ALL CHARACTERS IN THIS STORY ARE 18 or OVER. THEY MAY PORTRAY A ROLE OF A YOUNGER AGE, BUT THEY ARE STILL PHYSICALLY 18.

Max was overjoyed. He’d just turned 18, was just leaving college and was going to start at university in the autumn. Then it all changed, in an instant…

He was just walking down to meet up with his mates up the road at the coffee shop. They texted him, then phoned him, when he didn’t arrive…

No answer. He didn’t turn up at home, later, either. No response to phone calls. His mum started getting worried. She knew he stayed out occasionally, but she knew all the people that he stayed out with. She’d phoned them all. No, he wasn’t there. They’d been searching as well…

Meanwhile, in a disused toilet just down the road from the college, Max was waking up. He looked around. He was sealed in some kind of transparent box, and totally naked. There were cables connected to various parts of his body, and a mask was sealed over his mouth letting him breathe but not talk. He could see out of the window; it was getting dark and people were walking past, heading home from work.

Max frantically tried to call out, but he couldn’t, so all he could do was helplessly watch as people went about their days totally oblivious to him being held captive just yards away.

Suddenly, there was a bleep from a box on the floor by his box. Max felt a warmth in his arm. He was being injected with something… He was also sprayed with something that made all his hair fall out, head to foot.

There was another bleep, and a slot opened in the floor inside his box. Something came up out of the slot…

It was some kind of breastplate. It had a perfect set of woman’s breasts on it, and it was exactly the right side to fit him. He weakly tried to struggle, but he was held firm.

The breastplate sealed onto him with a hiss, and there was a warmth as the adhesive set. He was amazed at how realistic they looked; they jiggled just like real breasts.

He was still marvelling at them as there was a blinding pain, and he passed out…

While he had been ‘distracted’, the box had removed his genitalia, quickly and efficiently. The wound had been swiftly treated, then an artificial vagina had been plumbed in instead; this was all happening automatically. Max was now well on the way to becoming a woman. The injection had been a hyper estrogen compound to help his body ‘adjust’.

Now slipping in and out of consciousness, and heavily traumatised, Max twitched as an incision was made in his neck. A voice changing chip was then implanted. He tried to move his head as the mask came out of the slot…

The mask firmly clamped onto his face, and a blonde wig was fitted, giving him shoulder length hair.

The breastplate and the mask had moulded on so well you couldn’t even see the join. Max was now completely a woman.

Max was now dressed by the box in a local high school uniform. Pleated skirt, blouse, blazer, the works. Even a school bag was being made ready for ‘her’ outside the box. Max was now Maxine, just starting her third year at high school…

A helmet lowered over her head, electrodes pressing on her temples and headphones over her ears, with lights flashing in her eyes rhythmically.

Max was programmed with Maxine’s story; the orphanage that she had grown up in, the special pass that she had got to attend high school, as well as information about her ‘foster parent’…

The process completed; Max was now gone. There was only Maxine…

Maxine awoke on a park bench, watching the sun rise.

Damn, had she been out all night again? Irene was going to be furious…!

Jumping up and straightening her skirt, she raced home, after grabbing her bag from the seat beside her.

She arrived on the doorstep panting, out of breath, and knocked, unable to find her key.

Irene opened the door.

“And where exactly have you been all this time, young lady?”, she said. “I knew you were having an end of term meetup with your friends, but that’s no excuse for not ringing me!”

Maxine hung her head, apologetic.

Irene then laughed and hugged her.

“It’s ok, you little idiot!”, she said. “Your friends phoned for you; they said you were staying over. I thought they were going to drop you back, though?”

Maxine didn’t know, but this was all part of her new backstory.

“I must have tried to walk home on my own”, she said, guiltily. “I woke up in the park up the road.”

“Oh, you idiot!”, exclaimed Irene. “I thought you had more sense than that. You haven’t been drinking, have you?”

“Mum! I’d never…”, said Maxine.

Irene smiled.

“That’s the first time you’ve actually called me mum”, she said. “I rather like it…”

The pair hugged, and Maxine went into her new home…

Maxine settled back in quite well, not realising it was her first time there. On the pretext of doing everything for her, Irene managed to show her about the whole place without Maxine realising she was doing it, so the house became familiar very quickly.

Maxine, tired from being ‘out all night’, soon decided to go up to her room for a rest. That was when the nightmares started…

The ‘programming’ was good, but some of Max’s memories kept drifting in. Why was she dreaming that she was a man? The dreams were accompanied by almost blinding flashes of pain; partly the programming trying to keep Max under control and partly memories of being ‘converted’…

Irene came in to find Maxine howling in her bed. She sat on the bed and hugged Maxine until the sobbing turned into a quiet whimpering, then stopped.

