Constant in All Other Things 2: Interlude II (2/3)
by
Fakeminsk ([email protected])
(www.patreon.com/fakeminsk)

“Friendship is constant in all other things
Save in the office and affairs of love:
Therefore all hearts in love use their own tongues;
Let every eye negotiate for itself
And trust no agent.”
Much Ado About Nothing

Synopsis:
David Sanders returns to the Asklepios Clinic in the hope of leaving behind Cindy’s life and regaining a male identity. As his three minders discuss his fate, David struggles to come to terms with both his male past and feminine present.

What has gone before:
David Sanders saw something he shouldn't have: his boss, pharmaceutical magnate Jeremiah Steele, murdered the son of an underworld rival. Placed in witness protection, an assassination attempt forces David into the disguise of Cindy, a younger woman. For months he suffers the ignominy of living a life he despises, his torture both alleviated and acerbated once discovered by Julia, a jilted ex-girlfriend. A trip to the Asklepios Clinic, the research centre responsible for his transformation, triggered both uncomfortable memories and a violent encounter.

Interlude 2, Part Two: Bargaining and Depression
Scene Seven: “Tough Guy Talk”

“Slut!” Amplified by the speaker, the former agent’s howls resonated within the constrained space of his transparent cage. His screams were matched by the dull thud of Fosters’ fists against the wall. “Sissy faggot cunt!” The transformed assassin screamed, threw himself against the barrier, hammered his head until blood smeared the wall translucent crimson. “Did this—you—kill!” Spit flecked the wall between them.

Jonathon allowed Fosters his moment, curious how David would respond.

David stood there impassively, watching the man who killed him—the man now twisted into a grotesque caricature of femininity and rampant regeneration gone wrong—swear and rave. With insults raining down on him—bitch and bastard and vivid threats of rape and torture—David stood in silence and watched. He turned his back on the display behind him and faced the doctor. He appeared deeply troubled, and a dark and dangerous anger smouldered in his eyes.

“This is wrong,” he said.

Jonathon raised an eyebrow. “He killed you, you know. When Katherine found you, your heart had stopped. He shattered your leg. He’s the reason you’re several centimeters shorter than before.”

“Doesn’t matter,” David said. “We fought. He lost. He should be dead, not… this, this living nightmare.” He jerked one thumb over his shoulder at Fosters, who now stood, wordlessly breathing heavily, one hand still groping incessantly at his crotch.

“Help me,” Fosters whined. “Please…..”

Jonathon cut the feed. Anger bubbled up inside at the ingratitude and moral judgment of this man. “Wrong?” he said, quietly. “Dead?” He stepped closer to his transformed client. “You stupid. Selfish. Idiot.” He jabbed an angry finger at David. “D’you think you were the only person Fosters hurt that day?” He gestured at his prisoner. “This—man, hurt and killed on his way to you, David. His companion did the same.” With angry jabs of the finger, he brought up a secured data file and thrust the tablet at David. “Here – have a look – he’s a real piece of work.”

A life defined by violence, rape and murder. Cruelties abroad and at home; mercenary work, dark government contracts and most recently, private work under Steele’s broad umbrella. The litany of the man’s atrocities made for harrowing reading, and he watched as David’s eyes—such pretty eyes—danced down the list.

“Deserves?” Jonathon pointed at an entry in the litany of horrors attached to Fosters’ name. “There a good one; a personal favourite. Children, David. He killed children. You dare pass morale judgment on me? Yes—a living nightmare,” Jonathon concluded. “His outsides now match the inside.”

David passed the tablet back to him. His former enemy now seemed oblivious to them, writhing once more on the floor in a paroxysm of groping, breasts and cock and pussy and agitated limbs, moaning in denied release. The feminised man watched the assassin for some time before Jonathon gestured for him to follow.

They left the room in silence.

Later, sitting opposite his patient back at his office at the ground level of Asklepios, Jonathon regretted his outburst. He was pleased with the impact the revelation had on David; it had instilled in him a necessary fear regarding his transformation. But he also acknowledges his anger was rooted in guilt—a particularly annoying, pernicious guilt he couldn’t quite shake.

David looked around, tenderly raking hair out of his eyes with nails to which he’d yet to adjust. “Why haven’t I ever heard of any of this?” he asked. “You’ve talked about raids on secret laboratories. Mad science, human victims—you’ve got a war criminal, locked up downstairs?” He grimaced. “Stuff like this makes the news.” But even as he said it, his voice betrayed an all too typical belief in the power of the rich and powerful to do whatever the hell they want and keep it secret. “Something must’ve gotten out?”

Jonathon thrust his hands deep into his pockets. “Why? You’d be surprised how much of our funding comes from governmental sources – Neopharm’s too. Nobody wants this getting into the press. Undocumented workers used for corporate experimentation it’d help fund? It’s a bad look for everybody involved.

“After their site got raided, Neopharm certainly didn’t want news getting out—might hurt their stock value. As for us – for the first time we had something on the competition, and best of all they didn’t know it was us, thanks to Katherine’s involvement. Might’ve been a corporate raid; might’ve been the Chinese, the Nigerians….” He trailed off and shrugged. “And as far as they knew, the research was destroyed in the attack on the lab. They didn’t know we had it. And we had to keep it that way.

“When those agents followed you here, David, I’ll be honest: your survival wasn’t my top concern. Keeping the Tank secret was far more important.”

“Then why are you showing me all this?” David asked. “Aren’t you afraid I’ll go running to Steele? Or the media? Take what I’ve seen here and deliver it to him on a silver platter, try and strike a bargain with him? I’m thinking the bastard would love to know what you’re up to here. I’m thinking the bastard would pay through the nose to know what’s going on in here.”

Jonathon smiled, though it wasn’t a pleasant one. “You and I both know you’d never do that. There’s no bargaining with Steele. The only thing he wants on a platter are your balls.” With a wave of his hand, he indicated the feminised man’s figure, the full breasts and lithe legs and long hair. “And in your current condition? Can you imagine what he’d do to you?”

David scowled.

“As for the press,” Jonathon continued, “what would be the point? Maybe—just maybe—you’d slightly inconvenience Steele, put some pressure on Asklepios. Maybe embarrass somebody powerful in government you’d probably rather not have as an enemy.

“But more to the point—let me ask you, Girlie. You’ve seen that… thing, now, downstairs. Without Asklepios—without my help—are you willing to risk that?”

David stiffened. His grip on the chair tightened. “I don’t take well to threats, Scooter.”

“It’s not a threat,” the doctor said. “It’s fact.”

“It doesn’t roll off your tongue, doc,” David said, sneering. “This tough-guy talk.”

“It’s not—idiot!—just think for a moment. What the hell do you think I want from all this? You’re—a problem. A fascinating and frankly, extreme valuable problem. You’ve gone in the Tank and come out the other side and you’re healthy and—”

“Female.”

“Yes. Fine. But you’re also a concern, David, a risk to everything we’re doing here, especially if you fall into the wrong hands. So in all honestly, if it wasn’t for Katherine, I’d have you in a cage just like that abomination downstairs. A far more pleasant cage, to be sure, especially if you were a good little girl and played along nicely, maybe give you a job as a secretary or receptionist, but I’d have you under observation and available for study 24-7.”

David frowned. “No thank you.”

“Yes, well,” he continued. “It’s not up to me. Katherine, whether you believe it or not, keeps insisting you’ve got human rights, that you deserve a new life after the sacrifice you made of testifying against Steele. That you’ve made a deal, and that deal involved returning to a male life after all this.”

David’s eyes lit up. “Yes,” he said. “Tell me more about that.”

Scene Eight: “I’ve Never Done This Before”

He didn’t come to his scheduled session on the next day, nor the next. So when Crystal heard the tentative knock at her door ten minutes past the start time, she was already deep into some hobby-work and annoyed by the interruption.

“Yes?” she snapped.

The head that peeked around the corner gave a sheepish grin, and green eyes sparkled from between a frame of blonde bangs. “Ah—bad time?”

Crystal took a deep breath. “No. No, please come in.”

The young woman slipped into the room, barely opening the door wide enough to pass through. The first thing Crystal noted was her perfume, the scent of jasmine and cut grass that followed the girl into the room, the impression of a summer’s day. She was dressed down from their first session and looked far more comfortable in a grey tracksuit and simple top, hair tied back in a ponytail. Her appearance still exuded femininity in the pink piping down the legs, or the soft pastel of her wedge heel sneakers. The slim fit of her shirt emphasised rather than hid the swell of her chest, and hung loosely at the neck, leaving one shoulder or the other bare. Her makeup, though carefully and skillfully applied, remained subdued.

The overall look was quieter than before, a gentler femininity. To Crystal, the expression of girlishness was more powerful for its subtlety. This man, for whom this female impersonation was hateful, a humiliating and painful prison, somehow conveyed this unwanted identity so compellingly, so convincingly, even without overloading on the makeup and tight or revealing clothing.

Watching Cindy—or David; she waited to determine to whom she was speaking—slink into the room, Crystal did feel a stab of… more than annoyance, though far short of active dislike. She felt… frustrated by her patient, she decided. David’s comment last session had been all too accurate. Crystal was jealous of the gift he’d been given, the remarkable transformation that embodied everything she could possibly have once hoped for years ago, and even now yearned for in weaker and more tired moments. If only he could appreciate the miracle he’d been granted: not just (just!) his life, or an extended youth—but the opportunity for an entirely new identity, free from the burdens and limits of whatever past he’d escaped.

The—girl?—slid into the chair opposite, poised and expectant. Crystal continued with the task at hand. Other than the click of needles, the room was silent.

“Knitting?”

Crystal paused mid-stitch. “Obviously.”

“Wouldn’t have thought—”

“Why not?”

Silence resumed, and Crystal completed the row and started the next. She waited. Eventually, her patient sighed and leaned forward. “Listen, I just wanted to—”

“I should think so,” Crystal interrupted.

“I didn’t mean to—”

“Yet you did.” Crystal put her work to one side. “But I accept your apology. You were in pain and by sharing that pain you hoped to alleviate it. You wanted to hurt me. But I am not your enemy here. My role is simply to help.”

“Help?” The smile was lopsided, sarcastic. “Help who? And with what?”

Crystal nodded. “Your mistrust is understandable. But I am here to talk, and to listen. To ask questions and seek answers. To give you an opportunity in a safe space to share your concerns and explore your situation.”

“My… situation?” Her client shook their head in disbelief. “Is that what you call it?” They sighed and sat back. “Fine. But you know what? Let’s do this. God knows I could use the help.” They waved one hand, as though giving permission to begin. “Why don’t you ask me how I’m feeling today?”

“Fine,” Crystal said. “And how are you feeling today?”

“Who are you asking?”

“I’m asking you.”

“No,” they said. “You want to know how I feel? Honestly? I feel… exhausted. And scared. Mostly, I feel so goddamn fed up and tired of all this.”

“I’m sorry, David.”

At the sound of his name, the feminised man sagged. “Thank you,” he said. “Why couldn’t you have started like this last time?”

“I treated you as you presented,” she answered. “You came to me as Cindy; I spoke to you as Cindy.”

“But I’m not Cindy.”

“Maybe not.” She tapped at her tablet, bringing up some images she had prepared for their meeting. “And yet….” She passed the tablet to him, and he swiped through the pictures, an echo of their previous appointment. Cindy, sultry in a little back dress holding hands across the table with a handsome young man in a fancy restaurant. Two nights ago, beautiful in blue with Chad at the pub, red lipstick and glittering earrings; and finally, flirty in a peach sundress, sitting legs crossed at the thigh, gazing into the distance bathed in bright light from outside the diner. “Is this you?”

“That’s Cindy,” he said.

“Is this you?”

He stared at the images for a long time before answered. “No,” he said and then a moment later, “Yes,” he admitted. He fiddled with an earring and tucked an errant bang back behind his ear. “But it’s also… not me.”

Crystal nodded. “Can you explain?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “Like, yeah, obviously the girl in those pictures is me, it’s physically me, right? I was there, I remember.” He tapped one long nail at the screen. “The touch of Dan’s hand on mine, the taste of wine.” He flicked to the next photo. “The heat in the diner, the smell of grease, and how nice the dress felt after all those hours in the car wearing the outfit Julia picked out for me.” He frowned, paused and then went to the last photo. “And last night. Yeah, Chad. He’s alright. Talks too much, but sometimes I guess that’s what you want.” He looked up, eyes flashing with anger. “But Christ, don’t I get any privacy?”

Genuinely sorry, Crystal shook her head. “The Clinic is very mindful of all its clients. And the pub is technically on Asklepios property; the Clinic owns it. But perhaps more to the point, you know how valuable you are to Jonathon. And to Katherine.”

“Doesn’t mean I have to like it,” he conceded.

Crystal took back the tablet. “So you recognize the young woman in these moments as yourself, then,” she said.

“Fine, yes, I do. But like I said—only physically. That’s me. Or it’s a version of me. But it’s not the real me, it’s… a ‘production’ of me, Jonathon called it, a template applied to the real me. A disguise. It’s the part I’ve been told to play, forced to play.”

She nodded. “Of course. But if you don’t mind, David, I’d like to focus on a few details.” Turning back to the photo of Cindy and Dan in the restaurant, she zoomed in a little to centre the couple in the image. “Before all this started, had you ever held hands with another man in this way?”

He looked startled by the suggestion. “What? Hey—fuck no! Of course not.”

“Had you ever felt any attraction to another man before?”

“No,” he said. Then leaning forward, voice angry, he continued: “I’m not gay.”

“That’s not what I asked, David.”

“For fuck’s sake, this is about the story I told K, isn’t it? Back at the start, on the way to the Clinic, that night in the hotel room? Yeah, fine, my first kiss was with another guy, when I was like twelve years old.” One slender finger tapped at the table as though to emphasis the point, painted nail clicking against the surface. “K took it as evidence that I was really some kind of repressed homosexual or something.” His nose wrinkled in an expression of disgust and disappointment, but when he went to continue—“and you know, thinking about it…” he hesitated and went silent.

Crystal gave him a moment, then prodded. “Yes?”

“It’s just, well… in some ways, when Ken—that’s the boy who kissed me, like, over twenty years ago—I didn’t deal with it well, you know. I beat the living sh… I hurt him, Crystal, really bad. I regretted it then, and I regret it now. And like I told K, what really got to me back then was the anger, the disappointment. Not in Ken but in myself, because really, why did I care so much, it was just a kiss, right? He opened up to me at a time and place where frankly, being gay wasn’t exactly seen as acceptable. He took a real risk. There was real bravery there. And Ken was a good kid, he was a friend when I didn’t have any and I really looked up to him, nearly worshipped the guy.

“I would’ve been that boy for him if I could’ve, I think, but that wasn’t me, I couldn’t make it work and he understood that even if I wasn’t able to.”

Listening to him, Crystal found it all too easy to imagine the young, lonely boy torn between the desperate need to please a friend, the willingness to lie—to themselves, to others—and their innate sense that it was somehow wrong, wrong for him and that living an untruth could only ultimately bring pain to themselves and others.

“And yeah,” David continued, “since then, there’s been other kisses.” He counted each one off on a painted oval nail. “That boy in the hotel. Harry.” He grinned. “And Dan.” The grin floundered. “And after each one I think back to Ken and that first kiss, and I tell myself that I’m no fucking homophobe, that I don’t care if the world’s a cesspit that hates on gays and that I don’t give a crap because I’m a guy, dammit, I’m a man and that’s who I am. And all this shit, the tits and makeup and whatever, it’s superficial, it’s… external to what I really am, to how I feel on the inside.

“Not one of those kisses turned me on, is what I’m saying. It was just—acting. I’m still a guy. And if that’s true, then… why should it matter, right? What’s a kiss? How can a kiss change who I really am?”

Crystal remembered a kiss of her own, not her first but the first that mattered: the kiss that revealed to her who she really was. Julian Cooper, on a late-night train platform huddled under his umbrella in the rain after one too many post-seminar drinks. The closeness. The musky scent muddled with the heat of rain on pavement, and the intensely frightening, frighteningly wonderful sense of his arms around—her—the moment of realisation—and their lips met and she knew, suddenly who she was, the crystallisation of doubt into an unshakeable sense of self. And she thought how a single kiss might not change who you are, but that it certainly could bring to the surface the self that you’ve buried deep for so many years.

“But more and more, it feels like I’m lying to myself,” David said, and as he continued his voice shifted, becoming more… feminine, Crystal thought, though it was difficult to pin down precisely how so or what that even meant. “Because—because I am changing, aren’t I? I mean, look at me.” He grabbed at the tablet and stared at the photos there. “Look at me! A year ago, you’d never have found David Saunders in a tight dress holding hands with another man. But that… that’s me, and how can… that person possibly be a man?

“And I’m looking at these pictures, and I remember being there, but now I’m thinking maybe I wasn’t really in control, you know, and it seems like I’m remembering from the outside, like I was watching somebody else, watching Cindy living those moments.

“And now I’m wondering, maybe Ken knew something all those years ago, saw something all those years ago. And if that’s true then… who am I?” His fingers curled into fists, and he crumpled into himself, into a tight, angry ball, hugging his knees to his chest, and he squeezed his eyes tight against the tears. “Who am I now?”

Crystal considered for a long moment how to respond. Finally, she reached for her knitting and picked it up and continued the next row. The gentle clicking of the needles pushed back the silence of the room.

David opened his eyes. “Really?”

“I’m knitting a scarf. I’m doing it for my nephew,” she said, and held it up for him to see. Nearly a meter in length, it rolled out in bands of different colour: black, brown, blue, green; she’d just started on a new row in orange. A pattern of interweaving lines stretched across its length, uncoiling toward the unfinished end. “I could just have the thing printed, obviously, but it’s the effort that counts, right? Think he’ll like it?”

“How should I know? Listen—”

She held up a hand. “Just watch,” she said, and knitted another row, and then another, continuing with the orange, switching to black when adding to the pattern of coiling lines. It took her a few minutes, and once done she held it up for him to see. “Not bad, right?” she said, feeling more than a little proud.

“Yeah, I guess it’s great? But I don’t see—”

She held up a hand to forestall further protest. From a canvas bag at her feet, she retrieved another colour. Pink, shot through with threads of sparkly silver – to really drive home the point. Switching to the new colour, she quickly added a few more rows. David watched her proceed, clearly bemused.

“What do you think?”

“I think I shared something pretty meaningful? And you’re sitting there knitting?”

She nodded. “A scarf.”

“Sure.”

She continued knitting. “Is it still a scarf?”

He cocked his head to one side. “I don’t follow.”

“I’m adding another row. I’ve changed colour. Is it still the same scarf?”

He nodded.

Stopping, she reached back into the bag and pulled out a hobby knife. Sighing, she extended the blade and brought it to the start of the pattern, to the original stitches she’s knitted and purled. She cut a stitch, and another, and unraveled a strand. Mourning the lost work, she held it up for inspection. “What about now? Still the same scarf?”

“Sure?”

She unravelled a row, cut a few stitches out from the middle, put down the knife and began knitting out another row. “And now?”

“It’s looking a little rough, and I don’t think your nephew’s going to like it as much anymore but yeah, it’s still the same scarf.” He offered a little smile, shaking his head ruefully. “You didn’t have to ruin your work, you know. I get the point.”

“Do you?” She put down the knitting. “Tell me.”

“I’m the scarf?” he said. “And just because you’ve added some new bits at the end or trimmed some bits off the start doesn’t mean it’s stopped being a scarf.” He shook his head. “Sorry, but I’m not convinced.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s not the same scarf. It’s now a scarf with holes in it, it’s now a scarf with sparkly pink in it, and maybe that’s not the kind of scarf it was meant to be.”

