Almost everyone in the room seemed to be programmed to stand up when hearing the "Command Authority" voice, and those who weren't followed the general example.

"Now that I have your attention, let's establish the ground rules so there can be no room for misunderstandings." Fist-Leader Ryon said. "You have all been processed so you all speak and understand the same language. You will find that unless you had some pretty acute problems with your body before processing, nothing much has changed. Well, there is nothing for free; as you start exercising your body and mind, the changes will start kicking in. For some of you, it will be fairly gradual, for others, the changes will be radical. Think of it as the normal process of getting your body fit. Once you are at a certain level that I consider to be sufficient, then we will look at extending you to meet your personal potential.

"Most of you have prior military experience in one form or another. Well, keep that in mind but remember that this is basic training all over again and your prior experience might actually hinder your progress if you allow it to interfere with learning to do things my way!" The Fist-Leader paused for breath and looked around to see if everyone was up to speed.

It all sounded pretty familiar to me as I had heard, and even given, similar speeches myself in similar circumstances.

"Right," he continued, "let's start by getting those ugly bodies of yours adequately covered. Take a look inside the pillow on your bed and haul out the clothing you find there. Get dressed then fall-in outside. You have five minutes."

With that he turned on his heel and disappeared.

I checked my pillow and found a lime green roll of fabric neatly packed inside. I fished it out and unrolled it on the bed. Turned out it was what looked like a standard set of long pants and a shirt. I quickly pulled them on.

When I turned to Desrae, she was already dressed. I raised an interrogatory eyebrow at her and mouthed "Shall we go?" over the general hubbub in the room.

I got an affirmative nod and we joined the steady stream of freshly clothed people head for the door.

As I walked, I felt the slight discomforts of the new uniform disappear and it felt as though it fit me better than I thought it would. I looked down at myself and discovered that the uniform had adjusted to me and now fit me better than any other set of clothing had 'till that point.

I glanced across at Desrae and found her just as caught up in the novel sensation.

When I went through the door I was surprised to discover that we were actually outside rather than in one of the uniformly bland and ubiquitous white corridors. I looked up into a sky that was subtly wrong somehow, although I couldn't quite put my finger on just what was made it feel that way.

It struck me for the first time that I was truly off Earth and a long way from home; how far I had no way of knowing.

We arranged ourselves into a formation of six lines deep and had got ourselves mostly sorted out when the bellowing of Fist-Leader Ryon drew our attention again.

"Right. I see I have my job really cut out for me this time. It seems that someone has lied to me and you lot have never been in the military before. You look like a herd of animals trying to decide if you want to be prey. Pathetic. Let's see if the Finger-Leaders can do anything about that."

At that, a group of men and women dressed in red uniforms, similar to the lime green ones we wore, started moving amongst us. They had been loitering on the fringes of the area just watching. I noticed a level of competence about them similar to what Roger had displayed.

Once we were arranged to the Fist-Leader's satisfaction, he started to give us some basic drill instruction.

Within an hour or so, we had started to get the hang of it. With that accomplished, it seemed it was time for a run.

The Fist-Leader led us around the parade-ground and the off into some wilder country.

The feeling I got was that this area was sub-tropical with bush and plants that were similar enough to what I knew from home that it wasn't sufficient to trigger the 'you're not in Kansas anymore' response.

We ran for about two hours through a lot of bush, even crossing three rivers en route (or maybe it was the same river three times?)

The Fist, or company as my internal monologue still insisted it be called, slowly spread out. I had been next to Desrae all morning, and it seemed as if we were fated to be paired up as buddies. I initially found myself feeling protective of her and resentful that she should be made to suffer without having had much chance for the promised healing to kick in. As the morning had passed, however, I had been amazed to see just how tough and determined she was. After a while, I stopped worrying about her so much and just concentrated on the drills and exercise. Now as we ran side by side I realised that she was running smoothly and easily and that the constant grimace of pain was missing from her face, as was the slight limp that she had started out with.

"Desrae," I asked her now, "how are you feeling?"

"Actually I cannot remember when last I felt this good." she answered. "It feels like my body is 20 again."

As I glanced at her again, I did a double-take.

"Umm Desrae, have you noticed any changes to your body?" I asked her.

"Well, my joints are definitely no longer a problem, my hip needed replacement, but no longer and I generally feel much better."

"Yes, I noticed the results of some of that, I was talking about something more immediately visually evident." and I gestured in the direction of her chest.

Desrae glanced down at herself, then she almost stumbled. "Oh my GOD!" she exclaimed as I grabbed onto her arm to prevent her falling. She was obviously as gobsmacked as I was: this was the first direct, visual evidence that either of us had seen, of the regenerative abilities that we had been granted.

Where she had only had scar tissue before, she now had a pair of healthy, full breasts. When I tore my eyes away from them and looked at her face, I saw that she was smiling broadly.

“God that feels good!' she said

“Having breasts again?” I asked.

“No. Having a man struggle to remove his eyes from them.” She giggled. “I can see that the fringe benefits are going to be worthwhile after all.”