The Grand Wise-sir

Cold. 

The world around me comes into focus, into being, and I can see dark shapes moving. My face - yes, that’s what it is, a face - I can feel my own face, pressed very hard against cool surfaces all around. But the surface is getting warmer. Warmer. 

It’s like I’m looking through fogged up glass in the morning. But actually, you never see that happen anymore. Since I’ve grown up, they’ve found ways to keep glass transparent whatever the weather. Or they just change the weather entirely, if it’s out of favour that day. But the fogged up glass is warming and thinning and suddenly there’s no surface in front of 

“Hello, Grand Wise-sir!” a new face is smiling at me. I can see them in full detail. Resolution. In their hand is a crude blow torch device I think they used years ago in the dark ages. 

Grand Wise-sir? That isn’t me, is it? I’m … I can’t quite recall who I am, yet.

“Who - agh ou?” my words are slurred, with my mouth partly obstructed and still cold and stiff. It’s some sort of ice - that’s what's surrounding me. But past the cold block that traps me in place, there’s a thick layer of people, too, holding ancient clipboards and scrolls of printed paper, staring at me. Their little black sticks - pens, I think they used to be called - point from their mouths and hands like swords. 

“Don’t panic,” says the person holding the blow torch, as they brush it through the air near the lower part of my face. Heat licks at the ice. I can move my jaw more freely now. But the blow-torching stops after that. My limbs are still stuck in a freezing grip. I can barely feel the rest of the body attached to my head.  

“We want to ask you some questions,” says a new, wrinkled face. The eyes are covered by glasses - glasses, really? 

“We’re only asking one question today, Sasha!” says a different voice, “He’s running low on time, that’s the guidance.” 

It must be old Sasha who nods quickly. Locks eyes with me again. 

There’s a gleam in her eyes. The educated, burning curiosity of a researcher examining a specimen. I’m suddenly compelled not to speak. 

“Grand Wise-sir,” begins Sasha, “We would like to ask you, following the answer you supplied us last time: where will the Liana outbreak first start?” 

She smiles at me, her most winning smile. It’s strangely familiar. 

“To repeat,” says Sasha, “Where will the Liana outbreak first start? It’s fine if you need a moment to think, Grand Wise-sir.” 

I close my eyes. Liana. Just one word and all my memories start flooding back. Not the calming wash of a trickling stream but an uncontrollable torrent, carving through my mind-

bodies piling up in hospital floats, a stink of rotting human flowing through the air. Mails and messages and even citizens, in person, banging at the door of my office - yes, my office. I was the governor of Urelisa when the outbreak started. And I could do nothing to stop the slaughterous rampage of the disease, which spread somehow despite all the modern medicine and quarantines I put in place. 

I open my eyes. 

“The Liana outbreak - it started, well -” 

But I stop speaking when I see them all scribbling at their clipboards. Sasha’s face is glowing with excitement. 

“What will you do once this one question is over?” I say, trying to keep my emotion out of my voice. 

Sasha stares at me. The other people whisper to one another. I strain to hear the words but my ears are half blocked in any case. The coldness is really getting to me now. It’s hard to keep my eyes open. But I’m afraid to shut them. What am I doing here? I can recall fragments of my past now but… 

“We will give you a meal. We can wipe your face for health.” says Sasha, nodding, “Anything you wish for, Grand Wise-sir. We are all indebted to your wisdom.”

I close my eyes. I can’t feel most of my body, and the parts I can sense are weak and feeble. 

“Please try to stay with us, sir!” Sasha’s voice is harsh and close.  

I push my eyes back open. “Answer me a question in return, please.” 

Sasha flares her nostrils but nods. And then I can’t see what she does because my eyes are slipping shut again. 

“Why am I trapped in this freezing cell?” I speak with my eyes still closed. “Have you imprisoned me? I retired last year, please let me go back to my family!” 

A wave of exhaustion hits me. My lips are shaking. I open my eyes just a chink. A loose grey hair slips down my face and I know without asking that it is mine. But - I don’t have grey hair. 

“What have you done to me?” I stare at the researchers. 

“We have taken the best possible care of you, sir,” Sasha says, eyes wide. 

As she speaks I can’t shake the feeling I’ve heard those words before, from the same mouth. I try to dredge my memories, my mind sluggish. But that’s what it is - I’ve seen her before. Much younger than now. Sasha was standing in front of me last time I woke up, it was only weeks ago, wasn’t it? 

Yet now she’s an old lady.  

“How long have I been here with you?” My voice is hoarse.

“You are asking too many questions, Grand Wise-sir.” Sasha raises an eyebrow. “You’re going to overexert yourself. Don’t panic, and pray tell us about the upcoming Liana outbreak, sir.”

