Star Trek: The Transporter Incident, Episode 1, Revised Version free porn video

AUTHOR'S DISCLAIMER: This story series is a fictional work set in the Star Trek universe. I have made a reasonable effort to make the story's details consistent with known events, situations and hardware configurations established in previous Star Trek productions. I make no claim to be a Star Trek purist. Any errors, in continuity or otherwise, with prior Star Trek productions are unintentional. If such errors offend you, I apologize in advance. AUTHOR'S NOTE: I wrote this story 9 years ago with every intention of it becoming a series. Life got in the way but I eventually managed to complete episode 2 but the storyline of the follow-on required a few changes to the original story. This is the revised version. If you read the original all those years ago, please read the revision before moving on to episode 2. Star Trek: The Transporter Incident, Episode 1, Revised Version By EmiNow For one more time, the world around me lit up like a Christmas tree and went totally silent at the same time. I became wrapped in a multi colored fog. As the fog cleared I saw that I was back on the Enterprise. Teleportation is a technological tour de force but if you do it often enough, it quickly becomes routine. I was thinking that this had been just another garden variety transport when I noticed something very strange. As I took a step toward to edge of the Transporter pad, the raised platform that comprises the floor of the Transport Chamber, I was instantly aware that my body didn't feel right. As I looked at the floor to locate the edge of the pad, where I knew I had to step down, I noticed protrusions from my chest. "What the ....." I started to say. The voice that came from my throat was an octave or two higher than it should have been. I won't say I was in shock but I was certainly on the ragged edge. A quick squeeze confirmed that those chest protrusions were flesh and blood mounds and they were firmly attached to me. Likewise, my hips were now much wider than my waist and my butt protruded in a direction and to a degree that I had never before experienced. I had no opportunity to probe my crotch but I was getting sensations from that region that were definitely unfamiliar. Lastly, I noticed that I was no longer wearing the standard Starfleet issue male uniform. In fact, I was wearing a Starfleet female uniform. Starfleet officers are trained to maintain their composure and make a quick assessment of all new situations. My first assessment was that I was now in the body of a woman. My uniform told me that I was a Starfleet ensign assigned to the Engineering department. The woman whose body I was occupying was roughly the same size and weight as I had been, although much differently apportioned, and her hair, though much longer than mine, was the same reddish brown that I have (had?). My initial assessment was that I had, somehow, passed into some parallel universe or alternate reality. I was in the Transporter Room of what appeared to be the Starship Enterprise. Also in the room was the Transport Chief whom I remembered as the same crewman who had operated the teleportation machine when I beamed away from the Enterprise an hour or so ago. The Transport Chief expressed no surprise at having beamed up a female when he should have been expecting a male. His demeanor was one of business as usual. In fact, the Chief looked directly at me as he used the intercom to hail his superior to say "Transport complete; Ensign Burton is safely aboard, Sir." Perhaps I should fill in a few blanks. Until a few minutes ago, I was the very male Ensign Phillip "Phil" Burton. I had recently graduated from Starfleet Academy, received a Starfleet officer's commission with the rank of ensign and, along with two of my classmates, was assigned to USS Enterprise, NCC-1701-C. Among Starfleet Academy graduates, assignment to a starship is regarded as a plum assignment and the Enterprise is viewed as the best of the best. I was honored to get the assignment. My duty station was in the Engineering Department in charge of the section that maintains the data integrity of the main computer core. I had been aboard the Enterprise about two weeks when, as "newby" officers, my two classmates and I were required to undergo a survival training exercise. The Enterprise was mapping planets in the Ribos system. We had just finished mapping Ribos III. It was found to be a class M planet covered with a wide variety of plant species and inhabited with numerous animal species, some carnivorous and quite dangerous to humans. We found no evidence of intelligent life. While the Enterprise was mapping the moons of Ribos III, we were each beamed down to separate, well separated, locations in a forested area near the equator of the planet. We were allowed little more than our communicators and hand phasers for equipment. The communicator was for emergency use only. The purpose of the exercise was to see how well we could improvise shelter and food to insure our safety and survival. I was the last to beam down. I materialized in a thickly forested area near a rapidly flowing river. I determined that I was vulnerable to animal attack and needed protection from the steady rainfall. I was an hour or so into the process of building a shelter when I received a call from the Enterprise. "Transport Chief to Ensign Burton." "Burton here," I responded. "Please prepare for immediate beam up. The survival exercise is cancelled. The ship is responding to a distress call from a Vulcan commercial vessel. We will leave orbit when all away teams are retrieved. Please respond when ready for transport." I organized myself, gathered my gear together and hailed the Transport Chief. "Burton here. Energize when ready." A few seconds later, I found myself in the Transport Chamber of the Enterprise in a female body. "That's the last of them, sir" reported the Chief to the ship's intercom. He then turned to me and said, "Welcome aboard, Ensign, nice to see you back. Commander Erickson requests that you report to his office for a mission briefing. Immediately!" I didn't understand why the Chief was so nonchalant about me arriving on his Transport pad as a female and I was still on the edge of total emotional meltdown. How would you feel if you suddenly found yourself in a body of the other gender and no one noticed? Fortunately, my Academy training told me to maintain a rational approach to the problem. If I screamed out that I was really a man and wanted my male body back, I would quickly find myself in restraints and consigned to the psych ward. That would not allow me to investigate this apparent alternate reality which, somewhere, contained the key to returning me to malehood. Commander Erickson was the ship's Chief Engineer, and my boss, and he was waiting. This was no time to stop and ask questions. This was a time for me to go along and get along and keep my eyes and ears open. I headed off for the main Engineering deck. The turbo lifts on the Enterprise are voice activated. My work group had just refined the voice print security feature of the lifts. Lift protocol requires that all vocal commands pass voice print identification. This is designed to keep unauthorized persons off of decks and out of areas where they have no legitimate business. The reason that I bring that up is that the thought of voice print identification hadn't occurred to me until after the lift had accepted, without question, my verbal instruction, in my newly soprano voice, to take me to the main Engineering deck. How did my female voice get in the computer memory banks? Did the computer mistake me for another crew woman? Not possible, I thought. The turbo lift door opened and I exited to the Engineering deck. I headed directly for the Commander's office. When I got there, Commander Erickson was waiting. I had expected an assemblage of all the department officers. What I found was only the Commander. "You wish to see me, sir?" I asked. "Yes, Ensign, I do. Please have a seat," he responded motioning to a chair. I took a seat. My larger posterior made sitting an unusual experience. I tried to adjust without being obvious. "As you know, your survival exercise was terminated early. The Enterprise has detected a distress beacon from a Vulcan freighter. We know nothing of the circumstances that caused the beacon to be released. We have been unable to establish sub-space voice contact with the crew. We are heading there now to investigate. "Our path to the last recorded location of the freighter will take us dangerously close to the Romulan Neutral Zone. We've received good intel that the Romulans have been probing Federation space near the Neutral Zone looking for weaknesses in our defensive lines and in the shielding of Federation space craft. We have it on very good authority that they've found, and are able to exploit, a glitch in Starfleet's shielding algorithms. We haven't been able, yet, to identify the glitch. The Romulans may attempt to infiltrate our computer core as we pass by. I want you and your staff to go to the highest state of alert for probing actions and any other anomalous computer activity. I want to be personally notified of anything suspicious. I want this high alert to stand until we are well clear of the Neutral Zone. I will personally instruct you when to return to a standard security levels. Do I make myself clear?" "Understood, sir." "Good. Any questions?" "Could you share with me the source and circumstances that caused Starfleet to suspect the Romulans would attempt a computer core infiltration?" "No, Ensign, I can't share that with you. But if the threat weren't significantly real, we wouldn't be having this conversation. Do you understand?" "Yes, sir. But if we are faced with a full attack on our computer core, the last line of defense is to isolate and shut down the core. Life support systems operate independent of the main core but the core controls both the shielding and target acquisition systems. If we shut down the core, we'll be sitting ducks for a Romulan attack. "I understand the dilemma. If it comes to that, both the Captain and I expect to be fully involved in the situation. That means I expect to be continuously kept in the information loop regarding any suspicious or anomalous computer activity. Do you understand?" "Understood, sir." "Good. I know you can do the job. I don't need to remind you that relations with the Romulans are tenuous at best and that rumors of Romulan infiltration of the ship's computers will spread through this crew like wildfire if we allow it. I won't allow it. Knowledge of this situation, and your mission, is strictly 'need to know', even among your crew. I want a lid kept on this until we know what we're up against, understood?" "Understood, sir" "Good. And by the way, Dr. Petrovich sent me a note saying that you are overdue for your initial physical. We have several hours before we come into sensor range of the Neutral Zone. Would you please see her before you return to duty?" Dr. Petrovich is the ship's Chief Medical Officer. "Certainly, sir. I'll go there right after lunch." "I'd advise you go there now, Ensign," growled the Commander with no hint of smile. "On my way, Sir." Starfleet vessels operate on a 24 earth hour clock synchronized to a master clock located at Starfleet Headquarters in San Francisco. The beaming of the survival exercise participants to the planet's surface was timed to correspond to first light on the planet's