Chapter 11

Dopey was licking my face as I woke up. For a moment I had no idea where I was. A second warm and furry body was snuggled against my back.

"Wake up, handsome," Nurse Yardley cooed. "You have a special assignment today."

Yes, I was still groggy.

"You smell of dog," Nurse Yardley said in a faux British accent. Nurse Yardley talked like that all the time. "Tell the dogs to stay here and we shall take a shower. But first, turn your fanny towards me."

Goofy whimpered as he retreated to his kennel. Dopy cowered silently against the wall, her brown eyes wide as Nurse Yardley swabbed my butt and stuck a hypodermic needle in me. Goofy put his head on the floor and covered it with his paws. Dopey whined.

"Bath time, Cadet!?" The nurse led me back through the corridors to the dispensary. Nurse Yardley ditched the nurse uniform and joined me in the shower to bathe me. I leaned against the wall reflecting on the facts that had been laid before me during my first week at the Mackie Military School for Boys. "Penny for your thoughts, Scott?"

"I was thinking about the first time we met," I said as Nurse Yardley bathed my genitals. "Gender identity is the foundation of personality according to Mr. Giovanni. Goofy and Dopey identify themselves as male and female—even though Goofy has been neutered and Dopey has been spayed."

"You can't know that," Nurse Yardley observed. "You are anthropomorphizing dogs."

"You are correct, Nurse Yardley," I admitted, "but I can't imagine being born in the wrong body, as you were."

Nurse Yardley was a male-to-female transsexual. If you were observant, I didn't assign a gender to the nurse—I don't know what is appropriate. The Giovannis taught me that there were more than two genders, more than "male" and "female." Nurse Yardley had small breasts that were cone-shaped mounds with tiny areolas—and a shriveled penis that resembling an acorn. The scrotum was shrunk flat, testicles removed a long time ago—Nurse Yardley said they were removed as soon as adulthood had been achieved in order to eliminate conflict between natural testosterone and artificial female hormones. Those hormones were currently self-administered every second week. My mild curiosity was no match for my shyness—I didn't want to intrude on another's privacy.

I didn't even ask the nurse about age. Not my business!

Privacy is present even when nudity is constant.

"I envy you," the nurse told me. "Up to age 21 males can be naked in public. I would like to go shopping in the buff, but I have to get rid of this bit of flesh first. I don't have the money, not yet. Besides, my boy friend likes me this way."

The things we do for love!

Once bathed, Nurse Yardley donned a uniform (shoes and hat and dress) and walked me to her car. The drive took us down the gravel road to the county highway, an asphalt-paved strip with no center line. Eventually we came to an old church. Nurse Yardley's headlights washed across the peeling white paint and the other vehicles in the parking lot. The isolated location and dim lighting added a clandestine air to the old meeting house.

Good thing that the night was warm!

There were other cars parked along the road and beside the old church. I knew it was a church because a faded sign announced it as the Revival Bible Church. I padded along the leaf-strewn path between Nurse Yardley's car and the open front door. Inside, the church was dark except for a battery-powered lantern and several flashlights. A generator started outside—and...

"Nope," a male voice said. "Lights don't work."

"Look," a female voice answered. "No light bulbs."

"That's why we brought the field lighting kit," Commandant Mackie said. "Just a few minutes while the other cadets set it up.

"Cadet Thistle, so good of you to join us," Mr. Giovanni said from the front of the church. Or back—or whatever. There wasn't a stick of furniture in the place. Several of the boarded windows were broken. The floor was covered in dirt and leaves. "Come here, please."

I padded barefoot through the debris.

"You should have put shoes on the boy," Mrs. Giovanni scolded. "There's broken glass in here."

"If I may," I asked, "why this place? Why not at the Academy?"

"Some of people are anti-military," Nurse Yardley said. "This is a meeting of IGS—Inter-gender Siblings."

"There are more than two genders," Mrs. Giovanni said. "About one in 4500 babies are born with ambiguous gender. And the rate of men seeking sexual reassignment surgery to female gender is about one in 12,000."

Numbers, again. The 1980 US Census recorded 110 million males—which was something like 9,300 males becoming or wanting to become women...

"You have that look on your face again, Scott," Mr. Giovanni observed. "What are you thinking about?"

"Statistics, again," I confessed.

"You are about to meet those statistics," Mr. Giovanni said. "When you are a statistic, numbers don't matter—only your misery."

The meeting kicked off with something like three dozen people in attendance. The Giovannis were there as advisors—as expert sexologists. So were Miss Krystal and Harmony, representing the Federal Office of Social Awareness. Miss Krystal, Harmony and myself were the only naked people present. Nurse Yardley was transgender. Why was I here anyway? I wasn't alone in questioning my presence.