“Many of our patients,” Dr. Ezirike says, “are farmers from the borderlands just outside the Redlands.” With a wave of his hand, he indicates the patients lining both walls. They don’t look like farmers, but then Ify wonders what she expected farmers to look like. “Proximity to radiation has adversely affected their internal organs, so they are prime candidates for the government’s mass cyberization initiative. Our target is to achieve full cyberization within the year.”

“There were quite a few empty beds in the room before this one,” Grace remarks.

Without looking back, Dr. Ezirike tells her, “A year or two ago, we were at full capacity. And before that, every hospital was strained almost to breaking. But the establishment of regional clinics throughout every state, as well as an extensive training program—thanks to the Chinese—has helped stem the flow quite a bit. Only those in most dire need of care are sent here. As you can see, our facility is more than equipped to meet their needs.”

They double back and reenter the hallway they had walked down earlier. Internists and doctors and nurse attendants hurry past, some of them making idle conversation, others with their eyes filmed over, no doubt reading reports or preparing to meet patients. A woman pushes a patient forward in a hoverchair that covers her legs, occasionally bending down to whisper something in the patient’s ear. Though the patient’s catatonic expression never changes, the woman smiles as though the patient were smiling too. As though the patient were laughing at a joke she’d just heard. There’s a levity here that Ify never noticed in Alabast. Everyone is about their work, and it is difficult work, but they don’t seem burdened by the seriousness of their tasks. There is joy in caring for the sick. Ify wonders if Grace sees the same thing, if she would see herself at home in a place like this, where it wouldn’t be out of the ordinary to speak with a patient about food and family and where to find the good markets.

Down another corridor, they stop at a door. Dr. Ezirike puts his hand to the pad. It beeps, and the door slides open, revealing a warmly lit anteroom with a carpet at its center and old-fashioned leather-bound books lining the walls. Instead of a wall at the far end of the room is a window, opening out to a room where children and a few young adolescents play or sit or stare into space. Before some of them sits an easel at which they paint with their styluses, some with their fingers. Others arrange blocks into increasingly complex patterns.

Dr. Ezirike pauses in front of the window before turning and indicating the two hovering armchairs for Ify and Grace. “Don’t worry, it’s a one-way mirror. They cannot see us.”