CV19

The Real Impact of Covid-19

By Tiffany B. Quinn

As Covid-19 sweeps the globe, the world as we know it is changing forever. However, the real impact won't be felt for a few more years. Are we ready?

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When my younger brother and I came home from school earlier this afternoon, I found my mother sitting in front of her computer with tears streaming down her face. Unusually, my father was also home. He looked very angry as he paced back and forth behind my mother.

My older sister, Emily, being a high school senior, had gotten home ahead of my brother and I. She was sitting on the couch with her long beautiful legs crossed and a smirk on her face.

As I walked into the room, my father turned on me.

“Mark, I told you to try harder at sports!” he growled at me.

I was a slender kid of moderate height. Hardly the stature of someone destined for the major leagues. I was run over in every contact sport and did not have the strength to hit a baseball much past second base. I did fairly well in individual sports like distance running and swimming.

So what’s the problem with not doing well in sports?

This is 2040, twenty years after the first appearance of the Covid-19 virus in our country. The world is, I am told, a much different place from what it was pre Covid-19.

Early in the year 2020, the world struggled with the Covid-19 pandemic. Extreme measures were taken to social distance people in an attempt to slow down the spread of the virus to a rate that would not overwhelm the world’s health care capacity. These measures involved desperate pleas and orders to hunker down and avoid contact with anyone other than immediate family. The measures were, in large measure, effective in countries that were exposed to the virus in the later stages of the pandemic. The virus was slowed but not stopped. It eventually infected most of the people on the planet over the course of the year.

Nine months after the start of the 2020 lockdown orders a baby boom, of sorts, started. It would seem that sex was a favorite pastime of couples in lockdown and precautions were not always available. Who would have guessed!

What was unusual about this baby boom, however, was the much higher percentage of male babies being born. In regions hit hardest by the virus, the male portion of the newborns reached as high as 90%.

The virus returned for several more seasons until an effective antiviral was developed. By 2025 it was estimated that 85% of the world’s surviving population had hosted the virus at one time or another. By then the percentage of newborns that were male had reached 95% worldwide.

My sister was one of the few girls born in 2022. Our family was infected with a mild case of the virus in 2023. My parents waited until 2026 to have me. My little brother, Michael, came along in 2030.

Research showed that males infected with the Covid-19 virus were no longer producing X chromosomes in their sperm. The bad news was that virtually everyone had hosted the virus by 2029.

The last known female birth occurred in 2030. The same year that my little brother was born.

My mother had had her tubes tied after my little brother’s birth.

Now in 2040, with the number of women of child bearing age decreasing with every year, the world is facing a major crisis. The birth rate has dropped to record lows and is continuing to fall. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out the human population will go extinct in a generation without intervention.

Hence my current personal problem.

In the 2020s as the birth problem became apparent, every government on earth started to throw resources at finding a solution to the pending disaster.

At first, most research was focused on finding a way for males to produce sperm with X chromosomes. There were even efforts to produce artificial sperm with the X chromosome. After a decade of effort no progress was made on this front.

In a parallel effort, the focus was turned to the transgender medical community to accelerate research into making transgender women fertile. This program was more successful.

The idea being to keep babies coming into the world so that the human race would not become extinct. It was hoped that, even if all the babies were male, if a sufficient number of males could be converted into fertile females then the survival of the race would be assured.

Certain countries, including ours, had found some moderate success in this research. A big breakthrough was the development of a therapy to replace the Y chromosome with another X chromosome in men, thus creating XX chromosome men. This, coupled, with advancement in the creation of viable female reproductive organs from a man’s own tissues, have helped create potentially fertile women out of men. The best of the techniques, however, were only successful in creating a fertile transgender woman about 25% of the time. That is better than none at all.

Research is continuing to slowly increase the fertility rate, but has a long way to go.

There were a lot of radical shifts in public policy around the globe as the extent of the problem became apparent. First of all, contraceptives were no longer available. The remaining women were constantly inundated with propaganda about it being their duty to produce as many children as possible.

By 2033 anyone who wanted male to female sex reassignment could get it without question and without cost. They just had to agree to produce children if they were one of the 25% of trans-women that would become fertile. Still there were insufficient numbers of fertile transgender women being produced. The fall of the birth rate had been slightly slowed, but it is still declining rather precipitously.

Research soon found that the reassignment procedures worked best if performed before puberty hit the subject.

Also, the procedure seems to work best on those who experience late puberty, are on the small side of the height scale and did not exhibit macho male physical and psychological characteristics. It was the gentle souls that had the best chance for successfully becoming fertile females.

To address the birth rate crisis, most countries have instituted a mandatory draft of boys who show signs of being viable candidates for the reassignment process.