Crystal nodded and lay the scarf out on the desk between them. It lay in bands of colours across the solid wood desk, one end cut and frayed, the other unfinished, a meter of wool and hours of effort. “It’s not a bad metaphor for a life, though, is it?” she said, fingers poking through the popped stitches at the beginning of her work. “What holes have been punched into your life, David, and what remains unbroken in the pattern of your life, and what have you forgotten?” She traced a line through the length of the scarf, drawing out the single knitted line that led from start to end. “What will new experiences add to your tapestry, and what are you meant to be now?” All of the other lines went nowhere or ended prematurely. “For me, this is the key to the pattern. It runs the whole length of the scarf, an unbroken line from start to end.” She smiled at her patient. “Can you pick out something in your life that runs unbroken from start to end?”

David stared at the scarf, lips puckering a little with thoughts. Crystal was struck, again, at how… pretty, he looked, the smooth skin and wide eyes, lips painted a soft pink and the brilliant green of his eyes. It was easy, at times, to forget she was speaking with an older man, a violent man with a hidden past. The twenty-year old innocence he so easily projected remained compelling and convincing.

“I don’t follow,” he said.

“You could call it an essential property,” she answered. “Unlike a scarf, woven to a pattern, so much of a life happens out of our direct control.” She traced the lines that went nowhere, and her fingertips hovered over errors and damage she found in the weave, the dropped stitches, cuts, gaps and knobbly bumps. “Accidents happen, the unexpected happens, but does it really matter? If you stripped away those experiences, would it change who you really are?” She held up the middle of the scarf, a band in dark brown. “If I’d knitted this in grey instead of brown, would it make a significant difference?” She shook her head. “I don’t think so. I can’t even remember why I chose the colour.”

“But some events are of such significance, whether trauma or joy, that they prove transformative.” She returned to tracing the lines that danced the length of her effort. “I think something essential would be lost if I left these out,” she said. “If I cut out the middle, or knitted it only half the width, or length, or a different shape. At what point does it become a shawl, or stole, or even just a belt?”

David continued to watch and listen, remaining silent.

“You say you feel as though you’re losing something of yourself, but are these things essential properties, David? Are they the defining aspects of who you are? To me, it sounds as though your encounter with this boy twenty years ago truly matters; it was an experience that formed part of who you are. But this kiss with the boy in the hotel six months ago? Had it not happened, would it have made a difference?”

“I don’t know.” He spoke slowly. “To be honest, I don’t like thinking about the past much.”

“I understand,” she said. “To paraphrase, the past is a nightmare from which many of us are trying to awaken.” And she was careful to tread carefully here. She had a responsibility to dig out as much of this man’s past as she could, but also knew doing so could easily provoke him or break what little trust she had established with him. Better to draw it out surreptitiously rather than through direct questioning. “Would you mind if I focused on a more recent incident?”

He shrugged, one bared, slender shoulder rising and dropping indolently.

She checked her tablet. “Can we talk about Dan?”

David grimaced, a cute wrinkling of the nose. “I don’t know,” he said, and tugged at his neckline, covering up his shoulders. “It’s embarrassing.” He wrapped his arms around his slim frame and shivered. “And humiliating.”

Crystal reassured her patient, and slowly he warmed into a retelling of the night. He told her about Dan, the young man from Volumina International that had flirted with him from his earliest days there. The playful banter leading to an unexpected night out at Noir, a trendy local hotspot. “It wasn’t a date,” he insisted, and at first they spent the night talking, and he enjoyed the human company after weeks alone. And then drinking; too many drinks and ending up on the man’s lap, posing for a picture and—kissing him.

“One second I was looking into the camera, the next I turned my head and…,” he grimaced. “His tongue was down my throat like a rat down a sewer drain.”

Crystal nodded.

“And then I felt his hardon poking me in the ass,” David said.

“How did that make you feel?”

He laughed, though without humour. “I ran to the bathroom,” he said, “cried and threw up.” Which is how he met Julia, this woman from his past who seemed intent to push him into new feminine experiences. She pushed David into agreeing, under duress, to a date a week later with Dan.

Crystal made notes to follow up later: Julia; the intensity of David’s reaction; the suggestion of surging hormones and the subtle influence of other drugs. Meanwhile, David continued his story. Despite his occasional reluctance as he relived moments from the night, he almost seemed… relieved, to talk through the experience.

He spoke of getting ready for the date, showering and shaving, and the peculiar embarrassment he felt at slathering himself in shimmering body lotion that left his body sparkling and luminous. Then he described his shame at squeezing into the straps and lace of lingerie, slithering into a little black dress, the makeup and hair and drinking and chat with the other woman—a shame he admitted was tempered somewhat by the fact that there’d also been something fun, something exciting in the ritual of feminine preparation.

The moment he slid his feet into the arch of towering heels and stood, swaying slightly, and posed and pirouetted for Julia, he admitted to feeling trapped, like the ongoing misery of a tourist stuck in a holiday gone wrong to a foreign destination they can’t escape.

But he also felt a thrill, a delight rooted in pride, and a tingling deep in his belly to rival the nausea, at just how damn sexy he looked—at the hungry gleam he provoked in Julia’s eyes, in his own, a hunger that led her to grab and pin him up against the wall and forced him to repair his lipstick in the mirror several minutes later.

He skimmed over the details of the date itself, arriving early, his date arriving late, drinks and conversation, sharing the meal—and again, how he began to enjoy himself despite the constant frustration of playing a part he abhorred, enjoying the company if not necessarily his role in it. They talked about work; they talked about Shakespeare.

Then tears, arousal and frustration and anger. Another kiss. Again Crystal noted the intensity of his emotional swings. Something to raise with Jonathon, she thought.

The date ended.

“I walked with him to his place,” he said. “I was pretty drunk by this time and knew I should just get the hell out of there. But I was also kind of having fun, and then—I don’t know.” David shook his head. “I let him kiss me.”

“Let him?” Crystal asked.

David blushed. “It was fucking cheesy, but I’ll give the guy credit, he dropped the right line at the right time. I could’ve just walked away but instead I….” He shrugged. “I can’t lie to myself here. It wasn’t the booze and he didn’t force me. I didn’t start it but—I don’t know, it was like rewarding him for a game well played.”

Crystal nodded, impressed though not surprised by his willingness to share despite the discomfort at reliving the night. She knew her client was confronting the possibility that his life as Cindy might last longer than hoped. He’d arrived at the Clinic with clear expectations of returning to manhood: why deal with uncomfortable feminine experiences when he could just move on and try to forget?

But now?

His eyes were unfocussed as he relived that evening, and his hands fluttered in his lap.

“He kissed me and I didn’t pull away. It’s not like I wanted to, you know, kiss another guy… but he deserved it, right? At the end of the night, where he’s paid the bill and made at least some effort to show me a good night out….

“A kiss is the least he’d expect. The very least. Hell, I’d have expected a hell of a lot more from a girl—usually got it, too.”

As always, Crystal stilled her personal reactions to a patient’s words, but something must’ve shown. He frowned and his reply sounded defensive. “Hey, I’ve never forced a girl to do anything she didn’t want. But when a guy picks up the bill for the night with some chick he barely knows, of course he’s got expectations. First couple of dates, you barely know each other, right? You’re not there for the conversation.

“And it’s not like the girl doesn’t know the game. I can’t tell you how many—sexy, vapid, boring little bitches—have done their best to drain my wallet, and you better damn well believe I was happy to play along so long as they drained my balls afterwards.”

“And were you?” Crystal asked, drily. “Happy to drain his balls afterwards?”

David’s eyes darkened. “No,” he said. He stared at the table for some time before continuing. “No,” he repeated. “Even though I knew that’s where this was heading. Which is why I just stood there and let him have his fun. It was—one of the weirdest experiences of my Cindy life, one of the most uncomfortable. For a moment, it was like watching from the outside, and I could see this guy slobbering over this young girl, groping and grabbing her as she stood and rolled her eyes and stared into the distance. But that girl was me, and then I was back inside and living it, and I forced her… myself to respond, to… act, and I was about to break away and leave, when… well, you know.”

Crystal waited, and when he didn’t continue, prompted him. “Yes?”

He shrugged. “Steele’s man. Jeff—or whatever his real name is. The guy who’s been shadowing me since the start. And just like when he approached me at the restaurant bar, I knew I had to maintain the illusion, keep it convincing.

“So with that creep watching I couldn’t just walk away, couldn’t turn Dan down without appearing suspicious, without that goddamn creep possibly following me home, right? And so I agreed. I fucking agreed to go up to Dan’s condo even though I damn well knew what I means when a girl follows a guy up to his place after a night out for ‘just another drink’.”

Making a quiet note—Jeff?—to pursue later, Crystal nodded for David to continue.

The very pretty man opposite her reached into his handbag and rummaged around. He pulled out a little makeup bag. “It’s strange,” he said. “I don’t really want to talk about the next bit.” Crystal waited, and he sighed. “But at the same time, I do, I really do, I guess I’ve wanted to get this off my chest since it happened. I didn’t even tell Jules what happened, you know, though she’s been texting for details, believe me.

“But I’m not used to this crap, this touchy-feely bullshit, talking and sharing feelings so much.” He glared at her, almost accusingly, but then his expression softened into a lopsided grin. “Although you know, maybe it’s helping, just a bit.”

He spun one of the bangles around his wrist, eyes on the flashing sparkles. “But it’s not easy, and… and I’m nervous and it’s weird but recently, I don’t know why, but this shit—” and he pulled a lipstick from the bag and gestured with it, “—the makeup, I dunno, I find it calming.” His smile was a little sad, twisted with self disgust; a wan apology. “I hope you don’t mind.”

She watched as this man, at first with a slight tremble in his hands but then with calm confidence touched up his makeup. He repainted his lips a dark, matte cherry red and applied a coat of mascara and seemed to visibly relax as he continued the little ritual of beauty. “I don’t know why,” he said, glancing up at her from behind his reflected image on his phone. “But it helps.”

Crystal nodded and waited.

“So when Dan took me by the hand and brought me into the building, I didn’t resist,” David said, closing his handbag with a little snap and stowing it at his feet. He sat straight backed in his seat, hands on the table between then, fingers splayed. He affixed her with a penetrating gaze that bordered on unnerving. “I pretended to not see the little wink the concierge gave him on the way in.

“And yeah, he was all over me the moment we stepped into the elevator. He took me around the waist and pulled me close and kissed me and—and I kissed him back. His hand roamed over my tits, grabbed my ass and the other was at the back of my head and we fell back against the elevator wall, he had me pinned there and the whole time I could feel his dick jabbing into me. And I touched it, I stroked him through his trousers and smiled because… because what else could I do? When he went to kiss me again, I pulled back and the door dinged and we fell out into the hallway to his apartment, shushing and giggling like teenagers as he led me to his door. He fumbled with his keys and I laughed and he silenced my laugh with a deep kiss.

“His apartment was… nice, like really nice, very open concept and way beyond what I’d expect a guy his age to have, but then the steak, the wine… it was clear this kid was loaded, or at least his parents were. My reaction confused him, I think. He was obviously used to surprising visitors he brought home, impressing the panties off girl he brought back to his place and… I wasn’t that impressed, I guess, at this watered-down version of what I’d had just six months ago.”

David paused, as though contemplating what he’d lost, before giving a little shake of the head before continuing.

“He poured us drinks, a bottle of white he pulled from a wine fridge, and he dimmed the lights and put on some smooth music, and I almost laughed. But only for a moment, because now that we were in his place I was thinking, how the hell do I get out of here? We clinked glasses and drank. It was a good wine, nice and dry, expensive stuff. I drank it in big, nervous gulps and then he kissed me again, and I tasted the wine on his lips, citrus and white pepper on the tongue.” He gave a dry laugh. “On his tongue.

“When we came up for air he poured me another and we talked for a bit, but it was that awkward kind of empty small talk that fills the space when you know you’re really there for something other than conversation.

“Dan’s arm was back around my waist. He’s been stroking my knee through my stockings but now he held me close. His finger traced my spine, followed the small zipper that sealed me into that dress, danced down my bare shoulders, rested on the curve of my ass. His hand felt heavy, you know, and strong over the thin fabric and the underwear beneath. His thumb traced the edge of my stockings and snapped the garter. ‘Sexy,’ he said.”

David shivered.

“I leaned into him. I had to because in a moment his hand was going to try and go places it couldn’t. I wiggled in closer to Dan, and he kissed my ear, my neck; his tongue trailed along my collarbone. With one hand I still held the empty wineglass, and the other I pressed up against his chest. I remember being startled by how bright, how vivid and colourful my nails seemed against his shirt. How long they seemed, and shaped, the paleness of the pink and the crisp whiteness of his shirt and the contrast with the darkness of his skin. Were those really my fingers? I remember thinking. They seemed so—feminine—set against the masculine flatness of Dan’s chest.

“Dan took my glass, put it down, and I still see them, those two glasses, side by side, the one stained by the pink print of my lips. He took me by the wrist and held my hand to his mouth and kissed my fingers, one by one. And I saw the desire in his eyes, but more, I saw the—satisfaction, the smugness at his victory.

“Then he had me by both wrists, and I felt vulnerable as he kissed my neck again—suddenly aware of his strength, how slim my arms were in his grasp. It only lasted a second, but for that second I felt—afraid? Trapped, as he held me, and there was a hollowness in my belly, even as a half-dozen ways I could take him down flashed past my eyes.

“So I pulled away and he let me go. I asked for more wine, to buy time, to help see me through this; and my free hand brushed against the prick tenting his lap, the one that’d been jabbing me in the belly just a moment before. He smiled. I smile back, and I swear, it was like I could hear a voice in my head, a girl’s voice, giggling and eager for what might come next. With those bubbles of hysteria popping in my head, I smiled back and told him I needed a few minutes, that I needed to freshen up and you know, I almost lost it then, almost cracked at delivering a line I’d heard from the other side so often.

“Thinking about it now, I’m amazed I didn’t snap. I was close to—I don’t know. Losing my shit, collapsing, screaming, hitting him, running from the room—I don’t know. Instead, I walked calmly, ass swaying in heels for his viewing pleasure, into this guy’s bathroom and locked the door, thinking, what the fuck am I doing?

“That’s around when it hit me just how drunk I really was. Everything gets a bit hazy from that point on, impressions, more like snapshots than a video, if you know what I mean. Foggy. I remember staring at myself in the mirror over the sink. Smeared lipstick. Wide eyes and remembering, remembering who I used to be, but disjointed, confused. The giggling in my head came and went. And feeling sick, not like I was going to throw up but something deeper, a nausea deep in my bones. For a moment it felt as though I was about to hyperventilate. But then—

“A switch flipped.” David snapped his fingers. “The panic and fear retreated. Instead of freaking out I slipped off my heels and unzipped and wiggled out of that dress and went for a piss. God, how I just wanted to strip out of everything, I felt bloated and pinched in and overheated and uncomfortable and—fed up. But I gave my balls a few minutes to breathe, let everything hang out as I sat and took a piss. I washed my hands and padded around the small room in my stockinged feet.

“I rummaged around a bit. You can tell a lot about someone from their bathroom. It was classy, very modern, lots of mirrors, glass and exposed brick, recessed lighting. Very chic, bit pretentious for a kid his age. Checked the cabinet and found the usual guy stuff, deodorant and toothpaste and a razor, but also more pills than I would’ve expected, pain killers, anti-depressants—I might’ve popped something, I’m not sure, something to kill the noises in my head, something to bring the calm.

“There was also a single tube of lipstick, hiding behind some hand cream.

“Why was it there? Did he have a girlfriend? Was it left behind by a previous conquest – why’d he keep it? Cherry Whispers: a deep, rich red, mature and matte, seductive.” He smiled. “I’m wearing it now, actually. I looked at it as like it was some kind of message in a bottle, or a dispatch behind enemy lines, woman to… woman.

“I took the lipstick; I don’t know why, but I stole it. I returned to the mirror and touched up my makeup and I felt strangely calm, detached, leaning over the sink in my underwear in some guy’s bathroom, fixing the damages of the night.

“Eventually I found the willpower to slide back into those skyscraper heels and tape my cock back again, extra secure for the finale, right? I didn’t tuck; there was no way I was going to get my balls back up inside, not in that state, but so long as I kept his hands under control, I reckoned it’d be okay. Probably says something about how drunk I was at the time, trusting to blind luck to keep my disguise safe.

“Then it was time to pay the piper, as they say.”

He sighed. Staring blankly into the middle distance, he went silent, and Crystal noted a slight tremble to his lower lip. After a long moment, he gave himself a little hug, and smiling ruefully, continued.

“Something happened, then. I don’t know if I can really explain it, describe it in a way that makes sense. But there was a… moment. As I reached down for the dress, and stepped into it, carefully, I didn’t want to tear the thing with those heels. And I glanced up, and saw myself in a mirror, damn thing nearly took up half the wall.”

He frowned. “It was as though, in that moment, everything stopped, stopped and came into focus. The world froze, and I saw myself, daintily stepping into that tight little dress, half-naked in some guy’s bathroom, half-naked wearing panties and bra, heels and stockings, suspenders and waist-cincher, all those straps, bows, lace, tight fabric and mesh, midnight black and crimson.

“The smells and sounds, feelings, it all washed over me in that moment, a symphony of sensations that held me suspended in the moment. The tight grip around the waist, breath of cool air across the top of my tits, sudden goosepimples, the sound of Dan beyond the door, his sturdy steps in the kitchen and a shift in the music, something—blue, rolling and smooth, piano and bass—and strawberry and rose, lingering from the hand soap, the shimmer of colour at my fingertips. A hint of his cologne, sandalwood and smoke. A tickle of lace. Sensual slickness, the slither of stockings against the tightness of the dress, the stretch of the suspender across my bum; and the taste of my own lips.

“And in that caress of impressions I saw myself and wondered—is that me? And then: how is this me? Those curves and clothes, all that softness, the heavy fullness of breasts in their cups, stepping half in and half out of a woman’s little dress, and makeup: the reflection mocked me in its honesty.”

His nose wrinkled in an expression of confusion or disgust. “It literally took my breath away. As in, I felt light-headed for a moment. The contrast between the lingerie and skin—what you could see of it, anyway—the pale flesh of my thighs, the narrow band between bra and waspie, shoulders, tits; God, suddenly, I wanted this girl in my bathroom, primping for my pleasure, and—”

He shook his head as though in disbelief at the memory.

“But it was me. That girl was—me; and… how was that possible? Six months! Six months to go from… David to—this girl, preening for some prick waiting in the other room.”

He trailed off for a moment.

“So I watched this girl zip herself back into her dress, suck her gut in after all that steak and the reflection jolted me back into the moment. I saw this girl—saw myself—and I was fucking hot, I’d lost track of just how goddamn sexy I was. And something grew inside of me—an anger, frustration, something… dark; I couldn’t name it, but I fairly vibrated with this feeling.

“If this—thing—was going to happen, if I was going to do what came next, then it was going to happen on my terms, I thought. With a final wiggle, a little squeeze of the tits putting them on display, I stalked up to that mirror, wiped my mouth clean and reapplied the forgotten lipstick I’d stolen. I don’t know why, and that moment really stuck in my mind, the image of my face in the mirror, pale, leaning in close, framed by hoop earring and painting in those dark, red lips.

“Then I rode that swell of emotion back to Dan.

“He was waiting, standing next to the sofa, shirt half-unbuttoned, a large glass of white and an open bottle of whiskey and a generous dram in a glass tumbler, waiting on a side table. He drank me in as I left the safety of the bathroom. Did he notice the colour of my lips? I don’t know. He clearly liked what he saw, though. He went to speak but with a single glossy fingertip held to red lips, I silenced him.

“And stalking towards him, ass swaying, the click of heels on hardwood sounded loud in my ears. I felt hot under his devouring eyes. Music whispered and I thrummed with insane confidence—drunk—and with a different kind of desire as I reached him, and my hands slid in under his shirt, nails raking his skin as I explored his body. I’d never touched a man in that way before, never passed palms across hard abs and pecs in that way. Dan was in good shape and I respected that—envied his strength, really—and when I pulled him close it was as though I was trying to reclaim some of the power for myself. I—kissed him, tilting my head, shorter than him even in heels. Hungrily finding his mouth, I wrapped myself around him, threw my arms around his neck and drew him to my chest, burying his face in my cleavage.

“Then I shoved him back, onto the sofa, and straddled him, hovering over his lap and the hardness I knew waited.

