Papa gathered them around his feet to tell them stories.
“What is Mother?” Papa would say. “She took us up when our world failed. She is our protection and our home. We are her helpers and beloved children.” Papa held up a finger, peering at them with eyes almost lost in the wrinkles of his face. “We make sure Her machinery runs smoothly. Without us, She cannot live. We only live if Mother lives.”
Rak learned that she was a female, a worker, destined to be big and strong. She would help drive the peristaltic engine in Mother’s belly, or work the locomotion of Her legs. Only one of the children, Ziz, was male. He was smaller than the others, with spindly limbs and bulging eyes in a domed head. Ziz would eventually go to the Ovary and fertilize Mother’s eggs. Then he would take his place in Mother’s head as pilot.
“Why can’t we go to Mother’s head?” said Rak.
“It’s not for you,” said Papa. “Only males can do that. That’s the order of things: females work the engines and pistons so that Mother can move forward. For that, you are big and strong. Males fertilize Mother’s eggs and guide her. They need to be small and smart. Look at Ziz.” Papa indicated the boy’s thin arms. “He will never have the strength you have. He would never survive in the Belly. And you, Rak, will be too big to go to Mother’s head.”
Every now and then, Papa would open the Nursery door and talk to someone outside. Then he would collect the biggest of the children, give it a tight hug, and usher it out the door. The children never came back. They had begun work. Soon after, a new baby would be excreted from the tube.
When Rak was big enough, Papa opened the Nursery’s sphincter door. On the other side stood a hulking female. She dwarfed Papa, muscles rolling under a layer of firm blubber.
“This is Hap, your caretaker,” said Papa.
Hap held out an enormous hand.
“You’ll come with me now,” she said.
Rak followed her new caretaker through a series of corridors connected by openings that dilated at a touch. Dull metal cabling veined the smooth, pink flesh underfoot and around them. The tunnel was lit here and there by luminous growths, similar to the Nursery, but the light more reddish. The air became progressively warmer and thicker, gaining an undertone of something unfamiliar that stuck to the roof of Rak’s mouth. Gurgling and humming noises reverberated through the walls, becoming stronger as they walked.
“I’m hungry,” said Rak.
Hap scraped at the wall, stringy goop sloughing off into her hand.
“Here,” she said. “This is what you’ll eat now. It’s Mother’s food for us. You can eat it whenever you like.”
It tasted thick and sweet sliding down her throat. After a few swallows Rak was pleasantly full. She was licking her lips as they entered the Belly.
More brightly lit and bigger than the Nursery, the chamber was looped through and around by bulging pipes of flesh. Six workers were evenly spaced out in the chamber, kneading the flesh or straining at great valves set into the tubes.
“This is the Belly,” said Hap. “We move the food Mother eats through her entrails.”
“Where does it go?” asked Rak.
Hap pointed to the far end of the chamber, where the bulges were smaller.
“Mother absorbs it. Turns it into food for us.”
Rak nodded. “And that?” She pointed at the small apertures dotting the walls.
Hap walked over to the closest one and poked it. It dilated, and Rak was looking into a tube running left to right along the inside of the wall. A low grunting sound came from somewhere inside. A sinewy worker crawled past, filling up the space from wall to wall. She didn’t pause to look at the open aperture.
“That’s a Leg worker,” said Hap. She let the aperture close and stretched.
“Do they ever come out?” said Rak.
“Only when they’re going to die. So we can put them in the engine. Now. No more talking. You start over there.” Hap steered Rak toward the end of the chamber. “Easy work.”
Rak grew, putting on muscle and fat. She was one of twelve workers in the Belly. They worked and slept in shifts. One worked until tired, then ate, and then curled up in the sleeping niche next to whoever was there. Rak learned work songs to sing in time with the kneading of Mother’s intestines, the turning of the valves. The eldest worker, an enormous female called Poi, usually led the chorus. They sang stories of how Mother saved their people. They sang of the parts of Her glorious body, the movement of Her myriad legs.
“What is outside Mother?” Rak asked once, curled up next to Hap, wrapped in the scent of sweat and oil.
“The horrible place that Mother saved us from,” mumbled Hap. “Go to sleep.”
“Have you seen it?”
Hap scoffed. “No, and I don’t want to. Neither do you. Now quiet.”
Rak closed her eyes, thinking of what kind of world might be outside Mother’s body, but could only imagine darkness. The thought made a chill run down her back. She crept closer to Hap, nestling against her back.
The workload was never constant. It had to do with where Mother went and what she ate. Times of plenty meant hard work, the peristaltic engine swelling with food. But during those times, the females also ate well; the mucus coating Mother’s walls grew thick and fragrant, and Rak would put on a good layer of fat. Then Mother would move on and the food become less plentiful, Her innards thinning out and the mucus drying and caking. The workers would slow down, sleep more, and wait for a change. Regardless of how much there was to eat, Rak still grew, until she looked up and realized she was no longer so small compared to the others.
Poi died in her sleep. Rak woke up next to her cooling body, confused that Poi wasn’t breathing. Hap had to explain that she was dead. Rak had never seen a dead person before. Poi just lay there, her body marked from the lean time, folds of skin hanging from her frame.
The workers carried Poi to a sphincter near the top of the chamber, and dropped her into Mother’s intestine. They took turns kneading the body through Mother’s flesh, the bulge becoming smaller and smaller until Poi was consumed altogether.
“Go to the Nursery, Rak,” said Hap. “Get a new worker.”
Rak made her way up the tubes. It was her first time outside the Belly since leaving the Nursery. The corridors looked just like they had when Hap had led her through them long ago.
The Nursery looked much smaller. Rak towered in the opening, looking down at the tiny niches in the walls and the birthing tube bending down from the ceiling. Papa sat on his cot, crumpled and wrinkly. He stood up when Rak came in, barely reaching her shoulder.
“Rak, is it?” he said. He reached up and patted her arm. “You’re big and strong. Good, good.”
“I’ve come for a new worker, Papa,” said Rak.
“Of course you have.” Papa looked sideways, wringing his hands.
“Where are the babies?” she said.
“There are none,” Papa replied. He shook his head. “There haven’t been any… viable children, for a long time.”
“I don’t understand,” said Rak.
“I’m sorry, Rak.” Papa shrank back against the wall. “I have no worker to give you.”
“What’s happening, Papa? Why are there no babies?”
“I don’t know. Maybe it is because of the lean times. But there have been lean times before, and there were babies then. And no visits from the Head, either. The Head would know. But no one comes. I have been all alone.” Papa reached out for Rak, stroking her arm. “All alone.”
Rak looked down at his hand. It was dry and light. “Did you go to the Head and ask?”