The Alien Agenda (#Wattys2018)

[Chapter 21: Future Before Me]

"Please be alive," I whispered into the glass.

The gruesome face of the, futuristic human before me, did little to scare or disgust me. Instead I felt a sense of sympathy and disbelief at how inhumane one could be, to trap someone, or worse, kill someone, that was trying to help.

"Laila," Axel called.

I turned to face him.

"I think it's not dead. It seems to be in suspended animation. Look," he said pointing to a wide control panel.

The screen displayed a few bar charts, and values. They also displayed heartbeat, oxygen levels and so on. From the looks of it, the time traveler's heart was still beating.

It was alive. I sighed in relief.

"The coffin is filled with hydrogen sulfide. It's undergoing induced hypothermia. Hydrogen sulfide decreases the metabolic rate in the body," he explained, pointing at the steady hydrogen sulfide levels, and the slow heartbeat of the time traveller.

"I'll increase the oxygen levels and decrease the hydrogen sulfide levels. It should wake up from its trance," Axel said, tapping the control panel.

I felt hope surge through me as I watched Axel slide his fingers down a touch screen lever and slide his fingers up another. For a moment, I wondered how Axel knew to do these stuff. Then I remembered how he somehow knew the password to the secret room.

It was strange, extremely strange.

He did not even hack the system, he just simply knew.

I was about to ask, when I was interrupted by him,"Done! It might take minutes. Usually it would take hours for a creature that size. But... this is advanced stuff," he said, praising the high-tech system.

I decided to ponder on the topic some other time. I rushed to the glass coffin.

Colour slowly rose into the white skin of the time traveler. Though its original colour was grey, it was a healthy grey.

I prayed silently.

Finally after a while, the grey human flickered its eyes open. I could see the large amounts of effort required for it to do even that simple action, but it tried nevertheless.

I decided not to push it and let it slowly recover from its hypothermia.

Axel studied the Grey intently. He concluded a few things while waiting for the Grey to recover. It was a male, and its current physical state seemed to weak to be alive for any longer. It was malnourished.

The time traveler began to take in deep breaths and cough a few times. Finally he stabilised his condition, and registered his surroundings. I brought my face closer to the glass, hoping it would recognize me.

I realised it did not. And moments later, the glass fogged up. The temperature inside was warmer than the outside.

"Axel what do we-" Axel stopped me mid sentence and pointed at the glass.

Slowly but surely, the Grey's dried bulbous finger began moving across the glass. I noticed a shape forming on the glass. My eyes widened. Scrawled on the glass, was a symbol. The second symbol. The infinity symbol with two vertical lines bisecting it.

"Axel is it safe to open the coffin?" I asked him hastily.

He contemplated but then shook his head.

"Don't worry I think I can regulate the internal temperature of the coffin," he said as he typed into the control panel once again.

Slowly the fog began to clear, and I could see the wrinkly Grey once again. This time he looked at me with new-found recognition.