by Karen Healey
Hooyo shook her head. “Abdi will come back to God,” she said. She was so certain about it that I found myself getting annoyed.
“No, I won’t,” I said. “Hooyo, you know I don’t believe.”
Her eyes narrowed. “You are fifteen years old. You don’t know who you are or who you will become.”
“Well, I know I don’t want a gun,” I said, controlling my frustration. The whole adventure had been hot and noisy, with Halim making fun of me for missing the target even at the closest range. “I’m sorry, Hooyo. I won’t go back to the firing range.”
She touched my arm. “Thank you, Abdi. Now, go up to your room while I speak to your brother. I’m sure you have schoolwork.”
Behind her back, Halim made a gesture at me that would have earned him a much longer telling off if she’d seen it. I grinned at him and ran up the polished wooden stairs to my room. I was going to rehearse, not study. My cousin’s wedding was in a few days, and he wanted me to sing.
I’d sung for my cousin, but the world had noticed. The scholarship offer had come from Australia. And I’d decided to go, far overseas, to a place much less safe than Djibouti.
I sat up, no longer willing to reminisce.
“Good morning, sir,” the house computer said pleasantly. “Would you care to review today’s headlines?”
“Why not?”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t understand that.”
“House, show headlines.”
That was closer to the programming. The projection displayed lines of text; actual headlines. The house owner was apparently old-fashioned.
The one at the top read NEW REVIVALS REVEALED!
I tensed. “Show more.” The story was the focus of thousands of ’casts, and they were all saying essentially the same thing. The Australian government had announced the successful revival of two patients. One had died initially in a sudden accident, and the other had been frozen before he could be killed by a childhood cancer. I scanned a few ’cast synopses to pick up the facts, then ordered footage of the revelation to play.
The official press conference was a choreographed wrestling match, the journalists all surging to get at the revivees. The press had obviously been warned against shouting or speaking out of turn; they asked their questions in voices vibrating with restraint. The revivees sat, one on either side of President Cox, and smiled nervously. The boy who’d had cancer had family members still living. One middle-aged woman stood behind her older brother, now thirty years younger than she was, and wept and wept.
I watched them through different ’casts, different angles, picking out ’casts to watch again so that I could catch every nuance. The cancer revivee was twelve. The older one, the accident victim, was nineteen, a photogenic woman with a long jaw and glossy red hair, a black tattoo of a spider visible on her wrist when she gestured. She’d been frozen for ninety-six years. Like Tegan, she had donated her body to science without caveat. Like Tegan, that gave the government a certain ownership of her, yet to be legally contested. I watched her careful face and deliberate gestures, and wondered what she would do. Or if she could do anything.
President Cox patted her hand over and over, the same motion captured by a dozen bumblecams. He was animated, but dignified, as he spoke of new hope, new worlds, with this last obstacle between humanity and her future removed.
Two of them. Both so young, as Tegan was young.
Someone knocked on the door, and I pulled the sheets up to my chest. Where were my clothes?
“Come in,” I called, and only then remembered that I’d been drenched in Lat’s blood. No wonder my filthy clothes had been stripped away, though I wasn’t sure I wanted to know who had done the stripping.
Hanad came in, carrying Marie. They made an odd pair, she politely trying to pretend she didn’t need his assistance, he moving with panache to deposit her on the end of my bed.
Marie pushed her hair out of her eyes. “I wanted to check up on you.”
“I’m all right,” I said, edging away from her. “I’m fine.”
“Tegan will live,” she said.
My breath whooshed out in a sigh that was almost a sob. I covered my face with my hands for a few moments, inhaling and exhaling in that small, warm cave. When I emerged again, Marie was watching me, her eyes grave.
“When can I see her?” I asked.
“I thought we should talk first.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said, and tried not to sound as grim as I felt. The sheet fell to my waist, and I grabbed it again. “Uh, perhaps I could get some clothes, first?”
“In the wall,” Hanad said. “House, show wardrobe.”
Part of the wall peeled back, to show an array of clothing in several styles, from the flowing tunics and leggings favored by people here in their leisure hours, to the more elaborate shirt and trouser combinations used in business settings. While Marie politely turned her head, I scrambled into a pink tunic and some trousers. They were a little baggy around the waist, but not too bad. “What is this place?” I asked.
Hanad rubbed his eyes. “Our safe house. A rich man owns it. He has one in Sydney, Noosa, Adelaide—many places. He likes privacy, and he likes comfort. A friend of mine told me about it.” He chuckled. “The rich man will not be happy when he discovers we’ve been here.”
So Hanad trusted us enough now to take us to the safe house he’d avoided before—that was a good sign. Or maybe he hadn’t had the luxury of choice.
“What about Joph and Eduardo?”
“The water’s still high,” he said. “They’re all right in the main cave. But they can’t get out, and we can’t get in.”
It had been raining, I remembered, thick drops beating on my arms. Dirty rainwater, but still cleaner than the other fluids that had coated my skin.
Marie made an impatient movement, and Hanad left, winking at me as he went.
I was certain she wasn’t here for a medical checkup. “I feel fine,” I said, testing.
