Record of a Spaceborn Few

by Becky Chambers

  His dad noticed, and bent down to speak directly in Kip’s ear. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘I’ve got an idea.’

  It wasn’t easy for them to push their way back out of the middle, but they managed – his dad leading the way, Kip following the grey-striped print of his father’s shirt. It was a nice shirt, the kind of shirt you wore to naming days or weddings, or if someone important came to the hex for dinner. Kip was wearing a nice shirt, too – yellow with white dots. He’d struggled with the buttons, and his mom had had to help him get it closed. He could feel the fabric tugging tight over his chest every time he took a breath, just like he could feel his toes pressing against the ends of his shoes. His mom had shaken her head, and said she’d go over and see if his cousin Wymer had any bigger hand-me-downs lying around. Kip wished he could get brand new clothes, like the ones the import merchants hung outside their stalls, all crisp and straight and without stitches where somebody else’s elbows had poked through. But he could see stitches on his dad’s shirt, too, and on most of the shirts they pushed past. They were still nice shirts, though, as nice as people could manage. Everybody wanted to look good for the Aeluons.

  No matter whether the shirts were new or stitched, there was one thing everybody had on: a white band tied around their upper right arm. That was what people wore in the tendays after funerals, so other people knew to cut you some slack and give you some kindness. Everybody had them on now – everybody on the Asteria, everybody in the whole Fleet. Kip didn’t know anybody who’d died on the Oxomoco, but that wasn’t the point, Mom had said while tying cloth around his arm. We all lost family, she’d said, whether we knew them or not.

  Kip looked back once they’d cleared the crowd. ‘Where are we going?’ he asked with a frown. He hadn’t been able to see anything where they were, but the empty dock was far away now, and the ship would be arriving any minute. They weren’t going to miss it, were they? They couldn’t.

  ‘Trust me,’ Dad said. He waved his son along, and Kip could see where they were headed: one of the cargo cranes perched nearby. Some other people had already got the same idea, and were sitting in the empty gaps of the crane’s metal neck. His dad put his hand on Kip’s shoulder. ‘Now, you should never, ever do what we’re about to do any other time. But this is a special occasion, yeah? Do you think you can climb up there with me?’

  Kip nodded. ‘Yeah,’ he said, his heart pounding. Dad didn’t break the rules often. Ever, really. No way would Mom have gone for this. Kip was secretly glad she hadn’t come.

  They climbed up the crane’s service ladder, then clambered along the fat metal supports. The crane was way taller than it had looked from the floor, and Kip was a little scared – not like scared scared, he wasn’t a baby – but the climb wasn’t hard. It was kind of like the obstacle course at the playground, only way bigger. Besides, he was with his dad. If Dad said it was okay, it was okay.

  The other people already on the crane smiled at them. ‘Pull up a seat,’ one lady shouted.

  Dad laughed. ‘Don’t mind if we do.’ He swung himself into an empty spot. ‘Come on, Kip.’

  Kip pulled himself alongside, letting his arms hang over one support beam and his feet swing free below another. The metal below his thighs was cold, and definitely not designed for sitting. He could already tell his butt was going to go numb.

  But the view . . . the view was awesome. Being far away didn’t matter so much when you were up top. Everything looked small – the people in the crowd, the patrollers at the edges, the in-charge group waiting right at the dock. ‘Is that the Admiral?’ Kip said, pointing at a grey-haired woman in a distinctive green council uniform.

  ‘That’s her,’ Dad said.

  ‘Have you ever met her?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I did, last standard,’ said the friendly, shouting lady. She sipped something hot from a canteen. ‘She was on my sanitation team.’

  ‘No kidding,’ Dad said. ‘What’d you think?’

  The lady made a yeah, not bad kind of face. ‘I’d vote for her again.’

  Kip felt a knot start to unravel itself, a mass that had been tangled in him ever since the crash. Here was his dad, climbing up a crane with him and chatting easily with strangers. There was the crowd, assembled in the smartest clothes they had, nobody crying or screaming anymore. There was the Admiral, looking cool and official and powerful. Soon, the Aeluons would be there, too, and they’d help. They’d make things right again.

