Houston, We Have a Problem

By Alec Donald Miller

When Elsa attended her last night at the Star Trek Convention, she had no idea that the journey home would lead her to the other side of the galaxy, the ISS, and the future survival of Earth itself.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Release date: Dec 12, 2019
• ISBN: 9781645366812

Alec Donald Miller

Alec Donald Miller was born in a small seaside town in South Wales. He is the middle child of three children to a Scottish father and German mother. He left school at the age of fourteen. At the age of fifteen, he joined the British army as a junior guardsman and later joined the regular army with the 1st Battalion the Welsh Guards. He saw active service in Northern Ireland and Cyprus with the United Nations. He was transferred to Territorial Army Volunteer Reserve, the Royal Regiment of Wales, in 1977. He immigrated to Australia in 1982 and studied for three years, becoming a registered nurse in 1985. He became a member of the Australian Army Reserve in 2007 as a specialist service officer. He currently works as a theatre nurse in a southern suburb of Sydney.

Book preview

Worlds

About the Author

Alec Donald Miller was born in a small seaside town in South Wales. He is the middle child of three children to a Scottish father and German mother. He left school at the age of fourteen.

At the age of fifteen, he joined the British army as a junior guardsman and later joined the regular army with the 1st Battalion the Welsh Guards. He saw active service in Northern Ireland and Cyprus with the United Nations. He was transferred to Territorial Army Volunteer Reserve, the Royal Regiment of Wales, in 1977.

He immigrated to Australia in 1982 and studied for three years, becoming a registered nurse in 1985. He became a member of the Australian Army Reserve in 2007 as a specialist service officer. He currently works as a theatre nurse in a southern suburb of Sydney.

Dedication

I would like to dedicate this book to my daughters,

Eryn, Emma, Georgia, and Elsa; and granddaughter,

Aubrey May.

Copyright Information ©

Alec Donald Miller (2019)

Cover image credit for USS Enterprise:

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:U.S.S._Enterprise_NCC_1701-D.jpg), light and center console color by AMP,

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher.

Any person who commits any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

Ordering Information:

Quantity sales: special discounts are available on quantity purchases by corporations, associations, and others. For details, contact the publisher at the address below.

Publisher’s Cataloging-in-Publication data

Miller, Alec Donald

Houston, We Have a Problem

ISBN 9781643780719 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781643780726 (Hardback)

ISBN 9781645366812 (ePub e-book)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2019915864

www.austinmacauley.com/us

First Published (2019)

Austin Macauley Publishers LLC

40 Wall Street, 28th Floor

New York, NY 10005

USA

[e-mail]

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Acknowledgment

Thanks to Gene Roddenberry, who directed me on the path of being not only a fan of Star Trek but of science fiction in all its forms.

To Jan Elaine Miller, my beautiful wife, for her encouragement and ongoing support.

Chapter 1

The Farm

The convention, one of many she had attended, had gone well, reflected Elsa, listening to the local radio station as she made her way from the city towards her home in the country.

It was getting late as the bright lights began to fade in the distance, she had stayed far longer than she had intended on her last day. The crowds were far less at the closing stages which gave her more time to talk to individuals on their points of discussion relating to the individual seasons.

Her lecture on episode 25 season 5, she thought, had gone down exceptionally well with the fans, receiving loud applause at its conclusion.

Her thoughts now were dragged back to the present, on reaching the part of her journey she was always uncomfortable with.

A long lonely stretch of road that wound through the mountains for several miles.

This road, as with most country roads, was unlit with only the cat’s eyes in the center of the road which reflected back for company in the headlights of her Jeep.

As she drove, her radio began to receive less and less music and more and more static until that was all that she heard, not unusual as reception was quite bad through the hills; she turned the annoying hiss off.

She concentrated more now on the winding road ahead. As it had started to rain, she turned on her wipers, the rain gradually increased to a downpour. It was one of those nights where you were unable to see the moon or stars.

The cloud cover was thick and heavy through the tree line forest road that advanced to the edge of each side. Now and then, the sky lit up with sheet lightning and the crack of thunder. The rain was heavy and driving in it became more and more difficult. Elsa would have pulled over had she been anywhere else but not on this road and especially in this storm. She slowed the car, straining to make out the road in the heavy downpour. At times, it felt like she was driving through a car wash.

She drove on now with a determination to get through this part of her two-hour journey home. In her revision mirror, she noticed a set of lights. Generally, there would be nothing unusual on seeing headlights of another car in her mirror at night but there was something different about these lights, she could not quite put her finger on it.

She glanced in her mirror from time to time to see the lights remain at the same distance, neither falling behind nor narrowing the distance between them but occasionally disappearing around bends and then reappearing.

This went on for some time until she noticed the lights were gaining on her quite rapidly. She hoped it wasn’t some idiot driving too fast in this weather as it would only end in an accident on this road at night in this storm. Another flash of lightening hit as Elsa looked into her rear-vision mirror to reveal the vehicle behind. With a sharp intake of breath, Elsa realized what was odd about the vehicle behind her. Elsa was now descending down the far side of the mountain road and the home stretch to her parents’ farm was still over an hour away.

The lights then seemed to close within a car-length of her, Elsa had to flick her mirror as the lights were blinding and illuminated the interior of her car like it was day time. At this point, her Jeep suddenly died and slowly it coasted to a stop at the side of the road. Apart from the rain beating down on the canvas roof of her jeep, the lights had faded then died altogether. The bright lights from the vehicle behind had also disappeared but no one had passed her. A strange feeling in the pit of her stomach came over her as if something bad was about to happen; she tried to restart her vehicle. Click! Click! Click! Nothing. Where did the other vehicle go? she thought, getting more anxious.