Storiesonline.net ------- Old Man by Old Fart Copyright© 2005 by Old Fart ------- Description: A man wakes up to find he has been transported 10,000 years into the future. His assignment is to repopulate the planet. Codes: MF TimeTr ScFi preg ------- ------- Chapter 1 It felt like the power had gone off sometime during the night and I overslept. I lay in the bed with my eyes closed but I could tell it was too light for 6:30 in the morning. It was also surprisingly quiet. For the past eight years I'd heard a dripping faucet in the bathroom every time I lay in bed like this. For the past eight years I'd been putting it off till the weekend. The weekend would come around and fixing the sink was the last thing on my mind. I missed the steady drip. I didn't hear the traffic going by on the main street just the other side of my fence. And the kids who should be running around in the front of the house were silent. Something was wrong. I thought back to last night. I was checking my favorite story site for any new stories. Chapter 81 of a story I'd never heard of had been added. It sounded like a good old romantic story from the description. What the hell. I'll check it out. As I read, I ate a couple of microwaved dinners. And I had about a six pack of beer. And filled an ashtray with cigarette butts. I woke up at 2:30 in the morning with my chin on my chest. The monitor had timed out and was black. I wiggled the mouse and it came up in the middle of chapter 28. Good story. I bookmarked the main page and got off the web. I went back to my bathroom, took a piss, looked over at my toothbrush, said "Forget it," and set the alarm for 6:30. I'd had an appointment for 8:30 in the morning. Now, something told me I was already late. It was too light. I examined myself. Something was definitely not quite right this morning. My mouth should taste like shit about now. Not this morning. I could have kissed the most beautiful woman in the world and she wouldn't complain about my breath. She'd probably complain, but my breath wouldn't be an issue. No urge to pee. In fact, I couldn't remember getting up in the middle of the night to pee. A six pack means 2 or 3 trips to the pisser before the alarm goes off and a "can't wait" feeling when I wake up. I felt below my stomach and got the next shock. No stomach. Now, I don't mean no stomach. I mean no gut. I have a beer belly that's a classic. It's the reason I stay at home alone unless I'm forced to go out. They don't make a shirt that will cover my belly button for a full day. Now my stomach was flat and firm. I moved up and felt my chest. I've always had a strong upper body but had started to grow tits in the last couple of years. Nothing horrendous, but nothing a 12 year old girl would complain about, either. The tits were gone but there was definitely some muscle definition up there. My butt and my thighs were thinner and muscled. All in all, I'd say I had a 20 year old body in pretty decent shape as far as I could tell. Which would be pretty good if I wasn't 53 and had let my body go to hell over the past 10 years. Reaching under myself to check out my butt and thighs also brought another discovery. I didn't feel any bed or any anything beneath me. I reached under myself in all directions, as far as I could reach and there was nothing. A quick swipe above my body found no strings. For lack of a better word, I was floating. And I couldn't roll over. I've had days when I'll wake up and realize I had a hell of a dream last night. The most memorable are when I spend all night solving a problem. I'll come up with some weird solution, then kind of wake up, then go back to sleep and work on the solution some more, and repeat the cycle several times. It all makes perfect sense to me while I'm dreaming, but I can't remember any of it other than the fact it happened when I wake up. In fact, I can't even remember what the problem was and even if it was a real problem or one I just dreamed up. The only solution I could come up now with was I was still in the dream and I'd forget it when I awoke. Maybe I was punishing myself for degrading my body over the years. Might as well enjoy it while I can. I lay there for a while. Nothing happened. Usually I do things in my dreams. I was just laying there. I didn't even have any stimulation. I could feel my body but couldn't feel anything else. There was no sound. There was a sense that there was some light in the room or wherever I was but I hadn't opened my eyes to make sure. No smells, either. I counted to 1000. Nothing happened, nothing changed. I realized I was afraid to open my eyes. What could happen if I opened my eyes? I'd see where I was. OK. What would be bad about seeing where I was? Things were not as they should be. All my perceptions of the way things should be were wrong. A body in good shape. No pee problem. Clean breath. Floating in midair. Now that I thought of it, not even the trace of a hangover. I was afraid I was going to open my eyes and find out I was in a straight jacket in the middle of a rubber room. Or I was just a brain floating by itself in a jar of liquid. I took a deep breath and opened my eyes. Above me was a ceiling. I guess it was a ceiling. It wasn't sharp and distinct. Of course. I didn't have my glasses on. But they were reading glasses. I should be able to see the ceiling without them. My eyes must be getting worse. I could tell there was light coming from the ceiling but did not see any light fixtures. I found I was able to turn my head to the left. There was a wall that had several screens on it. There were displays of some type but were unfamiliar. Maybe some kind of graph. A couple of them were changing, maybe as things changed. I got the idea they might be medical conditions. My medical condition. I looked harder to see if I could figure out what they were and see how I was doing but couldn't. Unlike the ceiling, the displays were crystal clear. Just for the hell of it I put my hand right in front of my face. I could see every feature. I hadn't been able to see that clearly that close without reading glasses for the last 5 or 6 years. OK. I was in a hospital of some kind. I tried to sit up but felt restrained. Not like I had belts tied around my chest and legs. More like a blanket was stretched tight over my whole body and the edges of the blanket were tied down. I turned to the right. I saw a door slide open. No noise. Where was this place? I tried to call out and found that my throat was dry and I couldn't. Before I could panic a nurse walked through the door. I could tell she was a nurse even though she didn't look like any nurse I'd ever seen. Her hair was green on the right side, a reddish purple on the left with a black stripe down the middle. It came down to about where her collar would be if she had a collar. It curled under all around the sides and back. She kept the color scheme on her face. A black stripe down the middle, about the width of the gap between her eyebrows, hair line to under the chin. The colors were reverse. The right side of her face was purple, the left side green. She had reverse eyeshadow so there was a green eye in the purple side and vice versa. Her top lip was green, the bottom one purple. She was definitely a woman. She had the classic hourglass shape. Her top was like a long strap. If you took a strap and put the middle behind her neck, crossed each piece down and over a breast, then continued and tied them just above her butt, you'd have her top. It look like a big X across her chest. Her breasts were completely covered but it appeared the strap was the only support. She had a skirt that was about 5" long. Both were starched white. That's how I could tell she was a nurse. My immediate thought was "I hope my granddaughter doesn't see this. She makes Britney Spears look like a boy." She looked at me and said "How are we feeling, Mr. Roy?" I pointed at my throat. She said "How about some ice?" I nodded my head. She then looked at the back wall next to my head and said "Ice." The wall opened up and there was a shelf with a cup of ice on it. Kind of like Star Trek. She picked up a couple of chips and put them on my tongue. I tried to bite her finger but she was too quick for me. "Naughty, naughty." She let the ice melt and gave me the cup with the rest. The shape was right but I didn't recognize the material it was made out of. Once again, "Now that you can talk, how are we feeling, Mr. Roy?" "I feel pretty good. Why don't you come over here and I'll tell you how you feel.?" "My, my. You are a bad boy. I there anything I can tell you?" "Where am I?" "You're in the terminal recovery room." "Recovery room? What happened to me?" "Oh, you don't know? On the 5th of January in 2005 you died, Mr. Roy." ------- Chapter 2 It took me a few seconds to make sense of her words. This nurse is telling me I died today. "I don't understand. Where am I? How can I be dead?" The nurse faced the blank wall next to me. "Doctor to Mr. Roy's room, please." Then, to me, "Your doctor will be in to explain everything to you shortly." She just finished when a man of about 25 walked into the room. He had white shorts and nothing else on. His hair appeared to be its natural color and his face was tan as was the rest of his body. "Well, Mr. Roy. It's good to see you awake. I suppose you have a lot of questions for me." "Yes. This nurse tells me I died and I don't feel dead. I..." "I'll tell you what. Why don't you let me tell you what I think you want to know. If you have any questions after I'm done I'll do my best to answer them." "OK, Doc." "Alright. First of all, you should have died in your bed in 2005. There was a fire that started as a result of a cigarette you left burning when you went to bed. We have the technology to