surface. It was actually late morning on the ship and it was well past noon when I beamed back. I was starving but knew better than to ignore the Commanders 'advise'. I left the conference room and headed back to the turbo lift. Once inside the lift I commanded "Deck 12". Again, the lift responded to my command and, again, I wondered why. I'll admit that I was more than a bit curious about my new form. I was anxious to explore it and perhaps experiment with it. I needed some time alone to ponder how I'd come to change forms and why. I also needed to find a way back to the universe where I exist as a male. But the luxury of free time was something I was not allowed, at least not now. I arrived at sick bay. I told the attendant on duty, "I'm Ensign Burton. I'm here for the physical requested by Dr. Petrovich." The attendant poked a few computer keys and then passed both me and a medical records PADD to a nurse who directed me to an exam area. She weighed and measured me, recording my stats and vital signs on the PADD. She asked a series of standard questions about my general health. "Have you experienced any sudden gain or loss in weight lately?" "No," I replied, mentally adding "if you overlook the loss of my penis and testicles and the acquisition of a vagina and two oversized chest mounds". "Are you getting regular exercise?" "Yes." "Have you experienced any unusual changes in your physical condition recently?" Like changing sex and having no one notice, I thought to myself. "No," I replied. "Is your menstruation irregular or otherwise abnormal?" It hadn't yet occurred to me that, as female, I would have periods. "No," I responded. "When did you last have your period?" I scrambled to come up with an answer. I knew that a 'normal' female cycle was a 28 day affair. I split the difference. "About two weeks ago." "Are you now sexually active?" I paused to think that one through. As a man, I was when I could but not nearly often enough; as a woman, not yet but the concept was intriguing. I settled for, "No but I wouldn't rule it out." "You may want to discuss contraceptive methods with the Doctor," she responded dryly. She then instructed me to strip to my underwear. I got a sudden shudder as it dawned on me that I might be about to undergo my first vaginal exam. She closed the curtain separating me from the rest of sick bay, then exited. I stripped to my bra and panties. I was glad she had not instructed me to remove my bra. As often as I had assisted dates in remove their bras, I found accessing the hooks in the back of mine to be both awkward and confusing. I had a seat on the examination table and resisted a sudden urge to explore my newly acquired feminine parts. It was a good thing I did because just as the thought arose, the curtain was pulled back and there stood a young female. The insignia on her uniform told me she was a physician. She was a very pretty lady, not a world class babe and maybe not even major league, but she had a 'girl next door' quality that, were I still a male, I would have found highly attractive. I thought that it was just my luck to meet an attractive female crew mate when I was totally unequipped to pursue any type of heterosexual relationship with her. It was reassuring to me, however, that my thought processes seemed to have remained firmly male. "Good Morning! Ensign Felicia Burton, is it?" she chirped. "I'm Doctor Campbell but you can call me Maggie if you prefer. I apologize for dragging you in here today. You were supposed to have been examined when you came aboard but the Medical staff has been deluged and we are just a bit behind. I appreciate your understanding. Would you please remove your bra?" I froze. I knew I was in trouble. Having never before removed a bra from the inside, I did my best at blind backwards fastener manipulation. I found that it wasn't as difficult to undo the hooks as I thought it would be. As I was working my one woman contortion act, my mind registered that my female name was Felicia, for which my nickname was, presumably, Fil. Cute. "Nice to meet you, Maggie. Please feel free to call me Fil." Some doctors are thinkers. They examine you and mentally record the results of their poking and prodding. They might emit an occasional hum or grunt but the examination is largely a silent affair. Maggie was quite the opposite. She talked continually. She explained that this was her first starship assignment. She said she joined Starfleet because she grew up in central Kansas and knew there was more to life than cornfields. That and Starfleet paid most of her cost for Med School. Once I had the bra removed, Maggie gave my chest the full tricorder treatment as well as a systematic squeezing of each breast. "I expect that you know the routine for breast self examination. I hope you do one on yourself at least daily." "Yes, every day," I replied, not knowing what else to say. My mouth might have been idling but my thoughts were racing. Having my boobs massaged was something totally new and not at all unpleasant. I could get used to this. And were I still male, getting a chest massage from Maggie could fit into my schedule quite easily. "Good girl. Now lay back on the table, face down, please." I laid back and then rolled over. It was a distinctly odd feeling, lying on my stomach with a set of boobs between me and the mat. I felt Doctor Maggie giving my back the same tricorder once over that she had given my chest. She finished the process with an examination of my newly enlarged butt cheeks. Maggie continued her monologue. She was newly posted to the Enterprise. She came on board the same day I did, the day before the Enterprise left the Utopia Planitia Fleet Yard. That was just 10 days ago. "Please roll over on your back and put your feet in the stirrups." Maggie gently pulled down my panties. I didn't have a great angle from which to view my new acquired vagina. I did notice that it was unshaven. I always preferred girls with natural pussies; that mine was such was mildly comforting. About this time I noticed Maggie coming at my crotch with a tricorder extension that could have only one purpose. 'Oh Lord, here it comes,' I thought; 'brace for impact!' Without going into a full itemization of a vaginal examination, I found it simultaneously humiliating and vaguely erotic. As Maggie prodded my vaginal cavity, it occurred to me that she'd seen more parts of the female me than I had. I was slightly jealous, but her examination gave me brief hints of the pleasures that could be generated by my new sexual apparatus. Trying it out for myself became something to look forward to. Doctor Maggie examined my chart a time or two. "Do we need to discuss contraception, Ensign?" I didn't know how to respond. I finally managed to blurt out "No, I don't think so, but I know where to find you if things change." "Then we're done here, Ensign. Feel free to sit up and put your uniform back on. You appear to be in excellent health. I suggest that, before you leave sick bay, you check in at the dental clinic and schedule a cleaning. Appointments are backlogged; I suggest that get your name in the queue before it gets any longer. Is there any health issue that you would like to discuss before I move on to my next victim?" "Nothing I can think of." "Then, when you're dressed, you are free to return to your duty station. It was nice to meet you, Fil. Maybe I'll see you around the ship sometime. As you know, I'm new to this ship, same as you. There aren't that many single girls our age on this ship. I don't know very many of them and nights alone in my quarters are starting to get to me. Maybe we could meet for a drink after the duty day." "I'd like that," I replied. "Would you like to meet at the Officers' Lounge this evening, say about 1930?" "See you then." She turned and left the exam area, leaving me alone to address how I was going to get my bra back on without help. I eventually settled on fastening the bra around my waist with the hooks in front, then easing it up and around until it was where I wanted it to be. In truth, I wanted it to be on someone else; I wanted my old male body back. And I wanted some time to understand how I had come to be in my present body and why. But at the moment, I had an assignment to undertake. Once fully dressed, although I was tempted to break for lunch, I returned to Engineering and gathered together my work team. "Ladies and gentlemen, you all know how essential the data integrity of the computer core is. This vessel can not function without the computer but the computer will only function as well as the data it is fed. The old adage "garbage in, garbage out" has never been more true. That is why this work group exists. "Commander Erickson has told me that, as a training exercise, there will be one or more attempts to evade our security measures, infiltrate our computer core and either steal or scramble the data in the core. The who and when of this infiltration are unknown, at least to us. The how is for us to find out, preferably before rather than after the infiltration. But if the infiltration occurs, we are to take immediate action to secure the core data, including shut down of the main computer, if necessary. If it comes to that, both Commander Erickson and the Captain need to be informed, which means that I need to be informed, at any hour of the day or night, if you notice any suspicious or anomalous activities. This is an exercise but the ramifications of a core infiltration are deadly serious. As of now, this team is on yellow alert. We will remain on alert until we are given the order to stand down. Are there any questions?" There were none. "Until this drill is completed, this unit will work a 12 on, 12 off, 7 day schedule. All leaves are cancelled and all comp time is suspended. We'll work in teams of two; I'll post a schedule. Each work station will be monitored all the times. Teams will eat and take breaks in rotation. Don't overlook the possibility that there might be a spy or a saboteur in our midst. Trust your partner but verify their work. We're here to work a problem, not to cover each other's butts. Are there any questions?" Again, there were none. "OK, let's get to work. Nelson, I want you and Chang to start a level 1 diagnostic encompassing all shielding routines. While that's running, I want you to look for holes in our shielding systems. Think outside the box here. Think like someone who wants to break into our computer core. That might mean defeating our shields or it could mean by-passing them. Look at what we allow to get through the shields and how something we consider innocent or harmless could be used by a bad guy to enter our core without our knowing it. Baker and Kowalski, you do the same thing to our core activity monitoring routines. Sanchez and Umanta, you keep a continuous diagnostic running on core data queries. Look for information requests that seem abnormal. Use your experience and instincts. And all of you, keep me in the loop. Let me know immediately if you uncover anyhing suspicious. Have at it, ladies and gentlemen; this may be a drill but we need to treat it as very real." Having set the wheels of my team in motion, I realized that I'd been ignoring a need to relieve myself. Starships have lavatory facilities, called heads, in most major work areas. They are neither large nor luxurious and most are unisex, but they do provide a modicum of privacy. I knew enough about female plumbing to know that I would have to do my business sitting down. Lowering