Desperate Measures

Liam stared down at the sheet of paper, the tiny black font illegible unless he leaned in close, and the thick line down at the bottom waiting for him to write his name across it.

Do you really want to do this? he asked himself for what had to be the thousandth time.

Luke, his best friend and future...no, better not to think about that just yet...looked up at him, his own form signed the minute it'd been in arm's reach. He pushed it toward the smiling woman on the other side of the desk.

"You're not having second thoughts, are you?" Luke asked.

Liam swallowed. "I...I just...This is a big step we're taking, man."

"Desperate times call for desperate measures. You made a promise!"

"I know." Liam sighed. "I never really thought it would come to this, though."

The woman, Donna Calico by the name on her desk, folded her hands and smiled patiently. Her shining white teeth, perfectly aligned, lit up a face that was as free of wrinkles and flaws as a newborn baby's, topped by the most perfect golden locks Liam had ever seen. She wore a business skirt and expensive looking jacket that had obviously been tailored to show off her impressive chest. Beautiful perfection in every way, no exaggeration. Not that Liam would have expected anything less from the spokesperson for Sculptech.

How many times have you gotten the treatment? he wondered silently. How many different faces have you worn since you started here?

Finally, Luke sighed and slumped forward. "If you don't want to do it, then I won't force you. But Liam..." He leaned forward. "You know as well as I do that this is the only way."

Liam swallowed hard again. Luke was right, and they both knew it. Still, the thought of what they were about to do...how could Luke jump right into it so easily? Was he not scared? Not even a little? True, hundreds of people went through this every day. It's not like there was any danger. But it was a one way street. If they went through with this, there would be no going back. Ever.

You made a promise. This is the only way.

Hesitantly, with a shaking hand, Liam picked up the pen and signed his name. Luke relaxed, and Donna beamed even more brightly.

"Wonderful!" she chirped. "We can get you boys started immediately. If you'll just follow me..."

She stood, and the two young men rose with her. Leaving the office, she led them down a brightly lit hallway. Posters lined the walls on both sides, showing photos of smiling people with the Sculptech logo hovering over each of them. A few even showed two very different people standing side by side with the words before and after above them.

Liam shivered. Please, God, tell me I didn't just make the biggest mistake of my life!

Founded in 2032, it had taken less than two years for Sculptech to become one of the biggest companies in the planet's history, putting the likes of Walmart, Google, and Apple all to shame. Amazing, seeing how they only offered one single service.

Donna led them to a room with a closed door. "One of you can use this pod," she said, opening it for them. "The other will be just down the hall."

Liam and Luke shared a look, and Luke nodded. With his heart hammering in his chest, Liam stepped forward.

"Hey." Luke's hand touched Liam's shoulder. "I'll see you in a little bit, okay?"

Liam turned to look at him, and nodded. Still beaming, Donna shut the door behind him.

That clunk wasn't the door, his anxious mind told him. It was the rest of his life, every moment up to this point in time, being severed from him. A brief moment of panic shot through him, and he nearly grabbed the doorknob to bolt from the building as fast as his legs would carry him. Only one thought was enough to stop him.

Luke.

They had been best friends since first grade. Two socially awkward, unpopular nerds in a sea of beautiful, confident people—due in no small part to Sculptech—they had latched onto each other as quickly as if they'd been brothers. Throughout school and into adulthood, they were all that had separated the other from total social ostracism. Even their own families hadn't been as close to them as they were to each other.

One other thing that they'd had in common was that they both came from poorer homes. Not poverty stricken exactly, but neither of them had ever had the money to afford treatment from a place like Sculptech. That left them...well, not ugly. Just average. But in a world where physical perfection was as easy to achieve as changing your wardrobe, average and ugly were practically one and the same.

