You followed your sister into the lab. Your mother was looking into a microscope. “Dan’s awake and he’s changed even more” you sister informed your mother as you entered.
You Mother looked across at you. Was that a tear in her eye? She looked haggard. “Daniel , my son” she sounded rueful.
“What’s up Mum? Steph said you had a problem”
“We do. A major problem. The side effects are not as minor as we thought” You mother had come across and examined your left arm. She looked at your sister “Take measurements again. We need to know how fast it is progressing”
“Take a seat Dan” said your sister. She retrieved her kit.
Your mother sat opposite you. “Dan, you know how I explained that our magical ingredient was a strand of RNA?”
You could remember her telling you something but not the specifics. “Uh Ha”
“Well it is designed to modify each of your cells. It has. Our problem is that it is not just changing the cells we rubbed the cream on. It seems once one cell is infected it sends RNA strands to the neighbouring cells. As you can see from your arm it is spreading quite rapidly”
“Yeah. I guess it will be up to my shoulder by lunchtime”
You mother initially nodded then continued. “It’s not just your skin. I will want to do more tests but I suspect it is spreading internally as well. Hence your apparent loss of muscle mass. If it has got into your blood stream, which I suspect has already happening, then it is likely to spread rapidly”
“You sound like you are saying I have cancer!” Your father had died of cancer. It had spread throughout his body. That was why your sister had devoted her life to medical research.
“Sort of but it’s not a cancer. I don’t think you will die. You probably won’t even get sick. Your cells, well most of them, will stay healthy and function normally”
“Then why the sad faces? ….Uh I suppose it means you can’t patent your cream?”
“Well that’s one thought. We won’t be able to sell our cream” She looked at your sister with a wry expression on her face. “I’ll come to the point. We have been looking at the cells I scraped from your arm. They have been changed. As you would know each and every human cell has 23 chromosomes. 2 of these determine your sex. Women have two X chromosomes while males have one X chromosome and one Y chromosome” Your mother paused. “What we think the cream has done is to replace your Y chromosome with an X chromosome”
You were confused “Mum you know I’m no good at science”
Your sister broke in and said what you mother was struggling to say “Dan you are changing into a woman”