go back in time. We picked you up an instant before you actually died, brought you up to the present and rejuvenated your body. Now before we go any further, I need to go over something with you." "OK. I have to tell you this doesn't make a whole lot of sense." "I understand. Now, I understand that in 2005 there was quite a lot of activity with people called lawyers. From what we gather, they survived off ' greed. There was a whole culture that existed to profit from other peoples' mistakes and expanded to include plain stupidity. For instance, a woman made a fortune because she ordered and paid for a hot drink and was given a hot drink. When she spilled it on herself, she hired a lawyer who took the suppliers of the drink to task because they hadn't told her the hot drink she ordered was hot and she should be careful. If a company that made buckets didn't have a warning on their products that stated it was dangerous to fill them with water and stick children's heads under the water, they could have their whole business taken away by these lawyers. If a person said something that made another person uncomfortable, he was in trouble. It got so you were risking your job if you complimented someone of the opposite sex. "You have been saved from death and brought back to a better condition than you were ever in at a great expense to us. We did this because we want something from you, which I'll get to after we handle this point. You aren't the first person we brought back to life like this. There was another with your unique qualifications whose first action upon being resuscitated was to threaten to "take everything we've got" for saving his life. He was under the impression that we harmed him in some way by not allowing him to die and was perfectly willing to make life miserable for as many people as possible because of this. So, if you have any problem with us stopping your death, now is the time to say so. We will be happy to send somebody back to the time we picked you up to make sure that you die as scheduled." "There never was any love lost between the legal profession and me. I think I owe you thanks for bringing me back to life, not punishment." "That is the way we feel, too. However, if you change your mind as I fill you in on what we want, know that you still have that option. If you agree to help us out, you'll be stuck here. But I think you'll find that being stuck here will be fairly enjoyable. Before we go further, would you like something to eat?" "That sounds great. I'm starving." "Why don't you try some soup, then we'll see if you want anything more." He turned toward the wall and said "Chicken broth." A couple of seconds later the door where my nurse got ice chips from opened with a steaming bowl on the shelf. My nurse picked it up, got a spoon from somewhere and started to feed me. I could get used to this real quick. The broth tasted good, but I was full after a few spoonfuls. I held my hands up when the nurse brought another spoon towards me. "I can't believe it, but I'm full." My doctor said, "That's perfectly natural. You haven't had anything to eat for a long time. You've actually been unconscious for about 9 months as we repaired your body." "So, you've figured out time travel. So what is this? About the 23rd century?" "I'm afraid you're off by a number of years. It's 10,336 years later than when you went to sleep." I was glad I didn't have any of that soup in my mouth. I would have spit it out. "Ten thousand years later. So that would make this year..." "Oh, we don't keep track of years. We leave all that up to the scientists. I just knew you would want that information so I looked it up." "You mentioned you brought me here for a reason. What can I do for you?" "You can help us survive." ------- Chapter 3 I looked at my doctor. "How can I help you survive? I don't have any special skills. I'm not stupid, but I'm not a genius, either." "You have two things we need. First, you were always independent. Tell me. Have you ever heard the term 'politically correct'?" "Oh God. Don't tell me I'm going to have to put up with that crap. You'd think after 10,000 years of that shit people would have learned their lesson." "Yes, we have learned our lesson. Unfortunately, it was almost too late. You could say we came within an inch of politically correcting ourselves out of existence." "I don't understand." "Take a look at it. The whole PC movement was designed to make individual people feel special at the expense of everyone else. Anything that made them part of society as a whole was considered degrading. People whose ancestors were brought over to the United States from Africa 300 years before were brainwashed into believing they were not part of the country they and their ancestors had helped build for the last 300 years but that their heritage was in the jungle. It became close to criminal to call someone from a place called Mexico a Mexican. Being sick meant you were special and not subject to the laws of the able. Being weak was looked upon as a special kind of sickness and was coddled by government and business. Those who had addictive habits such as drinking, drugs, gambling and others were put in a special class. If they didn't perform well in work because of their vices, their employers were forced to provide costly and ineffective medical care. What had called for pity or disgust a mere 20 years before was now tolerated, even celebrated. "The races separated. Your country's greatness was in part because of the diversity of its peoples. Segregation, intolerance, racial superiority became the norm in all groups. Your Constitution had a phrase prohibiting establishing government religion. This became perverted so that any entity that mentioned, much less practiced religion was bankrupted through court trials. It was very obvious in America, but it was just as bad all over the world. Those things that had established or held countries together were pounded by the 'politically correct' until there was no common ground anywhere. Societies fell apart because there were no common goals and purposes. "Manners dropped out of society. It started when you were young with something very simple - litter. People didn't care where they left their trash. Any celebration, entertainment event, even religious service had to budget money to clean up after their guests and that budget got higher and higher as the years passed. During the decade before your death, this lack of manners was seen most often on the roads. Road rage became a common term to describe a common occurrence - people with no manners attacking people with no manners. It got worse after you died to the point that you literally took your life in your hands every time you pulled onto the freeway. Property was not respected as such by a large percentage of society. Someone would build an aesthetic building and a week later it would be covered in graffiti. If anyone or any company was smart enough to make money, they immediately became target of every cheap lawyer and fraudulent person around as well as the tax man. They were successful so they must be unfair. "Mankind's instinct to procreate and survive as a species was undermined by the tolerant. Children required too much effort to educate so they were allowed to run wild. More and more the solution to pregnancy became abortion. Two thousand years after your death 95% of all pregnancies were medically terminated. Same sex relations became a practice to be worshiped. You had a disease in your era called 'AIDS'. It was well known in the medical community that there were certain sexual activities that, if they didn't cause the disease, at least increased the chance that it would occur. These activities were engaged in by groups that were under the PC umbrella, so it was almost criminal to point out that engaging in them increased the chance of getting AIDS. Any who did were attacked as bigots. It became an epidemic. As groups individuated and kept others out, more and more of these diseases cropped up. Each PC group had its own designer disease and most of them were killers. We handled cancer. We eradicated Parkinsons and Alzheimers. There was no more common cold. But we couldn't keep up with the new diseases. We even came up with a new term for them - PC diseases. In order to be a PC disease, it had to be specific to a certain PC group. "Of course, as soon as every group decided it was better than all the other groups around, war was inevitable. The more laws that were passed to remove weapons from the society, the more the criminal or warring element got hold of. You saw the use of airplanes and trains as terrorist weapons in your lifetime. It spread to ships and all other kinds of vehicles. Children and animals became walking bombs. Children were shot for playing with balls or flying kites. Anything or anyone that was familiar and could get into an area was used at some time to destroy others. I take it you've heard of evolution?" "Yeah. It was a theory that animals evolved into higher animals over long periods of time. As things changed in the environment, animals would change to handle it. For example, those animals that grew long fur in an ice age made it, those that didn't died off." "That's fairly accurate. The idea of one species turning into another is a bunch of crap. If apes turned into humans, why are there still apes around? However, species do change depending upon conditions. The human species finally had enough of being pulled apart, killed off and prevented from being born in the first place. A pair of mutations occurred. It wasn't noticed at first but after it spread and it was too late we spotted it. Mankind ceased reproducing. And that's why we've brought you 10,000 years into your future." "Well, that's