Witless Protection Program

"Well, first we take x-rays to check on the exact conformation - a fancy medical word for shape - of any implants or other foreign objects, then we do a biopsy or two in the area to make sure there aren't any changes ongoing."

"Ongoing?" I asked. I was a little surprised to hear of such prolonged activity beyond when phenotypic changes were observable.

"Ongoing as in 'still occurring'," he explained.

I giggled again, genuinely amused and slightly reassured by how dense he thought I was. "So, like, what can I get done?"

"Too many things to list," he said, shaking his head, "What did you have in mind?"

"Well, I was thinking of my booty, but I actually already got that done."

"Really?" he said sitting up straighter in his chair. "At another clinic?"

I nodded.

"And you paid for that yourself?"

I shrugged. "I don't remember?"

"I see," he said pensively. "And how were you planning on paying for this one?"

"I don't know. With money?" I suggested, both to avoid giving away too much and to make clear that I wasn't going to trade sexual favors. Unless I really had to.

"Would this be your money?" he asked with gentle skepticism.

I hadn't anticipated the question, though it made sense to ask; on my best days I didn't strike anyone as a canny businesswoman capable of supporting myself. Would it be safe to tell him that I had money? I felt like maybe it wasn't. "I might, like, get some money from my friend Nikki," I said, and realized that this wasn't only a good cover story, it might also be true.

"Good, good," he said, "Why don't you invite your friend to come to a consultation with you to help guide the process."

In other words, he wanted the person with the money there to sign off on anything. That seemed like such a ruthlessly sensible rule that he'd be unlikely to budge, so I didn't try. I just went home to tell Nikki I was going to the clinic to look into getting more work done, and she agreed immediately with no questions asked.

That is, she asked many questions, but not until we were on our way. She was driving a car, which she'd just earned her license to do. I was mildly envious of the independence it gave her, but tamped down that thought with the memory that I only needed to last a few more months, or maybe another year at the worst.

"Seriously, Bubbles, I know you're forgetful, but it's kind of hard to believe you forgot what enhancements you want to get," Nikki told me.

"Well, there's so many things it could be, " I said, trying to keep my options open for as long as possible, "Plus they say they can't, like, do stuff with parts that have already been done."

"Oh, so you can't get any bigger?" Nikki asked with mock sympathy, then added, "I'm really honored that you would ask me for this. I'm really getting excited just thinking about it. Like getting matching tattoos!"

I didn't have the heart to explain that I had wanted her to pay for just my own treatment, especially given that I hadn't actually intended to expend any of her money on it because I intended to back out once I got some swabs of their treatment areas. I was sure that I'd still be able to achieve the same by saying I didn't trust the clinic or something similar, but now I would be disappointing Nikki.

Once there, I let Nikki take the lead in discussing the possible treatments, and I mostly went along enthusiastically with anything she suggested, wanting to move through the initial consultation as quickly as possible. A lot of the possibilities got shot down because of the treatments I'd already received, but Nikki finally settled on a treatment that would change our keratins to make our hair and nails more glossy. I was actually entirely okay with this very minor change, I thought, and was feeling very relaxed as we toured the treatment facility after making our initial selection but prior to making our advance payment.

"This is where it happens?" I asked.

Dr Jim smiled condescendingly. "Yes, it is. I'm guessing you don't remember having been here before."

I shrugged vapidly, and noted how unsurprised he was. Clearly he knew the potential for anterograde amnesia as a side-effect of the treatment but didn't intend to explain it. Did he also know about retrograde amnesia? If so, he was a deeply unethical doctor. Or he was in deep trouble with the mob. Or both.

The way he focused mostly on Nikki rather than me made me think that money was his overriding concern, making it easier for me to surreptitiously wipe parts of the room that seemed most likely to harbour mimivirus residue. Also, the price quoted for the treatment gave me an excuse to back out that I thought he would believe. I mentioned it to Nikki in private, and she seemed relieved.

"Yeah, it did seem pricey to me. Ten thousand dollars for what's basically a permanent salon treatment? I just didn't want to disappoint you," she admitted.

