The Vanished Birds

by Simon Jimenez

  “I am happy. Did you even get my letters? I met someone, and she’s fucking wonderful, and if she asked me to marry her tomorrow, I’d do it in a heartbeat. I’m sorry you’re feeling lonely right now, but don’t you dare try to tear me down—and thanks, by the way, for not calling me as soon as you left Umbai, for not making sure I was okay after I saw Huck’s—after I…You have no idea, do you? You didn’t even think about the hell I’d been living through, trying to forget what I’d seen. You didn’t think at all. You know, I used to think of you as a genuinely decent person, trapped under a hard shell, but obviously I was wrong. For all your pretensions, you’re just as self-involved as your mother. I can’t believe you’d even think—”

  Fumiko hung up.

  Once she let out a breath and she had steadied her nerves with a sip of wine, she was surprised by how little she felt. She pocketed her Handheld, and ordered another drink; she rejoined the party.

  The crowd was happy to receive her.

  * * *

  —

  Umbai’s Ark departed from the Colombian Elevator two years later, in early June. It was the third to leave Earth, followed by twelve more, from the Singaporean Elevator, and the Kenyan, on their way to other stations, which belonged to rival companies. The stations were still in active construction, but the trip would be long enough that they would be habitable once the people arrived. It was the leaving that was unpleasant. There were revolts, battles over rights to board the ships, all of which were lost by the rebels under the salute of gunfire, and the vague promises on the Feed that one day the Arks would return for a second pickup. They did not.

  In five years, more than one billion people rocketed into the stars under the time-stopping veil of cold sleep, their lips frozen in prayer for their eventual reawakening in a safer time, a better place. It was a sleep that lasted decades, until, pod by pod, the families woke up and pressed their noses to the band of windows, mouths agape at the sight of the massive birdlike structure silhouetted by the white sun; the two gracefully articulated wings in full spread against the light. Pelican Station. Their home borne on wings, with the stars their canopy. The transition was long and difficult for the first generation of settlers living so far from Earth, their dreams haunted by their lost north star, but with time, and the arrival of children who had no emotional connection to blue skies, Earth became only a story; a story shared lightly between strangers rich enough to afford passage between worlds while over the serving of hot drinks they traded speculations on the old ways of travel; if this was what their ancestors felt, when they boarded a boat and kicked away from shore, this dread excitement.

  Life spread—to Macaw, to Barbet, to Thrasher. Desiree and Palatian. To the outer reaches and the worlds with skies yet unscarred by man-made contrails, and the City Planet Capitals, whose every block, every turn, had been planned decades in advance. The routes were paved by corporate mapmakers who voyaged the yet-uncharted currents of the Pocket, cataloguing the distance and time debt, before signaling the colony ships, and then the company traders, who looped the systems together in the binding web of commerce. The ships dragged behind them the years, the contracts signed and stamped in undying digital ink, and the spires of City Planets were borne upward with the swiftness of bamboo, and, as it had been since the beginning, the steadfast tradition of hierarchy was continued in this fashion, the wealthy living above the clouds, and the unlucky down below. And though it was lost on no one the strangeness of this progress, of how humanity had come so far but still there were people who never saw the Stations, or even the sun, no change was made to the structure. They lived and died in the Minotaur’s labyrinth of the City Planet substrata, deep in the shadows of the glass towers, the steam plume underworks, the vomit of trash flumes, where there was no time, no progressive sign of the turn of the century or the millennia. Only the heat, and the daily stench of corpses wedged in the ventilation chutes beneath the streets, where they would be flashed into ash come next month’s heat cleaning, and soon forgotten, as Allied Space stretched its jaw and continued its swallowing of the stars. Its enlisted soldiers diving in and out of the Pocket, skipping over the eras of its history as they brought back the contracts of newly acquired planetary systems, and the noble wealth of their Resource Worlds.

