<strong>Dr. August Carrino<br/>Cryo Bay, RI <em>Swallow</em><br/>Low Orbit over Planet Prosperity (AC22-PROS-01)</strong><br/><br/>Gus had never been claustrophobic.  But there was something about the cryo pods, something about being immobile and contained for days, weeks,<em>months</em>.  There were stories of people who had been in cryo pods when the ship had been jumped by pirates or marauders.  Their captors made sport of the hapless victims, waking them into a nightmare.  Or those who were on lost or dead ships, waiting to be woken, if ever.  Theoretically, a person could drift for millennia in cryo before dying.  Would someone in such a situation die quietly in ignorant bliss, or would they become aware, trapped in their body while their mind slowly decayed over the centuries?  Those thoughts made caught his breath in his throat and made his stomach churn.  Every time he went on ice, he'd watch with a cold sweat covering his face as the crystalline glass sheath descended over him, sealing him away from the universe.  Would he wake to their destination, happy and warm?  To marauders, crowding around his pod with sadistic grins?  Or would he find himself in a dead ship, forgotten by time?<br/><br/>The sheath slid shut with a click, and the hiss of cryodep filled the canister.  "Happy and warm," Gus muttered as his extremities became numb and distant.  "Warm and..."<br/><br/><hr/><br/><strong>Dr. August Carrino<br/>Cryo Bay, RI <em>Swallow</em><br/>Low Orbit over Planet Sepik (SK01-PROS-01)</strong><br/><br/>"...happy."<br/><br/>Two months later, he opened his eyes.  No marauders, no dead ship.  Just the cryo bay, lit with sterile white light.  Some of the other passengers were moving about.  He was the last one.<br/><br/>The sheath slid up as a needle pinched his arm.  Life and warmth returned to his body in a sudden flood, flowing from the injection site like water from a spring.  Gus looked down over his body, tanned from months spent in the field.  Not as fit or tight as he would have liked, but there were worse things in the world.  He wore a pair of loose boxers for modesty's sake, stylized DNA strands wrapping themselves around the legs.<br/><br/>He stepped out of the cryo pod and looked around, blinking in the sharp light, the plastic floor cool beneath his bare feet.  "Made it," he muttered to himself.<br/><br/>And then he fell to his knees and threw up water and nutrient paste into the trough.  Even after his stomach was empty, he kept convulsing, retching.  His arm burned where cryostims had been injected.  What?  He'd never had a reaction before.<br/><br/>"Is there -- a doctor -- around?" he managed between empty retches.  "Never -- had a reaction -- before.  Jesus -- this sucks."