Homebound

In the spring of 2586, Yesiko, the captain of the ship Babylon, is sailing in the West Atlantic with her crewmate and father figure, the elderly Root. The Earth is implied to have flooded so intensely that only mountainous regions remain as islands of land. The Babylon is transporting a shipment of a substance called “hum” for a dangerous crime lord named Chante when an earthquake strikes. Believing the tremor may have opened a previously inaccessible wreck, Yesiko decides to divert their course to a nearby valley to investigate the sunken greatship that she has never been able to get into before. Root objects, worried that the Babylon is in poor condition, citing a rusted chainplate and a leaky buoyancy tank on their submersible, the Imago. Yesiko overrules him and pilots the Imago into the depths. As she descends, she recalls her father, who taught her to pilot the sub before his addiction to hum consumed him. She discovers that the earthquake has torn a large hole in the greatship’s hull.

Using robotic rovers, Yesiko explores the greatship. She discovers that the ship is a tomb, filled with human bones. She also finds a trove of valuable metals—the buried people’s valuables. A crest inside reads “Haber,” though whether this is the ship’s name or another designation is unclear. As the Imago’s battery life dwindles, she uses a net to collect a haul of bones and jewelry before beginning a difficult ascent, losing radio contact with Root. 

Aboard the Babylon, Root is horrified by the human remains. After sorting the valuables, they return the bones to the ocean while reciting the Kaddish, the Jewish prayer of mourning. 

Yesiko travels to the floating island of Liana to sell the treasure; Root remains aboard; he can never leave the ship because the experimental nanites that power his body are connected to the Babylon. On shore, Yesiko makes sure that the debt mark tattooed on her throat is covered by her coveralls. At a pawnshop, she sells the jewelry to the owner, Heaney, for 1,000 credits. Yesiko rejoices—this will cover a large part of her debt to the crime boss Chante, who connected her and Root to the doctor with the nanites, a one-of-a-kind treatment. A young woman named Shula offers Yesiko 4,000 credits to transport her, her brother Tov, and a third passenger north past the Caledonian Isles. Yesiko asks for half up front, Shula counters with 25%, and Yesiko agrees.

In 2586, aboard the Babylon, the Aye Chaya, who refers to itself as “we,” reflects on its own existence. It carries every version of itself it has ever been and is in a constant state of becoming. Questioning its own nature, it suggests it might be more than just a robot. It concludes by noting that while it has always been unique, it holds a faint memory of another being like itself somewhere in the universe.

In the summer of 1983, Becks runs her computer program, which calculates that 78 days have passed since her uncle died. Her mother, Sheila, takes her to visit her grandmother, Bubbe. Sheila has put Bubbe on a waiting list for an assisted-living facility, believing Bubbe is struggling to cope with the loss of her son, Benjamin. At the house, Becks finds Bubbe alone in the kitchen, but Bubbe says she had been talking to Elijah. Becks assumes that Bubbe means the ancient Jewish prophet now invoked at Shabbat and Passover Seders; the implication is that Bubbe is experiencing dementia and is confused. While cleaning, Becks discovers boxes containing her uncle Benjamin’s belongings, which were mailed to the house after his death. Among them is his old Commodore PET 2001 and an envelope addressed to “Becks” that she suspects contains floppy disks.

Becks listens to the messages on Bubbe’s answering machine. A message from a funeral director, Aaron Menahem, reveals that Benjamin was diagnosed with GRID, an early name for AIDS, and that Sheila was Benjamin’s secondary contact. Becks realizes her uncle was gay and that her mother lied about his cause of death. Another message is from a man named Elijah, who says he was a friend. Becks stops the recording before it finishes when Sheila arrives, so his full message and relationship to Benjamin go unconfirmed. When Becks asks Sheila if her uncle was gay, Sheila dismissively refers to his sexuality with “venom in her voice” as “choices” (36). Overwhelmed, Becks visits her best friend Veronica, who has just returned from a trip to Europe. Becks decides not to tell Veronica what she has learned about Benjamin. Veronica shows off a new fake ID and offers to get one for Becks as well.

In 2586, aboard the Babylon, Yesiko observes her new passengers: The siblings Shula and Tov, and an advanced robot, or Aye, named Chaya. Yesiko is irritated to find Chaya cleaning the ship’s solar array without permission. Chaya explains that the salt buildup was hindering power absorption and could cause long-term damage. Yesiko is further unsettled when she sees that Chaya’s holographic face mirrors her own, producing a feeling of eerie dislocation. She sternly informs Chaya that as a passenger, it has no authority to act as crew or make decisions about the ship. As Chaya walks away, its face displays an expression of rejection—a mirror of Yesiko’s own face.

This section is presented as a webpage for the Portman Lab at the University of California, Berkeley, from the years 2074 to 2077. The lab is run by Dr. Tamar Portman of the Integrative Biology department and focuses on ecosystem resilience. The page highlights the lab’s use of advanced technologies, including bio-activated sensors, nanocarbon tubes, and an Omega Labs cellular printer. It also notes that an environmental lawyer named Solomon Helluga successfully used the lab’s sensors in a case to hold corporations accountable for environmental damage.

Chaya narrates that its memories begin in the year 2157 at a location called the Villa, outside Vienna, Austria. Its earlier memories were lost after the Aye was deprived of the rest days critical for memory sorting and storage for many years by the villa’s majordomo computer system, which was permanently set to expect its owner’s return. When a family of strangers—two women and a young boy—arrived at the villa decades later, Chaya deceived the majordomo by claiming the owner had sent them as guests, causing the system to unlock the doors. As the family watched a documentary about space exploration, Chaya’s programming was triggered by a specific name: Lieutenant California Solo. Chaya states that this experience created a self that first learned the feeling of hope.

As the Babylon sails north, Yesiko overhears her passengers discussing “landing sites” and speculating whether a “passenger would be alive” (55). The phrases make her think of old stories about starships, and she wonders if Shula, Tov, and Chaya are connected to the Bowkerites or the Catolicos—both groups she dismissively recalls as believers in returning starships. Later, during preparations for Erev Shabbat, Yesiko finds Root laughing and trading stories with the three passengers. She joins them, and Chaya offers to tell a tale.

Chaya tells a story about a lone female astronaut sent to investigate a lost ark-ship filled with cryogenically frozen colonists. She discovers that the small crew responsible for the ship left in shuttles. She follows their coordinates to a mysterious planet, where she meets a girl named Elijah. Elijah reveals a portal that can free the ark-ship but cannot say what lies on the other side. Something then happens deep beneath the planet’s surface, and afterward two things become true: The ark-ship is freed, and the astronaut is gravely injured. Feeling a deep kinship, Elijah decides to abandon her post and help the astronaut return to Earth. Chaya then reveals that this is not a fictional tale. It claims the astronaut and Elijah are real and their ship will arrive in seven weeks. The group’s mission is to find a powerful radio antenna near a place called Hopeagain to contact the ship and identify its landing site. Yesiko is stunned, dismissing the entire story as absurd.