Chapter 6

Chapter 6

I’m ready to go right away, but Father wants to set me up a mock course first, so he can prep me for any dangers I might come across during my journey—this practice scheduled for the spare hours when we’re not crafting bunker plans, of course. I resist, but then I realize that Yarrow’s birthday is four days away, which means as a good sister I should delay until after that if I don’t want to miss it. Also, I guess I should make sure my wound has healed before I go setting off on any expeditions. I guess. A week’s delay isn’t the worst thing.

Yarrow protests that he would be fine, that what does a birthday mean anyway when we’re using Earth years on a planet that takes three times as long to orbit its suns? But we’ve never missed each other’s birthdays, and it’s the rare day on Minerva that has something unique about it. We’ve survived nearly eighteen years without a comet strike. I don’t think we need to be in an absolute rush to race out searching for metal.

I mean, no one in the history of this planet has ever celebrated a sixteenth birthday. I tell Yarrow as much, but when he looks up from watering pea seedlings, I can see he’s not impressed. “It never had a fifteen-year-old until last year, either. That’s been true for each birthday I’ve ever had. Not you, unfortunately. I keep being the one to break new ground.”

“If you’re not going to embrace your role as pioneer of humankind, I might have to take over,” I say.

He leaves the watering can by the greenhouse’s dedicated cistern. “You’ll have to get rid of me if you ever want to be out of the gates first.”

We go quiet. The idea of a life without each other is so horrifying that there’s nothing to say to it.

We make our way to the dinner table early, using our half hour of daily free time to continue this birthday talk instead of our usual Pink Lagoon rewatch . We don’t even have to say we’re doing it—we just start moving the table out under the stars and set up the chairs, then we sit down and hold hands and talk. I guess I’m trying to keep Yarrow’s spirits high because, despite his requests for a lemon cake like in the show, algal sugar pudding is the only birthday treat he’s got coming. The same algal sugar pudding we have every week. Rover is busy whipping it up in the canteen. It’s very sweet. I love algal sugar pudding. As far as we know, the universe hasn’t had any lemons in it for over thirty thousand years, so that was a ridiculous request for Yarrow to make in the first place. All the same—what would a lemon taste like, that kids made a pained face when they ate one, only to ask for another?

I did get Rover to print a new latch for Dad’s violin case for Yarrow’s birthday, so our Museum of Earth Civ will be a little more complete. Every birthday, something new.

Our family ritual is to have dinner the moment the sunset is officially underway, setting the phosphorus on the sky’s horizon glittering green. This half of the Minerva year, Big Sister is the first sun to go down, tailed by Little Sister, who lingers in the sky like she doesn’t want to go to bed. The evening meal is the only one that we have together, since Father is always up before breakfast to haul things around while Dad gets us ready for the schooling day. It happens that the moment of Yarrow’s sixteenth Earth-year birthday falls during dinnertime this year. (With an operating system around, we can be quite precise about these things. Because days here are nearly thirty-one Earth hours long, we decided our years would be 283 days so they’d be Earth length. It would be weird if my brother and I were still, I don’t know, five years old or something.)

Yarrow and I stand shoulder to shoulder, looking out at the broad, flat landscape that’s been our only home. The malevors make their lowing sounds on the other side of the shallow hill, agitated ever since we killed one of their own. “So what are you getting me?” Yarrow asks.

I’m not going to tell him about my actual present yet. “You get to sit in Real Chair tonight,” I say.

His eyes widen beneath his dark floppy hair. “No!”

There’s only one chair left from the Coordinated Endeavor —the rest are all printed by Rover. Real Chair is old. The seat falls off its supports, the arms bend outward alarmingly, my back begins to ache moments after sitting in it. All the same, Real Chair was made on Earth, this distant planet that was the cradle of all humanity, until an asteroid strike meant we became the planet’s only survivors. This chair was made by human hands. Well, robot hands, no doubt, but in a factory that probably had a human somewhere in it. It traveled across the universe, supported lifetimes of our cloned dads, and now it’s sitting on top of the hard dirt of our settlement site, available for our use. That’s why I’m usually the first to claim it, and Yarrow gets to feel superior because he’s the docile and sweet older brother who lets me. It all works out perfectly. But tonight is special.

