CRYONICS UK

A Toast To Cryonics

By  Maria Camacho

I woke up suddenly in a strange bed.  The sheets were white and a soft duvet covered my whole body, making me feel safe and secure.  I peeked from under the blankets and could see a big mirror right in front of me.  The metal fan above it made a swishing noise, sending waves of fresh air in my direction. I shut my eyes and tried to remember what I was doing here but my mind was a blank. I felt as if I had swum in a void filled only by dust and pain.  I glanced at the reflection of the bed in the mirror and glimpsed only a bit of my hair amidst the soft duvet. Is anyone there? I tried to ask but no words would come out of my mouth. "Help me," I managed to whisper. I ordered my right arm to move and could feel my fingers fluttering in the warm air. I felt very thirsty and my dried tongue tried to moisten my lips. I want to drink," I said aloud and a glass of cool water was suddenly standing on the small table that was next to my bed. Someone had obviously brought it or perhaps it had been there all the time and I had not noticed it.  An ice cube was floating and made a clicking noise as it melted. "I want to sit up," I said aloud. My muscles obeyed slowly as if my whole body had been asleep for some time and was now starting to wake up.  I reached for the cup and brought it to my lips, tasting the delicious coolness of the liquid. "That's better," I said. I touched the floor tentatively with the tip of my toes and it felt soft. I stood up and looked at the room from my new position and found it quite pleasant even with the intrusive mirrors.  A picture was on top of a table and I recognised my own face with its long nose and thin lips that were forever smiling. I didn't remember ever having a flat like this one.  Perhaps I had drunk too much wine the night before and had gone to sleep in somebody's house. "I want to have a shower now," I mumbled and was suddenly transported into a bath full of bubbles that popped in front of my face. "How did I get here ?" I enquired. "I'll tell you in a minute," a voice replied. I looked around but there was nobody else in the bathroom. "Where am I ?" I asked again. "You must first try to remember who you are and I will then help you to establish where you are." "I know," I said. "I'm dead and this is heaven." I looked at my reflection in the mirrors as if expecting to see a pair of wings sprouting from my back.  "You always wanted to live forever, didn't you ?" the voice asked. I vaguely remembered paying money into a life insurance with the sole purpose of having my body frozen when I died much to the horror of my family and friends. "Yes, I did," I replied. "You have just come back to life after spending aeons in suspended animation." "I don't understand," I said as I stood up, the water dripped from my thighs into the steamy bath.  I reached for the towel and dried my naked body while admiring my reflection in the mirror. "Have I really died ?"  "You were placed for many years in a capsule at a very low temperature and your brain survived nearly intact." "I must be in the future then." I whispered. "It's an alternative future and things are not really what they appear to be."   I took a bit of soap and blew on it.  "It looks very normal to me."  "I'll show you," the voice said. The soapy water started to fly about as if a gale was blowing in the bath. "Stop it," I shouted.     My face was covered in soap and my eyes hurt.  I searched blindly for the towel but it suddenly appeared in my hand and I wiped my face. "The normal laws of nature don't apply to this place," the same voice explained. "Who are you ?" I inquired. "You can call me your inner voice. I haven't got a body and only live inside your head but I'm real." "Are you trying to say that you are me or I am you ?"There was a pause as if the voice was thinking before she spoke. "I was brought back to life a while ago. I missed my formal existence and my friends, so I decided to upload copies of myself into silicon." "And my world is not real, is it ?" I asked again. "It exists only for you." I was very angry and kicked the mirrors and the pink furniture  that were in the room.  "Thank you very much for bringing me back to life only as a fragment of your imagination." The voice was concerned now and ordered me to stop thrashing the place. "It doesn't exist," I shouted as I threw the heavy wardrobe against one of the mirrors and it shattered, sending shards of glass everywhere.  My hands were bleeding. I touched the warm liquid which looked like blood and also tasted salty just like the real thing. "It's a trick," I said, expecting someone to jump out at any minute and tell me that I was in candid camera. "You only have to wish for things to be all right again."  "I wish to be back in my own world," I whispered. "That's not possible." I rolled on the floor in between the pieces of glass and wept.  Bits of mirror were hurting my naked skin and a pool of blood was slowly oozing around me. "I wish to be back on my bed," I cried. I was suddenly in between soft sheets. The blood had gone and I shut my eyes, trying to forget the pain of the last few minutes. "Do you want to listen to me now ?" the voice said softly.     I nodded and dived under the duvet as if accepting my fate. "I have created several versions of myself running on parallel so that I will never lose my identity. You are the one from the year 2000.  