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Finding the abandoned outpost was way too easy for my liking.
“Are you sure this is it?” I yelled to Galton through the howling wind.
Our bright handheld spotlights illuminated two stark spheres in the blackness that was digesting us, and those discs of light were cross-hatched with blurred lines of driving snow that seemed to glow in the light.
The only feature of this alien landscape was what looked like a large concrete outhouse with a steel door.
“Yes!” Galton called back. “This is the place.”
He stepped up to the door and then did something that amazed me. He slid open a small access panel in the door frame and punched in a nine digit code with his gloved hand.
The door made a single deep, metallic thumping sound, and Galton then grasped the knob and pushed it open.
Dim light spilled from within, silhouetting Galton in his chunky cold-weather gear.
“How did you know?” I called to him, but he was already stepping inside.
I trudged in behind him and he shut the door, tapping a matching panel on the interior to relock it. We shut our lanterns off, as the inside of this place was lit with thin glowing rods in the ceiling.
The only feature, other than the door panel, was a stairway that led steeply downward.
I repeated my question. “How did you know the code?”
“Research, Alex. Research.”
“So you knew this place was not just some relic from the twenties?”
“Come on,” he said, heading down the steps, his puffy Gore-Tex jacket and bib sliding noisily against each other as he went.
This was all too weird. He didn’t seem the least bit concerned about running into whoever it was that was maintaining this facility.
“I think it’s time you started telling me what you know,” I said, as we descended into the bowels of what must have been a vast underground complex.
“Alex, I know lots of things – much of it you just wouldn’t understand.”
We reached the bottom of the stairs, and I grabbed his shoulder, spun him around, and gripped him on each side of the head with my gloved hands. “I’m serious! No more games. What is going on here?”
“Right now? I’m sure they’re sleeping.”
“Who?”
“The Lucids.”
“Explain.”
Galton sighed heavily, as if dealing with a frustrating two year old who keeps asking “why.”
“Okay – history in a nutshell. First, you had the original proto-geneticists – the guys who set this place up. They were smart, well-funded, and driven to build a better world from the better humans they were intent on creating. But they lacked technology.
“Then you had the next couple of generations, and they quickly grew up to be much, much smarter – and much more driven. They had even more money – and they also started bringing in technology. Some of the world’s greatest minds contributed to the Permafrost Society.”
“Permafrost Society?” I asked.
“That’s what they call it – what this place is.” Frost glistened on his beard, and his eyes seemed full of fire. Our conversation seemed to be carried on the puffs of white breath that escaped our mouths.
“So then what happened?”
“There were a few special research groups – different areas of human excellence the Society wanted to develop. Everything from better mathematicians, to those with great physical endurance – even some who were bred to withstand the harsh environment up there on the surface. Others had super-memories, or even telekinesis.
“But the ones who emerged as the leaders – the ones who seemed to have the greatest capacity for intelligence and personal development – were the Lucids.”
I caught my breath. “I read about them in the journal. I’m – I’m descended from them.”
“Yes, you are.”
He turned and started down a long corridor that led off into darkness.
“So where are we going? What are we doing here?” I shuffled quickly to catch up. “I thought you said we were coming here to discover the truth about this place – but it sounds like you already know.”
He said nothing, but led me through a labyrinth of hallways until we reached a set of unmarked double doors.
I was getting warm from the brisk pace, and pulled my hood down and slipped my gloves off. Galton did the same, then opened another hidden access panel and keyed in the entry code. The doors unlocked, and we entered.
“You sure you’ve never been here before?” I asked.
“I never said otherwise.”
“Wait! You – ”
My words fell to the floor, just ahead of my jaw.
Before me was row upon row of hospital beds, hundreds of them - a huge infirmary. Upon each lay a sleeping individual, hooked up with sensors and tubes to identical equipment stands that seemed to be monitoring their health and feeding them nutrients.
It was quiet as a morgue – no beeping from the equipment, as you might hear in a hospital.
“What the?”
“These,” said Galton with a slow sweep of his arm, “are the Lucids of the Permafrost Society.”
I slowly walked from row to row, staring at the slumbering super-humans.
When I’d read the tail end of James O’Fallin’s journal, I didn’t fully believe it.
But now it was shockingly real.
“So, all of these people – they’re – ”
“Lucid dreaming,” Galton finished. “But not just any lucid dreaming. They’ve been genetically engineered to take the concept to a whole new level - beyond merely being able to control their dreams. They feel fully awake – alive and real. And they are all interconnected at the subconscious level. It’s such an amazing reality – they never bother to wake up – at least not this latest generation – they’re the first of the full-time sleepers.”
I stared at the Lucids, trying to wrap my head around it. “But how can it be fulfilling to spend your whole life asleep?”
