The last thing I remember was walking along the street. The night was cool, I had a hoodie. I spent the evening at a friends house, loud music, video games and pop until his mom sent me home because it was a school night and this week we Juniors had state standardized testing. Then there was a taste of metal in my mouth as something sharp poked me from behind and everything went black.
I woke up with a splitting headache and my heart was racing. As I began to come to my senses I looked around and realized I was laying on my back, I felt really weird and my body was in some kind of tube. When I turned my head the room seemed to spin and it was hard for me to get my bearings.
From what I could tell before needing to close my eyes, I didn't appear to be in a hospital but noticed several IV's were feeding into the machine my body was encased in. I tried moving my body but it was very difficult and felt the pinch and pull of needles tugging my veins, so I stopped.
The heavy feeling I have told me I'm sedated or drugged, maybe both given my racing heart. Even thinking was difficult and since I couldn't hear any voices nearby or see anything happening there was little I could use to fight the drowsiness that overtook me.
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"Hey buddy, how ya doin?" a distant voice called to me.
I fought against whatever was keeping me asleep and moaned, struggling to wake up.
"Yeah buddy, that's it. Come on! Wake up for me." The man's voice called.
I took a deep breath, and struggled with coordinating my lips. "Where... Amahhh?" I slurred. My eyes fluttered open for a second, I saw a white man with black hair and a bushy black beard .
"You're safe, you're in a safe house. Luckily one of our men found you before someone called the cops. Who attacked you? "
"I donno." you mumbled, slowly gaining more awareness. "Where are my parents?"
The man looked confused for a minute then concerned, "Nick, your parents died in a fire when you were a kid. We became friends in high school and started working... off the books."
"What?! I saw them yesterday! and my names Kevin, not Nick." I blurted out. Then the realization hit me. I looked at the man terrified, "No, you can't do this to me! I'm just 17! Please man! Let me go! don't Mobify me!" I struggled, ignoring the needles only to find that I was fully restrained.
The man claiming to be my friend didn't break character, "Oh Nick, you musta taken a blow to the head. You should get some rest."
He pressed a button on the tube covering my body as I screamed. I felt cold flow into my arm and immediately lost energy. He reached over and put his hand in my hair, "Don't worry Nick, you'll be operational in no time."
"No" I weakly moaned before slipping back into unconsciousness.
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The process of the face becoming a match to a new body is called Facial Bodification. It's been studied by scientists and although it can take a long time to happen there are ways to speed the process up. This was first realized when people began renting spare bodies while going through recovery or physical therapy. The heads on the bodies taking blood thinners and other medications to aid in flow of nutrients were noticeably more changed than the original owner.
This prompted people to study the effect more, and sure enough, the more physically active one is, the more blood circulates from the body to the head, and the faster the change.
Shortly thereafter, special drug cocktails were made to help rich old folks become young again quickly but the practice was banned after several tragic body-deaths occurred and everyone involved was sued.
The practice was perfected on the black market, and after decades of trial and error, rumors say the change can be forced to 100% completion within a week!
Every once in a while a person shows up at the Body and Head Crimes Division, claiming their body was stolen and although they can recount countless crimes their current body participated in, but they didn't do it. The head, of course, has some form of amnesia, and claims to be a missing person, but they cant remember who, or where, or how old they really are, or why someone would do this to them.
Never one to pass up an opportunity and adding more horror to everyday existence, the idea has been proposed that organized crime has taken up using bodies like burner phones, If they can twist someones mind enough to make them believe the proposed identity is theirs. They get a functional fall guy, and a more important and experienced member gets a clean slate.
Psychologists theorize that being presented with a completely different body and "new" face actually helps solidify the acceptance of the new identity by dissociating one from one's own original identity.
"They show you pictures of this tall lean person twice your age, but with your facial features, say, and they tell you 'That's you. You're my partner in crime.' Well, internally you immediately refute it because you've never been that tall or that old. They do this for days, maybe weeks, showing documentation of this version of you they created with simple photo editing software. They show you pictures of the person you are becoming while giving you the details of crimes you didn't commit and they want you prepared to take the fall for. These monsters would be calling them the good ole days, claiming you have amnesia. By this time, you have a really good idea of who this person is. you know everything they've done, in detail, all their preferences and where they've been. The drugs you have been forced to take have severely inhibited your mental state, maybe heroine and ecstasy, maybe medical grade designer stuff for this purpose. So, the only thing you have left to refute their claims that you are this mercenary, or contract killer, or whoever, would be your physical identity, your appearance. Then they show you a mirror and this person you've been saying isn't you, is you. Then your brain either accepts a new identity or you get murdered." -Robert Bettenhauser Ph. D.