Distant Memory

I recall my wife’s voice as if I heard it just yesterday. Memories can be deceiving, however. The distant memories can come to life right before your eyes, while things that happened in the recent past get clouded and lost. I would like to tell you how I reflect on my distant memories, but you’d probably think I was daft. At this point, it really doesn’t matter to me.

“Vernon!” She called out to me as I was working in the yard. “You have a phone call.

I shut the engine of my lawnmower off and walked to the front porch where she had been reading one of her magazines.

“Who is it?” I asked as I drew near.

“Dr. Welker.” She handed me my IPhone.

“Ah, I had a feeling he’d call me.” I took the phone from her, “Dr. Welker, what’s up?”

“We have decided to start the project on Monday.” His voice was clear and decisive.

“Why so soon?” I asked, glancing up at Helen who wore a blank expression as she sat down to continue reading her magazine.

“We have found out that the Bergeron Corporation has begun their project.” His voice conveyed a grave concern since Bergeron was in a race with our project on suspended animation. If they were to successfully complete their experimental tests, the government would most likely award them with the lucrative contract. Xanorstar, the company I worked for, had spent a small fortune with the hope of producing a workable system for extended space flights to Mars and beyond. We knew Bergeron was funded by foreign countries that were not friendly to us. Dr. Welker believed that losing the contract to Bergeron would be fatal to our operations.

“When do they intend to test their system?” I asked.

“Next week.” Dr. Welker answered. Every muscle in my body seemed to tense up when he answered.

“So, we don’t have much time.” My remark was obvious, but I had an uneasy feeling that we were about a month away from completing the project. Last week, when the tests were run, the results were inconclusive and somewhat inconsistent in places. We had worked with animal specimens, much to the negative public outcry, and of the five tests, only one animal managed to survive. In reviewing the data from the one successful test, we discovered that the physiological make-up of the goat was favorable to the radiation used to suspend the goat for a couple of hours.

As of this moment in time, Xanorstar had never tested a human subject. I had been selected to be that subject. I also assumed that we would have time to iron out all of the kinks we seemed to be running into.

“Are you sure Bergeron is ready to go on this project?” I asked as I glanced again at my wife. When she saw me glance at her, she smiled at me.

“There is too much at stake to make assumptions we don’t have at the moment. I do not wish to blunder this opportunity.” Dr. Welker replied.

He was right. There are moments in exploration and discovery, where you have to gamble. Such a gamble may cost me my life, but it was time for us to cross the Rubicon.

“Alright, I’ll see you Monday, sir.” I exhaled.

“Thank you, Dr. Bisbecky.” He sounded relieved that I was on board.

“Roger.” Was all I could think of saying before I pressed the button on my phone.

“So, what’s going on?” Helen asked as I put my phone in my pocket.

“I am scheduled for a test on Monday.” I shrugged.

“What kind of test?” She stood up and folded her magazine under her arm.

“You know I can’t tell you that.” I chuckled.

“Oh, you guys.” She shook her head, “You love having your secrets and all that, but sooner or later they reveal it on the local news.”

“It’s okay.” I took hold of arm and led her back into the house as the sun began to set on the flat horizon. The pink, yellow and orange gave the terrain a surreal glow. “I will be gone for three days.”

“Three days?” She gasped, “What will I do without you for three days?”

“You’ll manage.” I Sighed.

“I hope so.” She laughed.

She laughed like a sweet melody. How I miss it. I really miss it.

I walked into Xanorstar Laboratories about an hour early. I went to the test area where I would be placed in suspended animation. Vault 7 was where I would be placed in for thirty-six hours and was open like the maw of a giant monster. In a few hours I would enter this piece of technology where I would be put in suspended animation. In this state, I would reemerge not having aged a single minute. The whole process was made to be able to launch astronauts into space without them aging a single minute. From where I was standing, this was the true test of our capabilities. We had come so far.

Squatting down, I inspected what would be my resting place for the next three days. After my close inspection, I felt the vault met with the speculations of the upcoming experiment.

