Chapter 2 Chapter One

A gray and white building, short, with only thirty-four floors.It is written in large letters at the door: Central London Incubation and Conditioning Center, and the shield-shaped pattern is the motto of the world state: society, duty, stability. The huge hall on the ground floor faces north.Although it was cold outside the windows for summer, it was equatorially hot inside.A thin streak of foreboding light shone blindingly through the window, longing for some pale, goosebump-ridden image of a plainclothes non-professional, and found only laboratory glassware, nickel-plated cabinets, and bleakly lit of ceramics.Only desolation responds to desolation.The lab coats worn by the workers are white, and the rubber gloves on their hands are as white as corpses.The light froze, froze, became a ghost, and only under the yellow lens of the microscope did it find some plump, living matter.The thing was as rich as cream under the camera, lying in rows of beautifully polished test tubes on the laboratory table, stretching into the distance.

"Here," the director opened the door and said, "is the breeding room." When the director of the Incubation and Condition Setting Center entered the room, three hundred incubators leaned over the instruments.Some of them were silent, absorbed, and barely breathless; others were talking, humming, and whistling to themselves absent-mindedly.A group of new students followed the director humbly, a little nervous.They were all very young, rosy-cheeked, and still wet.Everyone held a notebook, and they desperately memorized every sentence the big man said—it was a rare privilege to learn directly from the big man.The Director of the Central London Incubation and Conditioning Center places great emphasis on personally leading new students on tours of the various departments.

"It's just to give you a general impression," he explained to them.For since their brains are to be worked upon, they must be made aware of the whole situation, though they need to know as little as possible if they are to be good members of society and live happily.The particulars lead to virtue and happiness, and that knowing the whole is a necessary evil, as every wise man knows, for it is not philosophers who form the backbone of society, but joiners and stamp-collectors. "Tomorrow," the director always smiled at them, said kindly and slightly threateningly, "you will be able to settle down and do serious work. You won't have much time to understand the whole situation. And at the same time..."

And at the same time, it is a privilege to go directly from the mouth of the big man to the notebook.The children frantically took notes. The director walked into the house.He is slender, slightly thin, with a straight body, a long chin, and quite prominent front teeth. When he is not talking, his two lips can barely cover them. The lips are plump and beautifully curved.Is he old or young?Thirty or fifty?Or fifty-five?It's hard to tell.However, in this stable age, no one would think of asking. "Let me tell you from the beginning." The director said, and the active student wrote down his meaning in the notebook: Tell me from the beginning. "These," he waved his hand, "are the incubators." He opened an insulated door and showed the students racks of numbered test tubes. "These are eggs that are supplied only this week, kept at the temperature of the blood," he explained, "and the temperature of the male mate," he said, opening another door, "must be kept at thirty-five degrees instead of Thirty-seven degrees. Standard blood temperature can disable gametes." A ram nestled in a heater is infertile.

Still leaning on the incubator, he briefed them on the modern process of insemination as the students' pencils scribbled across their notebooks.Of course, starting with the introduction to surgery—"Surgery is for the benefit of society, and it can also bring a reward, which is equivalent to six months' salary." Then he talked about keeping the stripped eggs alive and actively developing The technology, the consideration of the best temperature, the best salinity and the best viscosity; what liquid is used to store the stripped mature eggs.He then led the students to the workbench and showed them actually how the liquid was drawn from the test tube and poured drop by drop onto a specially warmed microscope slide; Abnormal, how the eggs are counted, how they are transferred into a perforated container, how that container is immersed in a warm medium with free swimming sperm - he emphasizes that the concentration of sperm in the medium is at least per cubic centimeter One hundred thousand (at the same time he led them to watch the operation), how to take out the container from the liquid after ten minutes and check the contents again.If any eggs have not been fertilized, they are soaked again, if necessary, and then soaked again; the fertilized eggs are then returned to the incubator, leaving the alphas and betas until finally bottled.And the Gammas, Deltas, and Epsilons were taken out again after thirty-six hours, and entered into the Bokanovsky procedure.

