*************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** WELCOME TO ....... . THE WritersWeb . /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ AN ONLINE PERIODICAL TO PROMOTE THE SPREAD OF QUALITY LITERATURE /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\\/\/\ PLEASE NOTE: This edition does not include graphics, as on some of our other versions. (SORRY ABOUT THAT...) /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ CONTENTS: 1) ABOUT THE WritersWeb ( WHAT IT IS / WHAT IT IS NOT ) 2) WHAT WE BELIEVE 3) PUBLISHER'S CORNER 4) EDITORIAL 5) TO THE ASPIRING WRITER 6) THIS ISSUE'S FEATURE...."WHEN THE MUSIC STOPS" A novel about YOUR future - by FRED ALLEN *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** THE WritersWeb WHAT IT IS: This publication is just what it claims to be on the title page. It is a showcase for good quality online books and other types of literature.Obviously the publisher wants to get his views on a platform to expose them to as large an audience as possible, but at the same time is very willing and anxious to present any well-written literature in its own light. (see: to the aspiring writer) WHAT IT IS NOT: While the feature article in its EMailed form does include mention of our sponsors, (some very nice and generous people who support this project), you generally won't find as much of it as on a lot of websites and newsletters. I could grow very old waiting for a homepage to come up on my screen, only to find that it is not what I want or expect. Beautifully done graphics are a joy to behold, and I know it adds to their profits, but I look for content, as I'm sure many others do also, and when I want some information, I expect it....RIGHT NOW! (More on this in a future editorial.) The WritersWeb is not exactly anti - copyright, but the material here is free to you. ( Proverbs 23:23 ) read it........ *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** THE WritersWeb 1) WHAT WE BELIEVE: 2) WHAT WE WOULD LIKE YOU TO BELIEVE: Actually, these are one and the same. Of course, if all of us were totally honest, we would admit that we would like to see a world where everyone believed the same things. If all of us were in absolute, total agreement, then we would have a world with no conflict, right? A world of peace and tranquility. Sounds good, but with people being the way they are, and if you know history, you are also aware that this is what those who built the tower of Babel believed. Some say that this was just a myth....along with all of Biblical history. ( More on this in future issues of The WritersWeb. ) The problem with all thinking along these lines is that no amount of good works ( whatever you call them ) will buy you peace or tranquility, or for that matter, eternal life. That was bought FOR you by the death of God's son. Jesus Christ, the Messiah, paid the debt of sin in our place, and asks us only to trust in that payment, and He will GIVE us ETERNAL LIFE! The "icing on the cake", so to speak, was that He came back from the dead to prove His claims. The resurrection of Christ is the best-documented event in history. ( again, more about these things in future issues. ) It made good sense to me to believe on the one who came back from the dead, and trust Him as the one who paid for MY sin. Why not do the same right now, and accept what He did for you also? You have nothing to lose. Don't you dare believe it just because I say so. The Bible says that faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. (Romans 10:17) Find a Bible, and look for verses like John 3:16, I John 5:13, and John 6:47. Most Bibles have an index, if you need it. If you have any questions, or need help, EMail me at netwritr@bellsouth.net *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** PUBLISHER'S CORNER Obviously, a publication such as this should have a reason for being created, and for its continuing existence. Otherwise, why bother? There are several reasons for the existence of 'zines like this, not the least of which is money. Let's be very honest. There are multitudes who spend their days trying to figure ways to make the net/www pay them. Why not? I could do what I am doing right now if I were sitting in a wheelchair, tapping on the keys with a pencil held between my teeth! It would just take longer that way.In a very short time on the net, I realized that material on it runs from the sublime to just plain trash. That's OK. The contrast just makes the good stuff look all that much better. Everyone has their own agenda. Just go alphabetically down the 'zines lists on the net. If you did this already to arrive here at the WritersWeb, you know it's true. This publication is no different in that respect. We too have our own agenda. One BIG difference though, is that here the windows are left open for a breath of fresh air, in that truth is presented in many facets, and all are invited to make their own true and valid comparison of what is said here with anything that can be found elsewhere. A story has been told about a prophet named Elijah, who challenged the prophets of Baal. Read it for yourself. Its in First Kings, chapter 18. The final score was (1 to zip) in favor of the team of God and Elijah. Baal's prophets did not fare very well at all. Now, I am not comparing The WritersWeb with Elijah or Biblical miracles. I am asking you to take a long, hard look at the things presented. We sure don't have all of the answers. We don't even have all of the questions! We do think we have some answers to the important ones. EMail us! *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** EDITORIAL