Fiat Lux

This is the canary version of Fiat Lux. It changes more often and may contain rougher prose than the relatively stable version on AO3.

Ante Finem Mundi

Coelia ‘Collie’ Swartz (please, just Collie is fine) looked out the bus window, wistful and hungover, as the streets went by. She was only stirred by an ad about a one-dollar coffee as a promotional price, and a gas station display with a number that began with a two. Grabbing the railing in the least demeaning way she could imagine, she alighted from the bus and beat herself up over being convinced to have one of Maia’s mocktails for dinner, the cause of her present unease. She bought a $25 poke bowl for lunch, to celebrate the fact that she did not kill an undergraduate in the morning for the crime of not reading the Mohsin Hamid assigned to him. The miso soup was extra.

The break room had an AC unit installed by someone’s butch rendezvous a week before the summer term began. The school would have liked to complain about unregulated appliances, if the school had so much as bothered to inspect. Collie buttoned up the cardigan Nona knitted. Her laptop had a tab open about how to get soy sauce out of wool and another about the university housing portal. The portal showed a label that said waitlisted without any further information.

The container went into a separate bin, installed two years ago, and the paper spoon over wooden was a procurement choice supposed to be again up for debate at the next student council meeting. She stepped away halfway into a stack of essays of dubious provenance, to go to the campus electronics store and cradle anew her now crack-free phone screen. The first thing she did with it was DM Maia about not coming home for dinner, yes, the workload was bad, and yes, the soup looked excellent, but no, at this rate she’d be sleeping on campus.

Adjunct Swartz (please, just Collie is fine) of the classical studies department had her own papers to grade now, and worse. The university had her assigned to teach freshmen about colonialism without mentioning Said and economics without mentioning Friedman. She spent her evenings in the long-awaited flat, thankfully far below market rate for something this comfortable this close to her workplace, which on the days that she did not have to wrestle Canvas meant just around two corners and the bookstore. Nona visited, quite often, and told her about the charity she worked at. One election cycle, she got Collie to show up on a video about the grain dole and what a government owes its people. The food bank director was in the next slot.

Nona had dragged Maia too, to observe the meeting where the campus food bank’s funding would be discussed. The three left to celebrate before the board took up the Biology department’s reply to the government’s RFP for regional water quality assurance. The dinner was at a restaurant lit with amber bulbs and fenced by overgrown trellises. The blackboard perched on the sidewalk touted that marinara sauce was made from local hothouse tomatoes.

The water had a marginally higher chlorine content two years after, and Collie did not notice. The next contract review proudly presented downward pressure on the UV disinfection budget.

Nadia Elbakyan is confused why the buses come in two colours and why one of them is noisier. Her mom Nona tells her that two different companies run the buses now, and that’s also why the map is confusing sometimes. Her friend Maddy, though, is even more helpless. But once she drags Maddy onto the bus, they can just relax and listen to the hum of the engine. Nadia always likes that their neighbourhood has more of the newer and less dirty red buses, instead of the noisy blue ones in downtown. Mom usually drives if they have to go downtown anyways. Maddy’s mom is someone who is very smart, and works at the university, where all the red buses live just outside. Auntie Collie is a nice woman, and sometimes big brothers and sisters come to her study room and ask her questions, and she kisses them both and tells them to cross the street to the park. Maddy doesn’t like the girls in the daycare next to that park, and Nadia is always sorry that Maddy has to study there. Auntie Collie has said that the daycare is safe, and that she is sorry too about the girls, but she will make sure that they are dealt with.

She likes Auntie Collie’s house too. It is on the third floor of a red brick building and it is so close to the supermarket and her study room. After work, Auntie Collie always teaches them fun things like how to make massive soap bubbles from bacon grease and ash from a campfire, or her mom would teach Maddy and her how to tie different knots and make sure that the branch is sound before swinging hard on it. She likes hanging out with Lewis too. He is a bit older and his mom Maia works at the observatory on the mountain, so he gets lonely sometimes. Lewis likes his console, and Auntie Maia gives him a game disk just before each time she has to go back to the observatory. Nadia wants to ask why the observatory people can’t move closer so Auntie Maia can be with Lewis.

Collie got Lewis a proper bunk when he was twelve and spent as much time at her apartment as he did at Maia’s place. Maia did sob and thank Collie through the handset when informed of the matter. Lewis, for his part, never did find a proper three-player game, the teams never were balanced. One time, over the lip of a patched pothole he slid off his bicycle with the console in his backpack, and—thankfully—one of the controllers took the hit. It still worked when he got to Mrs Swartz’s place, the scratched plastic just dug into his hands a little.

Nadia crashed her cart into his, and the controller didn’t rumble. He noticed it, just a little bit. When he rode back in the morning, his father took the thing apart, and showed him where the wire to the motor had gone loose. Lewis opened the window and held his breath as dad put a soldering iron to it and made it work again.

Remember, always test before you put the shell back together, save you some time.

He helped strip down and put back together Maddy’s bike in the summer when Mrs Swartz found it at a yard sale. The old brake cables had to be swapped out and the seat was too high. The console lived in the living room of her place now, which always was the more sensible option. The lights would go out after dinner sometimes at his father’s place, and the console with it. Last time mom was home, she talked with dad about selling the place when they thought he was asleep.

Senior Lecturer Swartz?

Please, just Collie is fine.

A Nona Elbakyan says she knows you?

That would be so, what is the matter? Swartz grabbed her coat.

She presented at the university clinic with acute abdominal pain, the clinic says they don’t treat unaffiliated patients.

She is affiliated with me. Is she still at the clinic?

Yes.

Bring me to her.

Mistress Swartz—

Doctor, Doctor.

Right, Doctor Swartz, you simply must understand that we are overloaded as is. There are twenty students out in the waiting room not yet even triaged.

I understand, and I sympathize. I furthermore ask you to consider the fact that Mrs Elbakyan’s child is currently in my living room unawares and that I have a mobile phone in my pocket I would most regret using as a device for—

I regret to tell you, but she is neither student nor staff, to treat her would mean treating the rest of the city.

It needn’t be, if you can deliver her safety, I can do my utmost to make sure the resources of your clinic are both sufficient and efficiently spent.

I—

She is a mother and treasured member of the community, Doctor, if this goes out the optics could be disastrous.

Doctor Swartz—

I ask only for her safety, Doctor. She held his hand unblinking.

Of course, Doctor Swartz. And then it was a handshake.

Maia and her husband came to Collie’s door for Christmas and did not leave until April, when the international students flew back home and never came back and the flats were open. The old house had finally been sold, and the silver took two people to bring to the third floor. They taught the children the importance of carrying the laminated cards that Maia and Collie wrote in longhand and signed. The two for Nona and Nadia were delivered over three pots of tea, while the children played with the console in the living room.

Continuity Test

Lewis had a job now, at the old repair workshop that fixed Collie’s phone back during grad school. He hated laptops and got handy with a microscope. Sometimes, new frames were printed instead of bought, because Fixer was reliable with bringing in liquor and spotty with chips and they were going to wait anyways. Maia wanted him in the electrical engineering department, but had to search for someone in the faculty to meet with him and see his projects. Fridays were paydays, when he would put his copper wires back into his backpack to put at home. Madam Swartz had grown a habit of patting him on the head on those, even though he definitely wasn’t that age anymore.

Every other weekend, though, Bréal and the boys from Epsilon Rho Rho would toot the horn outside the building to tell him they were there, and then they would all drive out to the city to find old parts. Madam Nona always made him bring two vials of mead on the way out. The small one for the guards at the gate, the bigger one for the boys around the fire. And she will want new rubber gloves and a few bundles of sage by next Monday.

Maia always hugged him tight before they headed out, he couldn’t bear to tell her that it was a bit embarrassing.

At her behest, he double-checked his backpack: one large electrician’s toolkit (packed last night), two pairs of insulating gloves, one hardhat, one tourniquet and first aid kit. One large vial of mead, one medium vial of mead, and one small vial of grease and ointment each.

Best bring back all your fingers. They’re for the saws to eat. If you lose one, though, the going rate is two pounds of sausage to a finger.

No it isn’t, don’t listen to your father except the bringing back fingers thing.

The truck bed smelled of french fries as it rolled down the highway towards the city. The governor was set at sixty kilometers an hour, with a screw that his father made sure he knew how to turn before his first outing. The biscuits had a taste of ginger from Nadia’s patch, and covered the slight rancid smoke from the exhaust.

The road to the hardware store had flashing red in the traffic lights and two moving cars on it. His job there was to haul salt and painkillers and disinfectant, which always was heavy, though it didn’t show until that night. The staff made him go into the warehouse and find the rubber gloves himself. Which the manager said now cost two vials of poppy. The trucks will be going elsewhere next month.

The medical student threw up from the fumes about the time when they lost sight of the river. From the cab, Bréal handed him a pouch of dried mint and a square of rolling paper, for the egghead.

First time, egghead? Lewis snatched the mint.

Yeah. the egghead wiped her lips with a stretched sleeve.

First time in a truck or first time in a truck bed?

A lick on the edge of the paper.

Well, the buses, and then we had cargo bikes. We never drove growing up.

That’ll do it, try and keep your eyes on the road.

Lewis took out his flint and knife and told the egghead to lean in. She held the cigarette with the hand she wiped her lips with, and held her briefcase with the other.

…what about you?

Must be in the dozens of trips now.

All smelling like… something died and someone fried it?

It ain’t so bad once you get used to it. Right, you oughta try these biscuits from my auntie.

They got to the town before sundown. Bréal dapped up the two campus guards who said something about can’t wait to eat at the dining hall again after a month out in the country, before they got to briefing the two guards from the caravan who would be their replacement.

The other med student had been here for three months, and handed over to Egghead the binders for the village and which patient was on what for how long, and which old man could never be trusted to take his pills so make his son make double sure.

He caught the general store just before it closed, and got himself a link of sausage and a yard of casing for the return trip.

The rest could wait, for tonight, they just had to sit around the town fire and share the soup the folks had made. Five jars of honey clinked in his backpack, next to a dozen of the smoked salmon from another run by another crew to another town.

The schoolteacher hugged her beau, the carpenter who rode the truck behind Lewis and Egghead. By the book, she still had five more months with this class before she would come back to the university.

The fire seemed to be the only thing in the world, a gyrating ember presence that compounded the sloshing mead. Lewis passed the bottle toward the carpenter, and the schoolteacher in his lap grabbed it instead. A chorus sang Ayy when she decanted from the bottle into his open mouth.

Lewis fell back-first into the truck bed, and did not feel the falling stop even after he snugged himself in his sleeping bag.

The copper run took place south of the town, when the rest of the trucks were already almost full with the butter, leather, and jam from the fields, and while the boys were busy with raising a barn or whatnot. Bréal unlocked the toolbox and tossed him the heavy pliers. Then, he got himself a hunting rifle and a shade for standing hours through a sunroof. The cut chain on the doors lay two feet from where they had cut it that spring. Lewis got to tagging out junction boxes and flagging appliances.

The clock on the wall said two in the morning and the overcast shade said about noon. Lewis wiped off the grease on his hands and bit into a sausage with his left, while his right sorted the rounds that would be of use for Bréal from another pile destined for his backpack. Someone had an ex-police laptop open and was jailbreaking a phone that was once a display unit.

My auntie said she needed some sage, so pardon me while I grab some.

Sure, lil bro, good luck out there.

Behind the thicket there was a blind with the littlest path to a lodge, and from there a dirt road back into town.

One knock, two, then out with four.

He adjusted his collar like how Madam Swartz taught him.

A deadbolt moved.

Diana.

She let him in.

