AotS Chapter 30.m - Vying for Knowledge (Patreon)

Acceptance of the Self

Book 1: Attunement of the Hearts

Chapter 30.m - Vying for Knowledge

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Madelaine

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[ - content warnings:  none yet suggested - ]

[ - Saturday, September 14, 2019 - 11:19am - The Anderson Household - ]

Sunlight streams in through the open bay windows of the Anderson’s living room. Dawn and Ellie are seated on the comfy leather couch facing the TV, while Vielet, who just arrived, sits on the soft leather armchair to our left. She’d insisted on seeing us sooner rather than later to talk about the 'Maddie' question, and Dawn, Ellie and I had nothing else going Saturday morning at 11am, so here we all are.

“...So let me get this straight, you have multiple personality disorder?” Vielet asks, after a heavy pause in the conversation.

I wince on the inside. We’ve been trying to explain my existence to Vielet for the past few minutes, and I’m honestly still quite scared of her rejecting us for being plural.

Ellie, who’s fronting, takes Vie’s comment in stride as she leans forward and replies, “It’s not been called that for a while, the new term is ‘dissociative identity disorder’, but essentially yes. There’s me, Ellie, and there’s also Madelaine, who goes by Maddie, and Anne, and maybe some others too, we’re not entirely sure.”

Vielet nods slowly. She’s got her feet planted firmly on the floor, elbows resting on her knees with her hands clasped in front of her. “And you only figured this out last week? How does that happen? Like, how did you figure it out? Also I’m sorry if any of these questions are insensitive, I’ve literally never encountered, what did you call it, plurality?” Dawn and Ellie nod. “Yeah, I’ve never encountered plurality before,” Vielet finishes.

“I really appreciate you asking questions and trying to understand,” Ellie says, “you’re not being insensitive at all, quite to the contrary. As for how we figured it out, well, that’s where things get complicated.”

Vielet raises an eyebrow, but doesn’t interrupt.

Ellie flicks our eyes to the side as she focuses and takes a deep breath. “Basically, Anne connected to Maddie and I from another world, where she has her own life and her own body. She believes our two minds have been linked for an unknown purpose, and she’s proven that her world’s magic works here in our world.”

“We even have video evidence of it now thanks to my dad Jay,” Dawn adds with a grin.

Vielet looks back and forth between Ellie and Dawn, clearly skeptical. “Are you both for real? Can I see this evidence?”

Dawn nods, already tapping away on her phone to pull up the clip. She makes the video fullscreen and holds it out closer to Vielet.

Vie leans forward, staring at the stilled image of Anne, in Ellie and I’s body, against the backdrop of Jay’s bookshelf-lined study wall behind her. Anne’s head is bowed, her eyes closed, hands resting on either side of the paper full of spell glyphs before her.

When Dawn hits ‘play’, Anne begins breathing slowly and evenly. It’s quiet for at least a minute, before Anne opens our moss green eyes and fixates them on one of the sigils towards the middle of the paper. A moment later there’s a flash of white light originating from the sigil.

Dawn and Jay react to the magic excitedly in the video, but I can see Vie’s looking confusedly at the screen.

“For clarification, there’s no light source on that table,” Dawn explains, “that white light also happened when Anne tried the same spell downstairs at the kitchen table, but we weren’t recording then.”

Vielet nods. “Can you play it again?” she asks.

Dawn nods. “Of course.” She rewinds to the beginning and hits the play button.

This time Vie watches it a lot closer, and her eyebrows go up after the flash of magic.

“May I?” she asks, reaching for the phone. Dawn relinquishes the device, and Vie rewinds it to just before the magic happens, then starts rapidly tapping the play/pause button until she finds the frame she’s looking for. She zooms in on the piece of paper, and I suddenly understand what she’s so interested in. On the page, one of the symbols is highlighted in faint white light. The light flares to take up the entire screen in the next frame.

“Damn,” she says, “that’s either really nicely edited or I need to get a drink to because you’re trying to tell me magic, like the stuff from fairy tales, is real? What do your dads think about this? I heard Jay in the video.”

Jay and Aiden are actually both on standby in their respective offices to come help explain things to Vielet in case our own explanations aren’t enough, or in case she needs to hear it from an authority figure. So far, so good though.

“They’re on board with Anne maybe being truthful about coming from a different world,” Dawn says. “They both actually seemed to accept the magic as real pretty quickly.”

