The Great Shift - Space Cadets free porn video

The Great Shift: Space Cadets By Jerrie526 Beta Quadrant, Space Station Terra 19, June 14, 12012 AD 10,000 Light years from Earth Commanders Log: It has been more than 10,000 years since the phenomenon that came to be known as The Great Shift occurred back in the late 20th Century. The event that changed Humanity for what some people felt was for the worst. But the human race had proved to be highly adaptable. The shift happened and within months, it was business as usual for Humanity. But we were so drastically changed in our outlook that actual comfort was not easy in coming. Many changes came out of it, due to the very nature of what caused the Shift, on a gift of the brilliant mind of a young girl. She single- handedly created things that permitted mankind to leave the confines of Earth and explore the galaxy and colonize it. This station is the result of her work. Being that it is made with one of the most thin walled substances ever made and it is stronger than steel of any sort. My station is located 10,000 light years from Earth. It is 5 miles long, 1 mile high and 2 miles wide. It houses nearly two million people in it's bulk. It also has enough lifepods to carry the whole crew out in case something happens but in the nearly 10,000 years this has been in existence, there has never been any emergency that required anyone to be evacuated. We have been struck by meteors the size of basketballs but all that happened was that we heard a huge thud on the wall where they had struck but that is it. We later found out that each one of the meteors had exploded into dust after hitting the panels. We owe a lot of debt to the young woman that goes by the name of Tamara. She created the polymer that allows us to build the shells of our space stations plus the polymer is used to build lightweight space ship shells. They protect us in space and we do not have to worry about hull breaches caused by space junk. Life is good here on the station but who knows, things can change in an instant if we are not vigilant. Col. Conrad Janson Commander, Earth Station Terra 19 GS + 4 days Medical Journal - Dr. Arthur Fielding I have been assigned to the case of a young girl, age 13, who was brought in to the hospital yesterday suffering from what seems to be multiple personalities. She has been speaking in three separate voices at different times. Most of the time, the voices are mixed together and all that comes out is gibberish. Nothing we have done has been able to bring her out of it and we have been forced to sedate her and strap her to her bed to keep her from possibly hurting herself. We will be trying some rather radical procedures to try to bring her out of this, umm, fugue state she is in. I know the term is not accurate for her condition but there really is no other way to term it. GS + 0 Young Tamara Clark was doing one of her things: she was talking to her favorite cousin, Jeremy, on the computer. Ever since her parents and his parents got them their very own computers, they have been conversing using one of the popular instant messaging programs. They were trying out a new voice program using a headset and microphone that was connected to the computers and the Internet. They both liked the ability to talk in real time and keep each other up to date with their lives. Tamara was 13 years old and her parents felt overly protective of her but they knew she was okay around 14 year old Jeremy. Both kids were the only children of their parents and were fairly spoiled. Since Tamara lived in New Mexico and her cousin lived in Minnesota, they rarely were able to see each other. But they did have the chance to spend time together every summer and they were making some finalization of the plans they were making for Jeremy's visit down to where Tamara lived. It was supposed to occur the next week and both kids were very excited. In Tamara's room, all of a sudden a sub-sonic vibration occurred that set her hair on end. As she stopped talking to Jeremy for an instant, things went black. The Great Shift had occurred. Tamara found her mind dislodged from her body and forced through the Internet into Jeremy's body. But because of her sudden arrival in his body, a jerk of his arm caused the goldfish bowl to be pushed off of the desk that took up an entire wall of his room. Because this young man had a fixation for anything electronic, he had all sorts of electrical cords and plugs scattered all over the floor below the desk. The bowl hit the floor and shattered, cascading water all over the electrical strips and over Jeremy's leg. Because of the interaction of the electricity and the water, a circuit was completed and a surge of electricity coursed through Jeremy's body. It was enough of an overload to cause a re-surge of the Shift force in Jeremy's brain and forced Tamara back out of the body. This time, her mind was sent back down through the Internet again but instead of making a straight line back to a body, she went through the Internet databases gathering information without even realizing it. On one leg of her nearly instantaneous journey, she encountered a force that was also traveling the Internet. The force and her mind came in contact with each other and merged. The force was the database that was contained in the object that caused the Great Shift. After the merging of the mind and force, a route was retraced back to the only place that was open to them: Tamara's body. Jeremy's mind had not yet regained consciousness and the merged mind/database re-entered the body. The body remained out of contact with the real world and the brain tried desperately to sort the data that was suddenly infused in to it. GS + 1 year From the journal of Dr. Arthur Fielding Tamara came out her fugue today. She woke up completely lucid and had asked where she was. Although she was still very weak, she wanted to get out of the bed. Since we could not actually restrain her anymore, we did permit her to get out of bed. Although we did make sure that it was only in a wheelchair until we can get her strength built back up to where it should be. She had a haunted look in her eyes that had the tell-tales of having gone through a literal hell inside her own mind. I was able to sit down and have a long conversation with her concerning her last year. She told me that when the shift happened, she had been shunted