Roswell Fanatics

The Night The Dreams Died



Mind Games

Chapter 40

XL



“The casino’s gone,” Michael said with a satisfied look, loading the last one-arm bandit onto a rolling dolly for removal. “Just my luck! We find a real casino right here on our own ship and we have to close it down.”

Max smiled. “Well, if you had played, you would have put them out of business anyway, Michael. They weren’t expecting ‘aliens’ with, uh, special abilities to be playing. They were bringing in their own business. Besides, the whole thing was all basically a diversion… well mostly a diversion. They were raking in some money on the side there pretty good while we were being diverted apparently.”

“I know, Max. But it could have been fun.” Michael pulled the lever on the machine in front of him then passed his hand over it. The electronic bar flickered, as little pictures of fruit flashed by for several moments, eventually stopping on a cherry… another cherry… and another cherry. But there was no payout.

“Story of my life, Maximilian. Story of my life.”

Max grinned.

“I don’t know, Michael. We could bring one or two of these back in and set them up in your room. You could play them whenever you want then… for fun.

Michael pulled the lever again. Cherry… cherry… cherry.

“Naw. What’s the fun in being able to make little cherries pop up… if there’s no payout, Maxwell? They’re just cherries. And they’re not even real… they’re just electronic pictures. Get rid of it.”

Max nodded and pulled the dolly out into the cargo bay. “I told River Dog his people could have all this. They can start their own casino if they really want one… down there somewhere. They’re getting a good deal. They started out with two one-arm bandits, a makeshift card table, and a substandard, half-size roulette wheel, and they’re getting fourteen bandits, a professional card table, and a regulation-size roulette wheel. Little Prairie Rat was tickled to death. He’s the one who started the original casino on the ship… when it was really Mesalikos running it.”

“Why do they call a 300-pound Indian ‘Little Prairie Rat,’ Max?

Max shook his head. “Maybe when he was a baby he was little… or maybe his mother saw a little prairie rat right after he was born. Lots of times, Indian names are given that way. Gray Hawk’s mother saw a gray hawk circling right after he was born. Tradition said that the ancestors wished him to be named Gray Hawk. Same with River Dog… and Little White Feather.”

“Crazy Fox and Wounded Bear,” Michael added. That must explain why Shaka-no-gala refuses to go by anything but his Mesaliko name and won’t tell anybody what it means. The rumor is that a hummingbird passed over and left a… uh… little gift the first time they took him outside to find out what his name would be.”

“Pooping Hummingbird?” Max asked, raising his eyebrows.

Michael shrugged. “Maybe. That would explain his refusal to tell anybody his name except in Mesaliko.”

Max laughed.

“Are you going down to the reservation today, Max?”

Max winced and shook his head. “I think I’ll stay on the ship.”

“They won’t give you any peace will they… the people wanting your help, I mean…”

“No. They’re camped out down there beneath the ship, Michael… thousands of them. Maybe tens of thousands. Everybody who’s got anything from a broken arm to some fatal disease to… a headache.”

“Headache? You’re kidding, right?”

“Nope! Yesterday three people wanted me to cure headaches. Two of them had hangovers.”

“Aw for the… What did you do?”

“Told ‘em there were other people who needed my help who were more urgently ill.”

“Good! You didn’t waste time on them then.”

Max looked down at the floor for a moment but didn’t answer. Michael nodded understandingly.

“You can’t say no when they plead and beg, can you, Maxwell? You’re setting yourself up for an early death, Maxwell! Every time you heal one of them it takes something out of you.”

“I recuperate.”

“Sure, Max, but how many times? How often? You’re burning the proverbial candle at both ends here. Exercise and hard work do a person good, but a person can be worked to death, too, and that’s what’s going to happen to you here, Maxwell! They’re going to work you to death! They don’t give you time to recuperate… not enough time.”

“We’ll be going back to Antar soon, Michael. I won’t need to worry about that anymore then.”

Michael nodded, looking Max in the eyes. He saw deep concern etched in Max’s face.

“But you’re worried about your double… am I right, Max? And you should be. If he’s like you… and we both know he is… they’ll use him up before he’s thirty. Hell, he won’t make it to twenty-five! They won’t give him a second’s rest down there, and you know it. You have to toughen up, Maxwell, so you can help him toughen up. He’s got to learn to say no… and then put it out of his mind… not worry about it… let it go.”

“That’s easy for you to say, Michael. You don’t have our gift. If you did, you’d understand. You don’t have to feel guilty about it, because you can’t do anything about it anyway. But if you could… and didn’t… you don’t know how you’d feel, Mikey.”

“Under the circumstances, Maxwell, I’ll let you get away with calling me that this time. But don’t push your luck.”

Max smiled. He knew that Michael hated to be called Mikey, but Michael never hesitated to call him Maxwell, when he was being stern with him or lecturing him, and Maximilian, when he wanted to be derisive or condescending. In that motel on 285 South, Michael had used both of these names on Max… almost in the same sentence. Michael never intended any kind of injury by it, of course. And Maxwell was Max’s real name… the name given to him by the Evanses, his adoptive parents. But Michael only called Max by these names in certain specific circumstances… like a mother calling her child by the child’s first, middle, and last name. There was a not-so-subtle meaning attached, and Max got it.

“I’ll talk to my double.”

“Do that, Max. I’m going to talk to my double, too. He’s going to have his hands full keeping your double in line. I may need to give him some pointers.”

“Gee, thanks, Michael.”

Even though no special names were attached to Max’s simple, short sentence, the sarcasm was there… and Michael got it. But Michael knew that he had a job to do; and protecting Max, even if it was sometimes from himself, was a full-time job.



----------



In his own room on the New Granolith, Rahn was sleeping. It was the middle of the day, but he had been awake most of the night and this was the first chance he had had to catch even a short nap. Max and Michael of Antar were still down in the cargo bay. Jim Valenti and his double were in Roswell processing Judge Lewis and turning General Hawkins and General Hawthorn over to the army authorities, who were quite delighted to have them back… in their brig this time… awaiting court-martials. Kyle was at Gray Hawk’s house with Angie Lee, as he had been almost every waking hour recently, and Amy, Alex, Isabel, Liz, Maria, and the others were mostly competing over who would get to walk Jung-Jo next. They had walked him through the arbors, through the gardens, and through most of the ship. Jung-Jo was thoroughly enjoying all the attention he was getting… and the petting; and the girls, especially, just couldn’t be around him enough.

