In 2010, the average uncorrected size of family where both parents had low intelligence was found to be 5.6 children. The average uncorrected size of a family where both parents had high intelligence came to 2.3 children. The projected rate of intelligence decline based upon the ratio of children of high IQs  to those of low was not discovered until 2060, when the number of professionals had declined, and public education of children was abandoned, as the INTELs, or people of high intelligence found the quality of education was far superior when provided at home, and the IDs, or people of low intelligence, simply did not care.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

Athena wept, the tears dripping down her cheek, then leaving her face to land in silent drops on her mother’s now lifeless hands. The grief was palpable, but she knew there was nothing she could have done, nothing that most could have done, to save her. The few who might have saved her had not been able to get the tools they needed: education, books, experience of the elders.

The cough had started innocently enough, as had the fever. The weeks had passed and it had gotten worse. Her mother had diagnosed herself: pneumonia. She’d done all she could to save herself, but the medications of old were no longer available. People had lost the knowledge of how to produce it.

Mankind had lost plenty in the past years, and was continuing to lose. The doctors, the real lawyers, and more. Schools were ancient history, and Athena had only come to educate herself because her parents, two of the few remaining Intels, as they were now called, had an extensive library of antique books. She’d spent most of her time there, as the other children had bored her senseless…and when they weren’t dull and impossible to hold a conversation with, interest waned because they were too busy fighting with each other. A reasonable resolution was no longer available. It had died with humanity’s intelligence.

There were still funeral directors and gravediggers, as that didn’t require much brainpower. She picked up the phone and dialed. The tears had ceased, and her voice was almost clear.

“Corpse at Ten-Oh-Five South Street. Please pick it up, put it in a coffin, prepare the ceremony, and dig a hole. Don’t forget to dig it deep enough. Use the rope. After the ceremony, cover the hole, and mark it with a stone. Thank you.”

She scowled, knowing they’d make some mistake along the way. Nobody ever did things correctly anymore. Not many people knew how.

Athena knew the reason why the intelligence was nearly gone from the world, and she worried that it would be completely gone soon. She knew the next step would be mankind’s extinction. With no medication and no doctoring, her mother’s fate would be more and more common. Lifespans were already drastically reduced. Her mother had been fifty.

One of the philosophy texts she’d found in the library had spoken of humanity’s breeding patterns. Families with low intelligence bore four or five children per family, while intelligent families had one or two. At that rate, it was only a matter of time before all intelligence was wiped from the world.

She felt alone as she waited on the corpse collectors to arrive. She’d done this once before, three years ago. That time, they had forgotten to dig the grave deep enough, so after the first flood, poppa’s body was found in the parking lot of the nearest Wal-Mart.

The loneliness grew as she pulled the sheet over her mother’s face. The clock on the walk bonged four times. Each chime sent another shiver of pain through her. Having nothing else to do, Athena returned to the phone and dialed.

“Hallo?”

“Hello, Betty-Sue. Could you please call my brother to the phone?” Athena expected the answer, and groaned when she was correct.

“Who’s your brother?”

“Your husband. Troy. The man you married. The man you have had children with.” She couldn’t keep the condescension out of her voice at this point. “Call him to the phone, please, then let me speak to him.”

“Oh. Okay.” Athena’s disgust with her sister-in-law didn’t recede with the knowledge that she had taken no offense at her behavior. She waited patiently until the breathing changed to a slightly deeper tone, then her brother spoke.”

“Hey, sis! What’s up?” Troy sounded cheerful, and for a moment Athena regretted the pain she was about to give him.

“Mom’s gone.”

“Gone? As in…” It took him a moment. Though Troy was an Intel, he had been married to an Id for ten years already, and had three children to prove it. One of the children showed some small signs of being an Intel, but there wasn’t much hope in Athena’s mind. “Dead?”

“Yes, Troy. The corpse-takers are on their way. We just couldn’t…I couldn’t…there was no more medicine.” The tears threatened to fall again, but Athena stopped them. “I’m all alone here.”

“You should find yourself a husband, Thenie.” Troy’s argument was that if she settled for some Id, she’d at least be cared for, but Athena’s pride stood in the way. She needed someone that she could speak with.

“I can’t do that, Bro. Not until. Not unless.” Her brain started churning at this point. “Troy? If I don’t find an Intel to marry…there will be less Intels born. I need to find one.”