out of her body over the Internet into Jeremy's body and was then rejected when his body was electrocuted. She was then bounced around several databases connected to the Internet and gathered information and retained it before leaving the site. She eventually ran into a huge force that turned out to be an alien database that was traveling the Internet searching for a new home since the one it was in had been destroyed. The contact with the young girl's mind was instantaneous and it merged with her thought patterns. She continued her travels and finally wound up back in her body. Since her cousin Jeremy already inhabited it, the entrance of her mind and that of the alien database caused a conflict in the storage areas of the brain. That is what caused her fugue state. It took her brain a year to merge all the data that had been poured into it on the day of the shift. We gave her an IQ test after hearing that she felt smarter and that the alien artifact that exploded had been intended to help the inhabitants of Earth gain the stars and join the galactic community. Her IQ results were off the scale. At a rough estimate, she has an IQ of around 20,000. Nobody has ever had more than a 300 IQ in recorded history. This girl has inside her head all the data that will help humanity leave the confines of the Earth and the solar system. GS + 1 Year 10 days From the Journal of Dr. Arthur Fielding Today, Tamara asked for a variety of common chemicals for what she termed as an experiment. She has physically improved over last 10 days since she re-awakened. She has been letting Jeremy talk with his parents as well as her talking with her parents. It is so confusing to hear the two separate speech patterns coming out of that person. Tamara's experiment was what she called a success. She went alone into on of the labs we have here at the hospital and was in there for about two hours. By the time she came back out, she was carrying a sheet of what looked like a stiff paper like substance. It was about 5' x 5' square and gave a slight wobble when it was carried. But it was so lightweight that she had no problem carrying it. She asked to be taken to a shooting range to do some further experimenting. Upon arrival to the range, she set the sheet up on a target frame. We had enlisted the help of one of the shooters that was there from the police department. She had been trying to re-qualify after coming back to the force from maternity leave. She had a lot of work to do on her former wife's body to get it ready to be a police officer again. Her wife had been two months pregnant when the Shift happened and they swapped bodies. Since both of them wanted the baby, she went ahead with the pregnancy and had the baby girl about 5 months ago. She still is not ready to go back to active duty but she expects to be in about a month. When Tamara was set up with the sheet, she explained that she needed the shooter to fire one shot at the sheet. But before the shooter could take aim, Tamara hurried over to where the sheet was and stood behind it. Ms. Hughes was so upset over that that she refused to fire. Tamara explained that the sheet was designed to withstand any impact that might hit it. Only with a lot of explaining and encouragement, Ms. Hughes finally relented and allowed Tamara to stay. Being very careful with her aim, she fired one shot. The sheet wobbled with the impact but it was not penetrated. Close inspection showed that the bullet disintegrated into nothingness. The test was a success. Tamara then explained that it was a new polymer that could be used as the skin of space going vessels. It was designed to withstand the highest velocity of impact and was only the thickness of a piece of shoebox cardboard. As a further test, it was taken out to a military firing range and set up as a target for a tank projectile. Again, the projectile was shattered into nothingness. The only thing that showed on the sheet was the dust of the disintegrated projectile. A patent attorney was contacted for getting a patent on the polymer along with its suggested use. GS + 2 years From the Journal of Dr. Arthur Fielding Today was a monumental day for Tamara. The US launched the first ship of the new design submitted by Tamara. It was the size of a medium sized motorhome and was made with a shell of the new polymer and had as its propulsion unit a new engine that was a bit larger than a jet engine but used a combination of fusion and jet-type propulsion. Tamara had managed to create the first real fusion engine that caused clean burning of the fuel. The fuel was contained in a 500- gallon tank in the lower side of the ship. The fuel was one of the most plenty substances on the planet: water. The engine was designed to propel the ship at speeds that would be nearly the speed of light. There was a little kicker to the ship - it could pass the speed of light by folding the fabric of the universe is some way that allowed it to pass thousands of light years in an instant. But please do not ask me how it is done because I do not understand the theory behind it. Tamara is the only one that understands it but that is only because of the alien artifact inside her head. Nobody else in the world understands it either but they can put the ship together and fly it. We had about 4 hours of wait before the test ship returned. It returned without any problems. The pilot reported that the flight was so quick that he had a hard time keeping up with the display. If it were not for the computer taking over the flight controls, he might not have returned. Somehow Tamara had managed to program the computer with all sort of aerospace data based on information from the artifact data. The pilot made a flight of about fifty light years one way. He managed to enter another start system and take photos of planets that surrounded the class F star. None of the planets were inhabited but that is not to say that humans could not use them if the atmospheres proved breathable by us. Further testing will have to be done. Tamara gave us a very cryptic warning to us about avoiding the Shift waveform or the Shift will happen again. The only protection that there would be from it in space would be the atmosphere of a planet. We were warned not to build permanent bases in space within the range of Earth. The wave was traveling the speed of light away from Earth and we may encounter it again one