"This was the first time I'd ever really been a female, so I went through the steps as completely and thoroughly as if I had a manual in front of me. I knew I was being really tested now, so I explored that body as if I were going to spend the rest of my life in it. I found out everything I could about what it meant to be a female. I suppose someone who'd grown up in a female body would think most of what I discovered was terribly naive, but I was excited. I felt like I was discovering a new continent. I guess, in a way, I was.

"Of course, I did all that stuff that you see in the movies. I pinched my nipples, I stroked my breasts, I rubbed the insides of my thighs-do you know the inside of a woman's thighs are extraordinarily sensitive? Most men don't. That's why they're such uninspiring lovers. There's a lot you can learn if you just listen to the body.

"It was a remarkable afternoon for me, Jim. My whole sexual identity was destroyed-and rebuilt. You see, always before I'd been a guest at a woman's body, a visitor. Now, I was the ... host. Hostess! I gave myself permission to do everything I'd always been curious about, but too polite to ask. It was like being given a wonderful, delicious toy to play with.

"I spent the whole afternoon playing with myself, Jim. I had a great time. It was terrific. I found out later that almost all men do that the first time they're turned loose in a female body. They can't resist their own curiosity. The women tend to be a little bit shyer their first time in male equipment. You figure it out. But it was an incredible experience, Jim. Do you know that female bodies don't experience orgasm like male bodies? A female orgasm comes in waves-wave after delicious wave that sweep up inside of you. It was incredible. I fell in love with myself five times over." Her face was glowing, her eyes were shining. Even the retelling of the experience had aroused her.

I felt momentarily embarrassed at her-his?-revelations. It wasn't just the information-it was the candor with which he shared it. It was too intimate. I was embarrassed because I was aroused-and fascinated. I wanted to hear every bit of his story. Her story.

"Do you know what they did to me?" she asked.

"What?"

"They left me in that body for three weeks."

"In the forest?"

"In the forest," she said.

"THERE WAS an old navy weather station nearby," Tanjy continued. "The Telepathy Corps used it as a retreat. Robots ran everything now, so the human quarters were completely available. It was the perfect place for this kind of exercise. We were on an island somewhere, completely isolated. There were three male bodies and four female bodies besides the one I was wearing. They greeted me as I came up the path.

"They must have been able to recognize that I was a new operator. Before I could even say hi, they led me inside into the main lounge. One wall was painted white and was covered with big black lettering-the ground rules for the retreat. They were very simple. The first one was you couldn't tell who you were. You couldn't tell your name or anything from your past experience. You had to make up a new name for yourself that didn't have any gender attached to it-I used my initials.

"You couldn't say anything that might reveal any past identity you might have held. No personal histories were allowed. Also, you couldn't speculate on the purpose of this assignment, and you couldn't ask other people how long they had been here, or any other question the answer to which would break any of the agreements.

"The point is, you couldn't go around explaining, `This isn't my real body, you know. I'm not really like this.' That's hiding out. That's pretending it isn't really happening to you. You had to be a person in the body you were wearing-nothing else. The only identity you could have was the one you created in this situation-whatever you made up in the here and now. I tell you, it was a very crazy time. I knew I wasn't really a girl, at least not inside-but I had no way of knowing I was a boy either, except by my own say-so. I didn't know what I was for a while. And neither did anyone else, I think. I gave off a lot of conflicting signals; come-hither mixed with bug-off, please-help-me, and I'mall-right-Jack. They were real patient with me though-or else they knew what I was going through.

"Eventually, what I found out was that I had an incredible investment in my sexual identity-and I had to give it up. Not the identity, the investment. I had to stop being a visitor in the body and start being the owner. I had to be a girl, as completely as if it were the only thing in the world I knew."

Abruptly, she shivered. "I still get cold chills thinking about it. It was an adventure. And the others-they were so ... supportive. Because they knew. They were going through it too. I think at least one of the other women had been a man before. I'm pretty sure-because of the way she spoke, the way she taught me how to be a woman, she was almost clinical-and by the way she made love. Oh, yes-there was a lot of lovemaking. A lot." She laughed and added, "There wasn't much else to do on the island. So we played combinations. The first time a man entered me I wept. I still don't know why. It was very intense. He was extraordinarily gentle."

She fell silent, remembering.

I was at a loss for words. I picked up my drink and held it in my hands. I looked at Tanjy, I looked at my glass again. I felt embarrassed-and I felt privileged. I'd never heard a telepath speak so candidly about his or her experiences before. And I felt even a little envious.

She looked up at me with those large Chinese eyes and smiled. The expression on her face was mysterious-as if she were looking at me from far, far away. It gave me a weird feeling of transparency-as if she were reading my mind. As if there were no secrets I could keep from her. I could feel myself stiffening. I wanted to be known-and I was scared of it too.

And then, abruptly, she grinned with Ted's old grin, and I knew it was all right.

"Hey-mix us a couple of Crazy Marys," she said. "I want to get out of this dress." She came back in a red silk robe that was probably illegal in some parts of the world, and sat cross-legged at one end of the couch.

I handed her a drink and parked myself at the opposite end. I wanted to hear the rest of her story.

"It was that willingness to experience that they were looking for," she continued. "That was the whole purpose of the retreat. They were tapping into me. They knew when I had broken through. When they picked me up again, they told me I'd graduated to the next level of my training. I'd demonstrated that I could assimilate. Now I was ready to be trained in assimilation.

"You can't imagine the classes, Jim. We wore the most incredible bodies, different bodies every day, bodies we'd never seen before. The paradox was that it was so we could be trained as beings, not identities. You see, identities and bodies are all tangled up together. You can't detach from one unless you also detach from the other.

"Do you know-no, of course, you couldn't-but after a while, when you know your body is just a transient phenomenon, you realize that bodies are irrelevant. Very quickly, you get detached from the physical universe that way; you lose all identifications and you begin to exist only in an experiential universe-a universe of pure beingness. I mean, the physical stuff is still there, of course, but it doesn't have any significance any more. It's just another piece in the game.

"And then after that, they started making us stay in the assigned bodies for longer and longer periods of time, so we wouldn't get too detached. Sometimes we had bodies as young as six, sometimes as old as seventy. Once I wore a Down's syndrome. Another time, I wore a little-girl body that still wet the bed. Once I was a football player. I felt like I was made out of bricks. They wanted us to know-and appreciate-the operating equipment that the rest of the human race is ... trapped in. So we could. .. sympathize with their condition.