“Okay, why doesn’t that surprise me? You’ve got to have the coolest parents in the country,” Vie says.

“Thanks, I do,” Dawn says with a smile.

Vie hands the phone back to Dawn, who accepts and pockets it.

“This is incredible,” Vielet says, her eyes distant. “I’ve always wanted to believe magic is real, but it’s been a long time since I had any hope of being proven right on that account.” She seems to come back to herself, her eyes focusing on Dawn’s, then Ellie’s gazes. “You guys aren’t fucking with me, right?” she asks trepidatiously.

Ellie shakes our head. “I pinkie pie swear it,” she says, holding out our right hand with pinkie finger extended.

Dawn holds out her right pinkie as well. “I swear it too, we’re for real.”

Vielet obligingly gets out of her chair and pinkie shakes with both of us.

“Alright,” she says, stepping back and putting both hands on her hips, “Well, fuck. I mean, this is a lot to drop on a girl, you know? What all is possible with the magic you have? Do you know?”

I feel Ellie shrug. “We haven’t had time to test much yet, all we know for sure is the light spell works, but I’m sure we’ll keep practicing whenever we get the chance.”

“Gotcha,” Vie replies.

We’re all quiet for a minute or so.

“So uh, back to the topic of Maddie, can she hear me? Can I meet her?” Vielet asks.

I blush at the way Vielet assumes I’m a girl. I’m not really a girl, but I’m not quite exactly not a girl either. I’m girl-adjacent, a void of gender in the shape of a birch staff-wielding enby who could easily be mistaken for a birch staff-wielding girl, if you will.

How do you want to handle this? Ellie asks me at the speed of thought.

I’ll talk to her once you introduce me, but only for a bit, I reply tensely.

“Maddie uses they/them pronouns,” Ellie says casually, “and yes they can hear you, they’re paying attention to us right now.”

Vielet’s eyes widen, but she nods in understanding. “Okay, sorry! Um, hi Madelaine, it’s nice to officially learn about you?” she says hesitantly.

“Would you like to officially meet them?” Ellie asks, “They can come to the front and I can take a step back, but only if you’re comfy with that.”

Vielet nods slowly. “Yeah, I’d like to meet them,” she says quietly.

Ellie nods, and closes our eyes.

For dramatic effect, she says as she steps backward and I step forward.

Nice, I think at her, settling into the body and taking stock of it for a moment before opening my eyes and looking up at Vielet. Ellie had been sitting on the couch still, but I quickly shift and stand up, so I’m back to near-eye level with Vie.

“Heya,” I say with as friendly a tone as I can manage, “I’m Maddie. I know everything about you that Ellie does, we’ve been copiloting most of our life, and we’ll probably continue to do that long into the future.”

Vielet studies me for a moment. “It’s good to meet you more officially, then,” she says, “I know practically nothing about you.”

I’d say she probably knows you more than she knows me, what do you think? Ellie asks.

I think you’re right, I reply.

“You probably know a lot more about me than you think. Ellie and I make up the same person you’ve known since grade school,” I say. “I love video games, playing them and making them, I love hiking and camping, and I love friendship and ponies, same as you.”

Vielet smiles. “That’s awesome, I really appreciate you all trusting me with this. It’s gotta be at least as scary to open up about this kinda of mental health stuff as it is to open up about being trans with people.”

I nod, crossing my arms and shifting my weight to the other foot. “Yeah it’s definitely no picnic.”

We all fall quiet again.

This time it’s Dawn who breaks the silence. “I don’t know about you three, but I’m thirsty. Let’s move to the kitchen and grab some drinks and snacks and stuff?” she suggests as she stands up to join Vie and I.

“Sounds like a good idea,” I say. Vie nods.

We follow Dawn into the kitchen and spend a few minutes rummaging through the fridge and pantry for sustenance. We end up opening a bag of doritos and cracking open some cans of cola.

I’m tempted to give control back over to Ellie, I don’t like being out this long, but at the same time it’s nice to be included, so I stay.

We all gather around the near side of the table to the pantry, and conversation starts back up.

“What do you plan to do like, long term?” Vielet asks me, after munching on a dorito. “Like, you’ve got magic at your fingertips! What would you want to do with it, if you could do anything?”

The questions takes me aback, because I haven’t really thought about it and yet an answer pops into my mind immediately: shapeshift into my ideal body.

