For King & Country (part 2)

by Miss K

The beginning of a new life for disgraced British Intelligence agent Anthony Pierce, 004, as he prepares to embark on a mission into enemy territory in a deep cover disguise he didn't expect to be wearing in his wildest dreams. The transformation begins...

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CHAPTER ONE continued

I must have sat in complete and stunned silence for quite a while as Bond, who was clearly expecting a reaction, was forced to continue.

"Doctors Easton and Dwyer will be the principals you report to from now on, Pierce. I'm also leaving Miss Loth here to help with your reorientation. I'll return to finish your brief when your time here is complete. To answer your question, that will be 120 days from tomorrow."

He began to collect his papers, then looked up, with a faint smile on that cruel, handsome mouth.

"Good luck, Pierce. It's an unusual mission."

With that, Commander Bond nodded smartly to Dwyer and Easton and left, accompanied by Miss Loth.

For a moment, there was silence. I was unable to make eye contact with Dwyer or Easton, nor make any sense of the thoughts tumbling freely through my head. Finally, I rose.

"It's impossible!" I shouted. "How can you do what he said you were going to do to me! I refuse to co-operate."

"I'm afraid the release you signed at Vauxhall leaves you with very little option, Commander, as you well know," said a voice from the doorway. It was Miss Loth, re- entering the room with a clipboard and a quietly efficient air quite at remove from that she had exhibited in Bond's company.

Sadly, she was right. I had signed my life away in a few seconds of remorse. I felt a bitter coldness churn in my belly when I realised quite how skilfully 'M' had manipulated my guilt this morning.

I sat down again, and tried to gather myself. I looked up at Loth, who was smiling quite pleasantly at me.

"So what happens? Am I going to have a sex change? Is that it? Then what? I'm not sure that a whore in the Red Fist dacha's going to have much access to sensitive information-" I choked as I realised what I was saying.

"Is that what I'm going to become..?" I buried my face in my hands, unable to continue.

Loth came over and put her hand on my shoulder, knelt by my face, and spoke in a surprisingly sensitive tone.

"I'm sorry. I really am, but it's been decided that operational details such as those aren't going to be divulged to you until we've completed your transformation.

"You're going to be in a very fragile state mentally, and we don't want that to prejudice how you view your new mission objectives until you stabilise. Please understand. It's for your good and the good of the mission.

"Yes?"

I nodded dumbly.

"Good." She rose and leant back on the desk, crossing her black tights- clad legs at the ankles. I again noticed how beautiful she was, quite dark, with big green eyes, long, straight brown hair and unbelievable legs. She noticed me looking and smiled unselfconsciously. She glanced over at Easton, who paused very slightly in her note-taking, then went on.

"To answer your first question, no you are not having a 'sex change'." She parenthesised the words deliberately. "We will be carrying out some of the therapy associated with gender reassignment techniques, but none of the non- reversible surgical work."

She could see the relief in my face as she went on, "in fact, there's absolutely no reason why you wouldn't be able to revert to a completely normal male life after the completion of the mission.

Now, are you ready for a brief medical? I realise it's been a long day, but time is of the essence."

With that I realised that it was this morning that I had awoken in Tangier. Amazing how your life can change in a day. I took a deep breath and nodded.

"Excellent," smiled Miss Loth.

***

Doctor Easton was a cosmetic surgeon. During the briefing, she'd been taking initial notes on my appearance and physique. Doctor Dwyer was explaining this as she conducted a brief medical examination in a room adjoining one of the clear areas. A pretty blonde nurse called Kirsty Reeves has taken my clothes a sample of blood and some urine from me and given me a powder blue gown to wear. Now I was breathing in and out as Dwyer examined my thoracic area from behind a radial PET scanner. Dwyer kept up a constant stream of chatter as she tapped away at her terminal.

So I discovered that Easton was a plastic surgeon and Dwyer was a research endocrinologist. I knew enough to be able to translate this in my head as 'hormone doctor'. In the glass partition behind the endocrinologist' s head, I could see the reflection of the 3D colour display of the inside of my chest cavity as she directed the cursor around.

After a while, she paused and clicked an icon which allowed her to freely rotate my physical position so that my genital area was on display. She looked up, with an apologetic look on her face.

