Thousands of years pass, the small peaceful town Franky used to live in turns into a vast desert. After approximately 12,000 years, three figures can be seen walking through the wastes, one of them was carrying a metal detector, the other was fanning themselves with their hand, and the last was flapping their fins toward the last two.
"UUUUGGHH.. We've been at this for hours.."
"We'll stumble on something soon Frye, I'm sure."
"Ay. (Yeah, and when we do, we should get portable fans.)"
These three figures are Shiver, Frye, and Big Man of the band Deep Cut, out on their daily treasure hunting adventures, they wanted to go to the Crater, but there seems to be some construction going on there, so they're left to sift in the sands.
"Big Man, you don't even wear clothes, you should be the coolest one out of all of us." Shiver said.
"Ay Ay. (I'm wearing this hat! It's melting my head off..) Big Man Ay-ed
As they talked, the metal detector finally picked something up.
"Hallelujah! Finally!" Shiver exclaimed.
"Let's see what this could be!" Frye said.
They swiftly sifted through the sand, and after a few feet of digging, they found what tripped the sensor, a small metal hatch with a valve.
"What the f-" Frye started.
"Jeez, this thing is ancient." Shiver interrupted
"Ay? (Should we open it?)" Big Man asked.
"Maybe it's some sort of time capsule." Shiver added.
After a few moments they decided to open it up. Shiver started twisting the valve on the hatch, but it wouldn't budge.
"Argh! This things locked tight!" Shiver grunted. "Help me out here Frye."
Frye grabbed the valve and twisted it with Shiver, after a few moments, the valve slowly started to turn with a loud screech, after some effort it opened.
"Alright, it's a dark creepy ladder." Shiver said
"Smells like treasure in there though. Let's go down it!" Frye suggested
Ay! (I can't fit in that tiny hole!) Big Man Ay-ed
"Well... then you keep watch up here, me and Shiver will go down there." Frye said reluctantly. She hated leaving one of her friends out of something, but it seems like it's the only option.
"Ay! (Got it!)" Big Man Ay-ed loudly.
"Alright, in we go." Shiver said, making her way down the ladder, which was in significantly better shape than the hatch.
"I hope this isn't like the Inkopolis incident.." Frye followed behind.
As they got to the bottom, a thick cloud of dust tickled their noses, causing them to sneeze.
"This place really is ancient.." Frye said.
"Well, it's in significantly better shape than the other ruins we found." Shiver said.
They stepped farther into the room, when a loud screech echoed throughout the facility, followed by a computerized voice.
"MOTI[BZZZT] DETECTED, ACTIVATING EMERG[BZZZT]Y BACKUP POWER."
Dim lights suddenly shined from the ceiling of the vault, not enough to make things easy to see, but enough to prevent the rooms to be pitch-black.
"What was that?" Shiver asked, startled. Obviously neither of them understood what the A.I. said.
"This place is freaky.." Frye added.
The A.I. spoke again. "WELCOME TO VAULT [BZZZT]! PREFORMING BIOLOGICAL SCAN... SCAN COMPL[BZZT]TE, NO MATCHES FOUND."
"Agh.. that things so loud!" Shiver yelled.
"Let's just find something in here that's valuable and leave." Frye said.
They split up to search the facility, Frye went into a room marked 'Bedroom'. The bed was covered in a layer of dust, but that didn't stop Frye.
"Aahh.. Wow this bed is soft.." Frye sighed. She wondered about somehow stealing this for herself, but decided against it, she sat up and spotted a drawer next to the bed. She opened it, looking for any valuables. She pulled out a photograph of a human family, a mother, a father, and their son. Written on it: "Don't Forget".
"Definitely human ruins." Frye said.
She dug through the drawer more and found more ancient trinkets. A human phone, which Frye turned on and was surprised to see it still functioning. It showed a boot up screen with a logo and played a jingle, then showed the lock screen for a fraction of a second before glitchy artifacts filled the screen, then it shut off.
