Not-Stars

Fern grunted as she wheeled one of the library’s six power banks into place beside her desk at the center of the main hall. It clicked in with a satisfying shnnnk to the hall’s A/V station, lighting up the monitor and communications board.

One of the junior librarians darted into the hall, looked around frantically, and upon noticing Fern sitting down at the A/V station began wringing his hands with even greater intensity. Fern smiled and beckoned him over.

“Hey Fern - I’m so sorry, the kids from San Martin are on their way through the tunnels right now. We need the spare power bank for movie night - we’re going to project it in the children’s section and then have a sleepover.”

Fern scowled - she had totally forgotten with everything going on. She inwardly cursed at Magnolia and the council for taking their spare power bank for ‘Efficiency Gains.’

Poor Brian looked like he wanted to melt. “I mean, I could tell the kids to turn around? Well, I guess they’d still need to sleep somewhere. Maybe they could-?”

Fern cut him off. “No Brian, we’re giving the kids their movie. Besides-” Fern paused. “I doubt she’s going to pick up tonight, either.”

Brian softened. He put his arm on Fern’s shoulder, a surprisingly warm gesture from the timid young librarian. “She’s okay, Fern.” Thanking her profusely, he took the power bank and wheeled it back across the library.

Their library - Fern’s library - wasn’t pretty. Certainly not compared to pictures of how it had been before the storm. Walls had been torn down, air purifiers and oxygenators messily installed, every open seam to the outside world triply sealed with duct tape and foam. Bookshelves had been uprooted and consolidated into a single room to save space. Cables carrying power, oxygen, and internet ran across the floor and climbed the walls in a messy tangle Fern had been tripping over her whole life.

The exception - what made the library beautiful, in Fern’s mind - was the ceiling. Steel lattice beams crisscrossed in intricate hexagonal ribs supporting an arched concrete ceiling. Three long glass skylights ran parallel to each other across the length of the ceiling. They used to be covered, but three years back, Ruby had deemed them ‘too depressing!’ - then proceeded to scale the wall, rip the tarps off, and rig a complex lighting system across the steel supports.

Fern half-smiled, half-grimaced at the memory of looking up an hour after opening and seeing her sixteen year old daughter fearlessly walking the beams with a mess of wire trailing behind her. They had both caught grief for that installation. The council predictably lost their minds, crying about potential seepage, toxins, teaching children the outside was anything but deadly. Fern rolled her eyes at this - she was doubtful anyone would ever forget how dangerous the outside was. Not while the wind howled and people suffocated.

Still, Fern couldn’t deny that her daughter had made staring out into that void oddly compelling. On the days the storm raged, long, sustained wind ripping past the roof in guttural howls, the lights soothed it with swirling ribbons of bluish green. On days when the storm stopped and the air stagnated, and the black fog seemed endless, the lights twinkled gently and slowly in mesmerizing patterns cascading across the ceiling. Fern had caught many visitors - herself included - losing focus on a conversation or book as a light caught their eye.

Fern heard the kids enter through the southern most tunnel, traipsing happily up the stairs. As she had done many times with Ruby, Fern marveled at the ability of children to focus on the shiny treat in front of them - despite what would undoubtedly have been a long trek after a difficult experience. Fern slid against the column of the A/V station until she was almost completely horizontal. She stared up at the not-stars as she recalled the last time she saw her daughter.

****

As per usual, Fern had heard Ruby before she saw her. Fern listened to her daughter excitedly greet the other librarians as she emerged from the tunnel entrance. Fern was in the corner kitchenette, pulling out a chili loaf as Ruby came tearing in. The teenager let out a delighted yelp at the sight of her bread. She managed to tear off a large piece of bread, eat it, and avoid Fern’s swatting hand while wrapping her in a large hug.

“M-prghm! Urhg, thgt’s hot! Yogre nghver ghna—”

Fern laughed, petting her daughter’s hair. “Chew, Rubes.”

Ruby rolled her eyes and swallowed with theatrical effort. She pulled out her phone and hooked it into one of the loose Ethernet ports littered across the library. “Mom — you know how the wind’s been stopping for longer and longer?”

Fern nodded, feeling a knot of worry rise. The storm had been slowing for years - when she was a child, it was a lovely break to get even two hours of still air to a hundred hours of fifty mile per hour plus winds. But these days, the stagnant air was around for closer to fifty percent of the time. Some were glad, claiming it was the first step back to a habitable atmosphere. Most were afraid. The stagnant air and its thick toxins killed you even faster than the storm.