  After a four-month journey through the interstellar currents, a flock of ships unfolded into reality like paper napkins. There were twelve in all: the Roendal, the Greenery, the Cedarcrest, the Helena Basho, the Brightband, the Solus, the Rock on Water, the BGT, the Mandolin, the Bittedank, and the Ghost Dog—ships that had been traveling alongside the Debby all this time but unable to speak or be seen through the frack of Pocket Space, flying together deaf and blind with their cargo of dhuba seeds. “We’ve done this so many times,” the old captain of the Rock on Water said over the link, “but there’s something about crawling out of the dark that makes me cry when I see your faces again.”

  Nia grinned at the fuzzed image of the old man on the console screen. “If you cry, I’ll start crying too, and that’s something no one needs to see.”

  The old man laughed loudly.

  “Agreed, Imani,” he said. “Agreed.”

  There were still a few more hours until they docked with Pelican Station. Nia sat with the boy in the common room until they arrived. He was still dressed in the red robe, with his hands in his lap. She told him what would happen when they landed. How there would be Yellowjackets waiting to take him to Nest. She told him that she would stay with him for as long as possible and that she would make sure he was safe. She told him that beyond this she did not know what the future held, but that she had enjoyed their time together. And after she told him all this, he nodded, somber.

  She hoped he understood.

  Baylin took final inventory. Nurse and Sonja surveyed the cargo bay, checked the temperature of the seed crates. Durat threw the ship code out to the Nest authorities for verification, and told them over the comms that the boy was well and fine. “Looks like everything’s in order,” the authority man said. “Yellowjackets will be waiting for your ship on the dock to take the boy and look over your manifest. Shouldn’t take more than a moment.”

  “Great. See you guys soon.”

  “Very good. And Happy Nakajima Day.”

  Durat raised an eyebrow. “Sorry?”

  “Nakajima Day. Thousandth anniversary of the stations’ completion. Tell your crew they’re in luck.” The authority man’s mouth grinned underneath his visor. “They’re about to see the largest party in the galaxy.”

  As the Debby arced toward the station’s waiting maw, the celebration long in the making was already on full display—a parade on the Avenue Strip underneath a virtual blue sky, populated by the dazzling projections of ancient animals whose roars and squawks were so loud even the adults flinched a little. Company bands with their twanging lyns and bellowing chufflahs playing the “Anthem of the Wings.” Delicacies from a hundred worlds slung from float carts: Adizan apples dipped in black sauce, fried billyduck tongues, and thirty-layer cakes—rich, sweet smells that were sold for too many iotas, which was fine, for today the people of Pelican Station and its visitors would allow the price gouging, the bumping and kicking, the incessant shouting and cheers, because they were electrified by the sight of her, the one without whom none of this would be possible—Fumiko Nakajima, standing on her float made of dust and light, waving to the roar of the crowd with her youthful hand, smiling for them, she their beacon of where they had come from and where they would soon be going, the crowd enraptured by her smile; a smile that fractured only once, only for a moment, when the first of the fireworks bloomed in the sky, pink and red and loud, and she saw in their fleeting shapes cherry blossoms in spring.

  4

  Departures

  In flowed the clamor of the Pelican docks—the spray of extinguishers that fought to contain a spontaneous fire in the Rock on Water, the sho
uts of crews negotiating the seed crates from their berths with thudding loaders, arguments over manifest numbers, the whirl of witness drones overhead, and the disciplined boot-stomp of Yellowjackets cutting across the immense space of B-3 with their sheathed batons, headed for the Debby. When the boy saw them, he gripped Nia’s hand; she could feel his rapid heartbeat through his palm. “It’s all right,” she whispered as the Yellowjackets scaled the ramp. “You’ll be all right.”

  He squeezed her fingers.

  The line of Yellowjackets stopped a fair distance from Nia and her crew—a neon wall of armor that blocked the Debby’s exit. The shortest of them stepped forward. “Captain Nia Imani?” The Yellowjacket saluted, rapping a gloved hand against her chest. “My name is Andetwa, first ser of Nest Security. Happy Nakajima Day to you and yours. May I be the first to offer my congratulations on completing your shipment cycle.” The beaked visor covered Andetwa’s eyes and nose. Nia could see only her thin-lipped smile. “Is this the boy you found planetside?”

