"I heard that... the Doors of Night once turned someone into a bird, and I thought - if Sunaira is supposed to be a good goddess - she might. You know. Give me a chance." 

"... faith, huh."

She just nods.

For a moment, Sable can't find the words. Finally, "I am so very impressed with your dedication and your courage, Pigeon. I only know the barest edges of what that must have been like. I described that experience — what turned out to be your experience — to illustrate what gender dysphoria is like, but to have to go through that while growing up on a refugee world..."

She sighs raggedly, shaking her head, ears drooping a bit, then looks Pigeon in the eye. "All I can say is how deeply sorry I am, for not having found a better way to set up the refugee worlds yet, for not having managed to make it easier for everyone in a situation like yours. It's desperately important that we get people out of places like the Imperium, but the results still aren't nearly good enough. I promise you, we're still working to make it better. I work as a software developer in Refugee Services, among other things on tools for policy outcome analysis, and for individual assessments, trying to move everyone to Half-Tamed worlds the moment they're ready, and trying to measure policies to find what gets people ready to integrate even just a fraction of a percent quicker. I'm so sorry that it took as long as it did, and so glad that you made it here and stuck it out. Thank you for making it here."

She takes a few slow, shaky breaths, and then turns to face Valimer-Pigeon across the table with a rueful grin. "Guess I'm telling that story now, huh."

Scooting back and turning to face both, she nods to herself and says, "I've got a bit of personal experience with how good Sunaira is. I had to be ordered to take a vacation in the first place, and when I got here I still had a breakdown about how I was probably letting people down by not being able to force myself onward longer. It hurt to stop. I spent an hour bawling. And when I was all cried out, I finally managed to open and read the letter that had been left for me in my room before I got here. It turned out to be from my third-degree boss, Director of the Humanitarian Division, Goddess Sunaira. I was floored."

She taps at her phone for a moment, and two temporary copies of the letter appear, one in front of each Pigeon.

"Yes, Sunaira is a very good goddess. If she can be this good to me, she can certainly manage to catch your trust-fall through a Door of Night and at minimum give you wings out the other side. You're why we do this, Pigeon. You and countless other people who deserve a better shot than you were given. You count too."

She hugs herself tightly for a moment. "Read that, if you'd like, and then let me know if there's anything I can do to help."

Pigeon skims the letter quickly and frowns a little. "I mean, you're pretty important, I'm not surprised that she'd write to you..."

"... I heard that she writes to everyone in the programs, that anyone in the Bowers can get a letter from her if they just ask. I haven't been brave enough to look yet."

She sighs, and shakes her head. "It's... No. I'm not important. I'm one lone madwoman trying to marginally improve how we do something actually important." She gestures indicatively at the wingless Pigeon. "That's what 'You count too' means. I'm not any more important than either of you. I just have a few skills that I try to help people with. That's why I work for the OTC at all."

She curls a bit tighter and sighs again. "Just pull up a program. Both of you."

After a few moments she manages to take another sip of her cocoa.

The two Pigeons share a look.

The wingless one holds up a hand.

"... program, please."

A program appears in her hand, branded with the rose sigil of the Bowers and sporting a quite nice picture of the gardens. 

She opens it to the front page, and takes a deep breath.

"I'm just going to read this out loud, okay?"

"Okay."

Sable nods, and takes another sip of cocoa.

Dear Pigeon,
Wow. I'm impressed. You've been working on this literally since your teens, and the circumstances of your birth mean that you've had to leave behind everything you knew - and you did, the instant you turned 18, and ever since you've been working for this one moment. 

I think at this point, it's sensible for you to double-check that this is really what you want to do. You're here, the money is spent, in a real way you've already decided - but you can always turn back, and there's no shame in that. 

To be blunt, Pigeon, you hardly know me, and yet you're staking five years of your life on my being worthy of your trust. I'm honored but also rather concerned. Are you really sure you want to put yourself wholly into my hands? Have you considered all your alternatives soberly?

