Violet Morningstar felt incredibly cold as she gasped for air. Her lungs wouldn't inflate. She was suffocating. A drone of voices penetrated her panic and one in particular stood out.
"Stop fighting the panic, Dr. Morningstar. The sooner you do, the sooner it will pass. That's it. Good girl. Now try to inhale slowly. No. You're panicking again. Inhale slowly. That's right. See, it's better now."
Violet listened to the monotone voice of the person guiding her through what seemed to be a dark tunnel toward a speck of light. She willed herself to relax and breathe slowly. Sometimes her determination to follow the directions of the voice calmed her; sometimes the panic overtook her again. She didn't know how long she and the voice interacted, but it seemed like a long time.
The light, brighter now, was hurting her eyes. The voice said, "You're coming out of the dark because you're squeezing your eyelids. That's great. Soon you'll be back with us. But for now, to help you, I'm going to cover your eyes. She felt gentle hands place something on her head and pull it down. The sharp pain caused by the light lessened. She relaxed. She wanted to go back to sleep.
"Violet, I know you want to sleep again, but if you do, we'll have to repeat this whole process. Do you understand?"
"Yes," she thought.
"Try to answer my question with your voice. Do you understand that you must stay awake?"
In her mind she screamed yes, but when she tried to respond, her mouth wouldn't move. She concentrated all of her effort again and an unintelligible sound escaped, which made the voice very happy.
"That's my girl! You're almost fully awake."
For a long time the voice and Violet continued interacting. Finally, they reached a milestone when the voice said, "Open your eyes."
Violet obeyed and saw darkness.
"Are they open?"
"Yes," she croaked.
"Excellent. Now close them again."
She did what the voice said.
"I'm going to remove the covering over your eyes and I want you to slowly open them. The light will hurt but this is something you must do. Do you understand?"
"Yes," she croaked again.
"Good. Now let's get you back into the land of the living, Dr. Morningstar."
Violet stared at the white ceiling in the hospital room she'd occupied for a week. She'd been staring at it for over an hour. Throughout each day and night, white-coated people with masks over their mouths would enter and inquire as to her wellbeing and also check the machines she was hooked to.
The process of bringing her out of cryosleep had been long, tedious, sometimes uncomfortable, and sometimes downright painful. When she'd become coherent enough to understand the happenings around her, the kindly doctor who had awakened her had visited. He'd been dressed in white garb and also wearing a face mask, so all she'd seen of his face were twinkling hazel eyes surrounded by wrinkles. He'd held her hand and said, "Dr. Morningstar, I can't tell you what a pleasure it is to finally meet you. I've been overseeing your cryocrypt for many years."
"How long…asleep?"
The doctor hadn't responded. Instead, he'd patted her hand with his gloved one and replied, "Please let me introduce myself. I'm Dr. Nathan Glasmir, the head of the cryogenics lab."
Violet had nodded but repeated her question. "How long have I been asleep?" Speaking such a long sentence hurt her throat.
Dr. Glasmir replied, "You mustn't overtax your vocal chords."
When she'd started to ask her question again, he'd lifted a finger to stop her. "You've been here longer than anyone—605 years."
Violet hadn't been able to breathe as her eyes rounded and tears clouded them. Everyone and everything she had ever known was gone.
Dr. Glasmir had puffed a breath. "I know that information is traumatic, so I'm giving you a sedative. When you wake, we'll talk some more."
Violet hadn't wanted to be sedated, but it was too late. The doctor had already lifted a tiny device to her neck that made her feel a gentle puff of air.
Now, turning onto her side and staring at a wall as bland as the ceiling, she reflected on Dr. Glasmir's revelations over the past week. The year was 3320 and the entire population of the world still lived underground. A procedure for terraforming the earth had yet to be perfected because scientists had never been able to keep seeds germinating for more than a month—the same amount of time Violet had experienced. When three hundred years had passed with no progress, they had turned their scientific minds toward improving life underground. A hundred years earlier the universities had removed the study of terraforming from their curriculums.
Dr. Glasmir had also brought her current on her own condition. About ten years previous a cure for radioactive influenza had been discovered and then gone through the tedious process of experimentation and trials. Only the previous year, GMADS, or the Governing Medical Association of Doctors and Scientists had approved its use. The doctor had assured Violet that she was inoculated during her "thaw" and her daily blood tests had revealed no sign of the disease.
Still staring at the wall she wondered if the entire underground world was as stark as this room. She closed her eyes and rather than continue pondering her present predicament, returned her thoughts to life as Frannie. It was as real to her as this room, more real in fact, because it was filled with life, color, emotions, sunsets, sunrises, and especially family. She stifled a sob and whispered against her pillow, "Frannie, why did you show me a life I can never have? A life I fell in love with?"