G brought me to the conference room. A ten meters long and wide room with a ceiling twice my height and walls bland enough that they painted them beige. The floor was also carpeted with the same furry blue as the rest of the building. What looked to be chair-desks were arranged in a large circle in the middle of the room. Each desk had an in-built computer, sleek and glowing with blue neon at the edges. The chairs looked more like the seats from a first class plane, fully wrapped in comfortable looking brown leather with enough arm space to fit an elephants' trunk.

I told him, “This looks nothing like a conference room.”

“It's for V.I.Ps,” he replied. “We usually don't get to use this place.”

I circled around the desks and spotted a large, metallic torus in the middle of the circle. Made of a shell of glass, the torus had wires running round its shape with four projectors joint in a cross at the perpendicular inner edges. An arms length away, it was connected to a black platform surrounded by four cameras which were stuck onto metal poles drilled into the ground.

“Does that make me a V.I.P?” I asked.

G followed me around into the circle and sat casually into one of the sofa-chairs. “You actually have higher security clearance than I do.” He turned on the laptop on his desk and settled back as he waited for the system to boot.

“Why would I have higher clearance? That makes no sense.”

“Something about you needing access to high security places in case of emergencies.” The computer finished booting and he began working on it. “I guess the higher ups thinks we'll still be here in a hundred and twenty nine years and whatever it is you're suppose to save us from will need clearance,” he laughed.

The glass torus lit up and a blue neon glow emitted from it along with a low humming sound. Small red dots lighted up on the four cameras as the equipments turned on.

“And what does these things do?” I asked about the torus shaped machine.

G wiped off a speck of dust that had settled into his glasses with a flick of his nails before replying, “Hologram projectors. Really expensive apparently. There's only one in each of the five cities.”

“Are you serious? Holograms?”

“Yup. That's the meaning of progress, man. It's still a prototype though. They're trying to make it more marketable but it's really costly to build. Joan will be using the one in Hillbury to contact you.” He then pointed to the black platform surrounded by cameras. “Stand over there. Once the machine starts up, she'll be able to see you as well.”

I did as he said and stood on the platform, feeling a little silly.

He continued tapping away at the touchpad of his computer. “Looks like Joan just activated hers,” he hit one of the keys harder than I thought he should, letting out an audible clack. The projectors in the torus powered up, lighting up the space in the centre of the circle with a block of red, green and blue lines. “Once she sets up her side, you'll see her in that,” he pointed to the psychedelic coloured block.

“And she can see me?”

“Yup. Just like a normal conversation really.” G got to his feet. “I'll leave you two to it then. Just come back to the Cryo chamber once you're done. I'll get someone to come up and turn off the machine. You have all day to talk this time.” After the instructions, he headed for the exit, turning off the lights before closing the door behind him noiselessly.

Alone in the dark room, save for the glow of the hologram torus and its projection, I was suddenly overwhelmed by nervousness. Joan was engaged. She was getting married. To someone who was not me. I rummaged through the thought of it as waves of unending questions beats into my mind.

The projection flickered and the wall of colours slowly faded. A chair, shaded and formed by the red, green and blue colours took form in what used to be the a coloured wall of nothing. From off-screen, Joan walked into view. From the angle, she seemed to have circled around my projection before coming into my sight. She stretched out her arm towards my face, her hands disappearing as they left the cameras' field of vision, but I knew she was cupping my holographic face in her hands. I closed my eyes, imagining her doing so, and imagined the warmth of her touch through my nerve damaged skin. All my anxious thoughts swept away.

I heard her voice, echoing out from the speakers of the torus. “Hey you,” she greeted.

Opening my eyes, I locked vision with her and smiled. “Hey yourself.”

She let out a breath of relief, retracting her hand. In my mind, I could feel her touch leaving my face. Smiling, she sat down on her chair, her hands cupped in her lap. She wore a lab coat which covered a shirt, vest and shorts. I was relieved that her style in dressing had yet to change over the years.

