The party lasted into the evening, when the full moon’s mild shine took over from the summer sun’s glare. Gwen asked Ashley, “What are you going to do with your babies?”
“Well, give birth to them and raise them together with Ashton.” Ashley glanced at her brother, who was clearly proud of being a father.
“Have you considered having an abortion?” said Gwen.
Ashley glared at her. “Are you out of your freakin’ mind? Did Ashton rape me?”
Ashton gently stroked over his trousers between his legs and winced. “As battered and squeezed as my poor little boy is, that should be out of the question.”
Gwen nodded and laughed.
“Well, then does my pregnancy pose any serious risk to my health?” went on Ashley.
“I guess not,” said Gwen.
“Okay, then is there a significant chance that our children will be handicapped and find life a burden?”
“As a matter of fact, yes. They’ve come from you-know-what, which creates deformed babies, as everyone knows.”
“Not that myth again,” sighed Ashley and rolled her eyes. “First of all, no, incest does not make deformed babies. It only increases the chances of having handicapped kids because it raises the risk of harmful recessive alleles from both parents coming together. But as long as the developing babies are regularly checked and if need be aborted, incest can and often does yield perfectly healthy children. Indeed, it can sometimes even endow the kids with extraordinary gifts. I’ll have our babies screened regularly anyway. I’d do it even if I had married someone else.”
“But doesn’t incest lower variation and thereby endanger the population?” asked Gwen.
Ashley answered: “Yes, a population with a small gene pool that keeps inbreeding lacks variation and is thereby vulnerable to infections and environmental changes. But that’s inbreeding on a large scale, not a bit of sibcest here and there. But sustained inbreeding on a big scale also has a positive effect: It eliminates many instances of the harmful recessive alleles since it raises the chances that those alleles are expressed instead of being passed on by carriers.”
Ashton went on: “As for our babies, they have a second shield against harmful mutations in addition to the screening Ashley will regularly undergo: our grandparents, Mom’s parents and Dad’s parents, have genetically augmented their children and freed them from genetic defects. That’s why we two in particular don’t have an increased risk from incest. It’s also how our parents could have opposite-sex identical twins and why we don’t burp, fart or poop. We four really have to thank our grandparents that we can eat fully artificial food instead of living beings.”
Ashley said, “Thus, neither rape, nor danger for me, the mother, nor danger for our kids is present. Therefore, anyone trying to abort my pregnancy would be a cold-blooded murderer and get kicked in the butt by me. And what’s true of others is true of me as well. Now, Gwen, do you know me, who am like yourself a lover of animals and plants and all living beings, as a cold-blooded killer?”
“Of course not, and you’d normally be right, but, but …”
“But what?” said Ashley, though she knew exactly what Gwen meant.
Thinking hard about how to put it, Gwen uneasily changed from one leg to the other repeatedly. “Well … the thing is … your kids are … how shall I say this,” she looked up, “well, they’ve come from, you know, ince…” she trailed off.
“Yes, they’ve resulted from the incestuous sexual union of me with my own identical twin brother Ashton whom I share an eternal spiritual link with, and I’m proud of it. They’re our kids, and we don’t care whether anyone else finds it immoral or whatnot. Happy?”
“Okay,” said Gwen. “You’re right. Live and let live!”
Chapter End Notes:
Do you agree with the linked Smith twins' defense of sibling incest? Why or why not?38Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmvUVKNZUve
