Chapter 1

 

No-one understood what had happened. No-one even realised it had happened for nine months. But then, on the 3rd July, without any warning at all, all the babies born were boys. Even then it took a few weeks before the authorities were apprised of the situation. But the next development was even more bizarre. Within the next month each of the new mothers, was again pregnant-whether she had had intercourse or not! As this fact became known to a few of the mothers and passed on to the medical authorities, each of the other new mothers were checked. It was true! Every one of them was again carrying-but not one child. This time, each bore the seeds of five babies inside her womb. And every day thereafter, all the babies were boys, followed in a month by a new pregnancy

Governments went into panic mode. The scenario was fraught with disaster. A six fold increase of the world's population over two years! And what if, after bearing the quins, the mothers again became pregnant? Scientists the world around investigated-but came up with nothing. Possible reasons ranged from the sublime to the ridiculous-most of them quite bizarre: extra-terrestrials had bathed the world in a 'ray'; a virus had spread like wildfire around the planet; someone had 'dosed' the world's water supplies-all at the same time! Such speculation did no-one any good but neither did the efforts of the world's best brains as they searched for an answer.

The obvious answer-to abort the second pregnancy soon proved to be just as dangerous as doing nothing, for as the women were monitored, it became clear that each of the new foetuses was female. And then, after nine months-exactly nine months, when they bore the five healthy girl babies, it emerged they were now sterile. Research into other women of child-bearing age revealed that all had become pregnant as their time came around-and each to a single boy child-to be followed by five girls-and then sterility. Abortion of the quins would wipe out the female population of the world in a single generation; so it was clearly no answer. Someone suggested that four out of five women be aborted-then the question arose: who would choose the four to be denied their children?

Governments stewed over the issue but weren't prepared to take unpopular decisions. But then the Australian prime minister, recently in power with a more than comfortable majority and backed by cabinet, decided to take the bull by the horns. He addressed the nation:

"No-one will deny that we are faced with a crisis. A six-fold increase in the population instantaneously! The capacity of the food chain to keep up will be severely tested. Overseas, it will be a crisis that will have whole populations starving. My government has decided on measures that are hard-but we believe, fair.

"Any mother who is prepared to voluntarily have her second pregnancy aborted will be able to do so with the full support of the Commonwealth-but no-one will be forced into this act. However, a family will have to be able to bring up their six children without any further assistance from the government.

"From now on, girls will again be segregated in schools. This will facilitate the competition that each will now enter into with her peers. As the new breed of girls reaches eighteen, each family group will undergo an assessment that will cover every aspect of her life-not just her academic and sporting achievements. One out of every five will be successful and will go onto to full citizenship. The others will not. Those that do will have equal status with successful males, who will also be assessed as to their suitability for citizenship. The difference here will be that only males who are deemed unfit, will lose that right; with the girls, it will only be the best that will win. It sounds hard and it is hard but the survival of our nation depends on harsh measures.

"You may be wondering how this will help? It will help in this way. Those who are not successful will be sold on the open market. They will not earn wages and will subsist on the barest minimum of food. Very basic food. A half kilo of rice a day together with second rate vegetables and butcher's offal will suffice. They may be employed at any task their owner decides for them and are to be worked very hard. Discipline will be necessary and laws will be enacted to provide for this..."

His audience, both in Australia and around the world, sat and watched in stunned silence. But then, as they asked themselves, what was the alternative. World starvation was a very real threat and anarchy would soon follow. Yes, perhaps the PM was right... Anyway that was eighteen years down the track. No-one had to worry about the slave thing for a long time yet and in the meantime, the agricultural community went into top gear to produce the new demands that were already being felt. Dairy farms increased their production by a hundred percent, then two; grain producers planted more fields; beef and sheep stations bred more herds...

But there were other considerations. The education authorities began to plan for the new schools that would be required. As the new generation began to mature, primary schools to cater for five times the girl population would have to be built. They were. Mothers began to worry about their daughters. Only one in each family was going to survive as a citizen; the others were destined for slavery. As they grew older and came to an understanding of their situation, competition between them became very noticeable in many cases. The authorities decided this was not a bad thing. Let them compete! Only the best would survive to become mothers themselves. The slaves would all be rendered sterile...

