Will get back to this this week

Time goes by fast.....

The First Day

Apologies to all my patient readers... I've been away from the previous story for so long that I just can't pick up the thread. But I've started a new one that is "burning within me"  ; )  so it won't take long to write so you'll get a complete story.

THE FIRST DAY

It was when the pilot announced that they were beginning their descent into Heathrow Airport that Shannon really started to get nervous.

She looked at her watch. Probably twenty minutes for the plane to actually get on the ground, another twenty minutes for it to taxi to the terminal, another twenty minutes before she could get off the plane, since she was seated far in the back.

Then…what? Twenty minutes….thirty…to get through Passport Control , collect her luggage, and go through Security?

Then, she’d be in Heathrow Airport.

And she’d have to find a place called the Meeting Point, where her employer would pick her up.

Where she’d meet him in person for the first time.

Shannon took a deep breath. There were so many possibilities swirling around in her mind…things that might happen, things she wanted to have happen, things she didn’t want to have happen…she knew what she wanted to have happen except for one thing…the fly in the ointment...her employer was married.

She’d worked for Stefan Rolf for a little over a year now. He’d hired her from an internet freelance service – he’d needed someone familiar with computer applications to take dictation and he'd chosen her after a Skype interview.

They’d gotten along well from the start.

What had attracted Shannon to him from the very beginning was his voice. Rolf was German, but had lived in England for 20 years, so overlaid over the tortuous Germanic construction of his sentences was an upper class English accent. .  the combination just…tripped her trigger, frankly.

Take your blood pressure medication

Spent most of yesterday in the hospital, where my mother was admitted. Her doctor had changed her blood pressure medication a couple of weeks ago, it wasn't doing the job. Unfortunately her doctor was out of town and a home therapist said we should take her to the Emergency Room.

Bad idea, as far as I'm concerned. Put her back on her old medication which was working, just causing her to cough.

Instead we brought her to the emergency room, and since she's old and deaf, this got her more stressed out and scared than ever, because they were all gathered around her shouting questions and wanting to run tests and I'm sure she thought she was dying or something, which sent her blood pressure even higher.

She spent the night there, and is still in today for more tests, which I don't think she needs but I guess since they've got her in there they want to get their money's worth out of our insurance...  she's in a private room which must be costing a fortune....

The reason for my headline... she was about 40 when she was first diagnosed with high blood pressure...took pills for a couple of days but didn't like how they made her feel....so she stopped taking them and tried to do the "natural remedy" thing.

Result, 20 years later she had congestive heart failure, and now instead of taking 1 pill a day she has to take 4. And has to go into the hospital periodically on occasions like these.

Moral of the story - go get your blood pressure checked, and if you have high blood pressure make sure you take your meds, otherwise believe me you'll wish you had, when it is too late...

The Class: Cary Grant and Audry Hepburn

Never get involved in a land war in Asia

and never agree to transcribe 20 hours of meetings from an Australian business meeting.

That's what I've been doing for the last 4 days...utter nightmare. Could NOT understand their accents. Making it worse were the bad audio levels and the fact that a lot of the people preesnt insisted on talking over each other from all around the room except in front of the microphone... I will never transcribe ANYTHING every again.

Anyway, so sorry to be MIA from my blogs.

Coming Feb 19

I can't believe how much time has passed since I last posted here, and I'm delighted that so many of my subscribers are still hanging in there. I appreciate it.

New chapter should be on line tomorrow.

I have not forsaken you!

I appreciate all my loyal readers who are still subscribed waiting for me to continue this story.

And it shall be continued, I promise.

I just need to get caught up on some work related stuff, which shouldl not take too much longer...

OMG!

Never realized I hadn't posted in over 2 weeks!

Sorry, folks

Things have just gotten away from me the last week and a half...posting should be back on schedule starting this weekend.

Posting resumes Thursday

I know I've been saying this periodically but this will be the last time I say it...I'm visiting relatives and although they have Wi fi I don't have a private room to work.

I'll be home Thursaday and will get back into the swing of things then.

Thank you faithful readers!

I've missed a lot of time during December thanks to family things going on. I'm grateful to see that most of my subscribers have remained with me. Things should be returning to normal after Jan 1.

New posting schedule

Now that I've got this new full-time job, I'll be posting in this blog twice a week - on Monday's and Wednesdays.

So the next post for this blog will be on Monday.

Thanks for your patience.

TechnoFish: Chapter 2

"Class," said Professor Phillip Droste, "Who among you has heard of the TechnoOcean corporation?"

Most of the students raised their hands.