all well and good, but I never had any children that I know of. I was married for 15 years but my wife had children from a previous marriage and we never had any of our own." "Let me explain. About 2500 years ago we figured out that we were not having any more children. The purpose to survive as a species kicked back in. All of a sudden it didn't matter to people what color a person's skin was, where he'd been born, how much money his grandfather had. We wanted humans to be around in the future. Our research took several paths. "First, we did extensive research to find out why our men weren't making our women pregnant. We were able to determine that the female egg had evolved. In layman's terms, it had a tougher skin. It was more difficult for sperm to pierce the egg and fertilize it. We also discovered that males had also undergone changes. The sperm had slowed down and was weak by the time it came to the egg. It was also more fragile and would damage when it came upon the reinforced egg. The combination of these made it impossible for present day men to impregnate present day women. Experiments were made with live subjects and artificial insemination and we determined without a doubt that there were going to be no more births from any modern couple. "As you can imagine, we did a pretty good job of killing each other off over the years. Now that we weren't reproducing, the population dropped considerably. At that time we were about 17% of the population on earth during your time. It has since dropped to 15% and is holding fairly steady. We went on a massive research campaign to see it we could extend life. It's amazing what a prod the threat of extinction can be. We developed some simple methods, mainly cleaning poisons out of the system and repairing deteriorated tissue. As time has gone by we've found the key to regeneration. So, you could lose your arm and we could grow you back a new one in a matter of weeks. Barring accident, the average person on earth will live to be about 3000 years old. "Unfortunately, we're starting to stagnate. New ideas are few and far between. We need to get new combinations of genes and that has been impossible. We noticed this fairly soon after we found out why we weren't reproducing. Also, we've only got about 500 years before we won't be able to rejuvenate any more unless we come up with some new technology. But it's time to have some children. "So our next big research project was time travel. We knew the answers weren't in our present. They were either in the past or the future. We took a chance on the past and we won. Do you remember donating to a sperm bank when you were in college?" "God. I'd forgotten about that. Yeah, I needed some money and they were actually paying for it." "Yours was one of thousands of samples we stole from the past. All our tests indicated that your sperm was fast and strong enough to do the job. We also found that your sperm contains an enzyme that is found in only one out of every 500,000 men of your time period. This enzyme actually eats away at the tougher eggs in our modern women. We figure it makes it 8 times more likely that you will impregnate one of our reinforced eggs than using sperm that has all the same qualities but no enzyme. We could determine no effect of the enzyme on women of your time period. We also found another man with the same enzyme. We have tried to synthesize it, transfer it into modern men, everything we could think of so that our men could impregnate our women. It dies off within minutes. "So, we went to the source. We sent three of our women into your time period and had them seduce you. We did the same with the other male. All six women had perfectly healthy babies. They are all on an island in the Carribean in a secret compound. "We tried to bring the other male into our time period and spent a lot of effort rejuvenating him, healing his many diseases, generally getting him into shape. I told you what happened with him. At that time we didn't have the technology to offer him his normal death in the past so we had to terminate him in our present. This was about 15 years ago. The termination had to be done but was abhorrent to us. We have come to value life now that we're in danger of losing it. Kind of like the old man on his death bed trying to make up for all his wrongdoing. Before we brought you back, we figured out how to let you die in your own time if you so wished." "Doctor. Why did you bring him back first instead of me?" "Of the 3 children he fathered, 2 were male. You had 2 females. We are going to need males to impregnate the females of our society." "That makes sense. But I'm 53 years old." "Yes, I suppose you could look at it that way. I could also prove that you're over 10,400 years old without too much effort. But you are actually functioning as an improved 25 year old." "What do you mean improved?" "You've been here the last nine months undergoing almost constant repair, rebuilding and rejuvenation. Your internal organs are in better shape than they ever were. They are fully mature without the effects of tobacco, alcohol and marijuana. Your blood is fresh and clean. Your sexual organs are also improved. We did a little special regeneration in that area. Keep in mind we got no complaints and quite a lot of admiration from the three women you impregnated. We took it upon ourselves to expand your penis to one and a half times its previous size. Your testicles have likewise been expanded. Your ability to produce sperm is greatly improved. You will find that you ejaculate about twice the amount as you did when you were 20 years old. I don't know if you ever had premature ejaculation issues, but you should be able to last just about as long as you wish before climaxing. You will also find that there is little if any time required to get a second erection. You'll find that you're ready for a second round almost immediately. Of course, this increased production is of your own sperm. We've also found a way to increase the amount of the enzyme your body produces. You should be impregnating women almost 100% of the time you have intercourse. "So, let me get this straight. You want me to take women to bed and make them pregnant?" "As many as you can, yes." "This sounds too good to be true. What about disease?" "It has all been wiped out. Of course, you'll undergo regular tests to make sure everything is functioning as it should. Believe me, you are considered one of the valuable people on the planet to a limited number of us. Until you are established and have fathered a significant number of children, we feel it would be for the best if we keep you away from society as a whole. I'm sure you realize it will take some work to get the males on this planet to be enthusiastic about you being the only one who can keep mankind alive. We wouldn't want a mob to tear you limb from limb." "I hope you're joking about the mob. But I'm sure I'll be fine on an island somewhere making women pregnant. By the way, I never got your names." "It's interesting you mentioned that. You'll find a lot has changed in the past 10,000 years. We take our own names and change them as we see fit. Many people find something about themselves that they feel proud of and make a name out of that. Any person's name is his name and that's it. You may find it disconcerting after growing up in 20th century America. You may run into Negroes who call themselves Blackie, Darky, even Nigger. Spic and Wetback are both popular names for what you used to call Latinos. Many people go by what they do. I currently use the name Doctor. And my nurse goes by Nurse. You'll run into Welders, Bakers and Smileys. Anything that makes a person special. You realize that you're going to have to come up with a name that fits you. 'Mr. Roy' isn't going to work in our society. No rush, but you should be thinking about it." "That's easy. Just call me Old Man." ------- Chapter 4 Three months had gone by since I awoke to find myself ten thousand years in the future. Many things had changed, but many were still the same. I searched in vain for any signs of prejudice, favoritism or intolerance. They appear to have been erased off the face of the earth. Good riddance. Instead, people take pride in their accomplishments, their heritage, anything that makes them stand out from others. Not as something that made them better than others, just as something to be proud of. I didn't run into anyone who had nothing to be proud of. We spent some time getting me used to having a 20 year old's body that hadn't been used for a while. Nurse had been my constant companion since I'd been released from the anti-gravity field I woke up in. She was there primarily to help me rehabilitate and to keep me out of trouble, but she was also a source for knowledge, letting me find out firsthand how people thought about different subjects. She was a very intelligent woman who had gotten in early on the Old Man Project, as they now called the plan to use me to repopulate the planet. One of the perks was she got to test out the equipment. I have to admit, it was most enjoyable to me, as well. I hadn't been laid for over 10,000 years, and I was ready. Nurse was about two and a half months pregnant with a healthy boy. Another almost constant companion was Library. Library was a robot, for lack of a better word. Picture a silver football on its end with no seams, a totally smooth surface. Now double all of its dimensions. And picture it floating around with no sign of anything holding it up or propelling it and you've got an idea of what Library looks like. I was given the opportunity to personalize Library's voice. We worked at it for a couple of days until she sounded like my third grade teacher. I could close my eyes and