In his bed, Rahn breathed a deep breath then sort of sighed. He was enjoying a dream about his adoptive home planet, Antar, specifically about one area of Antar, an ancient valley where the shape-shifters were rumored to have originated before they had spread out all over the galaxy and evolved different characteristics and races.

As Rahn slept, a hand passed silently over the sensor beside his door, and the door opened slowly. A strange man stepped into the room then walked quickly but silently to Rahn’s bedside. He pressed one finger to a point behind Rahn’s temple and another to a point behind his ear for several seconds, then he smiled slightly. “I’ve got you!”

The words never fully left his mouth. Rahn had been aware of the mysterious man’s presence in his room even as he slept. The human form lying on the bed changed suddenly into a large snake and wrapped itself around the intruder numerous times. The intruder reacted quickly, turning into a snake, too, and wrapping itself around the other snake. For several minutes they remained this way, intertwined, each struggling for dominance but neither able to achieve it. Then Rahn changed again, this time into a large Grizzly bear. The bear bit down hard on the snake, eliciting a reaction of pain. The mysterious man changed from a snake into a mouse to escape the bear’s grip then changed into something entirely different… a Dragon… from the planet Drago. Rahn immediately changed into a Dragon, too. They were evenly matched.

“We can go on like this all day,” the strange man said to Rahn.

“That is possible,” Rahn admitted.

“Then let’s call a truce,” the mysterious man said.

Rahn nodded and changed back into human form at the same time as the mysterious man did.

“What are you doing here,” Rahn asked. “You betrayed our planet… our people.”

“I saved your life, Rahn. You are ungrateful.”

“I don’t remember you ever saving my life, J’Shalo.”

“Well, I did. Who do you think sent the message into space… the message that brought this ship here in time to rescue you… just as the humans shot your ship down?”

“You did that?”

“Perhaps I am not as evil as you think, Rahn.”

“Even the evil will help others if there is something to be gained for themselves, J’Shalo. I am not the fool you take me to be.”

“Perhaps not, Rahn… but I did save you. And you are right. I do need your help.”

“Of course you do. Did you do that to anyone else on this ship, J’Shalo?”

“Do what?”

“The touch… you know… the mind touch… like you did to me… to see if they were me.”

“I may have… to one or two. What do you care?”

“One or two? Who?”

“What does it matter?”

“It matters!”

“They are only humans, Rahn… not like us. They are not our concern.”

“They are my concern, J’Shalo. Who did you use the mind touch on?”

“Some males… and some females… maybe ten all together… before you.”

“Why, J’Shalo? Did you think that even the females might be me?”

“It was possible. You can be anyone… any shape… any form. It was the only way to find you, Rahn.

“They must be prepared J’Shalo. If you did not prepare their minds… the touch could be fatal.”

J’Shalo shrugged. “Then there will not be a problem, will there, Rahn? We will not have to kill them later. It is always so messy killing humans. They don’t turn into dust like we do, you know.”

“Some of the ones on this ship are Antarians, J’Shalo… but you knew that, didn’t you… and some are hybrids… of human and Antarian. They are not humans either… exactly.”

“Yes, well, it is irrelevant, really, Rahn. Whatever they are, it is better if they die now… that way we will not have to kill them ourselves later… the messy way… and they will not be in our way.”

“I would not kill them, J’Shalo. And I will not.”

“You will do what you must do, Rahn. If they do not die from the touch, the secret will be revealed to them. That is against our laws.”

“NOW you care about our laws, J’Shalo?”

“I care, Rahn, when it matters.”

“When you agree with the laws you mean.”

J’Shalo shrugged. “It is the same thing.”

“No, J’Shalo. It is not the same thing. What do you need from me?”

“A way to get home, Rahn. It is that simple.”

“You had your own ship, J’Shalo. What happened to it?”

J’Shalo scowled. “That ungrateful little bitch stole it.”

Realizing that Rahn didn’t know what he was talking about, J’Shalo winced and stomped around the room a bit in an obvious display of emotional distress, but then, reluctantly, he began to explain…

“I saved her from the crashed ship… I raised her myself… and she repaid me by putting a mind warp on me… taking my ship… and leaving me here on this planet… with these inferior beings!”

“You, J’Shalo?” Rahn asked, with a vague smile starting to play over his lips. “You allowed a… hybrid… to mind warp you?”

“I did not ALLOW anything, Rahn. She tricked me. It could have happened to any of us. She is… deceitful.”

“Ah! Not at all like you, huh, J’Shalo.”

Be ware, Rahn! Even though you are one of my own people, I will not hesitate to kill you if you deride me.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it, J’Shalo.”

“You and I will take this ship back to Antar, Rahn… together… after the ones I touched have died and we have killed the others. There is no argument from you that will change this edict. It is decided. You will agree. You have no choice; I’m not giving you one.”

“And our king, J’Shalo? Are you giving him no choice either? Were you not sworn to protect him, just as I was?”

“Our king is dead, Rahn. Accept it. We failed! The only one I was able to save was that wretched girl… Ava’s hybrid… the one who took my ship. An old Indian took another pod… another one of our Avas. The army took all the other pods. They are no more, Rahn. We are alone here! Accept it!”

“You are a fool, J’Shalo.”

J’Shalo bristled.

Rahn shook his head. “You stupid… ignorant… traitorous… ass!”

“I could kill you where you stand, Rahn! I don’t know why I haven’t.”

“Because you need me, J’Shalo. You cannot pilot this ship alone. You cannot pilot it at all. It will not respond to you. You’re hoping that it will to me.”

“That, Rahn, is the only thing keeping your life hanging by the thread that it is still hanging by. I am warning you not to push me any further.”

“J’Shalo, our king is on this ship. In fact… it is a bit complicated, but there are actually two of him on this ship.”

J’Shalo seemed momentarily stunned. “Two of our Zan pods survived? How is it that I did not know this?”