day. The Shift was not meant to happen, according to Tamara. She said that the builder of the artifact had designed it to be a repository of all the knowledge of the universe and dispense it at request. But for some reason, the soil of the ground where it had been found had caused instability in some of the components. When it was discovered and subsequently investigated, the resulting energy that was released was one that had never been seen before by the builders. Therefore, what had happened was a fluke caused by chemicals in the soil of New Mexico. GS + 10,000 years Today started like any other day here at Terra 19. Sometimes boredom is first and foremost the only thing we have to keep ourselves busy. Big deal. Keep busy with boredom? That sort of thing will bring me into an early grave. Since I only have 10 years left on my life span anyway, what are 10 less years? Sometimes, after a person has been alive as long as I have, it all gets to the point that they really don't want to live. For me, I don't really want to live but I really don't want to die. Several years after the Great Shift happened, many changes had been wrought in the lives of humanity that it was hard to deal with. First, we were able to leave the confines of Earth for other solar systems. Then we are able to build the huge space stations that I happened to be in. Oh, I'm sorry. I did not introduce myself. I'm Conrad Janson. I run Terra 19 for Earth. I currently have over two million people in my station working for me or for others here. I have been the commander of this station for nearly 150 earth years. What was that? You don't believe me when I tell you I have been in charge for 150 years? Yes, I know, I do not look a day over 30 but that is the age I chose to remain when I reached the age of 30. The process that was invented by Tamara stopped my aging. As it did with any other human alive. Most people stopped their aging in their early 20's but I felt that I needed to establish a look of authority because I was going to pursue a career in space exploration. But the only problem with the anti-aging programs is that a person has only 500 years to live. For the most part, that is enough for most people to care for. Personally, I could use about 10,000 more years of life, if not more. But I am 490 years old and my time is drawing to an end. I have been training my replacement for the last 10 years but the man is so despicable that I cannot stand to be around him for very long. Jack Dawson has one of the most abrasive personalities that I have ever run across. He has no people skills and when he tries to get people to do something, all he can do is scream at them. If I had any choice in the matter, I would make absolutely sure that he does not it to the command chair of this station. But that is because I have more compassion in the tip of my little finger on my left hand than that man has in his whole body. I do not know what I did to upset the leaders and made them saddle me with this incompetent moron but I am sure they had a good reason for doing so. Suddenly, an alarm goes off throughout the station. As I look for the source of the alarm, my display terminal lights up with the warning. As I look at the display, some sort of energy field washes over me and I passed out. The Great Shift Revisited? As I slowly regained consciousness, things were not right. For one, I was not in my office in the command center of the Station. I was in a small bedroom on a bed. As I shook my head to clear the cobwebs out of it, I felt long hair slap my face. That woke me up fully. Although my head still pounded internally a bit, I was totally alert. I reached up with my hand and took hold of the hair that had slapped my face. The hair was long enough to reach halfway down my back and was a dark brown color. As I was looking closer at it, I noticed that the hand holding the hair was also different. It was a tiny hand and had chipped purple nail polish on. As I looked at my surroundings, everything looked huge! The bed seemed gigantic and the ceiling looked to be twenty feet high. I noticed a mirror on the far wall but I could not see anything so I decided to get up and go inspect myself in it. As I got off the bed, I could not help but notice that it seemed to rise four foot off the floor from the impressions I got from the view of it. I walked over to the mirror and gasped when I saw what was reflected out of it. Standing in front of me in the mirror was the cutest 8-year-old girl I had ever seen. She had on the standard issue school jumper that all children of school age wore to school. The tiny body could not have been more than three and a half feet tall and her hair was tousled as if she had been sleeping very hard. Large brown eyes looked back at me with a tired expression. Cute little button nose in the center of an oval face. Little harp-bow mouth and a cute dainty chin. Tiny shell-like ears underneath the huge mop of hair. No figure on the body but she was too young to have one anyway. All I could do was wonder what had happened. I could not hear anyone in the area where this room was so I had to find out where I was. I left the room and entered into a larger area that was someone's quarters. No one else was in the area so my investigations took me further out. I left the quarters and entered the hallway. Once the door was opened, I was able to hear shouts and screams coming from all directions. More than anything else said, I could hear people asking what had happened. I was curious myself but I seemed to be fairly calm about things. I had a pretty good idea what had happened but I had to prove it. First, I had to find a sector locator and find out where I was in comparison to the control room. I did not have far to go. It read that I was on level 62, quadrant Z16, section RM. Nearly as far as a person can go into the bowels of the station. We only have 65 levels and the bottom three are mostly the agricultural levels. Married crew with families lived in the levels of 45 to 62 depending on how many people were in the families. The higher the number of the level you were on, the smaller the family was. It seemed that there were only two or three people living in the quarters that I just left. Now that I knew where I was, I had to make start making my way up to the command center. Things had to be going crazy up there. I am pretty sure that nobody remembers