The City

Cryogenics

Prologue

     I smiled as I watched the rain carry his lifeless body away.  I was glad that I, once again, escaped the disease to survive another day.  I went down to the gutter that his backpack was in and opened it checking for supplies.  I searched for food, water, a flashlight, anything that could help, but there was nothing.  I figured he used what was in it before the disease took him over.  Disappointed I dropped the backpack in the overflowing ditch and started to walk away.  Then I heard it, footsteps, and all I can think was to run.  I ran as fast as I could, despite the rain, I was moving swiftly.  I turned to see if I had lost what or whoever it was that was chasing me.  As I turned my head my shoes slipped on the wet pavement and I fell.

1

     That was the last thing I remeber.  I never found out who was chasing me or why.  I never knew why they or it were chasing me.  All I know is that I awoke in a glass tube full of green water.

    I look around, desperately needing to breathe.  The only thing I see are chunks of ice floating in the water.  I frantically start kicking the front of the tube, but only manage to bang my back on something behind me.  Suddenly slits appear in the metal floor beneath my feet and the water quickly drains away.  I can breathe.  I inhale the biggest gulp of air that I ever have in the sixteen years I've been alive.

    "You can't leave." someone says. At least I know they aren't infected, the diseased couldn't talk anymore.

   "Why, what do you want from me, where am I?" I ask sternly, pulling my arm out of their grasp.

    
    "Your safe, you don't have to worry about getting hurt, we're protecting you," he says.

     "Who are you?" I don't really trust him or buy into what he is saying.  In this world there is no one you can trust anymore, I know that much.

     "I'm a scientist, you and others from your time were frozen to protect you from the outside."

     "What do you mean the outside, where am I?"

     "You're in a city. It has walls built around it and it has been safe for years."

      "Liar," I said turning around to face him.  He has a young feminine face and looks to be about six feet tall, not much taller than I am.  He has long brown hair that falls to his ears and wears wire framed glasses.  "Look I don't know who you are or what I'm doing here, but if what you say is true and we are in a city, how do you know it's safe."

     "Follow me," the man says as he turns and walks away.

     He leads me down to a doorway and it opens automatically.  We step outside to the sun beaming down on us.  There are houses, beautiful houses.  They're all identical. It looked like the neighborhoods you'd see in movies that had perfect modern families living inside.  This city looked so... normal.  It's just like it was before.  It's like I'm dreaming.  The last houses I remember were falling apart, some were burned down, but all of them were ransacked and cleaned of food and anything else useful for surviving.  Unlike before people are walking the streets, living healthy people.  There are even cars, working cars they aren't just in the road abandoned.  Beyond the houses I see a wall it is at least twenty feet tall and made of metal.  I think that this city is way too good to be true and it is.  In a city if one person got infected then there would be an outbreak. The city was a great idea but everyone being in the same place, at the same time, when there is a fatal disease on the loose is deadly.

     "I know this might be a lot to take in so I want to introduce you to a couple of people. They can explain everything to you," the man says as he walks away from me down the sidewalk.

     I follow him, still unsure if there is really nothing to be cautious about.  Maybe I'll stay here for a while but as soon as things start going bad I'll leave.  Who knows maybe things won't be as bad as I think.  Maybe the disease is over or there's a cure.  That's right I'm just worried about nothing.  This is just what I needed, a little hope.  Honestly how much worse could this place be?  These people have to be better than the ones I knew from before.  All they did was limp around eating people and corpse that they found, but these people have a future.  This was my chance to make myself one too.

     We turn the corner and stop in front of a small medieval-looking building made of yellowish bricks.  He opened the wooden door.

     "Ladies first," he says with a slight friendly grin.

     I reluctantly go in before him and he follows after me.  Inside id an office.  It has little cubicles that blocks off each worker's space.  They all have computers and chairs, some have picture of people I assume are their families.  There are people moving about working.  How can they possibly be working when those things waited outside of the walls?  This is crazy, they can't really just pretend that everything that happened wasn't real, could they.  The man leads me to the back of the room to another door.  By the door are two windows that shows a backroom with two women standing in it.  He opens the door and I walk in, when he comes in he closes it locking it behind him.  I turn around, startled, by the only exit being locked.  He walks me over to the women, and now that I was closer, I notice its a girl that was standing next to her.  She seems to be only a few years older than me.  Both of them have brown hair but the younger girl's was short kind of like a pixie cut.

     "I would like you to meet Dr. Calrod and Lisa," as the man introduces me Lisa gave a faint smile with a shy wave of her hand.  "This is...um... I'm sorry I never asked for your name."

      "I'm Jamie," I mutter unsettled by hearing my own name after such a long time. I'm really not used being around people.

     Dr. Calrod extends her hand to shake mine.  I glance down at it, a little confused, not used to formal introductions anymore.  I quickly advance my hand to hers, gripped it and pull away just as fast to complete an awkward hand shake.  I throw my arm back to my side and look away at the floor.  I get the feeling my face is flushed with embarrassment.

     "No, no it's okay.  You and the people like you went through a lot," Dr. Calrod begins, "who knows what you're thinking right now.  You must be confused, but that's why I'm here to explain anything you want to know.  So, where do you want to start?"

     "What do you mean people like me?"  I question a little offended.

     "You're not from here," she answers stating the obvious.

     "Well I know that," I say bluntly.

     "I didn't mean from the city, although you're not from the city either, I meant... have you ever heard of cryogenics?" I shake my head, "Cryogenics is the study of preserving organs and tissue in low temperatures.  We used cryo-preservation to preserve people of your time so that they would no longer have to endure the devastation of The Old World."

     "You did what?  You froze me, why, for how long?"

     "I didn't exactly freeze you.  The man who did isn't alive anymore.  When the city was first being built he wanted to give others a chance to survive.  Everyone already here stayed and created families.  All the survivors from the outside were frozen for later use."

     "For later use?"

     "I mean that the people here do not really understand what it's like to be outside of the walls.  It's gotten to the point in which we need help getting rid of people who have contracted the sickness, but only the people from your time know how to handle them."

     "Can you just be clear?  Why were we frozen and how long was 'my time'?"  I ask very irritated by the fact that my hope of the disease being over was gone.  It didn't help that Dr. Calrod is trying her best to give me the least information about what I wanted to know.

     "You were preserved for an army around one hundred fifty years ago."