The familiar warmth and coziness suddenly became a falling sensation that lasted only a second before something hard hit from below. The sound of splashing water assaulted her ears and a coldness enveloped her as she collapsed in a heap. She began vomiting, gasping and coughing as her body screamed for oxygen and as the last of the fluid was ejected, she opened her eyes to try and make sense of what was happening.
A blinding whiteness seared her retinas as she rolled onto her hands and knees, coughing away the last of the clear gloopy fluid. She squinted and blinked. Raising her upper arms to wipe her eyes and using her lower ones to hold herself up, she felt herself tipping forward and smacked her forehead on the floor.
‘Ow, shit,’ she croaked. That brought on another bout of coughing.
Rolling over and sitting on her backside, she concentrated on focusing. The reason she couldn’t feel her lower arms became quickly apparent. They weren’t there.
‘What the fuck,’ she said, staring at the two arms and hands with five fingers. She wiggled them and grimaced, before looking around and realising she was sitting in a round room, with a tubular glass container suspended from the ceiling, from which a plethora of umbilicals snaked up into the ceiling.
‘Oh, shit,’ she said, the realisation kicking in, which caused her to stare at her hands again. ‘I must have died and been reborn as a human.’
A low buzzing from behind her made her jump as a narrow nozzle motored out from the wall high up and began spraying water. Pol stood for the first time and although she resembled a newborn foal, she managed to stumble under the water and wash the birthing fluid off her body. Towels appeared in a recess and as she dried herself, she revelled at the length of her legs, her feet with five toes, her knees and her breasts. She hadn’t had those before. Although, she found she wasn’t so impressed with having to dry her upper and lower body separately, instead of at the same time. Having only two arms was a distinct disadvantage and would take some getting used to.
Wrapping one of the towels around herself, Pol looked up.
‘Cleo, are you there?’ she asked, raising her eyebrows as she found the sound of her own voice so different.
No answer was forthcoming, which she thought was a little odd and she felt a small sense of disappointment that no one was here to welcome her back.
Perhaps they don’t know yet, she thought, perhaps it’s the middle of the night and Cleo doesn’t want to wake anyone.
Concentrating hard, she stumbled across the small chamber to a recessed panel in one of the rectangular wall sections. It only had two buttons, one red, one green.
Thinking it was the most sensible option, she pressed the green one. There was a low clunk followed by a hiss, as if the pressure had to equalise and the wall panel sunk back slightly and slid inside the wall to the left. The smell of disinfectant hit her and she realised she had been behind a section of the wall in the medical centre.
Makes sense, she mused.
She wobbled her way out and passed the row of auto nurses, suddenly freezing as she reached the last one. She felt a shiver run down her spine as she stared down into the auto nurse at her own old lifeless body.
‘Fuck,’ she said, eventually. ‘I could’ve done without seeing that, Cleo.’
She turned her head to look up at the ceiling for a moment.
‘Cleo, are you there? Is anybody there?’
She sighed, because as before, she got no answer.
Shuffling towards the door, she stopped again and stared. A full-length mirror was set into the wall by the door and she gazed at her reflection. She dropped the towel and marvelled at her new look. She hadn’t realised she had such long hair as it was wet and plastered down her back. She pulled some of it round her head and ran her fingers through it, revelling in the feeling. Callametans didn’t have long hair, so this was a new sensation for her. She gazed at her narrow waist and curvy hips and the strange triangle of hair between her legs.
I wonder if human males will find this appearance appealing? she thought. I need to find Rayl, she’ll have some clothes and know how this body works.
Picking up the towel again, she turned and exited the room into the corridor. She stopped and looked back, a puzzled expression on her face. Normally, the doors to rooms on the Gabriel vanished as you approached and reappeared once you’d passed through. The door simply wasn’t there at all.
‘That’s odd,’ she mumbled to herself, turning and continuing on towards the tube lift.
It didn’t activate when she reached it.
Perhaps it doesn’t recognise the new me, she thought and after loitering a few seconds, just in case, she went left and took the narrow emergency stairway.
The bridge was deserted and as she slipped into one of the control couches, nothing happened. No holographic controls and no holomap greeted her, as it always had before.
‘Cleo, what’s going on?’ she asked, gazing up at the ceiling.
Except for the quiet whispering from the environmental vents, nothing stirred.
‘This is getting weird now,’ she shouted. ‘If this is one of your jokes, Andrew, it’s not funny.’
The bridge remained quiet and all the hairs on the back of her neck stood up, which was an alien sensation to her. She shivered and began to feel a sense of dread. She knew that there should be at least one member of the crew manning the bridge at all times when the ship was in space.
She hit the stairs again and now getting more accustomed to her legs and sense of balance, took them two at a time. Arriving on the top deck, she headed straight for the blister, her jaw hitting the floor as she took in the view. Rows of ships of all sizes and designs were docked to a massive space station of some kind. The docking levels stretched away above the Gabriel as far as the eye could see.
‘Where the hell is this?’ she shouted at an empty room. Making her way quickly down to the crew’s cabins several decks below, she headed for Andy and Rayl’s room to hopefully find some clothes that would fit her new body.
She stopped dead as she arrived in the corridor. All the cabin doors were open with clothes and bedding strewn around, some of it out in the corridor itself.
‘Hello – is there anyone there?’ she called, hopefully, already suspecting there’d be no response.
Oh, fuck, she thought. The ship’s been boarded.
Poking her head nervously into each cabin, she was somewhat relieved to find them all empty, with the distinct evidence of a struggle in each but no blood.
Whoever did this wanted them alive then, she thought, desperately searching for positives.
Returning to Andy and Rayl’s cabin she felt a bit voyeuristic going through Rayl’s clothing drawers and wardrobe, but soon found what she was looking for. She’d been present once when Rayl was changing and watched with interest at how human females had to wear a strapping affair to hold their breasts in place. She tried three on, but they were all a bit small, so she gave up on those. The underwear fitted though, and with a long green dress that fell below her knees and a pair of white training shoes, she admired herself in a mirror for a moment. Picking up Rayl’s hairbrush, she attempted to untangle and tidy her drying long brown hair. It took a while, but once satisfied, she headed out to search the rest of the ship.