"Well," I said gruffly, blushing, "I'm not sure that I came up with it, but I call it the Kissing Test."

"Everyone seems to think it came from you; you might as well take credit. It's rather elegant... cuts through self-deception, political correctness, through what people believe that they believe..."

"Basically," I said, chiming in and warming to my subject, "it shows whether a person really considers Sammy to be a woman. While they might like to look at her, while they may want to touch her, while they might even want to have... ah... intimate contact with her, the one thing that *really* shows whether they regard her as a woman is if they say *yes* when you ask, Would you kiss her?"
 

---

Groans From Timbuctoo
by Kaleigh Way
 
2. Would You Kiss Her?
 

[Warning: this story is another elaborate setup for a bad pun.]
 

Not many people knew Sam back when he was still Sam. I've talked to his co-workers in Language Analysis and even they didn't have much to say about him. He was a likeable nerd, got along with everyone. That was about it.

But once van Els transformed him into a... well... into a babe — there's just no other word — EVERYONE on the Timbutoo campus knew who she was, and everybody had an opinion.

Now that Sam was Sammy, she was a celebrity of sorts. A shy, retiring celebrity, but a celebrity nonetheless.

And van Els? Well! Everyone already knew who he was. But now his status was boosted to the rafters. At first he caught a little heat for conducting unauthorized research on human beings — in fact, he got an official, written reprimand — which in the end meant nothing. The fact of the matter... the fact that saved his arrogant ass... was this: no one, not a single one of us, had gotten the alien technology to do anything more than buzz. Then in comes van Els with pictures, and data, and... and...

Sammy!

Sammy was the most visible, palpable, spectacular result you could wish for. She was so beautiful that you'd forget to breathe, and yet she was so quiet, so modest and humble — well, let me put it this way: if she'd been the opposite — if she'd been an arrogant, vain diva, you'd have to hate van Els. But when you'd see her smile, a smile that was so demure and soft and lovely, you spontaneously declare that van Els is a goddam genius!

People say that if van Els died and went to Hell, in three days he'd have a laboratory where Satan himself would come looking for ideas.

But seriously: the man was unbelievable. He could break the most fundamental rules... commit ethical breaches — even crimes that would get anyone else thrown into jail... and yet — not only is he not punished, he comes out smelling like rose, with all the world rushing to pat him on the back and say, "Now that's a job well done!"

It drives me wild. Sends my blood pressure through the roof! So I try to not think about it. About him.

In fact, let's get back to Sammy.

As I said, not many people knew Sammy, the girl, back when she was Sam, the man, but everyone knew that his female gender was only recently acquired.

And everyone had an opinion about that. My lab partner, Vossberg, for example:

"I won't deny that Sammy is beautiful. Sexy, even. I love to watch her lips move when she talks and her hips sway when she walks. And, oh! Let's not forget that swell pair of lungs she's got!" he laughed. "I mean, have you ever followed her breathing? BUT — I can't forget that Sammy was a man until a few days ago. And that fact just stops me cold."

"Are you kidding?" I cried. "You just said that she's sexy and beautiful!"

"Yes," he agreed. "But so what? Nothing can erase from my mind the fact that Sammy was born a man."

I'd often hit this impasse when talking to other men about Sammy. It was just incredible to me that they could acknowledge her beauty, that they would admit to feeling attracted, and then stop. They wouldn't want anything to do with her because she used to be a man.

After a while I developed a very quick test to evaluate people's feelings toward Sammy. I called it the Kissing Test. I'd ask a man if he'd want to kiss Sammy. If he said no, it meant that he still saw Sammy as a man. If he said yes, it showed that he saw Sammy as a full-fledged woman.

I put the question to Vossberg.

"No," he said. "I wouldn't kiss him... her... whatever. No."

"That's ridiculous!" I growled in frustration. "You've just admitted to feeling attracted to her!"

"As you say yourself, Dr. Mahon, attraction is one thing, kissing is another." He smiled, a little wickedly. "Which brings me to an interesting point: you would kiss Sammy, wouldn't you."