I laughed. "Both of us didn't want to tell each other. We can do something else together."

She gave me a quick tight hug. "You're the sweetest Honey," she said, making it sound like she was complimenting me on my quality as a bee product. "I'll tell him."

"Thank you!" I said, and gladly left it up to her

"We offer financing on very good terms," he said, sweating a little after Nikki explained her position.

She was very apologetic, but also didn't budge, so he eventually gave up and let us go, saying that we should return in a few months when we'd be clear to take on major treatments that would be more worth the price. It looked like he was wondering if he'd still be around at that point.

The Special Offer

Unfortunately for me, though I tested my swabs as carefully as I could, I came up empty. I was wondering if maybe I should try to convince Nikki to get the treatment with me despite the price, when Nikki came to me with a proposal.

"I got a call from Doctor Jim!" she said excitedly, "He says there's a new thing they've got that we can try. Half the price and lets them treat even without waiting six months."

"Why would they sell that for less?" I asked.

"I guess 'cause it's so new. Also, well," she bit her lip as if she was considering whether to tell me something, "Okay, well, the thing is that I guess they use some animal genes. Like not human. But it's totally safe, except that you can have flu-like symptoms for a little while."

I stared at her for a moment as I tried to grasp the ramifications, and she blushed. "If that sounds too weird we don't have to do it. I mean, I'm not sure I'm down for it, either. I just thought it was at least worth going and looking into it."

"No no, I'm very interested!" I protested, perhaps with too much emphasis, because she seemed slightly taken aback. "I just didn't know they could do that." Also it was hard to understand how it could be possible; nonhuman animal genes would usually need other nonhuman animal genes and proteins around them to operate properly. It seemed to me that introducing animal genes would produce very unreliable results, if they did anything at all. I wondered what they really were.

We got an appointment for the next day, and in the meantime I spent a lot of time considering what, if any, relationship the DNA payload of the prospective treatment might have to nonhuman DNA. After thinking about it for awhile, I thought of some plausible ways to introduce mammalian genes, but they all required either a careful survey of and adaptation to the patient's exact genotype or to somehow entrain a process that used protein conformation feedback to alter gene expression. The first would be completely uneconomical, and the second seemed like far too huge of a technological and scientific leap.

No, whatever they were doing, I was sure they weren't using animal DNA to do it. They might include animal DNA in the payload, but it wasn't going to be the source of visible tissue alterations, if it was functional at all. I thought it might be some weird marketing gimmick for flogging the treatment to the sort of person who would like to tell people they had tiger DNA.

I was further confirmed in my conclusion when they didn't take samples of either of our DNA, something they would have to do if they were going to craft the appropriate adapter proteins. They couldn't just use previously-collected samples because previous treatments naturally caused expression shifts near the insertion loci. They were too minor to matter for human gene expression, but the amino acids sequence for any adapter protein would have to be far more exact in order to make functional proteins from nonhuman DNA.

"Look! Cows are on the list too!" Nikki said with a laugh. "Wouldn't that be cute?" She pointed at a computer rendering of a cow tail scaled to human size.

"That's not real, is it?" I asked, because there's no way it could be real, and I was a little offended by the idea of being lied to about something so obvious.

"Well, yes and no," Dr Jim said, shifting uncomfortably. "That's actually a living implant grown from an actual cow that has been treated with your DNA so your body doesn't reject it."

"Oh, so the same process, but backwards," I said before I remembered to be stupid.

Dr Jim nodded with surprise. "Exactly. Those do require some extra maintenance, though; every three months or so you'll need to come in for either a re-treatment or removal, because your immune system will still start to attack it at some point. It develops slowly so it's not really dangerous, but it can cause pain or numbness, swelling, etc."

"Oh, so it's temporary!" Nikki said, getting excited again. "That's perfect! We should do it as part of a Bubble Bar promotion!"

"Wow, that would be amazing," I said, covering my horror with feigned excitement. "But wait, does it cost extra?" I asked, hoping it would so I would have an excuse to turn it down.

"Uh," he said, and checked something on his computer. "Oh, yeah, there's a procedure fee for the initial impact and also for the follow-ups, though removal is free."