Droste nodded. "I'm glad to see that. For the benefit of those of you who don't seem to know, TechnoOcean is the largest employer in Crystal Springs, Florida. They built research ships and underwater habitats. Some of you - if you maintain a 4.0 grade average - will probably be hired by TechnoOcean once you graduate."

Alex nodded. He knew all that - and that was his goal. To work for TechnoOcean - that was every oceanographer and engineer's dream

Droste continued. "This is the month when we'll be going out to TechnoOcean for a field trip. We've got over 500 folks in this class so we can't go all at once, of course. Every weekend, 100 of you will be going. On Saturday, 50 of you will go to their main facility - the one on Marlinspike Road, while the other fifty will go out on one of their research boats, and on Sunday, you'll reverse the process."

This is it! thought Alex excitedly. If he was in the same group as that girl...or could get into the same group - he could start an innocent conversation with her.

"Your schedule has been emailed to you," Droste finished. "Check your email after class, and it will give you the date and time when you're to show up here. You'll all be loaded onto buses and taken out to TechnoOcean.

Damn, thought Alex.

He'd hoped that Droste would have handed out a list of names, divided by the weekend on which their field trip was to occur. But privacy laws probably prevented that. Well...not to worry. He'd show up every Saturday, and if the girl was in line to get on one of the buses, he'd get on to!

Droste had started his lecture.

Alex turned his attention back to class.

TechnoFish: Chapter 1

Present Day: Florida Marine Science University

The professor looked like a performing seal, Alex McAlpine thought to himself as he gazed down from his vantage point.

There was a bit of jealousy at work there. Professor Droste was tall, well-built, and dressed all in black. He was one of the most popular professors at Marine Science University - all the girls swooned over him.

Except the girl Alex McAlpine wanted. Well...maybe.

Alex risked a sideways glance. The lecture hall seated 500 students. The professor spoke from a stage-like platform, addressing students seated in the tiered rows of seats that stretched high over his head.

Alex hadn't intended to choose a "nose-bleed" seat when the semester had first started. Indeed, he preferred to sit in the first row of seats for all his classes. He was ambitious and he knew that all of his professors at Marine Science University were experts in their field. If he made a good impression on them, they could help his future career tremendously.

But he'd been delayed in getting to his Marine Law class, on that first day, and had been shocked to find that all of the front row seats had been filled. There were a handful of seats a few rows further up, but as he'd scanned the rows he'd seen a woman seated in the very top row - in the nosebleeds seats. There were four rows between her and the next row that had any students at all.

Alex had found this odd. Oh - he understood all about students wanting to sit as far away from the professor as possible. They didn't want to draw attention to themselves. But by choosing a position all alone in an otherwise empty series of rows, that was exactly what this girl was doing.

More than that, Alex recognized her.

There was a Seaworld in town, and he'd visited it a week or so before classes had started - having moved to the coastal city of Crystal Beach, Florida just a few weeks earlier to attend Marine Science University. And he'd seen her - she was one of the trainers working with the dolphins. Not the presenter, who'd not only been beautiful and blonde but also smiling and cheerful. This girl was beautiful too...she'd had a cap of black hair over an ivory-white face, but she'd never smiled... well...she had smiled...but only at the dolphins.

Intrigued, Alex had climbed up to the nosebleed seats opposite her, so he could look at her across the room without her noticing him.

He'd never seen her smile, he thought now. Her head was bent over her notebook and she was taking notes, her face expressionless. Occasionally Professor Droste would make a joke, which would draw a chuckle from most of the students in the class. Even from Alex. But he'd glanced at her a few times during these chuckle-fests...and he'd never even seen her twitch her lips upward in the ghost of a smile.

Now, after a month, he wished he'd been smarter to start with. He'd like to sit next to her and talk to her...but if he did it now, it'd be soo conspicuous. But if he'd done it on that first day - sat next to her - it would have been natural. He could have made some joke about liking to watch performing seals from a great height, the better to take in their performance...something like that, anyway.

But he'd missed his opportunity and now all he could do was sit and glance at her occasionally from across the room.

But one day, he thought....one day...

TechnoFish: Prologue

October 21, 1961

I.

It was cold...trawling for fish in the North Sea.

But Kendrick Trench enjoyed breathing in the fresh air. He was warm enough in his thick white turtleneck sweater and the thermal underwear beneath his blue dungarees.

The squealing of the crane over his head attracted his attention - they were bringing up another load of fish.

He looked over the side of the ship as the water began to boil, then the net full of fish rose slowly into the air. It would pause for a second, before the derrick arm would rotate so that the net was hanging over the large hold, then the net would be open and the fish would fall into the depths...depths that were circumscribed by the steel skin of the Titanica, best - because it was the luckiest - fishing vessel in the North Sea.

