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Eli rolled off Mano, lying back in bed to grab and light a cigarette from the nightstand.

"That was good," she said simply, drawing in and blowing out smoke as she spoke. The poet had always had a minimalistic streak to her. "I hope you liked that." Eli's body was more like a cis male body now than the cis female body she'd had before, but she was still her Mano's Eli. It didn't matter what she went by where they were. The turtle leaned over to kiss the octopus on the cheek, making Mano's skin shift to an eye-catching new set of colors when she did. "It always feels great with you," the octopus had answered. Eli drew in and blew out another cloud, scratching her flat turtle chest in thought. "So you're used to this? Down there, I mean?"

It was obvious from what she now looked like that the casual observer may have assumed that they were a straight couple, not a lesbian couple, whichever one they were by then. Eli had always been a girl who'd been 'sort of a guy,' but not really. She'd never formally declared herself as trans, switched pronouns, or made plans to transition but, in her heart, she'd still felt as though she 'should' have been born a guy somehow. Now that it really was up to Mano, she'd started giving her lover a chance to appear as she'd always wanted to, even in such an intimate setting as that. It took off some of what was bittersweet about it for them, reinventing everything as different like that. It gave the turtle a new kind of energy.

"Yeah, a lot! Not to be crass about it or anything." The octopus had always been so 'proper' in some ways. It had reflected her upbringing. She was still flesh and blood, and felt the things she did wholly, with the same body that she'd been given to do everything else. "Good, good." Eli seemed partly reassured, just maybe still a little concerned. Maybe just puzzled? It was hard to tell. She'd always been more demonstrative about certain things than about some others. "Remember when we first met, before we talked about all the gender stuff? We talked about the whole process we went through growing up, figuring out we weren't like other girls, finding out we were lesbians and they weren't, you know?" Mano nodded.

"What about it?" the octopus tilted her head at her. "I just wonder sometimes if it's right for me to have put you in a position where you're... with a man like this. Am I making you sacrifice that part of yourself that we talked about, the part of you that knew she could never be with a man? I mean, I know it's your mind, but... I planted the idea of me like this into it, you know?" Mano frowned. "Is that why you never followed through on this back when you were still alive?" The turtle shook her head. "No, no, it had nothing to do with that... Is that something you've been worried about, really? Is it something that's been on your mind?" The octopus nodded. "I wish I'd known. I'd have disabused you of that notion earlier, sweetheart."

Mano seemed to relax. "Thanks for saying so, my love. I never wanted to stop you from being who you really were, you know?" Eli nodded. "I always knew. It was just something I was curious about. Like... So you'd know if you wanted me back the other way, when we see each other here, whatever this is... Well, I'd be okay with it, really. What are any of us anyway, you know? It's what's inside that matters most." The octopus shivered. She was embarrassed that, in such a serious discussion as they were having, she would have thought so much of what her turtle and she had just shared with each other. Mano asked herself for the first time if she may have liked having had Eli transition before for more... personal reasons.

What would have it meant for her to have probably disappointed her parents by not having had a husband and children, if it meant that despite the lesbianism which had been her reason for not doing so, the octopus would have ended up with a man after all, though? Would it have represented some kind of betrayal or hypocrisy on her part? Would it have meant that she trivialized Eli's transition to herself, on some private level? But who could ever have been her judge in a situation like that? Maat? Maat had been a shit judge of *anybody's* character. That was why she'd ended up in such a high position at Atlan's service that she'd fought for his twisted cult with the energy of desperation even after it had started hemorrhaging followers.

"What we are seems to matter a lot to the people we're up against, I can tell you that," Mano replied. "Yeah, well... Discrimination will do that to people," the turtle said dejectedly. "That's very true," the octopus had nodded sadly. "I don't know what to do with this whole thing we're doing sometimes, Eli," she'd admitted. "I know, Mano. It's not easy." Mano gave her a pained look. "I wish you were still around to tell them yourself sometimes." The octopus regretted what she'd said when she saw the pain on Eli's face match her own. "I do too. I'm sorry." The turtle looked down. What could she possibly ever say to apologize for what she'd done? "No, I'm sorry for making you feel bad," Mano apologized, her hand on her shoulder.

"You can always turn to me about anything, Mano. I'll always be here for you here. I can promise you that." It was the calling that the octopus had taken on to relay the turtle's word to the world on her behalf, now that she no longer could. It just wasn't easy. "I don't know what to do about the use of violence," Mano went on. "On one hand, I was raised with pacifist beliefs, and I never want Fishism to go back to the extremes of violence that Atlan had in mind for it when he took it away from you... I want to believe that it makes us better, as people, to go to the trouble not to solve our problems with violence, you know? That violence is never an acceptable long term solution." Eli held her hand sitting up in bed encouraging her to continue.

"I sense a 'but' coming," she tilted her head at the octopus. "Well... Look at Brazil's history. Would we be free now if we didn't fight then? Look at species discrimination in America today. People went to war for freedom, for equality, to stop situations that were so oppressive to them that they were being killed in something called 'peace.' Now people fight back against police brutality at protests, and get told they're 'inciting violence.' Police send a few plants in a march for social justice, and dismiss as rioters people who are just trying to survive. The boats that fish our people, the access problems we face because of dryness, the outright violence against our people... Who am I to tell people not to fight back? Where do I draw the line, Eli?"

