Unfrozen

Sweet but bitter

I was starving, so I just couldn't wait to finally get to the dining hall and eat, but at the same time I dreaded a possible lesson on how to eat. I felt a bit anxious and wondered how much would I understand in the 21st century if I was born in early 20th and transported to the future. I mean, it's hard to imagine, everything in 21st century just seemed so straightforward and natural...  And we had computers in my time, so everything should just have a visual upgrade basically, right?

Amina finally led us to the hall and we sat like usually, not really knowing what to expect. When the food was served by huma-looking robots, we got... Basically all fruits and weird looking buns and few different kinds of liquids.

"As you can see, there is much less variety of food that you are used to. For example, no animal products" a different guide (I assumed he was one) said. He was wearing a perfectly white suit and neon green tie and he was bald. "In truth, you haven't eaten a piece of a real animal ever since you were unfrozen, only it's laboratory produced replacements. Why? We don't have any excessive animal protection laws, no. The truth is... We just don't have animals. Not outside labs where more are produced, for very expensive meat" he explained. Everyone was shocked, including me and Jasmin.
"What? How can there be no animals?" she asked me with eyes wide open
"I-i don't know!"
"But you are clever!"
"That doesn't make me know everything! But... I guess they died out?" I pointed out the obvioys
"Well no shit?"
"We... ate them?" I suggested jokingly to attempt to make the atmosphere less tense.
"Oh no! I should've gone vegan!" Jasmin replied, placing her hands on her cheeks in shock.
"I thought you didn't like vegetables enough?"
"Oh. Good I never went vegan." she replied smiling towards me. Jasmin was such a sweet person. She'd act stupid in the attempts to make me laugh and cheer up, but her sense of humour was awful. Still, thanks to her I didn't feel alone in this insane scenario. My shy smile disappeared from my face. She reminded me of Sarah. My best friend. Who died. Probably like 30 years ago. "Ellie? What's wrong...?" Jas asked me, but before I could say anything, we were interrupted.
"Shhh!" a blonde haired guy who sat at our table tried to silence us "He just explained everything. Didn't you wanna know what had happened to animals? Or are you this ignorant?" the man tried to keep his cool, but he was visibly nervous.
"Oh" I said silently
"... this means that production of plant based food became so much easier than meat production" the bald guide finished.
"So... What happened?" said Jasmin awkwardly.
"Ecosystems collapsed" July(?) said "Animals just simply died out" Whole hall was unsettled and nervously talked to each other. I wondered if they felt guilty...
The only person at out table who hasn't yet uttered a word, was a young man, probably in his early twenties. His curly and dark hair looked messy, like if he didn't even delicately touched it with a brush (or a robot stylist). He was extremely thin, even for unfrozen standards.
We finally started to eat, with Amina and Baldy (I never learned his name) and few other guides running around explaining to us, what and how, in what order, with what to eat. I didn't care that much and just grabbed a type of a roll, which I guessed would be just bread. I couldn't find any butter or some kind of replacement for it. I quickly gave up and attempted to cut the roll in half, but after I got through the crust, it literally exploded with some kind of jam, covering me in it. Everyone at the table stared at me.
"Why wouldn't you listen to the guides?" July said with an unpleasant tone and bit into the bun, without it exploding "Ok. That tastes weird" she said. Jasmin did the same thing.
"That's the sweetest thing I've ever had" she said, while slowly eating the bun. I awkwardly licked off the jam from myself and immediately regretted it.
It was sweet indeed. But not regular sweet, no. It felt a bit frizzy and creamy at the same time, with small fruity pieces that were sparkling, like a can of soft drink. I couldn't really decide on the taste, it was somewhere between fruity and plain simple sugary sweet with a mountain of whipped cream, that made it feel a bit toneless... And far  too sweet. And I only tasted a little bit of it.
"Yuck. I'm covered with fancy sugar water" I said as Amina came to our table.
"Oh dear!" she exclaimed "So, the trap exploded on you..." Oh, thanks Amina, I thought. I haven't realised earlier...
"Why is everything either extremely sweet or a fruit?" July asked the guide
"Lux and comfort are very important in our society, therefore we only accept the best tastes" said Amina.
"That was the creepiest thing I've heard somebody say about sweets" said July  "Can we have anything that isn't sweet?"
"Why would you eat something less tasty?" Amina asked visibly puzzled "I know, we gave you old fashioned dishes before, but... They were nothing compared to this"
"Those were multitudes of tastes. Sweet, sour, hot, bitter, salty... Meat, cheese, milk, asparagus... Everything was different, why is everything the same now?" July continued to argue with the guide.
"Because now, we are blessed" Amina said clearly offended and left the table.
"I don't like any of this" said July, crossing her arms.
"It... It seems weird... But..." I didn't really know what I wanted to say. If I wanted to try and defend the future? Why would I? Or if I wanted to condemn it?
"They do seem to push lots of pressure on perfection" said the blonde man who earlier silenced us "I really do not like it either... But what can we do besides waiting till the situation escalates?"
"I like sweets, so I think this is ok. But won't we all get fat?" Jasmin asked a bit stupidly. I had no idea why would she think that she is being funny. "I'm just kidding. But we shouldn't judge them yet... We still know so little"
"They destroyed ecosystem" reminded us July with a serious tone
"No" I refuted. "We did."
For the rest of the meal, we were silent.

