Read Online Twilight Earth by Ben Winston - Free Book Online

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    “The whole reason we’re down here to begin with is to insure that the human race survives what’s happening to it. Although it may seem cowardly, think of this as our part of the fight, or perhaps more accurately, as our lifeboat.
    “Now, I know it may sound like playing the fiddle while Rome burns, but I suggested we all have a picnic lunch so we can talk and get to know one another. In order for this to work, we are going to need to trust and respect each other. We need to start on that now." He paused and turned to the closest person and held out his hand. "Good afternoon, my name is Ben Bedouin."
    Jon’s wife, Ellie happened to be the person, and she immediately caught on to his ploy. She took his hand and introduced herself. “Good afternoon, Ben, I’m Ellie Lyam. It's a pleasure to meet you.”
    As he’d intended, the rest of the people also began introducing themselves, and relaxing. As the afternoon progressed, more people came to the park, and joined the picnic.
    Later that night, when the notification came for condition three, the residents of the pod were more accepting of what was about to happen to them. None of them wanted to go into the stasis chambers, but there were no problems getting them to go in either. So after a moment of silence for the massive loss of life that had brought them this situation, Ben verified that everyone had indeed entered the chambers before doing so himself.
    He found that it unnerved him to see all those people in the small glass coffins of the chambers. It especially bothered him to see Deirdre, Jorga, Kaitlin and Marcy in them. With a deep breath, he lay back in his own chamber and pulled the door closed.
    ––––––––
    Waking up was a slow, disjointed process. The first thing he noticed was the cold. It was weird, he felt like he’d been outside in the winter, naked, and just came back inside. Ben noticed that he couldn’t see through the door of his chamber anymore, so he had to assume he’d been out for some time.
    Checking the panel for a reading outside the chamber, he saw that it was safe for him to open the door. According to the instructions the pod doctor, in this case Jon, would also be waking up. It would be his job to make sure everyone was still okay while Ben checked on the outside world. They were the only two that would be waking up for now. If the world above was still in trouble, Jon and Ben would get back in the chambers for a thousand-year sleep. Something Ben wasn’t in a hurry to do.
    While he’d been sleeping, another experimental project went to work to teach him while in cryo-sleep. Ben thought it odd that they would even attempt such a thing, but they must have, because he now knew how to access the surface sensors from his terminal, as well as a bunch of other stuff he hadn't known before going into the chambers.
    He climbed out of his chamber and grabbed a jumpsuit before heading out to find the doctor. Jon and his family had been assigned the bay next to his, so Ben knocked politely before going in.
    “Come in, Ben. You know, I’m happy as a clam that these ‘coffins’ work, but waking up is a real mother,” Jon said. “Do you think we slept the full two-hundred-fifty years?”
    “That was the plan, no matter how strange that question sounds,” Ben chuckled. “You about ready to get started?”
    Jon nodded. “But before you run off, let me take a look at you. If these damn machines have any adverse side effects, I’d like to know.”
    The two men walked to the small medical area, which was just off of the chamber ‘hall’. Jon had Ben take his jumpsuit back off for the examination. While Ben stripped, Jon got them both coffees from the medical replicator.
    After a no-nonsense and very thorough physical, (including blood and urine samples) Jon pronounced him healthy and kicked him out of the small medical area so he could get busy checking the systems of all the hibernators. Ben headed for his office that was