“Good,” she said. “In the ambulance, you said you loved Tegan.”
“Did I?”
“You know you did. Abdi, you must know it can’t work. You’re going to Djibouti, and no matter what you want, she can’t go with you. It’s not fair of you to ask.”
“Go on,” I said. She had a speech prepared. She might as well make it.
“I’m her guardian,” Marie said, half angrily. “I’ve done a half-pie job of it, but I am. I have to look out for her emotional state as well as her physical health. I see how she looks at you. I see how you look back. You can tell me you love her, and I’ll believe it.”
“You should,” I said. “It’s true.”
“But you’re no good for her. Have you told her how you feel? Because if you haven’t, don’t. It’s not fair. She needs structure, calm. She needs to be settled in a place that can be home, at least for a while. No more risks.”
“I think that Tegan wants to take risks,” I said. “I think she wants to push her limits and always has.”
Marie struck the bed with a closed fist, hard. “That may be, but she’s not going to do it with you! Can’t you see how vulnerable she is? You turn up, mysterious and intense—and a musician, of all things! It’s as if you were designed to appeal to her! Can’t you see how easy it would be for you to use her, when it’s easy for you to use everyone?”
I couldn’t control my flinch, and Marie saw it. Her voice became softer, more persuasive. She might be nice, but she could be as ruthless as I was.
“I’m not saying you have to be separated forever. I’m only asking you, for her own good, to please back off and let her make her own choices for a while, without your influence.”
“Certainly,” I said, so furious I could barely speak. “If you’ll do the same. I thought Tegan had made it very clear she didn’t want anyone else speaking for her, ever.”
“I…” Marie said, then, “Look, I’ll talk to her, too, of course I will. I just wanted to say to you first—”
“That I should lie to her? Deceive her about how I feel? No. I’ll lie to anyone but her, Dr. Carmen. Can you say the same?”
She opened her mouth, then closed it again.
“What’s the truth behind the revival process?” I said, and watched her face fold in on itself. I’d planned to be more meticulous about this—to think through what was only a vague suspicion, and then broach the subject carefully. But I was sick of planning. Maybe I could follow Bethari and Tegan, and just blurt out what I was thinking.
“Why is it only young people who have been successfully revived, Dr. Carmen? Can you only bring young people back to life? Cryonics or not, are the older people who die dead forever?”
The questions hung in the air like thunderclouds, pregnant with violent possibility.
“Yes,” Marie said. “Every adult person who is currently cryopreserved is permanently dead.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Accelerando
It was clearly the first time Marie had said it out loud. Her already strained face tightened up further, as if voicing the idea made it much more real. She’d been holding this secret for… how long? Days, certainly. Weeks, months, perhaps. Unable to trust anyone with this knowledge, her whole career suddenly a waste.
“Are you all right?” I asked.
“No,” she said, and closed her eyes. “Abdi, I am not all right.”
“Let me get you…” I said. “House, bathroom.”
A hidden door glowed a soft green. I rummaged through the bathroom, finding a glass I could fill with water and a plush washcloth I could wet down. Marie refused the first but wiped the second over her face and neck, relaxing a little as she did.
She still looked tense, but I was no longer worried that she might simply break apart.
“I think that you were just much kinder to me than I deserve,” she said, placing the damp washcloth in her lap.
“You and your family deserve a lot of kindness from me.” The words came out without thought; I was still reeling from the confirmation of my suspicions. The implications! Were Marie and I really the only people to know?
But Marie appeared struck by my choice of words. “My family,” she repeated. “Yes. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have talked to you like that. I had no right.”
I sat back down, “You had some right. It’s confusing, Tegan and me. I don’t know what we are.” I shook my head. “It doesn’t matter right now. Does anyone else know that it’s only young people getting revived? Do they know?” I didn’t need to specify the they. Marie and I probably shared some nightmares.
Marie pinched her lip between her teeth. “I can’t think so, or Cox wouldn’t have had held that press conference. How did you know?”
“I could see that you were anxious about it, that’s all. You had to be hiding something, something much bigger than just knowing two more people were revived. And then I saw the new revivals, and I thought, they look so young… and Tegan’s young. Tegan said that she’d once seen another man, in his early twenties, but he hadn’t been successfully revived.”
“Nicolas Fisher. No.”
“They want you back,” I said slowly. “Diane asked me, ‘Where’s Dr. Carmen?’ If they can’t work out what’s going wrong, they must be frantic without you. Tegan’s not necessary anymore, though they’d probably like to have her. And me, to be their thirdie speaker to the masses. But it’s actually you they’re hunting. You’re the one they really need.”
Marie glanced at her mutilated feet and treated me to a slow, vicious smile. “Well, they can’t have me. My contract is null and void.” She sighed, collapsing a little. “I don’t know what to do. They’ll work it out eventually; they have all my case notes, most of my research. When it all comes out, there’s going to be an appalling backlash.”
“We might be able to do something with the information.”
“Such as what?”
“I’m not sure yet. But it’s secret, and it will upset people; that makes it valuable.”
Marie looked taken aback.
