Trent woke up groggy and cold, with a mask on his mouth and synth music bubbling through the liquid tank that held him.

He groaned and tried to stand up but he was floating, restrained by straps. The fluid drained until he flopped at the tank's base. A heavy, bulky cushion sat below him. Where was he?

His eyes widened as he recalled. He was probably on planet Savana! The last thing he knew, he'd been in a lab on Earth, stepping into a cryo tank. The layout of this one was different, and beyond the glass the room had a crude concrete look. He'd made it there, then. Groggy, he slapped a button on the inside that was marked "Attention".

Through murky, frosted glass, Trent saw a man with a too-long shadow walk in. Very short or standing on a low floor. This lab-coated figure peered inward, checked something to the side, then nodded and hit a switch. The tank window slid aside. The technician started to say, "Easy, now; reach down for the grip rails here."

Trent tried to step out of the machine and instead, fell forward. He felt like he'd been held back at the waist and tripped over both feet at once. Suddenly he was lower to the ground, as though he'd been standing tiptoe. The tech steadied him by one arm, saying, "I know the feeling."

The man was half lion. Below his normal, human waist, he had the lower body of a lion, centaur-like, with golden fur and a tufted tail. He wore a short white jacket over a green shirt. What Trent had taken for a headset was a pair of feline ears high on his head. Trent instinctively recoiled in surprise, but there was a weight holding him to the floor. He looked down and stared at the tawny-haired lion body that'd replaced his own lower half.

"Ssh," said the technician, stilling a possible scream from Trent. "Do you remember the situation?"

Trent shivered, feeling muscles twitch much farther down his spine than he was used to. The paperwork and presentations he'd seen back on Earth started to come back to him. He said, "The planet. Uh. Crazy pilot really wanted lion people. Everyone had to agree to sign up for colony slots."

The tech chuckled. "My name is Klaus, and you probably should get out of the habit of calling King Arminus crazy. We did remind him the standard colony charter is in effect, so he won't have you whipped or anything, but it's best if we humor him. Especially about the parts we can't change."

Finding subspace routes that led to a star system, as opposed to a lingering death, was a tough and costly process. Daring pilots risked their ships and their lives to probe the cosmic reefs and shoals for a valid travel path. Humanity's policy was that anybody who succeeded should get the reward of his choice of planet or moon, if any were present on the far side. Sometimes that meant ownership of a booby prize equivalent to Pluto, but even that was worth something. In the case of planet Savana, the explorer had lucked out and found a tolerably Earth-like planet amid the lesser prizes of a Saturn-equivalent, a Venusian hell, and an asteroid belt. So now, he'd picked his own title and his requirements for colonists.

Trent blushed and said, "I do remember agreeing to this. But how do I walk?!"

"That was the standard question for us Canaries." He met Trent's confused look and said, "Us in the first batch of settlers. We had to consult with people who'd been transformed on Earth and then do some weird exercises that proved useless once we were lion-ed for real. Did they make you second-group people walk around pulling a cart, too?"

"Yeah. With a shock mechanism for every time it banged hard into something."

"Maybe it's not totally useless training, then. Still, try moving your front left paw by itself. No, don't look down! Feel where it is."

Trent avoided glancing at his feet. He had four of them now, and twitched in several places when he tried to take a step. "My brain isn't sure which one is which. Why didn't we get changed back on Earth where we could practice?"

"King Arminus asked, but the cryopods weren't built for this body shape or the increased mass. So instead we had to pull you out of cryo and stick you into the bodysculpting tank while you were still unconscious."

Trent looked around at a rack of medical tools and a freezer. "Where is everyone?"

"Welcome to the Kingdom of Savana. Right now we have a live population of twenty-two, counting you. And not counting the others currently frozen and needing a trip to the bodysculpt tanks you're currently in."

That got Trent moving. He was in people's way. He lurched and all his feet moved forward at once. The medic steadied him and said, "Try the left two, then the right. Might be easier."

Trent wobbled, and his muscles didn't want to cooperate. "I'm trying."

Klaus said, "May I grab one of your feet? Now that you're awake it doesn't seem proper to start touching you on the lower half again, but it's strictly medical. Nothing romantic."

Trent wondered if this guy was somehow hitting on him, now. But he'd just said he wasn't. Confused, Trent nodded.