my panties gave me my first real look at my new female genitals. I'd seen vaginas before and never thought much of them. As a male, I never considered a vagina something to look as much as something to play with, usually in the dark. Mine was no different than a dozen or so I'd seen before, except that it was attached to me. I set my oversized butt on the toilet, unsure of exactly what muscles controlled urine flow. In due course, nature took over. It was then that I discovered that the relief one feels after emptying an overfull bladder is the same for either sex. I carefully wiped my nether regions and gave it a preliminary once over. There wasn't time, space, or sufficient privacy to do any serious further exploration. I also wasn't sure if masturbation while on duty was a court martial offense but I had no intention of finding out. I did take the time to examine my face in the mirror above the wash basin. It was my face, alright, albeit a female version. I wore my hair shoulder length and straight. The male me had a very prominent chin; the female me had one much more rounded. Both of us had blue eyes and rosy cheeks. I wore pink lipstick but very little facial make-up. I would have loved to further examine my new body but time didn?t allow. I returned to duty and retired to my ?office?. Space craft are compact things; work space is always at a premium. Even aboard an Ambassador Class starship such as the Enterprise, a junior officer?s ?office? is likely little more than a desk squeezed between a bulkhead and a maintenance shaft. Mine was no different. I was never sure of which I had less, space or privacy. Sitting at my desk was the first moment of peace I had had all day and it afforded me the first opportunity I had yet had to reconstruct the morning?s events. It was clear to me that I had passed into an alternate reality and the transport from planet?s surface was a triggering event. Now all I had to do was figure out why. That, I hoped, would allow me to find a way to get back. As I sat there, I discovered one thing quickly; while boobs are wonderful things to look at and play with on someone else, they are damn inconvenient when they are attached to you. That, combined with my new oversized butt, made getting comfortable at my desk a task requiring serious concentration. I wondered how women actually managed to accomplish a day?s work under such conditions. I eventually got used to my new exterior enough to get down to business. One of the luxuries of my assignment was a full access terminal into the main computer core. A starship?s core serves both as master database for the ship and as ?black box? for all ship?s operations. Virtually every activity that happens on board, from inter-stellar navigation to trash recycling, is computer controlled and/or monitored and is ultimately recorded in the ship?s operational logs. I called up the record for this morning?s transports, isolated the record of my specific transport and ran a level 2 diagnostic on the event. It came back nominal with a caveat; the cycle time through the pattern buffer was recorded as .73% longer than anticipated. While .73% is well within acceptable tolerances, it was anomalous. I filed the record for reference, then went on to examine historical documents referencing myself. The core had no record of a Phillip Daniel Burton ever serving in Starfleet. There were numerous references to Felicia Danielle Burton as both a cadet at Starfleet Academy and as an Academy graduate who was recently assigned to the USS Enterprise. Both Felicia and Phil were born on the same date in same town in west Colorado to the same parents, attended the same high school and graduated in the same year. This just helped confirm my theory that I had been transported into an alternate reality where my gender change was the only apparent difference between the two worlds. I found that fact, to quote a legendary former Starfleet officer, ?fascinating?. Before I could do any further database searching, my comm badge chirped. It was Commander Erickson. ?We are entering a point in space that is within sensor range of the Neutral Zone.? He said nothing further. Fully understanding the implications of his message, I replied, ?Understood, Sir. We are working the problem. I will inform you of any developments. Burton, out.? The rest of the afternoon was a blur of activity for my work section; running and rerunning diagnostics and sample data comparisons against established criteria, looking for any indication of infiltration. We found none, but kept looking. It wasn?t until 1900, when night shift relieved day shift, that I realized just what time it was. My night relief was Master Chief Jackson who politely, but firmly, insisted that I take a meal break and get some rest. I resisted and continued working. The chief threatened to have me physically removed from the work area. I took the hint. As I exited the area I noticed the time was 1920. 'Damn,' I thought, I told Maggie I?d meet her at 1930. I really wanted a shower and change of clothing before I met with her but there wasn?t time. With no good options, I set course for the Officers? Lounge. I got there at precisely 1930 and, true to her word, Maggie was sitting at the bar waiting for me. She had changed into civilian clothes, a casual lace front blouse and slacks, and she had combed out her shoulder length blonde hair which earlier she had worn tied back in a bun. She had also freshened up her make-up. She still had a ?girl next door? look but with a hint of elegant beauty. Hey, even beautiful women live next door to somebody. That I could still evaluate her with my male mind was reassuring. The presumably female hormones pumping through my new body were having no apparent effect on my male thought processes. ?Hi, am I late?? I asked lamely. ?You look so nice; I feel bad about having to come straight from duty. We?re working on a special project and it?s been non-stop since I left sick bay. I didn?t stop for lunch and haven?t had dinner yet.? ?No, you?re actually right on time. And no need to apologize; we all work for Starfleet. We work whatever hours are needed to get the job done. No apologies are necessary. Please have a seat.? The bartender asked what he could get me. Before I could respond, the XO came on the ship?s comm and announced to the crew that we had reached the point in space from where the Vulcan distress signal was sent. He related that there was no sign of a signal buoy or the Vulcan ship. He said we would stay in our present location long enough for a sensor sweep of the area and to report the incident to Starfleet Command. ?Damn strange,? said the bartender. ?Starfleet takes phony distress calls seriously. If we came all this way because some Vulcan set off a distress beacon in error and then didn?t report it, there?ll be hell to pay. I wouldn?t want to be in his shoes.? ?Strange, indeed,? I replied, wondering if this whole incident might be a set-up by the Romulans to lure us into the Neutral Zone. ?I?ll have a red house wine, please.? Maggie was drinking a dark ale of some type. ?And please bring another of what my friend is having.? She interrupted, ?The drink I have is just fine for me, at least for now. Thank you for the offer however. So tell me, other than busy, how was your day?? ?I can?t really tell you much about the project we are working on; it?s a security thing and if I told you, I?d have to kill you. You wouldn?t enjoy that any more than I would.? ?Well if you can?t give me specifics, tell me, in general terms, what you do all day.? ?If it?s alright with you, I?d like to leave my job out of this conversation. Work is work and this is a social occasion. Let?s get to know each other as people before we talk about our work. Is that OK with you?? ?If that?s what you want, sure.? she replied. ?It?s just that I?ve only been aboard the Enterprise a couple of weeks and I mostly associate only with the medical staff. I have only a vague idea what goes on in other parts of the ship. I?m really curious about what the rest of the crew does. It?s just part of my natural curiosity.? ?You know they say that curiosity once killed a cat.? ?Please don?t kill me,? she retorted. ?I promise not to for now, but let?s just get to know each other and leave the discussion of our work for another time and place, OK?? ?OK.? We sipped our drinks and made small talk for few minutes. I found Maggie very easy to talk to. ?You said you missed lunch,? she injected, ?and you haven?t yet had dinner. You must be starving.? ?Correct on both points,? I answered. ?I was thinking about ordering a small pizza from the bar, if you wouldn?t mind me eating in front of you.? I?ll go you one better. Pizzas, particularly the synthetic versions that the food replicators spit out, are fattening and bad for your heart. But, in my quarters, I have a recipe for a spicy chicken salad that is to die for. I can get the ingredients from the replicator and have it ready in no time. We can continue our conversation as I cook. Why don?t you let me make you dinner?? I pondered the idea for about 12 nanoseconds. I wasn?t really looking forward to a greasy pizza and I?d found the conversation with Maggie very enjoyable. The home cooked meal was a bonus. ?That sounds good to me, are you sure it?s not a bother?? ?None at all.? ?Then I?d be both delighted and grateful.? We finished our drinks and proceeded to the turbolift. Maggie commanded the lift to Deck 12, the same deck as my quarters. It turned out that Maggie?s quarters and mine were only two corridors apart. Junior officer quarters tend to be cookie cutter affairs, mostly all the same size and configuration and identically furnished. Neither of us had been on board long enough to personalize our quarters as some longer tenured crewmen had done. So, but for the fact that her floor plan was a mirror image of mine, we lived in identical spaces and her space was as stark as mine. ?Make your self at home,? she told me as she proceeded to the kitchenette. She retrieved her recipe book and commanded the food replicator to produce the required ingredients. She also commanded the unit to produce a large glass bowl, plates and silverware for two, and two glasses of red wine. ?I really prefer wine to ale but all the ship?s doctors are beer drinkers. As a survival tactic, I?m going to have to develop a taste for it. Just not tonight. Here, take one,? she said offering me one of the wine glasses. ?I can?t help asking this question again but I?m really curious about what your job is aboard this ship. I know so little about what happens on this ship outside sick bay. I joined Starfleet to see the universe and thus far all I?ve seen is tricorders, PADD?s and bedpans. Please tell me what you do all day.? ?Well, if you must know, what I do is just as boring to me as what you do is to you. The Enterprise has a huge central computer, the ?core?. The core monitors all ship?s operations. In medical terms, it's like the brain. Within established parameters, the computer actually controls most ship?s functions, kind of like an autonomic physiological system. You can?t stop or start your heart; it operates on auto-pilot directed by the brain. What I do all day is monitor the computer monitoring the ship. Exciting, huh? There are more details to the things I do. Those are the ones that, if I told you of them, I?d have to kill you. You?re much too nice to kill. So let?s just leave it at that.? The chicken salad was ready in no time. She prepared and served it like she?d