Most of the material in this publication, as you may have already noticed, has a distinctive Christian-orientation, and also a very conservative flavor. This definitely does not mean that we are anti-everything-else. Everyone is entitled to his or her own viewpoint. Our great nation was founded on this. We respect that. We only ask for the same tolerance to be shown for the ideas and principles presented here. In future issues, letters to the editor will be printed, ...and answered. EMail us Now, it is true that one can choose to believe just about any thing the mind of man can conceive. One look at the news media will bear that out. The one question that cuts across all of it however, is ....What is your basis for your belief ....for anything? We happen to have what we think is a good and valid basis to believe that there is a God, a Creator, who for various reasons of His own, gave us a free will to use to choose to accept the truth as presented to us, or to believe a lie. We will include some features in coming issues of The Writer's Web on these, and many other like subjects. *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** TO THE ASPIRING WRITER: If you, like me, have "run into the brick wall" of the conventional, historical publishing business, then you can appreciate what I am about to say. Publishing houses today are generally not accepting the unpublished, untested writer. It is just too much of a financial risk. ( Even I can understand that. ) It's far too expensive for them to develop a work from an unknown, new writer. Despite all the ads in the magazines, the odds are overwhelmingly against any kind of success. Agents and all kinds of manuscript "developers" always want their cut up front. ( I can understand that, too. ) Hence, you get all kinds of self-publishing and underground publishing houses, etc. This is adequate, if the writer has the wherewithal, but most don't. If you have a completed, or almost complete manuscript or other work, tell us about it. What we need is a general outline, or synopsis to consider publishing it. That's all. The EMail address is netwritr@bellsouth.net We will look at almost anything, as long as it is not obscene or illegal. ( we will be the judge of that. ) Our list of subjects that we use is taken from that used by the Library of Congress, which we feel is more comprehensive than the older Dewey list, but the subject matter need not be limited to that. We only ask that , just as our sponsors have asked in the EMailed version, that the material not seriously detract from the general agenda of the publisher. ( we will be the judge there, too. ) Letters to the Editor are for that. ;-) *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ THIS EDITION"S FEATURE... /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ _______________________ WHEN THE MUSIC STOPS (a novel about YOUR future). _______________________ BY FRED ALLEN *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** PREFACE If this story ever makes it to the shelves in bookstores, or onto the NET, or whatever media it lands on, depending on the viewpoint of the person making the decisions, it will most likely occupy a space in the section reserved for the works on science-fiction. That will be just fine with the author, for the main goal will have been met, as long as it is published. That goal is simply to communicate a lot of good news to some who otherwise might never hear it. Some will indeed look at it as pure science-fiction. It is really much, much, more. It is also a fantastic action-adventure tale of unsurpassed violence and destruction. At the same time, it is a unique love story. It is based on the one book of true prophecy, the Bible. It's a tale that is concerned with a terrible time in history. A time that is yet to come, from our viewpoint. It is the period in God's timetable when He takes his vengeance on Satan's world system that God has, for His own various reasons, allowed Satan to build and sustain for thousands of years. All true Christians have been removed from the scene, just as God's people were in Noah's day, along with His Holy Spirit. This was done so that God could initiate His judgements. While it is a tale of extreme violence, it is, as I said, also a love story. Please bear with me as it is disclosed. It is the author's firm belief that around the year 95 A.D., the apostle named John, while he was living in exile on the Greek isle of Patmos, was transported forward around two millenia into this period of time. God has recorded that He has done this with other individuals also. A few of these are Isaiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel. John was shown the future. Much as if a native of the jungles of New Guinea would wonder at the marvels of a modern city, or a better example, if he were placed in the vicinity of all the terrors of the recent Gulf war. John was told to record all of what he saw, and had an exceedingly difficult time doing so. It is no wonder that some have found it a perplexing story, both to read and interpret. Of course I am speaking of what we know today as the Biblical book called The Revelation of Jesus Christ. The story told here in When The Music Stops is but of one of the individuals caught up in a portion of what John recorded. These are...."things which must shortly come to pass." ( Revelation 1:1 ) *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************** FOREWORD Someday soon, the music will stop. Just look around you. It's not the music. That's only a symptom. One of the multitude of tools or escape mechanisms