He sits gingerly on the lumpy seat, facing out at the changing colors of Little Sister as Big Sister sinks below the horizon. “This is nice,” he says, lacing his hands and cradling his head as he leans back.

Real Chair dumps him to the ground, the seat sliding fully off its supports. I laugh. “No sudden movements in Real Chair, Yarrow. It doesn’t like it.”

He rolls to his side and sits up. “Maybe I’ll leave it to you.”

I replace the seat and rest a fraction of my weight on it. “Real Chair has moods. You have to feel your way.”

“Yes. I think moods are an unappealing quality in a chair.”

There’s movement from around the canteen, then the dads appear. They’re deep in conversation, and it’s not about the dish Dad is holding. He’s talking with his hands, like he always does, which means the pudding is listing dangerously to one side as he gets excited about some major point.

“Hey, Dad!” I call. “Careful with the birthday treat!”

Dad smiles in my direction, and then catches himself, righting the shallow bowl before it tips. “Yep, that’s definitely some more algal sugar pudding,” Yarrow whispers.

“You don’t know, it could be lemon cake,” I whisper back.

“Sure. Lemon cake.”

“What were you two arguing about?” I call as the dads approach.

“Discussing,” Father corrects.

“Discussing passionately?”

Dad glances at Father, then gives a minuscule shake of his head. “We’ll fill you in in a bit. There are more important matters to attend to now. It’s someone’s birthday.” He smiles at Yarrow. It’s a dazzling smile, especially once he let OS print a replacement for the canine tooth he lost when he tripped and fell onto Rover last year. He didn’t want to, but we’d all insisted. Life is better with Dad’s complete smile in it.

“Thanks, Dads,” Yarrow says.

“Sit, sit,” Father says. “Owl, give Real Chair to Yarrow today.”

“I offered! He doesn’t want it!” I protest.

“Owl...”

“She’s right, she offered and I didn’t want it,” Yarrow says, hands up in surrender.

Dad sets the pudding on the table as Rover floats over across the muckland, holding a tray filled with covered food dishes. “Rover, project the candles over the pudding, please,” Dad says.

“Let’s save that for the moment I turn sixteen,” Yarrow says.

“In that case, I will project the candles thirteen-point-four Earth minutes from now,” OS says.

“Thank you, OS,” Yarrow says.

Rover hovers nearby while Father and I place the food trays on the table, uncovering them one by one. There’s no need to rush. Every dish looks the same and they’re never hot, so we don’t even have to worry about them growing cold. They’re all pretty delicious, honestly. “So what would you like to do with your last thirteen minutes of being fifteen?” Dad asks Yarrow.

He considers it. Then a surprised expression spreads over his face. “I don’t want to do anything different. I like everything the way it is.”

The worst part? He really means it. “Yarrow, please,” I say. “There’s little enough to talk about when every day is the same. It’s been a while since our big yak attack. I’m basically healed. We’re counting on you. Give us something interesting.”

He shrugs.

A breeze wafts off the plains. Even though it’s weak, in Minerva’s dense air the wind’s force is enough to set my bowl edging toward my lap. I hold it in my palm to keep from wasting my portion of birthday pudding.

“Here’s something I’ve always wondered. Did paper clips have a power source?” Yarrow asks. “Like, how did they keep the paper together?”

“ That’s your interesting thing?” I ask.

“There is one minute remaining until the sixteen-Earth-year anniversary of Yarrow’s birth,” OS announces.

Dad leans back in his chair, the printed polycarb bending dramatically. He gestures to Father. “You tell them, flufferskunk. Go back almost eighteen years ago. Or almost 30,018 years ago, depending on how you think about it. Did paper clips have a power source?”

“No,” Father says. He considers how to explain. “Paper clips got their power from their shape.”

“Don’t think I didn’t notice that you’re both pointedly ignoring my question about what you were arguing about,” I interrupt.

“Was it like a spring?” Yarrow asks. “It, what, it sprang the papers together? Wouldn’t they just fly everywhere? How did that work?”

