Descending Road - ELENA PHOM by Dana W. Paxson

ELENA PHOM

2406 CE

Elena wanted to open her eyes, but her muscles were paralyzed. Covered only by a thin blanket, she lay naked on a steel table in a cold room, her body connected to dozens of monitors, samplers, infusers, and drains. The small bottle of precious tau, the cold-sleep brain preservative, hung from a rack of pouches and bottles, all lined into her bloodstream. One drop came from the tau bottle each second.

Even in the midst of entering cold sleep for the first time, even as the intense tickling sensation of the first-stage chemical changes spread throughout her body, she couldn’t curb her curiosity. As she lay immobile and waiting, a twinge of fear shuddered in her spine. Even with all the preliminary tests and trials, this would be the first really lengthy test of ultracold sleep. Elena would go down in for six months, and then, if everything worked, she would wake up.

It would take four stages altogether. First, the biofactory had to be diffused throughout every cell in her body. The biofactory was a symbiotic community of bacteria, viruses, and their initial nutrients, all harmless to human body chemistry, that would take over the second stage of descent. Along with the biofactory went a cocktail of anesthetics that would free her awareness from the more-difficult parts of the process.

All of the first stage took place at room temperature. Once the diffusion process was complete — in one or two days — the second stage would start. The trigger was a bath of microwaves of just the right frequencies and intensities to cause certain of the infused chemicals to change their shape. The new shapes would react with others, creating signals for some special ribosomal activity to begin. The ribosomes, ferried in by the bacteria, would begin manufacturing antifreeze for each cell, in the form of trehalose analogues specially designed to be compatible with human body chemistry.

Some of the microbes had specialized missions, primarily to neutralize some of the body’s natural immune reactions to the invasion of all the strange substances and creatures. Other microbes began mutating into forms that would eventually serve as the engines of ascent back from fourth-stage cold sleep into full wakefulness.

The third stage of descent began the drop in temperature, from the usual 30 degrees Centigrade down to what the sleep engineers called the Elbow, at about the boiling point of nitrogen. That’s where things got strange.

They’d had a lot of trouble around the Elbow. The ribosomes that had been designed for this stage sometimes didn’t work the way they were supposed to; in fact, they started spewing poison instead of preservatives. Although the body could descend into fourth-stage cold sleep, it would come back to third stage only to die. Ten of twelve volunteers had been lost that way. Only two had passed the Elbow and lived to talk about it.

Elena, forgetting her paralysis, tried to shift her shoulders. She hated remembering this part of it. After the last death, she’d said, “Next time, I’m going in myself. We’re going to get this right.”

Now was next time.

Story List	SURPRISE ME	Author Page
USER SURVEY	PUZZLE ME	MAKE ELM MARK

HOVER Lucida Bright BARE	HOVER Lucida Bright FULL	HOVER Palatino Linotype BARE
HOVER Palatino Linotype FULL	HOVER Times New Roman BARE	HOVER Times New Roman FULL
PAD Arial BARE	PAD Arial FULL	PAD Lucida Bright BARE
PAD Lucida Bright FULL	PAD Times New Roman BARE	PAD Times New Roman FULL


	ELENA PHOM 2406 CE Elena wanted to open her eyes, but her muscles were paralyzed. Covered only by a thin blanket, she lay naked on a steel table in a cold room, her body connected to dozens of monitors, samplers, infusers, and drains. The small bottle of precious tau, the cold-sleep brain preservative, hung from a rack of pouches and bottles, all lined into her bloodstream. One drop came from the tau bottle each second. Even in the midst of entering cold sleep for the first time, even as the intense tickling sensation of the first-stage chemical changes spread throughout her body, she couldn’t curb her curiosity. As she lay immobile and waiting, a twinge of fear shuddered in her spine. Even with all the preliminary tests and trials, this would be the first really lengthy test of ultracold sleep. Elena would go down in for six months, and then, if everything worked, she would wake up. It would take four stages altogether. First, the biofactory had to be diffused throughout every cell in her body. The biofactory was a symbiotic community of bacteria, viruses, and their initial nutrients, all harmless to human body chemistry, that would take over the second stage of descent. Along with the biofactory went a cocktail of anesthetics that would free her awareness from the more-difficult parts of the process. All of the first stage took place at room temperature. Once the diffusion process was complete — in one or two days — the second stage would start. The trigger was a bath of microwaves of just the right frequencies and intensities to cause certain of the infused chemicals to change their shape. The new shapes would react with others, creating signals for some special ribosomal activity to begin. The ribosomes, ferried in by the bacteria, would begin manufacturing antifreeze for each cell, in the form of trehalose analogues specially designed to be compatible with human body chemistry. Some of the microbes had specialized missions, primarily to neutralize some of the body’s natural immune reactions to the invasion of all the strange substances and creatures. Other microbes began mutating into forms that would eventually serve as the engines of ascent back from fourth-stage cold sleep into full wakefulness. The third stage of descent began the drop in temperature, from the usual 30 degrees Centigrade down to what the sleep engineers called the Elbow, at about the boiling point of nitrogen. That’s where things got strange. They’d had a lot of trouble around the Elbow. The ribosomes that had been designed for this stage sometimes didn’t work the way they were supposed to; in fact, they started spewing poison instead of preservatives. Although the body could descend into fourth-stage cold sleep, it would come back to third stage only to die. Ten of twelve volunteers had been lost that way. Only two had passed the Elbow and lived to talk about it. Elena, forgetting her paralysis, tried to shift her shoulders. She hated remembering this part of it. After the last death, she’d said, “Next time, I’m going in myself. We’re going to get this right.” Now was next time.