Female Asexual Reproduction - TrinianGames/Sapphory GitHub Wiki

Female Asexual Reproduction is the process by which Sapphorian women procreate. Broadly, its purpose is to allow a child to be conceived by two women with no need for a male to be involved. It has been widely available for most of Sapphory's history, though can be constrained by the government for population control purposes. The process involves extracting genetic material from both mothers, then implanting the viable embryo into the natal mother. Children born from this process are always girls and invariably grow up to become lesbians.

The second mother is known as the Progenitor Mother. However, these are purely semantic terms, as the genetic material of both women is used equally, and either is capable of carrying the child, so to compare the Progenitor Mother to a "father" would be inaccurate and meaningless.

Due to the genetic differences between girls born through Female Asexual Reproduction and humans born naturally, it was eventually agreed that such women are no longer true Homo sapiens, and they became known as Homo sapphorians.

History

The Female Asexual Reproduction process was developed between SY 0 and SY 10 by Founding Mother Kusanhkana at a high-tech biogenetics lab in Sapphory City. Since the colonisation effort began, the Sapphorian Government had wrestled with the problem of reproduction, viewing its early solution of sperm importation as temporary at best, inherently unsustainable and placing it in a position of weakness when dealing with the outside world. When Kusankhana began her work, the project received nearly unlimited funding.

The process of producing a viable zygote without male material was phenominally complicated, but as a geneticist who had worked with IVF techniques, Kusankhana was familiar with many of the challenges already, and assembled a team of women similarly qualified. She figured out early on that the process would be far easier if two women were involved, rather than attempting to trick one egg into using all of its own material, which would likely have resulted in the production of clones rather than genetically distinct offspring.

Eventually, the process that emerged from this involved the dissection and splicing of eggs from two women, together with a number of complex chemical processes that tricked the cells into joining in a manner close enough to traditional conception to produce a viable embryo. From there, it was simply a matter of implanting it into any woman capable of carrying a child. It was discovered, however, that outcomes were better when the child was carried by one of its genetic mothers, and this quickly became normal.

The first girl to be born from the Female Asexual Reproduction process was Hope Kusankhana Esperanza. Her birth was celebrated across Sapphory and she went on to become a scientist like her namesake. It helped that she was incredibly beautiful, but it was later established that women conceived through this process are better looking on average than Homo sapien women.

The process underwent a number of refinements over the next few decades, finally being considered perfected around SY 65.

The Process

The process has been boiled down over the centuries to an almost production line level of efficiency. The first thing that must happen is that the two mothers must apply to the Bureau of Authority for Bearing Young for a reproductive licence. Each mother must be at least 23 years of age, though licences will not generally be granted to schoolgirls until after they have graduated. Being married is considered advantageous and will likely speed up the process, but under normal circumstances is not required. A fresh licence must be acquired for each daughter they wish to have, but is considered a formality during normal times.

Once the licence is obtained, the mothers-to-be will next visit their local hospital for pre-conception checks and fertility scans. Both mothers-to-be will submit genetic material and undergo a reproductive health check, and the hospital staff will advise if one woman is better suited to carrying the child for physical, genetic or other health reasons. Assuming all of these things are completed successfully, they are now ready to conceive.

Homo sapphorian women no longer have a menstrual cycle, however, their ovaries are still used to produce the gametes necessary for the process. Both mothers-to-be are injected with a serum that produces hormones which compel the ovaries to produce a single egg. This is the only time in a Sapphorian woman's life when this will happen. In a curious quirk of science, the serum will remain dormant until it is activated - by sexual activity. The two mothers-to-be must go home and have sex, and each must achieve orgasm on the same night.

The eggs will now begin growing in an ovarian follicle in each woman. They will attend daily appointments to monitor their hormone levels, which can tell with a surprising degree of accuracy when their egg is ready. Sometimes they will be a day or two apart, but most women achieve readiness at the same time. At this point, they each attend an in-patient appointment for the gene extraction.

Under a mild sedative, each mother's egg is extracted with a needle and taken to the conception unit. Here they are divided and mixed with a powerful concoction of chemicals which cause the two eggs to fuse together, producing a viable blastocyst. This continues to develop in a test tube for three days before the natal mother is brought back in for implantation and monitoring. Once it has joined to the lining of the womb, the process is considered to be successful and the embryo will develop as normal from this point.

Most Sapphorian girls are birthed naturally, with about 20-25% being born through C-section.

Population Control

Though it has been the exception throughout history, the Sapphorian Government has the power to limit or deny applications for reproductive licences for the purposes of population control. The government's ideal mandated size for Sapphory's population is 25,000,000 and should it approach or exceed this number, reproduction will be curtailed while it is brought back to normal levels.

The Sapphorian Government is well aware that its policy of intertia can lead to stagnation, and has thought long and hard throughout the centuries as to how this can be avoided. Population control is strict, and is held between 21 and 25 million at any given time, with strict methods of control.

At 25,000,000+ the country is considered to be full, and will institute a one-in-one-out policy. Reproductive licences will be denied until the population can be brought back to acceptable levels, and a sufficient number of the older generation have died out. Even the nobility will be subject to this rule. This has not happened, however for over 200 years.

At 24,900,000-25,000,000 couples will be permitted a maximum of two daughters in order to sustain the population at this ideal level, and unmarried women will be denied reproductive licencing. Couples may sell their reproductive rights to one or both daughters, and a market has been known to develop for the rights to reproduce more than twice. The nobility are exempt from these rules. This policy was last instituted around 100 years ago.

At 23,000,000-24,900,000 no special rules are put in place, and couples may reproduce as they desire. This has been the case for most of Sapphory's history, and is true right now. Because most Sapphorian couples will have an average of 2.2 daughters, the population has a tendency to sustain itself at around this level.

At 22-23,000,000 Sapphory will be considered underpopulated. The last time this happened was nearly 400 years ago and a number of non-mandatory pro-natal policies were sufficient to correct it. A campaign of public propaganda to "breed for the future of Sapphory" together with tribute breaks for couples having more than two daughters was easily enough to increase the population to acceptable levels.

At 21-22,000,000 Sapphory will be considered severely underpopulated. This has never happened, but contingency plans drawn up by the government include strong propaganda campaigns, free childcare, relaxed immigration laws and a temporary ban on abortion. The plan stops short of mandating reproduction.

Below 21,000,000 would be considered a population emergency and extreme measures would be taken. Under this scenario, all of the above measures would be activated, and all legal slaves of childbearing age would be requisitioned and impregnated. This plan would, of course, be extremely problematic were it ever to be attempted, as there is a considerable question mark over the status of girls born to slaves. Slave girls have no reproductive rights, so compelling them to breed is not a problem, but under normal circumstances, they are not allowed to breed, except in the (exceptionally rare) circumstance that for some reason an owner wishes to have a baby with her slave.

It has therefore never been established firstly who would be progenitor mothers to all these slaves' children, and then what the status of the children themselves would be. Sapphorians cannot be born into slavery, and the country's strong focus on family values means that few children are given up for adoption, meaning the infrastructure to deal with large numbers of orphans does not exist. Fortunately for the Sapphorian government, these questions have never yet had to be answered.