see the bun and the glasses at the end of her nose. You notice I refer to Library as "she." She changed from an it in my mind as soon as I started working on that voice. Doctor and Nurse said they'd never heard of an information module being personalized, but were willing to go along with me and even started referring to her as she and her instead of it. She was hooked into a centralized computer network that kept track of the whole planet. The Network (which is the way everybody referred to it) had a lot of functions such as weather control, power, water, air flows in populated areas, making sure there were people assigned to all the tasks mankind felt needed to be done. The Network also kept track of all knowledge known to mankind. If I wanted information on anything, past or present, all I had to do was ask Library. Library worked in several different modes. She could talk to me as intelligently as any person around. If a question required some mass, she could project a hologram that looked totally real. And sometimes more than looked. For example, if I wanted to know how close to the real thing a synthetic steak made out of yeast was, she could project a steak on a plate, in three dimensions, sizzling so that I could see little bits of juice flying off it and hear the sound. It smelled like a steak and I could even feel the heat if I put my hand near it. The only thing she couldn't do was taste. (There was a synthesizer that could create food. That's what had been used my first day in the hospital.) If I wanted to know what a woolly mammoth looked like, she put one in front of me, full size. I asked to see how the last ice age progressed and immediately felt as if I was in space, looking down on the earth as the line of ice moved further and further south until most of the planet was white. After a few weeks she asked me if there was a problem when she was in conversation mode. It took a while to realize I wasn't used to talking to a silver football. We then worked a couple of days to come up with the perfect hologram for Library. She was there in the flesh from then on. I struggled for a while with how to refer to the two time periods. Of course, present was present and the past was the past, but I couldn't differentiate my membership in either one. And I didn't want to. I was proud to be a representative of the 20th and 21st centuries even though they had some crazy beliefs. And just as proud to be a member of mankind's struggle to survive. A rather important member, if I say so myself. I finally decided that both time periods were mine and mankind was mankind, no matter the year. What mankind did in the present would be referred to as "What we do", what happened in my first life would be "What we used to do." Simple enough. The transition from the old days to the present is actually when man realized he was dying and decided to do something about it. Of course, I wasn't around then but I've seen both sides of it. I just referred to that transition as the change. When it became known that we were on the brink of becoming extinct, Man turned vigilant. In the old days, anyone who could raise his voice would find people to listen to him. Many would listen without question and that's the reason the whole Politically Correct movement began. Now, as a whole and as individuals, if someone said things weren't right, we said "Prove it." We took a look at a lot of the things that people were bothered with before and shrugged them off. There was a device called a TV in my day that broadcast what was then called entertainment. It was run by private companies which were entities designed to make money. But the government, which was supposed to be part of the general populace and guide the populace, but was and did neither, had determined that it was in charge of the few frequencies of the electromagnetic spectrum that were used to transmit this TV. It was actually possible to use about 2000 times as much wavelength, but the "Pioneers" of TV, who had the rights to use them, "Proved" that these were the only frequencies that would work. Anyway, one of the companies would put something on TV and one or two out of the millions of people in the country would complain to the government. The government would then take money from the company, whether what was done bothered anyone else or not. Since this TV had many choices of programming on what were called "Channels", it was very easy for someone to move from one channel to another if he didn't like what was on the first one. Somehow this simple action was beyond the comprehension of the complainers. So, the expression "If you don't like it, change the channel" came to be known as the dying complaint of the person too busy living life for himself to try and force everyone else to change their life to please him. I happened to tell this story to Nurse one day. Within six months, "If you don't like it, change the channel" became the equivalent expression of another we used to have - "Fuck you." Well, maybe a little milder equivalent. Before I go any further comparing the old days with the present, we need to take a look at economy. Economy is basically the distribution of goods and services. In a small community, it's fairly simple. Some people are responsible for food, either capturing it or growing it. This was typically done by the men. Others were responsible for maintaining the community itself. That usually included raising of the youth, seeing that the food was prepared so it could be eaten, maybe some cleaning, supplementation of the food by growing small crops, etc. Basically all contributed in their own way and all survived. If one person decided not to contribute, he would probably be talked to. If he continued, he would be asked to leave. Or killed. Life was simple. There were two things that prohibited the planet from surviving this way. Some guy decided that his contribution was worth more than the contributions of the others. And this decision was unfair. Let's take a look at the village that is having two or three of its children carried off by tigers each year. And there's one guy who figures out how to prevent the tigers from doing this. The rest of the village will be more than happy to build this guy a palace if that's what it takes to keep him there. It's when he starts getting greedy or demands the palace without really earning it that things go South. Another problem is it just gets to damned complicated to run a large group this way. Even a small town isn't going to cook one meal for the whole town. Some people are going to want beans, others meat, others eggs. You can't just set up a barter system. What if you raise chickens and want some cloth for you and your family. And the cloth guy wants something else. They just isn't time to find someone who want chickens and has what the cloth merchant wants. The solution to this untenable barter situation was to come up with the idea of money. An egg would be worth this much, a bolt of cloth this much, hell, even a blow job this much. If you had something somebody else wanted, you could get money for it. This opened the door to crooks and the greedy. The highest paid people on the planet were actually in the process of tearing the structure of mankind apart. They grew and manufactured things called drugs that would prevent the user from experiencing life. They were supposedly chased after by the governments of the planet. Occasionally one of the people way down the chain of command was picked up and put away for a few weeks to prove to society that the government was protecting them from these wicked drug dealers. There was a whole class of people who were given government licenses to enslave the public with other drugs. The top of the chain was the drug companies. There were about 5 or 6 of these on the planet, all owned by the same handful of men. They would have their distributors, called doctors and psychiatrists come up with diseases. For example, if a man got old and fat, instead of making him get thin, doctors would say that he had high blood pressure. The person would have to pay the equivalent of a week's food every month to buy his blood pressure medicine. The medicine was designed to cause real things to go wrong with the person's body. This gave the doctor more work and allowed him to push more drugs onto the person. Psychiatrists had a complete made-up science that said that what made man what he was and what he used for thinking were combined in a two pound piece of meat in his head. They came up with the idea that chemicals in this meat had to be balanced. Any chemical imbalance was cured by taking special drugs that would kill a horse. As they gained more and more control, they "discovered" that these imbalances happened to younger and younger people. When I was scheduled to burn up in that fire, they had children under 6 months old on daily drugs. They had a program to have every school aged child on the planet under their influence and were actually ahead of schedule. There were no cures because people always came to them to late - even the 6 month old children. The president of our government had been working on getting legislation approved so these psychiatrists could examine all pregnant women for these mental diseases. A funny thing happened when the change came. It was found that any use of these drugs, whether in the present or in the past, affected rejuvenation. Those who were actively using many drugs could not be helped and died off within 50 years. The psychiatrists tried to get people to go back to the old methods of running voltage through the brain or chiseling out part of the brain, which they called a lobotomy. The people as one rose and demanded to see actual examples of correct and incorrect chemical balances. When they couldn't be produced, there were a lot of fatal accidents involving psychiatrists. Doctors didn't fare much better. Since drugs were out, some of them wanted to go back to their old methods, but with rejuvenation a fact and regeneration promising to become reality, the old ways of cutting out anything that had a problem dropped by the wayside. Things were now being cured instead of just covered up or removed. As I said before, people started working together after the change. The population was low and was dropping lower. They got together and decided what needed to be done. People found out what was needed and contributed what they could. The Network was in place. It was a fairly simple thing to figure out what was worth what. There was enough so that everyone had food, lodging, access to The Network and anything else needed to live comfortably. If you had one job and wanted to do another, you were responsible to see that your job was filled and then you were free to learn and apprentice the new job. Finding a replacement wasn't as difficult as it sounds with The Network to help. A few tried to be professional students and were assigned menial tasks and told they were free to leave if they so chose. In my day there were several philosophies of government. I realized that mankind was now practicing pure Socialism or Communism. These were systems of government that had never worked in my time. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what was different now. The only thing I can spot is that in my time there was always the greedy person who wanted more than everybody else. The person who wasn't happy unless he could make others live their lives they way he wanted them to. Or take a larger portion of what they produced for the "Common Good." As a species, we realized that we were a team and had to work together as such. And we got rid of those who didn't want to play or play fairly. I had some qualms about The Network when I first found out about it. There had been many stories in my youth about computers taking over the world. There was an actual company that made many of the common computer programs that engineered failures into their software. Some said they designed they programs with the idea of being able to get private information from any computer on the planet without the knowledge of the owners. So, I was skeptical when I found out that the whole planet was run by a computer network. Actually, that was wrong information. There were many functions that could be done much more efficiently by a computer than a human. Routing transportation, climate control, power, water and air distribution were all things that were easy to program a computer to do, then not worry about. Of course, safeguards were installed to protect against malfunction, but they were rarely needed. Above The Network was an executive committee for the planet. They made the final decisions regarding their departments. Of course, there were similar committees all the way down to the village level. The planetary committee didn't get involved in a dispute between two farmers, the village committee let the planetary group figure out the weather. The Network just kept track of things and ran its programs. It worked out well. As I said, those things necessary to live comfortably were provided to all. If you were growing crops and could prove that more land would result in more and better crops and not harm anything else, you petitioned the local committee. If it was determined to cause more good than bad, you would either get it or another solution that caused even more good and less bad. If you had an idea for regeneration and wanted to put a team together with facilities and equipment to see the project through, you submitted a petition. Something of this nature might go all the way to the top. And people might be pulled off other jobs to build your facility or manufacture your equipment. With The Network, it was always possible to find someone who was willing to switch jobs in an instance like this, so there was never any forced assignment of work. The primary consideration about any decision was "Does this add to or detract from the ability of mankind to survive better?" There was another change that became evident as I started to get around in public. The advent of climate control had made the need for clothing obsolete. People used clothing to accent and decorate. The need to keep warm was no more. As people became happier with themselves, they became happier with their bodies. Of course, rejuvenation to the cosmetic age of your choice didn't hurt, either. I found that Doctor and Nurse had both dressed up for me that first day so I would feel comfortable. What used to be called the Americas held just about all of the people in the world. This includes Alaska and Canada, down through the old USA and Mexico, and Central and South America. These were all names in The Network that had lost meaning for the average person. There were no countries anymore but there was occasionally a need to name a land mass. Some of the undesirables had moved to Europe after the change. When doctors, psychs and lawyers started dying mysteriously, there was a mass migration. Many of the so called experts who insisted they knew what was best for everybody else found that they'd lost their power and went over to Europe. And the few who just didn't want to contribute went or were sent. There wasn't any direct communication, but checks had been made over the past 2500 years and they were all gone now. The Old Man Project was one project that had gone all the way to the top. It was pretty much manned on a need-to-know basis. There was a fear that some men might snap at hearing that someone from the past was going to repopulate the planet. It had long been known that the male ego was fragile. Hell, even in my time we all knew that a woman saying "Is it in yet?" could make a man impotent for months. It was just safer not to shove it in their faces until it was an accomplished fact. The six women who had gone back in the past and become pregnant were on an island that used to be called St. Barts. It had been a hangout for rich people. They, their children and a crew of doctors, caretakers and others had been on this island for the past twelve years. Well, two of them for twelve years, two more for ten and two for eight. Both twelve year old children were males, were potent and had some of the magic enzyme that was going to save man. The percentage of enzyme was lower than my 21st century percentage, much lower than my reinforced percentage. There was a theory that they might get higher concentrations as they got older, there was talk of starting early rejuvenation procedures in a few years so they could increase the proportion as they had with me. There was basically a complete community set up in secret to protect these women and their children. The next phase was setting me up. The St. Barts facility was picked up and moved to Australia. What could be brought with them was, what couldn't or didn't exist and was needed was built in the new location. I was transported to Australia along with Doctor, Nurse, Library and a lot of others. And when I say transported, I mean transported. Just like in Star Trek. There were transporter pods set up all over the planet, watched over by The Network. It caused problems if St Louis and Philadelphia both transported someone or something to Kansas City at the same instant. Man still tended to cluster in towns and cities or near them. Horses with or without carriages and bicycles handled local transportation, transporters did the long term stuff. Not that we didn't have tractors and other devices to do work for us. But no planes flying through the air and no cars sat on a freeway spewing out carcinogens. If it didn't run on hay or muscles, it used hydrogen. And was 100% efficient. If you put in an ounce of hydrogen, you got an ounce of work. It was interesting to again meet the three women I had met in my old life. One had moved into an apartment next to me and had to go back home to take care of her sister shortly after we got together. Another I'd picked up in a bar, another I'd met while at a convention. There was no real love between us but we had a unique bond that kept us close. Of course, I didn't recognize the other three, but there was still some of that bond. All of the kids were great to be around. I'd jokingly asked Doctor if he was just going to start at the beginning of the alphabet and bring me women in order. He told me it had been given to The Network as a problem and that it would be taken care of. We'd been in Australia for a little over a month. Each day a different woman would start talking to me and we'd end up together. There was never any pressure or game playing. And it definitely didn't seen like a job. Even in these days it took a week to determine accurately if a woman was pregnant. So far I was batting 1000. ------- Chapter 5 Five months into the project. A lot of the women are starting to show. We're right at 97%. I'm averaging one woman a day, which means just about 150 with 5 or so who didn't catch. I'm not sure of all the logistics. The women stay around for a week or so, then disappear. They get tested and are given the chance to try again if they aren't pregnant. For some reason 3% don't get pregnant. I've been told there's a research team investigating it. After pregnancy has been determined, they get sent to another town. There are about 15 towns in operation with another 50 or so in development. Each town is independent of the others and was fully set up for taking care of pregnant women and birthing babies. The Network keeps track of how far along each woman is and all of her medical