1 – Awakenings

The light reached him slowly, insinuating itself in the most gradual way. But when his eyes opened, it came too fast. It took several minutes before he could keep them open comfortably; and even then, his eyes couldn’t resolve a single thing. All he could really make out were the smudged lines of color, green, teal and red.

It took several more minutes for his eyes to adjust to the point that he could focus them. At that point, the smudges began to retreat around the edges of discernible lines. Eventually, he could tell what he was looking up at.

Display fields.

The lines and colored markers indicated vital signs. They were his. Eventually, his eyesight improved to the point that he was able to decipher what they meant.

His heart rate was slow.

His breathing was slow and shallow.

His blood pressure was low.

His brainwave activity was rapidly picking up. The mere act of looking at his brainwaves represented as dancing lines appeared to accelerate the pace. His mind was coming to full wakefulness, though the same could not be said of his body. In the race between cognition and body, the latter always seemed to lag behind the former.

Nevertheless, all his vitals were consistent with a person his age awakening from cryosleep after many decades. The process was always long, tedious, and difficult; the greater the duration, the more difficult it generally was. And he knew from experience that a headache and a general sense of malaise were on the way.

[Greetings, Engineer Dube.] said a gentle voice in his mind. He moaned. He had been hoping to have a few minutes of undisturbed dozing before the uplink took effect.

[How are you feeling?]

[Fine, Jonas,] he replied, using the same communication pathway. [How is the ship?]

[The Transverse is functioning well within established parameters. How are you feeling?]

Dube groaned again. The question was pointless. The ships AI had access to every bit of information his biomonitors and the tube’s systems were collecting. But in the interests of crew morale, it was generally agreed that Jonas should show an interest in crew welfare.

[I’m feeling fine, thank you for asking.]

[Very good. Your waking phase will be completed shortly.]

Excellent, Dube thought privately. It was nice to know that at least his thoughts were his alone, when he needed them to be.

He braced himself for the uncomfortable process, one which he knew all too well. Already, the nanites that were being introduced into his blood were increasing his core temperature and oxygenating his blood. In response, his body began shedding any remaining traces of cryo-induced numbness. Within seconds, he could feel some tingling in his extremities. 

This was perhaps the strangest part, where slowly becoming warmer suddenly made the body feel cold. As his body and mind were brought to full wakefulness, his body responded by complaining more loudly. Soon, everything ached, including his head.

“Ah, why must we do this?”

[I trust that is a rhetorical question?]

Dube smiled. The programmers had also insisted that the ship’s custodian be capable of grasping irony. It was felt that the crew would become less annoyed with it over time if that were the case.

Like his eyes and then his nerves, his mind was slowly returning to wakefulness as well. The medimachines had a part to play in that too. Extended cryosleep was known for leaving subjects in a fog when they woke up. The mind as well as the body could be slow to recover. By ensuring proper oxygenation, blood flow, and the production of specific neurotransmitters, the medimachines in his body were bringing Dube to full self-awareness.

Questions began to form in his mind.

[Jonas, what is the current date and time?] The ship’s AI relayed it to him, down to the subjective minute and second. None of the values it gave him mattered nearly so much as the year.

[So, it’s my time at the helm, is it?]

[Correct, Engineer Dube] replied Jonas. [Engineers Chen and Vorhees are also in process. I recommend getting up slowly.]

[Thank you, Jonas. I have done this before.]

[Of course, Engineer. Just a reminder.]

Dube terminated the conversation and waited for the tube’s seals to disengage. A faint hiss signalled a slight change in pressure and the tube’s cover slowly retracted. He felt a slight chill as the ship’s atmosphere touched his skin. It gave him a shiver, another reminder that he returning to full wakefulness. As he pulled himself slowly up from the tube’s interior, he got many sensations at once. Tingling, aching and straining. Several parts of his body, all at once.

Swinging his legs over the side of the tube, Dube managed to right himself eventually. The ship’s gravity made itself felt immediately. Dube had little strength to draw on, at the moment. The fact that he was feeling the stress of an additional point two gees worth of gravity, that only made him feel weaker.

[Do you require assistance, Engineer? I can summon an exoskin or foglets if you like.]

Dube strongly considered the offer. Using the available exoskeletons to get reacquainted with the ship’s gravity was an entirely sensible thing to do. But Dube still had a modicum of pride and preferred that he walk on his own.

[It’s alright, Jonas. I need to get accustomed to it sooner or later. No time like the present.]

[Very well, Engineer.]

It felt like an eternity before his feet finally touched the ground. Once that was done, it was a simple matter of putting one foot in front of the other until he finally reached the lavatories.

[Are you comfortable, Engineer?]

Within the stall, Dube groaned. [This is bordering on harassment, Jonas.]

[Point taken. We shall speak again when you are finished?]

[I’ll let you know when I’m ready.]

Dube was finished with his ablutions and got dressed, throwing on a nanofilament robe that immediately responded to his body heat. His eyes filled with readings from the garment that told him he was in good health, though there was some lingering concern about his core temperature.

Whether it was the ship’s custodian or embedded sensors, the technology had a way of pestering a person to the point where they wanted to shut it all down. If only such a thing were possible, or even the slightest bit practical for people on an interstellar voyage.