  “It is,” she said.

  “If you would.”

  The Yellowjacket held out her gloved hand like they were exchanging a pet’s leash. Nia restrained the instinct to slap that hand away, and moved between the jacket and the boy, her arms crossed over her chest.

  “Nia,” Nurse said, tense. “Don’t.”

  The first ser’s smile flattened. Her fellows placed hands on their baton handles. “Is there a problem?” she asked.

  Nia’s jaw tensed.

  Durat laughed. “Uh, Captain?”

  She silenced him with a glance, and said to the first ser, “Where are you going to take him?”

  Andetwa seemed caught off guard by the question. “We will escort him to the security offices on the thirteenth strut for arrivals processing. If we get an ID match we’ll return him to his rightful guardians. No match, we’ll put him into the system, bring him to Child Services on fifteenth.” The ser looked between her and the boy, and, as if she understood the situation, her smile softened. Her hand moved away from the baton on her belt. “I assure you, he will be taken care of the entire way.”

  “Will you contact me with news?”

  A brief moment of hesitation as Andetwa scrolled through the pages of traveler’s rights on her visor. She nodded. “If there are pertinent updates.”

  Nurse put a hand on Nia’s shoulder.

  “It’s time,” she said.

  Nia shrugged her hand off and lowered herself so that the boy could see in her face that this was not the parting she wanted. “I’m not going to say goodbye just yet, okay?” she said. “We’ll see each other again. Do you understand?”

  Suddenly, he hugged her.

  He smelled like her ship.

  It was a brief hug. He stepped away before she could even think to return it. She walked with him and his escorts to the dock elevators, her heart twisting when the doors slid shut between them. His hand pressed against the glass. His eyes were wide, like he was waiting for her to rip the doors open and save him. And she reached out, to do what she did not know, her hand touching the glass when the vacuum pressure shot the platform upward, into the belly of the station. The boy gone. Her reflection wincing back at her.

  * * *

  —

  “It has been a calm fifteen years on Pelican,” their orientation leader said. The delicate tattoo of the bird’s wing on his cheek spread its feathers as he smiled. “There was an incident last year, station standard time, with the promulgation of floric leaves in the lower struts, which is why that product is now illegal contraband in station-space, and will be confiscated with a large fine if Nest Security finds any on your person. Retinal supplicants as well. But it is not all bad news. Umbai has opened new trade routes between the stations and the Grammaton-owned planets, so expect to find an assortment of new spices, clothing, and approved tech in the market—a personal favorite of mine is DanSen Tea, which comes in a glass bottle and is sprayed directly into the nostril. The misted caffeine is very cleansing.

  “As always,” the leader continued, “the Umbai stations retain strict control over linguistic infection. You’ll find that all the residents and most of the travelers still speak your version of Station Standard, with a few minor additions and changes, none of which should impede the enjoyment of your stay. The Avenue Strip on the upper strut remains the locus point for travelers, especially today, and for the following week, while we celebrate Fumiko Nakajima’s great work. And as thanks for your great work, Umbai has booked rooms for you all at the Travillion Suites for the next thirty days—station standard time—which, aside from its excellent view of the Strip, also includes free access to the worlds-renowned Travillion Spa. Please enjoy the perfumed baths and massages at your leisure.”

  In honor of Nakajima Day, and the Old Earth era during which Fumiko lived, each of the crew were handed their own private Handhelds for personal use for the duration of their stay on Pelican. The devices were served to them off a metal tray, like hors d’oeuvres, as thin and flexible as playing cards. Through the Handhelds, Umbai transferred the pay to Nia’s account, which she then dispersed among her crew’s accounts. She remembered to dock Nurse’s pay by ten percent even though she no longer wished to, for there were few things more important to her than keeping her word. Nurse made no expression when she saw the updated pay on her device. Nia suspected this would come up later, a midnight argument she would be ready for.

