Humans Don't Hibernate [Part 57/?] (Patreon)

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Evina

Cold.

Dry.

Dark.

And quiet.

Then, lights, a lot of them.

All of them at once, shining brighter than anything I’ve ever seen before in my life.

I was shivering, despite being fully clothed and clad in the ceremonial attire that the shelter elders had helped me don.

The outfit was uncomfortable, a layer of skin tight something, a material that I’d only felt before in older, rarer relics and machines that were kept away from prying curious hands for the sake of elongating their already elongated service life. The form fitting suit was plugged directly to the walls of this formerly off-limits zone, starting first with one, two, then rapidly expanding into a web of cables that felt ridiculous and overwhelming, but also terrifying at the same time.

“Evina, step forward.” I heard a familiar voice speak over the aging intercoms. Yet no matter how warm or familiar that voice was, it felt alien, cruel, and unforgiving when taken in this new otherworldly context.

I did as instructed, entering further into the chamber that glowed this brilliant, otherworldly tint of blue I’d never seen before. Stark white lines were rapidly forming on the floor, pointing me in the direction of a central pillar affixed to a series of carefully constructed pylons, flanked by purpose-built scaffolding, and handrails that looked entirely unnecessary and could’ve just been cannibalized for scrap…

In fact the whole room just felt superfluous, because in a world where anything and everything was fair game for the grabby hands of a small batch of survivors to pluck and repurpose, this place just shouldn’t exist.

This room, this entire chamber, felt unnatural, off, and completely wrong when compared to the rest of the underground facility I called home.

It was taking everything inside of me to not just run out of here with my tail between my legs, but to be honest, I don’t think I could even if I wanted to; because of all the wires, cables, and tubes attached to my suit and helmet.

“Step onto the platform, and stand facing the wall.” The voice continued, what was and should have been a reassuring, calming voice, now just stern and cold.

Seeing no alternative, and with my entire life leading up to this point… I relented.

This was my destiny. I thought to myself, as I took slow, prodding, careful steps through the massive chamber and up towards the central pillar.

This is who I was meant to become. I continued saying to myself over and over, trying desperately to drown out my animal instincts that yelled at me to get away from this otherworldly construct.

I will not break the line. I spoke inwardly as I noticed two handlebars to my left and right, with recessed areas built almost precisely for both of my hands.

“Remain with your front facing the wall, and grip the two constructs to your left and right. Do not release until you are instructed to release.”

I tentatively reached for the handlebars, my hands shaking before finally, I mustered up the last of my courage to grip them, both of them, tight.

It was then that the whole room went dark, as only a single spotlight above the platform illuminated me and the space immediately surrounding me.

“Initializing transference process.” The voice spoke sternly, ominously, before I felt as if my helmet was gripped tight by some unseen mechanical hand, holding it roughly in place, and my head along with it. “Do not move, any movement can disrupt the process.” The voice continued in a half-threatening, half-reassuring tone.

Nothing happened for the next few seconds, no additional orders, no movements from any of the machines. The world was eerily quiet, dark, and cold.

That was, until it was all interrupted by a harsh KA-THUNK of some breaker being flipped.

Barely a second later, my vision went dark. My whole body refused to move even if I wanted it to, and I suddenly felt as if I was somehow yanked away from my own head as it felt as if I was now floating just inches away from my form.

Then, suddenly and without warning, there was pain.

I screamed.

“The inheritance cycle has begun. Do not move.”

=====

32 Hours After the First Round of Interloper Interrogations. Bridge of the UNAFS Perseverance en route to the Medbay.

Lysara

“Right, so, what’s the situation with our alien friend here?” I spoke with a tired breath, feeling the surge of exhaustion starting to catch up with me now. It wasn’t immediate, but as I finally left the bridge for the first time in what was probably half a day of being glued to a screen entrenched in work, tiredness and exhaustion made itself known in the worst but most predictable ways possible.

It hit me in the form of a staggering lightheadedness, affecting my gait as much as it did my vision. This was soon followed up by a one-two punch in the form of an angry, prickly sensation gnawing at my mid abdomen, my stomach soon letting out an unrelenting growl of displeasure.

“Maybe we should be addressing your situation first, Lysara.” Vir spoke with a concerned sigh, very much miffed himself, and for good reason too.

“This wouldn’t be the first time I skipped out on a meal on this mission, or on other missions prior to this one in fact.” I spoke assuringly, staggering out of the room before working myself into a renewed vigor.

“Ugh, just at least eat a QuickMeal or something, you organics always love to flaunt around your abilities to forego the most basic of requirements in sustaining your weak fleshy forms like it’s some sort of a competition or a challenge. Numbers of skipped meals are thrown around like a badge of honor, and hours of sleep eschewed for work are tallied up like a pilot’s kill-count. It’s bizarre, and seriously concerning.” Vir continued prattling on, as we finally made our way out of the elevated tower that was the bridge proper, and started our descent towards the bowels of the ship where our guest was being rapidly rushed to the quick-assembly quarantine medbay.

