Borders in the the Oort cloud protectorates fluctuated rapidly, changing hands like old coins.

Centralized governments usually sputtered out as soon as they started up, but wed had a lot of success with Anishijibwe, for a while. Dealing with territorial disputes was unavoidable, however. Especially when the New American Dominion arrived in our neck of the woods. For 30 years, the NAD gobbled up every hunk of dirty ice and hydrocarbon that they could get their hands on- burning through countless comets and rich volatile deposits. Gargantuan in size, armament, and general colonial aggression, the NAD fleet beat us to every gas-rich planetesimal in sight, criss-crossing the empty space that remained with drones, annexing it for New America. Hot dogs and light beer and hand guns were shipped in by the ton- bit by bit, our people changed. It was if wed slowed ourselves down somehow, entering some violent consumptive cocoon, readying ourselves willingly for the prolonged process of cultural metamorphosis. Jumbled up in all the rest of this was the Redmask, a retrovirus that was genetically encoded into NAD citizens. Killing with a casual silence, the Redmask virus raged unchecked until every Anishijibwe was dead, or had been genetically dismantled and reformed. Left alive, those unlucky few, but altered. My own genes had been rewritten by the virus, and Id changed my name to go with it- Zachary Cartwright, six feet tall, slightly overweight, blonde-haired and brown-eyed. No one knew I was Anishijibwe. Oddly enough, Id managed to avoid cell death, but been dismantled all the same: Id disappeared completely. Pretty shortly after wed been sucked into New America, I was placed with the medical crew of a salvage company out at the fringes of the Dominion. Quotas were easy to make, and there was rarely any danger, so I spent most of the time working in the ships lab, which was well-equipped. Reading until my eyes burned, I spat out equation after equation, looking for the one that I wanted- the one that would return me to my roots. Suddenly, I found it. The next few days passed at a feverish pace as I tested the new virus: my little world had metamorphosed again, this time into a mad blur of insomniac hope. Under the guise of a routine check-up, I administered it to the entirety of the ships crew. Veins afire, the captain was the first to realize what Id done, though it was far too late. Watching closely, I saw as his hair shifted from blonde to black, straightening and lengthening. X and Y chromosomes dissolved then, though I couldnt see them. Zach? he croaked questioningly, his last word. Absolutely not. I said. Zach is dead.