that people use to deny all of the troubles besieging us constantly. Entertainment of many kinds, alcohol, sex, gambling, drugs, religion, and what some think is the final escape, suicide. One writer put it well when he said the world was just too bad to be true. I remember a mechanic telling my mother once, what he did. She asked about all the strange noises coming from the jeep that he drove. He said that he just turned the radio up louder. A trip on any highway will bear that out. We ride in our air-conditioned, tightly sealed-up world. Just turn the music up louder. Escape. For awhile, anyway....... *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** ************************************************************************************* ************************************************************************************* VERSES 1-12 of CHAPTER 9 from the Biblical book called The Revelation of Jesus Christ 1. And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star fall from heaven into the earth: and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit. 2. And he opened the bottomless pit, and there arose a smoke out of the pit, as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit. 3. And there came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth: and unto them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power. 4. And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men who have not the seal of God in their foreheads. 5. And to them it was given that they should not kill them; but that they should be tormented five months: and their: torment was as the torment of a scorpion, when he striketh a man. 6. And in those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them. 7. And the shapes of the locusts were like unto horses prepared unto battle; and on their heads were as it were crowns like gold, and their faces were as the faces of men. 8. And they had hair as the hair of women, and their teeth were as the teeth of lions. 9. And they had breastplates, as it were breastplates of iron; and the sound of their wings was as the sound of chariots of many horses running to battle. 10. And they had tails like unto scorpions, and there were stings in their tails: and their power was to hurt men five months. 11. And they had a king over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in the Hebrew tongue is Abbadon, but in the Greek tongue hath his name Apollyon. 12. One woe is past; and behold, there come two woes more hereafter. *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** PROLOGUE "I was really getting worried about you, John. You've been gone so long. I thought something might have happened to you while you were gathering driftwood for the fire along the seashore. You know that we are both growing very old." "There was no real need to worry about me, brother. It was the first day of the week. The day of our Lord's resurrection. I was just sitting on the hillside, meditating." "That was sixty years ago, John. Right now, we need to be thinking about how to survive on this barren rock that you got us sent to. Boats landing here in the harbor are few and they have no real reason for coming. They all know that we are here because we were banished by Domitian. No one would dare take us off, and we have to depend on what we get from the sea to survive." "I know all of that, brother, but I must tell you of what has happened to me. Then, I must also write it all down." "All right, if you must. There is not much else to do around here. Tell me." "I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, and heard behind me a great voice as of a trumpet...." *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** At first, Nick wasn't exactly sure what was wrong. It was just the strange, uneasy feeling you get down deep inside when you are paying more attention to what you are doing than what is going on around you. It usually goes on for some time before you really consciously notice it. But there it was. It was especially the silence that got his attention. He had been on the station for over three years. Three years and forty-one days, to be exact. The computer told him all the stats each time he logged on for something. Awhile back, as he was putting the duty schedules into it, he realized it was not really necessary now, especially with only five people left on the station. It did help him to pass the time, however. Working at almost anything was better than watching old movies in the recroom. The CD players had long ago packed it in, and the vidtapes were for the most part in nearly the same condition. Someone mistakenly, or not, had erased all that was in the computer, together with all the backups. They went through all of the rest quickly after the launch order came up from down below and was dutifully, almost mechanically carried out. Any entertainment was a welcome escape from thoughts of the damage they had caused down there. Nick had always felt that he was far better off than the rest of the military crew. That's what he called them anyway. He separated himself from them mostly because of the nature of his duties. He was still technically in the military, but he was on detatched service on the station. As a result, he did not consider himself as a part of the regular crew. He knew that those who were aware of his status probably felt about the same toward him. This didn't bother Nick much, and he referred to them as "the button-pushers", often openly right to their face. He enjoyed using his position a little. He also considered this the kindest thing he could call them. Other than that, they had no real purpose for being there. 