“I had an unusual education,” I told her. I wasn’t going to tell her that I was beginning to recognize just how unusual it was, how much my mother’s good intentions and own eager participation might have distorted my growth. Like an emotional bonsai.
But though I was beginning to question its effects, that training might be very useful right now. “To start with, we ought to make sure more people than just we two have this knowledge. Complete with some of the medical details, too.”
“The human brain is—”
I shook my head. “Not now. We should tell everyone at once.”
“Everyone? Hanad? Zaneisha?”
“I trust Zaneisha,” I said, and realized it was true. “And Hanad… I don’t trust. Not completely. But I think we can trust him with this.” Especially since Joph was still with Eduardo. I really didn’t want Hanad to get suspicious about us withholding information.
“You’re the expert,” Marie said, and if there was doubt in her voice, she seemed willing enough to comply. “Tegan’s asleep, and I won’t wake her. But the others are preparing a meal. Are you hungry?”
For a moment, I felt again the visceral, churning sickness of blood all over my body. My muscles ached, and there were sharp, sore points I didn’t want to investigate too closely, for fear of what had done the damage. Diane’s teeth and nails? Or Lat’s splintered bones?
But my brain needed fuel as surely as my body.
“Sure,” I said. “I could eat.”
The house guided us to the kitchen, upstairs, where natural light flooded through large windows. There were trees outside to screen us from the nearest neighbors, who were apparently some distance off. And grass. Fresh, green grass, kept that way from what had to be a private water source.
I reassessed the wealth of the man who owned this place and put him several places higher on the scale of “obscenely rich.” My respect for Bethari increased, too; even knowing the place was empty and no human guards were inside, getting through this security system had to have been something of a challenge.
The kitchen was a collection of varying food taboos at work. Hanad and Zaneisha were making a pasta bake. Ashenafi was grilling lamb steaks, while Thulani cut up pork on the enormous kitchen island. Bethari was at the table, industriously slicing carrots. She smiled at me when I came in. Hesitantly, I returned it.
Most Australians were vegetarian, but to Marie’s credit, she looked only mildly horrified by the fact that the safe house’s absent owner was a meat-eating pervert and that most of the men were happy to take full advantage of his secret stash. She picked at her portion of pasta bake while we ate. The rich scent of the cooked meat made my mouth water. I’d been reluctantly following my host country’s food customs for the better part of eighteen months. One of those steaks would taste great going down—and play havoc with my digestion. I gave in to my urges and had three bites of the lamb, hoping I wouldn’t have to pay for it later.
I waited until Hanad had eaten his fill and pushed his plate away before I looked at Marie. “Dr. Carmen has something to tell us,” I said.
Marie chewed on her lips with more energy than she’d devoted to her meal.
“It’s… the medicine is complicated,” she said. “But in brief, it is my professional opinion that there will never be a successful cryorevival of a fully adult human. The Ark Project is therefore useless, and colonies on planets similar to Earth will never be founded.”
Zaneisha choked on a broccoli stem. Bethari put down her fork very carefully.
“Um,” I said, “try a little less brief than that.”
“All right,” Marie said, shoving her hair out of the way. She wasn’t being deliberately obfuscating—just trying to dumb down the explanation to the point where we’d know what she was saying. Apparently the first time she’d told Tegan about how exactly she’d been brought back to life, Tegan had lost track of the explanation about two sentences in. “The largest obstacle to successful a
nd widespread cryorevival is the potential for damage to the brain.”
“I thought that tardigrade solution preserved it perfectly,” I said. They’d been using it for over a century, after all—Tegan had been one of the first test subjects.
“Oh, yes. The preservation is complete. It’s the revival that’s problematic. The… er, let’s say the thawing process results in minute cellular expansion. For most of the body, this is not a problem—either the damage is surmountable or cloned organs can be supplied. But for the brain, which is so complex, it’s another matter. I believed I had hit upon a solution. It’s a combination of techniques that relies upon slow warming and microvesselectomy, with the addition of—”
“You had a solution,” Hanad cut in, before the explanation could get any more technical.
“Er, yes. I tested it on Tegan—who we know was successful—and on a slightly older young man who had volunteered before cryorevival contracts customarily stated that no revival could be attempted until the procedure had a tested and audited ninety-seven percent success rate.” A shadow passed over her face. “At least, that’s what they told me. It wasn’t until much later I learned that they were using the early cases to test viability for the Ark Project.”
“I saw him,” said a voice from the doorway. “And I think they’re still doing it. That woman who died ninety-six years ago—I bet she’s there as a control case.”
“Tegan!” Marie said. Zaneisha and I both got to our feet—she smoothly, me dropping my fork on the lush carpet.
Tegan had wrapped a blanket over her clothes, bare feet flashing as she padded toward the table. That hectic flush in her cheeks had died, and she wriggled her fingers at me in a wave before assessing the room with a level stare. “Hi,” she offered.
“You should be resting,” Marie told her, hurrying over to check her temperature with the back of her wrist. Tegan responded to this motherly gesture with a smile so sweet I had to blink very hard and mutter something about too much chili in the pasta. Bethari rolled her eyes at me.
“Sit down before you fall down,” Zaneisha ordered, and I dragged up another chair for Tegan.