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Down at the turf racetrack, there is an Uma, stretching her legs in preparation for a run. She has chocolate brown skin, long curly hair covering one eye, and enormously long ears for her size. Decorating the right ear is an ornament, a small loop from which hangs a black spade outlined in blue.
Her name is Lady of Spades (hence the accessory), and though none of her friends know it… she is a trans Uma.
She was originally a high-stakes gambler in Las Vegas, making millions at the poker table. Until one fateful day, when she won too many times, and the House decided that she couldn’t be allowed to leave the country. The “house” being the mob, of course. Her only path forward was to somehow completely change how she looked, and after a random meeting with a quirky scientist, she quaffed a potion that changed her from the sleazy-ass man she used to be into a completely different person.
Funnily enough, despite transitioning purely for the sake of saving her hide… it has actually helped Spade feel a lot more comfortable in her own skin. Helped to resolve some lingering feelings that she had no idea existed until after the transformation. For now, Lady of Spades has contented herself with just being another American exchange student here at Tracen, blending in with the rest of the crowd. Making new friends and rivals along the way like everyone else.
Admittedly, she does wish that she could tell her friends about her secret. It’s caused her some problems in the past with how difficult it is “pass” amongst her Uma classmates, and if the truth was out in the open, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. But she’s on the run with the fucking mafia. And she knows well enough by now that those dudes not only don’t mess around, they got contacts everywhere! Who knows who here on campus knows someone who knows someone who knows the local mob boss?
And even besides that fact… she’s growing to want to pass just so she can pass. So she can be a woman, an Uma just like everyone else in their eyes. I mean, just look at her friend Chapelet Blanc! Walking along the grass, a parasol in her hand to shield her from the sun as she makes her way back to the dorm rooms. Now there’s a real Uma racer! Petite, feminine as all get-out, probably interested in hooking up with her trainer like half the real girls here seem to be.
Who wouldn’t want to be a “real” Uma like her?
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Chapelet Blanc has a secret. A very important secret, one that not even her closest friends here at Tracen Academy know about. One that the girl with long straight white hair and rose-pink eyes will likely take to her grave.
That secret… is that she is a trans Uma.
Shocking, for certain. Scandalous if it were to be revealed to the world. Certainly her parents back in France have done a lot to hide this secret from polite society, even creating a fake funeral for her old male form. The very thought of that abominable existence again makes her want to puke. To help sell the illusion, she was shortly “adopted” after their “son’s” death to make it seem like her parents were trying to deal with the grief of losing their only child by taking in another.
It was not the most airtight of stories, admittedly. Had she prepared things further in advance, they likely could have avoided some of the pitfalls she had nearly tumbled down into. But when that strange scientist offered her miraculous potion to her free of charge, only asking for “occasional readings,” she could hardly refuse on the spot! So it was that her noble house gained an heiress instead of an heir, and she could not be more happy because of it.
Of course, this sudden transformation also complicated any wishes she had of attending one of the more reputable racing academies in France. They held strict requirements for when and how one could apply, and typically there was a waiting list years in advance for the privilege of attending! As such, if she wished to enter into a proper institution with any degree of alacrity, it would have to be an overseas school.
Attending Tracen Academy had other benefits besides a higher admittance rate, however. It also meant less eyes on her pedigree, her background and, most dire of them all, her secret. In France, she would have expected pointed questions as to what hole she emerged from, and any answer provided would have been used to cut her down. In Japan, all of her fellow students were far more friendly (if quite eccentric…) and she was able to live as just “one of them.”
One of the girls.
It was this desire to remain one of the herd that led her to maintain her secret even in this friendlier space. Why risk exposing the darkest part of herself to someone who might even now betray her trust? And it wasn’t like that betrayal would necessarily be on-purpose either. Just look at Cavendish Curl!
The “gamer Uma” was a blabbermouth of the highest order! Part of that, admittedly, seemed to be due to her hobby of livestreaming, but Chapelet could not trust her with her phone password, let alone her most important secret. Perhaps that was the luxury one had, when they did not have to worry about “passing” as just one of the girls. Her rather buxom nature quite easily demonstrated that. Surely a real Uma like her did not have to worry about these sorts of things!
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So, uh, Cavendish Curl has a problem.
A big problem. A gigantic problem! A HUMONGOUS PROBLEM! “ANOTHER WORD THAT MEANS THE SAME THING” PROBLEM!
