Let Nature Take Its Course

"Put your clothes on the hook by the door F-C-312-478-954-398- uh…43573...V Your undergarments go on the table below in the black bag. Make sure they are secured and out of sight!" The final "vee" was dragged out for emphasis, and you felt the thorns around the pronunciation as you always did.

As was normal, the directive was a command, not a request. The laws were clear that whenever one person was placed in charge of another that all directions would be just that: directions. This was like all laws should be, to eliminate crime by preventing lawless behavior, even at the most elemental level.

It was one of those rare times in your life you were allowed to be naked. Again, to prevent criminal behavior, everyone was required to wear some kind of garment and keep their body parts hidden, except for face, hands, and sometimes feet, but not often. Penalties for lawbreakers were swift and sure, since no one was allowed to be unsupervised at any time, from cradle to grave, and the law made no exceptions. You remember what happened to 0283, the eff in the same squad as you when you were five, who took unlawful glee at raising her garment to see everyone react. She was swiftly disciplined before the entire institute, and it wasn't pretty. You remember how she smelled when she was finally released, having been forced to eliminate inside the punishment suit as well as sweat. No one ever followed her example, at least not in that institution. You feel waves of shame roll over yourself at your nudity, you feel so…so…

dirty!

You lower your head, cover your breasts and genitals, and back against the wall.

"Come, come, Individual! You are here for a great honor! Not every eff is allowed to reproduce. Stand up straight and show pride in your body! The examiners will probably fail you if you show any reluctance, and you know what that means!" This was said, or rather barked, by a neutered eff nurse, one with her graying hair crewcut and tattoos on both arms. There was no doubt she was neutered at or soon after puberty when it became obvious she would never be attractive enough for reproduction. She probably looked like an emm with breasts, but you didn't know for sure, having never actually

seen

an emm. That was the rumor the other eff-vees whispered to each other.

Beauty was a two-edged sword in the Age of Enlightened Democratic Control. As the old authoritarian dictatorships had fallen and Democracy had swept the world this most flexible form of government quickly solved the major problems that had beset Humanity throughout it's darkened past, at last truly bringing Liberty and Justice to all. Particularly Justice.

Little by little, the forces of Government were less consumed by external problems and had more and more time to devote to smaller and smaller problems, including the once-seemingly intractable problem of Crime, eventually having enough time and resources to go after individual criminals with the entire machinery of the Justice System fully engaged each time. "Using a sledgehammer to kill fleas is a thoroughly effective method!" Some senator had once said, and it was right.

At the same time, Media outlets proliferated, and with them the never-ending demand for material to fill the airtime of all those channels running 24/7. Eventually, even small domestic crimes such as noisy family arguments received total coverage on the global net, and were investigated and rehashed by talking heads on the visi for years after the original perps had served their sentences and died of old age or assist.

And it was odd how that phrase "twenty-four-seven" had persisted, even though time measurement had gone metric centuries ago, and even the laws passed mandating the use of metric phrases hadn't erased it. The Government was once again considering measures to stiffen the penalties for noncompliance

Eventually, given the overabundance of Media attention, Government studies, and legislative posturing, a general consensus (there was no other kind allowed) was that the sexual urge essentially lay at the bottom of all unacceptable (and therefore criminal) behavior, and that its manifestation in the form of sexual "love" was what was enabling all sorts of people to commit illegal acts. You yourself managed to survive those dreadfully boring required college criminology courses dealing with the Misty Somerst (people had word-names in those days instead of the more unique and efficient metric numbering system in use today) Case, where a woman had slit her children's throats to please her boyfriend, who then beat her to death because she wouldn't stop crying and fetch his beer, by forcing yourself to be the most strident and vocal "Angry Feminist" in the class. Indeed, it was your outward persona as such that landed you here at the fertility clinic as much as your feminine appearance.