Klaus backed off and then lowered his human torso like a crane to grab Trent's front-left lion leg with his hands. "Feel that? Move this set of muscles."

Trent focused on the spot where he was being touched. He felt ticklish fur covering muscle, and the fur was part of him. Yet he was still human above the navel or so, which drew his attention to the fact that he was naked.

Trent wobbled forward from the medical tank and onto its cold tile floor, feeling it under his four leathery paws. Klaus hopped back, saying, "Whoa, almost ran me over. Good, though."

"Could I please get some clothes now?"

"Of course." Klaus stood next to a high shelf and stretched up like a cat, reaching high to grab a pile of folded grey cloth. He tossed it onto an equipment table two steps from Trent, then lowered himself to his four legs again and grinned.

Trent wasn't sure how he'd moved so far, so it took him half a minute to wobble his way forward to the table. Klaus stood nearby, ready to prop him up, but it wasn't necessary. Trent held the table with one hand while feeling like he was on a tightrope. With the other he grabbed the clothes and shook them open to reveal just a t-shirt. "What about pants?"

Klaus chuckled. He wasn't wearing any. "There's ongoing debate about that. You'll be fine without them, but if it really bothers you we have these." He grabbed an ordinary spacefarer's towel, cheap white Trentcloth, and draped it over Trent's lower body.

"I'm wearing a tablecloth," Trent said. The towel weighed faintly along the middle of his... his second back. He discovered his waist was flexible enough that he could turn more than ninety degrees to get a better look.

"I know, it's strange, but don't worry much about modesty. You were briefed about this. Your new tail covers everything. See Celia about skirts if you want, later. For now let's get you through a basic checkup and show you to your quarters."

Feeling numb, probably still sedated, Trent got jabbed with needles and had bits of fur snipped and had to get his vision and hearing checked. That last test startled him because it was his first obvious introduction to having his ears that high up, and able to move. When he touched one it twitched, making him squeak.

Klaus said, "Everything's within expected range. Thanks for being the guinea pig among the second wave."

Trent was holding up the revival of ninety-nine other people. He'd been frozen very early on the way in. "Doc? I remember being told I almost the very first signup. Was I random?"

Klaus winced, and his ears drooped. "I was hoping to gloss over that. No, you were the second one thawed. First one didn't make it."

Trent felt his ears flick lower, too. "Sorry to hear."

"It happens. They've got the success rate up to over 95%, and we lost someone out of the first batch of twenty. So you're one of the lucky ones and I expect more bad news before we're done with the lot."

"Good news overall, though. You're bringing nearly everybody in safely. We're all glad for the chance at a new life."

"Yeah, that's the right attitude." Klaus started to usher Trent toward a door, then paused. "I don't know if it's obvious yet, but you were selected for the, ah, equalization program."

Trent froze. There'd been a checkbox in the paperwork, section D-10, one little section of ink that people snickered at. It had invited prospective colonists to raise their chances by entering a lottery to correct any sex imbalance in the colony. This wasn't the only planet to have such a settler clause, and this one's discoverer had bought good nanotech medical hardware. Trent looked back at his sleek lion body, and sputtered meaningless protests. He had, in fact, willingly signed up for this possibility. Which meant they'd had a shortage of women.

Klaus said, "You're not alone in this. In fact you could be helpful to the others in the same boat, as soon as we get going with the rest of the revials."

"Where's my room?" Trent said, now unable to meet Klaus' eyes.

Klaus coughed into one fist. "Right this way."

Trent wobbled despite having four paws, but the medic coaxed him along, focusing on the mechanical aspects of left feet, right feet, repeat. Like riding some clumsy cart with oars. Trent followed his guide, who kept darting ahead and roving back for him.

Klaus led Trent through a door into a metal hallway obviously built from the colony ship's struts. Its minimal girder structure held several intersections whose rooms were walled off mainly with curtains, with no doors. Klaus paused by a laser-etched "#022" marked on one strut. "You're now registered in the medical system and active colonist roster."

Trent felt a rumble somewhere behind him, belatedly realizing it was from his new built-in trailer. "Is that my stomach?"

"Yes, and I don't know what the schedule is like, now. There was going to be a party, but check the network." Already he was turning away to return to the lab. Not a single other colonist had shown up yet. He had scores more people to thaw.

