Terminagenesis: Adventures through Space and Time: Beyond Joe Shaw

By John Russell Marshall

In the third episode of the life and adventures of Joe Shaw, the intergalactic warrior and space traveler has passed away, leaving his son, John to continue his adventures in space. Joe’s bio-mechanical robot companion, Duke, has been transformed into a more humanlike creature with an intelligence that vastly outpaces that of humanity. When Duke follows the programmed orders of his former master, and informs John about his fathers’ and ancestors’ abilities, a spark is lit in John, and he decides to follow in his fathers’ footsteps.

After preparing the most advanced spaceship and weapon system their collective intelligence can create, John and Duke venture out into space to seek new planets and to make friends with new races. Just as his father did, John offers help to a myriad of creatures who are not as intelligent or advanced as mankind and they meet a few who are more intelligent. John and Duke also find themselves in awkward and often dangerous encounters with strange creatures.

After making their way back to Earth, John is faced with a number of obstacles, including warning the leaders of Earth about an impending war with a violent race he and Duke encountered while they were trapped in an alternate universe.

• Language: Afrikaans
• Publisher: Brighton Publishing LLC
• Release date: Jun 23, 2017
• ISBN: 9781621834182

John Russell Marshall

I was born in Los Angeles into a happy middle class family, with two older sisters and a younger brother. We all learned to read at early an age because our mother was an elementary school teacher before she married, and we were introduced to the “Wonderful World of Words.” I was an avid reader and spent much of my free time on the bench in front of the bookcases in our front hallway. I spent 2 years in the U.S. Army just after the Korean Conflict. Shortly after I got home from Korea I met and married the most beautiful girl in the world; Bonnie Jean, who has stuck by me all these years and who gave me three gorgeous, intelligent daughters. I joined the Culver City Police Department and retired after twenty years of service. For the next twelve years I worked at various security jobs and finished my working career with five years as Security Manager for the Los Angeles Mission on “skid row” in downtown L.A. until I retired completely from work in June of 1995. One of the books I read the most, being raised in a Christian family, was The Bible and I was fascinated by Old Testament history; primarily the first chapters of the book of Genesis. I had many questions which my parents and teachers were unable to answer to my satisfaction, so I began a study of ancient Biblical and secular history in an attempt to resolve these questions. Some of the ideas which particularly intrigued me were the possibilities of “Pre-Adamic Man” and the alleged “gap” between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2. Out of these studies came the idea for part one of Exogenesis and all I had to do was fill in the middle. Real work on the book didn’t start until after I retired from the Police Department and it was set aside many times for many reasons; mostly work, school and raising a family, and was only taken up again seriously after we moved to Prescott, Arizona, in 2005. Several medical setbacks gave me a lot of spare time while recuperating, and the book was finally completed in 2014.

Book preview

Prologue

The ship that Joe and Duke built years before was still in the hanger at Groom Lake and had been equipped with the best equipment and upgrades available. The warp drive had been perfected and, while not as sophisticated as the later model, it was quite capable of moving the ship across the universe.

This ship had no offensive weapons but was equipped with a defensive shield, which no weapon known to man could penetrate. Duke had delved deep into the information he’d shared with Joe and come up with something that was superior to the shield of their ship in the distant future.

Duke wasn’t sure what the future had in store for him, but he’d furnished with the newest and best technology available and continued to upgrade as new equipment was developed.

Duke felt that this was the proper time to show John the ship, and one evening, after most of the employees had left the facility, Duke took John to the hanger where the ship was stored. As they approached the hanger, John felt a momentary sensation of fear, as if something bad was waiting for him inside the hanger.

Duke reassured him that it was just the barrier Joe had built to protect the hanger from prying eyes and then unlocked the door. As they stepped inside and Duke closed the door, the feeling ceased. Duke turned on the lights.

John was astonished at what he saw. The hanger had been built to house a military jet cargo plane, and the ship inside took up the entire three-hundred-foot length of the hanger. It was cylindrical, about fifty feet in diameter, with a slightly pointed front and rear ends, and it was painted the flattest black, which made it almost hard to look at.

It had no visible windows, ports, fins, or anything like what John expected of a spaceship. In spite of its lack of embellishments, it was one of the most beautiful things John had ever seen.