The Government finally properly realized that the problem lay with our genitals, and finally "did something about it" by segregating and neutering the sexes, no mean feat. Many husbands and wives (whatever those were) were shot or blown up by mines trying to cross the noperson's zone until enforcement finally reached a sufficient level. Even after neutering was mandated in 1536 D.E., many still tried until long enough had passed that Nature accommodated itself to the new situation, and natural selection, aided by modern genetic science, had bred a new Humanity, one that had better control of it's sexual urges. Crime dropped precipitously to it's present almost nonexistent level. The program was a shining example of Democracy at work.

Neutering helped considerably by removing the desire entirely in those who were not selected to participate in the continuation of the species. Spaying was a rite of passage for most effs and emms after puberty, and while it was the ticket to success and prosperity (and no men…men… men

stration.

There, you said it!), every one you had ever known well enough to speak to said they envied you because you still bled.

So now you were here, standing naked in the white-tiled room, waiting your turn to appear before the Examination Board! Every eff dreamed of and dreaded this day, for to fail the inspection would mean almost immediate hystorectomy and an end to that which made one a

real

eff with the "V" for "viable" suffix to her I.D. You were still a "Woman," and were still called a "her" or a "she." Never an "it."

You didn't have to wait long, which was a relief because you were standing exposed alone with this sexless old crone who hated your guts for still having them, and were in no mood to yield to the social pressure to make small talk to it. Fortunately, you were spared having to, for it too was silent. It had seen too many candidates pass through and despised every one to the core of her soul, for most would pass through those doors and be fulfilled. She had only seen them to clean up afterwards Still, there were severe consequences for being antisocial…you tried hard not to think of them.

The door at the other end of the waiting room finally opened and a fat old doctor in a white coat called your number again, loud enough for all to hear, and jerked it's head for you to follow.

The room beyond was brightly lit, as were all the clinic's procedure rooms, with a straight-backed chair, a stepstool, two examination tables, one for gynecology, one for proctology, both with their taborets of gleaming stainless instruments, several medical machines on carts and stands, a toilet seat with a plastic bag underneath, and a desk, behind which the other two doctors were already sitting.

The big doctor directed you to sit in the chair before the desk and "make yourself comfortable," then took it's place with the other two. More thorns. Your ID is confirmed yet again, you are asked your medical history, which is printed out in greater detail before them on their terminal sheets than you can possibly remember yourself. One of the doctors is jolly, one is bossy, and one is bored. You are taken to the stepstool and stand while they touch you and poke you, they squeeze your thighs, buttocks, ribs, breasts, and arms to check body tone, they look in your eyes, ears, and mouth, take sputum, blood, urine, and stool samples (all three stood staring at you with their arms crossed as you provided the latter), and then gave you the most thorough rectal and pelvic examinations of your life.

The big gynecologist between your knees calls out: "She's still unbroken." What's not broken? It reaches for a plastic thing that looks like a sausage, coats it with gel, and you feel it being pressed into your opening. "You may feel a little discomfort…" it says.

The thing, whatever it is, hurts like hell!

You gasp as it stretches you open, and then you feel it hit the end, but it presses forward anyway. You feel the skin inside begin to stretch and suddenly tear, and the pain shoots through your hips and gut like fire…

But, not before you feel something else. The doctor strokes the tool a couple of times to make sure there are no more obstructions and the feeling, even through the pain, is…is…

is…!

Ultrasound proved quickly that you were not already pregnant (no kidding!), and that you were indeed…

viable

. A "plus" sign was added to your suffix, the final mark of approval. The doctors congratulate you (one insincerely happy, one curtly, the other just ignores you), and you're given a simple paper lab coat to cover your nakedness, then directed out the door at the opposite end of the room from the entrance.

"M-my clothes?" you stammer.

"You'll get them back!" the big bossy one snaps, and you know you are no longer welcome here. Even if it had once been a "she," that time was long ago now, and you're just another drop in the constant stream of reminders of what was or might have been.

