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"It's awesome living here," our young male, Jaden, observed. He was a little over eighteen, the minimum age requirement for this area of testing. I don't think I have to explain why. The female, Olivia, was somewhat vacant. Totally uncharacteristic of a provectus, but I supposed it wouldn't matter. She had the correct genetic makeup, she would do. She listened with an indifferent gaze at my clipboard and fidgeted with the white regulatory clothes provided to all our provecti.
"Yes, we hoped you'd like it here." I flipped through my stack of papers, finding the pre-typed sheet I'd use to carefully explain this awkward request.
"And it's great not having to pay taxes or rent or anything. I just started having to deal with that. I don't like it all that much," the boy's country accent made him sound a bit simple, but we knew he was not unintelligent. Just uneducated. His advanced brain would catch up quickly, once we gave him the chance.

Olivia, on the other hand...

"Yeah, sure, it's great. Get to the point, lady."

She wasn't simple, just apathetic. To me, a waste of special ability. I didn't think we'd get very far with her. Her uterus would have the most value to us, it seemed.
"We need younger specimens, but the laws we adhere to won't allow us to recruit children or infants. Not to mention, we'd like to see a purebred provectus human. There are also some very important observations we'd like to make throughout the entire process of conception, in-utero development,"

Jaden's head snapped around to look at Olivia. The girl only blinked blandly at him.
"You want me to... us to..."
"You don't have to marry her or anything drastic like that," I explained. "But we've had difficulties with artificial insemination. You're not like regular people. We're still learning all there is to know about you. That's why we're asking you to-"

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"I don't know... I'm not old enough to have kids," Poor Jaden was raking both hands through his short dirty-blonde hair, his noble brow creasing.
"We would care for the baby. It would not be either of your responsibility. You don't even have to see it."

Olivia turned her indifferent brown-gray gaze to me and lifted one eyebrow aloft. "Do I get paid or something? I won't do it unless I get paid."
"Absolutely. You will be compensated tremendously."
She shrugged. "I'm in."

Jaden looked at his knees, then at Olivia, then at me. Then he frowned desperately at his clasped hands. "Yeah. Alright. It's for the best."
I smiled warmly at both of them. "You two are going to go down in scientific history. You won't regret this."

---

I don't want to go into too much detail of the tribulations we encountered in this seemingly simple stage of testing. The poor boy was a virgin. He had been raised some form of back-hills Baptist, and apparently could not perform under surveillance. Of course I don't blame him. I mean, it's not like we were standing in the room, but knowing there were cameras watching from unseen angles would be too much for even me. The other males in our care weren't prime specimens. The only other two both had at least one STD, and the eldest had back problems. So, we stooped to chemical mood alteration. We drugged the boy's food.
That produced success. Thankfully, our female was still at prime fertility in her cycle. We gave it three days, but it didn't take. We ran more tests, and discovered something completely unexpected. The female was producing dead eggs.
To me, it seemed to fit. Fit her disposition, anyway. I was disappointed, but unsurprised.