I am a late bloomer and, while not at all feminine, I am also not a macho neanderthal. I am still waiting for the great natural transformation into manhood.

Hence my father’s reference to my lack of success in sports. Unfortunately, I could be the poster child for the prime reassignment candidate.

“Welcome home, ‘Sister’”, Emily says with a sad laugh. “You’ve been chosen. Welcome to the Sisterhood. I hope that you like it. I do.”

“What’s going on?” Mike asks.

Emily gave a sad smile, “Mark just got his draft notice.”

Mom just bursts into tears as Dad scowls at my sister.

Waving at the computer screen, Dad looks at me, “Emily is right. We received your draft notice by email today directing us to take you to the Selection Board office the day after school lets out for the summer. You will be starting high school next year as a girl.”

I sat down heavily on a chair. I have a month to get used to the idea of becoming a breeding machine. This is not what I had in mind for my future.

In our particular country, all viable young men are drafted into the Species Preservation Program (SPP) and are designated as females. There are also some relatively new constitutional demands on the female population.

The few remaining natural born girls, like Emily, are allowed to marry who they choose and produce a family. They are expected to produce at least six children if they prove to be fertile. They raise their own sons. The government provides substantial resources to help with raising the children.

Transgender women, on the other hand, while able to pursue whatever occupation they want, are expected to produce a child at least once every two years during their child bearing years beginning when they either graduate or drop out of high school. Each child is to be by a different father selected by the government. It is a selective breeding program. Only men without any identifiable genetic disorder are allowed to breed with fertile females. There is also evidence that there are some political criteria as well, but that’s not discussed openly.

The transgender women are assigned a new partner after the birth of each child. The father is responsible for raising the son that he sired. If no pregnancy occurs after a year with a man, then the transgender woman is reassigned to another man. After three consecutive unproductive assignments the woman is declared infertile and released from the breeding program.

If a natural born girl has not found a spouse by the time she turns twenty two, then the government will assign her to the same breeding program that it does transgender women until she chooses to marry or is proven to be infertile.

Infertile women, both natural and transgender, are allowed to marry whoever they like (male or female), if they choose to, and carry on with their lives in whatever occupation they have qualified for without government interference.

So, it appears that I will be reassigned this summer and four years from now, when I graduate from high school, I will be assigned my first partner. My ‘part time job’ during my college years will be to live with a succession of male roommates as we determine whether or not I am fertile.

The good news is that I will have a full scholarship and a substantial stipend while attending college.

Looking at the computer screen, I read:

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SELECTIVE SERVICE SYSTEM
ORDER TO REPORT FOR INDUCTION

To: Mr. & Mrs. Cartwright

Greetings:

You are hereby ordered to deliver you son, Mark Cartwright, to the selection board headquarters in your city for forwarding to a facility for induction into the Species Preservation Program on Monday 14 May 2040 at 10 AM. You may pick her up following the graduation ceremony at the training facility on Friday, 13 August 2040.

Your son is not to bring any clothes or any personal articles.

It is recommended that he consider a new feminine name, though he is allowed to keep his current one.

You are required to acknowledge receipt of this notice within seven days of receipt. There is a $10,000 fine for failure to respond on time. You may include a request for reconsideration with your acknowledgement. The request for reconsideration is to be based on the list of acceptable exceptions found on the Selective Service website. You are required to provide documentation verifying the exceptions presented in your request for reconsideration.

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The email was signed by the clerk of our local selection board. The father of one of the bullies at our school.

“How did this happen?” I ask in disbelief.

“You know that your doctor and school are required to report likely candidates,” my mother replies. “We’ve been paying off the doctor and school counselor for several years now to falsely report your progress, but I guess that someone must have outed you. We kept hoping that your puberty would kick in, but it hasn’t”

All boys are required to have complete physical exams annually. Doctors are required to report their findings to the Selection Board.

Emily smiles sadly at me as she says, “Haven’t you been listening in school? You are one of the ‘Lucky Ones’ chosen to save the human race.”

“You should be honored,” she adds with a slight smirk.

I know quite a few of the ‘girls’ my age that are going through the process right now. About 40% of our class are trans-girls. The trans-girls outnumber the genetic girls twenty to one. It is expected that nearly half the kids in my class will end up as trans-girls. That many are needed to produce enough fertile females to maintain the population. Until the success rate in producing fertile females improves the government’s goal is to draft approximately 50% of the boys into the program before they turn sixteen. That is, they will if they can find that many viable candidates. Not all males are biologically suited for the current procedure. If they can draft 50% of the males then, one eighth of the population will likely become fertile females. To keep the population steady each of the fertile females needs to produce eight children. So far the goal has not been met, but they are trying hard. Most third world countries are falling way behind due to lack of access to the latest technology.

