BREEDERS

Prologue

"How long have you had your periods for?" Dr. Emerson said, his holographic clipboard in hand.

"For six months," I said quickly. The sooner this conversation was over the better.

The woman in a white lab coat next to him whispered in his ear. He nodded and started checking things off on his clipboard. I pulled the dressing gown tighter around myself, looking at the tools on the table that I had never seen before. The walls were a pristine white, like someone came in every day and bleached them.

"You are sixteen years old, correct?" Dr. Emerson said without looking up at me.

"Yes. I will be seventeen in four months."

"We will start you on some prenatal vitamins. Take two pills everyday until you finish the bottle," He said. The nurse handed me a bottle with a small printed picture of a happy baby on it. I cringed.

"I just need you to lie back on the table and put your feet in these stirrups," He instructed. I felt the sweat begin to form while I scooted myself down until I could feel the very edge of the table, my legs clamped tightly together. The nurse smiled fondly at me.

"We need you to let your legs fall and be as relaxed as possible," she said sweetly.

Easier said than done.

"Do we really have to do this? I'll take the vitamins," I pleaded. She said nothing to me, prying my knees apart gently. Dr. Emerson brought a light closer and looked at me down there, and I could feel the panic arise in me.

"You are not sexually active, correct?" Dr. Emerson asked me. I heard a few metal things clank together and lifted my head to peer at him.

"I kissed a boy named Joey in my class a few weeks ago. It was a dare," I admitted.

I saw the amusement on the nurses face and blushed.

"Anything other than kissing?" Dr. Emerson asked with a serious tone.

"No," I said sharply.

"I am going to give you a pelvic exam. This is called a speculum. It may hurt a bit but i need you to stay as relaxed as possible." He lifted up a plastic thing, long and curved.

Dear God.

When the torture was finally over they handed me a towel to wipe up with and I tried to feel anything other than violated. I should have let my mother in the room, but I told her I did not need her for this, so she was sitting in the waiting room for me. She was always worried about this part. Always stressing to me what it meant that I was a female and told me that she hoped I was not fertile.

It is not as malicious as it sounds. My mother is one of the few people in the world who was able to give birth, and only had success after the fifth pregnancy. Giving birth to your own children without surrogates is unheard of now, and most teenagers coming into puberty get these exams to check fertility.

And we do not have a choice.

Dr. Emerson handed me a contract to sign, and I read through it carefully. The words jumped out at it me from the screen, glowing and bright. I held the tablet tightly in my hands, trying to steady my breathing.

Agreement for artificial insemination.

They want to make you think you have the free will to choose whether or not to have a child. We are a bunch of breeders, and these doctors were the farmers collecting calves. If you were a rich Breeder, then you could keep your kids.