“Is it really going to be that bad?” I asked.

  “Oh yes. You will not feel pain, but it will be miserable.” Kos-Api told me.

  “Can’t you knock me out?”

  “No. I will be messing with your nervous system and I need you awake to tell me if you lose feeling anywhere.”

  “Ok everyone, we are docked at the space station. Please take the lift in the starboard side air lock and then follow the corridor signage to the bus.” came the girl’s voice from hidden speakers.

  Ashley was waiting for us.

  “I sent everyone else ahead.” she said.

  “Wait for me please?” the pilot girl said as she stuck her head out the door to the front.

  “You’re observing?” asked Troy.

  “No, not directly. My Prima has an interest so I am sticking around to give my impressions of how the whole thing goes. My parents will be coming up to the station today for lunch.”

  We wound down and around through the station and onto another bus, but this one just took us and the doctors out to one of many exterior buildings(?) that were hovering outside near the space station.

  “Kos-Api, it is a pleasure to finally meet you.” said another unfamiliar voice.

  “You are Bezalel? This is rather exciting.” exclaimed Kos-Api. “Bezalel and I have been corresponding since I asked the space people for support. Bezalel makes human bodies from ah… DNA.”

  “I supervise the team that does so, but yes. I know a lot about how you are put together.” the voice clarified.

  “Bezalel will be doing the technology parts of this procedure while I handle the magic parts.”

  “Good to meet you?” I was still very confused.

  “The squiddies frequently digitize their brains. Electronic people are still people.” Troy leaned in and whispered in my ear. Ah, that makes sense.

  “And you must be Amanda.” the voice continued. “If you continue to the next room there will be a place to store your things.”

  I did so and saw a cloth laid out on a table with some shelves behind it. It was a poncho.

  “Not quite the medical gown you may have been expecting, but slightly less drafty.” the voice joked. It had followed me into this room.

  “I’m not feeling very good with all the people. Can we get together and talk about it?”

  “A moment while I collect your friends, but yes.” Bezalel said. After a few moments Kos-Api and Troy came in.

  “What’s up?” asked Troy. I just hugged him. He smelled good even with the space suit on.

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  I nodded.

  “Can you explain your part and then I will explain mine?” Kos-Api asked the voice in the room.

  “Yes. Amanda, it will be my responsibility to monitor your health and keep the needed chemistry in your blood. To that end, we will be introducing endoscopic probes next to your jugular down to your heart. We will stabilize them using something very similar to a cervical collar. It will be a little uncomfortable but it will not hurt. We will also run a catheter because we will be using your kidneys to assist the filtering. Kos-Api assures me the catheter will not interfere with the procedure.”

  “I will be reshaping the exterior using standard healing techniques. After that I will be reshaping your pelvis so nothing is squished when I am done. It is going to be a little distressing because I will have to introduce several breaks and heal them. Again, we will block pain but it will still be audible.” said Kos-Api. “From there I'll be working my way inward to get the appropriate new organs completed. Finally we will be implanting a token in your body to manage a gene therapy enchantment.”

  “In the interests of full disclosure, the token will also function like an IUD.” interrupted the voice over the speakers.

  “An IUD? You are giving me an IUD?” I asked.

  “Do you not fully understand what it is that you have asked me to do?” asked Kos-Api cautiously. “Do you need more time to fully consider it?”

  “NO!” I was frantic. “I want this! I just wasn’t expecting everything to be there and… functional, I guess.”

  “Must give body chemistry time to settle. No hormone birth control or supplements, no pregnancy.” Kos-Api affirmed emphatically. “Give body time to find cycle. One full year.”

  Hiccups. When did I get the hiccups?

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  “No crying.” Kos-Api took my hand and bit it again lightly. “You are my brave girl, remember?”

  “No HRT?”

  “Ovaries will make estradiol.”

  It was about an hour before I could stay composed enough to finish getting ready. Once I was on the table, which was more like a configurable padded surface than the operating table I was expecting, two robots put the collar around my neck and ran the catheter. Blegh. There was a strong pinch in my neck and then the robots put headphones on me. I got to watch music visualizations on the ceiling as tubes moved into place inside me and Kos-Api got started. God that felt weird.

  Kos-Api took a staff from another robot as yet another started arranging books in easy reach behind her.

  “That one and that one.” she corrected. “Those three go back, and those two also stay.” Books were rearranged.

  “Preparatory stages” she announced and started speaking in a language I didn’t know. Circles on top of circles appeared in the air, rotating and moving around her and each other. After a few minutes she seemed satisfied.

  “First stages targeting tissue deconstruction. Cellular material will choke the blood stream, must keep it filtered out. Note contents of blood, will need raw materials put back in at a controlled rate for the next step. Slowly ramp up blood pressure one percent per minute until at plus 10 percent of current. After modify as you see fit for best results. You probably know this better than I. Keep blood sugar at current level until the next phase. I am ready to begin.”