Trent gulped. "Thanks." He wanted to demand more information, a meal, reassurance, but right now he was in the way.

"Welcome. I'm sure the others will be along for something more formal." Klaus retreated, leaving Trent alone in the hall.

Trent shuddered, revived on another world in another species. Hooray? Right now the shock of being here was too much for him to think or plan. He pushed the curtain aside.

Trent's new room was an alcove three meters across. He stepped inside and released the curtain, then got confused when it hit him. It had snagged on his new lion tail. He didn't know how to control the new limb and took five seconds to untangle himself.

The room held a bed that filled the entire back wall, making him think at first that it was for two people. It stood low to the ground, built from cargo pallets, but the shelves that filled another wall stretched nearly to the ceiling. He had a footstool, a cabinet, and a floor cushion made from a standard cargo-wrap plastic. Standing in here, Trent had little room to turn around without banging his back half into things.

Something knocked on the metal struts outside. Trent wobbled and peeked out to find another lion-taur man, this one wearing a jacket with black-spotted white fur at the collar and a purple cape down his lower back.

The newcomer raised one of his front paws and said, "Welcome! It's good to see a new face."

"How did you do that?"

"What?"

"Moving just the one paw. I can still barely walk."

"Oh!" The man grinned. "It takes practice. I've gotten to enjoy being something new. Spent a lot of money on the biotech here, so I wanted everyone to get to use it."

Trent belatedly noticed that this person wore a shiny gold circlet, sitting between his cat ears. He startled and instinctively tried stepping backward, which meant bunching up his front half against his back legs, then wobbling.

"Whoa!" said King Arminus, grabbing Trent's arm before he could topple backwards. When Trent got steadied again, Arminus went on, "I've done that too."

"I didn't know you were in charge. They didn't give us a protocol lesson. Am I supposed to say 'your highness'?"

Arminus had stepped beyond the curtain and into Trent's room, but he backpedaled now. "Don't worry about it. Maybe at formal events. As you can see, you are nearly 5% of the population right now, and I don't want my approval rating dropping that far at once."

"It's so empty here. You're waiting for ninety-nine others. Ninety-eight."

Arminus winced. "I hope it's that many, yes. I'm a life-long spacer; I've lost friends to cryo. Between wanting to keep the revival rate as high as possible, and hearing stories about new colonies falling to unpredictable disease and accident, I focused on biotech with my award funding. Which let me live out my dream of getting an age reset with health upgrades and some other improvements." He wiggled his tail expertly.

"The recruiters told me I could expect a longer lifespan from the change. And... I got picked for other things."

Arminus looked aside. "Yes, that was on your profile. Are you all right? As soon as Klaus reported he'd successfully revived somebody, I wanted to see."

"I think I'm okay. Confused, though. I'm going to change the rest of the way, aren't I?"

"So I'm told. It's probably better than having only that lioness half and the rest of you unchanged. Do you like the ears at least?" His own ears perked up and he had a hopeful expression.

Trent reached up to touch his ears. "That's part of what's disorienting. The sounds are all coming from 'overhead'. I haven't seen a mirror yet, either."

"Mirrors! That's another thing we forgot to bring. I'll add that to the list for next season's supply run. For now you'll have to make do with cameras. You're listed as a machinist, right?"

Trent nodded. He'd worked in several factories on Earth, running and maintaining metalworking equipment. He said, "Is there work to do?"

"Is there! I haven't yet checked the full cargo manifest of what came with your ship, but if everything came as promised, there's equipment to keep you busy for a long time. Maybe take your mind off of other things."

"That's what I'm hoping." He yawned.

Arminus said, "But sleep if you need to. Our schedule is flexible, especially while we're processing the newcomers. The banquet hall is in Dragon Wing, down that way." He pointed.

Trent nodded and mumbled thanks. He looked over his shoulder -- his upper shoulder -- at the low bed, and wobbled as his human torso turned farther than normal. His guest walked away, quiet as a cat. Trent spent a full minute trying to figure out how to lower himself onto the thin sheets without crashing. Then another, getting under the sheets.

