Stretcher

It was late afternoon on cold Autumn day in a comfortable well to do suburb. Estelle Parker was sitting in the lounge of her very well appointed home reading a book. She was alone in the house, her housekeeper companion was having her day off but was expected back in an hour or two. She was forty two and widowed, her husband having died several years before, leaving her comfortably off. She was of average height with a square face, curly brown hair, just starting to go grey and had a prominent double chin. Reasonably shapely limbs and a broad solid figure completed the picture. Sadly, this last was almost thirty pounds overweight. ...

Dr. Wells lay in her improvised seat aboard the Soyuz capsule grinning from ear to ear. It had taken her years to get to this: the college work, application to the space program, the astronaut training. And now here she was, strapped into position aboard the Soyuz which had just docked with the International Space Station. As the hatch opened, the three other cosmonauts unlatched their belts and floated freely about the cabin. Wells had to wait. She was in a special fourth seat configuration, which she was told, had never been used before. It was so exciting to be making history! ...