I sigh, but it turns into a cough and then I can’t stop coughing; it's a fit. With my hands trapped by my side, I can’t even wipe the phlegm from my chin. 

“Leave the Grand Wise-sir alone now, won’t you?” a young researcher steps beside Sasha, “We have to send him back to sleep and leave him to return to his own time. He’s getting far too old for this now.” 

Sasha turns on her heel. Her voice is a deadly whisper. “Old age only brings wisdom, something you should have learnt before you joined this course! Get out and let me continue my research.” 

The young researcher ignores her, strides across the lab and slams a blue button. She turns to catch my eye, mouth firmly set. “Thanks for your predictions, Grand Wise-sir. You can see your family again now.” 

A veil of painfully cold gas blasts from vents in the floor and a sheet of murky ice creeps back over my mouth and nose and it's going to cover my eyes. I’m going to be blind again. But I’m seeing my family again. The temperature plunges and I feel my body and mind numb… 

Hot. 

Red swords slice at the icy casing. Three dark figures, fire in hand, are tearing away at the ice. A hiss and I can see again and smell again. Sasha is there, squinting at me behind her glasses. Not again. I don’t want to be here. But the ice keeps melting and with a jolt I sense my chest and shoulders. I might be able to move my arms.

“That’s enough,” says Sasha, motioning to the blow-torch holders. The young researcher who'd pushed the button is lying on the floor. She’s not moving. So I’ve been brought back after all. 

“That’s enough I said!” Sasha grabs a blow-torcher by the wrist and he cries out and shuts off the flame. But half the ice wall has already melted away, pools of water trickling into the floor. 

My feet and calves are trapped, but only by soft ice. I feel like crying, but I laugh instead. I lean forward, pushing my weight against the icy clamps. I could step free. 

As the numbness wears off and I feel the sweaty heat of the room against my skin, standing straight becomes difficult. A fever shivers through me and I collapse, my feet jerking free of the ice. I’m sprawled on the ground, shaking. My body doesn’t obey my orders anymore. 

They stare down on me, a circle of horrified and shocked faces.

My voice is faint. “What have you done to me?”

“We’re not doing anything, Grand Wise-sir” says Sasha, lowering her gaze, “Nothing wrong. You’re supposed to help us avoid mistakes. But now you won’t cooperate with us like you did to the first teams who found you.” 

“What teams?” Fury and helplessness burrow down my chest. “I’m the ex-governor of Urelisa. I don’t know who you are!” 

They gaze at me sadly. Like I’m a child who’s lost his way. 

Sasha turns her back on me and looks to the others. “My mother warned against the damage to cognitive function with multiple thaws.” She shook her head. “I should have listened. I knew it was better practice to keep the Grand-Wise awake for longer but with less thaws. Now look at him.” 

“Where is my family?” I sob, I can’t help it. None of my dignity remains to these people anyway. “Please let me go.” 

Sasha stares at me. In the corner of one eye, I think there’s a moistness, but it's hard to see past the rim of her glasses. 

“Your family are far away,” whispers Sasha. “If they exist at all in this future.”

“What do you mean?” I struggle to stand but it’s no use. 

“You should know, you came from the future, Grand Wise-sir,” says Sasha, straightening, “You are supposed to remember these things. You’re supposed to tell us what to avoid. The future will be better. So please, tell us where the Liana outbreak will begin!” 

I stare at my body, the body that won’t listen to me anymore. My skin is wrinkled and my limbs weak. But my mind is still as sharp as ever, no matter what these researchers say. 

“I’m not telling you anything.” I smile at Sasha. “Send me back to my family.” 

She glares at me, her hands in fists by her side. The other researchers are silent, fidgeting. Sasha flits her gaze around the room and finally it comes to rest on me. She nods, and her jaw is set. 

“Fine. We’ll put you back. As you wish, Grand Wise-sir.” 

Another researcher tugs at her arm, frowning, but Sasha bats him away. Some of the others are grimacing. But when they see me seeing them they tuck their expressions away.  

Two people take my arms and start to raise me to my feet. The world is heavy on my shoulders. I sway in their grip. My eyes are open but black spots mar my vision. A numbness takes my hands and legs, even though the freezing hasn’t started yet. 

“Grand Wise-sir!” Sasha’s voice is far away, from another planet. 

Distant voices. I’m not hot or cold. I feel less and less. 

“You should have left him in there. It was too soon to thaw him.” 

“Professor, you’re too ambitious.”

“We’ll ask it again in a few years.” 

The voices fade away. Just before they dim forever, I dream they are the morning whispers of my daughters, come to crawl on my bed and wake me up for the day ahead.