He was *long* when lying down. Even ignoring his tail, which he could feel slightly squashed beneath him, he filled most of the three-meter bunk. The lower half of his human body was gone now. His upper half looked the same, clad in the shirt he'd been given. Below his waist, his hips flared out absurdly, covered in gold fur, with the strong forelegs that'd replaced his human legs. Below that, this new second body segment, making him feel like an insect. Not a lot visible between his new hindlegs. He felt vulnerable laying on his extended back like this. When he pulled the sheets over him again he twitched several legs without being sure which muscles he was moving.

He fell asleep quickly, exhausted from his one-hour first day.

#

Trent woke up badly needing a bathroom. He winced and realized how unpleasant and confusing that was likely to be. He swung his forelegs out of bed and, like a spring toy, the rest of him got pulled along. His surprised grunt seemed to come from down in his lower body.

He pushed himself up to stand on his legs... hindlegs, then flopped forward onto four feet and wobbled his way out of the tiny room. A night light shined near his bed and a few more lined the hallway. There wasn't much signage, just engraved "apartment" numbers. Since he'd come from the medical lab, he staggered in the other direction and came to a four-way intersection. Dozens of rooms surrounded him. A hundred or more, presumably, but he was alone. He guessed that the differently shaded curtain was a bathroom. He pushed his way in there and stared in dismay at some weird trench-like ceramic toilet cubicles, Asian style.

It took Trent several minutes of embarrassment to figure that system out. His back half was female, adding to the difficulty. Shaken but at least proud he hadn't created a disgusting mess, he turned to the sinks and got confused again. He muttered, "I trained for this. Just couldn't put it into practice." There was a traditional row of sinks, and below that, a long tray for cleaning his forepaws. Three shower stalls and a big industrial dryer stall filled the rest of the bathroom. Trent figured he was funky from the cryo, and a stack of oversized towels sat nearby, so he did a brief shower without even attempting soap or shampoo. That was another round of banging into things, followed by standing in the dryer stall and having a ton of water blasted off of him.

After all that, Trent felt... not "human again", but more awake. He returned to the hallways and belatedly noticed there were two bathrooms side by side. He'd just used the men's room. That was arguably off limits forever, now.

For the moment he was starved. He'd ignored his probably-relocated stomach for however long he'd been asleep. He went exploring.

The "banquet hall" was the largest room he'd seen yet, made from a starship cargo bay. High ceilinged, draped with bare sheets like banners to dampen the noise, it held long tables with no seats at all. The only diners were a pair of men chowing down on oatmeal. They were sitting like cats, lower body crouching on the floor, upper paws dangling or resting on the table. Each wore saddlebags like a horse.

They spotted him. "You're Trent, the machinist?" one said, offering a hand.

"Yeah. Happy to have made it. Where is everyone? And where can I get a meal? And anything else?"

The two half-lions laughed. The taller one said, "Doc Klaus didn't feed you yet? One sec." He dropped to all fours and trotted away to a big metal bin along one wall. He came back with a fresh bowl and spoon for Trent.

"I can't eat all that."

The other diner grinned. "You're obviously new. This stuff's a bit stale, but it's our high-protein mix. Expect to get sick of the stuff."

"Cat food," agreed the man holding the bowl.

Trent took it and tried some. It'd obviously been sitting around for hours, but he was too starved to care. While stuffing himself he said, "You're almost the only people I've seen."

"It's three in the morning."

"I haven't seen a window yet."

"Do you have a computer yet?"

"Nothing. Oh, my stuff!" He'd been allotted a box of personal items. "Has my stuff been unloaded yet? Or can I fetch it?"

The diners checked their personal tablet computers. One said, "We're on break from the night shift of exciting sensor monitoring. The records say nothing's been taken from the cargo pile yet but the cryopods. Wait... 101 pods? Thought it was an even hundred."

The other guy said, "Looks like you destroyed your first meal here, so let's get your stuff moved."

Trent discovered that he'd finished off the entire oatmeal bowl. "All right."

#

They walked outside of the complex Trent had been in this whole time. There was no airlock but the exits had a double doorway to keep out the hot, dry air they now stepped into. Trent walked slowly, feeling ridiculous as he tried to march with his left pair of feet and then the right. The locals were doing a faster, more complicated gait he still wasn't sure how to copy. One was pulling a big-wheeled cart by using a rope harness around his waist, dragging it like a horse.