***
There was 5 of us at the table. Me, Jasmin, July, the blonde guy and the last man who never uttered a word. He was probably in his early 20s, tall, but skinny, even for our new, Unfrozen standards. His hair was a curly, black mess and did not wear anything too flashy, to our surprise. I didn't know him at all. I don't think anyone did.

***

After the breakfast, I still had sometime before we'd finally have a history lesson, so I went to the bathroom. There was a cleaning bot there, so I asked it politely to wash my jumper and realised that I have to choose everything manually. I really did not pay enough attention during the "lesson" earlier. The interface has lighted up, displaing an actual hologram with different options of softness, smells... Smells that I didn't really recognise. What kind of smell was "Twilight"? What did "Swearp" even mean..? Why weren't there just regukar smells, like... Strawberry. Banana. Roses. I just closed my eyes and chose randomly.
While waiting for my jumper, I walked towards the mirror and looked into it. I saw my messy, ginger hair, my blue eyes and my incredibly skinny body and felt like crying. I felt so lost, so hopeless. I wanted to go home, but I couldn't do it ever again. Tears flowed down my cheeks and I sat down and hid my face in my legs.
I sat there alone, until Jasmin came looking for me.
"Ellie?" she called me walking towards me. I looked up and saw concern for me on her face. She didn't say anything else and just sat down next to me.
"How come, you seem to be alright in this situation? Don't you wish to go back?"
"No, not at all."
"Why not?" I asked, despite all of us, Unfrozen, previously agreeing to not speak about our past lives, so it'd be easier to look to the future. I've seen so many people act nervous, cry, stay aloof, get mad over this situation. But Jasmin was cheerful and excited almost all the time.
"I needed a fresh start" she replied. Still, I wanted to know why, but... I decided not to push it. Just leave it.
"I got drunk at a party" I said instead. "I went to one for the first time, I felt like something new began in my life on that night" I sighed "Then I got hit by a bus."
"We agreed not to talk about the past..." Jasmin replied, but I shook my head.
"I don't want to disconnect myself from the past. It was real. And I had life back then. I don't want to throw it awa-" I continued, but my potential friend just stood up. She looked down at me with disapproval. I felt tingles in my stomach, the bad kind. Did I mess something up? Did... Did I try to vent too early, we probably weren't close enough?
"Well. We might have to. No point in crying over what you lost. Think about what you gained" she said while turning around and left me alone in the bathroom again. She is right, I thought. I should only move forward, I should try to live again. I got another chance at life. I may really be blessed. It hurt to try to sever my ties to the past, but I had no choice. Either this, or continuing to wallow in a bathroom. So I stood up, put on my jumper and left onto the jungle-ish corridor.