Light.

A lot of light.

Too much light, in fact.

Alex forced her eyes open and winced as the harsh rays of the lights above speared through them.

Where am I?

Slowly she looked around. She couldn’t move much. As she moved her arms up from her side they brushed on a smooth surface. She was in what seemed to be a giant glass tube, with condensation rapidly forming on the inside. She shivered. Breathing out, Alex could see her cool breath in the air. Frantically, she thrusted out her arms; pushing above her head. The glass above her seemed to be getting further away. She pushed harder and the lid fell down to one side with a thud.

Sitting up, Alex glanced at what she could see of the room. It was bare of all furniture except a desk in one corner and a dark wooden chair next to it. Bewildered, Alex swung both legs over the edge of the tube and got to her feet, swaying rather alarmingly and catching hold of the tube to steady herself.

Why can’t I remember anything?

Reaching down with the hand that wasn’t gripping the side of the tube, Alex’s hands went immediately to her pockets to check her mobile phone. It wasn’t there; neither were her house keys. She rummaged in the rest of her pockets finally discovering a folded piece of paper in one of the back ones. Half relieved, half dreading the possibility that it would be useless.

It was written in English but was nothing that Alex had ever seen before:

Subject’s name: Unknown
ID: 54387
Health: Fair
Pod number: 5

Alex looked over her shoulder at the pod, frowning as she caught sight of the large number five that had been stencilled onto it.

Pod 5? What the hell is that supposed to mean?

There was no date on the report, no name; in fact nothing to give her any ideas about who had written it or when. She turned the paper over in case anything else had been written on the back. There was nothing. Alex crumpled up the piece of paper and launched it across the room. “Where am I ?” she yelled, or tried to; talking was agony and she noticed for the first time how thirsty she was.

Pacing the room, Alex studied it properly for the first time. Behind her pod were four more on the floor that she had failed to notice earlier. All sealed, all occupied. Alex ran over to the first one and screamed. Examining the body, Alex noticed a feint blue tinge to the woman’s skin. Quickly she looked at the others, all female. Her head was throbbing. Clutching her head in her hands she fell in a heap on the floor.
…

Swaying ever so slightly, the five girls stumbled down the road. Guzzling the vodka, Alex struggled to keep her balance.
“Another year done, two more to go” Alex shouted, “Whoopee!”
Exams were over and the girls had decided to have a night on the town Paying little attention the girls ran across the road in an attempt to catch the approaching bus. Unaware of the man in the dark cloak following them, they caught the bus just in time.

“Operation in motion. I hope to deliver test subjects tonight,” Gerard said quietly into his mobile phone as he watched the girls carefully.

…

The sound of the heavy footsteps approaching brought her back to reality. Struggling to her feet, driven by instincts telling her to escape, Alex looked around for a way out. Two doors, both at opposite ends, lead out of the room. Alex ran over to the faraway door, the pounding of her heart drowning out the muffled sound of the footsteps. Colliding with the door she pushed her body against it. It didn’t open. Frantically she searched for some sort of a handle, or a crowbar maybe. A tiny red light caught her eye. A keypad.

Shit! A number. Where did I see a number before? The piece of paper! It had a number on it.
 
Suddenly she wished she hadn’t lost her temper earlier. Scanning the room with her eyes she spotted the crumpled white ball, clearly visible against the dark slate floor. Running back towards the door she unravelled the paper. Entering the number Alex wondered what lay on the other side of the door. The light flashed blue and the door began to slide open. Unfortunately for Alex the one on the other side did so too. A voice boomed at her from across the room. Panicking, she ran. The door gave way to a long, dark tunnel. She brushed her hands along either side of it. The walls were cold with a surface that was not all that different to jelly. A familiar sensation appeared in her head.

Not now…not again!

Alex fell back against the wall, and slid down it until her legs hit the cold surface below her. She blacked out.

A tall man walked quickly into the room. He glanced in the direction that Alex left, knowing that she wouldn’t get very far and turned to examine the others. Looking in each pod in turn, nothing seemed out of place. Sliding out his mobile phone from his trouser pocket Gerard smiled and pressed the same familiar numbers.
…

“No! Let me go! What are you doing?” Alex screamed, struggling against the weight of the bulging biceps holding her down. She jerked as a needle began to penetrate her arm; watching the yellowish liquid disappearing into her veins.
“Its okay, you’re just going for a nice long sleep.” A voice replied. Alex continued to fight against him until she began feeling drowsy. She stopped trying to force those arms off herself and felt suddenly content and sleepy.

“Not your best catch Gerard, that one was a little too feisty.” The boss said as he picked up the unconscious girl and placed her gently into a long glass cylinder. He scribbled something on a piece of paper, folded it in half and placed it in the girl’s pocket. Placing the lid down ever so carefully; he watched as her chest begun to rise less often and her breathing seemed to cease.
“So, uh boss, what are we actually doing here?” Gerard asked the short stout man in the corner.
“We are going to make me very rich,” He replied, turning away from the girl.
“Once their brains have been cryogenically frozen, we will leave them in that state for a year. When we wake them up, we will have proven it is possible to conserve a human being. And I will be famous!”
“But boss, won’t they run to the police when they wake up. We did kind of kidnap them…”
“Ah, but that’s the beauty you see. We should be able to manipulate their minds, so that they have no idea the whole thing even happened.”
Laughing, the two men left the room and the heavy doors closed behind them.