"Procedure Bokanovsky," the Director repeated.The students draw a line under the word in their small notebooks. One egg forms one embryo, one adult, as is the norm.But a Bokanovsky-processed egg will germinate, proliferate, and divide to form eight to ninety-six embryos, each of which can grow into a full embryo, and each embryo into a full-fledged adult. .In the past, a fertilized egg could only produce one person, but now it can produce ninety-six people.This is called progress. "Essentially," concluded the Director, "the Bokanovsky procedure involves a series of inhibitions of development—we stop the egg from developing and growing normally. And surprisingly, the egg responds by: Adorable."

The response of the egg is sprouting, and the pencil is busy. He pointed.On a very slowly moving conveyor belt, a rack full of test tubes was entering a huge metal cabinet, and another rack of test tubes was gradually emerging, and the machine made a slight humming sound.He told them that it took eight minutes for a rack of test tubes to pass through the metal cabinet.Eight minutes of intense X-ray exposure, which is roughly as much as an egg can withstand.Some eggs died, some of the least sensitive ones split in two, while most sprouted four germs, some sprouted eight.They are all sent back to the incubator, where the embryo continues to develop.Sudden freezing was given two days later.Freeze, suppress.Two divided into four, further divided into eight.The germ goes on tillering, and after tillering it is almost dead with alcohol, followed by tillering again, and tillering again--germ grows germ, new germ develops new germ--and then it is left to grow freely, and so on. If it is suppressed again, it will generally cause death.By this time the primordial egg may have divided into eight to ninety-six embryos—a remarkable advance over nature, you will admit.Eternal multi-birth is not the pitiful twin or triple life in the era of maternal division.At that time the division of eggs was accidental - now, in fact, one egg can grow into forty or fifty at a time, or eighty or ninety people.

"Eight or ninety people." The director waved his hands and repeated, as if throwing a bounty. But one of the students stupidly asked what good it would do. "My dear boy!" the director turned sharply to him. "Can't you see that? Can't you even see that?" He solemnly raised a hand. "The Bokanovsky program is stable. An important means of society!" An important means of stabilizing society. Mass-produced standardized males and females.A small factory is staffed entirely from a single egg that has undergone the Bokanovsky procedure. "Ninety-six multiple children operating ninety-six identical machines!" The voice was almost trembling with excitement, "Now you really understand your place, for the first time in history." He quoted the global His motto: "Society, Duty, Stability." These are great words. "If we could Bokanovskyize endlessly, everything would be solved."

These are solved by the Gammas of the same standard, the Deltas of the same standard, the Epsilons of the same standard, and the millions of identical superborns.The principles of mass production are finally being used in biology. "But unfortunately," the Director shook his head, "we cannot Bokanovskyize without limit." Ninety-six seems to have reached the limit, and seventy-two is already a very good number.Producing as many batches of identical multiples as possible from the same man's sperm and eggs is the best (sadly, second-best) achievement, and even that is difficult.

"Because in the state of nature, it would take thirty years for two hundred eggs to mature. But our task now is to stabilize the population, to stabilize the population at the level of the here and now. It takes a quarter of a century to produce a few Multiple births—what use would that be?" Apparently useless.But Pozinap technology has greatly accelerated the maturation process.They are sure to produce at least two hundred and fifty mature eggs in two years, fertilize them, and Bokanovskyize them—in other words, multiply by seventy-two, and you get about one There are 18,000 brothers and sisters, and 250 batches of identical multiple children, all born within two years and all of the same age.