The turtle caressed her girlfriend's squishy, bulbous head lovingly. "You're putting a lot of thought into these questions, aren't you?" Mano nodded. "Well, as long as you continue to pay close attention to everything that's happening around you, with all three of those lovely eyes with which you're looking at me right now, sweetheart, you're going to look at everything that happens around you on a case-by-case basis, with the same critical thinking that used to make me proud of you back when I was still alive. You're going to get informed, turn things over in your mind, and speak from the heart. They'll listen to you. I believe in you. When push comes to shove, you'll make the right choice, every time. They made you leader for a reason."

The octopus chuckled mirthlessly. "Yeah, because I was having sex with the boss." Eli couldn't hold back a genuine chuckle, despite how inappropriate it felt to her. Her girlfriend had always had a way with words. "Do you ever... Do you ever miss it, Mano?" The question had been on the turtle's mind for a while. "Do I ever miss what?" Was she pretending not to understand? Eli couldn't tell. "Sex, I mean." Mano frowned. "What do you mean? We have sex together every night." The turtle rolled her eyes. "You know what I mean. I mean in waking life, with, like... real people." The octopus didn't like the direction that was going. "I have to be able to think of you as real to me to be able to live, Eli, you know that. If I don't, I'll die."

Eli crossed her arms. "I wish I hadn't put you in a situation like that. You know when people say that thing about how 'Oh, if she were still alive, she'd want you to move on and get on with your life?'" Mano shook her head. "But you're a part of my mind. I won't listen to any part of my mind that tells me to forget you. I won't let myself get away with that on your behalf. It'd make me feel way too opportunistic. Thoughts like this don't belong in my mind. They should burn." The turtle sighed. "I don't need to tell you what your people used to do in the old days when a wife would outlive her husband, do you?" The octopus frowned. "I don't think that's an appropriate thing for you to be saying, darling." Eli looked suitably contrite.

"Look, I know it's not classy for me to be playing that card, but... You've taught me that all faiths can evolve, alongside all the rest of Darwin's creation, haven't you?" Mano nodded. "You've told me that faiths that have been regressive for a long time can be changed, and be made a normal part of progressive people's lives. I may still be an atheist, Mano, but I also still want to believe you were right about that. Be the change you want to see in the world. Don't burn alongside me, love..." The octopus removed the turtle's hand from her arm. "Please don't talk to me like that. This has nothing to do with what I'm doing. Is what we still share so less than sacred to you than you'd have me give it up to some girl or boy who still draws breath?"

Eli fought back the urge to put her hand back on Mano's arm, to drape her arm across her lover's chest and to hold her close, the way they always used to. The octopus didn't seem to be in the right kind of mood for it. "You don't have to forget about me to meet someone new, Mano... It doesn't always have to work like that. I mean, look at Klein." Mano raised an eyebrow. "You didn't even meet Klein. I just told you about him." The turtle raised a finger toward her. "That's true, but you've told me a lot about him since then and, well... I do see the world through your eyes now. I kinda have to, don't I? Look at Rakim, Soma, Mnemos, Ogun... Surely you don't think they don't take their relationships seriously, simply because they're poly?"

The octopus shook her head. "This is totally different though. We never had something like that when you were alive. It was always just you and me, together, forever. Eli..." Eli reached to wipe a tear from Mano's eye, stricken. "... Do you still love me?" This time the turtle wrapped her arms around her girlfriend outright. "Of course I still love you, Mano. I could never stop loving you. Don't think such things, my sweet mollusk..." She stroked Mano's head and back lovingly as the octopus wrapped all six of her arms around her body in turn, wracked by sobs as her girlfriend did her best to console her from the pain that she'd inflicted on her, all that time ago, that she'd never fully heal from, never in a million years... It was too much to ask.

Mano screamed and cried when she woke up. Eli was dead. She wasn't coming back.

***

"Hey, Klein...?"

Klein picked up his phone groggily. "Hi...?" She could hear him rubbing his face as he blinked himself awake. It was the middle of the night, but he was still picking up his phone. It came with the territory when you were friends with a fish, the mammal had had to accept a while back. Mano didn't need to sleep the way he did. A lot of the time, she'd be awake when he wouldn't be, even though she still chose to sleep for her own reasons, the reasons she was calling about in the first place, he'd learn. "Mano, what's up?" She strove to hold her phone steady as her hand trembled holding it. "Are you alone? Are you with a guy?" The skunk shook his head, stupidly forgetting for a moment that she couldn't see him on the phone.

"No, I'm not. I'm alone, I mean. What's on your mind?" His heart started beating faster. "Can... Can you come here, Klein?" He thought he could hear tears streaming down her face. "Yeah I'll be right over!" He got up out of bed to get dressed hurriedly, still holding his phone with one hand while grabbing some of his stuff to be able to keep talking to her as he did. "What's going on, Mano? What happened?" Her voice broke. "I tried to stop one of my hearts again, Klein... The same one that Soma had Rakim fix for me after it'd stopped working for all those years." His jaw dropped. "And, I... I was thinking, you know, when I'm through with this one, maybe, maybe I should move on to the second one, you know? And after, after that..."

His heart was now racing at top speed as he ran out the door just as fast. "It's good you called me. Don't go *anywhere*, Mano. Don't do anything. I'll be right over. Just wait for me I promise I'll be there as fast as I can. Just give me time to get there. We can talk about this. We need to schedule you a session with Mandrake. We need to have Soma take a look at your heart to make sure it still works okay. You're my friend and I love you, Mano." She was a lesbian and he was gay, but, she knew what he meant. "Please be good to yourself. I know it's not easy, believe me, I know. I know you miss her. It's awful. We all care about you, Mano. We all still need you around. Please, don't make us all feel how you're feeling right now, Mano..."

She wiped a tear from her eye, imagining it was still Eli's hand, wiping it in her dream...