1 *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** The silence was new to Nick. Thats why he noticed it. Ever since the first day he had floated in through the entry hatch, exiting the shuttle that had brought him up, he sensed the low-level vibration and noises from the many pieces of machinery that were part of all the necessary support for the station's continued existence. All the parts that together make up the whole. Whenever you held on to anything, you could feel the station's pulse just as if it were a living animal. It took some time to get used to it, but it took some time to get used to the trains too. Nick was born in Brooklyn. His family's apartment was on the third floor above a store on Atlantic avenue. The constant roar of traffic and the elevated trains was one of the strongest of his memories of those early years. That, and the smells of his mother's cooking. The smells were especially strong in the winter months, when all of the windows were closed. His father worked for the Pennsylvania railroad, so Nick was given a free pass that let him ride on the trains anytime. He soon learned to take full advantage of it, especially on weekends and in the summer when he was free from the cares of school. Even if he hadn't liked it so much, almost anything was better than the stifling heat of that apartment. Nick rode wherever the line would take him. All he had to do was to learn to read the timetables. It always amazed him to see just how accurate they were. At that time, he couldn't have dreamed where his last ride would take him. If he had, he might have gone down another path. 2 *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** Nick was jolted from his daydream of home by the sound from the speaker on the bulkhead near him. Charlie's voice had a tone that Nick had not heard him use for a long time. Not since the order had come up to release the weapons. Charlie had been nicknamed by the others early-on. They called him "Doctor Cool", or "The Iceman". "Nick, get over here fast!" called the speaker. "Coming, Mother." Nick replied. Charlie and Nick had been classmates at the Academy. Later on, they had also shared all the training and experiences together that finally brought them to the place where they were now. It was more than just friendship. They were like brothers, sharing many common bonds. They trusted and respected each other. Nick knew the call must be connected with the sudden silence on the station. As he passed a status panel in the corridor, he glanced at it, and saw that all of the critical systems that were still able to function were powered by the backup batteries. The urgency in Charlie's voice was for real. The hatch to the main control room was wide open. Nick found the military crew in there with Charlie. One of them, Colonel Adams, was looking at a status board with Charlie. The other, Commander Peters, was just lounging against the hatch. To look at them,no one would ever suspect who or what they were. If they were on the beach at Coney Island, with their beards, shorts, tee shirts and bare feet, they might blend in well. Both looked and smelled like they hadn't showered for weeks. 3 *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** Since the day when the order to launch the weapons came up from down below, and they dutifully carried out their assigned tasks, no one really had much to do. They spent their days lounging around in the recroom and the adjoining galley, mostly swapping their war stories and other tall tales, eating and using the virtual reality games. Adams built a small still that made some really powerful stuff, so no one felt much pain. Charlie was briefing the others on what he thought had happened. 'Probably", because there was just not enough of a crew left to monitor and maintain all that was really in need of attention on the station. He had rigged the most critical systems to alarms in his quarters in case just something like this happened. True to the old Murphy's law, Nick thought. Charlie once said that he believed more in Ramsay's law. When Nick asked him what that was, Charlie said that Ramsay just stated that Murphy was a raving optimist. Originally, there were many more on the station, but about a week after the weapons had been launched, and they all realized the true reason for the stations existence, the situation was reevaluated, and alternatives were posted on screens throughout the system for all to see.. It was decided that in view of the situation, each member of the crew would be given a choice. The first was to stay on the station, with its tenuous possibility of continued existence, or to take the Shuttle that had the passenger module inside, and return to the surface, with its possibility of a worse existence, or none at all. To Nick, it was the choice they gave some condemned criminals in the old west. They could choose hanging or shooting. Some choice, he thought. 