"Under special circumstances we can grow 15,000 adults from one egg." The director waved to a strong young man with light hair - the man happened to be passing by. "Mr. Foster," he called.The robust young man came over. "Can you tell us what is the highest record for an egg?" "Sixteen thousand and twelve at the Center," replied Mr. Foster without hesitation.He has jovial blue eyes, speaks quickly, and clearly enjoys quoting figures. "16,012, a total of 189 batches of identical twins. But in some incubation centers in the tropics," he continued, "the results are much better. Singapore's Production often exceeds 16,500, and Mombasa has hit the 17,000 target. But their conditions are excellent. If only you could see how black eggs respond to mucus! If you are used to using European material, the reaction of black eggs will surprise you. However," he added with a smile (but with a fighting light in his eyes and a defiant chin), "however, as long as there is Maybe we still want to surpass them. I am currently cultivating an amazing delta-minus egg, only 18 months old, but there are already 12,700 children, some have changed bottles, and some are still in the embryonic state , but still strong. We still have the potential to surpass Mombasa." "That's the spirit I like!" cried the Director, patting Mr. Foster on the shoulder. "Come with us, and let the children have the honor of gaining your expertise." Mr. Foster smiled politely. "Happy to help." They left together. The bottling room is busy, but harmonious and organized.The slices of fresh sow peritoneum cut into appropriate sizes are sent out from the organ bank on the second floor of the building by a small elevator, with a creak, and then a click!The elevator incubator is opened, and the people on the bottling line only need to stretch out one hand, grab the peritoneal sheet, stuff it into the bottle, press flat, the bottle that has been filled has not yet walked away along the transportation line, squeak, click!Another piece of peritoneum popped up from below, just waiting to be stuffed into another bottle—the next bottle in the endless procession on that slow conveyor belt. Next to the production line workers are the cashiers.The assembly line continued to move forward; the eggs were transferred from the test tube to a larger container one by one; the peritoneal lining was ingeniously cut open and dropped in accurately, and the alkaline salt solution was injected... At this time, the bottle had already left.Below is the job of the tagger.Genetic status, date of insemination, Bokanowski group—all the details are transferred from the tube to the bottle.This time it is no longer without a name, but signed and identified.The assembly line moved forward slowly, and entered the social condition reservation room through an entrance on the wall. "There are eighty-eight cubic meters of index cards in total," said Mr. Foster triumphantly when everyone entered the social condition reservation room. "It includes all the relevant information." The director added. "And it's updated every morning." "Adjust every afternoon." "They make designs based on data." "So many individuals of this and that quality," Mr. Foster said. "Distribute according to this and that amount." "Put the best weight in any given moment." "If there is an unexpected consumption, it will be replenished immediately." "To add immediately," repeated Mr. Foster, "if only you knew the overtime work I did after the last Japanese earthquake!" He shook his head and smiled mildly. "The destiny planners pass the numbers they designed to the fetuses." "The pregnant women give them the embryos they need." "The bottles are sent here to finalize the details of fate's setting." "Then send it to the embryo warehouse." "We are now going to the embryo warehouse." Mr. Foster opened a door and led them down the steps into the basement. Temperatures are still as hot as at the equator.It was getting darker and darker where they entered.The passage went through two doors and made two turns to keep daylight from entering the cellar. "Embryos are like photographic film," Mr. Foster said jokingly as he opened the second door. "Can only withstand red light." The place where the students followed him was dark and hot, and everything he could see was red, like the dark red in the eyes when they closed their eyes in the summer afternoon.The pot-bellied bottles on both sides of the aisle are lined up one after another, one level higher than the other, shining with countless ruby-like lights.Walking among the rubies are ghostly men and women, with blurred figures, red eyes, and all the symptoms of lupus erythematosus.The hum and click of machinery vibrated the air slightly. "Tell them a few figures, Mr. Foster." The director didn't want to say more. Mr. Foster would love to tell them some figures. Two hundred and twenty meters long, two hundred meters wide, and ten meters high, he pointed to the top of his head.The students raised their eyes to look at the high ceiling, each of them looked like chickens drinking water. The shelf has three levels: the ground gallery, the first-order gallery, and the second-order gallery. Layers of spider web-like steel frame corridors blurred into the darkness from all directions.Beside them were three red ghosts busy taking