Interview with Rei - Part 3 of 10

As Steve Fisch and I get the scripts ready to sell Rome's Revolution as a streaming series, he asked me for a lot of background information that I did not have. So I took some time out to interview Rome and Rei. Here is Rei's interview, part 3 of 10.
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Rei: We had some. I was being a little bit dramatic. But most of the money was accumulated and hoarded by a tiny, tiny percentage of the population that the vast majority toiled away in abject poverty. Even the smallest comfort items were hard to come by.
Interviewer: Why did so few have so much? Why did they not share their, money, with everyone else?
Rei: Because humans are greedy. It comes from our caveman ancestors where resources were so hard to come by. As we developed as a species, we also developed the attitude that if some is good, more is better. And some got very good at acquiring while the rest were left to rot.
(Interviewer shakes their head)
Interviewer: Anything else?
Rei: Yes, it’s a whole laundry list. Terrorists were everywhere…
Interviewer: Terrorists?
Rei: Yes, people who were so fed up with things that they felt they could only change the status quo by overthrowing the whole system. And they did this by killing people at random. Everywhere. Using every means available. Death, disease, mass destruction, whatever it took. When I first awoke in the 35th century, when I heard about the Great Dying, I figured it was some terrorist had finally succeeded. It wasn’t until years later that we figured out that it was Darwin and the Ark Lords who had done it.
Interviewer: Pardon me but I do not see the distinction. A group used mass destruction to overthrow the system as you call it.
Rei: You’re right. They were just government-sanctioned terrorists. (Rei leans forward). Look, we’re a flawed species. We are trying to get better. To grow up. But growing up has its bumps and bruises.
Interviewer: I cannot claim innocence here. Our species had its dark times as well. I understand your main point. So you were chosen to be part of the Ark program?
Rei: Yeah. It took some doing but I got on Ark II. Destination Tau Ceti. Ha.
Interviewer: I do see the irony in your statement. What was the process like?
Rei: Preparing for cryo-hibernation was horrible. It was grueling. They gave us next to no liquids and diuretics for two weeks until we were so dehydrated, we were half-dead. In fact, when they were developing the protocols for the process, a bunch of people did die.
Interviewer: How long did this go on?
Rei: For me, about two weeks. They continually tested your cellular density and when there was sufficient room for expansion so that your cells wouldn’t burst upon being frozen, they put you in a sarcophagus and dumped hyper-oxygenated cryo-hibernation fluid over you and froze you.
Interviewer: That sounds painful.
Rei: Actually, they drugged us so that even though it was excruciating, our brains didn’t even register the full horror of it all. The next thing I knew, I was awake, as it turns out, in the 35th century.

Tomorrow, part 4