Page 35 of G8
“To use people like us to fight aliens?” G8 teased. The comment got a smile out of her.
“Close. To send people like you to settle other worlds. From what I read, all of you are stronger than regular humans. Plus all of your senses are enhanced, except for F8’s. Hers are off the charts!”
“How so?” F8 asked, placing her good hand on the back of Ingrid’s seat.
“The best eyesight we humans can have is twenty-twenty vision. G8, you and P8 and the others have twenty-twenty, and you’ll probably never need to wear glasses your entire lives. But for people like me, our eyesight fades with time and age. I’ll eventually need glasses.”
“You said F8’s eyes are different?” G8 pressed.
“Yep.” Ingrid gave a nod. “Her vision is twenty-five.”
“Twenty-five? Isn’t that worse than twenty-twenty?” P8 queried.
This time Ingrid shook her head. “No. You’re not getting it. Her’s is twenty slash five. Not twenty slash twenty. Her eyesight is equivalent to some of the best predatory birds in the world, like the eagle. That’s why she can see things the rest of us can’t. And her hearing is just as keen. Which is why you’d be perfect to send to alien worlds to make it habitable. You’d be better able to withstand extreme conditions, and to protect yourselves against whatever comes at you. Or happens to you.”
“You want to talk off the charts?” F8 brought up. She motioned to G8. “G8’s stronger than all of us put together. He can bench press over six hundred pounds and not break a sweat.”
Ingrid’s mouth dropped open and she glanced over at him. He noticed she stared specifically at his arms and chest. “For real?”
He snorted. “You mean that wasn’t in the files?”
“Oh, hell, no!”
P8 leaned forward to whisper, “Ask him what he can dead lift.”
“I’m afraid to ask.”
“Nine hundred.”
“Nine twenty,” G8 corrected him. “And I wasn’t even trying.”
“What’s the most you’ve ever managed?” Ingrid inquired.
G8 shrugged. “I don’t know. I used all the weights that were available in the gym, and that’s what they amounted to.”
She held up a hand. “See? That’s what I mean. You excel in areas the average person can’t begin to attain.”
“In other words, we’re more expendable than normal humans,” P8 murmured, making his disdain evident as he sat back in his seat.
“Why would you say that?” Ingrid asked. “In my opinion, you’remorevaluable.”
G8 let out a derisive laugh. “Maybe up front.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because we can’t reproduce,” F8 answered. “We can’t make more of ourselves through natural means. We’ve been tested and prodded and impregnated so many times, K8 and I got sick. They ended up doing hysterectomies on us.”
“You didn’t read about that in those dossiers you spoke of?” G8 questioned.
“I did,” Ingrid admitted. “But I…I thought… Never mind.”
“They also made us donate sperm on a monthly basis,” P8 stated. That got a gasp out of her.
“That often?”
“They gave us pictures of women and showed us porno films to make us horny so we’d jack off,” P8 continued.
G8 snorted. “Funny thing is, we managed to donate, but it was a lot more difficult for us because we’d never had any practical experience.”
