The Laptop - Ch.40 - Walking & Talking (Patreon)

"What do you think?" Gwen asked warily.

Chelsea's ears were folded back and her tail stayed down low as she slowly shook her head, "I don't know. The map didn't show any other signs of civilization out here, did it Lisa?"

I had a hunting arrow set on my bow as I quietly looked up and down the trail we'd just stumbled across.

"Nope, according to the laptop there's no other settlements around here," I replied quietly, "But I don't think we can take that to mean these woods are completely uninhabited. Some people might live out here on their own, like lone trappers or hunters or something like that?"

Gwen grimaced, "Or outlaws? People who wouldn't want their homes to be found on maps."

My eyes narrowed as I started noticing various little details, tiny things that weren't obvious at first glance. Or to the untrained eye. I picked out faint marks in the hard-packed ground, the way branches were bent or broken. It was kind of freaky in fact, the way my ranger class gave me all these new skills and experience that I didn't have to work at.

Although that left me wondering why I got all those benefits when I added the Ranger class to my character sheet, but didn't gain all that sort of knowledge and experience from the SysAdmin class. I knew there had to be a reason, but I hadn't had a chance to figure it out yet.

We'd spent the past four days on the move, and happily we hadn't run into anything more dangerous than a noisy squirrel. We were still being careful, but so far Daearen had lived up to its reputation as a fairly safe realm. And after half a week of travel, we'd pretty much fallen into a routine.

We'd wake up with the sun, get dressed and have breakfast. Sometimes in that order. Then we'd pack up and set off through the woods. We'd spend at least half the day hiking, then around mid-afternoon we'd start looking for a good place to make camp. Such as another meadow or clearing, or something along those lines.

When we found a suitable spot Gwen would send Vix out to scout the area, and after her familiar confirmed that the location was safe we'd set up camp. We'd gather enough firewood to last the night, then have dinner, and typically we'd end up having some fun together afterwards. Then we'd drift to sleep in each other's arms, and the following morning we'd start the whole thing all over again.

Like I figured, we didn't have any opportunities to set up the solar chargers while we were on the move, so I'd avoided using the laptop at all. Apart from checking the map every evening that is, to ensure we were still going in the right direction. I'd been making some mental notes along the way too. More questions for Annie, and things I'd try and find in the documentation after we reached our destination.

For now though all my focus was on our immediate situation. And after a few more seconds studying the trail I let myself relax as I told my girlfriends, "It's ok. This is a game trail, I don't see any evidence of people using it. It looks like it's mostly used by something like large deer, or elk maybe? Smaller animals probably use it too."

Gwen asked, "Can we use it? I mean, is it safe? It looks like it's going in the right direction."

"It'd be faster than what we've been doing so far," Chelsea commented as her tail twitched back and forth. "And quieter too."

The little catgirl had a point there. As much as we tried to keep the noise down, it was almost impossible to move silently through the dense woods. We could do it, but only at the cost of slowing our progress way down. And it was tiring too, it took a lot of focus to move quietly. So we'd given up on that idea pretty quickly, and instead we hoped that the noises we made would scare any predators away, rather than draw them towards us.

After taking another look at the trail, then checking where the sun was through the thick canopy overhead I finally nodded. "Yeah this should be ok, as long as it doesn't have too many twists and bends in it. If it veers too far off course we'll have to give it up, but for now we should be fine."

"What do you figure's at the end of it? Where would it lead to?" our elf mage asked.

Chels shrugged, "Water or food? That's my guess."

I nodded again, "Maybe both. Water in one direction, food in the other. There'd have to be something useful at either end, for animals to keep following the same path over and over until it turned into a trail."

"We're still looking for that river, maybe that's where the trail goes?" Chelsea commented with a hopeful smile.

"That'd be nice," Gwen smiled as well.

With the decision made the three of us set off together along the path. It was definitely easier going, and in places it was wide enough we could all walk side by side. Gwen ended up in the middle, with Chelsea on the far right while I was on the left. I kept my bow ready just in case, but for the most part we were all fairly relaxed again. So much so that it wasn't long before the three of us started talking some more.