“You weren’t trying to find out, J’Shalo. That is my guess.”

“I did try to find out! Well… I would have tried… if I had known that the army didn’t have them all.”

“You didn’t try to find out, J’Shalo. And you never tried to rescue them.”

“And where were you, Rahn?”

“The army captured me… while I was trying to protect the pods. I was a prisoner for forty years… until I was rescued by Zan… and Rath.”

Hearing Rath’s name invoked for the first time in so many years, J’Shalo looked as though he had just been shot, which all things considered, might have been his fate in many cultures on many planets.

“Where are they now, Rahn?”

“Somewhere… on the ship. Would you kill them all now, J’Shalo?”

J’Shalo was quiet for several long minutes before answering.

“They must die, Rahn. I am not the same person I was forty years ago. Much has changed. I would not be welcome back on our planet if Zan or Rath went back and told them of my… inattention… to their cause.”

“It was your cause, too, J’Shalo… our cause.”

“Not any more, Rahn. They are not my people. I am a shapeshifter. You are a shapeshifter. They are… human-Antarian hybrids… not even shapeshifter. No, Rahn, they must die… all of them.”

“And allow Kivar to rule Antar forever, J’Shalo? We counted on Zan and Rath to return and take our planet back for us one day. You cannot tell me that you now willingly accept Kivar as our king… Kivar, the tyrant… Kivar, the ruthless, murdering despot!”

J’Shalo laughed. “Rahn, you are more out of touch than I am! Kivar is dead. There is no king on Antar now. There hasn’t been for more than five years! Kivar was killed by an alien from a distant planet who took offense at being, uh… asked to serve the new monarchy on Antar…”

Rahn stood in stunned silence. “A slave, you mean. Who… who is in charge then?”

“No one. It is anarchy, Rahn. There are factions spread all over Antar. None of them can manage enough support to overthrow all the others, so they remain fragmented. The planet is ripe to be taken over.”

Rahn’s mouth dropped open. “You mean… by you.”

J’Shalo nodded. “I did my time under the previous monarchy, Rahn. I was faithful for most of my life. I fought for the monarchy. I defended it. I put my life on the line for it. What did it get me? Stuck on this forsaken rock seven galaxies from my home… with an inferior species! The royal four were killed by Kivar and his men once. They had to be regrown here on this planet. Now they are vulnerable… and I am not. It is the law of nature, Rahn. Let it be as it is intended.”

“I will not allow it, J’Shalo. I cannot.”

“You cannot stop it, Rahn.”

“I will tell Zan and Rath of your deception. I will prepare their minds myself so that the touch you used on them will not be fatal. You will be banished.”

“I cannot allow that, Rahn.”

“You cannot stop me, J’Shalo. I am, as you may have noticed, as powerful as you.”

“Rahn, do not try me! I will take your powers away!”

Rahn shook his head and started toward the door. “There is nothing… almost… that can take a shapeshifter’s powers away, J’Shalo. You know that.”

“There is one thing.”

“Yes. A Xiangar Viper,” Rahn conceded. He turned back from the door to face J’Shalo, and something leapt at him, sinking its teeth deep into his arm. Rahn struggled to remove the viper, but he felt weak. Soon, the room began to spin, then his legs buckled. Rahn fell to the floor. He tried to change his form, but nothing worked. He couldn’t even stand up.

“I am sorry, Rahn,” J’Shalo said, changing back into human form again. “Well, maybe I’m not… but it will make piloting this ship more difficult for me. It will take three days for you to die. If you change your mind and swear your allegiance to me before then, I may - understand, I said, MAY - remove the poison that is killing you. You have three days to think about it.”

J’Shalo stepped out of Rahn’s room and closed the door behind him, then he smiled. <King J’Shalo…> I like the sound of it! Or should I call myself <King Nasedo?>” No. I like J’Shalo better. It is my real name. I will be J’Shalo again… J’Shalo, King of Antar.”



tbc

The Night The Dreams Died



The Danger Within

Chapter 41

XLI



Max stopped in front of Rahn’s room and stared at the door for a moment. “Have you see Rahn today, Liz?”

Liz thought for a moment then shook her head. “Come to think of it, I don’t think I saw him yesterday either. That’s odd, Max. He usually socializes with everyone. Maybe we ought to check on him. You think he’s in his room?”

“One way to find out.” Max knocked on Rahn’s door. “Of course, he could be in town… or somewhere else.”

“But it’s not like him to not let anyone know,” Liz said.

“Yeah, I know… You’re right,” Max agreed, as he knocked again. There was no reply.

“Doesn’t look like he’s here. He must have gone down to town.”

Liz nodded, but deep inside, she had a bad feeling that she couldn’t quite put a finger on.

“Do you think we should go look for him, Max?”

Max appeared to think about it then he shook his head wearily. “No.”

“You concerned about all the people down there who want you to heal them?”

Max shook his head again. “No. I could disguise myself. I’m just not feeling well today. I don’t know what it is. I never got sick before… but the last couple of days… I’d swear I had the flu or something. Even my bones ache.”

“Maybe all the people you’ve healed have taken too much out of you, Max. You need to rest. Michael told you you’re going to burn yourself out. You’re trying to give too much of yourself. There’s just not enough of you to go around. You can’t heal everybody who needs you.”

“Yeah. That could be it, Liz.”

Max didn’t really believe this, but he had no other explanation for the weakness he felt, and healing did take a lot out of him. For some reason, he just didn’t seem to be recuperating the way he should anymore. And his body seemed to have gone haywire. One moment, he would look perfectly normal, then he would go to comb his hair and it would feel like he was trying to comb porcupine quills down. Then there were the hairs on his legs. One moment they would be bristly. “Buffalo legs,” was the description Max had used. But the next moment they would unexplainably seem normal again.

Liz, too, had experienced some strange and abnormal physiological events, though she had tried to downplay them, pretending that they were nothing or that they had been merely products of an overactive imagination. But Max didn’t think they were nothing… or her imagination. He had helped Liz rub an anti-fungal cream into the skin on her legs, feet, and back, because she thought she had caught some kind of rash. But after rubbing the cream into her skin, Max had been left with something in his hands that looked like fish scales. The problem was that, within an hour, Liz’s feet and legs… and her back… were normal again, and she had written the whole thing off, declaring that the cream had worked wonders. Max didn’t think it was the cream, but with the problem gone, he could scarcely argue the point.