There is a hallway beyond the door that ran two ways, and two huge nurses to make sure you went the way you were told. In your case to the right, and the nurses are probably friendlier than if you had been directed the other way. You actually could feel a chill up your spine emanating from that door behind you. Many eff-vees were known to terminate after going through that door, all of whom were just swept up into another statistical category in the population control accounting feedback loop.

You are assigned a private room, equipped much like any room in a mid-priced hotel, to await your next ovulation, which could come any time in the next couple of days. A nurse takes your temperature and a urine sample once every couple of hours, otherwise you are left alone to wait. You don't feel like socializing with the other "eff-vee-plusses." The first night a group of them came by to check you out, some silly, some gushing over their "plus," some silent and withdrawn. You watch TV alone in the dark.

You yourself are still not out of the dark. If you don't concieve after a "reasonable" number of inseminations ("fulfillment" it's called), you go down that corridor the other way, bound, gagged, and sedated if necessary. You breathe a deep sigh and try not to think of

that

either.

TV is a bore, all the sitcoms, even your old favorites, just don't have any spark. You don't bond well with the other plusses, much less the nurses, and all the recreations, books…nothing.

You wonder what it must be like over on the emm's side. You have no idea what one looks like, much less what they use to make, what was it the nurses called them?

Babies

with. You were pretty sure they did something to you, and that you actually made the babies (baby?) yourself, but you had no idea how. Everyone figured that was the big secret in the fertility clinics, and that you'd get told when you were fulfilled.

The next morning when you woke up that prune-faced nurse was right there with the thermometer, the cup, and the test strip. Your guts tighten when you hear it grunt approvingly at the temperature and the colors, and the quickened pace of it's step out the door tells you your time has come. You drop your head back on the pillow and wait.

It isn't long in coming, and it's the big bitch doctor that's going to do it to you. Swell! It once again takes your temperature, rectally, and gives you a quick examination, and another urine sample, which it and the nurse watch this time. That takes forever, because you were fully drained the first time.

Finally they're satisfied, and the doctor tells you to lift your gown above your waist and raise your legs. Once again you are exposed. It runs a finger up inside your opening and probes around, and you try not to show that it feels…it feels…

good

actually. Ever since the episode at the examination you've been searching high and low for something,

anything

—a banana even—to try to duplicate that feeling you had when you were opened, but no luck.

Evidently now, for it grunts it's approval, and the nurse hands it a huge syringe, shaped like the tool. You brace yourself, but this time the pain of insertion is minor, compared to the feeling of having just the right size…

thing

pushed into you.

The doctor begins to slide the cylinder in and out of your opening. This one isn't smooth like the other one was, rather it is textured more like a tree, with bark, although not nearly as rough. You begin to feel a warm glow as the stroking continues, but what is it waiting for? What's going to happen next? You dislike it so much you don't want to say anything, much less ask like you're ignorant, but fortunately the doctor supplies the answer without being prompted.

"You should be feeling a feeling you've never felt before now, a good feeling, am I right?" You nod your head. "Good. Let the feeling grow and don't hold back. It will get quite intense and you may feel you want to shout or cry out. That's okay. It will tell me when the time is right."

"Right for what?" you ask.

"I'm going to inject a fluid that will begin the reproductive process." It answers. "It won't hurt, so don't worry. Some candidates don't even feel it, others find it quite pleasurable. It helps siphon the fluid deeper into you."

Pleasurable is the right word for it! You have to go back to the grocery and get some cucumbers! The feeling is growing so intense you want to lift your hips off the bed into the air and stretch forward to meet that wonderful…

thing

, whatever it is. You begin to gasp for air involuntarily and make little whimpering moises, which grow into whines and howls as the pressure in your belly climbs.

Finally a point is reached and you let go trying to keep that pressure inside, and you stiffen and cry out. You feel your insides squish with liquid, as the doctor shoves the piston home. Then it's over, and your hips drop back onto the mattress, and your heart pounds as if you've run far and fast.