The two drops that remained of the big bottle of mead sat on the steps to the blind.

He had at last learned to grab his aluminum mug by the handle instead of the body when she poured from the thermos. It smelled like chicken noodle soup, more metallic, more fatty. Strong sweet notes from carrot and onion. Herbs too, not like the dry stuff that made it to the university.

Duck noodle soup.

I see.

Made it this morning.

It is very good, thank you.

They waited for the soup to cool some more.

The hinge will want greasing soon.

Yes, ma’am.

And, it is good to see you. Diana said as she rose and put on her gear.

And I love seeing you too.

Sage, right?

Stay safe out there.

The hinge had grime on it, most likely from the last fire from inland. Lewis grabbed a brush from his backpack and got to work. He was brushing dried leaves off the roof when a gunshot cracked from the other side of the hill. He grabbed an armful of the leaves to start a fire.

She brought back a rabbit just as the fire took.

Y’know, my auntie always said that eating nothing but rabbits is how you starve.

That so? That woman teach you anything that would be useful out here?

I certainly pick up more with you.

Good boy.

She handed him his sage.

Anything else before I head back?

Well, umm.

The leg?

A nod.

She moved the empty bottle, sat down, and pulled off her metal leg.

Maddy was the one that made this cream, I told her I had a sore shoulder and she said she added peppermint to help with it.

Must you always bring up other women? She grunted as he massaged the stump.

What, you scared of my sister? We can talk about other things.

Tell me how good that Egghead character is, and if she can help with the leg.

Didn’t you just say no women?

It’s different when they’re a doctor.

He left a jar of Nona’s honey she told him to keep for himself, and put into his backpack an identical jar, with honey-sweetened huckleberry jam. The casing he’d brought would be filled with deer by the next time he came by.

Mother says hi, and to mind the trip home. A kiss. And he was on his way.

He met the crew back at the parking lot, the underside of his fingernails still peppermint-numb.

Bréal counted the convoy before they headed back.

Thirty kegs of salted butter, five sides of leather, twenty crates of jam. Seven bags of pool shock, two shipping boxes of laptops and speakers and headphones. A requisitioned trailer pulling two requisitioned generators cached and hidden two weeks ago.

One freshman relieved after two weeks under a tarp. Egghead’s predecessor, hugging the town children, two Campus Security guards and a Pelican case between them. One high-school aged child with a letter from the schoolteacher and a rucksack embroidered with red thread. The convoy was short one beau, and the town was up one carpenter.

Someone in the cab said something about how sweet sage must burn if its smoke can lose him in a forest, shut up. Someone else chuckled, and they went past university perimeter with thirty kilos of copper.

Maia made him swear that the mead went to the guards and the boys respectively, and he could honestly say yes. Maddy made her ointments with a bundle of herbs from another Epsilon boy. Madam Swartz did not say anything, but served the next breakfast with butter and huckleberry jam. The week after that, she brought cake batter to the bakery and layered it with the jam when she got it home. She told Lewis to bring a slice to Bréal.

He held his breath as he helped puff the sage smoke onto the apiary.

Fortification

Standard Loaf, version 2daeb1ae

From: Department of Food Sciences, Dietitian Nona Elbakyan

For immediate distribution to affiliated bakeries.

Formula

Ingredients	%
Flour, 75-25 wholemeal-oatmeal	100
Water	66
Salt	2
Yeast, fresh	2
Honey	2
Malt	0.5
Chalk	0.5

Process

Stage	Time	Temp	Endpoint
1. Sponge: 50% of the flour, all the yeast, water to slack batter	360-720m	25°C	Rising stops.
2. Final Mix: Remaining flour, salt, honey, malt, chalk, water	10-15m	—	Dough comes together.
3. Fermentation	45-60m	—	Dough doubles.
4. Divide	15-30m	—	1000g apiece for a 2 lb loaf.
5. Rest	15m	—	Moulds without tearing.
6. Mould and pan	10m	—	Greased pans, seam down.
7. Proof	45-75m	25-30°C	Three-quarters tin’s height, finger press springs back.
8. Bake	30-45m	220-230°C, falling	Internal temperature 99°C.
9. Depan and cool	60m	25°C	Depan and cool on racks.

Printed by Arbutus University Press.

The Swartz Carrot Cake

Serves eight, prepare and bring to the bakery after lunch when the oven has cooled slightly.

Ingredients

12 oz flour, try and get as much wheat content as you can

1 teaspoon potash

6 ounces salted butter

6 ounces oatmeal

6 tablespoons honey

3 tablespoons vinegar, use the mead vinegar.

6 tablespoons carrot, grated.

1 fistful salmonberry or blackberry raisins

2 eggs, whisked.

Your choice of toppings. we have huckleberry jam, but whipped cream is traditional if we ever found some.

Water to mix

Steps

Mix flour and potash in a bowl, then rub butter into it with your fingers until roughly incorporated. Add oatmeal and carrots and stir in two eggs and the honey. Add water slowly until you have a stiff batter. Butter the frying pan and put the batter in, use the one with our name on the handle. Time yourself 30 minutes, go to the market or do the washing in the meantime. Serve with huckleberry jam smeared on top.

Maia Tsien’s Dandelion Mushroom Noodles

Fill bellies in a pinch before the harvest comes in

What

Dandelions, yet to bloom

Salt to taste

Garlic with the greens, mince the bulb

Water

Noodles

Dried mushrooms, if the botanists still have any

Ginger, sliced

How

Rehydrate mushrooms in the pot the night before.

Pick for buds and their leaves, bloomed ones are more bitter. Serve buds straight.

Boil water with aromatics and mushrooms, cook noodles till good. Rinse the leaves in running water, then blanch in the broth for twenty seconds. Serve in the pot.

Formulary

The last doctor had left a note on the table, something about how Rusina is better at soups and Seia is better at pastries, as well as which family hearths would not pass health inspections if med students conducted health inspections. The note itself was held down by a grip-trainer, someone had carved moo on the handle.

Egghead flipped the note, and there was a small prayer to whoever is lactose intolerant.

The sign on her office said The Doctor is Out, find ~~him~~ her at this location.

The last doctor introduced her to the frequent fliers, and told her where to fire up the autoclave.

Hammers echoed down the street, someone was using a saw.

She said her greetings to Rusina, and Rusina had her kneel and learn how to squeeze an udder. The hammers gave a percussive rhythm as her arms wore out. The cow’s name was Ginger.

The trucks left with a foot of bandage and a square of gauze wrapped around a hand. It was her opinion that some people should not be trusted with hammers.

See you in the spring.

Day broke, and she flipped the sign on her office to The Doctor is In. There sat a young woman in flannel on the porch, with a yard of sausage draped across her torso and a bundle of pelt at her feet.

Doctor Egghead, right?

Actually, I prefer Rosa.

Egghead suits you more to me. Name’s Diana, see that your office just opened, Doctor Rosa?

Just Rosa is alright, no Doctor.

Out here, we call things by their names, Doctor Rosa.

I accept the compliment. So, how may I be of service?

The old stump is sore again. The last doctor left you anything about that?

Hmm, I do not recall seeing it last night, if you can tell me about it? And please do come in.

The pelts were set behind the door of the examination room.

Diana took off the sausage, and held it out.

’sfor you, and the visit.

I couldn’t possibly.

Yes you can. It’s deer.

Well, in that case. Thank you, Diana. If you could take off your pants and take a seat on this bed?

’course.

Rosa turned to face the wall while she did so. Diana rolled her eyes.

Thank you, it is the left leg, correct?

Yes ma’am.

Rosa gently leaned the prosthesis on the bed.

I see that you have doubled up your socks. The inside one was greasy.

Had to since fall, the socket gets loose.

Every year?

Every year.

I am so glad to hear that you are managing that.

We make do.

And so, when and where does it hurt?

About afternoon and evening, after I am done walking the traps.

You’re a trapper?

Yes ma’am.

I can already tell I will love the sausage. Now, does it hurt if I press… here?

Can’t say so.

Here?

A bit sore.

What about here?

Ow, fuck—pardon me.

It’s quite alright, so it hurts there after the day?

Yes ma’am.

Besides the sock, are you doing anything else about it?

Well, I try and stay in the blind more, get me more sit-down time in the day…

Okay, okay, that is very good.

And there is this lotion I been using. My boyfriend got it for me.

Hmm, do you have it on you?

Yes, should be in my satchel if you’ll gimme a moment.

Of course.

Some metallic things clinked together as she dug into her satchel.

’sgot peppermint in it is what I hear.

Must help with the pain, if I can take a bit out?

Whatever you gotta do.

Hmm, this is quite thick, Rosa pushed the thimbleful around her finger. do you know what else it is made of?

Dunno, I just warm the vial against me before I use it.

You said your boyfriend gave you this? What does his family do?

Well, just from the vial its quite clear they got someone making medicine, and always be talking about herbs and bringing mead so I figure they do beekeeping.

Rosa put the sample up to her nose.

Beeswax, then.

Something about it?

Well, Diana, you see how it is greasy and stays sticky after you put it on?

Yeah, saw that in the morning. The inside takes the grease so the outside stays fresh.

Mhmm, that is smart. When did you start using it?

Yesterday, when the boy was last over.

Is he on the convoy?

Maybe, maybe not.

That’s alright.

Rosa pressed more at Diana’s stump, and saw that the red had faded within the safety margin, though longer than she would have liked.

Been like this for a long while.

Has it taken longer? Shorter?

Well, takes longer after tracking season, and shorter when I’m holed up in the blind.

Rosa got her clipboard.

Alright, and if you are comfortable, can you tell me how the amputation happened?

Rosa could hear her own pen click.

It’s alright if you—

Crushing injury, when I was… twelve, I think.

I am sorry to hear that.

Dad brought me down the mountain, and, and, the vet helped me with it.

Okay, okay, that is all I need to know. Thank you for telling me.

Diana’s left hand combed her ponytail.

So… give it to me straight, doc.

From what I am seeing, it is a nerve bundle that had grown in when the amputation happened. Nerves grow into a blob when they’re cut, you see. And one is right here on the back left of your stump, just beneath the skin. And walking on it all day is what is hurting it and annoying you.

Can’t you take it out?

That would be beyond what I can do. A surgeon is needed for this operation.

I see.

But, keep using the ointment if it helps, though make sure that you put it on before bed and to wipe it clean before you put the socket back on. It would be dangerous if you put it on, and then walked. The numbing makes you unable to feel if it is hurting too bad and you need to take a break. Any questions so far?

Where can I get a surgeon?

I can write you into the queue for the university hospital, but the waitlist is quite long, so I can’t promise anything in the short term.

I see.

And, just to note, the time it took for the redness on your stump to fade was still within the safety margin, but towards the high end. See if you can adjust your workday so you walk less and spend more time in the blind. If the redness stays for more than ten minutes, come to the clinic at once.

Understood.

One last thing, try and get the formula off of your boyfriend.

What kind of doctor puts the easiest thing last?

Well, medical student, in my defence. Any questions?

Can’t say so.

Diana put her leg back on.

Thank you, doc.

You are more than welcome, Diana.

The next case came at lunch, when she was cutting bread for her butter, cheddar, colby, butter-fried egg and butter-fried onion sandwich. It was young Abe’s birthday, so Rosa had him stick his tongue out and then dropped the tincture in. It apparently tasted like salt and a bit like mold. There was some apple juice in the ice box, courtesy of her predecessor, and she gave it to the child to wash it down. The fact that it kept him in observation for the next ten minutes was entirely incidental.

The family gave her four bottles of buttermilk as thanks.

She hung the sausage on the coat rack at the front of the clinic, and slept on the examining bed.

