“Hi there, you must be the new one they said was due,” a voice interrupted, coming from somewhere on my right. “I’m Merador Sanglin, but you can call me Mera the way everyone else does.”
I opened my eyes to frown at the voice, and found myself looking at a small, dark, very pretty girl. She was kneeling on the cot that had been empty when I’d gotten there, and she paused in the middle of brushing her hair in order to smile at me. I suppose I must have looked surprised; her smile widened as she raised the brush again.
“That’s right, I’m not any more-‘honored’-than you are,” she said, her dark, lovely eyes twinkling. “I went one day for my weekly physical, floating along as usual, but when the doctor congratulated me on being pregnant, something-twisted loose. They tell me it was the shock of hearing about my first pregnancy, but whatever it was it brought me all the way back down. From then on I’ve been as you see me now.”
“Which is how long?” I couldn’t keep from asking, making no effort to return her smile. It was one thing to be conditioned into cooperating, but to do it voluntarily-!
“About three more pregnancies worth of time,” she answered evenly and calmly, not even insulted enough to stop brushing her hair. “Right now that sounds terrible to you, really low and awful, but you’ll find out it isn’t anything like that. I had a lot of time to think after I broke out, with no one to bother me and no schedule to keep to. Once you’re confirmed pregnant they transfer you back to the outer part of the complex, and they give you your own apartment with entertainment centers and servos and anything else within reason that you ask for. I wasn’t confused any longer and knew I could make a fuss about going along with them again, but the plain truth is I couldn’t think of a reason why I should make a fuss. Once you understand the routine it isn’t difficult being comfortable, so why make trouble when there’s no point to it?”
“If you don’t mind being a brood mare, I suppose there isn’t a point to it,” I agreed, not in the least interested in arguing. “Now, if you don’t mind, I think I’ll take a little nap.”
“You don’t have the time,” she said before I could turn away and close my eyes again, still friendly and outgoing. “It’s too close to lunch. And just what exactly is that supposed to mean, if you don’t mind being a brood mare? Didn’t they teach any history in whatever creche you grew up in’? Didn’t you ever get to look around at everyday life on whatever world you happened to be? Since when have women ever been anything but brood mares? If we’re the only ones physiologically able to carry and give birth to babies, who else are they going to get for the job?”
“Being able to do something isn’t the same as being required to do it,” I countered, sitting up as I was drawn into the argument against my will. “I never asked to be brought here, and I never volunteered to give my all to the Amalgamation. They decided to take it and me, and I have every right to give them all the hell I can in return. They want to force me into something I want no part of, and that they have no right to do!”
“Oh, come off it,” she said with a snort, finally putting the brush aside. “Societies have been doing that to women ever since there have been societies, and before that it was the men doing it on their own. Are you silly enough to believe a woman has to give her permission before she can get pregnant? Do you think every woman married off to a man was married by her own consent? It’s nice to have a man you’re madly in love with to give you children, but how many women have that kind of luck? And have you forgotten what we are? We’re Primes, special women with a special talent. How long do you think it would have been before someone in the government came along to tell us it was our duty to preserve and pass along our genes? That it was time we married and did something to pay for those expensive educations and soft lives we were given for almost nothing? You and I seem to be about the same age. How much longer do you think we would have had?”
Her question was a demand, straightforward and unashamed, but I had no equally straightforward answer. I had occasionally found myself wondering when the Amalgamation would ask something more of me than Mediating, something along the lines of what other empaths had been asked to do. I’d never heard of a Prime being approached, but normal empaths were constantly being urged to pair off, with all sorts of extras thrown their way if they did. But it wasn’t the same thing, not the same at all. E
“If someone had come by and asked, I would at least have had a choice as to who I was going to be involved with,” I pointed out, feeling familiar sourness flowing back in my direction. “I would have had some freedom of say in the matter—and I wouldn’t have produced babies I’d never even get a chance to see, let alone hold. I’m not a machine, I’m a woman, and I won’t let anyone turn me into a machine.”
“No, you’re not a machine, but you’re not a woman either,” she came back, still looking determined. “You’re a Prime, which makes you something else entirely. If you’d paired off with a single man, even one of your choice, what would have happened if you’d suddenly discovered you didn’t like him after all? Nothing, that’s what would have happened, because you’d be stuck with him. And after having the baby of someone you didn’t like grow inside you how long do you think you would have gotten to keep it? How long do other empaths get to keep their children? How long do normals producing talented children get to keep them? At least here you don’t have to go through the hurt of giving up a part of yourself, and you don’t have to worry if you don’t like the partner you’re assigned to. After he’s done his job you don’t have to look at him again, there are enough others around who are pleasant to look at. You have fun during your offtimes, fun during most of your fertile periods, the good life while you’re carrying, and don’t stay pregnant long enough to feel that you’ve lost something once they’ve taken it. Honestly, Terry, what more can you ask for?”
The question was just short of being exasperated, about as far from the rote response of conditioning as you can get, and she knew well enough shed made at least one valid point. Just as she and I had been raised in creches, our children, the children of any other empaths, and the talented children of any normals would be raised the same way. That had not only been a government requirement it was an out—and-out necessity, especially where normals were concerned. When a newborn baby is empathetic, it doesn’t simply cry the way other babies do. It doesn’t yet know how to read emotions, but general broadcasting is something you don’t have to be taught. If you suddenly find yourself feeling very uncomfortable, starving-to-death hungry, or cranky because you’re so tired, you can be fairly certain there’s a baby empath around. If the baby happens to be colicky or delightfully engaged in nursing, there’s no “fairly” about it. You know there’s a baby empath around, and either you take yourself out of its limited range, or see to it that it’s the one taken away while you still have your sanity. Adults experience a wider range of emotions than babies do, but they usually don’t experience them so intensely. A little of that goes a long way, and it takes trained workers to put up with it for any length of time. But I was letting myself be distracted off the track, and it was time to get back on it.