what happened after the Great Shift occurred but my suspicions were that some how, we had been hit with the Shift again. I had better get going. I had at least an hours travel before I get to the Command Center. When I finally arrived in the Center, chaos reigned. People were shouting as well as screaming. I heard several women crying as well as a lot of men doing the same. Most of all, right in the center of the room stood the Colonel or rather my own body. He was standing there screaming obscenities at people, who were doing their level best to ignore him. I had to laugh or rather giggle at the site. It was none other than my second in command now in my old body. He has not changed despite a new body. He turned around and spotted me and with a flair of anger, he shouted over at me, "Little girl, this is no place to be playing at the moment. You need to run back home and find your mommy!" Still the same old jerk he always was. "I am sorry but I have more right to be here than you do at the present time. I am Colonel Conrad Janson regardless of the body I am wearing right now. We have been hit with the Great Shift wave and I think the whole station has been effected." He did not seem pleased to hear me say that and his face turned beet red. Not easy to do when it was already there. It just turned a deeper red. "Well, if you are such a smart little know-it-all, what is the Colonel's clearance code?" "You know, Jack, that the code cannot be uttered to anyone except to the supreme commanders of the Earth base. I am going to have to contact them anyway to explain our situation. Now if you will excuse me, I am going into my office to make the communication." "You can't go in there," he shouted. "It is off limits to unauthorized people and you are not authorized!" "Since you seem to be thinking that you are the leader, you try to enter the office. It automatically locks when the commander leaves it during an emergency and will only open up with the commander's clearance code. Let's see you open it up." The faux Colonel went over to the door and punched in a series of numbers. A light on the panel lit up red and gave a loud electronic raspberry. "Well, *Colonel*, it seems that the door does not like the code you put into it. Now step aside and let me try." When I input the correct code, the door showed a green light and gave a quick beep along with a click. The door opened by itself and permitted me to enter. I turned and looked up into his face. "Any questions, Major? If not, I have to call Supreme Command on Earth to advise them of the situation. Carry on what ever your duties were before the Shift." With that, he gave a huff and went away. There was blissful silence with his leaving. As if there were not enough problems already, he seemed to be able to compound them a thousand fold just by being around. I went into the office and sat down to my desk. It was hard to see onto it since I was so tiny now. I activated the Comm unit and input the code for the Supreme Commander on Earth. Since the advent of sub-space communications, communications over a span of several thousand light years like this was instantaneous. It took a couple of minutes to get the command center on the vid unit. After I explained to him what had happened, he sent me right to the Earth President. Once I was connected to her vid, I could tell she was not happy. "Who are you to be waking me in the middle of the night? You used a code of the Commander of Station Terra 19 but you are not him." "Madam President, I regret to inform you that I am Colonel Conrad Janson of Terra 19. I am also regretting to inform you that my station was hit with what looks like an energy wave that was most likely the one the hit the Earth 10,000 years ago and caused The Great Shift. Somehow, it still was as potent as ever since it looks like it hit every one of the 2,000,000 people here on the station. Unlike the first one, this has been 100% shifting. There seems to be no known pattern for the shifts with the exception of a few people that changed bodies with someone they were touching. Most of the shifts were not even close to each other. I wound up in the lower levels of the station while Major Jack Dawson wound up in my body. I have yet to run a station wide check to see who people wound up being. That is the next thing on my agenda to do." "Since you have already been able to identify yourself using the specially designed identity codes all commanders are given, I accept you as you are. We need to add someone on to this. Tamara wanted to be alerted in case the Shift hit again. If you can stand by for a moment while I contact her." It took about five minutes before a split in the view screen occurred. A young woman about the age of 19 appeared and looked very tired. Her dark hair was tousled as if she just woke up. Of course, she had just awakened. The President opened up, "Tamara, you left word a long time ago that you wanted to be contacted if the Shift occurred again. I am sorry to say it hit again at Station Terra 19 about two hours ago." With that proclamation, Tamara's eyes went wide. "I warned you people that you had to be careful when building in space. Nothing except a planetary atmosphere could deter the wave from causing the havoc that occurred on Earth 10,000 years ago. You have been very lucky to go this long without an occurrence. Now, who is this girl that is on line with us?" The President looked apprehensive. "She is Colonel Conrad Janson, the commander of Terra 19." Tamara gave a loud barking laugh. "Oh, this is great. I can just see everyone there just falling all over themselves trying to obey her orders. She should be back in school re- learning her history. Now she has gone through what billions of people went through so long ago. And she has to live with the results." I could only blush with embarrassment. "Tamara, I know that it was a long time ago that you issued the warning, but we have to do something about the people here. Since you have the knowledge of the artifact in your head, is there anything that can be done to swap back people's bodies?" "Colonel, no matter what you ask, it is something that cannot be done. My database says that a mind is confined to a body for all times. The Shift was not what was supposed to happen. The only thing that can make a swap is the wave force from the shift. But it is too much of a risk to anyone that