How. How in the Goddesses’ holy name is she supposed to survive 3 years in this place without accidentally spilling the beans that she’s TRANS?!
Cavendish knows she’s got a problem keeping secrets. She’s had close call after close call because sometimes she’d mention someone who doesn’t know that she’s a her now, and they’d have no clue how she knew them! If she could just stick with her old channel, where all she did was speedrun the latest Super Monkey Ball all day, she would! It might have made things a lot easier!
But no. She just had to have the bright idea to do her old speedruns with commentary and a camera, and now everyone knows that “ElspethCrashNBurn” is an obese man playing video games. She can’t use her old channel now! Not when she got that magical transition from that crazy scientist lady a while back!
Sure, being an Uma, let alone a woman has been one of the best experiences in her entire fricking life, she could admit that to herself! Now exercising felt like a fun burn that got her blood pumping, instead of a slow, painful and very sweaty death! Now she could look in the mirror at the natural yellow highlights in her twintails and feel pretty and perfect! Now she could put her hands under her massive boobs and say “Yup, just got good genes, no fat rolls on me!”
That didn’t solve the problem that she couldn’t use her old channel. Sure, “CabanaSlamma” was making her rise in the RTA charts, but it felt disappointing that she had to go under a new identity (well, a new online identity, her new REAL ID was just perfect!) when she had spent so many years earning cred in the community with her times. Now half the audience kept accusing her of cheating, or having her boyfriend play for her!
(Like she’d have a boyfriend anyway, girls were so much better.)
You know who probably doesn’t have problems like these? Guns’n’Tulips! Her gal friend probably only has to worry about the make-up she puts on and how many reps she’s doing in the morning. She probably doesn’t need to worry about putting on muscle and being worried that it’ll make her too masc, not when she’s wearing the latest fashion trends to compliment it!
Oh, how Cavendish wishes she could be her. To be a real Uma, so she didn’t have to worry about keeping this big giant secret of hers a secret!
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Guns’n’Tulilps has been having a dilemma recently. A dilemma that her friends just aren’t gonna really get, ya know?
With how she’s a trans Uma and all that, she’s had to do her best to keep her status on the down-low. And a part of her really wants to tell everybody, because maybe she can help someone else uncover their true self and talk with Tachyon-chan to get a dose of that Vitamin U!
(The “U” stands for “Uma,” of course!)
But she also knows that she doesn’t want to handle that heat right now. Not in her early days, when she’s still bringing in fans and preparing to take racing by storm. Not right now, when she’s still getting closer to her friends and building that bridge of trust, and all that jazz.
Because Guns has been hit hard in the past by people she’s trusted before. Former gym friends who’d swore they’d keep her secret, only to spill the beans to everyone around so that they could mock the… the…
…Never mind, she doesn’t want to even think about it. She’s just been through some shit, alright? She was in a real rough patch before Tachyon-chan came along to fix her life, and she probably saved it with her femme-potion too!
Now Guns could dress as girly or as fashionable as she pleased without anyone thinking she was bad for it. Just look at that red pleated skirt she was saving for her G1 outfit! Long enough to cover the essentials, short enough to draw other girls’ eyes, it would be the perfect piece once she found the rest of the outfit. It matched well with her fuschia hair, especially when she had it in a ponytail like she did today. Unfortunately, her workout habits worked against her fashion habits, because she had to replace or resize her other clothes when she bulked up.
Seriously, as sexy as it might look to see a girl flex some back muscles and destroy their shirt in the process, that shit hurt! Just ask Mejiro Ryan-sempai, she’s probably destroyed a shirt or two by accident before!
Or hell, ask China Shop! Guns has actually seen her tear a shirt just because it was too small. Well, granted that was probably because she had the biggest set of tits on campus, and probably the biggest set any racer has ever had in the history of the sport. If there was one thing that Guns could admit to being jealous of, it was just how big her “naturals” naturally were. Guns never got a huge bust boost from Tachyon-chan’s secret ooze, and putting on all the muscle she did certainly didn’t help what she did have to stand out.
Geeze, to be a girl like her… a real girl like her, not a phony like Guns felt like sometimes. Wouldn’t that be something?
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Some days, China Shop didn’t know whether she wanted to kiss Agnes Tachyon or strangle her.
