When We Wake

by Karen Healey

“Oh, but I don’t want to increase the culture shock. If you’re used to it… let’s see. All right, it looks as if there’s a supplier two suburbs over. We could go past on the way home.”

  I was shifting in my shoes, wondering how I could get her to drop the topic. Most people weren’t paying us any attention, but a slim man with dark skin and reddish locks was giving me a disapproving look when his face suddenly changed. “Tegan!” he said. “Tegan Oglietti!”

  And then everyone was looking at me. Marie’s hand shot up to her EarRing and then came down on my shoulder.

  “I’m Carl Hurfest, Melbourne Media Collective,” Red Locks announced, stepping close to us. His bumblecam whizzed out of his jacket pocket and hovered by my face, right on the border of the sixty-centimeter legal boundary. “Tegan, just a few questions.”

  “No comment,” Marie said. She’d abandoned our shopping basket, and we strode toward the exit.

  “What’s your position on Australia’s No Migrant policy, and do you think it’s fair that the dead be given a loophole?”

  “Tegan has no comment,” Marie repeated.

  I hadn’t even heard of a No Migrant policy, so it was easy not to comment on that. The rest of the crowd was pressing around us, happy to let Hurfest ask the questions while they waited avidly for my replies.

  “Do you think it’s right that the army paid so much for your revival while the families of civilian freezies still grieve for their loved ones?”

  There was a murmur of disapproval from the crowd. I thought it was directed at Hurfest, and maybe his use of freezies, not at me, but I just wanted them all to go away and leave me alone.

  Through the mass of bodies, I saw Zaneisha, a tall woman in a casual suit that probably wasn’t fooling anyone. She’d pushed open the glass door of the supermarket and paused just inside, watching. One hand was out of sight, probably holding a sonic pistol. If she needed to down the crowd fast, she could, but packed in and shifting around as we were, she’d find it hard to pinpoint the shot. Marie and I could end up with ruptured eardrums and vertigo along with everyone else.

  Besides, Hurfest wasn’t threatening me with anything but his tiny bumblecam, and I wasn’t sure how to deal with that.

  “Don’t you think you have an obligation to speak to the people of Australia, Tegan?” he said. “They paid a great deal for you with their tax dollars.”

  That hit a nerve. “I’m a person, not property,” I snarled, and then, remembering, “No comment!”

  Hurfest’s smile sharpened, like a shark scenting blood in the water. I’m a city girl, and I don’t know much about sea predators, but I could tell that smile was trouble.

  “Your father was a soldier killed in action, wasn’t he? Do you think only the army should have this technology?”

  “Leave the girl alone,” an older lady told him.

  Hurfest ignored her. “What do you think about the allegations of the Inheritors of the Earth?”

  “Never heard of them.” I knew I should shut up, but his voice was burrowing into my ears, and his horrible little camera kept buzzing around my face. There was no way to stop it from getting a good shot, short of smacking it out of the air. Which was assault on private property, Marie had explained to me, and not the kind of legal trouble I needed. “I mean, no comment.”

  We’d reached the door. Zaneisha reached out, and Marie’s grip on me was replaced by a much stronger one. The bodyguard hustled me through the door and into the parking lot.

  “They say you should commit suicide!” Hurfest shouted after us. “They say the real you is already dead and that what’s left is a soulless husk!”

  I tried to turn, to yell something back at him—I wasn’t sure what—but Zaneisha forced my head down and shoved me into the back of the car. Marie scrambled in behind me, and the door slammed.

  “What’s the Thingy of the Earth?” I asked.

  “Do your seat belt up,” Marie said.

  I did, scowling. “Don’t you think this should have come up before?”

  “They’re a fringe group, nothing to worry about. They have extreme religious beliefs; a cult, really.” She tried to smile. “If it helps, Intelligence says they stress it would be sinful to murder you.”

  “They just think I should kill myself.” I sank back into the seat. “Well, gee, thanks for keeping me informed.”

  “It was impossible to cover ineffective cults with all the other things I’ve had to teach you,” she snapped back, and then winced. “I’m sorry, that was ungracious—”

  “Ugh, whatever.” I snorted. “I’m sorry that your pet project isn’t house-trained. That’s what happens when you pick up strays.”