As they were standing there admiring the ship, Duke took a small device out of his pocket and pressed a button. A door opened on the side, and a ladder extended to the floor. Duke said to John, Come on. Let’s go inside.

They climbed in through an air lock into the control cabin, and Duke just let John soak it all in for a minute. The he said, Your father and I built this ship years before you were born to explore the Milky Way, and we spent several months cruising around and investigating. Over the years, it has been upgraded with the most modern equipment possible and is now capable of travel between the stars.

After a brief pause, Duke continued, It had been your father’s wish for he and I to use this ship to explore space and just see what’s out there, but obviously that’s no longer possible. Joe and my predecessor, which was the computer built into his previous ship, used that ship to travel around the universe in the far distant future visiting races of beings, which, still far in our future, will be contacted by aliens seeking knowledge.

As they toured the ship, John commented on there being just one bed, and Duke reminded him, John, I am a computer and have no need of sleep. Neither do I have the need for food.

John thought a minute and asked, What do you do when I’m asleep?

Think! Duke replied.

Oh, John said.

John sat in one of the control chairs and looked at Duke with his mouth hanging open in amazement. While he had inherited all of his father’s memories and abilities, he had not yet had the time to sort through those memories. Duke’s statement came as a complete shock to him.

As he sat in the chair, he idly reached out to the console and picked up a large knife that was lying there. As he held it in his hand, he felt a strange feeling of belonging, as if it was his, even though he had never seen it before.

For a minute, John looked deep into his mind and read what was there about Joe’s previous adventures, and again he was amazed at what he saw. Until recently, he had seen his father only as an extremely intelligent business tycoon with a flair for new things, but now he saw Joe in an entirely different light. He had accepted Duke’s story that Joe had traveled in time, but this was something entirely new and different.

As he let Joe’s memories flow to the surface of his mind, John was introduced to the warrior king of the ancient world of more than twelve thousand years in the past who had joined a multitude of other beings and forces to fight evil, the young man who had played high school and college football and then fought in the Vietnamese War more than three hundred years in the past, and the adventurer who had traversed the universe, visiting many strange races more than twelve thousand years yet in the future. Duke was impressed.

This was the father he had never known and, while he loved Joe and felt as close as any son had ever been to a father, he fervently wished that he had been aware of who his father really was.

However, the abilities John had inherited from his parents were not just added together; they were multiplied. John had also inherited his mother’s passions along with her gift, and he was now completely different from his father: different in that he was not only mentally stronger but also had the added ability, in most situations, to see the ultimate results of his actions before they actually happened.

This usually came in the form of a hunch or just a vague feeling, but when he concentrated, John could almost see into the future and know what was going to happen before the event occurred.

He had not only inherited Jean’s gifts but also the one thing that had kept Joe from becoming, in the most complete sense, truly J’Osha. He had gained a soul and with it the compassion and love of life that had eluded his father.

Duke then interrupted his thoughts. John, I think it would be your father’s wish for you to carry on where he wanted to go and to use this ship to explore as yet uncharted space. There are many areas of space he and the original Duke did not get to, and I believe he would want you to go there in his place.

John thought for a minute and responded in exactly the manner Duke thought he would. I think you’re right, Duke. And I’m sure he wants us to go together, wherever the trip takes us.

John continued, There are many things that must be done before we can leave, but with help from you and Ken, I’ll do whatever it takes to get this show on the road!

Ken was brought into their confidence, and after his initial resistance, he gave in to their wishes. For several months, the three worked together to get the family’s corporation to a place where it was almost totally self-sustaining. Any new ideas and products were being produced and distributed all over the world.

John, Duke, and Ken held a meeting of the board and told them that Ken was to be interim chief operating officer as well as chairman of the board of directors and would be completely in charge of all operations.

Unknown to Ken, John had impressed into his mind what he understood to be Joe’s vision for the corporation, and he and Duke had complete confidence in Ken’s ability to run things as well as his unfaltering honesty and dedication to Joe and his ideals.

Duke and John then saw to the complete stocking of the ship, said a few good-byes, and engaged the planetary drive to get them out of the Milky Way. They sat in space for a minute, and Duke asked John which way he wanted to go.

