The Queen of Purple

A suburban office park at two in the morning offered little to lore or the beginnings of an honest struggle. Although, those who frequented the parking lot during the day would consider themselves to be at the forefront of a very specific struggle; the fight for business. In truth, there was only one office listed on the marquee sign that would have anything to do with a fight. Five or ten businesses made up the white glowing sign at the entrance of the parking lot, but it was the one at the bottom with part of a light shifting between dim and illuminated that quietly beckoned for adventure. Avian Technologies, AT for short, in bold, red letters was often confused with the aviation school down the street and at times AT would receive anything from mail addressed to the school to actual aviation students showing up at the front door ready to attend class. This was something that annoyed Megan Mora, who often picked up the nightshift at AT to work on her doctoral research in both the late and very early hours.

Arriving promptly at nine in the evening, Megan Mora, along with another researcher, would first collect the mail dropped through the mail slot before clocking in and donning their lab coats and protective eyewear. Dr. Joyce Nkosi and Megan Mora possessed a wonderful working relationship that revolved around a responsiveness regarding each other’s feelings. It was easy to tell if Megan was up for antics or conversation as she would wear her tie dye lab coat and front a rolling smile with jokes at the ready. While Dr. Nkosi relished in silence, more often than not she would be the first to speak to Megan, giving the student the go ahead for a night of stories mixed with hard work. On nights when detail and concentration were valued more, the women would simply nod when seeing one another and take their places at opposite ends of the twelve thousand square foot office space. Nights seem to dwindle time when one found themselves wrapped in deep conversation or when hands occupied themselves with forceps or a scalpel.

Often, nights procured some kind of delivery from the third shift couriers who dropped off everything from time-sensitive bio-samples to manuscripts spelling out new projects. Permits arrived by special delivery and were one of the items in most need of attention, as they were just as time sensitive as the actual vials of bird tissue. The exception was Wednesday nights, which were the least busy, and so the two scholars had a fondness for these nights especially. It was, in fact, a rainy Wednesday night that had Megan Mora arriving late, something she hated more than burnt coffee. Forgetting a rain jacket or even a car umbrella, the student quickly scanned her ID to gain entrance to the cold building, where she rushed to her locker and found one of her hoodies. Pulling over the cardinal garment, which proudly showcased every member of the Gruidae family or crane family, Megan ditched her lab coat, knowing no management would be present to scold her.

Within the lab Megan’s non-skid shoes on acrylic resin tile signaled to Dr. Nkosi a guest had arrived. “I was just about to text you,” Dr. Nkosi spoke over the body of a brown pelican recently removed from the iced box it arrived in. Megan waited for Dr. Nkosi to speak again, hoping it would be the kind of night the two could jest back and forth while striving to better serve the entire class of Aves. “You know what they say…the PhD student who’s late gets to hold the refuse bag.” Without looking away from the pelican, Dr. Nkosi wafted open a red biohazard bag from her seat and held it out for Megan. Taking the red bag, Megan stepped closer to the fume hood where below the body of an adult pelican lay with its silver-brown belly facing up.

“What happened to this guy?” Megan asked, slipping on her protective eyewear and mask. Dr. Nkosi sighed the way she did when the answer was always the same. “Probably red tide.” The pelican, now limp and lifeless, showed itself emaciated and riddled with what Dr. Nkosi would later confirm as feather mites slowly eating away at it. Megan looked over her shoulder at the walk-in refrigerator that carried both entire bird specimens and tissue samples from all over the world. Over eighty percent were there due to some human related consequence. “Red tide does occur naturally,” Dr. Nkosi spoke so that her recorder would pick up her dictation she would later use for her report, “but red tide is also exaggerated by human activity causing it to become more frequent and more deadly.”

Megan watched as Dr. Nkosi examined the bird and noted its poor condition from its skin elasticity to the abrasions in the pelican’s air sacs, which would have made breathing unbearable. “Megan?” Dr. Nkosi asked. “Yeah,” the student answered. “You’re the one with the literature degree, tell me a story.” It was a common request, especially when the subject of the night was a stark reminder of how much trouble birds and by extension humans were in. Megan did not have to think for very long, as she already had a story she wanted to share. “There’s this myth about a bird, a macaw, from the mountains who brings tidings in the form of dropped berries and branches.”

“A seed dispersing macaw. Sounds more fact than fiction.” Dr. Nkosi commented.

“That’s the thing about myth, Doc, it’s so much closer to fact. Anyway, this macaw had a name, Purpura Regina. The Queen of Purple. Purpura was said to have the wingspan twice that of a harpy eagle and a call so deep and rupturing it could command volcanoes. All that power, all that might, and she instead laid lavender eggs and gave birth to the whole of everything living, including humans who were her final creation. She flew into the dark mountains after brooding and hatching her human children and there she remained. The humans, forgetting their origin, cut the mountains down, swallowed whole the ash left behind, and cut the thread tying them to Purpura. Myths are circular in nature and where there is a suspected ending, there is actually a new beginning. Purpura refused disentanglement from humanity’s thread of life and so her spirit wafted as air into the world where it was slowly inhaled by the right people who would do her justice.”