“He handed me a glass. The glass was very full. I took it from him with a grin and knocked it back in one, in great big gulps, and then tossed the empty glass aside. Glass shattered. Then I had him again, lips tingling with alcohol, running my fingers through his hair, gripping his shoulders, pinning him to the sofa, rubbing my body, tits up against his chest and….”

He shook his head.

“I don’t have a fucking clue what I was doing at this point. I was a mess. My head was swirling. I’d had some vague idea of—I don’t know. I knew I wanted out of there but didn’t how to make it happen. Puking and begging off drunk and grabbing a cab or slinking away in the morning, maybe; but the urge wasn’t there, I didn’t feel it in my belly, the need to be sick. At least not in that way. Maybe I was still thinking about Jeff waiting and watching outside, buying time. And maybe at some level I saw myself in Dan’s position, had been there with some sexy bitch in my lap and damn well knew what I’d expect at this point, what I deserved, how a girl like Cindy repays her man.

“And the room was whirling and I felt like everything was spinning out of control – out my control, at least—and that swell of emotions, that inchoate anger that started in the bathroom began to spill over. My hands roamed across his chest. My lips found his. I kissed him. I kissed—him, crushed lips against his and my ass grinding his lap. I kissed him and groaned, nails digging into his flesh and he cried out and I didn’t care. If—this—whatever—then I wanted to be in control.

“I stood over him. Tossed my hair and licked my lips, caressed my curves and slid my arms down my side, my thighs – onto his lap and felt Dan’s hard cock, waiting. My hand lingered there. Cindy knew what he wanted – I knew—

“But I hesitated.”

David’s eyes dropped and he avoided eye contact as he continued.

“Dan’s the first guy to touch my tits,” he said.

“It happened so quickly. In my drunkenness I thought I was in charge, but then he had me by the wrists, and his hands seemed so big, so strong; and without any effort at all he pulled me down off those heels and into his lap. His arm’s around my waist and suddenly I felt so… small, weak and breathless under his touch, and the heat that buoyed me until then went cold and scooped out any illusion of control, left me empty under his hand. Confidence evaporated and I went still as his fingers slid up my back and… he found the zipper and—”

He paused.

“I used to love that. You know, with a woman, when she’d turn and lift her hair and expose the back of her neck to me. The sparkle of an earring, the glitter of necklace, and that little patch of bared skin between hair and clothes, open and vulnerable. The trust, maybe? But also that feeling of… of power over her, just a little and the anticipation. And yeah, in the heat of the moment I might tear her out of those clothes but I always preferred to take it slowly, let my finger trail down her spine as I released her, like the satisfaction of slowly peeling fruit before tasting the flesh.

“But as the girl?” He shook his head. “I hate it. I hate that it’s so awkward to reach the zip on my own, especially with these nails. I hate the sense of… openness, of dependency, needing someone like Jules to, to… seal me into my clothes. And that’s what it feels like, being fastened into something; trapped. The tightness. The way it draws in around the forced curves of lingerie, the restriction, the… reminder of how tiny I’ve become, how… delicate.” He chuckled drily. “It was a very tight dress.

“But suddenly the dress was down around my waist and I was missing the little protection it offered. I was in another man’s arms, half naked in my underwear, and I’ve never felt so exposed, so vulnerable, somehow ever more naked than if I’d actually been naked.

“Half naked?” he grumbled. “Like for a second. He gave a quick tug, and next thing I knew the dress was down around my ankles, and as much as I hated the damn thing I suddenly found myself missing it, intensely.

“Then he was holding me, he was kissing me, he had me balanced on his knee with his fingers tracing the boning upwards, whispering in my ear, ‘you’re so fucking sexy,” he said, “so hot,” shit like that, grabbing me as his tongue found mine, and then his hands were on my tits, over the bra, and it felt….”

David covered his face with one hand and groaned. His shoulders shook as he took a long breath but after a moment collected himself enough to continue.

“I don’t think I’d realised until then just how different a man’s touch can be. Julia, she’s really into my tits. To humiliate me, I think, to remind me that I’m not the man I was. She likes to grab and pinch and twist and—it hurts, but dammit, I kinda love it. Nipple shit never did anything for me before but now—I guess there’s just more to play with—and with her—fuck, but it’s hot, it really turns me on when the mood’s right. My tits up against hers, her softness up against mine, and even when she’s at her most brutal her touch is still… somehow, I don’t know… feminine. Even at its most embarrassing, like when she forced me to play with my own knockers, wearing—whatever she picked to remind me I’m her girl—it always leads to me fucking her, burying myself deep in her cunt, and well—”and David grunted with satisfaction—“yeah, whatever she does, at the end of it all I still feel like a man.”

“But this, this was a man touching me. A man with his arms around my waist, holding me close, a man’s scent, a man’s hot breath on my neck, nuzzling at my neck, stubble like sandpaper against my cheek, then biting at my ear; a man, running his fingers through my hair, paddling my shoulders, reaching behind and then –

“He unclasped the bra and it came off.”

David stopped.

Crystal waited.

“I don’t know if I can keep going,” he said.

She nodded. She waited as he reached for a glass of water, took a tiny sip, and very carefully put it back on the table. Then he reached for his handbag. He stared at it blankly for a moment and put it back without opening it. Finally, he sank back into his seat, staring up at the ceiling.

“Would you rather continue another day?” she asked.

There was a long wait before he finally shook his head negative.

“Can you tell me how you felt at that moment?”

He glared at her. “How I felt? With my tits in another man’s hands?”

“Only if you feel up to it,” she said.

Lurched forward, he gripped the table with white-knuckled anger, and leaning over the table went to speak—and then sagged, the emotion draining from him almost instantly. “You want to know the truth?” he said. “It felt—”

He looked pained. “You have to understand. I was drunk. Confused. Angry and afraid. I was all over the fucking place. But at no point in the least bit turned on, not by any of it. The whole time I was all over him, and he was all over me, I was—performing, I guess is the best word. Running off of some kind of instinct rooted in the girls I’d made out with in the past, only flipping it around and playing their part. The whole thing was an act, right?”

He grimaced. “My whole fucking life’s an act.

“But when I felt his hand on my chest it felt… good.” He shuddered. “And so different from Julia’s touch. Stronger, more confident, even though she’s never been one to hold back. Somehow it just felt more—natural; and when he touched me, when his thumb flicked across my nipples, and they went hard—something jolted through me, I gasped and suddenly felt weak in the knees—and next thing I knew I was half laying back on the sofa and he had one hand on my right boob, and he was kissing the other. He licked and twirled around the nipple and then sucked and I moaned like a bitch in heat, and for a moment it felt like my whole body was centered around those two hard, little points, and I was arching my back, throwing my head back, shoving those tits towards him—except it didn’t last because then, yeah, I did get excited, and thank God the tape held, but when I groaned it was in pain, not pleasure, not that fucking Dan could tell the difference.

“But he did stop, thank God, and with his hardon poking me in the belly and his body held over mine, his breath hot on my neck, he whispered into my ear: ‘I want you’.

“With a nod of the head he gestured towards what I assumed was his bedroom. ‘I want you so bad’, he said, ‘I want to take you into that room and spread you wide and fuck you,’ he said. The words didn’t come naturally to him. I could tell; he was trying to talk dirty, play tough—I guess be the guy he thought Cindy wanted.”

David shuddered.

“So what did you say?” Crystal asked.

“Well I damn well didn’t say ‘okay’,” David answered. “His hand was creeping up my thigh as he said it, and things were about to get… bad. But some guy telling me he wanted to spread me like butter did a lot to bring me back to Earth, let me tell you.

“So I placed my hand over his and he stopped reaching for a pussy that wasn’t there. I whispered into his ear. ‘Oh babe,’ I said to him. ‘I’m so sorry. I wish—I want to, I really do. I’m so turned on right now,’ I told him, and I forced my other hand to drift to his cock and he was so hard I thought he might tear a hole through his trousers. I gently rubbed him as I spoke. I gave him a great big kiss, moaning into his mouth as our tongues danced. ‘But I can’t,’ I said when we parted. ‘It’s that time of the month.’”

“His hand retreated as if I’d told him I had the plague, and you know, for a moment there, I felt a little thrill of fear. He had me pinned to the sofa, he was like twice my weight and while I could’ve fought him off, it wouldn’t have been pretty. But the look that flashed across his eyes when I told him… it wasn’t pleasant. For a moment there, I saw anger and frustration, and his grip on my shoulder grew painfully tight.

“But only for a moment. Then he relaxed and next think you know, he’s looking so sad, so pathetic, like a child who just dropped their ice cream cone. I could’ve laughed, you know, if I hasn’t been nearly naked under this guy with my tits hanging out.

“Dan sat back. I sat up. His hand still held mine, rubbing it in small circles over his dick. He was still hard—harder, even, as he looked at me with a little smile.

“’How about…?’ he started, and cupped my chin with his hand, his thumb pressing against my lips.

“And when he pushed his thumb into my mouth, I let him. I whimpered a little as he forced his thumb back and forth, moaned as with the other hand he held my heavy breast in his hand once more and kneaded. ‘God, you’re sexy,’ he said. ‘A sexy little tease, aren’t you?’

David looked pained.

“‘Naughty,’ he said. ‘Naughty clothes,’ he said, and his hand left my tit to trace my lingerie, dancing down the boning nipping in my waist, finding my stocking tops and snapping the straps he found there taut across my thigh. I whined around the thumb still slowly thrusting into my mouth as he continued, ‘for a naughty girl.’ He took his hand from my mouth, then, and kissed me deeply, passionately, and forcefully. ‘And naughty lips,’ he said.

“And then he asked, ‘You’re a naughty girl, aren’t you?’.

“Wide-eyed, I nodded.

“‘Will you do a naughty girl thing for me?’ he asked.”

David grimaced, and with elbows on table clutched his head between his hands. When he looked up at Crystal, his eyes despaired.

“What the fuck could I do?” he said. “What choice did I have? Dan looked at me, all hopeful like, and I gave a little nod. His hand was a heavy weight guiding me, but even more I felt the weight of expectation. I slid off the sofa and sank to my knees.

“I knelt—between his legs. Between a man’s spread legs. Dan gave a happy little sigh and shifted a little, making room for me, leaning back into the sofa. He even reached over to the side table and picked up his tumbler, can you believe it? He sat back and sipped his whiskey as he waited, one hand idly caressing the side of my head, playing with my hair, my ear, as I knelt there between his legs and fumbled for his belt buckle.

“And I knelt there remembering: how many girls have knelt like this between my legs?

“And I knelt there thinking: that should be me with some pretty little bitch on her knees, reaching for my cock.

“And I knelt there wondering: how the hell did I get here, how could this be happening, this couldn’t be happening, I didn’t want to do this, I couldn’t be about to stick some guy’s cock in my mouth, I’m not a cocksucker, not a….”

David trailed off and stared at the table. When he continued, he was unable to meet Crystal’s gaze.

“I undid his trousers, pulled them and his boxers down to his ankles and reached up and touched another man’s penis for the first time in my life. He had hairy legs; that surprised me, and I remember the hair bunching beneath my palm. And then the thing in my hand, twitching under my touch. And saying it now it sounds gross, impossible, like how could I possibly have crossed that line in the sand, right? I’m not gay. I’m not—but there I was with another man’s dick in the palm of my hand. The thing I most clearly remember thinking was, Christ, he probably went for a piss when I was in the bathroom.

“But in the moment—with his hand stroking my head, like a master with a skittish pet—and the room swirling with booze, blurry, I was aware—painfully aware—of kneeling there, in stilettos, in stockings, in sexy underwear—tits out—and the way he gently drew my long hair to one side, over one shoulder, and sighed under my touch…. In the moment, it all just sort of happened. I wasn’t thinking, not really, it was all just stuff happening in disjointed flashes.

“And in one of those flashes, I’m staring at this bastard’s penis up close and it’s….” David gave a dry chuckle. “Well, it was a man’s cock. We both know what a man’s cock looks like. Uncut. It looked like that. And there it was, the closest I’ve been to a dick not my own, though I felt pretty far from the girl’s hand that held it. Like, those slender fingers curled around the shaft, the pretty nails—that couldn’t be my hand, right? And maybe that was the trick, to just… disassociate myself from what was happening. It wasn’t me kneeling between Dan’s legs, but some drunk, half-naked girl eager to please her guy, some girl with pretty fingers and long hair dancing at the edge of her vision, the taste of foreign lipstick at her lips, mouth dry and in her hand—in her hand….

He paused.

“Dan’s smaller than me.” David glanced up and something adjacent to dry humour touched his voice. “Like, I’m trying to pretend I’m not there, but the first thing I notice as I’m eying this guy’s meat up close, this thing I’m holding in my dainty little girl hand is: yeah, sure, not bad but fuck if I’m not bigger; and I feel this surge of, oh I don’t know… pride? For just a moment.

“But it didn’t last for long because even if I’ve got the bigger rod, I’m the one on my knees about to impale my face on this asshole’s prick. And he’s looking down at me, so cocky and comfortable, and I’m looking up at him through bleary, half-lidded eyes heavy with mascara, earrings dancing against my cheeks and I’m feeling tiny, so… lost; and I really, really don’t want to do this thing.

“‘You’re fucking gorgeous,’ he whispered, drinking me in, and I can feel his gaze burning across my body, taking in the full sight, the dark lingerie and lingering over naked tits before settling in anticipation on my red and ready lips. “Thank you,” he added before cupping the back of my head and—guided me in.

“And I went with the gentle pressure, felt the heavy pull of breasts as I leaned forward, felt hot, felt trapped, felt my chest tighten, felt out of breath, breathless, I opened my mouth to draw in air and….”

He stopped.

“And?” Crystal prompted.

“And—I couldn’t do it,” he said. Tears beaded in the corner of his eyes, sparkled and rolled down his cheek, dropping silently to the table between them. “I just couldn’t do it.”

Crystal waited, and he shrugged, almost apologetically.

“That close I could smell his musk, that smell of sweat and balls that’ve been stewing all evening. His nob loomed large before me, bobbing just a bit, a bit purple, shiny with pre-cum. I thought of all the girls that’ve gone down on me and how easy they made it seem. I also remember thinking: no way he’d last long, surely he’ll blow his load straight away. I just had to… give it a little kiss. A lick. Open up and swallow like a good girl. A few swirls of the tongue and he’d be done. It wasn’t me doing this, right? It was Cindy. It wasn’t gay for a girl to blow her date at the end of the night, give him a wet little thank you for a night out…”

“And for fuck’s sake, it’s just a blowjob, right? I’d known girls who’d drop to their knees faster than they’d share a kiss.

“So I could do this. I wanted to do this. Just to prove—”

David sighed.

“Like I said, I was pretty fucked up by this point, and it all just swirled around my mind as I knelt there with Dan’s prick there—right there—centimeters from my lips, those sexy, red lips he’d been fantasising about all night.”

“His hand at my head pushed a little harder, and I—”

He winced, as though at a painful memory. “It was like there was this schism in my head. Pain: this flare of blistering pain, like a lance of light through the brain. And on the one side, I could see Cindy—this pretty, sexy girl looking up at Dan and cooing with pleasure as she held his dick and went down on him. She smiled and opened wide and took his prick into her mouth, dark red lips a crimson ‘o’ around his shaft as she held him there for a moment and swirled her tongue around the head. Then she started to bob up and down his shaft, moaning, her own pleasure blossoming as she fondled her own tits with one hand, pinching and pulling her own nipples as she played with his ball sack with the other, and he groaned and threw his head back and—”

David shuddered. “The whole thing was like a roll of old-school film unspooling, flashes of images flickering against the back of skull. And at the same time, I saw myself—like, myself-myself, male me; but also on my knees, looking ridiculous in stocking and heels and makeup, a mockery of femininity. And there was this swell of… shame and confusion, and… rage, blinding rage and even as I imagined my pretty blonde head bobbing up and down Dan’s dick, overlaid I saw myself grabbing him by the throat, throwing him to the ground and—hurting him.”

He cut off and looked pained.

“I felt suspended between the man I used to be and the girl I could become if I just submitted to this one act. And—I froze. When Dan tried to guide me in, I resisted. I pushed back because if I hadn’t, I don’t know what would’ve happened.

“Sitting back on my heels, I couldn’t meet his look. His hand cupped my chin and lifted my gaze. And I could see he was annoyed and frustrated. ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked, irritated, and then he saw the way I was trembling and the tears dribbling down my face.

“‘I’ve never done this before,’ I told him, and the sound of my voice—it was pathetic, a little girl’s whine—but they were the truest words I spoke that evening. ‘I’m not ready,’ I said. ‘I want to, but I’m not ready.’”

David went silent. Quiet tears continued to bead along the sharp line of his chin, fall and he rubbed the wet spatters into the table’s surface.

“So what happened?” Crystal asked after some time.

The feminised man wiped the back of one hand across his eyes, smearing his makeup. “Not much. I guess I was pretty lucky. At the end of the day, Dan’s an alright guy. He didn’t try to force anything, even though he was clearly disappointed. He told me it was alright; he apologized; he—said I could spend the night, if I wanted, and he’d call me a cab in the morning. And the whole time he was talking, I still had my fingers wrapped around the base of his penis, even if it wasn’t quite as hard as before.

“Maybe because he was being such a nice guy, I don’t know, and almost without realising it but as he was talking, I started to rub my hand up and down his penis, just a little and not too fast, and the words died in his mouth, and wow, how quickly he got hard again.

“And still looking up at him, still kneeling, still naked, I smiled with a sudden idea. I stopped, just long enough to unclip one of my stockings. I slid it off my leg and then rolled it down over his dick.

“What can I say? I’ve been at the receiving end of too many bad hand jobs and the guy didn’t deserve that.

“So when I started up again, palm sliding smoothly up and down his length with the silky whisper of the stocking, he groaned, and sighed, and hissed, you know, ‘yes’ and ‘oh god,’ and ‘just like that,’ that kind of shit, and I shuffled in a bit closer until I was leaning against his thigh and picked up the pace and for some reason this was so much easier, I was a goddamn pro at jerking off after all these months and this… this was just like that, sort of, at least that’s what I was telling myself and even the sight of my slender fingers and those flashing nails around an erect cock didn’t seem that strange to me, not then, not in the messed up state of mind I was in, it was a bit like watching porn, drunk and late on a Saturday night.

“And so I jacked this guy off until his hands gripped my shoulders and he dug his fingers in and it hurt, and his whole body suddenly jerked, and his cock spasmed in my hand and he shot his load.”

David took a deep breath before adding: “I’d just made another man cum.”

Crystal nodded. “And how did make you feel?”

“Feel?” Red eyed, scowling, David sounded disgusted. “Angry.” Then his eyes slid away. “But also pleased.” He paused then added, “Messed up.” With a wry look, he held up his hand as though reliving the moment. “And gross. I threw the stocking away. Couldn’t picture myself ever wearing them again, not without imagining his spunk burning into my skin.” David’s smile was thin and sardonic. “They were my favourite pair of stockings, too.

“So. Yeah. After he took me by the hand and sat me on the sofa next to him. He held me, gently. To comfort me, I think. We shared a sip of his whisky. He laughed at me—as the drink burned my throat and I coughed—this idiot kid thought he knew his scotch better than me, pretentious little shit.

“Then we cuddled. And it was… nice.” David sounded quietly surprised. “Even though I was still in my underwear and he had most of his clothes on, I curled up on the sofa next to him, finally kicked off those goddamn shoes and he held me close and it felt… good, his arm around me, like really good. I had my head on his shoulder, my hand inside his shirt, feeling the gentle rise of his chest. I listened to the quiet sound of his breathing and it was… peaceful, even if his hand rested possessively on my boob.

“It was weird, but nice-weird. I’ve had plenty of girls cuddle with me like that but I never expected to… you know, be that girl. But by this time I was too drunk, too exhausted, too emotionally worn out to think anything of it.

“I fell asleep like that. When I woke it was the middle of the night. The room was bathed in moonlight and it was quiet, as if the world was holding its breath. Dan snored a little. The bottle of whisky was empty—he must’ve polished it off while holding me.

