Chapter 1 - prologue

The Blue Headed Macaw sat on the branch in the morning twilight.  Its eyes opened slowly; for this was the last time it would see the Peruvian forest, the green paradise where it had hid for generations.  A gentle feeling of satisfaction and contentment fell over the bird, as its senses took in the first hint of morning’s color; the cool breeze blowing up from the valley as the air-pressure from the solar-heated air 300 miles to the east began to push into the vicinity moving the local air-masses with it; the faint and not-so-faint calling of millions of other birds in the valley and on the mountainside singing their praises for the coming day and all of its possibilities for life, for love, for food, for fun.  Its eyes glossed over and become like glass marbles embedded in a feathered statue; they never moved or changed focus, yet somehow the life within evidently left them, and the bird swung around the branch it was clutching until it was upside down, its talons lost faith, and it fell dead to the ground.

The sun rose.

Jazmin screamed in pain.  “¡Empuje!” they told her.  She was not fully "there" anymore, listening to the words of others or the hum of the machines in the room, nor observing their movements, the expression in their eyes above the masks on their faces, the glare of the artificial light above; she was only pain.  Then, as the first rays of the morning sun rose above the Andes Mountains, broke into the room through the open window and reflected off the mirror on the wall and then reflected off the stainless steel instruments in the hands of those watching, the head of the new born babe broke free and the sunlight fell on her closed eyelids.