There are other versions of you from 2005, 2010, 2015, etc, at five years intervals and you might like to meet them one day. "That's fantastic," I said. "I will live forever and ever in the same year." "You will never get old or suffer from any illnesses." "What about my friends ?" "You can recall all of them here if you want." "But they will be just illusions, won't they ?" "You can make them as real as you want," the voice said. Suddenly a girl who had worked with me at my office appeared. She was called Mary and was wearing a small skirt and the blue transparent blouse that she thought was very sexy. "Hello," she purred. "What are you doing here ?" I inquired. "I'm coming to celebrate the new year with you." I turned around on my bed. "I didn't want you here today." She pulled the covers, exposing my naked body. "Why is she here ?" I asked the voice. "You wanted her to come, didn't you ?" "No, I didn't and you have to stop trying to guess what I want." "Who are you talking to ?" Mary asked. She got up from the bed and looked around the room, admiring the big mirrors and pink furniture. "This must be a game and you are hiding someone else here." I stood up not realizing that my blanket had fallen on to the floor. "I want you to go away." She sat on the sofa and looked at my naked body. "I can't leave." "I want her to go," I pleaded with the voice. "She cannot go before January." "Why ?" I asked. "She was part of your life just before you died and she will go away as the year ends." I put my nightgown on and looked at the calendar on the wall. "Will the new year be two thousand and one ?" "No, it will always be 2000." Mary was still seating on the sofa but she was staring ahead. "Hello," I shouted and waved my arms in front of her face but she didn't move. "She is only a computer projection now," the voice explained. "At least she doesn't talk anymore," I said. "I have to live always in the same year and virtual reality people will be my only friends." "You are actually moving through time." I sat down again on my bed. "What do you mean ?" "Time is passing by even as we speak." "What is the date now then ?" "It is 25,800,800,800 AD," the voice whispered. "Why did you take so long to create me ?" I screamed. "I'm trying to save energy so you live a second of your life every five hundred million years." "Very generous of you," I said. "Another ten billion years have gone. How time flies !" "We are running at the moment in a straight line through the space continuum but our path will be altered once real time ends and we start to wander down the realm of other dimensions." "Can't you explain it in plain English ?" I asked. "Look out of your window and in a few moments you will see the visible universe come to an end." I  moved to the window as Mary seemed to come back to life. She followed me, muttering something to herself. There were the trees and the lights of distant buildings shining in the night. The stars were in the sky and they looked normal.  Orion was right above us and Sirius was at its side as it had been for billions of years. Something odd then started to happen. Eerie objects that I guessed were black holes seemed to be swallowing most of the stars. I watched in a trance as the starry sky was suddenly turned into a black void. Mary was worried about us being alone in a place in which time and space had ceased to exist and I must confess that I also felt uneasy.  The universe had finished with a whimper after all and I wanted to know what was going to happen to me now. "Don't worry about a thing," the voice said. "We have infinite time ahead of us and there are certain tricks that I might be able to explain to you one day.  It is all quantum mechanics." Mary wiped her virtual tears with her expensive blouse as I looked at the space left by the departing universe and wept. "Would you mind restoring the old sky ? It just doesn't look right without the stars," I pleaded. "Of course," the voice said and the old familiar constellations came back into view. I heard people talking behind me. I turned around and was surprised to see all my friends and family. "Happy new year," they chanted. "Did you see how the universe finished ?" I asked. "I don't know what you are talking about," my uncle Harry replied. Some people were looking out of the window. "It is a clear night," someone said. "But it's only a computer generated sky," I tried to explain. "Let's have a toast for the new year," uncle Harry said. Everybody raised their glasses while Mary sang and her high pitched voice echoed around the room.  I went out into the balcony and stood there for some time in the gentle evening breeze.  London laid at my feet and I wondered how everything could look so normal when the universe had gone. "It's all right," the voice explained.  "We have taken another path in the space continuum and are living in between universes now." "Take a piece of paper and fold it," it ordered and I did as I was told. I noticed that there was a space in between the two sheets. "That's called hyperspace."     Uncle Harry was looking at me.  "Who are you talking to ?" "She often speaks to herself," Mary said.     "And you only live in my imagination," I replied. "Are you all right ?" my elderly aunt asked and I nodded. I switched the television on but Einstein's face appeared on the screen and someone was explaining the theory of relativity.  I was living in a place where time had stood still and space was non existent and I was eternal.  I then asked for everyone to be quiet.  "Dear family," I said.  "I want you to raise your glasses to toast to Cryonics." "To cryonics," they chanted and I smiled. The earth then appeared on the television, followed by the solar system, the galaxy and our local group of galaxies. "All that is gone," the presenter explained. I then saw myself floating around in the void.  I now had immortality and could play with space and time and the theory of relativity. "To Cryonics," I repeated, raising my glass in front of my family and their faces became blurred and were lost in the darkness of space.

The End