He didn't state it as a question, but I answered as if he had: "Yes. Yes, I would kiss Sammy." Then I turned as red as a beetroot. I wanted to kick myself.

"Now, Dr. Mahon, here's the interesting part," he said, leaning toward me, his grin widening. "The question for you is: Would you kiss a man?"

"Sammy's not a man!" I shouted.

He shrugged, pleased that he'd succeeded in riling me. "Maybe to you. But to me... whatever that machine did to him, it didn't rewrite his history."

"What if you didn't know his history?" I blustered. "What if you only ever knew Sammy the way she is now?"

"Well, Dr. Mahon, now you're arguing against fact, and before we take a wrong turn into your favorite place — the world of hypotheticals — I'd like to get back to work."

With that, he turned his back to me and started typing at his computer. Just to tell you what kind of jerk Vossberg is, he's one of those guys who use a standing desk: he doesn't have a chair, although I've caught him sitting in mine.

Well, anyway... I should have gotten back to work myself, but I was troubled and wanted to walk. I wasn't just irritated at Vossberg, I was irritated at myself. Why did I allow the man to goad me?

As I wandered, the anger that burned inside me gradually died away, and my mind began to turn (as it so often does) to Sammy. In my mind's eye I could picture her perfectly. Her hair was still pretty short, but her head was so small and cute, the short hair gave her a spunky, lively, very young look. And her proportions! The curves in her body were practically engineered, they were so smooth and balanced! Her curves were full without being excessive. If I ever had a chance to talk to van Els, I had to ask him: was it just Sammy's genes that made her what she is, or did the alien device do some optimizing? Of course, it could easily be both, because Sammy... well, you couldn't imagine anyone more perfect. Not an inch too tall or an inch too short; breasts big enough to bounce the right way, but small enough to be firm and pert; legs not overlong, and just enough muscle definition to—

Smack! I walked into a doorframe.

"Ouch, Dr. Mahon! Are you alright?" a young female technican asked.

"Oof!" I replied, rubbing my forehead, "Yes, I was just lost in thought."

"I think you're going to have a bump there," she said. "You hit that doorway pretty hard. You're sure you're okay? I can walk you to the infirmary."

"No, no," I replied, getting a little irritated. "Thanks for your concern, but I'm sure I'm fine. I'll just get a cup of coffee to wake me up a little."
 

There are kitchenettes all over campus, and as I happened to have smacked my head at one, I went inside and made myself a cup of coffee.

As I did, I realized that quite by accident I'd wandered over to the kitchenette nearest the Language Analysis area, where Sammy works. And... coincidence upon coincidence, who would wander in but Sammy herself!

"Oh, hello, Dr. Mahon," she said, smiling shyly.

"Well, ahem! ahem!" I said. Suddenly, all I could do was clear my throat, over and over. It must have been something in the air.

Sammy handed me a throat lozenge, and it helped.

"Thanks," I said, and for some reason I became very red in the face.

"No problem," she said. "You should carry some, it seems you get those ahem-ahem attacks often."

When I couldn't think of an answer to that, Sammy smiled and turned to go. My jaw fell open as I watched her perfect form pad softly away, as if on little cat feet. When she turned in the hallway, I caught for a moment the lovely line made by her back, her derriere, and her legs. Her feet were so tiny, so cute! Where on earth did they make such little blue sneakers!
 

I couldn't think of Vossberg without getting angry, so I went wandering again until I smacked my head into another doorway. This time it was van Els laboratory. The great man himself was sitting at a table playing with — of all things — a slide rule. He looked up at me with no expression on his face. He regarded me for a moment, then gestured silently to an empty chair. He was inviting me to sit with him!

"What are you doing with that relic?" I asked.

He turned the slide rule over and over in his hands, and pushed the slide up and down. "I'm trying to get it to work," he joked, "but I can't find the ON switch." He handed it to me.

I fiddled with the thing for a bit, remembering immediately the principles, looking to see which scales were on it. "Amazing device," I mused. "I wonder who invented it?"

"A man named Oughtred, back in the 1600s," he informed me. van Els watched me play in silence for a while, then he asked, "What can I do for you, Dr. Mahon?"

