“We think that is what is tying your memories together, those you have accumulated over the course of your life and those you were . . . given upon your creation. Your brain has immense computing power. Indeed, the brain of a synth may be the most powerful computer ever created. And there is an incredible amount of heterogenous data in there. It shouldn’t be able to hold itself together. The incomplete nature of the memories would suggest natural deterioration, but there is something in your coding that is fighting that process.”

She pauses. I am wondering why she is telling me about khipu and what it is having to do with saving me from Enyemaka and burning forest and the arguing that I am hearing earlier about going to space.

Then, after a long silence, Ify is saying, “Right now, there are hundreds of children in the hospital where I work, maybe a thousand, who, I believe, are suffering from identical illnesses. They have each fallen into comas.” She is getting up from where she is sitting and walking back and forth and I am wanting to tell her not to be nervous, but words is not coming from my mouth so all I am doing is following her with my eyes. “In one building, refugees are being kept and taken care of. There is a ward for them. I was supposed to be helping them. But they became sick. And their condition has been worsening. Since the epidemic began, not a single one of these children has emerged from their coma.” Another pause. “This is why I came back to Nigeria.”

“What is my brain having to do with this?”

“The children . . . they’re losing their memories. We think that you have developed an antibody to the virus that is making them sick.” There is light shining in her eyes, and I am thinking that she is looking at me like I am something special. Not because I am carrying Onyii inside me, but because of something else. Xifeng is sometimes looking at me like this. “You . . . you somehow found a way to organize your data.”

“My rememberings?”

“Yes. Your rememberings.” She is moving closer to me, close enough to touch, but she is not reaching out to touch me.

At first, I am thinking it is because she is looking at my woundings and finding me disgusting. But then I am seeing the look in her eyes and I am seeing that she is scared that if she is touching me, she is wounding me further. I am wanting to reach out and touch her or tell her it is okay, but my body is still not moving. I am feeling nanobots inside me, repairing me, but I am still too weak for my arms and legs and fingers to listen to what my brain is telling them.