  The dock lights turned yellow, indicating an incoming vessel. Even up high, Kip could hear the crowd hush. All at once, there it was. It flew into the dock silently – a smooth, gleaming Aeluon skiff with rounded corners and pearly hull. It almost didn’t look like a ship. Ships were angular. Mechanical. Something you bolted and welded together, piece by piece, chunk by chunk. This ship, on the other hand, looked like it had been made from something melted, something poured into a mould and polished for days. The entire crowd held their breath together.

  ‘Stars, that’s something,’ Dad said quietly.

  ‘Get ’em all the time over at cargo,’ the lady said. ‘Never get tired of it.’

  Kip didn’t say anything. He was too busy looking at the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. He almost asked his dad what this kind of ship was called, but his dad obviously hadn’t seen one before, and Kip didn’t know the lady, so he didn’t want to ask her. He’d look up Aeluon ships on the Linkings when he got home. He knew all the types of Human ships, and he also liked to know stuff about alien bodies, but he hadn’t ever thought to learn about their ships. It was easy, in the Fleet, to think that Human ships were all there was.

  A hatch yawned open. How, Kip couldn’t say, because there weren’t any edges on the outer hull to suggest doors or seams. The crowd broke into a cheer as three Aeluons stepped out. Kip had really wanted to see them up close, but even at a distance, they made his heart race. Bare silver heads he knew were covered in tiny scales. Patches on their cheeks that swirled with colour. Weird grey and white and black clothes that, he guessed, had never been anybody’s hand-me-downs.

  ‘Why are they wearing masks?’ Kip asked. ‘Can’t they breathe oxygen?’

  ‘They can, and do,’ Dad said. ‘But sapients who don’t live around Humans tend to find us, ah . . . pungent.’

  ‘What’s pungent mean?’

  ‘We stink, kid.’ The lady laughed into her canteen.

  ‘Oh,’ Kip said. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. And the longer he sat there, the less he was sure how he felt about anything. His insides began to tangle themselves again as he watched the Admiral greet their otherworldly neighbours. Her uniform no longer looked cool, the crowd no longer looked smartly dressed, and the dock no longer looked normal, not with a big flying gemstone resting in the middle of it. The Aeluons were here to clean up a mess the Fleet couldn’t, a mess that wouldn’t have happened without busted ships and worn-out tech. They shook hands Human-style with the stinky, stitched-up council, and beneath Kip’s excitement, beneath his wonder, a sadness spread.

  He watched the Aeluons, and he felt ashamed.

  Sawyer

  The trick to living on Mushtullo was knowing which sunrise to wait for. Ressoden came up first, but only spacer merchants and little kids made the mistake of going out that early. Ressoden was dinky, capable of providing usable light but not enough warmth to burn off the cold. The pre-dawn fog carried the kind of insidious wetness that wormed its way to your bones, and you couldn’t be blamed for deciding to wait for the third sun – big, fat Pelus – to banish the clouds entirely. But that, too, was a rookie mistake. You had about a half an hour after Pelus’ appearance until the surrounding swamps to evaporate, and the roasting midday air became thick enough to chew. The second sunrise – Makarev – was where it was at. Makarev held court for an hour and sixteen minutes, just long enough for you to get up and catch a tram to wherever it was you needed to go. Not too damp, not too muggy, not too hot, not too cold. You didn’t need to lay
er, and you wouldn’t show up to work with a sweaty shirt that wouldn’t dry out. Ideal.

  Sawyer pressed his palm against the inner wall of his capsule bunk, and he could tell that Makarev was just about there. His capsule was supposedly temperature controlled – and okay, sure, he hadn’t frozen to death or anything – but the insulation was as cheap as his rent. He lay under his blankets, waiting for the wall to hit that level of warmth that meant . . . now. He sat up on his mattress and hit one of the buttons on the wall. The sink shelf slid out, a thick rectangle with a basin and a pop-up mirror and the almost-empty box of dentbot packs he needed to restock. He rinsed his face, drank some water, cleaned his mouth, combed his hair into place. He pushed a different wall button. The sink retracted, and a larger shelf extended, holding a quick-cooker and a storage box full of just-add-water meals. He knew he had a long day at work ahead, so he opted for two packs of Magic Morning Power Porridge, which were still heating up when he checked his scrib and discovered he had no job to get to.

