Ahimsa was so much better at this bedtime story thing than me. I was always looking for concrete answers, but she liked to keep questions open. She said that much of the brain’s wiring takes place after birth, so we had to make Robin’s wiring as expansive as possible while we could. The Earth will never come alive for him unless our songs and stories give life to all the beings, seen and unseen. Still, it wasn’t my favorite activity. He could be a little wound-up this time of day.

“Redberry!” Robin shouted. His pudgy hands reached out for the colander in Ahimsa’s hand. “Want a redberry!”

“Raspberry,” I said. “Razz…berry. And please.”

“Redberry!” he said. “And please!” He opened his mouth wide as if Ahimsa didn’t understand what it was he wanted. His body was small, but his will enormous.

“Raspberry!” I repeated.

“He can call it what he wants,” Ahimsa said, as she placed a scarlet berry on his tongue.

“Don’t you think we should try to use a common language?” I asked.

“We both knew what he wanted, and he knew we knew. What more out of a language do you want?” A light-bell pulsed from above. “Bedtime,” she said. “Isaura, put him down so I can finish the day’s hatch report.”

I swooped Robin up in my arms and he struggled with laughter. His body was so alive. He was just bathed and smelled like almond soap. Almost four years old. I felt as if something was wrong with him, we’d know by now. We were almost out of the woods.

“Story! “he shouted.

I groaned, and Ahimsa gave me a look. No need for words with her.

“Okay, a book,” I said, putting him back down. “One book.”

“Two books.”

I pulled up the rocking chair by the window. “Sit on my lap and we’ll read one book, or you can go straight to your room and we’ll read no books.”

Robin made a running leap, then jumped up on me with such force the rocking chair tilted back. He thought this was hilarious. After I stabilized the chair, he chose a new book from the hologramic panel I pulled down in front of us. “The Fluffy Fantailed Fairfeathers,” I announced, and we settled in. “’A long, long time ago, there was a flock of fantastic birds called the Fluffy Fantailed Fairfeathers living on a small island in a great big lake. They had many beautiful colors in their feathers. Violet, red, yellow, green, orange, and blue. Even magenta! When they were happy, and they were happy all the time, they fanned open their feathers and made rainbows of their tails.’”

“Colors are pretty,” said Robin, gently touching a tail.

“Want to know something interesting about color?” I asked. I wanted to tell him that the real world was gray and color was an illusion. The brain compared wavelength variations to create color, without which it would be hard to sort out the world. Ahimsa would have trouble finding those berries among the brambles, because everything, the leaves, stems, and berries, would be gray. Our brains create something that is not there, so that we can make sense of our environment.

“Don’t say it,” Ahimsa called from the other room. “Beauty doesn’t need any explanation.”

“Yes, pretty,” I told Robin, and made a mental note to share my color lesson later. Colors might only be wavelengths of sunlight, but the light was real, even as it shone on us and through us, even as it reflected off of us and onto one another. But it was hard to teach him about the realities of the world with Ahimsa right around the corner. I believed information expanded wonder, but she thought at his age, and in our current world, the less said about reality the better.

“And rainbows,” said Robin. “I like rainbows.” He sat balanced on my knees, studying the bird tails in the illustration, putting his nose right to the panel and pushing his face through the hologram image. Then he sat up straight and pointed out the window, past the flight cages and over the woods. The sun was low in the sky and was framed by a rainbow. There was always a rainbow, often several at the same time. Not really a good thing apparently. We’re told the sky is clear blue underneath the haze, and rainbows should be special. That’s what our global intelligence system, Talos, was trying to work back to. Right after the Extinction Emergency, countries—the ones that still functioned—began spraying saltwater mist over the oceans, creating low-lying clouds to reflect sunlight and lower the planet’s temperature, and while it made the world a little dimmer, it worked. It bought us time. Or at least, it bought some of us time. For other parts of the world, it messed with the monsoons and upended food and water supplies. There were always unintended consequences with geo-engineering. You could say that we went through a century or more of unintended consequences, as humans tried everything and anything rather than just stop using fossil fuels. That only ended when we nearly ended. As Ahimsa says, we always make the right choice when there is no other. These days, global marine cloud brightening is regulated by Talos to the benefit of everyone, and as the atmosphere cools it has slowly decreased the spraying. One day soon, we’re told, the sky will be sky-blue once again.

“I like rainbows too,” I said.

“Can I have all the colors on my feathers too?” he asked.

I ran my hand along his featherless arm. His skin was tinted a pale silver-green, as was ours, a reflective tone that Talos integrated into the human genome ages ago as a guard against lingering radiation. If we don’t need it in the future, it will be slowly phased out, like the cloud brightening. Like Robin’s hair. Talos recently started splicing follicles back into the genome, believing this generation just might be able to keep their hair. Robin’s is a thin brown fuzz, but it’s more than Ahimsa and I have under our turbans.

“You don’t have feathers,” I said.