And the years had gone by, with Luke and Liam forced to watch their classmates, and eventually coworkers, hook up, jump in and out of relationships, even get married and divorced. With every passing day, one thing had become clearer and clearer: romance was a world that they were never meant to inherit. After all, what woman would choose an average guy when she had her pick of all the Tom Cruises, Johnny Depps, and Brad Pits they could ever want? But then, on his twentieth birthday, Luke had come up with a solution. The most ridiculous solution Liam had ever heard, but a solution nonetheless.

If neither of them had found a girlfriend by the time they turned thirty...they would date each other.

Liam took a deep breath and looked around the room. It was small, about the size of his apartment's bedroom. A computer sat on a desk nearby, with a leather rolling chair in front of it. At the far end was a large glass tube that reached from floor to ceiling. With his stomach roiling so much that he felt like he was about to fart butterflies, he walked over and sat down at the computer.

Please enter your name, the screen said. His hands still shaking, Liam typed in his name.

Welcome, Liam Harvey. Please select all elements that you wish to change: Muscle mass. Height. Weight. Race. Skin color. Hair color. Hair length. Eye color. Eye shape...

Liam skimmed down the list, and his eyes froze when he saw the very last option.

"Think about it. It's perfect!" He could still hear Luke's excited voice as if he'd only just explained this hairbrained scheme last night, rather than ten long years ago. "We live together. We work together. We hardly go anywhere without each other. We're practically in a relationship already!"

Liam had laughed at that. "Dude, in case you haven't noticed, we're both...well, dudes. And neither of us are gay!"

Then Luke had slapped the pamphlet for Sculptech down in front of him, and Liam had finally paused his video game to really listen.

Now, a decade later, Liam selected almost every button on the screen, working his way down the list, heart beating a little harder with each click that brought him closer to...

"That's where they come in." Luke had insisted. "We save up money for the treatment..."

Click. Click. Click.

"...one of us goes..."

Click. Click. Click.

"...and when we come out..."

Liam's mouse came to that last option, and hovered it.

"...we're boyfriend and girlfriend!"

Liam stared at that button. He was scared. That didn't mean he was unwilling, though. He just needed time to come to terms with all this. He would have thought that ten years would have been enough time to mentally prepare himself, but now that he was here...staring at that computer screen, literally typing his past life into nonexistence...the hugeness of what he was about to do weighed down on him like a skyscraper.

Do I really...REALLY...want to do this?

He eyed the door. It was unlocked. There was nothing to stop him from getting up and leaving. Sculptech would shred the papers he'd just signed, and life would go on like none of this had ever happened. All that stood in his way was the thought of the look of betrayal Luke would give him if Liam made him go through this alone. Because it wasn't as simple as Luke had thought at first. One of them getting the treatment wouldn't be enough.

Both of them would have to.

Using state of the art technology, Sculptech had found a way to rebuild people on a molecular level. Anything from musculature to height to skin color. Even your gender could be changed. And not like the phony surgeries people had gone through in decades past. Real, actual changes. A complete transformation, right down to your DNA.

Put simply, Sculptech didn't just make you look like a woman. It made you a woman.

The problem was, Sculptech could only change your body. Who you were on the inside would always stay the same. That meant they couldn't change your sexuality. A gay man could change genders and come out a straight woman. But if a straight man went through the same treatment, he would for all intents and purposes become a lesbian.

No, they had both realized soon enough. One of them becoming a woman wouldn't solve the problem because he (she) still wouldn't be attracted to the other. The solution was obvious. More expensive, twice as intimidating, but still obvious.

They would both have to become women. Have their genders changed, and then live their lives together as a lesbian couple.

And there was no going back. You could remake yourself as many times as you could afford, but each time, the DNA you had before would be erased. You could never turn back into the person you were before.

A mirror on the wall showed Liam his reflection. Average, made even worse by his pudgy form and bad posture. Nothing that any woman would find attractive, but it was still him. If he went through with this, that face would only exist in pictures and memories.

Was it worth it?

Yes. Yes it was. Liam was surprised by how strong that sudden conviction was. He was scared of what the future would hold if he went through with this, but more than that he was tired of being lonely—lonely in a way that Luke could never fix.

