Wakeup

The man from the past woke up suddenly, standing in a room filled with strange machines and people he didn't know. His tongue felt like a strip of dry cardboard, and as he started to move muscles that had lain stiff and dormant for lord-knows-how-long his nerves began to cry out that he was

"Cold."

The faceless hazmat suits surrounding him stepped backwards with a start, and began to turn to one another, filling the air with the buzz of radio static.

"I'm cold."

One edges forward and presses a button on their visor, which unclouds to reveal the vaguely worried face of a young woman. At the flick of a switch, the black box on the visor's front begins to speak in her voice.

"Yes, you've been in… well, we don't know. Our best guess is stasis. Your nerves are all raw and, uh, frizzled. It's not actually cold, you just feel it."

The man shivers, stamping his feet on the laboratory floor. "I'm… definitely cold." He blinks. "Where am I?"

The woman looks to her colleagues for support. Finding none, she sighs and turns back to the man.

"It's going to take some explaining. We've no idea how long you've been under for — whatever the tech was that was keeping you alive was preventing any kind of cell growth. You're basically the same as you were when you… went under."

"Not…" The man coughs, dribbling a small amount of clear blue fluid down his bare chest. "Not what I asked."

"Right, right. Are you familiar with the concept of Earth?"

"I should think so, yes."

"Well, this used to be it."

"Used to be?"

"Told you it was going to take some explaining." She looks around the room, flicks the switch on her mouthpiece again, and tells somebody to for God's sake get this man a chair. And some clothes.


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