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Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781468541182 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | AuthorHouse |
| Publication date: | 01/17/2012 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 72 |
| File size: | 109 KB |
Read an Excerpt
The Three Friends
By Jeanne Hansen
AuthorHouse
Copyright © 2012 Jeanne HansenAll right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4685-4119-9
Chapter One
The Trip To Planet Green
"Hey, you guys," Sam called when he saw his friends Jacob and Mark walking down the street. "I have been looking for you. I finally finished working on my transport vehicle and I'm ready to take it on a test flight ... Do you guys want to go with me?"
"Oh, yes!" answered Jacob! You mean we finally get to see your big secret project?" Sam's two friends were on their toes with excitement. Sam had been keeping his project a secret for a long time and Jacob and Mark had waited for this day. When they walked into the garage, Mark and Jacob were both talking at the same time. "Wow! What does it do? What do you call this thing? Can we get in it and sit down?"
"Well, I've named it the U Cell," Sam answered. "What it does is simply amazing; hop in there is room for three." The boys climbed in. "Well, what do you think?" asked Sam "These seats are great but where are the seat belts?" asked Mark.
That is one thing I have perfected," Sam explained. "I have eliminated all gravity in the U Cell so you don't need seat belts and you won't feel any gravity or the motion of speed. Why don't we just take a short trip this first time, we won't be gone more than a few hours." "Okay." said Mark. "Sounds good," said Jacob. Sam pushed a button on the control panel of the U Cell and the whole roof of the garage opened up. Sam pushed another button and the U Cell hummed swiftly to life. Within seconds they were looking down at their town and then their state. Then the earth was fading away beneath them.
"Wow! This is just great!"
"Where are we headed?" "What are your plans?" "What a great adventure." Jacob and Mark were all questions. There was no hiding their excitement.
* * *
Sam hesitated, smiled, and then said, "We are heading for the second galaxy past the sun to a small planet there. I have already been in contact with the inhabitants there and a Mr. Green has been waiting on our arrival."
The U Cell tore through the Cosmos as smooth as a canoe across a still lake. Through the small port windows the boys watched stars and meteors and comets fly past.
As they descended toward the planet, they could see nothing but green. There were no trees or grass and no houses or roads. It was just a huge expanse of beautiful shimmering emerald green. As soon as they landed, a figure appeared at the U Cell door.
He was a brilliant green color too. They could see he was excited. "Welcome! This is amazing," said Mr. Green. "The first time we have had visitors from your planet."
The three earth boys looked around. They wondered where Mr. Green lived, where his house was, and how many people lived on the planet. Jacob and Mark were also wondering how Mr. Green knew where they would be landing. Mr. Green answered the last question before they had a chance to ask. He told them he had been in contact with their friend Sam.
"But how?" Mark asked. "You couldn't have talked to Sam on a telephone!"
Mr. Green explained. "Oh, no, I don't even have a telephone, but we talked to each other by airwaves. We don't communicate with each other as you earthlings do—we listen to the airwaves. When Sam was so deep in thought building the U Cell, he learned the secret of deep thinking and meditation. It was then that I was able to get a message through to him. I gave him instructions. I told Sam I would guide him to this landing site through airwave thoughts. Sam concentrated and meditated during the flight and followed my instructions." "Sam has become very good at tuning himself into the airwaves."
Jacob and Mark stepped out of the U Cell carefully. They wondered what the bright, shiny green ground would feel like. It felt like a soft carpet of grass, but they didn't leave any footprints as they walked around.
"I am hungry," Mark said. "What do you have to eat up here on planet Green?"
"Well," said Mr. Green, "we do not buy our food, nor do we plant seeds. It takes some deep thinking and work to get food on our planet. If you are willing to do that, you can have whatever you want. I have a spoval for each of you. Mr. Green held up a spoval. "Hey, that looks just like the wooden spoon in my mom's kitchen," said Jacob. Just start thinking very strongly about what you want to eat. Then take the spoval and start forming whatever you want from the ground. Concentrate on what you want and how you are going to make it."
They all started working with the spovals. It was quiet except for the sounds of the strange green ground being worked by their spovals. After a while, Mark said, "Look what I made. It is yummy! This is amazing." They all turned to watch Mark as he ate a foot-long hot dog.
A few minutes later, Jacob said, "Oh, darn! Mine all fell apart."
Mr. Green asked him what he was making. Jacob told him he had wanted a banana split. "Don't give up," Mr. Green said. "Lots of things are hard to do the first time you try. Start again."
About then Sam had a hamburger ready to eat. Mark had made some French fries, and Jacob was eating his fancy banana split with gobs of whipped cream and nuts sprinkled on top. Afterward, they all sat back, full and happy. They'd had so much fun making their lunches.
"Mr. Green, I was wondering," said Jacob. "Where did you get your clothes, like those shorts and that great T-shirt?" Mr. Green said he could tell him, but he thought Mr. Purple was the best one to ask about getting clothes. He asked them if they would be going to planet Purple. Sam said that the next trip they took would be to planet Purple. Then they looked to see what time it was and decided they had to start for home.