Max stopped at his younger double’s door and knocked on it.

“Come in.”

The voice was that of his double, but it sounded weak… even desperate almost. It shocked Max. Max opened the door, and he and Liz went in. The younger Max was in bed.

“A little early for bed isn’t it, Mini Me?”

The younger Max hated this moniker, and Max knew it, but he didn’t show any reaction. That in itself spoke volumes.

“I needed some rest,” the younger Max said. “Healing so many people has taken a lot out of me. I haven’t had time to take care of myself.”

“You think that’s all it is,” Max asked his younger self.

The younger Max shrugged wearily. “What else could it be? I don’t get sick. You know that. You don’t either.”

“Yeah. I don’t know what else it could be, either,” Max from Antar admitted. “Have you had any odd… uh… things happen to you in the last day or two?”

“Odd… like how odd?”

Max looked flustered. “I don’t know… like… like… the hair on your legs going all bristly or the hair on your head getting hard and bristly… then being normal a few minutes later…”

The younger Max looked shocked.

“Never mind,” Max from Antar said quickly. “It was just a stupid question. I didn’t mean that anything was happening… like that… you know… I just wondered. I don’t know why.”

The younger Max pulled the cover off of himself and rolled over with some difficulty. His back was pocked with deep leathery pocks, and along the length of his spine there were small ridges, like the beginnings of the fins along the backs of some dinosaurs. But these kept moving around as Max looked at them. They came and went, appearing first at one point then at another point along the spine.

“I can’t control my own body,” the younger Max said weakly. “It’s draining all my strength. I don’t know how long I can… go on.”

Max from Antar looked at his younger double aghast. His mouth opened several times, but no words came out. Finally, he shook himself and managed a reply.

“We’ll get to the bottom of this. Just hang on. Don’t give up, whatever you do. I’m going to send Varec up here to look at you… to see if there’s anything… conventional that can be done. Then I’m going to find Rahn. Somehow I think this is something that he can explain.”

“Max!” the younger Max called out, as his Antarian double turned to leave the room.

Max turned back around. “Yes?”

“Have you seen Liz… I mean… my Liz? Is she… alright? It doesn’t matter about me. Just make sure that Liz is alright. Please?”

Max nodded.

“I saw her this morning,” Liz from Antar said to Max’s younger double. “She seemed fine, Max. I think she’s okay. We’ll check on her, though. You hang on. I already paged Varec… He’s on the way.”

Even as Liz spoke, Varec appeared. Max let him in and quickly tried to explain what was going on, but it was difficult, since Max had little clue himself what was going on. He could only describe the symptoms to Varec.

“Check him out Varec, please. Take him to the healing ward if you need to. I’m going to look for Rahn.”

Max rushed out of his double’s room with Liz by the hand. At Rahn’s door, they stopped again.

“Max,” Liz said, “I think we’d better check Rahn’s room.” She didn’t say why; she didn’t need to. Max passed his hand over the sensor, and the door opened. The doors to all the rooms were preset to recognize certain people. Max was one. Liz, Michael, Maria, and Jim Valenti, as well as Alex, Isabel, and Kyle would be recognized, too. In fact, everyone on the original trip from Antar who belonged on the ship had access to all the rooms, though they did not generally let themselves into someone else’s room without knocking or asking for permission first. This was a special case, however. Rahn either was not there or… well, Max hated to think of the possible alternatives. He looked quickly around the room and in the bathroom and closets. Liz looked, too. It was Liz who first spotted him… on the floor behind his bed. Liz rushed to Rahn and lifted his head gently…

“Rahn, can you hear me? Rahn! Answer me, Rahn. Please be okay!”

Max rushed to Liz’s side. “Is he… Is he…?”

“I don’t know,” Liz said, shaking her head. “He’s breathing, but I don’t think he’s conscious.”

At that moment, Rahn opened his mouth, then he opened his eyes and looked at Liz and at Max. It appeared as though he might close his eyes back at any moment… for the last time. It frightened Liz to think that they could lose Rahn. He had become such a good friend.

“Rahn, can we do anything for you?” Liz asked. “Can you tell us what’s wrong with you? Is there anything that we can do?”

Rahn breathed out a long ragged breath and closed his eyes, but then he opened them again and seemed to find a reserve of strength from somewhere within himself. It wasn’t much, and Liz knew that it wouldn’t last long.

“You are… in danger…” Rahn managed to say in a whispered voice. “I must… help you.”

“You need to help yourself first,” Liz said. “You don’t have enough strength to help anyone else.”

“There is… nothing… I can do… for myself.” Rahn struggled with the words. “Xiangar viper… bit me… I have… no powers… to shapeshift… I… will die… before today… is over. Only… J’Shalo… can help… and he will not.”

“J’Shalo?” Max and Liz repeated as one, looking at each other with a puzzled look. “Who is J’Shalo,” Max asked.

“Nasedo,” Rahn managed to say weakly. “You may know… as Nasedo.”

Both Max and Liz reacted as though they had been asked to hold a bare power line and someone had suddenly switched on the electricity. The younger Max and Liz would have had no idea who Nasedo was, because Nasedo had never shown up in Roswell in their dimension… until now. But Max and Liz of Antar knew very well who Nasedo was.

“Nasedo is on this ship… on my ship?!” Max asked, in a voice somewhere between incredulity and shock.

“He… J’Shalo… Nasedo… touched your minds… in your sleep. He… changed you. You must get help… or you… will die… all of you.”

“What can we do,” Liz asked, sitting beside Rahn on the floor and cradling Rahn’s head in her arms.

“If I… had not been… bitten by… viper… I could help… prepare… your minds… to accept the touch… but I have… no power now… no power to help with.”

Liz shook her head, desperate to help Rahn, who was fading fast even as they spoke.

“Rahn, what can be done for YOU? We need to help YOU!”