encounters it." "But if it is a risk, how can we find out if we can swap bodies back?" "Someone would have to be a guinea pig to find out if it is possible to swap back by deliberately placing themselves in front of the wave as it passes a certain location. But since they would be knocked out, you would have to have the ship they are in automatically returned back to the base. But again, it is not something that I would recommend doing. As I said, it is a serious risk to their safety and their lives. Nobody can predict what could happen to the people involved." "Is there anything that you can recommend besides that idea?" "No, I do not. But I will tell you what, I am going to come out there to see what sort of things can be done. If you could hold off with any experiments until I get there, we will see what can be done." "I will see what I can do. But I have to offer all alternatives to my people. I am going to leave it them to see what they want to do. But as you said, I cannot risk their lives but if someone wants to voluntarily try, I will not stop them." "Colonel, you cannot allow it at all. We do not know what we are dealing with, with this force. It is abnormal and no risk should be taken regardless of whether someone 'volunteers' for the risk. People should adjust to what they are now." "Tamara, I will try to do as you ask, but as I said, I have to offer the alternatives." "Then so be it. If it fails, you will be the one who will be to blame for it." "I accept the responsibility but I will try to keep anyone from making any attempt at changing back until you get here." "Thank you, Colonel. I will leave as soon as I am able to get my ship ready to fly." All I could think was 'What a cold person. The computer in her mind has made her something other than a human.' The split screen effect vanished and I was left with the President alone. "Madame President, before we sign off, I have to ask a couple of questions of you concerning my second in command." "Colonel, I think I know what you are going to ask. He is there at my request. I know of your history and your temperament and I felt that he would learn a lot from being around you." "To be perfectly honest with you, he is not fairing well at all. After the shifting here, I managed to make it back to the Command Center an hour afterward. But when I came into the room, he was standing there in my body screaming at the top of his lungs at people. In my opinion, the man is not of command quality and should not even be in the position he is in right now. But the second item is that he is now in my body and I was only ten years from my physical termination. I am 490 years old and we all know that the best anyone, except Tamara, can live are 500 years. Which means that if we are not able to switch bodies back the way they were, he would more than likely be dead in ten years instead of the 200 that he would have had left. It should be myself that is in the position, which is why we have to try to get people back to where they were. I still have to report the possibility of being able to switch back." "Please do be careful. We cannot afford to lose any people." "I will. Terra 19 out." Quick Cure? After I cut the circuit to Earth, I could only think about what I had to say to the crew of the station. It was hard enough dealing with it myself, sitting here in this tiny body. After I gathered my thoughts, I opened the hailing circuit throughout the station. "Attention. May I have the attention of all people? This is Colonel Conrad Janson. As you all know, we have been subjected to an energy force that caused us all to switch bodies. From the reports, it seems that we have 100% crew coverage and no one is in the body they were born in. I am affected as well. The cause of this switching of bodies was the wave from the Great Shift that occurred on Earth 10,000 years ago. We belatedly found out that it was still going strong after all this time. Now we are working on trying to find a way for everyone to be returned back to his or her original bodies. It is not possible to switch a body because science has never been able to discover a way to separate the mind from the body. I have been in conversation with the only survivor of the original Shift. Tamara is on her way to the station as I speak now. Her arrival will occur within the next 3 to 4 days. "One idea had been discussed about how we could get as many people back into their own bodies and that is to take a few of our shuttles out with limited crews and get in front of the wave and let it pass through them. Now, Tamara says there are risks in this course of action that may cause a loss of life. I for one am not going to order anyone to try this because I do not want to risk anyone's lives unnecessarily and will not ask for volunteers until we can be sure that no ones lives will end. But at the moment, we are going to build a list of people who swapped as a pair and there is no third party involved with the exchange. Once the list is comprised, we will work out the issued of starting to change people back the way they belong. But until that time, please bear with us while we work things out. "Now until such a time as we can find out if re-exchanging bodies will work, every person on this station has duties pre-existing. If you were a child before and you are now an adult, you will still have to finish your schooling. If you were an adult and you are now a child, you will only be limited to the physical limits of the body. You will have to identify yourself to the assigned level leaders who will input the information into the computer system so that we can update the records. Effective immediately, all personnel will report to their level leaders unless your position is vital to the every day critical operation of this station. If you are critical, you will be given the chance once your shift duty is over. Level leaders, chose a second and a third to relieve you after a regular shift length. That is all for now. Thank you for your cooperation in this matter. Janson out." With that, I signed off. I stifled a yawn. I suddenly realized that my body was exhausted and needed to sleep. I had now been in this body for nine hours and I can say for a certainty that it was not used to being pushed as hard as I have been pushing it. I was going to have to find out where the original occupant of this body is. But until I can do that, I am