“Yes I do,” he said, and he pulled up his pajama tunic and showed me a single, dark hair on his stomach.

I looked around for Ahimsa, but she must have been in the hatchery. I wasn’t sure about this hair. Did a rogue follicle indicate a deeper problem?

“It’s a hair, not a feather,” I said. “Let’s show that to Ah sometime.”

“I want to show Ah now.”

I pulled his tunic down and patted his tummy. “Later,” I said. “Let’s get back to the story… ‘The Fairfeathers were so beautiful that a little girl named PattiCake came to the shore everyday to watch the birds swishing and swashing their rainbow tails as they paraded around the island.’”

“Was the island Zaratan?” Robin asked. “The island that was a giant turtle?”

“No, the Fairfeathers don’t live on Zaratan, that’s another book.”

“Can we read that? I want to see the giant turtle.”

“We can read it tomorrow. Right now we are reading this one before bed.”

“No bed. Were Fairfeathers one of the First Birds?”

First Birds were the predecessors of the birds today. They had the genome they were born with, not the ones manipulated by Talos so they could survive in a world so very different from the one they had evolved in. Talos used the stored genetic material of the thousands of bird species that once existed—the First Birds—and combined them with genes from other plant and animal species to create today’s birds, such as the robins that we raise and rewild. Was a Fairfeather meant to be a First Bird in the book? There were birds that once existed, birds that still existed in some form or another, and then those in children’s books like this, fantasy birds that never existed but were often meant to stand in for First Birds. Fantasy birds gave them a hint of what had been, so they knew what we were all working towards, without smothering them in grief along the way.

Ahimsa was standing at the door, looking at me. Possibly she’d been there for some time. “I’m not too familiar with these Fairfeathers,” she told Robin. “They may or may not be First Birds, but they are certainly special birds.”

And then she was gone. I wondered if I should call her back to look at the dark hair.

“Can we go see them?” Robin asked. “Can we go to the island and see the Fairfeathers?

“The Fairfeathers live in this book,” I said. “And when we read the book, they live in our heads.”

Robin put a hand to his head with a worried look. “Birds?”

“Our imaginations,” I said. “They live in our imaginations. I’m going to keep reading this story now if that’s okay with you.”

He looked around the room. “Where is imagination?”

I put my hand on my own head, which was beginning to ache. “The imagination is in your brain, and these birds are now part of your imagination.”

“Brain!” He tapped my head, then he tapped his. He knew his anatomy. Brilliant child.

“Let’s get back to the story,” I said.

“Is it a real story?”

“It’s a real made-up story. Let’s just read it. ‘The Fairfeathers laid their eggs in burrows on the island, and after they hatched, the baby Fairfeather chicks peeped and pecked all around the island until they were old enough to fly. The deep water around the island kept them safe from the animals who wanted to eat them.’”

“Our eggs come by hover.”

“Yes, they do,” I said. Every day a gross of fertilized robin eggs arrived from a Talos biofab unit for us to hatch out, nurture, then release into the woods. “But Fairfeathers lay their eggs in the wild,” I explained.

“The wild,” Robin said. He looked outside at the trees quietly growing next to a field humming with bees. Birds swooped over the grass searching for the last meal of the day. All the elements of a temperate ecosystem, all created in a biofab unit. Real wild areas, those as yet untouched by Talos, were burnt-out barrens. But for Robin, for now, the wild was simply the outdoors. He looked back at the hologram and studied the illustration of a lush, green island with beautiful birds, surrounded by water that reflected the sky above.

“Why is the sky blue?” he asked and drew his finger across the panel.

The story was obviously set before the worst of the Extinction Emergency of the early millennium, before we had to mist over the sun. That’s what I wanted to say but didn’t. Ahimsa was not far away. “In this story,” I said, “it just is.”

He nodded solemnly and I pulled him closer, feeling the beat of his heart against my chest.

“Okay, let’s get back to the story,” I said. “‘Then one day, the rains stopped coming, and the water level of the lake got lower and lower. This went on for a long, long time, until one day the water was so low that one day, the animals who lived near the lake were able to just walk to the island, dig up the Fairfeather burrows, and eat the eggs. The Fairfeather chicks tried to run and hide, but the animals ate them too.”

I wondered what kind of book this was for a child, although Robin was no stranger to death. None of us were. Many of the robins perished here at the station before they reached adulthood. “Will they all die?” Robin asked in a whisper.

“The adult birds are still there,” I said. “Looks like only the eggs and chicks are being eaten.”

“Who eats them?”

From the pictures, it looked to me like big feral cats and some kind of giant rodents. “I think they made these animals up.”

“Talos made them?”

“No, the author of this book made them in their head.” I touched the panel page. “Let’s keep reading. ‘PattiCake had been watching the water get lower, and when she saw the animals walk to the island to eat the eggs and chicks, she gathered up all the people in town and brought them to the lake. ‘Something has to be done,’ she said.’”