Off Label Part I

Rosa spent the morning on horseback, the ranch had put her on a mare to help with driving the cattle in. There were several small expletives she would rather not repeat, and a curse to her past self for not paying attention during the four-credit riding course. Someone rode for her before noon, she tossed her whip to the closest townsman and followed. The rider’s horse did not so much as slow down in the u-turn.

Sorry, what did you say? Can’t hear anything over these hooves.

Cassidy kid, kicked, in the head. Went down on hay, thank god.

Okay, head trauma, she trained for this.

When did it happen.

I heard that cry and rode and had a look and then I rode for you.

How long ago? Rosa yelled, only part of it was for the hooves.

Say ten minutes.

Was he making sense when you left? The other half of her mind was counting what was in her panniers.

Was moaning, didn’t hear him say much.

Where on the head?

On the side. Was bleeding when I left.

Shit. Okay, breathe in, four seconds, hold, four seconds, breathe out, four seconds, hold.

How much?

Well, uhh…

Seeping or gushing? The gauze was in her bandolier.

About the middle.

Where is he now?

Just outside the Cassidy barn, the folks dared not move him.

Good. He awake?

Yes ma’am.

Did he black out? The alcohol was in a pouch on her right hip, 140 proof. It never stopped smelling like cinnamon when it was empty.

No.

Doesn’t mean much.

Okay, what’s next, what’s next. What did Doctor Franklin say in freshman year?

How old?

Fifteen.

Laying down, how? She slacked the reins more.

On his back.

Did you see any vomit?

Umm—

Rosa wondered what the rider was to young Mr Cassidy.

Yes or no. Now!

Yes.

No time for caution, she unhooked the carabiner holding the keys to the clinic. And tossed it to the rider.

East wall, middle—right—cabinet. Need: stretcher, head immobilizer.

Understood.

Mrs Cassidy was kneeling next to him, crying, and holding a handkerchief to his head. The father too. And hardly any better.

Freeze! Keep his head straight! They made sure she could yell before sending her out.

Unmount, a stumble, she took off one side of the mare’s pannier and washed her hands from the pouch.

If you’ll excuse me, Mr—

Please, you have to save him. Please, you can take whatever you want, please.

Hey, my name is Rosa, I am a doctor and I am here to help you. What is your name? The gauze she unwrapped was packed in wax paper, and was stamped with a seal of Arbutus University.

Impact on temporal bone, major laceration, moderate bleeding.

uhh, i am… attis? Dazed, he opened his lids. The right pupil was larger than his left.

…

Right.

She put a finger into his mouth.

No indication of blocked airway.

Okay, Attis, I am putting a piece of cotton on your head, can you hold onto it where I put it? Patient’s nails are pink, blanch returns slow. Matches cold ground.

mmm.

Mr Cassidy, we are turning him to the side now. I need you to hold him at the thighs. Mrs Cassidy, hold his torso from the left side. I need to hold his head.

He was heavy, the way a sack of flour is heavy.

And what day is it today?

its a thursday, november… don’t think i recall the date.

Do you remember what happened?

a gate, i… kneel down for the lever, and Buttercup panicked. please don’t put her down.

I see, and I promise that won’t happen.

Okay, Attis, now I need you to keep pressing that cotton for me. And I need you to remember three words: Bundle, Book, Banana.

what’s a banana?

Shit, uhh, Don’t worry, let’s do… sword, tree, pillar.

mmm.

Now, I am going to take your wrist for the heart rate. The watch was branded by a company that she thought no longer existed. The back cover was engraved with the university’s seal and motto. T+0-60, fifty-four BPM. T+60-120, twelve breaths, irregular.

Not good.

I need your arm for blood pressure, if you can raise your forearm so I can slide it on?

She pumped the leather bellows. The gauge read 148/72.

…okay.

I am going to shine a light in your eyes, keep them open for me, okay? She had just cranked it before dawn.

Pupil constriction, right side slower than left, slightly. Don’t show panic, if you panic everybody panics.

Mom and Dad, do you remember what happened? She said as she shone her light in his ear. Something in the shape of tear tracks ran to the back of his head, duller than when it must have glistened before Rosa got here.

It was my fault! We were turning the cattle in, when, when I went to get the barn, and then— Mr Cassidy put an arm around his wife.

Okay, okay, ma’am, deep breaths, take it easy. Now, sir, did you see what happened?

Mr Cassidy shook his head.

Now, Attis, can you tell me the three words again?

umm, sword, apple, …paper?

Mrs Cassidy screamed, but not before burrowing herself into Mr Cassidy’s chest.

I am going to take your vitals one more time, m’kay?

mmkay.

170/60, pulse 44, pauses in breathing. Rosa tried her best to recall what it was you were supposed to say to the parents now. She asked Attis about the man who rode for her.

She told Attis that it was okay to feel drowsy, and said that his uncle would be back any moment now, to bring him to the clinic, where she had the rest of her equipment. She signaled the parents to come and hold him steady. Mr Cassidy said something about how supper was still on the stove, son, with the good bread from the baker. Mrs Cassidy’s thumb stroked her boy’s chin.

Agonal breathing arrived, and Rosa pulled out her stethoscope. His lungs sounded of bubbling stew, with a burnt bottom.

His uncle came back, with the stretcher and the head immobilizer. He saw the new doctor performing chest compressions, and announced that he brought what she asked for.

She looked at her watch, the one by the extinct company, and pronounced Mr Attis Cassidy dead at 1148 hours. She pulled his eyelids down, pushed his jaw back up, and logged the hour in her planner.

He was rolled, back to supine.

She removed the blood pressure cuff, wrapped bandage on the gauze on his temple, and clicked back into place the holster of her flashlight. She decanted her canteen entire, to wash away the blood on her hands.

Y’all can move him now. Would you like me to tell the priest on the way back to town?

they could handle it from here, thank you, doctor.

and, madam, the bleeding was inside his skull, nothing could have saved him after the kick. he wasn’t in pain.

…moving him would not have helped.

The uncle was saying a prayer.

i will be back, saturday, noon, at your home. does that sound alright?

Mr Cassidy flicked his wrist, back first.

…otherwise, i’ll be at the clinic.

Rosa put the pannier back on her mare, and collected the university’s stretcher and head immobilizer.

the keys, please.

right, and buttercup…

The Cassidys did not answer.

On the way back to the clinic, she ripped a blank page from her planner, sprinkled mint like how the boy on the back of the truck did, and licked it at an angle that spilled a dash of the dried leaves. The matchbook was from an outfit along the river, and it was in the clinic, half-used, when she moved in.

There was a figure, sat on the porch of the clinic. The mare took a few more steps, and the figure resolved to the Schoolteacher. Rosa took off the pannier, and let a man lead her mare to the stable. The Schoolteacher’s face resolved into a name.

Carmen.

The kids call me Ms Warner these days. And I see that you’ve gotten your degree, VP…

—Rosa, and no, not Doctor Rosa, not before the practicum is over.

There’s the girl that got us real bell peppers in the dining hall. Carmen’s old friend smelled of mint.

I still haven’t figured out where to get vitamin C out here… how can I help today, Carmen?

I am pregnant.

Come in, I’ll start a kettle.

You’re too kind.

How many weeks, by your reckoning?

Well, must’ve been a convoy in the summer. Say July.

Second trimester, then.

When was your last period?

Rosa pulled out a notepad, and the cap came off her fountain pen.

I am sworn to privacy, if that assures.

Well, it hasn’t been consistent for a long while, so I don’t really remember.

Neither was hers.

Thank you for trusting me with that. How did you find out?

Oh, I had been sick for a while, the little bugger kicked me last week and that was when I figured.

Nineteen weeks.

How have you been?

Rosa scribbled something, then the pen slacked in her hand and she looked Carmen in the eyes.

Is the father in the picture?

Yes, came on the same convoy as you on Monday. He works in the carpenters’ shop now.

Good.

Morning sickness? I want to hear more about that.

Oh, it doesn’t get in the way of the day.

Rosa wrote and underlined something. A whistle went off.

Let’s take your blood pressure. While I get the equipment, Carmen, would you mind putting the tea in the pot? Both are in the glass case.

Which tea?

Whichever you like, Cars.

Rosa wiped down the blood pressure cuff, first with a splash of water, and then something from the flask. Carmen chose something with a purplish hue. The listening horn was stored on a shelf that required stepping on a chair to reach.

Notifiable

Isolation

The coffee pot was once complained about, the way it turned water acrid and then made the cup noodle gross. Even now, that bitter threatened to pollute the acidic notes of the rose hips and blackberry by whoever plucked today’s blend. Though, a gentle overthrowing of this herbal vinegar would not be entirely undesirable.

The compressor kicked in and replaced the slight tinnitus in Oyá’s ears. The LEDs on the board glowed while her professor sat in the next chair and read something that was definitely not from the university library.

At least I am not out there slowly getting carbon monoxide poisoning like the sparkies.

Oh, blink and it’ll be your turn digging pipes and laying wells out in the sticks, just try and enjoy it.

I am trying, get me that flask.

She held out her mug.

The professor said something about oak chips and about the chemistry department.

The odometer slaved to the south inlet turbine stayed the same number while the day got warm. The professor folded a page out from the extracurricular publication.

A yellow LED came on.

What is it, Oyá?

South tank, draining.

Wait, what time is it?

The wall clock said 1000, Oyá’s wristwatch said two-past-ten.

Either way, that isn’t right. What does sensor 342 say?

Gauge says dropping pressure, is that not one of the inbound pipes from the—

Yes.

The landline phone did not have a number pad on the front. The operator got the professor the engineering office.

Before she connected them, though, the professor gave the handset to Oyá.

You know enough. Then it was a handshake.

The phone fizzed to life.

South Station, Grand Central. Grand Central requests two trucks out to radio readings on gauge three-hundred-and-ten through to twenty, and three-hundred-and-forty through fifty.

And one more with a high-gain radio, I want the city on the line. The professor shouted from the record room.

And one communication truck to establish contact with city water works at 1215 Windsor Street.

South Station receives.

The map on the table was printed the same day Oyá was born. The professor’s scrawl on it had yet to dry. The handset was on speaker.

South Station, readback on gauge three-four-three.

Right, uh, sorry, field team one reported 25.5 metres half an hour ago.

Radio them for another readout.

Standby…

24.8 metres, Grand Central.

Thank you, South Station.

0.7 metres over half an hour, that’s 1.4 per hour, contamination starts at 14.3…

The professor began using the red marker.

Check time, the wall said 1104, contamination begins at around 1830.

South Station, prepare eight work parties at your location, details to follow. Phone the Douglas station and send a runner with the message “Isolate northern municipal ingress, begin filling trucks”.

South Station receives.

Bréal went downstairs to fill his water jug, and let it run for about ten seconds until it was clear. Must be the university patching the pipes again.

It was ice-cold, and tasted faintly of blood.

He whittled his pencil, and considered how to convince the Rector not to look too close at the pledge records this semester. Then onto more pragmatic matters, if an extra circle on top of a “0 credits this term” read convincingly enough as an 8.

A brother called for him to the common room, said a Madam Oyá asked for the bossman on the phone, and that it was urgent.

You’re talking to him.

…

I see.

…

Loud and clear, thirty minutes.

The phone clicked shut with a thud.

If you would ring the bell and rouse the men with me. I want every brother in their work gear and at the driveway in ten.

Grand Central, Operator. I have the team at Windsor on the line. Connecting you now.

Perun, get me some good news.

Hate to disappoint, Prof. We found two guys and a red phone that nobody on the other side picked up.

Any information you got on why the pressure dropped?

