Donny knew that wasn’t how it was supposed to work, but in his panic he couldn’t help but lapse into a reflexive search for patriarchal authority structures to navigate. The sun was all in the day now, the heat of midmorning that felt the way midafternoon used to. Donny felt the sweat soaking through his clothes.

The louder he yelled, the louder they laughed.

Some of them had cameras out, recording the spectacle like kids at the circus.

He looked over at Heather. She was curled up on the floor of her cage, wrapped in a ragged blanket.

“Is this what we fought for?” said Donny, trying to conjure dignity. “So we could keep fighting? So we could kidnap each other’s kids?”

“Yes!” yelled two voices in the crowd, one of them laughing.

“I want to speak to the People’s Defender! I’m here to defend this woman before the Tributary.”

“You’re too late, dude,” yelled Peter Pan. “She was already sentenced.”

“What do you mean? There’s a hearing scheduled for today! I saw the notice.”

“They moved it up,” said the guy. “There’s a big storm coming.”

“Without a lawyer to defend her? What a joke. I thought you all stood for freedom.”

“Freedom!”

Feathers fluttered. Hats and articles of clothing were tossed in the air. Some of the kids were making out. Others were passing around some of their special crop.

“Freedom is a lie!” yelled a boy.

“We are all servants of the Earth,” yelled a girl. “Free to fly, but always connected to the sky.”

“Free to work!”

“Free to die!”

“Free to wear a tie!”

Donny looked down at his bright-green tie, which was the closest thing he had to a feather. Then he heard the raucous sounds of birds. Donny looked, and saw the parakeets in flight over the square. They had the same kind in Houston—the descendants of illegally imported exotic pets that had escaped and gone native.

He cowered as they flew over, but felt the impact on his shoulder.

“Goddammit,” he said.

The floor of the cage was caked with filth, not just from birds. But what had hit him was just a peanut shell, discarded by a bird who already got the prize.

By the time he realized it, the cage was swaying intensely from his spaz-out, knocking him to his knees.

Now they were really laughing.

He tossed the peanut shell at them, and they just laughed harder.

Looking out at their bright colors, he realized how hot he was getting. The sun was shining right on him now. He was red in the face and wet all over.