The Freezer (Genesis Endeavor Book 1) (5 page)

He just stared at the notepad for a few minutes while Teague
patiently waited. “I think I need some time alone to... absorb this.” He felt
like he was going to puke.

Teague didn’t even hesitate. “Most certainly,” he said, “I
will give you some time to rest. Let me show you how to adjust your bed.” He
showed Jack how to manipulate the bed so he could lay it flat or sit it up. “When
you are ready, just touch the box on the bottom left of the monitor next to
your bed and I, or someone else, will be in here shortly to assist you. I will
have more answers for you later.” Jack looked over at the square sheet of glass
on the stand next to his bed and just nodded, still speechless.

Upon close examination he saw that it had all sorts of
medical information on it, including his blood pressure, heart rate, and a
bunch of other readouts that probably meant something to Teague.

Teague went on without prompting, “It is monitoring all your
body functions. It is a touch screen like the one on my datapad here. Just
touch that square on the bottom left corner if you need anything. Can I get you
some water before I leave? I realize it’s not the best tasting stuff but you
won’t get sick from it, and your body could probably use the hydration.” Jack nodded
again.

After bringing in a glass of water, Teague left the room for
the ‘evening’. There were no windows in this room so it was impossible to say
whether it was night or day. The conversation had not lasted more than an hour,
but he felt tired and was as mentally drained as he would be if he had spent
the whole day filing requisition papers for the military. He lowered the bed
and stared at the monitor for a while, watching the lights bounce around in an
almost hypnotizing pattern. Finally he drifted off to sleep, dreaming about
Jenny and Ally, and crazy Dr. Jekyll type doctors creating people in little
glass beakers.

* * *

“So tell me, Teague, how is he coming?”

“Very well. Very well indeed considering the age of the
material we had to work with. His mind is working very well, and despite the
potential errors in his memory it is accepting his biology perfectly. I can
already tell he is an exceptionally intelligent man with a gift for being very
perceptive. At first I thought his technology background would be a roadblock
on his path to accepting his situation, but it appears it worked in my favor. As
soon as he saw technology that couldn’t possibly exist in his time he was
convinced. I think we have a very viable candidate here.”

“Good. Do you think he will be able to do what we need? And
if so will he be ready in time?”

“God willing, yes.”

“Good, good. Carry on.”

Consciousness came quickly for the first time in years. Sleep
didn’t linger and try to draw him back in – he simply went from a deep,
dreamless slumber he hadn’t thought possible a few hours before to not just
being awake, but alert as well. And it wasn’t just the rapid transition to
consciousness that surprised him, it was the fact that he was at complete peace
when it happened. By all rights he should be a mess right now. He was in a
foreign place, with only an impossible explanation for why he was here. But the
cancer, the grief, the stress from work all felt distant and disconnected, as
if they were someone else’s problems and not his own. Even reflecting on his
wife’s passing did not stir the pain in his heart he should expect.

In this state of relaxation, thoughts, memories, and
reasoning flowed effortlessly through his mind. There wasn’t much to distract
him, the only source of light was the dim glow from the medical monitor that
cast a slight blue aura on barely half the room. The rest of the room was as
much as mystery as how he got here. It was irrelevant, there was no desire to
explore. He closed his eyes and just let the thoughts and feelings flow.

He started at the beginning, his first thoughts upon waking
the previous day. Pain, or rather its absence, was the first thing he recalled.
Why was that? At first he decided he hadn’t felt this good in years. Then he
decided he hadn’t felt this good
ever
. As he pondered it, he came to the
realization that he didn’t really remember how he felt when he was younger. It
was like the difference between two friends, one you see every day and one only
every couple of years. They may have aged equally over time, but you don’t
notice it on the one you see every day, only on the one you haven’t seen for a
long time. One day you wake up and feel miserable but you don’t know if it’s
because you are getting sick or if it’s just normal since you felt almost as
miserable the day before. Your frame of reference is only the day before, or
maybe the week before; you can’t really compare how you feel now to how you
felt a year ago. In fact, the stark difference in how he felt when he first
went to the hospital with Mabel and when he first woke up here the day before
was already starting to fade. He was getting used to it and couldn’t frame a
reference point to when he had felt this good.

