Spinal Tap
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

The device was a simple spinal implant. Something injected into the fluid of the spinal column, carrying the capacity to deliver tiny electrical impulses. These impulses were so small that the minute battery had sufficient capacity for one hundred single tiny surges. But directly in the spine those surges translated to bursts of incredible pain. Julie felt that one hundred such jolts would be all that was needed to adjust behavior. In the case of her own son Chris, she had used less than fifty.

Of course, no mother wants to see her child in pain, but Chris barely seemed aware of the pain that he had put her through even in his young life. It seemed to her that he would do much worse if she did not do something. As long as he was on this path, her pain would continue. She might suffer perhaps many thousands of bursts of pain at the hands of this child of hers, before she died, a sad and bitter woman. Fifty short searing jabs of pain seemed like nothing.

“Fuck you, Mom,” he said to her. “I do what I want to do. Just keep food on the table and keep doing my laundry.”

She could do something. She had access to the technology.

Working as an orthopedic nurse, Julie had done many spinal taps and epidurals. And she had heard of the microscopic implants controlled by a simple radio control, originally designed for intramuscular insertion to assist in patients with paralysis through spinal injury. Two rejected units were scheduled for destruction even though barely used. Julie rescued them. She had an idea.

She had learned that the tiniest electric impulse in the spine could cause pain; pain that was instantaneous and crippling but caused no permanent injury, pain that could be used for aversion therapy.

And that idea came to fruition with her own son. It was not enough to use aversion therapy to stop his bad behavior. She could never be beside him to give him the preventative command. What she needed to do was to turn him into somebody else. Somebody nice. Somebody who would not associate with those macho low-lives he hung around with. Somebody soft and gentle and kind. The very opposite of people like them, and what her son had become. Somebody like the daughter she had always wanted.

Implantation was easy. It should not be done at home. She asked him to visit her at the hospital when she knew there was nothing scheduled. She took him to the operating theater to show him where she worked. She told him about the nitrous oxide and its effects. Of course, he wanted to try it. She said that as a precaution he should lie down.

Implantation in a sterile environment was the easy part. And she had already tuned the signal to one that could be created from an app on her cellphone. It would be close quarters only, so as to prevent some ambient signal throwing her boy into extreme pain. But of course, that pain must be delivered to show the boy that she was serious.

“What the fuck have you done, Mom?”

Yes, no mother wants to see her child in pain but it only took two bursts to bring him to the realization that he had no choice but to obey his mother, no matter how outrageous her demands were.

“No fucking way!”

But it took time for those demands to bring results. It started with new clothes. Clothes that meant that those so-called friends would see him as a faggot and stay clear. He could make whatever excuses that he liked, but flouncy blouses and yoga pants shriek “gay”. And after inflicting a few bruises those nasty boys stayed away from Chris.

“See what you have done? I can’t live like this. Everyone thinks I am a fag.”

But that is not what she wanted. His attitude and his demeanor needed to change. Much could be achieved by setting a code of behavior at home and administering small shocks to ensure that his deportment was correct when she was in a position to observe it. But when he was away from home, and able to hide his blouses under a borrowed sweater, she needed something that he could not cast off or disguise.

She was able to secure the female hormones from the hospital where she worked. Expired stock was still effective, and Julie hated to see good things go to waste.

To her delight, the new Christina gobbled up the hormones. You see, she had promised Christina that once she had achieved total change the implant would be removed. In fact, such removal would require spinal surgery – something way beyond the ability of a mere nurse. And to seek surgery would mean disclosing her actions – why the implant was there is the first place, and all that would follow from that. It could not happen. It was a lie. The implant would stay. The power would fade over time and it would become inert, but it would stay.

“I am only doing this to be free of the thing you have put in my back.”

Christina was counting on the forthcoming surgery and would do all that she could to bring about it happening as early as possible. That meant taking the tablets and submitting to further feminization including skin and hair treatments.

“This is crazy, Mom!”

And then there were new clothing choices moving far away from effeminate neutrality to extreme femininity. Her mother wanted to ensure that Christina would develop into “a proper young lady”. Underwear, predominantly pink, with plenty of lace, dresses only, sometimes with pantyhose, and feminine tops or coats.

“You’re kidding. I can’t wear this shit.”

“Oh yes you can,” she said. “And mind your language. In fact we need to fix you voice completely. You will need to practice sounding more like a girl. If I hear you speak like a boy, there will be a jolt, I promise you.”

Chris considered whether he might seize the control unit. But she had more than one, the principal unit being her mobile phone which she always carried. His ability to overpower her before she could trigger the shock was decreasing every day as his muscles showed the effect of the hormonal changes.

