Fledgling, p.2
Fledgling, page 2
Moineau may beg to differ with the dossier.
I suddenly feel stuffy. My gown had felt elegant at first but now feels overdone.
A gaudy ornament hung among refined jewels.
The familiar fear washes over me again: I am a pretender in this world.
I leave the cheery sounds of tinkling glasses being lifted from or set back on serving trays, lilting laughter, buoyant conversations, the full orchestra providing a symphonic background to it all, and find my way to the Hall of History, quiet and dead.
Unknitted, I feel the panic coming on: I’m failing at Papa’s assignment, failing at securing our future. Simply failing, like I always seem to do.
* * *
From my earliest memory, I knew I was different, and those differences were shortcomings on Upper Earth. Though I tried to mimic the other kids as much as possible, my efforts were to no avail.
I couldn’t ever achieve their sunny, even-keeled dispositions. I couldn’t ever accept the losses that came my way without throwing a tantrum, without bursting into tears and descending into depressive episodes, without acting out my frustrations.
I cannot lie and say my peers rejected me; that wasn’t true. They loved me through my maladjustments—but not because they were saints, nor because I was lovable.
It was because of my mother. Hers was the first precentenarian-term death recorded in Upper Earth files, having died at thirty-three, when I was nine years old. No one else here has had anyone die so early in their families.
I sit now on the sole bench, a round orange one, in the middle of the Hall of History and activate my scalplink with three rapid blinks. The bare gray walls come to life, and I flick my fingers in the air to find the beginnings of recent history. I zoom in on the part of Earth called the Bridge, the inhabitants of which joined an alliance with Upper Earth ten years ago.
When I was nine and my mother was thirty-three.
I watch the explosion with morbid and philosophical fascination—how can anyone extinguish human life without a second thought?
My mother was killed by the brutes who took the air carrier she was in hostage, as a way to disrupt the merger of the Bridge and Upper Earth, to prevent ALIGN from growing. I’d already gone up to Upper Earth with Papa, while my mother had stayed behind to help with the process of knitting Bridge residents into our systems. They blew her up on her way to join us.
My scalplink, attuned to my bewilderment on this topic, feeds me background by providing the brutes’ ethos: The brutes despise our way of life. They detest our freedoms. They fear the equality of men and women, and they reject the fraternity of all people. They despise ALIGN.
I wonder if this is where the seed of my disturbance was planted: in the story of my mother’s death. Papa said the brutes were angry because they believed my mother was a traitor: Since she was born into a family on Lower Earth, her work to increase the scope of ALIGN was a betrayal.
I also wonder if my temperament is because I’m not purely of Upper Earth, like Papa is, like most everyone around me is. Because I am of Lower Earth too.
Because working extra hard to show up with the “natural elegance” expected of me is exhausting, and sometimes I just can’t do it any longer.
But those wonderings are surface ones.
I turn off my scalplink and slide it off my head completely, feeling my jaw slacken as the probe loosens its connection to my left temple. Cradled in my hands, the green jewels Dame Kizuwanda clipped onto my link for the event sparkle in the recessed lights running along the edges of the ceiling.
The truth is something I can reflect on only with my scalplink off, in case Papa sees the extent of my anguish. He often checks in on my emotional state if I’m knitted.
He can’t know.
He might not trust me again with the tasks he assigns me, tasks that affirm his belief in me, that affirm he doesn’t hold me responsible in any way for—
I’m a mess inside because my mother died because of me.
She was meant to stay longer, finish her mission on the Bridge, wait to board a heavily fortified carrier from the Council of Guardians, but because I’d cried every passing day, begging for her to join us in Upper Earth, which was then a strange new world for me, she left earlier.
She died in compliance of my yearning for her.
She no longer lives because I couldn’t live without her.
* * *
But I must remember I still have Papa.
And Papa has a plan: Once Lein agrees to a strategic marriage with me, Raisa, daughter of Aeon, the chief guardian of the Council of Guardians of ALIGN, a child of both Earths, we will tour Lower Earth to celebrate our wedding and to usher in Enlightenment, the process of transferring the knowledge streams into the inhabitants below via scalplinks.
The final hope for peace: the rest of humanity knitted into the ALIGN system willingly.
Since my mother’s death, this has become my primary fascination, the focus of my life: I want to finish my mother’s work for peace—the work I cut short with my cries for her.
The first step toward my goal is through Lein’s heart.
Birdsong floats from the Visionaries Ballroom, announcing dinner. Recorded birdsong, as, while many bird species survived the Great Catastrophe, there are none that could live so high on Upper Earth—though numerous attempts were and are still made to bring them up here. People buy them in cages from the Grand Market on Lower Earth in hopes they’ll be the lucky ones to keep them alive.
But they all end up dying eventually. And our scientists have never been able to breed them in the atmosphere artificially engineered to sustain us and our other pets.
Birds flying free are the only things we miss in Upper Earth, and so everything avian is highly prized.