"Excellent!" the doctor says, and even the prune is smiling. "Excellent!" You feel like a trick pony that has just performed, but then it's gone after telling you to stay on your back for the rest of the morning with your knees up, and details the nurse to stay "in case you need anything." You know it's because they're watching you and making sure you comply.

You wish you could clamp your legs together and hold in that feeling that's tingling down there like ants crawling inside you, that's what you "need." You "need" that nurse to get it's skinny ass out of the room so you can figure out a way to do that a

gain!

You don't know what "crime" is, nobody does any more, but whatever it is, if that's it then THROW ME IN JAIL!!!

This scene gets repeated several times over the next couple of weeks, but you know something's wrong when everyone's disappointed you have your period but cover by reassuring you that it's not all that unusual, most plusses take several cycles before the process begins, especially their first times.

But after several cycles have gone by, things are becoming grim. Every weapon in the ancient arsenal of reproductive science is brought to bear on your womb, with no success. People are beginning to look at you differently, and even your few other plus friends are beginning to avoid you. You see other plusses squeal with delight when the daily sample turns positive and they move once more through those doors at the far end of the building to the maternity section.

The final blow for those who have overstayed here is to be called into the doctor's consultation room to be given the bad news. You've been here long enough now to know a couple who have made

that

trip. You resign yourself and wait.

Sure enough, one day that little prune-face with the tattoos (

God

, what were they

thinking

when that was the fashion?) motions to you to follow. Sure enough, there was that big bitch behind the desk, looking like the cook put too much garlic in the prunes and onions it had for breakfast.

"Sit down, please." It said, and you did.

That was the last you saw of her, or the fertility clinic, or the life you had known. In afterthought, you think that Little Prune-Face had hit you with a syringe in the neck from behind. All you know is that you woke up an unknown time later in a wooden box, lying on your back, apparently in the cargo hold of an agrav.

It was night, and you could feel the agrav descending, the air pressure popping in your ears. Some things hadn't changed in the thousand years since people had learned to fly. There is that bump as it touches ground and the lid is pulled off, there are no lights of any kind. You are hauled to your feet by two people and flung out the hatch onto the ground, something else thumping to the grass beside you. The door is closed, and the agrav lifts off into the starry night sky.

You don't know much about the stars, but you do know this is not the sky you have seen all your life. There are even a couple of…what do they call them? Nebulas? Galaxies? in the sky, and you know there is nothing like that in the Northern Hemisphere of Earth. Are you on another planet?

Not in the original Solar System you're not, at least not on the surface without a protective suit on. Here the trees look normal and the animals of the night sound right. There have been several discoveries and explorations of new stellar systems in the past thousand years, but none have been reported as being Earthlike enough to sub for the real thing. You decide you're still on Earth, but perhaps in the southern hemisphere. Besides, you couldn't have been sedated for long enough to make the years-long voyage to another star to not remember at least some of it.

You feel for the other thing they threw out with you and discover a large knapsack. A flashlight is attached by a chain, and you switch it on. Now you're getting somewhere!

There is an envelope tucked on top with a survival manual, a diagram of how to repack the knapsack, a map with your position marked and the words "go upriver" written on it, and a letter:

Dearest 43573:

Sorry to have to handle you roughly this way, but I know you'll understand. I've used my own DNA enough times to calibrate the equipment to recognize the pattern when I see it, and I saw it in yours when I was reviewing potential candidates. This can mean one thing, and one thing only: I am your "mother," and you are my "daughter."

These terms haven't been generally used in centuries, so don't feel bad if you don't recognize them. It means I was the plus that made you, so many years ago. You weren't the only one I produced, but you are the only one I know of.

Like you, I was brought into the clinic by the manipulations of my mother, the woman you call "Prune-Face." (Yes, I know your name for me, too.) This makes her your grand-mother, by the way. It wasn't easy doing the same thing again, for if we were caught you know what would have happened, but we'd do it over in a heartbeat if it were to happen again. Keeping it a secret from you was the hardest thing we've ever done.