spent time in a commercial kitchen. It turned out that she worked her way through undergraduate school as a waitress and bar tender. We ate and talked, worked ourselves through another round of red wine and then talked some more. Like earlier in the day at my work station, I became so involved in the conversation that I lost all track of time. Before I knew, it was 2030. ?This has really been a fun evening.? I said to Maggie, ?but I?m due back on duty at 0700. I need to get to bed. You do too, I?m betting. Why don?t we call in an evening?? ?I suppose you?re right, but this really has been a delightful evening. I?m glad you like my chicken salad. I?ll have to have you over for my vegetable stir-fry sometime.? Maggie got up from her chair and I tried to get up from the couch. I had still not fully adapted to a female?s center of gravity and the three glasses of wine I?d consumed weren?t helping any; getting up was harder than I had envisioned. After one failed attempt, I gave an extra push off to the couch. I misjudged the force necessary to land me on my feet. Instead, I overshot an upright position, lost my balance and fell forward. As I went over, I fell into Maggie and we both wound up in an overstuffed chair with her on the bottom. She then did something that caught me totally unprepared. As we lay there, me terribly flustered and her pinned under me, she wrapped her arms around my me and gave me a full open mouth kiss. My male thought process led me to return the favor and we lay there locked in each other?s arms, kissing deeply, for what seemed like an eternity. When the dust settled and we each had regained some degree of composure, she said, ?If you wanted to spend the night, why didn?t you just ask? You?ll find that the bedroom is much more comfortable than this chair.? My recollection of the next hour or so is very hazy. I remember that Maggie and I went to the bedroom, which was only slightly larger than the single mattress that comprised Maggie?s bunk. It was never designed to sleep two although, initially, sleep was not our intention. The lighting was quite dim. Maggie lit a candle, then another. Neither provided much light but they did set the mood. We undressed each other and set ourselves on the bunk with me on the bottom. Much as she had done earlier that day, Maggie began a methodical examination of my now naked body using her tongue as stand in for the tricorder. She started around my neck and shoulders, dropping down to and around each of my breasts, gradually dropping lower yet to my stomach and abdomen and then at last to my vagina. That this method of lovemaking was new to me goes without saying. Likewise new to me were the sensations I received when she caressed my breasts. I would have assumed that the sensations would be localized but they started quickly to envelop my whole body. I was also developing an unfamiliar wetness in my crotch unlike anything my male self had ever experienced. Maggie lowered her head to just beneath my crotch and inserted her obviously talented tongue into my vagina. I can remember thinking, ?The Eagle has landed? as she found my clitoris and began a rhythmic pattern of tongue massage. In no time I experienced my first female orgasm and the evening?s activities began to blur. As I told you earlier, when you are transported, the first thing you experience is being surrounded in a cloud of multicolored light. A female orgasm is somewhat like that but much more, involving a sense of weightlessness and a feeling not unlike a male orgasm but not limited to the groin. In fact the pleasure spreads out over the entire body. And unlike a male orgasm, it isn?t over with a few good squirts; it keeps coming in waves, each better than the one before. But I digress. When the waves started coming, my mind lost its incentive to record the events going on around me. I remember my clitoris being stimulated by Maggie?s tongue. I have intermittent remembrances of a vibrator of some sort. And I recall dropping into what I can only describe as the most peaceful semi-sleep I can remember. The next thing of which I have a detailed recollection was the very jarring blare of a klaxon in the hallway. On a Starship, the klaxon signals an alert, either yellow or red. It means that all crew members must immediately report to their duty or battle stations. The klaxon was followed almost immediately by the chirping of my comm badge and, a heartbeat later, Maggie?s comm badge. Whatever was going on, it was demanding both of our attentions elsewhere. Our time together had come to an abrupt end. Duty called. I scrambled through the pile of clothing at the foot of the bed that was my uniform. I located my comm badge. I squeezed the badge and answered ?Burton here.? ?Chief Jackson, ma?am. We?ve got a situation here. You need to get down here NOW!? ?Understood. I?m on my way. Burton, out.? I turned to Maggie. She was already up and attempting to make herself presentable. With a wet wash cloth, she gave us both a very quick sponge bath. She brushed out my hair and offered to freshen up my makeup. I told her that under the circumstances, the make-up could wait. In fact, I had only a vague idea that I was even wearing make- up and had no idea how to apply it. I hurried into my underwear and then my uniform. As quickly as I was decent I gave Maggie a goodbye kiss and, as I left, I asked ?Can we do this again soon?? She replied, ?Sure. I?d love to. How about we meet here for dinner tomorrow, say 1800.? I was well into the hallway when I responded, ?See you then.? The hallway was chaos; crew members were running every which way to get to their stations. I instinctively checked the lights next to the klaxon. One is yellow, the other red. They indicate the level of alert. The red light was flashing. Whatever was going on, it was serious. I picked up my pace to a dead run. The thought that immediately ran through my mind was that running is a different experience for women than for men. Wider hips and a lower center of gravity significantly affect running motions. Bouncing boobs only magnify the effect. The expression ?you run like a girl? took on new meaning for me. As the turbolifts were overloaded, I took the gangways to Engineering. As I jogged, it occurred to me that for the second time in 24 hours, Maggie got to play with my new body more than I did. I still had not even seen my naked body full on or even in a full length mirror. I was more than a bit jealous; I decided Maggie owed me one. But then I owed here a couple too. I decided that we could settle up the following evening. When I finally got to the Core Maintenance Section of Engineering, Chief Jackson was waiting for me. ?Bring me up to speed, Chief.? ?Well, ma?am, I?ve been working all evening with Chief Yamato of Sensor Control. We were detecting increasing levels of subspace micro-radiation, levels massively greater than we could explain. We couldn?t locate a source, just the radiation. Yamato alerted his boss, Commander Wasserman, who got so concerned that she took it to the Captain. They?ve concluded that the radiation source is a cloaked vessel, probably Romulan. The vessel appears to be probing our shields, looking for weak spots.? ?If there?s a Romulan vessel nearby, the Romulans are in Federation space. That puts them in violation of the treaty that established the Neutral Zone. Am I wrong, Chief?? ?No, ma?am, you got it right. The Captain wants to flush them out. She is planning on firing a broad spread volley of photon torpedoes in a full sphere pattern. Her hope is that we either hit the Romulan vessel outright or force them to fire back. In either case, they would have to de-cloak. The instant they become visible, and before they are sufficiently de-cloaked to fire their weapons, the Captain plans to hit their warp nacelles. If we can disable them we can hold them in place, in Federation space, and then kick the problem up to Starfleet Command and let the diplomats and bureaucrats decide how to handle the situation.? ?Sounds like a gutsy move on the Captain?s part.? ?That, Ma?am, is why she sits in the big chair while you and I work in the bowels of this high tech tin can. You had better take your station.? Among the few luxuries of my position is that all ship?s data recorders are routed through our control panels and then into the ships memory core. At my duty station, I have a monitor that replicates the bridge?s main view screen. I also have access to display feeds from any of the dozen or so stationary cameras mounted around the perimeter of the bridge to monitor and document bridge activity, and to the two dozen or so cameras mounted on the hull to view activity outside the ship in all directions. I am also able to monitor audio feeds from the bridge?s voice recorders. The sum of these feeds allows me a unique opportunity to see and hear what is happening on the bridge and outside the ship without actually being there. From my station I could hear the torpedoes being charged and being loaded into their respective ejection tubes. I?d participated in mock torpedo drills at the Academy. This was different. This was chillingly real. I then heard the Tactical Officer report to the bridge ?Photon torpedoes set for wide pattern dispersal. All tubes armed and ready, Captain?. The Captain responded ?On my command?. She then went off comm and turned to remind the Tactical Officer, who was positioned to her rear, to be prepared to target all ship?s phasers on anything that resembled a space craft as soon as it was detected. She then went back on comm and issued the order ?Fire?. I scanned through the feeds from all the exterior cameras hoping to see a hit. Each torpedo exploded in its targeted area but I saw no obvious evidence of a hit. On the bridge you could have heard a pin drop. Each member of the bridge crew was intensely watching their data and video screens. After a wait that seemed like an eternity, I heard someone call out ?Vessel de-cloaking aft of the starboard nacelle?. The Captain immediately commanded, ?Concentrate all fire. Target their engines. Fire phasers!? I quickly punched up the feed from the starboard nacelle camera. It was hard to immediately detect the vessel. It looked like a ripple in a pond but the pond was the fabric of space. Gradually it began to take on the form of a space craft. Even before it was completely visible, it was hit by our phasers. It was to be assumed that the vessel?s shields would be at full force. Our initial phaser volley had no effect. The Captain ordered a second volley. The vessel, which was now fully visible and obviously Romulan, veered hard as a phaser beam scored a direct hit on its port warp nacelle. On the bridge I heard someone report ?Direct hit to target?s port nacelle. Target?s shields down to 63%.? By this time the enemy vessel had fully materialized and had gotten under way. It got off a volley of disrupter fire directed at our nacelles. Our shields held; sensors recorded no significant damage. The Romulan ship pulled sharply to starboard, passing over the top of us. Our targeting scanners reacted accordingly; we got off a volley, again concentrating fire on their port warp nacelle. As they passed over us, they fired a volley directed at our bridge. Again, our shields held. From the bridge I heard, ?Our shields are holding at 85%. No significant damage to our outer hull. Another direct hit to their port nacelle; their shields are down to 47%.? Then the Romulan ship did something quite unexpected. All cadets at Starfleet