She glanced around the room again. The wallpaper had peeled beyond repair a few months ago, and she debated having it replaced. She’d hire some females to do it…as they were less aggressive. With so much effort being put into keeping her mother alive, she’d not had time for simple housework. The tiles were rich, but uncleaned.

Athena thanked heaven that she was, at least, not being left without funds. Her family had always been wealthy, and as others grew less and less intelligent, they’d found ways to gain more money. Some might have thought to call them con artists, but it was simply a case of making intelligent choices.

“Troy? The funeral will be tomorrow.”

“So soon?” His voice sounded incredulous.

“Yes. I need to get out of here for a while. I need to…” She stopped, not sure of what she needed. “I just need to get out of here.”

“Just wait, sis. Wait until I get there. We’ll talk when I get there.” He sounded a little desperate, flustered. She agreed, but told him she’d be packing until then. She settled the phone on the receiver with a hint of abandon, and took one more peek in on her mother. She lay in her bed, the sheet over her face, but the blanket still covering up to her neck, as if she were just sleeping. The posters of the bed were covered with dust, and she gave the dust an idle brushing. Athena glanced at the vanity and pulled it open, then lifted the secret drawer that only she and her mother had known about. The small book she removed felt cool to her palm, but as if it belonged. She closed her eyes and let her finger trace over the faded, engraved word on the cover. “Diary,” it read. She didn’t need to see it in order to know what was written there.

The diary tucked inside her pocket, Athena moved to her room. She tapped the closet door open and pressed a button. The inside of the closet began to turn, slowly, until it settled on the portion of the little room where her containers were stored. The rotating closet had been one of her father’s experiments, and she was fond of how it helped her keep the neat, organized life she had preferred. Her father had been that way as well. She smiled briefly, remembering him, then lost it in the grief for both him and her mother.

Once Athena had yanked the suitcase from the bottom shelf and plopped it on her simple bed, she turned to the window. There was no sign of the corpse-takers arriving yet, so she moved to her dresser. The white wood was shiny…she realized she’d cleaned her own room when she was frustrated and had nothing to do, but the rest of the house had been ignored. A flash of guilt settled over her. She glanced at the suitcase, then through the door to her room. With a sigh, she pulled open the top drawer and began to pack.

A half an hour later, the corpse-takers arrived. She sent them on their way with her mother’s empty shell, then returned to her packing.

Across the country, while Athena was packing, Vincent was lining bottles up on the long table in his kitchen. On the counter behind him were several bottles, containers, and beakers…all in less than perfect condition due to age, rather than misuse. Propped on the chair beside him atop a mound of antique comic books was a large volume, equally ancient. This book splayed open, and was held on its page by a knife that lay across the pages. Vincent’s fingers brushed each bottle as he placed it on the table with care. When the last bottle was set, he glanced at the book, and murmured to himself.

After reading a portion of the book, Vincent nodded, tied a towel around his face, then opened the cabinet, pulling out the plastic bag, and its contents. Placing the bag on the table he reached for the plastic wrap and covered his fingers, as he’d run out of cleaning gloves earlier that day and was too preoccupied to go out and buy more.

With the make-shift gloves he felt confident enough to open the bag and pull out the moldy slice of lemon that sat inside. He began to scrape the mold off it into one of the glass bottles.

That was when his phone rang.

Cursing, glared at the telephone, then sighed in resignation. If it were an Intel calling him, it would likely be important. If it were an Id, he’d probably spend hours listening to them try to call him over and over again, not understanding that he was either not home, or not willing to answer the phone.

He ripped the makeshift mask off his face, stoppered the bottle, and reached for the phone.

“What do you want?”

“Is that any way to speak to your darling sister, Vince?” The voice at the other end was pleasant, sweet…but weak. She’d contracted a cough a week ago, and she was the reason he was working so hard to try to come up with some makeshift medication. His parents had been scientists, and he’d inherited their massive library when they died, suddenly, in a car crash. Vincent still had troubles bringing himself to travel on the highways…he blamed drink and the lack of intelligence that brought the Ids who killed them to drive inebriated.

“I’m sorry, Paige. I was a bit preoccupied.”

“I’ll say! So what time are you coming tonight?” Vincent paused, his black brows creasing. He strained to remember what he was coming to or for.

