This blog was written in response to an invitation by the Hive Book Club to participate in a contest. The contest was for bloggers whose native language is not English. My native language is English, so I don't feel I should compete. However, I did ask permission to participate in the exercise because I found it intriguing.
The challenge in the contest is to find ten words in a story written by 
If you read
I enjoyed this exercise, and hope readers enjoy my story.
Ten Translated Words with Deepl
1.system:Spanish, sistema
2.sleep:German, schlafen
3.longevity:German, Langlebigkeit
4.life:German, Leben
5.cessation:German, Beendigung
6.antiquated:Spanish, anticuado
7.eternity:German, Ewigkeit
8.ethereal:Spanish, etéreo
9.brains:Spanish, cerebros
10.anguished:Spanish, angustiado
Credit: Storm, by 
The Long Sleep
"To sleep, perchance to dream".
The words floated in Chaya's fading consciousness. Serum surged through her veins. She was surprised at her awareness of the organ systems as they slowly succumbed to the drug's effects. She had been informed that the last of her body to relinquish control would be the cerebral cortex, and she had been comforted to learn there would be no fear. The sympathetic nervous system would be affected almost immediately. No fight or flight response. No panic. She was able to note, as an objective observer might, the gradual process of suspended animation.
Would this detachment be what she remembered when she was reanimated--if she did survive the suspension? Ironic if that was so, because she had a zest for adventure, and embraced life passionately.
"Is there no chance?" This had been her first reaction to the cancer diagnosis--squamous cell carcinoma, the most lethal of pancreatic cancers.
"It's a rough road ahead," the doctor advised.
"How rough? I want the truth. I want to deal with this head on and understand my choices."
He regarded her soberly. She was young, not yet thirty. Usually this conversation was with someone older, who had enjoyed a more generous portion of life.
"The chances are very slim, but with aggressive treatment we can extend the expectation to maybe 10 or 12 months. In your case, the cancer has metastasized so the battle will be hard. Of course, there are experimental trials..."
She'd rehearsed this moment for years. Every time a friend or relative received the diagnosis, cancer, she'd imagined herself in that position. "What would I do?" She'd weighed hypothetical options and made hypothetical choices. Today it was no longer an exercise. It was the final performance.
"I've seen my friends go through this, and I'm not going down that road. There is another path, another kind of experiment I'm willing to try."
He considered her words and was about to question her, but she interrupted him.
"Thank you doctor, for the information, but medicine has no effective role any longer, as you have made clear. Now it's a matter of values. I will make a decision based on those."
Experiment? If she was going to be part of an experiment it would not be one with an almost certain course and conclusion. She would pursue another course--Interval, the serum that suspended life in order to prolong it.
There had been mouse trials, tissue experiments, and computer models. These all promised, or at least suggested, the drug might suspend life without ill effect for defined periods. Nothing like cryonics, which Chaya considered grotesque--cutting off the head and returning at an indefinite time when all one knew or cared about would long be gone. Interval allowed suspension without mutilation, for a specific number of years. If a reawakening resulted in a less than optimal physical state, then termination of life would be in the contract.
Fifteen years. All she needed. It was predicted a cure for pancreatic cancer would be discovered in that time. Science was so close, but not close enough to save her, now.
"I want a divorce," she announced flatly to a flummoxed Darin.
He at first brushed the idea off with a shrug and a chuckle. One of her weird jokes, obviously.
"Darin, I've got terminal pancreatic cancer with almost no lifespan predicted. We can spend everything we've saved looking for a miracle in an experimental trial. We can waste the little time left together, struggling. Or we can end this sensibly. I have a plan and it does not involve you, my dearest love."
"What do you mean, it doesn't involve me. How can a divorce and your terminal illness not involve me?"
"I've got money saved from when I was single, $250,000. I'm going to spend that on the life suspension drug, Interval. In fifteen years I may come out of it and have a chance at life. But those fifteen years you are not going to suspend your life. You can't babysit a body that is in a state of suspended animation. We've talked about this drug. We know the score. It's what I choose."
He sputtered, "All of this, and you haven't discussed it with me?" He was crushed. He was processing the cancer, her choice, his life ahead.
Chaya softened her tone. He was suffering, almost more than she was. But she would not let the anguish in his voice soften her resolve.
"We have discussed it, theoretically. Now it's real. You know me, Darin. My mind is made up. There are no good choices and I have the right to make the best one for me. I'm at peace with this path. That's the most I can hope for."
It was a long night. He did come around. He would give her the divorce, but stay with her through the drug preparation and administration. He swore he'd stay by her through the suspension, but they both knew that wasn't going to happen. A five year marriage, in abeyance for fifteen on the chance she would emerge healthy from her experiment?
The day had come. Darin was by her side as the drug took effect. Life termination contracts had been signed. Her eggs had been harvested and frozen, just in case. It was comforting to think some day she might be a mother.
She locked eyes with Darin through the glass tube that would be her home for the next 15 years. Her feet and hands succumbed, as did her face and eyes. She could no longer see Darin, or the room. She felt the serum creep into her brain and she realized seconds remained. She had a final thought, a line she remembered from long ago that had been uttered by a forlorn life form,
"Will I dream"?
Quote in the first line is from Shakespeare's "Hamlet"
Quote in the last line from the film 2010: The Year We Made Contact
Thank you for reading my blog