A couple of years ago, there were reports on the news of an African country conquering their neighbor and subjecting 100% of the males in the conquered population to the gender change. The UN was ineffective at stopping the atrocity. The men in the victorious country now have many concubines and their birth rate has stabilized. The fertile concubines are each producing a child a year and the infertile concubines are in charge of child care. All their sons are destined for the change.

In our country, the selection process starts around age 12 but anyone can be chosen at any time before puberty hits. At last count, about 40% of the boys that I started school with have been drafted. I had thought that, at age 14, that I might have dodged the bullet.

Apparently I was wrong.

Many of my fellow male classmates received induction notices over the past two years. I doubt that many of the remaining males will be receiving one this year as most have at least a toe hold on puberty.

“Jenny is turning out alright,” Mom pointed out through her tears, mentioning my best friend (formerly James) who was inducted last year. “You should call her and find out what to expect.”

Jenny and I have talked a lot about her experience last summer. I have a pretty good idea about what to expect. It doesn’t sound like fun. She came back from the experience a different person in more ways than one.

“Maybe I should just run for it,” I mused.

“You know that’s not a viable option,” Dad pointed out.

He’s right.

Everyone has an identity chip embedded in their forearm at age five. It makes things much easier than the old days. My parents tell stories of things called credit cards, driver’s license cards, passports, library cards and other identity cards. Those have all gone the way of the horse and buggy. Now, your chip is linked to your bank accounts and your electronic profile also includes a list of your certifications and permissions. All you need to do to purchase anything is wave your wrist over a scanner. If someone wants to know your identity, all they have to do is scan your wrist with the right scanner.

There are no ticket machines on the bus or subway either. All you have to do is walk through the door and the scanner’s built into the door frames determine who you are and deduct the fare from your accounts.

Emily works for a local fast food restaurant on the weekends to earn extra spending money. All she does is wave her wrist over a scanner to clock in and out of her shift. It is very convenient.

Identity theft is difficult.

So is robbery of a business, as the scanners determine and record your identity the instant that you walk through the door. Robberies are extremely rare.

Solving crimes of all types is easier as the police detectives can easily determine who was near the scene of the crime from data recorded from nearby scanners.

The scanning technology is everywhere and, hence, the government knows where you are most of the time.

As they say: You can run but not hide.

Mom wraps me in a hug. “I’ve looked at all the exceptions, Mark, and you don’t qualify for any of them but we will try to make something up anyway.”

That’s not a good idea. False statements can result in heavy penalties if found out. In fact, I suspect that my doctor and school counselor will really need to find a way to cover their tracks if they’ve been reporting false information. I’d hate to see my parents fined and jailed over this.

“Don’t Mom,” I admonish her. “I’d hate to have to visit you in jail. My only hope is to fail the physical exam at the induction center.”

Dad looks me over and sighs, “You are right, however I doubt that you will fail unless your voice drops overnight.”

I nod at that. “One can only hope,” I agree with him.

“I think that I need some time to think about this,” I tell the family before heading upstairs to my bedroom. I leave a lot of long expressions behind.

Tossing my school bag in the corner, I flop down on my bed.

Staring at the ceiling, I ponder my future.

I spend several minutes going through the ‘how do I get out of this’ ideas. Nothing would work. Others have tried, but I don’t know of anyone who has successfully avoided the draft. It’s not like I can bolt to another country as they will just return me under the current international agreements. Every country wants to preserve the species so they cooperate on this issue.

It isn’t long before I give up the idea of avoiding the draft.

The next questions to contemplate are why me and who outed me.

The ‘Why Me’ is actually fairly obvious. I meet the criteria. I’ve known this for a while. In fact, most of my friends at school were surprised last year when I wasn’t drafted. Being relatively short and physically immature for my age stands out like a beacon. I suspect that my parent’s efforts to pay off the doctor and school counselor have protected me so far. I’ve been praying for puberty to kick in, but it hasn’t.

And, I’m pretty sure that I know who outed me. Jimmy Coghill has been smirking at me all week. He’s made a few snide comments about it being ‘my year’ this time around. He has been the bane of my existence since he hit puberty. Like all bullies, he likes to pick on those who he perceives as weaker than himself. Fortunately, our school is pretty aggressive about jumping on bullying so his efforts haven’t gotten out of hand… too much anyway.

His father is also the clerk of the Selection Board. Mr. Coghill also has a reputation as being a bit of a bully himself. All it would take is for Jimmy to convince his father that I should be drafted. It can be simply because he doesn’t like me. I could see his father going along with such a suggestion and getting the rest of the board to agree.

