“I will wake you,” I tell her. Then I am watching her walk into her bedroom. She is standing at the threshold for a long time with her back to me, as though she is looking inside and not recognizing what she is seeing, as though what is before her now is not matching what is in her rememberings. But then she is walking through, and the door is sliding shut behind her. I am walking to the closed door and pressing my ear to it to hear what is happening, but I am hearing nothing, not even crying, then I am hearing rustling that I am knowing is bedsheets and then I am hearing snoring.
My footsteps are silent as I wander the apartment. I soon find a room that I am knowing to be Ify’s office. On the desk is many tiny machines, including small small bees I know she is using to be taking apart and examining thing. I am seeing tablets and styluses and even document that is printed out and that is having diagram of brains and the insides of red-bloods. I am seeing a closet that is housing white coats and kaftans and slippers. I am seeing dust that is settled over everything, and that is how I am knowing that no one is walking through this place for a long time.
At the window, I command the blinds to open and I look down and see, from high up, a room filled with hospital beds, and I am knowing without anyone telling me that this is who I am helping. Some of the people in hospital bed is glowing red in my screen and I am knowing that this is red-blood, but some is glowing blue and I am knowing that this is synth, and I am wondering what synth is doing here when Ify is telling me I am the only synth left.
My mind is reaching out to talk to them, but it is like my fingers fumbling through smoke. I am trying to hear a signal or feel their presence, open my mind to them, but it is like they are expired. Even though machine connecting to them is telling me they are still alive, their brain is telling me nothing.
I am opening my mind wider and wider and nothing is coming back until I am finally hearing ringing. It is not a sound I am usually hearing when my mind is connecting to another synth’s, but I am thinking maybe it is different in space.
I activate the communication signal, but then hologram opens up in front of me.
At first, it is shaped weirdly because window is distorting it, then I am backing up, and that is when I am realizing that hologram is being projected from me.
The woman in the hologram is squinting, then saying, “Ify? Ify, is that you?”
Metadata is beaming into me from the call, and it is telling me that the woman in the hologram is Céline Hayatou, female, age nineteen, black hair, brown eyes, non-cyberized, graduate of Alabast Polytechnic, chief Colonial administrator of the Centrafrique Satellite Colony of Alabast. I am remembering my journey with Ify through the Colonies and when we are stopping briefly in Centrafrique and Ify is looking like she is searching for someone who is never coming and I am knowing she is searching for this person.
“Who is this?”
I am saying nothing, because I am knowing that when Ify is searching for this person and not finding her, she is sadding.
“Where’s Ify?”
But I am just frowning at her.
“Wait.” Then she sucks in breath, and surprise is shining in her eyes. “It’s you. You’re . . . you’re the cure.”
I am not liking that she is calling me thing and not person, so I am saying, “Ify is sleeping. Do not disturb her.”
“I just . . . I want to make sure she is okay and—”
“She was looking for you.” My fists are clenching at my side and it is taking much effort to be unclenching them. “When we arrived in Centrafrique, she looked for you. Everywhere, she looked for you. Where were you?”
“How dare you? I’m a Colonial administrator. I have an entire Colony to run! Who are you to talk to me li—”
“I don’t know you.” My voice is even when I am saying these words. I am thinking of the hurt on Ify’s face and how she is being tired as we are traveling and wanting something badly, and I am knowing that what she is wanting is for this woman to be telling her hello and this woman is not doing that, so I am angering. “And I am not caring who you are. Ify is here to be doing work, and she must rest. Do not disturb her.” Then I am ending the transmission, and hologram is winking away and there is nothing blocking my view of the sick people below that Ify and me are to be helping.
* * *
■ ■ ■ ■ ■
As soon as I am entering hospital, they are putting me in chair that is hovering over the ground and dressing me in gown that is feeling too big on me. Everything is white and smelling like it is too clean. Whenever I am seeing hospital in my remembering, I am seeing it full of people who is dying, people wearing military uniform, people missing arm or leg or missing part of their face. Sometime when I am thinking of hospital, I am seeing image of tent and I am feeling heat on my skin and I am seeing dirty robot that is stomping around and trying to stop people screaming by feeding them chemical. And sometime when I am thinking of hospital, I am hearing quiet and it is because everybody is dying and there are being only a few of us left, and I am thinking that in all of my remembering, hospital is meaning death and dirt and blood. But here hospital is clean and there are people wearing gown like I am wearing who are walking or who are smiling and talking, and sometime I am looking into their room and seeing them in bed with nurse watching them and chatting like they are being neighbors on the side of the street in Lagos.
I am feeling hand pressing on my shoulder. Gently but still firm, like it is trying to be telling me something, and I am looking up and seeing Ify and she is not looking at me. She is looking ahead. But she is squeezing my shoulder.
“Don’t be nervous,” she is whispering to me, beneath her breath, almost like she is saying it to herself too.
It is making me to be feeling better to be seeing her like this. The way she is moving and standing and holding herself is telling me she is feeling certain and comfortable and she is not being afraid of anything.
Soon, we are going into part of hospital where there is being fewer and fewer people. And soon we are getting to part of hospital where there is being no one but doctor and nurse and sometime droid that is helping them. Then she is bringing me into room that is large but not as large as main room in Ify’s apartment. In the center is being a machine that is part bed but part cylinder that the bed is going into. And there is a console next to it and a desk and many machine I am not knowing.
There is white wall surrounding me everywhere and there is much space to be walking around in and very little furniture. But even though it is looking like there is much space, it is still feeling like prison. The walls are meeting over my head to form dome shape so it is looking like I am inside a bulubu ball that is being cut in half.
Feeling is warring inside me, and I am not knowing why but my heart is racing racing and when I am standing, I am moving from feet to feet, just bouncing like child that is needing to go to the bathroom. I am nervous. Then I am hearing Ify’s words in my head, replaying, and she is saying, Don’t be nervous, don’t be nervous, don’t be nervous.