An iron segment gave at midnight, corroborates with our downtown clinic reporting dropping pressure on their daily radio.

The professor covered the microphone, and told Oyá to issue evacuation orders for the community clinics on the office phone.

Anything else?

Yes, get those valves turning on their end, and take whatever maps they have that aren’t twenty-years old. Bring the two workers back to the university.

One sec… The shift leader said they already tried the valves. About three neighbourhoods are already bone-dry and the rest of the city will depressurize by 2000.

You have a pin on the broken segment?

Yes I do. Clark Street and Erickson Street.

That will be all. I will hand you back to South Station.

The truck rumbled down University Road at eighty an hour. Bréal spoke into the CB radio thus:

Friends, Brothers, Epsilons. Now hear this, the university’s fate is in our hands. The city’s water is dying, and if we don’t dig up and turn those valves by sundown we get poisoned as well. That shovel in your hands is here today not just for you, but for what it means to wear this seal, for your mama huddled in our house, and that chick you are so fond of. Till Valhalla!

From outside the rolled-down window: Oorah!

Valve E-2 connected the municipal water mains to the university farm, and then entered the campus proper through the South Station. Oyá circled where it would be from what the team at Windsor Station described, in the red marker. Then, it was simply an issue of calling the agronomy and medicine departments with the utmost composure she could muster.

FM  AGRONOMY DEPT
TO  EPSILON RHO RHO FRMN BREAL
INFO  MEDICINE/FOOD SCIENCES/FIRE SERVICES
NR 013
GR 91

RESTORE WATER SUPPLY TO GREENHOUSES 1 AND 2 AND PLOTS 5 AND 8 AT BEST
SPEED STOP WATER INLET LEFT OF EAST ENTRANCE STOP TRIAGE LIST TO FOLLOW

USE FIRE HOSES FOR EMERGENCY PIPING DIETITIAN NONA ELBAKYAN WILL BE
OUTSIDE GREENHOUSE 1 TO COORDINATE

FULL WATER GREENHOUSE 1
ATROPA BELLADONNA
DIGITALIS PURPUREA
PAPAVER SOMNIFERUM (PRIORITIZE FLOWERING PLANTS)
SALIX ALBA
VALERIANA OFFICINALIS

SURVIVAL DRIP GREENHOUSE 2 AND PLOTS
ALLIUM SATIVUM
ARTEMISIA ABSINTHIUM
CALENDULA OFFICINALIS
LAVANDULA ANGUSTIFOLIA
MENTHA PIPERITA
ROSA CANINA
SALVIA OFFICINALIS
SYMPHYTUM OFFICINALE

LEAST PRIORITY
BORAGO OFFICINALIS
MATRICARIA CHAMOMILLA
TANACETUM PARTHENIUM
BT

There was a camp now, outside valve E-4, six men to a tent meant for four, in twelve-hour shifts to lay the new permanent pipes.

Bréal was in the office tent, where the engineering department had laid the pencil drafts on a folding table. Someone tried to knock on the canvas opening.

Enter.

Good to see you, Bréal, how is the project going?

Half the farm is brown, in the middle of the dry season, and, the agronomists said not to mind. He pinched his nose bridge. But all we are getting are pickles and biscuits from the country. Fifty blocks are on water trucks, and we are running low on gas. What brought you here, Madam Swartz?

Well, first of all I am glad to hear that what needed to be saved was saved.

Just, get to the point.

I can get your men whatever fresh produce the Swartz family can get, in exchange, you restore water service to our district first, right after the hospital and school get it back.

I don’t believe that is up to regulation. And, why should I do this?

Because, Bréal, I have some jam of my own, and Maddy already brought your woman a sample. At the Epsilon house.

Is that a threat against my property?

Oh, nothing of the sort, but I had asked the girls to make something for the boys out in the camp. I could see how weary they were just coming in. Sewing crop covers just isn’t as labour intensive as laying pipes, you know?

How do we explain this?

Oh, you won’t have to. Just… recommend the engineers to recompute the district triage with slightly different weightings. The sandwiches are just here to relieve our working boys, yes?

Okay. okay.

And, just for my best foreman. Collie produced a bottle that must have been tied to her calves. A gift, from Château Swartz.

Where did you find grapes?

I have my means.

Boil Water

Maddy woke up some time in the night, before the sun rose up. She was in the top bunk, and Nadia was on the bottom. Some birds were outside, cawing. Lamplight shone through the bottom of the bedroom door. The LED lamp that Collie had in the office growing up, next to the little statue of Venus that always made her laugh.

She snuck down the ladder, she was good at that part.

Mom.

Maddy. Quite early today. Collie held a lit piece of paper, and put it in the iron.

Yeah.

Your sister still asleep?

Most likely.

Fetch the kettle, and make us both some tea.

Collie was ironing her good dress, the one she hung to dry inside her room instead of on the clothesline that stretched to Lewis’s side of the building.

Mr Tsien said he will have our chunk of the hallway walled up by the weekend, if Lewis would help with hauling brick from the fifth floor.

So he will be the one at home this week? The kettle was getting heavier quite slowly in Maddy’s hands.

Yes, and he wants opinions on which of our doors to install in the new wall.

I always liked ours better.

The tea was from Maddy’s pouch, dried from whatever good leaves she found on the family patch in the greenhouse.

What are you ironing the good dress for?

Oh, just a meeting with the Emeritus today.

What about?

Bréal and I had a chat, and that gave me an idea. And why are you up so early?

mmm.

Is it getting too hot? I can have Lewis bring us back a fan.

No.

The sheets itchy? Nona can take a look.

Not that either.

Well. Let’s just drink some tea then, you always pick such a calming mix. You’ve got school and I’ve got work, long day ahead. Collie hung up the good dress, and pulled in a shirt from the clothesline. The bearing squeaked if she went faster than a creep.

I dreamt about her.

Collie opened the iron’s lid, and quenched the smoulder with a squeeze sports bottle. To bring the temperature down.

What about?

I couldn’t save her. I fed her juice and I held her up and I couldn’t save her.

Maddy held her mug with both hands, Collie worked on the sleeves.

Neither could I.

She smiled through it.

She did. And she did it most to you.

The collar was stubborn, someone had put too much starch in the washing. Maddy delivered a new lump of coal by way of tongs.

Why did it happen?

We don’t know, but we lost a lot of good people that season.

She took her medicine. I helped her steam the syringes.

And you made her the peppermint oil for the nose.

There were two tabs open on Collie’s computer the day before they made their first vial: one was about children needing some amount of agency when encountering stressful situations, on the left. The other was a website on homemade smelling salts for nausea, on the right.

And mom is still dead. Buried in a grave in the city.

…yes, and we did our best, Maddy. We all did. Do some deep breaths for me, baby. She didn’t tell Maddy that the drug safety agency was tendered out three summers before that.

Maddy didn’t.

Did it hurt? When mom died?

It didn’t, the syringes were properly disinfected and stored, and it drew excellently that day.

We, found some poppy. She just went to sleep.

Maddy nursed her cup. Collie put the iron down, poured more of the tea, and went back and worked on the chest.

She loved you, she loved you so much.

And she is gone, mom. It doesn’t change that.

No, it doesn’t.

It is unfair.

Yes, it is.

Collie squeezed the bottle too hard. There was a plume of steam.

Who was she to you, mom?

She was the bookworm, if you’ll believe me. The one who gave me her textbooks with the year-old notes and the one who got winded from chasing the bus.

And they couldn’t find a better vial for her.

They couldn’t find a better vial for anyone in the city. Grandpa and grandma did everything they could.

That doesn’t make it any better.

No, it doesn’t. The bottom of the shirt was always the most wrinkled.

A flock of birds cawed outside, Collie hung up the shirt and doused the coals more. Maddy poured herself another helping. There were a few more hangers on the clothesline.

They were quiet for a while.

You must be hungry, when was the last time you ate? Come help me with breakfast.

I ate a late lunch, with the doctor, when the rush died down in the hospital.

Then you are having two eggs with your breakfast. Come on, what do you want to eat?

Maddy considered the onions, and rejected them on the grounds of chemical crying leading to emotional crying. She then rejected the cheese, because the grease won’t sit well by lunch. She looked at the sausage, and decided that Collie already had enough trouble for one morning.

Mushroom, the ones Nadia put on the counter Tuesday.

We can do that, with the garlic powder too.

I can tell you are trying to cheer me up.

I always was a bad liar.

They put potatoes in the boiling water. Maddy was cutting the mushrooms and Collie whisked the still-warm eggs.

What did she tell you? Before she died?

She told me to stay healthy, to bury her next to your dad.

Collie unhooked the frying pan, the one with the Swartz name on the handle.

She also told me to take care of you, Medea.

Why did you use that name?

Because we picked it, together, when she was carrying you. And because I never got to telling you what it meant.

The mushrooms were thinly sliced, and they would go into the butter before the egg.

Medea was a princess in a kingdom called Colchis, a granddaughter of the Sun. She made magic and medicine. When people wronged her, she did not sob and mourn like the other princesses, well, not just. She used her magic, and made poison, to make them pay. She was strong, and she found a place with people she could trust, and lived happily ever after.

Collie rinsed her hands, even though they were clean.

Your mother saw what was coming, and she wanted you to be strong, very strong.

The mushroom dissolved its flavour into the oil.

What were their names?

Collie deglazed with a spoonful of water. The tap was slow.

What matters is that you are mine now.

Maddy held a shallow breath, for half a second. I want to know.

You have a photo of them both framed on your desk.

I want to hear it. And I want to hear it from you.

Collie moved the mushrooms to one side of the pan, and did not look at her thirdborn child.

Alice, her name was Alice Swartz and she was my sister. I was there when you were born and I was there with you when we buried her. Take out and mash the potatoes. She set down the spatula, and grabbed the bowl of whisked eggs. Maddy took the pot off the stove and took out the potatoes. She was generous with the ramekin of butter. Your father, Richards, he, God.

That is all, thank you.

Maddy set down a cloth where Collie then set down the pan. She gave Collie the nice bowl of potatoes she smoothed with the spoon, instead of the one she mashed in. Her bowl had the potato up to the edge on the left side and dug out on the right.

She, she told me to protect you, and, changing you to a Swartz was the only way, to make sure that the university knew you were mine.

Collie sprinkled some more salt on her eggs.

I am sorry, Maddy. I am sorry I never told you why.

She cut the egg into bite-sized pieces, and then carried on cutting. The yolk pooled like a thin moat around the potato.

I can write it all back, now that things are better.

Maddy glanced at her aunt, skewered two mushroom slices on her fork, and stabbed a third unblinking.

Don’t worry about that, mom.

The mushroom was a bit undercooked.

Collie did the dishes, and Maddy dried them with a towel before setting them back in the cupboards.

I have to do my makeup before I go, you go and get some sleep.

I want to watch.

There was a black paste and a rust-red one.

This one is called eyeliner, used to be that it came as a pen, like a fountain pen. I made it with an Egyptian recipe, with our beeswax and oil and crushed charcoal. Close your eyes so I can put some on you.

The brush was from a younger Collie’s attempts at watercolour, the old house was filled with oil paintings signed A. Swartz.

This one is blush, it is the same base, but with purified rust. Women began making these in Persia five thousand years ago. Purse your lips like you are about to kiss someone.

Collie’s fingertips were warm. She did another two dabs on Maddy’s cheeks.

There. Now you’ll be the fanciest apprentice in the entire hospital. Just don’t touch your face if you can help it.

Maddy looked into the mirror, a different woman looked back.

She always liked that upward flick. Collie said.

Collie put hers on, while Maddy packed her lunch and notebooks and braided and tied her hair up.

So what does the day hold for you? Collie asked.