But what is my ‘ideal’ body? I’ve been inhabiting this mortal form for so long that I just assume it naturally in headspace, yet it doesn’t feel like my ideal, really.

“Um,” I mumble, “I guess I’d want to use it to shapeshift into our ideal body.”

“Oh fuck yeah, that’s what I’m talking about!” Dawn says excitedly, “Give me an instant magical transition, or fuck even a slow one, and I will be eternally yours in mind, body and soul.”

She says that last part while staring right at me, and I blush hard. “I- I have no idea if that’s even possible,” I say uncertainly, “But I can certainly ask Anne about it the next time I see her.”

Vielet puts down her can of soda and looks at us with dark brown eyes. “How does that work exactly, is she off in her own world right now?”

“She is,” I reply, “and she’s preparing for a big expedition right now so I’m not sure she’ll be able to help with this anytime soon. As for how it works, there’s some sort of protected channel between our mind and hers. We can use it to cross this weird void between our minds and then we’re in her system, connected to her body, the same way she can come here and connect to this world and our body. Ellie and I have both traveled to the other world now.”

I bet Anne will be able to help us with magic still, she has her whole system to keep track of things on their expedition, Ellie muses from her position curled up on a green armchair.

True, but I don’t want to distract her if her system needs her on their dangerous trek, I say.

Touché, Ellie replies.

“This is so cool,” Vielet whispers.

I smile at her as I sip at my cola.

“I didn’t realize you’d gone over to the other side too, Maddie,” Dawn says. “What’s it like over there?”

I swallow a mouthful of sugary liquid and say, “They live in a city called Amaranth, it has a very ‘sword and sorcery’ type of vibe, with maybe some magitech going on too? We haven’t exactly had time to do a full cultural exchange program yet with them, so I only know bits and pieces of what life’s like there.”

Vielet’s eyes are wide. “That sounds dope,” she says.

“Yeah, I’m honestly jealous that you all get to experience that,” Dawn says to us with a smile.

I blush. “Sorry, it’s not like we had any say in this.”

“Don’t apologize cutie,” Dawn says, leaning over and pecking me on the cheek with her lips, “you have nothing to be sorry for. You’re absolutely right, you had no say in this stuff, you’re really just rolling with this weird-ass set of punches life’s decided to throw at you.”

I feel my face burning, and I stutter slightly as I say, “R-right, um, sor- er, not sorry, um, thanks for the kind words?”

Dawn laughs lightly, and Vie chuckles too. “You’re so easy to fluster, Maddie, it’s a shame I don’t get to see you as often as I see Ellie,” Dawn says with a grin.

They’re right cutie, you are kind of easy to tease, Ellie says with a smile, maybe you should front more often.

I actually have to hide my face in my hands. “Bullying! This is bullying!” I exclaim.

Vie, Dawn, and Ellie laugh again, much to my chagrin.

The conversation turns towards more mundane topics, like what we should do with the rest of our day. Vielet repeats her desire to talk to Sky about gender stuff, and Dawn and I resolve to play some of our To Be a Princess game while we wait for Vielet to join us for more fun multiplayer madness.

As we’re getting ready to go upstairs to bother Sky though, we hear footsteps tromping down the stairs.

Sky enters the kitchen a moment later, their light blue hair messy and their outfit a pair of batman pajama pants and a scooby-doo tee shirt.

They do a double take when they see the three of us gathered around the table. “Did I miss a memo?” they ask uncertainly.

“Not at all, we were actually about to come find you. Vielet has gender questions,” Dawn says with a smile.

Sky’s eyes widen, and they excitedly clap their hands together. “Hell yes! Hit me!” they say, their bright grey eyes fixated on Vielet.

Vie’s looking equal parts excited and scared. “Uh, um, I wanted to know how you knew you were nonbinary? And like, how you figured it out?”

Sky grins. “Absolutely, do you want to talk here in front of everyone, or go upstairs to my office?” They gesture towards the stairs with a grin.

“Whatever you’re more comfortable with, I’m cool with Ellie, Maddie, and Dawn listening in.”

Sky’s eyebrows rise. “I see that cat’s out of the bag now too, eh?”

I nod. “Hi Sky, Maddie here, we just finished filling Vie in on what’s been up with us.”

Sky nods. “Awesome!” they say. “Well how’s about we all get comfy at the table and get into some good good gender discussion.”