“That’s the beauty of it. It’s not just a seventy or eighty year life,” said Galton, strolling among the comatose. “Sure, their bodies only live that long. But inside – in their reality – they are immortal. Time passes at an infinitely slow rate according to their perception. They’ve chosen a life that never ends – with endless possibilities. They can do whatever they want, be whatever they desire. It’s a paradise, for them.”
Galton sounded wistful – almost jealous. Which brought my thoughts back to the purpose of our visit. “So, why are you showing me this? Why did you bring me here? And what was all that stuff you were babbling about on the boat – about DNA and the little white pill?”
“Well, you see – there’s one empty bed – right over there,” said Galton, pointing to the far corner of the giant sleep chamber. “And it’s mine.”
“You’re a Lucid?” I asked, dumbfounded.
“No. Not yet. But you’re going to help me become one.” He stepped toward me, his face dark.
I backed up. “How?”
“You have a recessive gene. Your father – my father’s brother - was not a Lucid. He was a supply ship captain who lured your mother away from this place and condemned her to a life of normalcy – of mediocrity. They had you, and when you were thirteen, they were killed.”
“In the car accident.”
“It was no accident, Alex. They were punished for your mother’s defection from the Society. You were spared according to the Society’s own laws.”
My stomach lurched. I couldn’t believe Mom and Dad had been murdered. My knees buckled a little, but I stayed on my feet. “How do you know all this?”
“I’ve made it my life’s work.” His eyes widened, and his voice was breathy. “I want what these people have, Alex. What Aunty Margaret gave up for the foolishness of love. I want the immortality and omnipotence afforded by the eternal living sleep of the Lucids. You could say, I’ve always dreamed of this moment.”
/> He suddenly lunged at me and wrapped his strong, bony hands around my neck before I could even move away.
“What are you doing?” I choked, grasping at his wrists and pushing back on him. “I can’t – breathe.”
“I need to take out your cerebral cortex – while you’re conscious,” he grunted, forcing me against the wall. “I’m sorry, Alex, but you won’t survive the procedure.”
He brought me down to the ground with all his weight, and pulled a scalpel out of his pocket. He shoved my head sideways.
I pushed back at him as hard as I could, but he was freakishly strong.
“I solved the riddle,” he panted. “I mastered the pill, and now all I need is your cortex and the equipment in this facility to be able to take the gift you’ve inherited and migrate it to my own biology. You never even used your gift. Probably never even realized you were – special.”
He brought the razor sharp blade down on the soft spot at the base of my skull and started to slice into my flesh.
“Arrgh!” I screamed.
I suddenly felt Galton rise off my body.
He was being pulled away. Two men in blue jumpsuits hoisted him up, disarmed him, and restrained him.
“No!” he yelled. “What are you doing?”
A third man, wearing an expensive looking black suit, stepped toward me from behind the bouncers and spoke in a clear, calm voice. “Hello, Alex. Welcome home.”
I rubbed at the cut at the back of my head and sat up. “Home? Who are you?”
“I’m Charles Keynes,” he said with his mild British accent. “I’m the current Waking Executive of the Permafrost Society.”
“Why did you say welcome home?”
“You were born here. Your mother took you away when you were only three months old. Ran off with a Standard. We’re glad you’re back. You may only be half-blood, but you are still very much one of us.”
“I don’t understand. How did Galton know about this place?”
“We hired him. To bring you back. He was under the mistaken impression that we only wanted your brain tissue – and that he could have some of it in exchange for bringing you here. But he’s just a foolish, somewhat insane Standard. A useful tool, though.”
I looked at Galton, who was struggling in futility against the grip of the very large men, his eyes bulging in anger. “What are you going to do with him?”
“Don’t worry – he’ll be put to good use.” Keynes nodded and the thugs dragged my cousin away. I could still hear him yelling and screaming long after the double doors were shut.
“What do you want from me?” I asked, a whole-body shiver passing over me as a result of the ordeal.
“Nothing. You’re free to go. But you must sleep on it.”
“Excuse me?”
“I want you to go lay down in that bed over there in the corner. And I want you to go to sleep. Just for the night. If, in the morning, you still want to leave – to return to your hopelessly banal existence – no one will stop you.”
“What’s the catch? How do you know I won’t blab to the world about this place and the weird secret organization you’ve got up here?”
“You won’t.”
I took a deep breath and started to calm down. Something about the dim green lighting in the room was comforting, despite the bizarre nature of it all.
“Fine. I’ll sleep on it. Besides, I’m exhausted,” I said, breaking into a yawn. I looked at the blood on my hand and touched the back of my head again. “You got a Band-Aid or something?”
Keynes called for a nurse who didn’t speak the whole time she treated me.
After that, I was “tucked in” by Keynes, who smirked as he said, “Pleasant dreams, Alex.”
And then, rather quickly, I fell into a deep, incredibly surreal sleep.
And dreamed.
Forever.
THE END
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