By Moe
Chapter 2 – Orientation
The drive was over 850 miles from the Rejuvenation Farm to the HumaFoods facility in North Junction, Montana and took two days. The van drove the last thirty miles without seeing any apparent signs of habitation or civilization before finally arriving at the front entrance gate of HumaFoods. After checking through security and getting all the new recruits photo ID badges to wear around their necks on lanyards, Jane drove the van to the administration building.
Dr. Taylor greeted the girls in a conference room and then put on a PowerPoint presentation for a brief introduction at the facility. He then pointed out that it was required that they all go to the Health offices for a brief series of shots. He said the company did not want the girls to get any illnesses from life on a farm and just as importantly did not want the livestock to get a disease from the outside city girls. Each girl got three shots, two in the buttocks and one in the arm as well as couple of pills. They were informed they would get two more shots in the morning to complete their initial series of inoculations.
After a small dinner, the girls were shown to their temporary living quarters with two girls sharing a room dormitory style. Each girl was given several temporary work uniforms and a case of toiletries. Everyone was tired from the long day of travel and the excitement of arriving at the final destination and had little trouble falling to sleep quickly.
The next morning at Jane collected the girls from their rooms and ushered them to the company cafeteria for breakfast. Everyone wore the company uniform that was very similar to a surgeon’s scrubs in a light green color. After breakfast was finished, each girl got two more shots and more pills before being led to the conference room again for the formal orientation session. In addition to Dr. Taylor, there were several other people in the room whom the girls had not met.
Dr. Taylor started the meeting by introducing his assistants and stating that these would be the people mainly working with the new recruits. “Drs. Jennifer Goodson and Alex Smith are biological research scientists, Dr. Josephine Hart is a veterinarian and Jane will continue to assist in your day to day needs. I would like each of you to introduce yourselves and provide a bit of background information about your selves. Let’s start with you Heather.”
“Hi! My name is Heather, I am 15 years old and I grew up in Detroit. I was abandoned by my mother shortly after birth and have been bounced around different foster care homes for most of my life. I made the mistake of getting caught in a stolen car with my boyfriend at the time and was sentenced to one year at JCC. I’ve served four months time before coming here. I am really looking forward to having a chance to start over at such a neat place like this.” And so it went around the table with each girl having a similar story to tell.
“Now that we know each other, let me tell you about what it means for you to be a food production worker at HumaFoods since you are now part of the team. You will be working in the experimental egg production facility. The average egg you buy in a grocery store weighs only about two ounces which means it takes about eight eggs to get a pound. The average farm egg laying hen lays less than one egg per day throughout the year. As poor as this is, this is actually much better than egg production 100 years ago. Here at HumaFoods we have made a significant breakthrough in egg production. Our specially bred chickens can lay 8 to 12 eggs per day instead of only one. Even better, each egg weighs between 6 and 8 ounces each.”
“This is where you young ladies come into the picture. When I offered you food production jobs, I meant it literally. You will each become one of our specially bred egg laying hens producing large quantities of special HumaFoods eggs.” Except for a few gasps, the room was silent as the girls took in what Dr. Taylor had just stated.
“You may be thinking that you do not want to become special egg-laying chickens. I hope this is not the case but I understand and we hope to convince you that this is the good life we promised you. We told you that you would be employed for life, we would take care of all your health needs, take care of all your food and shelter needs and anything else you would require in your life as a chicken. If you think about it, you will be leading simple, productive lives without any worries which most of the human population strives for and we are giving it to you.”
“If you still think you do not want to become hens, you have all signed employment contracts giving HumaFoods the right to use you as we see fit in your employment with us. Actually, technically speaking you are not employees but will become part of the livestock owned by HumaFoods Corp. You do not have any legal rights. Legal matters aside, you have all received a series of shots and drugs when you arrived and again this morning. You have already begun the process of being transformed into chickens and this process is irreversible. You will soon be human chickens or as we call you, Huma-Chicks. Rest assured we will take the very best care of each and every one of you since you are the food producers here.” Two of the girls began to cry and the others were in a state of shock at what they just heard.
“Let me tell you about the transformation process and then I will answer your questions. The complete transformation takes place over three weeks’ time which for you started yesterday. We categorize the process in three stages where you start out as chicklings, then you become chicks and finally you enter the hen maturation stage. Each stage lasts about one week. At the end you will be about 90 to 95% developed as chickens retaining just a few of your human features. One important thing is that your brain retains all its human functions and memories. Even though you will be mostly a chicken in body, you will still have your human thought processes although you will acquire some chicken intuition and instincts as well.”
“During the transformation, each day you will begin by getting more booster shots and drugs to helps the process along. At times you will feel some aches and pains occasionally or nausea as your body changes internally but nothing too bad. Because of the tremendous changes your body is now undergoing, you will often feel fatigued and so we encourage plenty of resting periods. Over the next few weeks, you will receive a special diet to accommodate your changing body’s internal organs and needs. In addition to the drugs, each day you will have a health exam where you will be checked, photographed extensively and have many body measurements taken and recorded daily so that we have a complete record of your transformation. Our goal here at HumaFoods is to have you become the best, most productive chickens you can be. Any questions?”
Obviously, there were a lot of questions which lasted for more than an hour. At the end of the session, although upset, most of the girls were resigned to their fates. Two of the girls actually said they were looking forward to their new lives as hens knowing that they would never have to worry about anything in the future.
The meeting concluded with Dr. Taylor saying, “We will meet every morning after your health exams for a short time and I will then explain what changes and developments you can expect over the next day or so. Between now and tomorrow, you will not see much in the way of physical changes as your body is being set up internally with its new DNA structure during the first day. After that, you will then begin to notice the changes daily. You are now scheduled to go to lunch with Jane and then you will want to rest this afternoon. See you tomorrow morning.” With that, Dr. Taylor left the room with his assistants.