Kendrick watched the net as it was hoisted into the air...all that silvery blueness as the fish within struggled to escape their sudden captivity - never knowing what had happened to them...

Kendrick started to bring a cigarette to his lips and then stopped.

Mother of god!

There was a human face in the net.

A human face...silver...alive....staring at him.

Not taking his eyes off that face, he yelled, "Stop! Stop! Don't drop the net!"

But the noise was too great. No one heard him. As Kendrick watched...as the humanoid figure in the net watched him! ... the net traveled on its path over the open hold...one end was released, and a thousand pounds of fish dropped into the hold.

Along with that silver man.

Kendrick dropped his cigarette and ran. As he passed a life preserver he grabbed it up. As he ran he shouted to one of his shipmates to turn off the machinery.

There was a catwalk that ran along the top of the hold...if he could throw the life preserver into that wiggling mass of fish...if the silver man could somehow "swim" to the top, he could grab the life preserver and Kendrick could pull him to safety.

Kendrick made it to the catwalk, looked down desperately into the mass of flapping bodies. The machinery had been turned off...there was no noise except for the flapping of helpless fish.

What was that?

It was the sound of screaming metal...the sound that might be made as if someone with extremely strong fingers were peeling back the metal of the hold...making a door for itself to get out from under the oppressive mass of fish...

Then there was a more distant sound of peeling metal...was that silver man making another door for itself...was it going to be able to bore through the entire ship and out the other side?

If it did so...ripping its way through so many water-tight bulkheads...the Titanica would no longer be water tight.

Kendrick ran to the bridge. "Captain, we've got to abandon ship," he snapped.

Captain Shore raised a hand. "Calm down, Kendrick. Tell me what's happening."

"There was a man...a humanoid...in the net. It's ripping through the bulkheads...it's destroying the ship."

Shore looked at him incredulously. With any other crewman he'd suspect a drug-induced hallucination, but Kendrick Trench was as straight as a die.

But it was too unbelievable.

"Come on, Kendrick. You've got to give me more to go on. What happened...you saw a body in the net? Probably just some poor sap who fell off a yacht or a cruise ship or something."

"No, sir. It was alive. It was looking at me. From the time I caught sight of it until the time it dropped into the hold, we were looking at each other. It blinked...it was moving...and then...when it dropped into the hold...I could hear sounds like the bulkheads being ripped apart....this ship is going to sink."

The captain reached for his microphone that broadcast into all areas of the ship.

"This is the Captain speaking. We may have a ... situation. Everyone who is not on duty go check out the watertight compartments. All of them."

 
II.

The lifeboats were filled with men. They were high-tech lifeboats, plenty of food and shelter from the cold of the black water beneath them...nevertheless none of the men were talking. They sat, alone with their thoughts. Everyone had got out, after a couple of men had reported that the water-tight compartments had been breached - going straight down - and the Titanic was rapidly filling up with water.

They were alone with their thoughts...but their thoughts were all the same. No "silver man" had done this thing. It had to have been Kendrick himself...dropping a bomb into the hold to sabotage the ship...that was the only possible explanation.

It was only because Kendrick sat next to Captain Shore that there was not a mass movement toward him to throw him overboard...

He was safe for now...but sooner or later...he'd be alone...


III.

 Kendrick lay in his hospital bed, arms folded behind his neck, staring at the ceiling. He was under arrest...he was allowed no visitors.

Suddenly there was a knock on the door, then the sound of a key turning in the lock. The door opened and a man in a blue business suit came into the room. He sat down in the chair beside Kendrick's bed so he could face him.

"Mr. Trench," the man said, "I"m Special Investigator Tracy. I'd like you to tell me your story again, please."

"I've already told it twenty times. To twenty different sets of people. I'm not going over it again."

"Mr. Trench," said Tracy, "Let me explain this to you. You say that you saw a silver man in your fish net, and that he tore open your ship in order to get back to the ocean."

"Yes."

"Consider what would happen if we believed you, Mr. Trench."

"What do you mean?"

"Where there's one fish man, there's bound to be others. A whole race of these people...living under the sea. Well...the North Sea, anyway."

Kendrick sat up. "Yes," he said excitedly. "Yes!"

"So what do you think is going to happen? Do you think the world's super powers are going to send out peaceful expeditions to track these underwater people down? Of course not. They'll be captured, they'll be studied. Even if they prove to be intelligent, that would do them no good, just as it never did any good to any other indigent people on this planet. People who can breathe underwater, live underwater - at great pressure! Every super power in the world will be after them, and it won't be because they want to help them civilize enough to accept a seat at the UN."

