Astro-Projectionists were paid well. There was no denying that. They were some of the richest people on any given planet. But they were used to their limits also. Going into a coma for days and weeks at a time was hard on a body. Nearly all of them were too skinny. Not enough time to fatten up before the body was put back into starvation mode. They struggled to have family lives too.

Nobody wanted to marry someone who will be in a coma for over half their marriage. Nobody wants to have a child and have to raise it themselves because their partner was out. The worst part was they could be sent on a trip at any time. No vacations because you had to stay where you could be found. No privacy for fear that you could be kidnapped to be sold and used by another. There was also the risk that your planet might sell you to another, so your whole family would be uprooted and moved galaxies away.

The two brothers had been taken at the same time. It was almost unheard of for two Astro-Projectionists to be born in the same family, but they had. They were not the only children of their parents, they had five other siblings. But they were the only ones who had the skill. Thomas still remembered his mother shrieking as they were herded into the shuttle, his father yelling obscenities and fighting to reach them. It was no good.

They had been sent to a world galaxies away. The first part of their adolescent had been spent learning how to travel by Astro on the ship. They had no human teacher present. Instead, a dozen robots, manned by a team of doctors and therapists on the planet had taught them. They had run of an entire galactic ship. The only other humans were in hyper-asleep. The robots though were lifelike enough and they gave good simulations. They played games to keep them active, they watched movies, and they were taught several languages and about different cultures on different planets. They learned how to survive in various climates that were simulated, and how to approach species of unknown origins.

When they were young adults, they were put into hyper-sleep with the others to finish their trip. When they awoke, it was nearly two decades later. Their parents were dead, their siblings grown and had children of their own. And they were on a entirely new planet, completely foreign to them.

The two brothers worked hard together as messengers. But they yearned for freedom. So, out came the mercenary work. Oh, they weren't the only ones doing it. There were maybe a dozen others, working undercover in their spare time, killing for money. They found a teacher, and ended up being some of the best at it.

It was a lucrative business. Of course it was. How do you kill a mercenary that can just leave a body, and come back in another? A mercenary that can travel from planet to planet to avoid arrest? It was impossible.

They were rich beyond their wildest dreams, but it still wasn’t enough. They had to offer an outrageous sum to win their freedom. For two reasons. One, to actually win their freedom. They were no fools. The officials of their planet would happily take their money, but would still use them. Through threats or whatever means. They had to leave, and in order to do that, they had to be someone entirely new. That was the second part. To buy a whole new identity. Not just ID cards and such, but a whole new genetic database. They had to find someone who had never been tested by the government, buy their DNA, and then use it to leave their planet on a ship. More hyper-sleep, a new world, but at least they would awake with their freedom, and the ability to live their lives as they wanted completely anonymous.

Ryan awoke with a jolt, but he didn’t open his eyes. He took a moment to remember. It was the first step in training. Remember who you are. The details came back quickly enough. Planet Bezants, the contract, the plan. He tried as usual to remember details of his trip, but spirits, our souls, or whatever you wanted to call them, never remembered such things. They couldn’t. They could only feel. Traveling always left him feeling peaceful. It was odd, doing the work he did and coming back after killing feeling peaceful about it. But he did it anyways.

“What is the time?” He asked. At the sound of his high pitched voice, he shot upright. “Stars above, I’m a woman.” He gasped.

“Aye. You are. You want the local time? Or the intergalactic?” A deep baritone voice responded back.

He looked at the short stocky man to his left. “Intergalactic.”

“52:33:87”

“Oh good. Did it in only twelve.”

The man raised a thick bushy eyebrow. “Aye? Twelve hours? Good job! I’m Curtis.”

Ryan stretched and lowered himself out of the bed. The body he inhabited had been very well maintained. Ligaments were loose and flexible, he could feel well defined muscles pulling, and senses worked perfectly. It was odd though, feeling the weight of what appeared to be small breasts at his chest, and moving with hips wider than a mans.

The lab he was in was very secure, he could tell that immediately. Thick walls of stone, eye identification at every machine that beeped, and kept so clean that even a smudged thumbprint would have stood out.

Another man, this one tall but also thick, came through a heavy steel door with a hiss. He carried an honest to heavens chicken sandwich and Ryan’s body reacted immediately with salivation and stomach gurgles. Ryan smiled as he reached for the plate. “Whoever she was loved those.”

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The man gave a small start at that. “You can see her memories? I thought that was impossible.”

“It is impossible. But strong likes and dislikes leave an impression on the body. She really liked chicken sandwiches.” Ryan said through a mouthful of bread and meat.

“Oh. Yea. Yea she did. I’m Leo.” Ryan pumped the man’s arm.

“Ryan.”

Cordialities finished, the two men quickly gave him a run down. The plan had not changed much since the last update, but it was good to go over with them in person. Mainly because communication took a while. Messages, even traveling faster than light speed, still took almost two weeks to reach him. Anything could have happened in those weeks.

“Ya got a half day to get used to that their body.” Curtis said. “Thats twenty four hours, just like ya asked. After that, we gonna take another half day, let ya go over blueprints, and meet the team.”

Ryan nodded. “Perfect. You have engineers right?”

