My Name Was Jack

The bus door hissed open and I stepped off into a wall of fear. The other students practically oozed it, a palpable miasma of anxiety that clung to the air like wearing too much deodorant. They shuffled along as if they were being herded into some goddamn Nazi death chamber, their gazes fixed on the pavement under their feet, shoulders hunched as if bracing for a bullet. Pathetic. But I knew the reason for their fear. I let a slow grin stretch my lips. Let the little fuckers sweat. The thought coiled in my mind, giving me warmth. Tomorrow’s assessment? A distant thunderstorm that would never touch me. I felt untouchable while the others lived in fear of this day.

I made my way towards the school, needing to walk under an old stone archway that still carried the original carving: WEST DISTRICT MILITARY ACADEMY FOR BOYS.

For some reason, maybe just for the irony of it, maybe as something for the parents to point at on parents’ day, they’d kept it. I personally found it hilarious. A school meant to shape boys into manly soldiers has become a sorting ground for who even gets to remain male.

I passed under the arch, my pace unhurried, moving toward homeroom. A few familiar faces caught my eye; I gave them a nod. Some nodded back, a tight, quick dip of the chin. Others wouldn’t even meet my gaze. It wasn’t fear in their eyes, not quite. It was caution, a species of self-preservation that the system had bred into them. One wrong step, one failed test tomorrow, and they’d find themselves flat on their backs with some stranger’s cock splitting them open after the government rewrote their DNA into that of a woman. The ultimate humiliation, dressed up by the suits in government as a civic duty, a privilege. Propaganda so thick you could choke on it, but no one believed the lies.

The hallway bustled with enforcers, their uniforms stark against the drab walls. They were setting up checkpoints, their movements efficient and practiced. No contraband, no stand-ins, and most importantly, no runners. Every year, the same performance. Not since natural-born women became nothing more than history book entries. Not since the Continuation Act remade society. Not since test scores became the currency of identity, determining whether you remained the man you were born or became the cunt the state demanded.

But none of it mattered to me. Not the checkpoints, not the fear. My old man’s badge saw to that. Not some rookie enforcer’s tin star either, he was Chief of Police. Head of the local jackboots. The protection statutes were carved in stone: immediate family of high-ranking officials were untouchable, exempt from the Reassignment Review. I’d grown up breathing that rare air, a life without the gnawing dread that chewed through every other boy in this place.

In homeroom, I dropped into my usual spot near the back, sprawling across the chair with one leg kicked out, leaning back far enough to challenge gravity. Then Mr. Varrow walked in. The man looked like death warmed over. His skin was yellow-gray parchment; his eyes looked ready to shatter. He clutched his tablet as if it were a wallet in a room full of pickpockets.

“Jack.” He pointed a finger at the floor, that universal gesture meaning “sit the fuck up like a human being.”

I let my chair thump back to the floor with a sigh. The eye-roll wasn’t on purpose; my body just betrayed my emotions.

“Congress has made some changes to tomorrow’s assessment.” Varrow’s voice sounding something like sandpaper. He lifted the tablet, thumb swiping across the darkened screen to wake it. His eyes darted across the glowing text, his Adam’s apple bobbing with a nervous swallow.

A wave of dread rippled through the classroom, to say it was suffocating would be an understatement. I could almost taste their fear, sour, salty. Most of them were probably thinking the test had been made harder again. It wouldn’t be the first time. The government pulled that shit three years ago when they needed a fresh crop of wombs to keep the population churning. All that talk about giving every man the chance to have a female keep their belly warm was just another way of saying they needed more cunts to breed with.

“Tomorrow we’ll find out the specifics.” Varrow said, feeling the classroom’s tension. “But I can tell you one thing for sure: the academic portion of the test isn’t getting harder. Nor are they raising the score you need to pass on that part.”

What he said must be what it felt like to be a death-row kid handed a pardon five minutes before the needle. A collective exhale rippled through the room, the sound of thirty pairs of lungs remembering how to breathe. Most audible among them was Peter, that whiny little shit I’d been tormenting since second grade. Peter’s sigh came out loudest, almost as if it was a sob.

“Disappointed, Peter?” I leaned forward, letting the words drip with acid. “Figured you’d be chomping at the bit for a chance to fail. After all, a dick down your throat would finally put a stop to that endless fucking gorging, and you’d get that soft, girly body you’ve been secretly dreaming about, hips for grabbing, tits for squeezing, a tight little cunt just begging to be split open.

From somewhere behind him, a faceless student let out a sharp bark of laughter, then abruptly stifled it as if he’d inhaled a fly.

“You know what, you—“ Peter’s face was turning that blotchy red he always got right before he cried or swung. His mouth hung open, but Mr. Varrow didn’t let him finish.

“Enough!”

I shot Peter one last grin, a razor-thin slice of my triumph, before turning away. Mr. Varrow noticed what I did and had something to add. “You want detention? Because I have no problem making you spend the rest of today and tomorrow there.”

I crossed my arms, the fabric of my t-shirt pulling taut across my shoulders, and let the silence hang in the air. I’d already won this round, gotten my hooks deep under Peter’s skin while looking like a goddamn king doing it. To be fair, Peter was a soft target, always had been. The extra padding he carried made him self-conscious, a weakness I’d exploited since we were kids. Fucking easy. Still, I knew how this would play out. His old man ran the department that paired fresh cunts with their new handlers. Peter would probably get first pick of the juiciest ones, the ones with perfect tits and tight little holes. And he’d likely whisper in Daddy’s ear, make sure I got some worn-out hag with a pussy as loose as a wizard’s sleeve. So he’ll win, but whatever. Until then, I’d keep twisting the knife. The mutual hatred between us went so far back I couldn’t even remember the reason. It just was.