John waved his right hand around above his head for a few seconds, grinned, and then pointed over his shoulder into the depths of outer space and said, That way!

Part One

Chapter One

Unlike his father Joe, John was completely unfamiliar with the ship, its controls, handling and equipment so Duke took John on a three-week familiarization trip around the Milky Way. During that time Duke gradually let John take over more of the ships handling until Duke was satisfied that John was almost as capable as was Joe.

They then returned to Earth to replenish the supplies and double check all the ship’s systems before they embarked on their long journey.

***

As they were preparing to head into deep space, Duke turned to John and said, I have been thinking of our nuclear power plant. It is not as efficient as the power plant in your father’s ship and will need a constant supply of fuel. I believe we can build a power source for this ship using the same element used in the power supply in my body. There is enough of the foreign element on the planet where your father was rescued to build it and eliminate the unstable nuclear power plant. It would be smaller and safer and more powerful, and it would need no fuel.

John thought about it for just a few seconds and then agreed with Duke. I never thought about it, but you’re right. He then asked, I suppose you have a plan in mind for the power plant?

I have, Duke answered. I have given it much consideration, and I have all the data needed for its construction in my mind.

So instead of moving out into space to explore, John and Duke traveled to the planet where Joe had been rescued by the Thoreson, and there they collected a sufficient supply of the as yet unnamed element that was the core of Duke’s power supply and would be the basis for the ship’s new power plant.

The basically unknown and slightly unstable element was kept in a storage facility a safe distance away from the rest of the settlement because no one knew just what it was or what to do with it. It was a simple task for John and Duke to convince the mine staff to let them take it off their hands, and they left with more than enough to meet their needs.

On the way back to Earth, they discussed the possibility of equipping the ship with weapons in the event of hostile actions by any of the beings that they might contact. Duke explained that during Joe’s travels, they had been forced to fight several times, and the weapons would be of benefit if such circumstances arose during their travels.

So they returned to Groom Lake to replace the nuclear power plant with an entirely new engine and equip the ship with whatever weapons were available and would fit into the ship’s slightly smaller space.

It was not necessary to sneak back in, as Joe had done many years earlier. They simply flew the ship to Groom Lake and moved it into the still empty hanger. (The same hanger, coincidentally, that in the second half of the twentieth century was rumored to be where the government kept the flying saucer that had allegedly crashed in New Mexico.)

They recruited a group of technicians and engineers from the facility staff and worked for several months on the design, construction, and installation of the power plant and weapons until they were almost satisfied with the operation.

The old nuclear power plant was removed and a newer, smaller unit was built in its place using the new element as its core. It was considerably smaller than the old nuclear plant, but many times more powerful and completely stable, and it would never need refueling. Much of the additional space gained was used to accommodate the new weapons systems.

A prototype of the stasis freeze ray weapon that Joe had designed was available at Groom Lake, as were several other weapons that Joe had put in storage in the remote bunker.

Duke then told John of the hybrid mini-gun/chain gun that Joe had built into the old ship, and after he’d described its operation to him, John agreed that it would be a useful addition.

This time, however, they didn’t have to go digging through history to find the specifications. There were working models to copy in the Wright Patterson Air Force Museum in Ohio, and soon they had a replica of the old gun in the new ship. It was mounted behind a door beneath the nose of the ship and was controlled through the ships computer, either from the console or remotely by mental commands from John or Duke.

The ship now had the latest version of the stasis weapon and the cloaking device, which Duke had built from his memory of the original. They rejected the electromagnetic cannon like the one in Joe’s old ship in favor of a powerful blue-white laser, which could cut through almost any substance known to man. This addition was made possible by the greatly increased output of the power plant.

Built into the nose of the ship was an electron-imaging telescope, which would enable them to reach far out into space with greater clarity than the old Hubble telescope or its successor, the JWST, developed by NASA in the twenty-first century. The new telescope had the capacity to display the images directly onto the ship’s view screen, giving John and Duke the ability to see far into the distance in real time.

The final piece of equipment was a proximity alarm built into the planetary drive computer, which would detect any object in space that might pose a threat to the ship and then either alter the course to miss the object or shut down the drive and halt the ship. In warp drive, this was not needed, but when traveling through a galaxy in the planetary drive at more than a million miles a second, it would be a prudent addition to the ship’s equipment.