“No one… can help. J’Shalo will not. Only… another… shapeshifter.”

“Liz!” both Max and Liz said at the same time. “You changed Liz,” Liz from Antar said, referring to her younger double. “You changed her mind to let her alter her spine so that she could walk again. Could she help you?”

Rahn was silent for several moments. Liz wasn’t sure if he was thinking about it or if they were losing him.

“Rahn… Rahn! Don’t die on us! We need you! Stay with us, Rahn!”

Rahn coughed weakly. “I… I don’t… know. It may… be… possible. But she… is not… trained… not… experienced. She… could not… be expected… to know how… to help.”

Max was already paging the younger Liz on the ship’s communication web, and he put an EXTREMELY URGENT tag on the message, asking her to report immediately to Rahn’s quarters. Liz was either not far away or she flew there, because almost before Max had put down the paging device, Liz was running down the hall towards them. She looked around, her eyes asking the question.

“Over here,” Liz from Antar said, calling to her younger double. The younger Liz rushed to Rahn’s side.

“What happened? What’s wrong with him?”

“A shapeshifter named Nasedo turned himself into some kind of viper that is deadly to shapeshifters and bit Rahn. Rahn thinks another shapeshifter could help him… to get rid of the poison.”

“How,” Liz asked. “Just tell me how.”

“It is… not… something… I… can explain… how to do,” Rahn said. “You will… have to… feel the answer… in your mind… and… in your… heart. You need to put… one finger here…” Rahn indicated a point near his temple. “Another… here…” He indicated behind his right ear. “Then you… would need… to feel… my thoughts… my mind. Open… the door that… holds… the poison. Release… the poison. If you can… release it… from the… box… Nasedo has put… around it… we may… be able… to destroy the… poison… together.”

Liz put one finger on the spot Rahn had indicated near his temple and the other finger behind his ear as he had shown her.

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” Liz said frantically, tears starting to roll from her eyes. “I don’t know what to do to help… to make it work.”

“Just… concentrate,” Rahn said weakly. “Concentrate on… the box. Find it… with your mind… open it.”

Liz shook her head. “I’m trying… I can’t see anything, Rahn.” Tears ran freely down Liz’s cheeks, and she began to shake.

“It’s okay,” Rahn said, touching her arm gently. “You could… not be expected… to do… this. Do not… feel bad.”

Liz closed her eyes and gritted her teeth with a newfound determination, concentrating with all her mind and all her heart… then…

“I found it!”

It was right there, in Rahn’s mind, a sort of blockade composed of pure thought waves that held back some kind of neuronic poison… kept it right where it would do the most harm… and where Rahn could not reach it. With her own mind, Liz nudged at the thought waves holding back the poison. Then she nudged again. The “box” distorted briefly but went back to its original shape.

“He’s dying,” Liz from Antar said, as Rahn began to tremble in her arms.

In desperation, the younger Liz closed her eyes, and her mind released a blast that she had not known she was capable of directly into the thought wave blockade in Rahn’s mind. Apparently, the power of her feelings were sufficient… in fact, they were more than sufficient. The blockade, composed of remnant thought waves placed there by Nasedo, burst apart, blasted into nothingness by the power projected from Liz’s mind. She then concentrated on the poison itself. She had no idea how to destroy it or how to eliminate it from Rahn’s brain, but she was not about to let that stop her now… not now!

Liz concentrated and projected her own mind waves at the poison. The poison reacted almost as though it were alive and protecting itself… as though it were a solid entity living in Rahn’s brain. With the sheer power of her mind… and its newfound abilities… Liz reached into Rahn’s mind and grabbed the poisonous entity, strangling it and wrenching it from its chosen spot in Rahn’s brain. The moment it lost its hold, Rahn’s brain seemed to come back to life… as though a switch had been turned on and the lights had just come back on inside a dark room. Liz felt – and, in a way, she actually saw- Rahn grab the poisonous entity along with her, and together, they ripped it apart. Rendered inert and harmless, the poison began to vaporize then simply disappeared.

To Max and Liz of Antar, watching from the side as she held Rahn’s head in her arms, the light in Rahn’s eyes, which had been almost extinguished only moments before, seemed to come back on suddenly. Liz gasped and knew in her heart that her younger double had succeeded.

The younger Liz knew it, too. She opened her eyes and looked at Rahn then at her double and Max. Then she smiled and wiped the tears off her cheeks.

“I think I did it.”

Liz from Antar grabbed her double and hugged her then began to cry, letting out the feelings she had been holding back, as the two girls held each other for several long moments. Though clearly affected, too, Max said nothing. His face, and especially his ears, became redder for several minutes, and his eyes looked misty. He smiled at his wife and her younger double then at Rahn.

“I need to help you now… all of you,” Rahn said, trying to stand up.

Max started to suggest that Rahn should rest first, but then he remembered that his own double was in much worse shape than he was… and there was no way to know how the others who had been touched were faring. He helped Rahn to stand up. Rahn stood on his legs for several moments, as the strength came back into them. Then he turned to the younger Liz, who had just saved his life.

“Let me check you first.”

Liz nodded. Rahn put one finger near her temple and one behind her ear and nodded then smiled.

“It is just as I thought. I prepared your mind when I gave you the power to transform your spine. J’Shalo did not know this. He thought that every one of you had been affected by his touch, but you were not.”

Rahn reached toward the other Liz and placed his fingers on her head the same way. Then he concentrated for several moments.

“There. You should be okay now.”

He motioned to Max. Max stepped closer, and Rahn placed a finger behind his temple and another behind his ear and concentrated. Then he opened his eyes and smiled.

“Was that all there was to it,” Max asked.

“That’s all there was to it for you,” Rahn replied. “I prepared your mind just now. You see, what J’Shalo did was activate the part of your mind that sends orders to shapeshift. But he did not also activate the other parts of the mind that would allow you to control it. Without that ability, you would become more and more out of control. Eventually, you would be changing into different things constantly… totally out of control… or more likely, your body would simply destroy itself trying to do something that it cannot do… because you are not shapeshifters. The strain would kill you. At some point, your mind would rupture. Then you would simply collapse onto the ground… and be dead… turn into dust if you are Antarian. J’Shalo counted on this.”

