There are Still Parrots in Pasadena

The first thing K learned about magpies was that they were known for brutally killing small songbirds and their young. Magpies tore apart nests and destroyed eggs, often eating the young and smaller parent birds in the process. Because of this and more, they earned a reputation for being the menace of the bird world. They were considered the meanest of all the corvids yet also one of the smartest, which in turn probably inspired much of their said meanness. Someone once told K that intelligence breeds meanness. She told them that she had heard the same said about stupidity. In the end, intellect doesn’t matter. Sharp or dull, it’s still people who breed the worst kinds of meanness.

K doesn’t have any infatuation with magpies, but it bothers her how negatively the birds are depicted by the informative literature written about them when they still existed. It feels somewhat like a personal attack, since K is a magpie herself. No, she’s not a bird, but people throughout Mi-Byeok and the Southern California Zones call her a magpie because of her profession. Implant sourcing and extraction. Artificials, mostly, but K and a few other magpies with steady hands and mediocre surgical knowledge manage to extract synthetics just as efficiently. Like the bird, these magpies aren't thought of too fondly, either. But as much as they might detest them, the world’s remaining human population relies on magpies like K for their survival.

Birds were the first to die, falling from the sky in great, feathered downpours and painting the earth with blood and the smell of rotting organic tissue. Certain birds that were not initially affected, like magpies, saw this as a carrion feast, but they became part of the same putrid menu soon after. Before the last birds began their descents, humans were already infected. It’s understood that the rot found its way to humans through the birds. Because humans do not naturally fly naked through the skies, and they do not live high up amongst trees, rooftops, or bridges, their rotten limbs would not fall as far and create as great a mess when making their final departure from their hosts. But the smell was the same.

Over ninety-three percent of the world’s population experiences organ failure and limb loss from what is commonly referred to as the rot. Limb decay is the most common symptom, with the rot affecting internal organs at only half the rate. Luckily for nature’s demigod turned underdog, humanity postponed its extinction with the help of various biomedical corporations nestled in the south western coast’s walled city-state of Mi-Byeok which had already been producing a wide variety of implants and advanced prosthetics years before the rot made its first mark upon human flesh.

For those that outlasted the first waves of the rot, what seemed like the final nail in the coffin of the world’s collapse eventually turned into something as mundane as scheduling an appointment with your dentist for wisdom tooth removal. It’s not fun, painful for sure, but at some point, everyone will need to plan a replacement for a finger, hand, or arm, depending on how quickly the rot spreads and where they stand on the waitlists for their procedure. If they’re especially unlucky, they’ll be coming back to their local grinder—not everyone can afford a licensed implant surgeon in Mi-Byeok—for that tongue they swallowed in their sleep or the eyeball that all of a sudden went dark on them then fell out of their head while they suffered through a coughing fit spurred on by a failing lung.

Then there are people like K. The rot won’t touch her and seven percent of the world population. Her flesh is entirely her own, not an inch of it synthetic or plated by artificial replacements, and her heart is just a muscle. These rare individuals live and deteriorate at the natural pace humans were once more used to fearing. The slow decay of cells. Old age drapes it’s foul smelling and wrinkled blanket over a person’s flesh before their heart gets lazy or liver too fatty. K has learned to be hated by most people for one or both of these reasons: She is a magpie, and she is a seven-percenter, unafflicted by the rot.

The client ends their previous meeting ten minutes past schedule but offers no apology. K doesn’t mind. Since entering the room, she’s been more interested in the client’s physical form than why she had to wait a little longer than scheduled. A torso of nude organic flesh, small breasts, vampirically pale skin drawn taught over a ribcage, a winking navel, is all that seems untouched by the rot. Upon further scrutiny, a small section of the clients’ head seems organic as well, a cap of skin bordered by white bone from their forehead upwards and back to their occipital bone at the rear base of their skull, but every other aspect of the client’s form is comprised of distinctly non-humanoid replacements. Strangest of all, a stasis providing half-egg props the client’s torso along with their artificially connected brain and upper skull into a proper posture to face whom or whatever the client addresses. Whatever technology keeps the torso and head from slumping over is unclear, and so K has been rudely staring at the client's half-egg form throughout the meeting while trying her best to keep up with the details of the job she came here to accept.

“You will go to Pasadena, then?” the client says with a flat, genderless voice. “Today?”

“What?” K momentarily forgets where they were in the conversation. “Yes—No, I mean, I’ll head out tomorrow. It’s going to take fourteen hours or more to get my travel permit cleared.”

“Not an issue. Rose will provide you with a two-day yellow permit the moment the contract is signed.”

“Who’s Rose?”

“My assistant. You’ve already met her, just outside.”