They thanked Mr. Green, got in the U Cell, and headed home. They talked about how much fun they'd had and all the questions they still had for Mr. Green.
Trip Two: Planet Purple
"I cannot believe it. I can't believe we lost that game!" Mark told his friends Sam and Jacob as they walked home from their last baseball game of the season.
"Everything went wrong from the first pitch!" added Jacob.
They were all quiet for a minute, and then Sam asked, "Do you think we should try to forget about the game and think of something fun? How about taking a trip to planet Purple? We have time now that baseball season is over."
"When? When? When can we go?" yelled Jacob and Mark.
"How about tomorrow morning?" asked Sam. "We should get an early start. The trip to planet Purple will take longer than the trip to planet Green."
"Great," said Mark. "We will be at your U Cell garage at nine thirty on the dot!"
The next morning at ten o'clock, the three boys were watching as the earth became a mere speck beneath them. "Did you notice the lunch bag?" Jacob asked. "I brought some sandwiches and some fruit so we can eat on the way. We won't want to take the time to make food on planet Purple."
There was no talking, just the silent hum of the U Cell as they watched with amazement as they passed groups of planets of other galaxies. Later, when they finished their lunch, Mark said, "Um . . . excuse me, Sam, but haven't we gone far enough? Do you even know where we are?"
Sam answered, "We are almost there, but I don't dare talk right now. I am too busy listening to Mr. Purple on the airwaves. He is giving me directions on where to land the U Cell."
They were in for another surprise when they landed on planet Purple. They expected it to be a lot like planet Green. It was not! Mr. Purple was not alone.
A whole group of beings from planet Purple were standing by Mr. Purple. They all smiled and jumped up and down in greeting. Some were lavender colored and some were lilac—all shades of purple! They clapped their hands and bowed to them. The boys could feel the airwaves sway as they were welcomed to planet Purple.
When they stepped out of the U Cell, they stopped and stared at the ground. Nothing on earth or planet Green had prepared them for what they saw. Rocks were everywhere, but they were not like earth rocks. These were all different shapes and sizes. The rocks were star shaped, octagon, rectangle, oblong, square, and round—all in different sizes from tiny to large, but they were easy to walk on.
After greeting them, Mr. Purple asked, "Do you want something to eat or drink?"
"No, but thanks for asking," said Sam. "We ate lunch on the way here. We want to learn the secrets of the universe, and Mr. Green said you could show us how you make your clothes."
"Let's get started then," Mr. Purple answered. "We know you don't have lots of time. We use the softest thing in the universe to make our clothes. We use the clouds."
The three boys looked up at the clouds and asked how they used them.
"It is not too hard if you concentrate," said Mr. Purple. "We turn off our gravity force enough so we can float up to the clouds and gather the amount we need. Today we will make T-shirts."
Several of the group went with Mr. Purple as he floated up to the sky. They gathered a bunch of clouds and brought them down to planet Purple. "Did you notice," asked Mr. Purple, "how fast Mr. Lavender could gather the clouds? He has a longer reach than any of us, so he can do it faster. Remember, boys, we are all made differently. Don't spend time wishing you had a longer reach like Mr. Lavender. Spend that time thinking about how you can work to get what you want.
"Now we take some clouds and form them into T-shirts. You can make them as thin or as thick as you want." Mr. Purple worked as he dabbed bits of the clouds and shaped them into a T-shirt. "You have to concentrate while you are doing this, or the cloud will just come apart and float up again. Be sure to think very strongly about what you want to accomplish as you work—nothing happens without thinking and working for it!
"Now I will take some staff of life, which you call 'water' on earth. I will find some stones to make the design I want and get them wet. See how they change color? Now we can pick any stone that we had soaked and stamp them on the T-shirt for a design." After a while, Mr. Purple said, "There! That one is done. I wish I could give you each a T-shirt to take home, but I am afraid they would just disintegrate when you got them back to your planet."
The three boys stood there looking at the T-shirts. They were amazed and excited about what they had learned. Then Jacob looked all around. "I have a question for you, Mr. Purple. Where are your houses?"
Mr. Purple smiled. "That would take a little time to explain," he said. "Do you plan to go to planet Yellow? Mr. Yellow will show you all about that, and he is a good builder."
The boys thanked everyone from planet Purple and got in the U Cell for the long trip back home. They had had a wonderful afternoon, and now they knew where they would be going on their next trip. Planet Yellow!
Trip Three: Planet Yellow
All three boys, Jacob, Mark, and Sam, were very busy that summer. Jacob had put an ad in the newspaper saying he would house-sit pets while their owners were on vacation. All summer he had at least four dogs and two cats to take care of. He really liked all animals and thought that maybe he would be a veterinarian someday.
Mark worked mowing lawns, planting and weeding flower beds, and trimming bushes. Mark enjoyed working with any kind of plants. He dreamed of becoming a horticulturist and having his own greenhouse and florist shop.
Sam got a newspaper route to earn money. He spent lots of time reading about outer space and the oceans. There was so much to learn. He wanted to know as much about oceans as he was now learning about space and other planets—then maybe he could become a deep sea diver or an astronaut.