Oh, probably just checking in on the diarrhea cases. Looking to discharge a few.

Good, remember to keep your handkerchief on tight when you are in the sick ward.

The nurses already drilled that into me. Maddy double-checked that she packed a spare.

And, take these.

Collie held out the two compacts and the brush.

Just, keep them in one piece. They used to be grandma’s.

mmm.

Druzhina

The Emeritus’ property was something done in concrete and stone, in the brutalist style that was in vogue after the Second World War (unlike the red brick construction of the Swartz property that was popular before that). The windows were no longer glazed, but rather covered with wooden shutters that did not seem to be painted, or at least painted yet. Collie relaxed the fingers gripping the straps to her tote, and presented the doorman with her card.

And the purpose of your visit, Madam Swartz?

Socializing.

Please come with me.

She was led in, and was patted down once the two turned a corner. The doorman apologized for the measures, and Collie was gracious in understanding due caution. She was delivered to him, in the garden, where hydrangea and lavenders were in bloom.

She walked past a bronze sculpture of Demeter.

Coelia. On his knees, he clipped a weak branch, before turning to face her.

Dr Fleming. Collie’s smile reached her mouth first, and her eyes a millisecond later.

Sit, my dear. He said, in the process of standing up, leaning on his walking stick.

Your servant took my bottle, said she is to cool it for us.

Oh, yes, quite lovely, isn’t she?

And the loaf, she said she will bring them sliced with the butters.

You simply must try the one she makes with lard and dill.

I can hardly wait for the cinnamon buns. Collie’s eyes did not twitch.

Ada, Fleming’s granddaughter, brought the fine china. She poured tea into Collie’s cup first, which she had the arm to do from the other side of the table without standing up. She was in a dress too, another pre-collapse piece, but with fresh embroidery at the waist and shoulders. Collie could faintly recall seeing the same dress from an old magazine.

Let us wait until we are done with the first course, today is too good a day to squander in the name of business. Dr Fleming said.

Tell me, how has Maddy been doing at school?

Apprentice now, hospital took her in in the spring.

I simply must see that little sunshine again soon. Fleming said. What of Lewis?

Fixing old laptops, building parts and pulling wire with Epsilon on crews.

Laptops. Ada interjected, with the tone and eyes that one reserved for relics.

He is a resourceful young man. Collie replied.

Dr Fleming drank from his cup, a delicate porcelain one etched in pink and gold. A bee crawled on the tip of a bloom.

I see you finally finished the old greenhouse. Collie said.

Yes, Ada, why don’t you tell Coelia what you did about the roof? Fleming commanded.

Well, it wasn’t much, really. Just some strings and weights and some quick math to get the frames just right. Ada’s voice was almost all nasal, and her throat did only half the work of talking.

Oh, you know it was anything but trivial. Fleming pressed.

Umm, well, y’know, I just, did it with physical models. Collie could see that Ada was shy.

And entirely without electronics! Isn’t she smart? Fleming patted his grown granddaughter on the head. From his eyes, she was just still a baby.

Well, Ada, that really is something to be proud about. I don’t even know how to operate a slide rule. Collie said.

Oh, well, it’s easy, dealing with the thorns is harder, I am sure. Ada put on her best impression of puppy eyes toward her grandpa.

Shame the old faculty never got to it. And for once I did the trendy thing in time. He chuckled.

Picturing the creature that had transfixed the internet population for two months and thirteen days, and the dance that Dr Fleming did in imitation of it four months in, Collie smiled from her eyes and covered her mouth half a second after a rhythmic giggle began their departure.

It is good to see you, Coelia.

The servant brought them the bottle and the sliced bread, with three butters, jam, and a platter of cheese. There was pepper butter, cinnamon butter, and a plain one. The servant decanted the Swartz mead into champagne flutes.

I was curious, where do you get your butter, Fleming?

Same town as you, most likely, the one to the east. What’s its name…

Aldermere, papa. Ada supplied.

Funny, then. My Lewis has a sweetheart there, though he thinks I am clueless. Collie said.

He is getting about that age, isn’t he? I hope you are learning just how fast they grow up. Fleming stroked Ada’s cheek with his thumb, Ada covered her face, Collie said an Aww.

And how about your own? Collie said a moment after they toasted, to good health.

Oh, Cecilia’s out building now, with the rest of the engineers. Last I heard she was up the coast, fixing mountain passes.

And her mother?

Ada went still for a moment, Dr Fleming went still for half of that.

Less so, Klara’s quite lethargic these days, doctors say nothing to worry about, though.

The doctor put her on a plan, she is comfortable. Ada recited.

See? What would I do without her? Fleming chuckled.

Collie topped her toast with pepper and gouda, Fleming had his with cinnamon and jam, Ada just had hers with butter.

I will have my people bring herbs, then. Collie said.

Right, regarding that. Fleming washed down a crumb with a sip of tea. That girl, Nadia. My sweet Ada said your girl is quite excellent helping in Botany. Ada giggled, in a way that did not engage the vocal cords, but rather made its sound entirely by the rushing of air out of her nostrils.

Yes, she really is so much more a greenthumb that our generation ever was. Collie said.

I have something for her. Fleming said, in a tone befitting the line.

Collie perked up, but caught it in time to turn it to a piqued.

Ada, would you go back to the weaving? Me and Lady Swartz will need a moment to ourselves.

Yes, papa. Ada nodded, and excused herself back to the ground floor, where the looms were.

She will want some field experience soon, for her degree. I have a slot for her, for the next season.

She is already quite comfortable in the greenhouses, I think.

—and a less backbreaking post for… what’s her name, Nona, yes? I am sure you would love it.

She slathered one more slice of toast, with jam and parmesan. A moment passed before she triangulated her next line. Have you considered voting in support of the entreaty with Epsilon and Iota?

The servant came back with more tea, along with a few strips of bacon and eggs for the two, nothing too absurd to get in the way of the afternoon.

I don’t think I can, Coelia.

Bréal would be delighted.

Yes, he would, but you cannot possibly think he would always be bought with wine alone.

It worked for Rome for four hundred years.

It was less reliable east of the Balkans. He let the bacon’s heat melt the pepper butter, onto a slice of toast. There was rosemary in the loaf Coelia brought.

Collie helped herself to another cup.

Coelia, think of this less as foederati, but as the legions.

And you wrote the book on how the oligarchs got filthy rich, after the Soviets fell. Collie opened a jar of liver paste, which made a pop as the button gave under it. You could be the biggest winner. Nobody quite remembers who took over Doctor’s Sausage. Collie folded her legs, under her wine-dark dress. The same one she wore for the first week of every semester.

My bloc won’t flip, I suggest you ask me to help you finding a place for Bréal instead of scheming about a private army.

Collie sighed, and rose to follow Dr Fleming’s walk through the glass-covered garden.

I will tell Bréal myself first, then the rest of the men.

Just Bréal. Because after the vote, you will be escorted by Campus Security into the Epsilon building, to convince them to hand over their guns. Fleming fed a caged bird with nectar.

I say this now, before the University commissions you to, because he and I would both trust you to do it right. Fleming continued. There was a shower above the university then, and the catchment from the roof flowed upon the glass to water the covered gardens.

Then I would appreciate a slot for Lewis in Electrical Engineering.

Dr Fleming sighed, rang a bell, and whispered into his servant’s ear. He sits, like anyone else. Dr Fleming wiped what was left of the yolk with a piece of toast.

Of course. Collie gripped on her knife a little too hard, and the muscle was seen straining.

He will be behind, and would be for two years.

You always were steadfast about academic integrity.

It is sausage that fills stomachs. You yourself should know panem et circenses.

I specialized between Athens and Sparta.

Hobbes wrote in Latin.

They had something fluffy and light after that. Topped with whipped cream.

In exchange for Lewis, I want you to cover something for my Ada when I am gone.

What will she need?

She is smart, she will know. All she needs is someone like us to sign.

Someone like us.

Klara is in no condition to sign. And, I want to back the bill that would grant us our holdings. Collie helped Dr Fleming sit back down.

That bill was going to pass anyway.

Generous, then, to show us the reason why we should back you. Collie said.

The matter with Nadia, please do not take it personally. I just found the notion of attending a coronation tiresome. He said.

They had another helping of mead.

Right, I don’t think I ever got back to you on how that internship went. She said.

Well, how did it go?

That department had the budget slashed midway, there was no return offer.

Would have been a sinking ship anyway. Host and guest emptied their second pot. I just want you to know. When I wrote in that letter that you would have thrived anywhere, I really did mean it.

One must focus on what they can control. Collie set cup and plate back on the table.

…and still as disconcertingly amicable as always.

You taught me that, before the thesis defense.

Take care on the way home, Lady Swartz. And, congratulations on the new apiary. Fleming did the above-the-waist part of a courtly bow. With the twisting of the outreached hand as flourish.

Deliver my greetings to the family, Sir Flemiovich. Collie did a curtsy.

Fleming considered which flowers to put on the family Coat of Arms, and settled on wheat.

The oven was fifteen degrees warmer than it was supposed to be at this hour. The man working the counter gave the woman before Collie two dozen flatbreads to put into her bag herself.

No pie today, Madam Swartz?

No, not this week. What do you have hot?

The samosas just finished baking. We have potato and we have peas.

Two. And a sausage roll.

Madam, you look green, is everything okay?

Just the pastries, please.

Collie had a metal one for takeouts — and in the earlier days, gruel — its lid held with a spring-loaded mechanism that she was never quite able to describe in words.

It clicked down, sharp. Here you go, madam.

How much would that be?

Twenty-five dollars.

Collie opened her leather wallet, and gave him two tens and a five. On the Obverse were three reproduced signatures, one by the University President, one by the Dean of Economics, and one by the Director of Food Services. The centered seal had a Dogwood flower wrapped in a Mahonia wreath.

She went to the market after, to distract herself.

Ground

Nadia, be sweet and grab me a bottle of soda from the ice-box before you head to the greenhouse? Alex Tsien said, kneeling before a waist-high wall coming up on the family’s side of the third-floor hallway.

Here, and one for Lewis, when he comes down.

Thank you, tell the botanists I love whatever they’re putting in these bottles.

The elevator doors were perpetually open and there was a garden gate installed so people wouldn’t fall in. Alex was there when they took the car out. What remained was a winch that reached the top floor, a cargo basket rated to carry 500 kilograms, and a label in bold font that said DO NOT EXCEED 100 KG. You drove it by sending a young man to the ground floor and hollering down the well step on it, Lewis! Nadia, of course, took the stairs.

It would appear that he cursed himself, under the breath, for forgetting to tell her to buy some new hinges on the way home.

A basket came down from the fifth floor. Lewis’s voice came down the well. Daaaad, bricks for ya.

Come down and help me with wall.

They sat down and drank the soda first. But not before Alex went to the bathroom and ran the tap to a bucket. It was a honey-sweetened bug, with a smattering of whatever it was that Nadia helped grow in the greenhouses. It smelled faintly of oak.

How are we gonna take out the threshold? and I found tiles to match our foyer on fifth.

Foyer?

A xuanguan.

Ah.

So, after this is done, we’re gonna put the shoe rack on the new back-wall?

Might have to paint Nona’s one black, like ours. The white is so dirtied.

Water spilled onto the shower’s floor.

Now, help me with mixing the concrete.

Collie came home sometime in the afternoon, and made the boys wash their hands before handing them their potato samosas. They had bits of carrot and onion in them, and were spiced with dill and caraway.

They took off their tools, and doused themselves in their clothes. Collie put her good dress back in the wardrobe and washed off her makeup before the sweat did it for her. Someone had ripped a knee off their jeans, and Nona was at the greenhouse so it was up to her to patch it.