As the chirps from the ballroom die down, I slide my scalplink on and activate it, a momentary but necessary rebellion, and brace myself for the zing of conduction, the probe rejoining my mind. It always takes a few seconds to get used to the linking pressure, but as soon as it happens, my spirit lifts as it reconnects me to the world.
Back on, I quickly switch my scalplink to mirrormode and look at myself on the wall across from me in the Hall of History while knitting into the palace dossier to prepare myself to be in Lein’s vicinity again at dinner.
Lein likes petite and fair women. His last love interest, Clure, had blond hair and blue eyes, a small nose, and a rosebud mouth. He would have made her his partner if it weren’t for the fact she was a castoff from one of his father’s bride-market purchases. He understands the peril this brings, to introduce instability into his bloodline, as his constituents in Lower Earth would see it. He is aware of the need for a propitious match.
My skin is brown; my mouth is full; my nose is long; my stature is tall and healthy. I look like my mother, and I won’t apologize for it. I straighten and blink thrice to flick my scalplink idle before making my way to dinner.
* * *
I sit across from the eldest Upper Earth guardian on the council, Wilfred, 120 years old. On the way in, I saw a switch had taken place—instead of my nameplate, the charming Moineau’s now sits across from Lein’s spot.
I can’t imagine poised Moineau doing such a thing—it must have been Lein, completely besotted by her, so I ponder taking a moment to turn my scalplink to thinkmode to record the failure to secure this evening’s goal. Perhaps if Papa knows the loss of this opportunity early, we can try some sort of intervention before dessert.
I glance to the head of the lengthy table, where Papa presides, with the head guardian of the Bridge at his right arm. After him, the other Bridge guardians are seated in order of importance. Papa’s hair whitened when my mother died, and now it hangs neatly combed back from his head, falling slightly wavy to his shoulder. His beard, similarly white, is trim and edged precisely. He sees me and smiles encouragingly, blue eyes crinkling at the edges like they always do the moment they land on me. I smile back but look away quickly, afraid to reveal too much in front of guests.
Maybe I should have saved my thoughts; the way I broke Papa’s gaze just now, he’s sure to check my thinkmode stream immediately to see what I’m upset about. He can’t stand to see me hurt. He often reminds me, Always record your feelings in thinkmode so you can be helped to feel optimally at all times. We don’t need to waste time on unproductive emotions.
Lein is standing, tucking in his dining chair.
He makes his way behind the line of diners sitting, chatting, preparing themselves happily—flicking out napkins, straightening cutlery—for the arrival of the first course. I don’t care that I’m staring keenly. Maybe even shamelessly. I might make a bad spy, but I will never lose sight of someone I’m trailing.
He stops behind Wilfred’s chair. He bends and whispers a few words into the old man’s ear.
Wilfred gets up from his seat, holding his nameplate.
Lein sets his nameplate down.
Across from mine.
Then he finally looks me right in the eyes. Smiles a smile I haven’t seen yet at this party.
“At long last, I get to have some time with you,” he says, his voice thrillingly low and smooth, superb, in a tone that seems made only for me. “I’ve been waiting for this moment all night, Raisa.”
6th Day of the Month of Graze
Lower Earth
Lunar Year 1579
Musaid of Underground:
At the Tower of Bones
Musaid descended the decommissioned escalator to Atlantis, the subterranean apartments where his aunt still lived, where he had lived as a child. It had been a few weeks since he’d promised to come by for a visit, and he never liked to let his sole remaining family down.
Especially since any day now, he’d be flying to Upper Earth to bring Lein’s fiancée to Lower Earth for the Enlightenment Tour. The hangar would be busy from then on, and he wasn’t sure he’d be returning to his old neighborhood any time soon.
He took his air filter mask off when he neared the lobby landing of the former mid-rise building—which opened to the stairways that accessed each subsurface story full of apartments—and as various food scents assaulted his nose, his mind immediately went to his new clothes. He cringed, remembering his earlier excitement at the possibility that Aunt Patma had made his favorite, a layered rice dish called mujda; now he was worried about the smell.
He wasn’t sure how his sleek dark gray suit with conductive trimming on the front yoke and shoulders would react to the odors—would it absorb the cooking smells wafting their way into the gritty halls that led to Aunt Patma’s?
After this visit, and a visit to the cemetery, Musaid’s last stop today would be the hangar. Tiller, his Upper Earth supervisor, would be there, and he’d expect his new recruit to be completely presentable.
A month ago, right after he’d been hired as an air carrier pilot for the palace, Musaid had donated his old clothes to the largest charity landfill in Verg, a few blocks from Atlantis.
Then he’d gotten a new wardrobe consisting of only three outfits, and each cost more than all of his former clothes put together.
He’d been saving for years to switch to purform clothing.
Securing the job he’d dreamed of since his parental guardian, Nene Nushba, had taken his nine-year-old self up into the sky with her on a quick trip to Upper Earth was the impetus for the splurge to change his look.
Now he glimpsed himself in a reflection of the rusted mirrors that lined the hallways of the sunken former mid-rise, and a sense of accomplishment turned his walk into a swagger.