The world sat back and watched-for a few years. But then, when no other course presented itself, each in turn followed the Australian lead and within five years of the 'disease' hitting the world, almost all countries had followed suit.

Slavery was reborn-at least in theory.

The Clarke family were your typical middle-class household. Young Jamie was a chip off James' block: tall, well-built and handsome; a good scholar and a superb sportsman in many disciplines. So were his sisters, exactly ten months younger than he was. There was not a lot between them and in former days, each would have become a middling or perhaps a top executive or possibly a professional woman and eventually a mother. Not now though. Amanda, Beatrice, Clare, Diane and Elizabeth soon came to understand that each was competing against the others and that no matter what, only one of them was going to survive.

They remained good friends but the rivalry was there, underneath everything they did. Like Jamie, each was blonde and blue-eyed. They were not like-quins but there was a distinct resemblance between them all. Each was a good but not brilliant scholar. They worked hard at their studies and each came out near the top in her subjects.

It was the same with sports. Physical development was as important as mental and each one of them strived to perform to her best. The hard work paid off and as the years passed, their bodies developed into magnificent specimens of young womanhood. They were tall but slender, their muscles firm and supple. Their breasts developed well but were not too big. Their thighs were shapely and like the rest of their flesh, were totally devoid of fat. Their buttocks were small and rounded, like a boy's. Their bellies were flat and muscly and their waists small.

In short, there wasn't a lot between them and as their eighteenth birthday approached, their mother and father worried more and more about their future. Only one of them was going to survive as a citizen; the other four were going to become slaves.

Slave! Even the very word made their mother shiver in fear. Slavery had been unknown in the civilised world for nearly two centuries. Now it was going to return and four-fifths of the world's female population were going to be classed amongst its members, to toil at hard labour for the rest of their days, subject to the whim of their owners. Yes, there would be male slaves too, but no-one thought for a moment there would be many of these. A boy would have to be pretty bad not to be classed as a full citizen.

Already some enterprising men had set up slave dealerships. They rightly assumed there would be a need for such establishments to act as a clearing house for the thousands of girls who were soon going to be flooding the market. It would take some time before society became used to having slaves once more-servants for their houses; workers for their factories; and labourers to work on municipal and government projects.

Jake Carruthers was one of these entrepreneurs. He lived on the Gold coast of Queensland and had tried his hand at a number of enterprises, most of them on the fringe of legality but each one making him richer than before. Now, he saw the opportunity to make a killing. None of the girls who came to the slave block would have the temperament of a slave. Each would have been competing against her sisters for a place in society and as such would have assumed she would win. Few would have contemplated their future as a slavegirl with any seriousness-it was a horrible thought and none wanted to dwell on it.

Jake would therefore take this raw material and lick it into shape. He would turn girls into slaves: docile but lively, bright and vivacious but obedient; able to perform any and all tasks demanded of them. He would specialise in domestic slaves. He would take the best on offer and break them down-then build them up again; but now as slaves. They would be trained as domestic servants; cooks, housemaids, gardeners and the like. But he would also train them in another area. He guessed there would be many men-and some women, who would wish to use their girls sexually. He would therefore have them trained to be the best whores there were.

He was looking forward to the date, not far off now, when the first girls were going to come onto the market. He had prepared his establishment well. He had had the place purpose-built and he had staffed it very, very carefully. Physically, his new premises were the ants pants. A very tasteful showroom fronted the street. Above this was his own quarters. Behind the showroom were the training rooms and right at the back, surrounding a brick-paved courtyard were the zoo-like cages in which his slavegirls would be housed.