“But… Nasedo was one of our protectors, Max said, clearly having trouble understanding how the Nasedo of this dimension could have done what he did. “How could he turn against us like this?”

“Nasedo has been away from Antar and from his charges for too long. He is basically not what you would call a nice person. He kills… and it doesn’t bother him. Once, he was forced by an oath stronger than death to protect you, but after so much time… that devotion has worn away. The final shreds of J’Shalo’s devotion disappeared when he found out that on Antar there is no longer a king.”

“And Kivar?” Max asked.

Rahn shook his head. “Kivar was killed five years ago. Antar is dominated by factions now… disjointed factions. None of them have the support of most of the people.”

Max nodded, absorbing what Rahn had said. “Let’s go, Rahn. Can you walk now?”

Rahn nodded. “I think so.”

“Good. We need you to help my double… and the others Nasedo touched… while there’s still time.”

Max held Rahn by the arm to make sure he didn’t fall while they left Rahn’s room, but Rahn’s strength was returning faster than Max would have thought possible. Rahn, Max, and both Lizzes ran to the younger Max’s room. He was lying on the floor now, and his body looked like a large sack that someone was struggling to escape from. Arms and legs would appear randomly all over his body, suddenly protruding from nowhere. Appendages that Max didn’t even recognize appeared on his body then disappeared just as quickly as they had come. For a moment, the young Max became covered with feathers, then just as quickly, he looked like a fish flopping on the ground out of the water. What was totally obvious was that his body would not be able to stand this stress for much longer. His mind would rupture, and it would be over.

Varec, standing at the younger Max’s side, had done everything for him that he knew how to do and then some, but this was clearly beyond Varec’s abilities, as vast as they were. He had already requested an aide to assist him in moving Max to the healing ward, a place rarely used on the New Granolith, since no one got sick there and Max could heal most injuries on site.

Rahn reached out and touched the side of the young Max’s head, placing one finger behind the right temple and another behind the right ear, somehow holding his fingers there as Max flopped around on the floor. After a few mere seconds, Max’s body relaxed… then became calm. The look on his face went from agony to utter relaxation.

“He will live,” Rahn said simply. “He will be fine. We need to find the others.”

Max of Antar looked at his double. The young Max was lying on the floor, sound asleep after his ordeal. The younger Liz and her Antarian double took the cover off the bed and covered him up with it.

“He’ll sleep it off,” Rahn said. “We need to go. Varec can stay with him.”

The others knew that he was right. What had happened to the young Max could very well be happening to the others as they spoke.

Max rushed to the room of his best friend from Antar, Michael Guerin, with Rahn and both Lizzes right behind him. He knocked on the door urgently, and Maria, Michael’s wife, opened the door.

“Maria! Are you guys okay?” Liz asked.

Maria nodded. “Well… maybe you’d better tell me what you mean by ‘okay,’ Liz. We’re still here and… yeah, I guess we’re okay. But something weird’s going on.”

“Like… how weird?” Liz asked. Maria turned and pointed toward Michael, who was just emerging from the bathroom. He had a full-blown feather sticking down out of his chin.

“You didn’t shave it off?” Maria asked. “I thought you were going to shave it off?”

Michael winced and shook his head. “I can’t. It feels like part of me. When I try to cut it, it’s like trying to cut my nose off or something. It hurts.”

Max looked at the feather approvingly. “Well, it does give you a nice… different… look, Michael. If it were on the top of your head instead of on your chin, you could leave it there and say you were a Mesaliko.”

“Oh, yeah, funny,” Michael said, clearly not as amused as Max.

“Is that all that’s happened to you so far,” Max asked.

“All? Isn’t that enough?” Michael asked in an exasperated tone of voice.

“Well, I’m just surprised, that’s all,” Max said.

“Why?”

Max sat down and quickly explained to Michael and Maria about what Nasedo had done and the expected consequences to those he had touched.

“Let me touch you,” Rahn said. “I’ll fix it.”

Michael nodded silently and leaned forward to let Rahn prepare his mind with the mind touch. Rahn placed his fingers on Michael’s head, and immediately the feather began to retract into the skin of his chin, totally disappearing after about ten to twelve seconds. Michael rubbed his hand over his chin approvingly…

“When I need a shave, Rahn, I’ll call you. You do good work!”

“Thanks,” Rahn said sincerely. “But I do not do shaves.”

“He was joking, Rahn,” Maria said.

Rahn smiled. “I thought so. But I wasn’t sure.”

Rahn reached out and touched Maria’s head for several seconds, and Maria relaxed as the mind adjustment took effect.

“You will be okay, now,” Rahn said. “I have made the adjustment.”

Maria looked at her fingers and smiled. “I guess you’re right.”

“What was wrong with your fingers,” Michael asked.

“Nothing important,” Maria replied with a dismissive wave of her hand. “I just had webs between my fingers… like an otter or something. They’re gone now.”

“You didn’t tell me that,” Michael exclaimed, alarmed that he had not known.

Maria shrugged. “It was nothing. I kept my fingers together so you wouldn’t see it. I didn’t want you worrying about me when you had that… uh… feather to worry about in your chin.”

Michael looked at Maria aghast. “Maybe I want to worry about you, Maria. You’re my whole life! My God, if anything happened to you…”

Maria puckered her lips playfully. “Well, it didn’t. I’m just fine.”

“If something like this ever happens again, Maria, I want to know! I want to worry! I want to make sure you’re okay. Okay?”

Maria kissed Michael on the lips and smiled. “You take good care of me all the time, Michael. Let me take care of you when you need it.”

Michael sighed and shook his head, then he relaxed and put both arms around Maria, pulling her to him and kissing her.

Max turned his head and put one hand over his eyes. Noticing Max’s feigned modesty, Liz threw both of her arms around his neck and kissed him, too.

“I think I understand this human ritual…” Rahn said with a puzzled look. “But I do not always understand what precipitates it.”

After several moments, both couples separated, and Rahn quickly suggested that they find the others right away. “They may not have suffered as few consequences as you and Maria did,” he reminded them. Max and Michael both nodded their agreement and headed for the door.

