapsing to the ground. “Why?!” Kim cried out, “Why can’t I-” She slowed down; she was panting. “Why can’t I just let the hell go?!”

 Winona let down her block and Kim collapsed into her arms, sobbing. Winona hugged her as they rested on the floor: they were both shaking. “Everyone else has moved on… why am I so stuck on… on you?” She muttered.

“I’m… sorry,” Winona said, the guilt for everything she caused setting in like a thick paint.

“I… I love you, Winona.” Kim stuttered out, Winona paused for a second. Her heart thumped.

“I love you too, Kim” She responded, it was the only thing she could possibly say. They hugged each other tighter.

***

ST. JOEL’S CATHOLIC HIGH SCHOOL (ONTARIO, CANADA)

8 YEARS AGO

The school bell rang, Kim didn’t really care. She and Scott Winona were already out skipping class: that bell only indicated when they technically stopped breaking school code or whatever. She snuggled into his her arms as they gazed off into the rural shrubbery that lay before them, just behind the school. She held onto Winona’s arms and wrapped them around herself as she sat in the girl’s lap. This was it… life. 

“Hey, Winnie,” Kim whispered to her.

“Yeah- wuh?” Winona mumbled in a daze; she was half asleep. Kim giggled as she held onto her girl’s arms, covered by that big ol’ baggy coat. 

“I love ya a lot, you dolt.” Kim teased. She moved her arms up to ruffle her long hair.

“Oh- yeah cool” Winona muttered, still kinda out of it. She must’ve been tired. “I kinda already knew that, sooooo…” 

“Pfft-” Kim giggled, “nice one, real smooth.”

“Whaaat???” Winona complained. Kim started laughing.

“You’re damn lucky that only makes me like you more.” Kim teased.

“Yeah, I really… am?” Muttered Winona, it was always fun for her to run conversational circles around her while she just sat there, dazed. 

“You’re also lucky that your arms are really warm…” Kim let out a sweet sigh and leaned into her chest. Winona held Kim’s head and nuzzled her back.

“It's getting late.” She said softly. 

“I think it’s warmer in my car…” Kim responded as she took her hand. “Let’s go.”

Winona’s hand locked in Kim’s as they dashed together to the car, both of them giggling like they were back in middle school. Kim felt the air rush past her face as the ground flew past from beneath her feet. She was flying, hand in hand with the boy girl she loved. Kim Pine was free, for just a moment. She had control over her destiny; they danced through the empty parking lot as one, and they twirled around each other. Kim Pine felt herself rise into the air as Winona twirled her around. The world was theirs, just for tonight. 

They climbed into the car. Kim sat in the driver's seat as she held Winona on her lap. She flipped on the stereo and switched the radio over to 89.3, perfect. She gazed into the brown-haired girl’s eyes, they were a deep unending brown. She felt them tunnel straight into her soul. She moved her head closer to Winona’s and their lips brushed against each other, she wanted more. She wanted the world. 

Her lips dove into his as they locked together, and Winona pushed back against her with her own passion. She wrapped her hand around the back of Kim’s head and held her softly. As they pulled back from the kiss to take a breath, Kim went back in and did it with her tongue. She held her mouth open as it met with hers again. She moved her tongue into Winona’s kiss, she tasted absolutely invigorating. Their tongues danced between each other and sparks crackled, filling the car. They pulled away from their kiss, a strand of saliva stretched between their warm lips before breaking. Wordlessly, they climbed into the back of the car while holding each other, they needed more room to spread out. She lay down at the back of the car and Winona climbed on top of her, the stereo started playing Kim’s favorite song. 

“Listen to this song… this is a good song.” She muttered as she gazed into Winona’s eyes. Their lips locked as they made out again and started making more advances. The car was flush with sparks, their light beamed through the windows and out into the night as Kim and Winona made love to each other for the first time.

***

Things would never go back to that… but maybe they could make something better.

*** 

Ramona's ears rung. The party was dead silent, Winona’s defeat was still washing over the audience. Ramona felt her wrists compress as they were held into the air by the twins. They were pumping their fists in victory as confetti rained from above. She felt like vomiting. She tilted her head down and closed her eyes in defeat, it was over. 

