ElateLand: Generation 0.1

    Aarman’s POV:       This is the moment I had been waiting for since my 25th birthday.     I couldn’t help but feel excited as I walked towards the check-in counter and swiped my wrist over the sensor. The light beeped green and the glass doors clicked unlock.     The door slid open.     My home vibes filled my senses.     Laughter, conversations, and familiar sense of belonging filled the room. My eyes scanned the busy waiting area as the strong smell of freshly brewed coffee hit my nose. Distracted by my own excitement, I was standing blocking the entrance and quickly moved to the side, allowing those behind me to pass.     “Sorry, excuse me” I apologized.     It was packed. I smiled back and greeted familiar faces. Their nervous, impatient expressions probably a reflection of my own.     We were all here for the Big Reveal. Something that would change our lives forever. Today was the day we would finally find out the identity of our potential mates.     Yes, you heard that right! “Mate Reveal Day!”       Confused? Well let me give you a quick flash back.       We are Generation 0.1.     This is the year 2050.     We were conceived from eggs and sperms donated to Human Edit Technology, HET. Once a prestigious scientific community, known for its breakthrough medical treatments and advanced research in gene therapy. Unfortunately, many organizations felt threatened by their breakthrough research.     Pharmaceutical companies were losing ground against HET and scrambled to attack their reputation in any way possible.     In 2021, HET was sued. Blamed for unlawful practices.     Instead of fighting to stand their ground, they shut their doors to the public and sealed their labs and offices. They continued with their research in secret bunkers. They were scientists, not lawyers or politicians, and decided that hiding was their best option.     They were losing precious time.     These dedicated men and women had come a long way in their research and wanted to see their work in action during their lifetime. Their work could have revolutionary impact on mankind, and they understood the need to continue with it regardless of the circumstances they were facing.       They slowly Isolated themselves and their families to an abandoned Island.     They built basic infrastructure to continue living and testing in secrecy until their first successfully edited human embryos were ready to be placed inside surrogate mothers.     Recruited couples and willing single women were brought in from around the world to surrogate these edited embryos under tight lipped deals to preserve secrecy.     The surrogates were kept unaware of our modified genetics.     For their own sanity.     For our safety.     Everything was classified. Confidential. Sealed.       As for us.     We were the products of revolutionary discoveries and lifelong struggles endured by this exceptional group of scientists who had put their lives on the line.     We were masterpieces of human advancement in Science and Technology.     There were thousands of us. Frozen embryos. Awaiting wombs to grow in.     We were the embryos that would change mankind forever.     Our genes were edited clean of defects and enhanced under the direction of Dr. Laura Woods, the Lead Scientist on the Island.       The first births were the most anticipated.     They had watched our development like a hawk. Our surrogates were monitored 24/7. When the first group of Edited Babies were born, more than anything else, the scientists were relieved to see normal.     Ten tiny fingers, ten tiny toes, wrinkly shedding skin, swollen faces.     Hope, celebration, and the need for community growth triggered change in the dead island.     However, all of us, as babies were on the bigger end of the normal human percentile charts.     Development was also exceptionally faster for us in comparison to normal babies.       The Island began to grow in infrastructure.     Hospitals, homes, schools, training centers and recreation facilities were built to beautifully blend with the serene green and mountainy terrains of the island we grew calling home. The intention was to stay hidden. Stay blended in nature. However, the growing island couldn’t stay hidden forever. Soon our Island earned its mark on the world map as the Autonomous Island Nation of Elateland.     Our beautiful Elateland.     However, the rest of the world does not know anything about us.     We are the island’s best kept secrets.       Sure, we come across normal humans every now and then. Our Island is popular for its beaches and fertility clinics among normal humans.     But they don’t know what we are.     They can’t. They won’t understand.     We are the First Edition of the Human Edit Technology.     We are ‘The Edited Ones.’ The TEOs.       Now don’t get me wrong.     I am not talking about an army of creepy scientists creating crazy creatures.     This was a group of highly educated, renowned and celebrated individuals who chose to sacrifice their livelihoods because they believed so strongly - they had hit a milestone discovery that could change mankind forever.       Curious how their creations turned out?       Well, well, well!     We look human. Okay, maybe incredibly attractive human.     We are much stronger than the normal humans.     We gain muscle mass much more easily than normal humans.     We feel physical pain. We feel emotions.     But we feel it much more intensely than normal humans.     Most of us required a lifetime of training to learn how to manage our intense sense of pain and emotion. We still train every day.     Our senses are incredibly powerful and some of us have additional senses that normal humans cannot understand.     Our reflexes never fail us.     We don’t need to raise our voice to be heard among our kind - our hearing sense is so strong that we need to soundproof our infrastructures to stay focused on the task at hand.     We can hear things from miles away.       However, there is a catch.     Isn’t there always!     We can only reproduce with our assigned mates.     And we would discover their identities after both of us had turned 25.     There is absolutely no getting around this one rule. The Scientists don’t know how our modified DNA would react with the various versions of normal human DNA.     Besides, I had never felt attracted to a normal human to begin with.     Don’t get me wrong now.     We are free to date. Mingle. Have relationships.     I’ve had my fair share of relationships. Same goes for the other TEOs on the Island. But this rule was embedded in our minds since our first s*x education class.     “Reproduction is allowed only with your genetically edited mate.”     But the scientists didn’t stop there.     All the TEOs have been kept sterilized since they hit puberty.     The sterilization would be undone after we accepted our Mates on Mate Reveal Day.       I had my fair share of casual relationships, so did everyone else on the island.     I had dated a TEO for a year when I was 19. And that was the longest I had dated anyone.     Sarah.     At 5’8”. She was probably among the shortest female TEO on the Island.     Her brown eyes would crease on the sides when she smiled. Her laughter always came from the heart. Her face always bearing expressions of a cute child lost in her own mind.     We had swim training together. She turned my head all the time.     Her bathing suits always revealing just enough to keep the eyes lusting for more.     Her perfectly proportionate body. She wasn’t as muscular as other TEO Females.     I loved to tease her. She hated the constant training. She wished she were a normal human.     The one thing that we connected on was how frustrating it was to be in this unfulfilling limbo of having to wait for our mates to be revealed. Most normal humans don’t have to deal with the restrictions we have to deal with.     Sarah loved thinking up random stories about how we would get invaded by normal humans one day. Then we would all be free to live life as usual. No strict training regimes. Just be free to do as we wanted. Like normal humans.     “Free bird Sarah. You would have us all killed. We would end up cut up in a lab run by normal humans as research specimens” I would scare her.     She wanted to travel around the world.     Time would fly with her and that’s what had attracted me to her.     Our relationship was more than just make out and s*x.     We were still years away from finding out about our mates so we decided our relationship would be harmless.     However, eight months into our relationship she was getting too emotionally attached. Making it hard for me to maintain our stance on remaining emotionally detached. She cutely wished we were mates. All the time!     She always got excited when we talked about Mate Reveal Day.     She loved to wonder if we would end up being each other’s mates. I always backed out when she started asking. It was too risky to be so emotionally invested when we knew the rules.     I never understood how this was something so easy for her to talk about. So easy for her to hope about. Did it not scare her?     Chances of us being mates were narrow.     There were thousands of us here in the island.     At least two hundred TEOs were present for today’s reveal.     I wondered if she was here today as I scanned through the room.       Our emotions, our behavior, our physical development, everything has been under the microscope. Nothing was normal about us.     We are the first of our kind. Every Step needs to be taken carefully.     Our survival depended upon it!