These were open-fronted, being secured by iron bars only-to make the girls understand once and for all, they were now little more than animals themselves. The walls between them were solid. At the back was a drain that ran from cage to cage through a pipe in the base of the wall. Water ran in this continuously and was designed to carry away their wastes. At the front was a similar conduit through which water also ran. This was their drinking water and to partake, they would have to get down like a dog and slurp up the water. Both drains were designed to demean the girls-bring them down to size as they would have to pass their wastes into the rear drain in full view of anyone standing at the cage front; and drink like an animal, right there at the bars.

His men and women were recruited with one thing in mind. An ability to cow and exert rigid discipline over the slavegirls. Their other skills-physical education, domestic science and knowledge of the sexual arts was secondary to this prime requisite. It wouldn't matter how good they were at the latter skills if they couldn't control their charges. Here they had some help from the government, for the laws enacted had made it perfectly legitimate to use any and all means to control the new slaves. Once a girl was your property, you could whip, cane or beat her in any way you chose; apply disciplinary electric shocks to her body, modify her in any way you chose-even kill her if you wished.

The aim was to reduce the population of these unwanted females. Work them as hard as you could so they died off young; flog them into submission so they weren't a bother to polite society; and kill them when you tired of them-if you could afford to...

Yes, Jake and his staff were ready all right. Jamie had no favourites among his sisters. He loved them all and he was as sad as his parents that in a week or so, all of them bar one were going to be relegated to this terrible position as slaves. Could it really have come to this, he like so many others around him wondered. For the thousandth time he racked his brains to try to think up a better solution to the problem. That it was a problem, nobody denied. Already, eighteen years after the onset of the disease, food resources, even in a rich country like Australia, were stretched to the limit. In some Asian countries, people were dying of hunger. But there didn't seem to be a solution other than the one now in place. You couldn't just kill off unwanted people and at least under this regime, you had a chance.

Every married woman these days now had a boy child, followed ten months later, by five girls. After that she was sterile. It meant that every family had six children, far more on average than before. Twice as much in fact which, while not as bad as had first been thought since no-one had initially realised that the women would become sterile after bearing the five girls, but certainly bad enough.

The Clarke girls neared their assessment exercises in trepidation. They all knew they were close so far as achievement went. None stood out above the others. Who would it be? They shared a large room in their parents' house-a new kind of house had emerged: a master bedroom for mum and dad; a small room for the one boy in the family-and a very large one for the five girls. If you could afford it, you also had a guest room. In their room, their girls talked endlessly about the coming exercises. No-one had had any experience in these things. They were among the first of the new breed.

They did know the government had appointed teams that moved into each girls' school-boys who were deemed unfit for citizenship were handled by a recommendation to the minister from the boy's school principal followed by a personal interview by an officer of the department. But they were few and far between.

The girls however were a quite different matter. The panels moved into the school for a week or so at a time and interviewed, tested and inspected each group of five sisters at length. The panels were staffed by a chairman (or woman); a medical officer and an academic. The interviews were extensive-and very intrusive-as the Clarke girls were to find out.

They duly presented in the room set aside for the interviews. At first, it was all together and they stood up in a line facing the panel who leaned back in their chairs looking the five girls over with interest. They were new to this task too and were still finding their feet. They were conscious of the responsibility that rested on their shoulders-that they had virtual power of life and death, or at least of citizenship or slavery over these girls-and it was irreversible. There was no appeal from their decision.

The girls were each dressed immaculately. They wore the school uniform of course: short, pleated skirt that showed off their shapely calves and powerful thighs to perfection, short white socks and flat shoes, and a form-fitting blouse that hugged their pert young breasts to perfection. Under these were the regulation bikini panties that barely covered either their buttocks or the triangle between their legs and a half vest that came down to just under their breasts.

They now stood up, outwardly calm but inwardly quaking with fear as they tried not to look at the two men and the woman who were about to decide their fate.

"Right turn," barked the chairman. "Quick march... Walk around the space in front of the table." They obeyed, turning right and now walking in step around an imaginary square while the three officers looked them over for a few minutes. Then, "Halt! Turn and face us." Once more there was the implacable stares of the panel and then came the next order: Blouses and skirts off!"