For convenience and reader ease, all conversations are translated in English.

Ciwalen, Jawa, Indonesia

"Hey Cary, wait up!"

Hearing my best friend Fariz's voice I halted in my stride, so he could catch up and we could go together to school, which was still at least another kilometer away. As he caught up with me he said: "Did you hear about Rino?"

Rino was another friend of us; he caught MORFS a week earlier. I shook my head, "No what happened?"

"He was taken away by some government people. I heard he got some monkey traits."

Now it made sense. The laws where I live are very strict against MORFS survivors with animal traits. Indonesia isn't a pleasant place to live in these days, if you happen to be a MORFS survivor or a female. It wasn't quite Sharia law, but it came very close.

Fariz asked, "What do you think; they will do to him?"

"I don't know, I hope he'll be okay. Do you think we'll ever see him again?"

Fariz shrugged, "Don't know, I hope so."

Then we walked past a group of giggling girls dressed in their long skirts and wearing their Hijaabs. I felt sorry for them having to wear those clothes, I liked seeing girls with long hair. I even wanted to grow it myself, but boys are expected to have short hair. Arriving at the school building we went in with all the other boys, while the girls had their own entrance. There were no mixed classes anymore. And all the teachers were male, female teachers were not allowed. Well, I think there were some teaching the girls, but not many.

After being rigorously drilled with all the knowledge they wanted us to have, we were free to go home early as it was Friday. I had gotten a bit of a headache at school. I blamed it on the forced teaching methods they used. Fariz complained about that a lot as well. Even as we walked back home he complained why we couldn't study more like they did in other countries. He had an older brother that studied in Europe, so he knew about things there. There was still one good thing though; we were required to study English. Though the language is used by the hated countries like America and England, it is one of the most used languages worldwide. So we had to learn it. Still I never quite understood why the government said that they are hated countries.

This being Friday meant we had to get home quickly and get ready to go to the mosque. My family wasn't Muslim, but we had to pretend we were. Several years ago all the Christian churches, Hindu and Buddhist temples were burned down to the ground or leveled. Now everyone had to go to a mosque, or be declared a heretic and be subject to 'Re-education'. I didn't even want to know what that meant.

"Mom, I'm home."

She came out of the kitchen were she had been cooking something for tonight. "Hi son, how was school?"

"Oh, okay. It just gave me a headache. Can I be excused from going to the mosque?"

Mom sighed, "Don't you wish, I don't like going there as well, but you do know some bad people will tell on us if we don't go."

I made a face, "I don't understand why we have to pretend to be Muslim. We're Christian aren't we?"

Mom hugged me, "Yes we are, but the religious rulers have too much influence on the government, so they have been able to ban all other religions from the country."

Then she looked at me, "Now you have just enough time to wash up and put on decent clothes before we have to go, your father will meet us there."

Quickly I ran to the bathroom and splashed some water over me. Mom had laid out the clothes I needed to wear on my bed, they were made from fine cloth, but I still didn't like wearing them. I hated even more all the wasted time being in a mosque listening to some religion that I didn't want to know.

Moments later we were walking towards the mosque, with mom wearing her burqa, as was prescribed by law. She was so beautiful and had to cover it all up. They said that if she wouldn't do so, it was like she was offering herself to men. I really hated those laws here.

We were almost at our destination when I started to feel queasy. I wanted to alert mom, but then I felt so nauseous that I ran to the side of the road and threw up violently. Mom was really concerned and felt my forehead. "You have a fever, I guess you did have a legitimate reason for wanting to be excused."

I didn't answer, I just kept throwing up some more. Mom talked to someone, saying that she was going to take me back home. We couldn't go to the doctor's office yet, as he was most likely inside the mosque himself.

After we got back home I first had to go to the toilet, then I crawled into bed feeling like crap. Mom soon came into my room and took my left index finger. I felt a little prick and looked with blurry vision at it. She was getting some blood on some sort of device. In my confused mind I didn't even recognize what it was. Then my mom saw the result on it and said to me, "I'm sorry honey, but you have MORFS."

Now I got really worried, would I be taken from my house by government people? What would happen to me after I morfed? "Mom? What is going to happen to me?"

Mom shushed me, "Nothing is going to happen, you're just going to be sick for a while, after that everything will be okay again."

I was about to scream out that it wouldn't when seemingly out of nowhere she produced a home transition pack and inserted the needle expertly into my arm. The sleeping drugs soon knocked me out and I fell into a deep dreamless sleep.