stats. As time goes on, women will be moved around. The plan is to have a limited amount of women in each town with due dates spread over the spectrum. They could handle multiple births, but why have one town with all the women expecting in the next day or two and another with nobody due for over 8 months. I'll tell you one thing. There won't be any such thing as daycare in any of these towns. There will be cooperation in caring for the children but every woman who has been allowed (that's right - allowed - women are fighting over the privilege to let me knock them up) to be with me has been thoroughly screened to make sure she wants to be a mother more than anything in life. No, they won't be chained to the baby for 18 years, but they won't spend 10 hours away from their children each day. One of the main reasons for the destruction of my society was the idea that anyone could raise a child. Another common misconception was that a child didn't need both a mother and a father. We discovered that men and women really are different. Women gestate a child for 9 months. Women nourish children at their breast for the first few months. A mother can settle down a crying baby nobody else can do anything with by just picking it up. But children do need to see the proper ways for males to behave. So, they don't need a dedicated, full time father, but they do need access to one. And the words father and sperm have little to do with one another. Most of the production in these towns is done by men. The children will see men as people whose main function is to make life better for others. All women will be required to put in some time making meals each week. Not every meal, every day. But enough so they know they have contributed. Hell, look at a kid standing alone in the kitchen as Mom is sweeping the floor. He'll rock back and forth, suck on his thumb, he has to do something. Put a dustpan in his hand and he'll be kneeling down, holding the dustpan, saying "Here, Mommy" every 5 seconds so he can help. We all need to contribute, no matter who we are. Something unexpected happened a few days ago. I met a woman. Not unusual in itself. I met a different woman every day. But this was a different different woman. I hadn't realized it since it had become a way of life, but ever since my wife left me in 1996, I've been lonely. That's over 10,000 years of being lonely. Not alone. I dated and picked up women in the years before my death, but I never got close to anyone. And I've had a different woman in my bed almost every night for the past five months. Sex is a wonderful thing, but it doesn't replace love. I actually got a taste of what I'd been missing the first few months after my rebirth when Nurse was constantly around. If the timing had been right, something may have come of it. But she represented the transition from one life to another in my mind. I didn't admit it at the time, even to myself, but I was pretty shook up to find my known world gone and all I knew to be different. Her name was Butterfly. The name matched her personality to a tee. She was interested in everything and seemed to flit around. I've never met a woman with so much energy. She showed up one day and I figured I would bed her that night and that would be the last I saw of her. That was pretty much the way things went these days. It was late morning when she dropped by my place. I was immediately taken in by her smile. It was spontaneous and frequent. She had a bright laugh that accompanied it. She seemed to be delighted in everything. I invited her to accompany me to lunch. There was a town cafeteria that reminded me of a buffet on a cruise ship. She laughed, shook her head and took off toward the edge of town, dragging me with her. "I know a much better place to eat." We ran some but walked most of the time. She pointed out the different sights. Things I'd never even known to look for or forgotten since I was a child. We checked out an anthill for over an hour. Butterfly was thrilled with the way each did his own job for the good of the hive. I didn't realize how many different types of weeds were in the area I now lived in. She spotted a hawk soaring in the air and took off, dragging me with her. We were able to see it swoop down in the distance, then rise up again, holding on to something in it's talons. We'd been in a hilly area for a while. Not anything we couldn't handle, but not flat so we could see for miles, either. Butterfly looked at me, said "You've got to see this," then dragged me around a corner. There was a stream coming down from the north. It gathered into a lake about the size of a football field, just on the other side of the hill we'd come around. There was a smaller stream heading out from the south end of the lake. The far side had a big lawn area with bushes spotting the lawn. Clumps of trees were also spread over the open areas. It looked like a park you might find in an upscale area in my time. Butterfly was taking off some necklaces she wore. They looked like acorns strung together. "Come on Old Man, you know how to swim, don't you?" I shucked off the sandals on my feet. Both of us were now naked. I gave Butterfly a shove on her left shoulder, pushing her off balance for a second. I used that second to take off for the lake, running out about 10 feet into the water, then diving forward. I'd forgotten how refreshing a swim is. I didn't have long to luxuriate in the feeling. A laughing Butterfly came flying through the air, flopping down right next to me, splashing me with water. Of course, this was war. We spent a good fifteen minutes dunking and splashing each other. There was also a good amount of touchy feely thrown in. We might have gone on for the rest of the afternoon if she hadn't grabbed me and kissed me as I came up sputtering. Just a quick kiss, but it caught my attention. I stopped playing. I noticed that Butterfly was standing in front of me. No flitting around, no "have to be doing something." Her breathing had become shallow, not quite panting but rapid. Her hands were down at her sides. She had a slight smile on her face, but her eyes. Her eyes were shining. I would have been able to spot the love from the other side of the lake. The kiss had been quick. Just a hint. But it felt like she touched my soul in that second or so. I walked up to Butterfly and wrapped my arms around her waist. She followed suit. We just stood there looking into each others' eyes for a week or so. She was leaning back a little. The top of her head came up to my nose, so we weren't quite eye to eye. I felt her heart beating in her chest. It wasn't all from the hard play we'd just been engaged in. 10,000 years of loneliness sloughed off me. As if I'd been covered in mud and walked under a waterfall. How do I put it into words? One second I was lonely, without anyone. The next I was fulfilled, totally content. I would have been happy to stand there forever, just soaking in the love she was exuding. Butterfly looked at me. "Hey. Old Man. Kiss me while I can still breathe." That snapped me out of my reverie. I leaned in to her and our lips met. No brief swipe like before, but not a mad, torrid kiss, either. Our lips met. Hers were moist and fit mine perfectly. I moved mine, she reciprocated. We melted into each other and became one entity. Our hearts were both rocketing but they blended together and also became as one. Somehow we were able to continue breathing through our noses. I don't know how long we stayed there, water up to our waists. Butterfly finally eased back and looked in my eyes. "Come across with me. There's something I want to show you." She let go and started swimming across the lake. I followed. Towards the middle I put my feet down and found I couldn't touch. I continued, my eyes on her kicking legs and the cheeks at the top of them as they would come out of the water. Butterfly was waiting, one foot in front of the other, her right hand out to pull me out of the water. We ran to the closest clump of bushes. Close up, we could see they were full of raspberries. "Take some. This is your our lunch." We both picked berries. "Whoa. Don't fill up. There are others all around." She turned, said "Come on," and started running to the next bushes. She was laughing, filled with joy about her adventure. I followed, eating raspberries as I ran. I'd never had fruit this sweet. I met her at the next clump. Blueberries. We took a handful each, then took off to the next clump of bushes. We filled up on blackberries, then she turned and looked at a clump of trees. "Come on, Old Man." She held out her hand. We walked to the trees, content to be with each other, hand in hand. The three handfuls of berries had taken the edge off, in fact I didn't feel especially hungry. The trees were filled with deep red apples. You could smell apple standing beneath them. "I'm not really hungry, Butterfly. Go ahead if you want some." "They'll still be here later." I still had her hand. I pulled it and she flowed into my arms, a smile in her face and sparkle in her eyes. We kissed and we felt and we hugged and we ended up on the ground with me on top of her. We were dancing a dance as old as mankind but it was new and exciting. I slid into her as I had with a different woman every day for the last five months. It felt as it had in the 1960s when I and a nervous 15 year old each gave up our virginity. Fortunately, I was able to last a lot longer than I had as a teenager. She fit me like none before. Hot, moist, velvet. Tight, with muscles that rippled tighter. Her sex was hungry, trying to pull me in and devour me. We kissed, we held on to each other, we made love. Her expression, her voice, her body all started to signal that it was time. I felt myself grow inside her, which