At first we talked a bit about home. This was our seventh day on Daearen, tonight would mark our one-week anniversary since leaving Earth. And it was about twelve days since I got the laptop in the first place. That meant this was Tuesday back home, although with the days here being slightly longer it meant sooner or later we'd gain an extra day. Or lose a day, depending on how you counted them.

We also passed some time talking about what we missed, and what we didn't miss. Chels was still worried about her university course, and the fact that she was missing exams. And all three of us missed getting food delivered. We ended up talking about that for a good half hour, like what we'd be eating if we could order anything from anywhere. Pizza ended up being at the top of that list, for all three of us.

Eventually I changed the subject away from food as I lamented, "I miss modern plumbing. Showers, clean running water, and especially toilets."

Both Chels and Gwen agreed with me on those points. Although nobody felt like elaborating on those feelings the way we'd been doing when we were talking about food. In fact we ended up walking in silence for a little while after that.

My thoughts wandered away from food and plumbing and other modern conveniences, and I ended up contemplating another subject I'd been thinking about on and off since the day after I got my hands on that laptop. I'd been keeping those thoughts to myself all that time, but I had a feeling Gwen might be able to help. Or at least she'd be sympathetic, and she'd probably have some good advice.

So I took a deep breath to steady myself, then broached the subject. "Hey Gwen? Do you mind talking about some uh, gender stuff again? No pressure, I know that can get kind of personal."

She glanced at me and shook her head, "Of course not Lisa. What's on your mind?"

"If you want some privacy I can go up ahead a bit?" Chelsea offered. "Like do some scouting or something?"

I shook my head, "It's ok Chels. Anyways I'd rather the three of us stayed together, for safety's sake?"

Gwen agreed, "I don't mind either Chelsea. So what's on your mind Lisa? I'm guessing it's more trans stuff?"

"Yeah I guess so," I replied with a grimace. I felt my cheeks heating up as I hesitated, before finally saying what was on my mind. "There's something I've been wondering, and if we were still back home I'd have probably just tried looking this stuff up on the internet? The thing is, I'm uh, starting to wonder if maybe I'm not really trans after all?"

Before either of them could comment I added quickly, "It's not that I don't like being a girl, I really do. I like how I look, I like having boobs, and I'm even getting used to being called Lisa. It makes me really happy when people use she-her pronouns for me, or refer to me as a girl."

My best friend seemed a little confused as she asked, "So what's the problem then? All that sounds to me like you're happier now than you were before. I remember when we talked about this the day after you got the laptop, you said you hated the idea of going back to your original body."

"You said that a few times," Chelsea added. "In fact it was the very next morning when you wished none of us would have to turn back to our original bodies."

I could feel my cheeks getting brighter as I nodded, "Yeah. And I definitely don't want to go back to my old self. Or at least, not entirely? It's just... There's been a few times where I kind of miss something."

It took me another couple seconds to get to the point, "I sometimes miss my old junk. Not that I don't like my new junk, and it's not all the time? Just sometimes, like I said. And maybe it's silly, but since we came to Daearen there's some practical stuff too. Like going to the washroom out in the woods? That'd be a lot quicker and easier with guy parts."

"And to be honest I don't remember really hating my junk before?" I admitted quietly. "I think maybe I never really got bottom dysphoria? Not the way I read about real trans girls describing it anyways. Maybe that's an egg thing though? Like I didn't know I was trans, so I didn't know I was supposed to hate having a penis?"

Then I sighed, "Anyways all that stuff leaves me questioning or second-guessing myself? Like if I'm really a girl, then I shouldn't be thinking about missing it at all. Right?"

By the time I was done Gwen had a thoughtful frown on her face, and I was positive she was going to tell me I was right, that I probably wasn't a trans girl after all. Chelsea's expression was a little harder to parse. Not that I couldn't tell what she was thinking, because it was pretty easy to see she was thinking about sex. The part I didn't understand was how she'd found something sexy or exciting in anything I'd just confessed.

