THE AWAKENING BY JACK SHARKEY [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Galaxy Magazine February 1964. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] They awoke after ages of hiding--to emerge into a world richer than they had dared to dream of! Rik's first impressions were an uncomfortable chill creeping along his bare flesh, and a bright milky swirling of light that encompassed his entire vision. He shivered and blinked his eyes a few times, and then the swirling settled down and became the vault. The chill, he realized, was due to the body warmth being methodically sucked away by the cold slab on which he lay. Another shiver brought a gasp of breath into his lungs, and then he was wide awake. When he sat up and swung his legs over the side, the interior of the vault began swirling again. He had to grip the edge of the slab to keep from falling. The air was humid, much too humid, and he could taste the prickly presence of carbon dioxide when he breathed. "The pump," he mumbled, dropping to the floor on feet that he could barely control. "Something's happened to the pump." He pushed himself determinedly erect, then stumbled down the long corridor between the other slabs, hardly glancing at their silent tenants, until he got to Zina's. She lay still as death, not flicking so much as an eyelid, and her flesh was like frozen wax beneath his exploring fingers. There was nothing he could do for her until he got the pump working again.... Rik pushed away from the slab on which Zina lay, and went through the archway into the next chamber. Here another fifty of the group lay on their slabs, not so much as a muscle twitch betraying the fact that they were all quite alive. It seemed only a few hours since he had lain down on his slab in the other room and gotten his injection, but he could not, for a dizzy moment, recall in which direction the pump lay. His mind seemed to be plumbing dust-covered depths to dredge out his memories, one by one. He suddenly remembered the War. The war that had driven the group to build this place, to try and safeguard a handful from the holocaust that would set fire to the surface of the world and turn the seas to steam. Was it possible the war had passed? Or had it ever come! There was no way to know without going outside--Wait! There was! Rik thought hard, trying to get his sense of direction back. The atom-powered clock that marked off months instead of minutes was in the central vault, where the elders slept. The other nine vaults ringed that one, he recalled, veering at right angles to his first direction, which would have taken him on a circular tour of the nine vaults and back to his starting place again.