The MacLeod Saga

By Chance A.P. Cosgrove

Influenced in reading classic literature and participation in plays and musicals and being a journalism student took a hand at writing poetry and short stories. Being influenced by many sci-fi programs as a boy and an adult gave me an incentive to write a two-piece story collection of one possible futuristic outcome. Current events encouraged by imagination with sardonic twist and turns lead to some interesting future events and developments. Thank you, and I’ll see you back in the future.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Feb 7, 2022
• ISBN: 9781662442773

Book preview

Tomorrow Is a Promise to Nowhere

Chapter 1

March 30, 2031

Quinten Sunny Daman MacLeod. That’s who I am whether anyone likes it or not. People often refer to me as a hermit, the last man on earth because I live by myself in the middle of nowhere, not because I’m an immortal, although it is amusing.

I love New Mexico. I live in a moderate three-bedroom one-story dwelling on the Rio Grande with weeping willows, swaying and whispering in the wind on the front lawn with an eight-pecan-tree orchard in the back surrounded by a wood with rabbits, squirrels, quail, roadrunners, rattlesnakes, and deer. And all around on the horizon, there is the Purple Mountain’s majesty.

The front lawn has three flagpoles, and risen every morning is the ensign (the US flag), proudly baring fifty-four stars, the New Mexico state flag, and the Confederate flag. I don’t believe a movement or cause—no matter how righteous, or noble—should determine that an entire heritage be deemed wicked. The good in one’s heritage should not suffer for it. Let’s not defame President Thomas Jefferson because he owned slaves. It was the culture of the time. Did it mean it was right? No, and many of our forefathers knew so; but it was a new nation, and they did what they could at the time, knowing it would take time to change the hearts of men and is still taking time today. Let’s not start another civil war over it. Such a scenario would have detrimental consequences. Taking down a statue of Robert E. Lee simply because he was a general of the Confederacy doesn’t mean he wasn’t a good and honorable man as Abraham Lincoln. There is much difference between social injustice and something illogical. When does the lunacy end?

I am retired, alone, except for my faithful companion, a bloodhound whose name is Howdy. I read, write, and sketch, so I’m not lonely or unhappy. I love New Mexico for indeed, she is God’s country, for I am a mere wayward shepherd passing through his ecclesiastical garden.

Being signaled out as another Bradbury, Orwell, or Huxley by my peers is an exaggeration by any means of the imagination, but still in all remains a distinguished honor. It was indeed a humbling experience when Spaceport America’s administrative board and crew of the newest and latest Space Jet XZ28 chose me among thousands of others to fly on its inaugural flight to the moon as its first mission specialist. The training has been a little rigorous, not as bad as normal astronauts, but even so, you have to be prepared to chip in when necessary. Being a small-plane pilot didn’t hurt any. Most of the training involved emergency procedures and what different uniforms to wear whether during flight, at the base, at your workstation, or on the moon’s surface. When asked as to what it was I desired to do as a mission specialist, I requested being a caretaker of one or both the domed rain forest sanctuaries on the moon’s surface already. Domed sanctuaries containing vegetable, fruit, and flowers also are placed there, five domes in all. Who knows, maybe I’ll become the next George Washington Carver.

Quite the commemorative birthday for an insignificant, romantic soul searcher as myself. One placard has been placed on the Spaceport America’s museum wall: Space Jet XZ28 with the list of crew member’s names on April 9, 2031. For my benefit, another will be placed at the base of the domed sanctuary on the moon: To Quinten ‘Sunny’ Damon MacLeod on April 09, 2031, at age seventy-four in commemoration and thanks of a grateful nation. Signed, Sarah Palin, President of the United States.

Chapter 2

March 30, 2031

The oldest granddaughter, Zoe, called and Skyped to say hello and that she saw my picture on a story on Fox Hannity News and PBS World.

How you doing, Poppa? she asked, continuing, You look well!

Reassuringly, I replied, Doing fine, kiddo. It’s a lot of hooey for someone who’s only written two books in his life! I added then, How’s Saphira?

Zoe shot back, Mom’s doing great. She, Sondra, Nickie, Landen, and Aunt Peg will be there when you board and depart on the XZ28. We all love you and are so proud.

Thank you, baby girl. You and Sondra doing okay with your studies at UNM? I asked.

Classes are going well, Poppa, and Landen’s being transferred to Kirkland Air Force Base in a month. He’s looking forward to dual training and fieldwork at both Kirkland AFB and Los Alamos but has a quickie three-week training at Fort Huachuca, Arizona.

The screen started getting fuzzy, and soon, the link would break up, and I quickly said that I loved them and still had to hook up with sis and begin or finish ten days of memoirs before the ninth.

Ten more days, I heard her say. You can start tomorrow was the last thing she said as I waved goodbye to the box.

As the picture and sound dissipated, I said out loud, Tomorrow is a promise to nowhere, baby girl, and walked to the front porch. Come on, Howdy, let’s walk awhile.