“Hey! Assholes!” A voice called from the crowd, Ramona jolted open her eyes. “You might’ve thrashed Winona but you aren’t making it through me.” Wallace declared, pointing at the twins. 

“Oh… what?” The twins taunted, “Do you want a turn on her?” They snickered. 

“No, you creeps,” Stephen called out, walking up with Wallace and holding his hand. “We’re her friends.” 

“Yeah!!” Roxie called out from the corner, still in a makeout session with Julie. The meaner girl climbed back on top of her and the session continued… Neither of them were gonna help, were they? The twins sneered at the challengers standing in front of them. 

“Yeah, like you-”

“SNEAK ATTACK!!!!” Knives Chau yelled from behind the twins as she slashed her dual daggers, incapacitating both of them at the same time. She sheathed her short swords, grabbed onto Ramona, and started running. 

WINONA PILGRIM’S WEIRD FRIENDS

VS.

THE KATAYANAGI TWINS

“Knives?!” Ramona yelled from the teenager’s carry, she was surprised that Knives was strong enough to hold her. “Why are you helping? I thought you hated me!” 

“Well now that Scott is a girl and I’m 18 and apparently she cheated on me , so I don’t know what to think anymore!” She said while darting through the party. Wallace and Stephen attempted to hold the twins down as Knives tried to get Ramona to safety. Knives placed Ramona down roughly as she faced off against the twins, now in hot pursuit. She dodged and weaved through their attacks, trying to kite them into a corner so that the rest of the gang could get the jump on them. She darted as fast as she could, but the twin’s legs were longer and faster than hers. Kyle grasped at the tuft of her hood, but Joseph jumped from behind him and wrapped his arms around his neck, taking him down to the ground. 

Knives ran as fast as she could but she was losing stamina fast. Ramona had to act. While the twins were distracted, Ramona dived into the crack between the nearest couch cushions into a mini subspace pocket and jumped out of her bag on the other side. She snatched it off the coathanger she left it on and jumped back into the fight. Ken caught a glimpse of her in his eye right before she crushed his face in with her hammer. Kyle came running at her after he managed to get Joseph’s bear hug attack off his neck, Ramona kicked him in the chest before he could get an attack off. He quickly got up and the two attempted a double attack on her. She reacted fast, spending 9 GUTS points in order to do a hammer spin attack, and knocked them back. Ken scrambled on the floor, his eyes darted around the bright lights of the party as a shadow loomed behind him. Knives went in for another sneak attack, but this time Ken was ready.

“SNEAK AT-” Knives shouted before her arms were caught by Ken’s cybernetic grip. He grabbed her by the hood and raised her up into the air.

“Not a second time you little sneak-” Sneered Ken, he held Knives up in the air as she thrashed around in his clutch. “Now. Ramona… come over here and accept defeat…”

Kyle tossed an odd-looking piece of machinery over Ramona’s head and into Ken’s hands before scurrying away and jumping into a kitchen cabinet. Ken held the gadget up to her head. It was a laser cannon, scrapped from the remains of Robot-01. A ball of energy formed at the barrel as it charged up. “...or the kid gets it ” Ken finished, Knives was trembling as the courage faded from her face. 

Everyone was stone still, this had turned into a hostage situation real fast; the only noises other than the shrill sound of Ken’s laser charging up were Julie and Roxie STILL fucking making out in the corner- how long had they been going at it?! 

“No.” Stephen’s voice echoed from the silent crowd. He slowly marched towards Ken. 

“Don’t try anything stupid, homo!” Insulted Ken, he was struggling to decide whether to point the gun towards Knives or Stephen. Stephen stayed silent. “I’M WARNING YOU!” Ken shouted, fear rising from his stomach to his face. Stephen stayed silent and stood right in front of Ken: the twin started sweating. “I-” he stuttered. Stephen wound back his arm and socked Ken directly in the stomach in a single fluid motion. The cannon fell to the ground with Ken crumbling down along with it. Stephen started kicking him as he writhed around on the ground in pain.

