174
CHAPTER FIVE
As the door closed, I looked around in the chamber but couldn’t see anything. I closed my eyes, hoping everything would go well..I opened my eyes and appeared to be in a highly futuristic city, neon lights and tall skyscrapers everywhere. I was standing in the middle of the street, looking around in awe. It seemed as if multiple years had passed.. A lot of years. I walked down the sidewalk, cars were everywhere. The majority of them, from what I could see, were self-driving. Robots were cleaning roads, cutting the grass, doing construction work, inside buildings, manning work stations, greeting people, every job imaginable was being run by a robot. It was honestly kinda scary, since most of them had the figure of a human, yet no facial features; just a metal, gray exoskeleton.
One approached me yet I looked at my feet and continued walking, not having the guts to talk to any of them. Someone abruptly ran into me on the sidewalk, thankfully, not a robot.
“Hey! Oh- Sorry about that.” The person yelped.
“Sorry about that..”
“You okay?” They asked, getting back up from falling on the concrete.
“Yeah, are you?” I nodded.
“Yep.” They nodded as well. “I haven’t seen you around before.. New here?”
“Ahh.. yeah kinda.” I shrugged. “Could you tell me what day it is?”
“Oh! Nice to meet you then. Also, sure. It’s Thursday September 22nd 2076.”
“Alright.. Thanks.” I continued walking, shaking my head.
What was this place? I didn’t look any different which would be impossible.. If I was born in 2011, launched into space in 2032 when I was 23, and now it was 2076. That would make me 65? This all didn’t seem right.
I continued to walk down the streets, looking around. Everywhere I turned was something high tech, like nothing I had ever seen before. Why were there so many robots? How was this 2076? What city was I even in? Many questions started to run through my head as I thought to myself. I tried to stay out of the way of anyone, to avoid coming in contact with anyone; human or robot.
“Excuse me?!” Someone called from behind me.
“Yes?” I turned around and stopped, trying to make out who was behind me.
“Are you Scottin’s Daughter? I recognize you.” The person was a boy, a little taller than me and looked about 19 to 21. He had brown hair and bright green eyes with a casual outfit on.
“Yeah, he’s my dad. Why?” I shrugged. Scottin was my father’s last name, meaning it was mine as well.
“Oh! Well, I’m your neighbor. Why haven’t you been here for the past couple of days?”
“What? I don’t know what you’re talking about, Kid. I don’t even know you. I woke up in the middle of the street!” What was this Kid going on about..? I looked around, seeing if anyone was watching.
“You’ve been friends with me for 4 years, how can you not know who I am?”
“Okay, Kid. Listen. As I said before, I don’t know you. Can you tell me where my Dad is?”
“Fine fine.. He’s at your house.” He muttered, rolling his eyes.
“Thank you.” I walked away. Wait- where even was my house?
I heaved a sigh and stopped, stepping to the side of the sidewalk. I pulled out my device, which was conveniently in my jean’s pocket. I started to search for my father’s name, in hopes to get an address in which I could put into a GPS and follow home. To my surprise, he was actually there. Lieutenant of the Tucson Country Police Department. After a bit more searching, I plugged the house address into my device and started to walk down the sidewalks, following its apparently 16 mile route. It took about an hour at a speed walk to get to my father’s house. It looked just like the one I had lived in before the launch yet now had a balcony and an updated porch. I walked up to the door and knocked, anticipating what was going to happen.
“Who is it?” My Dad yelled.
“It’s Fae?” I called back.
The door then opened after a few moments, my Dad didn’t look any different. He looked like he hadn’t shaved his beard in a little bit, but that was the only difference.
“Fae! Where have you been?”
“Uh.. Walking home?” I shrugged, looking to the sides.
“Okay.. Glad you’re okay no matter what happened.”
I walked inside the house, looking to see if it was any different than what I had remembered. It wasn’t any different than before, not one bit of it had changed.
“Hungry?”
“Uh.. sure?” I shrugged to the question, sitting at the kitchen island’s countertop.
Hours went by afterwards, going through the normal routines my Dad and I would have on a daily basis. Talking, watching TV, going on a walk which was an occasional thing but seemed to happen today, and other random things we did. I did however notice that DNA was not anywhere, no one in my room or around the house doing something. He was gone. It came to my mind to look for him, but in all honesty, I was just confused on what was going on. Questions from earlier came back to mind as I sat at my desk, reading one of the history books I had on my bookshelf.
“I have to leave now for work.” My Dad poked his head in the door, dressed in black pants, a bullet-proof vest, black shirt; his normal outfit.
“Alright.” I nodded to him, waving. “Love you.”
“Love you too.” He smiled back at me and then closed the bedroom door, walking out. I could hear him open and close the door, using his keys to lock it once it was shut.
I sat there, aimlessly reading, for about another 2 two hours. Multiple random topics came up in this book that confused me.. I had read this book so many times, why was it different now? Things that were in 2032 were in this book, now titled as ‘History?’ I rolled the chair over to my bookshelf, starting to dig through any other history book that was there, wondering if anything else had changed in them that I didn’t recognize from before.
As I scanned through them, quite a bit of what I remember had been changed. Of course, some things were still the same yet the majority? Different. Things from the early 2000s to the 2030s were here, marked as history. Some of the later 1900s, that were supposed to be in there, were still in the books. Most of it was changed otherwise. I laid down in my bed and tried to go to sleep, closing my eyes.