We walked down the old highway and waved and said hello to my neighbor Merle, then we strolled through the orchard, turning on the watering system and farther into the woods. I pondered about my son, missing and seeing his son, my grandson, growing up. J. J. would be so proud of Landen. He passed away so young.

Chapter 3

2020

Memoir, day 1: March 31, 2031

After toast, an egg, juice, and coffee, I searched for some paper and my old typewriter and set them at the kitchen table and sat down. Looking at Howdy, I said, I’m a dinosaur and a cynic. What do they expect? I enjoy being a dinosaur. Then speaking to anyone who would listen, What a ya say, Poppa Q, nine, or ten memoirs, one per day hitting the highlights of each year? And I began to remember 2020 as if it were yesterday.

The year 2020 was a horrific year with the COVID-19 virus attacking—it seemed like—everyone near year’s end. Many, however, were naturally immune, which doctors never understood, and others were never affected to the extreme, fighting off the virus and not passing it onto others. By year’s end and most of the following months, treatment was developed, and inoculations were given in consecutive doses fourteen days apart. After everyone in the world first fought to take credit, finally, the US and other countries had COVID-19 under control. Most everyone continued wearing masks into the middle of the next year just in case. One poor sap, an Afro-American, was brutalized and murdered by a White city police officer, and the country came unhinged. Yes, the man died needlessly and the officers surrounding the murder were punished and Black Lives Matter people and the cause possibly warranted some demonstration, but the aftermath of riots and destruction of property, mistreatment, and death of innocent lives caused more turmoil than needed, or necessary, especially in the wake of COVID-19. Inescapably, the election became a political nightmare, if not a fiasco.

The country as a whole didn’t blame President Trump for the virus and realized he was ultimately responsible for bringing the country into an economic recovery prior to the COVID-19 taking hold. Nevertheless, the vote counting continued into January of 2021, and in a close election, Joe Biden had squeaked out a victory. Until the election could be verified by everyone and anyone, President Trump left office on January 20, 2021, and Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, was temporarily sworn in as president of the United States, the first female US president. This allowed the necessary time for both the incoming and outgoing administrations to have some dialogue and set the record straight on the status quo of the country. On March 1 of 2021, Joe Biden and his vice presidential running mate, Kamala Harris, were sworn in at a smaller-than-usual inaugural ceremony, and speeches were given. It was noteworthy that Kamala Harris was the first female elected vice president and first Afro-American vice president of the United States.

Chapter 4

2021

Memoir, day 1 continued: March 31, 2031

People just wanted a change. The country was in debt up to its ears, and President Biden was trying to pick up the pieces left by a disastrous year with the COVID-19 and the fallout of the Black Lives Matter movement. Policy changes were slow in coming, and Biden’s administration concentrated on getting people back to work through new and invested training programs in education, medical science, natural resources, defense, communication technology, the space program, and most importantly, infrastructure. A new infrastructure feasibility study was conducted called Transformation of America, loosely based on the US Interstate Highway Program, Corporation of Engineers and Dam Construction.

Rather than highways, it would incorporate the building of new supersonic railway systems connecting major metropolises, rural towns with cities, new subway, and El train systems. The new transcontinental railways would be on ground, below ground, and above ground. The majority of inner-city rail would be electric subway and city to the suburbs by El train. Mass training programs would enable the work to be completed and keep costs down the first couple of years. The new supersonic rail train would go two hundred miles per hour, thus eliminating some of the national air traffic and hybrids and electrical cars, and less air traffic would eliminate 60 to 70 percent of automobile traffic on the highways, thus eliminating that much more fuel use and use of pollutants in the air. A new company using hovercraft, helicopter, hydraulics, and aerodynamic gravity simulation technologies manufactured a hovercraft road vehicle, which could and did take place of most remaining automobile traffic, except for trucking goods, which was still viable. These hovercraft rose two to three feet above ground, having no wheels and sped along the roadways up to seventy miles per hour.

For lack of imagination, these new vehicles were called land speeders.

The Transformation of America program lasted into the mid-2020s and put millions of people to work.

Chapter 5

2022

Memoir, day 2: April 1, 2031

It was only a matter of time in early 2022 before the telecommunication industry moguls and dreamers invented the newest phone device, which fit on or in the ear, similar to hearing aids. And these innovations became the in thing, no smartphones or iPods to carry anywhere on your person. Everything worked the same, only all was through listening, speaking, clicking your fingers, tapping the device, or simply flicking your neck. I called the device The Snowden, and we have been using them ever since. Smartphones and iPods were put to pasture.

Before the end of 2022, the secretary of education began a new unpopular program where the majority of elementary to eighth-grade-level education was done on the Internet, like when it happened during the COVID-19 scare. Basic education subjects as English, math, reading, writing, history, general science, music appreciation, civics, home economics, social studies, geography, etc. were through Internet applications. When these same courses had practical applications, such as general science,