***
“…hell do you think you’re doing?” David’s outraged voice broke the silence.
Almost in response, he heard a hissing sound and that of
machinery struggling to accomplish its task.
The surface of the tube remained in place, not sliding in the fluid
manner Daniel recalled it closing in when it sealed him into the cold sleep he’d
never asked for. He pressed against the
frosted tube, thankful that the arm and leg restraints had at least released
their hold. Despite the added pressure
from his body, the tube remained just as stationary, but Daniel didn’t give
up. Somebody had to answer for this; he’d
never granted permission for anyone to put him under for anything. He half expected to burst free and find his
previous coworkers gathered around in amusement at his struggles, even though
none of them had themselves volunteered.
Bracing himself on the padded surface within the chamber,
Daniel forcefully kicked the closed panel, trying to give the machinery a
helping hand (or in this case, foot), but he remained ensconced within. Something must have malfunctioned, despite
all of the failsafes they’d gone on and on about even as they’d strapped him
inside. Flawless, his ass. See how they liked being trapped inside an
icy, sealed, claustrophobic test tube.
He flung himself forwards and slammed his shoulder against
the unyielding surface, and thought he felt it give slightly. Bracing himself, he tried again. This time, the frozen poly-whatever they’d
called it shattered, and Daniel toppled out to the laboratory floor outside,
his left shoulder landing directly on a jagged piece of the shattered tube.
“Son of a bitch!”
He looked at his shoulder, saw a piece of the tube embedded
there, and winced as he pulled it out.
Turning his attention aside from his wound, he realized the lab had
fallen into quite a state of disrepair.
None of the fluorescent lights cast any light, the only sources of it
stemming from some of the emergency lights and that making it through the
blinds over the windows. Every surface
he saw rested under a thick layer of dust, and numerous pieces of equipment lay
smashed and equally as coated by dust.
How long had they kept him under, and what had happened here?
Daniel walked to the window and looked through the blinds,
not comforted in the least by the view that presented itself. While the sun shone bright, the city--or what
remained of it--appeared preternaturally stagnant. Below, cars sat motionless in the streets,
many of which had extremely pockmarked surfaces, the highway overpass so
typically crowded with vehicles all but destroyed, only a slim strip of
pavement reaching over the rubble on the street below. The city’s buildings had not fared any
better. All of those visible had shattered
windows at best, but some previously noteworthy high-rises now existed as
little more than giant piles of shattered and twisted glass, rock, and metal.
Daniel stepped back from the window in a daze and tripping
on a frayed power cord, fell to the floor.
How could something like this have happened? Beyond that, why did the city appear so thoroughly
abandoned? Had North Korea or Iran
finally gone fully insane and launched a strike on America? He supposed he’d find out soon enough if he started
suffering the effects of radiation exposure.
Or maybe this was still a trick being played on him, making him think he’d
awakened from suspended animation to a post-apocalyptic wasteland when instead
they’d placed him in some exceptionally immersive virtual reality program.
“Okay guys, you had your fun. I’m damned sure none of this was in the
employment contract I signed, and if you don’t pull me out, I will sue the
ever-loving shit out of this company!”
No response, everything remained as it had upon his egress
from the tube. Daniel sighed. While it wouldn’t surprise him to have them
ignore his legal threat (from what he’d seen, management took an interest in
the scientists’ behavior only rarely), he had to at least entertain the baffling
possibility that he’d actually emerged from cyrosleep into this abandoned and
destroyed world. Another look around the
room confirmed he’d not find any useful information here. All the computer terminals lay smashed, and
given the state of the city, he imagined internet connectivity an impossibility
even if they’d remained in functioning order.
Before leaving the room, his gaze returned to where he’d so
recently broken free, and spotted three other tubes next to the one that had
held him. Only one of those had been
present when they’d sealed him in, but all three looked closed rather than
open. Figuring companionship would trump
solitude (even if this proved a mean-spirited joke from his coworkers), he
walked back over. In so doing, he noted
the locking mechanism on each had been destroyed. No wonder he’d had such trouble getting
free. A quick glance around revealed the
apparent tool used for the wonton destruction: a cast aside crowbar.
Daniel retrieved it and approached the first of the three,
coated in an exceptional amount of frost.
He tried to rub some of it clear without success, but through the ice on
the panel saw the release indicator flashing.
Wedging the crowbar into the hinge, he forced it open with a loud
cracking of ice. Inside lay an aged
Scott, a researcher hired a few months after Daniel, but his appearance made it
clear that his unit must have malfunctioned.
In addition to his frozen flesh, the pain and panic written on his face
told the rest of the story.
Shuddering at the thought that Scott’s fate could have
befallen him, Daniel moved to the next tube over, but didn’t even try to open
it. Its coolant tube lay severed behind
the unit, the body within not one Daniel recognized but already starting to
decompose, somewhat preserved by the sealed suspension chamber. He took a deep breath before advancing to the
final tube, telling himself not to get his hopes up. Solitude had to beat death, after all.
However, the last contained appeared neither damaged nor
exceptionally frosted over, and the woman within looked both awake and unable
to extricate herself. Daniel thought he
recognized her, but couldn’t place her name.
Staring openmouthed, he only snapped back to awareness at her renewed
pounding on the glass.
The tube groaned at the imposition of the crowbar, but
Daniel managed to force it open. The
woman stumbled out alert, head darting around and only returning to meet his
gaze once she seemed to convince herself that no immediate danger existed. Upon meeting his eyes, she looked just as
surprised to see him as he’d felt seeing her alive.
“Daniel?”
“Um, last time I checked.”
“We didn’t think--never mind that, how long have you been
out?”
“I dunno, a few minutes maybe. You seem familiar.”
“Stephanie. We were
in the same hiring class?”
“That can’t be right, she was…” he trailed off as her
appearance clicked. She’d looked at
least ten years younger the last time he’d seen her. “Younger.” He finished.
“Well, thanks for calling me old.”
“I-er, sorry.”
“To be fair, the last time we spoke I was a good
twenty-eight years younger.” How did
Scott and Beth fare?”
“About the same as the lab.
You went in together?”
“Yes, when the riots started.”
“Riots?”
“There was a nasty virus going around. Highly contagious and always fatal, without a
cure in sight. Cities were being quarantined,
flights grounded. People didn’t take it
well.” As she spoke, she went to the
window and her eyes widened.
“What else? Surely
all of this didn’t happen in response to a plague.”
“There was some talk of an extinction-level event, but no
definitive proof. Most of us wrote it
off as paranoia stemming from the spread of the virus.”
“Yet you put yourselves into suspended animation despite not
buying it.”
“I never said that was why we did it. That said, there may have been some truth to
the rumors.”
“Why’s that?”
“Shortly before we made our decision, Yellowstone erupted.”
“Shit. So what
prompted your choice prior to that?”
“We--well, Quasar Dynamics--may have had a role in creating
the virus. None of us, mind, we were
perfecting the cyrotech. Or trying to.”
“Yeah, thanks for volunteering me.”
“Wasn’t my call. I
actually argued against it, but the execs saw money and wanted a human
trial. They were none too pleased when
the awakening protocols failed to bring you back.”
“So you thought I was dead, then.”
“Assumed you must be, but we kept updating the software on
that initial unit of yours regardless because we couldn’t be sure.”
“So what now?”
“I guess we get to explore the future. Or what’s left of it.”
She gave Daniel a small smile, then they left the lab and
headed out into the new world that awaited them.
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