It was usual for Dr. Nkosi to make a witty comment after one of Megan’s stories, but the growing silence almost fooled the student into thinking Dr. Nkosi might have something to add. “So does that mean we’re the offspring of a purple bird?” Dr. Nkosi smiled for the first time as her full lips added light to her umber cheeks. “It means we’re the striving of air. Both fluid and strong, uncompromised by anything solid and flying to great heights when all else fails.” The older woman nodded her head and chuckled to herself. “I could get behind that.”

Just then a buzz at the lab’s back door, where couriers dropped off packages, sounded through the lab along with the flashing of a red light. “Were we expecting a delivery tonight? It’s Wednesday.” Megan asked Dr. Nkosi, who shook her head. “It must be a priority delivery.”

Megan relinquished her punishment as she placed the red biohazard bag into a bin and left the bin next to Dr. Nkosi. Peeking through the peephole at the back door, Megan expected to see the courier outlined in the single light above the backdoor, but there was no one. “It must have been a prank.” Megan said to Dr. Nkosi who mentioned the kids down the road that often cut through their parking lot on the way to the arcade down the road.

Half-way to Dr. Nkosi, Megan jumped at the sound of the back door buzzer going off for a second time. Partially annoyed, Dr. Nkosi rose from her seat and stood next to her current work load deliberating if she wanted to give the rowdy teens a piece of her mind. As for Megan, she waited with her feet planted firmly on the lab floor, as if waiting for someone to come bursting through the door. Megan chuckled nervously as her mind cooled to the lessons her mythology teacher taught her. “What is it?” Dr. Nkosi asked. Megan turned back to Dr. Nkosi. “Offers in threes are common in mythology.” As if hearing whatever Megan said, the buzzer sounded for a third and final time. In union the two women approached the door and Megan quietly peeked through the hole, unlocked the bolt, but kept the latch secure as she looked through the crack into the mostly unlight back parking lot.

“It’s a package.” Megan said to Dr. Nkosi and growing bolder, she unlatched the door and quickly brought in the suspicious package wrapped in brown paper. “No mailing address. It doesn’t weigh much.” Megan commented, removing the brown paper to reveal a brown, unmarked shoebox with a red sticker proclaiming there to be a live animal within it. “Did someone drop off a live bird?” Dr. Nkosi asked, now leaning over the package Megan placed on a clean lab table. “It wouldn’t be the first—” Megan did not finish her sentence as she bent back the box’s top. There lifeless at the center of the box, was a violet macaw with a near black and deeply curved beak.

“What the hell?” Dr. Nkosi reached for the bird, but before her gloved hands could touch the bird the lab’s fluorescent lights popped and all went dark. Both women yelped, but that was all the movement their bodies allowed them. “It was the lightening outside. It was the storm.” Megan said, shoving her hand into her hoodie’s front pocket and removing her cell phone. Using the cell phone’s light, Megan shined it down into the shoebox to reveal the violet macaw was no longer there. Vanished. As if it had never been there. Both women looked up from the package and found each other’s astonished gazes.

“Was that a purple macaw?” Megan asked. “It looked like it. It must be fake. Is this a joke? Because if it is, it’s a good one.” Dr. Nkosi asked. Megan shook her head. “Dr. Nkosi, are there purple macaws?”

“No. Purple isn’t a color of the macaw.”

A deep rumble like boulders grinding against one another sounded through the lab, causing the two women to draw closer and weave their arms together. “What the hell is going on?” Megan asked, but the rumble cared little about human questions. Shinning the light towards the assumed origin of the sound, some place close to the ceiling at the top of a shelf, Megan found the source. Standing about a foot tall with feathers near midnight purple was a macaw who held a galaxy for beak all black and white speckled and two ever watching, ever thinking eyes. The macaw cocked its head, and the rumbling stopped.

“Dr. Nkosi?”

“Yeah?”

“Look at the bird’s feet?”

The older woman, well-practiced in rationality and science, eyed the macaw’s feet where it held tight to a broken branch. “It’s time.” The bird spoke clear as day and not in the rough grumblings of a usual macaw.

“It’s time for what?” Megan asked, staring up at the bird, who looked at them as one might a student.

“It’s time to follow me again.” The bird spoke clearly, sending the women into awe as fear faded and something like hope rose mighty and tall.

“This is not an end, but a new beginning one where all my clutches come together for a cause far greater than any one being.”