These two were taller than him. Now that he was walking with them, they had a distinctly heavier build to their lion halves. Above the human/lion division they were about the same, but he stood several inches shorter at the waist and shoulder. Trent looked away and focused on the landscape.

Planet Savana stood dark and quiet. A landscape of tan rocks stretched to the horizon with no vegetation in sight, but for a greenhouse complex and some native moss. A tiny green-tinged moon stood out against countless stars. The two colonists had flashlights to help light the way.

"I've seen pictures and the training sims," Trent said, feeling sand under his paws. "How is life here?"

"We're barely set up. In debt up to our waists, probably. Going to take years to have proper farms and shops, and there's nothing to export for money yet."

"I figured the, ah, King was super rich."

"It's like owning a farm. The value's high but he's got no cash. Just a claim on us for some low-paid labor for a while."

Trent said, "Did anyone else get revived while I was sleeping?"

"We heard there were three or four successful revivals yesterday, counting you. There was some kind of controversy over it but Doc Klaus didn't give details."

The colony had a few other buildings in sight, but besides the main habitat and the greenhouse it was mostly sheds and other incidental structures. A mass of cargo containers filled a low, flat rocky plateau that looked scorched by engines. Some had been taken apart already. Trent said, "I guess only the StarMule ships can land without a proper pad."

"That's what did the deliveries, yeah. One of the things holding us back is being limited to the most rugged frontier cargo hauler. We already opened the most critical containers while you first few people were getting the feline treatment."

The other escort unlocked a container, banging metal rods and doors around. He shined a light into a dim, dense set of racks and his ears perked up. "This is the one. Hundred or more boxes of personal deliveries including hopefully yours. And mine."

"They let anybody open these?"

"I typed in my code so it's logged. Better than being unable to open a box because a Royal Cargo Minister has the only key."

There wasn't room to walk in. The three of them began sliding plastic tubs out and setting them down on the luggage cart. Each had a name rather than a number and they weren't sorted. Trent wobbled under the weight of one and one of his escorts snagged it, saying, "Let us get these."

"No, no, I can handle it."

The others exchanged a look. Trent pawed at the ground and said, "See mine, yet?"

"This one?"

Trent's name stood out on a high shelf. "Yeah, here."

One man hefted it and set it down. The other tried pulling the cart and said, "That's my limit for one trip. Need to get back to work, too."

The other guy said, "I'll haul this one," then glanced at Trent. "Unless you'd rather."

Trent felt his ear linings burning. He reached down, with vertigo at the weird position of his ears and waist, and managed to lift his personal box in both arms. It was heavier than he remembered. He was weakened by an interstellar trip. "Let's go."

They walked back to base with the luggage. Trent avoided showing the strain of doing his wobbling four-legged steps while weighed down.

He got back to his room and put the box at last. "Thanks."

"There's a meeting at nine. If nobody's issued you a computer yet, want someone to knock on your door?"

"I should have one I can use in my luggage, but... as a backup, sure."

The other guy said, "We need to get back. If you can't sleep till then, maybe distribute these."

Trent noted, "No room ID numbers."

"Right. Leave them here for now, then. Good night! See you around."

#

Trent was left with no official work. He rummaged through his box. He'd brought no pants, for good reason, but had a personal computer, trinkets from home, and a few favorite tools he'd used on memorable jobs. He'd brought one good shirt, a formal "seersucker" in blue and white stripes, good for hot weather. He buttoned that on to replace his generic hospital-like shirt. He filled a shelf with a framed photo of his parents and a few other things, nodded, and decided to explore some more.

Nobody was on duty in the medical lab, and he didn't have a badge or code to get in. He heard rustling from several curtained rooms. Then he set foot outdoors to practice walking, and found the machine shop.

They hadn't done much with it yet. The Savana colony had one stand-alone building for its construction and repair needs. No wonder not much else had been done yet! He'd taken it for a large shed at first, and that wasn't far from the truth. It had room to work on a tractor or something indoors, and was obviously arranged to avoid tight cluttered corners. But it was otherwise set up all wrong. Snaking trip-hazard cables, inadequate ventilation and fume filters, hand tools scattered. Trent stood with his hands on his hips and startled at being reminded of the fuzz and muscle down there.