"Maybe we see how we like others options without extra charges first?" I suggested to Nikki.

"Oh, yeah, that makes sense," she said easily enough, but I could see her looking at the various implant options with fascination. "So what can we do that's included with the basic charge?"

He led us through a list of bovidae-derived options that was stunningly well suited for us. For example, one combined many milk ducts into a quasi-bovine central duct, making it faster and easier to milk. Another created additional milk reservoirs like a miniature version of a cow's udder to increase breastmilk storage capacity. There was a keratin enhancement that was apparently very similar to the human keratin treatment we'd selected then rejected, except this alternative used a tougher and more pliable keratins mix derived from both cattle and bighorn sheep. A longer tongue was an attractive option, and the eyelashes would have been as well if I didn't already have pretty exaggerated lashes. Finally, there was an option to alter menstruation so that it was experienced like a heat instead of a horrible bloated crampfest.

An especially unexpected item caught my eye: one option was titled 'lactose-free milk', and replaced the usual sugar in milk with oligosaccaride, which was not a capability I could image to be conferred by any mammalian gene. "Is this... natural?" I asked, trying to figure out how to ask about it without giving away too much.

"Absolutely natural," Dr Jim insisted, but didn't explain further.

I wondered if he even knew how it was done. I didn't doubt that it was the truth, much, because it was such a strange lie. In fact, it was a bizarre transformation to offer in the first place. How many people could have a business plan that involved personally milking themselves to make dairy goods? Were lactose intolerant babies a major concern? Could babies digest oligosaccharide? Could adults?

There were other options derived from canid and felid families, but only one family could be sourced per treatment, so of course we selected the bovidae menu. We signed releases, paid a small test fee that, he assured us, would count toward our treatment costs, and provided a few drops of blood from multiple parts of our bodies to confirm that we were eligible for the various elements of the treatment, but nothing was guaranteed nor were we committed until the tests were complete. I appreciated this because it gave me an opportunity to search for what techniques they might be using, if it wasn't all a ruse to get samples of our blood.

The Birthday Present

I stayed up very late at night on the eve of our return to the clinic trying to hash out some testable hypotheses about the treatment, if it existed. I was becoming increasingly convinced that it did not, and that we would return to be told there was some problem and we weren't eligible for the treatments after all. In case they did seem ready to go through with it, though, I wanted to have rehearsed questions that might eliminate some of the possibilities. I wished I'd read the releases more carefully, as they would have been instructive as well, but I intended to get a copy when we returned, prior to when I gave my excuses and backed out of the treatment.

Nikki seemed even more eager than I would have thought, barely able to contain her excitement. It made me feel bad, thinking about how I would inevitably spoil her fun, but of course there was no way I would let them insert a bunch of untested ruminant genes into me, even if it hurt Nikki's feelings. Besides, it was my birthday, and though I hadn't told anyone that it was, I was feeling irrationally irritated that no one had ever asked me what the date was, when they made a big deal out of all the other girls' special days. Not only had no one planned a party to celebrate my nineteenth birthday, I'd woken late and missed my morning milking, which was also making me uncomfortable. Maybe I didn't need any presents, and maybe I had no one to blame except myself for the pressure in my boobs, but I at least not feel guilty about declining to do something extremely risky for someone else's pleasure on my special day.

Though Nikki looked so friendly and adorable, it made me feel ashamed of my silent resentment. And it was entirely unfounded resentment, I recognized while we waited in the treatment room for the doctor to arrive with the test results.

"Happy Birthday!" Nikki whispered in my ear and hugged me from behind.

"You knew?" I asked, laughing with an elation almost as irrational as my previous petulance.

"Of course, bestie!" Nikki said, and gave me a kiss that was perhaps a little bit warmer than normal between besties.

She noticed me wincing and jumped back. "Oh my god, I'm so sorry!" she said, mortified. "I'm so stupid. I misread."

I laughed awkwardly. "That's not it. I missed my milking this morning and I'm overfull, so the pressure was not so comfortable. But you didn't know."

"Oh my god, really?" She laughed with relief. "They actually have a milker on hand; I called ahead."

