Nineteen 15 Small steps slowly.

©Copyright to Beverly Taff 2020.

List of Characters.

Terry Harrington. Fugitive boy marked for compulsory transitioning.
Samantha, (Sam) First transitioned kid Terry meets on the streets.
Theodora (Dora) Leader of the transitioned kid gang.
Jessica. (Jessie) The only natal girl in Dora’s gang.
Charlie Member of the transitioned gang.
Jan Another member of the transitioned gang.
Ron Café owner who lost his daughter to egg-snatchers.
Doctor McTavish. Female paediatrician
Doctor Cummins Professorial Consultant Paediatrician
Sarah. Senior Midwife at the maternity unit
Dawn Very young trainee nurse.
Eleanor Jessica’s mother.
Diana Terri’s mother.
Marek. Refugee from ISIS terrorists in Syria.

Part 15.

When Professor Cummins finally reached the sanctuary of the clinic he virtually collapsed into Jessica’s arm chair and recovered his breath. Jessica slipped into the kitchen while Terri tended to the twins Eleanor and Diana. She emerged with a tray of tea and some cake and placed them on the coffee table beside the professor.

“It’s a stiff whisky I need,” the prof croaked.

“Sorry Prof, we’re tee-total. Tea’s reputed to have more caffeine than coffee so tea it is. What was the reception like – to our conditions?”

“Plenty of protests but those will have to be resolved in due course.”

“You know our conditions Prof, firstly ALL my daughters are to enjoy full human rights as declared in the US constitution both in the letter AND the spirit.”

“But why copy the Yanks. Brits enjoy pretty much the same rights.”

“I just like the declaration, it’s some of the best pro’s in English and it’s succinct. Pity really that the Yanks don’t even apply those rights in their own country but I’ll be sitting on the arbitration board to discern if the spirit is being upheld. There’ll be no colour thing or Jim-Crow shit anywhere.”

“But why didn’t you use the United Nations declaration of Human Rights?”

“Oh come off it Proff! Have you seen which countries sit on the U.N., Human Rights commission! Leave it there! Human rights have been a joke at the UN since Paddy came over. And as for women’s rights; let alone mother’s rights, well! Least said, soonest mended!”

The Professor frowned. “I get the women’s rights but mother’s rights; well that could cause problems, rights to abortions and stuff. The Yank right-to-lifers might get a bit arsey.

“Who’s going to abort Proff. Every one of my daughters will definitely be a wanted child, at least insofar as the transitioners and few remaining genetic girls are prepared to volunteer for impregnation in every instance. Besides’, they get a decent mothering allowance, more than enough to live on.”

“So what about your sons? In the long term, their ability to produce granddaughters is equally important.”

“That’s fifteen to sixteen years hence. Inbreeding will be averted by storing harvested eggs for impregnation for one, two or even three generations hence. Those first generation eggs will not be related to the ‘second-generation’ half-blood sperm. Unrelated first generation eggs can even be stored to be impregnated with third or even fourth generation sperm and the genetic relationship will be distanced even further from Terri.”

“Good God, we’ll have to keep a stud book!”

“Only to avoid inbreeding and hereditary diseases. Absolutely no first or second cousin consanguineous impregnations. Egg and sperm selection will be random subject to genetic and hereditary checks.

Professor Cummins and Doctor McTavish shrugged philosophically. Keeping a worldwide ‘stud-book’ was going to be inevitable anyway to avoid inbreeding and maintain a robust gene-pool.

The thorniest biological question was how long healthy eggs could be kept frozen to increase the genetic distancing in perpetuity. Now was the time to address the science and the law surrounding these issues.

“Well, at the moment, we can keep fertile eggs frozen for up to thirty years. If sperm is taken from adolescent boys at say fourteen or even thirteen, that’s three generations accounted for. If we can preserve eggs for longer, then the fourth and possibly even fifth generation separation will clear the inbreeding hurdle completely.. The only reason we don’t know, is because nobody’s ever done it. We’ve only been freezing eggs since the nineteen-eighties.

The British law was last amended some thirty years ago to allow eggs to be frozen for twenty-five years. That is obviously going to have to be changed.”

“Well that’s up to the lawyers to sort.” Terri concluded bluntly. “They’d better get their act together.”