  “I am also ready to begin.” came the voice from above the table. “Amanda, do remain calm. As we discussed, this will be unpleasant but you are in no danger.”

  “If you get an itch or something you can speak up and we will aid you. Try to keep arms at sides and legs mostly still. Normal body movements will not be dangerous.” Kos Api finished and directed her attention back to her hovering magic circles. She started speaking softly again in that strange language. I would call it a chant except she didn’t repeat herself in a pattern I could pick up. Circles moved but overall I felt nothing unusual except for the slowly developing headache. She kept talking softly to herself, and circles kept moving but nothing else seemed to happen. I got bored and more headachey but mostly bored.

  “Amanda, you can try to take a nap if you like. At the current rate of progress this part should be complete in about four to five more hours.” the voice said over my headphones and then the music resumed. Kos-Api never broke her rhythm in speaking to her little magic circles but I noticed at some point a pitcher and a glass of water had appeared on the table next to her books.

  “Getting hungry.” I murmured softly.

  “I am keeping your blood sugar at a consistent level, so the feeling is just your digestive system complaining at having nothing to do. Please bear with it and know that your health is in good hands.”

  I drifted off at some point. I could finally see why Troy just tried to sleep if he wasn’t doing anything. Was this boredom what military life was like? After a nap they put a crafting game on the screen on the ceiling and the instructions up on the screen said they would just measure my hand motions for the game controls. It was surprisingly intuitive.

  “Alright. Take short break and then we will be ready for next step.” Kos-Api finally said. She looked over at me. “Light liquid only. Robot will help you. You can sit up but don’t try to touch anything. Not done yet.”

  The curiosity was killing me. However, I would be an adult about this. The table reshaped under me and a robot kept me stable as I sat up. The collar around my neck wasn’t too heavy and the tubes had enough slack that they didn’t pull on me. The poncho still draped over me fully down to my knees so I couldn’t see what Kos-Api had done.

  I had a bowl of some thin soup and then the robots aided me in some stretching before laying me back down again. Kos-Api spun up her magic circles again and checked them all.

  “OK, put in pain block now for bone modification. Amanda, you will hear bone breaking lots but not feel it. Hold still until I say. Need to get pelvis shape correct. Do not try to help by moving your pelvis.”

  “Would a general nerve block so that Amanda can’t move anything below the waist be advisable?” asked the voice.

  “Yes, do that.” I quickly went numb from my tummy down.

  “OK, Amanda, are you ready to continue?” Kos-Api asked me.

  “Yes.” I tried to get comfortable again and breathe slowly. The robots replaced my headphones.

  “Increase blood pressure and blood sugar slowly. Keep under danger levels and be ready to stay ahead of rapid increases in sugar consumption when I do this.” Kos-Api splayed the fingers of her left hand above her head with her thumb pointed down and touching her opposing ear.

  “Why that motion specifically?” asked the voice.

  “All words and motions used when performing Workings exist only to ensure every act is deliberate.” Kos-Api answered. “I will do that because it is a thing that would not be done by chance.”

  “Understood, and I am ready.” said the voice. As the music resumed in my headphones, Kos-Api started her murmured incantations again, directing her attention this way and that before settling on a thousand yard stare towards my middle. As she spoke, she picked up and put down a scepter in the hand that wasn’t holding her staff in order to touch one book or another. I directed my attention back to the game on the ceiling and tuned out the frequent clicking transmitted up through my body to my eardrums.

  Again the minutes stretched as Kos-Api kept talking softly to herself and her magic circles. Occasionally she would inform the voice of a needed adjustment, but even that got boring to listen to. After a while the numbness went away and the soft murmur of Kos-Api’s voice lulled me to sleep again.

  Some time later Kos-Api woke me up. As I looked around I could see that everything had been put away and the lights dimmed.

  “Are you feeling rested? You have had a busy night.” she joked.

  “Oddly yes. What time is it?”

  “In North Carolina it is currently ten in the morning on Saturday.” said the voice.

  “You’ve been at this for… how many hours now?” I asked.

  “Enough to be finished. It is done.” Kos Api confirmed.

  “Can I see?”

  “Silly question. Is your body. Observers are gone. Is only me and Bezalel here, and we know what you look like inside and out now.”

  I threw off the poncho. No mirror. Crap, I couldn’t ask for one like some kind of creep. I’d look closer later. All I could see now without gawking like a perv was that I was smooth and my hips were lower and wider. It was wonderful.

  “I need a shower.”

  “Put your poncho back on and I’ll show you where to go.” said the voice.

  “You have read up on proper care for new parts, yes?” asked Kos-Api. “I need to go to Texas now and report in. You and Troy follow and I talk to you once free.”

  I couldn’t help it. I was suddenly crying again, and I wrapped Kos-Api up in as tight a hug as I could manage. She didn’t seem put out at all about being glomped by a nakie woman in tears.