High on one wall, poorly placed like everything else, hung a weird toolbelt. Saddlebags, meant for someone like him. He had to stretch to reach it. So, experimentally, he twitched his forepaws until he could move just one, slapping it onto a table. He then levered himself like a cat trying to snag something from a human's dinner, putting both forepaws up. That move gave him enough stability to extend nearly to the ceiling with his upper half, and snag the harness. He managed to get down again, and started figuring out how to put this thing on. It wasn't meant to be a team effort, was it? He didn't want to have one of the guys from last night buckling all this onto him.

Feeling his ears burn, he wriggled around and found the saddlebags went on easily enough, designed for the purpose. He still felt like this long back half was a trailer he was riding, and it kept twitching in ways he didn't know how to control. He ended up with a pair of belts around his lower body, with a pair of bags and tool holders. He trotted in a circle and managed to not fall over.

He startled at seeing a big reflective metal sheet. A half-cat colonist looked back, wearing a fancy shirt and scruffy toolbelt. Golden fur showed off muscle underneath, and a twitchy tail showed off a fuzzy tip as though it wanted to be admired. His natural black hair now had golden-blond roots. The complete picture impressed him.

Behind his reflection stood an unchanged human.

Trent turned and fell over, barely catching himself with his hands before his face could smack the concrete floor. The newcomer was dressed in rumpled business wear, saying, "What are you doing here at this hour?"

Trent propped himself up on six limbs, then pushed upright to stand on four. "Who are you?"

The thin, sharp-faced man towered over him, though Trent wasn't sure how to judge anyone's height at a glance anymore. "I'm Oliver Vind, representing People's Interstellar Holdings to oversee our loan investment."

"In the middle of the night?"

Oliver said, "I haven't acclimated yet."

"And you're not a lion?"

"Very perceptive. I'm exempt from our client's personal rules, especially since I'll be returning soon and I need to fit into a pod. Now, are you in charge of this workshop? I have a few questions about operations here."

Trent folded his arms and discovered his chest had become sore. Annoyed, he wondered how long it'd take this man to realize Trent had come in on the same ship. "I believe so."

Oliver readied a tablet to take notes. "Describe your progress in moving beyond minimal setup into viable economic production."

"With the new tool and personnel delivery we expect major progress in the coming months."

"When did our esteemed client give instructions to devote construction efforts to luxury facilities?"

"Which ones?"

"Curtains, elaborate indoor shower and toilet facilities, greenhouses."

Trent stared up at this human. "You're going to need to take that up with the King."

"I definitely will. On a planet with a breathable atmosphere and supporting basic nutrient production --"

"We're scarfing down oatmeal."

Oliver rapped the side of his tablet for emphasis. "There is a specific build order intended for maximum efficiency. You should be producing test shipments of base metal parts already."

"I'm sure the geologists and other specialists can tell you more about the local conditions we're dealing with. For my part I can assure you this workshop will get more productive within a week, and that will affect everything else. Assuming the latest tools got delivered."

"I saw to the cargo manifest myself."

"That puzzles me. How were there 101 cryopods? I thought the system was set up for blocks of 25."

Oliver tapped out some notes. "Per company orders, I had myself added to the life support system. There's spare capacity for a VIP pod."

"You know that at least one traveler didn't wake up, right?"

"That's a risk, but I took it for the colony's sake. We we can focus on ensuring 















everything runs well from this day on."

"Agreed."

Oliver turned away. "Now, I'll be returning to bed. I expect an all-hands meeting in the morning."

"I'll bring extra paws."

Oliver grunted and exited. Left alone in the workshop, Trent did a quick inventory and walked out, returning the toolbelt. He went back to his room and slept well.

#

In the morning he had his computer alarm go off moments before somebody knocked. Trent fell out of bed again. "Who is it?"

"You up for a meeting?"

"If I can walk, yeah."

Trent braced himself against the bed and levered himself up to four legs. He looked down at his feet, wobbled, and eventually made them move to get him outside. Doc Klaus was in the hall, knocking on the next few walls.

"How many people are awake now?" asked Trent.

Klaus looked frazzled from ears to tail. "Yesterday I took it slowly after the initial... trouble. After you I got only three people done, and it looks like they're all too exhausted to get up -- except our new auditor. Let's go; how are you feeling?"

"I slept well and walked out to the cargo pile, then the workshop. Oliver the Two-Legged was looking around, too."

