I glanced over to Patton, who’d managed to keep his convenience store meal – beef taquitos – on the inside. He smiled, gave a little wave and a supportive thumbs up. That he was even conscious was a feat as wild as our abduction.

I kind of wished that Aptat had waited to clean away my privacy screen. The prisoners, including Smooth Face next to me, seemed suddenly interested in my costume swap. I picked up the little black box and rotated it in my hands. It was solid, smaller than a Rubik’s Cube. Spinning it in my hands like a squirrel preparing to devour into an acorn, I was totally lost on how this was supposed to be clothing. “Uh, what is this?” I asked.

“Wearable body bag,” said Aptat through the intercom.

“Body bag?”

“It has the advantage of keeping your fluids from leaking out,” they said. “I don’t have clothes just laying around for when people befoul themselves. You’ll have to make do.”

I found a small starter tab on the outside of the cube similar to the loose bit of cellophane on a pack of gum or cigarettes, and gave it a yank. The thing popped open, sending out a billow of black fabric. The material was light and airy, riding the currents within my chamber. I plucked it from the float, barely able to feel it. It was as if chiffon were engineered to a tenth of its weight. Not only was it tissue-thin, but it didn’t look sized for humans who lived by the food-cancelation method of dieting. There was no way it could be stretched over my body without bursting. Suddenly I had the terrifying image of it splitting up my middle with my belly puffing out like dough from an exploded biscuit canister.

“Uh, do you have anything larger?” I asked. “Something maybe in the husky range?”

“It will adapt to a certain extent. Make it work.”

I didn’t like undressing in front of other people. It’d been a thing for me ever since the Donnie Robautham era of gym class. Stretching those emerald green shorts up over my hairless thighs to the jeers of my classmates, some of whom already had full mustaches and neck beards, had built in some trauma.

I set Pickles gently down and clutched the space chiffon to my middle, trying to work up the courage to begin. I glanced over at the neck-hole person, who stood with arms patiently crossed. They lifted a hand and did a get-on-with-it finger twirl. Oh my god.

I didn’t feel like getting naked in front of these people but escaping the rancid clothes was the stronger urge. “Fuck it,” I muttered, yanking my shirt up and over my head and tossing it. I sucked in my belly out of habit, but then, how were these people to know I wasn’t anything but the ideal physical specimen by the standards of Earth? At that thought, I relaxed and let my belly go free, but kept my biceps low-key flexed.