When Time Comes 'Round Again

Ami

And at 11 she was the youngest corporal…



Ami stood in front of the full length mirror examining her uniform. The mirror was one of the few of her mother’s possessions she had kept. The master bedroom had made an excellent study center and place to keep the books she collected, once her mother’s furniture had been removed. Few traces of her mother remained in the apartment and none of her father.



Ami liked the way the uniform looked on her. Dark blue dress slacks with light blue piping, tunic and matching turtleneck. For a moment her eyes lingered over the small white corporal chevrons she had just attached to the sleeves.



She knew that her self-pride was disharmonious. The uniform and rank gave her no authority, no special powers. No one would salute a cadet in the Educational Guard of Progress unless they were very drunk or it was very dark. But people in Tokyo did not get very drunk, and curfew was at sunset. Still, in all of Japan there were only 45 students entitled to wear the uniform. And at 11 she was the youngest corporal in the Guard. The weight of the telescoping steel baton on her hip felt oddly exciting. Its leather holster accentuated her hips. She had been practicing and could draw and shatter a board in less than a second. She had never used it on a human being, but under certain circumstances she could. She was required to. Ami was not a violent person, but she wondered how it would feel to kill an enemy of the STATE. The thought made her… tingle.



Ami frowned and made a mental note to herself. At her next public confession she would inform on herself to both pride and conceit. The Proctors and her neighbors had warned her about these shortcomings before and although she guarded against them, sometimes they slipped through. The “tingle” was not something she would report.



Ami still attended Juban Middle School three days a month. The commander of the Guard and her advisors from the Office of Educational Enrichment thought it would be a positive experience for her to keep close contact with regular students and (especially) vice versa. Of course, by “regular students” they meant students of lower potential and ambition, but not lower genetic acceptability!



At first Ami had not liked public school. When she had returned from the Oasis colony near the ruins of San Francisco, she found it hard to make friends. She had little in common with the other students. But things were different now.



As Ami entered the classroom everyone turned their heads. “Cadet Ami” they yelled and seemed genuinely glad to see her. When they noticed the new corporal chevrons they got really excited. Even the teacher smiled and bowed. It was nearly a gesture between equals which gave the pre-teen a warm feeling. Someday this teacher would bow down to her Ami knew. The teacher knew it too, though she tried to keep the glimmer of fear out of her eyes. Still, Ami could see it there. “I wonder what Haruna is hiding?” Ami wondered.



Soon Ami was in the middle of a dozen conversations, laughing and joking with the others. Most of the students crowded around her. But no one came near enough to touch her. Not really.





Ami & Usagi

The STATE does not discriminate against the genetically impure.



For a moment Ami was distracted by a pair of blue eyes at the back of the room. The girl with the long blonde odongoes and western features looked at her for a moment and then turned to the window. Ami could see the blood-red triangle tattooed on her cheek.



Usagi had been Ami’s first friend. She was funny, silly and entirely unlike anyone Ami had known. By the age of 11 students are granted their Provisional Certificates of Racial Acceptability. Ami, of course, was given a green card with unrestricted breeding rights. Usagi was red carded, then tattooed.



Usagi was the only person who had ever had gotten close to her.



Their friendship hadn’t ended then, not exactly. Ami was always destined for greater things, perhaps even Elite status someday. Usagi would never have been part of that world, even if she had an acceptable genetic background. It wouldn’t be fair to expose her to the wider world she could never be a part of. Military conscription or more probably voluntary service on a Baby Farm was still open to her. But at least it wasn’t involuntary commitment to a labor battalion or reclamation team. She wasn’t a criminal! They would have drifted apart eventually. In her heart, Ami wished her well. Nevertheless, they did not approach each other. They did not speak.



It should have been no surprise. Usagi’s hair, eyes and skin tone showed unfavorable genetic pollution. The rest of her family had blue cards and even some green (and there are always a few gray cards in any family) and it was assumed that Usagi would be granted a grey breeding card, controlled reproduction. But when a red card appears, a re-evaluation of all blood kin in the same generation was required. Now Shingo would automatically be gray carded, at least provisionally when he came of age, even though he showed no signs of tainted western features.



The STATE does not discriminate against the genetically impure. Those who bear the red triangle are excused from some of the burdensome chores of ordinary citizens. They didn’t sit on juries or vote or testify in court. They did not attend the mandatory lectures by the Office of Political Stabilization. They still could go to the same schools, and were even encouraged to skip classes whenever they felt like it. They did not have to worry about being called on during lessons or take tests. Homework was strictly voluntary. Most choose to not go back to school at all (which, of course, was further proof of their genetic unreliability)! And for those who did stay in school… well, if they tended to sit by themselves in the back, it was not because they were made to. It was their choice.



Usagi was still required, (same as if she was a full citizen) to dedicate 3-5 years of her life in service to the STATE, though the list of approved services for her was limited. She might even be allowed to breed under certain circumstances, as long as she did not further corrupt the main gene pool. All citizens accepted genetic counseling in breeding decisions anyway. There was even a chance she would be allowed to choose her breeding partner (assuming she was not assigned to a Baby Farm).



Japanese girls became sexually mature early thanks to STATE sponsored hormone and drug therapy. Although the age of consent was eleven, first impregnation was usually discouraged prior to the age of thirteen. There was no law mandating the number of offspring women were required to have. Culture and custom set the number at eight. A significant financial bonus was credited to women who produced twenty five viable embryos by the age of 25.



The “Vine-Maturation Process” could produce a fully developed newborn in three months, so the burden on women (and girls) was judged to be minimal. A typical Japanese family gestated and raised two to three children, the rest being implanted in host mothers on the Baby Farm. The STATE was mother and father to these children.



The Poisoning of the West

Natural blue hair was considered very desirable…



The surfacing of some recessive traits was believed to be a side affect of the Poisoning of the West. Though billions had died overseas, the Poisoning was also cleansing impurities in the Japanese gene pool. In a few generations the main gene pool would be completely clean, so the experts insisted. Any remaining impurities would be isolated to specific subgroups which could be managed. Japan had been spared from the worst effects of the Poisoning, so the cleansing of the gene pool was an added benefit, at least as far as the Japanese were concerned. It also left them the opportunity to inherit the rest of the world.



The appearance of various shades of blue and green haired individuals was also ascribed to the Poisoning. The difference was that these recessive hair color genes were assumed to be part of the original Japanese genetic mix, coming back to the surface after being blocked by generations of Western impurities. Natural blue hair was considered very desirable, especially by the Elite. Green hair also tended to appear mostly in the upper strata of the STATE society.



Not every child with natural blonde hair otherwise showed traces of polluted genes. In fact there were even some blondes among the Elite, but not many.



Scientists had (at first) claimed that differences in races were indistinct at the level of the genome… and that there was no such a thing as “polluted” genes. But science and scientists were encouraged to conform to higher truths. In the years since the Poisoning, the STATE made sure that science conformed to the laws of Harmony and Conformity. The STATE decreed that genetic pollution could be detected and that crimes of disharmony and nonconformity were genetic in origin. It was up to the scientists to gather evidence proving these truths. If there had been any reluctance by scientists to conform to the higher truths, it is unrecorded… and the STATE was very good at promoting patriotism.