“Oh I’m quite sure they’ll jump when the science is made brutally apparent,” Doctor McTavish smirked. "It will be good to see biological science and reason superate religious law and primitive superstitions. The holy men won't like it."

“Their problem, not mine.” Terri finished as she turned to re-join Jessica in their apartment.

After she had departed the Professor turned to his colleague and sighed as he held Terri’s declaration in his hand.

“Well Aggie, this is going to set the cat amongst the pigeons.”

“We already know that Prof. Have you seen those religious groups gathered by the cross-roads waving their placards. It seems that Terri’s conditions are against the laws of their gods.”

“Yes and it looks as though they’re already having some sort of argument with those other groups.”

“Well, that’s for the police to sort, Aggie sighed."
"Too right, Professor Cummins agreed. George and I have work to do.”

“Well for the next few months it’ll just be sitting and waiting won’t it.”

“Not in the labs love. We’ve got to develop more sophisticated and faster techniques to ensure safety and success during impregnation and egg extractions. Not to mention the simian womb transplants. It’s as much a matter of scale as well as success rates. There’s billions of babies to sort.”

“I read last week that the Canadians seemed to be having some transplant success with porcine wombs. You know, plenty of pigs around.”

“Yeah.” The professor frowned, “I’m sure that’ll go down with the Muslims.”

“Well that argument defaults to Terri’s conditions about religious ethics and restrictive constraints. You know how she’s dead set against religion, all religion.”

As they spoke, the noise of the crowd outside increased suddenly as the two opposing groups at the centre of the mostly peaceful crowd by the cross-roads erupted from name calling and threats, to violence. A score of hot-heads had clashed and the police were struggling to get at them through the crush of peaceful people trying to escape the trouble.

“It’s started already,” Professor Cummins sighed as the two doctors watched the police struggling to maintain order.

ooo000ooo

So what was the trouble about?” Terri asked that evening when it was over.

“The conditions you stipulated about women’s freedoms and your babies.”

“Oh come off it Proff, I set very simple standards concerning freedom for transitioners and the few remaining genetic girls. Anybody disputing them is exposing their own bigotry or chauvinism.

“Well the Muslims were claiming your requirements for women goes against Koranic law. The right-to-lifers were objecting about abortion choices being solely in the hands of the mothers if a foetus is found to be damaged while the feminists are objecting to the muslim demands about father rights. Then the christian fundamentalists were going on about the destruction of family values and I don’t know what else.

“That’s a joke. By 'family values' they're really alluding patriarchal values. The only person who’s got any father’s rights is technically, me.”

“Do you expect to exercise such rights?” Aggie McTavish wondered.

“Not bloody likely. That’ll bring me right into the public spotlight and expose my disguise. By the way, are all the entrances to the hospital blocked by these numpties?”

“Yes, but seemingly, hospital staff are getting through provided they’ve got ID badges.”

“So are Jessie and I going to get badges?”

“They’re in the pipeline. Two or three days max.”

“So I’m stuck here until Thursday.”

“Count yourself lucky. Jessica will need a helicopter to avoid being followed and located. She obviously cannot stay here at the clinic with the twins under lock-down.”

“While I come in by bus pretending to be a nurse or something.” Terri pointed out.

“It should work. The nurses and doctors are managing.”

Terri exhaled wearily.

“What happens when these clowns get organised; you know; monitoring traffic.”

“They don’t look as though they could organise a party in a brewery at the moment.” Professor Cummins observed

“These clowns might not, but other, more determined agencies might. You know, governments who refuse to follow the protocols. They might organise kidnap gangs or sperm theft or something. The sperm is going to be vulnerable to theft or interference anyway when it’s being despatched all over.”

“Yes, we’ve only just begun to address the security issues. There’s a lot to be done.”

“Well, I’m tired so I’m going to sleep on it.” Terri yawned.

“Have you moved in with Jessica permanently?”

“Yes. Once a person’s shared a bed and parenthood with another, it get’s pretty lonely sleeping alone.”

With those words, Terri made her excuses and returned to find Jessica already fast asleep. After checking in on the twins, she slipped very carefully into bed and remembered nothing until Jessica stirred at dawn.

ooo000ooo

“Mmmm.” Terri murmured softly as she savoured the warmth and softness of their mutual embrace.