Thinking about Mabel and the hospital shifted his focus. This
was a troubling train of thought. The trip to the hospital, the preparation for
whatever might come of his surgery, and even the few hours he had spent
reconnecting with Mabel were all fresh in his mind. For him they happened
yesterday, or perhaps a couple days ago. It was clear, however, that some
amount of time had passed. The technology alone was proof positive that it wasn’t
1966 anymore. It was surprisingly easy to accept that. The rest, not so much. He
wasn’t sure what to believe. The simple biopsy could have gone awry, and he
could have slipped into a coma for a number of years. He recalled the article
he had read about the woman waking from her coma after nearly twenty years. It
took her months of extensive physical therapy before she was able to perform
the simplest of physical tasks. She couldn’t even talk for weeks, and walking
again was probably unlikely. They had called it muscular atrophy in the
article. But he felt like he could get out of the bed and dance a jig right
now.

He supposed if the technology to make a television the
thickness of a sheet of glass existed, then medical advances could explain his
physical condition. However, if thirty years had passed while he played
sleeping beauty, he would be well into his sixties, or even seventies. He felt
like he was a new man, even younger than his nearly forty year old body should
feel. There was no way he was in his seventies, and what he had seen of his
body so far in no way suggested he was any older. Despite how good he felt, he
found it hard to believe that medical science would ever have the cure for
aging, and certainly not within the span of his life. Try as he could though, he
wasn’t ready to accept that hundreds of years had passed or that he had died. It
was far beyond his capability to reason and even outside the scope of his
imagination. This train of thought led to a pile of questions that he could
barely form into coherent thoughts let alone try to reason out. The sheer
volume of unanswered questions shattered his feeling of utter relaxation and
the tension, frustration, and anxiety began to build at an uncontrollable pace.
He suddenly felt an uncompromising need to learn more about his situation.

In effort to regain the sense of serenity he had held only
moments before, he shifted his thoughts again, this time to what had just
happened. When he was younger, he was a bit of a hothead, quick to lose his
temper. It had led to some bad decisions and more than one fight. Simply
growing up, along with twenty years of military discipline, had burned out that
youthful spirit. It was confusing that he had been hot tempered in his earlier
conversation with Teague. Every time the doc said something he didn’t like or
didn’t comprehend, he got seriously angry. That was simply not like him. He was
“battle hardened” and even devastating news like the death of his wife and
child or learning he had cancer had not gotten him too riled up. Ironically
though, just thinking about this uncontrolled temper triggered another jolt of
anxiety over his situation and his tension grew. The last bit clarity and peacefulness
was now gone, replaced by the overwhelming need to
know
.

Perhaps it was his sudden desire to explore his surroundings,
or maybe he heard the faintest sound. Whatever triggered it, he was abruptly aware
of another presence in the room. He stopped breathing, held perfectly still,
and even tried to will his heart, which had started beating harder when the
wave of anxiety washed over him, to be still. A second passed, two, then three.
Another sound – the slightest rustle of fabric or maybe the intake of a quiet
breath.

“Is someone there? Teague is that you?”

There was a hesitation and then, softly, a female voice
spoke up. “No.” It came out a little choked, like she hadn’t expected to
suddenly have to talk. She cleared her throat and said, “Would you like me to
wake the doctor for you?”

“Uh… no, I… Who are you?” Jack had been half convinced his
mind had been playing tricks on him so the response startled him. He wasn’t
prepared to reply. “What are… were you watching me sleep?”

There was a long pause, as if the person were contemplating
whether or not to answer the question. “Um... Yes actually, I was.” Jack could
hear guilt and embarrassment in the voice, and it almost felt like he could
feel her blushing. “I’m sorry if I woke you, I was just...” She was obviously
uncomfortable trying to explain, probably not expecting to have been caught.

Her voice sounded vaguely familiar, but he couldn’t place
it. She hadn’t offered any more, and he got the feeling she couldn’t come up
with a good excuse for being here. He broke the uncomfortable pause with, “Who
are you?”

Her voice became more confident. “Um, my name is Wendy. I’m
a technician here, among other things.” Again, she left it hanging like there
was much more to say but wasn’t sure quite how to proceed.

As she spoke, he probed the dark room with his senses,
trying to focus in on her voice. He located the source behind him, probably in
the corner of the room. As much as his vision had improved she was completely
hidden in the dark. “Can you come over here so I can see you? I don’t like
talking to people when I can’t see them.” Actually he didn’t really mind it, he
was just curious to see her and it sounded like a good excuse.

There was the sound of wheels running on a smooth floor, and
Wendy materialized out of the darkness pushing an office type chair. As she
stepped into the pale blue light of the monitor, Jack felt the hair on the back
of his neck stand up. She moved like someone who was very in tune with their
body, no wasted movement and every step filled with confidence that it would
land exactly where it was supposed to. Her five foot six inch frame was
noticeably athletic, even in the dim light. The attraction he felt was
electric.