“I know it hurts, love…”, Irene said. “They said it would get better. The doctor said it was because you were abused as a child…”

Maxine was happy that she was on summer break. However, something didn’t ‘feel’ right. She kept getting a sense of ‘Déjà vu’. Irene was saying that she was just transferring into the college, but it all felt familiar. She knew where every class was, where the library was, everything.

“Are you sure I haven’t been here before, mum?”, she asked. “It all looks so familiar.”

“No”, her mum said. “It is laid out similarly to some other colleges in the area, though. I think you also looked through the brochures with me when we chose it.”

“That must be it”, said Maxine. “My memory is still so patchy.”

“I know, love”, Irene said. “I’m proud of you; you’ve come so far.”

Max was almost totally buried, now; the regular ‘medication’ that Maxine was on had completely changed her hormone levels to a woman, as well as making her younger-looking. She had been told she was taking the medication due to her ‘mental health issues…’.

Irene still took her daughter everywhere; she was very protective of her. She had reason to be worried; Maxine was having the occasional ‘attack’ during the day. It was impossible to totally supress the trauma ‘she’ had gone through, and it could surface at the most inconvenient times. They were both sitting in a café, having tea, when the symptoms resurfaced.

Maxine couldn’t help it; she started screaming, then crying. Irene just held her…

A staff member came over.

“Can I help?”

“No, it’s ok, she’ll calm down in a minute; she just has these fits every now and again.”

The staff member went away again; however, she kept an eye on Maxine.

Maxine finally calmed down; however, it had taken so much out of her she fell instantly asleep in Irene’s arms.

Irene called the staff member over and asked her to ring for a taxi so she could take Maxine home, and they left the café.

Maxine was devastated when they got back home.

“Mum, I’m so sorry!”, she cried. “You do your best for me and all I do is embarrass you. I’m sorry to cause you so many problems.”

“Sweetie, don’t worry about it!”, Irene said. “I’m your mother; it’s not your fault. I only wish they’d caught whoever did this to you.”

Maxine went back to her room for a lie down. She didn’t want to cause people problems, especially her mother! Why did she have to be ill? It did seem to be fading a little; perhaps the medication was working. It was all so frustrating…

Unknown to her, her mother was making a phone call…

“Why are you torturing the poor child? She’s doing the best she can to be my daughter, and a good one! Why must she keep having these attacks?”

“if she was being a good daughter she wouldn’t be having them; they are her programming punishing her for trying to remember who she was. They will go away with time, as she gives up; just keep being supportive of her and be there when she needs you. The medication will help as well; she should be fully female by now. Her prosthetics are permanent anyway; they replace the top layers of skin. There’s no way back to who she was, now.”

“I hate her being hurt, though! I think I’m falling in love with her!”

“That was the idea. She was supposed to be a direct replacement for your real daughter, who was actually killed when she was kidnapped a while ago. This is the incident which the replacement was provided to you for, don’t forget that. The kidnappers won’t be a problem for you, either; we’ve taken care of them…”

Irene went quiet for a minute. The call had reminded her of her previous daughter; Maxine had been helping her to forget, but the call had brought it all back…

Irene broke down with a howl, hanging up the phone. Maxine came flying in and hugged her.

“Mum! What’s wrong? Mum!”, she cried, hanging onto her for dear life. It was Maxine’s turn to provide support…

Irene told her daughter that she had been onto the ‘clinic’ about her condition, and they had said there was nothing else they could do for her. Maxine would just have to live with it and let it run its course and go away on its own (if it ever did).

“What about when I go back to college, mum?”, she said. “I might have a fit in class.”

“They are aware you are a ‘special needs’ student, but they won’t publicise it.”, Irene said. “If you feel a fit coming on, signal that you need the ‘rest room’. They will let you go to a room set aside for you straight away. All the staff are aware.”

Maxine sighed with relief. She wanted to go back to college; that was the only thing that had been worrying her.

Maxine still had another fit that evening, more violent than ever.

“I’ve had enough of this”, said Irene, after having her daughter crying on her shoulder again. “I’m getting a second opinion.”

Completely ignoring anything to do with the people that had ‘supplied’ Maxine, she took her daughter to the local hospital A & E.

Maxine conveniently had another fit at the hospital; this, unknown to either of them, was a security measure to stop her from being ‘deprogrammed’. She had to be sedated, for her own safety.

The hospital kept her in…

“There’s something not right about this”, said one of the doctors, an experienced psychologist as well as a GP. “Her EEG is all wrong for Epilepsy, and for most other conditions that cause these fits. I think it’s definitely psychosomatic, not physical.”

“Don’t forget her foster mother said she was abused by her real parents when she was a child”, the nurse said.