I told Helen I would be gone for three days, but did not elaborate as to the reason why since this whole project was top secret. She was a good sport and knew that I could not talk about the project. But I sure as hell wanted to.

“Good morning Dr. Bisbecky.” Dr. Welker walked into what we called Area 44. The overall record of this vault was encouraging. This was where they recovered the goat last week.

“Good morning, sir.” I nodded.

“Are you ready to go where no man has ever gone before?” He began to open up some of the circuits.

“Do I have a choice?” I chuckled, but there was a serious side to the question.

“What you are about to do is the culmination of years of hard work we have put into this project.” He waved his hand across the open vault. “I have some assistants who will help you into the special suit.”

“Looking forward to that.” I forced a smile.

“You will be suspended for thirty-six hours. You won’t even be aware of the time.” His voice sounded excited and hopeful. “Dr. Rathamatan will be at the controls.”

“I’ve worked with him. He’s highly qualified.” I shrugged.

“Indeed he is.” Dr. Welker confirmed.

If only I knew then what I knew now, Helen, I would not be sitting here talking to you. There are so many things I wish I could say, but none of it seems adequate at this point.

While I waited for the assistants to dress me for my adventure, I read the reports from the failed attempts last week. In Vault 4, where a German Shepherd named Rocky had been cooked when the temperature control malfunctioned. I hoped the end came quickly for him.

In Vault 1, a chicken named Morse received a dose of electrical charge that blew his insides out. They were still cleaning the internal organs from that vault.

After reading both of those reports, I could not take it anymore. My team had arrived to dress me.

“Are you ready, Dr. Bisbecky?” One of them asked me as he put me into a skin-tight suit with a zipper in the front.

“Ready and willing.” I nodded, but the willing part was a bit of a lie.

“I have your gloves.” Another tech slipped the gloves over my hands.

The suit was designed to keep the person wearing it from aging. I was not a part of that research, but it really made me wonder if I was willing to put my faith into such technology. There were things that were invented that failed. I knew Thomas Edison sat in his laboratory at Menlo Park testing over a hundred elements in his electric light bulb before he came up with tungsten. How many people would have been able to do what he had done, but without it, we would all be still sitting in the dark.

“Let’s get your boots on.” A woman shoved my foot inside the boots with the zipper on the side. “Are you comfortable?”

This was no time to be honest. Comfortable would not be part of what I was going through.

“We have ten minutes.” One of the researchers announced from the open door.

“We are ready.” The head assistant confirmed. “I will walk you to the vault.”

“Alright.” I nodded.

I found it difficult to move in the skin-tight suit, but with assistance, I was able to manage to walk down the hall into the room. Dr. Welker sat by the control panel flanked by two technicians.

“Place him in the vault.” I heard Dr. Welker’s voice over the intercom.

The assistant made sure I was helped into the Vault. My heart was racing. Soon I would be entombed in complete darkness with only my special suit to protect me from the bombardment of the electrical impulses. Once the vault had been bombarded, I would slip into a state of suspended animation if everything went as planned.

The technician closed the lid. I heard the vault lock as my mind floated in darkness. I wondered what was going on outside my vault.

Electricity surged through the wires. There was a whirring sound. I felt like Dante ascending into the Inferno with Virgil. I know I groaned. I know I let sounds of fear escape from my lips, but even with my eyes open, I saw nothing. I felt no pain as if I was being rocked in a cradle. Somewhere I entered the state of suspended animation.

I now know the error. It has rolled through my mind many times since I was released from Vault 7. I have no idea what you went through while I was in the vault. All I know was, there was a horrible error.

All I remember was walking through a landscape that was from the imagination of a creative being. I felt as if I was walking across the scenery of Frank Baum’s The Wizard of Oz. I kept telling my mind to open my eyes and escape from this awful place, but I did not have control of my own senses. Something else had control.

“Vernon, where are you?” I heard Helen’s voice.

“I am trapped, dear.” I answered, but she did not hear me.

“The tech at the controls was a spy.” Dr. Welker explained. “He locked the system, and we can’t get Dr. Bisbecky back.”

Can’t get me back? What are they talking about? What has gone wrong?