pot-bellied vials from the conveyor ladder. Elevator from the Social Destiny Room. Each bottle can be placed on any of the fifteen shelves.Although invisible to the naked eye, each shelf is a conveyor belt, moving at a speed of 33.3 centimeters per hour.Eight meters per day, two hundred and sixty-seven days.A total of 2,136 meters.One of the transmission lines in the basement is at the height of the ground, one is at the height of the first-order corridor, and half is at the height of the second-order corridor.On the morning of the 267th day, sunlight entered the bottle-changing room, and the so-called "independent life" appeared. "But before that," concluded Mr. Foster, "we've worked a lot on them. Ah, a lot." He smiled knowingly and triumphantly. "I like this kind of spirit." The director said again, "Let's walk around together, and you come and introduce everything to them, Mr. Foster." Mr. Foster complied. He introduced them to the embryos growing on the peritoneal seedbed, let them taste the concentrated blood substitutes for the embryos, explained the reason why the embryos must be stimulated with placental preparations and thyroid preparations; They looked at the injection port that automatically sprayed the pregnancy hormone every twelve meters from zero to 2040 meters; introduced the mucus that gradually increased in the last ninety-six meters; Described the artificial maternal circulation installed into each vial at 112 meters; had them look at the blood surrogate pool; looked at the mechanism that drives the fluid over the placenta and drives it through the synthetic lungs and waste filter Centrifugal pumps; spoke to them about the troublesome tendency of embryos to anemia; about high doses of pig stomach extract and liver of embryonic horses - the human embryo needs these nutrients. He also showed them a simple mechanism that habituated the movement by shaking each embryo every time it reached the last two meters of its eight-meter run.He reminded the seriousness of the so-called "trauma of bottle changing" and described various precautions for proper training of the embryos in the bottle to minimize the dangerous shock.They were introduced to the sex test at around two hundred meters.Explained the labeling system: T means male, O means female, and those who are destined to be infertile women are a question mark, black on a white background. "Because, of course," said Mr. Foster, "multiply is superfluous in the vast majority of cases. One multiply in twelve hundred eggs is sufficient for our purposes. But We want to be selective. Of course, there must be a large insurance factor. Therefore, we let as many as 30% of the total number of female embryos develop, and the rest will be separated every 24 for the rest of the journey. Rice gave a dose of male hormones. The result: By the time the bottle was changed they were infertile women—completely normal anatomy.” Only, he had to admit, they did have a slight tendency to grow beards.” But sterile. Guaranteed sterile. And that brings us finally," Mr. Foster went on, "out of the slavish imitation of nature and into the world of human invention, which is much more interesting." He rubs his hands together.They certainly didn't settle for hatching embryos: hatching embryos is something any cow can do. "We also predetermine the fate of people, set the conditions of people. The babies we produce are socialized people, called alphas or epsilons, and let them dig the gutter or..." He had planned to say "dominate the world ", but changed his mouth, "Be the director of the incubation center." The director of the incubation center smiled and accepted the compliment. They were passing in front of frame No. 11 at 320 meters.A young beta-subtractive technician was busy with a screwdriver and wrench for a passing blood pump—the one used to pump out the vials of blood substitutes.He tightened the screw, and the hum of the motor intensified ever so slightly.Down, down... With one last twist, he glanced at the revolving counter, mission accomplished.He took two steps down the line, repeating the same procedure before the next blood pump. "With fewer revolutions per minute," Mr. Foster explained, "the circulation of the blood substitute slows down and takes longer to flow through the lungs, so that less oxygen is delivered to the embryo. There's no better way to reduce embryo size than to reduce oxygen." He rubbed his hands together again. "But why did you lower the embryo size?" asked a naive student. "Silly boy!" After a long silence, the director said, "Didn't you think that Epsilon embryos must have Epsilon environment and Epsilon inheritance?" The student obviously hadn't thought about it, and he was bewildered. "The lower the caste," said Mr. Foster, "the less oxygen is supplied. The brain is affected first, then the bones. Oxygen up to seventy per cent of normal to become a dwarf. Less than per cent Seventy is a freak without eyes." "That would be total waste," concluded Mr. Foster. And at the same time, if they can find a technology that shortens the maturity period, what a service they will make to society! (His tone becomes confidential and urgent.) "Imagine a horse." They imagined it. Horses mature in six years; elephants mature in ten years; and humans are not sexually mature until they