Alter: Olivia

Local Network World: 0098

Dates: 22/02/2026

Soft, So Soft, So Slow

Olivia and Kade sat on the rickety bench, nestled into a bend in the long, snaking park which sat between several roads and clusters of housing. A few metres away, brambling thickets arced and threaded their way out and uphill from a shallow creek. On the far side, gnarled and craggy trees; out beyond, clusters of brick houses with wide windows and dark roofs. The sky above was bright and blue, in a way that, to Olivia, felt mildly like a betrayal. She didn’t come to England for sunshine. She sighed, letting her head drop onto Kades shoulder, her left hand finding Kades right, fingers intertwining.

“Are you doing okay?” Kade asked.

“Yeah. Think so.” Olivia nodded into Kade’s clavicle. “Just thinking about Anna. It’s hard, y’know? Not getting a proper goodbye? I doubt it would have made it any easier, but…you kind of tell yourself it would have. Torture yourself with it.”

“I wish I could just…create an Otherwhere and give you closure. But I never knew your version of Anna. It’d just be some...fake version I imagined into being.”

“Like me in the penthouse?” Olivia smirked.

“Ahh. You read that memory, huh?”

“Yeah. Like the first time we saw each other afterwards. It was sweet, knowing what we shared was impactful enough that you wanted to like…game out the possibilities. And it’s probably worth mentioning that I wasn’t using you, that night. I just have trouble processing and separating out emotions, and my…like…default response to having them is projection. Acting like what I’m feeling is something someone else is feeling at me. Yet another thing to work on. Another fucking opportunity for growth.”

“I hope you know that I was never trying to make it more than it was.”

“I know that now. I knew that then. I guess what I’m saying is that I might’ve been worried that I was going to try to make it more than it was. You didn’t need that. I feel like you can probably understand this: the shape of how I feel about you is complicated. It’s not easy to define. It could be one thing or another. But I love you, y’know? That much is unquestionable to me. I love you like a piece of me.”

“I love you too, just the same. The shape of it doesn’t have to matter. Like I told you that day…for me, intimacy is complicated. We just…let each other know where we stand. You don’t have to feel any way other than how you feel with me. It’s up to me what I want to do with that. Same goes in the other direction.” Kade smiled. “Fucking Many Worlds, huh?”

“Yeah,” Olivia replied, eyes widening comically. “It’s literal insanity.” She adjusted in her seat. “I think I still have some back pain from that thing with Seven.”

“Y’know, in retrospect, I’m genuinely shocked that you didn’t end up with internal bleeding after some of the stuff she put you through.”

“I’m tough.” Olivia murmured, smiling. “I’m starting to think I might heal faster than normal people. I feel like ending a fight with blood in your mouth isn’t usually something you just…walk off and mostly recover from within a few hours.”

“That’d be pretty cool. Maybe we should test it, see if it’s another power.”

“You’re just saying that because you’d love an excuse to kick my ass.”

“Only for science, I swear.” Kade insisted. “Hey, do you remember the first time we met?”

“Hard to forget. One of your figments tried to gut me.” Olivia chuckled.

“You thought so little of me back then.”

“And here we are: you’re Neo from the fucking Matrix and I’m still…just this girl, y’know? Shows what I know.”

“I’m nothing special.” Kade shrugged. “Or…no one’s special and we all are? The power thing, it’s just dumb luck.”

“Dumb luck? I dunno. It’s almost enough to make me believe in some kind of…larger organising principle to the Multiverse. Knowing that, somehow, the right person ended up with it.”

“The ‘right person’?” Kade sighed quietly to herself. “Y’know, there was this moment, when I was in the Otherwhere fighting those soldiers where I just…I got a glimpse of the extent of it. How far I could potentially take it. It’s beyond little shockwaves, and shields, and throwing people around. It’s not a superpower, it’s…being at one with the fundamental forces that hold the entire multiverse together. Being able to change them with a thought.”

“How do you mean?”