Not yet, anyway.

He clicked the gender button.

A new set of menus came up, these ones designed to help him build the perfect body. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the piece of paper that Luke had given him that morning. Liam set it on the table and set to work.

Dark brown hair, Liam thought, sorting through the options. Wavy, a little past shoulder length. Olive skin, dark but not too dark.

It was Luke's description of his perfect woman. The one he could fall in love with at first sight. Luke had a similar list that would help him turn into Liam's dream woman. Liam had been hesitant to let somebody else decide on the body he'd spend the rest of his life with at first, but in the end had decided it made sense. They were doing this so that they could be a couple. It was only fair that they each make themselves as attractive as possible for the other.

The minutes slowly ticked by as Liam digitally constructed his new self. A couple inches shorter than he was now, but slimmer, with hips that flared enticingly. Firm, rounded butt, large breasts, and exotically slanted brown eyes. There was even an option for how sensitive Liam wanted his new breasts to be. Taking the slider, he moved it toward the far right of the scroller bar. Not quite all the way, but enough that it promised heavenly pleasure when...when he and Luke...

I can't believe I'm already thinking about that! he thought with shock.

That was it. He was done. The digital model of his new body stared at him from the computer screen. Beautiful, if not quite to Liam's personal tastes. In a time before Sculptech, she would have been the envy of every fashion show on earth.

Taking a deep breath, Luke clicked the button that said Complete.

Immediately, a beep came from the other side of the room. He looked just as the glass tube slid down into the floor, revealing a chair like you would sit in at the dentist's office. Another screen on the wall lit up, giving him instructions.

Please remove all articles of clothing, it said.

Liam stood up and pulled his shirt over his head, dropping it on the floor. His shoes and socks joined it, and then he unbuckled his belt and slid his jeans and boxers to the floor as well, leaving him naked in the small room.

Somehow, the computer knew it. Please take a seat.

With goosebumps rising all over his skin, Liam crossed the room, turned, and eased himself down onto the chair. It was cold. The sensation made his cock grow a little.

That's probably the last time I'll ever feel that, he thought. Suddenly, he wished he'd jerked off one last time before coming here.

The glass tube rose up around him, closing him off from the rest of the room.

"Sculpting process," said a robotic voice, "will begin in five...four...three..."

Liam tensed.

"Two...one."

A soft hissing sound came from the floor, and the glass fogged over as gas was pumped into the chamber. Liam had no idea how the science behind sculpting worked, but he knew that the gas would do something to—for lack of a better word—soften his DNA. Make it easier to reshape into his desired form. He breathed it in eagerly, sucking down huge lungfuls of it. Then he waited. Less than two minutes later, he could feel it taking effect. A sense of what he could only describe as looseness spread through his body. He felt like he really was becoming a lump of clay, waiting for the potter's hands to mold him into something new.

The hissing stopped, and was replaced by a mechanical thrumming. A surge of pressure ran through the tube, starting at the bottom and going upwards. Liam gasped slightly, feeling every cell in his body ripple from the force. It came again, then again, over and over, nonstop, each time pushing against Liam's body in a slightly different way. It didn't hurt, it wasn't even uncomfortable, but it sent tingling sensations coursing up and down his entire being with every pass.

Hesitantly, he raised his head, half afraid he'd find that he'd been reduced to a liquid puddle of flesh. That wasn't the case. Instead, he stared in amazement at his own body. The process was working. Already, his pale pink skin had darkened a few shades. His nerdy plumpness was receding inch by inch, and...

"Holy fuck," he whispered, watching as a pair of breasts began to grow out of his chest.

The whole process was...kind of arousing, he realized. His cock swelled under the machine's constant pressure. Darker than it had ever been before—and smaller too. Liam's eyes widened as the machine did exactly as he had told it, shrinking his erect penis a little further with every minute, until there was nothing but a smooth mound of flesh between his legs.