going to have to sleep or I will not be able to function. I made my way to my personal chambers on the command level and pressed the unlock code that permitted me to enter. I went to the full-length mirror on my closet door and again looked at my new self. The girl in the mirror looked like a waif that had tried to stay awake so that she could watch a late night vid broadcast from Earth. Her eyes were rimmed with dark circles and her shoulders were slumped in all evidence of being exhausted. I turned away from the mirror and went to see if there was anything that I could wear as a bed gown. The only thing that I could find that was fit was a t-shirt that seemed to be as big as a circus tent on me. It would have to do since at the moment, I had nothing else to wear. I will have to see that that changes in the morning. I reluctantly did my nightly ablutions and went to bed. I had no sooner lay down and my head hit the pillow, that I was sound asleep. Trying To Ease The Confusion When I finally woke up, it was as if I flipped a light switch. One minute I was asleep, the next I was wide-awake. This girl must have been one of those proverbial morning people. I certainly did not have any ability to stay awake at night. I have never had so much energy as I have now and I was literally bouncing off the wall to get started. Before I could do anything, I had to get something in my tiny little belly because all of a sudden, it let off a loud growl of hunger. I had to think about the day before and it came clear to me that after the shifting of everyone, I did not have anything to eat the rest of the time before I went to sleep. I wondered why I fell asleep so quickly. The only thing I could come up with was the possibility of low blood sugar. I knew that children had a tendency to get sleepy when they have not eaten for a while. I was going to have to watch myself closely until I was able to get everyone back in his or her own bodies. After my new morning ritual of eating, I prepared myself for a day of trying to get things rearranged and issues settled. I had to go to the clothing dispenser to get a new uniform that would fit this tiny frame. Since it had all documentation on every person on the station, all I had to do was place my hand on the ID plate, chose what I wanted to wear and it was delivered within five minutes via the dispensing chute on the wall next to the dispenser. What I had ordered was a new uniform that sort of took advantage of the special facts that I was female and had to have certain things in the design of the uniform but it had everything on it that showed that I was the Commander of the station. Final check was to make sure that I was presentable to the crew and looked professional in my presentation of military regulations. I know that none of them took into consideration to the fact that eight-year- old girls are not station commanders. I felt that I was ready and presented myself to the station at large. As I walked into the control room, I was given a brief glance by all and made my way to the commander's position. "What is the current situation of the crew? I need to know the mental state of all people. I know this is a lot of work but I am sure that after my speech yesterday, everyone has made his or her statements to the level leaders as directed. What I need to know at the moment is the worst cases. Are there any people that do not have the ability to function in their assigned jobs?" One of the Yeomen can forward with a datapad with the information I requested. Although this yeoman was male, I knew that she, now he was up to the task that all of us were involved in. I thanked him and turned to look at the data in front of me. It seemed that the majority of the crew has been trained well enough to take the changes in stride. The first Shift taught us all a lot about the human spirit and psyche. Adapting to a new body was the hardest thing to do back then but it had to be done without the technology that we have now. All training given to people has a lot of simulations done in 3D-VR sim chambers. There are many sims that involve a changing of bodies to many different forms and sexes and well as ages. By the time the training is complete, a person has learned to adjust to a different body although in reality, they still have the one they were born in. Now that reality has set in, training has overcome any problems that might have occurred. The majority of the problems are from those that do not have the extensive military training that 70% of the station has. That group is the civilian populations: wives, children and elderly parents. There are some instances where husbands switched with their wives and a few were in labor to give birth. I know this sounds cruel, but better them than me. I have to try to get this straightened out soon. As I looked over the data, I noticed a special category of volunteers willing to try to swap back using the wave again. All contained the names of two person swaps and the ages of the new bodies. Two of the names were senior officers who were married and will place their lives on the line for their honor and love of who they were before. There was a note stating that they would exit the station in a ship on a moment's notice to make an exchange to restore themselves. I took the matter under advisement. I sent a note off to them stating that they were not under any orders to remain on the station but that if they made the decision to try, they would have to be monitored by medical personnel. But I did let them know that it was advisable to not go until the possibility of problems was worked out. It was only a matter of minutes before an answer was sent back to me that they would try to swap back anyway since they really hated their new bodies and to them any risk was worth it. I sent a note to the medical department advising them to get down to the hanger to wire up the two people for monitoring. We needed the data that would be transmitted back to the station from the ship during the re-exchange. Once all the preparations had been completed, I voiced one last plea. "Jason, Millie, please don't do this. Let's wait for Tamara to arrive so that we can use her expertise with the wave. I fear that you are wasting your lives for something that might not be useable." "Colonel, we have to do this," said Jason. "If we do not do this, we are going to wind up hating each