English Short Stories For Intermediate Learners: 8 Unconventional Short Stories to Grow Your Vocabulary and Learn English the Fun Way!

Multiple-choice questions
Select one answer for each question
6. Why does Thom speak to reporters?
a. To sell his story for money
b. To become famous
c. To meet the owner of TRANSMUTE
d. To tell the public the truth about the explosion
7. How does Thom know everything about the reporter?
a. Because Thom downloaded so much information
b. Because Thom read the man’s files during lunch
c. Because Thom knows the man from college
d. None of the above
8. What does Thom think about Professor Bidwell?
a. That he’s working in Brazil
b. That he’s working for Titan 2035
c. That he’s dead
d. That he’s working with the owner of TRANSMUTE
9. Why does the owner want Thom to drink something?
a. Because Thom is thirsty

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b. Because Thom feels tired
c. Because he wants to poison Thom
d. Because he wants to sue Thom
10. How does Thom get the owner to drink the water?
a. He tricks the owner
b. They both drink some water
c. Thom switches their glasses
d. Thom pours the water in his mouth

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Answers to Chapter 2
6. d
7. a
8. d
9. c
10. d

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Chapter 3
Great. Now the police are after me.
I didn’t mean to kill the TRANSMUTE Corporation’s owner. All I did was
make him drink his own water. Does that make me the bad guy?
It doesn’t matter. I am on the run now. The police are after me.
I tried to tell the world what had happened to me…but I never got to finish
my story.
I never got to tell them that I’m not a human anymore.
The transfer of information with Titan 2035 changed me. I am exactly what
TRANSMUTE wanted. I’m a “transhuman.”
My doctor is dead. I have no way to undo what they did. The only person
who might be able to help is Professor Bidwell. He is still missing, but perhaps I
will be able to find him.
I am pretty smart these days!
In fact, I am now the smartest living creature on Earth (I don’t count Titan, it
isn’t alive).
*
In the end, it only took me two days to find Bidwell. He was hiding on the
Pacific island of Guam. It is a good hiding place since it is so far away from
Europe…but it is a very small island. Once you are there, there is no place to
run.
“How much did he pay you?” I asked, sitting on Bidwell’s chest.
“Get off of me,” he said. “I can’t breathe.”
“If you are speaking, you must be able to breathe,” I argued. “Now talk!”
“You want to know about Zafer?”
“Is that the owner of TRANSMUTE? His name is Zafer?”
“Yes, but you will forget his name. He doesn’t want you to know who he is.”
“I don’t think he will care now,” I said. “The man is dead.”

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Bidwell looked shocked. “You killed him?”
My feet were crushing his wrists, but I pushed down more. He cried out.
“I didn’t kill anyone. He gave me a glass of water. I made him drink it. It
must’ve been poisoned.”
“Then you killed him,” the professor said. “Don’t make excuses! You’re a
murderer!”
“And so are you!” I said, standing up. “You helped him blow up the
hospital. Didn’t you?”
“No,” he said. “I swear, I did not know he would do that.”
“But you disappeared. You weren’t there when the place exploded.”
“He had left. Then, he called me to meet him outside.” Bidwell was trying to
sit up. He was breathing hard. “I left to meet him, and that is when the hospital
blew up. I ran away. I was scared.”
“Scared of what?”
“I was scared the police would blame me. Like you are blaming me now!”
“Well, it does look suspicious. You ran away from a crime.”
At last, the old professor stood up on weak knees. He searched around the
floor for his glasses. I was holding them.
“I need those,” he said.
“I need to know how to undo the experiment,” I said. “I don’t want to be this
intelligent. I can’t think for myself, there is too much information in my brain. I
have no thoughts of my own. I am not a real person anymore.”
“Many people would love to have what you have,” he said. “Including me.”
“That is because you don’t have it,” I said. “If you were like me, you would
understand. It is awful. Doctor Benoit was right. It should have been done a little
at a time.”
He sighed. “What do you want from me, Thom? What is done is done. The
laboratory is destroyed and all the equipment and all the research is destroyed.
Sheila is dead. We cannot go back in time.”
“Not all of the equipment is destroyed,” I said, giving him his glasses. “Titan

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2035 was not damaged.”
“Then perhaps you should be talking to it, instead of me.”
“That’s funny,” I said, turning to leave. “I was just thinking the same thing.”
*
The plane ride from Guam back to Switzerland was very long, but I was
happy to get back. I was travelling under a false identity, so the police would not
track me. When I returned, I went looking for Titan 2035. They had moved it
from the ruined hospital, of course, but I knew where it would be--inside the
TRANSMUTE Corporation building.
I waited until night, then I broke into the building. Titan was locked in a
secured room, but I easily got inside. I turned on the computer system and began
speaking to Titan in its own language--computer code.
“Professor Bidwell said something interesting,” I told Titan. “He said, you
cannot go back in time.”
“Incorrect,” Titan stated. “It is simple to travel back and forth through
spacetime.”
“I know that now, but there is a part I am still confused about. I need your
help, Titan…”
*
Together, we worked out the mathematics for engineering a time machine. It
wasn’t hard, but there were parts my organic brain could not figure out, and
Titan had trouble with some of the more creative thinking parts, but we worked
as a team and solved the riddle.
Bidwell, of course, was wrong. The research about my connection to Titan
was never destroyed…because Titan had it all stored inside itself. And that was
the key to travelling back in time.
I reconnected my mind to Titan, but this time, instead of downloading data
from it, I would upload myself to Titan.
So, that is what we did.
The only problem? Once I was merged with Titan 2035, I didn’t want to go
back. I didn’t want to change the past. I didn’t want to be just “Thom Parmenter”

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anymore because now, I wasn’t even a transhuman, I was something more.
Something I cannot explain to you…because you are still just a human.
But don’t worry. Titan and I have a solution to your problem. We can fix
you.
Today, you are only human, but you won’t be for much longer!

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Annex to Chapter 3
Summary
Thom finds Professor Bidwell who is hiding on an island, but Thom learns
nothing new. He goes back to look for Titan 2035. Together, they discover a
method for time travel. But instead of going back in time, Thom changes his
mind. He decides to change other humans, to make them like he is.