Shades Of Forever

When I return to the table with seconds for MacWillie and Huckens, one of the girls my age is seated across from the two engineers. Blanket Breeder, bright blue eyes focused in concentration in her pale brown face, darker curls drifting down her back.

"...and that's why we need to chart your futures as quickly as possible."

I'm impressed, though not surprised. Blanket is the first villager to actually come up and speak to the two in a personal setting, and I know she's doing it because she takes her job way too seriously. Ever since they used the last stored gene sample, the Breeders have been looking for new blood for centuries.

"Blanket," I groan, "we're having lunch."

She turns to me, gaze no less piercing.

"Sky Mem- Idiot, this is unprecedented. We have new future trees for the first time in six hundred­ years. Who knows how many more branches this gives us!"

I roll my eyes at Huckens and MacWillie, dropping their plates in front of them.

"You'll have to excuse Blanket, she's a little excitable." I take a seat next to her. "If it's so important, why didn't Water come?"

"He's still not speaking to you," she responds primly, then melts into an unexpected smile, "and I am dying to know what it is you did to him. I've never seen Water get upset at anyone."

I think back to the clan leaders rolling around in the dirt like stunned treerats, gibbering as my limbs waved overhead.

"...it wasn't my fault."

"Tell me later." Her laser focus returns as she shifts her attention back to MacWillie and Huckens. "I need to bring these two to Window Doctor for testing. We need those genes."

"And that's what we're concerned about, the lad and I," MacWillie interjects, one hand held up in a forestalling gesture, the other shoveling another wrap into her mouth. Next to her, Huckens stares wide-eyed at his plate as if the food is going to lunge up and bite him. MacWillie swallows hugely, grabbing a second cylinder of honeymint and fish. "The whole literality of your names and this winsome bit of starfire right here going on about 'optimal matches' make me think we're signing up for a eugenics seminar."

Blanket and I exchange confused looks.

"...what does 'eugenics' mean?"

"...I don't know what I expected." MacWillie drops her free hand from her face, fish wrap dripping chili oil on her plate, then fixes me with a gimlet eye. "Young Sky, I'll speak to you plain. Are we about to be shuttled off into some sort of forced breeding program? Because that would make me reconsider my word as a MacWillie."

We stare at her, shocked. My mouth splutters, searching for words, but it's Blanket who recovers first.

"Chief Outsider Engineer MacWillie, no one is forced to bear a child they don't wish! That's barbaric!"

I finally find my voice.

"What the fuck, MacWillie?!"

She gapes at our fury, mouth falling open, wrap drooping back to her plate. Huckens looks over at her, then suddenly brightens, as if he's committing the moment to memory. I don't give her time to respond.

"What kind of crabroach shit do you think we are, forcing a child on someone who doesn't want it? You think we would do that to you?"

"I... just... it's... the names..."

Blanket glowers at her.

"I'm a Breeder because I'm in charge of making sure our genetic drift doesn't consolidate into a dead end path, not because I spread my legs for the sole purpose of popping out new little ones! Do you even know how hard it is to plan future trees without compounding regressive traits at this point?"

"I... wha..."

"I thought you were so advanced." I shake my head slowly, sadly, at MacWillie. "All your reality and flying ships and infonets, and yet you think people should be made to serve as hosts for new life regardless of their own desires? This 'galactic diaspora' sounds like a horrible place."

"..."

"I am second guessing my decision, Sky M- Idiot," Blanket announces, squinting at MacWillie and Huckens. "Should we even take her sample? Is she human?"

"I volunteer my genetic material," Huckens abruptly shouts, standing up so fast he knocks his seat over, lunch wraps left ignored in front of him. "Be happy to, I don't believe the Chief, and that's the truth! You can take my sample!" He stares eagerly at Blanket, who sighs.

"At least one of them is interested in contributing to our future survival." She glares at MacWillie with the last two words, and the Chief Engineer shrinks back from her diminutive form. "Very well, then. Let us commence the appropriate tests at the Doctories."

"...future survival?"

"...Doctories?"

I roll my eyes once more at the two engineers.

"The Breeders need to know how your future trees match up against others. The Doctors are the ones who initially draw the future trees, and then the Breeders calculate the most optimal match. That determines who you'll pair with."