Yeah, she could admit now to feeling a lot of dysphoria before her transformation. It took her a long, long while to come to terms with it. But it was true, and she could acknowledge that fact in the safety of her own mind. She was a woman, she had always been a woman, and she had just needed some help realizing that fact for herself.
But for Heaven’s sakes, did she have to make her a damn cow?!
Shop didn’t wanna be “the world’s first ushimusume.” A cow-girl cowgirl from the Deep South, ain’t that the joke of the year? She was already queer, she didn’t need to be a steer on top of all that! Shop didn’t have horns or anything, but her white-and-black-furred ears were always flopping to the sides, and she had to make up some fake condition or something to explain why her tail was baby-ass naked. Turns out it’s a lot harder to communicate quietly with people when they can barely see your tail shaking. At least her black hair was somewhat normal, if spotted with white...
And then there were the boobs. Good Ladies in Heaven almighty, the udders. Human shaped, but definitely not human sized, they bounced around like bees in a bonnet and made her feel like a human ice cream machine. The only good news was that what Tachyon had done to her had improved her back muscles just as much, so she could actually carry that weight without feeling sore in the morning.
‘Course, they don’t exactly make bras in “Heifer” size, especially not around these parts, so she had to custom order every. Single. One. On Tachyon’s dime of course, had to pay the mad woman back somehow. The worse part is that the scientist lady didn’t even blink when she saw the receipt. Rich people, she swears, never have to worry about a thing like the rest of us common folk.
At least she had her friends around to help her. Without Spades around as a fellow American in a foreign land, Chapelet with her naturally feminine style and manners, Cavendish with her nonchalance and Guns with her fashion sense, she would have been left upcreek without a paddle at Tracen! She truly loved each and every one of them from the bottom of her heart.
Which is why she couldn’t tell them that she used to be a man. Not just because they might think she was a fake woman, but because she wasn’t even a real Uma now! She was just a big girl with cow ears who couldn’t even run half as fast as they could. Sure, she could lift up a barn now, but Guns probably could do the same thing, and SHE was a real Uma to boot!
At the end of the day… she was nuthin’ but a fraud. A freak attending an academy she wasn’t even meant for. And all she hoped for was that when the day came that everybody inevitably found out… they wouldn’t leave her like a calf in the mud like she deserved.
If only… if only she could be a real Uma like them.
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Inevitably, the five girls, all “fake” Umas each and every one of them, converge together near the dorm area. They hide away their insecurities, putting up brave fronts and friendly expressions as they prepare themselves for another round of social interaction with their supposed peers.
Of course, halfway through their initial conversation, they are soundly interrupted by the terrifying cry of “A-HA! There you are!” As one, the group turns their heads to look in the direction of the approaching, encroaching Agnes Tachyon.
The scientist carries in one labcoat sleeve a clipboard, and in the other a red pen, and on her face a familiar grin. “Apologies, my guinea pigs, I’ve been rather busy as of late, and haven’t had the time to speak with you all as a group.”
“Guinea pigs?” Lady of Spades mutters, looking at the other members of the group. Did any of them ever agree to do an experiment for Tachyon or something? Maybe it was one of her trademark glowing liquids, something like that.
“Tachyon-san,” Chapelet Blanc began with a slight hesitation. “If I may, what precisely are you interested in speaking with us about?” The others nodded in agreement, realizing that the mad scientist’s experiments weren’t always fully planned out. “This would not be a… new experiment of yours, would it be?”
“Oh, nothing of the sort, I’m still banned from testing any new formulas until the 31st! Just 15 days from now…” Tachyon trailed off as she flipped through several pages on her clipboard, before finding the desired page. “Ah, there we go, my questionnaire!”
The scientist looked up from the board to give a too-wide smile to the assembled group. “I really must thank you for gathering together like this, it makes my job as a researcher significantly easier if I do not need to track you all down. So! Allow me to start things off with an easy question.” She cleared her throat, and asked,
“As transgender females, how would you rate your enjoyment of life compared to before your transition?”
At first no answer came forth from anyone’s mouth, as all were too stunned by how easily she asked such a personal question in public. After that, their eyes collectively widened, glancing back and forth each other as they realized that Tachyon was referring to them in the plural. And then…
“UHHHHH…”
“Excusez-moi?!”
“WHAT?!”
“Wait, huh?!”
“THE HELL?!”