This is it. This is the coding. This is what is living inside Uzo’s braincase.
When Ify woke up, she fumbled over to her workstation and had all her monitors running almost instantly, sketching the shapes that still burned vivid in her head and logging those sketches into an online editor where she watched it all come to life, the black rings of fire touching, then interlocking, growing more and more complex until they began to fold on each other like bits of origami. Then, from that, Ify had derived the algorithm to replicate self-assembly, and suddenly she was staring at the mechanism for mnemonic repair.
The cure for memory erasure.
And now that coding exists in a liquid filled with nanobots that nursing assistants begin to inject into the arms of the children they all stand around.
Ify has no idea how long the mechanism will take before activating—whether it will begin its work immediately or lie dormant in the bloodstream for months or maybe even years, by which point too much precious material will have been eaten away. All Ify can do after the injections is tell the nursing assistants to stay with their patients and monitor for any change in activity.
She’s on her way out with Grace when she hears the dull roar of cheering from far away. “What is that?”
But Grace, now paying attention to the world around her, taps in a sequence on her tablet and gasps. “Doctor.”
Ify turns, annoyed even now at Grace’s insistence on calling her that, but stops as soon as she sees the image on which Grace’s eyes fixate.
Grace gulps, then reads some of the text in a document next to what appears to be a government press conference. “‘The Migration Board finds no reason to question what is stated about the health of the children affected by this current crisis. It is therefore considered that, for their recovery, they need to be in a safe and stable environment. This is necessary for full recuperation.’” Grace looks up from her tablet. “What does this mean?”
Ify walks out to the floor where, already, families gather around the sickbeds, excitedly speaking to children who may or may not be able to hear them. Some are weeping into their child’s blankets, others are taking a patient’s hand and, not realizing they’re doing it, shaking it as they dance in place. “The deportation orders have been canceled,” Ify says. The full import of the words that just came out of her mouth sinks in. “The deportation orders have been canceled.”
* * *
■ ■ ■ ■ ■
It amazes Ify how much solving a medical mystery can calm her before the men of the Medical Committee. Where before they had seemed like sphinxlike demigods scrutinizing her from on high, ready to hurl judgments and proclamations like bolts of lightning, now they just look like what they are: old men who’ve modified their bodies, their faces, their hair in order to stroke their vanity while resting comfortably in positions—head of genetics, director of this department, chief of that department—they had inherited more than earned. She looks up at the row of men seated before her and sees nothing but a row of men, none of them extraordinary, none of them more deserving than her of the right to be put in charge of the lives of hundreds, even thousands, of people. None of them have done what she has just done. Knowing this, understanding this, she’s able to stand straighter, breathe more easily, relax her posture, and pace her words. She’s able to hear the moods in their tone and adjust hers accordingly.
The academic from earlier with his false French accent leans forward on his elbows. “So we’ll never truly know whether the solution to your problem was a medical one or a political one, will we?”
Ify wants to respond to his calling it your problem but instead says, “The treatment of illnesses must be holistic in my profession, sir. Would you really suggest curing their medical illness, then sending them back to a country of origin whose turmoil would have them coming right back to us, to do it all over again? Nun sind sie halt da.” Now they are here. The German had come out of her before she could stop it, but the look on the academic’s face satisfies her. It was too easy for Ify to see through the man’s persona and uncover a genealogy full of eugenicists and discredited race scientists from what was once Central Europe. Guilt spasms through the man’s face before he retreats into his seat.
Ify faces the rest of the group. “The recall of deportation orders, we’ve now determined, was the activating ingredient in the cure we devised for the patients.”
Director Towne, the only man on this committee whose approval she has ever sought, raises an eyebrow at her.
“Experiences coded in the DNA, Director Towne. They are arranged differently in a particular variant of cyberized brain than in those of natural-born humans or even those cyberized later in life. Their method of bonding mimics altogether different structures. When the base pattern was made clear, it became very easy to extrapolate a pattern of self-replication that would combat the virus that had infected not only those children who came to us with cyberized brains but those with no cyberization as well. Biomechanics is still beholden to biology.”
Director Towne’s frown deepens. “And where did this eureka moment come from?”
“Excuse me, Director Towne?”
“No one simply comes up with an otherwise unknown and unseen DNA bonding structure made up of tiles that are, in turn, composed of mnemonic material.” There’s a dismissive smirk on his face, but Ify reads frustration in it too. “How did you do this?”
“Sir.”
“Internist Diallo, I don’t think you understand.”
Ify’s eyes go wide at Director Towne addressing her with that title. It drips disdain.
“You’ve cured Alzheimer’s disease.” A chuckle escapes his throat. “Vascular dementia, maybe even Huntington’s disease. What, did this come to you in a dream?”
Ify’s body temperature plummets when she realizes what is going on. He doesn’t believe she did this on her own, that she could discern the molecular structure of the cure, that she could decipher the data of cyberized memories and discern the very fabric of personhood. Who would believe her? But Ify knows that were one of the men sitting next to him to say the exact same thing she said, Towne would have congratulated the man without a second thought, would have praised him and recommended him for any number of awards.
Ify squares her shoulders. “Well, dreams come to prepared spirits, Director Towne. That is how theoretical chemist August Kekulé put it when telling the story of how he discovered the structure of the benzene ring, if I remember correctly. In fact, that was one of your first lessons.”
Towne holds her stare, then reclines in his chair, as though he is conceding defeat.
Ify addresses the rest of the group. “I’d like to tell the story of one of our earliest patients, a young girl named Ayodele, who had immigrated to Alabast prior to the initial cessation of hostilities during the Biafran Conflict in Nigeria four years ago. She was one of the first victims of this most recent health crisis. She had come to Alabast with the remnants of her family: a non-cyberized father and a mute younger brother. The boy had not been born mute. Very quickly, Ayodele enrolled in school and became the most popular student in her class. Academically and athletically skilled. Because the Biafran War had ended, the family’s asylum application was denied. But there exists a provision concerning the welfare of the child. If it is not proven that the applicant will be persecuted upon returning to their country of origin, then the case must be made that deportation would severely affect the child’s psychological health. The headmaster of Ayodele’s school even wrote a letter in support of her family’s resubmitted application. But then the new immigration law went into effect. The first deportation orders were issued that same day. Within a week, the first wave of children had fallen victim.”