enhanced her reactions. The dam finally burst and her sex fulfilled its mission. Either I drained every ounce I had into her or she drained it out of me. I didn't think I'd ever be able to couple again, I felt so emptied. We lay there, our arms wrapped around each other. I eventually fell out and rolled over on my back. Butterfly rolled onto her left side, her left arm wrapped around my right somehow. Her left leg was up against my right, her other leg draped over my two. She was playing with the hair on my chest, fascinated as if she'd never seen hair before. We occasionally kissed, nothing passionate, just loving. Neither of us had anything to prove to the other. We checked out the clouds overhead, commenting on what they looked like. "I can't leave like the others." She was voicing something I was just taking as understood. I knew we belonged together and had just taken it for granted that we would be. "Butterfly. You know what my job is." She looked at me, doubt in her eyes. Her lower lip started quivering and I saw her left eye fill with moisture. "Would you be able to be my wife, knowing I was with a different woman every day?" The doubt vanished, the smile and sparkle were back. Both eyes were flowing tears, but these were tears of joy. "You are the only one that can save our race. Because of you there will be babies crying in a few months. Do you know how long it's been since a baby cried on this planet? I would be so proud to be your wife." We kissed some more and made love again. After a while we tried the apples and the peaches and the oranges. The place was our Garden of Eden. We talked and talked and talked. At least I did. Butterfly was able to draw me out and get me talking about things I'd been avoiding, both in this life and the past one. My feelings that I didn't really fit in in the 21st century but wasn't convinced I belonged here, either. How the loneliness had become almost unbearable. That I looked on the seeding of the women as a chore. How different it was making love with Butterfly. We slept under the stars on the grass. We spent the next day talking, making love, eating the wonderful fruit and berries, just being close. About 2:00 in the afternoon we headed across the lake, picked up my sandals and her necklace and started for home. Butterfly moved in and we took up married life as if we'd been together for ever. We ate with the others, interacted as before, but it was evident we were a couple. She and I spent a week getting to know each other better. It wasn't obvious the women were staying away, but they were. There was no avoidance, but instead of making conversation as a prelude to mating we just never went further than a quick social comment. After a week had gone by, Doctor came up to me as we were leaving the cafeteria after lunch. "Hey Old Man. I've never met your lady." "I'm sorry. Doctor, this is Butterfly. Butterfly, Doctor is the second person I saw after I woke up." Butterfly hugged Doctor. "I suppose you're going to tell me you need him back." "Not back. But we do need to borrow him occasionally." She had his arm hooked in hers. She smiled and turned to me. "Well, Old Man, I know you've been dreading it, but it's time for you to go back to work." I looked at her. "I know. How are you going to take this? We really don't have room, so it's going to be right in your face every day." Doctor didn't let her answer. "Didn't I tell you? We knew you would eventually find someone you wanted to be with. We've built you an office." We walked through the town, the opposite direction from my house. Doctor led us up to a small house and opened the front door. Inside was a living room with a hall at the far end. A good sized bedroom was on one side of the hall and a huge bathroom with a massive tub and a shower that looked like it could fit five people was on the other side. We sat down in the living room. Doctor said "I assume you both want to be in on this. We need to set up some ground rules since it's not just you, Old Man." Butterfly and I looked at each other. I nodded to Doctor. "You are in a unique position. There has never been a man before who had to repopulate a planet. It would be very easy to turn it into a clinical action. I don't know if you are aware of it, but I interview every woman before and after you are with her. I also follow up and do the pregnancy testing. We always have a surplus of women because I find that there are some who are too afraid or nervous or something of the sort and we have to move someone up in line. "I haven't met one woman in the five months we've been doing this who wasn't nervous to some degree. The need to reproduce is great. Without that instinct, I don't think you'd have any customers. One for one, their attitude is changed after they've been with you. They come out enthusiastic about being mothers. I think most of them would be glad to take Butterfly's place if given the chance. The point I'm trying to make is it hasn't been clinical. You've taken the time to make each of them feel safe, if not loved. You are one in a million, Old Man. Not only do you have the enzyme that's going to give us back our race, you have a unique ability to flow love to an infinite number of women. To be quite honest, we expected that you would reject 25% to 50% of the women we sent your way. We planned for that when we set up the project. As I said, I've had to weed out a few who just couldn't handle it, but you've really gone beyond what was expected of you. And I know the way these women leave here beaming is going to make a big difference in the health and well being of your babies." I looked at Butterfly. She looked proud of me. Quite honestly, it was hard for me to think with. The thought of my previous wife hearing how I was doing such a good job of making the women I was bedding feel comfortable sent shivers up my spine. Doctor was talking again. "I can't point to any tests and say it would make any difference if we just shoved women under you blindfolded, you shot them full of sperm and we shipped them out. Hell, I'd never seen a pregnant woman until a few months ago. But I feel in my gut that the care you take with them does make a difference. I want you and Butterfly to get together and figure out what you can live with, but I'd like two hours a day, at least five days a week. I know your attention will be on her, but I'd like you to continue to try to make the women feel good." Butterfly looked at me while answering Doctor. "I think right after lunch would be best. Right about this time. We'll be halfway here and we can meet that day's woman and eat lunch with her. There won't be any problem with Old Man being rested and fed. I can always find something to do for a couple of hours after lunch." She looked into my eyes and grabbed my chin. "You better take care of those ladies and give them the love they deserve. Those children are half yours and they should come into the world with love." We talked for a few minutes and agreed that I'd spend a couple of hours after lunch Monday through Friday doing my job. We left weekends optional, depending upon whether we wanted to do something together. Doctor told me since it was Tuesday, we might as well wait till next Monday before we started. That got him a hug around the arm and a kiss on the cheek from Butterfly. Doctor left and we spent the rest of the afternoon breaking in my new office. ------- Chapter 6 The Old Man Project has been going on for 14 months. That's right. Five months longer than the human gestation period. At last count, there were 146 of my decendants. I'd met a few and was glad for my part in ensuring the survival of mankind but they didn't seem like my children. I'd known each of their mothers for a maximum of 6 hours, 20 minutes or so of which was spent having sex. These days I had something else on my mind. Butterfly wasn't doing a whole lot of flitting about these days. She happened to be exceedingly fat with children in her belly. Yes, children. The planet's first set of triplets in over 2500 years. She was thrilled. It hurt your eyes to be in her presence she was beaming so much. She insisted from the beginning that she did not want to know what sex her babies were going to be. She tried to go on as if nothing was different but she needed help to get out of bed, get out of a chair, get out of the bathtub, get out of just about anything but work. Doctor and Nurse had practically moved in. You'd think they'd never seen a pregnant woman before on this planet. Of course, they hadn't seen any in this town. They were all shipped out to other places. It was determined before the towns were even set up that the breeding town would be totally separate from the birthing towns. Except for me and mine. After the project had been going on for a couple of months it was evident that the pregnancy rates were way more than what had been hoped for. 25% was considered more than acceptable. 