"I can do most of the internal examination on the computer, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to do a very quick cavity inspection to check the state of your prostate."

I closed my eyes and nodded. She went on, "it's good that you're still quite young, you know."

Good for whom, I wondered.

"Your body will be more tolerant to the therapy.." she tailed off, concentrating on the screen for a moment.

"What exactly is the therapy to entail?" I asked pointedly, sick of the magical mystery tour.

Dwyer sighed, looking up. "I'm afraid I'm under instructions not to tell you. Commander Bond and Miss Loth are insistent on that. I'm sorry."

"Not as sorry as me," I muttered.

"Pardon?"

"Nothing."

I decided to change tack.

"What's your background, Dr Dwyer? How did you end up on this mission?"

She didn't look up from her work, but answered promptly, "This is the perfect job for me. I wanted to do security work - my father was in the Service. When the endocrinological research post came up, I went for it."

Somehow that didn't ring true, but I decided not to press it. How about Dr Easton. Have you worked with her long?

"No. In fact we only met yesterday. But her reputation is brilliant, both in reconstruction and cosmetics. I think you're in safe hands."

"I hope so. I don't want to end up looking like her."

Dwyer sniggered, looking askance at me from her monitor. "I don't think there's any danger of that.

"She told me that from her initial look at you that she was confident of an excellent result."

Excellent for whom, I wondered again. "And what about Miss Loth? She seems an interesting character."

Dwyer pursed her lips.

"Yes... I'll bet you find her very interesting...

"Actually, I don't know her very well either, but she is the Director of this facility, so it doesn't do to argue much."

Noting the surprised look on my face with another of her smiles, she got up and reached for a box of sterile gloves.

As if on cue, Nurse Reeves returned with a tube of lubricant.

It was time for my cavity exam.

***

Apparently, I was in perfect condition inside and out. Dwyer told me that I could please myself for the next hour, and suggested that I might want to go to the canteen to eat. It was 20:30. She asked me to return at 21:30 to finish my exam. I got up and must have been looking a little confused.

"What's the matter?" she asked.

"I - er, my clothes?"

"You'll be fine in your gown for now, Commander.

"Everyone in this complex is used to it." I looked down at the gown which covered me to just below my groin, and shook my head.

"I don't think so. My trousers please." Again, she looked a little embarrassed, and gave her little sigh.

"I'm sorry Commander. Miss Loth has instructed us that you are not to wear trousers from now on. It's for-"

"The good of the mission. I know.

"What can I wear?"

"Leggings or a skirt."

I sighed. "Give me some leggings then." I guess I wasn't quite ready to lose the seams between my legs.

Nurse Reeves brought in a pair of navy blue leggings, which I struggled into with a great deal of embarrassment. I then turned and left the examining room without a word.

In the corridor leading to the canteen, I passed a couple of security staff, who turned out to be tough-looking RN maritime policewomen. They saluted and I saluted back, feeling foolish.

I glanced back as they passed me but they were either well trained, or completely disinterested in my plight or my ridiculous appearance. The canteen was similarly deserted to the rest of the complex. I got a light pasta from the bored looking girl behind the counter and sat down with a glass of apple juice to eat in lonely silence.

All I could hear was the hum of the omnipresent air-conditioning and the clatter of my cutlery. I wondered what was going on in the house above me. Probably the two old dears were watching the box. Suddenly feeling emotional, I finished my pasta and left the canteen, walking quickly to my room. I lay face down on my bed in the darkness, thinking about my parents.

They'd be doing the same as the old couple above now, settling down for a quiet evening before bed. I wondered if my funeral had happened yet. Probably. I wondered if Dad had cried with Mum. If only I knew either way it'd be a little better. And Christine. We'd split up just before the mission. But she had remained close to my parents. Had she been at my funeral? I thought of her often, still.

Ridiculously, I realised my eyes were watering. I wiped them with the back of my hand and lit another cigarette.

It was nine o'clock, and I was quite alone.

***

"Are you all right, Commander Pierce?"

I nodded. I must have seemed very subdued after the relative levity of just an hour before.

