Jon and his family sat down in the chairs which surrounded the woman who was talking to them. He noticed Zoe glancing at the window a couple of times, perhaps looking for her friend, to see if she was still there. As far as Jon could tell, she wasn't.
The woman continued to talk. "As you already know, your bodies will slowly coalesce over the next seven days, the extent of the retreat. And ..."
"Excuse me," Jon said.
The woman looked annoyed that he interrupted her, but then said "Do you have a question?"
"What do you mean by coalesce?"
She looked a little confused. "All of this was explained earlier, when you signed up for the retreat." After she saw that Jon really didn't know, she sighed. "Right now, your body is made up of segments taken from the other members of your family. But it's all mismatched. Over the course of the week, all of the segments will coalesce into one normal and uniform body."
"So, when the week is over, I'll ..."
"You'll probably stay male, and might lose your breasts. But I'm not sure what age you'll be. It all depends on which segments are more dominant."
"Dominant?" Jon asked. What did she mean by that? How could one body segment be more dominant than another?
The woman began to get frustrated with Jon's questions. "Listen, you should have known about all of this before you were changed."
"He was," Jon's mother said. "I'm not sure why he doesn't remember."
The woman sighed, then continued her "welcome" speech, ignoring Jon's question all together.
Jon wished he had brought the stone with him. He still didn't really know what was happening and he could have easily found out by using it.