“Um. The time you said?” He knew this wouldn’t work, but he tried anyhow. It was their typical game, and she always caught him at it. He cut her off this time, however. “I can’t recall what I promised to be at…I’m so busy, you know I am…”

“I know, Vince. But don’t worry, I’m feeling better today.” He allowed himself a breath of relief, and was about to relax, when she continued. “The bris, Vince. You promised you’d be there for it.”

He winced. “Did you find a rabbi?” He was dreading the prospect of being the substitute.

“Yes, don’t worry. You don’t have to do the slice and dice. He’s a Half-Intel.” This only made Vince feel partially better, but he was comforted by the fact that he’d have enough wit to do the job properly. Half-Intels tended to be closer to the Intel side than the Id side, unless there was a mental disorder unrelated to the “Down-Breeding” issue.

“Do you need me to bring anything, and what time?” Vincent glanced back at the bottles on the table, and on the counter, and decided he deserved a break. He tucked the phone between his cheek and his shoulder and began to clean up as he spoke with his sister.

“Have you any kosher wine? Nevermind, I think Rabbi Cohen has that. Bring some of those cookies you bake. Everyone likes them. I’m not having too many folk there. Just the Bernsteins, the Cohens, family, and Mary-Beth. She’s coming alone, but she does such a nice job tending the place that I felt I owed it to her to invite her. Irv’s proud as a peacock…he’s such a sweetie sometimes.” Irving was Paige’s fair-haired Half-Intel husband, and Vincent found himself fond of the man. While he wasn’t normal, as he favored the Id side of his family, his demeanor was more Intel, and he was gentle with his wife, and kind. His lack of intelligence was almost endearing.

“I’ll bring those cookies…and a few hundred hugs for my sis.”

“Love you, Vincent!” She sounded excited as she disconnected and Vincent bobbled the ziplock back into the cabinet before hanging the receiver back on the wall. Vincent began cleaning the bottles and putting them away, leaving the stoppered bottle of scraped mold aside. He stared at it, as if it were an alien thing about to move, then placed it in the refrigerator for storage. Once the kitchen was clean he made his way to the bathroom, jumped into a shower, and got himself ready for the day.

He worked from home, so usually he’d not have to leave the house. Since the death of his parents, he wasn’t fond of leaving home, it had almost bordered on a phobia, one which he kept telling himself he’d have to work on…tomorrow.

Tomorrow had never come, but he did go out when he had to. With his nephew having his bris the next day, he felt bound to bring a gift, not just the cookies promised, so once he was dressed he left the house, locked it, and flipped the three bolts he’d installed the previous year. Many Ids had compensated for lack of brainpower with excess physical prowess, and he wasn’t sure he could stand up to a crew of them who decided to break in to his house when he was out. It was another reason he wasn’t fond of leaving the nest.

“Not much of a nest,” he thought to himself, glancing back over his shoulder as he walked away from it towards the nearest public transport. He’d chosen this apartment for its proximity to the various shopping areas he’d need to visit, and it was a convenience he thanked the Lord for every time he needed to get some milk or groceries.

The gift shop was a little further, past walking distance, so he went to the underground tram and found himself a seat. As he waited for the doors to close and the ride to begin, he lifted his fingers to touch his left breast pocket, brushing over the solid lump there that was his stunner. That was another essential, these days. Personal protection wasn’t a question of “should I” but more a case of “how can I not?”

He rode and he thought. The medications he was working to develop were a stopgap, and he knew it. Vincent was well aware that he needed more, needed some sort of way to reverse the humanitarian decay that had settled upon the world. People needed to be replenished with a sense of intelligence. He wasn’t fond of killing, but other than killing of the many Ids who continued to breed faster than an army of rabbits in hyper-mating speed, he couldn’t thing of any way to slow down the decay of intelligence.

The only alternative he could think of was to introduce a more intelligent strain, but how one went about that, he had no clue. There was the obvious way: Find as many of the Intel women he could, bang their brains out, and repopulate the world with intelligence almost single-handedly. Not very probable, and not an enticing prospect for himself, either. He wasn’t fond of rape.