“The tech at the controls set the vault for thirty-six years instead of hours.” Dr. Welker was sitting in a senate hearing.

“How could you allow this to happen?” A man sitting in front asked.

“Well, Senator Mayfield, we had no way of knowing Desi Ragonni was a spy. We had his identification listed as an employee.” Dr. Welker closed his eyes for a moment.

“It seems to me, your security was lacking, doctor.” Senator Mayfield pointed a finger at Dr. Welker.

“An oversight.” Dr. Welker shook his head.

“And an innocent man pays for that oversight.” He snapped and then glazed around the table. “And you tell me there’s no way to break the lock the tech set on that vault.”

“That is correct, senator.”

“And how long has Dr. Bisbecky been locked in the vault?”

“About a year.” Dr. Welker answered.

“Just thirty-five more years, eh?”

“Yes sir.”

“I want him taken out. NOW.” The senator commanded.

“If we attempt to remove him, he may not survive.” Dr. Welker explained.

“This all seems like a piece of science fiction gone wrong.” Senator Mayfield remarked.

“Yes sir.”

“And what about his wife? Helen Bisbecky.” The senator asked.

“She is in the hospital. Nervous breakdown.” He answered.

The world went black at that moment.

I felt distant memories come to life. Distant in relation to time. I moved through the fields of my grandfather’s farm. Swam across a river with my cousin. Saw turtles in the river. The sun was at attention in the sky. These were my memories.

“Vernon, it’s time to come home.” My mother beckoned me home. The sun was going down in a blaze of glory. She would pass away before I graduated from college.

“Vernon, why would you sign up for a top-secret project?” My father questioned me when I signed on to Xanorstar. I told him that I wanted to be on the cutting edge of technology.

“Vernon, I can’t even remember the password to my computer.” He shook his head as if I was just another egg head. He passed away before I got my doctorate.

I have no one to share these memories with anymore. Sinking into the depths of my despair, suddenly there is a blinding light as my vault yawns open. Looking around the room, I am alone and it seems that no one has been in this room for a very long time.

Removing my special suit, I see a mirror tinted with the dirt from age. Wiping the filthy mirror, I look at my reflection. My face has not appeared to age a day since I was put in the vault.

Perhaps that horrible dream I had of occupying the vault for a lengthy amount of time, what just that no more than a dream.

But as I look around, I notice it has been a while since someone had cared for Area 44 or Vault 7. It was as if this place had been abandoned a long time ago. Walking down the hall, I see evidence of vacant spider webs and dirt clinging to places that should not have dirt.

I notice the front door is chained and it appears it has been chained for quite some time. I put a shoulder to the fragile glass in the chained doors and manage to get to the sidewalk in front of the building. The parking lot is empty except for my car which appears as though it has been parked there for a long time.

My car won’t start when I find the key in my pocket.

“What are you doing?” A passerby asks me as I turn the key one more time hoping to hear the engine roar.

“Trying to start my car.” I turn the key again.

“Is this old heap your car? I haven’t seen one of these for years.” He shakes his head.

“What is the date?” I ask, feeling desolate and lost.

“It’s May 23.” He answers without thinking.

“What year is it?”

“What year do you think it is?” He chuckles.

“I don’t know which is why I am asking.” I am getting annoyed with his smart aleck answers.

“Are you having a mental breakdown?” He looks at me suspiciously.

“What year is it?” I blurt out.

“2058.” He shrugs and decides to walk on.

2058? Thirty-six years after I was put in the vault. Thirty-six years.

Tears come to my eyes. I look in the rearview mirror. I still have the face of the thirty-five-year-old man I was when I started this experiment. When I exit the car, I see a big sign across a computer screen declaring Bergeron is the place where innovation happens. I do not see a mention of Xanorstar anywhere.

Then I remember a distant memory. I find my way to the cemetery using public transit that has not had any major changes for thirty-six years.

The sign is worn, but I find you quickly.

There you are and I walk over to your cold stone and run my fingers across the lettering chiseled in marble:

Helen V. Bisbecky

Beloved wife

(1998-2027)