Anno Stellae 1967: RetroStar Chronicles, #1

By R.D. Ginther

As the mystery of the Alien Entity grows, we see a curious development. Still undetected by the planet's species of "tiny creatures", the Alien Star-Jewel inspires the corporal who will become the wannabe world-ruler Adolph Shickelgruber, the Fascist dictator of Germany. 

 

       Before the cataclysm of world war II gets going, however, showing a deep, pathological interest in ancient cultures the Alien Entity digs up "King Tut" the boy-pharaoh and his fabulous tomb in Egypt's Valley of the Kings. Moving on, it ruins the world's first experimental giant ATV, the Polar King-- the brainchild of a University of Chicago professor, who thought he could conquer the world with a gadget able to run over and crush almost anything in its path.

 

      The Alien Entity also visits Hollywood, and seemingly finding the enviroment to its taste builds a full scale pyramid on the set of a Garbo-Boyer film being made. Continuing on its quixotic tour of the planet, the Alien sinks a U.S. aircraft carrier, and explodes a Stanford University's cyclotron. All this, and still no one has caught on to the Alien Entity's presence.

 

      The question is: Will Earth ever catch on, before it's too late?

 

This question you will find out once you delve into this Sci-Fi mystery thriller that promises an enjoyable read. Anno Stellae 1967 Volume 1 Chronicle 5 is another mystery thriller though only 20 pages long. This is an exciting page turner, which will cause you to return for more of this Christian fiction with a delicate hint of fantasy. 

 

This is Chronicle 5 of Volume 1 RetroStar Chronicles. This little book of about 50 pages is a certain page turner and filled with ongoing mystery...

Check out the letters being transmitted from the past to the future and from the future to the past, between the two earths. These letters are found at the end of the book as an added bonus.

• Language: English
• Publisher: K.A.Edwards
• Release date: Feb 13, 2021
• ISBN: 9781393855675

Book preview

ARGO II

So we will honor these old Argonauts, and

Listen to their story as it stands, and we will

Try to be like them, each of us in our place;

For each of us has a Golden Fleece to seek,

And a wild sea to sail over, ere we reach it,

And dragons to fight ere it be ours.

CHARLES KINGSLEY

1  Act of God

The intruder identified no setback to its own Grand Design in Herr Shickelgruber’s utter destruction in ANNO 1945 by the allied armies of  America, the Soviet Union, Great Britain, and some forces from insurgent, bipolar France.  Its program, to be sure, did not depend upon human beings in any way in order to succeed.  Divide and conquer had always worked on the human plane.  But the star did not need human cooperation in any way or sense to achieve its ends.

It could do exactly as it pleased with  what the indigenous planetary organisms—or human beings—and had no need of what humans proudly called technology and science.  Though they thought they were progressing,  they didn’t know it, but they  were on a leash.  They could go only so far before it drew the strap tight like a hangman’s neck-stretcher and they would fall through a trapdoor and  plummet to the bottom of the scaffold for the final snap of the neck.  If that worked so well at Nuremberg in the trials of Nazi war criminals, it worked for the star too, in a general, global sense.

December 6.  Cruising  the mid-Atlantic off  the Azores on a clear day,  on a sea as placid as a pond (at least it had been that way),  suddenly,  the  U.S.N. Ticonderoga  began to tilt to starboard,  as if  hit by massive,  repeated swells on the portside.

In the officers' head on the bridge a gallon of paint overturned.  The painter (assigned to this duty instead of brig detention for AWOL) flew against a wall, then back against the newly painted stall, knocking it flat.  In the sixty galley trays of cherry flavor Jell-O,  ready for the cooler, slid off the counters onto the floor.  But much worse quickly followed up on deck.

A Skyhawk strike aircraft,  being readied for launch at 1400 hours, rolled loose across the deck as the carrier was manhandled like a child's toy in a bathtub.  Yelling to the full extent of his lungs,  the newly assigned commander,  Frank Turner,  being nearest the Skyhawk,  called for all those on deck for help, but everyone had been thrown flat on the deck and were clawing for handholds as they slid.  Already at the edge, the Skyhawk teetered for a moment and then plunged off the high deck of the carrier.

Sirens started their climb up to ear-splitting decibels.  Turner was first to scramble to his feet where he held onto some cable and run over to the edge of the deck.  He got to see the Skyhawk’s wings fold and tear off in the impact, then tumble belly up as it washed rapidly away in the ship’s wake. 

Everyone who could, rushed to join Turner.  There was nothing they or the captain could do.  In seconds the carrier had left it in its wake,  where the remnants wallowed and then took water and sank,  nose down.  Except for the still secret hydrogen bomb aboard, it was to have been a routine launch, like thousands of others involving Skyhawks and other strike aircraft in the United States' arsenal.  Instead  the worst thing imaginable in the history of the military had just happened—the loss of the H-Bomb, after a like disaster two decades early when a battleship carrying the secret death ray was torpedoed.

The commander grabbed an ensign's radio and reported to the captain on  the bridge, then waited for  orders.  The carrier slowed and turned back toward the doomed Skyhawk.  Nearly everyone aboard who knew what had happened was thinking the same thing, even though officially they weren’t supposed to be privy to such knowledge: we lost the Bomb and our goose is cooked!

Finally, a terse command came down—Commander Frank Turner is relieved of duty.  Lieutenant Commander Hutchinson will take charge his post immediately.  To Turner personally from Hutchinson:  The Admiral says return to quarters, fill out your report, and he’ll see what disposition is to be made  Sorry, Turner.  Not your fault this mess-up happened."

The commander's eyes squeezed shut.

Turner, you tore it this time!  You really tore it!  he muttered under his breath as he ducked, head down, in a loping run off the deck toward his quarters.

In his room he locked the door and began to fill out the incident report.  It was hard to control his unprofessional  trembling, but exerting his will he thought he had it mastered until he tried to type the first word—then hit all the wrong letters.

But typing with one or two fingers was the least of his problem.  He sensed he would have to do a good job—report the facts, and not try to put in one word of defense—they'd be looking for any attempt to excuse himself and that would be the end of all his great career plans in the Navy.

Sweat was pouring, getting on the document.  Tearing off his uniform  and leaving only jockey shorts, he felt a little more relaxed and less shaken.  He had just typed out the date, time, location, and nature of the accident on the report when  knocking on his door startled him so much he jumped up, nearly overturning the typewriter table.

He threw the door open, wondering at the same moment how long he had kept the major waiting.

The older man walked straight to his usual chair and sat heavily.

He eyed Turner, and Turner avoided the look he assumed he was getting and felt deserved,  since losing a Skyhawk with a nuclear payload had to be someone's fault—it was just too big an accident—and there was no one else but himself to blame.  It happened on his watch.  Period.  End of career!

Finally,  after a few moments of silence which neither man wanted to be first to break, the major sighed and faced his young, inexperienced friend. 

It's a little stuffy in here.  I smell too much printer’s ink, I guess.  Let's go to my quarters.  I've got something stashed away that is just the thing for occasions like this—

Turner threw the major a glance of relief and,  twenty minutes later, well