"Oh!" I said, "I'm surprised you know my name!"

He shrugged and smiled. "You're the one who came up with the Kiss Test."

"Well," I said gruffly, blushing, "I'm not sure that I came up with it, but I call it the Kissing Test."

"Everyone seems to think it came from you; you might as well take credit. It's rather elegant... cuts through self-deception, political correctness, through what people believe that they believe..."

"Basically," I said, chiming in and warming to my subject, "it shows whether a person really considers Sammy to be a woman. While they might like to look at her, while they may want to touch her, while they might even want to have... ah... intimate contact with her, the one thing that *really* shows whether they regard her as a woman is if they say *yes* when you ask, Would you kiss her?"

"And you, Dr. Mahon, would you kiss her?"

"Me... ah... uh... well," involuntarily I glanced around the room, and seeing no one, I replied, "Yes, yes, certainly. I would like to kiss her."

van Els' eyes twinkled. "Why did you look around before you answered? If someone else were here... say Dr. Vossberg, for instance, would you have answered differently?"

"Ach! That idiot!" I scoffed.

"He wouldn't kiss her, I take it."

"No, damn him, he wouldn't!"

He repeated my damn him with an interested raised eyebrow. "You've got to tell me, Dr. Mahon: Why on earth would you want Dr. Vossberg to kiss Sammy?"

"I don't!" I cried. "The thing is... the thing... the thing is this: *I* want to kiss Sammy. I am wildly, desperately attracted to her. I would LOVE to kiss her."

"But?"

"But," I never knew the rest until now, until van Els asked me, even if it was plain as day. "Knowing that Vossberg — and other idiots like him — well... knowing that they would think I was kissing a man..." and there I broke down and couldn't continue.

When I say I "broke down" I don't mean I cried. I just mean that I couldn't go on. Words failed me.

"I see," van Els said.

"What I wish," I growled, clenching my fist, "What I wish, is that we could take a man, a man's man, and transform him with that device of yours into a beautiful woman..."

"To seduce Vossberg?" van Els supplied. I nodded.

"Ah, Dr. Mahon," van Els replied. "This is your lucky day. Just like in a fairy tale, I happen to be able to grant that wish."

I looked up. "Really?"

"Of course. But you would have to be that man. AND you'd have to agree to let me perform a number of other, unrelated transformations."

"Wha..."

"Of course, in the end, I'd change you back to just as you are now."

"But why?" I asked.

He smiled. "If we're going to stick someone into that machine again, we have to get some serious science done. I don't care what you want to change into, or what you do while you're changed, as long as I get to check off a few tests I've been waiting to do. And of course there will be photographs, examinations, blood work..."

"Oh, I don't think so," I said, shaking my head. "I'm not up for any of that."

"That's too bad," he said. "So far, Sammy's been my only volunteer."

"Really! I'm quite surprised! I thought you'd have people lined up around the block!"

"Oh, sure," van Els agreed. "There are plenty of people who want to get their hair back or lose their potbellies or do some other silly thing, but none of them are willing to let me do a little science on them. And if they won't, then I won't. I got an official reprimand, you know."

"Oh yes, I know about that—"

"The only reason I got away with it is because, in the end, I had some hard science. Real results. The next person who steps into that machine is going to go through seven transformations that I have on a list. The eighth can be whatever they like, and afterward they can go back to what they were. If they like."

"Does Sammy ever talk about going back?" I ventured in a hushed tone.

"Never," he said. "In fact, she asked me to destroy her genetic snapshot, the thing that would allow her to go back."

"Why would she do that?" I asked.

"She's afraid the administration here might force her to change back to what she was."

"Could she?"

"Not any more," he said.

"Well," I said, gathering myself to rise from the table, "I'm sorry for your lack of volunteers, but — as much as I'd like to have the last laugh on Vossberg — there's no way I could do such a thing."

"Ah, that's too bad," van Els said, with a trace of sadness. He picked up the slide rule once again and glued his eyes to it. As he pushed the rule back and forth, he sighed, "Poor Sammy!"

That stopped me. "What do you mean poor Sammy?"

