471 Homo Sapiens Sapiens 2.0

In a cube on the outskirts of Athens.

*Movement detected,* the VI of a medical pod reported. It was the first finger twitch of the person inside its pod in over two weeks.

Theodora “Teddy” Costas was one of the first three people in all of Greece to be brought to a cube for emergency treatment after collapsing in the middle of a grocery store. Ironically, she had been shopping for groceries because her parents and extended family had been caught by the lockdown in her house, and she was running out of food.

The VI monitoring her medical pod was immediately overridden by the AI in charge of all medical pods, Aceso, who increased the supply of fast-absorbing nutrients to provide Teddy with instant energy and logged her into the simulation to gather data about her situation.