“Good point”, the doctor agreed. “This does look more like a repercussion from some traumatic event, not an illness. We might be able to help her…”

Hypnotherapy was tried; however, something totally unexpected happened. As soon as Maxine was hypnotised, she fell into a deep coma (another protective security measure). She had to be injected with a strong stimulant to revive her.

“I’ve never seen anything like this!”, the doctor said, frustrated. “It’s like she’s deliberately blocking me at every turn.”

The doctor spoke to Irene.

“Childhood trauma alone can’t account for Maxine’s condition”, he said. “There’s something very wrong here. Can you think of anything else that might be causing this…?”

Irene was torn. Did she dare risk saying anything?

Love for Maxine won her over.

“Before I say anything, I want police protection for myself and her”, she said. “If the people behind this know I’m talking, they’ll stop at nothing to silence us. I just can’t bear to see her suffering anymore.”

“Are you both being abused?”, the doctor asked.

“It’s much, much worse than that…”

A short time later, a police officer joined the group.

“I’ve got another officer stationed outside”, he said. “There will be someone outside that door 24/7.”

Looking down at her sleeping ‘daughter’, Irene started her tale…

“Putting it bluntly, I’m obscenely rich”, she said. “Unfortunately, the wrong people found that out. They kidnapped my daughter and asked for ten million for her back.”

The officer went to look up the case.

“Don’t bother; we never involved the police at the time”, she said. “The problem was they didn’t give enough time to get the money together. I was told I had just cost my daughter her life. The body was dumped in a ditch by our main gate an hour later…”

Irene paused, and her shoulders shook…

She recovered, then continued; “I fell into a steep decline. I tried to commit suicide twice. My daughter was my world…”

“After the incident, someone left a business card in my letterbox. I phoned the number and said one word, ‘Yes’”.

A few weeks later, Maxine was left in the park up the road from the house and she walked home and met me. She was almost a perfect copy of my daughter; some mannerisms are missing, but physically she’s identical.”

“It’s because she’s so accurate that I fell in love with her. It’s because I love her that I’m doing this for her…”

“Doing this for him, you mean”, the doctor said.

“What!?”

“’Maxine’ is a he, not a she. We almost didn’t catch it; he’s been so well altered. Another month or so and there would be no trace. No wonder he’s going through such trauma; he must have been altered totally against his will.”

Irene dissolved in a heap.

“I didn’t know! I swear I didn’t!”

“You would have had no way of telling who Maxine was. We can’t, either; there’s not enough DNA left to confirm that, the change was very thorough. All we can tell is that Maxine was once male.”

“She’s almost completely turned into a woman, now. There’s no way of stopping it; the process is irreversible. It would probably harm her more to even try. I suspect that it’s her original memories surfacing that are causing the pain.”

“You’re right about that…”, a weak voice came from the bed. “The sedative that you used has broken the programming. I can think for myself again.”

All eyes turned to Maxine…

“My name is Max Braddock”, Maxine said. “I’m 18; I’d just left college for summer break when I was grabbed. I never saw who took me; the conversion ‘process’ was all automated. My real mother must be worried sick…!”

Irene gasped. She’d never thought that ‘Maxine’ might have a real family waiting for her…

“Don’t worry, Irene”, Maxine said. “She lives away; I’d just helped her pack the night before I was ‘taken’. I was going to be living on my own, getting ready for going to university. I’m not exactly broke either; I’ve got a flat all bought and paid for.”

Irene started to cry. She’d saved her daughter, but she felt like she’d lost her at the same time…

“Doc, physically, how old am I?”, Maxine then asked; a very puzzling question.

“You said you were 18”, the doctor said, confused.

“No, physically. According to your tests.”

“Physiologically, I can’t understand it. I would have put your age at 13 to 14.”

“So, I’ve been turned from an 18-year-old boy into a 13-year-old girl. Way too young to own a flat, wouldn’t you say?”

“Well yes, but…”

“Good. I’m staying with Irene.”, said Maxine, determinedly.

“What?”

“You weren’t the one that kidnapped me; you showed genuine remorse when you found out what had happened and, putting it bluntly, you love me. That’s good enough for me. Maxine is going to need a mother.”

Irene just threw her arms around Maxine.

Maxine still had attacks, but not nearly as often or as violent.

Now she knew the reason for them, they didn’t frighten her nearly as much. She was also able to push past the pain and recover Max’s memories, including his mum’s mobile number, so she was able to ring her and put her at ease.

She was very puzzled at how she was going to explain her change of appearance when she met her next…!

As both Maxine and Irene had no idea who took her, they weren’t able to take anything further with the police, and the investigation dead-ended before Max’s captors were aware of it. As far as they were concerned, Maxine had got over her fits on her own thanks to her medication (which the hospital had confirmed she needed).

Max was now Maxine, for the rest of ‘her’ life, and she loved Irene just as much as Irene loved her…