Moments later, a few doors down the hall, Max knocked on the younger Michael’s door, and Maria came to the door.

“Oh, Max!” Maria’s voice sounded full of desperation. “Am I glad to see you! Michael called me. He wasn’t feeling well, and now he’s having seizures or something!”

Max looked at the younger Michael lying on the bed. He did appear to be seizuring.

“It is an effect of the touch,” Rahn said, hurrying to place his hand to Michael’s head at the proper points. “His mind is shifting continuously, but his body is not able to interpret the commands from his mind. The result is seizures.”

“Can you help him,” Maria asked. But as she spoke, Rahn’s touch began to take effect, and Michael became calm, then he opened his eyes and looked around him.

“Are we having a party? What’s everybody doing here?”

“You were having your own party, Michael,” Max said. “Not one you’d want to go back to, though, I’m afraid.”

Rahn turned from Michael and placed his hand to Maria’s head at the necessary points for several seconds then smiled.

“You’ll be okay now, too.”

“Maria, didn’t you have any unusual reactions?” Liz asked.

“Yeah… I guess I did,” Maria replied. “But I was so worried about Michael, I didn’t have time to die.”

Everyone laughed, and Liz of Antar smiled then hugged the young double of her best friend and nodded.

“Well said, Maria! Well said!”

“We must check on the others,” Rahn reminded them, hurrying everyone toward the door again.

“We need to see if Isabel is alright!” the younger Maria exclaimed. She looked at Michael as though to ask if he would be okay now, but instead of saying, Go ahead, Michael got up and walked toward the door with them.

“Can you make it,” Maria asked, putting a supporting arm around Michael. Michael just gave her that patented crooked grin that said, What do you think?

Together, the group ran to the younger Isabel’s room, and Maria knocked… “Isabel! Are you in there? Isabel?”

There was no answer. Maria looked at Max, and Max nodded. Maria passed her hand over the sensor, and the door opened.

“Omigod!” her double from Antar exclaimed, “We must have the same handprint!”

Though the sensors were set to respond to all the Antarian crew members, including the Maria from Antar, they had never been reset to recognize the younger doubles. Only their own rooms and common areas had been set to respond to them. It wasn’t a matter of trust; no one had seen any reason to reset everyone else’s doors to respond to the doubles from this dimension. Apparently, it hadn’t been necessary, it would now seem.

“Isabel!” the younger Maria called out again to her friend… “Isabel, where are you? Are you here?”

Maria looked around the room, in the bathroom, then in the closets. There was no one.

“I don’t think she’s here,” she said, turning to Michael and Max.

“Looks like that,” Max agreed. “We need to look for her. Let’s go see about Alex. Maybe she went to his room.”

“Yeah! That’s probably where she is!” Maria said, nodding vigorously. “Let’s go.”

The group ran down the hall and around the corner to the younger Alex’s room. Again, Maria knocked. The door opened, and Alex appeared. Well… it kind of looked like Alex. Maria had to take a second look to be sure. He was covered in long, shaggy hair from head to toe.

“Omigod, Alex, you look like… like bigfoot… without the big feet,” Maria gasped. Then she looked at Alex’s feet… just to be sure.

“Oh, gee, thanks, Maria. I’m not bigfoot… I think he’s inside of me trying to get out. I feel awful.”

“That must be hot,” Michael said, running his fingers through the foot-long hair on Alex’s arms and face in awe.

“That’s an understatement,” Alex said. “Try hot, itchy, sweaty… and downright friggin’ smelly. God, I hope Isabel doesn’t see me like this!”

“You mean she’s not here?” Maria asked, alarmed.

“I haven’t seen her,” Alex said. “To tell the truth, I haven’t wanted anyone to see me… but right now, I’m starting to wish she were here… even if I am… what I am. I’m not sure how long I have left. I don’t know what’s happening to me, and if I’m gonna die… I don’t want to die without seeing Isabel again. Is there some kind of alien virus or something you guys never told us about, Max?”

“It’s… something else, Alex.” Max motioned to Rahn, and Rahn reached out to touch the side of Alex’s head. Alex pulled back instinctively, but then he allowed Rahn to touch him. He seemed to relax almost immediately. Moments later, the long hair began to disappear. It was an odd sight. The hair rapidly got shorter and shorter, looking for all the world like it was being pulled back into Alex’s arms, face, chest, legs, feet… every part of his body. After about two minutes, the hair was gone… except what he had had before the ordeal. Alex was normal again.

“What did you do?” Alex asked Rahn, amazed by what had just happened. “I feel a hundred percent better. A thousand percent!”

“It’s a bit of a long story, Alex,” Max said. “We’ll explain on the way. We have to find your Isabel… and we still have to find our Alex and Isabel and help them, too.”

Alex looked suddenly pale. “Isabel’s in danger? She’s affected with this… whatever it is, too?”

“We all had it,” Michael said. “We just had different reactions. The end result would have been the same for all of us, though. We all would have died… if it hadn’t been for Rahn… and Liz. Liz saved Rahn’s life, and he’s returning the favor for the rest of us.”

They walked rapidly down the hall towards the older Alex and Isabel’s room, as Rahn and Michael took turns trying to explain to the younger Alex what had happened. On the way there, they met the young Max, who was determined to join the others after awakening from his brief nap feeling greatly refreshed and better than he had felt for some time. When they arrived at Alex and Isabel’s room, Max of Antar knocked on the door.

“Alex! Izzy! Are you guys in there?” Max waited for an answer but heard nothing. Without bothering to call again, Max opened the door and went in, followed by the others.

“I don’t see them,” Maria said, looking around.

Liz went to check the bathroom, while Alex checked the closets and Max looked behind the bed.

“Where could they have gone,” Maria asked. Then something dripped onto her arm, like rain. Maria looked up. There was something floating near the ceiling… something formless and ethereal. It began to drip more then dropped slowly to the floor at Maria’s feet, like a cloud dropping to the ground.

“Ewwww!” Maria exclaimed, shaking the strange raindrops off of her arm. “What is this?”

Rahn looked at the formless cloud floating near the floor. “I think… that used to be Isabel… or Alex… Maybe both.”