There’s agreement all around, and the four of us gather around the kitchen table. Sky sits at the east head of the table, Dawn and I sit on the north side, and Vielet sits on the south side.

“So,” Sky begins, “I never felt like I fit in with boys or girls, I grew up bouncing around different orphanages until the Andersons found me when I was eleven. By that time I’d met one trans girl orphan and learned that other people felt somewhat similar to how I did, except that I never really vibed with being called she or her that much. Jay and Aiden helped me figure myself out, helped me realize there are other things out there than just binary boy and girl, I chose the name Sky because I feel like my gender changes as often as the sky does and has as much variety to it. Then Dawn joined the fam and was really big on protecting me and defending my gender identity, which absolutely helped me come into my own as a queer trans person.”

Vielet, Dawn and I are all listening intently as Sky speaks.

“Thank you, that makes a lot of sense. I’m so glad the Andersons found you and Dawn,” Vielet says with feeling.

Sky and Dawn both smile. “Me too,” they chorus.

Then Sky continues, “As for how I ‘figured it out’, I just went with what felt right? Like I asked myself: in an ideal world where I could be whatever I wanted to be, what form would I choose? That’s what being with our dads felt and feels like, an ideal little haven in the midst of a cruel and uncaring world. And the form I would choose is very feminine but again, I don’t vibe with being called a girl or a woman. I like ‘enby’ and ‘nonbinary’ because they feel expansive enough to accurately describe the way my gender feels to me.”

Vielet’s nodding by the end of Sky’s explanation. “That makes a ton of sense, thank you so much Sky.”

Sky smiles and nods. “No problem Vie. Now, do you have any gender feelings you’d like to share with the class?”

Vielet blushes beet red. “Uhm, well, I guess I’m still feeling out my gender. I like the labels ‘girl’ and ‘woman’, ‘she’ and ‘her’, but I also really resonate with concepts like nonbinaryness, that expansive feeling you describe. I don’t really want to fit into the tiny checkbox of womanhood, I want to fill it in completely and scribble an ever-widening circle all around it on the page.”

“Damn girl, that’s poetry right there,” Dawn comments.

Vielet blushes even brighter, her dark brown eyes darting away from Dawn’s mirthful amber gaze.

“All that being said,” Vie says slowly, “I do kinda want to be seen as a woman by people at the moment. Like I want to spend some time getting used to that feeling of being perceived differently, and then start to expand my sense of self from there?”

“That sounds like a great idea, as long as it’s what you really want!” Sky says happily.

“It is, I think,” Vielet replies.

“Heck yeah, I think this calls for some celebratory gaming time with all four of us, a buncha transes figuring ourselves out,” Dawn says with a grin.

“Better make it quick then, I’ve got to meet Eve for a uh, thing, later today,” Sky says.

There’s a few raised eyebrows, but nobody questions them.

We end up staying downstairs for another half hour as Sky eats breakfast and we all chat about gender, our feelings around it, and how much we support each other in pursuing our bliss.

Then we file upstairs to the gaming den and get it set up for more Crawl, since more people is generally more fun in that game and Sky loves it as much as we do.

Sky’s also a wizard at video games in general, so they easily woop the rest of us any time they get to be the hero. They’re a good sport about it though, and make sure everyone gets their time to shine as the human player of the dungeon.

All too soon, Sky has to leave. We exchange hugs all around, and then Vielet starts up a new interrogation about the magic of Anne’s world and all that we know about it. That turns into a few hours of discussion about any and all details we’ve noticed about our otherworldly companions.

Finally, it’s time for Vie to head home for dinner as well.

Jay and Aiden report over dinner that they’ve not had much luck finding anything exactly matching our circumstances in the lore and history they’ve been researching.

Dawn, Ellie and I turn in fairly early after dinner, the three of us exhausted from a long and arduous week of school.

Anne ends up keeping Ellie and I awake for another hour or so, reporting in from her world and then getting updates from us on our magical progress. Her system has been making all the necessary preparations for their impending departure from the city of Amaranth, and Ellie and I have been practicing with our focus objects and personal headspaces as frequently as we can.

Once we’ve reached the end of our energy limit, we bid Anne goodnight and turn in for the night for good.

Sleep comes for us easily and swiftly.

End of

Chapter 30.m - Vying for Knowledge