A Wonderful World

Back to Nature

I woke up but it was still completely dark. Strangely, I could hear sounds of animals. Was someone watching TV? Oh that's right, I must be in Andromeda now. Did they have TV's there? The smell...it was a little weird. It smelled like a dirty toilet. I could feel that I had something over my body. Maybe it wasn't a good idea just being in a T-shirt and boxers. It felt like a heavy blanket but it was a little furry. It must be a dream because I couldn't open my eyes. It was confusing, I could still use every other sense. I wiggled my toes and twisted my head. Finally, I was able to move my arms. I reached for my headset and felt nothing there, except for a splitting pain. "Are you okay?" said a voice.Person? "Uh.." I made a noise."He's waking up." said the voice.The room started getting less dark, but my head was still hurting. I moved everything that I could in my body, but it felt like everything was lighter. It felt like I shrank into this tiny thing and now I was ballooning back to my normal size and strength. I wasn't overly strong whatsoever, but strong enough to do three chin-ups. Most people couldn't even do that back on Earth, so that was something to be proud of. I could feel my vocal cords slowly expanding. It was an odd feeling."Hey.." I said."Welcome to Andromeda, buddy!" said the voice. "How old are you?""Um, 25." I responded. That was a weird first question. "Wow, 25. How is Earth doing, and why did you get an entry level headset?"Oh, that's why he asked that question. Wait, did entry level mean something?"Entry level?" I repeated."Oh no, you didn't even know what you were getting into?" He sounded worried."No...I just wanted to escape." I replied."Buddy..." he lamented. "Entry level means you enter this new life with no technology."At those words my eyes suddenly jerked open."Ahhhh!" I screamed. "My eyes are burning!"Suddenly the blanket was thrown over my head. Phew, that was better. I blinked my eyes just to make sure that they didn't explode. I touched where they should be and thankfully felt something squishy there. "Be careful, buddy," the voice said, "you don't want to end up like some of the other guys here."Wow, having been born again but blind. That would have sucked. Thank goodness this "buddy" was here to help me out. "Hey thanks...uh." I started."I'm Joni." he said. "You can see what I look like in a few minutes." He started laughing. "I can't believe you got an entry level even though you could choose.""Wait, you couldn't choose?"Joni sighed. "No, it was based on your net worth during the drafting. Everyone in this city is a worthless entry level.""I'm guessing it wasn't voluntary..." I started."No way, buddy!" Joni interjected. "I loved living with those robots back on Earth. They may have taken my job but at least I didn't have to worry about it anymore.""Well..." I felt a little stupid. "I was being paid so little money that it still took months to save up enough money for that, and I didn't eat for more than half of my pay period. The next tier would have cost at least 2 years of that."I felt a pat on my head over the blanket. "There there," said Joni, "It's normal for young kids to feel that way. You just don't know what you got 'till it's gone. Hey, you can check if you are blind or not now."The mild aggravation from being patronized faded away as I lifted the heavy blanket and saw color, seemingly for the first time in my life. I saw a roof made out of blue and white stones, it almost looked like bricks. They were held together by some kind of cement. There was no light fixture. I turned my head while still under the blanket. I didn't see any windows, pictures, or even anything hanging on the wall. There was a space on one of the walls where it looked like a fire was built. It was all black in that area, with pieces of black wood there. I finally saw a man with a grizzly black beard, pronounced wrinkles around his eyes, orange-brown skin, and the biggest smile on his face. I smiled back weakly."Hi Joni," I said, "I'm Justin. I'm so glad I can see you. Thanks for saving my eyes.""Haha!" he laughed out loud. "I'm just glad I was here when you awakened. Do I look like an angel to you?""100%." I responded. "So, we really are on Andromeda huh?""Yeah buddy," said Joni, "this place is oddly similar to Earth. The Chinese designed the whole planet to be more efficient than Earth. Kind of like an Earth 2.0 since the humans didn't treat the first one so well. Our city of entry levels don't get to use any fossil fuels. That's only reserved for the next level that produces things in factories and transports them."I looked around. I saw that Joni was barefoot but had some clothes that looked like leather. In fact, I smelled my blanket and it had a faint smell of blood on it. There was no sink, no countertops, not even a second room. The door behind Joni was wide open, allowing the bright sunshine to spread its way around the stone floor. I saw windmills similar to the ones on Earth in the outside background."Are those windmills?" I pointed outside. "Why does this house look like it was literally built in the stone age?"Joni laughed softly. "Those windmills generate electricity, but for the next level of citizens. In order to preserve the planet, most of the world lives without electricity, while the rest lives off of mostly renewable resources taken from us. Since the research and technology team requires so much energy, they need most of it. Leave it to the Chinese to make everyone work together for the greater good."I suddenly felt a bit of panic. This world was worse than the one I left. Just yesterday? I'll assume I was only knocked out for a day. Just yesterday I took a nice warm shower and was comforted by my robot puppy. Did I have to take cold showers for the rest of my life?"There's no way back, is there?" I had to ask the rhetorical question.Joni laughed loudly. "Buddy! We're all in this together. You should have seen the massive panic we all had when we first started awakening. Thank goodness that headset must've had a translator chip or something. We all spoke the same language."That worried me even more. If this headset inserted some language translator, what else could have been injected into all of us? Spyware? I was getting sick to my stomach. Speaking of stomach, it was growling. I wondered what they eat in this world. I was so used to just buying whatever I could with the money I made.