Academy study the battle tactics of other worlds. There is no recorded incidence of a Romulan ship deliberately attempting a suicide collision with a Starfleet vessel. Yet now I watched as the Romulan ship looped behind us and made a high speed collision run on our stern, coming in at full impulse. ?Evasive maneuvers!? yelled the Captain. The helmsman turned hard to port and full down. The Romulan vessel didn?t respond quickly enough and passed directly over us. As it did, it let go another volley of disrupter fire aimed at our bridge. Again, our shields held and we suffered no significant damage. Then I noticed something particularly strange and unexplainable. The Romulan vessel ejected a capsule of some sort which shot down and attached itself to our exterior hull just above and behind the bridge. The capsule wasn?t big enough to carry a person; smaller, in fact, than a standard photon torpedo. But it was obviously intentionally jettisoned from the Romulan vessel and was aimed at our bridge. If it was an explosive device, it failed to detonate. By this time the Captain had apparently had enough. She ordered the helmsman to double back on the Romulans. As we came about, she ordered a full round of photon torpedoes in a narrow spread intended to unleash as much firepower as we could muster on the Romulans. The Roluman ship visibly rocked side to side as it was hit. From the bridge came the report, ?Direct hit, Captain. Romulan shields down to 12%. Romulan warp drive appears disabled; she?s venting anti-matter to space.? The capsule had not gone unnoticed on the bridge. The weapons officer reported, ?Captain, a small capsule was ejected from the Romulan vessel during its last pass. The capsule had attached itself to our outer hull. It appears not to be explosive in nature but rather some type of radio beacon.? At that instant the bridge light up with an array of multi colored lights that could only mean one thing; someone was transporting onto the bridge. I instantly recognized the transportees as Romulan. They materialized with charged disruptors pointed at the senior bridge officers. Our bridge had been boarded! ?I am Commander Gaulgetar of the Romulan warship Tribax. You are all my prisoners. You will now raise your arms and keep them raised while my boarding party removes your weapons. If you violate my commands you will be terminated. Hands up, NOW!? As quickly as I saw it happen, I alerted ship?s security who replied that they were monitoring the situation watching the same video feeds I had on my screens. The conversation ended abruptly when the voice feed went dead. Commander Gaulgetar motioned to his crew and they started frisking the bridge staff for weapons. Once frisked, plastic ties were used to bind the hands and feet of the bridge crew and they were made to sit on the deck against the main view screen. The Commander opened the ship?s comm and made an announcement to the ship. ?This is Commander Gaulgetar of the Romulan warship Tribax. This vessel has violated Romulan space. We have seized this vessel in the name of the Romulan Empire. I have taken your Captain and bridge crew as prisoners. You will put down your arms and surrender to my boarding party. Those resisting capture will be terminated.? Additional Romulan boarding parties beamed to the bridge and were dispatched from there to critical parts of the ship. It was only moments before Romulans arrived in Engineering. Commander Erickson had managed to take control of the helm from the Master Engineering Station. He set up a security perimeter around access points to the temporary helm. The security crewmen were armed with phase pistols and given instructions to shoot to kill. Commander Erickson was an engineer by training with little experience in combat tactics. He set his security perimeter around entry points without considering that an enemy might transport inside his defensive line. The Romulans did exactly that. They quickly took as prisoner the Commander and all the engineering crew. Those in his defensive positions either surrendered or were quickly subdued. Shortly thereafter, my section was overrun by Romulans. I was taken prisoner, tied hand and foot, and pushed into a storage area. There must have been 20 of us crammed into that storage room. The Romulan centurion assigned to guard us was a talkative sort. It didn?t take much to get him into a conversation. Several of my fellow prisoners got him talking. I just listened. ?I can?t believe how stupid your Captain is to have fallen for the fake attack we pulled on you. You realize, don?t you, that the entire purpose of the attack was to get close enough to your ship to implant on your hull a relay device that would allow us to transport through the Enterprise?s shields. Once the device was attached to your outer hull, overrunning the Enterprise was child?s play.? He went on to say that once complete control of the Enterprise was gained, the Romulans would attach a tractor beam to the Enterprise and tow her to Romulan space where the ship would be displayed as evidence of the Federation?s treachery and deceit. We would all be tried as spies. In Romulan courts, we were told, the purpose of a trial is not to ascertain guilt or innocence but rather to determine the severity of the punishment. Senior officers would, in all likelihood, be executed; junior officers and ratings would be sentenced to labor camps. The younger females, he said with great delight, would be ?assigned? to ?relaxation stations? for Romulan troops. Select females would be put into breeding programs to be cross bred with captured Klingons. The purpose of the program was to produce a genetically engineered species designed for heavy labor. I listened and immediately felt badly for the female crew. Then it hit me that I was one of them. My future could lay in some Romulan prison, brothel or baby factory. If I remained in Romulan captivity, the likelihood of my finding a way back to malehood was non existent. I felt an overwhelming urge to cry but I refused to submit to my emotions. I wasn?t just some ?girl?, I was a Starfleet officer. There had to be a way out of this situation. I had to do was to remain calm and think through the problem. I heard a shuffling down the corridor outside our holding area. Our centurion guard heard the same shuffling and promptly snapped to attention. Whoever it was that was approaching, the fear he instilled preceded him. When he arrived it turned out to be Commander Gaulgetar himself, whom I surmised was either the Captain of the Romulan vessel or the leader of the tactical operation to seize the Enterprise. In either case, he was high in the pecking order of this particular situation. Gaulgetar ordered all prisoners to stand. He then had the officers segregated from the rest of the ccrew and the females from the males. As it happened, I was the only female officer in this particular group. I was quickly herded into a small conference room. There was a table and a half dozen chairs, all secured to the floor. I was commanded to sit. A Romulan officer then entered the room and gestured for the guard to leave. The guard exited and closed the door behind him. ?Ensign, please state your name.? ?Felicia Danielle Burton,? I replied. ?That?s quite odd,? the examiner replied. ?Romulan records of this ship record no Ensign Felicia Burton. We do list an Ensign Phillip Burton but, of course, you could not be that Ensign Burton, could you?? It was as if I was struck with a thunderbolt. This Romulan knew of me as a male. How could there be records of Phillip Burton in this apparently alternate reality? How could the Rolumans have records of a male me when all apparent Starfleet records showed me as female? The Romulan then dropped a folder on the table that contained my complete male service record and several photographs of the male me at the Academy. ?This is the file we keep on Ensign Phillip Daniel Burton. There is a striking resemblance between the two of you, wouldn?t you say? It?s almost as if you two were twins. But how could this be? You have no twin brother, do you, Ensign Burton?? Obviously, the Romulans knew more than they were letting on. They were up to something. In that something might lay the key to returning me to my male self. Continuing to deny that I was not Ensign Phil Burton appeared to be a dead end strategy. My ability to determine what I should admit to and when would be critical to my gender future. As I was assembling an action plan from the handful of facts at my disposal, the Romulan took a seat directly in front of me and looked me straight on. ?Ensign Burton, let?s put our cards out on the table. We both know that you were, until yesterday, Ensign Phillip Burton, a male. You have recently graduated from Starfleet Academy and you were assigned to duty here on the Enterprise. You serve as Data Integrity Officer in charge of the main computer core. You were on a survival exercise which ended abruptly. When you were beamed back here to the Enterprise, you materialized in your present female body. Do I have my facts in order thus far?? I had no idea how the Romulan knew so much about my past 24 hours but he did have his facts straight. Whether or not the Romulan?s had a hand in my transformation from Phillip to Felicia, there was nothing to gain from denying what we both knew to be true. ?Yes, you do. But how do you know these things?? I asked. ?The Romulan Empire knows a great many things. For the moment, all you need to know is that the Empire possesses the technology to return you to your male body and life. You would like to return to your male life, wouldn?t you, Ensign?? The answer was a definite yes but I didn?t want to present myself to the Romulan as overly eager. There was a deal about to be presented. I would be in a weaker bargaining position if I appeared desperate. ?What exactly are you offering?? I asked. ?There is certain information that the Federation possesses to which the Empire would like access. That information is contained in the computer core of the Enterprise. You have access to that information. You have it; we want it. "In exchange for that information we will return you to your male body and your original realm of reality. If you accept our offer, the transformation to your former male self will be quick and painless and we will leave the Enterprise and its crew in tact and unharmed. If you decline, you and your crewmates will be left to your respective fates as prisoners of the Romulan Empire. Sad to say, the Empire?s prison conditions are rather primitive, particularly for females. The choice, of course, is yours.? ?And, specifically, what information are you seeking?? ?Codes. In particular, the arming and disarming codes for the various classes of Federation photon torpedoes.? ?You must know that I don?t carry the Federation?s code book around with me. If I did, you?d have taken it from me by now.? ?That?s true, Ensign, but you do have access both to the current codes in their encrypted form and to the encryption key. You have the ability to retrieve both from this ship?s computer core using only your standard core access code and password.? The Romulan had done his homework. I did, in fact, have access to the ship?s entire database including both the current torpedo codes and their encryption keys. Anyone possessing that data could easily recreate the arming codes for Enterprise?s inventory of torpedoes. It crossed my mind that someone of my lowly rank probably shouldn?t have this level of access. Then