On that trip with Nene Nushba to Upper Earth, other than the way their entire physical world looked different, he’d also noticed something strange about the Upper Earthers’ appearances, but he couldn’t put a finger on it. It wasn’t their skins or hair textures—they were as diverse as the people of Lower Earth and the Bridge.
Later the same month as that impressive flight, he’d observed dignitaries from ALIGN visiting the palace and been further confused as to what made them stand out so much, what made them seem more regal than even Nene Nushba, the leader of Lower Earth before Amir Gauis, herself.
Finally, when the guardians and palace officials assembled to smile for a recording on the negotiations underway for Lower Earth’s agreements with ALIGN, it struck Musaid what made them look exceptional.
It was their clothes.
The people from the ALIGN nations of Upper Earth and the Bridge wore simple clothes, subdued shades—usually in one color. Their clothes didn’t overflow or hang and weren’t layered haphazardly as though they were thrown together without thought, nor were they loud or embellished with countless designs. Each outfit looked well put together, efficient, and effective as protection against the elements, so volatile on Lower Earth.
A few short years later, he’d learned why, even in the harshest of winters, when the temperature in Verg hit freezing point, ALIGNers still wore simple, trim clothes and not the heavy coats nor the bundles of layers like those Lower Earthers who couldn’t afford to purchase coats did.
There they were, the people from Upper Earth, in their streamlined outfits, while even Nene Nushba, the most powerful person on Lower Earth, strolled among them in a thick coat.
ALIGN clothing was made from purform, a fabric regulated to adjust to outside temperatures, intimately intuitive to the wearer’s discomforts, quick at providing responses accordingly.
Engineered to serve people, not the whims of ever-changing fashion norms as was the case on Lower Earth.
Like everything Upper Earth citizens made, their attire was intelligent and efficient.
Smart attire that, due to long-standing agitation by revolutionaries against innovations promoted by Upper Earth, wasn’t accessible on Lower Earth. Under rebel tutelage, the population grew suspicious of tech-infused materials like purform, convinced that it was a means of spying on the people of Lower Earth.
You couldn’t buy purform clothing anywhere, not even knockoffs.
Until Amir Gauis came into power after Nene Nushba, that is.
One of his first reforms was to open up the sale of purform.
Musaid had immediately begun saving. To have three outfits that provided everything one humanly needed was better than having a closet full of inefficient choices.
He couldn’t wait for the upcoming Enlightenment Ceremony.
Lower Earth joining ALIGN would finally boost everyone, pull them out of poverty, including his aunt Patma and her three kids, who came to the door now, sporting the same level of excitement he did. Their eyes were lighting up due to the bags filled with gifts he held in his hands; his aunt’s spirits were lifted because she knew he also arrived with the portion of his salary that sustained her, while his excitement had a simple source: He could smell that Aunt Patma had made his favorite.
His trepidation about an odorous impact on his new clothing disappeared on seeing his aunt’s kindly face and her loving eyes.
Perhaps he’d bring back some mujda for Tiller, to make up for the smell.
* * *
Two hours later, Musaid emerged onto the streets, maskless. He’d insisted Aunt Patma take his, as he always did when he visited. They repeated the game each time, his aunt shaking her head, reluctant to accept such a generous gift, air-filtration masks being only for the wealthy, he assuring her he had access to a supply at the palace, that she had emphysema and needed it more than he did.
But he coughed now as thick smog embraced him. Atlantis was in the sweatshop district of the largest city on Lower Earth, so far on the outskirts, it barely hung on to being considered part of Verg, the only prosperous area of Lower Earth, controlled by the Verg family. He still marveled that as soon as he’d learned to walk steadily as a child, he’d walked seven miles six days a week with his parents just to get to the market to hitch a ride on produce carts heading to the palace, where his parents worked, and then got a ride on a real land carrier back home at the end of their shifts, along with other employees.
That’s when he’d grown fascinated with carriers—on those magical rides under evening skies in a fast-moving vehicle, instead of wearing out the thin soles of the mismatched shoes Mama found for him in the landfill, always a size too small or too large.
First land carriers and then air ones had opened his mind to the possibility of a better life.
“Musaid.” A hiss broke the silence on the dead street, most of the populace shut in factories at this time of day.
He looked around.
“Up.”
He paused and tipped his head back to scan the floors of Atlantis that remained aboveground, its exterior a mess of green lichen and soot, most of its windows blown out or boarded up. The air was too polluted to live in apartments that were, due to decay, no longer sealed against the elements.
“Behind you.”
He spun around to a strange sight: a man on the roof of a half-subsurfaced warehouse clutching his arm bound in cloth splotching red as his wound bled, face shielded with the lower part of his head cover.
Musaid shook his head when he recognized what he was looking at. He spun around and walked.
“For Nush.” The hiss was urgent.
He froze for a beat in anger. For Nush. That one had been used on him many times.
It was the revolutionaries’ code in safe spaces. He never fell for it, aware of their hubris. Aware of the atrocities the Ahraar committed in the late Nene Nushba’s name.
He was also highly aware that he was only one degree away from being suspected of having links to them due to his background growing up as an Underground.