are thirteen years old, and they are already twenty years old when they are fully mature.Of course, the result of delayed development is human intelligence. "But we on the Epsilons," said Mr. Foster, with great justice, "do not need human intelligence." "I don't need it, and I can't get it. But Epsilon's mind is mature when they are ten years old, but their bodies are not mature until they are eighteen years old. Is it wrong to let immaturity take up many years?" Necessary, but also wasteful. What a saving to society it would be if the development of physical strength could be accelerated, say, as fast as a cow!" "Great savings!" murmured the students.Mr. Foster's enthusiasm is infectious. He speaks quite technically of endocrine disorders that retard growth, and suggests budding mutations as an explanation.So, can the effect of this mutation be eliminated?Could an appropriate technique be used to revert individual epsilon embryos to normalcy like dogs and cows?That's the problem, and it's pretty much solved. Pickington in Mombasa has bred individuals who are sexually mature at four and fully grown at six and a half.That was a triumph of science, but it is not yet useful in society.Six-year-old men and women are too stupid to do Epsilon's work.But this is a "package" program, either unchanged or completely changed.Their attempts to find the ideal compromise between a twenty-year-old adult and a six-year-old adult have so far been unsuccessful.Mr. Foster sighed and shook his head. They wandered around in the scarlet twilight, and came to the vicinity of the 170 meters of the ninth frame.From here down, rack No. 9 is closed.The bottle ends its trip in a tunnel-like thing.There is an opening in the tunnel every certain distance, two or three meters wide. "It regulates the temperature," said Mr. Foster. Hot tunnels alternate with cold tunnels.Discomfort in the form of intense X-rays was combined with freezing, and the embryos experienced horrific freezing when they were bottle-changed.These embryos were destined to immigrate to the equatorial regions to work as miners, rayon reelers, and steelworkers, and later to make their minds follow the judgment of their bodies. "We set the conditions so that they can thrive in hot climates," concluded Mr. Foster, "and our colleagues upstairs will train them to love the heat." "And the secret to happiness and virtue," said the director as if saying aphorism, "is to like what you must do. The goal of all conditions is to make people like their inescapable social destiny." In an empty space where the two tunnels meet, a nurse is carefully probing the jelly-like substance in a passing bottle with a long, thin needle.The students and the guide watched in silence for a while. "Lenina," said Mr. Foster, after the nurse withdrew the needle and stood up straight. The girl turned around in surprise.One could see that, despite the light making her blush like lupus and her eyes red, she was beautiful. "Henry." She flashed him a red smile—a row of coral teeth. "Charming, charming," murmured the director, patting her lightly two or three times, and getting a respectful smile from her. "What are you adding to them?" asked Mr. Foster, his voice deliberately businesslike. "Ah, the usual typhoid and sleeping sickness vaccines." "Workers at the equator will be vaccinated at a distance of 150 meters." Mr. Foster said to the students, "At this time, the embryo still has gills. We make the 'fish' immune, and they will not get humans in the future." sickness." He turned to Lenina, "on the roof at four-fifty this afternoon," he said, "as usual." "Charming." The director said again, gave her a final pat, and left with the others. On the tenth rack, rows of next-generation chemical workers are being trained to withstand the hazards of lead poisoning, caustic soda, tar, and chlorine.On the third rack are embryonic rocket plane mechanics, each batch of 250, the first of which is passing the 1,100-meter point on the third rack.A special mechanism keeps their containers spinning. "It's to improve their balance," Mr. Foster explained. "Once the rocket is in space, it's very difficult to get out of the rocket to repair it. We slow down when they're upright, and make them hungry." ; we double the supply of blood substitutes when they stand on their heads. That way they associate comfort with being on their heads. They're actually only really happy when they're on their heads.” "Now," Mr. Foster went on, "I'm going to show you the characterization of the Alpha Plus Intellectual, which is very interesting. We have a bunch of Alpha Plus on Rack Five. Promenade," he called to the two boys who had already started down the first floor. "They're roughly around 900 meters," he explained. "Before the embryo's tail disappears, it's actually impossible to set intelligence conditions. Come with me." But the director was already looking at his watch. "Ten minutes to three," he said. "My concern is that there won't be time to look at the intellectual embryos. We have to get back to the nursery before the kids wake up from their naps." Mr Foster was disappointed. "At least check out the bottle changing room," he begged. "That's fine too," the director smiled generously, "Then let's have a look."

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