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Scoaliera Tefwe, who had been a friend and a lover of Ngaroe QiRia long ago, when he was already a very old man and she had been of conventional middle age – a little under two hundred – woke slowly, as she had woken slowly a few dozen times, over the intervening centuries. Only it wasn’t really waking slowly; she was being woken. All dark at first. Stillness and silence too, and yet the sensation that things were happening nearby, and inside her head and body; organs and systems and faculties being woken, revived, checked, primed, readied. It was at once reassuring and somehow disappointing. Here we go again, she thought. She opened her eyes.

SIMULATION, said the glowing red letters along the bottom of her field of vision. Ah, she thought, whereupon the word faded away.

So she was still sort of asleep, after all. But her consciousness and sense of embodiment were being woken up.
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Scoaliera Tefwe woke slowly, as she had woken slowly a few dozen times, over the intervening centuries. Only it wasn’t really waking slowly; she was being woken. All dark at first. Stillness and silence too, and yet the sensation that things were happening nearby, and inside her head and body; organs and systems and faculties being woken, revived, checked, primed, readied. It was at once reassuring and somehow disappointing. Here we go again, she thought. She opened her eyes.

The word SIMULATION, which was what she expected to see first, albeit briefly, wasn’t there. She blinked, looked around.

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Scoaliera Tefwe woke slowly, as she had woken slowly a few dozen times, over the intervening centuries. Only it wasn’t really waking slowly; she was being woken. All dark at first. Stillness and silence too, and yet the sensation that things were happening, both inside her head and body; organs and systems and faculties being woken, revived, checked, primed, readied. It was at once reassuring and somehow disappointing. Here we go again, she thought. Hmm. That thought itself felt … familiar. She opened her eyes.

She was sort of expecting to see the word SIMULATION, however briefly, but it wasn’t there.

Потому что 1) это литературная техника многоуровневой интеллектуальной прозы, то есть Настоящей Литературы™, и ему хотелось позабавиться этим и в НФ. Just for fun. Вероятен и другой ответ 2) потому что Бэнксу не жалко разбрасываться такими идеями. Оба ответа подтверждают мою исходную посылку.