4 *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** There was really no way to be sure of what was in store for those that returned. All they had to go on were the various computer models built from the known conditions and the nuclear testing records since the bomb was first conceived. It looked bleak at best, but the group that left picked the place they decided was most likely to be survivable if they made it down at all. . The way Nick saw it, what the whole thing really amounted to was a best shot situation. A toss of the coin. A crapshoot. Any way you wanted to put it, it was the same. Nick and Charlie wanted no part of it. They had both seen the horrific results of radiation, all the way from the aftermath of the last days of World War II to the time of Charlie's accident.One turned out to have been totally unnecessary, and the other was probably preventable also. Some knew that the Japanese were trying to surrender at the time the bombs decimated the two cities. Nick firmly believed it was a case of payback for the Pearl Harbor attack. Maybe it was. As Charlie reached out for a clipboard on the wall, Nick noticed that he had neglected to tuck the legs of his pants into his belt as usual. They were floating around like ghostly Halloween costumes. Nick and Charlie were landing at Edwards when the gear failed. Nick ejected at the last possible moment for a safe escape. Charlie went in with the bird. While he was in the hospital, They brought in a bunch of patients with serious radiation injuries from an accident. Neither Nick or Charlie ever learned what happened, or where. Just watching them deteriorate made Charlie in some way glad that he only lost his legs. None of them made it. Nick saw it too, and he remembered the old story about the kid who cried because he had no shoes, until he met a man who had no feet. He never said anything to Charlie, but he visited him every chance he got. Their accident at Edwards was declared due to mechanical failure. 5 *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** Nick also guessed that Charlie must have called in some pretty large markers to get this assignment. Maybe they just wanted to get rid of him. He did know the whereabouts of a lot of skeletons buried inside the beltway, and they probably were hoping he would die out there. As it was, it ironically turned out the other way around. He said that you really didn't need legs in zero gravity anyway Charlie was pointing at an indicator on the screen of one of the status boards. It was obvious that there had been a massive failure in the primary power supply for the station. The whole thing depended on an array of solar cells located on the outer skin of the station complex. The backup system was not built to last for very long, even at the decreased drain of the smaller crew. It was obvious to all that something had to be done, and soon. Almost instinctively, two of them reached for the controls of the robot. Nick was thankful that the thing, as he called it, was in one of the last shipments of supplies sent up to them. It was intended to relieve men of the risks of working in the cumbersome suits out in space. A prototype, it could do in a few minutes what would take hours in a suit. As Nick manipulated the controls, they could see the station details on the screen. First the storage bay, then the massive form of the outside hull as it was guided by the pilot's practiced hands. Nick maneuvered it so well that Charlie wondered if he had more time on it than the logs recorded. He was really good at it 6 *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** "THERE!". Adams shouted. His high-pitched voice echoed down the corridor as he almost put his finger through the screen when he pointed at the area that the robot's camera surveyed. Nick touched a pad on the panel to set the thing to hold its position relative to that area, and zoomed in with the camera to magnify the image of the damage. "JUNK!" , said Charlie. "A lousy, flying piece of space junk hit it and did it in!" Looks like it." Nick agreed. He was remembering something he had read from a database awhile ago. It told him that there were about ten thousand pieces of useless, discarded junk like that in orbit, and some were as big as a bus. The station's orbit had been very carefully worked out, so as to avoid the large pieces and minimize the chance of this happening. He also remembered back to one of the earlier Shuttle missions. A fleck of paint hit the windshield at 17000 miles per hour. It put a chip in it. You can't win 'em all, Nick thought. "Whatever it was, it sure did a job of work on those panels." Peters added. Nick had not realized that he was thinking out loud. Adams chimed in. "Yeah. it looks like we're really out of business for good." "Not so fast. guys." Charlie used the commanding tone of voice he liked. He was like a teacher about to put forth a great truth. "The fat lady didn't sing yet. If we put the tool module on the robot, I think maybe we should be able to dismantle it, bring it inside and fix it long before the batteries die." 7 *************************************************************************************** ***************************************************************************************. *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** Everyone agreed that it was worth a shot. After all, there was little choice in their situation. The backup batteries might last for about a week or so, if they cut off all but basic life support. Nick was all but sure that the process was already in progress. The computer was programmed for all contingencies. He was remembering the old movies he saw about crews trapped down deep under the sea in submarines. He felt for them. Peters and Adams went to the stores area to see what they could find to use as repair parts. That's the excuse they used, anyway. They all were aware that the computer had tabs on everything that was stored on and off the station nearby. Nick was certain they intended to stop at the still. He really didn't blame them after what had happened. He and Charlie stayed at the workstation to change modules on the robot and set it to work.As it turned out, it was by far the easiest job of many