THE ETERNAL MAN - A SCIENCE FICTION ADVENTURE BY MELVIN C. DUNCAN - Entertainment - http://maxpages.com/blackcatprod/THE_ETERNAL

Pay Pal provided for your convenience.

It was while I was building what I had intended to be a more efficient electro-magnet for reclaiming scrap metal that I accidentally stumbled on to something which almost killed
me. I didn't realize at the time it would change my life and make me unique.
I closed the switch. Then all hell broke loose!

The shock wave tore me up pretty badly. I came to, in the hospital three days later.
Will Taylor filled me in on what, to the best of his knowledge, had happened.

"Hold everything", I told Will.
"I remember what happened the last time you said that," he exclaimed, covering his ears.

I began to wonder what this source of power would do for an air craft hated the idea of messing up mine, since I had spent so many years designing and building it. I decided to
design one around this specific power source.

I asked the FAA for a type certification on my monster.
“You’ll have to keep it within 50 miles of home base for at least 40 hours flying time,” they told me, “you’ll have to indicate flying time, and all flying time has to be recorded in a flight log.”
“It’s been itching like crazy,” I replied. “I had figured that would be normal for such aninjury.”
He gave me an odd look. “Yes, but look.”
I looked. The stub was almost completely healed over and was all pink on the end.
The doctor shrugged, re-dressed it and told me if it bothered me to come back and he would have another look. It didn’t, so I didn’t go back.
The damned thing was growing back!!

To add insult to injury, I mailed NASA prints of all the pictures I had taken. Someone leaked them to the press and the Air force got a lot of publicity it didn’t want.
Seven hours later in Little’s office, he picked up the red phone on his desk and said to the party on the other end, “Mr. President; You’re not going to believe me, but I have been to the Moon and back today. Hell no! I’m not pulling your leg. We did it in six hours 45 minutes round trip,” He listened. “What? No, it wasn’t one of ours. No, it wasn’t one of theirs either. If they had something like that you don’t think they would tell us, do you?” He explained. “Yeah. That’s what I said. Six hours and forty five minutes.” Even to me it sounded impossible.
When the lock was pressurized, the moisture in the ship’s air caused a thin film of ice to form on everything that had been exposed to vacuum which made footing very
treacherous in the light gravity until the warmth of the ships air evaporated the ice. One worker slipped on the ice and snapped an air hose on his suit and didn’t notice it until the air started bleeding out of the lock.
“THAT’S IT--- THAT’S IT!!”
“Now that we know what we have, one damned thing is for sure. We got us a building block.”

“Now, now, this is supposed to work the other way,” She chided. “You are supposed to be trying to get me in the bed, not trying to keep me out of it. Besides, I may decide I don’t like it. I’m a virgin, you see. You can’t deny me a trial run. Can you?”
She took my hand and led me to the bed. She turned and gazed deeply into my eyes and said, “Mac, you will try to make it good for me, won’t you?”
“Honey, I’ll do my very best,” I promised in a weak voice as she gave herself to me more completely than I knew was possible.

“We found it! We found it!” She kept screeching as I tried to make sense of her excitement.
“For goodness sake, found what!” With her carrying on like that I would never find out what she had found.
“The library!

“You didn’t have to scare him half to death getting him here,” I laughed.
“You said to hurry,” Lance answered, pretending to be hurt. He started down the short ladder, got his size 14’s tangled in the rungs and sprawled on the ground at our feet.
He got up, brushed himself off, and made it to the cook tent. Several crashes were herd, then silence.
Tiny shook his head. “You know, that kid scares me worse on the ground than he does in the air.” He added. “Well, let’s see what you got that was so important.”