50% would have been fantastic. We were still at 97%. And pregnancies resulting in live, healthy births were 100%. If I knocked 'em up, they stayed knocked up. The Planetary Council was happy with the way the project was going. The decision was made that whatever made me happy, I got. I could have had half the fucking planet if I wanted it. There was another success that nobody had anticipated. I was known as the new father of mankind. Anybody could have anticipated that if we had 10% of the results we ended up with. But nobody took Butterfly into account. For the past nine months, she had befriended every woman I serviced. She would meet the women, we would go off and then we would all get back together. No "he's my man and don't you forget it" crap or anything like that. The thing that had drawn me to her in the first place was her ability to instantly love anybody. I don't mean screw. I mean love. When you were in her presence, you felt safe, secure, loved. Like a child at his mother's tit. I may have been the father, but she was Mother Earth. Doctor continued to interview every woman after we spent time together. They still appreciated the love and affection they got from me. But they appreciated Butterfly allowing them to help more than that. They all considered it an honor to help since she couldn't do the whole job herself. And they considered themselves custodians of her children. That's right. They carried the children, would birth, feed and raise them, but they belonged to Butterfly and me. If either of us wanted to raise any of the babies after Butterfly came on the scene the real mother would have felt privileged to give the child up. As soon as it became known we were expecting triplets, women from all over started petitioning their town councils for strollers, cribs, blankets, you name it for our children. It got to be a competition to see who could get the babies the best gift. Most of the stuff had ended up in a warehouse because we didn't have room for it. Word got out about that and it was decided that one workman from each or the 15 towns would be sent to our town to build our new house. Not 2, 3 or 4 bedrooms. No, they decided to set us up for triplets for the next 3 years, with a room for each child and one for us. A 10 bedroom house with 5 bathrooms and 2 kitchens. They'd been here for almost three months. We got to move into the house last week. As did five women who weren't too far along in their pregnancies. Not called maids or nannies, but that's what they were there for. They were going to be rotated from the various towns so the same five couldn't monopolize serving Mother Earth. A couple of six bedroom "nurses quarters" were being built on our property so women with children could also be part of the rotating corps of "helpers". Another "office" was in the works so I could be with my women on the property. Not that Butterfly would have had any problem giving up the marital bed a couple of hours a day if I wished it. We just felt it was better if we had a place to ourselves when I was making babies. The mothers deserved it. The thing I liked best about our new house was it's location. We were on a hill, overlooking the lake we went to the day we met. I could look across the lake and see where we had our first meal together and conceived our children from our living room and the terrace off our master bedroom suite. When we found out that she was going to have triplets, I told Doctor I was going to stop working when she reached 8 months. We'd see how it went, but I was going to take at least one month after the birth off. I had two reasons. I knew I wasn't going to be any good as a lover during that time period. And I didn't want her to feel she needed to be with any of the women during the same time. She insisted she'd be fine. I think this is the first time since we'd met that I didn't let her have her way. It took some work, but I finally convinced her I wasn't going to change my mind. Today was 9 months. If things went perfect, I'd have three new children by tonight. But when did things ever go perfect? I was scared shitless. I should be telling Butterfly everything would be alright. Instead I was lying on the couch, my head on her lap as she stroked my hair to calm me down. She was singing a song about children and unicorns and fairies and old men that she insisted she hadn't made up when I felt her body tense up. She still had her hand on my head but stopped stroking. I rolled over on my back so I could see her face. She had a look of concentration and was biting her lower lip. Her left eye had a tear in the corner. I reached up and took her hand in mine. The fear and nervousness blew. "It's OK, Babe. We're going to be parents!" She nodded and smiled. "That was a surprise. I thought labor pains started off light and then grew." She tensed up again and sucked in a deep breath. I called out. "Library. Get Doctor and Nurse in here. Right away." "Yes. Old Man. Is there anything else I can do?" "No, Goddammit just do what I tol..." Doctor and Nurse came running in the room. I had no idea Library could summon them without physically seeing them. I guess if you can create a Woolly Mammoth, you can call someone in the next room. Doctor was examining Butterfly while Nurse was pulling me off her lap and out of the way. "Is she..." "SSSSSHHHH!" Nurse put her hand over my mouth, then pointed to the corner of the couch. I moved over to the corner, sulking. All of a sudden there were five slightly pregnant women running into the room. Three of them and Doctor pushed the couch with me and Butterfly on it to the back wall as two more wheeled in a delivery table. They lowered the table till it was even with the seat of the couch. As a group they lifted up Butterfly's legs, held her shoulders, twisted her around so she was lying on the couch then scooted her over to the delivery table. They looked like a precision drill team. No wonder Nurse wanted me out of the way. The delivery table was rolled over near the huge picture window that overlooked our lake. Somehow, they rolled and raised in at the same time. By the time is was in it's final position, Butterfly's feet were in the clamps (yes they still use clamps and spread 'em wide open) her face had been turned toward the lake and a couple of the women were rolling in a unit that had a little counter, a sink, and all kinds of medical supplies. I guess they weren't going to send me to tear up sheets and boil water. After everything was in place Nurse came over to me, grabbed my hands, pulled me off the couched and guided me over to the far side of the table. She grabbed Butterfly's right hand and put in in both of mine. "Take care of her. That's your job. She's going to have your babies." Butterfly gritted her teeth and grabbed onto my hand like a pitbull. Doctor was down at the business end. "Speaking of which, there's a head coming out of the tunnel here." In less than a minute he had a squirming, shriveled body in his hands. One of the women was holding a blanket across her open arms. Nurse had a bottle with a nozzle on it and was squeezing something out to clean the baby's eyes, nose and mouth. Doctor was cutting the cord. The baby was wrapped up and Nurse presented it to Butterfly. She had to tug several times before I realized I had to let go of her hand. Nurse said "Meet your son." I hardly had time to look at him before my arm was being squeezed and Doctor said "Here comes number two." The assembly line started up again and Butterfly had two sons in her arms. I estimate we had four minutes to admire our sons before Butterfly grabbed onto me again. This one took two minutes before she was ready to make her appearance. Women are like that. I fell in love with her at first site. I know you're not supposed to have favorites. I loved the boys. But this was my daughter. I could see that Butterfly was flowing love to all three of them. And I'd thought she was beaming while she was pregnant. The whole room was brighter. I reached up and brushed the hair out of her face. She turned to me and pursed her lips. I leaned over my children and kissed my wife. "This is the first time I've ever kissed my children's mother." She smiled. I suddenly thought. "Hey, Doctor. How is my wife going to nurse three babies with two breasts? Is she going to have enough milk?" "Probably. But we already thought about that. We have three mothers with month old babies who have probably arrived. They were ready to go and were summoned when Butterfly went into labor. We'll work out a rotation so that each baby gets an equal amount of feeding from Butterfly and the other three ladies will take care of their own babies and take turns feeding any of yours that are left out." "That was awful quick. I thought she'd be in labor for hours. Especially with three babies." "Yes, it's interesting. We've been keeping track of just about everything since you arrived. As of a couple of days ago, the longest labor on record is just under four hours. Prior to the change, it was not unusual for a woman to be in labor 10, 12 or more hours. The average time in labor is just over 20 minutes. You took 27, but you popped out a couple of extras, too. "We don't know for sure, but our best guess is that the combination of the tougher eggs of the women and your stronger sperm combine to shorten labor somehow. It may be a survival instinct. If a wild animal took hours to deliver, every carnivore within miles would be around to feast on mother and baby. This is the first time mankind as a species has been able to procreate for 2500 years. We may be starting over in that respect." "Well, whatever the reason, I'm glad Butterfly didn't have to go through a long labor." "I wouldn't have expected it even in the old days. You may not realize it but this lady was created for producing babies. Her hips, her ovaries, the elasticity of her vaginal passage are all perfect. She could be working in the fields, stop a minute, drop a baby and continue working." I looked at Butterfly, expecting a dirty look. I got a smile. "I wouldn't mind, as long as it was yours." I looked at all the people in my living room. My wife, who loved me more than anything. My new family, including the most beautiful daughter ever born, Doctor and Nurse, the guides to my new life and the five pregnant helpers, who would probably lay down their lives if Butterfly or I requested it. And I realized it wasn't just mankind that was saved. This old man was, too. ------- The End ------- Posted: 2005-01-09 Last Modified: 2006-09-25 / 01:28:35 pm Version: 1.20 ------- http://storiesonline.net/ -------