Human Resources

Human Resources is a very important branch of every hanyo corporation. After the Helios Fail, Human Resources becomes the department in charge of keeping the chicks and slags in line, running schools and the Charm Test, running marriage and resource generation, sending burned resources to Corrections, allocating and transferring people to duties, and generally regimenting people's lives. Each corporation had its own style of handling HR, but some features, such as marriage, remain constant across corporations. To slags, chicks who work for Human Resources are possibly the most hated figures after Bully Boys .

Origin

Since the hanyo corporations were descended from the institutions of the Old Men, they inherited the corporate structure and style of their fathers. However, they quickly rejigged these organisations to suit their needs. After Helios, many of the slave-keeping functions which the patriarchal family had performed under the Old Men were now shifted to the ambit of Human Resources, since the family no longer existed.

After Helios

The department of Human Resources has two main functions: to manage the service economy of the territories, and advertise for and handle marriage. Post 2050, apart from the hanyos there were the Old Men, mostly dying as a result of their encounter with the Masterchair, the corpsecs, who were men hired before the Helios Fail to run security, all therefore rapidly aging, and there were the slags and chicks. Once marriage became a thing, there were also the Orbisons. Marriage produces babies who spent the first year of life being nursed by their biological mothers, either in the Baby Barracks (if they're girls) or remotely in their bubbles if they're boys. Slag-produced boys are Orbisons. All females spend the first five years in the Baby Barracks. In their fifth year, they take the Charm Test, and a tiny minority qualify for Charm School. HR encourages the employees of a corporation to see their organisation and its territories as a universe. 'Training' therefore includes indoctrination into socio-corporate roles, both through formal school and through entertainment, pastimes and other inputs.

The Baby Barracks

Most corporations allow the mother one year of leave to feed and bond with her baby, then on her child's first birthday they unceremoniously kick her out. A few, like WorldoMin, allow mothers to visit up to the age of five, but most cut off all contact and punish mothers who disobey. The idea is to keep mothers guessing as to which is their child, thereby securing their loyalty for the corporation as a whole. From ages one to five, the girls are raised in groups of 20 with a 'teacher' in charge. They learn basic reading writing and arithmetic.

The Charm Test

The main purpose of the Charm Test from the point of view of Human Resources was to select those slags who have both beauty and brains, in other words, pretty children desperate to please who will do anything for Daddy. HR uses medical parameters to measure bone structure, skin quality, body shape, hormone levels etc to rate the girls for beauty, and then puts them through a series of psychological tests to see if they have the qualities desired by hanyos. Three to five percent pass the Charm Test.

Slag School

Slag School is designed to teach useful skills and absolute obedience. Flunking out of Slag School usually gets you sent to Corrections. Ninety percent of HR time is spent managing Slag School.

Charm School

Charm School is where chicks learn people-wrangling so that they can do the dirty work of corporate oppression while being oppressed and chicken-hunted themselves. From ages five to ten, chick advance through Charm school year by year, studying basic curricula and being deluged with steamy romance content. At age ten, the whole batch gets to attend their first party with the seniors. They have to quickly attach themselves to the entourage of a senior or HR busts them down to Slag ASchool, where they have to join with the five-year-olds. From age eleven onwards, chicks have to make theri own entourage, and failure to to do this impressively enough also gets you sent to Slag School. The best possible route out of Charm School, it is said, is to win a reality contest open to final years (ie fifteen-year-olds). Some of the winners become celebrity wives, but if they don't find a hanyo to marry them they will quickly end up being this month's disposable party girl. Runours of what happens at these parties abound, so most of the smart chicks study and steer clear of reality shows. Those who use their brains can become Corporate Assistants, Legal Assistants or Meidcal Assistants. Since the law is whatever the hanyos say it is, mostly what the Legal Assitants do is strategise against other corporations. Chicks who fail all of these courses become models, ie hanyo party-fodder.

Marriage

After Helios, human resource generation came directly under corporate control. Since there were no more men or sperm banks outside the corporate enclaves, people could not conceive unless sanctioned by their employers. It was widely felt by the hanyos that it was undesirable to let chicks have babies, apart from the special case of celebrity wives. In most cases, the surgical enhancements and modifications that chicks had to undergo as part of their service contracts precluded pregnancy and nursing.

Slags, however, were unmodified bodies ripe for pregnancy. provided they were not handling hazardous material and were healthy. Victims of chicken-hunting were debarred from marriage, as were RanDees. Human Reosurces hardsold marriage to the slags as a temporary respite from the drudgery of their lives. To sign up for it, they had to pay a year's salary in service dollars in advance, and pass a battery of tests.

The 'bride' was 'married' to a 'husband' appointed by Human Resources who accompanied her on a three month 'honeymoon' at some glamourous destination. This husband was fitted with a loophead so he could not impregnate his 'bride'; he was usually a low ranking Orbison whose job was to romance the slag and hormonally prepare her for implantation. This was the slag's first experience of sex with a man, and it was a very big selling point. On returning from the honoymoon the slag would spend three weeks in a corporate flat with her 'husband' playing at domestic bliss, while the fetus was implanted and tested to see if it had taken. If it had, she was transferred to hospital where she would live in a MAKER ORB for the duration of her pregnancy.