Do you or a relative work directly for the Party or as a cleaner? If yes, your application will be prioritized.
Have your parents or grandparents ever been a private landlord, investment banker, debt collector, wheel clamper, antique dealer, accountant, hospital manager or consultant? Your answer will be checked by Chain-gang Records. Please note that the sins of the father shall be visited upon the children as God wills and a Licence to Populate will not be offered to the children or grandchildren of any of the above.
Has any member of your family created more space for the next generation by committing suicide, including any method not on the government approved list? A yes will give you housing priority.
Do you eat the government recommended ten pieces of fruit per day?
Do you participate in any of the following dangerous activities: surfing, tree climbing, or animal spotting?
Do you own a horse, camel, or a bicycle?
Do you use more than four grams of opium per week?
Do you smoke more than seven joints of cannabis in a week?
Does your daily consumption of cider amount to more than two flagons?
Are you a regular attender at church? Your vicar might be asked to verify your answer.
Have you ever had points deducted for bullying at work, unneighbourly conduct, or comments construed as subversive?
Has any Party member ever raised concerns about your health?
Has any member of your family ever suffered from asthma, eczema, or a sight defect?
In the final tick box, one had to agree that should any new-born fail to meet the government guidelines for health and wellbeing then the natural laws of survival would be allowed to determine the viability of said infant via an unsupervised overnight stay in the jungle.
As soon as they put down their pens, the door at the rear of the office opened and a hand beckoned them into the next room.
‘You can either call me Administrator or Admin,’ said the young man.
He was thin and probably had a tapeworm in his stomach stripping the food of fat. He wore an armband with a parrot stitched upon it and removed a pencil from behind his ear.
Administrators were Party members and had a single parrot sewn onto their armband whether they were a filing clerk, pencil pusher, auditor, or higher bureaucrat.
‘Well do take a seat, I won’t bite,’ he said.
Bastian and May did as they were told. The administrator went over their forms one by one, sometimes tutting and writing his own comments on the reverse. Eventually, he stamped them both and handed them back. As he did so the rear door opened.
‘I’m Heinz,’ said the MHCA standing in the doorway. ‘Please, take a seat whilst I go through your forms.’
He sat on a stool behind a counter removed from the front of the old cinema and brought upstairs. Bastian and May sat together on an old red sofa.
‘I see that you’re a teacher, May,’ said Heinz.
‘Yes,’ she said smiling and fully expecting her job to give her bonus points.
‘Have you adopted any children?’
‘Not yet.’
‘But you do care about our children’s future?’
‘Of course.’
‘So long as they’re in class,’ said Heinz. ‘But tell me, why is it that your school only lost three pupils in last year’s 11 plus exam?’
‘Honestly, Heinz, I don’t know. I guess it was a good year.’
‘Or a bad one,’ he said. ‘Would you believe that some parents have taken to hiding the abnormalities of their offspring? If I were to grant you a Licence to Populate and unfortunate circumstances visited upon your own children, would you report it?’
‘Yes,’ said May and Bastian together.
Heinz ticked a little box on his own sheet.
‘Of course, no one ever says no,’ he said. ‘Now, Bastian.’
He sat up.
‘A policeman who’s never been caught in a sandstorm, really?’
‘Never.’
‘And you’ve never been bit by a snake either.’
‘No.’
‘Vampire bat?’
There was a new species in the night skies, ones that fed on human blood.
‘No.’
‘You do use opium?’
‘Who doesn’t?’
‘It does have a rather pleasing effect on one’s mind, though ten citizens have already died of an overdose in the town this year.’
‘A shame,’ said Bastian.
‘Good fortune surely, leaving more room for the rest of us.’
Heinz paused for a moment and wiped the sweat from his brow.
‘And neither of you mind breeding with someone of the same race?’
‘Not at all,’ said May.
‘No,’ replied Bastian.
‘Well I don’t see any problems then. Take a seat in the next room.’
This time they opened the door themselves before waiting a good hour. But the room had a table laden with fruit and glasses of cider.
‘Congratulations,’ said Admin upon entering the room from a side door. ‘Here’s your Licence to Populate, but remember it’s only with each other. You may kiss.’
They did as asked before leaving down the back stairs. May checked the licence, as large as a dinner plate with the letters L and P writ large in red on a white background.
Bastian tied the licence to the back of their horse and they rode slowly through town on their way back to the village and to the cheers of bystanders.
By the time they reached the village it was twilight and everyone knew of their success ahead of them. Bastian tied the horse outside Dragonfly the Chinese restaurant, ready to spend the government vouchers he’d been saving all month. The bell on the door rang as they entered.
The tables were reclaimed from old antique shops before protestors had the chance to burn them and the chopsticks were made of ivory harvested from the local jungle. Bastian ordered a flagon of cider as May checked the menu.
‘Sweet and sour zebra for me,’ she said.
‘Then I’m having elephant curry if we can share.’
‘On the house,’ said a waiter placing a bag of dried monkey meat on the table as an appetizer.
Bastian ordered their meals with rice and May gazed into his eyes before he nodded to someone across the room.
‘Who is it?’ she asked not wishing to turn