“And that was that, really. I got dressed, called a cab and went home.”

David collapsed back into his chair and looked utterly spent. It seemed to Crystal that she could see the man trapped under the layers of girlishness, even if only for the moment: tired and drained, vulnerable and frustrated, deflated by the effort of sharing. Long hair fell across his face and his breathing was quiet.

She gave him some time before speaking. “Thank you for sharing. I know it was difficult.”

“Yeah,” he managed. “So… you asked me to talk about Dan. And now we have. Is this what you wanted to hear?”

Crystal nodded.

“So is this where you tell me everything’s fine? That I didn’t do anything wrong?” He slowly drew the bangs away from his eyes. “That there’s no shame in the way Cindy acted?”

“Is that what you want to hear?”

He nodded, slowly, and in that soft movement the illusion of the older man was dispelled, the girl was restored and it suddenly seemed to Crystal that it was Cindy sat opposite, her eyes puffy and red, mascara smeared and lower lip trembling. And against her professional judgment, she spoke the words she had been invited to speak: “Cindy, there’s no shame in anything you did that night,” she said. “You didn’t do anything wrong. And everything is going to be fine, Cindy.” She held the girl’s eyes and repeated those words: “everything is going to be fine.”

The pretty young woman who stared back at her seemed genuinely mollified by those words. She slowly sat up straighter and tucked her hair back behind her ear. Accepting an offered tissue, she dabbed at her eyes. “Thank you,” she said.

“Have you heard from Dan since?”

“Yes,” Cindy answered. “Well, sorta. It was Saturday when I went out with him. Monday, your car picked me up and brought me here. So I haven’t seen him in person. But he’s been messaging me.”

Crystal nodded. “And how have you responded?”

She sighed. “At first I just ghosted him, which I know kinda sucks, but I couldn’t deal. But yesterday I finally answered him. Apologised. Told him I’d had to take some time off work for an emergency. Nothing to do with our date. I think he bought it.”

Knowing she should end it there, Crystal nevertheless felt compelled to ask. “And…?”

A giggle escaped the girl’s pink lips. “Take a look for yourself.” She passed her phone over.

Crystal raised an eyebrow. “Your first dick-pic?”

Wide-eyed, she nodded. “Dan sent it this morning.”

“It’s a…. fine example of manliness,” Crystal noted.

“I think I’m to blame,” Cindy said. “Check out the picture I sent.”

Scrolling back through a flirting exchange of short messages, she soon found Cindy’s photo: her naked tits, pert, full and round in their youthfulness, large areolae and erect nipples. Crystal felt a momentary and most unprofessional swell of… jealousy, instantly quelled, at the sight of the young woman’s perfect breasts.

“I think I’ve got a boyfriend waiting for me if I go back,” Cindy added.

Crystal nodded. She checked the time: she was well past the time for her next appointment. “I’m afraid we need to stop here.”

The young woman stared at her for a long time before standing up. “Yeah,” she said. She paused at the door. “Same time tomorrow?” she asked over her shoulder.

“Yes,” Crystal answered and then impulsively and against the dictates of professionalism, added, “you should grab a drink tonight. You’ve earned it.”

“You fuckin’ think?” Shoulders shook with silent laughter. “Way ahead of you, doc.”

Scene Nine: “Healthy, Safe and Stable”

The three of them met the next week, Crystal, Jonathon and Katherine sitting down together to decide their ward’s fate. Though they’d met frequently in pairs over the previous days, this was their first three-way face-to-face since David’s arrival. The room was intimate and warm, wood-panelled and decorated with expensive paintings, gifts to the Clinic from wealthy, grateful clients: impressionistic, hazy swaths and swirls of light and dark colours, apparently valued in the millions. A bust of the Greek god Asklepios overlooked the chamber from a high mantle. Overall, the room gave an impression of old university stuffiness, of dust and still air, one in which even the walls and heavy oak table were infused with knowledge and aged secrets.

“I hope you both appreciate this,” Jonathon was saying, pouring out some wine, one of several bottles sitting beneath the table. He’d already started before the others arrived and was well into his third glass. “I dug out some of the good stuff.” He held it up to the light. “DeGrave ’33. The vineyard never recovered, but they say the heavy flooding that year really brought out the mineral flavours. You won’t taste one of these again.”

“I gave that to you,” Katherine said flatly. “We seized the case from the Neopharm site.”

“Wasted on those bastards,” Jonathon said.

Crystal sat in silence, staring into the ruby darkness of the drink. There’d been daily encounters with David and Cindy—increasingly, considering them as separate clients seemed appropriate—over the past ten days, often both morning and afternoon sessions.

Day-by-day, Crystal found it fascinating to watch the gradual evolution in her client’s behaviour. Despite his angry outburst at their first meeting, ever since unburdening himself of the night at Dan’s, her client had proven far more… compliant? Or at least willing to talk openly. In their meetings, he seemed far more relaxed—at times, even happy. Much of the anger had drained away, leading into a period of—negotiation, perhaps, in which Crystal might propose an experience, an experiment or opportunity to explore a little more deeply this new Cindy.

Occasionally, he might flat out refuse; but gradually, as the week passed, Crystal found him, if never eager, at least open to new suggestions.

One consequence proved a fascinating parade of evolving fashions. As Cindy, there seemed an almost newfound confidence in how she presented herself. The day after their long session, she arrived in the morning wearing a very cute floral print romper, off the shoulder with delicate frill trim. That evening, a long, fuzzy, light blue sweater and hip-hugging capri pants, cinched in with a wide belt; and another day, a crop top and pleated plaid skirt, baring her toned midriff.

He became a daily fixture at the Clinic salon. Already a familiar figure with the staff there, they took great pleasure in the free pass he gave them—playful experiments with hair, nails and makeup—but also frequent indulgence in their more luxurious services, massages, medi and pedicures, and facials, the best they had to offer.

Overall, Cindy’s presentation remained undeniably feminine, but less aggressively so, and to Crystal’s mind it hinted at the beginning of an exploratory phase, one in which the girl was beginning to search out her own style. It might all be a bit gender-stereotypical, but then what wasn’t these days? More to the point, it somehow seemed more… comfortable and genuine, rooted in a growing sense of self rather than a projection of male fantasy.

Cindy certainly still skewed towards what could only be termed ‘girly’, high heels and bright makeup and vivid colours, especially in the evening, but Crystal took some pleasure in seeing the subtle changes in her. In speaking she seemed calmer, at ease, with fewer bouts of knuckle-whitening anger, crying jags, or moments of shame and doubt. Her voice was more measured and contemplative and the resentment and fury lurking within those eyes had retreated behind precisely applied mascara and delicate eyeshadow.

In these sessions, Cindy opened up a little about her relationship with Julia, her anxiety over the experiences the older woman had forced on her, and still could. Together, they explored Cindy’s developing sensibilities over the role of women, of contemporary femininity, and what was expected of young, pretty girls like her. They talked about fashion, and music, and her work at Volumina International.

They talked about Dan and about Chad.

Other sessions, those more focused on David, gave tantalising glimpses into his past. Wayward comments, the occasional dropped hints—vague intimations of violence, rough living, lost love—enough for Crystal to suspect some traumatic history he was keen to leave buried and behind him.

And today? The last update Crystal received had Cindy tightly cinched into a corset, a look of mild panic to her as they prepped her for the next stage of her photography session.

“Oh, lighten up, Carl,” Jonathon said. “We’re celebrating.”

“Are we?” she answered and struggled to supress the tremor of anger and guilt running through her voice. “And what exactly are we celebrating, Jon?”

“Success!” he said, raising his glass in a mock cheer.

“Success?” Crystal asked. “Do tell.”

“What else would you call it?” He dropped heavily into his chair, some of the wine sloshing over the rim and onto his lab coat. “Shit.” He rubbed at the stain and shrugged. Feeling ebullient as the initial run of testing returned on their special client, a little spilled wine or a sullen colleague wasn’t going to dampen his mood. Everything, it seemed, was going according to plan—better, even, than expected.

The greatest achievements of the week were of course highly confidential—not something to share with his companions. Carl and he might work for the same Clinic, but in very different divisions. The therapist owed him a certain loyalty, but their over-developed sense of professionalism and annoying ethical dogmatism could also get them all into trouble.

And as for Katherine—well, she’d always been a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma. The key for as long as he’d known her had always been her unwavering hatred of Steele. So long as their interests aligned, she could be trusted. Beyond that? Impossible to say. Even now she sat at the far end of the table, forcing him to stand to slide the glass of wine to her. Separate from the other two, she watched them both with an inscrutable smile.

No. Best to keep certain details to himself.

“The initial test results on the blood samples confirm what I’d both hoped and predicted: David’s blood shows a greatly reduced levels of the regenerative compound, with mmol/L concentrations halved since our first measurements four months ago.” He ticked each point off, finger by finger. “This reduced level of the Juice is exhibited across a range of samples—blood, soft and hard tissue, and so on—with a similar reduction by half since exiting the Tank. Consequently, enhanced regeneration within the subject continues at a limited and non-hazardous level. Further physiological changes to the subject appear to have slowed as well, though the ongoing transformation over the past several months has been nothing short of spectacular.

“As I’m sure you’ve noticed,” he added, grinning and waggling his eyebrows at Katherine. “He won’t be going around braless anymore. You’ll be pleased, I’m sure, to learn that he’s—how do you say?—blossomed from an initial small-B to a healthy C-cup.”

“Please, Jonathon. Keep it professional.”

“Height reduction seems to have halted at a petite 157 centimeters; his hips have filled out a little. He measured 86-74-81 as of a few days ago, weighing fifty-four kilos. Hair’s nearly down to his ass, facial features have softened; facial hair growth has halted. Even muscle mass and composition have altered towards female-norm, especially in skeletal musculature, exhibiting a shift towards slower-twitch, less dense fibres.”

He smiled, flushed red with pride and wine. “I doubt there’s a person or A.I. recognition software out there that could link our little twenty-year-old Cindy to nearly-forty David Saunders.”

Behind the warm glow of success, however, remained irritating doubt.

Earlier in the week, he’d asked David: what makes you so special? The question continued to vex Jonathon. It annoyed him profoundly that his success with their patient appeared to be rooted in nothing more than pure, dumb luck. This simple truth—and one he avoided raising tonight, one that in more sober moments undermined the doctor’s satisfaction—was that it remained a miracle that David had not only survived the Tank but come out of it healthy and whole. Even accounting for the tweaks made to the process following the initial experiment on Fosters, there’d been no reason to expect David would emerge… intact.

Yet he had. Something—unique—to the man, some fluke of genetics, something buried in his DNA, made him the perfect candidate for the process. Finding him had been a stroke of pure luck, a totally unexpected key to unlocking the process—a discovery on level with the harvesting of HeLa cells nearly a century ago. And just as those immortal cells had transformed medical research around the world, so would Saunders’ cells transform humanity.

Cultures of DaSa cells were maturing under carefully controlled conditions in the laboratory downstairs, had been cultivated there for months, ever since Saunders first left the Tank. Initial testing of carefully calibrated microsamples of Juice tempered with DaSa cell on Fosters had proven somewhat successful, temporarily taming the out-of-control extravagance of the regenerative process; and recent reports on their third and final human test subject remained positive as well.

None of this, of course, needed sharing with the others. Turning to Crystal, he resumed a more serious tone. “He’s emerging from what could be considered a heightened second adolescence and hormone levels are stabilising into those typical for a young woman in her early 20s. As David is a male in his late thirties, this is likely having some impact on his behaviour. Based on some of heightened emotional swings you’ve reported, we may need to consider whether further adjustments are necessary. Overall, however, he appears to be remarkable healthy, safe and stable.”

He turned to Crystal. “Your turn,” he said, and reached for his glass.

Crystal took a moment to compose her thoughts. She updated them on their client, adding a few points of her own, observations related to their client’s recently improved behavior and emotional well-being. “Overall,” she said. “He’s doing surprisingly well. Much of the anger and frustration from the start of the week has been channeled into what appears a form of… bargaining, for want of a better word.”

“What do you mean?” Katherine said.

“On the one hand,” Crystal continued. “David hopes that before he leaves here that he’ll be restored to a male identity. On the other, he dreads that we are setting him up to continue Cindy’s life. In between those two possibilities, David seems to believe he can— negotiate —with us to restore him to maleness. In his mind, this relies on convincing us that he has come to terms with Cindy; that he has learned to embrace his feminine side, as it were.

“Consequently, it is difficult to assess to what extent the behaviours he exhibits are genuine, which is to say, embedded behaviours that have become natural and unconscious; and which are performative, an act to convince us he has… learned his lesson, I believe is how he put it once.”

“I see,” Katherine said. “And what do you think?”

“I think it’s very unlikely the behaviour we’ve seen are entirely a performance put on to fool us. You’ve probably seen for yourself—unconscious little acts, like playing with his hair or checking himself in reflection, seem too natural to be forced.

“Rather, I think his own efforts at presenting the behaviours he believes we want to see have become self-reinforcing, which is to say, in pretending to be the kind of girl David thinks we want Cindy to be, he’s actually, at some level, becoming her.”

“As you planned,” Katherine said.

Crystal frowned and said nothing. When Jonathon first invited her into this conspiracy of three, Katherine convinced her that they were acting in the best interests of a man who needed help in maintaining a disguise. The hyper-masculinity of this man—the arrogance, the history of sexual conquests and misogyny—intrigued her; could she really enable a man like that to successfully pass as a woman… no, as a pretty young girl, vivacious and vibrant, so antithetical to his real self?

The nature of the challenge was undeniable. So, too, the personal appeal. Almost instantly, she identified within herself a desire to… externalize her personal journey towards self-actualisation onto another. From behind the safety of her desk she could explore, maybe even put to rest, pains that plagued her to this day, the gnawing insecurities, remaining doubts, and lurking fears. The temptation to play out her own unresolved issues through David Saunders was intense.

But she also recognized deeper within herself a darker impulse, a terrible desire to strike back at the type of man David Saunders represented. Hyper-masculine, alpha male, aggressively heterosexual—everything she had never been—the type of man who had made her life—her old life—a living nightmare. Let him suffer as she had; feel the agony of living a life in the wrong body; and unwillingly play out her own fantasies and nightmares.

And for these reasons she declined Jonathon’s offer. The potential for abuse—the personal closeness and professional conflict of interest—was too much; she couldn’t guarantee the necessary detachment from the project.

Only when it became a request—when he insisted he needed her on this project—did she agree, out of an abiding sense of obligation to the man.

So she’d worked with them following the attack on the Clinic to devise a strategy designed to keep David safely ensconced in the identity of Cindy Bellamy. She studied the data Katherine provided and created a new life for their client. She picked out the apartment and generated the fragments of a life David had never lived, photographs with his new face, framed memories of a new life. She arranged for the transportation of the real Cindy’s estate to the new home, the few remaining artefacts of a former life. Then there’d been clothes to buy and a job to arrange. Pulling a few strings, Crystal got Cindy hired on as an executive assistant—a secretary—a demotion designed to remind him of his new role over the coming months.

There’d been dozens of minor little details to create and plant, digital fingerprints to disperse and a female presence to maintain, all part of the meticulous crafting of a personality somewhere between the tragic young woman who’d died under the Clinic’s care and the man who was going to inhabit that vacant space.

Then the drugs—psychotropic or otherwise—and synthetic hormones, calculating the perfect balance, minimizing negative side-effects and enhancing the positive, keeping his sex drive boosted and carefully determining the slow-release dosages to keep him both calm and sane, whilst also buttressing his efforts at conforming to feminine rules of comportment.

“Considering the flood of hormones and psychotropics he’s on,” Crystal finished. “It’s a testament to how strongly he identifies as male that he’s able to perform as Cindy so convincingly yet revert to being David with ease. The contrast between the two grows more marked over time. And considering the relatively short length of time we’re looking at here,” Crystal said, voice tinged with disbelief, “there is something genuinely amazing at how quickly he’d adapted. He already presents a host of typically feminine habits as though he’s practiced them his whole life.”

Chuckling drily, she added, “It took me ages to learn to walk with any degree of confidence in heels, and to be honest, he’s already better at it than I am.”

“The test results aren’t in yet,” Jonathon said, “but I believe we’ll find the behavioural changes have worked out as I theorised. My hypothesis is that the slow-release administration of psychotropics has run parallel to the regenerative bolstering of new neural pattern development.”

Deep in his pockets, his fingers twitched with excitement. The implications were immense. Learning was such a slow process, a painful process, reliant on repetition and rest, the gap between expectation and reality, vulnerable to emotional swings, distractions and context. At the same, what was learning but the generation of connections between neurons, the forming of new synapses and encoding of experience into the brain?

Although levels of the Juice across David’s body had halved in the past six months, their scans discovered that this wasn’t true in the hippocampus and in distinct locations across the cortex. There, in those deep structures of grey matter, the compound seemed to be enhancing the patient’s neuroplasticity, boosting the brain’s ability to not only encode new information but migrate it to the cortex and form long-term memories. Higher concentration of the regenerative compound near mirror neurons suggested the boosted learning may even extend to so-called “muscle memory,” considering the aptitude the patient displayed at moving and reacting in new ways—such as learning to walk in heels.

The process had not only regenerated the man’s body but his mind as well. Driven by the threat of discovery, the man’s intense focus on learning to behave as Cindy meant his brain may well have encoded the patterns of her life and in doing so, changed him in unexpectedly profound ways.

The details of all this were another Asklepios innovation he felt no need to share with his companions beyond the bare minimum. “As Carl put it,” he continued, “the man’s adopted a lifetime of desired behavioural habits—feminine ones—in a space of months rather than years, thanks to our efforts here.”

They were already working on developing a short-term, focused version of the process. One of his colleagues, Dr Thelma Makris, had already theorised an ingested, short-lived version disassociated from the Tank, capable of boosting learning and retention, even the formation of memories. He smiled, thinking of the ambitious woman, intelligent and beautiful, and the way her bangs curled, like crimson DNA helixes, and fell across her face as she leaned over his shoulder to traced data points across his screen.

Thelma had already formulated a series of tests. She’d been keen to highlight the potential to cure degenerative conditions of the mind: reverse dementia, eradicate schizophrenia or help hasten the long-term physical rehabilitation of patients. But when his fingers twitched, it was from considering how he might adapt those tests to the prisoner in the basement. What learning could they augment, which behaviours could they encode? What memories could they create?

“All-in-all, I’d say we engineered ‘Cindy’ just about perfectly,” he said. He held up his index finger and waggled it at Crystal. “And if that wasn’t enough, well, finally, the subject’s taken on board every lie I’ve sold him this week. You call it a negotiation, but it’s all one-sided. Whatever bargain he believes he’s struck with us, he’ll behave. He’ll do as he’s told; he has to out of fear of ending up like our specimen downstairs. I told you that showing him Fosters was the key.”

Katherine frowned. “You know I disagreed with you.”

“And you know you were wrong,” he said. He took a long drink of his wine and smacked his lips in pleasure. “Fuck me, but that’s good.”

“I hate it when you get like this,” Crystal said. “Smugness doesn’t become you.”

“It does when I’m right.”

“It’s not right. It’s wrong. Have you considered the cost of what we’re doing here?”

“What we’re doing?” He twisted in his chair to face her. “What the hell do you mean?”

“We’re destroying a man,” Crystal said. “We’re breaking him in two. We’re taking a mentally healthy man—”

Jonathan coughed.

“—a man secure in his sexuality and in his masculinity,” she continued, glaring at him. “An identity rooted in absolute certainty of his heteronormative self and—tearing it in two. From everything I’ve learned of this man, it’s clear that his relationship with women—and specifically, the taking and giving of pleasure with them—is central to his identity.

“And we have removed that from him; made him the woman within that dynamic and forced him into redefining his self through his ability to find pleasure from, and return it, to men—other men.

“He described several times a sense of ‘watching’ from outside himself.” Making air quotes, she frowned. “I told you already that there is widening gulf between his male and female personality. This isn’t merely a gap, but a growing division between the two halves of his self. First there’s a Cindy half, an amalgam of his own deep-rooted misogynistic ideas of how an attractive young woman should act; and his interpretation of the personality forced upon him—she’s a bundle of stereotypical feminine traits reinforced by drugs, hormones and your process, Jonathon.”

He nodded. “Just what the doctor ordered.”

“And then there’s David.”

Katherine leaned forward, clearly intrigued but still with that slight, secret smile. “Yes?”

“This second half,” Crystal continued, shifting her attention to the other woman, “increasingly seems like a distillation of masculine violence and anger. At some unconscious level, he seems to be… isolating these aspects of himself, these essential characteristics, as though protecting some core self from what he might interpret as the corrupting influence of Cindy.” She shook her head. “Without knowing more about his past it’s difficult to precisely identify what parts of himself he’s consolidating; it’s unclear what aspects of himself he values most. But it seems clear he is creating his own shadow to balance out the anima of his lived personality. Both aspects of his selves are being pushed to extremes: ever more stereotypical “masculine” balancing out increasingly “feminine” behaviours, or at least as he perceives them.”

“So what’s the problem?”

Crystal frowned, ignoring the doctor as he poured himself another glass of wine. “Frankly, as I said before, considering the psychotropic drugs we’ve flooded his system with, the bath of hormones you’ve released in him, it’s not just a testament to his strength of will that he’s held on to his male, David self; it’s a miracle his psyche hasn’t already shattered.”

“No, it’s a testament to your good work.” Jonathon interjected. “Listen, you’ve brought him around. A week ago, he crippled a man in that diner so he could reassert his masculinity – that’s what you said, right? And when he first got here, he described living as Cindy as… what was it? Medieval torture? And he told me directly he’d rather die than continue to be a woman.

“And now… he’s what, openly talking about a possible relationship with another man?—yes, Carl, I’ve read the transcripts. Going on about fashion and other frivolous shit? And he’s been playing dress-up all week. Hell, yesterday you two were swapping makeup tips. It sounds to me like, at one level or another, he’s coming around to the idea of being Cindy for longer.”

“Maybe,” Crystal admitted.

“Because you’ve done good work,” he said. “Look, to put it another way—where is he right now?”

Katherine glanced at a tablet sitting to one side at her end of the table. “Tracker places him on Clinic grounds.”

“He’s in the Thalia Building – the photography studios. I convinced him to try out our photography suite,” Crystal said. “One of our ‘therapeutic experiences’. I started to set it up last week, but to be honest I didn’t really expect he’d go for it. I’m a little surprised he agreed—it didn’t take that much convincing.”

“See, that’s what I’m talking about,” Jonathon said.

“I imagine he’ll be finishing up soon.” Crystal checked the time. “He told me—or rather, Cindy did—that she’s got a date tonight.”

Katherine checked her tablet. “With that physiotherapist—Mr Jenkins, is it?”

“They’ve been meeting up pretty much every night.”

“Look, you’ve even got him flirting with another man.” Jonathon grinned and slapped the table. “Like I said… we’ve done good work here. If I thought you’d take the bet, I’d put good money on Cindy dropping to her knees with his dick in her mouth before she leaves, mark my words.”

Scene Ten: “A Little Gift for Your Boyfriend”

As the tightly bound figure twitched and yanked at their restraints, Jasmine Poole considered how she both loved and hated her job in equal measure.

On the one hand, on an almost daily basis she felt an intense and hateful jealousy of the gorgeous fashions and intense situations she designed for others. Such beautiful clothes; such wonderfully weird and exciting and titillating and often erotic experiences—wasted on all these rich fucking bastards that passed through her hands. They never appreciated the artistry, the craft then went into making their fantasies an experiential reality.

Oh, sure, the occasional actor or musician got it. A lifetime of backstage costume changes and posing in front of the camera and performing on stage gave them some small inkling of the effort Jasmine put into her work. But the billionaire portfolio holders, the socialite daughters, energy barons, cocky CEOs and elite aristocrats and spoiled inheritors—fucking bastards, all of them, expecting the world and giving nothing back but complaints and ever more demands.

You’d think elegantly bespoke corsets just grew on the rack, or that they kept stylish dresses, sparkling with a thousand embedded crystals, perfectly sized and fitted, lying around in storage. To say nothing of the props, costumes, and decorations; the preparation and planning; the posing and photography—the incredible effort her team put into their art. 3D printing and on-demand drone delivery only got them so far. The local town worked hard fulfilling their orders, an unlikely commune of skilled artisans delivering clothes, props and setting on demand.

Wasted, Jasmine grumbled, on wealthy, entitled pricks looking for a new experience, some titillation to fill the emptiness of a life already brimming with everything the world could possibly offer them.

Dickheads and bitches.

Except, she admitted, sometimes the effort really was worth it.

Last week, they’d brought to life a terminally ill child’s Disney princess dreams, frothy frocks and a fantasy landscape filled with princes and anthropomorphic animals. Another week, the sci-fi hallucinations of a failed writer—the century-old ray-gun and go-go boots aesthetics a crazy thrill to manifest. She loved her job for those moments; she hated it for the boardroom power fantasies, tropical bikini shots and trite nightclub stripper delusions.

On the other hand, she thought, pulling corset lacing tighter and eliciting a strangled gasp from her client, every now and then something special came along.

“You okay there?” she asked.

The client gurgled around the gag in their mouth, then with a twitch of long blonde hair jerked their head in assent.

Despite the boobs and feminine name, “Cindy” was clearly born biologically male, judging by the generous package tightly taped back in their delicate panties. Unusual, but not surprising. The intimate nature of the work made the fact impossible to hide, and “Cindy” was hardly the first man she’d strapped into lingerie before. Normally there was some indication on the client’s record, but not always—anonymity reinforced by terrifyingly-intense non-disclosure agreements ensured clients experienced their fantasies or therapy at the level of privacy they required or desired.

Football hero to cheerleader, star to starlet, CEO to secretary, husband to housewife, master to maid, groom to bride—and vice versa—and far too many strippers, sluts and college girl skanks—the fantasies started to feel mundane after awhile, like they were a dream factory of misogynistic tropes. At least the so-called ‘therapeutic’ sessions, where the client was apparently learning something, brought a frisson of excitement—there was something delightful in seeing these powerful men (and occasional women) squirm in discomfort as she squeezed them into some tight little outfit and had them act out in ways so contrary to their inclinations.

“Cindy” was something else, though. There was a wonderful discordance to the client—clearly consenting to the process, but equally clearly hating every step of it. The way their eyes widened in fear—in near panic—as Jasmine spoke thrilled her. “I’m going to tighten it a little more,” she said, “and then seal away the lacing and the busk. You’ll be locked in; the locks are one a timer; it’ll be impossible to loosen the laces until we’re done. Understand?”

Cindy moaned, sparkling red lips blanching as they bit down on the gag. As Jasmine explained the D-rings and showed off the arm binders and other gear, they went pale under heavy makeup. They closed their eyes and when opened again there was such fierce determination and anger there that Jasmine found herself flushing hot.

“You’re doing great,” she whispered, leaning in close with one hand resting gently on the narrowed waist. “You’ve got this.”

Afterwards—after stripping away the corset and bondage and wiping away the photography makeup—Jasmine sat with the client. Cindy blew at wisps of steam rising in curls from a herbal tea, a simply cotton gown hanging loosely revealing the twin swell of naked breasts. Jasmine flicked through the raw footage from the first two shoots of the day.

“How is it?”

“Good.” She flicked threw the images. “Like, really good. Great. With a bit of editing we’ll really get these to pop.” She glanced up. “Do you mind if I ask you a question?”

Cindy shrugged.

Jasmine hesitated. Strictly speaking, she wasn’t really meant to engage with the client like this—keep it professional, keep it cool. Guide them through the process, ease their anxiety when necessary, draw out their best. But there was something about Cindy that invited questions. “Are you enjoying this?”

Grimacing, Cindy glared at the floor for a moment before answering. “Honestly?”

Jasmine nodded.

“Between you, me, and whoever’s listening at the other end of this thing—” and they tapped their armband, “no, not really.”

“The first one was kinda fun,” they continued, passing a hand through long hair, picking out purple and pink streaks. “Even the clothes and makeup. But that last one?” They shivered and drew the gown tighter around their slender frame. “No.”

“You did great.”

“I was fucking terrified.”

“Fear is good,” Jasmine answered. “Brings intensity to the shoot.” And it’s fucking hot, she thought, seeing this—man?—trussed up and tied back, tits jiggling with the struggle against their restraints, eyes wide with fear, breathing heavily—as heavily as the crushing corset would allow—around the bit parting plump lips—every muscle straining in bondage—suffering an extremity of feminine indignity—at least as they understood it.

Jasmine couldn’t help but wonder if she’d maybe lost just a little professional focus in her enjoyment of Cindy’s predicament. She may have laced the corset slightly tighter than necessary and trussed her client up that little bit more savagely than warranted.

Cindy grunted, a decidedly unfeminine sound, and sipped their tea.

“So why are you doing this?”

There was a long pause as the client seemed to consider this. “You know, you’d think while you had me all tied up there that I would’ve had time to think up a good answer, right?” They shook their head. “But—no. I was too busy trying to keep my shit together. And yeah, believe me, I’ve been asking myself the same thing: why the fuck am I putting myself through this?”

Cindy frowned. “Like, I knew what I was getting myself into, but I didn’t ‘know know’, if you get me. I knew what we were aiming for but….” With a vague wave of an arm—a wide gesture that parted her gown again, with one sleave slipping down an appealingly bare shoulder—she took in the expanse of the studio. “Not all this. Didn’t think it through. Didn’t think the corset would be quite so tight.” Cindy glared at her in mock anger. “Or that I’d feel so….”

Their voice trailed off.

“Hey, like I said—you did great.”

“I was scared.” Cindy voice sounded like a little girl’s voice.

“A little fear isn’t uncommon, Cindy.”

Cindy shook their head. “You don’t understand.”

“You can stop. You’ve done two out of four.”

“No,” Cindy said. “That’s why I’m here, right? For the experience?” They spread their hand wide, wiggling fingers and watching the sparkling nails flutter and flash. “To learn something, right? Build up some… girl memories, I guess.”

Jasmine gave a bark of laughter. “You think these are typical girlhood experiences?”

“No, of course not. But—well, also, yes.”

“I’m not going to speak for my entire gender,” Jasmine said, cocking an eyebrow. “But most women I know aren’t into locking corsetry and heavy bondage.”

Cindy grinned sheepishly. “I know. But—how did Crystal explain it?—it sort of made sense before, when she explained it—it’s about the vulnerability, the… fear.” They looked up from their hand and locked eyes with her, gazing directly into with an intensity that Jasmine found unnerving. “Feeling constrained by things out of your control. Restricted in what you can do. Being at somebody else’s mercy, voiceless and completely dependent on them to let you out. Agreeing to something and then the fear that comes when you realize you don’t want it to happen anymore but you don’t know how to make it stop.”

Jasmine flushed and looked away, suddenly annoyed by her own discomfort. For a moment there, she’d felt afraid, as though Cindy was some kind of threat to her own safety. “You always had the option to stop this whenever you wanted.”

“With my hands tied behind my back, and gagged?” Cindy shook their head, slowly. “Listen, I know this is all illusion. And you and your team were good—really fantastic—and got me through this.” Cindy eyes unfocussed. “But there was a moment there, when you cinched me in really tight, and I thought I couldn’t breathe, and had that fucking thing between my lips, and I couldn’t move, couldn’t talk, couldn’t… and….

They sighed. “I felt… afraid. Like I haven’t felt in a very, very long time.”

What are you, like twenty? Jasmine wondered but remained silent. While it wasn’t uncommon for clients to work through some kind of epiphany during or following a session, it rarely happened with her—she rarely got to sit with her subject in this way. And watching Cindy process—something—it seemed suddenly very clear to her that she was sitting, talking and working with a man, with someone who identified as male despite their physical appearance. Something in the way he spoke, the cadence of voice and expression, convinced her that this was a man—a very feminine man—and somehow that made everything all the more exciting and troublesome for her.

She reached out and took his hand in between hers. “Listen, I don’t usually say this but… maybe you should stop. Maybe try again later.”

“No,” he said. “There won’t be a later.”

She raised an eyebrow.

“I’m running out of time,” he said. “And—I want to finish this. Damn her for being right, but Crystal knew what she was signing me up for. It’s a fucking weird form of therapy but I’m working through stuff I buried years ago.”

Jasmine smiled, unsuccessfully hiding her pleasure at the idea of strapping this strange man into his next costume. “If you say so.”

He noticed the smile and groaned. “It’s another corset, right?”

“This one’s gorgeous,” she said, eyes sparkling wickedly. “And even tighter.” Her smile grew. “But we’ll save that one for the end. We’re doing the lingerie shoot next.”

He unconsciously drew the gown a little tighter around his lithe frame. “Wonderful.”

“It’ll be fun,” she said. “Besides, you get to keep most of this stuff.”

“Great.”

“Anyone special to wear it for?”

The sudden blush blossoming across the pretty man’s face betrayed the truth. “Yeah, maybe.” He bit at his bottom lip. “I’ve, ah… been seeing this guy for the past week. Wanted to do something special for him tonight.” The blush deepened. “He works here as a physiotherapist.”

“You don’t mean Chad, do you?” She couldn’t suppress the joy from her voice. “Oh my God. That’s… that’s wonderful!”

“You know him?”

“Tell you what, Cindy.” Jasmine grinned. “If you’re a good girl for me for the rest of the shoot, I’ll let you in on a thing or two about Chad.” She tapped a finger on her client’s nose. “And if you’re really good, maybe we’ll sneak in an extra little shoot—something quick, something special—a little gift for your boyfriend….”

Scene Eleven: “Formed by Tragedy and Loss”

“He is strong,” Katherine said.

“Yes, he is.” Crystal glanced up from her uncomfortable study of the table. “He’s remained remarkably secure in his masculine identity despite the trials of the past few months.”

“To what do you attribute this—stubbornness? Willpower?”

“Maybe.” Crystal considered for a moment. “But there’s more to it than that. On the one hand, there is the influence of this woman, this Julia.” She looked askance at Katherine. “Did you make that happen?”

Katherine gave a thin-lipped smile. “Not everything is by my doing, Ms Dawn. The arrival of this woman from Mr Saunders’ past, I am reluctant to admit, appears to have been entirely coincidental. Though I find her intriguing, from the data my team has collected on her.” Her smile grew by the slightest of degrees. “An ordinary woman driven to revenge by the thoughtless cruelties of a man. Yes. Her part in pushing Mr Saunders deeper into his role appears to have been fortuitous.”

“Maybe.” Crystal voice was doubtful. “Yes, she’s had an influence on her ex-boyfriend. And yes, in her desire to humiliate David, she’s pushed him further into femininity, and faster, than he may have done on his own. Reinforced by the accelerated learning of Jonathon’s process, I concede her involvement’s been… helpful.”

“But.”

“But.” Facing Katherine, Crystal sat back in her chair, arms crossed. “Her own… desires? And unresolved issues with their shared past? And apparent need for David also serves to reinforce his masculine identity. Even as she’s dressing him in the most feminine of clothes or subjecting him to new feminine experiences—such as dating that boy from his office—her very need for him ultimately feeds his male ego.

“He spoke with some enthusiasm of their physical relationship. To be blunt: every time he fucks this woman, it brings him back to himself. And not just for the physical pleasure it brings him but for the pleasure he brings her. Sex is one of the foundations of who he is—not just masturbation—but the give and take between man and woman.”

Crystal hesitated. “Had he remained alone, I believe that ultimately the loneliness and his own pleasure principle would have driven him in the role of Cindy into the arms of another man. He would have necessarily relied on his Cindy identity to enable this and in doing so, this feminine aspect of himself may have become ascendant.

“But so long as he’s having sex with this woman, David remains dominant.”

Katherine thought for a moment. “A pity,” she said. “Her role in this has proven… useful. But we may have to arrange for her removal.”

Crystal winced. “Do you have to make that sound so sinister?”

“A new opportunity. A change of jobs or promotion. Nothing more.”

“Or you could, you know…,” Jonathon cut in, “just get rid of his cock.”

“No,” both Katherine and Crystal replied.

“Why not?” He scratched at his beard. “Listen, right now, his body actively wants a vagina, okay? We’ve had to actively intervene to keep his manhood from withering away. He’s no longer at a point where the process will do it on its own, but he’d recover from any surgery we do a hell of a lot faster than if we wait another couple of months. A day’s surgery and we’d be sending him back within the week with a brand new pussy.”

“Jon!” Crystal turned on him. “That’s enough.”

He grinned. “Hey, he goes back to his girlfriend and they have a little strap-on fun and he learns to be a good girl, right? Seems a win-win to me.”

“Don’t be crude,” she said. “This isn’t funny; this is a man’s life. His identity. Yes, he needs to accept his Cindy identity to survive; but it’s the promise of returning to his male self that keeps him going. Take that possibility away from him, and….”

“Yes?”

“For all our talk of his willpower, his stubbornness and desire to survive, there’s also increasing evidence of strain. Not just the mood swings or lashing out. Those were expected.”

“Then what are you concerned about?” Katherine asked.

Crystal hesitated, though only for a moment. “You’ve also been monitoring our sessions?”

“Of course.”

“To be clear, it’s entirely possible that David has been lying to us. As much as Jon wants it to be true, his recent… submission might be an act, even if that act ultimately subverts his own rebelliousness. But there remains something about him—what he says, or how he says it—that just doesn’t sit right.” She pinched at the bridge of her nose in concentration. “It’s difficult to explain. Beyond the bargaining, at times it feels as though he’s… not so much lying as telling me what he thinks I want to hear, filtering his experiences through the lens of my own hopes and expectations.” She looked at Katherine. “Do you know what I mean?”

The other woman gave a slow nod.

“It’s difficult to assess how much of his—anger, frustration, sadness—anything he’s shared is genuine. I can’t quite pinpoint it, but at times it feels as though there’s a… an emptiness underlying so much of what he says, a hollowness at the core of him he seeks to fill through a remarkable empathy that takes on the other person’s expectancies and experiences. And so, his story about following Dan up to his apartment….”

Jonathon reached beneath the table. His glass was empty, and he pulled up another bottle. “I listened to the recording,” he said. “Steamy stuff.” Working the screw into the cork, he grinned lasciviously. “You think he made it up?”

“No,” Crystal said. “At least—not all of it. We know he followed Dan up to his apartment. We know what time he caught a taxi home. But the details of what actually happened—without interrogating the young man, there’s just no way to confirm. And some of the details, they just don’t didn’t feel right. The lipstick in the bathroom. The lap dance. Falling to his knees.”

“What, you think nothing happened? Or he actually blew the boy and lied about it?”

Crystal pulled a face. “No. That part I think was true. I think he genuinely tried and couldn’t do it.”

“Then why doubt the rest?”

“I don’t know, okay?” Her jaw clenched and she counted to five, biting down on a further retort. How to explain that those little details—extraneous touches unnecessary to his story—somehow resonated with her? They were details she appreciated and found disconcertingly exciting. David’s retelling of the night with Dan was remarkably detailed and precise—more narrative than recalled experience—and filled with little touches that resonated uncomfortably with her own predilections.

“I don’t know. But often. something feels off when I speak with him.”

She closed her eyes, briefly, considering. She turned her attention back to Katherine. “Tell me about this Jeff—this agent of Steele’s that he says has been following him since the start.”

Now it was Katherine’s turn to hesitate. With one finger tapping the table, she held back from responding for some time. She took a sip of wine—her first—and returned the glass to the table in precisely the same spot as before.

“I’ve uncovered no evidence of this man,” she said. “No trace of ‘Jeff’. There was no one in the restaurant footage. Only Cindy sitting alone at the bar until her date arrived. There was no one outside the other man’s apartment building that night either.”

Jonathon looked at her. He frowned, even as Crystal nodded.

“Does he exist?” she asked.

“No,” she answered.

