“So, a lot happened before we woke you,” Dad says as he’s going through the flimsies that are scattered all over his desk. “We now face a crisis. We have more men than women, and that’s not viable.”

  He pauses and sits down beside Mom.

  I nod and ask, “I gathered that much from what Dr. Mayes said. The question is, now what?”

  “We have to ask for volunteers for men to become women,” Dad states.

  The thought of that makes me a little sick. I adore women, that should be obvious, but that doesn’t mean I’d want to be one. Of course, it’s possible. The technology to change one’s sex has been around for a long time. Personally, I just can’t see a man willingly giving up his manhood to be a woman. There have been plenty that have made use of the technology when they’ve felt they were born the wrong sex, but I’ve never heard of a man or woman willingly changing sexes without an underlying reason like that. I shudder as I think about it. Nope, I’m damn sure that I don't want to change my sex.

  “Do you want to try it?” Dad asks, sliding a flyer over that advertises the information across his desk toward me. I gnced at it just so that I could say that I looked at it, and then politely pushed it back.

  “No, thanks,” I say firmly while shaking my head. After all, I have Athena.

  “What about 22b?” I ask to change the subject.

  A full-blown smile blossoms, and he says, “Even better than we expected. A little bigger than Earth, but completely habitable. A biosphere that’s very simir to Earth, with a bit more nd, too. The scientists are going insane coming up with names for it since they didn’t like my idea.” I quirk an eyebrow. “Terra,” he says.

  “That’s not very original, but it suffices, I would think.”

  “Originality is overrated. Simple is best, I believe.”

  And that, folks, is how Kepler-22b became the Terra we all know and love.

  ◇ ◆ ◇ ◆ ◇ ◆ ◇

  After we talk a bit more, I’m finally allowed to leave. You know where I’m heading, Athena’s cabin. I message her to let her know that I’m coming. Along the way, I pause by the main lounge. The passengers are huddled together in little groups talking. All of them are grim-faced, and most telling of all, even the children are quiet.

  I frown for a moment since I can’t bme them. We keep losing people, and now we’re facing extinction unless many men agree to become women. This whole thing has been one big clusterfuck, as Dad would call it.

  Continuing along the way, I see Athena standing outside her door waiting for me with a huge smile pstered across her beautiful face. She runs to me, jumps up, and wraps her arms and legs around me. You’d think it had been the actual five years since she has seen me, instead of just a few hours.

  “Thank God, you’re alright!” she excims while hugging me tightly. “I didn’t know what to do when I saw your pod status was amber. All I could think was, ‘What if you didn’t wake up?’ I was terrified that you wouldn’t or that you would have deficits.”

  I pat her back. “As you can see, I’m fine.”

  She leans back enough to give me a long, deep kiss. As we kiss, two men walk by, and one of them says, “Lucky bastard. Must be nice to be the Captain’s son and get your pick of the batch. I bet she’s a hellion in the sack.”

  I set Athena down, turn to them, and growl out menacingly, “What did you say?”

  He turns around and smirks. “You heard me. What of it? So, is she as good in bed as she looks?”

  I literally see red, and don’t remember a thing that happened until I come back to myself with three crewmen holding me down. Looking over, I see the man that made the remarks. He’s ying on the deck and no longer moving, a battered and bloody mess. The other one is nowhere to be seen. I guess he took off. Then, I think, ‘Oh, fuck! Now I’ve done it! Dad is going to jump all over me!’

  I’ve always had a temper, especially where someone I care about is involved, but I’ve never totally lost control, until now. A Marine shows up, tells the crewmen, “I’ll take him,” grabs my arm, and lifts me to my feet. I almost have to trot to keep up with him until we reach the brig, where he pushes me into a cell and closes the door.

  Sitting down on the bed, I hang my head because I know Dad is going to be furious. I’m supposed to set an example, and here I am fighting. Not only that, but I hurt the guy pretty badly.

  ◇ ◆ ◇ ◆ ◇ ◆ ◇

  Dad paces around the brig outside of my cell as he attempts to calm down. Bars separate us, but to me, they feel like they are nothing more than tissue, yet they’re all that keeps him from taking me apart. I’ve never seen Dad this angry before, and in a way, I understand why he’s so angry.

  On the other side of the room, Athena sits quietly, waiting to see how things turn out.

  I decide that trying to expin myself is my best option right now, so I blow out my breath and step up to the bars. “Da-ad,” I attempt to say, but my voice catches in my throat. I clear my throat and try again, “Dad, I can expin…”

  Dad stops his pacing and stares daggers at me. “Expin? Expin what? That you almost beat a man to death? And, for what? What the hell, Avery?! You know very well how bad things are, how tenuously most people are hanging on after everything that has happened. Yet, you think it’s prudent to beat someone down like that. Sure, go right ahead and expin!”

  “I…”

  I stop what I’m beginning to say when he holds up a finger to silence me. “Shut. The. Hell. Up. Nothing you can say will make this alright.” He turns around and looks at Athena. “Sweetie, go back to your cabin. Avery and I have to have a little discussion.”

