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When Lilith was kicked out of the garden of Eden, she was forced to fend for herself in a harsh, unforgiving world. Lost and alone, she came upon a bloke named Satan. Their love produced two children who were twins. However, the first born twin was weak and fragile, while the second was strong. At some point, the younger twin killed his brother, and would go on to father the entire human race.

So it has always been throughout history. Whenever a multiple birth of two or more children is to be expected, ( twins, triplets, etc), only one is born completely normal and grow to live a long and productive existence. The others are either born sickly and underdeveloped, or are stillborn. Those who make it to old age remain fragile and weak their whole lives. However, we should rejoice in this. Humanity is a vile and worthless species, and only those who rise above the fray are deserving of life. This world belongs to those who are strong, while the weak suffer what they will.

HAIL SATAN!

That fierce competition for survival should begin as early as possible, even in the womb. I need to introduce a mechanism where fetuses "fight" for space while in the mother, so that result will be some "very early" births (presumably miscarriages) and a final "normal birth" of the "winning" one. How would I be able to make this possible?

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    $\begingroup$ Hint: since you are using religiously biased names, I would avoid the cheering up you have put in the text. $\endgroup$
    – L.Dutch ♦
    Commented Feb 24, 2020 at 21:25
  • $\begingroup$ Stephen King's the Dark Half uses parasitic twins although much more fully absorbed than the examples on wikipedia. Julian May uses pre-birth fratricide for Marc and Matthieu, but I can't remember which book of the Milieu series it is in. $\endgroup$
    – Jontia
    Commented Feb 25, 2020 at 14:52

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While in the womb each of the two fetuses has to connect its own placenta to the womb itself.

The more surface area covered by one's own placenta connection, the better exchange with the mother's body.

Here is where the competition starts: the fetus who can faster develop its own connection can saturate the womb and induce starvation into the remaining one, which will be then miscarried.

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  • $\begingroup$ You could also have the placentas capable of fusing and leading to a process analogous to twin-to-twin transfusion syndrome, except more beneficial to the recipient twin. $\endgroup$
    – Ettina Kitten
    Commented Jun 4, 2021 at 14:25
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The real-world example of this happens in certain species of shark. The female tiger shark has two uteruses. The two largest and most powerful offspring devour the others while still inside the female.

From the sound of it, you don't need any fancy mechanism. The offspring maximize their chances of being born by eating the other babies. It's in their instinct and necessary for their survival. Of course, successful mating results in several eggs being fertilized and several babies starting the growth and development process. In the end, though, only one can be born alive.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/melissacristinamarquez/2018/12/29/shark-cannibalism-its-a-thing-and-it-just-got-weirder/#352566445e10

http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20170103-shark-babies-eat-each-other

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You could have something similar to how baby sharks gobble up all but one if their siblings in the womb, it is believed that this due to other embryos being from other fathers, so the first and more developed shark will kill off most of the rest.

You could have a survival instinct as part of their genetic material, survival of the fittest needs to start in the womb, the one that is victorious in the womb will surely have a better chance in the world, so as other animals have instinctual behaviour as soon as they are born, these children will have it in the womb, to ensure that one child will be strong and a fighter.

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  • $\begingroup$ I have just seen Greig has wrote the same thing while I was writing this lol. $\endgroup$
    – user69935
    Commented Feb 24, 2020 at 23:05
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There is an existing mechanism within embryonic development that allows for this type of scenario:

Human Chimerism

In which an embryo literally absorbs it's counterpart, leading to such strange possiblities as this and equally bizzarly, this

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It would be interesting to imagine that during an early stage of development of "human" fetuses, that the fetus would start to produce a toxin, probably some for of antibody, and emit it into the placenta.

The antibodies would recognise the self (the fetus that produced it), the mother (because the mother transfers blood cells with her own antigenes on them from day 1), but not any other fetuses in the womb. Therefore, the first fetus to reach this stage in development would hinder the growth of the other fetuses and may even cause to mother to reject one of them, if the mother's body detects it as a source of inflammation.

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