Diah Sumanti looked at her young son laying unconscious in his bed. She worried about his future. She knew that in this country MORFS survivors rarely got a chance to pick up their lives again. With even a hint of animal DNA spliced into their bodies, the survivor was taken away and never heard from again. There were rumors that they were being experimented on or that they were re-educated to serve as slave soldiers.

"Diah? What happened, I heard you excused yourself and Cary from the service." Gus entered his house coming home from the mosque.

"Oh Gus, Cary got sick on the way, I already checked his condition. He has MORFS. At the moment he is out of it on his bed. I put the transition pack we had here on him. I hope everything will be all right. I don't want to lose our only son."

Gus Sumanti looked at his wife with a serious face. "The odds are against it, there is almost no MORFS survivor that I know off still living here. Still there is nothing we can do but wait till the changes are finished."

I woke up feeling fine, a bit odd, but fine. I noticed something on my arm, which made a slight beeping noise before falling off. That must be the home transition pack falling off, so I must be finished with my changes. I was hesitant to see what MORFS had done to me. Would I be fearful for my life now? Or was I going to be able to pick up right where I left off? I wanted to stay in bed and not know what had happened to me, but I smelled and I had a pressing need to take care of, so I forced myself to get up.

As I pulled away the sheet covering me I got to see the first changes. I was taller, and then I noticed that there was something missing in my briefs. Quickly I dashed into the bathroom and undressed completely. I nearly screamed confirming what I feared. I was a girl now. I now had a vagina and breasts, though they were hardly noticeable. I could easily pass for a boy if I dressed like one. Then I noticed another change, I now had very long luxurious black hair hanging all the way to my waist. I wondered how I could have missed the weight before. I admired it and looked at it in the mirror from all sides. I really like having such nice long hair. Too bad I had to become a girl to get it.

After taking care of business and showering, I wrapped a towel around myself and wondered how I was going to dry all this long hair. My thoughts got interrupted by a knock on the door and mom asking, "Can I come in Cary?"

I opened the door for her and looked her straight in the eyes. I really was a lot taller now. "Hi mom, I really have changed quite a bit haven't I?"

"Yes you have honey, but you're still our child, so I don't care much."

I asked with hope, "If I dress like a boy, I can still look like one. Can I stay a boy in registration?"

Mom sadly shook her head, "Sorry, but the transition pack refills are registered. So we have to go to a MORFS center to register you as having gone through MORFS. And they will find out your new gender there. I'm sorry but you'll have to dress like a girl soon. And you'll have to change classes at school as well."

My face fell, I realized that now I had to go into the other entrance and join classes with the girls.

Mom saw the face I made and said, "But we can cut off that long hair of yours, so it won't be a bother to you."

I recoiled, "No mom, don't cut that off. It is the only thing I like about the new me."

Mom smiled, I guess she knew how I felt about that. She had nice long hair as well but could only show it inside the house. I shuddered, that would be my burden now as well. I had to dress like a girl, covering everything up. Or get arrested for presenting myself to men. I really hated this country and its stupid laws. One thing was fortunate though, it looked like I didn't get any animal DNA inside me with the change.

A few hours later my dad drove us all to the MORFS center in Bandung. I was wearing an old Hijaab from my mom and a sari with an old T-shirt of my father. It was barely long enough. If I had been any taller, my bellybutton would have shown and I could get arrested for indecent exposure.

We arrived at the center without problems though and went in with trepidation. We waited for a while, till my name got called and I had to go alone with a nurse. The doctor was a surly man called dr. Kumari. He gave me a complete physical exam, and I do mean complete. I didn't know what girls are like, but after that I knew only too well.

Next was a male telepath who was also an Imam at the local mosque. He didn't announce his name or his intentions, he just briskly entered my mind with his probe. I tried to hide as much of myself as possible, but he just broke through my barriers like they weren't even there. After an agonizing 15 minutes he released his hold on my mind and looked sternly at me. Quietly he said, "I will forgive your transgressions of Christianity. I have studied other religions so I don't see anything wrong with those. Though you could pay more attention to Muslim religion. Now your fears of having any animal DNA inside you, can be laid to rest. I have the preliminary blood work here and you don't have any hybridism evident."

He paused for a moment, "You do however have something of a power inside you. I will have to report it, and you might get contacted by the government because of it."

My blood seemed to freeze hearing that. 'Am I going to be re-educated? Will I never see my parents or friends again?' The man continued, "But I don't think they will take you away from your life as is. Now I know you'll have a big adjustment to make with becoming a girl, but you shouldn't be too afraid of it."