it crossed my mind that the Romulan?s must have a sophisticated level of espionage to have detected this apparent flaw in Starfleet?s security protocols. ?Assuming you are correct, if I give you the data you are asking for, I would be subject to court martial. I would probably spend the rest of my life in prison, maybe worse.? ?Well then you have a decision to make. You can give me the codes and risk spending your life in a Federation prison, as a male I might note, or you can refuse my request and spend the rest of your life in a Romulan prison as a female.? The Romulan stared me in the eye with a look that was stone cold; it was clear to me that he wasn?t bluffing. ?Choose wisely, Ensign.? The Romulan?s dry sarcasm reminded me of a Vulcan classmate I had at the Academy, not surprising since Vulcans and Romulans share a common line of DNA. This negotiation was not going well. I needed to rethink my strategy. I needed time to think things out. ?Let?s say I do give you the codes. What will the Empire do with that data?? I asked, hoping a diversionary question would buy me some time. ?That is for us to know, human. Your part in this has already been defined.? ?I?m curious. Somehow I was transferred to an alternate reality in which I am female. If that is true then this entire universe is part of that reality. That would include this ship, your ship and both crews. How were you able to transfer me to this alternate reality? Are you part of this reality or were you transferred here as well? And if you are part of this reality, how is it that you know about the reality in which I am a male?? ?You are a bright young man, or should I say woman, Ensign, but you ask too many questions. Again, you have a choice to make. Choose please, and be quick about it.? The Romulan wasn?t going to be easy person to distract from his assignment. I was desperately trying to remain exteriorly calm and at the same time think my way out of this blind alley in which I found myself. Then I noticed something totally inexplicable. At the Academy, all cadets study the various operational systems and sub-systems of a starship. Because I majored in computer science, I was specifically trained in computer anomalies and how they affect a ship?s operation. I spent almost an entire semester studying the operation and maintenance of the holographic environment simulator, referred to in engineering circles as an HES and referred to generally as a Holodeck. The walls of a Holodeck are covered with thousands of microscopic omni-directional holo diodes (OHD?s for short) that, when activated by the deck computer, generate lifelike three dimensional recreations of objects, animals and humans, all directed by the computer. In their power down state, the walls of a holo chamber are a monotone black with a grid of yellow bars and white dots, the dots being control junctions for the OHD?s and the bars being the busses through which all data transfers pass. All of that is quite interesting, but only if you?re an engineer. It came to my mind instantly when the wall behind the Romulan, only for a split second, faded from solid white to black with a grid of white dots. In that instant I realized that I was in a holographic simulation and that this room was not real. The Romulan, on the other hand, did not fade out. He was real, but real what? A thousand questions flashed across my mind. Why was I in an HES? Was this HES on the Enterprise or somewhere else? If I was on the Enterprise, was this some sort of Federation stress exercise or, perhaps, a practical joke being played on me by one or more of my classmates? If I was somewhere else, exactly where was I? Why was I there? And what of the Romulan? Was he a real Romulan or a human in a very good costume? I had lots of questions and precious few answers. I decided I had no choice but to call the Romulan?s bluff. ?Why are we in a holographic environment simulator?? I asked. ?What is it that you are trying to make me believe is real that is not? Is it that you are not really Romulan, that this is not really the Enterprise, or, maybe, that I am not really female? What is it?? The Romulan grimaced. He was trying to maintain his composure but was obviously upset at my line of questioning. He paused to gather his thoughts. ?You are indeed a bright person, Ensign, bright enough to have noticed the power fluctuation that we experienced a moment ago. You have concluded that you and I are in a holographic environment simulator. You have probably also concluded that I am a real, not a computer created holographic image. Am I right so far?? I nodded my head in the affirmative. ?Did you happen to notice your own image as the power fluctuated?? I hadn?t. I nodded my head to indicate negative. ?Well, Ensign, had you done so, you would have noticed no changes. You and I are, in reality, exactly as we appear here and now. I am a Romulan male and you are a human female. The rest of this scenario is a creation of this HES. But make no mistake, your transformation from male to female has nothing to do with this HES and the change can not be reversed with a computer command.? With that he commanded ?Computer, end program.? The walls room around us reverted to a powered down HES with a few pieces of prop furniture scattered about. I quickly took inventory of my body and, as the Romulan had predicted, I was still female. ?As you see, Ensign, you are still a female and a female you will remain. The technology exists to return you to your male body and that technology is readily available to me but you will remain in your present female state until you provide me with the arming and disarming codes we discussed earlier.? ?Where, exactly, am I?? I asked. ?That is not relevant to the matter at hand. Ensign, you have a decision to make. Please do so now and stop wasting my time.? The Romulan was back in his pushy mode. I needed to slow him down. ?How do I know that you can really return me to my male body?? I asked. ?You don?t. You?ll just have to take that chance.? ?Well, would you please explain to me the process by which you changed me and how the reversal process works? If you can give me a reasonable assurance that the process is reversible, I?ll have a lot more incentive to give you what you want.? ?You, Ensign, are, as you Earthlings are fond of saying, a real pain in the ass. While I won?t give you all the details, I will tell you that the Teleporter, what the Federation calls a Transporter, is involved.? ?How so?? ?Again, you waste my time. But if you must know, I will lay it out for you. As you are aware human cells are composed of chromosomes which come in two forms, X and Y. Male cells have one X and one Y, females have two X. As you also know, the teleportation of living tissue requires that individual cells be scanned and converted to energy. The energy is then transmitted to its destination and reassembled into the original matter, cell by cell in the case of living tissue. Since the difference between human males and females is the single Y chromosome, if the energy stream is diverted, while in the pattern buffer, and routed through a matter substitution subroutine that substitutes an X chromosome for every Y chromosome, when the image is rematerialized, the reassembled human will be a female version of the original male. That, Ensign, is how you came to be female. "The reverse process, converting a female to a male is significantly more complicated because you must selectively choose to convert the proper X chromosome of each XX pair to make an XY pair. Choosing which of the two X?s to convert is critical and tricky. It requires so much computing power that the process is a practical impossibility.? ?So how do you intend to return me to my original male form?? ?Fortunately for you, Ensign, there is an alternate method to recover your manhood.? ?And what would that be?? ?That is for me to know, but it is very real. If you have any hope of ever regaining your manhood, Ensign, you now need to give me the torpedo codes while my offer to return you to your male form is still on the table.? I pondered what to do. I was quickly running out of delaying tactics. The story the Romulan had given me of how I came to be female made sense. It made so much sense that I was beginning to abandon hope of ever returning to my male self again. And then I suddenly connected some dots. To have become female as the Romulan said, I must have been transported via a Romulan Teleporter. And since I became female during my transport back to the Enterprise after the survival test was aborted, both the order to abort the test and the transport itself must have been a Romulan trick to take me into custody. They must have transported me onto their vessel and directly into an HES simulation of the Enterprise. Everything that had transpired since that beam-up must have been a Romulan holographic simulation of activities on board the Enterprise. But why would the Romulans go to such extraordinary lengths to obtain Federation torpedo codes? Codes are changed every 96 hours so whatever the need for the codes, it would have to be short term. Were they planning an immediate invasion the Neutral Zone? There was much more here than met the eye. As I was contemplating all this, the lights in the room in which I was being held dimmed, flickered, then gradually reestablished themselves. Romulan ships usually travel wrapped in a screen of invisibility. This screen, commonly referred to as a cloak, consumes significant amounts of a ship?s power. If a cloaked ship is damaged or otherwise constrained for power, but still needs to maintain its cloak, other ship functions must be cut back. When a ship?s cloaking power requirements compete with life support requirements, the Captain must choose between the two. I sensed that this vessel was in such a predicament. I surmised that the Romulan ship was in trouble. And then I connected some more of those dots. ?How much longer can you keep your cloak up?? I asked my interrogator. He gave me that grimacing look again, which told me I was on the right track. ?You ask too many questions, Ensign; perhaps too many for your own good. As you have surmised, this ship is losing power. We have reached a point where we must choose between maintaining the cloak and operating the ship. Without navigation, there is no way to return to the Romulan side of the Neutral Zone. In order to get under way, we must drop our cloak which will immediately draw the attention of, and perhaps the fire of, the Enterprise. Yet if we do nothing, we will eventually lose our cloak anyway. Whatever we do, we do it with you aboard and in your female form. So you see, Ensign, like it or not, you have a stake in this situation.? ?So, if I understand the situation, you want the Federation codes to disarm any of the Enterprise?s photon torpedoes that might be fired at you if and when you make a run for the Neutral Zone. Do I have that right?? ?As I said, you are bright. With any luck, our shields will protect us from the Enterprise?s phaser fire long enough to reach the Neutral Zone. But we will be ... I believe the Earth expression is ?sitting ducks? .... for torpedo fire. We need those codes, Ensign, and if you ever again expect to see a penis from the user?s perspective, you do too. Now let?s quit wasting each other?s time. Will you work with me or not?? I thought that I had painted myself as far into this corner as I could. I still needed more time to think but time was something I was all but out of. The door