The Ark

Chapter 2

Chapter Two

DAY 1075

The large conference table in the center of the room was covered with papers and laptop computers, coffee cups and not just a few soda bottles. Fourteen people were seated around the table, discussing the events of the morning. At the front of the room, a door opened, and a tall man entered. He strode in with authority, dressed in a US Army dress uniform. On his shoulder boards were the silver eagles which denoted his rank as an Army Colonel.

The Colonel appeared to be in his late fifties and stood just over six feet tall. He was quite thin and his brown hair was well on its way to being gray. The name tag above his right breast pocket read 'Fitch'.

Following behind him was a stocky man of medium height who was in his mid-forties; he wore a lab coat, the name 'J. Cowan' embroidered onto the breast pocket. Cowan walked with a mild limp and was slightly shorter than the Colonel.

No sooner had they entered the room than everyone seated at the table got to their feet. Half the room stood at attention, and the rest stood casually, differentiating the civilian workers and their military counterparts. A faint nod of the Colonel's head was all they needed to sit down and return to work.

Fitch took out a pair of glasses, slipped them on, and quickly scanned the clipboard he held. “Okay, tell me what went wrong with those two systems,” he demanded. Again requesting the information he had asked for over the intercom when his team had been suited up in the chamber.

After a brief pause, a short-haired Asian man in a lab coat spoke up, a slight quiver in his voice when he spoke. “Sir, I've been reviewing the data from Capsule Ten. Sometime last year an unexpected hardware failure occurred in the primary cooling system. Three seconds after the failure, the backup system engaged. Since then it has been running without a problem. Just to remind everyone, there is also a third tier in this system, an auxiliary cooling system that comes online if the two other systems failed. This auxiliary system has never engaged and appears to be completely functional. It looks like the built-in fault tolerance worked exactly as we had hoped.”

“No, Lieutenant,” Cowan snapped, “that isn't how we had hoped it would work. That primary cooling system was supposed to be able to operate, unsupervised for twenty years. Now you're telling me that it only lasted four years into this five-year test.”

Colonel Fitch nodded in agreement.

The Lieutenant opened his mouth to respond but seeing the look on his superiors' faces, decided against it.

“Now will someone tell me what killed Miller?” the Colonel demanded. There was more frustration in his voice than anger.

A woman of medium height, with long brown hair, stood up. She wore a US Army dress uniform with Captain's bars on her shoulders and spoke with a slight New England accent. “Colonel, something shorted out her primary life support computer. Until we get her out and can get to the computer, we won't have all the details. However, the monitors indicate that she suffered some form of a seizure about a year ago. And that she was alive for almost two hours afterward. At that point, for reasons still unknown, her life support computer shorted out. When this happened, there was a sudden increase in temperature in the electronics compartment that houses the bio-computer. Apparently, the temperature was in excess of five hundred degrees for about thirty seconds. The main computer cut power to the electronics compartment in her capsule, due to the threat of a possible fire. At this point, the temperature rapidly decreased. The main computer was seconds away from terminating the entire experiment and sounding a general fire detection alarm. Even though the results were tragic, it looks like most of the systems responded as designed.”

Colonel Fitch's initial reaction had been a cold stare which slowly melted away as he listened to the facts. He nodded slowly.

Cowan, in a more relaxed tone, asked, “Captain Travers, when will we know the cause of the seizure and what created the short circuit?” As frustrated as James Cowan felt regarding the failure, he wouldn't vent that frustration on Amy Travers. She'd been his right-hand person on this project for several years, quickly gaining expertise in this science. She was the only one who understood the artificial sleep processes well enough to continue this work, if he should ever decide to move on. He'd been offered more lucrative positions recently, but was committed to seeing this project through.

Travers replied. “We won't know the cause of the seizure before the autopsy. Until Miller is removed from the capsule, we won't be able to get under it to see the electronics compartment.”

“When will we be able to go back in the chamber without the biohazard suits?” Cowan asked.

A short, balding man spoke up. “Bio-contamination scanning is just finishing now. If the computers found no problems, we should be able to re-enter within the hour.”

“Sir, what about the wake-up?” Travers said.

“That should probably wait until we get the body out,” a voice from the back of the room suggested.

“I agree, let's hold off and see what we find with Miller and her capsule and then we'll start working on Group One,” Fitch instructed. With a nod to those around the table, Fitch and Cowan left the room together.

Fitch could feel his head pounding from the stress and frustration of the morning. He'd been serving as the Project Director for the past several years and he'd planned on this being his final assignment before he slipped away to a quiet retirement.

Matt Fitch began his Army career as an infantry officer fresh out of the military academy at West Point. His career moved quickly, and he'd been posted to various locations all over the world. He'd even seen some combat during those years.

He'd developed a reputation for his organizational skills and been promoted to the position of Operations Officer in his unit. Within weeks of reporting for his new duty, a medium-sized mass had been detected in his right lung. Two-thirds of the lung had to be removed, to ensure the cancer didn't spread. Nowadays, he was minimally aware of the decreased respiratory function, and it was only annoying when he exerted himself. However, the impairment was enough to keep him from ever serving again in a combat unit.

Fortunately, Fitch had made the right connections over the years, and one of those connections got him the assignment he currently held, as a Project Director in Deep Sleep Research.

About an hour later, the massive steel doors started to move again, only the second occurrence in the last five years. Now the technicians and a pair of physicians weren't encumbered by heavy air tanks and containment suits. They brought in medical equipment, including drug kits, portable oxygen tanks, and heart monitors, rolled in on four-wheeled stretchers.

While the medical staff began setting up the equipment, a fifth stretcher was rolled up to the third capsule in the first row. A black, heavy vinyl bag, seven feet in length was unrolled and laid on the stretcher with the zipper facing the capsule.

At the beginning of the first row, a technician began inputting commands into the console. “I can't open it from here. All the automatic systems are down for this capsule.” He stepped over to the side of the capsule and crouched down. He removed two small hatch covers using a flat head screwdriver to pry them off.

Both openings were barely large enough to insert a hand. The technician reached into the first, and after a moment a slight movement of the transparent lid could be detected, followed by an audible hiss as the pressure changed within the capsule. He withdrew his hand and reached into the second opening. After a slightly longer delay, a loud popping sound echoed in the room, and the lid jumped up about an inch.

“Okay, we should be able to lift it now,” the technician announced.

He rose to his feet, and with the help of one of the physicians lifted the lid. The smell of death wasn't as bad as they'd feared, but it was still noticeable. After the face mask was removed and the tubes and wires cut loose, the body of Rhonda Miller was gently lifted from the capsule. The irony of the dead woman being lifted from a coffin-shaped container was not lost on any of them.

Miller was laid flat on the stretcher, and the black body bag was zipped shut. Two safety straps went over the bag and were fastened to keep it firmly secured to the stretcher, and Captain Amy Travers and a physician left with the body to begin the autopsy.

Once the body was gone, James Cowan moved in to begin investigating the cause of the fatal failure of capsule three.