Leo chimed up. “The best we have”

“Good. I’m no engineer, but I take directions very well.” Sandwich finished, he stood up. “Now let’s get to work. I need to get back to my own body as soon as we can. The quicker the better. My own glycogen stores are low from running as messenger and side working as mercenary. The faster we get this done, the faster I can get back and refuel.”

Leo stood up. “I understand. Lindela was one of our own. She taught me everything. Here, I will show you to your living quarters. Take a moment to yourself, then ping me when you are ready to hit up the exercise room.”

Leo led him out the heavy steel doors and down a dark hallway. “Are we below ground?”

“We are. Believe it or not, it was easier to tunnel down and air seal everything to relieve pressure than it was to stay on the surface of this planet. Our ancestors did back breaking work to get a livable environment. Actually, most of us whom have been on the planet for generations show it. We tend to have denser bones and more muscles.”

“I believe it.” Ryan said looking at the thick forearm of the woman’s body he currently resided in.

His room was not much. Only a small cell with a cot, clean blankets, a change of clothes, and a small toilet and shower in the corner. He didn’t care one bit. He wouldn’t be here long enough to even enjoy what the cell contained.

Leo waited outside while Ryan used the toilet. That alone was a disarming process. He had used female bodies before, but as a messenger. He had never resided in them long enough to even have to use the toilet. Messengers spent only a few hours at the most in the bodies. He had never had a female body as a mercenary.

He held a bit of soft cloth in his hand. Did he wipe back to front? Or the other way around? He went with the way he normally would in his own body. Front to back. Afterwards he looked into the little mirror above the sink and took in his temporary face.

She had been a cute female. High jawbones, dark auburn hair that was buzzed close to her skull, no doubt so nobody had to waste time washing and brushing it. In life, she probably had kept it longer. Slightly crooked teeth with a smattering of freckles across a pale face. Not a beauty, but cute enough. Thick muscled legs and arms, with small breasts and wide hips. He could not see a cause of death. Normally scars would tell but none appeared to be present. He shrugged, dropped the plain brown shirt back down, and walked out.

“You knew her?” Ryan could not resist asking Leo. He knew it was none of his business, but he always had a curiosity about the bodies. It seemed respectful to at least know their history.

“Yes. She was a good friend.” Leo replied with a pained glance at him.

“I’m sorry. Didn’t mean to pry. I just like to get a sense of them since I’m well…. possessing them pretty much.” Ryan said, backpedaling at the pain in Leo’s eyes. He had not meant to cause pain truly. He was here on a job, and had no time for emotions.

Leo shook his head though, a small smile on the corner of his lips. “That is kind of you. No I can tell you a little.” Leo walked and talked at the same time as Ryan followed him, a step behind. “Lindela was born here, and we worked together in university. She did messenger work and for the most part, the government didn’t interfere in her schooling, so long as she stayed close to the capital, and agreed to work close to when she graduated. We worked in biological work together. Trying to terraform this god awful climate. You would think two thousand years of inhabitation would have gotten us somewhere, but only on the poles are we making any sort of progress. The Sudsers worked with us. They originally called us for help terraforming. They can’t space travel, so they paid us to come. They were becoming overpopulated and needed a milder climate to grow more food. We came, but now some religious fool has taken over their colony, calling for them to embrace their old ways of life. So they created a bug, a virus, that makes us bleed out to try and extinct us. Our only saving grace was that our homes and tunnels below ground are always air tight.”

Leo waved a hand towards me. “Lindela was outside when the bug was let loose. She was one of the first ones to die in the first wave. Bled out, right into her pressure suit.”

Ryan’s skin crawled at the thought. Or rather, Lindela’s did. “Why didn’t they just ask you leave?”

“They always thought of us as weak. Beneath them. We can only survive at the poles, and our bodies are much flimsier than theirs obviously. They view us as… vermin. So rather than get us to leave, they decided to just exterminate us.”

Ryan thought about that. “So what we are going to do, won’t that make them mad?”

“Oh very. But it’s unfortunately needed. We have a population of five thousand we need to evacuate, and we can’t gather everyone up when their lab is only a few miles away. Every time we try, they release that damn bug and more die. We tried to air lock pressure suits, they put the bug into tiny machines to burrow in. We tried to make better suits to stop the bugs, they created acid rain clouds. They won’t meet with us, and our inside sources say their next plan is to breach the underground air locks.”

“No more playing nice huh?” Ryan felt a moment of pity for the poor humans.

“Not anymore, no. We plan to flood their lab. That will kill thousands of them. The closest population. With them out the way, we can fire up the shuttles and get everyone off within a week.”

“Where will you all go?”

“There is a moon with a good size human population only ten years away in this solar system. We will rebuild there. Plenty of water, good climate. Cold, that will will take some getting used too.”

They had reached the exercise room. A few people milled about, lifting weights or jogging. A few eyed Ryan, taking in the body he inhabited.

“Do people know she died?”

“Oh yea. No worries. Messengers and such use her all the time. We keep her fit and in shape. They know she died. Still doesn’t stop them looking though.”

“Right…” Ryan narrowed his eyes. He might be in a female body, but he still had an entirely male brain. Let one of those lunks make a move.