I’d lay good money down on a bet that Jimmy colluded with his father to generate my draft notice.

There’s not much that I can do about that now.

I pick up my phone to call Jenny. I might as well prepare myself for what’s coming.

Jenny used to be a rather slight and shy boy until last summer. Now he’s on his way to being a trans-girl. The process takes a couple of years. For now she doesn’t look much different than he did before, but the changes are happening.

She hasn’t had a real haircut in a year and her hair is longish. It was recently styled in a short feminine fashion.

The hormone therapy has started her breasts to grow. She has noticeable breasts and started wearing a bra a couple of months ago. Her general shape is slowly starting to change as well, but not drastically.

Being a government program interested only in a viable uterus, there is little effort expended on making trans-girls look totally feminine. There is no plastic surgery offered. The only feminization that occurs is the byproduct of the hormone and chromosome replacement treatments. Some trans-girls come out looking like a real girl. Others just look like a cross between a male and female. Some families have been known to privately arrange for plastic surgeries that will help their sons become indistinguishable from a naturally born girl.

Jenny looks like she might just make the trip to full femininity without the aid of plastic surgery.

“Hey, Mark,” she answers the phone. “What’s up?”

“I got my draft notice today,” I inform her.

She sighs, “Welcome to the club. How do you feel about it?”

“I’m scared,” I admit.

“You should be,” she says seriously. “Boot camp is not fun.”

It would seem that the Species Preservation Program (SPP) boot camp is designed along the same philosophy of military boot camps.

The program is designed to psychologically reprogram young men to become happy baby producing machines. They intentionally create an intensely stressful period to force the reprogramming. While there is stringent physical training aspect (fit trans-girls tend to have better ‘luck’ at becoming fertile), instead of 20 mile runs through impossible obstacle courses and weapons training under the direction of abusive drill sergeants, the inductees are stressed by intense sessions focused on changing the inductee’s perception of themselves and their futures. They are drilled mercilessly on all things feminine, day and night, and trained to see themselves as the saviours of the species. The drill sergeants are all hardcore trans-women who make sure that all the inductees are yelled at, hurried, and stressed. The inductees are run ragged until they don’t know what direction is up. They tell you that you are inferior and only through effort will you become worthy of being a true trans-woman. They hold out the image of a fertile trans-woman as the ideal goal.

Everyone is initially issued the same pink uniform jumpsuit along with pink panties, ankle socks and girls trainers. Individuality is discouraged in the first half of the training. Every effort is made to break down your psyche so that you are reprogrammable. Inductees need to unlearn everything they’ve learned about growing up to become men.

After they break down your psyche, they build it up again in the image of a committed trans-girl. It is during this final phase where inductees get to develop their own feminine identity. Inductees get to select appropriate feminine attire and learn the basics of makeup and hair styling.

She sighed, “I suppose that you could get lucky and fail the physical.”

The physical is the first hurdle. A team of doctors work you over to determine if you are a viable candidate. There are blood tests, scans, etc that will tell them if you have a chance of becoming a fertile female. If you do not pass the exam, then you are released from the program. Maybe 10% of the inductees will be released from the program and will be home within the week. Most of those released are older inductees, like myself, for whom puberty is about to strike.

“I can only hope,” I reply.

“I wouldn’t hold my breath if I were you,” she responds. “You might as well as resign yourself to the inevitable. Fighting the process only makes it worse.”

I’d heard that about all indoctrination systems.

“Does it hurt?” I ask her.

She doesn’t need to guess what I’m asking about.

“No,” she says, “They give you a sedative for the procedure. Things are a bit sore for a week or so, but they don’t give you time to think about it. In fact, they don’t give you time to think about much of anything.”

The procedure involves the harvesting of your testicles. If you are not lucky enough to fail the physical, they take you into an exam room and remove your testicles. They leave your ball sack and penis for future operations. Jenny still has hers.

Someone figured out how to grow ovaries from testicles. They also figured out how to clone a compatible uterus to go with them. It takes about a year, but the scientists can grow a complete functioning female reproductive system custom made for the original donor. The next summer, the system is implanted. Jenny will be going through the implant process this summer. They will use her penis and ball sack to form a vagina and female genitalia. She will be able to go off hormone therapy once her new system starts producing its own estrogen.

“Have you thought of a new name yet?” She asks.

“No,” I reply, “I’m thinking that I just stick with my current name. That’s what a lot of the other guys have done.”