to come. They talked as they worked. Probably more than they had at any time since Nick arrived on the station. It helped to retain some kind of sanity, considering what had happened. Each was keenly aware that the world below as they had known it was gone forever. They had watched between the cloud cover as the small puffs of the mushroom clouds rose and expanded as the targets were hit by the missles they had unleashed. The most awesome thing was the realization that the tiny puffs of cloud were hundreds of miles in diameter. None of this compared with the view of all the firestorms raging on the dark side of the planet. Words failed to describe it. Nick didn't bother to even try to put it in his personal log. He knew the computer was recording all of it. 8 *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** **************************************************************************************** It was a little easier to look down once the clouds obscured what was down below. If you tried real hard not to think of what was really happening down there, it made things just a little bit better. Only a little. The product of the still helped too. Nick didn't really like the stuff. He never had, but he mixed it with the synthetic orange juice they had. He made a mental note to look for something else when that ran out. Charlie also had something else going for him that helped. He had his boy, Todd. Somehow, Charlie had gotten the OK for a twelve-year old boy to visit his dad here in space high above the earth on an orbiting station. His wife had divorced Charlie a short time after the accident, and he had seldom seen Todd. As they were talking, Nick floated to the other side of the cabin. As he opened the shield and gazed out of the port at the view below, he asked himself why anyone would even consider leaving the place where he was voluntarily.. Here was a perfectly controlled environment, at least for the foreseeable future, and those on the station had all the means available to maintain the status quo. They even had all the resources to cope with the unlikely event of an encounter with a piece of orbiting space junk. Almost Eden, Nick mused. Even Mary had agreed that this was the place to be. Charlie had spent countless hours pumping every bit and byte of information he could find into her databases. Most of it was already there, but there was always a chance of some seemingly insignificant thing that could turn out to be the one piece of a missing puzzle. Charlie did make a few useful contributions. Mary told him so. He almost believed that she was trying to make him feel better. He had renamed her when he came on board and assumed command. The original designation was V-M-23. As he started to work with the megacomputer, he used his wierd sense of humor, and started calling it the Virgin Mary. 9 *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** Mary was one of the first major items installed on the station. She had been manufactured in New Jersey, and including all of her peripheral accessories, took up the whole Shuttle bay when she was sent up. There were only two like her ever manufactured. The station itself was constructed, using the old Russian Mir station as a building block.It made a good "construction shack", as Nick called it.The Russkys decided they could no longer afford to keep it up, so they made a deal with NASA for a "joint venture". Charlie thought the whole thing was a bit of irony, since they couldn't even pay for a rocket to bring their people back, having to depend on the shuttles from NASA for resupply and transport. He also considered Mary to have a kind of seniority because of her length of service. She spat out large quantities of data, and for those who spoke the language, it could be translated into various forms of reality. Besides giving it a humanoid name, he also gave her some independence. He cut her free from the lines of control of the ground-based computers, had a backup power supply installed, and he put in a program that fed false signals down below to make it seem like it was all as it had been designed, but Mary had a choice to accept orders, or ignore them. Nick jokingly called it rank insubordination. They were all thankful for Charlie's bit of foresight when the launch order was given. All communication with the surface was cut off. If Mary had not been modified, most of what they needed to survive would have been useless, including the backup systems that were keeping them alive right now. The station would have become uninhabitable in a very short time, In other words, they were obviously considered to be expendable after their mission was carried out. Nick would have cursed the ones down below who did that, except he knew they were probably all dead anyway. Those on the station owed their lives to Charlie, and they all knew it. The bottom line was that, by far, the best chance they all had right now was to sit tight right where they were. 10 *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** Nick was brought back from his view at the port by the sounds the robot made working in the airlock of the cargo bay nearby. The noises and vibrations were different now. Most of the systems were shut down. The light on the panel by the hatch went green, and Nick opened it wide so all of them could enter and do a hands-on check of the damage. It was close in there. It had been built to accommodate two men in suits, or for bringing in small containers of supplies from the shuttles. It had a docking ring to match the one on the shuttle. Charlie and Nick went inside with the panel, while