“As I was saying,” he says, turning away, “you are to arrive here in the main dome every morning, gathering at the entrance of the labs until one of the scientists comes to admit you. Who that scientist is will vary, depending on what you are studying in a given week. You will not have unlimited access to the facilities until you have completed at least one year of your internship. Understood?”
We’re all outside the Zoo now, most of us probably wondering if this has all been an elaborate ruse or if we’re actually going in. I was so absorbed by showing up late, I didn’t even notice the fifth member of our internship group, and when I finally look, annoyance crackles through me like a strike of lightning. Of all people, Yaya. I’ll have to watch my step with her in the group: she’s eager to get top marks, and I wouldn’t put it past her to find a way to inform the nearest whitecoat if I’m not meeting standards. Alma catches my eye from across the group, and I expect to exchange a mutual rolled eyeball over the presence of Yaya. Instead my friend’s face is open, asking a question: What is it with you? I wish I had an answer.
“I’m sure most of you have heard about the oath that will be required of you. You will take it at the end of your first week in the labs,” Dr. English is saying. “Not only does it signify your commitment to research in N’Terra, it holds you to secrecy about the work you will do here.”
The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them.
“Secret from whom?”
All eyes are on me, including my father’s. Alma stares at me, eyes wide and disbelieving, from across the group. We’ve always asked questions in class, but this is a different kind of question, I know. This question has roots, talons. I order myself not to look at her. Rondo, on the other hand, has the smallest of smirks on his lips.
“The who is not a question,” my father says after a pause. “The oath is a Council-implemented requisite for all who wish to enter the laboratories.”
I expect him to go on, but he doesn’t. I also expect him to admonish me, but he doesn’t. He barely looks at me, instead just turns to the guards with the buzzguns, nodding at one. She steps aside, allowing my father to press his thumb against the entry pad, and the doors whisper open, revealing a long hallway, painted stark white. No one moves. No one even breathes. I chance a glance over at Alma and her mouth is squeezed shut, her hands clasped tightly together. Even Rondo, who “doesn’t give a damn about mammals,” seems to be frozen by awe. My father has stepped inside already and looks back at the huddle of us, taking in our faces. This is the moment we’ve been dreaming of: the Zoo has opened its doors to us. I anticipate impatience from him, annoyance, but even he can’t help but chuckle.
“Come on now,” he says, beckoning. “We haven’t got all day.”
When the doors slide shut behind us, I feel the way my grandmother must have felt when she stepped out onto Faloiv for the first time. My first step into the Zoo feels like setting foot on a new planet entirely. The ground is hard—too hard. It doesn’t give under my feet at all, solid and smooth.
“What’s wrong with the ground?” Jaquot asks, scuffing it with his shoe.
“It’s artificial,” my father says without looking back. He leads the way down the hall. “Made of synthetic material. It makes for a more sanitary environment.”
Yaya stumbles, the strange floor catching at the bottom of her shoes. Jaquot is at her side like a flash of eager lightning, his hand on her elbow. She thanks him with a smile, and I roll my eyes, even as I trip slightly myself. It’s strange not seeing grass or soil at my feet. Even our ’wams are grass and dirt inside, with mats laid down in the bathroom and hallway. Walking normally doesn’t seem possible: having something so hard between me and Faloiv is unfamiliar. Rondo appears beside me as the interns troop down the hall. Alma is at the head of the group where I would have been, as if nothing has changed. I don’t blame her: for her, nothing has.
The rooms we pass are all empty according to their windows, but still my classmates turn their heads eagerly as we pass each one. They’re looking for animals: any kind. For years we’ve seen projected images of them in the Greenhouse with Dr. Espada, learning their unique characteristics and their adaptive trajectory, but aside from the occasional winging oscree or scurrying kunike, that’s generally where greencoat first-person experience stops.
“Where is everyone?” Jaquot says. He says “everyone” as if referring to the whitecoats, of which we’ve seen none, but we all know he’s talking about specimens. Still, for me the thrill of the proximity to animals is lessened as I also think about another organism: the spotted man. Is he still here? What had happened to him? Every time we pass one of the windows of the research rooms, I sneak a quick, nervous look. Nothing. Brought under cover of darkness and now invisible.
We’re approaching the end of the hallway, a set of doors ahead, and I glance back over my shoulder at the entrance, far behind. The hallway had seemed like it might go on eternally, the whole lab one sprawling illusion. At the sight of the doors, I can sense the eagerness of the group: beyond this are the animals. We can feel it. All those empty exam and research rooms: this is where the specimens are. Dr. English approaches the doors—they don’t require a scan—and they slither open to reveal what we’ve been waiting for. . . .
Eggs. All I see are eggs. Hundreds of them. In baskets and in piles. My blood initially freezes at the sight of them, thinking of the egg I have hidden under my mattress. I shoot a glance at Rondo and find his eyes already on my face. Do I have the egg of some monstrous creature of Faloiv in my bedroom? I imagine it hatching while I’m in the Zoo, growing exponentially in a matter of moments and wreaking havoc on N’Terra from the inside. I scan the room for a sign of an egg that resembles the one I have, but nowhere do I find the same pearly iridescence. The colors here are bright and in some cases almost jarring: fuchsias and deep greens. I admire the varying sizes and shapes before me, like a vast beach of multicolored stones. The sight of them fills me with a pleasant feeling that is welcome under the harsh, artificial lights.
“Your first project,” Dr. English says. “These eggs are from recent collection trips. They need to be classified and sorted so they can be transported to the correct compounds. Be gentle, but don’t worry too much. Their shells are very durable.”
“They have to be on this planet,” Jaquot jokes. My father, astoundingly, actually smiles. The corners of my mouth dip in a frown, remembering him raging at me about “scientist decorum.” Jaquot is anything but decorous, and besides, it baffles me when Jaquot talks about Faloiv as if he wasn’t born here: as if our home is a temporary habitat.
“I didn’t know N’Terra asked finders to collect eggs,” Yaya says. Jaquot, of course, makes a sound of agreement.
“Only if the specimens have been abandoned or have been found to be nonviable.” The smile is gone from my father’s face as quickly as it appeared.
“They’re beautiful,” Alma says, and I wonder if she’s filled with the same warm feeling as I am when looking at them.