The soil, plants, and building material all contained traces of strontium 90. Not enough to be lethal, but definitely a bigger dose than would be considered healthy for a living
organism. The building material turned out to be an organic compound very simier to plastic, only with a 60 percent mixture of silicone with traces of minerals. That is, sand.
We spent the rest of the first two weeks on Hom hunting for a clue to the key to the codes to get the vast store of information out of the large storage banks. An examination of the tapes themselves proved that each one was made of a thin flexible metal and each reel was marked with a series of symbols .
Who gets to make the entry?” Jerry finally asked.
“I think Mac should. After all, this is his expedition.” Tiny suggested.
I looked at them all and nodded, picked up the recorder control. Pushed the record button and punched out the simple truth, which had been apparent to us almost
immediately.
“You poisoned yourselves with strontium 90.
Your power plants poisoned you.”

I looked deep into those beautiful green eyes and asked, “Jo is he what you want?”
She nodded. “Mac,” she said earnestly, “I want a couple of kids, with him to spend my life with.”
“Baby, If he’s what you want, don’t stop for anything. Just grab him and go make a life for yourself.”

Anna walked through the entrance hall into the living room. I watched her for a long time. That elusive memory bringing me a shred of familiarity. What was bothering me! I just kept worrying it like a dog with a bone.

Anna finally learned why I was always Cautioning her to be careful and keep her shield activated. We had gone about 200 yards along a well-used animal trail when a catlike
creature with one pair of legs to many jumped from the thick underbrush and knocked her to the ground. The animal weighed at least a thousand pounds. I heard the breath hiss out
of her lungs like a sudden explosion.

“Baby, you just found out why I have been nagging you for the last four months to keep that damned shield turned on when we were outside.”
"What hit me, Mac? I was walking along, then Wham! Nothing."
"Some kind of catlike creature jumped you from the bushes."

Anna heard my cry. As she rushed out, I yelled "Get back." But it was to late. Two soldiers had sprung in and had carried her, struggling, away before I could collect myself.
The blood was pouring from my wound. Somehow I managed to retreat to the ship.
Anna, struggling in the grasp of the soldiers,had disappeared into the crowd.

I explored the ruined town. Among the ruble I found a child. A little girt. She was about two years old, I saw. She had been burned badly on her right arm and leg. The
wounds were several days old and the child was almost dead from exposure and as I picked her up, her hazel eyes stared up at me in fear. "Mom!" she cried and fainted.

"Helo Mac". She managed a smile.
“Anna!" I kissed her with an intensity of feeling I didn't know I possessed.
"I saw your ship - I was lucky enough to find you."
"I thought you were dead."

“Does Anna die? Who is the child? What happens to our wanderers. Read the book and find out.
Click on the LULU button and you will go direct to my LULU site where you can buy all my books. THE ETERNAL MAN starts at $3.75.

HOME http://www.maxpages.com/blackcatprod

ORDER ONE OR MORE OF OUR BOOKS. READING CAN BE FUN.
THE LIMIT OF YOUR ADVENTURE IS THE LIMIT OF YOUR IMAGINATION

BUY OUR BOOKS DIRECT FROM http://www.lulu.com/duncanpublishing.
Prices have been reduced as of April 5, 2004 to make buying more
convenient.
Contact: blackcat@artelco.com

HOW TO ORDER

TO PLACE AN ORDER CHOSE YOUR BOOK(S) at http://www.lulu.com/duncanpublishing

THE BEGINNING (PREQUIL TO BOWMAN)Print $12.23 Download $2.50
BOWMAN
LANCE SAUNDERS, ASTRONUT
STARMAN
THE ETERNAL MAN
THE 200 YEAR WAR (available at www.1stbooks.com for $5.95
Printed version is $8.95. Order from lulu.com/duncanpublshing Print $9.57 Download $2.50
THE HAUNTED MANSION

Use pay pal it's convenient and will accept bank drafts, and credit cards.

Sign Guestbook

View Guestbook

BLACK CAT PRODUCTIONS
254 Red Hill Road
DENNARD	Ar.	72629
United States
501 745-4369 PC line 501 745-5610
Fax 1-916-237-3095
^A blackcat@artelco.com

Visitors: 01019

Page Updated Tue Jun 28, 2005 10:41pm EDT