Visited
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I will write this down but I will tell nobody. The world is full of lunatics and I will not be branded as one of them. Despite all of this I have made a place for myself and there is no room in that place for aliens or miraculous changes. But I record it because it must be recorded. The fact is that we have been visited. The fact is that an alien species has come to earth and interfered with humanity. I know, because it happened to me, or rather it happened to us.

Connor Mulligan and I went down to the Roadhouse on Highway 87 on August 6, 2019. In those days we co-owned a water borehole drilling truck and we had been working hard that day in hot weather and we were gasping for a beer. It was mid afternoon and the place seemed empty except for a woman sipping wine at the bar and an old drunk in the corner.

The first round was gone in under a minute, but as the barkeep racked up Round Two, two young women entered the bar. It is hard to imagine two less likely women to enter a bar in the middle of nowhere that these two. Honestly, they looked like they were off another planet, which it turned out they were.

They were both thin and pale, with blonde hair to their shoulders in identical style, although otherwise they did not look related. They approached the bar and when my face came into their view, they both smiled. I took my cue from that. Before the bartender could even ask, I called out – “I’d like to buy you ladies a drink if you don’t think that too forward.”

“Forward?” One of them spoke, appearing not to understand my meaning. I detected from that single word that they were foreign. Connor suggested they might be Swedish.

“A drink, ladies, a drink,” I held up my own.

“Yes, thank you,” they said together, almost as if rehearsed.

“Why don’t we sit at a table?” Connor said. There was one nearby. “You ladies look like you might have travelled some distance.”

“Yes, we have traveled a great distance,” said one who later introduced herself as Bea. She introduced the other as Elle. I told them that I was Zane and that my friend was Connor. They seemed ready to drink beer with us. We figured that Swedish girls would, drink beer that is.

“You seem strong and healthy,” said Bea. It sounded like a compliment. “Are you clever too?”

I laughed. It was a strange question.

“Sure, I have a college degree, but I like working outdoors,” I said. “Connor is the same. We own our own machinery. We drill for water. We install pumping gear and filtration systems. Our work requires brains as well as brawn.” It was partly true.

“Very good,” she said. It was like ticking off a checklist. It had been established that we were not as stupid as our work clothes might indicate.

“Are you ladies staying in town tonight?” Connor asked Elle.

“We have a room at the Motel,” she said. “With two large beds in it.”

Connor and I looked at one another. The word is naïve – right? It seemed like such an odd thing to say, but for both of us it seemed clear why she would say it. We figured that before the night was out, we could be in those beds with these girls. Why else would she talk about beds?

“Why don’t you join us for a meal tonight?” I said. They eagerly agreed. It seemed so easy.

We drank and talked, but I guess that we did most of the talking. It seemed as if they had arrived in this town straight from wherever they came from, without visiting any major city. They seemed to know nothing, so we had a lot to tell them. But somehow the conversation always came back to our families – strange details like how our grandparents died.

Even the meal seemed new to them. Surely, they have cheeseburgers in Sweden?

Then after the meal it was their suggestion not ours: “Why don’t you come back to our motel room to continue talking, and then maybe we could have sex?”

I think my jaw must have dropped. That had never happened to me quite like this. I looked at Connor, but he was already up and grabbing his hat.

I suppose that when we walked in there, I should have noticed that there was no luggage of any kind. Actually, I did notice, but I did not give it any thought. There were other things on my mind, or just one thing, and that was the only thing on Connor’s mind too. Looking back I also noticed that the only thing that was in the room was a store bag from a clothing boutique and some lipstick and mascara on the shelf in the bathroom where I went to take a piss. This all became clear only later, because from the moment that we got in there it seems that four minds all had the same desperate purpose – sex.

They did not even want protection. They just seemed desperate to get a good fucking, and that is what I gave Bea, and from the grunts of satisfaction in the bed next to me, that is what Connor gave Elle, just before I did.

It all happened so fast that when it was over you are left in that awful silence where you just feel like saying: “Well thank you Ma’am … that was great … now I best be on my way”. Not that I did say that. I just lay there looking up at the ceiling, and I saw Bea looking at me.

“You must sleep here tonight,” she said. Like, it was an instruction – not something I expect from a one-night stand.

“Well, I am not sure that we can,” I said.

“We need to observe you both,” said Elle.

“You want to watch us sleeping?” asked Connor.

“We want to make sure that you do not change,” said Elle. “We want to make sure that you do not become like us.”

