Do you know the name of this short story...?

Bert

Cadet
Hello SciFi forum-goers,

I read short story in a compilation and I can't remember what the title of the story or the compilation was. I've lost the book it was in. The story was disturbing and interesting, and I can only very vaguely remember it. It may even have been a dream. I can't describe it to you without risking spoiling it, as it does rather depend on some suspense to get the full effect. Can you help me identify it?

You can probably safely read 1-3 and it not spoil the story.

(1) It starts off all happy families with a man and wife living alone in a house (or do they have a kid? Can't remember) on an idyllic world.

(2) The bloke gives his wife a pill or an injection or something every day. IIRC, she is always very eager to please him and he is irritable and a bit 'on-the-edge'. She may be pregnant but I'm not sure.

(3) Some stuff happens, can't remember what. She somehow stops taking the meds, I think. Leaves the house to have a look around, and discovers stuff.

(4) - if you don't recognise (1), (2) and (3) you may want to STOP READING HERE. I've put the next bit in white so it's not readable until you select it:Anyway, it turns out that the wife is actually a bloke who has been surgically messed with by the 'husband' and made capable of child-bearing. They were astronauts, (last of human race?) supposed to colonise a planet or explore (or something), crash landed (or something), and only these two survive. Or others survive and went mad and killed each other, or something. In order to ensure having offspring, one bloke operates on the other and gives 'her' drugs to make 'her' into a willing child-bearer and mum who doesn't ask questions.

Anyone know what the name of the story is?

Or was it just one of my messed-up sci-fi dreams?
 
Bert;582687 said:
Or was it just one of my messed-up sci-fi dreams?
I don't recognize the story but if it turns out that it was just a messed up dream, start keeping a notebook by your bed and writing this stuff done as you encounter it. You never know what might come out of it.
 
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