  “You’re not a stray,” she said. “I know that was unnerving, Tegan, but please don’t snap at me.”

  I turned away and stared out the window. “We’re not going home,” I said after a while.

  “No,” Marie said.

  After several trips to the base to get poked and prodded and subjected to really annoying questions, the route to Williamstown was beginning to seem horribly familiar. I hadn’t said anything too bad, I thought… but I had talked to the press. Two weeks after signing a contract that said I wouldn’t do that without prior approval. “How much trouble am I in?” I said.

  Marie gazed at the gates of the base as they opened for us. “Probably quite a lot.” She met my eyes. “I can’t tell you everything, Tegan. But I promise I’m on your side.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Things We Said Today

  When Colonel Dawson walked into the meeting room where Marie and I were sitting on uncomfortable stools, he was clearly really, really pissed off, and just as clearly trying not to show it.

  He pulled his computer out of his pocket, shook it rigid, and looked at me. “Tegan, you broke our agreement.” His voice was tightly controlled.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry may not be good enough,” he said, and twisted his fingers at the computer. My face filled the screen, and I winced. My hair looked terrible. Almost two months’ growth had turned it into shaggy black waves standing out in all directions, unstyled except for my amateur snips in front of the mirror. The little caption across the bottom of the screen named me as TEGAN OGLIETTI: LIVING DEAD GIRL.

  “That is an awful nickname,” I muttered.

  Dawson tapped his finger in the air twice. “—person, not property,” my voice snarled.

  “A stirring statement from Tegan Oglietti in this exclusive interview,” Hurfest’s voice said.

  I stiffened. I hadn’t given him an interview.

  A caption flashed under an image of an older woman in a military uniform, identifying her as Keiko Nakamura-Chang, president of the Returned and Services League. “Ms. Oglietti has performed a great service to the armed forces of Australia,” she said solemnly. “The RSL has seen too many of our fellow soldiers die and be suspended in the hope of eventual revival. Ms. Oglietti is a symbol of that hope, so soon to be realized. We thank Ms. Oglietti for her sacrifices and for her commitment to the principles of comradeship and loyalty that all Australians hold dear.”

  That didn’t seem so bad to me. What was Dawson worried about?

  A new face flashed on the screen, and a man with long dark curls was identified as Charla Flamdt of Second Chances. He was beaming at the camera, tears gleaming in his eyes. “As I’ve been saying for weeks, Tegan’s amazing recovery is an inspiration to all of us who work in cryonics advocacy. I’m so glad to hear from her own mouth that she’s a firm believer in the inherent personhood of cryonic survivors. Companies that are funding the suspension process in return for an agreed term of labor after revival are engaged in indentured labor. Australians are entitled to the basic human right of a second life.”

  Huh. The politics of cryonics were obviously a little more complicated than I’d thought.

  “But not all commenters are so pleased by Tegan’s revival,” Hurfest interrupted, and a third face flashed on the screen, identified as TH
E FATHER. Unlike the others, he was speaking from an outside location, face partly shaded by a wide-brimmed hat. I could make out dark eyes on a pale face, and a strong jawline. “This poor girl is a victim,” he said. “She is a victim of humanity’s godlessness, of its meddling in matters it was not meant to touch. Death is a divine mystery, not a medical conundrum. The real Tegan Oglietti is dead. Her husk may proclaim that she is a person, but she has been separated from her soul, and her body is desecrated by this supposed resurrection.”

  I gasped.

  The Father stared out of the screen, dark eyes appearing to fix on my own. “Tegan, if you are watching this broadcast, I’m praying for you. I pray that you have the courage to return to God, and to the death and everlasting life he decreed for you.”

  “The Father of the Inheritors of the Earth,” Hurfest said. “Well, there you have it. Three people, three opinions. What do you think? Leave your thoughts and tubecasts in the comments.”

  The picture froze on the Father’s serene face, a small smile lightening those deep-set eyes.

