Mark Dunn - The Age Altertron

No, there was no time to test the machine, to run the usual diagnostics. And this was a machine that perhaps required even more testing than usual. For the very first time the Professor had delegated the construction of one of his inventions to his two apprentices. Rodney and Wayne McCall, with Professor Johnson’s guidance, had put every piece of it together with their own hands. Would the new Age Altertron succeed? There was only one way to find out.

At the City Nursing Home Aunt Mildred lay upon her narrow cot, praying. Former Pitcherville police officer (Loud Noises Unit) Woody Wall, was saying a little prayer himself as he soaked his tired feet in a tub of hot water. At the Ragsdale house Petey and Grover sat Indian-style on the floor of Petey’s bedroom surrounded by all the trappings of Petey’s boyhood (his model airplanes, his bug collection under glass), their eyes closed tight, their fingers crossed. In the Craft living room Becky waited nervously upon the edge of the sofa, sitting next to her father who was just as nervous as she was. There would be no waiting for midnight this time. Because, as luck would have it, midnight was already there. It came just as the switch was flipped, and within the bat of an eye every Pitchervillian was returned to the age he was before.

Aunt Mildred sat straight up on her cot and let out a happy yell. Others around her sat up as well, and when they realized what had happened, they started to hoot and yip and jump up and down in their now much younger bodies. Officer Wall felt the pain lift from his soaking feet. Becky touched her neck to find it smooth and youthful again. Petey and Grover felt the tops of their heads and discovered hair — and two quite bushy mops of hair at that!

And standing next to the machine that Rodney and Wayne had built, the machine that finally saved the town of Pitcherville from its worst calamity yet, Rodney looked into the face of his brother and saw his mirror image, and Wayne looked at Rodney in the same way, and each twin was pleased to see a reflection in the other of his own boyish grin.

As for Jackie Stovall and Lonnie Rowe — well, we’ll tell what became of them in the very next book.

What we learned from the Age Changer-Deranger-Estranger:

1.) The calamities are getting harder to correct. Being eighteen months old one day then being sixty-six the very next day is much harder than being the color of peaches.

2.) The calamities are getting more dangerous. Several old people almost died and I bruised both of my knees learning how to walk all over again.

3.) The Unknown Entity took our Dad but it also took his diorama “Democracity II,” even though it wasn’t finished yet. Why did they want to see it? Is he still working on it?

4.) Why can’t I call my Grandpa and Grandma McCall on the phone but Aunt Mildred gets to listen to her radio shows and Petey gets to watch his wrestling shows on TV and Wayne and I get to keep watching our cowboy shows?

5.) Petey and the other young children were taken to a special place without walls or floors. A place where they floated as if they were in space, where there was nothing but a telephone. Where is this place?

6.) Are Jackie and Lonnie working for the Unknown Entity? Lonnie is too stupid. But maybe Jackie…

The End

The author wishes to thank the following individuals for helping to launch this new book series through their support and valuable input: my wife Mary; Ariel, Jake, and Laura Atlas; Kira and Pat Gabridge; and Jack Walsh. The author also wishes to thank his literary agent Amy Rennert and his editor David Adams, as well as his publisher David Poindexter and editor-in-chief at MacAdam/Cage Pat Walsh, for their many years of dedicated support to this quixotic scribbler.