Every time the tram’s wheels made a rotation, it caused a clicking sound which was rhythmic, much like a metronome, that aided in his thought process. He was a closet scientist. He could make that his next project…find a scientific cure, for lack of a better word, for stupidity. After, of course, he dealt with the medication issue.

The tram finally grinded to a halt with a piercing squeal that jarred him and had him trying to clear out his ears.  Before he could stand, he found himself pushed back into his seat by several elbows and bodies as they all clamored to leave the vehicle at the same time, and people tried to push on, neither of them willing to wait for the other.

He felt the anger rise within him. They couldn’t wait, they couldn’t even show the slightest hint of respect. It bothered him, and made him wonder if common decency was tied into intelligence. It couldn’t have been too difficult to take turns, to show the proper courtesy. But still, the group pushed and shoved, until one man had enough and pulled out a gun. A shot was fired, several screams ensued, and Vincent found the motion had stopped. As had the tram. People were being tugged left and right to clear the way, find out where the gunshot had come from, and who had been the victim of it.

Vincent waited, knowing that if he ran, even an Id policeman would assume him guilty, and finally he saw the criminal caught. A body lay on the ground, that of a young child, barely clothed. It sent another flash of anger. Crime was bad enough, but of children. Was that child an Id or an Intel? He couldn’t tell by the clothing, but the woman who cried seemed to wail with abandon. Nobody tried to console her, so he moved towards her, put one arm around her shoulder, and patted it.

“Ma’am…” he began, then realized he didn’t know what to say. “What was his name?” It was all he could come up with, and he kicked himself for using the past tense as she wailed louder. He pushed, a little more firmly, on one shoulder, and guided her to a bench outside the tram. Her wails started to cease, and he continued to make calming noises.

“He…he’s  my boy…my only boy! How dare they!” The anger had risen in her, he saw, pushing the grief to a backdoor. She had the fire in her eyes, determination and fury. “How dare they? I’ll sue…but wait. I can’t. Damned Ids.”

“Damned Ids,” indeed, he thought. They’d taken another Intel life, and narrowed the margin of intelligence even further. He cursed, and moved to where the body still lay. The cops had pulled the criminal away, but the kid was dead. Nothing they could do about him now, so why bother?

He pulled the child out, yanking at his coat at the same time, then wrapped it around him. Moving to another bench, he lay the child there, then returned to the mother.

“I’ll make sure he’s taken care of, Ma’am. Do you…have anyone to call to help you home?”

“No…Ids…killed my husband a month ago.” She begain to cry again, and he found his arms wrapping around her, holding her close. She cried herself out, and then spoke again, in broken tones, her voice cracking. “Please…get him to my address.” After she told him the address, he turned to pick up the boy’s body, and as he did so, he heard the loud crack of a pistol. He cursed again, knowing what had happened. Without glancing over his shoulder, he called out “Someone call for the corpse-takers!”

He placed the child in the arms of the now dead woman, and pulled his coat over their faces. Vincent had no clue why he had involved himself so much with these two, but he felt obligated to see it through. “So much for getting a gift for the bris,” he muttered to himself as the police strode up to find out what happened.

“She killed herself. Gun’s there. My fingerprints aren’t on it, and I don’t have enough blood on me to warrant having shot her. Look at my fingers and nails. No gunpowder, no way I shot it. The child was just killed on the train, you got the criminal. The mother…she killed herself. Grief.”

The policewoman he spoke to nodded, then glanced at the piles of blood and back at him. “Your name, sir, and your relationship to them?”

“Vincent Schechter, and no relation. I was outside the throng when the boy got shot, and tried to comfort the woman. She gave me her address to bring the boy’s body to, and when I turned to get the corpse, she shot herself.”

She nodded, then asked him the standard questions, informing him she might call on him again with more. He agreed, pleasantly, then glanced down at his blood-stained shirt. He’d either have to return home and change his clothes or press on and buy a new outfit. As he’d come this far already, he chose the latter.

It wasn’t far to the nearest Walmart, but as he went there, he realized the stir a bloody t-shirt would cause. He’d already lost his jacket to the corpses, and the corpse-takers, so had nothing to cover the stain. He pulled the shirt over his head, reversed it, and looked at the inside. That was no better. He stood in the sidewalk, pondering what course to take.

He eventually settled on trying to get into the store without a shirt. He threw the shirt in a nearby garbage bin, and continued to the Walmart.