…
When I opened them, I was not in the same place. It was completely dark and extremely cold. I looked around, feeling around in the tight space. Then it hit me; I was still in the cryostat chamber. That’s why that had been so weird, it was a dream. That was a relief. I tried to find the control panel to open the door to the chamber, doing so within a few moments.
“Good Morning, Fae.” I heard something say, recognizing it as DNA’s monotone voice.
“Hey, Buddy.” I said, opening the storage locker. “What happened?”
“There have been in total 16 voice recorded messages left with information on the black box device. I have listened to all of them, recording them in case something went wrong with the box. No one has arrived in the capsule yet and I estimated we are hundreds of thousands of miles from Earth.” He explained, ending with the usual; a thumbs up.
“Ookay. Can you start playing back the recordings one by one so I can listen to them?”
“Yes. They are approximately 3-10 minutes long each.” He said, his audio starting to play the first recording of Caismir’s voice.
It took about 2 hours but I eventually got through every one of the 16 voice recordings he had left with information he found to be necessary. It entailed what tests were being ran, what day it was, how far away I was from Earth and information on the retrieval of my capsule. The last one, the 16th, ended with saying that it would only be a few days more before they came to me and that it had been 11 days since I had gone into the cryostat chamber.
“Thanks for playing them, DNA. Did my Dad ever say anything that you could hear?”
“He only said that he hoped you were okay. That was 7 days, 11 hours, 23 minutes and 38 seconds ago.” He said, displaying each number on his screen as he said it.
“Gotcha.” I nodded. “So we’re kinda just stuck here for now?”
“It seems so. The 16th recording by Caismir was recorded approximately 1 and a half days ago. So they should be here within the next 24 to 48 hours according to what he said.”
“That’s good to hear. The idea of floating endlessly in space without any contact is a scary thought.”
“Indeed. We have floated quite a bit off track but are still able to be reached by this device.” He used his hand to point to the black box.
I shrugged and strapped myself in, wondering if I should try and contact Caismir. I decided to do so, just to let them know what had happened. I started to turn the dials as the static came back on.
“Hey, can you guys hear me?”
“Oh!” Caismir exclaimed, seemingly taken aback. “Hello there, Faelyn.”
“Hey, just wanted to contact you to let you know I was out of the chamber.”
“Thank you for reaching out, we are still working on getting someone to you.”
“Yeah, I heard. My robot recorded everything you said over the past 11 days and played it all back for me over the past couple of hours.”
“Okay, talk to you soon.” He said as the static came back in.
I leaned back, DNA sitting on my lap as I held him, preventing him from flying away. I thought of what to do, humming to myself. DNA quietly started to play the song I was humming, his screen changing colors frequently.
“Why is your visor doing that?”
“I am attempting to ‘Lighten the mood’ as humans call it.” He said, clasping his hands as quotation marks. I smiled back at him.
I changed the song I was humming a couple of times, thankful I wasn’t sitting here by myself. Well.. I kinda was but it didn’t truly feel like that.
“Faelyn?” Casimir came through the black box.
“Yes?”
“Hello. So, I just ran diagnostics on the engine, boosters and things on the craft we are using to retrieve you and bring you to the ISS. The tests uh..”
“What happened?” A sinking feeling started to settle in.
“The main engine and a few other minor parts of the craft are not safe to use. So this could set us back.. Quite a bit.”
“Alright.” I heaved a sigh. “What do you want me to do?”
“We are going to attempt to reach the ISS and use one of the supply capsules attached to the ship currently to reach you. However we have to figure out a route to safely get there and make sure that craft has enough fuel.”
“So, should I go back into the cryostat chamber?” I asked, shrugging.
“No, we haven’t tested back to back cryostat sessions. I would say it is unsafe at the moment. Speaking of this, my mind has been all over the place.. Are you experiencing any side effects? Things such as immense headaches, fatigue, heart rate surges and things?”
“No, I’ve been fine.” I quickly thought back to the past couple of hours.
“Alright, good to hear.” He mused, seeming to be thinking to himself. “Let me know if anything like that happens. For now, I would advise just waiting and I will contact you later.”
“Okay, Casimir. Talk to you soon.” I said as the box’s sound went to static.
I then sat there in silence, staring down at DNA who was silent as well. I hugged him, hoping for the best. I felt helpless, I couldn’t do anything. I rested my head gently on top of his, starting to think of, in fact, there was anything I could do.
Hello! Thanks for reading Chapter 5 of Millennium. :D Hope you enjoyed! Let me know if you have any feedback, suggestions or comments. :)
Chapter 1: https://www.planetminecraft.com/blog/millennium-chapter-1/
Chapter 2: https://www.planetminecraft.com/blog/millennium-chapter-2/
Chapter 3: https://www.planetminecraft.com/blog/millennium-chapter-3/
Chapter 4: https://www.planetminecraft.com/blog/millennium-chapter-4/
Chapter 6: https://www.planetminecraft.com/blog/millennium-chapter-6/
Chapter 7: https://www.planetminecraft.com/blog/millennium-chapter-7/
Chapter 8: https://www.planetminecraft.com/blog/millennium-chapter-8/
| Tags |
tools/tracking
6148288
6
millennium-chapter-5
Team UNNAMED
Dandalf
KongPlayz
thai2141
EarthUser
GalaxyCat24
GreekRussian
Panda_Iceberg
Papa Enny
seventeenpointfour
MarecekD033
Create an account or sign in to comment.