The President called it the Epitome of the American dream. Daddy called it the unholy alliance of business and government. But all it really was, was America giving up. Bailing out in order to join the Financial Resource Exchange. A multinational alliance focused on one thing: profit. Fund global medical care to monopolize vaccines. Back unified currency to collect planet-wide interest. And provide the resources needed for a select group of scientists and military personnel to embark on the first trip across the universe in a quest to find more natural resourcesmore profit. The answer to my parents dreams. And my worst nightmare. And I know something about nightmares, seeing as how Ive been sleeping longer than Ive been alive. I hope. What if this is just a part of a long dream dreamt in the short time between when Ed locked the cryo door and Hassan pushed the button to freeze me? What if? Its a strange sort of sleep, this. Never really waking up, but becoming aware of consciousness inside a too-still body. The dreams weave in and out of memories. The only thing keeping the nightmares from engulfing me is the hope that there couldnt possibly be a hundred more years before I wake up. Not a hundred years. Not three hundred. Not three hundred and one. Please, God, no. Sometimes it feels like a thousand years have passed; sometimes it feels as if Ive only been sleeping a few moments. I feel most like Im in that weird state of half-asleep, half-awake I get when Ive tried to sleep past noon, when I know I should get up, but my mind starts wandering and Im sure I can never get back to sleep. Even if I do slip back into a dream for a few moments, Im mostly just awake with my eyes shut. Yeah. Cryo sleep is like that. Sometimes I think theres something wrong. I shouldnt be so aware. But then I realize Im only aware for a moment, and then, as Im realizing it, I slip into another dream. Mostly, I dream of Earth. I think thats because I didnt want to leave it. A field of flowers; smells of dirt and rain. A breeze ... But not really a breeze, a memory of a breeze, a memory made into a dream that tries to drown out my frozen mind. Earth. I hold on to my thoughts of Earth. I dont like the dreamtime. The dreamtime is too much like dying. They are dreams, but Im too out of control, I lose myself in them, and Ive already lost too much to let them take over. I push the dream-memory down. That happened centuries ago, and its too late for regrets now. Because all my parents ever wanted was to be a part of the first manned interstellar exploratory mission, and all I ever wanted was to be with them. And I guess it doesnt matter that I had a life on Earth, and that I loved Earth, and that by now, my friends have all lived and gotten old and died, and Ive just been lying here in frozen sleep.