Rose must be the woman with extensive facial replacements, a combination of synthetic and artificial, that sits behind the desk in the waiting room. For facial plating, Rose gold is a questionable choice, but the sleek lines of her eyes and the delicate curves of her nose bridge and cheekbones exude an air of refinement. While waiting, K watched the woman’s plump, pink bottom lip softly crease under the habitual bite of her white teeth as her gleaming forehead edged slightly closer to her monitor so that she could better read or inspect whatever was displayed there. That woman’s replacement work is incomparable to the client’s crude current form.

“I’ll go today, then.” K sighs, readjusts her lazily crossed legs. “It’s going to be hot today, way out there...”

“It’s always hot in Pasadena.”

“I guess. Never been.”

The egg shifts forward with the soft purr of whatever technology keeps it afloat from the ground. “Magpie, did you know that there are still parrots in Pasadena?”

“Like the actual bird?”

“Yes. Not a human adopting the name of a bird, like yourself, but a real bird, with real feathers and a real voice.”

For a moment, K reflects on how strange it is for the client to imply that she doesn’t have a voice. It’s more annoying than offensive. To satisfy her irritation, she imagines herself tipping over the ridiculous, torso cradling egg floating before her. K starts thinking of the client entirely as the egg rather than the client, but she knows better than to address them as such.

“I doubt that’s true,” she says plainly, “that there are parrots or any other birds in Pasadena.”

The egg makes a noise like a hum. “Just let me know if you happen to see one while you’re there.”

K is silent, still unsure if the egg is serious.

“Parrots or not, you’ll bring me what is in that man’s chest.”

“Right, the heart,” K says. “Is it an artificial? You didn’t—"

“Make sure you destroy his body, his face especially. I want there to be no indication that whatever is left of him was ever human.”

"That sort of thing is not really our forte.”

“Magpies are cruel things. I’m sure it’ll come naturally. And you won’t be paid otherwise.”

Pasadena proves to be hot and boring. K can’t come up for a reason that the implant's host she’s been hired to track would go there. And as it turns out, K finds the host just beyond Pasadena, at a location called Descanso Gardens located just northwest of what used to be Pasadena's city limits. But the gardens, which had been neglected for years then quickly thereafter entirely consumed by one wildfire or another, are also quite boring. When asked to clarify about the host’s most recent whereabouts, K’s data broker swore that the host would be here and not somewhere more central to Pasadena. They were right, but they didn’t mention that the host would already be dead.

By no explanation that K cares to explore, a mostly intact blue tiled, curved roof remains unofficially supported by two half-split pillars and wedges of fractured concrete. It is beneath this uniquely preserved roof where the host’s body lies. K works her way over large chunks of concrete partly swallowed by the earth and beneath rotten piles of lumber before cautiously stepping under the roof.

The host is a fully organic male, a seven-percenter like herself. She knows this at a glance because his dried blood is red, brownish and black in some spots but not the blue and purple of those with artificial or synthetic replacements. A recently made incision at his chest causes her to fear the worst. With her hand buried inside the open cavity, K’s fears are confirmed. There is no implant, only a dark, cold, cavity of pink flesh. She pulls the incision wide, the skin resisting the pressure of her fingers and forearms, and spots a glint of light. Her fingers reenter the opening in the man’s chest and fish around until her nail scratches something hard.

Pinched between K’s forefinger and thumb, a golden locket in the shape of a heart shines under the not-quite-Pasadena sun. K spits on the locket and wipes off the blood with her shirt before prying it open to see the small photo of a young woman inside. The woman’s face is vibrant and healthy, but when K holds the locket closer, she notices a bandage on the side of her head, where her ear might be. Despite this small imperfection, K thinks the woman looks beautiful and happy.

With the heart-shaped locket in hand, K looks down at the dead body and sighs.

“Sorry to tell you,” K says, “but I didn’t see any parrots.”

The egg hums. “And you didn't hear any?”

“Don't think so.”

“You would know if you did. The sound a parrot makes when flying overhead is more like that of a child or small dog being violently strangled and shaken than any sound a songbird might make.”

K makes a point of furrowing her brows. “Sounds like a wonderful bird.”

“Not as wonderful as the magpie.”

K stands up. Her height, which is nothing extraordinary, puts her head a full foot above the egg’s pale, fleshy skull cap.

“Are we done, here?”

More humming. “What about the body?”

“Pulp.”

“Good. Was it easier than you thought?”

Before leaving the room, K takes one last glance at the egg. The heart-shaped locket is held against their chest by an extended mech hand previously hidden somewhere within the half-egg structure. K thinks she hears a sound like soft, human crying, but it ceases when the door closes behind her.