  Of course I had given the state of my soul some thought. If you grow up thinking that your soul is going to heaven and eternal happiness, where you get to help and guide your loved ones left behind, the whole New Beginning thing was a shock. Like, where was my soul when I was dead? Was it waiting with my body all that time? Was it in heaven and then it came back when I started breathing again? Had it been in some sort of not-quite-real place?

  I wrestled with the idea for a bit, and then I decided it was probably one of God’s mysteries that I wasn’t meant to actually understand, like how exactly bread and wine became the body and blood of Christ or how a virgin conception worked.

  Until the Father, I’d never considered the idea that my soul and I might now be separated.

  I knew that it wasn’t true. But I didn’t know how I could prove it.

  I stared at the Father’s face, thinking about arguments I might make, until Dawson pulled my attention back to more worldly matters.

  “The ’cast has millions of views already,” he said quietly. “Most of the comments are assuming you’re aligned with their cause and are praising you. The rest are… not so kind. This is exactly the kind of situation we were hoping to avoid by controlling your media presence very tightly, Tegan. But you broke the contract with this interview.”

  I jumped to my feet, no longer concerned with concealing my fear. “I didn’t do an interview! I said that one thing, and the rest was all no comment. Ask Marie if you don’t believe me. It was just one thing! It wasn’t even about the project!”

  “It only takes one thing,” Dawson said. “I didn’t place a media ban on you only to protect the project. These people will twist anything, and they jump on any weakness. You’ll find yourself saying things you never intended and could never have meant. I’m getting a lot of pressure from my superiors to bring you back inside.”

  “You can’t,” I said frantically. “I just got out. I’ll go crazy. You can’t—please, please. I am a person; I’m not property. You promised me.”

  “My lawyer—” Marie started.

  “Dr. Carmen, lawyers won’t be necessary. I managed to get Tegan a second chance.”

  I sucked in a deep breath and sat down again.

  “Tegan is starting school next Thursday,” Marie said anxiously.

  “And if I didn’t think boredom was a trigger for trouble, that wouldn’t be happening,” Dawson said. “But I imagine the Elisabeth Murdoch Academy will keep you busy. Your alma mater, I believe, Dr. Carmen?” He didn’t wait for Marie to reply but waved a finger in my face. “And from now on, you’ll have a bodyguard with you at all times whenever you leave the house. No more waiting in the parking lot.”

  I opened my mouth, but Marie gripped my shoulder tightly.

  “That’s nonnegotiable,” Dawson said. “You’re a public figure—a largely celebrated one—but we’ve received threats, and we’re going to take them seriously.”

  “You didn’t tell me that!”

  “We didn’t want to scare you,” Marie said.

  “But I think you can handle it,” Dawson said. He folded his arms and stared down at me. “Am I wrong?”

  I knew he was manipulating me. But I couldn’t stop the automatic surge of pricked pride. “Of course I can.”

  “Good. Then you’ll do what your bodyguards tell you. And no more surprises.”

  Which just went to show, he still didn’t know me very well.

  Still, with only a few days left before I started school, Dawson didn’t need to worry about unscheduled trips to the supermarket. I didn’t have the time. I had never worked so hard in my life.

  It helped that Koko automatically recorded and organized everything into searchable mind maps and knowledge trees, but it was still a lot to cram into my head. Marie started teaching me slang along with the history and customs lessons, but I was more dubious about that. A mum-aged person teaching a teenager slang?

  On the final day, I got a security seminar from Zaneisha, who put me through protocols (never walk through doors first, basically), communication codes, and a dangers briefing. The Inheritors of the Earth weren’t on that list—as Marie had said, they were counted as low-risk.

  High-risk groups included the Australia for Australians crew, who had also taken exception to my claim that I was a person. They’d decided I was an immigrant from the past, and therefore, according to Australia’s No Migrant policy, an illegal immigrant, who they didn’t seem to think were people at all. They were campaigning to get me deported. Working out where I should get deported to didn’t seem to have bothered A4A; “anywhere but here” was their guiding principle. They were armed and fanatical, and had killed at least two dozen “foreigners” in the Northern Territory this year alone. Two of the victims had legal visas for short-term visits. Three of them had been Australian-born.