Two t-shirts that were not grey in the morning found themselves in the hamper. Alex found Lewis a stool for laying the top of the wall. Two arms complained about a trowel’s journey up and down and a scoop of paste and back up again. Someone pulled out a length of string to measure for the doorway they needed to nail together tomorrow.

Several pieces of 2x4s framed the doorway, the women had to duck coming home. Lewis said sorry and that it will be gone tomorrow, promise.

Father and son washed up with a towel, in the men’s part of the river. Alex made sure that Lewis’s hair was as dry as the towel could get it.

The nightstand held a beeswax candle, unscented.

Alex.

Hmm? what is it, four-eyes?

The committee talked today.

On?

Moving the observatory, and they want me back up there to do the packing.

When are they sending you out?

We haven’t decided yet, but they say it will be after the dry season.

And they must need an electrician, right?

They should.

You should tell Collie, then.

I will, in the morning, I just wanted to tell you first. Maia hugged him tighter.

There, there. We’ll go up there together, hmm? A gun can’t be that different from a nail gun.

I’m just, then Lewis will be here alone. And when he rides we won’t know if he—

—He will have the cousins, the boys are careful, and Maddy is smart, she can keep him alive.

—but we won’t know how long we will be away! He hardly had me, I can’t take you away from him too.

His hand covered hers, he could feel her nose and forehead on the small of his back. The candle flickered from a gust of wind.

We could bring him too, he pinched at the back of her middle finger, letting the skin slide off his fingertips.

But—

An electrician needs an assistant.

And he will be away from the family.

And close to us, and another hand to pack things, and we will be out in no time.

But, won’t it better, if, he is young, and, if we don’t, Collie would—

We will, I promise. Our son has good eyes, your eyes.

With his left hand, he held her hand in his; with a shuffle, his right palm smothered the light.

The shuffle continued, and turned him supine. The hand that found her chin was still warmer than blood. He cursed himself for getting the order backwards, though her lips were soft candlelit or not.

She shifted the held hands.

Why is the doorframe only half as thick as the wall?

Because I’ve been meaning to get us a proper gate, like how we had back in the old country. They knew their things.

Right, so, I’ll want to find one next time I am out?

Ha! Just don’t get left behind by the big boys.

Oh, Dad, they won’t dare to leave a brother, much less a Swartz.

…Better be, now get the keys to the machinists, I’ll get us all something chunky for dinner.

Collie brought home a casserole, with thinly sliced potatoes, butter, and pickles on the side. A towel was formed into a donut shape, to hold the round-bottomed pot of corn chowder ladled from the dining hall. Mugs toasted with apple cider in them, to celebrate the new entrance. The tiles set into their places beneath a temporary plank.

The pot was labeled a wok, when a young Alex Tsien bought it from an Asian grocer three months after landing on this side of the planet. He also bought something made of mango and sago that day, for the train back to campus.

Lewis picked the lock on another apartment on the fifth floor. The shelves they found took a bit of finagling to tie to the cargo basket. The pair of radios he found on last week’s run came in handy. Nona complained about the sawdust in the second living room, so they ended up building the rest of what Collie asked for outside the building, out of old pallets from the city.

Collie’s room was on the west side of the apartment, and the afternoon would remind her of her duties outside of it. One of the women was working a hand crank to bring a basket of groceries up.

Someone knocked on her door. She closed a binder.

Enter.

Doctor Swartz? A head peeked in.

By Jove, Alex! How long have we eaten from the same loaf, just Collie is fine.

…can never be too polite.

Walk the rest of yourself in, sit, tea?

Would be lovely. The chair was upholstered in a pleather that had stayed remarkably intact.

So, what is it?

Well, just, regarding the decision to expand the storeroom in the other side of our property, I had Nadia go to the archives, and there may be a weight concern.

How so?

I looked at the building’s blueprints and age, nobody had been inspecting it for years…

And?

Nona and Nadia make honey, and it might be too heavy to put on our floor, grains, too.

Does Lewis have an opinion?

Not yet, he is still tearing things down on the fifth floor.

Have him take a look at it, Collie sipped from her mug, in your professional opinion, where should we put our storeroom?

Well, the simplest would be to just buy as we need, and to keep the honey at the apiary, Alex looked at Collie’s face, but I understand that something closer would be best for winter.

Yes, it would.

We would want the weight on the foundation, so we either build a new storehouse off the road, or, we wall off a chunk of the ground floor.

I see. Did the blueprints give any obvious options?

The common room, I think, or one of the abandoned stores, the common room would be easier to secure.

That, then.

But, we would then also be walling off the common room. I don’t know how we can handle that.

Oh, it shouldn’t be too hard. I will try my best to convince the neighbours. We can acquire locks and keys, yes?

Certainly.

Would it be hard to secure the common room?

The windows will want a few more men to handle, but it is the same brick.

How many?

Me and Lewis… Alex did something with his right hand, I will want four men, six in total. Two days, in our building.

I will need some time to arrange the bedding, how does next Wednesday sound?

Should work.

And, given that we are not installing more shelves, can you and Lewis make two rooms out of the living room? Or, actually, can you disassemble the bunk bed into two beds?

Would be easier just to build a fresh one. Will push the common room business to… next Friday.

I will visit Epsilon, but in that case expect them next-next Monday.

Yes, ma’am.

Collie let that slide.

Alex, what do you have for the rest of the afternoon?

Oh, just building out the backlog.

I hope I am not taking too much of your time. I know electricians don’t handle concrete if they can help it.

The season has been quiet, so it is good to keep my hands busy. And less dangerous work too.

And how is Lewis? Picking up the trade well?

Yes, he knows a lot already, brings himself back alive from the trucks. Just, is a bit more willing to work on hot wires than I want him.

That I can’t help you with.

You operating any power tools later? Collie asked as she bent down from her chair.

Why do you ask—oh. Well, I shouldn’t.

It is 24-proof on a good day, just one. You said yourself Lewis can handle himself.

…but, his mind raced for an excuse, still I need to take measurements for the stuff and…

You sure?

Very well, just one. I tell you, just one.

It was not just one.

Wild Oats

A secretary was leaning on a workbench and staring at Bréal, when the latter saw the newly spun part blue on its surface.

Sup, Vavasseur?

New requisition letter from Agronomy, needs your rubber-stamp.

And what might that be?

They want three trucks, with drivers, for something called phytoremediation, something about grass.

They’re farmers, it is always about grass.

Here’s your pen, bossman. Pages one and four will want your signature, and all pages will want initials. But, before you sign, just want to let you know that a kid specifically asked for Lewis driving her.

We a valet company now? Bréal looked closer. Wait, that just me or does that say Medea Swartz on the third slot there. The one for Planting Assistant.

That do be the case. That’s Lewis, Nadia, and Medea for truck 02.

Huh.

That’s why I said the But, boss.

What the hell they sending out the princesses for?

Something about grass, I figure.

You did get signatures for everybody?

Yessir.

And where is the AO?

Three-day circuit inside University country, radio check-ins every eight hours.

Okay, that I can sign off on. Bréal put it down in cursive. And get truck 02 some extra firewood and uhh… whatever else you got lying around. We got pemmican?

We got pemmican. Vavasseur jotted something down.

Bréal grabbed a towel, the part was no longer blue. Now, V, stand aside if you don’t want to risk a nasty blister. The whatchamacallit cooled further on the now-complete tray, next to its brethren.

Boss, permission to speak freely?

Spit.

Why you seem so pressed about them? Lewis is cool, if anything bit soft for a brother. And the girls capable bachelorettes.

Well, the bossman took off his safety glasses. You ever seen them all together? Like, lined up, side to side. Or, like, heard Lewis talk about his moms and dad, singular?

They do look very different, yes.

The dad, he had me brick up a good chunk of the ground floor at his building.

But it is the Madam that frequents us. What I do know of Mr Swartz is that he is an electrician working for the university.

And I used to be in a private school, Bréal nailed the lid for the parts. Get them the pemmican.

The seed launcher on the back of truck 02 would, twenty years ago, have been classified as a Destructive Device and bankrupted the university in tax stamps. It was electrically primed, from a pair of alligator clips attached to a lead-acid battery (itself next to the cooler). It made a satisfying thunk when a seed packet fell in and subsequently flew out in a beige confetti.

God, and to think you get to roll on these streets every other week, Lew! Nadia shouted into the cab, a few minutes after rolling something herself. The herbs being from the garden on fifth floor.

Thunk.

Yeah, and no workman’s comp. Gimme that rollie and keep busy. Lewis steered around a pothole.

Put that thing on the B-side first. Nadia wheezed, having been jostled by the rim of the same pothole.

Thunk.

Maybe this’ll finally put some hair on your chest. Lewis smoked with his left hand and flipped the cassette with his right. It took ten-ish seconds, but it was okay because the road was empty anyways.

Puff, puff, pass. Man. A third voice joined in alongside a hand making the gesture of a gimme.

No thunk, there was instead a guitar solo.

Where did you even learn that, Mads? Lewis inquired, eyes still glued to the road.

Oh right, your problems don’t puke cancer on you. Maddy spat.

Sod off, at least you know you’re dying if’n you fuck up. Lewis the Junior Electrician parried.

Maddy had been taught what an accelerator is thirty minutes earlier, and the brake, ten. It was Lewis and Nadia’s turn on the launcher. The cab window was rolled down, in case Maddy needed reminders about which pedal was which. So far, though, she seemed quite alright and not inclined to converse. They were on one of Nona’s cassettes, there were no vocals and a disconcerting amount of cello.

Thunk.

What’s the next stop again?

The uhh… Lewis unfolded his map. …Calypso Diner, at Weirwick, they’re expecting us. The flag is in the toolbox, right?

Yeah, I double-checked. What do they eat out here in the country anyways?

Oh, I dunno, you know I run the other route.

Well, it’s not like Maddy would have a better idea.

Thunk.

So? Take a guess at what’s our lunch?

This is fish country, see if we warrant some fish and chips maybe.

Maddy’s voice rang in, from the cab. Remember, only eat the hot stuff.

But it’s so hoooooot Nadia moaned.

Okay, this advice I can actually get behind. The rest of that child’s antics notwithstanding. Lewis grabbed another seed packet.

Ugh, we were like three months apart. There was a growling that was not from the engine. One of these days I am going to be the family doctor, and then you’ll be sorry.

The seed spreading stopped two crests before the fishing town, and the flag was raised one crest before that. Lewis was on the binoculars, and Nadia behind the wheel.

Visual, guard tower one o’clock. Driver, toot the horn twice.

The horn on this truck was something more guttural than a toot.

Driver, roll to stop just after the crest. Turn off the engine.

Lewis waved his hand from the window, Maddy could see that the man in the tower had his own binoculars. She did another count of what they had on the truck. And visualized the shotgun in their briefcase.

A voice came in on the radio. Lewis opened an envelope and mumbled something back into the microphone.

Maddy, stand up on the bed and wave to them.

They let them in, the handful of people on Main Street turned their heads.

Nadia unfolded the leather wallet the department gave to her and produced her chit, along with a metal seal of Arbutus University. The mayor and his men took stock of their share of seeds and said the diner was expecting them.

Here, at the front for our university’s officers. And, you are a doctor, right? Madam… A woman in an apron welcomed them.

—Maddy, and just a Medical Assistant right now. No Madam. The bar was full of fishwives, as were the tables further from the window.

Right, Nurse Maddy, a few of the townsfolk would like you to have a look. After your lunch, of course.

…Okay, we only have three hours here, though.

The woman walked back into the kitchen.

…Officers? Maddy said to no one in particular.