to the HES opened and Commander Gaulgetar entered. My Romulan interrogator quickly exited. ?Very well, Ensign, you leave me no choice, announced Gauletar.? He pulled out some sort of communications device. It chirped a time or two to indicate that it was operational. ?Bring in the other prisoner,? he barked to whoever was on the other end of the transmission. I heard a small commotion in the hallway and then the door whooshed open. Two rather large Romulans dragged a small bodied person through the door, dumping the body on the floor in front of Commander Gaulgetar. The hulks saluted the Commander and quickly exited. The door was closing behind them when I realized that the person they had brought in was Maggie. She was somewhat worse for wear but appeared largely unharmed. She slowly got to her feet and looked around. We made eye contact but neither of us spoke a word. ?You two have met so I believe no introductions are necessary. I had hoped, Ensign, to gain your cooperation without bringing Doctor Campbell into the conversation, but we are out of time. ?Ensign, if you thought you were the first human to have undergone a Romulan gender shift via the Teleporter, you unduly flatter yourself. Many have gone before you. ?Our gender modification process was not created without problems; it took dozens of teleportations to get the procedure down. In theory, chromosome transfer is a simple procedure; in reality it is highly complex and leaves huge opportunities for things to go wrong. Some of the earliest transfers produced fatalities. Once we got past that, we found that certain humans respond better to gender transfer than others. Some subjects preferred to remain female. Those were of no use to us; we held no leverage over them to make them do our bidding. We relegated a few of them to our genetic engineering program. They were used as incubation chambers for Human-Klingon cross breeding. News of that convinced most of those that came after to cooperate.? ?Am I right in assuming that you do not ?transfer? Starfleet personnel at random? You must have a plan and certain criteria for selecting your transferees, right?? ?Well, of course we have criteria. We have two criteria for transferees. The first is that they have specific knowledge that we lacked, lacked in depth or needed greater depth of details. The second is that we need opportunity, that is, a place and time to snatch our transferees without them being missed for some time. Snatching a man from a planetary base or space port is much easier than a ship in space. The majority are snatched at the end of their duty day and we anticipate that we will have 12 to 16 hours before they are missed and a serious search begun. You met both criteria, Ensign, which is why you are here today.? ?Excuse me, sir, but how, exactly, do you exercise leverage over those whom you have transferred?? ?That, Ensign, was quite easy. Most transferees do not receive such an elaborate scenario as you did. For a typical snatch, we bring the transferee directly on board, routing them through the matter substitution subroutine in the process. Once aboard, the captive is brought to an interrogation room where we let the situation sink in. Then we explain to her, that the only way to ever return to their former male self is to do as we Romulans command. We then lay out our expectations. ?We start with requests for immediate information, some of which we already know so we can tell if the captive is telling the truth. If the captive gives us lies or half-truths, we point out the fact and close off the interrogation, leaving the captive to consider her options. She usually breaks fairly soon thereafter and agrees to work with us. ?Sometimes, if we come up against what your humans call a tough customer, we try a little trickery. One of our favorites involves threatening to teleport the captive into the body of an animal, usually a reptile. Commander Taupeda has been more than willing to loan us his pet yxder. We actually just bring in a crew member disguised as Vulcan. We tell the captive that the Vulcan has failed to cooperate and is about to undergo an animal transmogrification. We teleport the crewman to a lower deck and immediately teleport an animal back to the original teleportation pad. It looks to the captive like we have turned the Vulcan into an animal. We quickly cage the animal and, although the captive doesn?t know it, return it to Taupeda. Most captives usually cooperate fully after that demonstration.? ?Please understand that we do this not to torture anyone but to gain information useful to the Empire. But we do document the information we get from each captive. Today, there is an assortment of males scattered about Starfleet who have spent time as female guests of the Empire. Most of those who have returned to being male have continued with their Starfleet careers. They understand that going public with their ?secret? would leave them vulnerable to charges of mental instability, not something that enhances promotion within Starfleet. That, and the fact that we have agents throughout Starfleet who could use the captive?s documented cooperation with the Empire against them. We Romulans have a saying, ?What happens on Romulus stays on Romulus?. ?The case of Doctor Campbell is unique in Romulan history. Would you like to tell the story, Doctor, or shall I?? Maggie stared at Gaulgetar with a look that could kill. ?You?ve done quite well thus far; why stop now?? she responded dryly. ?As you wish, Doctor. As you might have concluded, Ensign, the Doctor has participated in one of our Teleporter experiments. Unfortunately for the Doctor, there was a .... what do you humans call it .... a glitch in returning the Doctor to his original male form. As was said earlier, the process to transfer from male to female rests on a rather simple algorithm; you scan the data stream for Y chromosomes and replace each with a X. The reverse process is significantly more complex. You must first scan for XX pairs, then discern which X chromosome of each pair must be replaced with a Y. Get a pair wrong and you have an unstable organism. Get enough pairs wrong and the result is fatal. ?The calculations to determine which chromosome to change are enormous, well beyond the computational capacity of either your ship?s computer or mine in anything close to real time. In fact, we once calculated that to run a full scan on a human would take our fastest computer well over 100 earth years. All of which makes such a calculation a practical impossibility which is of no consequence to you, Ensign, but is critical to the Doctor. ?You see there is a way to avoid the XY conversion algorithm altogether while returning a Teleportee to his male body. It is really very simple. As the teleportation process is underway, but before the matter stream is routed through the Y to X chromosome substitution routine, a complete copy of the matter stream is retained in the core of the computer monitoring the teleportation. In your case, Ensign, as you were teleported up from the surface of the planet, your original form was copied to our ship?s core as it was shunted to the Y to X substitution routine. When the time comes to reverse the process, the saved matter stream image is substituted for the actual matter stream and, as if by magic, the Teleportee emerges in his exact original male form. ?That leads us to Doctor Campbell and her dilemma. It seems that her male matter stream image somehow became corrupted. When we attempted to return her to her male self and send her back to Starfleet to act as one of our undercover agents, the transfer failed. We couldn?t send her back to Starfleet; they were expecting a male Doctor Campbell and a gender change would have been impossible to explain. We had no choice but to hold her here as a guest of the Empire. She has been with us for about 6 earth months now. Since she came to us with skills we could use, we spared her consignment to the genetic engineering program and put her to work in our ship?s sick bay.? ?How does a physician schooled in human physiology function on a ship populated with Romulans?? I asked. Maggie responded, ?As it happens, one of my areas of specialization was Vulcan medicine. Since the Romulans and Vulcans share a common DNA strain, making the switch to Romulan medicine was fairly easy.? Gaulgetar continued, ?Thus far, she had been very cooperative in performing her assigned duties; she knows that the alternative is very unpleasant.? ?Aren?t you afraid that one of your former ?guests?, having returned to Starfleet, won?t ?discover? a means of using the Federation?s Transporters to feminize a few Romulans?? ?Humans are different from Romulans, and Vulcans for that matter. Our DNA is differently arranged. Nothing as simple as chromosomes differentiate a Romulan female from a Romulan male. The process will not work on either Romulans, Vulcans or any other direct descendant of that particular branch of the genetic tree. ?Now that leaves you with a decision, Ensign. You have experience with the computer core of a Starfleet Ambassador Class starship. Those skills will be useful to us. If you give me the information I want, you can continue to use those skills as a male officer in Starfleet. If not, you can join the Doctor as a permanent guest of the Empire. You can assist us in our computer development, as a female of course, and if you perform to our standards, you will be treated on a par with any Romulan officer. But if you betray my trust, consignment to the GE program will be swift and final. ?If I don?t have your response in the next 60 seconds, Ensign, I will seal your fate by erasing your male matter stream image. You have no more time and I will accept no more questions. You must give me your response. Now!? This time I really had painted myself into a corner. I?m sure that if I could have seen my face it would have a distinct look of a deer caught in headlights. My brain was muddled, my thought processes confused. Then, in an instant, an idea struck me. The fog cleared; I knew exactly what to do. ?Commander Gaulgetar, I?ll retrieve the torpedo codes you want, but on one condition.? ?No conditions! Give me the codes, now, or your matter stream record disappears.? ?Please, sir, hear me out. If I provide you with Starfleet?s torpedo codes, what do you intend to do with me?? ?As I promised, I will return you to your male body and you will be teleported back to the surface of Ribos. We have been monitoring communication from the Enterprise. They still think you are on the planet?s surface undergoing a survival exercise. We will assist you in building the shelter you had started when we brought you aboard the Tribax. When the Enterprise returns to retrieve you, all will appear to be normal. You will return to your duties aboard the Enterprise. From time to time, we will contact you seeking information which you will give to us without question.? ?Might I be allowed, after providing you with the codes, to remain aboard the Tribax in my present female form and undertake the mission of reassembling Doctor Campbell?s male chromosomal sequence?? ?Why would you choose to do that, Ensign?? ?Because, sir, by doing otherwise I condemn the Doctor to live as a woman forever and to be in the service to the Romulan Empire all the while. She deserves to have some hope of returning to her male persona and to again return to Earth and to work with humans. That is what you will grant both of us if I succeed. And until I do succeed, I will