Dad starts to say something, then stops. “I don’t know. How did they work? Friction? I feel like the answer to these things is usually friction.”

“I wish we had paper,” I grumble. I don’t like the sound of my voice. I decide I’m going to try not to grumble anymore.

Father starts gesturing with his fingers and explaining with way too many Dimokratía words, too fast. Dad starts laughing, and then Yarrow and I follow.

“Ten, nine, eight...,” OS starts. Rover projects candles over the algal sugar pudding. For years we used to make birthday candles out of pressed carbohydrates, but fire is hard to maintain in Minerva’s atmosphere and it’s depressing when candles go out on their own, so we switched to projections. These candles are Yarrow’s favorite color option, sparkly green black.

The projections are so pretty. To make birthdays feel special we don’t use them on other days. I lay my hands on the table and rest my chin on top of them, getting my eyes right up to the sixteen candles and their oily movements.

“Make a wish, Brothership!” I say.

“Prepped it a week ago,” Yarrow says. Only my brother would prep his birthday wishes in advance. Probably about wanting peace and happiness for the whole universe.

“Three... two... one...,” OS says, drawing out the last word. Under Yarrow’s and my direction, our resident AI has acquired some good dramatic flair over the years.

Yarrow blows. The projections flicker out believably, the one he’s farthest from even needing an extra go to extinguish.

We all clap.

When Yarrow leans back, I’m shocked by what I find on his face.

My brother isn’t there. It’s like he’s someone else entirely. His eyes are dark, cold, lifeless. I’ve never met anyone new before, but it’s like a stranger has suddenly dropped into our family.

I’m on my feet before I even know it, Real Chair pitching behind me onto the packed soil of the settlement, wind yanking it farther and farther away from the table. Seeing me, Father staggers to his feet, taking my hands into his. “Owl, what’s wrong?”

I turn toward Yarrow, fear at what I’ll find twisting up inside me. But my brother is back. He’s looking at me with concern, just like the dads are.

“I’m fine!” I say.

I go retrieve Real Chair, and when I return, I find that they’re all staring at me. Like I’m the crazy one, not my brother, who just spent a second being someone else. My skin pricks with sweat. “I swear, I’m fine! Stop gawking!”

“Okay then,” Yarrow says. “Maybe you want to have a seat and eat some birthday pudding?”

I set Real Chair down, hoping the others don’t notice my shaking hands. I know what I saw. But I also know my fathers’ journey on the Coordinated Endeavor , of not knowing the reality they were in, the one they thought they knew. There could be more to my brother than I’ve ever known. Or the problem could be me. Or the world we’re in. We could be in a simulation of OS’s design, for all I know. I give my thighs a good slap. Get it together, Owl.

“So, what did you wish for?” I manage to ask Yarrow. Maybe knowing that will help explain what just happened to him.

“He can’t tell you that,” Dad says. “That’s against birthday rules.”

I know that, of course. But I had to fill the void somehow, and asking about his wish was the first thing I thought to say. But Yarrow surprises us all by going ahead and saying what he wished for. “I want Owl to get to explore a full ten days. That’s my birthday wish.”

My eyes widen. I gulp. I look at the dads.

They stare at each other. “We talked about how long she could go for. Ten days is pushing it, but if we carefully plan her route, and she brings Rover with her...,” Dad says.

“We can allow this, Owl,” Father says. “For Yarrow’s birthday.”

Tears are in my eyes. It’s been a whiplash of a minute. “Yarrow,” I say quietly. “You gave your birthday present to me.”

Just like I’d expect him to, he gives me that goodlier-than-good smile of his, like I ought to be thanking the universe for its magnanimity rather than him for his mortal kindness. But there are still signs that he’s not himself. His brow is shiny. His hands are clenched tight. A thousand wrong things are hitting my brain in its subconscious parts, telling me that Yarrow isn’t quite Yarrow anymore.

I see him see me see him.

Don’t say anything , his expression says.

He’s my brother, and I love him, so I don’t.

But he’s also not my brother. I don’t know where my brother went.