Safiya and Ĉaŭŝo

Mechanical difficulty.

Safiya’s baby is three months old. His name is Ĉaŭŝjang, on the polis rolls, but everyone calls him Ĉaŭŝo. She and Feng dote on him as if he were the only baby in the world, and so does everyone else, because babies are essential, and there are never enough of them.

There weren’t enough babies on Earth, and that was one of the causes of the war, and there haven’t been enough babies on Iphigenia either. She carries him everywhere, his black eyes peering out of the carrier on her hip.

She’s following the harvester, which is big, red, and has yellow letters on the side—Feldmeister GmbH. It isn’t new, nothing is, and the maintenance men are always in it, replacing parts they have to machine by hand and waxing the chassis to prevent rust. The wheat is cut down, the gains pulled in, and the straw dropped, and the women following the harvester glean fallen grains into sacks at their waist. Every grain is vital. Enough grains is a loaf of bread, a meal for a hungry mouth. Enough grains is a planted field, meals for hundreds of mouths.

Men guide a wagon along the harvester, the horses patient with their big hooves and shaking their bony heads and nickering at the choppy noises it makes. Feng is on top of the harvester, and he swings a chute over and the golden spangles of grain pour out into the wagon.

Safiya plucks up another grain and another.

“Safnjo, how’s Ĉaŭŝo?”

It’s Kaarina, tall, almost white-haired, nearly as brown as Safiya, but with the sun, not her genes. She’s going woman to woman, emptying their bags at their waists into a reed basket to take to the wagon to empty them. Her eyes are white-blue.

“He’s fine,” Safiya says, straightening. “Oh, my back. He got over the croup.”

“I heard, I was worried.”

“No worries.”

“You and Feng are lucky. When will you have another?”

Safiya laughs. “Let me rest a few months, eh? You and Kiet still an item?”

Kaarina nods. “Maybe we’ll get married after harvest.”

“So soon? No! Don’t stop for me,” Safiya says.

“Babies, babies, babies,” Kaarina agrees. She chucks Ĉaŭŝo under the chin and moves to the next woman.

The harvester makes a moan, puffs winey-smelling smoke from its stack, and stops.

“Aw, shit,” Safiya says. “Ho, merdo.”

Mechanics are running across the field from the portable workshop in the tent, but the gleaners straighten and trot to the roadside, where a table is waiting. There is a tool their parents never touched, their grandparents, or their grandparents’ grandparents before them. Curved blades on short handles. They pick up the sickles and head into the field again, and another wagon leaves the place it had waited.

The women whoop to build spirit, and begin to cut the wheat by hand. You can’t waste a minute in the fields. The wheat must come in, and the grain must be gathered. The harvester may be down an hour. Or two. Or until tomorrow. And every bit of grain and straw that comes in by hand can be put to food or other good use instead of fuel for the machine.

Cut, cut, cut. Safiya swings and cuts. The sweat flows, the sun shines on the blades. Ĉaŭŝo lies in the sling on her hip and his dark eyes stare at the aqua sky, and at the flash of metal, and his ears hear the old, old sound of cut stems.

Snick, snick, snick.

The harvester sits silent, and the mechanics undo its engine cowling.