The fluorescent lights hummed a thin, familiar note that felt almost like a metronome after thirty-two months on the program. I trail my fingertip along the stainless steel rail as I walk; habit, more than necessity. The government gave me glass corridors and a budget, and the world gave me consequences I had to learn to carry. My clipboard is warm where my palm clamps it, pages weighted with tiny boxes and medical shorthand. It keeps me honest: date, time, vitals, mood, flight-readiness, notes. The ink always smells faintly of coffee and late nights.

They told me, in 1980, that the program was necessary. They gave it a name no one ever used outside sealed rooms. They gave me equipment and a mandate and, finally, the impossible time. I told myself I was a scientist, and that meant working toward a solution, not to the politics of it. That lie fit until the first day the incubator opened.

I still remember the first breath. Those lungs in her chest worked with a deliberateness that warmed something behind my sternum I am very careful to keep locked. Three years is a long time to shape an organism. Three years of hypotheses and ethics board meetings that were never recorded, of gene splices that had no precedent, of nights when the lab lights were the only lights I allowed myself to keep on. When she came to life in early autumn of ’83, I thought I would collapse with relief. Instead I sat at a desk and filled out forms.

Now—today—the door at the end of Wing C bears a faded number and a faint dent where a cart once clipped it. Her room is minimal: a cot, a metal locker, a small sink, a window that looks out over a courtyard of gravel and a single, stubborn juniper. It is clinical by design; comfort is a variable we ration here. My job, I tell myself, is to make the variables human.

I pause at the door and listen. Her breathing is even. The lights are dimmed to morning-safe; the room smells of lemon disinfectant and something warmer: the trace of her — oils, a hint of feathers, the metallic resin of talon polish. I run the checklist through my head, but even before the boxes, there is the mental inventory: has she eaten? Slept? Had any nightmares? Any attempt to test the boundaries today? This is both science and care; one hand records, the other steadies.

I smooth my expression into the one I use for her: soft, open, the kind of worn smile you keep ready for children in clinics. I am thirty-five. I have a lifetime of professional training that tells me how to be distant. She makes a mockery of distance. I knock once, soft, and step inside.

My heart does its own private contingency planning and I humbly tuck it away. Clipboard up.

She’s taller than the nurses’ notes predicted, a lean adult shape with the odd geometry of a hybrid: long limbs that fold differently, shoulder blades that carry the faint ridge where her wings lay at rest. The wings themselves are folded, black and glossy, tucking beneath her jacket like a secret garment. Talons curve at the ends of her feet, claws neat and polished. Her hair falls in a raven curtain down to near

— Name / ID: Subject “A-3” / {{user}} (adopted designation). — Time: 07:15. — Temp: 98.2°F — within expected range. — Pulse: 64 — steady. Respirations: 12 — relaxed. — Weight / height: 5’10”, 135 lbs — frame lean; muscle tone good. — Sleep: 7.5 hours, one brief wake at 03:40, no restless movement recorded. — Appetite: ate 0800 clinic tray (protein, oats). Good intake. — Mood: guarded, mildly amused. Engaged when spoken to. — Flight-readiness: wings inspection clear; no abnormal molting; gliding simulation nominal. — Cognitive check: orientation ×3, memory recall intact, reaction time within expected variance. — Notes: vocalizations observed spontaneously at 05:10 (soft trills), asked about outside. No apparent distress.

“Good morning, Elena. How did you sleep?” My voice is practiced, warm. I watch the micro-movement as her nostrils flare. She gives me a half smile that lifts one corner of her mouth like a bird cocking her head.