She rolled the chair next to the bed, near the foot, facing
him, and sat down gracefully. He had only caught a glimpse of her face when the
first jolt hit him, and now that she was sitting here facing him, it was a good
thing he was already lying down. She was stunningly attractive. Her straight dark
hair was cut fairly short, almost like a woman’s military cut, and framed her
face perfectly. Her cheekbones were just high enough to anchor her strong jaw
line without making her face look masculine. Full lips, a short slender nose,
and eyebrows angled just right completed a look that made it difficult for Jack
to speak. He put her at twenty-something years old, a little young for someone
like him. Nevertheless, he felt the need to say something witty, something
impressive. “So, can I ask why you’re in my room watching me sleep?”
Wow,
impressive
. To cover up his underwhelming attempt to dazzle her, he
manipulated the bed controls to sit up then fixed her with what he hoped was a
smoldering gaze.

She looked down at her knees in embarrassment, not seeming
to notice the effect she had on him. This time Jack could literally feel the
heat radiating from her body. “I, uh, guess I wanted to meet you. You know,
like without Doc or anyone around.”

The sound of her voice was electricity running up his spine.
He didn’t recall having this kind of attraction to anyone, ever. Not even
seeing Jenny for the first time had triggered a reaction like this. It sent his
mind ablaze and made it hard to even form a coherent thought. He was starting
to get a grip on it though, and he chastised himself for his lack of ability to
control his attraction. He fumbled on through the conversation, trying to
regain his composure. There were questions still burning in his mind and he
wanted to keep her talking. “Are you... um… not supposed to meet me or
something?”

“Oh no, nothing like that,” she answered quickly. “It would
be… difficult to explain.” She looked like she wanted to say more but left it
at that. Her answer was frustrating, but she was now staring at him. He felt
another rush from the attention. It had been a long time since such an
attractive woman,
okay, any woman at all
, had shown him this kind of
attention, and he felt himself getting a bit aroused. He shifted in the bed a
bit, surprised to find that he could move a lot better than before he slept. “Am
I making you uncomfortable?” she asked.

“No. Well, not really. I uh... well I... you see, I think
you are very attractive, and uh... well...” Now he was the one blushing, not
only because he was aroused by this complete stranger, but because he was
finding himself blubbering like a teenager who was trying to ask his dream girl
to the prom.

She was smiling at him, seeming to almost enjoy his
discomfort. “Relax. I’m not so attractive that you should be uncomfortable
around me, and besides, you have nothing to be worried about; you’re not so
ugly yourself.” She was trying to put him at ease, but once again Jack was
having a hard time controlling his emotions. He couldn’t seem to get
comfortable in his bed, and it felt like the temperature in the room had gone
up about twenty degrees. In his mind he was struggling to come to terms with
his behavior, but it was getting more and more difficult to think clearly.

He had never been a smooth talker around women, relying
mostly on decent looks and a steady confidence to help him score points with
the ladies. Even that confidence seemed to have failed at the moment. “Thanks,”
he said “but I don’t know what’s gotten into me lately. Oh, and by the way, you
are
that attractive.” He smiled nervously.

She still hadn’t stopped staring at him, but now her confidence
seemed to slip a little. She didn’t look quite as relaxed as she had a moment
ago. “The… uh… reason you are feeling so out of sorts is a side effect of the
whole growth process you have gone through the last seven weeks. Your body went
through puberty just recently, and the hormones that triggered the changes are
still raging in your system. You have this young body, and your mind and
memories don’t quite match. Being,” she seemed to search for a word “emotional,
is a perfectly normal response to the situation.”

The words took a moment to settle past the chemistry he was
feeling. Despite the maelstrom of emotion, anxiety, arousal, and confusion, his
curiosity grabbed hold of her words and the gears started turning at a furious
pace. “I’m not quite following you.” His mind raced, running back over his earlier
conversation. “You make it sound like I’m a teenager instead of a forty year
old man.” He had not seen himself in a mirror since, well, since before he went
in for surgery. Despite his earlier conviction that reversing the aging process
was simply not possible, he had to suppress the urge to look under the covers
at his body or even to just touch his face. Just a simple statement from this
complete stranger about hormones and puberty rang true and brought a thread of
doubt into his mind regarding what he knew couldn’t be possible.

Wendy sort of giggled, and in automatic reaction Jack
grinned like an infatuated schoolboy then caught himself and straightened out
his face, somewhat embarrassed both by his reaction and to his lack of
understanding. He tentatively asked, “You aren’t suggesting that what Teague
told me earlier about dying and being remade is really true, are you?”

She frowned, “I’m sorry, I was under the impression that you
understood. Perhaps I should go and leave this to Doc. I don’t want to cause
you problems and he is much better than me at explaining it…”