That’s what’s on the paper. Nadia stated.

All fancy schmancy now, aren’t ya?

Oh, as if you don’t enjoy yourself on your trips, Lew.

Fuck off. He said while unscrewing the cap on their disinfectant.

It was not fish and chips, but rather fish and potatoes arranged together in another manner.

Salmon chowder with biscuits, for our hardworking botanists. The woman said as she unloaded her tray.

Nadia blew her smoke away from the table, it was something milder than her morning one. So, tell us about your girls, playboy.

How did you know anyways?

Oh, I told her. Maddy interjected, while trying to snap off a chunk of biscuit. Why is this so tough to crack?

Is there no secrets under our roof?

No, not really. Except that magazine you keep under your pillow. Maddy said. Nadia raised her eyebrow.

Lewis groaned, and gestured for the cigarette.

Well, uhh, name’s Diana, lives on the outskirts of town, real good trapper, lives with her mom. God, and the way her eyes look when she’s angry.

And you either love her under the sky or in her mother’s home. Nadia muttered something about men.

What is it with y’all and my romantic life.

We only want to make sure that you love her, yes? Maddy’s eyes had a sharpness to them.

Yeah, of course, absolutely. Where do you think the honey goes and where the jam comes from?

That’ll do. Nadia dipped her biscuit into her soup.

Well, then, Nadia. What about who’s getting you so giddy after the long days at the greenhouse? Maddy pivoted, before taking a sip of the tea she asked for.

Oh come on!

Maddy conducted her practice on the cleared diner table, with her kit from the truck. A man who had yanked out something sharp from his hand that morning brought in his boy. The finger had been swollen since two days ago and the boy had slept a single digit of hours since. She disinfected her scalpel on the griddle. An earwax plug was flushed out next and the woman wanted to bring it home as a keepsake.

Nadia instructed the mayor’s men on how to spread the seeds over the polluted areas, and not to disturb the land for several years. It took some sweet-talking and leaflets to convince the farmers to plant the new landrace, which was far easier on the land than the old crop, for the price of yielding proportionally less.

She was authorized to assign four additional oxen for each town, and had before the trip thought it was a ridiculous number.

Lewis hooked another generator into the town’s power grid. Three fuses were taken from the truck.

Nadia and Lewis leaned on the right side of the truck, and shared a waterskin. Maddy walked out of a house that was not a diner.

Lew, need you to work the radio.

Who to?

The hospital, need to call something in.

M’kay. Lewis said, as Nadia was already starting the engine.

There was static at first, and then Maddy told the other two to walk to the street corner until she waved them back. Something about confidentiality.

They could see that she adjusted her collar as she walked back to that house. The fishwife in that house could see the sun behind Maddy’s hair, or rather what still showed of her hair beneath the cap.

Took you long enough. Nadia said.

There is still a queue I need to go through before we leave.

How many? Lewis asked.

Five.

Good god, we’re supposed to be rolling in thirty. Lewis sighed.

What do I even tell them?

Have a swig first. Nadia handed over the waterskin, and looked at Lewis. You know how the paper makes us officers for the duration of the ride?

Mmm.

University officers are also supposed to render aid to our townships where possible.

Are we now?

Yes.

Maddy was on the precipice of emptying the skin.

We have enough play in the seeding window?

They did the math, I saw it.

Mmm.

The bees’ll live?

They’re hardy.

Nadia took the waterskin, and screwed the cap back on.

Well, the wires will want inspection.

Yes, and the farmers will want to know more about the new irrigation schedule.

…Radio’s still warm. I’ll let them know. We leave tomorrow noon. You heard that, Maddy?

Yessir.

Maddy got to two more patients before supper, which the three took at the house of her last patient. It was grilled salmon with a side of sauerkraut. The patient’s wife was the woman from the diner. She brought out the good bread, and gave Maddy another helping of the salmon.

The couple had two children around the table, one was fifteen and one was ten. The younger one asked Lewis about what it was like in the university, and the older one asked about the new seeds they brought in. The woman said that the older one was always quite curious so do forgive him, did I tell you how he helped his father with shaking down the last boat? Maddy took from her satchel some herbal candies she and Collie made, and ate one first, at the dinner table. They were the green ones and not the white ones, Maddy made sure of that.

After dinner, the woman had the kids go wash the dishes. Husband and wife uncorked a bottle of something that they said was nothing much, and toasted to good health. Maddy expressed an amused concern about him pulling his shoulder again.

Nadia went outside with a torch, to bring the truck closer, so that it would be easier to haul the briefcases with them back inside. She recognized the front of the house by the fact that it was one of the bigger ones, and that the paint was smooth. The husband was entertaining Lewis with what the sailors brought back from their trips down the coast, when the wife intercepted a Maddy who had just brushed her teeth.

Madam.

Miss Swartz, I would just like to give my heartfelt thanks regarding fixing my husband’s arm, it had been bugging him in the shipyard ever since the last doctor left.

Oh, it is no problem, just doing my job.

In the living room, Lewis did the laugh that Collie did. The one she used when she wanted something done and had to laugh with someone for it.

But, really, it is more than that to all of us. Really, thank you. Now, before we go back to the boys, let me just get you to the guest room for you and Nadia, mm?

Maddy reached for her collar, and stopped short, to tug at her shirt around the third button down. That shifted the collar by half a degree.

Most certainly. She walked upstairs, behind the woman from the diner.

The bed was plush, something with layers of wool above the hay. The pillow had a fabric tag on one end.

I want to talk with you about my boy.

Hmm, yes. He seemed quite sharp to me, is there anything I should look at?

Oh, no, nothing of the sort. He is perfectly healthy, I assure you.

Then what would be the matter?

Well, he is coming of age, and quite sharp in mathematics…

Yes, he really is. Few people can keep up in conversation with my sister, you have reasons to be proud.

Oh, thank you. You really are an angel.

I can only say I was properly trained.

And so humble too, the woman thought.

In that case, Miss Swartz, can I ask you for a favour?

How can I be of service?

She produced an envelope, as yet unsealed. There was a letter of recommendation inside, addressed to University Admissions. A few lines of handwriting each, from a skim, between navigators, shipwrights, and builders.

I was wondering if you could add a line of yourself, or even just bring it back to the university.

Why, I certainly can deliver it.

Maddy signed the letter, next to the other signatures, and put the envelope in her pocket.

Thank you, Madam Swartz, thank you.

Just doing my duty, ma’am. Maddy said to a woman twice her age.

And, if this is not too much to consider, there is this other letter I was writing, for your mom and dad.

Oh.

I was wondering, how should I address them?

Um, my mother’s name is Collie, and father is, uhh, Alex.

The woman scribbled something down, on the top of the letter that was otherwise written. Okay, thank you. It’s just, the boy really should be going to the university soon, and he would need someone there.

Of course, of course.

And, the townsfolk all agree, it already was wonderful having you help all of us.

Oh, it’s nothing, the next doctor will come soon anyways, and can help better than me.

You have been so kind.

I am flattered.

The woman sealed the envelope. Just know that, whatever happens, a bed would be here for you, okay?

Why, thank you. You are being such wonderful hosts.

Downstairs, Nadia hauled two briefcases from the truck cab to the foyer. Something warbled through the stairwell and communicated the general idea of Lewis-Luggage-Now. The two brought the briefcases and themselves up. Nadia was brought to the room Maddy sat in, and Lewis was being guided to the adjoining one.

Maddy looked Nadia in the eyes. Nadia’s head nodded half a degree.

Um, madam, actually, we would like to have Lewis in the same room? It’s how we slept growing up. Nadia lied.

Oh, but the other room—

—really was wonderfully made, ma’am, but I can’t begin to imagine what these two would do to me if I defied them. Lewis said truthfully.

But, Maddy, think of what your mother would think. You and Nadia sleeping with Lewis in the same room. The lady said.

I get why you worry, but, we would feel a lot more comfortable if we had big brother close.

Not much was said afterwards, except that Lewis unlocked the briefcase with their personal effects, and took out the family shotgun. The action was freshly greased, and the two shells slid in without a sound. The floor was not cold, but his back grew sore from the hardwood as Nadia and Maddy slept, holding each other. The other bed was empty.

Wind tousled the translucent blinds, and moonlight shone on the girls. Lewis felt with his thumb the part of the stock carved with the Tsien family name, in the script that he could hardly read. His eyes were half-closed and still locked onto the closed door.

The bed creaked, and a figure haunted Lewis.

Nadia set her foot down onto the floor with a light thud, and gestured about the gun.

Gimme.

He did, and conked out perpendicular on the empty bed. Nadia felt for the shells in their breech.

She had the watch.

Mulberry

Something was wrong with washer #17 in the university laundromat on the corner of Agronomy Road and Campus Parkway. The unit was on the end of the first row in, on the right, next to the machines with the German badges. Alex took off the bent-sheet control panel on its front and looked at the wiring. The original warning labels had faded to a translucence, and there was some text in Korean under that. On the back of the university’s panel was a label, with the name of the student who rewired the machine and the professor who signed off on it.

The loads in the other machines were pure white.

Alex made a connection manually, and watched it sputter and attempt to spin. It jiggled back and forth instead.

How long would it take, Mr Tsien?

Hmm, could just be a bad connection, or could be a broken sensor. I’ll have to bring it out and get a better look.

The closest workshop was two storefronts next to them, and Alex worked outside it under the shade of a tree. Goddamn direct drives were always a pain in the ass and he wanted the extra light.

He spun the drum with his hand. Hmm, smooth, so it’s not a mechanical issue. He then unscrewed a panel. There was a mild stink inside, crossed with ozone, nothing unexpected. Okay, check the connections the rebuilders must’ve soldered and those look good… something was green at the terminal, and the wire was sheathed in red rubber.

Hmm, should be this one then.

The multimeter did not exactly have the longest wires, but he still got the common to sing.

He washed the lead with vinegar on something that was once a tablecloth, rinsed it with alcohol, and got to reflowing it with his soldering pen. He put some more alcohol on after the lead cooled down.

It took two extension cords to wire it back to the shop. On making a connection, the machine wanted to fill itself with water, and then began to jiggle in the way that it was supposed to.

Alex wrote in his name and fix on the inside of the bent-sheet panel, and wheeled it back in. The next job wouldn’t be for half an hour, and he mulled about what to do. Then, he remembered what the women said about jerrycans, and ceased mulling.

Maia moaned about how the hospital just had to take over the laundromats in the driest month of the year, and about why the kids just had to be off-campus this weekend. Nona folded the cleanest towel they had, and put it between the top of her head and the bottom of the tubs she was carrying.

Collie was weighed down on one side more than the other, by the washing board and their clothesline. The soap was a powder in a canvas pouch.

The river seemed to flow okay. The men had already bathed in the morning and the women wouldn’t come for a few more hours. It was the best time of day to do laundry, as the other wives attested by their presence. Someone nodded and greeted the three with Madams.

Come on, let us set up the clothesline first. We won’t want to after bending down for the wash. Nona commanded.

The clothesline was made, in part, from chunks of the fifth floor, after one side snapped from age some time ago. It had hinges to fold its legs in, should the family ever want to move it off the rooftop. Alex made it look so easy. They began with Nona setting a bucket into the river and pulling up water almost to the brim. The dirtiest pieces were to sit in there until the other pieces were done. The other two buckets were sprinkled with soap, she told the others to start with the nice clothes.

Collie took out her nice dress, the wine-dark one she wore when she delivered gifts. Nona ran the line between the two poles of their clothesline, and tied with a knot that neither Maia nor Collie could name. The tub was built for stepping in, but Collie used her hands instead. Maia received the sopping dress with two hands, rinsed it in the river, and squeezed it dry not in fistfuls but a folded palm.