The illustration showed a few dozen humans standing next to what was now a very small, shallow lake. They had pink skin or brown skin, but none were tinted green. Instead, they wore old-school protection gear, used before Talos was programmed to save us with a geno-knife and symbiogenetic combinations.

“Look,” I said. “They’ve come to help.” Actually, it was hard to imagine any of them being able to help, they were all so sickly looking, even PattiCake. “’The townspeople saw what the problem was,’ I continued, ‘but they could not stop the hungry predators from eating the eggs and chicks. The people tried building a fence, but the animals climbed over it. They tried to scare them away but got scared themselves when the animals tore at their protective gear.’”

“The animals are bad,” said Robin.

“No, not bad,” I said. “They’re just trying to survive.”

“Can’t they eat cricket wraps like us?”

“They have to eat whatever they find.” I touched the panel and began reading again. “The Fluffy Fantailed Fairfeathers hopped around their island, poking their long necks into all the burrows, looking for their eggs. They searched under all the bushes for their chicks. They were so sad, they dragged their beautiful tails behind them until they were the color of dirt. PattiCake and the townspeople watched as one by one, the Fluffy Fantailed Fairfeathers started flying away into the dust-filled skies, off to find another island to lay their eggs, searching for somewhere safe.”

“Far away?” asked Robin.

“Maybe,” I said. I really hoped that this was not an endling story. I wondered if I should just stop reading.

“Will that happen to our robins?”

“No silly, they stay around here.” I did not say that they learned soon enough not to leave the woods, or else perish in the barrens.

“No one eats the robins?”

Do I tell him about the magnificent hawks who dined on the robins? The goal of de-extinction and rewilding wasn’t just to restock the world with creatures, it was to create an integrated web of life, restoring relationships, not just bringing back single species. I heard Ahimsa in the kitchen and decided to keep it simple. “That’s hard to tell.”

“Will the animals eat the townspeople?”

“Can we get on with this story please?” I touched the panel. “‘When PattiCake saw the last of the Fairfeathers fly away, she began to cry. Then, one by one, all the townspeople arrived and they began to cry too. They cried and cried, and more humans came and they cried too, because they all loved these birds so much. ‘It’s over!’ they told one another.’”

“The story is over?” said Robin.

“No. They just think the story is over.” There was so much hopelessness in those early days, so many deaths of despair. Now we know the importance of keeping hope alive and finding joy in our work. Ecological health leads to spiritual health, as our teachers used to say.

“What did they do?” Robin asked.

“Well let’s find out,” I said and touched the panel. “‘PattiCake and the townspeople stood by the dried-up lake and cried for days and days, and then weeks and weeks, and months and months, until one day, the lake began to fill up with tears. The more they cried, the higher the water got, until one day, the water was too deep for the animals to get to the island.’”

He put his hands on the illustration. “Water!”

“What do you see in the sky?” I asked.

“A bird. Two birds!”

“’And so, one by one the Fluffy Fantailed Fairfeathers came back to the island to raise their families. Soon the burrows were filled with eggs and little chicks were peeping and pecking all over the island, safe from harm. The townspeople had loved the birds enough to mourn them. PattiCake named herself the water guardian for life, and every time the lake got low, she gathered the townspeople to the shore. When she told them they could lose the Fluffy Fantailed Fairfeathers again, they would begin to cry and bring the water level back up to safety. PattiCake and the townspeople saved the birds with their love. The End.”

“Can we go to the island and see the Fairfeathers?” he asked.

“No, it’s bedtime.”

“Tomorrow? I want to see the Fairfeathers.”

“We can’t see them,” I said, and turned off the hologram. “They’re only in our heads, remember? It’s time for bed.”

“No bed,” he said.

“Yes bed.” I stood up with him clutched in my arms, and as he struggled, Ahimsa came to the door.

“He’s not down yet? What have you two been doing?”

“Have a look at this,” I whispered, and I pulled up Robin’s tunic. “That hair.”

“Feather!” said Robin. “It’s my feather!”

Ahimsa looked closely at the dark hair, then she plucked it off. “Ouch!” said Robin.

“There,” she said. “Problem solved.” She kissed his stomach and pulled down his tunic. Then she kissed him on the forehead. “Nighty-night, sweetie.”

Robin’s head rested on my shoulder in defeat, and he was nearly asleep when we got to his room. He pointed out his window. “Colors,” he whispered. Another vibrant sunset, glorious in oranges and reds, even a splash of green. The field glowed and the woods shimmered in the reflected light. Like the rainbows, our sunsets were amplified by the crap we’d put into the sky. Still. The colors might not be real, but they were our reality. This was our world, and the world needed us to love it madly. “Nigh-night, sunset,” he said, with a weak wiggle of his fingers as I laid him down. His eyelids flickered as he fought sleep, then surrendered. I tucked him in with a kiss, then waited for my heart to return to my chest. We might still be wandering in the woods, but we were far from lost.