Dr. Dwyer was looking at something on her flipscreen. I was lying on the examining table in my gown and leggings, looking blankly at the ceiling. I heard her rise.

"You'll be pleased to know that the result of your blood and urine was very positive. We can proceed as planned." She walked over with a glass bottle filled with a clear liquid.

The bottle had a rubber cap into which she was inserting a hypodermic needle. "I'm just going to give you a small injection, then you can go to bed. I'm sure you're exhausted."

She put the hypodermic on a tray exposing my left arm and swabbing it inside the elbow joint. She picked up the hypo and leaned over. In a rapid movement, I grabbed her wrist and dug my index finger into her tendon, painlessly rendering her unable to hold the needle. She gave a startled yell as the hypodermic clattered to the floor. I held onto her arm, careful not to hurt her. I looked into her face, which was set, and beautifully calm.

"I'm sorry," I said. "Just please tell me what it is. Do you have any idea what it might be like for me? I'll take it, but tell me what I'm taking."

I let go of her wrist. She continued to look into my eyes for a moment, then broke off, picking up the needle and throwing it in a sterile disposal unit. She got a new hypodermic out of a vacuum pack and refilled it, before coming over, and sitting down by me so that her head was next to mine. She held up the needle so I could see it.

"This is a dilute solution of the complex of hormones which my away team and I have synthesised for your treatment programme. I'm not obliged to tell you anything, but I'm going to because I respect you and the sacrifice you're about to make. I'm administering this low dose tonight so that we'll know if you have an allergy to any of the constituent drugs in the mixture." She got up again and swabbed my arm.

She looked down at my face. I nodded. I felt the needle enter the vein and closed my eyes as the liquid entered my system. Doctor Dwyer continued, "this dose won't have any effect on your body, but very soon, if the allergy test proves negative, I'm going to start you on an aggressive treatment programme, which, over the next few weeks, will give you the body chemistry of a pubescent girl."

She pulled out the needle and I heard it clatter into the disposal. Dwyer went quiet and I could hear her tapping notes into her terminal. I turned my head.

"Please go on... I don't want to lie in silence.." I heard her come over to me and sit. Her hand took mine. She went on in a soft voice.

"There are four main types of hormone in your personal cocktail.

"They're going to work together in your body to make it all happen. There's the two female hormone types, oestrogens and progestogens which will do the main work of transforming your body shape into a woman's.

"But they need help because of all the testosterone floating round your body which will stop them having the optimum effect.

"We're sending in two more types of hormone to work against these - otherwise we'd have to castrate you. The androgen receptor antagonist will effectively stop the testosterone from being able to have any effect on your body, and the androgen inhibitors will tell your testes that there's enough testosterone already in your body and they'll cease producing any more."

She got up but continued talking as she went back to her terminal. "Once the hormones kick in, you'll notice many changes. Your breasts will grow, maybe by even a cup size or two. Your aureolae and nipples might swell a bit too and everything will be much more sensitive.

"Your penis and testes will shrink. Your face will become more typically female in shape. Your body fat will move away from the waist and toward the hips and bottom. Your body hair growth will slow and becomes less dense, and may lighten in colour. You'll tend to lose muscle tone and be prone to putting on weight with less food. Your skin will become finer and softer, and more sensitive.

"You'll sweat less and smell nicer. Your hair will become fuller and grow faster. You may lose your male sex drive but gain a female one." She sighed. "All these things have been documented, but you might only experience some of them. It's all very unpredictable."

She came and helped me sit up. "There's one thing you should know. We've tried to calculate your programme so that we'll get the best results possible in the shortest possible time.

That was the brief. That means the treatment programme is exceptionally aggressive. You will be very ill for a week or so once we start the course. I'm afraid there's nothing we can do about that."

She paused looking into my eyes, pursing her lips. "I thought you should know."

I took her hand. "Thank you Doctor Dwyer." I said.

She placed her free hand over mine. "Mary," she said.

***

The terminal in my room woke me with a triple chime. I knew as soon as I awoke where I was and why, and felt curiously more purposeful today. I flipped the screen open and checked the morning headlines. The arms buildup in Kazakhstan was continuing, and fresh combat had broken out in Georgia and the Ukraine. The little red flag waving on my mailbox icon showed that I had correspondence.