  She merely nods, gnces at me, and then leaves the brig.

  “Now, then, where was I? I’d love for you to give me a good enough reason to overlook this, but I seriously doubt that anything you have to say will hold any water with me. Do you have any idea what kind of pressure cooker this ship is right now? People are scared. Very scared. They know something is wrong, but I haven’t told them that we’re facing extinction if we can’t get enough men to become women. All of this, and you add even more bullshit on top of me. So, rather than brainstorming with my command staff about how to persuade men to do that, I’m down here, dealing with you.”

  Dad looks at me and shakes his head with a sad and regretful expression. I tense up because I know he’s about to mete out my punishment and going by his expression, I’m not going to like it one bit.

  “Avery, you have no idea how disappointed I am in you because you know, you know, how bad things are. I just can’t believe that you would do something like this,” Dad says quietly.

  “I’m sorry, Dad. More sorry than you know,” I murmur.

  “Look, Avery, your mother and I talked before I came down here.”

  I merely nod and wait for the axe to fall. What’s the worst that they can do? Help in the kitchens? Clean the toilets? Confine me to our cabin? Now, that is a punishment I would hate since I wouldn’t be able to see or talk to Athena for however long he did. Though, as I said, whatever he pns to do, I’m not going to like it one bit.

  “We both realize that there isn’t a whole lot that we can do to punish you, so here is what is going to happen. You will work in the kitchens until we reach the orbit of Terra.” I nod. I can deal with that. Then he continues, “And, you will be helping out by serving the ship in the best way you can. You will volunteer to transition.” I begin to say something and he raises his voice to talk over me. “You will not compin or sulk, and you will do everything you can to make the best of this whole fucked up situation, understood?”

  All I can do is stare at him dumbfounded for a minute. I have to become a woman? What the ever-loving fuck is he saying?

  “What?! I have to do what?!”

  “You heard me. I told you before we left Earth orbit that I needed you to lead by example. Now, you are going to help us all by transitioning. You will lead by example, and maybe, just maybe, by you transitioning, it’ll encourage other men to follow suit.” He looks at the Marine guard and points at the cell door, who comes over and unlocks it. “Now, you’re coming with me back to our cabin. You will not leave it other than to report to the kitchens. Tomorrow, you will report to Dr. Keller and begin your transition.”

  If I thought begging would help, I’d have gotten down on my knees and begged as if my life depended on it, but I simply couldn’t bring myself to do it. Don’t get me wrong, I wanted to scream and argue until I lost my voice, but I just couldn’t do that to Dad after what I’ve done and everything that’s happened. In the end, I merely nod and follow him quietly. Now, what was that about the perks of being the Captain’s son?

  ◇ ◆ ◇ ◆ ◇ ◆ ◇

  Dad drops me off at the cabin and reiterates not to leave. What he didn’t do was tell me that I couldn’t talk to Athena or have her over. As much as I hate to do it, I need to tell her what’s going to happen. She at least deserves that much, so I send her a text and ask her to come over.

  It isn’t long before the door chimes, and I open it to see Athena standing there. She looks like she took a shower after leaving the brig, her hair is up in a ponytail, and she’s wearing a sky-blue crop top, a navy pleated mini skirt, and heeled sandals.

  She smiles at me, gives me a short kiss, and says, “Hey, there. I hope your dad didn’t do anything too terrible to you.”

  I despondently say, “Hi. Come on in. We need to talk.”

  When I say that, her smile disappears, and she silently follows me over to the sofa and sits down beside me.

  “So… Dad was furious, as you know.” She nods. “In a way, I can’t bme him since he has enough to deal with without me creating more problems.”

  “But, you were defending me!”

  “Against words, Athena. Had he id a hand on you, I might have had at least a sembnce of a defense for my actions, but all he did was talk. He was rude, obnoxious, and most definitely a prick, but he did nothing that would excuse me beating him up like I did.”

  I guess talking in the tone of voice I have been using has put her on edge because she anxiously asks, “What did he do to punish you?”

  “I have to work in the kitchens until we make pnet fall, and…”

  When I pause for more than a few seconds, she asks, “And?”

  “I have to volunteer to make the transition.”

  “Hang on, transition? Transition to what?”

  I forgot she doesn’t know yet. “Athena, a lot of the men are going to have to volunteer to become women, or we’re not going to make it as a colony. There simply aren’t enough women left to make a viable start. So, Dad is going to ask for volunteers. In my case, he volunteered me.”

  “But what about us? I wanted us to be together.”

  “I did too, but I brought this on myself. Dad has to do something to save all of us, and he can’t be seen as being soft on his own family when it comes to punishment. It isn’t as if I’m going to disappear, though. I’ll still be here, just not as a man.”

  “I wanted you to give me my first baby. More than anything else, I wanted that.”

  I nod. “I wanted to do that, too. We can hope that you’re already pregnant, and, if you want, we have until my family comes home to try again. I have to report for transitioning tomorrow morning.”

  Tears are in her eyes, but she nods. Then she stands up to offer me her hand, and leads me to the bedroom. I lock the door, and we make love repeatedly until my family comes home.