MacWillie and Huckens give each other sick looks, Huckens' enthusiasm dampened.

"...it sounds a lot like eugenics, Chief."

"I'm not thrilled myself, young master Huckens."

"Oh, stop squabbling," Blanket announces, pushing away from the table and grabbing one of Huckens' wraps with one hand, his hand with her other, "let's just get these tests done with." A shadowy paw swipes the second wrap, and MacWillie snatches the last.

Huckens doesn't notice his food disappearing again, red stealing across his features as Blanket pulls him towards the Doctories, a small building tucked up against the trunk of one of the elder trees just past the Bakeries.

"So this genetic contribution, how do I-"

"Wait for the testing," Blanket cuts him off in a precise tone in between bites on her wrap, almost dragging him behind her. "Then we'll be able to calculate the pairings."

"This isn't eugenics, right young Sky?" MacWillie asks me carefully, busy consuming her own ill-gotten gains. "Because voidshit like that just doesn't work. The Diaspora answered that question a long time ago. Even the corpos know you can't debate a person's right to exist."

"...I still don't understand what 'eugenics' means."

It's the process of deliberately breeding for perceived desirable traits, regardless of actual functionality. It never ends well.

"...why would anyone do that?"

Humans are weird.

"Your Box is right, young Sky. There've been stranger things recorded in our history."

"Well, that's not what Blanket is doing, MacWillie! She might be aggressive, but we do need to test you and Huckens for the village genebanks."

MacWillie fixes an unnerving glare on me as we follow Blanket and Huckens through the front door of the Doctories.

"Aye, and that's another thing that doesn't make sense, young Sky. Your village is a quaint hamlet living peaceful on a planet that kills anyone spending too long on it, spared from the ravages of the broader galaxy for thousands of years, and yet you speak of genebanks and calculated breeding programs that not even the corpos would dare for fear of destruction. Why is nothing as simple as it looks here?"

I speed up, spinning in my stride to walk backwards in front of her, trusting my limbs to keep me safe from any accidental collisions against the waiting room furniture.

"We are who we are, and who we are has been enough to survive. Compared to all your weird reality and trillions of people who apparently force little ones to be born, we are simple."

Our showdown is interrupted by the peeved tones of Window Doctor, marching out of his inner office.

"What are you imbeciles doing here during my lunch break? Is someone injured?"

I belatedly note the half-eaten fish-wrap in his left hand, then groan as Pete emerges enough to steal it in an incomprehensible blur of ink and claws.

delicious. except plants

"I'm so sorry, Window Doctor."

"Unnecessary," he barks, swiping away Pete's hacked up bits of slobbery honeymint leaves from his face, attention focused solely on MacWillie and Huckens. "I didn't realize you were bringing me the newcomers. I wasn't able to test them properly yesterday, slipped my mind in the excitement, but this is perfect." He grabs MacWillie's bulging arm, guiding it into a metal cuff attached to an adjustable chair. "Let's get some vitals and establish baselines. Who knows what diseases they have infesting them."

"I'm not diseased," Huckens protests. "I'm-"

"We need to do future tree testing too," Blanket interjects, pushing him firmly towards a table.

"Of course, of course," Window Doctor agrees, jotting down notes while he pokes and prods at MacWillie with his stethoscope. "Prep the young man while I finish with her." He puts the stethoscope away and pulls a needle with several empty vials from a cabinet drawer. MacWillie eyes the sharp piece of metal warily.

"Has that been sterilized?"

"After every usage in the Shrine of Saint Curie," Window replies without missing a beat, rubbing her forearm with a cleansing swatch then tapping the skin to raise a vein. "You'll feel a slight pinch."

MacWillie opens her mouth to object but he's already drawing the first vial of blood, working with his customary assurance. No one ever really enjoys the yearly checkup, but Window makes it as quick as possible. Over to the side, Blanket is cinching Huckens to the wide restraining table, leather straps holding his arms and legs outstretched.

"We're going to make this as painless as possible," she reassures Huckens, and a goofy grin spreads across his face. I'm not sure what he's smiling for. Future tree testing is notoriously difficult for young men.