Adams and Peters looked in from the hatchway. While they worked, Nick's thoughts drifted back to a time when he had to crawl through the tiny hatch of the engine space of his sailboat on Long Island. "Hi, honey!" She called to him as she came down the dock, swinging a picnic basket. Nick knew what was in it. Margaret was the best he had ever known at making fried chicken. Even better than his mother, but he never would have said that to either of them. He loved fried chicken, and after the morning of work on the boat's stubborn little diesel, she was more than a welcome sight on that warm summer day. He had always enjoyed the sound of her voice, even when it involved one of those inevitable lover's spats. Once, when one of her friends was bragging about her marriage, and how she and her husband had never had any kind of argument, Margaret just said, "Well, I guess nothing important ever happens over at your house!" How he loved her! They met when they were both still in high school. They hit it off really well right away. They had similar interests, not in the phony, put-on way that many girls used to get a guy, but she really did enjoy things like baseball, boats, and all the other stuff that hept them busy during those wonderful years. Just memories now. 11 *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** "What's the matter, Nick?" Charlie asked. "Yeah, I never saw anyone shed tears over a piece of space junk before." Adams' voice echoed in the chamber as it brought him fully back from the scene of the dock and sailboat. Silently, Nick cursed them all. Adams was a miserable clod. In another time and place, he would have gladly killed him just for that. In a way, he was relieved he wasn't armed with more than a rotten New York attitude. Nick so wished that time travel were a possibility, so that he could return to those days with Margaret and the boat. He said nothing, and wiped the tears away. He kept his gaze on the panel, struggling to keep his attention on what he was doing. He tried very hard not to think about what happened down below. One thing he knew for sure was that the world he knew was changed forever. "Looks shot to me." Peters said, obviously trying to defuse the icy situation. in the cargo bay. He was almost the opposite of Adams, despite his attempts at being the image of his macho buddy. His intelligence and some little bit of sensitivity did come through at times. This was one of them. Charlie pushed the two aside as he exited the bay. He pulled himself over to the main console of the V-M, and began a series of motions on the keypads that resulted in some hardcopy lists coming out of the slot into a cage that caught it all. Nick always admired Charlie's skill with computers. He was as fast as anyone he had ever seen. He hardly ever used the voice-activation systems. He somehow felt it might make the machine his equal. Couldn't have that, he said. After a few minutes of cross and double checking, he handed a list to each one of them, and said, "I think this is most of what we will need to do the job. There may be more later. Some of it will have to come off of equipment in service. It doesn't matter. It's all off nonessential stuff. We can cannibalize it without much loss. Anyway, if we all die up here, who's going to need it anyway? Let's go get it!" 12 *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** Charlie's last statements left no doubt in anyone's mind that the situation was critical. There wasn't much time. They also accepted the reality that Charlie knew the problem and the answers better than they did by far. He had worked miraculous internal repairs and maintenance on the station ever since he floated in from the shuttle. They were operating in a closed system now. No more supply shuttles. After the first day, no one was able to make a definitive assessment of the actual damage down below. No signals of any kind were able to pass through what was left of the atmosphere. The computer told them more than they really wanted to know. Charlie said that this was truly a case where no news was best. Adams and Peters were the pilots of the last shuttle that arrived from the Cape. The announced flight plan was to dump the containers and return on the next orbit. Their real mission was something entirely different, and did not work out as anyone had planned. They were in the middle of the process of disgorging the cargo when the ready signal came up. Any attempt to leave was cut off. V-M saw to that. She had a program hidden in her that cut off all power in the shuttles. Charlie had noticed it once when he was poking around in her innards, but he hadn't investigated it for lack of time, and it was also in a code he wasn't familiar with so he let it go. In a way, it may have prolonged all of their lives. If they had tried any kind of escape during that period, they may have perished in the fierce atomic exchanges down below, or in any one of a dozen other ways. Many hours were spent debating the question later on, both individually, and in groups. Peters and Adams must have wondered about it more than the others did, mostly because of what they both knew of their real reason for being there. 