I thought, 'Yeah, easy for you to say, you're not a second class citizen. You don't have to live with all the stupid rules women have to live by.' I guess he picked something up from my thoughts, because his face became even more rigid.

Coldly he said, "Now your power seems to be chemical in nature. I'm guessing you can be described as a chemical elemental, or more correctly a chemical reaction elemental."

My mood lifted a bit since I heard all the bad news. "I can change materials? I can change lead into gold? Cool!"

The man quickly rebuked me, "No you misunderstand, you can't change an element, you're more like a catalyst. You can manipulate molecules and elements."

"Oh? So what does that mean?"

He sighed, "You could make a chemical reaction happen. Like for instance water is made out of Hydrogen and Oxygen. Normally by applying an electric current you can reverse the process and get those elements from a water molecule. You on the other hand can make it happen with your power without the electricity needed for the natural reaction. Or take a combustion engine, inside fuel made of Carbon and Hydrogen burns with Oxygen to carbon dioxide and water. You might be able to reverse that process and produce fuel. What you can't do is transform one element into another or change the basic nature of an element. So turning lead or any other substance into something else is not possible, that would be transmutation. And you can't make diamonds from Carbon, although they are pure Carbon creating them requires heat and pressure not any chemical reaction so you won't be able to do that."

As I thought about it, I could see how this might be cool. I even liked being an elemental. But then I realized that I needed to know a lot of chemistry, and I didn't know if girls were allowed to study that anymore.

The man didn't react to my thoughts anymore, he wrote something in his eCom and dismissed me.

I joined my parents and they were given a folder with the findings of my examinations. My father asked, "What is a chemical elemental?"

Mom explained it to him while I just kept quiet and got inside the car as quickly as I could. I was expecting us to go home, but instead we drove to a big shopping center. Mom explained, "We have to buy you new clothes. You have to have some hijaabs, blouses, skirts and school uniforms."

I made a face again, 'Bleh, school uniforms!' I wasn't looking forward to wearing the long skirt and silk blouse. And to make matters worse, with my new height I would stand out like a sore thumb. Sighing my frustrations I followed my mom into the shopping center and had a gruesome time getting fitted and trying on the clothes.

As we got home, mom had another surprise for me. At the center she not only had my gender changed in registration, she also decided without my knowledge that I should have a name change. Now my name was Caryn. I did protest for a while, but she didn't care about that. And to tell the truth I wasn't that against the new name, I'd just like to know about it beforehand, and maybe have a say in it.

Only a week had passed, so on Monday morning I walked as fast as I could in that bothersome long skirt to where I normally would meet Fariz. He was just walking past the fork in the road as I got there and I yelled, "Fariz, wait up!"

He stopped and turned to look at me? "Excuse me? Who are you and how do you know my name?"

I sighed, he didn't recognize me. Of course he wouldn't, my face was now quite different as well. "It's me Fariz, Cary. Or Caryn as it is now. I just had MORFS."

His eyes almost fell out of their sockets, "Cary? I don't believe it!"

"Well believe it. It is me, though I wish I hadn't changed this much."

Fariz quickly got his face back in line, "No I can't believe it, you're just some girl trying to con me into thinking you're my friend. He got MORFS and has probably been taken away to some unknown place."

"Fariz, it is me! Really!"

He interrupted me and yelled, "No you're lying, all my friends have been taken away. Get away from me. I don't consort with girls. I have to go to school."

With that he ran off towards school and left me standing there at the side of the road. I was really hurt inside. How could he not believe I was his best friend? Then a girl came up next to me, "Hi, who are you, I'm Ika."

I smiled wryly to her, "I'm Caryn."

"Lets walk together, and hurry, or we'll be late for school. You really don't want to be late for school." Ika practically dragged me along and we hurried along the road to school.

School was even worse than I had thought possible. Instead of learning something useful, we now only had some reading, writing, and simple mathematics that I already knew and a lot of sewing, cooking, cleaning and other household duties that as a woman I would need to perform. I did have a hard time at first learning cooking and sewing. I mean cooking was okay; mom had me help her a few times. But I didn't know how to sew a button on a shirt, let alone all the other stitches and stuff. It really sucked being a girl in school. Even more so since I knew how it was for a boy to be in school. Ika was quite okay as a friend, but she didn't know any better. Changing my registration at school had already been done and very discreet fortunately. Nobody knew I was new at being a girl. Except that everyone, especially the teachers frowned at my missing knowledge of cooking, cleaning and sewing.

