1936: The Year of Secrets

1936: The Year of Secrets

The Eternal Child - Book Three

By Andy Phillips

Published by Action Girl Books at Smashwords

Copyright © Andy Phillips 2014

All Rights Reserved

Cover design by Action Girl Books (using GIMP)

Background: 175915781 Copyright © Robert_s

Woman (Body): 69639688 Copyright © Guryanov Andrey

Woman (Hair): Titus Tscharntke (Public Domain Image)

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy.

Table of Contents

Chapter One: Ageless

Chapter Two: The Hidden Truth

Chapter Three: Escape from Marzahn

Chapter Four: The Translation

Chapter Five: Three Women on a Boat

Chapter Six: In Father's Footsteps

Chapter Seven: Message from a Goddess

Also from Action Girl Books

About the Author

Chapter One: Ageless

I stand barefoot on Gustav's weighing scales. His steel tape measure clinks as he aligns its zero end with the crown of my head.

Any taller? We both know I'm not, but I ask anyway.

Gustav returns to the workbench, pulling a pencil from behind his ear. He methodically records the measurements in his notebook: 157 cm, 48 kg. Centimetres and kilograms. Over a decade spent on the continent, and I still think in Imperial feet and pounds. But the choice of units is irrelevant. The result would be the same: I haven't grown. Not an inch. I'm twenty six - well into adulthood - but stuck in the body of a fourteen year old girl.

A slight decrease in weight, Gustav says. But you are not wearing a coat, so that accounts for the difference.

Wear a coat in this heat? Even with the windows wide open, it's roasting. Aside from undergarments, all I have on are a white blouse, long sky-blue skirt, and my faded old cloche. Those hats went out of fashion in the early 1930s, but I kept the replacement I bought as a reminder of-- I don't want to think about the fire, in case I relive that memory again.

Gustav's stripped down to his waistcoat. He's got a few thin wrinkles on his cheeks and nose, but overall he's aged well. A full head of blond hair, slightly thicker beard and moustache, eyes as alert and inquisitive as ever.

It is time to relocate, he says. I have already made travel arrangements. We leave for Munich tomorrow.

Again!? I cry in disbelief.

Since coming to Germany, we've moved from Berlin to Munich, to Frankfurt, Hamburg, back to Berlin, and now... We're going round in circles.

It has been three years, Gustav says. People get suspicious when they see a girl who does not mature. First there will be questions, and then rumours.

And then they will learn the truth. So you've told me.

More than once. I've learned much under Gustav's private tutoring, but I never have – or will – understand his reluctance to share knowledge with his peers. He's always praising German scientists, but they can't solve a problem they don't know about.

And you want to keep me secret, don't you Gustav? It's more an accusation than a question. Until you figure out what was in the vessel.

I have a theory about that.

You always do.

This is the third this week. I dismount the scales, and step into my flat-soled, leather boots. Masculine footwear. Heavy on the feet, but practical. I haven't seen Lydia since our scuffle at Liverpool Street station, but I don't want to be wearing cumbersome high heels if – or more likely when - we cross paths again.

When you sustain an injury, Gustav ponders, pacing back and forth, the liquid restores your body to its former state of health. It repairs skin, mends broken bones, seals wounds. Perhaps... it regards cell growth as an undesirable change, a mutation, and acts to reverse it.

Easier to comprehend than his last two crazy ideas, but it's more mystical than scientific. I'm sure Gustav's come up with this one before, but there have been so many conflicting theories over the years I've lost track.

You speak as if... my blood's alive, I say.

I lean through the nearest window, feeling a lukewarm, summery breeze on my face. Twenty men of the Wehrmacht – as the German army is now called – parade in double file around Gendarmenmarkt Square. Jackboots pound paved stones as the soldiers march past the Konzerthaus, the classical style concert hall opposite the Academy. The Games of the Eleventh Olympiad are scheduled to open this afternoon. Flags are everywhere: steel poles, lampposts, street signs, the columns of the two cathedrals that border the square. Looking over the fifty or so banners, I spot a few Olympic Rings, but the majority are red, white and black Nazi swastikas.

Your blood is alive, Edith, Gustav says, waking me from my daydream. Your entire body is.

From the window below I hear an agonised male scream, quickly followed by smashing glass. Another failed experiment? We're on floor three of the Academy of Sciences, a place where geniuses experiment all day (and often night) with chemical flasks, prisms, electrical circuitry, and whatever other apparatus they have in their labs. I come out of the sunlight, leaving the unseen man to his groaning.

But you were thinking intelligent life, Gustav deduces. Correctly, as usual. From what I have observed, and what you have told me, I am inclined to agree.

He pauses by an open encyclopaedia, a volume taken from a shelf of dozens. A glossy insert is dedicated to aquatic life. There are pictures, dissection diagrams, and descriptive text in coloured boxes. It's written in German, but I'm able to read most words.

Fish? I ask, bemused. I've got fish swimming in me?

The creatures would need to navigate your bloodstream quickly and efficiently. Mammals can swim, but we are not the fastest, and we cannot extract air from liquids.

It does make sense, only... They're too big.

The ones inside you are much smaller. And sufficiently numerous to repair your entire body at once. Perhaps they convert nutrients into electrical energy, act as batteries, store charge to power your... abilities. And the vessel, when you are in contact.

All those slimy creatures swimming inside me? A scary thought.

The new electron microscopes are very powerful, Gustav says, leaning forward to inspect my arm. I am curious why the creatures were not present in any of the blood samples I have taken. Do they remain in your body? Swim away from the wound? Or perhaps they were always there, but so small I could not see them. If I take another sample, repeat the experiment...

I jerk back in disgust. Another needle? Not today. Have you made any progress? I enquire, eager to focus Gustav's attention elsewhere.

He walks to a steel lock box, opens it, and removes the two items I'm starting to wish I'd never handed over. The pages of my father's diary are browner, but the black metal ball - like me - hasn't aged a bit.

Lord Clayton was a cautious man, says Gustav. He knew he was on the verge of a major discovery, and he did not--

Want others to follow in his footsteps, I snap. So he kept his diary simple. No landmarks, no grid references, only vague notes. You told me all this twelve years ago. This isn't progress, Gustav.

I glance round at the blackboards. Metre long equations, Greek symbols, complex diagrams. Unsolved problems - the story of my life.

"I asked about progress, I complain with a heavy sigh. Why are we still in Germany? If we go to Egypt, we might find the tomb Father