Page 46 of Death of the Author

She stared at him with wide, frantic eyes, wishing with all her heart that he hadn’t asked her that. Now, yet again, whatever happened next would beherchoice. She glanced at her legs, so stick thin, she could see even beneath her jeans, caged in the delicate metal of the exos. More than two decades after the accident, they still looked to her like the legs of a child, the child she’d been, stunned by what had happened to them. But they’d grown. She kept them meticulously shaven; enjoying the smoothness when she ran her hands over them was how she reminded herself they still belonged to her. She couldn’t touch them now, with the exos wrapped around her lower half. She hoped she wasn’t about to do even more damage to them. Her family’s voices began to fill her ears. Quickly, before she could change her mind, she blurted, “Yes. Yes, proceed. Let’s go.”

Hugo pressed the button. The table began to slowly tilt forward. She shut her eyes and took a deep breath. “No, keep your eyes open,” Hugo urged her. “And breathe normally. I know it’s scary and feels like shit, but you have to be present for this.”

“We’ve got you, Zelu,” Marcy reassured her.

“But think like you won’t need us,” Uchenna added.

Zelu opened her eyes and saw Marcy nodding in agreement.

The table was slowly angling itself—it had tilted by maybe fifteen degrees. Zelu was looking down at herself when Hugo stepped directly in front of the table. “The exos will respond to you,” he said firmly, commanding her attention. “The AI is trained to read your every intention. It knows you. So just beyou.”

When the table was angled about forty-five degrees, the effects of gravity began to overtake her. The weight of the world was pulling on her,reordering her skin and bones. Fifty-five degrees. Oh, the pulling. The straps held her tightly in place, but she swore she could feel her spine sliding against the table. What if something snapped? What if she fell? She glanced down at her legs. She saw her left foot stretching toward the ground. Limp. Unmoving.

Now she was at seventy-five degrees; this was the most upright Zelu had been since she was twelve. She frowned down at herself, but this time not with fear. “I remember,” she whispered. Being eye-to-eye with others. Stretching tall to grab things from high up. Her knees locking and bending. Back muscles working. Spine over legs. One leg would go forth, followed by the other. Carrying her. Moving her. Bringing her. She remembered how effortless it was. Not a distant memory. Up close. She saw her twelve-year-old able body standing beside her body today, separated only by a trivial bit of time and experience. She wanted to weep.Why am I torturing myself like this?, she thought.

The exos tightened around her ankles. She couldn’t feel them, but she saw them constricting, the metal mesh grasping, intent, intelligent. She nearly screamed. Then she realized what was happening. They were configuring themselves around and beneath her feet for balance. They were shifting into a better position... for walking.

“Oh,” she gasped.

The aerographene had tiny wires running through it that used electromagnetic charges to contract or expand parts of itself like muscle. She’d known this on an academic level, but seeing it on her legs as she was about to step on the ground was something else. The exos were contracting and tightening all over her legs, making a soft crinkle.Trust, she frantically thought.Trust the technology.She was eighty-five degrees, and it felt like the weight of her legs was going to pull her lower body from her waist until it inevitably separated.This is when it happens. Shit! Shit! Shit!

“Shouldn’t I have... footrests... so... my legs... won’t... pull?” she choked out, struggling to breathe.

“We’ve found that the stretching of your body and the sensation of itmakes for a better transition,” Hugo said. “I know it’s uncomfortable. Try to relax. Only a few more seconds.”

“’Kay,” she wheezed. She somehow let out a long breath and whispered, “Relax, relax, relax, fucking relax.”

And then her “feet” were on the floor. “Zelu,” the exos announced. And then they kicked in 100 percent, tightening a bit more to hold flush against her legs and waist. At the mystical demarcation where her paralysis began and ended, she felt her body move to support itself in a way that was subtle yet very, very powerful. She was not going to fall. “Whoa,” she whispered. Not horrible. No, not horrible at all. “What thefuuuuuuck!” She glanced at Hugo and the others. “Sorry.”

They all laughed. “No worries,” Hugo said, stepping forward to release her wrists and arms from the straps. “Drop all the f-bombs you want. That often helps.”

Then he released her waist strap.

Zelu was standing. Well, “standing.” She grinned. “My God,” she whispered. “Oh my God.” Her back was still to the table. She fought with everything in her power not to grab it, not to cling to it. Marcy and Uchenna remained beside her, but now their hands were out and ready if she needed them.

“What... what do I do now?” she whispered.

Hugo nodded gently. He said slowly, “Touch the hip sensor, just how I told you.”

“Or flex my abdominals?”

“If you can,” Hugo said. “We’ll work up to that eventually.”

She could barely feel her abdominal muscles, but she could flex them a bit. She’d need to see another physical therapist to learn the workouts that would help her strengthen her body enough to properly handle using the exos. But today, she just wanted to know that she could do it. She flexed them now. She gasped. The exos were receptive and amazingly smooth in their response. One step, another step. Distributing her weight, balancing her, moving her legs for her, supporting her, allowing her other muscles tohold her up. She waved a hand down, touching the sensor. A muscle in her back cramped up. She gritted her teeth.

“Where?” Uchenna asked.

“Lower back, lower back,” she grunted, touching the spot. It felt like stone. “Shit!”

Uchenna immediately started massaging the area. Within a minute, the muscle relaxed. She took a few more steps and another muscle did the same thing. Her body was adjusting and doing so much work to figure out what the fuck was going on that muscles she hadn’t used in decades were waking up and trying to help. Hugo kept assuring her that this was normal. Maybe it was, but damn, it was painful.

She pushed through for another fifteen minutes before she couldn’t stand it any longer. “Enough!” she gasped. But then she laughed. And then she groaned as another muscle cramp ripped through the center of her back.

Marcy and Uchenna helped her back onto the table. Hugo stood above her, absolutely beaming. “Holy shit, Zelu. You did phenomenally!”

“Really?” she said to be polite, but she knew it was true. Despite all the pain, she could feel herself commanding the exos. She’d even had two moments when she’d glimpsed what it would be like toreallydo it. Staring at the ceiling, she laughed loudly until she lost all the air in her lungs and it turned into a coughing fit.

The rest of the time was less eventful. While Zelu calmed down and the exos quietly processed the data they had learned from their trial run, Hugo opened up a laptop so they could watch the Nollywood movie Uchenna had mentioned right there in the physical therapy room. It was even more surreal than she’d imagined. Whoever had made the film haddefinitelyread her book, had strange ideas about Americans, was a hopeless misogynist, and had hired designers who had no clue how to construct a costume.

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