  He didn’t bother to finish reading the soulless form letter his (former) employer had sent. He knew what it said. Unforeseen funding shortage, blah blah, sincerely regret the abrupt notice, blah blah, wish you the very best of luck in future, blah blah blah. Sawyer fell back onto his pillow and shut his eyes. He was nineteen, he’d been working since twelve, and he’d had ten jobs by now. The math there was not in his favour.

  ‘Great,’ he sighed, and for a while, he considered staying in bed all day, blowing the extra creds needed to cool his capsule while Pelus was out. But now his creds were even more precious than before, and if he’d been laid off, that meant everybody else at the factory had, too. They’d all be descending on the commerce square, ingratiating themselves to business owners until one of them offered a job. That was how things worked with Harmagians, anyway. No résumés or interviews or anything. Just walk up and hope they like you. With other species, finding a job was a less tiring to-do, but Harmagian jobs were where the creds were at. There were jobs in his neighbourhood, probably, but Humanowned work didn’t get you very far. Much smarter to head out to the square and try his luck. He could do it. He’d done it before.

  With a weary will, he sat back up, ate his porridge, and put on clean clothes (these, too, were stored in the wall). He scooted off the end of his mattress and out the capsule hatch, planting his feet on the ladder outside in a practised way. He gripped his doorframe as he started to lower himself down, and immediately withdrew his hand with disgust. ‘Oh, come on,’ he sighed, grimacing at the grey gunk smeared across his fingers. Creep mould. The grey, greasy stuff loved the night-time fog, and it grew so fast you could clean it up before bed and find a fresh new mat in the morning, just like the one inching over Sawyer’s tiny home now. He wiped his palm on an old shirt and resumed his exit, taking care to not get any of the gunk on his clothes. He had new bosses to impress, and this already wasn’t his day.

  It would be, though, he decided, hoisting his mood as he climbed down. He’d go out there, and he’d find a job. He’d find something even better than the job he’d had yesterday.

  He headed out into Mushtullo’s second morning, weaving his way through the neighbourhood. The narrow paved streets were as packed as the tall buildings that lined them, and the general flow of foot traffic was headed for the tram stations, like always. He saw a few other better-dressed-than-usual people in the crowd, and he quickened his step. Had to get to the square before the good stuff got snapped up.

  Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted something out of the ordinary: a small crowd – old people, mostly – gathered by that little weather-worn statue of an Exodan homesteader over by the grocery. They were decorating the statue, laying wreaths of flowers and ribbons over it, lighting candles around its base, scrubbing creep mould off of it. Sawyer dimly remembered talk at work a few days before, something about a homesteader exploding, or decompressing, or something. Some horrible shit. He figured that was the reason for the crowd, and would’ve kept going on his way were it not for one face he recognised: Shani Brenner, one of the supervisors from the factory. She wasn’t headed for the trams, she was helping some old – no, ancient – lady light a candle. Did she not know about the layoffs? Had she not checked her scrib?

  Sawyer hesitated. He didn’t want to waste time, but Shani was all right. She’d shared her lunch with Sawyer once, when he’d been short on creds. This day hadn’t had a lot going for it yet. Maybe, Sawyer thought, helping somebody out would get the universe back on his side.

  He changed course and hurried toward the statue. ‘Hey, Shani!’ he called with a wave.

  Shani looked up, first with confusion, then with recognition. She patted the old woman (who was sitting on the ground, now), then met Sawyer halfway. ‘Shitty morning, huh?’ she said, rubbing the back of her neck.

  ‘You heard,’ Sawyer said.

  ‘Yeah. Got a letter, same as I bet you did. No idea it was coming. Stingy bastards. I gave Tolged a thanks-for-being-my-boss gift three days ago and everything.’

  Sawyer jerked a thumb toward the street. ‘Aren’t you going to the square?’

  Shani shook her head. ‘Not today.’ She nodded to the statue. ‘That’s my grandma over there. You hear about the Oxomoco?’

  ‘That homesteader that . . . ?’

  ‘Yeah. She was born there. Came here when she was seven, but still. Roots, y’know?’ Shani eyed Sawyer. ‘You Exodan?’