“You should think about it,” she counseled me. “The trans-girls who jump into the role seem to adjust a lot better. It’s just not worth it to fight the process. I tried at first, but eventually gave it up. You can’t win. Not only that, but it’s really not that bad being a trans-girl. Just different.”

James used to try hard to be a jock and a man’s man. His attitude was pretty macho. Unfortunately his body was pretty wimpy. I was somewhat shocked last fall when she came home from the SPP boot camp. She now seemed to revel in all things feminine. She has really embraced her new situation.

She is right, however. Some of the draftees that I know are still resisting the change. Even though the treatment has given them feminine characteristics, they still try to act and dress like guys.

“You are probably right,” I sighed. “I really don’t want to be like Carl.”

Carl is one of those who still fight change. She is not a happy camper and spends a lot of time in counseling. Rumor has it that she tried to commit suicide over the Christmas break, but people are not talking about it.

Carl still insists on being treated like a boy. Even though the hormone and chromosome therapies have been particularly effective on her, she still cuts her hair in short boy style. She wraps her developing breasts, which has to be uncomfortable, and wears boys clothes that don’t really fit her new body all that well. She is never happy and snaps at just about everyone.

She’s not the only one.

“Yeah,” Jenny agreed. “You should have seen her in boot camp. She got every dirty job there was as punishment for her rebellion. She was scrubbing toilets almost every day, with a toothbrush and wearing a french maid’s outfit, and the instructors rode her pretty hard. She just wouldn’t give in. I hear that it takes four orderlies to hold her down for the hormone and chromosome therapy injections every month. If she doesn’t straighten up, her future doesn’t look bright.”

There’s a rumor that the most uncooperative trans-women are basically condemned to sexual slavery. The rumors say that they are put in government run brothels. With the shortage of women around, the brothels are pretty popular with the men. The only way out is to get pregnant. But that is only temporary, as the women are returned to service after delivery. Their sons are put up for adoption.

Another rumor is that anyone convicted of a crime carrying a sentence of ten years or more (i.e. violent criminals, drug dealers, sex trafficers, etc) is subjected to the procedure and serves out their sentence in the brothels. No one cares if they become fertile females or not.

Crime is not very prevalent in our country.

I shudder at the thought of doing anything that would bring on such a sentence.

Jenny and I spend about an hour talking about the details of being a trans-girl before I am called down to join the family for dinner.

When I get down stairs, Emily wraps me in a hug.

“I’m sorry for being insensitive earlier,” she tells me with sincerity. “I know that this must be hard. I am here for you, little brother.”

I know that she means well, but even though I will become a female I will never be a true girl like her. I will be that third gender, a trans-girl. I will be in her world but not in the same way that she is.

During dinner, conversation is stilted. No one really wants to address the elephant in the room.

What can you really say anyway? It is what it is.

We do have a family council about the situation after dinner, however. Mom insists that we deal with the issue.

Sleep is slow in coming after I crawl into bed for the night.

As I stare at the ceiling bathed in light from the streetlights outside my window, I resign myself to the fact that I am going to become a trans-girl. That part of my fate is outside my control. There is nothing that I can do about it.

One thing that Mom pointed out in tonight’s council is that life often throws us curves that we’d rather not have, but we have a choice in how we deal with them. Our happiness depends on our choices.

She reminded me of a friend of the family who was in a devastating car accident a few years back. He is a quadrapelegic now. The other people in the car were not so lucky.

I have spent many an afternoon and weekend sitting with him or running errands for him. He has been a family service project and we have all come to really love him. He is also one of the happiest people that I know. He always sees the upside of everything and takes his limitations in stride.

Becoming a quadrapelegic is not something that he chose. In fact, I’m pretty sure that he’d rather be drafted to be a trans-girl than to be a quadrapelegic with ongoing physical issues. His condition is something that was inflicted upon him. The accident was outside of his control. It was not fair to him. There is nothing that he can do to go back to the way things were. Even though he requires aid to do just about anything, he is one of the happiest people we know. He has chosen to accept those things that he cannot control and do what he can with what capabilities he has left.

In our conversation this evening, Mom had pointed out my situation has some parallels. None of us want this for me, but it is outside our control.

Dad pointed out that at least I will still be whole, just different. I will still be able to go to school and have a profession. I will still be able to walk and run. I won’t be in pain or dependent on others for my basic daily needs for the rest of my life. Also, transgender women are somewhat revered in our culture as they are recognized to be the salvation of the speices.

Jenny has told me of the many perks of being a trans-girl over the last school year. There is a silver lining to the whole situation.

I sigh as I roll over in anticipation of sleep.

I will give it my best shot, I decide. I will look at the silver lining.

My situation could be worse. Much worse.

>>> The End <<<