Ruby didn’t notice her mother tense. “So — a settlement in Salinas started re-investigating cloud seeding technology. They’ve been playing with different propulsion rockets to lift seeding flares up-”

Fern sighed. Her daughter woefully overestimated her understanding of science. “Ruby-”

“No, Mom, listen.” She crouched, holding her mother’s hand and looking her directly in the eyes. “For ninety years the wind never stopped, right? And people thought that was a good thing - more movement meant less chance for the toxins to settle in. But now that it’s stalling out, we can isolate the nuclei of the toxins-

“Ruby. English. Just show me what you want to show me.”

“They seeded the clouds. They used silver iodide flares for the cold-” Fern raised an eyebrow at Ruby, who rolled her eyes. “They put a bunch of chemicals in the cloud to create rain that binds to the toxins and drags it out of the atmosphere.”

Ruby’s grip tightened on Fern’s hand, and Fern noticed for the first time her daughter’s eyes were wet.

“Ninety years of storm and fog, and one afternoon of rain washed a hole straight through it. Mom, they - they saw the sun.”

Fern felt the floor fall out from under her as Ruby hit play.

Five figures in full hazmat suits stood outside, illuminated only by a ring of dragged-out LEDs. No sound — but Fern could easily tell the storm wasn’t raging, because they weren’t being tossed around like ragdolls. Suddenly, a fire illuminated the dark space between the figures - Fern realized it was a rocket taking off.

Someone tilted the camera up, and all five walked off, taking the lights with them. Fern watched the black overhead for what felt like an hour - and just when she was about to admonish Ruby for a cruel, cruel prank, the dark started to thin. It was gradual at first, almost as if Ruby was just upping the brightness on her screen - but it thinned, and kept thinning until -

Warmth. Slow at first, then white-hot. A ring entered the screen before a scorching brightness. Light.

Fern sat rigid. Ruby watched her, anxious, bouncing on her heels.

“So? What do you think? We have to go, right?” Ruby was talking fast, her words tripping over each other. “They’ve been texting for volunteers - they want people to help build up infrastructure. I’ve been texting the head councilwoman there - way more on top of their shit than Magnolia, by the way - and they asked me to come work on the toxic water problem, what happens when it comes down. And they have a library, Mom, you could work in it! There’s a bus tomorrow, but they’re running it every week, so we could even take a couple weeks to pack—”

Fern felt the excitement rise in her own chest, and then curdle into something colder. She’d seen videos like this before. Never this good - but good didn’t mean real. She shook her head. “It’s fake, Ruby.”

Ruby went still, like she’d been slapped. “What are you talking about?”

Fern reached for Ruby’s hair, more out of habit than anything - but Ruby stepped out of reach. “It can’t be real,” Fern said gently. “I’ve seen videos like this - settlements luring people in, promising them the sun. But everyone just wants more workers, more people, more resources.” She saw frown lines start to appear on Ruby’s face. “Baby, it’s been ninety years. It’s a lot easier to fake a lens flare than it is to fix the air.”

“You didn’t even look at it, you just decided—”

“I looked at it.”

“You decided before you looked.”

That was the fight, more or less, though it went on for a long time - the largest version of the same fight they’d had for years. Ruby pushing for more while Fern tried to make her understand they had it as good as they were ever going to get. She remembered Ruby’s voice cracking on the last thing she said before they went to bed.

“Why can’t you just let yourself hope for anything?”

Then, that morning, Ruby was gone. Fern knew exactly where, but she shut down the library that day anyways. She called everyone she could, walked the tunnels to the Apartments and Grow Rooms, even the Council’s chambers where she got a frosty reception and lecture about spreading “the fake news out of Salinas.” On top of that, the storm had started again, so the next few above-ground drives to Salinas were canceled until it abated. After a couple days, Fern was about ready to put on a suit and walk the sixty miles there herself when a text finally came: made it, I’m okay.

For the first month, their conversation pretty much went like this:

Fern: Come home right now. Please.

Ruby: nope no way no how. here’s a dumb picture of a dumb vial with a dumb liquid that WONT WORK

Fern admitted she might be paraphrasing a little. But eventually she came around to the idea that Ruby might be doing something that mattered, and sent one more text: I’m not happy with where you are, but I’m glad you’re safe. Please call me as much as you can. Ruby did. For the next few months that meant two calls a day at the A/V station, Ruby breathless about toxic-water samples or some other scientific mumbo jumbo, Fern working hard to look nonchalantly concerned instead of just concerned.

It held together until about a month ago, when Ruby called to say she was planning to go outside once the storm abated with her team to try seeding another rocket. Fern — understandably, from her perspective — completely lost it, and spent twenty minutes laying out exactly why that was impossible and why Ruby should just come home already.

Ruby let her finish. When Fern finally ran out of air, they just looked at each other through the screen, until Ruby broke the silence.

“We can’t live in the dark forever, Mom. I’ll call you back later.”