Then a sudden, sharp wave of new sensations washed over washed over Liam, making him arch his back with another gasp. Not in pleasure or pain, but just from sheer strangeness. It came from between his legs. Where his dick had once been, now there was a growing feeling of...emptiness. It started at the surface, but slowly burrowed its way deeper into his body, becoming a part of him that he'd never imagined having before now.

And then, all at once, it stopped. Liam fell back onto the chair, panting for breath. Something fell to cover his face, and he reached up to brush long, chocolate brown hair away. He paused when he saw his hand. Slimmer than before, all the fat that had accumulated from years of sitting around playing video games gone forever. The skin was several shades darker, too. Just like he had told the computer to make it.

Slowly, he sat up as another gas was pumped into the chamber to re-solidify his DNA, looking at himself in wonder. No more pudgy nerd gut. Now his stomach was smooth and athletic, though he had a hard time seeing it past his breasts. Now those were plump. They even bounced a little when he sat up. With hesitant hands, he reached up to cup them. A bolt of unexpected pleasure shot through him when his fingers brushed against his brand new nipples, and...

A new feeling blossomed between his legs. A quiet gasp came from Liam's lips—a softer, creamy smooth voice that didn't sound at all like his own—and he tentatively took one hand from his breasts, lowering it down to his new...

No, not his vagina. Her vagina.

But no sooner than did her fingers brush those foreign, moistening folds, than did the computer beep at him again. The glass walls sank into the floor again, leaving Liam sitting in an empty room once again. For a minute she just sat there, unsure of what to do. Her old life was over. A new life was beginning. How did one react to that?

Luke!

The thought finally spurred her into movement. Feet touched the cold floor, supported by legs that felt familiar and alien at the same time. Liam couldn't help but run her hands over herself again, feeling the smooth contours of her new self. The mirror reflected somebody that Liam had never seen before in his—her—life, but who matched her every movement perfectly. Another tingle of pleasure stirred her crotch when her fingers trailed over her nipples, but she forced herself to ignore it. There were better times, better places, for that kind of exploration. For now, she needed to check on Luke.

Her clothes lay piled up where she had left them, and she set to work getting dressed. It was odd how the same clothes that had fit her snugly just minutes before were now loose and saggy. She had to loop the belt almost twice around her waist to make it fit, and under them her boxers felt strangely empty without a cock pressing against the front. The shirt hung loose too, and after a moment's thought she tugged it forward to show off a little more of her cleavage.

After all, she thought, heart fluttering, if Luke and I are going to be a couple, then...

No! There'd be time to think about that later!

With nervous movements, she opened the door, letting light from the hallway spill into her room. Just outside, she was surprised to find Donna standing there, waiting and smiling as brightly as ever.

"Wow!" Donna said. "You look amazing!"

"Th- Thank you," Liam said, a blush rising to his cheeks. "Is Luke..."

"Luke finished a few minutes ago. He's waiting for you in my office. Follow me."

Liam silently followed Donna back down the hallway they'd just come through. It was crazy how different everything looked with just a couple inches taken from her height. They passed a few other workers leading patients to their pods. More than a couple of them gave her approving looks.

Sorry boys, she thought, smirking a little. And girls, too. I'm taken!

The door to Donna's office was closed, and Liam paused outside of it, suddenly nervous. If Luke really was in there, then when Donna opened it this would be the first time Liam would see him in his...her...new body. And the first time Luke would see Liam in his new body. What if Luke didn't like him? What if Liam didn't like Luke? They were stuck like this now, and—

The door opened, and Liam gasped when the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen filled his vision.

Luke was everything Liam had hoped for. Silky smooth hair, so blonde it was nearly white, spilled down to the middle of Luke's back, framing a pixie-like face that was peppered lightly with freckles. Large blue eyes, the very picture of naïve innocence, opened wide to stare back at Liam. She stood up slowly, letting Liam take in her figure. Slimmer even than Liam was, with breasts that were barely visible in the baggy shirt she was wearing. Liam knew they'd be small and perky, just big enough for a handful, just the way he liked them.