Derin woke up at dawn to Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier, playing as per her instructions to her personal computer, Konfidulo. She sipped her coffee while watching the ocean view with the first emerging rays of the sun. While she was in the bathroom, Konfidulo had completed his analysis and was presenting the report to Derin. "Saluton, bonan matenon Derin Kaplan. Vi estas tiel sana! Nenio zorgi pri via sano. La vetero estas suna, 27 celsiusgradoj. Rekomenda vestokodo estas S32."[1]
Konfidulo was speaking to Derin in her father's voice. "Dankon Konfidulo," she replied sleepily. It would be good to watch the sunrise at breakfast, she thought.
"Ĉu vi povas servi mian matenmanĝon ĉe la tegmenta restoracio?"[2]
"Certe sinjorino,"[3] Konfidulo replied.
She did her morning exercise on the elliptical machine, took a shower, brushed her teeth, and put in her contact lenses. Choosing dress code S32 upon Konfidulo's recommendation, she then took the elevator to the rooftop restaurant. As the capsule went up to the roof terrace, Bach continued to play in her ear and Derin hummed along with the melody.
A few other people were having breakfast with Derin in the restaurant. She greeted them all and sat down at her table. A few seconds later, one of the service robots controlled by Konfidulo brought her breakfast and provided the calorie information. He stated that if she were to add a mixed fruit juice, she would meet her daily vitamin needs to a large extent, but Derin didn't want it to. She preferred to drink tea. Over breakfast, she reviewed where she was at with her project. Two more of her hamsters had died yesterday after being injected with artificial blood.
Derin had been working on this project since the day she chose to become a cryogenic engineer. She had made great strides and had managed to gain entry into the worldwide cryogenics working group of twenty-two people. They had a meeting coming up soon.
She turned her head when she realized that someone was watching her. It was her mother. "Good morning, Derin," she said when she caught her daughter's gaze. "What are you doing here this early?"
Derin smiled. "Good morning, mom. I have a meeting. What about you?" Ayda touched her daughter's shoulder tenderly. She had grown old, but her hands didn't look wrinkled thanks to regular tissue regeneration.
"Dad and I are going to visit the nearby USLAs[4] today."
"Sai isn't my father. You know that, mom!"
"Yes, honey, your father is dead. If you could get used to that fact and move on with your life, you would be happier."
"My father isn't dead, mom," Derin muttered behind her mother.
Turning the corner to leave, Ayda called out "Adiaŭ![5]" Derin shrugged; she didn't have time to deal with her mother. Konfidulo informed her that fifteen minutes were remaining until her meeting by reflecting a notification onto her contact lenses. "Would you like me to remind you of the meeting agenda?" he asked through the tiny speakers integrated into her inner ear. Derin went down in the elevator to the meeting room while listening to the agenda. She was particularly curious about Roberta's presentation from the Brazilian USLA. Her work could be a turning point for humanity.
When she entered the meeting room, Konfidulo was projecting images of the twenty-one other participants around the round table into Derin's lenses. The images of those who were not yet online stood still; those who were online greeted each other. Roberta's image was standing still. A total of one hundred USLAs were positioned close to the equator, making as much use as possible of the solar energy. Roberta's USLA was just above the equator, north of the old city of Fortaleza. Derin lived in the USLA outside of Mogadishu. It was midnight for the Brazilian USLA because of the six-hour time difference.
Within a few minutes, Derin opened the session with "Saluton amikoj![6]" By this point, everyone was online and paying attention. "As you know, we've come a long way in freezing and reanimating living organisms. The hamster whose antifreeze fluid we'd changed recently was able to breathe for three minutes and had a steady heartbeat. Now it's been almost a month. We've received news of important developments from Roberta in the Brazilian USLA. Roberta, can you tell us what's going on?" She gave her the floor.
Roberta spoke with excitement. "Yes, Derin, there have been important developments. I have one in my palm right now," and she raised her hand for all to see. Everyone looked at the hamster that she held. The animal seemed content with life, busily gnawing on a sunflower seed. "We froze this hamster two weeks ago with our special freezing technique. We thawed it yesterday. We didn't see any problems with his movements. He successfully passed the test of his five sensory organs!" Now twenty-two people around the world were screaming, cheering, and applauding. This was something they had been working on for years. If they succeeded, one could go to galaxies hundreds of light-years away and travel to any place in the universe where there was a possibility of life.
Derin spoke again. "Congratulations, Roberta! What have you done differently from our previous work?" Roberta stammered for a moment: "Well, there were a few snags. We don't exactly know what we did differently. There's a video documentation of the experiment. I've watched it myself several hundred times. That day, we took two hamsters to be tested again. Unfortunately, one is dead, but I have the other one alive. I'm sending the video log to your PCs."
The joy in the group gave way to silence, and after a few small details were discussed, the meeting was over.
Derin asked Konfidulo to transfer the video to her lenses. The process was clearly visible. Roberta took two hamsters into her hands and put them into the blood exchange machine. When the antifreeze liquid, which prevented their blood from freezing and cracking their cell walls, had penetrated into all of their cells, the red eyes of the albino animals turned blue, and then the liquid nitrogen valve was opened to fill the space around them. So far, this was all exactly what Derin had done.
She began watching the reanimation sequence part of the video. Roberta attached the frozen animals to the thawing machine, the animals were heated to just above the freezing point, artificial blood began being injected, the eyes of both animals turned red again, and the ambient temperature was brought up to 99.5 °F. One hamster came to life, but the other hamster didn't move. In this part of the video, the hamster that had come to life sauntered into Roberta's palm while she was explaining what she had done. Although Roberta looked overjoyed, she was also clearly surprised that one of the hamsters had shown no signs of life.
Derin played the video multiple times. She considered everything, but she couldn't see the difference. There must have been a difference in the freezing and thawing processes of these two hamsters—but what was it?
[1] Esperanto: "Hello, good morning Derin Kaplan. You are healthy! Nothing to worry about regarding your health. The weather is sunny, 27 degrees Celsius. Recommended dress code is S32."
[2] Esperanto: "Can you serve my breakfast in the rooftop restaurant?"
[3] Esperanto: "Certainly, madam."
[4] Esperanto abbreviation for Urbo sur la akvo: "City on the water."
[5] Esperanto: "Goodbye."
[6] Esperanto: "Hello, friends."