That was 30 days ago, and Fern hadn’t heard from Ruby since. Tonight the air was stagnant for the first time in a month, and Fern watched Ruby’s stars twinkle softly against the black veil above. She heard the projector being turned off and the kids start rolling into their sleeping bags, giggles and shushes galore. Brian wheeled the power bank back over, thanking Fern profusely as he too retired to his room.

Mechanically, Fern clicked the power bank into the A/V station and booted it up. She pulled up Ruby’s name and called again - and…nothing. Just like the past month, Fern felt the faint hope that had been building in her gut bottom out as her second and third attempts went unanswered.

To be honest, Fern didn’t remember when she’d decided to make the trip to Salinas to go after Ruby. Fern had just noticed, a little over two weeks ago, that she’d laid out a hazmat suit and rebreather by a fully packed bag in her room. Being the librarian was sort of like being the entire community’s therapist, so she heard that people were still patching up old cars to make the drive, and it wasn’t hard to get someone to agree to take her.

Yesterday had been the tipping point. The council officially banned any vehicle departures to Salinas - too many people were leaving, either to join the new colony or go looking for family whom they couldn’t reach. As soon as the announcement went out, Fern pulled aside an old student she had heard was planning a departure and arranged a ride. Judging by the horn that blared outside, that ride was here.

Unhurried, she rose from the A/V station, pulled on the suit and rebreather, and walked to the front doors. The main hall had completely emptied out. Right before she stepped into the airlock, she gave the library one last look — her attention straying, the way it always did, to Ruby’s stars.

The horn sounded again, short and impatient.

The A/V Station beeped.

Fern froze — long enough to almost let it go, to walk out and let the machine take a message she’d probably never come back to hear — then she was across the room, breath caught, hitting accept before she let herself hope.

Ruby’s face filled the screen.

“Mom! Mom, I’m sorry. Those idiots on your council cut us off. It’s been hell trying to get the inter-cabling back up—”

“Freaking Magnolia,” Fern said, outrage flaring up, hot and immediate. “She swore she didn’t! How did she even-“ Ruby cut her off. “Mom! It’s okay, it’s okay! You were right - it’s been really hard here. We’ve spent the last month waiting for the storm to calm down just to try this. But look, we had a test flight today and it went better- you can see - AGH, just look!” Ruby was breathless, half laughing, half crying. The picture swung wildly, fabric and a zipper pull spinning past the lens then steadying on Ruby standing outside. Actually outside - no hazmat suit, nothing but goggles and a mini rebreather over her mouth and nose. Fern’s hand went to her own throat - but it wasn’t fear. It was that she could see her daughter at all. Her daughter was outside, with no flashlights or lamps, and Fern could see her.

The scene had a soft, diffuse cast to it. Fern could only see Ruby from the torso up, framed against faded and damaged brick, awash in a beautiful, rustic glow. But what really caught Fern’s breath was the single stripe of light crossing across Ruby’s body. It looked as if the light was peeking through a rafter - the line started at Ruby’s left torso, running diagonally across her dirty shirt, up past the mole on Ruby’s chin that matched Fern’s own, through one stunningly green-grey eye, and culminating in a curve over Ruby’s auburn hair. This was it - this was how her daughter had always meant to be seen. Fern didn’t trust herself to speak.

Ruby ducked back inside and pulled off her goggles and mask. A voice called Ruby’s name from off-screen. “Coming!” Ruby yelled back, before turning to the camera again. “It’s worth it, Mom. I promise it is. I’m coming home soon. The head councilwoman here yelled at Magnolia for an hour earlier and got her to agree to restart the bus routes - there’s one doing rounds next week. The team here says I should take a break and that they won’t need me for a few months. But I had to show you.” Ruby was crying now too. “Mom. It’s here. It’s really here.”

The screen went dark before Fern could answer.

Fern sat back. The relief came all at once, hitting her so hard it felt almost like grief. Ruby was safe. Ruby was coming home. Fern could stay — unpack the bag, wave the car off without her, go back to her cozy routine with the books, and the movies, and to taking care of all the people who needed a little bit of distraction from this terrible world.

This terrible world where - for the first time - she could see her daughter in the sunlight.

The horn sounded a third time, longer now, more impatient.

Fern looked up at Ruby’s stars. The lights twinkled on, slow and gentle, exactly the way they always did on a still night.

Let yourself hope for anything.

She stood, and found she was already moving.

Fern shouldered her bag, pulled her mask down over her face, and stepped out into the toxic, black air, illuminated only by the car’s headlights. She took one look back at the library - unsurprisingly, all she could see was soft illumination evaporating out of the roof. Fern turned, climbed in the car, and shut the door behind her.

As she settled in for the drive, Fern thought that someday, it would be nice to see the moon.