"Good progress! Come back to the lab for blood samples."

"More than one?"

"Upper and lower. Need to make sure your human half's not going to fall off. Then get you on the right diet."

Trent winced at the image, then followed Klaus to the banquet hall.

The twenty-plus colonists were all gathering. Trent beelined to a cauldon of oatmeal next to a table of fried potatoes and some kind of algae paste dispenser.

One of the guys saw Trent peering at the last stuff, and laughed. "We call that the glop generator. High protein. Nice to see somebody new!"

Another settler added, in a lower tone, "Someone who's with us."

Trent shook hands all around. Then King Arminus finished a quiet talk with Oliver in the corner, and called out, "Attention!"

Trent felt lungs expanding and contracting in his lower body. He figured they were good for shouting. The king certainly knew how.

Arminus said, "Good morning. As you can see, we have a few new faces. Trent, here, will be our new machinist. We also have two more permanent residents unfrozen and still resting, plus a bank representative."

Unprompted, Oliver addressed the group. "It's good to see that you've begun construction. Now that you have more people, it's time to begin repaying the trust that People's Interstellar Holdings has placed in you. I will remain here for the next three months to monitor your progress toward export production, at which time the company will determine the status of further repayment terms and the shipping of supplies going forward. Ladies and gentlemen, you have what you need to restock next season's incoming scout ship, so building and operating a proper set of production facilities is your goal. Dismissed."

Nobody moved; everybody stared. Oliver said, "I'm more used to the boardroom. Carry on."

Arminus spoke again. "In any case, we'll be adding more people as Klaus unthaws them. Although the labor supply will be rising, I expect everyone to be patient with all of the newcomers, as they literally relearn how to walk. I remember how it was with me. Some of course have more adaptation to do than others, so bear with them. Any questions?"

Trent raised one hand, and one of his forepaws lifted too. "I need basic equipment issued, and to know if I'm officially taking over the workshop. I want to reorganize everything."

One of the colonists answered, "I'm quartermaster; I'll get you equipped right after breakfast."

Arminus nodded. "And yes, Trent, you're the shop cat now."

It took Trent a moment to understand. "Meow, sir. I mean yes."

Arminus grinned. It was nice to see he didn't take the royal role too seriously.

Everyone ate. Trent got drawn into conversation, asked about current events back on Earth as of his own departure, and about his own background. This seemed like a good group to work with; they were held back mainly by limited manpower and equipment, and everything could get moving faster soon.

Afterward, he met with the quartermaster, who worked out of a shed. Where most of the group had human-style hair, he had only lion-like fur on his head and down his neck, shaggy like a mane and distinctly inhuman. "Nice look," Trent said. "Did you get to design what you got turned into?"

"That was one of the conditions for letting Arminus talk us into this. Did you pick...?"

"Ah, just details like hair and eye color." He'd signed up for hair matching the fur, and that was already starting to grow in, and while he was at it he'd gotten his eyes changed to a contrasting deep blue.

"Looks nice on you!"

Trent wasn't sure how to answer that. He kept quiet while the quartermaster issued him a rugged computer tablet, a saddlebag tool harness of his own, and some miscellaneous gadgets. "If you're going to walk out of sight from base, always have your radio and a canteen."

"Got it."

#

The day was a mix of shop work and an ongoing meet-and-greet. There'd been only three people unfrozen right after him, including auditor Oliver, so a pair of new lion-folk eventually walked into the workshop.

Trent was re-organizing everything, making a great banging and thumping, when the two men staggered in. "Are you Trent?" one asked.

"Yeah. Need something?"

"We just woke up an hour ago and got sent here to say hi. I barely know how to walk!"

"That's part of my problem too," Trent said. "If you want practice, you can move these shelves around."

"Could be helpful for learning all these muscles," the other guy said. He had a lot of them, visible moving under his shiny fur.

"And afterward I might have you whitewash a fence for fun."

"Uh, sure. Trying to earn our keep, and all the regulars are too busy with what they've been doing, to know how to use us."

The newcomers helped Trent with hauling furniture around, moving some out to the sand to make room for more sensible arrangement of cables and machinery. The work went much faster with them. Partly it was the sheer number of hands, but these two were stronger both with their arms and at carrying loads on their backs. Each was taller than him, too, with a larger lion half. He was going to see a lot of that, apparently.