  After orientation, it was a ten-minute ride on the elevators to the top of Pelican. The crew’s excitement for their return was dampened by Nia’s Handheld call with Nest Security during the ride, her quiet, tense replies into the receiver—the call ending with her grunt of frustration after the secretary on the other end of the line gave her the vague assurance that her contact information was catalogued, and that the first ser would reach out if there was any relevant news.

  “He’ll be fine,” Nurse said.

  Nia ran her hand over her scalp.

  The grains were coming in.

  When the elevator doors spiraled open, they stepped into the twelve-kilometer-long canyon of commercial enterprise that ran down the length of the Pelican’s back, the crew so used to the sight they were no longer dazzled by the many shops and playhouses and meeting spots that projected the bright ghosts of words like DEALS and LUXURY PRODUCTS. They headed for the Travillion Suites. During the walk, Nia saw that little had changed since her last visit—or rather, everything had changed, but those changes were all expected, and easy to pass over. Shops gone, devoured by the competition, subsumed into larger entities, with long chaining names that asserted their predatory lineage. New holos of unfamiliar celebrities that gazed longingly at her below entertainment loglines. But the feel of the place was the same—the sidewalks still lined with photorealistic trees from fir to red maple to mountain birch, all of which swayed in time to the artificial breeze; the vaulted ceiling that was still a precarious span of digital glass, the pane now faded to a royal purple to represent evening and pricked with white dots that would in an hour resolve into stars. The only notable difference was the presence of flapping banners that declared the thousandth birthday of the stations and the various planetary and corporate flags that proclaimed their allegiance to Umbai and Nakajima—so many flags that Nia recognized only a fraction of the logos. She wished the boy were there, so that she could point out the ones she did know, and tell him why it didn’t matter.

  In the warmly decorated lobby of the Travillion the crew discussed how they planned on celebrating the first day of their furlough. Nurse intended to visit the station hospital and offer her services. Durat teased her for being so predictable, before he surprised no one with his plan to scout the new drug pubs and to see about the dances. They spoke with enthusiasm about these plans, but when they were done, no one moved, the five of them standing in the middle of the lobby while other travelers moved around them, be
cause after four years of being in one another’s company, it was strange to now go their separate ways.

  One by one, they left to begin their vacation with their nods and their see-you-soons, until only Nia and Sonja remained under the Travillion’s twirling chandelier of glass and dancing pictos.

  “So what are you doing?” Nia asked her.

  The vet side-eyed her. She accepted Nia’s invitation to dinner, not seeming to care one way or the other, her shrug noncommittal. They found a place a half kil away; a snow globe of a restaurant, with holographic white specks that flurried about, and tables that circled the projection of an acacia tree. Birdsong played from unseen speakers while they took their seats at the table in the back, the song interrupted by an announcement on the Feed that at 1930 there would be a performance in the Grand Hall on Schreiberi Wing by a singer whose name Nia did not recognize, but who she figured was very famous if the eruption throughout the restaurant was any measure. “So some asshole designed this station,” Sonja said, her voice raised against the din. She waved a white speck from her face. It reacted to her movements, and swam away. “You know anything about this Nakajima?”

  Nia said she didn’t, not really listening as her thumb described the outline of the Handheld in her pocket, waiting, waiting. When the bowl of kurim berries was placed on her mat, she moved the berries around with her spoon, not eating, and ignored the wet sounds the vet made as she swallowed the strips of flowered meat whole, like her throat was a well that dropped into nothing, and the meat the wishing coin. She knew this was a mistake. She should’ve stayed in her room at the hotel, or her ship, somewhere quiet where she could wait for the call from Nest. All she needed was a few words—a simple confirmation that he was taken care of. She sighed. Hadn’t realized how long the table had been quiet till Sonja broke the silence.

  “Never liked kids,” she said. Her eyes were on her meat, her expression severe as she cut through the coarse, vat-grown grain. “My brothers were little shits. Didn’t listen to good advice, didn’t care who they hurt.” Her knife stopped cutting. “But he was all right. That kid.” She looked at her captain in the way Nia imagined she would’ve looked at a fellow soldier who had lost their friend in battle. “Sorry you guys got the short of it.”