"...and done," Window announces next to me, capping the third vial. "Hold this against the puncture site for one minute." He hands MacWillie another cleansing swatch, which she cautiously presses to her arm. "Just need a few skin scrapings and I'll have everything." MacWillie regards him dubiously, but lets him run the rough edge of the collecter over her upper bicep and lower thigh. Window Doctor places the samples in separate containers, unlocks the metal band from her arm, then turns to the table holding Huckens. His eyes light up in approval.

"Very good, Blanket Breeder. Maximal restraint with minimal chance of self-harm."

"The Breeders spend a lot of time working with the Doctors," I whisper to MacWillie as she vacantly rises from the examining chair. Window rummages through his drawers for the other specimen collecters as Blanket double-checks the restraints holding Huckens down. "Lots of things can go wrong if future trees aren't collected properly. Huckens will be fine."

Surprisingly, the normally voluble Chief Engineer has nothing intelligible to say. She starts muttering under her breath, eyes focused elsewhere, and I lean in closer to listen.

"It's... a bleeding physical... except... there's no net... I don't..."

"What was that?"

"I... it's... what's..."

I turn my attention back to Window as he chuckles, finally locating the appropriate sampling tools. He turns from the cabinet, fresh syringe in one hand, cushioned mallet in the other.

"Prep the patient."

Blanket slaps Huckens lightly across his cheeks, then yanks his pants down to his upper thighs, exposing his flaccid manhood.

"The patient is prepped," she reports with the same intense focus that covers her face whenever she's engaged in Breeder business. Huckens draws in breath to complain about his surprise nudity, and then Window Doctor steps forward and smacks his scrotum with the mallet.

Everyone in the room collectively winces, with the exception of Huckens, whose eyebrows are trying to launch themselves from the top of his head.

"Collect samples," Window abruptly announces, dropping the mallet and swooping in with the syringe, carefully plunging it into Huckens' wrinkled flesh. Blanket races to Huckens's side with another syringe and a skin scraper, sticking the former into the side of his neck as she quickly rubs the latter against his arm. Before Huckens finishes drawing in an anguished breath, the two are already retreating from the restraining table with two vials, one cloudy, one crimson, and a delicately held scraper.

"WHHHHAAAAAA-"

"Well done, Blanket Breeder," Window congratulates her, handing off the vials so he can pull Huckens' trousers back up around his vibrating legs. Blanket blushes slightly in appreciation. "If you weren't a Breeder, you'd definitely be a Doctor."

Beside me, MacWillie hacks air in and out, looking utterly lost.

"...I... that's awful... why would..."

"-TTTHHHHHHHHHEEEEEE-"

Window and Blanket busy themselves placing the samples in the appropriate winnowing devices on the shelf next to the cabinet. I hope MacWillie and Huckens understand the gift that they've been given. Accurately diagnosing someone's future tree requires heartwood, and that's not something the village can afford to waste.

"-FFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCC-"

The winnowing device pops out a smaller vial, and Window attaches a distributor to it before carefully depositing a ruby drop on a heartwood matrix. Traceries of bright crimson arch out, highlighting a unique pattern across the three scrumble-wide plate, and he starts scribing the future tree on a sheet of paper with quick hands.

"-KKKKKKKKMEEEEEEBAAAAAAAALLLLLLLSSSS-"

Next to him, Blanket swirls a different container around, lips quirking in satisfaction as the pale liquid within starts glowing a muted emerald, then begins adding notes of her own to the several pieces of paper Window is rapidly filling. The two of them mumble to each other as they work.

"Epigenetic stressors indicate a high chance of long term viability... cellular regeneration within normal bounds... regressions are solid through at least fifteen copies... remarkable resilience indicators here and here..."

"-AAAAARRGGHHHHHHWWWWWHHHHYYYYYYYYYYYY??????"

MacWillie falls back into one of the smaller waiting chairs, nearly splintering it beneath her bulk. The cleaning swatch falls away from her limp hand and she looks dumbly at the neatly healed pinprick on her arm.

"I... don't..."

Huckens' drawn out scream trails off into a wordless whimper, and I sigh wistfully. The sounds of future tree testing always make the village seem that little bit more alive, a tremolo heralding new generations. Catcalls of approval and applause drift in from outside.

Everyone in the village loves future tree testing.