Later when we got out of school I saw Fariz again, he looked at me and I stared back. Then he quickly turned around and with another boy ran towards home. Ika stood next to me and said, "What is it with you and that boy? Don't you know that you can get into a lot of trouble looking at boys like that?"

I turned to her, "Yes, you are right. I thought I knew him, but I guess I didn't."

She took my mind of my problems, starting to talk about all the things she learned at school today. I didn't tell her, but thought that all those things looked so useless to me.

Back home I quickly disappeared to my room, despite my mom asking how my day was. I guess she could feel that I didn't want to talk about it. In any case I wasn't called down till dinnertime.

A few days went past in an agonizing slow pace. I resigned myself to be a girl learning all the girly things so that I could be a good housewife later. But I was getting more and more frustrated all the time. Mom tried to lift up my spirits saying that it wasn't that bad. Still I had tasted the other life and wanted it back.

Then on Thursday I got home from school and found some ominous looking men waiting inside the house. Mom quietly served them some tea and looked fearful at me as I arrived home. One of the men got up and indicated for me to sit down. With trepidation I sat down fearing what would come next.

The other man introduced himself as Mr. Widsastri and said that the first man's name was Mr. Kudarjo. He said, "We're from the ministry of paranormal powers. We read your file and need to test you in a controlled environment near Jakarta."

My blood froze in my veins. 'I knew it; they are here to take me away.'

Mr. Kudarjo added, "You'll be away only for a week at the most. So don't worry about school or your friends."

I wasn't worried about any friends. I didn't have any anymore. Well maybe Ika, but I didn't really think of her as a close friend. Still I was very fearful to go with them. I really had the impression that I would never see my parents again ever. I turned to mom. "Mom?"

She sighed, "You have no choice in the matter Caryn. You have to go with them."

I got up in a hurry and hugged her. I whispered, "I'm scared Mom."

She whispered back in my ear, "I know, but there is nothing we can do about it now. Just hope for the best and think positive."

I let go of her and felt a few tears roll down my cheek. Mom brushed them away and told me to be brave. I felt like going before a firing squad as I followed the men out of the house. Just as we approached the car the men had come in, some other men jumped out of the bushes and started shooting at the government men.

For a moment I was totally confused and just stood still as a gunfight erupted around me. Mr. Kudarjo returned fire with a gun he pulled from his shoulder holster that I hadn't noticed before. Mr. Widsastri already lay on the ground dead from a gunshot wound.

Then the fight was over and some unknown men grabbed me and pulled me away into the bushes. I looked back at mom. She was screaming for them to let go of me, and then the view was blocked by the plants around us.

The armed men didn't say anything to me other than to hurry if I didn't go fast enough and to indicate a direction for me go. Soon we arrived at a helicopter that had landed in a field and with all of us inside we flew off to the east.

I didn't notice where they took me as I was sleeping when we reached our destination. Some time later I woke up in a small room and met the leader of my captors. I never learned his name, only that sometimes his people called him 'Os Duto'. He made it very clear to me what he wanted. They had kidnapped me for my power.

He explained that a chemical elemental was the only person to transform some components of some leaves into a powder. Since their current chemical elemental was very sick I was to take his place and produce the powder for them.

I was taken to the other chemical elemental. He was very thin, his skin was almost like a see through parchment. He didn't have much fat as well and I could almost see his bones. He didn't say anything else than what I was supposed to do and he showed me what to do with the leaves to produce the powder. Then I was left in a room with a supply of leaves and was told to start producing. I said, "You can stick those leaves where the sun don't shine."

Os Duto smiled cruelly and said, "We also kidnapped your parents. If you don't do as you're told, they will be tortured beyond your imagination."

That quickly got me going and I started making the powder as they wanted it. Sometimes I ingested a little of it, and when dinnertime came I felt ravenous. Everything smelled sharper and tasted better as well. Even my touch was more sensitive.

After a few days I understood why all this happened. The powder was a kind of drugs. I had to eat a lot to keep my body fat intact and I always felt very hot, like I was running a fever. I also knew that my predecessor was sick because of this. A few times I asked to see my parents and they showed me a holorecording of both mom and dad shackled and threatened with guns to kill them or at least hurt them a lot.

My sense of time began to blur as all I did was produce powder, eat and sleep. Sometimes I was dragged somewhere and a teleporter took me to another place where I had to start work again. I didn't even know what country I was in anymore.

One time I tried to change the composition of the powder, to make it harmless, but their quality control noticed it immediately and I got punished severely. They stripped me naked and I got flogged with ten beats of a cane stick in front of everyone.