“Have you got some fucking disease?” I said. I was more worried than mad.

“We can explain,” said Bea. “We hope that everything will turn out right. If it does and you do not change, we would like you to come with us. We can make it very rewarding for you if you do. But that could only happen if you stay as you are. If that does not happen then we will have a problem – our effort in coming here will have been wasted. And you will have a different problem …”.

“What the fuck is happening?” Connor called out. He seemed to be clutching his crotch. Then I felt something in mine too. It was as if I was being turned inside out.

“This is very unfortunate,” said Bea without any emotion at all.

“What the fuck have you given us?” I cried out, my voice seeming to break like a teenager.

“We cannot help you,” said Elle. “We would like to, but we cannot. Change is unstoppable. We have tried many things. It cannot be stopped. If you lie back and do not fight it then it will be painless.”

“Who are you?” I shouted in distress.

The two women looked at one another, and then Bea dropped the bombshell.

“We are not of this world,” she said. “We have travelled here from the other side of the galaxy. As you can see, we are a humanoid species just like you, but we have an adaptive metabolism. We had hoped that because you are not adaptive in this way, you might not to succumb to the sex change problem that has plagued our planet. It appears that we are wrong.”

“Sex change problem!” it was Connor’s voice but higher. I would not have believed it if I had not heard it, and then I looked over at him and saw physical changes too, happening before my eyes.

“Wake up!” I shouted in the hope that this was what it was, a nightmare. I would waken in my own bed alone. I had never met these people. This had never happened. The only logical explanation was that it was all a delusion.

Bea continued to talk even as our bodies seemed to crack and contort. “Our planet is in trouble. Coitus has changed our men into women. Without men our species cannot survive. Reserved sperm is running low and has insufficient variation.”

“We should have just milked them,” said Elle to her colleague. “Now we don’t even have that. The male glands of both subjects have disappeared.”

I saw Connor reach between his legs. There were no balls there and the little member that was all that was left of his penis escaped back between his fingers. I dared not reach down, but my chest was swelling and I soon found myself cupping breasts that were becoming increasingly heavy.

I could see that Connor’s hair was growing too. It was fair with a tinge of ginger and he normally wore it short. Now it was in large volume and growing. My hair was long and tied back, but that tie was irrelevant as large falls of soft hair now appeared on either side of my face.

“We must go,” said Bea. “We have to report the failure of our mission. But you can keep our clothes which are no use to us, and the currency payment device that we built beside the bed. We are very sorry that this did not work out. We wish you well.

They were both stark naked, as we were too, but just like that they walked to the door of the room and left.

“What are we going to do now?” The voice came from Connor, but it was a woman’s voice. Connor was standing by the bed now, reddish hair framing a pretty face, and a taut and curvy body in full view.

“I think that we should follow but I am not going out naked,” I said. I saw my jeans and shirt and Bea’s dress and heels. I should have known that something even stranger was afoot when I went straight to the dress. It was only later that I found out that my own clothes would hang off me like a scarecrow.

Connor took my lead, but by the time we stepped outside, there was no sign of two naked women.

“Where could they be?” chirped the girl who was Connor, smoothing her dress over the bra underneath it. “Maybe they have gone back to the Roadhouse?”

“I don’t think so,” I said. “But we can check. It is not as if we have any other ideas.”

It was only a block away. We had got from there to the motel is seconds when we were hot for sex, it only took minutes to walk back.

The Roadhouse had filled up during the time we were talking to our visitors, but now it had emptied again to only a dozen people, mostly men. They looked at us as we walked over to the bar.

“Hey Mac,” said Connor to the barkeep. “Have you seen our two friends? Two blonde Swedish girls?”

“You are wearing their dresses,” said Mac, clearly puzzled that there was yet another pair of strange women in town, without wondering how she knew his name. “So you probably know that they left with those two contract drillers, Zane and somebody.”

“Connor,” squeaked Connor, his girly voice indignant, his feminine lip pouting and his breasts heaving.

I took him by the arm and led him away to the back. There were toilets there, and I had the good sense to point him into the ladies.

“What are you doing? Look at yourself in the mirror. You are not going to tell them that you are Connor the driller are you?”

“I look awful,” said Connor.

I had a small bag that had been left by Bea and Elle and I had put the lipstick and mascara in it. Connor grabbed them as I offered them.

“I can do this,” he said. It seemed as if he could. I could too.

“Let’s go back out there and start again,” I said. Maybe ask if anybody has seen them?”