“It would seem as if it’s quite a human thing to do as well, judging by your reply.” I tried my best to dodge the AI’s solid arguments, leading to what I could only describe as an unamused face being plastered on Vir’s screenface. Two solid horizontal lines coupled with one longer, larger line underneath it, whilst decidedly simplified, did not detract from the message being conveyed. “That’s probably not the best justification I could have brought up, so I guess I stand corrected.” I relented, allowing the AI to shift his expression once more to one of a bemused concern, before the elevator dinged and we were once more thrust into our usual motions.

It took us a solid four minutes to make our way down the long, straight corridors, and towards the very same medbay that I’d occupied just a few weeks ago.

I knew it hadn’t been that long, but so much had happened in the span of so little time, that it honestly felt like a lifetime ago now where I had that heart to heart with Vir; where my whole world was turned on its head with the revelation of the whole Vuark situation.

I still don’t know if I truly have moved on from that yet, or if I’ve just become increasingly more jaded to it over time.

Regardless of what I felt, it was clear that our new unexpected visitor was very much still knocked out cold, their status completely unknown to me, as the medbots began the careful, meticulous process of moving the alien from the transfer pod and gently onto one of the beds in a newly set up part of the medbay.

“Quarantine procedures, and you said humanity hadn’t yet encountered an alien species in their time?”

“They hadn’t, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t extensively plan procedures for when it did happen. And contrary to what early science fiction may have led many humans to believe, any first contact, or heck, any second, third, fourth, or twentieth contact is always to be conducted with Modified Biosafety Level A-4 procedures in mind. Viruses, bacteria, fungi, heck, even organic particulates whilst probably not cross-compatible due to the fundamental differences in biology, can still act as biological irritants at best, or outright biohazardous allergen at worst.”

“So, my first contact with Elijah, why was he so eager and able to meet in person-”

“Because he had an entire lifetime’s worth of xenobiology researchers to properly confirm that there was no risk of this with your kind. So, that was sort of a one-off situation I guess.” Vir shrugged. “But in the case of these unknown critters, we’re going to be respecting the MBSL procedures.

I didn’t have anything to add as I continued to watch as several readings began making themselves known on the observation screen separating this part of the medbay from the hallway.

Soon enough, more and more monitoring attachments were hooked onto the alien. From their head all the way to their chest, wired and wireless sensors and nodules were fastened on tightly, leading to a flurry of readings that I could not interpret for the life of me.

“So, how’s our furry friend looking?”

“I mean, take everything I say with the huge caveat of the fact that I’m sort of flying blind here without a good xenomedical atlas on their species, let alone a medical reference… they seem to be… stable. Airway’s intact, which is good. Breathing’s fine as well, I don’t see any injuries or any issues with the respiratory tract at least. Though we are seeing some circulatory issues, blood pressure’s all over the place, going to be doing a full scan of them soon to see if there’s any internal bleeds going on. Otherwise, there’s quite a bit of bruising going on along and around their arms, and legs so, there’s that.” Vir spoke in rapid succession, eliciting a single nod from me and not much else, as I looked on into the room with concern.

“Well, here's hoping that Team B comes across some medical texts, and fast.” I replied after a while, as I watched on as a larger scanner was brought into the room.

It took a few moments to properly finagle all of the wires attached to the furred alien up and around the bed, before sliding their whole form in.

However, just as the machine was starting to warm up, and just as the first readings were coming through, several alarms started to blare as the already-fluctuating readings began spiking or flatlining in equal measures.

“W-what’s going on?!”

Vir, not wasting a single second, not even showing a sign of panic, brought up brainwave patterns coming in live from the alien. “Seizure.”

“Did… did the machine cause that or-”

“No, or at least I hope not.” Vir replied, as he brought up another scan, one that the machine had clearly done just before the seizure. “Intracranial hemorrhage, nothing too major, but it’s clear this species might be particularly sensitive to intracranial trauma. Or perhaps something else, I don’t know. What I do know however is that I have to get her into emergency neurosurgery, and stat.”

“But, we don’t even know if-”

“If we don’t do anything at all it’s definitely game over for them. So, it’s do this blindly, or don’t, and be assured in their death. I’m going for emergency intervention, but I need your call on this too Lysara.”

The whole world suddenly weighed down atop of me again, but it didn’t take me longer than a few seconds to decide on the most obvious path forward. “Do it. If the alternative means assured death, then we have to at least try something.”

No quicker did I say that, did another alert suddenly come through, as Vir turned to me with a look of abject disbelief.

“Team B has found what looks to be a massive library.” The AI announced, eyeing me down knowingly.

“How big?”

A live feed was quickly brought up to the window, revealing a structure that at one point was probably in the orders of magnitude as large as several sports stadiums.

“Then leave it up to me. I’ll help you narrow down the location of where the medical texts more than likely are. Just get me a sample size from each quadrant of the ruin.”

Both of our eyes soon turned to the deceptively unresponsive looking alien, as we knew that we had to act fast.