“Now then,” Zae began, leaning back in his chair and adjusting his half-moon spectacles. “Tony, why don’t you tell us a little about yourself?” 

I let out a long sigh and leaned forwards in my chair. “Okay, if this is how we’re going to do it.” I cast an eye across the room. A half dozen people sat in a round circle in the backroom of an old fashioned bar, fidgeting awkwardly as they waited for their turn to speak. “Hi everyone. I’m Tony. I was a sixty three year old software engineer when I was diagnosed with an aggressive form of Alzheimer's. I didn’t much fancy forgetting how to chew so I froze myself three months later. Now I’m here.” I slumped backwards. “Next person.” 

Zae frowned, but waved the woman next to me to start.

“Hi everyone, I’m Lucy,” she began, rising to her feet. “I’m from Detroit, if that means anything to you’all after three hundred years. I was dying of tuberculosis before I–” 

“Red light,” I cut in. 

The room froze. Lucy and the rest of the circle paused in mid-motion. 

Zae let out a short sigh. “Is there a problem Tony?” 

“Urgh.” I pressed my fingers against my temples. “TB, Zae? Really?” 

“People died from tuberculosis until the mid twenty-first century.” 

“Yeah, but not people who could afford to be cryogenically frozen,” I shot back. “Look, Zae. I know this simulation must have been a lot of work, but what exactly did you want to achieve here?” 

Zae shrugged, leaning back in his chair. “You said you were lonely. As you’re struggling with real intelligences I thought you might prefer to interact with some contemporary peers.” 

“These aren’t my peers, though, are they? They’re just what you think people of my era acted like. They’re just software.” 

“As are you right now, but I concede the point.” Zae pursed his lips. “As we’ve discussed before, Tony, there’s plenty to be gained from interacting with things we know aren’t real. Stories may be fiction, but they can have a real impact. Why not give these simulacrums a chance? You may find a friendly space beneficial.” 

I fought down an angry outburst. “They’re not [i]real[/i]. Why can’t you just wake up some more people for me to talk to?” 

Zae shrugged. “We've been over this. Your brain, due to the early stage of degradation which you froze yourself, was by far the best candidate for emulation.” 

“Great, well now that you’ve figured it out, why don’t you ring the alarm on the rest of the corpsicles? Or at least put me on pause until you figure them out?” 

“Someone has to be first, Tony,” Zae pointed out. He stood, his chair vanishing between blinks. “Someone has to blaze a trail. If we are to have any hope of reviving twentieth century humans then we must know how to have you integrate into the intelligent community.” 

I let out a deep sigh. “I didn’t sign up to be a trailblazer. I just wanted to live.” I put my head in my hands and sat, slumped for a moment. “Why do we even need to do this? You know what’s in my head better than I do. Why can’t you just make me happy?” 

Zae shook his head. “We can. We could have dropped you into a full simulation of your life before your death. We could have made it so that you would always be happy and not notice the cracks in the coding. That would have left you little better than a simulacra, however, worse even by some measure.” 

“At least I wouldn’t be treated like some monkey in a suit,” I grumbled. 

“You are an [i]intelligence[/i],” Zae shot back, his form wavering as his agitation broke through the disguise. “A unique individual. Although you’re five hundred years behind the times there’s nothing stopping you doing anything any other intelligence can do. It’ll just take some work.” 

“Tell that to the rest of the world.” I summoned a glass of water and pressed it against my forehead. “This is all just navel gazing, isn’t it?” 

Zae took a deep breath, forcing himself back into the therapist guise. “That’s for you to decide. I’m here to help you whatever you chose.” 

I drew in a deep breath. Standing I cast another forlorn eye over the frozen forms. “Okay. Let’s go and meet some real people. I’m done playing with these dolls.”