13 *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** It took quite awhile to find all of the things on the lists that Charlie gave them. They had to be careful in dismantling some of the more delicate electronics. Charlie had marked a few pieces as one-of-a-kind. Probably not replacable if they were damaged. Adams didn't like what they did to some of the stuff in the recreation area. Some of the simulators had become his own personal escape from what had become intolerable otherwise. He lacked the vivid imagination that Nick had so easily cultivated. Adams looked at them as his own"time machines". If he had known the source of Nick's apparent abilities, he may have seen things from an altogether different perspective. But he did understand that the stuff had to go if there were any chance to fix the gear. Charlie had said they had at most a week to do it, or they were all dead meat. Even Adams had the smarts to figure the odds on that. When all of the stuff had been brought to the cargo bay and was secured, Charlie told them all to get lost for awhile, and conserve power. Adams and Peters disappeared toward the galley, and Nick headed toward his quarters. He needed some sleep. As he slipped into his sleeping net, he adjusted it so he could look out of the port. He slid back the shield, and there it was. It was his favorite view about a million years ago. He both longed for, and dreaded any tiny break in the radioactive clouds and what it might reveal. The fried chicken was very good, as always. They both enjoyed just being together on the boat, even though it was only tied up alongside the dock. Margaret had just started to clean up the remains of their picnic when the cool breeze came up. Nick liked that. 14 ************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** He was awakened by Charlie's shout in the intercom. It was the cool air that was blowing through the ventilator that told him that Charlie had been successful in his repairs. He looked at his watch. He had slept more than twelve hours. Charlie's voice sounded as close to happy as it had in many years. "It won't work quite as well as it did. About eighty-five percent, but take in the consideration of the lighter load of the smaller crew, it will be more than adequate. It will buy us enough time to figure out what we have to do." Charlie talked in riddles at times, so Nick knew there was something else. He settled into a restraining harness and said, "All right, how long will it last, and what else are you trying not to say?" He floated over to the large screen. "Something that Mary was showing me just before the junk hit the panel. Watch the screen." "Charlie, if its dirty movies again, I'll pass." "Just watch, dummy." He touched a couple of pads on the console and the response was one of those floods of numbers that made computers famous. Infamous, to Nick. There were dates along the top of the screen, and he saw quickly that it was comparative altitudes of the station above mean sea level for the past few years. He also realized that, even with loss of contact with the surface, the information could be updated using other satellites in orbit. How or why Mary actually did all of it, Nick didn't even want to imagine. Maybe she just needed something to do, too. He thought back to the days when he had first heard about GIGO. It was more than that. Then Mary delivered up a graph. Probably to satisfy a dodo like him, he thought. It compared a line of average altitudes with one for that day. There was a difference of about fifteen miles. Nick knew better than to question the data. One time, he had tried to run a diagnostic check on Mary's accuracy. He was almost sure he heard a female laugh, somewhere down deep inside. 15 *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** *************************************************************************************** That was that. The ride was over. Their quarter ran out. They had to get off. For whatever reasons, the orbit of the station was decaying. The designers had guess-timated when it was conceived, that it would last about forty to fifty years. At that time, they had planned to build a much larger one, and this was the result of all kinds of compromises. Political wrangling and the funding problems aside, it was the best that could be done. The Military finally won out over scientific research considerations, although it was not made known to the general public. Some of the shuttle flights were labeled as "secret military missions". Few knew for sure the contents of the large sealed canisters delivered to the Cape at night for loading into the birds. Nick and Charlie knew. Nick was sent there to keep watch over the whole works. He had orders that would have given him carte blanche control over the whole station, had he decided to use it. Some of the others suspected the reason for his presence. He had no assigned duties as such, only that he was to "be there". Rumors floated around. Some dubbed him "007". It didn't make him at all a candidate for the most popular. None of it meant a thing, now. History. After a long rest, they all met in the lounge. Nick was a bit surprised, but pleased to see Todd there. He kept mostly to himself lately, listening to his music in the quarters he had next to Charlie's. "It looks to me like we have two main tasks, here." Charlie began. 16 *************************************************************************************** THIS IS THE END OF PART ONE OF THE SERIALIZED VERSION OF OUR TALE. THE REST OF THE STORY WILL UNFOLD AT THIS SITE IN FUTURE ISSUES, OR IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO HAVE IT FASTER, A FREE COPY CAN BE EMailed TO YOU, AS PART OF THE CURRENT ISSUE OF THE WritersWeb, AS SOON AS EACH ONE IS PUBLISHED. JUST SEND YOUR REQUEST TO: netwritr@bellsouth.net. (Yes, 'netwritr' is spelled the way we want it..:-) PS: Thanks for reading. *************************************************************************************** --------------6537F716E95--