Maia’s and Nona’s best clothes were back on the third floor, in a closet. What was here, though, was an abundance of graphic tees, jeans, and dress shirts, beyond every colour the children could imagine.

With every reach, Maia rummaged the hamper of dirty clothes longer than was necessary for grabbing just the topmost one. Now I am sure that Maddy packed my cropped hoodie for her trip out.

I am literally washing a hoodie you stole off a guy you only dated for three months. Nona said. The women had rearranged themselves relative to the river for better conversation.

It’s her size now, isn’t it? They grow up so fast. Collie said to no one in particular.

I don’t have the heart to tell her, but pairing that with the light jeans really should still call for capital punishment. Maia drowned a t-shirt further into the river.

I don’t think Missus Hoodie-and-Leggings should have that strong a fashion opinion. Collie had the home-field advantage.

And you had the ones that had the freaky strap going under the foot too. Nona had picked a side.

It worked, and it worked beautifully. Maia mounted a rudimentary defense.

I believe you, and I am not one to abuse an astronomer and her… particular requirements. Collie flanked.

Shame they wore out, though. Pajama pants just don’t have the same feel. Maia said.

Yeah… it was all spandex when we were their age, now everyone’s all baggy all the time. Nobody shows off properly anymore. Nona wrung the soap free of the hoodie. There was half a logo left, of a band none of them listened to.

Are we becoming our parents? Maia asked, but not really.

Rinse this hoodie and I will tell you. Nona extended her arm to Maia.

Some time after that, the women made Collie sing, just sing whatever. She began with something that was made with an 808 and an inordinate amount of autotune. The women joined in, one singing the lyrics the others had forgotten. By the time the hamper was two-thirds empty, they had run out of songs from that era. In their silence, a woman from another house sang something in Arabic, and the three hummed along.

Around the bottom of a hamper was an item of underwear. Nona had bought it from a seller who somehow found a full case of the things and broke the bulk in the university’s bazaar. It was soaked in lye for half a day before anyone wore it, and she took out the elastic when it rotted and sewed in a cord to tie instead.

The name MADDY had been sewed in on the tailbone, facing outward. Nona put it in her bag, and made a mental note to run a small bucket and soak it overnight. Something to work on for tomorrow.

The bedding was the hardest to wash, large and unwieldy as it was. Collie and Nona did the wringing. Collie had to be swapped out to Maia about halfway. Collie complained of a sore wrist and Maia almost twisted her back. They washed the clothes on their backs last, the pieces they hung up first had already begun to billow slightly in the wind.

The T-shirts they were wearing hung somewhere around the tail-end of the clothesline, where they still had room after the bedding ate most of the rest. Maia coaxed the block of soap in her hands first, before massaging the liquid into Nona’s hair, Collie sank most of herself into the river.

Nona, babe, can I ask you a favour?

Hmm? What is it.

The dress, the good one, it’s sagging at the waist.

You want me to bring it in? Nona said as Maia clasped a lock of her hair between her foaming palms.

Yes… but only if it’s not too much trouble.

We’ll want dresses for Nadia and Maddy pretty soon too. Maia said to Nona’s part.

I already have an idea. Nona, you can grow us dye, right? Collie bubbled from barely above the surface.

See if you can chat up the chemistry department, they’ll know better. Then she told Maia to be stronger with her fingers.

I think Nadia would look better in the Egyptian style.

You already got a pattern? That’s not like you at all.

It’s literally just two yards of rectangle.

And it would not embarrass the girls? Maia raised, between two attempts at untangling Nona’s hair.

Helen of Troy launched more ships with less.

And, Collie. I know I won’t remember it, but just bring me yourself and the dress when we’re at home. Nona accepted the favour.

Cheers.

The big radio needed the engine running, and the engine was noisy, so Lewis wired it to the CB handset and took the call in the cab. The girls were unloading the rest of the gear into this town’s pub, to the room upstairs.

University Station, This is Truck 02, coming in for our evening check-in. Over.

Truck 02, University Station receives, status report. Over

Making good progress, preliminary data from the Mission Specialist indicates a higher variance and greater recovery effect than previous models predicted. Joker on fuel, settlements cooperative. Expect to RTB tomorrow afternoon. Over

University Station Receives. And, one message from your mom, Lewis. Over.

Huh? Over.

hang on let me just… Truck 02, message is as follows: Lewis, hope trip is well, need grocery, find butcher to get liver or blood sausage, Love, Nona. Message concludes, over.

Thank you, University Station. Over.

Good luck with your groceries, Truck 02. Check-in complete, see you at 0600.

Maaan, fuck you, Vavasseur. Over and out.

Notions

The town was dry, and sandy at the margins. Nadia, Lewis, and Maddy rode in before dark and checked in as university officials. Nadia bought a discount for dinner by opening her leather wallet to the other side and presenting the chunk of copper engraved with the Swartz name. They shared an onion and egg pie, with less butter than they were used to. For vegetables they had something they and the town called kimchi, though the specific spice profile would have been alien to their parents. Ale with hops washed it down. It was good.

A few children played skipping rope outside, before the innkeeper told them to git and head home for dinner. The children put their tire-made sandals back on and walked home.

Nadia had to walk out midway, to sign some papers for this town’s seeds. Maddy speared and stole a slice of hard-boiled egg from Nadia’s pie when she was busy. Nobody would say they noticed.

After dinner, an oil-lamp light shone in the girls’ room. Maddy was supine, on the bed, doing half a cat’s cradle. Nadia crunched the numbers that came in from this town’s mayor. The wall adjoining Lewis’s room was silent (barring a snore audible only when both of them held their breaths).

Still working? Maddy asked.

Almost, the abacus will want wax when we get back.

How are the numbers?

Good, better than what Professor had theorized. At this rate the soil will be stable in two hundred years.

Maddy translated two hundred years to her language, roughly eight generations. Whoa.

Yeah, he’s going to love the numbers. Nadia did not notice the exclamation.

Any inducements I can give to get your head out of the books?

Sadly, no.

What if, I told you I found something to read when cleaning mom’s room and snuck it out?

Mom Nona?

No, other mom.

… Nadia took a moment. Maddy, see if the innkeeper has more oil, and go down and grab us a snack. I’ll finish up.

Hehe. Maddy chuckled as she stood up and made for downstairs.

They found themselves a bowl of dried nuts, roasted to a slight bitterness. Maddy excavated the better half of their suitcase to retrieve the smuggled article. Nadia sat herself on the bedroom floor and ate a pinch of the nuts.

A magazine. Nadia uttered, between mastications.

Yes, I found it buried under a stack of old periodicals. Maddy said as she settled herself opposite Nadia.

Why is the woman in front of the title?

Beats me. Maddy laid the magazine flat on the wooden floor.

Come on, page one.

It was a two-page advertisement, a model raced down mahogany stairs carrying a clutch.

Oooh. Nadia exclaimed. She’s got one of Auntie Maia’s big wallets.

Maddy’s eyes rested on the bag, with the same naturalness with which a hand settles on a well-worn tool, and lingered there for a while. After the brief trance, Maddy’s eyes followed the model’s three-fingered cradle on the bag upward to her arms, her shoulders, dwelled a moment at her scarf, and then her cheeks. The model was thin, and tall, her name was known to Collie, and her current whereabouts were unknown to anyone west of these mountains.

The dress the model was wearing did not seem to have pockets.

But where does the canteen go? Maddy replied, belatedly.

She must have drank at fountains. Nadia confidently extrapolated.

Must be annoying, always having to find one.

Or maybe she had servants to bring her water.

mmm. Maddy conceded.

Nadia reached and turned the next page.

Another two pages, bought out by one brand. On the left a woman stood in a form-fitting lilac top, and a high-waisted leather midi skirt. The stilettos were made of the same leather.

Maddy looked at her calves, and saw that they were in tension. She is on her tippy toes. The model was photographed face-on, and so the heels were covered by the front of her feet.

No, look, there is no crease in the shoes. Nadia said. It’s heels, look at the photo on the right.

Maddy’s eyes began at the mesh-covered waist and the translucence that allowed the patterned tights to show through, and marched down to the other model’s feet.

Oh god. Maddy’s legs went sore, vicariously and approximately twenty years late.

It’s just a little taller than the pair Mom Collie has.

But it’s on a needle. How is she standing?

Mustn’t be that hard. Nadia guessed.

Remember that time you fell and almost scratched mom’s pair walking in them? And they were way wider.

That’s only because they were a size too big. Nadia flipped to the next page, and Maddy said Hey, I was still looking.

It was a two-page spread of a leopard.

What a strange cougar. Nadia said.

Wait, why is it weird?

…You don’t get to call me silly for the heels.

Next page. The flame flickered.

A bust of a model, with tousled hair, wearing a pair of bulky smart glasses with a dedicated app that received a total of five updates, though nothing on the page communicated its electronic nature.

Oh dear, must have been embarrassing for her. Maddy remarked.

Did she get stung by a bee? Why did they take her photo like this?

Right on the lips too, and still pushing out a smile…

That’s a cool leather jacket, though. Nadia defended her.

They didn’t put any patches on for her. Maddy said, while picturing Bréal’s own jacket.

Must have been a loaner.

[one more page]

[Sleep]

The clock they used were also from before they were born — and was wound mechanically. It rang its physical bells before the sun came up. Nadia covered the hammer a second after it came on, and told Maddy to go back to bed. She set the alarm to ring again in a ninety minutes. Doctors needed good sleep to work at their best.

She changed from her pajama pants into her jeans and lit a lantern. The backpack with her kit was heavy when she went to lift it up, and considerably less unwieldy when she put it on. last item of preparation was to go down to the truck and collect the family’s bees, which were kept warm under a blanket.

The dry grass crunched under her boots. The local apiary had been expecting her, Mom Nona told her. Nadia scratched at an itch on her nape. She couldn’t wait to finally go home for a proper wash.

She cleared her throat, and knocked on the door to the beekeeper’s house. The door opened.

Nadia Elbakyan-Swartz, I am here about the mites?

Oh, yes, young lady, the mites.

[1. Count first — alcohol wash from the truck’s disinfectant, half a cup of bees off a brood frame, mites counted at the bottom. “The mites” as a known thing means they’ve already seen them on bees]

[2. The abacus — counts against the line across the keeper’s hives, a fixed number of queens to spend, done on the beads while the keeper watches]

[3. Sage in the smoker]

[4. Nona’s rubber gloves on her hands]

[5. A number of queens off the truck, under the blanket]

[6. Find and pinch the old queens — dawn, clustered and dull; cage between two brood frames, candy end up, don’t open for a week]

[7. The one crashing hive — deformed wings, crawlers, spotty brood; she wants it killed before it gets robbed out; the keeper may want it kept. She loses this one, or doesn’t]

[8. The keeper corrects her hands, once — grip, stance, or smoke]

[9. The exchange back — a frame of survivor brood or a queen cell for the family apiary. Nona sent her for this too]

[10. Written orders left in the keeper’s hand — release dates, what to look for, when to radio. The result arrives after the truck leaves]

[11. The clock — sun up means robbing; Maddy’s alarm in ninety minutes]

Ante Finem Mundi

Continuity Test

Fortification

Standard Loaf, version 2daeb1ae

Formula

Process

The Swartz Carrot Cake

Ingredients

Steps

Maia Tsien’s Dandelion Mushroom Noodles

What

How

Formulary

Off Label Part I

Notifiable

Isolation

Boil Water

Druzhina

Ground

Wild Oats

Mulberry

Notions

Ruts

Skywave

Pulp

Colt