Since they were so busy, they had to keep postponing their trip to planet Yellow. Finally the day came when they all were not busy with their jobs for a day, so they made plans for the trip to planet Yellow. That morning, just after sunrise, they climbed into the U Cell and headed up, up, and away!
No one asked questions about where they were on this trip. Mark and Jacob had both learned to concentrate and meditate like Sam did, so they too could hear Mr. Yellow speaking to them through the airwaves. The trip went fast, and suddenly they were listening to Mr. Yellow telling them where to land the U Cell.
They had all tried to guess what planet Yellow looked like. They knew it would be different from Earth, planet Green, or planet Purple, but they still were amazed when they landed. The planet was not all yellow, as they had imagined it would be. It was jet black. But planet Yellow's sun sent down spirals of golden yellow rays and everything was a shining, glittering gold.
Mr. Yellow was happy to see them. He said he had been hoping for a long time that someone from an unknown planet would come to visit. He asked if they had any questions about planet Yellow that he could explain.
They looked around. All they could see were the bright, glittering rays of yellow reflecting off the jet black surface. "Wow," said Sam, "this is beautiful! I couldn't have imagined it even if you had tried to describe it to me."
Jacob said, "We have been wondering where you live. Do you have houses?"
"No, we don't have houses," said Mr. Yellow. "We live everywhere."
Mark asked, "But where do you sleep?"
"Well," Mr. Yellow paused and then answered, "have you ever heard of an air mattress?"
"Oh, yes, we have air mattresses on Earth, but I don't see any here," Mark answered.
Mr. Yellow laughed. "I can't wait until I get to go to your planet Earth and see what kind of material you use to put around air to make air mattresses. That will be so much fun! We just use air pups here."
"What on Earth?" Mark said. Then he laughed and said, "Or I guess I should say what on planet Yellow do you mean when you say you use 'air pups'? We don't even know what air pups are."
"I'll try to explain it to you," said Mr. Yellow. When the airwaves are really young, we call them air pups, or air puppies. They get tired fast. They can only go around the universe a few million times and then they are tired and ready for a nap. When we want a new air mattress, we call and ask for an air pup who says he wants to take a nap. They like to take really long naps. When an air pup comes down, he wraps himself around some air and falls asleep. It is not well known, but airwaves can expand. They puff themselves up and keep the air inside. We can bend them any way we want to—the air pups don't mind that at all. We use them to sleep on or make them into a shape you call a chair."
"Okay," said Sam, "but if you are always sleeping outside, do you ever get cold?"
Mr. Yellow explained, "Do you see those small flat clouds floating around in the sky? Those are the blankets we have made from clouds, and we store them up there. If we get chilly we turn off our gravity, zip up, and bring a cloud blanket down." The boys felt around and found some airwave chairs and mattresses to sit on. "This is so soft!" said Jacob. "I could take a nap right now! But we should be starting our trip back home."
As they said their goodbyes and were getting into the U Cell, Sam said, "Oh, I have another question. Do you play games up here in the universe?"
Mr. Yellow answered that with a question. "Have you thought about going to planet Blue? That is where we hold the galaxy championship games. Mr. Blue would love to explain our games. That is where we win blue ribbons!"
"Oh, great!" Mark said. "Now we know for sure where we will go on our next trip. We will go to planet Blue!"
The three boys were getting used to traveling through the universe. They were so busy talking about what they had learned that it seemed just a short time later when Sam opened the top of the U Cell garage. They then floated down and landed back home on planet Earth.
Trip Four: Planet Blue
Mark was walking down the street one day when he saw his friend Kent. "Hey," said Kent, "You, Jacob, and Sam must be working hard this summer. I haven't seen you at the swimming pool or the lake. What have you guys been doing?"
"Well," said Mark, "We have been going to see other planets."
Kent laughed. "Yeah, I bet! Well, be careful of those Martians and those UFOs." He laughed again. "I have to hurry or I'll be late. See you at the swimming pool or at the lake."
None of the boys had shared their secret trips to other planets. They were sure their friends would just laugh as Kent had. Mark hurried to the U Cell garage. This was the day they were going to planet Blue!
It was another wonder-filled trip. Mark was telling Jacob and Sam about seeing Kent and what he had said. They were so busy talking that Sam missed the landing site and had to circle around to land.
Mr. Blue was waiting for them. "I saw you go by and was wondering if you could find your way back," he said. "I am sure glad you caught my airwave messages and found me. We are ready to play some games, and the teams are waiting for you. One team is from planet Green, and one is from planet Purple."
(Continues...)
Excerpted from The Three Friends by Jeanne Hansen Copyright © 2012 by Jeanne Hansen. Excerpted by permission of AuthorHouse. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Contents
Introduction....................vThe Trip To Planet Green....................1
Trip Two: Planet Purple....................5
Trip Three: Planet Yellow....................9
Trip Four: Planet Blue....................13
The Gift....................16
Trip Five: Planet Rainbow....................19
The Parade....................22
The Test....................25
Planet Hersky....................28
The Chameleon Caper....................31
The Gems....................34
Giving....................39
The Fall....................44
Alchemy....................48
Planet Mute....................51
Petal Parents....................54
The Fair....................56
Planet Utopia....................60