Prologue
"Hand me that femur, will you?"
"Which one, I've got a D12 and an E7 here."
"The E7, give me the E7."
It was a rainy Thursday afternoon, and Brandon Wells and Nicholas Hughes were at work in the Creation Zone. It was the largest building in the Society, made of old blocks of stone, with some ivy starting to crawl up the left side. Inside, many Creators were at work, building the Society's residents. Twenty two years ago, a young doctor named Hugo Wallace figured out a way to create babies. Using his vast scientific knowledge, he was able to make muscles, skin, and bones out of natural materials, and with these, he and his team formed a live, human baby. There were some complications, but over the years new discoveries were made that fixed these difficulties. Mr. Wallace and the rest of his workers would say that this was a better way to live. No more deaths during childbirth, or parents who had a child to take care of even though they had never wanted one. And now they could cure illnesses in a child before it was even born. More and more of these lab-born people were made, and less and less true-born people gave birth. After fourteen years, a law was passed that stated that you were not allowed to give birth in the Society. If you were against the new way of life, then your name would be recorded and you would be sent to another town that was far away from the Society. Those who gave birth in the Society were shamefully exiled.
Brandon passed the bone over the spotless metal table to Nicholas, who was holding out his arm, waiting to carefully attach the bone to the bottom of the pelvis. It was difficult and precise work, and was done by only the brightest men and women in the community. Many of the Creators were waiting for the MoTech- Modern Technology- scientists to come out with a machine to do the work. Nicholas, being the head of the Leg Department, had received information that MoTech had made a breakthrough, and were expecting the finished product to come out in only two years. But for now, manual labor was required.
Nicholas was about to insert the leg bone into the pelvis when a grunt coming from Brandon's section startled him, causing him to almost jab the bone into one of the ribs.
"God, Brandon, you almost made me break a rib over here! You know how much these things cost!"
"Sorry, sorry," Brandon called, with a concerned look on his face. He was staring at some papers and charts that he was holding. "I was just reading about our . . . subjects, I guess that's what you would call them."
"What about them?"
"Well, I was just thinking . . . they don't seem to be . . ." Brandon was struggling for the right words, " . . . normal. Have you ever seen a single one of them laugh? Or cry? Or even yell at someone?"
"No . . . but why do we need them to be angry and upset?" Nicholas was confused. He had been working with Brandon for over twenty two years, and had come to learn that Brandon was not a patient man. He couldn't stand when people whined or complained. Why, all of a sudden, was he craving that reaction from the subjects?
"It's not that I want angry and upset people," Brandon replied, rubbing his forehead, his face still a mask of distress. "It's that they don't seem to- feel anything. They don't have emotions," he finished, finally voicing his concern.
Nicholas, a deep thinker, paused for a minute. He scratched his beard and said, "well, if they don't need to love, for the obvious reason that the purpose of this emotion is to create babies, why do they need emotions? Isn't love the only emotion that people really need? Why do we need hatred, sadness, whatever else there is?"
Brandon considered this theory. "I guess," he answered reluctantly, "but it doesn't seem right. I'm going to research it."
"Be my guest," Nicholas said, shaking his head, "but I really don't think that there's any point."
