Life went on day after day. The Hospital still seeming to glow in the distance, Ken took his time today. He knew he needn’t hurry. He was on breeder duty today. All he needed to do was just spend as much time as he could trying to impregnate the lady he was honored to be with this week. And this week it was an honor.
He had never seen this girl before. He met with the council and found out he was granted breeder duty this week. He had no qualms with it being a week early especially when he saw her. She was blond; small framed with huge blue eyes, a slim waist, and carried herself well. He knew it was not fully her choice to be a part of the breeder plans but it seemed to him that it was a stipulation for her to join the camp to be a part of this institution. Ken though “Things must have been really tough where she had come from to agree to this.”
Back before the war he would not have been ok with this. But as times got harder and harder and pleasures fewer and farther between he knew he had to make use of what he had when he could have the chance. He was never one to have a lot of money before things took the turn. He worked hard each and every day but it was rare for him to have any left over after his basic bills were taken care of. If he was lucky he bought a record or a novel with what he had at the end of the month. But this usually only happened once a season or so.
When it came to the ladies he was a big and strong guy at a height of 6’4” and 286 lbs. He got some attention from the ladies but was just too shy and ashamed of his meager earnings to really try to be with any one seriously. He usually just went out with a group of people that happened to have a few ladies along and would live vicariously through the guys who had girl friends.
After the wars came and all that seemed left was this area he had the community in and the Our Demize Rd’s hospital. Because he was big and strong he became a high member of the society. Most of the other survivors were short, old, and unable to care for the needs of others because of their stature. This was where Ken learned that he could shine. He carried what he could for those in need and pulled more than his weight when it was time to haul crops or timber for what they could use for housing. Of course all these attributes from social beneficence to physical strength to strong health made him the best breeding stock from the society. This is why he got to have Nykki this week. The council felt that if a beautiful new comer and Ken could breed the next generation humanity may still have a chance. They would have looks, know-how, physical strength and aptitude, and the respect of the others in the camp.
Ken did not really like being the ‘top stud’ as some of his friends liked to call him. But he did enjoy the attention and the time he got to spend with the ladies assigned to him. He tried not to get too attached to those he was with but this one seemed different. She did not seem to mind her time with him but she still had self confidence and pride. Ken could tell she was not doing it out of pure submission to social duty but knew it had a great deal to do with her intelligence and knowing that this was the way to survive in the current situation. This was just one more sacrifice for the group as a whole.
Nykki had hardly said anything to him during their time together. But Ken could tell she was observing him ad watching his every move. He was not sure if he liked being watched so much but felt sure he was in no real danger. Danger had been his experiences after all hell broke loose and he found himself in situations like he had only though of in night mares just like every one else had.
He got up and went to put more wood on the fire. It was not really very cold in his dwelling but he did not want to have to deal with the fire when night fall did its descent and the winds carried off the heat. Then he heard her laughing.
Was she out of her mind? This was the kind of hysterical laughter he had only heard from the likes of Mrs. Rowen when she had lost everything from her house to her family and finally cracked under all of the pressure. Do to the lack of professional care and the burden she was placing on the society she was killed and her body taken to the hospital. They had taken the time to see if she would get better or could be put to any use but as time went on she continued to be nothing more than a blithering idiot that would do nothing but make noise and attract dangerous animals. Plus she was ugly as sin and refused to stay clothed even in the most extreme chill of weather. Her burdening was too great for the hard times that had come about so extreme needs of the many damned the one.
Ken did not like thinking back on those times. The memory filled him with the dread that filled him, and every one he knew, from those memories of times when each felt that all was lost and life could and/or should not go on any longer. But listening to the wail of laughter that came from his bed-mate made him freeze a moment in fear. Then it became infectious and he smiled and brought her some chamomile tea from the tea pot over the fire and asked her what the humor was brought on by.
“The situation reminded me of better times,” Nykki stated. “I have spent my time as a thinker and creator of art and just seeing you unclothed walking to the wood pile reminded me of a painting I did years ago. It did not sell for very much but it was one of my favorite paintings I ever did. Although you are much larger than the model I used the proportions are the same.”
“So you were a painter?”
“I did a lot more than that… But that was one of the many things that I did do. I first got into it to relieve stress when others found that I had a talent for it. Maybe one day society will return to what it once seemed to be and I can spend my time in near dreams and arts again.”
“I think I like how my life has turned around” Ken gently stated. He could tell, from being around any one who was happy before all of what came to pass, that few came out of it better than before like he did. He never wanted to seem boastful but he knew if the nuclear wars had not happened he would still be miserable and pretty sure he would have been a suicide victim by this point. “I was no high member of society. I was a common worker with nothing else going on but the miserable, dead-end job that I could not get out of. Days went by and the only thing that changed was how I looked in the mirror. Though many people lost greatly I have feel that I would have never been anything without what happened.”
“You lucked out. While it has given you status and power most have lost. I feel much like a prostitute, if not an enthralled by the self-loathing for being prostituted. I did volunteer, but to get what I needed to be allowed into a group that is pretty self sustaining I did have to give up my body to a man.”
Ken fell silent when he thought about what she had just said. He wanted to respond but there were no words for him to use in a situation like that. In the past he would have never agreed to what he was doing. Or would he? As he though he saw that he was taking advantage of a situation but his needs and pleasures meant too much to him. He’d never gotten to enjoy them before now and he did not want to go back to his days of misery.
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