The Jury Farm

Janie only wanted to know where her sister was.

Ellie Barbour was a lot older than Janie, and Grant said she would have been fourteen now. It was Ellie's birthday today, Grant said, but they couldn't talk about it. They had to remember Ellie in their hearts but make everybody think they forgot her. Grant was very wise about things like that. He was almost as old as Ellie and he was their brother.

So Janie pretended to forget Ellie but remembered her very much in her heart. Which means she didn't even talk about her to Grant. Only to Mommy.

Ellie had gone over the fence, Janie had reminded Mommy, and gone down the road and found out where the noises were coming from. The snorting and humming and whining and thumping and scraping didn't come from alligator cricket tournaments or monsoons or wild moose parties, Ellie had said. They were made by giant misshapen cars with huge claws, digging holes in the earth. And then Ellie had been taken to the police station, and nobody had seen her since.

And now Janie had been taken to the police station. There were two parts to the office she was in, and the officer was meeting with her parents in the other part, with the door closed. She had tried to listen through the door, but the secretary had music on, and she couldn't hear a word. So all she could do was wait, and pretend very hard to not remember Ellie. And she could read.

Nobody knew she could read. Not even Mommy knew that, because reading isn't something you do in your heart. Reading is something you do with your eyes, and you just do it, and there really isn't anything to talk about. But it really helps when you're stuck in an office with nothing else to do.

So Janie found a spot near the window by the secretary's desk where there was a stack of papers, gave the secretary her most innocent smile, and started reading:

CONFIDENTIAL

Pre-Harvest Report

Jury Farm Project

Mission: 

To provide a reliable source of individuals qualified to serve as jurors at all court levels throughout all states and territories.

Progress Toward Goals:

Repeated here for reference purposes, five main objectives established at the outset of the Project are relevant at this stage:

1. To build a self-contained habitat ("the Farm") for jury candidates ("the Candidates").
2. To seed the population of the Farm with persons under the age of 30 months, who are wards of their respective states and do not receive regular visits from their families of origin.
3. To raise the Candidates in an isolated setting, ensuring that they remain untainted by any knowledge of real events which could disqualify them from serving as jurors.
4. To educate and condition the Candidates to be optimally qualified to serve the prosecution as jurors in any trial in any court in the United States.
5. To harvest the Candidates as needed to serve in jury trials.

The current status of Progress toward each of these objectives is outlined below:

1. The Farm is approximately eighty-four percent (84%) built, which conforms to the timeline set forth by the Plan, as amended. The remaining sixteen percent (16%) represents the final phase of construction, to accommodate the expected population growth as the current population matures and begins to reproduce (See p. 32 of the Plan, section 12: "Sustainability").
2. Four thousand, five hundred thirty-eight (4,538) qualifying Candidates have been transported to the Town over the sixteen (16) years since Stage One of construction was complete. These consisted of two thousand, two hundred sixty-eight (2,268) males and two thousand, two hundred seventy (2,270) females, and they have been living in small groups in homes on the Farm, along with adult caretakers they believe to be their natural parents.
3. Isolation has been completely successful with the following exceptions:
1. A total of six (6) Candidates were exposed to construction in progress, and had to be terminated.
2. A total of eight (8) Candidates showed persistent curiosity regarding life outside the Farm, and had to be terminated.
4. Education and conditioning have been highly successful. The following methods were implemented:
1. Schools. All the Candidates attend school from Kindergarten through Grade Twelve (12), and some attend preschool as well. Eight hundred four (804) students will begin attending college in the fall. Curriculum and teaching methods promote a binary ('either/or') thinking style, to help Candidates efficiently identify trial defendants as either good or evil.
2. Home. All the homes are run by trained staff whom the Candidates believe are their biological parents. Education and conditioning in the home begins before the Candidates start school, and continues throughout childhood.
3. Neighborhood. Conditioning is extended to the Candidates' neighborhoods and every aspect of their lives. For example, the Farm is divided into fifty-six (56) sections, each named after one of the fifty-five (55) states and territories of the United States plus the District of Columbia. Each of these divisions is in turn given one or two designations which mimic common town names, such as  'Springfield' or 'Hillsborough.' This way if an attorney asks a Candidate during voir dire where he or she resides, the Candidate will be able to provide an appropriate reply in full honesty.
5. Harvest of the first crop of jury Candidates is scheduled for the third week of June. This inaugural crop will be small, only one hundred twenty (120) Candidates, as outlined in the original Plan, as amended.

Harvest Methods and Best Practices

Several factors set the inaugural harvest apart from subsequent harvests, including the smaller size of the crop and the fact that the harvests do not yet form a part of the Candidates' lives or cultural frame of reference. To this extent, conditioning for this inaugural crop cannot be complete, as previous harvests form a necessary part of Candidate conditioning under the Plan. 

The following methods and practices are being strictly adhered to for the inaugural harvest:

1. Surprise. No advance warning or indication will be given to any Candidates that any harvesting will occur, except for the fact that the subject of jury duty is presented in their education as an important civic duty in a free society. When the inaugural harvest occurs, it will be a surprise to both the members of the crop and their peers.
2. No publicity. No Candidates except those who are an actual part of the current crop will be aware of the harvest until after it is complete.
3. Final conditioning step and guarantee of confidentiality. As outlined in the Plan, as amended, the aftermath of the harvest will be leveraged to achieve maximum efficiency in the trial process, as well as to allow for the retirement of some veteran staff members. To complete the conditioning process, the disappearance of the harvested Candidates will be explained as a brutal mass murder, with appropriate graphic details and evidence provided. After serving as jurors, to preserve the integrity of the Farm's confidentiality and ensure a continuous supply of jurors without activist interference, the entire crop will be returned to Farm property for termination.