For Chris resistance meant pain. People have to adjust, and pain forces that. You learn to limp to avoid the pain, and then it just becomes the way you walk. He would brush his hair as required and stare into the mirror wondering who he was.

“Your hair is so pretty, and your skin is perfect,” Chris’s mother told him. “And you look at peace.”

Was that what it was? Chris stared into the mirror and saw Christina for the first time.

For her mother, there was support from other parents who admired how well she handled the transition of her transgendered son. One of those was the mother of Chris’s friend Mark, an equally rambunctious and difficult child.

“You have done so well. When did you discover that Chris was transgendered?” she asked.

After some conversation about the problems that her friend was having with her own son, Chris’s mother whispered the admission: “Actually, I have created his transgendered inclinations by a little mind control; aversion therapy to replace bad behavior with inclinations towards girlhood.”

Without pause, Mark’s mother said: “Can you do the same for my boy?”

And that is how Chris’s old friend Mark came to stay.

The same would go for Mark Smith too. But for him, at least there was Christina to serve as an example. An example of what needed to be achieved before the torment ended.

Christina came home from ballet and found that the other bed in her pink and lace curtained bedroom was occupied by Mark. She could see that he was wearing a mint green nightie and that his body had been waxed smooth. And she could see the surgical dressing in the small of his back.

His old friend stirred. Christina kneeled by the bed. Mark opened his eyes. He saw Christina, her long hair in a ballet bun, and with theatre make up on.

“Is that you Chris?” he asked. “What’s happening?”

“You have to run,” she whispered. “You have to leave here and get out of range. Leave this town and never come back. If you don’t want to end up like me, you have to run.”

But it was too late. Chris’s mother was standing in the doorway.

“Chrissie,” she said. “If you think that you know Mandy here, well you don’t. Her mother has sent her to stay with us for a bit. Mark had the same group of friends as you did, and her mother has had enough. So, I had an extra implant and now Mandy is in the same position as you. I am counting on you to explain to her what that means. I am counting on you to help Mandy adjust, with the minimum of discomfort.”

“What have you done to me, bitch?” shouted the new Mandy, reaching down to feel her stripped off hair and the silkiness of the pink nightie she was wearing.

“I’m quite glad you asked that Mandy.” Chris’s mother had a cellphone in her hand. “It justifies me giving you a taste of what disobedience feels like. And I am sure that you will think twice before you displease me again.”

And with that a simple touch of a button threw Mandy off the bed to writhe in agony on the floor.

After her mother had left the room, Christina sat on the floor in her leotard holding her friend, still convulsing from the after-effects of the shock. She knew that Mark’s father was gone, so if Mandy had been placed in this house of pain by her mother, all she could do was to help minimize the agony.

“If you do as I do, we will both get through it,” she said. “Mandy, you need to follow my example.” She used the name that had been given, because that was how things needed to be. Christina believed that there would be an end to this. If it was the surgery promised or him becoming old enough to leave, it would end – so he thought.

“I can’t handle that again, Chris.”

“It’s Chrissie now. Remember that. Now, let’s get you as girly as possible as quickly as possible so we can ensure no more shocks. And if we both show that we can be girls then you can get the relieving operation with me, and we will both be free of this.”

As Chrissie explained it in her soft feminine voice that now came so naturally: They were in it together. They knew what they had to do. They could help and support one another. They could help one another with their hair and makeup. They could correct one another if their conduct slipped into boyish or masculine behavior. It was a partnership of a kind.

They took their medicine and compared the effects that the hormones had on them. In many ways the changes were the source of internal conflict. Neither of them wanted the changes, but as they occurred, they saw them as proof of their compliance with the directions they were given.

“Look at my breasts,” Chrissie said to her mother proudly. “Mandy’s breasts are not as big as mine.”

“That’s not true,” insisted Mandy, cupping her own through her frilly blouse. Her mother was there too. She had been given her own control to allow her to shock her own child, now returned home, but she had never had to use it. She was now Mandy, a demure well-behaved young lady.

“Ask the boys at school,” said Chrissie. “They are always staring at mine, especially when I wear that lilac top.”

“That’s a slutty outfit,” said Mandy. “But I do quite like it on you.”

The mothers smiled at one another. It seemed that their objective had been achieved.

“Does that mean the surgery?” It was not that the new girls truly understood, it was just something that they had always wanted. Of course they agreed. They both happily signed the releases in front of the surgeon, without any questions.

“At last we will be free,” said Mandy. Christina nodded eagerly, her high ponytail bouncing.

And they were both free when they woke up in their hospital beds, side by side, but not from the implants in their spines. They were now free from their masculinity, forever.

The End.

© Maryanne Peters 2020

Chrissie and Mandy in their cheerleading outfits