"Huh?! Oh come on!" Frye shouted, trying to turn it back on, but to no avail. She knew she was probably just imagining things, but she thought she saw some familiar faces in the lock screen before it broke.
"Ooh!" Frye said spotting something else, a bunch of human coins. These sold for moderately high values at museums.
Shiver was looking through the kitchen, she rummaged through the cabinets and drawers, finding knives, spoons, forks, spatulas, a gross jar of god knows what, and more kitchen utilities.
"Uugh.. This is nothing.." Shiver groaned. She turned to search somewhere else but found a metal door that said "PRESERVED FOODS"
"Mmm.. The safe!" Shiver grinned. She immediately tried to yank it open.
"WARNING, UNAUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ATTEMPTING T[BZZZT] ACCESS FOOD RATIONS, ANTI RAIDER DEFENSES ACTIVATING.
The door emitted a shockwave, knocking Shiver back.
"Aahh! What the heck?!" Shiver exclaimed. She stood up and stomped out of the room.
Shiver and Frye met back at the main room.
"What did you find?" Shiver asked.
"A phone that still worked for a minute, and human currency!" Frye said.
"Mmm... that's not enough." Shiver said.
"I don't see YOU with anything." Frye said.
"Hmm, we need more.. we didn't dig through that sand for nothing.." Shiver said.
"What about that room?" Frye asked.
There was one room that they haven't checked, the one behind a big metal door marked CRYO-CHAMBER.
"Good idea, Frye. But the last metal door I tried to open pushed me back." Shiver explained.
"Really? Hang on, let me try.." Frye said before grabbing the handle and pulling on it, but the door wouldn't budge.
"Frye, the arrows." Shiver said. Frye looked up to see arrows indicating that it was a sliding door.
"Oops.." Frye said. She slid the door open, causing the A.I. to speak again.
"WARNING: YOU ARE ENTERING A VERY DANGEROUS AREA, TO MINIMIZE THE RISK OF A COOLANT LEAK, PLEASE REMEMBER TO KEEP YOUR FEET ON THE WALKWAY AT ALL TIMES."
"Brr... it's really cold.." Frye stuttered.
"Yeah.. what is this place? It doesn't look like ant other room." Shiver shivered.
The room had a large container in the center of it, fog spilling from the vents on its sides.
"That has to have something in it!" Frye shouted. They hurried over to the pod trying to find a way to open it. Shiver wiped on the frosted window on the front of the pod to peer inside, but to no avail.
"Permafrost?" Shiver said. "What's causing that?"
"Wait, Shiver look!" Frye said spotting a big red lever on the side of the pod. Without hesitation, she pulled it.
"ABORT COLD SNOOZE PROTOCOL ACCEPTED, REVIVING SUBJECT."
The pod started loudly humming as it vibrated, the frost on the window began to slowly melt.
"Woah! Here we go!" Shiver said.
"This better be good.." Frye added.
The pod stopped humming, and started opening with a loud *FWOOSH*. Revealing a dense, cold fog, Shiver and Frye fistbumped each other and stepped closer to the machine. They weren't expecting what would happen next.
A leg stepped through the fog onto the ground, startling both Shiver and Frye. A hand clung onto the side of the pod, pulling the rest of the being out, stepping down one of the 3 stairs. Shiver and Frye recognized its form.
Human.
The human took another step towards the two, not even reacting to their presence. Frye got a good look at the humans face, it's eyes were closed behind its frost covered glasses. It's clothes, consisting of a white jacket, white pants, and a red shirt, still had patches of frost on them. The human took another step, before losing his balance, falling in front of them.
As Shiver stared at the lifeless human, she started to poke it with her fan until the human started to rise again. Frye immediately ran off with Shiver staring in shock for a moment before running back as well. The human slowly got up from the ground and put on his glasses.
"GOOD moRNING. YOU HAVE BEEN IN SUSPENSION FOR [ 12.. THOUSAND..] YEARS. AS PART OF REINTEGRATION, WE WILL NOW COMMENCE YOUR MANDATORY FITNESS AND MENTAL WELLNESS CHECK."