I clicked it open and was greeted by a video message from Miss Loth.

"Morning Commander. I hope you slept well. The enclosed document is your agenda for today. We have no items until eleven hundred so please feel free to take a stroll and a swim, and we'll see you at eleven. Please do not shave this morning, Commander."

I opened the agenda file:

========================= Agenda - Commander Pierce =========================
11:00 | Procedural and Welcome | D Loth | Director's Office
11:30 | Initial consultation | Dr S Easton | Room 206
13:30 | Lunch | D Loth | Lake Consequence Room
15:00 | Laser therapy | Dr S Easton | Room 206
17:00 | Consultation | Dr M Dwyer | Room 214

I bluetoothed the agenda to my personal tablet and then looked in the wardrobe.

There was my first shock of the day. My clothes were all gone. In their place a range of unfamiliarly feminine-looking garments.

Frowning, I picked out a rather fitted black top with a low-cut neck and a pair of black leggings. I looked in the mirror.

Ridiculous, and the leggings did very little to conceal the unfeminine looking bump on my groin. I selected a pair of brand new Fila trainers and left the room carrying my data tablet.

***

I had noticed one thing. Well, noticed is probably not the right word. A realisation had seeped into me over the last hours suddenly surfaced in me as I waited for Ms Loth.

There were no men here.

Apart from Dennis, who had vanished as quietly as he had entered my life the previous evening, and Commander Bond, who had also, I presumed, left the facility, everyone in the complex, from MP to cleaner, was female. I was in a world of women. Of course, I was no fool and the reasoning behind this situation was obvious, but he realisation hit me with some force nevertheless.

So I sat in Ms Loth's spare but elegantly furnished office, awaiting my appointment.

The small, kidney-shaped desk seemed to be finished in a black, stone- like surface like obsidian. I looked at my pale face in the mirror-like stone, wondering how long it would remain familiar to me.

"Good morning Commander!"

Loth's voice snapped me from my reverie.

Once again she looked spectacular, dressed in a simple but beautifully cut black trouser suit; I found myself admiring her as she poured tea and we made small talk. Then a small thought popped, unbidden, into a corner of my mind...

....I hope I look as good as that by the end of this...

What was that all about? I sipped my Lapsang Souchong and continued to smile and listen, smile and listen.

***

Pep talk aside, one aspect of my meeting with Ms Loth had been useful. In her schedule overview for the first fortnight, she had indicated that I would be spending most of the first ten days out of commission due to Dwyer's drug therapy.

That in itself was worrying. More so was what I was hearing from Doctor S. Easton as I lay naked under the scrutiny of a vast array of scanning equipment. Ms Loth had walked me to Easton's consulting rooms where I had for the first time spoken to this extraordinary dried out husk of a woman. Tall and exceptionally slender, she was a sinister combination of schoolmarmish frump and vampire glamour.

She spoke in a cigarette-ravaged basso profundo and punched the air with half inch scarlet talons as she made a point. The faded tweeds she sported were an uneasy counterpoint to the black patent stilettos on her feet. Every five minutes or so she would emit a rumbling cough from her red, lipsticked mouth.

"Good. Your body hair is quite fine," she said as I lay naked, cold and embarrassed before her, fearing for the little hair I possessed. She continued her computerised examination of my anatomy, droning on in her bass monotone about the changes I was to undergo.

Much of it sounded a little too permanent for my liking, and I said so.

She paused and walked over to me. "Commander Pierce," she said, "I think you know that we all owe a debt to our country. Some more than others." She turned and went back to her console, then went on to finish her consultation in silence.

***

That afternoon I had my body hair removed.

Permanently.

Doctor Easton had had me drink a strange, tasteless blue fluid at lunch which she had explained to me was a specially developed enzyme with a radioactive marker attached to it, designed to affix itself to the base of all the hair follicles in the body. This was used to create a targeting matrix for an advanced computer-guided laser system that her laboratory had developed that would quickly and painlessly remove all the targeted hairs.