“Time to get up.” Jessica whispered.

Terri simply tightened their embrace, greedy for the last delicious crumbs of intimacy before bodily needs forced her to get up. Reluctantly, they separated and shared the bathroom before checking in on the sleeping babies.

“What d’ you want for breakfast darling?” Terri asked as she enviously watched Jessica prepare to feed their daughters.

“Same as usual,” Jessica replied as she settled in her favourite comfy chair.

Terri obliged then shared their food before pitching in with the nappy-changing. Once they completed preparing the girls they were ready to face the day.

Outside the clinic, in the street. The vast bulk of the crowd had dispersed as they realised the futility of protesting about their different issues. Only a modest group of determined protesters remained sharing the pavements outside the main gates with the nucleus of press hoping to somehow catch a glimpse of Jessica and her twins. As the day wore on, while Jessica and Terri were busy with the clinic staff inside, the pavement vigil group slowly shrank until barely a score of hopefuls remained.

Jessica looked down from her curtained window and considered the situation.

“They don’t look too angry or violent down there now.”

“They’ve got nothing to be angry about.” Terri added. “The baby girl issue has been technically solved, it’s just a matter of numbers now.”

“Well, I’m getting cabin fever stuck up here all day. Shall we sneak out the back way?”

“I’ll call the bodyguards.” Terri agreed. “But we might as well face the music and confront the rabble outside. Hopefully, at least the press will have had their fill by then.”

“And the protesters?” Jessica queried.

“We’ll know how many are left after the press are finished. Hopefully, the police and the guards on the gate can keep them at bay. If they prove to be too aggressive, we don’t go out past the gates.”

“We're like bloody prisoners.” Jessica cursed.

Terri shrugged. There was little she could do until a helicopter was put at their disposal.

After organising the bodyguards, Terri and Jessica cautiously approached the main gates and confronted the group. Inevitably, camera’s flashed as the press identified Jessica from the previous photo-shoot, but they asked about the other girl. Jessica lied by describing Terri as her nanny to help with caring for the twins. Eventually the crush of pressmen settled down and their curiosity was satisfied. They had their pictures.

The next hurdle was the protesters.

ooo000ooo

A quick body-count determined the protest groups to number fourteen people, four fundamentalist muslims, five right-to-lifers and a mixed fundamentalist christian ‘family-values’ group mostly concerned with children growing up without a stable nuclear family environment. The three small groups stood slightly apart seemingly more self-conscious of their paucity of number than the righteousness of their protests.

Terri studied them and sensed that while their numbers were small there might be some chance of at least finding some degree of reason or even consensus. She approached the police inspector monitoring the gathering and suggested some sort of meeting.

“Possibly each group separately.” Terri suggested, “over there by the garden seat under the cherry tree.”

“Would you like one of my officers to be with you?” The inspector asked as he considered the potential for small groups to somehow bring a calmer measure to any meeting.

“A couple of lady police officers might be best,” Jessica offered. “We’re all girls on our side so if there are any issues about talking to women, (she stared pointedly at the muslims and the almost all male ‘family values’ groups) we’ll bring some measure of balance and perhaps courtesy to the meetings.”

“It’s worth a try,” the inspector replied as he crossed over the line to speak to the protesters.

Within minutes, the ‘Family values’ group were escorted to the garden seat where Jessica and Terri were fussing with Eleanor and Diana. Their issues very quickly proved to be none-issues insofar as families were historically based upon blood ties and those were now over. The group also concluded that somehow, Jessica was involved in a lesbian relationship with her partner Terri. This further devalued their arguments against men living with transitioners to bring up the first generation of survivors from the fundamentalist’s perceived gender holocaust.

With their arguments proved baseless, the family values group were forced to concede that the future of mankind lay essentially in the hands of one man and he had proven to be impossible to locate let alone meet. If they pressed with their arguments concerning family values based upon the world-wide, historically patriarchal structures, then they placed the fate of mankind directly into the hands of that one patriarch. Such a situation would force them to relinquish their self-aggrandised status based upon their own patriarchal mores and Abrahamic beliefs.

Thus were the Christian fundamentalists politely despatched with their metaphorical religious tails between their legs.

