The door opens like tree boughs reaching for /
the sun, and you’re sure /
you didn’t move, but the floor moves you inside /
like wind buoying a bird through its branches /

Lir tapped a rhythm on her leg, reading her magazine on extraterrestrial plants. The plastic rose hanging from her mirror redirected the sunlight, creating a pink gleam on her cheek.

Nimia pulled her body along the underground tunnel with her muscled arms, one grip at a time. She passed the pods where other Pullers, like herself, worked, their hands plugged into the company interface.

Her mother minced her steps like she did green onions, small and quick and determined. Her waist, trained the smallest in Faize to the width of an arm, showed the beating of her heart through her spine, and the rise and fall of her lungs, stacked atop each other.

“Can you believe it?” Est-L’s wife, Nen-L, twirled and pointed at her microscope. “There’s even smaller things called planets! They orbit those tiny stars!”