“Now, pay attention,” Varrow continued, his voice grinding on like worn-out gears. “There will be changes. You’ll hear rumors about the new changes, but they’re just rumors until the official announcement tomorrow. Got it?” He reached into his desk, pulling out a thick stack of forms. “These are I-20 forms.” He began moving down the aisles, the papers hitting desks with a soft, final thud.

“This gives each of you a chance to volunteer for the Reborn program. I strongly encourage those of you who are gay, or feel you were born in the wrong body, to fill it out. Because you passed the test, going from boy to a man, understand same-sex relations carry with them the death sentence out of necessity. As well, those of you who know, or even suspect that you’ll fail tomorrow’s test to fill one out.” He paused, letting his eyes sweep over us. “Because volunteers get privileges that those who fail tomorrow wont have. Privileges such as being given a bit of a choice of what man you will be paired with, within reason of course, no endless vetoes of men. As well, you get to choose your own name, instead of the man you’re assigned giving you a name. “ He places one of the forms on my desk as he makes his way to the other desk. I take a peek at it, feeling glad I didn’t need to worry about the form. I then look up, figuring there will be some who are so scared that they were even considering filling it out. Sure enough, some boys were holding it in both hands, staring at it as if their very souls were staring back. Some looked to the left and right like they wanted someone else to sign first, then they would.

My eyes drifted to Peter, and I cocked a brow. The little fuck was staring at that form like it held the meaning of life, his hands trembling just enough for me to notice. I let the smirk play on my lips when he noticed I was looking, and just like that, his gaze darted away. He slammed the paper face-down in his desk, his knuckles white. If he’d been thinking about signing up for the Reborn program, that ship had sailed. Too bad. The satisfaction would’ve been fucking delicious—seeing Peter on his knees, tits swelling, mouth stretched around some handler’s cock while they whispered his new name.

“Now, pay attention,” Varrow continued, his voice taking on a more measured, authoritative tone. “You have until the last bell; after that, you have no choice but to take the test.”

Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw him. My head whipped around like a cracked whip. There he was, Jason, my boy, one of my crew, actually filling out that damn form. My eyes went wide, and for a second, a dull thud of pain throbbed in my temples as every muscle in my neck seized up. I shot a glance at Varrow, his head down, looking at something. I crumpled a loose sheet of paper into a ball and winged it at Jason’s desk.

He flinched when it hit, turning to face me. His eyes darted between the form and my face, a ping-pong match of panic, before settling somewhere over my shoulder. His entire frame seemed to shrink, his shoulders caving in. I knew what that was. Shame. He was really going to do it. Going to sign away his dick, his future, his goddamn identity.

Jason was a legend, the star quarterback, built like a brick shithouse with a face that could make any of the government-created cunts wet their panties. If natural-born women still walked the earth, he’d have them lining up around the block. A man’s man through and through. This made about as much sense as a screen door on a submarine.

“What the fuck, man?” I hissed, leaning close. “The hell are you doing? You... you a fag or something?”

“N-no,” he stuttered, the word catching in his throat like a fishbone. “It’s just... fuck.” He ran a tongue over his chapped lips, hunting for words that wouldn’t come. “I... I’ve always scraped by. Sixty, maybe a sixty-five on my tests, if I’m lucky. I know I’m gonna fail tomorrow, Jack. I’d rather have some say in what happens. What if they stick me with some sadist who’ll beat the shit out of me, or worse, Peter or someone from Peter’s Quiverfull family who thinks a woman’s place is chained to the bed?”

I watched his throat work as he swallowed hard, his eyes dipping lower still, fixing on the scuffed floor. He sat frozen like that for a beat, then he swiveled back to his desk, scrawled his signature across the line, and shot his hand into the air, clutching the form like it was his only lifeline. He spoke before Varrow even acknowledged him.

“Mr. Varrow, sir.”

“Yes?” Varrow’s voice was flat.

“May I be excused?” The words came out in a squeak, his voice cracking like it hadn’t since we were kids. “I’m volunteering.”

Varrow’s gaze sharpened on him, and suddenly, every eye in the room was locked on Jason, their shock mirroring my own disbelief.

“You may. Just give that to the first enforcer you see in the hallway. They’ll take care of you from there.”

I held my breath as Jason pushed his chair back and strode toward the door. Part of me expected him to jurk around, yelling “Gotcha!” but he never did. Just kept walking, his shoulders squared, until he vanished into the corridor.

The door clicked shut behind him. Thirty chairs squeaked as the boys shifted away from the empty seat as if it were already contagious.

Then another hand went up, clutching a signed form. No surprise there, we all knew he preferred men. But Jason... Jason was the gut punch. That he’d jump ship first, before anyone else, made it all the more impossible to swallow.

“Those two are heroes,” Varrow said, his eyes scanning the room. “Remember that. Remember that if you become a woman, you will be a hero, serving humanity through your sacrifice, producing the next generation of boys so that the human species can continue. For the rest of you, treat them well, treat them like the heroes they are. Don’t abuse your power over them. Show them the respect they deserve. After all, they will be carrying your children.”

Hero? The word curdled in my gut like spoiled milk. Hero, my ass. More like a tragedy. Sacrifice? You can’t call it a sacrifice when a gun’s pressed to your temple and you’re told to bend over. That ain’t sacrifice, that’s survival.

Jason. My Jason, my friend, soon gone. Not dead, but worse. Erased. Some new creature with a pretty version of his face and tits would be walking around out there, and the thought twisted in my gut like a goddamn knife was stuck in me. I didn’t want to feel this shit. The ache in my chest, the hot prickle behind my eyes. Fuck that. I needed something to break it, something to make me forget.

“Pete!” My voice cracked through the classroom’s heavy silence like a gunshot. “Got a minute, you fat fuck?”