The thawing was more painful than they’d led Rosemary to believe, but InterSpace Agency had been right about one thing. “No dreams,” the tech had said. “That’s the weirdest part. It’s like you get turned off.”
Now she was being turned back on, the shell of the Eleazar series cryo pressed warm against her like a laser tanning bed. The gastric tubes down her throat felt like she was swallowing scalding coffee. She was impossibly cold and hot at the same time as blood pumped into her arteries and pushed out the antifreeze serum. Parts of her swelled tight as a balloon and her nerves were needles that screamed as they came back to life.
She tried to blink away the dark, but her eyes weren’t working yet.
An alarm went off. She didn’t know if it was her alarm or Cheng’s. She pulled out her tubes and hit the release. The alarm got louder.
She stumbled out of her cradle and crawled on all fours to the second unit. Half blind, she found the emergency lid release and reached inside.
Cheng was still cold. Her hands got lucky and found the kinked hose, put the lid back down.
The alarm went silent. She sat in a pool of her own condensation until he emerged.
“Cheng? You alive?” she asked.
An alarm went off. She didn’t know if it was her alarm or Cheng’s. She pulled out her tubes and hit the release. The alarm got louder.
“Almost.” Cheng’s eyelids were swollen. “Have you taken a look yet?”
“Been waiting for you. You had a blocked hose.”
“What if someone’s already knocking at the door?”
Rosemary stood up, using her hands for support. The gravity wasn’t so bad. She went to the console and flipped switches.
The screen came on. Four cameras showed similar views of an open plain lit by an enormous rusty sun. Orange-tinged rocks stretched in all directions.
“No welcoming committee yet.” Rosemary didn’t see any structures, either. “We landed in the middle of nowhere.”
Cheng tipped his head and winced. “That’s good. Gives us some time.”
Rosemary half-smiled back, one side of her face still stiff. “You’re not ready to play ambassador yet?”
Cheng opened his eyes a little wider. “I just think we should get dressed before we meet the aliens.”
This is an excerpt from The View from Proxima Centauri, written by Susan Pieters. It was originally published in the January/February 2019 edition of Analog: Science Fiction and Fact.