Steeling myself for what was to come, I forced myself to step into the building.
The interior was stuffy, the air thick like the place had been shut up for weeks. It was early May, and while temperatures reached the mid-70s during the day, they dipped into the low 50s at night, meaning a lot of places chose to keep the air conditioning off to save on utility bills. That was another issuethe rapidly declining population had caused. Not enough people meant everything was more expensive, and few people could afford the basic necessities let alone luxuries like air conditioning. A huge chunk of the population was on government aid, which was why some fertile women chose to go above and beyond what was required by The Fertility Act.
Women like me were obligated to serve the way American men had once been required to register for the draft, but there were financial benefits of staying in the program longer. Years ago, I’d worked with a woman who’d served the government by having five children by the age of twenty-eight – babies two through five came with a hefty bonus – while another former co-worker had given birth three times before she turned twenty-six. She moved out of the country when she was finished and now lived on the beach somewhere in the Caribbean. Not wanting to live with a target on her back, she’d gotten a hysterectomy first.
I moved farther into the building. I’d expected it to be busy since it housed more than just the Department of Fertility but didn’t know why. The population was less than half of what it had been twenty-seven years ago and went down every year, and even though the streets of our downtown always seemed to be teeming with activity, it was an illusion. Small towns and cities, while not crowded, at least still felt full, and thanks to government funding, little areas like ours were thriving, but at this point entire rural neighborhoods had been abandoned for decades. Anyone who did choose to live in the middle of nowhere had to arm themselves since they were too often accosted by teenagers who, while out exploring – and probably a little altered by alcohol or drugs – didn’t take the time to make sure the house they’d chosen to search was actually empty. It was a problem, but with police forces stretched thin, there wasn’t much anyone could do about it.
I scanned the signs affixed to the lobby wall, looking over the list of various offices and departments located inside the building. Next to the directory was a sign announcing that masks were optional but encouraged, and hand sanitizing stations had been set up where people could get a mask if they didn’t have one. There was even a box of latex gloves in case someone was a realgermaphobe. Not that I could really blame them, considering the last pandemic had petered out going on four years ago and the world was currently holding its breath and waiting to see when the next one would pop up. It would happen eventually; we just didn’t know if it would be next week or next month or even next year.
“Can I help you?” asked a woman in her sixties.
I had no memories of my grandmothers since they’d both died during one of the early pandemics, but one of my high school friends had been raised by hers after her parents died during the RNAB pandemic of 2055. This woman reminded me of her. Closely cropped gray hair and deep lines at the corners of her mouth that made it look like she was frowning even though she wasn’t, and kind looking eyes. I tried to take comfort in the comparison, but it didn’t work, and I had to swallow the lump in my throat before I could respond.
“Department of Fertility.”
The woman’s face lit up. “Fertility Act?”
What little comfort her good natured expression had given me melted away at the sheer excitement in her voice. It was more than a slap in the face because she was a woman, and she should understand what this visit meant for me. Would she still be thrilled if she were in my shoes? No way. But it wasn’t something she’d had to worry about since she’d been well past her childbearing years when the law was passed, which made it easy for her to overlook how it affected others. Made it easy for her to forget I was a person with hopes and dreams, and that no one should have a right to my body except me.
Since saying any of that would be pointless, I waved to the sign. The Department of Fertility wasn’t listed, but there were several Health Department offices on the list, and I figured I would head that way.
“I see where I have to go.”
“Actually, the Department of Fertility is on the top floor.” The woman beamed like she was sending me to the penthouse of a swanky hotel, not a medical procedure that I was submitting to against my will. “The Health Department is for vaccinations andthings like that. There’s much more room upstairs.”
I looked around, searching for a sign that would confirm this but once again saw none.
“It’s not on the sign.”
It wasn’t like I thought she was lying; I just wasn’t ready to go yet and wanted to buy myself time. Even if it would only be a few seconds.
“Yes, well,” she began, her tone tightening, “you know how those anti-fertility zealots can be. So unpredictable. It’s best if we don’t advertise.”
I swallowed, thinking about the bombings I’d seen in the news over the years.
Anti-fertility activists were in the minority these days, although it hadn’t always been that way. When The Fertility Act was first passed twenty years ago, a lot of the country had been in an uproar. Even with the dwindling population and rapidly declining fertility rates, the idea of any woman being forced to get pregnant against her will hadn’t sat well with most people. Protests had been widespread and often violent, but it hadn’t lasted. All we’d needed was the RNAB pandemic of 2050 to wipe out another fifty million people, and the outrage had been replaced by fear. The human race was already struggling. What would we do if the next pandemic wiped out the majority of us? We had to plan ahead, had to make the hard choices, had to put the human race first.
After that, few people opposed The Fertility Act.
It changed the anti-fertility activists, too. They became less of a group calling for social change and more of a terrorist cell, bombing Public Health buildings and hospitals, and killing fertility doctors. It didn’t seem to matter that the very women they were supposed to be helping might be inside those buildings, because they’d turned feral in their desire to abolish The Fertility Act, and they would stop at nothing. Literally.
“We’re completely safe,” the gray-haired woman rushed to assure me, obviously interpreting my hesitation as fear. “Metal detectors and top-notch security guards. Cameras. Don’t you worry. We’ve never had an issue here.”
She waved down the hall, and I glanced past her to the security checkpoint where several uniformed guards stood beside a metal detector. There was even a soldier, the familiar Department of Fertility patch on his arm and a deadly looking automatic weapon in his hand. The whole thing looked intense.
When I turned my attention back to the woman, she gave me a reassuring smile. “Once you get through the security checkpoint, take the elevators to the top floor. Okay?”
I nodded but said nothing.
She waved again and smiled wider. “You’ll want to hurry along, though. I’ve heard the first visit can be quite long.”
She’d heard because she didn’t personally know, which made her reassuring smile repulsive.
Three
Ihadn’t expected the presence of such tight security to comfort me, but to my shock, it did. It started with me walking through a metal detector, which was followed by one guard going through my purse while another patted me down. It was something that might have felt invasive if not for what I was facing once I reached my destination.
Once I’d been cleared of having any weapons or other paraphernalia on me – the anti-fertility activists weren’t above suicide bombings – I was allowed to proceed to the next security guard.