For example, are you aware that there's a charity program working out of the Bowers addressing morphological freedom and especially dysphoria? You'd have to pay a portion of the cost of your treatment on a sliding scale, potentially over years, but you would get your wings, likely within a few weeks. There's no question in my mind but that you qualify; your history is textbook. 

Similar charity programs operate out of a few dozen of the Trades as well, including Arcbright. I'm sure Sable would know someone who would know someone who would be able to refer you. 

I should also mention that if you were willing to emigrate to Valimer, the local leadership is anxious to preserve their species and have a program of offering Mythic Gene-Splices to Aevis to all their immigrants. You'd have most of the conveniences of a Trade world, and would be among other winged people daily; if you want, more than anything else, for your having wings to be utterly beneath comment, I would suggest you put in a placement request under that program.

The Doors of Night are, of course, open to you, as they are to all visitors to the Bowers, but I have a strict policy of making no promises about what lies on the other side. 

The choice is yours, as it has always been. 
- Sunaira

Sable smiles warmly, nodding. "She's right that the Doors of Night are an intense option. I'd certainly be glad to put you in touch with any of those charities, either here or on one of the Trades. You'd have to talk to Pigeon about the Valimer option, though."

She hums thoughtfully and holds up up a finger to request a pause. She taps at her phone for a few moments, winces, then nods firmly.

"I'll take this up a notch. As long as you're somewhere within reach, I promise you'll have wings by the end of the day. The Bowers offer the absolute best cosplay semblances on the market, with nerves and sensory response and everything. If you go with any of the charity options, or if you go through a Door of Night and come out without wings and not on a personal journey beyond the reach of comms service, I'll rent a pair of wings for you on my tab, and you'll be able to keep those until it's your turn in the charity queue and you get your wings."

"I can't make this choice for you, but I can damn well try to make it easier," she finishes with a fierce grin.

"Seriously? You just met her!"

She splutters for a moment, then laughs, blushing a bit. "Yeeaah, this is personal. Dysphoria due to missing limbs like wings or tails is at least as bad as gender dysphoria." She hugs one of her tails. "I didn't realize it, when I got True Persona cast, but missing these was hurting me too."

She smiles softly, squeezing the tail close, and then looks back up. "Also I have a habit of doing this. I don't buy much, so I wind up doing some random gifts like this and then giving a bunch to charity, 'cause letting more money than I need for basic savings just sit around feels... wasteful. If I'm not saving it for something specific, I want it to go to helping someone."

"Plus," she adds as an afterthought, "most of the expense here is the deposit, which I'll get back."

"Gosh. I mean, if you're really sure..."

"Didn't Sunaira literally just lecture you on throwing yourself on other people's generosity?"

"Yes, and she does have a point, but this isn't such a large favor for someone like Sable."

She gives the still-wingless Pigeon a nod, and grins lopsidedly at the winged one across the table. "Is that what you took from it? Sounded to me like she spent about half the letter describing more sources of generosity to turn to. So it seems to me like the lecture was less about throwing herself on people's generosity and more about a single point of failure that she doesn't know very well. About staking her dream on trusting someone she doesn't know yet. If I loan her some wings, the risk is on me. Further, she's not depending on me exclusively. I'd just be making the potential gap a bit less miserable."

Her smile softens, a bit of concern slipping in. "Are you up for telling me your real objection?"

"What? That was my real objection! What are you implying, seriously?"

"I'm implying that you missed the primary concern in the lecture, and that you were reactively concerned about my actions, because some other emotion is getting in your way — probably anxiety or maybe vicarious guilt, possibly one of a few other things. You didn't ask, you scolded. That suggests a sharp feeling, a sharp sense of concern or guilt or fear."

"I'm implying that you need to pause, and breathe, and collect your thoughts, before instinctive reactions stress you further. It'll be easier to take the moment wherever you want it to go if stress isn't getting in your way."

"You deserve better than for trauma to steal control of the moment from you."

"I'm not a child, thank you, I can control my own emotions and don't need you telling me what they ought or ought not to be. Seriously, could you be any more condescending?"

The wingless Pigeon's gaze flicks back and forth between Sable and her alt.