other and our love for one another will have been wasted all our married years." With that, they launched the ship from the hanger bay. Since the wave has been gone for about 22 hours, they would have to proceed to a point that is 24 light hours from the station in order to set themselves up and prepare for the contact. It would take them an hour to arrive at a point beyond the reach of the wave without actually contacting it. To do so, they would have to go to subspace drive and shoot through it to the rendezvous point. Once there, they will have 30 minutes in which to get themselves prepared. The wait was intense for all the people watching the monitors from the ship. As the time grew closer, warning indicators sounded from the proximity of the wave. Before we knew it, the wave contacted the ship and we watched the couple aboard it stiffen and go unconscious. The readings from the brain monitors changed dramatically and went through some very wild gyrations before flatlining. I stood up and screamed out, "Get that ship back here immediately! Activate the return program and make it return double time!" I knew I was too late even as I said it. All body monitors were ceasing to function as they sent back readings that showed no life in either body. But we would have to wait until the ship returned. Because of the accelerated return program, we were able to get the ship back here within 15 minutes but it did little good for the two poor souls aboard. I sat down heavily on my chair. I knew something was going to happen to them but I could not talk them out of it. All I could do was sit there and cry. It was my fault for not ordering them to remain onboard the station. Settling In By the time Tamara arrived, things were sort of getting back to normal, if the mass confusion could be called normal. The loss of the two people had devastated the morale of everyone here. Nobody was really saying anything about the Shift and their new bodies. One thing that was some sort of consolation to me was the fact that I may have lost two people out of two million, when the Earth was hit originally there was a loss of life of more than five million world wide. Many came from automobile crashes or airplane crashes. There were about one hundred that died skydiving during an exhibition in Las Vegas. There was only one survivor and that one was not shifted out of his body. The rest had all swapped with someone that was never found out because they all died when they failed to open their parachutes and hit the ground at two hundred miles per hour. Tamara's arrival was a quiet affair because nobody really thought she could do anything for us. I and a couple of other officers were the only ones to greet her ship. She swept onto the station hanger deck as if she owned it. The first thing out of her mouth was, "Colonel, I told you that you could not permit anyone from making the attempt to re-exchange. From the report I received two days ago, you went ahead and let two people go to their deaths. And from the looks of things, you have done nothing to limit the damage. I had expected a better greeting than this but from the looks of things, your people feel that you personally murdered these two people." "Tamara, everything you say is true. I have lost the respect of my people and my rank means nothing to them. Everything has to do with my physical stature and physical age. People look at me and see an eight-year-old girl and they have no respect of me. I could have stopped those two from leaving the station but my own self-doubt had taken a hold of me. I can see the anger and the hurt in every person's eyes. I have let everyone down with my personal indecisiveness and I feel that my career is at an end. I was going to retire in another year or two but now, I don't know. Maybe I should step down now. It is too late to prevent the deaths and the respect is gone." I said the last part with tears in my eyes. Before I knew it, I was curled up in a corner bawling my eyes out. I could not help myself. Before too long, I was all cried out and could do nothing but sniffle and dry my eyes. Tamara had made no move in the half-hour it took me to cry myself out. She acted like she was completely untouched by my outburst. But of course, she was 10,000 years old and had seen practically everything that she could see. "Well, Colonel, maybe if you are through, we can see what we can do about damage control. Now, I need to see the data that was transmitted back here from the ship. If you will take me to see it, I will do what I can to interpret what it says." I lead her into the medical department and logged onto the computer and accessed the data from the ship. "Tamara, I have duties to perform and I need to leave for now. If you need anything, all you long have to do is ask someone and they will do it or get it for you. If you need me, all you have to do is ask the computer to contact me. I will come as soon as I can." I left her to her work and made sure that her bags were taken to her new quarters and were waiting for her to make use of them. But afterward, I went back to my office and began the preparations to start my retirement. I could no longer be in command of this station without the respect that I had earned so long ago. I set to typing out my resignation and retirement papers and when I was completed, I transmitted it back to the President. I then went back to my now former quarters and began to sort through my belongings to see what sort of things I was going to keep. The communicator chimed a request to be answered. "Colonel Janson here." "Colonel, this is Tamara. I have come up with some information on the two dead officers. Can you come up here? I will go over the information with you." "Certainly. I will be there in a few minutes." I immediately left and went to medical. Upon arrival, I noticed a look of concern on Tamara's face. "What have you found?" I asked. Tamara turned away momentarily. "I don't think I have any good answers for you. It seems that the re-exchange was successful because I was able to look at the brain scans of both people that were taken several months ago and compared them to the ones that came from the ship. I was able to determine that both minds made the transition but it seems that both the brains rejected the original minds once they were transported back to the other body. From the look of other information, the