The Undesirables

Untitled Part 1

Beta'd by RhaenaTargaryen

In the year 2519, thanks to advancements in birth control, it is rare for a child to be naturally conceived. Though there are no penalties for doing so, parents who naturally conceive are looked down upon by others. To naturally conceive will get you labeled as a "breeder." Children of such unions are referred to as "undesirables."

All fetuses are normally specially bred and grown in a lab and have been for hundreds of years now. Each fetus has the traits their parents have chosen for them. Poverty has been all but extinguished due to population control and advancements in agriculture, therefore even the poorest of the poor can afford their own specially bred child. The rules are simple: two specially bred children per couple, and no undesirable traits are allowed to be selected.

Children who were naturally conceived are obvious to all around them. They're not as pretty, nor as smart, as other children. They sometimes have emotional, or physical problems. A common insult hurled in school playgrounds is "I bet your parents were breeders." Such children, with their average looks and average IQs, were seen as a burden upon society. Many parents could not even bear the shame of having a naturally conceived child.

Eventually, a law was passed demoting any naturally conceived child to "secondary human status." When they were born it was up to the parents what to do with them. They could either kill them, sell them to slave labor camps, or raise them as they would a specially bred child. If they decided on the latter, the child would have to pass a series of IQ, physical fitness, and mental stability tests once they reached the age of eighteen. This was referred to as a "humanity test." If they passed, they would be upgraded to equal status with the genetically engineered, and if they failed, they would remain considered secondary humans and as such be taken into government care for slave labor.

Although by this time a lot of medical advancements had come to pass, the average lifespan had only increased to one hundred and fifty. At that point, you would likely die of old age soon, no matter how good of care you had taken of yourself. Scientists had tried to come up with a way to increase it.

What they came up with instead, however, was due to a fringe scientist. A young prodigy, by the name of William, everyone thought him to be mad. However, with an IQ far off the charts, he had been selectively bred for his intelligence and scientific knowledge. It was he who discovered that human beings do in fact have souls. It was he who managed to succeed in finally separating the soul from the body. He discovered that you would retain all of your current body's memories, though you would otherwise have the limitations of your new body.

Eventually, this procedure became commonly known and a vote was made. The majority of the population voted to make "body-hopping" legal, on one condition. The soul in the new vessel had to be a reject, an undesirable, who had been sold by their parents for this purpose. After all, these undesirables were the ones who shouldn't exist regardless.

Parents who had naturally conceived began to sell their children off to this company. The parents were able to turn a very nice profit from this, and the company even more so. Only the most wealthy could afford such an opportunity.

It wasn't long before others caught on. The stigma of being a "breeder" was horrible, but not so much so that people were willing to forgo the huge fortune to be made. Still, some couples, of course, wanted their two allowed births to be for their genetically engineered children.

Unfortunately, the procedure wasn't perfect. A common side effect that soul hoppers experienced throughout their lifetimes was blackouts. Some frequent, some not so frequent, but every soul hopper could tell you about their blackouts. No cause was ever found and it was dubbed as "soul hopper sickness." Still, soul hopper sickness was not a deterrent for many, if any, elderly.