They sat around eating lunch, soon. He said, "That's most of what I wanted to rearrange. Thanks! You've got your own stuff to start on, right?"

One of the two explained, "We're both here for mining, so getting the tool repair place fully running was a priority. Oliver already got on us about following up on the first team's prospecting."

"Need me to unpack the picks and mules and gold-mining pans, or whatever you've got?"

"We've got it; it's heavy stuff. Expect us coming back for sharpening and cleaning though."

Trent nodded. "I'll fix your tools, too."

The two grinned and left. Trent blushed, questioning his own motive for chatting and joking with them outside work.

Arminus arrived as he was leaving to return to the shop. "Trent. How is the setup going?"

"Open for work, though I'll still be moving things around all afternoon. You really didn't have a full-time mechanic?"

"We were all doing some of everything. As soon as you can, I want you to set up the industrial plastic fabber. We're going to have actual houses and furniture this year!"

#

Trent had what he thought of as customers. He was technically getting a token salary as part of the colony, but nothing was formalized enough yet to make him a real owner of the workshop or more than the paltry contents of his room. The first batch of colonists trickled in during the day, sometimes to borow or return tools and sometimes to meet him. Several of these people grumbled at Trent's new formal check-out system. "We have a quartermaster already," one said.

"Not for this equipment. Come on; try this system and we'll be able to stay organized as we get scores more users wanting to use the drills and wrenches."

"Yeah, fine; Arminus did hire you for this."

The next visitor was a lion-woman leading a pair of wide-eyed guys who shuffled along, barely able to stand up. She said, "Hey, Trent, I'm Madeline, from the greenhouse operation."

Trent shook her hand. "Are you the one they call Our Lady of the Potatoes?"

Madeline grinned. "They said I couldn't grow them in this soil. I said *what* soil? We're creating it from bare rock. I have a special request for you. These two are fresh from the freezer, and both got randomly picked for the D-10 program."

Trent winced. "I thought we weren't advertising who was in it."

"Uh, it's not something you're hiding well."

Trent looked down. Where he'd been feeling vaguely sore before, he could now see distinct breasts under his shirt. Small, for now, but his enrollment in this biological adjustment program was no longer subtle.

Madeline quickly added, "But that's good! You're contributing. These two will be joining you in the process. I was hoping you could walk them through what you've done."

Trent looked aside, scratching one twitchy ear. "Yeah, I can. I don't want to dwell on it though."

"You don't have to. Oh, I got you a gift. We're short on materials for everything, but I have spare cloth for these." She wiggled her tail, showing off an orange ribbon near the tuft. She then offered one to Trent.

So far, the other two newcomers had stood there tired and ragged. Trent said, 

"Are you two up for a little work?"

"Maybe something easy?" said one, his cat ears laying low.

Distracting himself from one social task with the other, Trent took the ribbon and nodded to Madeline. She waved and departed quietly.

Trent found work for them, sorting a poorly organized set of cables. It took a while before either of them spoke up. One said, "So we lost the lottery."

Trent said, "I wouldn't say that. We all applied for colonist jobs, and some of us gambled more than others." He thought back to his dead-end career on Earth. "If I'd not checked that box on the form, I'd have gotten passed over for somebody else, and holding a rejection letter. I'm better off here."

His assistants muttered and nodded.

Trent asked, "What are your official specialties?"

"We're manufacturing guys. Uh. Gals."

"Your names?"

The other one said, "Bo and Dave. I guess we have to change them."

"I haven't thought about that yet. Everybody understands we're busy."

"Well, we're here to work on the heavy industry they don't actually have."

"Good. You'll be setting up using the equipment here, then. Let me run you through the way I've arranged things."

They seemed more confident about that, since it was within their job description. Within an hour, they had a decent idea of how they were going to set up the first refinery, and were half asleep. Trent called a halt and escorted them back to their rooms.

He stood in the hall, hearing snoring from a few rooms and seeing a tail that peeked out from somebody who'd sprawled weirdly behind a curtain. That reminded him of the ribbon from Madeline. It'd be polite to try that on. Curling his tail around to within reach took him three tries, and he blushed at feeling his hands on the warm, twitchy thing. He tied the decoration on like a shoelace. It was... nice. Looked good on him.