Steve E Donaldson
Stories (6/0)
Trouble in Denmark
Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say. However, it would not have surprised me if the screams Jessica made from within the Hibernation chamber echoed throughout the rest of the ship and made their way outside. I sucked greedily at the drink tube that provided the mix of water, salt, sugar, protein powder, vitamins and caffeine – known as wake-up juice. The screams became louder as my pod door cracked opened and a blast of cold, stale air rushed in and made my body shiver. I had discovered that no matter what I wore in the sleep pod I always woke up cold. This time I had ditched the uncomfortable long johns and went with gym shorts and a tank top thinking the change would keep me from sweating as much. Nope, I was still soaking wet and the stale air from the ship made it worse. I squeezed my eyes shut to help clear the blurriness, took one last swig of wake-up juice and pushed at the pod. The top went out then up and like usual, I slid out and landed on my knees. The floor of the chamber was padded for just this occasion. As normal, I had lost all feeling in my legs. It was one of the various side effects of cryogenic sleep. The doctors didn’t know what caused it, but it happened to over thirty percent of those awakening, and the since the effect only lasted a few minutes with no long-term problems, they simply added padding to the floor. As I waited for the pins and needles to start, I looked around the chamber to see who else was up. This was it. After 200 years of space travel, we would be arriving at our destination.
By Steve E Donaldson2 years ago in Fiction
The Shark
The bump jars me awake. I pry open my salt-crusted eyes and see a blurry blue-colored sky framed in the open orange door of the life raft. Wind pours in through the opening and stirs the stale air inside the raft. The air flow feels good against my sunburned skin and helps revitalize my body. My mouth is dry but I manage to conjure up enough moisture to lick my cracked lips. The relief is short-lived.
By Steve E Donaldson3 years ago in Fiction
Grunt Work
The elevator door opened and we stepped onto the transportation yard. At least it is called a yard though we are still two levels below the surface. Six trucks were lined up in convoy formation. There were 48 of us on this trek, the largest I had been on. Without speaking we walked to our assigned trucks and waited for the transport guys to load us aboard. Once I had wanted to work up here in what I considered “fresh” air, but after one visit and a few hours of breathing the toxins they take in every day I was happy to stay below and suck on recycled air.
By Steve E Donaldson3 years ago in Fiction