001 - Before

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"Alright class, don't forget the homework! See you guys tomorrow."

Said one of my favorite teachers, Mr. Wilson. Why was he one of my favorites you ask? Well because he didn't wake me up in class. As long as my test scores were good, he didn't really care what I did. I lifted my head and quickly put my almost empty binder in my bag. Ignoring my other classmates, I rushed to the back parking lot, hoping to run into my best friend Austin and Casey, a girl that I've been trying, and failing, to flirt with all year.

"Hey Noah!" A voice shouts. Said voice happens to belong to just the friend I was thinking about. Austin was a tall guy, and pretty skinny too. He wouldn't look weird on a basketball court, but all he did was play video games. It was the main reason we were friends. That's all I did when I wasn't working too.

"What's up man?"

"Oh, ya know. Bout to hit some ranked queues, you in?"

"You know I gotta work man. Have you seen the skins coming out next patch?"

We laughed while walking in the crowded hallways. Eventually we made it to the back of the parking lot, and our cars. Sadly Casey was nowhere to be found. Austin drove a newer black American muscle car that his dad bought him, while I drove the cheapest car I could find. Our family situations were a little different.

"Oh yeah! I almost forgot!" Austin yelled as I was about to get into my car.

"My dad's friend Gerald is doing a research study thing. I figured I'd tell you about it. Here's a flyer. Maybe with this you can take a week off and help me get into plat!"

I started to get excited. I knew what friend he was talking about. He was the CEO of NaN0, a new tech company that was extremely promising. I climbed into my car and let it heat up, frankly I hated the cold, it was a good thing I lived in the great southern state of Georgia, Winter still sucked though. I looked at the flyer, and my jaw dropped!

"Looking for research subjects!"

"$1500 for a five-day experiment!"

It also had some details about the experiment and company behind it, but I ignored all of that nonsense. I immediately emailed the company and told them I would volunteer.

After the email, I threw the flyer in the floor of my car and started to drive home. 15 minutes later I walked into my small apartment that I lived in with my mom. It was just the two of us, and she worked around 80 hours a week to keep us up. Of course, that meant I only saw her a few minutes a day unless it was a weekend. I had to do my part too, so I quickly changed into my uniform and drove to work.

After 8 hours of cutting pizzas and cleaning I made it back home a little after midnight. Of course, I immediately went to bed. I had school in the morning after all. Waking up a few hours later I got to say bye to my mom. She was a short lady with long black hair. "Love you, bye mom!" I shouted as she walked out the door. "Welp, 3 more days till the weekend! Let's do this!" I hyped myself up for the boredom that awaited me.

The week passed slowly. I had a few tests and got yelled at for sleeping in class a few times, but that was all normal. I also asked my manager to give me next week off, as the experiment was going to give me a lot more money than working would. The plan was to surprise my mom. I could afford to miss a week of school, and chances are my mom wouldn't even notice I was gone for a week with how busy she was.

The weekend passed quickly as always, I played online with Austin and had a couple shifts at work.

Finally, the day arrived. Instead of my usual drive to school, I drove into the city. It took about 40 minutes, but eventually I mad it to my destination. The headquarters for NaN0, One of the most promising new tech companies in America. They were focused on technologies that sounded like they came from a sci-fi book. Nanobots, flying cars, laser weapons, pretty much any ridiculous sounding tech you could think of, NaN0 did their best to make it. They were surprisingly successful too. They had working prototypes and models for a lot of crazy stuff, but mass production was way too expensive.

I never did read the details on the flyer, but I was sure it was going to be pretty awesome. I parked in a parking garage about a block away and walked to the building. It wasn't hard to find, being the tallest building in the city, but it took almost 20 minutes because of all the traffic.

Eventually I made it and walked into the building. The ground floor was almost all open. They had screens everywhere showing successful prototypes, and models. In the middle of the floor was a large desk with six women in uniforms sitting and talking to the various people that had business here. I stood in line for ten or so minutes.

"NEXT!"

The young woman whose line I was in called. I walked up to the counter and told her why I was there.

"Oh, you're here for 'That' program. Well good luck, here's some paperwork, after you finish go to the elevators over there and head down to the basement."

I quickly signed my name a few times, not really reading the forms, and went to the basement.

The elevator door opened into a long hallway. There were industrial looking doors at regular intervals, and at the end of the hallway, there was a desk with a man sleeping behind it. As I walked towards the desk, I noticed all of the doors had a scanner and keypad beside them, and no obvious other way to unlock them.

As I approached the desk, I let out a cough hoping to wake the sleeping man. It doesn't work.

"Sir." I say … nothing. "Sigh. Excuse me, Sir!" I say a little louder.

"Ahhhhh, I'm not sleeping!"

"I'm here for the research program sir" I say respectfully, while trying not to laugh out loud.

"OH R-right, sorry about that kid. I'll take your paperwork, then you can sit over there and wait for Dr. Moore to get here. She usually runs a little late." He pointed to a group of four chairs that I had overlooked earlier.

"Sounds good, oh and I won't say anything either" I chuckle a bit.

"T-Thanks" He stuttered.

After handing him the paperwork that I signed I sat down and waited… and waited… eventually I took out my phone and started reading a book I definitely paid for.

*DING* About two hours later, a tall blonde woman in a lab coat got off of the elevator and hurried over to the desk.

"Mr. Hayes, has the subject go here yet?" She askes … standing a few feet away from me.

"Yeah, he's been here since nine, the time his appointment was." The man behind the counter chuckles and points at me.

"O-oh yes. Well, I apologize for making you wait, Follow me." She quickly said.

"No problem, I'll get out of here on Friday, right?"

"Yes, Yes. Five days in the chamber to test long term survivability. You should be fine, although you might be a bit sore afterwards."

"Awesome" I said, now somewhat worried about what I signed up for, and regretting all the papers I didn't read.

Dr. Moore swiped a badge on one of the scanners and entered a long series of numbers on the keypad. After the door opened, I finally got a look in the room. It looked very …? Everything was white, and there was a hospital bed and a stool on one of the walls. There was just one thing stopping me from thinking I was at my doctor's office. The large, person sized pod. There were tens of tubes and hundreds of wires connected to the thing, and it looked like it could hold someone a good bit bigger than my average height and weight.

"Ok, go ahead and take your clothes off and step inside the chamber. I will wait on the other side of this curtain. After you close the door ill come out and turn on the chamber."

Well, that's a bit weird, I guess. I wonder what this thing actually does? Oh well. I took off my clothes and stepped into the pod. I looked around for a way to close it, but after a few seconds a metal layer rose up from the ground. There was a piece of glass around where my head was. As I looked out the glass, I noticed how thick it was … almost an entire foot! This 'Chamber' was seriously sturdy.

"Ok, I will now initialize the chamber, it will be a little cold." The doctor said into a microphone with a little laugh.

I quickly realized we had different definitions of 'a little' as the temperature dropped, and gasses started to enter the pod.

"Please place your hands beside your body and relax" I heard a female voice say. I did, but I wasn't really sure why. I felt weird… and cold. A few seconds later, consciousness escaped me.

"Test 001 of Cryochamber version 8.35 has begun." The doctor mumbled while typing on a computer.

Three days later … the world ended.