The new statue had appeared overnight, at the entrance to the college. It looked like it was made from white marble; it felt cold, and there were veins of other minerals running through it. It was an amazingly detailed representation of a young woman, wearing the college uniform.

No-one had seen it arrive; the college hadn’t ordered it, either. A small plaque on it gave a title; ‘Late for College’ and an artist name of ‘Tilly’…

Puzzled, the college arranged for the statue to be moved into the grounds; it was installed in roughly the middle of the campus, so it could be seen from any of the buildings. Students came out and sat on benches by it, eating their lunches. The art students amongst them marvelled at the detail in the artwork. But who was the artist, and where had the artwork come from?

After a lot of research, one of the students, Gail, tried face recognition on the statue. If it was that detailed, it might give results that way. To her amazement, it was found within a couple of minutes, in the online version of the college ‘yearbook’…

The model for the statue was a student, Tilly Easterbrook. She was a perfect likeness. There as also the statues reference to Tilly on the plate. However, she was designated as the artist. Was the statue a self-portrait?

This was as far as Gail got, however. She was totally unable to locate Tilly. She hadn’t been into college since the start of term…

She had no way of knowing that she’d been next to Tilly, every time she looked at the statue. Tilly was sealed inside it, permanently locked away from everything she knew but, at the same time, able to see it just beyond her reach…

The base of the statue held all the electronics needed to hold Tilly in a state of suspended animation; just barely aware, but totally unable to move or do anything for herself. There was also a tube connected to her foot feeding nutrients into her to keep her alive; similar tubes were connected to her anus and urethra. Being fed liquid food made all the waste easy to dispose of; the statue just processed it in the base and ejected it as a faint dust that quickly blew away on the wind.

The whole surface of the statue acted as a giant solar cell; it kept internal batteries charged and the electronics running. Tilly would live for years, immobile. The statue even had a certain amount of flexibility built in, to cope with a reasonable amount of growth.

Every now and again, Tilly would almost regain awareness. “Help me…”, she murmured faintly, unheard, as she sank back into unconscious oblivion.

The college never found out what happened to Tilly. The statue became a memorial to her…