Gene. Sys. by Aaron Denius (best ereader for comics txt) 📕

“I was hit during one of the explosions. Mag took the pieces out of my leg.” I glance at Mag, and she gives me a small smile.

“We’ll do a scan,” he says as he walks back around to the front of the group.

“Ladies, come with me.” Dr. Metzger walks off, and the girls follow. Dr. Peters heads off in the opposite direction, and I walk after him. The other boys come along as well. The ocean of people parts as we walk through.

Cal catches up to me. “I can’t believe they destroyed our rooms.”

I look at him. “I’m glad we weren’t in them.”

“Yeah, thank you for that. My pillow was saved too!” Cal smiles.

I reciprocate. I had forgotten that I told them to take their pillows to the simulation room. It seems so trivial now.

“So, where do you think we will be sleeping now?” Al jumps in as he steps forward.

“I really have no clue. Hopefully, a room with a roof.” I smirk. Cal and Al laugh, but I notice a few looks of disgust from some of the people we pass. The joke was in poor taste.

We reach one of the larger rooms in the medical ward, and Dr. Peters walks through the door. The room has three operating tables with glass lids. As I walk in, I bump my bandaged leg into the first operating table, and a searing pain rushes through my body. I wince as I gently rub my leg.

“Atom. Lie in that first bed, I’ll be there in a second. Titan and Ox, take the next two,” Dr. Peters orders. We all do as we are told, and he closes us in with the glass tops.

As he secures the glass over my body, my heart races with the growing sense of confinement. He presses a button on the side of the table, and the glass comes to life. A series of different colored scans pass over my body. I turn my head and see that Titan and Ox are going through the same set of scans.

Dr. Peters walks back over to my table and reads some information that has appeared on his side of the glass top. He frowns and walks back to the other two, opening their lids and having Sil and Al switch places with Titan and Ox. He runs them through the scans, and it isn’t until he lets them out and puts Cal in one of their tables that I begin to panic.

Why isn’t he letting me out? What happened to me? As confined as I felt a moment ago, I now feel as if the space has gotten smaller. The glass feels like it’s moving in closer to me and wrapping itself around my body.

I feel around with my hands, looking for a way to open the top, but I can’t. I watch as Cal gets released and joins the other guys by the door. Dr. Peters speaks to them, and the boys all walk away. The glass is soundproof, so I don’t know what he’s saying to them. He turns his attention back to me and walks over to my operating table.

“Let me out!” I pound on the glass.

Dr. Peters looks at me and raises a finger, telling me to hold on. After reading some more information on the glass, he finally opens the lid.

“What are you doing? Let me out of here!” I sit up, but he pushes me back down with surprising strength.

“You have a hairline fracture in your leg, and you have lost a good amount of blood.” He looks at me.

“Oh.” I settle down.

“This should only take a couple of days.” He enters some information into a pad next to the table.

“What will?” I ask, but before I get my answer, the glass closes back over me. “Hey!”

I pound hard on the glass, and as I do, it turns into a light blue crystal color. I can no longer see through it. My eyes begin to get heavy, and just before they close, I see a white gas cover my body.

The dream comes right away. I’m standing in the middle of the same white abyss as before, but this time I hit a wall or a force field when I try to walk forward. I put my left hand on the invisible barrier, and I walk along, making sure to keep the wall to my left. After hitting my nose on a wall a couple of times, I learn to have my right hand in front of me. I’m in a labyrinth.

Far ahead of me, I see the same blonde figure as before. I can only assume it is Fe. When the next wall forces me to turn right, I see a different figure far ahead, and this one resembles Ev. Another right turn, and I am staring down the massive Pyramid of Giza. I pick up my pace, wanting desperately to get out of this maze.

Just as I feel like I am making progress, the floor gives way from underneath me. I fall, or so it feels. My heart jumps, and I struggle to grab at something to stop my fall. My hands swing around but aren’t making contact with anything. I begin to hyperventilate. I look around and see that even though I have the sensation of falling, everything remains in the same location. I’m still on the same plane as I was before.

I need to regain control of the situation, so I close my eyes and focus on my breathing. Slow and steady. When I open my eyes, I am no longer in my dream. I am lying on the operating table, and the glass lid is opening up. Dr. Peters stands above me.

“What happened?” I ask.

“You are done,” he responds.

“I thought you said it would be a couple of days?” I’m confused. I can’t have been in there for more than five minutes.

“It was,” he says as he walks away.

“Trippy, isn’t it? Almost like time doesn’t exist in there,”