A Level-Three Correction

By David Lee Short

I wrote this short story as an exercise to see if I could write without a slow spot. The story is free--see what you think.

• Language: English
• Publisher: David Lee Short
• Release date: Aug 16, 2022
• ISBN: 9781005335830

David Lee Short

I was born at an early age (OK, age is just a number; mine is unlisted) in Kualakapuas, a Dayak village in Central Kalimantan on the island of Borneo. My parents were missionaries–McGregor Scotts by ancestry, Americans by birth. At the time, Kalimantan was ruled by the Netherlands and known to foreigners as the Netherlands East Indies. Shortly after my birth, a Japanese invasion appeared imminent; we all returned to the United States. We waited out World War II in Springfield, Missouri where my father wrote and edited for the Gospel Publishing House. After the war, we returned to Borneo and lived in the coastal city of Banjarmasin. The way back was long and hard; civilian transportation was still very limited, and while the Army Air Corps would fly us on a space-available basis, very little space was available. We waited 3 months in Adelaide, South Australia, and another 3 months on the island of Ambon in the Moluccas, or Spice Islands. By the grace of God, none of the Japanese munitions I collected from the Ambon beaches exploded. I did, however, develop a fondness for mangos that has never left me. After Borneo, we lived outside Manila, the Philippines, where my father helped build the Far East Broadcasting Company. My father never had a slow button, and after just more than a year, he collapsed from exhaustion. Our ship docked in Burbank, California on December 20–it snowed 6 inches just for our benefit. We didn’t own so much as a long-sleeved shirt.Although I wrote in school, fighting wars and raising babies caused me to set it aside for some years. While snowbound for a week at our Wisconsin home, I decided to write a short story to pass the time. A little more than 100,000 words later, the novel Pastime came to be. The noted author of spy novels, David Hagberg, mentored me for a while. His judgment, correct as always, was that Pastime was a mixed genre; it is Earth-bound science fiction but has whole chapters where no sci-fi takes place. Just to prove I had it in me, I wrote The Devil and Omorti’s Circle, an off-world novel that expands on some of the alien races introduced in Pastime, and has a few of its own. There are now four novels in that series and a spinoff. A Level-Three Correction is a short story that further develops two of the alien races of earlier works. I wrote it to see if I could write a piece that had no slow passages. I give it a B+, but you may judge for yourself. Alaya is a departure for me. Fantasy, rather than hard science fiction, it’s Swords and Sorcery without the sorcery. It too has sequels and a spinoff.I currently live 6200 feet up the side of Colorado’s Grand Mesa and love it.

Book preview

A LEVEL-THREE CORRECTION

by

David Lee Short

© 2008, 2019 David Lee Short

All rights reserved

Chetek Lorenz didn't particularly welcome the return of consciousness. It was like coming to the opening at the end of a dark tunnel. Slowly at first, then progressively faster, a distant spot of light expanded in the blackness. His head was an overripe melon, his mouth a cesspool, his black tongue thick and slimy. Even before the last wisp of fog had cleared from his mind, his nose told him he was in jail—again. His face wrinkled in annoyance at the familiar smell. Eyes clamped tightly closed in a vain attempt to prevent the world from spinning, he cautiously rolled over on the unyielding slab that served as a bed. Only willpower forced his stomach contents