“So this… Jeff, this agent of Steele’s; he’s not real?” Jonathon asked.

“It seems unlikely,” Katherine answered. “It is possible that this ‘Jeff’ was able to access the footage from the restaurant and eliminate any trace of his presence. The same with the civic security camera outside the apartment. But he would have had to act swiftly before my people accessed and made their copy of these files. Furthermore, they found no traces of manipulation.

“All possible, of course—but the far more likely explanation is that this man does not exist.”

“So he was lying, then?” Jonathon asked.

“No,” Crystal answered. “I think David genuinely believes this man is pursuing him.”

“But—”

“Consider when he appeared,” Crystal said. “Just as Cindy was about to leave the restaurant, escaping an unwanted romantic encounter. Instead, this hostile presence forced him to remain. Then, when Cindy attempted to leave at the end of the night and thus avoid following her date up to the apartment – an act with only one possible outcome, in David’s mind—this Jeff suddenly appeared again and forced her into that man’s embrace.

“It seems to me that David is projecting this… boogeyman as an incentive to force himself into acts that he can’t consciously commit to; a facilitator for femininity his male ego won’t allow. Jeff manifests an external agency enabling David to submit to the Cindy role he despises but must embrace to survive.”

Jonathon blinked. “So he’s nuts?”

Wincing, Crystal shook her head. “Please, Jon,” she said. “We don’t use that kind of language. And no, he’s not. But equally, he’s not well.” She returned her glass to the table, wine untasted. She stood and stepped away from the table.

“So what’re you saying, then? That deep down inside he actually wanted to fuck that guy?”

“No.” She gritted her teeth. “What he wanted was to survive. But we’ve taught him—trained him, even—to act as though his survival is contingent on successfully passing as Cindy. And Cindy—as I’ve told you—in his mind, seems to be this jumble of his own misogynistic expectations of a pretty young woman, and the characteristics we’ve forced on him. You,” and she pointed a finger at Katherine, “expect Cindy to be soft, compliant and dependant—an inversion of David’s own strength, stubbornness and self-sufficiency.

“Then in his own mind, a woman like Cindy has to be superficial and shallow, sexual and flirty, defining herself through her relationship with men. And you,” and here she pointed at Jon, “have engineered a balance of chemicals and hormones that work to bring out the most stereotypical of behaviours. And all this feeds into his own practice at playing Cindy, reinforcing those behaviours at an unconscious level.” She picked up her glass of wine again and swirled it. “And then there’s the influence of the real Cindy, the ghost of the girl whose life he’s taken on—and she was a bundle of insecurities, too, obsessed with her own appearance and others’ perceptions of her.”

She sounded sad as she finished. “David could’ve been—something else, I think; but this is what we’ve created.” With that, she took a long drink from her wine, half finishing the glass in one go. “That is good,” she admitted ruefully, and sighed.

“No, it’s excellent,” Jonathon said. “And so is what we’re doing here.”

“No,” she said. “It’s not. What we’re doing to him is unethical,” she added. “It’s wrong. I joined this project because you—” and she raised her glass in a mock cheer at Jonathon, who responded with an exaggerated ‘who, me?’ expression—“invited me onboard. You thought I might have some special insight.”

“You’re a woman who spent most of her life pretending to be a man,” he said. “And he’s a man pretending to be a woman. Seemed obvious. More to the point, you’re good at what you do.”

She turned to Katherine. “And you convinced me that this was the best way to keep him alive. You made a compelling argument for helping this man accept this fabricated personality—”

“Cindy wasn’t fabricated,” Katherine interrupted. “She was a real person.”

“And she died because the Clinic failed her.”

“And her death provided a lifeline to this man—”

“A lifeline?” she snapped. “A line leading to what sort of life? Even if he willingly accepts to live as a woman—without needing to summon up violent boogeyman—is this the type of woman he’d choose to be?”

“Nobody gets to choose who they are.”

“I did,” Crystal said, glancing aside at Jonathon.

He smiled, lips stained with wine.

“Then you are fooling yourself,” Katherine answered. “We are who we are due to circumstance. Of life and chance and adaptation. Formed by tragedy and loss. But so very rarely choice.”

Crystal held the gaze of the woman at the far end of the table for as long as she could before flinching and looking away. “What happened to you, Katherine?”

The woman opposite merely returned an enigmatic smile over the rim of her glass of wine.

The table went silent. Katherine waited patiently at her end of the table. Jonathon smacked his lips and tapped a message out on his phone. Crystal stared into her glass again, lost in thought.

“Hey, you look good tonight,” he suddenly said in a low voice, interrupting her musing.

She started and smiled, feeling an unusually happy little flutter within. “Thanks for noticing.”

“Not your usual—”

“I know.” She plucked at the low neckline of her dress, still not entirely comfortable with how much it revealed. “I think Cindy’s rubbing off on me a bit.”

With a wolfish grin, he made a show of looking her over. “I like it.”

“Pervert.”

“Nothing perverted about appreciating a fine pair of—” he started but cut off as his phone dinged. “One sec.”

With him frowning at his phone, Crystal turned back to Katherine. “You convinced me, six months ago, that this approach was the best chance of keeping this man alive. And so I helped. I spoke with him; I developed a conditioning regime to help ease him into the protective personality of Cindy, something aligned with both the girl she’d been and what this man might accept. I worked with the information I had on both David and the Clinic’s files on the girl. And now….”

She sighed. “Why are we still doing this?”

“Actually, I’d quite like to know that as well,” Jonathon interjected, sliding his phone back into his pocket. “I don’t really give a shit, either way. But I’d keep him here if it was up to me. He’s an extremely valuable asset for the Clinic.”

“Locked up downstairs?”

“Under our protection,” he answered.

Katherine leaned forward, and her smile had disappeared. “Because he isn’t safe,” she said. “Here, or anywhere, as a man, as anyone that can be traced back to David. Because even now, Steele searches for him.

“I vowed to keep David alive. And he will live, no matter what.”

“Even if he doesn’t want to?” Jonathon asked. “He might’ve moved on from the death wish of earlier this week, but I’m sure he’d still jump at the chance to be male again.”

“Can he?” Katherine asked.

His fingers stilled in his pockets. “Yes,” he stated with a confidence he didn’t quite feel. “Conventional surgery could restore a masculine appearance to him, albeit he’d be a scrawny specimen. Mastectomy, some cosmetic work to the face, take away the hair—he’d pass. Maybe. Although the behavioural changes aren’t likely to just disappear, either. He’ll still move like a girl, act like a girl until he’d unlearned those new behaviours. It takes time for conditioned behaviours to go extinct, and the latent regenerative process might undermine it further, reestablishing neural links he’s trying to decay.”

He scratched at his beard. “What I’m saying is, he wouldn’t just look like a short, scrawny man—he’d come off as totally effeminate. In theory.” He looked at Katherine, and then Crystal, and shrugged.

“Also, the process has slowed, not stopped. He’d recover quickly from any surgeries, probably, but in doing so his body might begin to lean back into the Cindy template. Hair would grow quickly. Nails as well. He might develop breasts again. The skeletal and muscular changes would remain, possibly even progress further if his physical recovery kicked the regeneration back into high gear.

“Now of course, we could compensate a lot of this through traditional methods, hormones and so on. As I said earlier, we already are to some extent, to keep his cock from shrinking, per your insistence. Just in case it wasn’t clear before, it would’ve been a lot easier to send him out with female genitalia four months ago. His body wants a vagina.”

“And the initial shock would’ve broken him. He might never have recovered,” Crystal said.

“What about putting him back in the Tank?” Katherine asked.

Jonathon’s finger twitched. “It could restore him. In theory. Obviously, we’ve worked hard at minimising the feminising effect of the process. And in theory, we should be able to engineer smaller-scale changes; targeted healing or growth, or tweaks to an existing template that don’t require full immersion in the Tank.”

“In theory?”

“In theory.” In theory, they might compensate for the automatic feminising; in practice, they might bolster it. Experiments run on Fosters suggested the latter. Akslepios was far more advanced with the process than he’d let on with David that afternoon down by the Tank. They were capable of subtle manipulations—Cindy being a fine example of refined adjustments—and learning more every day. But private experiments on Fosters aside, very little research had been completed on the effects of the process on those who’d already undergone it.

Besides, with finite and diminishing quantities of the Juice available, and with little success at synthesising more, Jonathon was reluctant to use it unnecessarily; and he saw no real or immediate need for returning David to his male life.

“I wasn’t lying,” Jonathon continued, “when I told him there was a real risk to going back into the Tank.”

“Fine,” Crystal cut in. “So… what about a far simpler disguise? Breast binders, cut the hair, baggy clothes. Set up a life for him somewhere boring, in the middle of nowhere. He could lie low until he’s clear of… of whatever you’ve filled him with, Jon, and then get whatever surgeries he needs at that point. He’d jump at the idea of—”

“No.” Katherine’s voice was firm, simmering with restrained anger. “We will not waste the effort of the past six months. We will not put him at greater risk. Cindy remains.”

“But why?” Crystal asked. “Yes, we’ve put all this work in, and so has he. But this isn’t some sunken cost fallacy. It worked! He’s alive. And even if he’s ready to carry on as Cindy for another six months—and it’s a big if—surely there’s no need? By this point, Steele must have given up.”

Katherine stared at her. She did not blink, but her eyes narrowed, and Crystal felt a thrill of fear pass through her, goosebumps rising across her forearms as this woman studied her; and Katherine sneered, the slightest curving of the lips and baring of the teeth.

“You do not know what you are talking about,” Katherine said. Her seat creaked as she leaned closer. From the far end of the table she fixed them both with her gaze. “You do not know our enemy, not as I do. You do not understand what he is capable of doing.”

“Yes, maybe, but—”

“He has not given up. He will not give up. He can not give up. Jeremiah Steele is no more capable of ignoring David’s insult than he is capable of forgiveness. The man is driven by a purity of vision—a clarity of purpose—in all he does, but especially in his desire for revenge. David must be found; he must be punished; and David must know at that point that it was Steele that brought him low. To suggest Steele is no longer a threat is to speak from a position of extreme ignorance.”

Jonathon glared at her, scowling with anger. “Mind your tone, Kat.”

She turned and gazed at him and after several long moments he flushed and looked away. “We stay the course,” she continued. “Mr Saunder leaves here as Cindy. He resumes her life until it I have determined it is safe for him to abandon it. And in the meantime, it is in all our interests if he submits even more fully to the female identity we have constructed for him.”

“Our interests?” Crystal asked. “Or yours?”

She turned her steely gaze to the therapist. Crystal cooly returned the other woman’s glare. After several long, uncomfortable moments, during which Jonathon resolutely returned to his glass of wine, Katherine relented. She smiled, and to Crystal it suddenly felt as though she’d passed some kind of test.

“Jonathon is very lucky to have your friendship and loyalty,” she said. She reached into her briefcase and retrieved her tablet. “A moment, if you will.” It only took her another minute as she booted up her device, linked to the screen on the wall, and retrieved a file. She sent it over to the screen.

“Please watch.”

Scene Twelve: “You Saw Nothing”

In frame, two men.

The first, a face intimately familiar to the world having graced countless “Man of the Year” magazine covers, labelled ‘saviour’, ‘genius’, ‘disruptor’, ‘the most powerful man alive’—a strong-jawed, sculpted face, aquiline nose and deep-set, penetrating eyes burning under a famously bald head. He stood tall with utter disregard over the body at his feet, blood pooling across the bare concrete floor. Steele stood shirtless, dark-skinned and broad-chested. His suit trousers were grey and tailored, shoes shiny and black, and at his wrist a heavy watch. With his attention focused off-screen, he seemed oblivious to the arrival of the other man.

That other man was David Saunders. It was difficult to reconcile the man on the screen with Cindy Bellamy. To those watching the sight was a visceral shock, a reminder of how much he had changed. Short, especially juxtaposed with Steele, but compact and wiry, whip-like and ruggedly handsome despite his disheveled appearance. Dark hair tousled and his clothes were stained with grease and grime, shirt haphazardly untucked and trousers torn, but he carried himself with an arrogance that matched that of the man opposite.

“Hey,” David barked. The audio quality was good, as befitted the next-gen mobile that captured the video. The phone had clearly been propped up somewhere to catch the action.

If Steele was surprised by the shout, he concealed it well. He turned slowly and assessed the man opposite. “I know you,” he said, voice deep and smooth as twilight. “David, is it?” He considered for a second. “Yes. David Saunders.”

Hearing his name on Steele’s tongue, more than anything, seemed to surprise David. He scowled. “Yeah,” he said. “We met once.”

“The event at the Delhi office.” Steele nodded once. “Your name’s passed my desk a few times. Rapid riser. Someone to watch for. Potential.” He cocked his head to one side. “Perhaps I should have watched more closely.”

“No shit.” David stepped a little closer. “What’s going on, Jeremiah?” He nodded towards the body at Steele’s feet. Even at a distance, the gruesome details were visible, the blown-out skull and gore mingled with blood.

For the first time, Steele seemed to acknowledge the corpse at his feet. He stared at it for a long moment and when he looked up, something akin to—sadness?—briefly washed across his face. He slowly dropped into a crouch, resting one hand on the body, and he grimaced, brilliant white teeth bared in a rictus grin of rage. But when he looked back up at David, the previous aloofness returned.

“An accident,” he said.

“Some fucking accident.”

“What do you want?” Jeremiah Steele asked.

“You know, that’s a really good question,” David said, stalking closer. His steps were light and swift, cat-like as he closed the distance. “A really fucking good question. What are you offering?”

Jeremiah seemed to consider that for moment, and the first hint of a smile curved his lips. “Nothing,” he said. “The best you can hope for is nothing, Mr Saunders.”

“Yeah.” David sighed. “That’s about what I expected.”

Jeremiah watched with obvious curiosity the approach of the other man. “Why are you here, David?”

“I was fucking your P.A.” David grinned. “Dipped my wick in the corporate vat, so to speak.” He was close now to Jeremiah, almost within touching distance as he looked down at the crouching man. “She’s a real firecracker that one, isn’t she Steele? God, what a bitch.” He said it with pleasure, appreciatively. The camera’s software automatically zoomed in to keep the two in frame. David’s gaze burned with fevered intensity to counter the barely restrained rage simmering behind Steele’s eyes. “Came up for a little fresh air. Heard a noise. Saw—”

Steele’s impassive demeanour wavered. “What did you see?”

“I saw….” David’s grin grew. “I saw what I saw, Jeremiah.”

“You saw nothing,” Jeremiah hissed. For the first time fear brought a tremor to his voice.

There was a sudden sound off screen—unclear, perhaps of something falling over. Maybe a startled cry. Jeremiah twitched towards the noise.

“I saw everything, Steele!”

With a snarl, Steele refocused his attention on the shorter man. “Nothing!” he roared, and suddenly there was a gun in his hand, a compact, nasty-looking thing he yanked out from beneath the body. His arm swung towards David. A shot rang out. David leapt out of frame.

“Mr Saunders!” Jeremiah shouted.

From somewhere off screen, a voice taunted, “You’re a sick fuck, you know that?”

Steele spun towards the voice. Another shot rang out.

Then silence. Jeremiah stood as though frozen and the long silence was broken only by the whistling of wind and from somewhere off screen, the flap of plastic sheeting. Eventually, Steele stirred. He took in a deep, calming breath. Stared down at the corpse at his feet. And then he howled, with the full rage of a powerful man used to getting his way in everything suddenly finding his desires thwarted: “You’re a dead man, Saunders!”

“Tell me something I don’t know,” David whispered, suddenly close to the camera. The video skewed wildly, taking in a wash of walls and ceilings, as a hand closed around the phone, and then ended.

Scene Thirteen: “There is No David Saunders”

“Mr Saunders witnessed Jeremiah Steele murder the son of a powerful and influential rival. From that moment on, Mr Steele has been—how shall we say?—distracted.”

“Is that what we saw?” Jonathon snorted. “Because I didn’t see a murder.”

“He’s on camera standing over a body and he’s got a gun!” Crystal protested.

“Didn’t see him shoot.” He shrugged. “And he only had the gun after he felt threatened by David. Frankly, I imagine his lawyers had a field day with this.”

“Jonathon is correct.” Katherine nodded. “On its own, this footage would be a mere inconvenience to Mr Steele, especially once his team began to obfuscate reality through accusations of deepfake manipulation and industrial slander.”

“So why does he care so much about David? Clearly, he’s used to getting his way. But there wasn’t enough there to draw his ire; not to the extent you’re suggesting.” Crystal pursed her lips in thought. “There’s more, isn’t there?”

“Yes.” Katherine nodded. “David also recorded the shooting itself.” She grimaced. “You do not want to see it. Jeremiah was exceptionally violent in his killing of the other man.”

Crystal considered this. “But there’s more, isn’t there?”

Katherine stared at her for a moment and her lips curved into a slight smile. “Yes.”

“Something we haven’t seen?”

“Yes.”

“What is it?”

“I do not know. Mr Saunders indicated that there is another video he took, prior to the killing. He has yet to share this. He insists that it remains secure, uploaded and stored somewhere safe. Mr Saunders referenced it in the courtroom, in ambiguous terms; but Steele seemed to take his words seriously. Whatever it is that David witnessed beyond the murder so enraged Mr Steele that he resorted to open assassination in an effort to eliminate him.”

“And you have no idea what it is?”

“None.” Katherine tapped at her tablet, rewinding the video to a still frame of Steele, face caught in a contortion of rage. “And of course, even without vague threats Mr Saunders’s testimony in court four months ago has proven very troublesome for him.”

Before answering, Crystal wracked her mind for any memory of the trial. “Has it? Because I haven’t heard of anything.”

“It hit NeoPharm where it hurts most,” Jonathon muttered. “Their stock value.”

“And Asklepios picked up some very lucrative contracts, as I remember.” Katherine smile fell very short of her eyes. “Internal comms suggested shareholders and investors were somewhat spooked by the idea their largest shareholder and CEO might also be a murderer. Though I suspect they were more concerned with the unwanted judiciary attention.”

“What attention?” Crystal said. “Like I said, it felt like it barely registered, barely got the media attention it deserved.”

“Indeed.” Her eyes betrayed an anger her otherwise impassive voice did not. “It seems there was a concerted push to suppress reporting on the proceedings. Originating from—well, from any number of vested interests, I suspect.”

“Why’d he do it?” Jonathon interrupted. Bleary eyed, he eyed Katherine with suspicion. “You’re not telling us the whole story. Why’d David confront Steele like that?” He pointed at the screen. “There was a noise, off screen. Steele was distracted before David showed up. What was it?”

“A friend,” Katherine said, and sighed. “Everything that has happened to Mr Saunders since that moment is because he was trying to protect a friend. David and a work colleague, a Mr Thomas Turner, were engaged in a… friendly competition, that evening.”

Crystal raised an eyebrow. “What kind of competition?”

“To see who could reach Steele’s secretary first. A sexual competition.”

Jonathon chuckled. Crystal shook her head. “These are men in their thirties, right?”

“When I first saw this footage,” Katherine continued, “I thought Mr Saunders was lucky. Very lucky, indeed, to avoid getting shot at that range. Even more lucky to escape the building alive. Now, of course, when I watch it is clear that he anticipated the shot. He knew the gun was beneath the corpse. He was ready for Mr Steele’s attack.” She shook her head in displeasure. “I should have noticed immediately.”

“What happened to her?” Jonathan asked.

Katherine raised an eyebrow. “Who?”

“The secretary.”

Katherine frowned. “She was… promoted. To the position of Steele’s direct personal assistant. Relocated to his immediate entourage.” With clear frustration in her voice, she added, “She hasn’t been seen since.”

Crystal felt a chill run through her.

“The security manager working that evening also suffered an unfortunate heart attack a few days after the incident. Unsurprisingly, it consequently took days to recover the security footage from that evening. The footage revealed nothing of value.”

“So it was for nothing, then?” Crystal shook her head in disbelief. “David sacrificed—his life, his manhood—for… nothing?”