The ‘right-to-lifers’ were despatched with equal alacrity when it was made abundantly clear that virtually every harvested egg that could be fertilised, would eventually be fertilised. Consequently every foetus would become valuable and absolutely vital to expanding the human gene pool thus giving humanity some hopes of going forward.

Abortions would virtually disappear except in the rare cases where the foetus was clearly proven to be somehow disadvantaged or damaged and even then, the decision could only lie with the foetus’s carrier; the transitioned womb-holder or the natal female with her own egg.

All their old arguments would have to be put aside for at least two, or even three generations while the genomic qualities and genetic ‘in-breeding’ log-jams were extirpated and the gene-pool widened enough to resume ‘free association’ in all groups irrespective of gender, race or religion.

When it was the fundamentalist muslim’s turn, both Terri and Jessica were surprised and pleased to learn that the four men, despite having reservations about talking to strange women, had recognised the reality. Based on the unknown sperm donor’s clear stipulations, the four fundamentalists recognised that there would have to be some substantial reforms within their Islamic faith. Terri put it bluntly.

As she produced the list of conditions and stipulations that the world health organisation had been compelled to accept, she numbered them and read each one out carefully. On completion, she studied the four over the paper list.

“Well, gentlemen, on the basis that the sperm donor, whoever he is; demands that women and transitioners are treated respectfully and with clear equal rights in ALL aspects of their lives including and especially child conception, birth and rearing; are you prepared to accept what every other society has been forced to accept.”

A begrudging, collective ‘yes’ was the reply but Terri wanted more.

“I think gentlemen, that you realise I have occasional contact with the sperm donor. He realises that there are obvious dangers to his person such as assassination, or kidnapping.”

The four nodded reluctantly as Terri pressed her advantage.

“There has already been one terrorist threat to somehow access and steal donated sperm but this was averted by negotiation. The sperm donor clearly fears for his life and is now forced to live a secret life, thanks to terrorist threats.

The very first threat proved to have its origins in islamic scriptures and this worries the sperm donor. He has been forced to live now with proper and permanent protection which is invasive and oppressive. These very recent developments have alerted him and frightened him thus compelling him to lay down additional strictures towards ALL religious groups.”

The four fundamentalists shifted uncomfortably as Jessica reached into Terri’s briefcase and produced a bundle of printed sheets. She pushed four copies across the garden table and sat back while the four protesters read them.

During the interval, Terri and Jessica gave each other a hug and a kiss to blatantly demonstrate their relationship to the fundamentalist protesters. One of them stopped reading and protested.

“There is no need to behave so offensively in front of us.”

“Who ever told you our love for each other was wrong is the very person or persons we want to expose and, if possible, deport from this country. The police want names from your organisations or you will be facing charges of advocating murder. There is plenty of evidence to show you shouting death threats down there in the street during yesterday’s demonstrations.”

“You are discriminating against our faith!”

“No. This list has been made available to all religions and the same conditions apply. Any threat to the sperm-donor’s life will necessarily result in deportations of all foreign people deemed to be a threat or, they will face a trial under current hate laws if the perpetrator is a British national. The laws have always been there, it’s just that political correctness has dissuaded the police from being robust.

The situation is now drastically changed and hate laws will be strictly enforced. – At least, they will in the UK.”

“What about other countries, muslim countries for example?”

“The British government cannot speak for any other country; it is now a sovereign country concerned only with it’s own laws and it’s participation in the United Nations.”

“But this list describes actions that interfere with other country’s laws!”

“That is NOT a list compiled by her majesty’s British government. It was compiled by the sperm donor and presented to the United Nations Human Rights council in Geneva. Those are HIS conditions.”

“But he chooses to remain anonymous.” The protester accused.

“He doesn’t choose to remain hidden,” Terri replied, “he’s forced to hide because of very real threats to his person. If you have anything more to say that is constructive, I suggest you contact the authorities in the UK and possibly negotiate with them or preferably the UN. That is all gentlemen, my partner and I need to attend to her babies.”

By stopping the discussion to attend to Eleanor and Diana, Terri and Jessica had laid down one more subtle marker to demonstrate that child-care was more important than arguing about law, religion or anything that used to be perceived as 'men's business.'

“This isn’t the end of this business!” The lead protester declared.

“Indeed not!” Terri countered. “It’s just the beginning.”

ooo000ooo