  ‘I mean . . .’ Wasn’t everybody, at one point or another? ‘Like way, way back. I— I don’t know what ship, or anything. I’ve never been.’

  Shani shrugged. ‘Still counts. Wanna come sit with us?’

  Sawyer blinked. ‘Thanks, but I—’

  ‘There’ll be jobs tomorrow,’ Shani said. ‘I’m not worrying about it, and neither should you. We’ll both land on our feet, yeah? Things work out.’

  Over Shani’s shoulder, Sawyer could see other people joining Grandma Brenner on the ground. Some were weeping. Some held hands, or passed a flask around. Some were speaking in unison, almost like a chant, but he could only catch a few words. His Ensk was scattershot at best.

  Shani smiled at Sawyer. ‘Up to you,’ she said as she walked away. She, too, sat on the ground, and held her grandmother close.

  Sawyer did not join them, but neither did he turn back. There was no reason for him to stay, and yet . . . and yet. He imagined the jam-packed frenzy that awaited him at the commerce square, the lines of eager people desperate to impress. It was the antithesis of the scene in front of him, this quiet mourning, this shared respect. The idea of joining them felt awkward. He didn’t want to intrude. He wasn’t one of them, didn’t belong there. But as he watched them share tears and songs and company, he wished that he did. He didn’t have anything he was a part of like that. Even in grief, it looked like a nice thing to have. Maybe especially in grief.

  He thought, as he rode the tram to the square, of the recited words he’d managed to make out. They circled his mind, over and over as he watched crowded neighbourhoods blur through mouldy windows.

  From the ground.

  Part 1

  From the Beginning

  Feed source: Reskit Institute of Interstellar Migration (Public News Feed)

  Item name: The Modern Exodus – Entry #1

  Author: Ghuh’loloan Mok Chutp

  Encryption: 0

  Translation path: [Hanto:Kliptorigan]

  Transcription: 0

  Node identifier: 2310-483-38, Isabel Itoh

  [System message: The feed you have selected has been translated from written Hanto. As you may be aware, written Hanto includes gestural notations that do not have analogous symbols in any other GC language. Therefore, your scrib’s on-board translation software has not translated the following material directly. The content here is a modified translation, intended to be accessible to the average Kliptorigan reader.]

  * * *

  Greetings, dear guest, and welcome! I am Ghuh’loloan Mok Chutp, and t
hese words are mine. I hope my communicative efforts will be sufficient to make any time you spend on this feed here worthwhile. I shall exercise my skills to the best of my ability, with the aim of educating and entertaining you. If I fail in these endeavours, please accept my sincere apologies and know that such failings are mine alone and are not reflective of my place of employment, my schooling, or my lineage.

  If you are unfamiliar with my work, allow me to provide a brief introduction. I am an ethnographic researcher based at the Reskit Institute of Interstellar Migration. I have worked in this field for twenty-two standards, and my focus is on transitory and orbital communities in the modern era. I am proud of my work thus far, with a few exceptions. I am confident that I am qualified for the task I will describe momentarily. I hope you will agree.

  What do you think of, dear guest, when I mention the Exodus Fleet? You could define the term literally: the collection of ships that carried the remnants of the Human species away from their failed planet. Perhaps the Fleet sparks some deeper association in you – a symbol of desperation, a symbol of poverty, a symbol of resilience. Do you live in a community where Humans are present? Do you know individuals born within one of these aged vessels? Or are you from a more homogeneous society, and therefore surprised to learn that the Fleet is still inhabited? Perhaps the entire concept of the Fleet baffles you. Perhaps it is mysterious, or exciting. Perhaps you yourself are Human, dear guest, and think of the Fleet as home – or, conversely, a place as alien to you as to the rest of us.

  Whatever your background, the Fleet is a source of curiosity for all who do not have some personal connection to it. Unless you have a close Human friend or are a long-haul merchant, it is unlikely you have travelled there. While Humans living in GC territories and planetary colonies outnumber Exodans in aggregate, the Fleet is still where you will find the largest concentration of their kind outside the Sol system. Though many Humans have never set foot in the great homestead ships, the journey of the Fleet is a history they all consciously carry. That lineage has inextricably shaped every modern Human community, regardless of foundational philosophy. In one way or another, it affects how they think of themselves, and how the rest of us see them.