**Veiled Identity**

### The Year of Crisis

The gripping tale of 2020 begins with the innocent 7-year-old Ben Harman. Ben was an exuberant child, his bright blue eyes ever curious about the world around him. His tousled blond hair waved around his forehead each time he took a bouncy stride. On this fateful day, he wore a simple, yet loved, ensemble: a red hoodie with a classic cartoon character standing out on his chest, blue jeans, and worn-out white sneakers that had seen many adventures in the park.

Ben's mother, Rachel Harman, was a resilient woman of 32 years. Standing at 5'7" and weighing around 140 pounds, she was born on February 10, 1988. Her long brown hair, often tied in a pragmatic ponytail, shimmered under the stark fluorescent lights of the grocery store. Her hazel eyes scanned the desolate aisles, seeking supplies amid the chaos. She wore her favorite sneakers, size 8, a practical choice for the grim realities of their new world.

The grocery store felt eerie, the usual hustle and bustle replaced by an oppressive silence. It was more than just the scarcity of products; it was the palpable sense of dread that lingered in the air. They wearily grabbed canned goods, bottled water, and any other necessities they could find, piling them into their cart with urgency and fear.

As Rachel reached for a can of soup on a high shelf, the store's doors burst open. Zombies, their grotesque figures and decaying faces, started pouring in. Rachel's heart raced. She grabbed Ben's hand.

"Run, Ben!" she yelled.

They darted through the aisles, the cart abandoned, but soon, they were separated in the chaos. Ben's tiny legs struggled to keep up with his mother. It was then that a figure appeared amidst the confusion. A woman, draped in a Muslim feminine gown of deep emerald green, stood resolute. Her attire included an intricate niqab that covered her face, save for her intense, dark eyes. She wore delicate shoes, feminine in style, and adorned with golden embroidery. Her jewelry—six distinct pieces—glimmered in the faint light: a wrist chain with Islamic inscriptions, a gold-plated necklace, two ornate rings, a pair of dangling earrings, and an ankle bracelet, all of which carried a strong cultural significance.

Her name was Safiya, aged 47, originally from Egypt. Standing at 5'5" and weighing around 130 pounds, she had black hair neatly secured beneath her garments. Her shoe size, a mere 7, smaller than Rachel's, attested to her petite build. Safiya, dedicated to her faith, had come to the store to find sustenance for her family, a commitment reflecting her deep Muslim virtues, especially the care and protection of her loved ones.

She noticed Ben, wide-eyed and petrified, among the scattering crowd. In Arabic, she spoke softly but urgently, "تعال هنا يا عزيزي" ("Come here, dear"). She reached out, her hand wrapped in a fabric glove.

Ben tried to avoid her, but Safiya was quicker. Her hand grasped his arm, and he instantly felt a dizzying sensation. The world around him turned dark.

When Ben opened his eyes, everything felt different. He was taller, the fabric of the niqab brushing against his skin, and the gown hung heavily on his frame. His hands, no longer small and pale, were now darker and more mature. He looked down to find himself wearing the same feminine shoes Safiya had worn, and his skin tone was no longer his own.

"Mommy!" he screamed, but the words came out fluently in Arabic, "أمي!" He tried to run but stumbled, the bulky gown and unfamiliar shoes tripping him up. Hearing his new female voice, he gagged, squeezing his eyes shut in disbelief.

Ben tried to gather his composure, running away from the zombies, albeit awkwardly in the shoes that seemed impossible to manage. He eventually put enough distance between himself and the threats to find a reflective surface. Staring back at him was Safiya's face. His new hands traced over the unfamiliar eyes, trying to change them back, but his efforts were futile.

"I want to go home. I want mommy," he cried, the words emerging with an Arabic accent, "أريد أن أذهب إلى المنزل. أريد أمي," even though he tried to speak in English.

His new voice felt alien, and he started crying. Desperately, he fiddled with the bulky niqab, attempting to remove it but failing. He tried various methods—untucking it from his gown, searching for pins or buttons, pulling it over his head—but each attempt was unsuccessful as if the niqab were an inseparable part of him now.

He tried to remove the gown by pulling it over his head, searching for zippers or ties, tearing at the seams, shaking it off, and even using objects around him as a fulcrum, but the garment remained steadfast.

Next, he attempted to take off the feminine shoes. He loosened the laces, tried shaking his feet vigorously, pulled at the heels, slipped his fingers inside to unhook unseen fastenings, and even stomped, but they wouldn't budge.

Then came the jewelry. He began with the wrist chain, pulling at the clasp, twisting it, sliding it, pushing it in various ways, and using tools like sticks, but to no avail. He moved on to the necklace, attempting to unclasp it, slide it over his head, use a reflective surface to view the clasp, and even stretch it, but it remained securely around his neck. The rings were next, but twisting, pulling, soaping, and tapping yielded nothing. The earrings were equally frustrating, with his attempts to unclasp, unhook, numb and twist them off proving to be in vain. Finally, the ankle bracelet resisted his every effort, whether pushing, pulling, twisting, using tools, or even trying to slip it off.

"I'm scared," he cried out again, this time the words emerging incoherently in Arabic, "أنا خائف!" though he wanted to scream it in English.

The parking lot was a desolate expanse, filled with more of the undead. Ben, now Safiya, was terrified. Alone and battling both the physical and emotional turmoil of his transformation, he fought to navigate those feminine shoes, each step fraught with the risk of tripping.

He stood at the store's entrance, the emptiness around him contrasting sharply with the internal storm brewing within. Ben's yearning for his mother turned into a heart-wrenching sob, with the whisper of a single tear tracing down his newly darkened cheek.

This story was generated by user manemansteve with assistance by one of OpenAI’s large-scale language-generation model; prompts used to help generate the story are shown below.

Images were generated with OpenAI's AI system, DALL·E 2, or uploaded by the user.

AI Prompts