The Tellers

They say cryosleep can cause insanity. That's why it has been banned for nearly the past century, since 2550 AD.

I've been in cryosleep for nearly 200 years.

That surreal feeling of ascending from deep underwater and breaking the surface, the one that usually accompanies waking from dreams, was more like a whale breaching. And then, instead of the serenity of a quiet bedroom, all was chaos. The hazy memory of my dream- it had not been a pleasant one- was swallowed up in a blur of flickering lights, warning buzzers and Jardine's voice shouting at me to open the exit hatch, along with an odd rattling sound like someone was throwing rocks at the outside of my survival pod. Hundreds of rocks. I struggled to clear my head. Why was there water on the floor? My eyes were tearing up from the lights. I could barely see. Jardine was insistent. Slowly I moved my hand, which had been in one place for I didn't know how long. Remarkably, it still worked. I was not sure where I was. Dream and memory all ran together in my head, filling me with panic. Also, there was the little matter that my legs wouldn't obey me. I flexed my hand slowly, feeling the blood work its way back into the muscles. I turned my head and looked at my other hand. Slowly it, too came to life. A million needles seemed to be shooting through my forearm and I began shivering uncontrollably. The water was rising at an alarming rate. It had been only a couple inches high and now it was almost a foot high. I was lying on my back at an incline, and I started flexing my body forward, trying to raise my torso. I could feel each muscle in my abdominal section as unused nerves began to recruit them. After three tries I finally succeeded in sitting up. The water was pouring in, and I was looking up at the archaic red wheel on the door in front of me marked "exit", the one Jardine kept screaming at me to open. I lifted both arms toward it and pain shot through my back.

"Great." I muttered. My voice came out in a husky, barely audible growl. I was now overwhelmingly ticked off. The lights pulsed on, then off. I focused my ire on the door. The sound of rocks smacking the outside of the pod had subsided, but now a new sound arose, distant, the sound of wind sucking up water. I realized no sound should be audible through the thick pod walls, but whatever leaks were letting water in were letting noise in too. And the noise was growing louder. The water level inside the pod dropped suddenly. The door creaked, groaned, and suddenly was simply not there anymore, sucked away amidst the crack of shearing metal and howling wind. Then there was a dropping sensation, and water flooded thru the open hatch. It was then I realized I was strapped at the waist to my seat. water swirled all around, up to my hips in seconds. I struggled to find the clasp but my fingers felt as though they had frostbite- barely any feeling. I was moving much too slowly, but I forced myself not to panic. As the water reached my chest I finally felt the seatbelt give. I floated free, aiming at the open hatch. Fortunately the pod behind me was sinking faster than the pod in front of me, meaning the door was now in the ceiling. All I had to do was float thru it.

Outside, I glimpsed the sky, black and stormy, and then a wave slapped me in the face. Fresh water. I gagged, sank briefly, then thrashed my way to the surface again with my still-too-slow arms. My legs remained entirely inert. I tried to look around. It was raining hard, Little chunks of ice floated in the water, and the waves kept tossing them at me. I was confused by this, since it wasn't cold enough for ice. Jardine was speaking into my ear.

"Land to the left, Lewis." Jardine was my simulcrom, the evolution of the smart phone historians had told me- in a distant memory- was prevalent at the beginning of the millenium. He resided in a nanochip in my forearm, and could beam images directly into my eyes and speak directly into my head. His mention of my name brought my focus back. I redirected my attention to the direction he indicated. Sure enough, there was a dim mass that indicated something solid to stand on. My arms felt like lead already and the rough water kept filling my mouth and nose with water. I put my head down and began to swim. After what seemed an eternity I looked up. To my despair the land was still an impossible distance. There was no way I was going to make it. Jardine was speaking again but his voice seemed to come from far away. I was underwater, now I was afloat again, gasping for breath. On the shore there were two figures, I could just make out their silhouettes and their shouts before I was under again. When next I came up, there was only one figure. I wondered if the second one had gone for help. Too late for that. As I went under once more I wondered briefly if there had ever been two people or if my eyes decieved me. Then all was black.