And for the first time, Katherine smiled seemed genuine, eyes lighting up with glee accompanied by a thin-lipped, nearly imperceptible curving of the lips. “Hardly,” she said. “His sacrifice has made a difference. His friend, this Mr Thomas Turner, is alive. And in the weeks both preceding David’s day in court and in the months since, my agency has been… well, if not inundated, then at least at the receiving end of a noticeable increase in reports on Steele’s more nefarious activities. Most of these are anonymous, and some of them are clearly crackpot, but collectively enough of them form a growing pile of evidence with which to attack Steele’s operations. Formal media channels may have been suppressed, but the word nevertheless got out of David’s willingness to stand up and be heard.”

“That’s wonderful,” Crystal said. “But probably cold comfort for David. I think he would’ve hoped for something more tangible, more significant.”

“More tangible?” Katherine’s went silent and for a moment Crystal wondered if something was wrong until she realised the other woman’s shoulders were shaking with silent laughter.

“More tangible than this, Ms Dawn?” She swept her arms wide, taking in the table and its occupants. Jonathon, until now glowering sullenly at the table, started as though startled awake. “Consider the extraordinary efforts of all of us in this endeavour. The financial cost of all this. Your remarkable innovations, Jonathon.” The doctor raised in glass in recognition of his own brilliance. “Your sterling work in supporting Mr Saunders in his role, Ms Dawn. And I assure you my team have met the challenge with equal determination. And for what? To keep one man—”

Jonathon coughed into his wine.

“To keep one witness alive in the face of unsurmountable odds. Steele’s inability to enforce his vendetta reveals his weakness; it is an open invitation for others to exploit this weakness. Mr Saunder’s betrayal—for he sees it as a betrayal, I believe—remains a thorn under the skin, an outrage requiring rectification. David insulted him—to his face—and mocked him in the presence of others; and such flagrant disrespect demands retribution.

“Yet he lives! Six months since Mr Saunders first witnessed this murder, he lives—as a direct consequence of his own remarkable efforts, and our own. Yet these efforts have been matched—surpassed, even!—by Mr Steele’s obsessive hunt for his target. You have only the slightest inkling of the opportunity cost our client’s mere existent exerts upon his enemy, to say nothing of the financial cost. To be blunt: in remaining alive, and by drawing Steele’s attention, David is doing a good thing—a wonderful thing.”

“Yeah, a real hero,” Jonathon said.

“Jesus, Jon, what’s with you tonight?”

“Nothing,” he answered. “But let’s not overdo it here. He’s hardly the second coming of Christ or something. Hell, if anything I’d say he’s probably quite a bad man.”

“You don’t know that.”

“No,” Katherine interjected. “But we have good reason to suspect Jonathon is correct.”

Jonathon turned to face her. She, too, had yet to touch her drink, and was examining its crimson depths with a frown. “Got something?”

She nodded. “The first report arrived this morning. There is more due, but what we have already makes for fascinating reading.”

“And….?”

With a grimace she turned to Crystal and said, “There is no David Saunders.”

Crystal blinked. “What do you mean?”

“The identity of Mr Saunders is a fabrication. A lie. The algorithm sifted through nearly two decades of data and found the expected patterns, correlations; every indication of an ordinary man leading an ordinary life.” She paused to consider. “A few abnormalities over the past few years worth pursuing. They’ll require feet on the ground, visit to locations he’s visited; but nothing egregious.

“But before those years? Nothing.”

Jonathon raised an eyebrow. “No records?”

“A birth certificate. High school and university graduation records. A driver’s license. A few low resolution scans of physical documents. But beyond that: virtually nothing. No location stamps, no consumer history, no online existence whatsoever. A digital ghost with only the minimum presence required to summon up a liveable identity.”

Jonathon fingers twitched and tapped the table. “So… what does that mean? Someone wiped his childhood record clean for some reason?”

“Possibly,” Katherine answered, “though unlikely. Digital records are notoriously difficult to eliminate so thoroughly. It seems more probable that the man we know as David Saunders previously went by a different name, was a different person for the first twenty or so years of his life. And then, for reasons unknown, he abandoned that identity and began life anew as Mr Saunders. The forgery is skilled, but I suspect the technological limitations of the previous decade limited its digital reach.”

Katherine smiled, turning to Crystal. “In many ways, Cindy Bellamy was—is—a more real person than David. She has a verifiable history, a lived history. Mr Saunders? A dance of light and shadows on the cavern wall.”

Crystal nodded. Katherine’s explanation aligned with suspicions of her own. “So who was he?”

Katherine shook her head. “I do not know.”

“A psychopath,” Jonathon said. “If you ask me. You should’ve seen him. He didn’t flinch. Fosters was howling, swearing, threatening rape, smashing against the wall and David just stood there. Watching.” He took a deep drink of wine, paused, and took another. “Not normal.”

“Police? A soldier, maybe?” Crystal asked.

“Possibly,” Katherine said. “Though he would’ve been young. He has demonstrated some familiarity with weapons. And he recognized the tattoo on the man in the diner.”

“Blackwater Phoenix,” Crystal said. “I’d never heard of it.”

“No reason you should have,” Katherine said. “Five years ago. It was a miliary operation out east, in the Crimean Dominion. Mercenary unit contracted through so many layers of secrecy no one ever really determined who hired them. They raided an R&D site—maybe Chinese, maybe Russian, Indian or American—it was never clear. May even have been corporate independent.”

“I heard it was a manufacturing site,” Jonathan interjected. “Neopharm-type stuff, viral engineering and bio-horrors.”

“Like you keep downstairs?” Crystal snapped.

Jonathon glared back. “I’m not going over this with you again. Fosters gave up the rights owed any individual when he decided to raid my lab and hurt my staff. He was a war criminal before he stepped through our doors, and frankly, he deserves whatever we do to him, and more.”

Crystal’s face flushed red, but she kept silent.

“The few survivors,” Katherine continued, “of Blackwater Phoenix have either been unable or unwilling to clarify what happened there. When hints of this crept onto the internet, you can imagine the field day conspiracy theorists had with it.

“Ultimately, though, the attention died down. Part of that seems to have been active suppression. But the survivors’ own stories never aligned; they themselves never seemed to understand what they were doing there. Most were deeply traumatised. The only general consensus that emerged was that whatever went down there, they averted some kind of major catastrophe.”

She shrugged. “No major government has ever claimed responsibility for the incident, and we may never know. But it seems we all owe a great debt to those who returned, and to those who did not. Like Mal.” She gestured towards Jonathon. “Is he still recovering in the infirmary?”

The doctor nodded. “A screaming nightmare the first few days, but he’s doing better now that he’s cleaned up a bit. Major substance abuser. A few days here has done him a world of good.”

“David’s recognition of the tattoo may be an avenue worth exploring.”

“He couldn’t have been part of it, surely?” Crystal asked. “Five years ago, you said. He was working at Neopharm then.”

“Also, no tattoos,” Jonathon interrupted. “Not when we put him in the Tank.” He hiccupped and felt increasingly irritated by the conversation. They were there to celebrate his—their—success, and he was determined to get drunk, disgustingly so. With some luck he’d end up in bed with someone and he didn’t particularly care with who. “Several old injuries, though. Some hadn’t healed well. He probably lived in constant mild pain before the procedure.”

Katherine raised an eyebrow. “You never mentioned.”

“You never asked,” he said, mimicking her voice, “and I don’t report to you. After we stabilised him, we ran a full set of scans, confirmed his suitability for the process. With Fosters in the Tank and David stabilised, we had a bit of time and wanted to get it right. And afterwards it wasn’t relevant. Those old injuries are gone,” he said proudly. “Totally healed.”

“He jests at scars that never felt a wound,” Crystal said softly.

“Whatever.” Jonathon scowled at her. “Jesus, give it a rest, Carl. We’ve done good work here. You,” and here he waved his glass at Katherine, wine sloshing over the edge of his glass onto the table, “managed to keep the bastard alive against all the odds.” He pointed at Crystal. “You’ve got him ready to accept being Cindy for another six months.” And raising his glass in a flamboyant cheer to himself, he finished, “and I’ve just gone and unlocked the secrets if immortality!” He dropped down in his chair and grinned at the others. “Frankly, I think I’ve outdone you both.”

Crystal stared at Jonathon for a long moment, and the sighed. Asshole, she thought. She liked the man, maybe loved him, in a way, and had even entertained some romantic interest in him, once upon a time. She owed him much, a debt she knew she could never repay.

But damn, he made it hard sometimes. He’d been getting steadily worse over the past year as well. It went beyond the constant deadnaming, the crass comments and belittling tone—she’d come to accept that from him in a way she wouldn’t from anyone else. But since the divorce, the arrogance and rudeness had gotten worse; so had the drinking. The high-stakes gamble with Katherine, the stress of developing the Tank. The strain of monitoring David and keeping so many secrets. And finally the guilt—a guilt she chose to believe they shared—over what they were doing to David and to the patient downstairs.

It also didn’t help that he wasn’t wrong. She found her role in all this distasteful and had serious morale qualms about what they were doing to… David, or whoever he really was. Cindy, then. She wanted to believed Katherine’s insistence that this was the best way to ensure the man’s survival, and if it meant helping him accept this new identity—a replacement for a previous identity that now seemed about as real as a mist of breath on a mirror—then so be it.

“And so,” Katherine resumed, turning to both her companions. “Are we agreed, then? As to what we are telling David tomorrow.”

“Six more months,” Jonathon said.

Crystal frowned. “Why six? Why not three—surely that’s enough? Another six months will mean he’s lived as Cindy for nearly a full year.”

“Yes,” Katherine said. “And? If required, he will remain as Cindy for another year beyond that, and another, and another. The disguise remains until it is safe to discard it.”

Crystal sighed. “But there might not be anything of David left by that point to recover! You insist all this is necessary for saving this man’s life—but what if there’s nothing left of the man at the end of all this?”

Katherine looked at her levelly. “Do you think this is likely?”

Crystal considered for a moment and answered: “I don’t know.” She weighed everything she knew about her patient, his stubbornness and will, and matched it up against their efforts: the biological and psychological changes, the drugs and hormones, conditioning and subtle influences; and simply couldn’t decide. Certainly, the experiences would have a profound and long-lasting impact on the man; but would it destroy him? Katherine’s earlier revelation suggested something traumatic had happened in this man’s past, sufficient to force him to recreate himself in the persona of David Saunders.

Who had he been, before? What happened to him? Without this, she felt as though she were operating in the dark.

“Cindy isn’t real,” Crystal said. “She is a construct, a disguise built on a foundation of Mr Saunder’s own personality. In many ways her characteristics are an inversion of his own; he may simply revert to his ‘authentic’ self once the need for her is gone. Though that ignores the very real difficulties he’ll face: unlearning behavioural habits that will only grow stronger over time, recovering from the physical changes; even the ordinary and mundane challenges of starting all over in a new life.”

Her fingers danced across the table as she spoke, sketching out her thoughts as she spoke. A line down the middle: male and female symbols on either side, the proud shield-and-spear bearer, the vain mirror-holder.

“That’s the best-case scenario. In six months from now you extract him from Cindy’s life and he resumes a male identity, relearning how to ‘be a man’ and eventually moving on from the experiences of the past year. Perhaps he’ll be a kinder man, a gentler man.” Her finger drifted to the male sign, tracing out jagged, angry lines. “Just as likely, his anger and resentment pushes him even further into misogyny and violence.”

Shifting to the female side, she drew out a question mark. “More likely, I think, what will emerge is a synthesis of his David self and his Cindy self. It’s impossible to say what this might be: a very effeminate heterosexual man? A life-long crossdresser? Possibly a gentler and more empathic individual, but also one whose confidence and resolve has been eroded by doubts and anxiety.”

“Worst case?” Katherine asked.

“Suicidal depression? Insanity? Possibly the collapse of his self, a complete giving way to the shell we’ve created for him: the identity-death of David Saunders. Or whoever he really is.”

Her finger finished a crude sketch of Cindy bisected by the line, a stick-woman figure with long hair, triangle body and straight-lined mouth. “I suppose in this scenario, insisting on a return to masculinity would be even worse. Forcing the… female personality that survives his collapse to resume a masculine identity would be torture.”

Katherine considered this in silence for some time. “I believe you give him too little credit, Ms Dawn,” she said. “David is strong; he will endure; and he will survive Steele’s vengeance.”

“It just seems… cruel.” Jonathon, sitting quickly and staring at the table, looked up and met their eyes. He slurred his words as he spoke. “I don’t particularly like the guy, but I can say that when I spoke to him, he clearly thought we’d brought him out here to restore his manhood. He’s hoping to leave here a man. Or at least, to leave here and go somewhere he can live as one. Even after everything I’ve shown him, he’s thinking the regenerative process is winding down. That Steele’s lost interest. That you, Katherine, are going to uphold your part of the deal and let him be a man again. He really expects this. And when we tell him he’s stuck as Cindy for another six months….”

Jonathon drained his glass and belched. “He’s not going to be happy.”

Scene Fourteen: “One of the Good Ones”

Chad said goodnight to his colleagues, paid his part of the bill, and left, grinning sheepishly at their knowing winks and laughing comments as he crossed the pub floor to meet her at the bar.

She looked especially good tonight—very feminine, a real change from the past few nights. Short, pleated white skirt and collared shirt, with a sweater vest, soft pink and figure-hugging. Her legs sparkled in patterned ivory stockings, and she wore lace-up platform heels that were far taller than her usual footwear. Her makeup was similarly pink and sparkly without being overly loud, and her hair was up in a high ponytail, and the blonde tumble now had streaks of purple and pink. The girl gave off major co-ed vibes as she gave him a cute one-handed wave.

The problem, he thought as he joined her, is that I think I’ve fallen for her.

It was a real problem. He deliberately made a point of not keeping a tally of the number of women—and the occasional man—who’d crossed his path during his time at Asklepios: the many nights, like this one, in the pub filled with meaningful chats, drinks both cheerful and sombre, and often, the caresses late into the evening, the final dawns, the last kiss, cuddle or fuck. Often, they went on to resume their ordinary lives beyond the Clinic. But too many of them never did.

Somehow, Cindy was different. They’d met nearly every night since that first at Eros: a few times at a restaurant in the nearby village, but usually here, in the comfort of the wood-panelled snug beneath the portrait of a glowering Churchill, chomping down on his ubiquitous cigar. Not even two weeks, but he’d found himself thinking about her constantly.

They hadn’t even kissed, hadn’t really gotten beyond holding hands. He’d had his hand on her thigh, once, and felt the smoothness of her skin beneath his touch. He’d jerked off more than once thinking of her: moist lips, hot skin, her scent, the promise of full, heavy breasts, the curve of her ass and the tickle of hair, all flaring through his mind before climax.

Spending time with her had often felt like a disorienting ride, a whirlwind of expectations and tone. She’s start flirty, then turn brooding and resentful. Or she’d be all saccharine girly sweetness and shift, abruptly, to crass rudeness, foul language and graphically sexual. She often seemed wiser and wearier than her twenty years. Her mood was all over the place—angry, resentful, sad, joyous, sympathetic, funny and relieved—and yet she never felt… crazy, for want of a better word, but rather as though she was responding to thoughts and surging emotions she barely comprehended and which she had only just started to share with him. He never quite knew where he sat with her and… he found it exhilarating in a way that completely took him by surprise.

Yet her appearance rarely gave any indication to her mood. One night she’d shown up in grey track pants and a baggy sweatshirt that swallowed up her curves, and she’d been all over him, smouldering eyes and flirty, licking her lips and flicking her hair and touching him throughout the night. Another night: the shortest of skirts and tightest of tube tops, with heels taller than her skirt, and she’d spent half the night glaring at him with a fuck-you expression dripping with resentment; only to turn sweet and grateful near the end of the night, hugging him and thanking him for the evening.

And… he loved it.

What he loved most of all, maybe, was the way she’d gradually opened up (as they so often did), moving from the almost-sullen quiet of their first encounter to the lively, convivial chats of recent nights. Early on they’d swapped numbers and starting messaging throughout the day. She’d sent him photos, sometimes getting his opinion on what she was going to wear to the pub that night. She never took his advice.

And day by day, Chad found himself increasingly looking to the evenings, and their time together.

Cindy sighed, a contented sound, as she slid into their booth—their booth. Her lips sparkled as she smiled and she played with a twirl of hair that framed her face, twisting it around her finger. “Fancy meeting you here,” she said.

He raised his pint in salute, and noted hers when she raised it in return. “Going soft?”

“Giving the liver a rest tonight.” She glared at her orange juice, and then formed the cutest little pout. “Doctor’s orders. Sorry.”

Chad grappled for something clever, something light and breezy but came up empty. His usual confidence escaped him. Instead, he grimaced and said nothing.

“Hey, you okay?”

Nodding, he took a deep pull at his beer and then steeling himself, asked, “operation tomorrow, eh?”

“God, I hope so,” she said, and for a moment she became distant, staring into the distance. One of her hands drifted to her side and slowly tracked across curves and clothing. Her lips grew to a slow smile, and he felt her pleasure as a punch to the gut. “I really do.”

“So, I guess this is it, then,” he said. “Final drinks.”

His words brought her back to the table. “Final drinks,” she said, nodding.

“I’m going to miss you,” he blurted out. The words caught him by surprise, and he looked away, flushing with embarrassment. God, what’s wrong with me, he asked himself. A gentle touch on his cheek brought him back around. Cindy was now sitting next to him. He could feel her thigh up against his.

“I’m going to miss you too,” she said. She stared into him, emerald eyes wide and deep and beautiful, and there was something sad and angry there, too. “This week, it’s been difficult. But you—”

“Cindy,” he started, before she silenced him with a kiss.

It took him by surprise, her lips crushing against his, the taste of her lip gloss—cherry—and her perfume, the scent of pale flowers on a hot summer’s day. Her tongue slid into his mouth, danced against his. Instinct brought his hands to her waist—so tiny—and the feeling of lingerie beneath her clothing, boning and fabric; his arm coiled around her waist by instinct and pulled her closer.

He held her close for a long moment. She felt small in his arms. He breathed in the scent of her hair and her breasts pushed into his side, and she trembled slightly in his embrace.

Her hands cradled his face. “I’m sorry, Chad,” she said, pulling away. “I never meant to—”

“You didn’t—”

“It’s not—”

He put his finger to her lips, took a deep breath, and forced a smile. “Let’s start over,” he said.

Staring cross-eyed at his finger on her lips, Cindy smiled. She gave the tip of his finger a quick kiss, grinned, and scooted back opposite him. Sitting there, in the warm half-light of the pub in her white and pink clothes, hair gleaming like burnished gold over her shoulder, eyes and lips and nails shimmering—it suddenly occurred to Chad that he’d never been so immediately and powerfully attracted to a girl. His desire was physical, yes, to judge by the uncomfortable swelling in his pants; but there was something deeper that he struggled to understand.

“You go first,” she said.

Nodding, he scrambled for something to say, still thinking of her scent, her taste, the feeling of her body beneath his touch; his erection hidden beneath the table was very distracting. “Was that a… corset?”

She blushed. “It is.” Her hand fluttered at her side. “It was—my therapist’s idea.”

“To wear a corset?” He gave a lopsided grin. “Jesus, your therapy sessions are way different than mine.”

“Like you wouldn’t believe.” She considered for a moment, then added, “So—umm. Did you know the Clinic has a photography suite?”

He’d used them for a passport photo, once, and dated one of the photographers for a bit; Jasmine: short, quirky and with a fondness for erotic photography he’d initially found fun. She’d taken great pleasure in posing him, dressing him up, taking photos—he still had a few of them.

“Well, my therapist signed me up for a, uh, how to put this—‘fantasy photography session’? To umm, act out certain ideas, externalize some fears—to embrace them, I guess.” Cindy’s face grew steadily redder as she spoke, blushing beneath her makeup, and she couldn’t quite meet his eyes.

He’d heard of this service, of course; it was a popular one. The image at the end was only a small part of the package. After all, for most clients it’d be a lot easier and cheaper to just hire a digital expert exploiting AI photo generation to create an image of them in just about any situation imaginable, in any style.