"Well," he said. "Think about it: if you went through the machine, she'd have someone to talk to... you two would be able to compare notes. That poor thing! She's had an experience that literally no human being in the world has shared. She has no one to talk to about it. Oh well!"
 

Early Saturday morning, I showed up at van Els laboratory. Friday night I'd undergone an extremely thorough physical exam, and I was ready for the transformations.

"Each transformation will take only moments," van Els told me, "but we'll need a good bit of time between each one to take photographs, do blood work, scans if necessary..."

"I understand," I said. "I'm ready."

"Good!" he said. "And your plan is..."

"The last transformation turns me into a beautiful woman; I go to the social event tonight; tomorrow morning you change me back."

"Fine," van Els said. "Remember — as I told you — I can't guarantee that you'll be as beautiful as Sammy. She had great genes on her side. But we'll do our best."

I swallowed hard and said, "Let's get started!"

The seven transformations were pretty awful. I don't want to dwell on them at all, but each one was uglier than the one before. At one point van Els told me that they were trying to figure out what the aliens looked like in their natural form. "The settings we're using on you will help to narrow down the possibilities," he said.

The fifth transformation was so painful that I had to be lifted bodily out of the machine and set on a table. I'd never felt such general, whole-body pain. It was excruciating. I couldn't even speak, it hurt so badly.

"I didn't think it would be *this* uncomfortable," van Els said. "Hang in there."

Hang in there? Did I have an alternative?

At long last, the seven awful changes were done, and he changed me, as promised, into a woman. Frankly, I was more shocked by that last result than the seven before it. Being a woman... well, it was truly alien to me.

"You don't look very comfortable," van Els said. "Are you sure you want to go through with this? I can change you back to your original form right now, if you like."

"No, no," I said. "I didn't go through all that pain for nothing. I've got to show up that idiot Vossberg."

van Els shrugged. "It's your nickel."

"I think it's a bit more than that," I quipped, but it didn't sound as funny out loud as it did in my head.
 

One of van Els' female techs helped me into a dress and shoes and so on and did my hair and makeup. The experience was quite strange; it reminded me of nothing so much as getting ready for a school play, or Halloween.

"There, done!" the tech said, but she didn't look quite convinced.

"How do I look?" I asked, and gazed at myself in the mirror. "I think I look pretty damn good, if I do say so myself!"

"Uh..." the tech said.

"What's wrong?"

"Could you try smiling a little?" I smiled. "Oh, no! Not like that! A little less... oh, dear." She looked at me for a moment, then said, "Try this: don't smile... just think about smiling."

I did, and felt the corners of my mouth move up slightly. "How's that?"

"It'll have to do," she said.

"Yes, I think it will!" I agreed, looking at myself from various angles. "Thanks so much!" and off I clomped down the hall to the social.
 

I could feel all eyes upon me as I entered the hall and made my way to the refreshments table. I was sure I was making a hit, and I chattered a bit with random people in passing.

There was nothing strange about a new person on campus. New people were joining all the time, temp workers came and went, so I didn't really stand out for being new.

It took about an hour before I spotted my prey, and another half hour before he was alone. That's when I moved in for the kill. All I had to do was get that shlub to kiss me, and then I'd have the last laugh.

"Hello there, handsome," I said. "Who are you and what do you do here?"

"I don't think so," he replied.

"What?" I said, taken aback. "I'm new here. Wouldn't you like to show me the ropes?"

"Not particularly," he told me.

"Why don't we chat for a little bit, get to know each other? Why don't you tell me a little about yourself?"

"No," he said, and he coughed in a funny way. I was beginning to feel a bit put out. What was wrong with this guy?

"Why don't you want to talk to me?" I demanded with a frown. "Is there something wrong with me? Tell me!"

"Oh come on!" he replied. "I can see right through you. I know who you are."

I scoffed in disbelief. "Who told you?"

"Nobody had to tell me," he laughed.

"My disguise is perfect!" I retorted. "I don't just look like a woman, I *am* a woman!"

"You might be a woman," Vossberg replied, "but you talk like a Mahon."

© 2011 by Kaleigh Way