A'Llyn Ettien's "Immigrants" (short story, survival, free): Is any cost too high to be able to have children?

Story summary.

Mostly a sad story of a colonized world - now quarantined from rest of humanity because of a local viral contagion. Infection that kills most babies, adults need constant "maintenance" treatment & still keep getting killed by it.

Only way a woman can have a baby is by getting the embryo gene-treated with virus - a process that mutates children into another species altogether!

Story is of a woman's determination to still have a child of her own - even if it will not exactly be human.

See also.

1. Judith Merril's "That Only a Mother": Very moving story of a woman in a similar dilemma - baby is almost certain to be deformed, but she wants it too much.

Fact sheet.

First published: Medgadget, 23 October 2007.
Download full text from publisher's site (need to scroll down the page to see the story).
Rating: A.