Praespero by Jada Xu

“How are you feeling, sweetheart?” the nurse asked me as she handed me the tray of food. A plate of the finest sushi with a little dish of wasabi and soy sauce. A bowl of steaming beef ramen. And a matcha chocolate parfait topped with a mountain of whipped cream. It was perhaps the finest meal I would ever eat in my life. Really, not bad for a last meal.

“Good.” I smiled and swallowed thickly. She left the room as I turned to the food. My mouth was already watering just smelling the aroma, but my stomach was churning furiously. I didn’t think that I would have been able to stomach a few bites, but I forced myself to finish at least half of every dish before giving up completely and ringing the bell.

The nurse reappeared, picking up the tray but frowning at the amount of food left behind and clucking her tongue in disapproval, because in this world, wars could be waged over a bowl of soup. Ever since the Flare, where the sun released a massive jet of plasma into the inky blackness of the universe, everything had changed. A wave of heat rippled across the solar system, burning Mercury, charring Venus, and turning Earth from a planet of blue to one of red. Forests became deserts, oceans became dry trenches, and over half of humanity had been killed in the weeks after. Earth was no longer sustainable and no longer humanity’s home. 

Thus, Project Praespero was born. Planet X45-094 – now named after the spirit of hope and known simply as Elpis – was discovered in a far corner of the universe. It was a little smaller than Earth but it had a breathable atmosphere and rotated close enough to its star, giving it plenty of sunlight and earthlike seasons. It had oceans and dry land, and even incredibly primitive life forms. It was perfect for humanity’s new home.

 However, Elpis was far, so terribly far that it would take over two hundred years for a person to make it there – and that was Project Praespero’s job. It recruited five hundred of the human race’s best and brightest, training them from birth to be in peak physical condition, to understand engineering and agriculture, and to work together. They were to be placed into hibernation before entering the ship and once they arrived, will rebuild the Earth.  They will turn the plains into fields and the forests into cities, protecting and raising a new generation of humans. Truly, they are humanity’s only hope.

The nurse left with the tray. Moments later, a small army of doctors came in, all of them dressed in pristine white lab coats and smiling. 

Or trying to. Their foreheads shining with perspiration and eyes flitting about betrayed their nervousness at the task at hand.

“Are you ready?” One of the doctors asked.

 I nodded. He pressed a button, and a panel opened from the wall, ejecting a little pod that was about two meters in length and looked very much like an egg sliced vertically in half. I ran a hand across its smooth metal side and shivered, my spine tingling uncomfortably. It looked far too much like a coffin to me but I stepped in, laying down on the padding that was molded to fit my body. The doctor pressed another button, and a glass panel slid across the pod, encasing me inside. There was a hiss as the pressure was adjusted and I could hear safety locks snapping in place.

Then there was the cold. It hit me like a truck as my hair was suddenly encased in ice, my skin covered in frost, and my eyes frozen in a half-blink. The pod plunged me into hibernation… hibernation… hibernation… but I could still see. I was supposed to black out after hibernation, to enter a deep dead sleep for two centuries and wake up in a foreign world, but I was still conscious. I could see the doctors clapping each other on the back as they congratulated each other on this success. I can hear them making final adjustments for the ship that would take us all into outer space.

I wanted to scream. I’m still awake! I’m not asleep! But my lips were pieces of ice that refused to release a whisper. I wanted to bang on the glass, to let them know that I didn’t want to spend the next two centuries like this, alive but not alive, trapped in a frozen husk of a body. I was going to go completely mad! But my fists refused to move, my feet refused to kick, and there was nothing I could do.

I felt the pod move, sliding down a hallway and into a dimly-lit massive chamber where the other four hundred and ninety-nine pods were. I recognized the design of the room. We were already in the ship. I glanced around me, squinting at the frozen figures in the other pods. Were they blissfully asleep? Or were they like me, screaming themselves hoarse but yet unable to make a sound? I didn’t know how long I spent there agonizing, praying, hoping. Hoping that some doctor monitoring my vitals would somehow realize that I was still conscious. Hoping that there would be some emergency that would force them to defrost me.Hoping that anything would happen, to let them know that I was still alive.

Many hours later, the room plunged into darkness before bursting into flashes of dizzying red light. I could hear engines roaring in the distance, and even feel the chamber getting a little warmer.

A loud voice pierced through the air, “Ready. Take off in three… two… one…”

 There was a boom, and the ship took off into the air, shooting into the night sky. I could feel my bones trembling, my teeth chattering, and my soul shaking from the sheer power that rumbled through the spacecraft, and for a moment, the fear of being awake and alone for two hundred years seemed to still as I marveled at humanity’s ingenuity – from a mammal that started off using sticks and stones to one creating masterpieces of iron and steel that could conquer the stars.

And the fear never returned. Not because I managed to conquer it or anything. But because I wasn’t able to. One moment, we were taking off. And the next moment, there was a tremendous crack. I smelled the stench of oil. I heard electricity crackling in the air. And the next thing I knew, the world was awash in blazing blue fire that melted steel like butter. The delicate glass barrier protecting me vanished in an instant and I didn’t have a chance to even squeeze out a second thought before the flames devoured me whole.

It was humanity’s darkest day on the eve of the 5th of May in the year of 2484. Thousands of what was left of the human race stood on the barren surface of the Earth, holding hands with tears brimming in their eyes as they watched the launch of the ship into space. Their hearts were filled with hope for humanity’s survival on a new planet, a new world, a new beginning.

Then, the ship exploded. It burst into blazing blue light as a leak in its fuel chambers caused a drop of oil to enter the delicate machinery inside the engines, releasing a chain reaction that shattered the spacecraft. Debris rained from the night sky, streaking trails of flame as they landed on the pitted earth where they came from. Smoke poured from the ruins, as if the snaking black tendrils were reaching for the stars they desired to go to. And just like that, humanity’s only hope was gone.

Featured Image- A rocket ascending into space Courtesy of ibtimes