brain seized caused the loss of the minds. It does not look like anyone will ever be able to go back to their original bodies. It seems that you are all stuck as you are now. For some it is a disaster while for some, it will be a blessing. Your case is most prevalent. You were just short of personal termination and now, you have a whole lifetime ahead of you again. I think that you need to advise your people that they can all just settle in and learn to be who they are now. There will be no way that a body will take a second shift without the person dying. My job cannot continue now that I know what can be done. But I am going to stay here for a while to help the people adjust to what they have become." "You are welcome to stay here for as long as you wish. I have tendered my resignation and my retirement from the service. But with the situation I find myself in, I will have to re-evaluate my priorities. I am now too old not to retire but yet, I am too young to be in the position of authority that I am in right now." Just then an announcement came over the loud system. "Colonel Janson, incoming communiqu? from the Earth President. Please take immediately. This is urgent. Thank you." I had to leave quickly and answer the call. As I arrived in my quarters, I sat down and hit the switch to transfer the call to my personal station. The vid screen lit with the face of the President. "Yes, Madam President?" "Colonel, what is the meaning of the resignation papers I received?" "Madam President, after the deaths of my two crew members, I have reached a point that I no longer have any respect from my people and no one wants to take any orders from an eight-year-old. Therefore, I feel that it would be in the best of interests that I resign my commission and retire from the service." "Colonel, before you make any rash decisions, please think hard before you do something as irreversible as this." "Madame President, I cannot help things out as they sit. Things are not the way they were a week ago. Tamara advised me not long ago that no one would ever be able to return to his or her original bodies. It seems that the brain will reject the original mind for some reason that is unknown to even Tamara. From what she has said everyone will have to learn to live in the bodies that they all have." "That is unfortunate but it has happened before. People learned to live that way before and I am sure that you can all live the rest of your lives that way. Besides, every person has gone through extensive training to adjust to a new body even if it was simulated. Their training will have to come forward and they will have to adjust. They have no choice now." "The adjustment has already started. But I feel that I will be one of the few people that will have a harder time adjusting. My second in command is one of the others that will have a difficult time. His new body is nearing full term and he will be dead in ten years. It should have been me in that position but it is no longer my life to worry about anymore. I can adjust but it will take a long time." "Well, I have an offer to make to you. If you give me 15 more years, I will accept your final decision and let you do as you wish." "Fifteen years! What ever do want fifteen years for?" "If you must know, I would like you to go into further training. You can make a decision afterwards. Since you have a new lifetime ahead of you, let's get you used to your new body and that is what you are going to be training for. We need people like you and you just need to become used to being who you are now. I would like you to enter the Start Academy under the officer-training program. Once you are completed, I would like you to return to officer's cadet school for the space branch. There, I would like you to undergo the most extensive psychological testing and evaluation. If you pass all of these things, you will be given the opportunity to choose a command post again. Does this sound satisfactory to you?" "I...I really don't know what to say. It all sounds like something that I would rather not do over again but I am sure that I would be a special case since I would be the first person to go to OCS twice in one lifetime. But I think it would be the best for me. My body has a lot of growing up to do yet and I really think it would be for the best if I accept your proposal." "Good. I will put in the recommendation immediately and you will be able to return back to earth as soon as you are ready. I will not make your arrival to the academy until one month from now. Take your time in getting ready but report in one month to the academy. That is all." "Thank you. I will not let you down." And I signed off from the call. That was a kick in the fanny. Not only do I not get to retire; I get to go back into space cadet training again. At least I would be able to learn about my new body. I just feel bad about the former owner not being able to grow up in this body. Her parents had made contact with me a couple of days ago and while I felt nothing for them, I could see that they felt it for me. Their daughter had become one of her schoolmates and he does not recognize his parents in his new body. They had both become women that were not known to him. And even though they still want to raise him, the point is not well received by him. He found the original bodies of his parents and both occupants rejected him but did so apologetically but that did not help him out at all. He had no choice but to go back the residence that his new parents. It will be hard since he has not had any sort of training to adjust to a new body but since his parents love him, I feel that he will adjust. It will just be a matter of time. Now, I am having some very serious thoughts about my future. I just realized that as I grow up again, I was going to have to go through puberty again but this time a female puberty. That was something that I am not sure that I want to go through, but who knows what I will feel like in a few years. Only time will tell. But since I will have to be female for the rest of this body's life, I have decided to call myself Connie. A whole new start will make my wish from a while back to be able to live a lot longer than I was given. I now have another 492 years to go. Who knows, maybe I can arrange for another shift to happen in 490 years so that I can get a whole new life again? As they used to say. Shift happens.