Theo was not the type who would normally sign up for bizarre medical experiments but he needed the money.  It was surprising they even recruited him because he was almost sixty and out of shape.  After too long teaching English in Saudi Arabia and sedately overindulging in local culinary delights, his gut was bigger than it ought to be.

Theo had been in shape back in the day, when he’d been a scuba diving instructor in Palawan.  Swimming every dawn, living on fish and bananas, tepid nights spent hammering sweet young things.  It paid next to nothing.  But by God, that had been the life.  He wished he could relive those years forever.

But now Theo was ready to retire and found that his savings were a bit light-on.  It was either this experiment or go back to teaching in the Kingdom for a few more years.

He chose the experiment.

It would be preferable, he calculated, to sit in a hole for six months than to ever again suffer the indignity of being jostled and abused by the ill-mannered scions of minor Saudi royalty.

The university couldn’t give Theo full details because the study was supposed to be double-blind, but was informed that it was some kind of sleep experiment.  They wanted to see how a person’s sleep patterns would alter if deprived of normal cues like sunlight, temperature changes, clocks and so on.  They would put him in a comfortable room underground for six months with no connection to the outside world and observe how he slept. 

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Richie Rolle’s life was almost perfect.

One of the smartest young men in Barbados, he’d studied at Harvard and now relished his dazzling finance career in Tokyo.  Richie’s income was about thirty times the local average and his upscale Meguro apartment had more floorspace than the whole Caribbean villa where he’d grown up. 

Richie enjoyed Tokyo life to the fullest, particularly its nocturnal diversions.  He had three girlfriends.  All were busy office ladies so he could only see them on the weekend: thirty-something Mika on Friday nights in her messy little apartment, beautiful Kyoko on Saturday (she was the only one allowed over to his place, to avoid complication) and cute, jagged-toothed Shiori down in Yokohama most Sundays at a plush love hotel.

Herein lay one of the few difficulties in Rick’s life: his copulations were all concentrated over this thirty-hour period.  He liked to have two or three goes each time and was fully sated by Monday morning.  However, weekdays were barren and his vigorous libido made him ache with frustrated desire.

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“Your predecessor went missing,” Mr. Kumar told Meira, his toad lips curling a smile.  “In any other case we would have been hiring a much more experienced surgeon but we had no choice but to accept the very first person who was basically qualified and available.”  His accent was so thick that Meira doubted any non-Indian could comprehend a word he said.  “You are extremely fortunate to enjoy this opportunity,” he continued, “and I hope you will be making the most of it, Meira.  Very fortunate, indeed.”

Meira fumed stonily, a carved idol slighted.  “Thank you, Mr. Kumar.  I’m sure the hospital will find my performance more than satisfactory.  If you don’t mind terribly, in my previous position at Boston General Hospital I was accustomed to being addressed as Dr. Ram.  I would prefer to keep things formal, especially in the Middle East given that I am both a woman and a foreigner.”  Her accent was similar to his though softened by years abroad.

“Of course, Dr. Ram!” he said, emphasizing her Dalit surname.  “In America they address surgeons as ‘doctor,’ isn’t that correct?  We British surgeons go by ‘mister’.  Or missus, of course.  But at BGH you were not yet a fully qualified surgeon so I guess the difference is not relevant in this case.  How is your house?”

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On his fiftieth birthday, Stephan bought himself a True Beauty™ doll.  It was the most advanced in the range: an intensely lifelike silicone model equipped with some movement and conversational AI.

Stephan was well-off.  He’d risen to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel in the army and had diligently saved and invested his income over the years.  He now had a house worth half a million euros, almost paid off, and a salary that he found difficult to spend as a single man with no children.

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First published in Terror House Magazine

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Bill, Mark, and Elon sat down in the control room, preparing to argue again. Their families and the others sheltered deep below. Only the Steering Committee were allowed to come up here. Only they could be trusted to remain calm when scrutinizing data, and to make the right, critical decisions.

After all, they’d paid more than their fair share for a place in the bunker.

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