Rather, it was the experience: of being the bride or groom at a wedding that might never happen; or posing powerfully at the head of the boardroom table as the corporate head, or alternately, sitting demurely to one side, the submissive secretary, and learning from that as well. He’d even taken part in one several months past, an extra in the background—a strange one, all swords and sandals, heroic speeches and buxom princesses.

“It was an interesting afternoon,” she said.

“You’re afraid of corsets?”

She rolled her eyes. “You ever wear one?”

“Yeah, every other weekend.” He laughed. “Of course not. It’s not exactly something men wear, eh?”

“Yeah,” she said.

“Sexy as hell, though,” he added. “What’s it like?”

“What, wearing a corset?”

He nodded.

“Feeling curious?”

He shrugged. “Sure. It’s not something I’m likely to try outside of Halloween, right?”

“Maybe if you play your cards right tonight,” she purred, “I’ll let you slip into mine.”

“Is it tight?”

“Very.”

“Easy to get into?”

“If you do it right.”

He coughed. “We’re still talking about the corset, right?”

She laughed and gave him a little punch in the arm. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m not being very nice tonight, am I? I’m just—nervous, I guess, about tomorrow.”

Chad forced a smile.

“But to answer your question: yes, it’s tight. But not as tight as it could be—like earlier in the day—but the ladies at the studio didn’t overdo it with the lacing before packing me in this outfit and sending me out tonight.” She plucked at the sweater vest in contemplation. “And no, it’s not uncomfortable—well, a lot less than I’d expected, at least when it’s like this. It’s like….” She paused, wrinkling her nose and twirling a bang of hair around her finger. Her fingernails flashed ivory, and Chad felt a hollowness in his belly. “It’s like a firm hug, a constant caress, but one you can’t really get out of. It’s always there. Sitting here, I’m more… here, I guess, feeling this thing wrapped around me. It reminds me to move in certain ways, avoid bending too much.”

Arms akimbo, holding her hands at her waist, she spread her fingers wide, as though trying to touch thumb-to-thumb, index-to-index around her narrowed waist. “And then there’s the little tug from the stockings when I stand, or the feeling of breathlessness when I get a little too excited, climb some stairs or move a bit too quickly. It’s fine so long as I don’t engage in any strenuous activity.” She grinned and fluttered one hand as though to cool herself. “Oh my.”

“That doesn’t sound too bad, actually.”

She smiled and hugged herself. “It feels a bit like I’m wearing a layer of hidden armour, you know, protection against the world.”

Chad laughed. “You’ve never worn armour, have you?”

“You have?”

“Absolutely!” He banged himself on the chest in a display of masculine vigour.

“What? Kevlar body armour? Makrolon face shied?”

“Chainmail hauberk.” He scratched as his chin, remembering a beard he’d long ago shaved off. “Heavy.”

“Bullshit.”

“’tis true,” he said, taking her hand in his, bowing his head. “Milady.” He kissed the back of her hand softly, and when he looked up he was surprised the effect his kiss had on her: she was blushing, lips half-parted with a sigh. “They were filming up at the ski lodge, some kind of period piece, and….”

As he launched into the story, he felt back on comfortable ground, recapturing the special place they’d occupied this past week. The chat and banter, the sharing of stories and the gradual growing confidence, on her part, to also share until it was no longer just him talking most of the time. He was going to miss this. He was going to miss her.

“Was this before or after the thing with the heiress, her butler and the diamond dildo?” Cindy asked.

“The diamond was just the piss-hole,” he said. “The dildo was gold-plated.” He thought a moment. “Before.”

“I see.” She hid a small smile behind her fingers. Her eyes were happy, and for some reason that made him happy, too. “So… what was your point?”

“I had a point?”

She made a strangling sound in the back of her throat. “You’re an idiot, aren’t you?”

“Probably.” He gazed into his pint. “But clever enough to know you’re changing the subject.”

“Am I?”

Her hand was still in his, had been ever since he’d reached across the table to gift her his gallant kiss. She hadn’t pulled back, and her slender fingers and ivory nails were achingly pretty, hinting at purity and innocence, the skin pale and soft, something he felt was delicate and worth protecting, like a silk flower or a terrible secret. Clasping her hand between his, he leaned closer.

“What’re you nervous about tomorrow for?”

“Because….” And here she hesitated, eyes dancing to him and away again, and she stared at the floor as she answered in a quiet voice. “Just because,” she said.

Chad watched her and suppressed the urge to move to her side and hold her. “Did it work?”

“Did what work?”

“The photoshoot. Did you… learn, anything? Face your fears?”

At that, she looked back at him and slowly smiled again. “You know what? Yeah—maybe I did.” She thought for a moment. “I thought she was fucking nuts when she suggested it, but—it wasn’t half bad. Totally professional and really… reassuring? Like, they never made me feel weird or anything.

“Thing is, I’ve always had a thing about control. You know, as though I need to be in control, and there’ve been times in my life where everything’s fallen apart and feels totally shit and the only thing I’ve got remaining that I can have any influence over is—myself. And so long as I can control… well, me, then maybe things aren’t so bad, they haven’t hit rock bottom.

“And I think this left me with a real fear of letting others take charge. Of giving up agency and letting others do things—for me but also to me. And lately—well, I haven’t exactly been, you know, in charge of my own life, and it’s been… hard.

“But today, giving myself over to these people, letting them dress me and pose me, telling me what to do and just going along with the flow, it was… liberating, in a way? Maybe even fun.” She tapped a finger against her pinks lips and smiled. “Sometimes.”

Chad listened and nodded, and her words resonated with the few glimpses into a life she’d shared only reluctantly throughout the week. He didn’t know how much of it was true. He suspected she was a consummate and skilled liar. But he also accepted that she’d likely never share what had really happened in her past—probably couldn’t, even if she trusted him enough—but how he wished he could be there for her when the truth finally emerged.

“If it taught me one thing, it was that I didn’t always have to be in charge, and that something good, exciting even, can come out letting someone else take over. Submitting, letting someone else be dominant.” She nibbled on her lower lip in thought. “Maybe? Because in a weird way, at the same time, I was always in charge; like, I could stop the whole thing anytime I wanted. And there was something fun about being totally in control even when I was, like, totally….” She trailed off and blushed a deep crimson.

“You were totally…?” It was fascinating watching her work through these ideas. Her words rang hollow, as though reciting the lesson she knew she ought to have learned rather than genuine feeling. Behind the blush and embarrassment, he picked up a current of anger and possibly, fear.

“Tied up,” she whispered, eyes sliding away and then back, glaring at him as though daring him to comment.

He raised an eyebrow but stayed quiet.

Reassured, Cindy continued. Her fingers danced from earring to hair, fingertip to corset-induced curves. “And all this was part of it, too. The clothes and hair and makeup, and the posing, it all really pushed me out of my comfort zone.” She gave a dry laugh. “Like, really really far out of my comfort zone. A few times I nearly freaked out, which, by the way, is so much worse when you’re stuck in a corset. But they were so easy-going, so relaxed that they always got me through the moment, and—”

She smiled wickedly. “Wanna see?”

“Yes,” Chad answered. “Yes, I do.”

She slid her phone over to him. He picked it up, aware of her eyes on him. He looked at the first photo, and the next, onto the third one and back again. Shifting uncomfortably in his seat, he hid his response behind a long pull of his pint glass, emptying it and willing his erection to die down again.

“Pretty sexy, huh?” she said.

“Is that….” He coughed. “Was that the Sin-DI photoshoot in -Lumen-?”

“And more.” Cindy grinned. “It was running pretty late by the time they finished the final photos. They cleaned me up, then got me ready for tonight as a little bonus. Told me to just keep the corset on.” Her eyes shimmered with wicked humour as she watched him. “It’s all bridal lingerie under here,” she said, slapping her flank.

He swiped back and forth between the three photos: pre-date Cindy, posing with Champagne flute, pigtails and sparkling smile; Cindy posed in a wedding dress, an ivory hourglass; and post-nuptial Cindy, resplendent in ivory lingerie and heels, on her back in black-and-white photography.

“You’re killing me here,” he said.

She grinned.

He swiped though a few more photos, variations on the originals but from different angles or with stylistic edits. “So—where’s the other one?”

The colour that’d begun to fade from her face returned, brighter than before, up to the tip of her ears. She snatched her phone back. “None of your business, mister.”

He laughed. “I was joking,” he said, but then watching her squirm in her seat, his jaw dropped. “No way. You—”

She looked away.

“Corset, harness, leash…,” he ticked each item off.

“Stop.”

“Cuffs, binders….”

“Please.”

“Bridle and bit?”

Cindy groaned and buried her face in her hands.

“Wow.”

She peaked between her fingers. “You must think I’m some kind of colossal slut or something.”

He cocked an eyebrow and, genuinely curious, asked, “why?”

“Because it’s… kinky and weird and perverted?”

“Hey, I’m firmly in the ‘sexually liberated’ camp on this one. Yeah, it’s exploitative and kinky as hell, and I certainly couldn’t imagine doing something like that. But I reckon it takes some serious balls to do that kind of thing.”

“Exactly!”

“You wanted to prove you’ve got the balls?”

“Sort of,” she said. “Yeah, I guess I kinda did.”

“So can I see the photo?”

“Not on your fucking life.” Then she grinned. “But if you play your cards right tonight, I might just have a special gift for you.”

She disappeared to the toilet after that, and he went to the bar to order another beer and an orange juice. It was getting busy, and the counter was crowded as he waited. A girl next to him tried to catch his eye—pretty and tall, friendly and wearing a nice dress; he’d seen her around before.

But he wasn’t interested. Returning to the booth he saw that Cindy was already back, sitting with a little clutch purse open on the table. She was touching up her makeup, and he watched as she meticulously painted her lips and fixed her mascara, swept a brush across her cheeks. Chad watched and waited, unwilling to interrupt the moment.

Only after she cleared away did he rejoin her in the booth. To his surprise, she slid in next to him in the close space of the snug. Instinct once again brought his arm around her shoulders and then she lay her head against him, and Chad realised he couldn’t do this for much longer. There was a rumbling in his chest and he never wanted her to move and he wanted—more; something he could never have.

Cindy appeared preoccupied, comfortable in his embrace but staring at her Asklepios armlet. She kept tapping at it, lost in thought as he took a silent drink. He waited and eventually she shifted in his arms. Facing him, she looked sad and for a moment it felt as though his heart stopped.

“Chad,” she said. “I just wanted to say—”

“Hey, hey—you don’t—”

“Shut the fuck up,” she interrupted, giving him a punch to the arm. “Let the lady speak.”

“Ouch.” He rubbed at his arm. “You’re no lady.”

She gave a dry laugh. “True. But seriously. Chad.” She curled her legs beneath her bum in the narrow space of the snug and sat back on her haunches, heels jutting to one side. Cindy raised herself to his height. The pleated skirt rode up her thigh and he glimpsed snowy stocking tops, garter tabs and a flash of pale skin.

Then she reached up and held his face between her hands, long fingers tracing the line of his jaw, passing gently over stubble and threading into his hair. She held him and kissed him again, deeply, pressing up against him so that he could feel the corsetry beneath her clothes and the soft crush of her tits against his chest. His hands drifting down her side, over and then under her skirt as he gripped the firm spheres of her ass. He felt her grow tense, and then relax and draw even closer and shudder beneath him, kissing him ever more furiously, almost desperately.

And then—suddenly—“Thank you,” she said, softly, a hot whisper in his ear.

He gazed at her in wonder and before he could speak, she lay a finger over his lips. “You’re one of the good ones, aren’t you?” she said.

“You’re a good man, Chad.” Cindy gazed at him in what felt like admiration. The tiniest of smiles tugged at the corner of her lips. “When I needed you to talk, you talked. When I needed you to listen, you listened. And when I just needed some quiet but couldn’t bear to be alone—you were there. You never pushed too hard, or took advantage, even though—” and here her hand brushed against the all too obvious erection tenting his trousers—“I know you want me.”

Cindy’s finger left his lips to tenderly draw across his cheek, and he leaned into the palm of her hand. “It’s been a tough two weeks, Chad, and… I really don’t know what’s going to happen next. Everything might change tomorrow. Either way, in a day or two, Cindy will be gone.”

He closed his eyes and focused on the touch of her skin against his. He closed his eyes and focused on the sound of her voice.

“Whatever happens, I just wanted to say… thank you, Chad.”

Her touch disappeared. He opened her eyes. She’d shuffled back to her side of the booth. She was watching him, chewing with what seemed like indecision on her bottom lip. One hand rested on her armlet, where she kept tapping the hard plastic with her fingernail.

“So is this goodbye?” Taking a deep breath, and feeling empty inside, he asked, “Is that what you want?”

Cindy stared at him and seemed to come to a decision. That hint of a smile grew to a full smile—by way of something darker, a scowl of frustration or self-loathing she couldn’t quite conceal quickly enough.

“No,” Cindy said. She reached across the table and held his hand. “I’m tired of drinking orange juice and I’m tired of wearing this goddamn corset. I want you to come back to my place, Chad. I want you to undress me, slowly; I want you to peel me out of these clothes.

“And then I want to give you a proper thank you, because you deserve it and because you’d never ever ask for it. I want to suck your cock, Chad and give you the best fucking blowjob of your life.” Her grip tightened painfully around his hand and she fixed him with her gaze in a way that he found intensely arousing. “That’s what I want.

“So, what do you say, Chad? You coming back to mine?”

“Yes,” he said. “Yes, I am.”

Scene Fifteen: Bio-engineered Venus on a Half-shell

Katherine left.

With her gone, Jon seemed to deflate and sink into his seat. He was far gone into his wine by this point, sullen and quiet. Leaving him to find his own way home would be best, but in good conscience Crystal knew she couldn’t do that. Instead, she knelt next to the man to whom she owed so much.

“Come on, Jon,” she said. “Let’s get you to bed.”

Bleary eyes fixated on her. The wine had brought out an angry flush in his cheeks and nose, ugly splotches visible under his patchy beard. He hadn’t shaved in days. She hadn’t noticed, preoccupied as she’d been with David. And Cindy. Jon had never been one to care about his appearance, but she hadn’t seen him like this since the divorce.

He grunted and lurched to his feet, still holding an open bottle of DeGrave ‘33. Crystal helped him along, out into the corridor, quiet and dark at this time of night, soft lights rising and falling with their passage. “Fucking Thelma,” he muttered, and “nice…” he slurred, his eyes fixed on her stocking-clad legs. Fortunately, it wasn’t far to his office—the sofa there had served as his bed many times before and would once again.

“Here we go,” she said. “Sleep it off.”

“Fucking mediocrity,” he slurred. “Bitch.”

“Go on,” she said, taking the bottle and holding his wrist to the access panel. The door clicked and unlocked, swinging open silently.

“Melody,” he said.

Crystal sighed. “She’s been in touch?”

“Getting remarried,” he said. “To—” he hiccupped, “Tyrone, that idiot, that pedestrian piece of shit.” A shudder passed through him. “I miss her, Crystal, so much.”

“Oh Jon,” she said. “I’m sorry, I really am.” Impulsively, she leaned down and kissed him, once and lightly, on the cheek.

He looked at her, then, fixating on his wrist, where she still held him, and then up her arm, gaze crawling from shoulder to neckline and the exposed curve of her heavy breasts, the line of her neck, upsweep of hair and finally resting on her lips. Jonathon tried for a charming grin that drunkenness made creepy and lecherous.

“You’re beautiful, you know that?”

She hated that his words brought a little flutter to her stomach.

“You want to come in, Crystal?” he asked, his hand falling heavily on her waist. “Like the other time?”

Crystal smiled, sadly, and shook her head. “That was once. And long ago.” Stepping back, she freed herself of his grip, but reached up and brushed the back of her hand against his cheek. “Sleep it off, Jon.”

She left him with the bottle. Crystal turned and walked away and left him alone.

He stood at the threshold to his office. He picked up the bottle and took a swig. He knew he should head into the room and collapse onto the sofa. Sleep it off, as his friend said. But he knew he wouldn't. He shuddered to think of the incoming hangover, then flushed with indignation. It wasn’t fair. Cindy—David—whatever; they didn’t suffer from hangovers—possibly—another unexpected benefit of the process—the process flushing the brain clean whilst they slept off the effects of booze.

Sleep….

Jonathon stumbled into his office, leaving the door open behind him. He fell into his office chair and woke his computer. Drunken jabs at the keyboard brought up the live feed on his client. The tracker on David’s wrist had him back on Asklepios grounds—back in his accommodations—a quick check confirmed another presence in the room: Chad Jenkins.

Fucking Canadian bastard, Jonathon thought. Jenkins was a bicycle half the Clinic had ridden, and what was he? An idiot, a barely-educated ski instructor; and everybody loved him. Cindy certainly seemed to. And I bet her lips, those full, plump lips, shiny and pink are wrapped around his cock right now. Lips I engineered! He imagined her head bobbing up and down between that idiot’s legs, the long hair falling across his lap, the full, pert breasts—those curves he created—felt the swelling in his pants and thought, mine, all that ought to be mine.

Jonathon lurched back into the corridor, still carrying the half-full bottle of wine. The elevator welcomed him, dinging as it pulled him down into the sub-levels beneath the Clinic. When he entered the chamber, the lights came on at half-strength, the monitoring AI familiar with his habits. He pulled a chair over and collapsed into it.

“Hello, Doctor,” Fosters purred. “I was expecting you.”

Jonathon grunted. He stared at his prisoner. Fosters was at his—no, her—most beautiful, now; only yesterday they’d removed her from the cage and carved away the excess flesh, incinerating the grotesque mass of rampant growth, half-formed limbs and tumorous eruptions. The scars and cuts had already healed over; by tomorrow, the first new growths would begin; but tonight—tonight only—she was….

“Thank you,” she said, voice low and sultry. Turning slowly, she slid her hands down her flanks, slowly tracing the exaggerated curves of femininity as she reached down to her calves, bending over with easy suppleness, perfectly formed ass high in the air. “I feel… mmm, good tonight, doctor.”

He knew it was all a product of the extreme androgen intolerance generated by the first trial of the regenerative process; and that the feminising of the subject had been pushed to even further extremes by the ongoing experiments he’d run on Fosters; and that this gorgeous, lithe creature was really a man, despite the exhibition of hyper-femininity. She was a caricature, a doll—his doll—a devil in the guise of an angel.

But as she stood, one delicate hand cupping her groin, one slender arm across her chest, long raven hair tumbling in midnight waves to mid-thigh, full-lipped, wide-eyed, soft and curvy and grinning wickedly, a bio-engineered Venus on a half-shell—he wanted her. Jonathon desired her with painful intensity, with an ache in his chest that made his breath run short.

“Dance,” he groaned.

“Like last time?”

He nodded. She began to sway and turn, hefting her firm, prodigious tits for him, caressing herself, moaning and calling out to him, always careful to keep her penis hidden and out of his view, even as she slid a finger in and out of her pussy. Jonathon took another pull from the bottle and set it aside and unbuckled his trousers and let them fall to his ankles.

With a sound halfway between a sob and grunt, he pulled out his throbbing, erect cock. Jonathon masturbated, watching his creation mince and prance, twirl and fondle herself.

Fosters smiled, watching him. She licked her lips and waited.

Author’s Notes:
If you’ve enjoyed this – please, leave a review! If you didn’t like it – please, leave a review! It’s nice knowing whether people are still reading the story. And if you really like it, and want early access to works in progress, sneak peaks, and to read the rest of the Interlude early, why not pop over to the patreon (https://www.patreon.com/fakeminsk)?
For those following from the very beginning, I’ve made some tweaks as I’ve come back to the story. Cindy’s surname changed to Bellamy (originally ‘Long’) and David’s age moved upwards into the thirties – this gave room for more backstory. The encounter with Steele was never really fleshed out in the first series, so finally gets some overdue attention. Jonathon “Scooter’s” personality has probably changed the most, but hopefully it makes for a more rounded character. Inconsistencies will all get tidied up when I give the whole story a final edit at some future point.