There was a large machine at the back of her consulting room which comprised of a metallic framework inside which was a suspension harness big enough to accommodate a human body. The framework was mounted on a set of articulated gimbals which permitted 360 degrees of free rotation in all axes. At the top of the framework was the laser projection assembly. It seemed like a pretty efficient solution and I wondered if the government developed these sorts of things all the time. I supposed that they could make quite a lot of money in the commercial market.

"This will be going into production and on sale in the US later this year," said Doctor Easton, clicking over to me in her spike heels, as if reading my thoughts.

"Remove all your clothing please."

Dumbly, I complied, and stood self- consciously, trying to cover my groin. Easton had a tube of a colourless gel in her hand, which she proceeded to smear all over my scalp, eyebrows and pubic area.

"This is a barrier gel which prevents the marker signal from being read by the targeting system," she explained efficiently as I stood in acute embarrassment while she worked the excruciatingly cold gel into my pubic hair. She then gave me a pair of dark blue goggles to put on. "These will prevent removal of your lashes and protect your eyes from the laser mesh".

After a while, she stood back and looked me over. Apparently satisfied, she nodded, and indicated that I should follow her to the depilation machine. I stepped inside the spherical framework and Easton began to strap me into the harness, which attached at the wrists, upper arms, ankles, knees, waist, chest and neck with translucent straps which I supposed would allow the laser mesh to penetrate. Then she went over to the control panel and pressed a combination on the touchpad which made the harness retract into the framework so that I was raised up and suspended in mid-air, my arms and legs wide open. It felt utterly perverse.

I heard her moving around behind me, then a cold sensation in my buttocks, followed by a sharp needle. A coldness seeped out from where she had injecting me, and I realised I couldn't move.

"The targeting computer works best when the subject is immobile," I heard her intone emotionlessly. I heard her pressing another combination of keys and the framework began to rotate slowly. I was bathed in a cold, blue light in which I could just distinguish individual, infinitesimal laser beams. It was not an unpleasant sensation, somewhat like being tickled very gently all over my body; after a while I drifted off into a semi-sleep.

When I came to I was covered in a thin layer of ash. Easton was using a small hand-held vacuum cleaner to remove it all, and I realised that this was the remains of my hair. The paralysing drug was wearing off, and I began to flex my arms and legs, which had pins and needles. Easton went away and came back with a rather nasty looking pen- shaped implement.

"What's that?"

"Pen laser depilator. I'm going to sculpt your eyebrows and bikini area."

I thought that that sounded too much. "Wait a minute. I mean, is that really necessary? I thought women did that kind of thing themselves?"

Easton stopped, and shrugged. "I thought it might be more convenient for you. It's your choice."

"No thanks. I'm not going to be wearing any bikinis anyway.

And I'd prefer not to have no eyebrows for the rest of my life." Easton shrugged again and clicked away. After a while, there was a whine from the mechanism and the harness lowered me to the floor.

"Go and shower thoroughly in tepid water," she said, handing me a towel. "Then report to Doctor Dwyer."

***

The machine had done its work. I was as smooth as a baby all over and it felt very strange. A red rash had appeared on my skin, but Easton had told me this was normal and would wear off overnight. The sensation of clothes on my hairless skin was novel and intense. Mary Dwyer was not in her consulting room when I arrived, and I was puttering about when she walked in.

"Hello, Commander Pierce."

"Doctor Dwyer. What's the news?"

She smiled. "Good. Your blood's come back fine. Any ill effects? Dizziness, nausea?"

I shook my head and sat down.

She stood and looked at me for a while. Then appeared to come to a decision.

"Well, I don't see any sense in delaying." She walked over to a cupboard and came back with a bottle of colourless fluid, with a label that said "PIERCE" on it, and a large syringe. As she was filling the syringe, I began to panic.

She noticed me sweating and shivering, and stopped.

"Afraid?" she asked, gently. I nodded. My mouth had gone dry and I couldn't speak at all. She walked over and put her arm around me.

"You're a very brave man," she said quietly, "and your government doesn't deserve you." I couldn't say anything.

"Shall we proceed," she went on, "or do you want to wait?"

I couldn't answer for a while, then I looked into her green eyes, and whispered, in the tiniest voice, "do it."

She rubbed my upper arm with alcohol and then the needle went in. I watched the colourless fluid drain into my vein.

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to be continued...