“You. Do. Not. Threaten. The. Kid.” Stephen uttered between kicks. “Understand?!” As Stephen dealt justice to Ken, Knives managed to get up from the ground and cheered him on. 

“Rgh-” Ken grunted as he reached for the cannon. Ramona dashed over to smash it to bits but it was too late, she stopped in her tracks as he got a hold of it. Stephen was so blinded by his rage he didn’t even notice. “Fuck it- you’re DEAD, Flowers.” He aimed the cannon at Ramona as it charged up. She wanted to fight, she wanted to dodge, but all she could do was freeze. Kyle darted out of the kitchen, carrying a pile of spatulas. 

“Bro!!!” He called to the seething Ken. “I’m here to help! I brought supplies!” He held out the spatulas. “I could build a death ray with these!” 

“Wha…” Out of genuine confusion, Ken lost his focus. Stephen’s thrashing made him lose his aim and by the time he got it back on he ended up aiming where he was looking: right at Kyle’s spatula collection. He tried to stop it but it was too late, a bolt of energy fired out of the cannon and hurled itself directly at Kyle. 

“BRO LOOK OUT!” Ken shouted in vain. 

“Don’t worry I’ll-” Kyle dropped his spatulas to get into action, but before he could finish his sentence, the laser bolt smacked straight into his chest and turned him into a pile of jangling pocket fillers. 

“Shit!” Ken yelled, partly because he just laser obliterated his brother, mostly because the cannon was overheating and burnt his pathetic little hand. He dropped the gun to the floor and held his hand in pain. As he licked his wounds, Ramona started to notice that the cannon fell onto its “autofire” button. “Waitwaitwaitwaitwait” Ken panicked as the cannon jiggled around on the floor before aiming at him by some twist of fate, and firing again, disintegrating him as well. 

Stephen stumbled over the pile of coins where Ken once was and almost threw himself into the wall. “Ah dammit. Dirty KO stealer…” he grumbled to himself as he checked on Knives to see if she was doing alright. Everyone in the party let out a collective breath and went back to partying irresponsibly. 

“ Okay…” Ramona thought to herself. While she wished she could just unwind and get back to the party, there were still two people she needed to save. She located and darted down the dark hallway that she saw the twins huck Winona through.  

She busted down the cellar door with her hammer and dashed below, into the breach. “Winona!!!” She called out, “I made it!” She reached the basement but was instantly stopped in her tracks. Winona and Kim were hugging- were they making out?! No- it didn’t quite look like it. Were those tears falling down Kim’s cheeks? What happened?

The two stared at her, eyes wide open. Her eyes locked with Kim’s, they looked sad… desperate even. Guilt clouded her mind. “I…” Ramona stuttered out.

“Hey Ramona, can I sleep at yours tonight??” Kim blurted out. 

***

Kim held Ramona’s hand along with Winona as they darted through the party, they were tired, depressed, and ready to just go the hell to sleep. They stopped by a corner to go pick up Roxie who was… making out with Julie. How did she even… Kim didn’t care. 

“Hey- Rox. We’re leaving ” Ramona stated sternly. She grabbed Roxie by her hoodie like a cat and dragged her off. 

“Wha-” Roxie stuttered. “Noooooouhhh.” She complained as she writhed around in Ramona’s grip childishly. “Hey- Jules!!! Here’s my number!” She pulled out a ninja star with a note attached to it and hucked it in Julie’s direction. It landed a few centimeters from her face. “Call me!!” Roxie hollered as she was dragged off with Ramona along with Kim and Winona. 

“...wuh?” Julie blinked twice and looked around the party in a daze, she was completely kiss-drunk and barely hid it. Kim didn’t envy her.

Kim felt herself tumble through subspace as Ramona briskly rushed them home. She almost vomited out of traumatic recall and alcohol, but she managed to keep herself together until they got to Ramona’s place. Ramona sat Winona and her down on the couch, then sat down along with them.

“Alright… let’s just slow down for a goddamn second. What the hell is happening with-” Ramona groaned, barely looking at them as she rubbed her eyes irritably. 

“Listen, things were intense and like she just came at me and it all happened at once and what was I supposed to do?” Winona blurted out, words spilling from her like a gushing waterfall. She was only making things worse with that talk.