“Liv…I’m pretty sure that there’s not a limit to this thing. I know I could do what Seven did. I even know how. And it wouldn’t be harder than reaching out and flicking a switch. I could literally do it right here, right now, without standing up. Hell, I could do it without lifting a finger. I could do more. I could crack this world like an egg. And honestly…it terrifies me. Because I’ve been to that place, y’know? Think about your worst days. Think about how you felt, what you wished you could do, how much you wanted to just…lash out at the world. What if you’d been able to, with no limits? There have been times in my life where, if I’d had these powers…I might have been Seven. I might have been worse.”

“You’re nothing like her. Other than the power, I mean. I don’t think I asked: did they give you any explanation of why you have the same powers as she did?”

“If I can even believe what Damien said, the way he explained it was that Seven’s world and mine were very close. So when whatever happened to her during the siege happened, I was…close enough to be similarly affected. Something something string theory, something something quantum entanglement. Bunch of Schrödinger’s bullshit, really. Which is funny, because when he said it…all I heard was that Seven and I were…” Kade sighed again, shaking her head.

“You weren’t the same.” Olivia reiterated. “If you were anything like her, you wouldn’t have come to us after what happened. You would have ignored us and just straight up destroyed the pylon, no matter what Cee had to say about it. You don’t think you know better. You don’t think you are better. Thinking she had to stand above everyone to get to where she needed to be was Seven’s defining trait. It’s something she shared with Anna, and Kira, and as much as I hate to admit it…me. Months later, even after realising how much power you have, you’re still just…one of us. So uh…I think you might be good.”

“That’s a nice way of looking at it. I guess I’m also ahead on the count of not reacting to being dumped by doing a whole-ass Apocalypse. It’s the little things, y’know?”

“I might have. Sapphic breakups are the worst.”

“It wasn’t even Sapphic.”

“It was for you and Seven, even if it wasn’t for Sara. Hazards of dating straight girls. Caution: could end the fucking world.”

“Maybe I should just be strictly T-for-T.”

“Oh yeah, cause that’s a safer bet. Truly, when it comes to dating…when it comes to finding community more generally, people are people before they’re what they identify as. Messy, complicated, fucked up people. So you take off the rose coloured glasses, you evaluate on a case-by-case basis, and you hope they’re not lying when they tell you what their deal is. To you or to themselves. Then uh…you hope for the best?”

“Oh yeah? And how’s that ethos working out for you?” Kade queried innocently.

“Fuck you.” Olivia chuckled.

“You’re not wrong though. Trust is a bet.”

“Mmhmm. And you can leave the table at any time.” Kade nodded.

“But if there’s no risk, there’s no reward.”

“And loneliness is hell.” Olivia mused.

“And other trans girls.” Kade teased.

“And other people. And bureaucracy, and bills, and life maintenance, and the trauma you’ve learned to live with, and the trauma you haven’t…” Olivia trailed off. “Honestly, what isn’t hell?”

“Moments, I guess. Like this one. Little bubbles of time where the outside aligns with the inside and you can find some…equilibrium amidst the chaos?”

“I like that.”

“I do too.” Kade smiled to herself. “We should probably head back soon. Your Dawn is going to think we’re hooking up.”

“I mean, do you want to hook up?” Olivia smirked into Kade’s shoulder. Kade snorted.

“Not to deprive you of that validation you love so much and pretend not to, but I think once continues to have been enough for me.”

“No, I get it. Like I said…I love what we have. Whatever this is.”

“Self-love, I guess?” Kade tilted her head to press her lips against Olivia’s forehead.

“Yeah…” Olivia sighed contentedly. “So. Today’s the day, right?”

“Yeah. February twenty-second.”

“How does it feel? A whole year on HRT?”

“Well, my boobs hurt.” Kade shrugged, bouncing Olivia’s head slightly. “I’m still struggling with the same things. Honestly, I might be forever, but…”

“Mmm?”

“I keep thinking of that Jean-Paul Sartre thing from Nausea.”

“‘I exist. It is soft, so soft, so slow’.” Olivia intoned, deepening her voice. Kade chuckled.

“Yeah. I think that’s how I feel about it. I finally exist. Never used to. And it’s just…this.”

“Is ‘this’ enough for you?”

“It’s all I’ve ever wanted. Everything sucks and it’s perfect. I’m me.”