We went back out and walked back to the bar. We asked the barkeep to call out, and he did.

“Listen up everybody. These ladies are from out of town, and they have lost their friends. They were two slim blond women who wore similar clothes to theirs. Can anybody help them with some information?”

I saw Hal Nordstrom walking over. We had a few run ins with this guy. He owned the tractor dealership and mechanical engineering workshop in town and had sold us pipe at inflated prices.

“If I were you, I would be looking for Zane Browning and Connor Mulligan. They were last seen with your friends. They strike me as an untrustworthy pair.”

“Well, I am Zoe Brown, Zane’s sister and this is Colleen who is Connor’s sister, and our brothers are out looking for them right now, so that is no help.”

“I can see the family likeness now you mention it,” said Hal, without missing a beat. “So why don’t you let me buy you ladies a cocktail while we wait for your brothers to get back?”

I looked across. She mouthed the name “Colleen” with a look of disapproval, but I guessed that she wanted what I wanted – a strong drink. So that is what we asked for.

We went back out to the ladies for another meeting about a half hour later.

Colleen said: “Do you think that we have what they have? I mean, do you think that if we have sex with guys, it will turn them into women?”

“Are you talking about having sex with guys? Are you crazy?”

“Maybe if we have sex like they did with us we will change back?” said Colleen, reaching for our shared lipstick to freshen up.

“They said it was unstoppable, and as it is a problem for their planet I guess it is irreversible. But they did say that we are different.”

“I don’t mind the idea of being a chick,” said Colleen puckering at the mirror. “But being a chick that can’t have sex does not sound good. We need to know. If it turns our sex partner turns female then with Hal Nordstrom that would not be so bad. But you should do it. It is clear that he has the hots for you.”

I should have been surprised that she was talking like this, but I wasn’t. It seemed that the change we had undergone had played with our minds too. We had female feelings and urges. I suddenly found myself imagining Hal Nordstrom naked, and it excited me. I too, needed to freshen up, and check that my breasts were on display.

So we went back in and while Colleen chatted up the bartender Hal worked his chat on me. I played along, but I had decided that Colleen was right – we needed to know.

I put the motel room key on the bar, and Hal snatched it up. I winked at Colleen as he led me away.

Within minutes I was experiencing my first sex as a woman. I have to tell you that it is ten times better than sex as a man. But I was a little drunk and tired from everything that had happened that day, so I just fell asleep in his arms.

I remember waking with my back to him, dreading that when I rolled over a woman would be in bed with me and that I would carry a curse that would see me unable to live the life I had only glimpsed and seen might be perfect. I could barely look. I swung my legs out of bed. The body next to me stirred.

I turned and there he was – Hal Nordstrom, his eyes blinking in the morning light.

“You’re a man!” I almost shouted it. I pulled off the sheet to reveal his penis, now flaccid but still large. I stroked it lovingly. It was an instrument of pure pleasure. “Thank God, you’re a man.”

“Yes, I am,” he smiled. “And you’re a woman.”

And he was right. I still am.

We are married now, Hal and I. He is a good man really. Hard nosed in business, but that it just because he looks after his own, and now that includes me.

Colleen is married too. She lives two doors down. Our kids are the same age so we basically live in one another’s houses.

Zane and Connor never reappeared so their sisters sold out – it is now Nordstrom Drilling. Colleen and I sit on the Board.

So, you see, we can tell nobody. We live our lives. Why say anything? Nobody would believe us. We would be branded as crazy. We have only one item of proof, and that is “the currency payment device” that they left us. It is a little grey thing, about the size of a credit card. When you hold it near an automatic teller machine it turns of the camera and just dispenses $1,000.00. We have only used it a couple of times in our town – we don’t want our ATM removed. But in other towns we have used it a little too much, and I guess that makes us thieves.

Our husbands provide for us, and we have some money of our own, but it is nice to have our independence and just get away sometimes.

And when we do we always find ourselves looking up at the sky and remembering that we were once visited. And when we do that, we are always smiling.

The End

© Maryanne Peters 2021

Author's Note:
Erin is always haranguing me to write more fantastical stuff – she loves aliens. I did my best to resist, but I finally relented. It is not usually my thing, but here is a fantastical alien story. But there is more coming. I am working on an anthology to be published on Amazon which will be entirely science fiction and will include stories like "Virtuality" and "Anomaly" and one that Erin had a hand in called "The Doll Factory" so wait for that. But I am not sure whether this story even belongs there ... what do you think?