Turnover Point

by Alfred Coppel

Every era in history has had its Pop Ganlon's. Along in years and not successful and not caring much anyway. A matter of living out their years, following an obscure path to oblivion. It was that way in ancient Egypt, just as it will be when the Solar System shrinks to our size. And once in a while such men are given an opportunity to contribute to the society that has forgotten them.... Pop Ganlon was no hero—he was only a spaceman. A spaceman and a father. In fact, Pop was rather no-account, even in a profession that abounded with drifters. He had made a meagre living prospecting asteroids and hauling light freight and an occasional passenger out in the Belt Region. Coffee and cakes, nothing more. Not many people knew Pop had a son in the Patrol, and even fewer knew it when the boy was blasted to a cinder in a back alley in Lower Marsport. Pop went on eating and breathing, but his life was over after that. He hit the bottle a little harder and his ship, The Luck, grew rustier and tackier, and those were the only outward signs that Pop Ganlon was a living dead man. He kept on grubbing among the cold rocks and pushing The Luck from Marsport to Callisto and back with whatever low-mass payloads he could pick up. He might have lived out his string of years like that, obscure and alone, if it hadn't been for John Kane. Kane was Pop Ganlon's ticket to a sort of personal immortality—if there is such a thing for an old spaceman

Genres: Short Stories, Science Fiction

12 pages, ebook

First published July 29, 2009

About the author

Alfredo Jose de Arana-Marini Coppel was an American author. He served as a fighter pilot in the United States Army Air Forces during World War II. After his discharge, he started his career as a writer. He became one of the most prolific pulp authors of the 1950s and 1960s, adopting the pseudonyms Robert Cham Gilman and A.C. Marin and writing for a variety of pulp magazines and later "slick" publishers. Though writing in a variety of genres, including action thrillers, he is known for his science fiction stories which comprise both short stories and novels.

Reviews

[Atlas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pop Ganlon, A spaceman and captain of a small ship "The Luck" and a father of a dead officer in the patrol, a dead officer who was blasted to a cinder in a back alley in Lower Marsport, a spaceman who find himself face to face with a Kane, a killer who wants to get out off mars ASAP.
After his son`s death, Pop simply turned into a living dead man, and he was...until he talked to Kane and found out about what he did back there in that very same alley in Lower Marsport.

Good story ^_^

[Forked Radish · Rating 2 out of 5]

Space pig turnovers 😋. Very similar to Coppel’s “ Wreck of Triton”.