The room hummed.
"SCAN COMPLETE. YOU HAVE SUFFERED MINOR BRAIN DAMAGE, CONSIDERING CRYO-STASIS IS A NEW TECHNOLOGY, THIS IS CONSIDERED AN OPTIMAL OUTCOME. YOU MAY EXPERIENCE SIDE EFFECTS SUCH AS MEMORY LOSS, CONFUSION, LOSS OF CONCSIOUSNESS, AND PARANOIA."
"Uuuhh.." Franky groaned, gathering his senses. He slowly regained his ability to use his legs, and started walking.
Shiver and Frye were watching in awe from the doorway.
"Is that what I think it is?!" Frye whispered.
"It's.. an actual living human.. extraordinary." Shiver whispered in awe. "Wait till we tell Big Man about this!"
"This is definitely our best find yet!" Frye whispered.
Franky collapsed again, struggling to use his legs, they were still very cold. Groaning, he stood up again, a small table with a steaming mug and a tablet on it began rising from the ground.
"PLEASE ENJOY THIS COMPLENENTAR[BZT]Y HEATED CHOCOLATE DRINK."
Franky took the mug, shivering, and slowly drank it. Maybe it's because it technically has been 12,000 years since he's tasted anything, but this hot chocolate was the best thing he's ever tasted. Finishing the drink, he gained much better control of his body, but then he heard quiet rustling to his right where the door was.
He snapped his head to the right, startled, but saw nothing.
Shiver and Frye darted around the doorway when the human turned in their direction, narrowly escaping being spotted.
"What do we do?" Frye asked.
"I don't know yet, hang on." Shiver responded.
Franky moved to the generator room to restore power to the vault. After he flipped the switch, the vault began sputtering to life.
"FACILITY FULLY OPERATIONAL. PREFORMING SURFACE SCAN... SURFACE STATUS.. HABITABLE. WARNING. TWO UNKNOWN LIFEFORMS DETECTED IN FACILITY."
Franky's spine went cold as soon as he heard the A.I. say that. His heart was pumping out of his chest, frozen in fear, what does it mean two unknown lifeforms?
After all of this is he really going to be killed by God knows what's in here with him? After a few moments, which felt like forever, he worked up the courage to go and try to leave the vault.
As he rounded the corner he spotted them, but they didn't see him, he ducked behind the large table in the main room. The exit was right in front of him. As Franky looked at the two strange humanoids, terrified, he took an opportunity to make a dash towards the exit while they weren't looking, but he slightly slipped on the linoleum floor, making a loud screech, then fell onto the floor.
Shiver and Frye snapped there heads to Franky, startled. Franky quickly picked himself up and looked at the lifeforms in shock before immediately heading for the exit.
"Väquelah!" One of them said. They sounded almost human like, but not quite. Nevertheless Franky kept going.
As he reached the top, the sunlight blinded him, as is eyes adjusted, he stared out in shock. His small town he used to live in, was now a big desert, but not completely void of life, as there was a city in the distance.
"Other humans mayb-"
"Ay!"
"GAAAHH!" Franky jumped back at the sound behind him, coming face to face with a large... manta ray?
"Ay?"
Franky looked at the ray with a confusing look, it was giant, but, it seemed harmless enough. Franky decided to just run away towards the city on the horizon. Maybe his theory was correct.
Shiver climbed out of the vault followed by Frye, both frantically looking around.
"Big Man! Did you see that human that came out of here?" Frye asked.
Ay! Ay. Ay. (Yeah! I talked to it but, it didn't seem to understand me. It took off towards Splatsville.) Big Man explained in Ay's.
"Should we go after him?" Shiver asked.
"He could be dangerous.. We probably should." said Frye.
Ay. (I agree.) Ay-ed Big Man.
"Alright, let's go after him." Shiver said as they all took off towards Splatsville.
To be continued..