"Ok Lisa," my best friend responded with a little sigh. "It seems like you're confused about something, so let me clear this up right now. Being trans isn't just about your junk. That goes double for gender. Our society likes to pretend otherwise, that it's black and white, blue or pink. It isn't. There's loads of girls out there with penises, and lots of guys with vulvas. And there's plenty of trans people who don't want bottom surgery, and just as many who don't get bottom dysphoria."

She slipped her arm around my shoulders and gave me a side-hug as she added, "I'm sorry I didn't make that clearer when we talked about this stuff back home. That's my fault, I probably oversimplified things. And I definitely made some assumptions. Partially because you'd already transformed yourself, and you seemed really happy with your new body."

Finally she suggested, "If you'd hatched then started to transition the normal way, you'd have had plenty of time to figure yourself out as you went. Including whether or not you wanted to keep your old junk. It can take some people years to make those sorts of decisions, so speed-running it in half a day meant you didn't really get the chance. Like I said though, some trans girls decide not to do bottom surgery. That doesn't mean they aren't trans though. And it certainly doesn't mean they aren't still girls."

I was quiet for the next minute or so as I slowly wrapped my head around everything she just said. Then I finally asked, "So if I used the laptop to um, experiment a bit and find out whether or not I liked that better... Would you two still want to be with me?"

Gwen gave me a gentle squeeze and nodded, but Chelsea spoke up first.

"Are you kidding Lisa?!" the little catgirl gave me a hungry look. "I've spent the last ten minutes fantasizing about how much fun we could have while you're 'experimenting'. Not to mention how hot you'd look! Gods, I can't wait to see you with a gock!"

Her eyes lit up as she continued, "You wouldn't be limited to normal mundane junk either! Improve, enlarge, enhance! You don't even have to pick a side, right? Best of both worlds! Think of the possibilities! We're going to have so much more fun together!"

Her enthusiasm actually dispelled most of the tension I'd been feeling, and it explained why she'd been thinking about sex during that whole awkward conversation. Rather than respond I just facepalmed, while Gwen's eyes widened and she quietly blushed. Except I could tell from my best friend's expression she wasn't actually opposed to anything Chels just said.

After a few seconds the tall sexy elf finally spoke up again, "Ok first off Lisa my answer is yes. I'd absolutely still want to be with you! You're my friend, my girlfriend, and I love you. It doesn't matter what's between your legs. Second off..."

Her voice trailed off for a moment as her cheeks got brighter. Then she added quietly, "Chelsea's right. I wouldn't have put it as bluntly as she did, and maybe I wouldn't have said anything at all until you were ready to actually start trying things out? But um, yeah. She's not wrong. About any of that stuff."

"So what do you think?" Chelsea gave me another hopeful excited look. Her ears and tail were all standing up tall as she asked, "Wanna set up camp early today, so we have more time to help you figure yourself out?"

I grimaced then shook my head, "Sorry Chels. I'm glad we're having this discussion, but I'm not in that much of a hurry. Let's just stick to the plan, we'll stop when it's time."

"Maybe I'll try something with the laptop tonight? We'll see," I added when her ears and tail all drooped as she pouted at me.

The little catgirl continued pouting as she sighed, "Fine. I'm going to keep fantasizing about you though, so when you're finally ready to experiment I'll have lots of hot sexy ideas for you to try out."

I couldn't help blushing and smiling at the same time. The whole conversation ended up going in a direction I never expected, but I was actually kind of happy for how it turned out. It seemed like I'd been worrying and second-guessing myself over nothing after all.

My mood was definitely a lot lighter as the three of us continued following the game trail through the woods. Both Gwen and Chels seemed to be in good spirits as well, which left me wondering if they were both fantasizing about 'helping me' later on. And that in turn left me doing a little of that as well, especially what Chelsea said about unlimited possibilities.

It was a fun diversion, and certainly made the hike go by faster. Unfortunately with all three of us daydreaming it meant none of us noticed the exact moment when the forest seemed to change around us. I was the first one to pick up on it though, and when I did I couldn't help frowning.

"When did the woods get so quiet?" I asked softly.