be Doctor Campbell?s female human partner aboard this ship in service to Romulus. Do we have a deal, Commander?? ?What do you say to this proposal?? Gaulgetar asked Maggie. ?I?m humbled by your offer, Ensign Burton. It gives me hope that I may finally return to my male self and to Earth. In the meantime, the companionship of another human would go a long way to making life amidst the Romulans bearable. If you are willing to make the sacrifice, you have my support and deep gratitude.? ?Very well, then, Ensign I agree to your proposal. But as you are aware, we are under a time constraint here. If you fail to provide the codes in time, and assuming we all reach the Romulan space alive, both you and the Doctor will face immediate consignment to the GE program. Understood?? ?Understood, sir.? ?Good. Now you need to get to work.? ?But how, sir? I?ll need a terminal with access to Starfleet?s computer network.? ?You underestimate the resources of the Romulan Empire, Ensign. Come with me, please.? Gaulgetar lead me out into the hallway and down to a nearby room in which set a virtual duplicate of my work station aboard the Enterprise. ?You will find that, from here, you have complete access to the Enterprise?s computer core. Now, please get to work. I need those codes quickly.? I was flabbergasted at what I saw in front of me. What I saw were things that I had been told were top secret Starfleet technologies, but here they were on a Romulan vessel. Obviously, Starfleet?s security wasn?t as tight as I had been told. In took me only a moment to log onto the Starfleet net and another moment to retrieve the encrypted torpedo codes and the encryption key. I was about to either sell out my world to a devious enemy or help a distressed vessel return safely to its home world. I wasn?t sure which. I passed the data I had retrieved to Gaulgetar who smiled widely. He quickly passed the data off to a centurion who left the room in a hurry. ?Well done, Ensign. The Empire owes you a debt of gratitude, as do I.? Gaulgetar then left the room leaving me alone with Maggie. Very shortly thereafter, the computer terminal at which I had been working went dead. Whatever gratitude Gaulgetar owed to me didn?t include unsupervised Starfleet computer privileges. And I would have given very good odds that there was a large and well armed Romulan in the corridor outside whose job was to keep me and Maggie inside. I turned to Maggie. She was smiling. ?Have I just betrayed my home world?? I asked her, still not fully sure whether I should trust her any more than Gaulgetar. ?You have done a noble thing. You have given the Romulans a way out of a situation that would have been, at best, diplomatically difficult and, at worst, the grounds for an all out war with the Federation. You maintained peace in the galaxy. That must be worth a few weapons codes that will be obsolete in 48 hours, don't you think? And, from my selfish point of view, you have given me at least the hope of returning to my life on Earth as a human male.? ?Well, don?t go thanking me so soon. I was tops in my Academy class in computer algorithm creation and manipulation but Gaulgetar is right when he says that the number of XY chromosome pairs in the adult human male is mind boggling. If we have to calculate each pair, the total number of calculations is equally mind boggling. My hope is that with your medical expertise and my computer skills, we can find a short cut that will allow us both to return to Earth as human males. All of which means that we have work to do, but we can?t do it from a dead computer terminal.? I tried opening the door. As I suspected, it was locked. Just then a klaxon sounded. Maggie looked at me with concern but not panic. ?Security Condition 6. That?s the Romulan equivalent of Red Alert?, she said. ?We must be making our run for the Neutral Zone. I?d suggest that we get under the table and hang on to something secure.? I agreed. We both ducked under the table and crouched there between two hefty steel posts. From our perch, we could hear phaser hits on the ship as well as our own outgoing disrupter volleys. We had no way of knowing which of the two ships got the better of the exchanges of fire. Neither did we have any way of knowing the status of our ship?s vital systems. It was truly like flying blind and it was a frightening experience. I could see from Maggie?s face that she was no less frightened of our situation than I was. It was hard to tell whether she could tell how scared I was but in short order we were both hugging each other as tightly as we were holding the support posts. One thing led to another; as the battle proceeded, hugging led to petting which led to licking and sucking which led to full out oral sex. We were both naked and consumed by the moment when we were interrupted by heavy footsteps in the hallway. The footsteps stopped just outside the door to our room and, in very short order, the door opened. Maggie and I scrambled to regain our clothing and our composure. Fortunately, our visitor did not immediately see us huddled under the table. We were able to regain some modicum of decency before a face peered under the table at us. It was Gaulgetar. ?Nice to see that you ladies were not harmed in our brief skirmish with the Federation. It might interest you to know that we are now through the Neutral Zone and into Romulan space. Damage to our ship is considerable but we are still functional and we sustained no loss of life. We were pursued by the Enterprise but she abandoned her chase when we entered the Neutral Zone. Damage to the Enterprise was negligible and they, likewise, suffered no loss of life. The codes you produced for me, Ensign, worked as expected. The Enterprise was unable to launch even a single torpedo. ?I?m an honorable man, Ensign. I intend to keep up my end of the bargain we made. Outside the door is my First Officer, Commander Taupeda. When you are ready, he will escort you to your quarters. There you will find as complete a computer access terminal as the Empire can provide. For the moment, you will not have access to Starfleet systems. That will come after I have had a chance to evaluate your loyalty to the Empire. As soon as the Doctor can organize her personal possessions, she will be reassigned to the same unit. I expect the two of you will find the accommodations comparable to Starfleet quarters. ?Again, thank you, Ensign, for your assistance to this ship, to the Empire, and to the maintenance of peace between the Empire and the Federation.? With that, Gaulgetar left the room. Maggie and I quickly finished dressing, then looked each other over, just in case. When we were confident that we had at least the outward appearance of professional military officers, we opened the door. A Romulan officer approached. Maggie spoke up. ?Good to see you again, Commander Taupeda. I trust you are feeling better than the last time we met.? Maggie turned to me and said, ?The last time I saw Commander Taupeda, he was suffering from the Romulan version of stomach ulcers. Too much stress.? ?It is nice to see you again, Doctor. I?m feeling much better, thank you.? Now if you and the Ensign would please follow me.? Commander Taupeda led us down three decks and forward in the ship, to the officers? quarters. We were shown to a two room suite which, on a Starfleet vessel, would have been assigned to a married couple. I immediately noticed that the suite came equipped with a computer master terminal, exactly what I would need to work on a chromosome reassembly algorithm. Taupeda told Maggie that her personal items had already been moved from her previous quarters. He told me that I had been given the temporary Romulan rank of Ensign and that my closet had been stocked with a complete issue of Romulan officers? uniforms, under garments and foot wear. He wished us well before leaving us to ourselves. What happened next was both predictable and, perhaps, necessary if Maggie and I were to function as a team. You have to understand that we were both born and raised as male. We had each been recently transformed to females without our consent but we both still considered ourselves male. Although Maggie was coming to terms with being unable to return to her male self, she still thought as a male and reacted as a male in most situations. We both considered ourselves as heterosexual and, as such, were attracted to females even though we were both exteriorly female and neither of us could function sexually as males. So it should come as no surprise that, left to ourselves, our immediate desire was to fuck like minks, albeit lesbian minks. What followed that evening was something that the male me could never have imagined much less attempted to describe. Maggie had been female for several months. As such, she had had time to explore her female body. She was much more aware of a woman?s erogenous zones than I could ever have been. The fact that she had medical training didn?t hurt. Combined with a natural teacher?s disposition, she had the exact combination of traits to make her a perfect lesbian lover to me and uniquely suited to teach me to become the same to her. So teach she did. To describe the night as orgasmic is understatement beyond belief. As a male, I frequently experienced orgasm both with partners and by my own hand. I found it to be an immensely pleasurable feeling but fairly short lived and generally localized to the region of my groin. By comparison, I found female orgasms to be a full body experience that come in waves and can continue for what seems like an eternity. I quickly decided I could get used to this! The opportunity to get used to it presented itself again and again. Maggie had as gentle a touch with her tongue as she did with a scalpel. We fingered and tongued ourselves until we could finger and tongue no more. Maggie eventually collapsed into a deep slumber. I was physically exhausted but I can?t say that I actually fell asleep. It was more like an out- of-body experience. In a trance-like state I began to reflect on the strange direction my life had taken. 48 hours ago I was an officer in Starfleet. Now I was, presumably, a traitor to Starfleet. How could I have betrayed my home world? 48 hours ago I was a heterosexual male. Now I find myself a female, and a lesbian at that, with no certain path back to my original male self. 48 hours ago I was a bachelor with no significant other. Now I .... What? It was then that I fully understood why I had agreed to give Gaulgetar the torpedo codes and why I had agreed to stay with the Romulans as a female. I was in love. I was in love with Maggie. I, a formerly male now a female, was in love with another formerly male now a female. I further realized that I had no real desire to return to malehood or to return Maggie to her former male self. I was quite comfortable being Maggie's lesbian lover forever. If that meant living among Romulans for the rest of my life, so be it. In my semi-slumber state, it never occurred to me that Maggie might not want to be my female partner for the rest of her life, although she certainly appeared to enjoy it in the short term. Nor did I consider that Maggie might not want to remain as a female at all. With all this floating around in my brain, I eventually faded off into a peaceful euphoric state such as I had never before known. The next thing I distinctly remember was waking from a wonderfully sound sleep only to stare directly into the face of Commander Taupeda. "Good morning, ladies." TO BE CONTINUED