"Really? Perfect!" I said, and a few second later both a cute little mini cake and the milker entered, both being presented by rather cute nurses who sang happy birthday and then left Nikki and I alone. It was strange eating cake while being milked in the doctor's office, but extremely pleasant.

Too pleasant, in fact. I was about half done with my piece of cake when I realized I was slipping into a milking haze. By then my judgment was already very impaired, though, and I couldn't feel that anything was the matter. Nikki was there, and she wouldn't let anything bad happen, after all. She had remembered my birthday, and gotten me a cake, and even paid for extra cute treatments from her ForFans income.

Meaning that instead of backing out at the last minute, I joined Nikki in being jabbed by a number of large syringes containing what had to be the mimivirus. I knew that I was supposed to be worried about this, and paying close attention, but acting on that knowledge wasn't possible.

My birthday present unfolded over two weeks that I remember only intermittently and imperfectly, though it's not completely missing time like some of the others. When it was over, I felt like my faculties were fully restored, and I didn't seem to have suffered any retrograde amnesia either.

That meant I could remember agreeing to all the treatments in my milking trance. I had conflicting feelings about this. On one hand, it didn't seem like there had been any serious complications of the treatment such as I had feared beforehand, and some of them had proven quite convenient, like the changes to my nipples that had more than doubled the speed at which I could be milked. I was also producing half again more than I had before, and rising. We'd had to change the recipe slightly to accommodate my slightly sweeter cream, but overall it was an improvement. And of course, I now had mimiviruses and adapter genes available to study.

On the other hand, the cute cow ears and tail Nikki had given me as presents were extremely extra. Nikki had also gotten them herself, so I at least was not the only bimbo cow around, but while hers were mostly cosmetic, mine where very active, almost twitchy. I could sort of hide my bonus bovine ears in my hair as long as they stayed still, but whenever I felt a strong emotion, they'd express themselves by shifting or flicking, which inevitably exposed them. My tail had the same issue, except that I couldn't really hide it even at rest. I only had to put up with it for another ten weeks, but that was plenty of time for me to establish infamy as Bubbles the Extra Bimbo Cow, I was sure.

There was another way in which my changes were more marked than hers: mentally. She had experienced less anterograde amnesia than I had, and while she would moo during milking like I did, she could choose not to moo, and only did so because she felt it was cute or funny. For me it was an irresistible reflex, and I don't think she even knew it was. In fact, I had the distinct impression that she thought I was just maintaining an extended cosplay character like she was. I feared she was even correct, in that my behaviors were not brought on by the mimiviral insertions. Rather, by guiding me through the cosplay character's habits during my amnesiac period, she had unknowingly ingrained in me the compulsions of a sexy cowgirl.

The Pet

No doubt when Nikki had first offered my teats to the rest of the Squad, there had been amusement or consternation, but that unremembered event was a fortnight in the past by the time my brain was storing long term memories again. By then I found myself offering a teat to anyone in the kitchen without a second thought, or even a first one. When I saw coffee or tea in the making, it also seemed as if my hands would move of their own accord to present a nipple for their use, which they would take with a polite thank you and no mention of the little noises I would make as they squirted however much cream they wanted into their cup.

I also found myself feeling unexpectedly comfortable going outside in my cow costume, complete with cowbell and Holstein-printed halter top. People looked at me like I was being purposely salacious rather than as a dumb bimbo who'd half turned into a dairy cow, and I'd clearly been traveling around with Nikki dressed in the same outfit. I knew I should feel embarrassed, but in a way I felt protected. When dressed up like a character, I didn't arouse suspicions that my cow ears and tail were real. They were just very clever gimmicks, and the more appreciative and generous-minded people even congratulated me on my craft.

The one development that I hadn't gotten used to already was my horns. I'd already been growing during the lost weeks, but they didn't really emerge until about the third week. Nikki, of course, thought they were cute and was a little put out that she didn't get any, but otherwise shrugged them off as an unexpected bonus rather than an alarming and unexpected development. Andrea, on the other hand, was extremely fascinated, and asked to see the rest of my curious cow parts.