  A4A wore black masks in their tubecasts and ranted on-screen about how I was a fake Australian, taking up resources that real Australians couldn’t spare. And they scared the shit out of me.

  Zaneisha finished the afternoon with a pop quiz, including a couple of questions she hadn’t actually covered in the session.

  “If anyone threatens you with a weapon and tells you to get into a vehicle, what would you do?” she asked.

  I thought back to the one compulsory self-defense class I’d taken at school. You were supposed to give someone your wallet if you were mugged—your money wasn’t worth your life. “Cooperate,” I said confidently.

  “No. Scream. Run in a zigzag. Draw as much attention to yourself as possible.”

  “Uh,” I said, “what if they shoot me?”

  “Anyone who wants to get you into a vehicle probably wants you alive, so they won’t risk it. Or they want to get you somewhere quiet where they can kill you very slowly. At least if it happens on the street, it’ll be fast.”

  My eyes bugged out so hard it actually hurt.

  Zaneisha nodded soberly, and then her EarRing chimed. “Ah. Ms. Miyahputri is here. I wanted to teach you some self-defense, but we’ve run out of time. After you start school, inshallah.”

  “Inshallah,” I echoed weakly. Self-defense sounded like a really, really good idea. Why had I spent all that time practicing guitar instead of taking up boxing, like Alex? “Are you sure you can’t just show me a few—”

  Marie bustled in. “All done?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Zaneisha told her. No matter what Marie said, she couldn’t get Zaneisha to call her anything but ma’am or Dr. Carmen.

  “Well, Bethari’s here, Tegan. Let’s go and say hello.” She smiled. “Or geya.”

  We went upstairs, Zaneisha trailing us unobtrusively, and found a girl my age sitting at Marie’s big golden table, a cup of tea steaming gently in front of her.

  Bethari Miyahputri was the daughter of one of Colonel Dawson’s army colleagues, and she also went to Elisabeth Murdoch. She was supposed to be my guide to the school.

&nb
sp; I hesitated in the doorway. Marie, who could be ruthless when she wanted, nudged me through.

  “Geya,” I said, the slang greeting sitting awkwardly on my tongue. “I’m Tegan.” They were the first words I’d spoken to someone my own age since I woke up.

  “Hello,” she replied, turning toward me. Bethari was a really pretty girl with light brown skin and a few dark freckles sprinkled over her cheeks. Her nose was long and turned up at the end. She was wearing a flowing dress made of purple memory fabric and a gorgeous yellow-patterned headscarf. “I’m Bethari.”

  I scrubbed my hands on my linen drawstring pants, wishing I’d had a chance to do some shopping.

  “Um, so, thanks for agreeing to do this,” I said. “It’s really kooshy of you.”

  Bethari’s thin eyebrows jumped, but her face returned to polite blankness. “You’re welcome,” she said.

  Marie beamed. “Why don’t you show Bethari your room, Tegan, and I’ll prepare a snack? You girls don’t need us old ladies standing about.”

  Zaneisha’s expression remained absolutely impassive, but I had the feeling she disagreed with this assessment. “Sure,” I said. “Come downstairs.”

  We walked down the spiral staircase in absolute silence. My skin was crawling all over with embarrassment.

  “So, this is my room,” I said.

  Bethari barely glanced around. “It’s nice,” she said, sitting carefully on the edge of my bed.

  It was nice, though I still wasn’t used to having no windows. A skyshaft to the surface let in natural light, but it wasn’t the same.

  Still, the decor was good. The furniture was all matching blond wood. Marie had let me choose prints to make and hang, and I’d mostly gone with landscapes of urban decay that reminded me of clambering through old buildings with Alex. On the nightstand was an iron statue of a stylized woman standing half submerged in a cresting wave, long hair hanging down her back and flowing over her breasts to become the sea. Her features were obscured by rust, and it was hard to tell whether she was rising from the ocean or falling into it, but I liked the shape of her head, and the strength in her outstretched hands. I’d seen the statue on the tubes when Marie was teaching me how to use Koko, and she’d bought it as a surprise.