She did not worry or react when I stepped out of my cameras' view. I circled her closely, taking in as much details of her as I could in spite of the odd RGB colour tone. Though the resolution wasn't clear enough to show wrinkles on the face, I could tell immediately she had aged slightly, her hair slightly less thick than it was before. Though not a major change, it was a glaring difference for someone who stepped out of a time from years ago. I squatted down at her side and gently controlled my hand to be placed over her digital ones.

As if she could feel my action, she smiled and said playfully, “I hope you're not doing something perverted.”

I laughed and replied sarcastically, “Use your imagination.”

Getting to my feet, I searched the room and saw the outline of a stool in a far corner. I jogged to it and brought the furniture back to the platform. I took a seat in front of her as she traced my action.

Face-to-face then, I asked, “How are you?”

Still smiling gently, she said, “Good. Can't complain. There's still some work to be done before the Mist reaches us, but we'll still be here for you to come back to.”

Slightly concerned, I told her, “You don't have to worry about me so much you know?”

She looked down to her hands as she fiddled with our wedding ring on her left ring finger. I noticed a second one of her right hand. “I can't help it,” she said. “I'm so afraid that you'll have nothing left to come back to one day. A hundred years. I can't live that long. Not even Leila.”

“Is that why you started the project to counter the Mist?”

Letting out a chuckle, she looked back up and met my stare. “You see right through me.” A short pause followed as she took in my face and put together her sentences. “You have two weeks to live, and yet, you'll outlive all of us. I have to make sure you have a place to come back to.”

I couldn't reply. I felt helpless, the burden of my life shouldered by the woman I loved. Even with contemplation, I could only manage a weak, “Thank you.” Before going silent. A thought then occurred to me and I asked, “Where's Leila.”

Her smile faded slightly and I could see her struggling to maintain it as my pillar of strength. I didn't point it out as she'd never admit it, and I wouldn't give her even a seed of doubt in her incredible spirit. “She went shopping with Leah,” she answered. “I don't think she's ready to talk with you yet.”

You were gone! Just like that! You climbed into that stupid machine and you were gone for seven damn years just like that!

My daughter's words to me all those years ago rang out loud and clear in my day old memory. I could only nod in reply to Joan's words.

“Milton,” Joan said my name. “There's something I need to tell you.”

“You're engaged,” I replied without hesitation.

She didn't look shocked, managing to maintain her calm nicely. “Did G tell you?”

I nodded and smiled back. I genuinely smiled back. “Congratulations. Is it someone I know?”

“Yeah. You know him.”

“It's G isn't it?”

She cocked her head to the side. Again, not shocked, but merely the look of curiosity. “How did you know?”

“I'm guessing in ten years, everyone I knew either moved on with their lives or had forgotten about me. My students are too young and we didn't really have a large social circle or anything either.” A thought occurred to me, “What was the cover story for my disappearance by the way? I never asked.”

Joan took a second to remember the decade long story before replying, “You died during your prosthetics surgery.”

“Right...” I was surprised how calm I was at hearing the tale of my death. Instead, I put the new information to my deduction. “There was only a few people on the project to begin with. They'll be the only people who knew both of us after my 'death'. It could be one of the other guys but G's the most obvious choice.”

“You're amazing, you know that?”

She had said that to me before and I could never take it to heart. I was, after all, just a dead schoolteacher. “I'm very normal.”

Another gentle smile to calm me. With an uncharacteristically apologetic tone, she softly said, “Sorry.”

“For what? Getting married? Finding happiness?” I leaned as far forward as I could without my body crossing the border of the platform. “You don't have to be sorry for that. Never. Ever. Sorry. I love you to the end of the world. Even if that means you'll get married to another less funny, uglier looking man to be happy, so be it.”

She laughed at my joke and wiped away unseen tears from her eyes. Looking away from me as she cried, I patiently waited for her to gather her composure.

After a minute, she took one last deep breath before finally saying, “Do you have time to talk?”

I grinned widely and replied, “All the time in the world.”