"You mean..."

"They'll be enslaved, of course. Like highly intelligent dolphins sent out to hunt for magnetic mines, like we're trying to do now. Or worse, they'll all be dissected, so we can learn how they can live underwater. Whatever we do with them...they're doomed."

Kendrick stared at Tracy, his face white.

"It's your call, Mr. Trench," said Tracy. "Your story has actually made it to the newspapers - lots of your shipmates told the story.  They all scoff at you, but there are plenty of loons in John Q Public that will agitate that you be let loose. They'll want to go after these silver men to and our government will probably even help them do it. With a result that will not be happy for the fishmen. But it will save you... you'll be free."

"Or..." said Kendrick slowly.

"Confess to being a member of some anarchic group opposed to commercial fishing. There's one called SoS - Save Our Seas. They were formed last year, as a matter of fact. Tell the newspapers you lied...that you were just covering up the bombing of the ship. Tell 'em it was just a spur of the moment thing and you never expected anyone to take you seriously. That anyone who did take you seriously is an idiot. Kill entirely this idea that there are silver men living under the sea.

"And if I do...?" said Kendrick, still slowly.

Tracy shrugged. "You'll go to jail. But you'll be shown some leniency. After all, you could have let your entire crew die. Instead you warned them and everyone escaped with their lives. That counts for something."

Kendrick smiled wanly. "A couple of years off of a 20 year prison sentence?"

Tracy shrugged again. He stood up.  "It's up to you, Mr. Trench. I'll let the press in now."

And he went to the door and opened it. Dozens of men and women carrying huge cameras and large microphones streamed into the room, each talking over the other in an effort to ask him questions.

Kendrick swallowed hard...and said what he had to say.

New story

I'm bringing Island Romance to a close. You all know how it was going to end - they were going to be on an island, there'd be more misunderstandings before they fell in love. There'd be some underwater erotica, but not much because they were both air-breathers.

But I've got a new idea for a story which I'm much more excited about and which is more in keeping with the theme of this serial-fiction blog.

It will be much more complex as well...

I have not forgotten this story!

I just have had so much writing to do right now for clients, that when it comes to writing fiction, I can't get in the groove.

However, things are clearing up now. Hope to get started on this tomorrow.

Nice body 2

I'll get back to the story soon, never fear.

Until then, some eye candy

Island Romance Chapter 8

Michelle put down her phone and sat for some minutes staring at the opposite wall. Vic Durant wanted her to be his caddy! A professional golfer wanted her to be his caddy... on the main stage. The PGA - bloody - tour! But of all the golfers in all the world...why did the golfer have to be Vic Durant? He'd been such a jerk... she hadn't wanted to see him ever again, for all that she'd more money for that one day's week than she'd earned in the whole previous part of the year. And why did he want her? He hadn't liked her any better than she'd liked him! She'd helped him win - there was no doubt about that - but they'd been playing on her home course. She'd had the edge... but if they were playing on a course that she knew nothing about...her advantage was gone. Michelle took a deep breath. She must let the fact that she didn't like Durant influence her decision. He wanted to work with her and he didn't like her - she could do the same. Just a professional relationship. With the possibility of some hefty earnings if she could help the guy win some tournaments. Michelle jumped to her feet. She'd already told her manager that she was on her way in. Time to go in and grab this opportunity with both hands!

Nice body

Island Romance Chapter 7

A few days later, Vic Durant stopped in at the country club to talk to the manager.

He was greeted warmly, as befitted a tournament winner.

"I wanted to talk to you about my caddie, Michelle Bravo." he said. "I want to hire her permanently."  Vic believed in coming straight to the point.

The clubhouse manager, whose name was Paul Friedel, stared at him. Then he said, "Let me call her up and get her down here."

"Thank you."

Freidel picked up his phone and called Michelle's number.

As it happened, this was the one day Michelle wasn't working. And she'd taken advantage of her day off to go for a drive upstate to visit a botanical gardens. All Freidel got was her cellphone.

"Michelle. This is Paul. Vic Durant has stopped by and wants to talk to you about caddying for him on a regular basis. Give me a call as soon as you get this message."

He hung up and turned to Vic.

"Today is her day off, she must be out and about.  Did you...I mean...if you'll give me her phone number I'll have her call you."

Vic stood up, nodding. He told Friedel his phone number, and Paul promised to give it to Michelle as soon as she called.

"Thanks," said Vic. "By the way, as long as I'm here, do you mind if I play a few rounds?"