“No- not with that . We need to look at the… all of this.” Ramona sighed. Kim stayed completely silent, a pit was starting to grow in her stomach. She wanted to vomit again. “What the hell is going on with us??” Her voice was weary; it weighed heavily on the air like a feather resting on the surface of a lake. “This has just been… chaos. Event after event happening with no damn throughline… no label to describe any parts of it.” 

“You’re worried about labels ?!” Kim complained harshly. “Who gives a damn!” 

“What- do you want to keep it this way?” Ramona snapped, “With us just constantly orbiting around each other, occasionally colliding for a makeout sesh before drifting only a few feet apart to stare awkwardly at each other?” Kim felt the weight of everything start to press on her. She was right, things were completely out of control. Her mind suddenly cobbled itself together as it formed a thought, a single coherent thought, but most importantly: an idea. She had to say it now. It was do or die. 

“Well labels won’t do crap to help us with the chaos, we’ll just end up switching up the label every time we wanna jump ship.” Kim began, she felt her confidence rise for once in her life as thoughts merged together to form concepts and words. “We need a commitment ” Ramona winced at the word; talk about commitment-phobic. She continued, her idea was clearer than ever. “All three of us need to stay in this exact damn house together for a whole week.” Kim pitched. “If we can survive it without hating each other by the end, that’ll be proof of something. Just everyone promise: no flaking, no stirring up drama, just living.” 

“Uh.. yeah sure! I think we can do that!” Winona agreed, it was a damn good thing that her dumb ass never backed down from a challenge. “You up for it, Rammy?” Ramona sat stone still, it seemed that she had reached her peak capacity for “tough conversations”.

“Yup, mhm, commitment, all that yeah.” She muttered. Not much of her mental energy was going into communication, it seemed. Kim took the opportunity and grabbed her hand.

“Hey… it’ll be okay.” She said softly. Kim was shit at comforting people, obviously, but maybe tonight was the night for her to get better. “Just take it one day at a time. You don’t need to think of all of the days ahead.”

“Just one day at a time,” Ramona repeated after her. Kim smiled warmly. 

“You got it.” She comforted. She gave her a quick hug and then got back to her normal self, if she stayed that sweet for that long she’d probably get diabetes. “Now I’m tired as hell and done with hearing all of you talking. Let’s get to bed.” She complained sarcastically. 

“I’d like that.” Ramona smiled at her; Kim couldn’t help but smile back.

“Yeah- totally!” Winona added. Even when going to sleep the exclamation marks were mandatory it seemed. 

The three walked upstairs, hand in hand. The way the moonlight bounced off the walls reminded her of that night after Ramona rescued her. She still didn’t know why Winona didn’t kick her out, why she enjoyed it when she cuddled with her, it all didn’t make sense. The fact that both Ramona and Winona didn’t hate her by now was a miracle. Winona and Ramona… She felt so greedy. It was the two people that she needed the most, both together with her. 

They made it to the bed and they all climbed in. Thank god it was big enough to fit all three of them. As they chaotically ruffled around with the sheets and each other to get somewhat comfortable, they finally found a position that felt good enough. Winona and Ramona faced each other as they cuddled, with Kim in the center of the cuddle, receiving all of it. It didn’t feel real. Winona hugged her as tight as she could, like those old middle school days but with far more care; not to mention that she also had boobs now that would of course double as pillows for her. Ramona’s flowery arms comforted Kim too; she felt unfamiliar, but in a good way. It was something completely new. The strange and the familiar both comforted her and told her that everything was gonna be okay without even using words. 

Kim rested on Ramona’s chest and gave her a nuzzle, Ramona tilted her head down and gave Kim a little smooch at the top of her head. Kim laughed softly: it reminded her of that one faithful afterparty all those nights ago. To think that their simple late-night drinking session would turn into this. She rolled over to Winona and gave her a kiss on the cheek, the brown-haired girl blushed a bit from it. She hugged Kim and Ramona even tighter in response as she brought them both closer together. Kim felt herself melt into a little puddle of comfort and coziness between their arms. The world was hers, just for tonight.