Bird Girl’s eyes open. She blinks and spreads her wings. Two searchers attend to her now, grooming her fine feathers with the tips of their arms. She’s smoother, less frazzled—being dolled up for something, I guess, some major introduction or presentation, but who could possibly care how she looks, way up here?
Our link is back but it’s filled with emotions and scrambled information I can’t make sense of. I try to sort and filter the emotions—and then realize they’re both intensely political and intensely romantic.
Bird Girl is terrified. And she’s in love.
The searchers move away. She straightens her shoulders and spreads her wings with a pride and presence I’ve never seen or felt from her—like a princess entering court for the first time. The searchers allow us to float free, but we aren’t nearly as good at drafting as the Antags, and the canes are out of reach. Then they remove and roll up the big blanket, revealing what could be a huge, shiny black slug with purple highlights. But it spreads a wide set of wings, as if waking, or as a welcome… dwarfing Bird Girl, the searchers, us. Wingspan of at least ten meters.
Bird Girl speaks. DJ and I hear a raspy version of what she’s saying, in both English and Russian. “Thank you for witnessing. This is my husband—our husband. We are together again. Isn’t he beautiful?”
The emotion pouring through our link is extraordinary—immense relief that this huge Antag is still alive, that the family they trained and fought with has been rejoined, ready to resume something approaching a normal life—along with a sense of completion. Where did they keep him? Somewhere on Titan, I presume, and then carried here… asleep, waiting for a safer moment to return and take charge.
“We are together, we have come this far, and we are going home!” Bird Girl announces.
The big male’s head is at least twice as wide as hers, his four eyes farther apart but roughly the same size and color. He surveys the searchers and Bird Girl with a sleepy calm, all is well, all is in order, he approves—but then his four purple-rimmed eyes light on DJ and me. With apparent surprise, he scrutinizes us, feathers rising around his massive shoulders. I gather that we’re unexpected, unwanted—why are we here?
And that could be a problem. Based on the emotions coursing through our connection, to Bird Girl—and no doubt to the other female Antags on this hijacked ship—he’s the ultimate reference point, their mentor and mate, mate to all…
Scares me, really, because to him, we’re completely disgusting. We’re still the enemy.
THE SECRET WORLD OF PLANTS
The big male speaks to Bird Girl in a high voice that belies his size—more screech-rasp, untranslated. This goes on for a few minutes, with DJ and I out of the loop and way out of our depth, but happy to be ignored.
“She’s filling him in,” I say.
“I don’t think he likes us,” DJ says.
Nothing on our link except a smothering mask of affection, not meant for us. Bird Girl is truly enamored.
“They should get a room,” DJ says. “Is she going to keep him all to herself?”
He had to ask. From behind, we hear more Antag music, chirps and rasps and soaring notes. I rotate by waving my arms and see five searchers escorting seven more females, including three of the formerly oh-so-superior armored commanders, singing their appreciation like groupies. All of them have folded their wings, leaving Bird Girl as the only female to spread them wide. Clearly this is a great moment for the larger family. We know our enemies not at all.
Two searchers spray something from their tails at the canebrakes. From the shadows we hear rustling and rattling and watch as more canes grow and weave to shape arched thickets, which then fan to connect with the bulkhead, a spiral of climbing ways and bridges.
“That’s cool,” DJ murmurs.
The searchers take hold of us, gentle but no nonsense, and Bird Girl slowly folds her wings, then allows herself to be conveyed by her fellow females away from the big male. Her moment with the paterfamilias seems to be over. Her grief is obvious even without our link—and overwhelming when I dip in. Separation is such sweet sorrow. What a guy. What a species in which to be male! What’s required of the big boy when he’s at home? Is he tasked with a head-butting competition to win his place in the herd? Alpha male sports? Keeping a rolling orgy going 24/7?
DJ and I keep silent on all frequencies as our escorts guide Bird Girl and us toward a spiral bridge of fresh canes.
“Ever seen a dead cell?” DJ whispers.
“Plenty, after a bare-knuckle fight.”
“In microscopes, I mean! Cells got a skeleton made of fibers just like these bamboo bridges—grow at the tips when the cell wants to move, shrink back when it’s not needed.” DJ can be full of surprises. Not all porn and old movies in that noggin. “Kill the cell and the gunk, the gel, shrivels, and leaves a pile of sticks. This ship is a giant cell!”
Good to know. I don’t believe it for a moment, but it’s better than anything I’ve got. We’ve been sedan-chaired around that internal skeleton for half an hour or more, and now, through gaps in the canes we see spaces accessible by other arches and bridges—dark, empty spaces. Maybe Gurus once slept there. Maybe they kept sporting victims up here and pulled them out when needed to fight and die.
I once got into a classroom argument with a teacher about the plural of the name Spartacus. The other kids ragged me all day, on the playground or walking home. Now we’re surrounded by cages and maybe holes that were once filled with Spartacuses. Spartaci. Spartacoi. Fuck it.
Echoes tell me our surround is narrowing. It’s become completely dark. Not even the searchers are illuminating. Not at all reassuring that Bird Girl is with us, because based on what’s passing through our link, her deadly sadness and lovebird grief, she might happily be going to her doom, having displeased the big male with our presence, her dealings with the enemy. No way to know how smart the big male is or what they said to each other. He might have given her instructions to gut herself and us besides.
As the lights come back up we can see that we’ve reached a much slimmer portion of the ship’s hull, perhaps closer to the actual bow. Bird Girl isn’t committing suicide. She’s taking us to Ulyanova. Big male (I’m going to call him Budgie) may not like us, but that hasn’t changed the basic plans.
“Why aren’t the showrunners doing something about us? Why haven’t they learned?” DJ whispers.
“Showrunners? Learned what?”
“Gurus!” DJ says with a critical scowl. “Ship’s been hijacked. Shouldn’t there be a fail-safe, some sort of dead Guru switch, that would blow it up if it’s hijacked?
“Damned obvious,” I whisper back. “Ulyanova’s convincing. Or maybe—” And this hurts to both think and say, I almost want to shut up and just curl into a ball. “Maybe the plan hasn’t changed. We won’t matter a great goddamned toothpick to this ship unless we get boring.”
DJ plays out my drift. “So we’re doing exactly what it wants—and this is our third act!”
I have to admit I was bored back in the tail, for a while, but this is definitely more and more interesting. I’d fucking stay tuned. What do we say to Ulyanova when we meet up? Wonder what Budgie will say once he’s brought up to date?
Somehow these awkward thoughts leak to Bird Girl. She directs her searchers to move her and favors us with close examination. Four eyes bore into my two. I’m outmatched.