Park was fortunate enough to grow up in one of the biodomes, a shining construction off the California coast. Often she looked out past the clear walls, toward the shore, and imagined a figure emerging from the compressed green carpet of trees. The figure, blurrily, would have a face similar to her own, with wild cascading hair and arms tattooed with plant dye. She imagined the figure spotting her in the heart of the city and beckoning. At her signal, Park would be lifted out of New Diego’s glass bubble and deposited into her mother’s arms, which would feel like the bowers of a tree.

But of course, the figure never came.

“What was my father like?” she asked her uncle Sylas once.

He had been silent for a while. “He was a God-loving man,” he said, finally, decisively.

At the time, Park misunderstood this: she did not know who God was, and assumed it was some other, secret adult term for her mother. And therefore, her mother must be God. But later she would realize that Sylas was most likely being sarcastic: would a God-loving man really tumble around with an unwed Feral woman in the mud and the leaves?

“Perhaps,” Glenn had said once, when she was older. “Recall the story of Adam and Eve.”

“That would make me Cain,” Park said, who had been reading up on the subject. “And you’d be Abel. And that means we’ll try to murder each other.”

He’d blinked, perfectly serious. “I would never harm you.”

Park had turned away. “I know.”

She was a stoic child—watchful, perspicacious. Almost fierce in her solitude. Throughout her youth, her uncle—awkward in the presence of a little girl—left the majority of the child-rearing to a top-of-the-line nanny bot: an android named Sally. And then, when Park was older, Glenn.

Park remembered the first time she encountered Sally, with her shining limbs, her bland smile. She had entertained no notions that Sally was her returned mother: she was far too tame, too ordinary-looking, with her crisp white uniform and her brown hair scraped back in a bun. The child that had been Park had said, “Who are you?”

“I’m Sally,” Sally answered. “I live here now.”

“Why?”

“I’m here to take care of you.”

Park had said nothing; had only gauged this new presence silently. Sally hauled her up by the armpits and set her on the high barstool her uncle had forbidden her from climbing on; she began to roll the dough for a flourless bread. Park had never seen or eaten bread before. Many common crops, including wheat, had been wiped out by the invasion of the Comeback plants, and were only eaten now as a luxury.

At first she merely watched, fascinated by the contortions of forming dough in Sally’s hands. When Sally offered her a wad, Park refused, shying away; she wasn’t used to dirtying her hands.