The one thing obviously missing was the just-in-case device that Joe had built into his original ship. Hopefully, there would be no need for such a piece of equipment in their travels.

All the modifications necessitated literally cutting the ship in half and adding almost twenty feet in the middle, but that didn’t affect the performance. It now meant, however, that the ship had to be turned diagonally to fit in the hanger.

They also added a pair of the latest large-caliber pistols adopted by the military, a large store of ammunition, and, naturally, John kept his father’s big knife.

Space suits were a problem at first because the current models were bulky and required a large backpack. So Duke designed a suit from his memory of what he and Joe had worn many years in the future, and they were custom fabricated to fit John and Duke. Each suit had a removable gravity pack for those planets where the gravity was low or too high, and the suits would need adjustment. John’s suit had a sheath for Joe’s knife built into the right leg, as his father’s suit had. Then two spare suits were fabricated for John in case the need arose.

Even with all his awesome supernatural powers, John, like his father, was human enough to want his ship equipped with a lot of firepower and with a big gun and a big knife readily accessible.

John then gently erased all knowledge of the power plant and the weapons, as well as the memory of having worked on them, from the minds of the workers and returned them all to their routine duties thinking that they had been busy on their regular assignments.

Occupying a prominent place in the cabin was his mother’s computer pad, which contained a copy of her old family Bible and information on several hundred years of the McCray family history back to apothecary William McCray and his wife, Jean. They had lived in seventeenth-century England and escaped being hung as witches only by fleeing to France and eventually securing passage on a ship from Spain to the colonies.

The modifications to the ship required John and Duke to travel back and forth between Groom Lake and Palmdale several times, and they made frequent contacts with Ken and Beverly Lake, and, naturally, their daughter Barbara.

Most of the other employees had no idea that John and Duke had been gone because they had become quite accustomed to the pair coming and going at all times with no warning or explanation.

However, the one person who most noticed John’s absences was young Barbara, and she raised strenuous objections to the idea of John’s leaving for an extended period of time. It had become obvious to everyone involved, except John, that Barbara had fallen deeply in love with him, and when Beverly gently broached the subject to him, John was naturally flabbergasted.

He still saw Barbara more like a sister, and the thought of a more personal relationship with her had never crossed his mind. However, the more he thought about it, the more he realized that his feelings for her had also grown beyond the brother/sister status.

When he really looked at Barbara objectively for the first time through the eyes of a young man, John saw a beautiful redhead with deep green eyes and a flawless figure, and the freckles on her nose were the only things that spotted an otherwise perfect complexion. Suddenly, the thought of being away from her for any length of time made him wonder if he was making the right choice for his future.

Duke was absolutely no help in a situation like this, so John turned to Ken and Beverly for advice, and after much discussion, they told him to go ahead with his travels, and they would handle Barbara’s emotional situation until he returned.

So it was with a confused mind and a strange new sensation in his heart that John joined Duke and prepared to set out on their journey.

***

But Duke had other plans—plans that were not actually his own but had been implanted in his mind by Joe in the event that Joe was not around to see to the education of his son, John. He had left very explicit instructions for Duke to tell John about his ancestors, his abilities, and how to use them, which Duke had no recourse but to follow to the letter.

John was still a few months short of his twenty-first birthday, but he felt almost as if he was thousands of years old, with the knowledge of the existence of countless races of beings locked away in his mind. He had inherited all of his father’s memories and abilities but not the tremendously powerful brain that Joe had possessed, so he was not yet able to tap all that information.

John also did not have the instantaneous reflexes that Joe had because Joe’s brain had been influenced by the alien ship’s storage unit when all the data had been dumped into Joe’s brain. Neither did he have the mental capacity to store all the data from the alien ship’s data banks because John’s mind had not been altered by contact with the alien ship’s mind machine as his father’s mind had been. Not even Duke with his powerful computer of a brain had that capacity.

But it was all stored in their ship’s computer. When Joe and Duke had built the ship, Joe didn’t make the mistake he’d made with his original ship’s computer by limiting its capacity. This computer had room for all the data from the alien’s ship and much