Consciousness returned in waves, sluggish and disorienting. First, there was the hard, unyielding press of the floor beneath my back. Then, the muffled hum of voices, distorted and distant, like they were speaking through water. Every inch of me ached—a dull, throbbing pain that seeped into my bones, heavy and unfamiliar.
I groaned, instinctively bringing a hand to my face, and cracked my eyes open. A sharp, blinding light stabbed into my retinas. I winced and slammed them shut again, my heart hammering in my chest.
“Mia? Honey, can you hear me?”
Mom’s voice. Tight with worry.
I tried to respond, but what came out wasn’t my voice. It was a deep, hoarse croak, like someone else had spoken through me. Slowly, I forced myself to sit up, every movement feeling clumsy and strange. I blinked a few times, letting the room swim into focus.
My family stood over me, forming a tense semicircle. Mom was still in her lab coat, her face pinched and pale. Dad was there too, his usually sharp suit rumpled and hanging awkwardly on him, like he hadn’t slept in days. And Chloe—my little sister—was wide-eyed and silent, hugging herself as if trying to disappear into the background.
“What…?” I started to speak, but my voice— that voice—stopped me cold.
It was rough, gravelly, and unmistakably masculine. My stomach churned.
“What the hell…” My hands trembled as I stared down at my body for the first time. And it wasn’t my body. Gone were my slender arms and soft curves. In their place were thick, hairy limbs—muscle-corded arms that stretched out far longer than they should have. The pajamas I had fallen asleep in were stretched tight over broad shoulders, a flat, hard chest, and hips that no longer fit the narrow waistband. Everything felt wrong. Bigger. Heavier.
Between my legs…
“Oh my god.” The words tore out of me, strangled and panicked. With shaking hands, I groped at my crotch, hoping—*praying*—I was imagining it. But there it was. Solid. Unmistakable. A penis and testicles where there should have been smooth skin, soft mounds, the body I had always known.
Nausea rose fast and hot, burning the back of my throat. “Oh my god, oh my god…” I could barely get the words out, my breath coming in ragged gasps.
“Mia, look at me.” Mom’s voice cut through the rising panic, urgent but gentle. She knelt beside me, her face creased with worry. “The pills in my office—the ones in the glass vial—did you take them?”
I could only nod, jerky and uncoordinated. “I… I thought…”
“You wanted to be older, didn’t you?” She let out a long, shaky breath, pinching the bridge of her nose. “The nanites in those pills were programmed to accelerate aging. But the gender switch…” Her voice trailed off as she shot a pained glance at Dad. “That must have been caused by the testosterone boosters we added to counteract muscle loss. They weren’t calibrated for a teenage girl’s biochemistry.”
Dad let out a sound that was halfway between a laugh and a sob, running a hand through his disheveled hair. “Christ, Elizabeth. You’re telling me our daughter overdosed on anti-aging drugs and turned herself into a man?”
“I’m not a man!” The shout exploded out of me, louder and rougher than I expected. I scrambled to my feet, nearly toppling over as my legs—too long, too unfamiliar—struggled to hold me up. I stumbled across the room in clumsy strides, heading straight for the mirror.
I froze when I reached it, staring at the reflection of a stranger who stared back. The same hazel eyes, the same crooked quirk to the mouth, but that’s where the familiarity ended. The face in the mirror was harder, wider, covered in rough stubble. Close-cropped hair, thick eyebrows, and an angular jaw that looked like it had been sculpted from stone.
It was like staring at a distorted version of Dad. A funhouse version of myself that I couldn’t escape.
Tentatively, I lifted my hand to my face, the movement sluggish, like I was swimming through water. The man in the mirror mimicked me, and when my fingers brushed the rasp of a beard, reality hit me all at once.
A primal, keening cry ripped from my throat, raw and agonized. I clawed at my clothes, trying to tear them off, trying to tear off this skin, this body that wasn’t mine. But it wouldn’t come off. No matter how hard I pulled, no matter how much I screamed. The body in the mirror —this strange, terrifying, male body — was mine now.
“This can’t be happening,” I moaned, sagging against the wall, my legs trembling with the weight of everything crashing down on me. “It was supposed to make me older, not… not this!” My voice cracked with desperation. I turned to Mom, blinking back tears, my heart racing. “You can fix this, right? You can change me back?”
She hesitated, her face crumpling with sympathy. “I… I don’t know, sweetie. We’ve never tested the nanites’ effects on trans-sexual mutations. The reversal process… it’s complicated.”
“You have to try!” My voice broke, the panic rising again. “I can’t stay like this. I can’t be a… a…”
“A man,” Dad finished, his voice heavy with resignation. He stepped forward, awkwardly laying a hand on my trembling shoulder. “But that’s what you are now, Mia. At least on the outside. Until your mother finds a way to fix this… you’re going to have to learn to live with it.”
I shook my head, backing away from his touch, my throat tight with anger and fear. “No. No, I can’t. This isn’t… this isn’t me.” My words dissolved into a sob, and I felt my knees buckle as I collapsed onto the couch.
"Starting with keeping your new equipment in your pants, young lady!" Mom’s voice cut through the chaos, shrill and sharp. Her eyes darted to Chloe, who was still standing in the corner, pale and wide-eyed. “I know this is a shock, but you can’t just… go flopping around in front of your sister!”
I stared at her, horrified, suddenly aware of how exposed I was. My hands—those huge, foreign hands—were hovering near my crotch. Mortification rushed through me, burning my skin, and I yanked my hands away like they were on fire.
I buried my face—my alien, unfamiliar face—in my hands, trying to steady my breathing. Trying to process the unimaginable.
What had I done? In my desperate attempt to escape the awkwardness of my teenage life, I’d trapped myself in something so much worse. A body I didn’t understand. A life I didn’t want. It felt like some kind of sick cosmic joke, and I was the punchline.
And now, I had no idea how to break free.
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