PROLOGUe

The birth box was large squarish glass plated box. It was filled with a reddish bubbling liquid that seemed thick to an outsider, an unbeliever, almost like hair gel. It stood on a heavy metal four legged stand and it radiated light that would spill across the room, and flood the premises with an eerie light, like that of a science fiction movie. It poured over the twin IBM's that sat cheek to cheek on the mahogany desk just beyond the box's reach. It cast red shows on the monitors and gages that swamped about it's square frame like sharks in the ocean, the machines with the sole function of monitoring the life that grew within. The ceiling was high and strewn with wire after colored wire and large circular metal rods that fell from their base and met to hold in unison a metal ring, which supported the long metal arrow that hung like a guillotine over the birth box. And finally, in it's rays of light the reddened glow passed on the it's creator.

A woman, dressed to the nine's in a two piece navy suit, her skin now a bright red as she leaned in gently to tap the shiny, almost reflective surface of her grand creation. She won the Nobel prize, but that thought cranked dully in her head. With a well manicure finger nail, that remained vacant of any artificial color, Gillian tapped lightly upon the ersatz uterus and the light trembled with the motion. And as the light shimmered, so did thin red line the blipped across the main monitor, that was somehow hooked up to the giant arrow, through what she figured was the masses of colored wires over head. The finer details of the equipment never really bothered her. She had of course leaned their make-up and assembly once, the neck bones connected to the shoulder bone, etc, etc. Now, their function was her only concern.

And with the sharp jumping of the thin line that played it's way across the main monitor, inside, floating in suspension, enveloped by the red light, unit 7-5-1 peeled open it's tiny blue eyes. She called her Gwen.

Gwen was now beginning to define herself. Her head, a large mass of tissue looking so out of place on her tiny body was cushioned with nero-transmittic wires, and it made the embryo look almost captive in her watery home. Short little arms with tiny fingers adoring them rested comfortably before her. The small legs curled convulsively beneath her umbilical cord and then unit 7-5-1 peered, almost wisely over at Gillian. Then lifting her head, in what could have been taken as an act of acknowledgement, she closed her tiny blue eyes, to shut out the thought of her captivity.

Gillian straighten her body, and feeling suddenly, a little empty and tired all at the same time, she turned on the tiled floor that seemingly glowed the same red color and headed for the door. Her heels clicked in timing on the glossy tiles and swam in the light. It was 12:36 am on a Friday night, it was early December and outside she knew it would be snowing, it was Ichabod Institution in New York city, and it was a very long day for Dr. Gillian Annson.

I

The factory again. It was always right behind her eye lids, waiting to manifest itself to her again and again. The factory with it's lone worker. A woman, in a long crystal white lab coat that drug itself along the purplish-gray floors. She was short and her face was never very clear. And everything was covered in a purplish-gray film, almost like sticky dust. The gears churned with a screeching sound that never reached the woman's ears because she was deaf, and she was blind. Those empty watery green eyes stared vacantly ahead as the assembly line crept by with it's parts strewn in neat rows.

It was the human doll factory, it's parts, tiny cupie doll arms, legs, bellies, heads, all appeared somehow and somehow, with agonizing slowness found their way to the hands of the lone woman. She seemed to know just when a piece began to slink her way, and she would feel for it momentarily, brushing her well manicures fingers over the rubbery purple surface of the assembly line. Finding it in seconds she would lift the piece, this time a head, with large painted blue eyes and hold it to her, almost tenderly, almost in a kind of mourning, and know that the belly was next. And in that way, piece by inching piece, she would assemble the babies.

Clicking the head into it's gaping neck socket, she would relish the soft skin of plastic as it gave gently under her fingers. Little bow legs wheeled their way down the line, with ten perfect little toes, for she would brush over everyone with the instruments that now served as her eyes. With a nudge both limbs were firmly in place. And finally the pair of arms, strong pudgy extremities, rattled down to her side and completed the infant.

Then she would hold it out, straight into what would have been her line of vision, had the Trust not interfered, just for a moment, knowing that the next head was near, the next baby to be made already shaping itself on the assembly line, she would hold it out-and see her creation, without seeing it at all. And with a trace of satisfaction tugging at her lips, she placed the baby doll, with loving hands on to the proceeding line, that carried the blue eyed baby up and out of the factory, to whatever waited outside the purple haze of her beginning.

And it was as if the woman sensed the moving on, like clock work, she turned back, as another tiny head reeled forward, just within her finger tips....

II

Dr. Gillian Annson woke up. She found herself bent over, quite uncomfortably, her long oak desk. Setting her chin on the shiny wood, long arms shaped into a perfect W before her. Her reading glasses hung lopsided off the end of her nose. She was still in her navy suit, and as she began to take in her surroundings, she cursed, when she saw out the large four paned window that it was still snowing.

More snow that we've seen in years, she thought as a wide yawn slipped from her lips. She pushed her herself up with her hand, laying flat now, against the cold surface of the wood, and mentally prepared herself for the coming wave of pain that was sure to strike. And with a sigh, she pushed up, and as sure as there was snow in New York that day, a pained rolled up her spinal cord and rested at the base of her neck.