“Oh my God…” Maria whispered, turning pale. “Can you help her… them… Rahn? Do something!”

Rahn placed his hand over the pulsing, spreading cloud, but then he pulled his hand back.

“I cannot… I cannot find the head. It is all one big… formless mass. We will have to wait and see if it changes again.”

“Could that happen?” Maria asked.

“It is possible,” Rahn said. “But it is not certain.”

For ten minutes, they watched the large plasma-like cloud spread and then contract, occasionally moving in one direction or another with slow, undulating movements. Then something changed.

From the corner of the mass, an ear appeared. It was enough. Rahn reached down and placed his two fingers in the proper positions, and the cloud of plasma began immediately to reshape itself. After thirty seconds, it looked vaguely human. After another thirty seconds, it was clear that Alex was back. He immediately grabbed the sheet off the bed and wrapped himself in it tightly, his clothes having somehow disappeared.

But there was still a large cloud of plasma floating near the floor.

Falling onto the floor beside the remaining mass, Alex pleaded with it…

“Change, Isabel… Please… Change back.” He looked at Rahn imploringly. Help her, Rahn. Do whatever you did to me. Bring her back! Please!”

“I am trying,” Rahn said. “But I must know where to touch. It is impossible.”

Alex reached under the cloudlike mass and picked it up in his hands. It stayed together, though it looked like it might not.

“Iz, come back… please!”

When Alex said this, a part of Isabel’s head reappeared momentarily, and Rahn seized his opportunity. As Rahn touched the points he had just seen, the mass began to reshape, slowly taking on the form of a human… then after a while, of Isabel.

Moments later, fully reformed, Isabel fell into Alex’s arms, and he wrapped his sheet around her, too, and held her there.

“What happened to us,” Isabel asked, still shaking though feeling like herself again for the first time in a long while.

“Yes, I want to know that, too,” Alex said.

“It’s kind of hard to explain,” Max said. “The short answer is, we have an intruder on board… Nasedo. He did something to all of us in our sleep that caused our minds to go out of control, shifting, or trying to shift, continuously. If it had continued, it would have been fatal for all of us. Rahn was able to stop it, but we still have to find the other Isabel. From what Nasedo told Rahn, we think she’s the last one of his victims. But we can’t find her.”

“She’s not in her room?” Alex asked.

“No.” Maria shook her head.

“Maybe she’s in your room, Maria,” Isabel said.

“My room?”

Isabel nodded. “You saved her life… in the caves. The two of you were very close for awhile. And she is my double, after all. If I were your Isabel… from your dimension… that’s where I would have gone if I were having these problems… to check on you and Alex, to make sure the two of you were okay.”

Alex nodded thoughtfully. “I did hear someone knock on my door before you did, Max. But I was… well… I didn’t want to be seen. If it was Isabel, she may have gone to check on Maria when I didn’t answer.”

“Let’s go,” Maria said, rushing out the door. Everyone else followed. At Maria’s room, Maria ran her hand quickly over the sensor, and the door opened. Everyone went in.

“Isabel!” Maria shouted, spotting her friend lying on the bed, as she rushed in.

Isabel lifted her head up and managed a weak smile.

“Maria! I was… was… so worried about you. Something is happening to me. I was afraid… for you… that you might be sick, too. Where’s Alex?”

“I’m here,” Alex said, rushing to Isabel’s side, as Maria sat down on the other side of her.

“Maria and I are fine now, Iz. We were affected, but Rahn fixed it. He’s going to help you, too.”

Isabel looked at her legs. They were fused together, making it impossible for her to walk. It could have been a shift gone wrong that was supposed to turn her into a snake or some other legless creature. In any case, she still looked human… except for the fused legs.

Rahn touched Isabel near the temple and behind the ear, and she relaxed visibly and instantly, then her legs began to separate into two individual legs again. The whole process happened very quickly, taking no more than twenty to thirty seconds.

Rahn could change from a human into a small bird, a bat, a huge grizzly bear, or even a large snake in under five seconds if there was the need… but he was amazed that these humans and Antarian hybrids were shifting at all. He would have expected them to all react more as Michael had… suffering seizures, not changing form. Nasedo had activated a part of the brain that created and emitted shapeshifting signals to the body, but human and Antarian bodies were not capable of shapeshifting… except in very limited ways… ways that did not actually change the size or external shape of their bodies. Every shapeshifter knew that.

And Nasedo had not activated the parts of the brain that would keep the signals in check. The result should have been seizures… and eventual death. The brain would fire uncontrollably, but the body would not be able to respond properly. Without the control centers functioning, even a shapeshifter would be in trouble. The odd thing was… these humans and Antarians did shift. It was not controlled or desirable, but they actually did shift… except for the young Michael. And if the others did it… Michael might learn to.

Then again, it was entirely possibly, Rahn knew, that with the control centers of the brain now open and activated and the signals in check, their bodies might never shift again. The shifting might have been entirely the result of their lack of ability to control the cascading signals… like a broken high power cord snaking all over the place… When it is repaired, it remains still, because the signal… the power… is properly channeled. Human and Antarian bodies were not supposed to shift… ergo, it must have been a unique occurrence brought on by unusual and unforeseen circumstances, and it would most likely not reoccur, Rahn decided.

Then again… he wondered…

Isabel hugged Alex then hugged Maria to herself, as the others told her of their own experiences.

“I had to know that the two of you were alright,” Isabel said to Alex and Maria, sitting beside her on the bed. I can’t imagine you as bigfoot, Alex! I wish you had let me in.”

“I wish I had, too,” Alex said. “I’m sorry, Izzy. I didn’t know what was happening. I just felt so… self-conscious about looking like… well… bigfoot… without the big feet.”

Isabel rolled over and kissed Alex. “I love you, Charles Alexander Whitman… hairy or whatever. Don’t ever forget it.”

Alex nodded. “I know. I love you, too, Iz… and I would even if you had turned into a mermaid or something.”

“Now that sounds like a match,” Max said playfully… “Bigfoot and the mermaid!”

The others laughed.

“It might be preferable to being a plasma cloud, the older Alex from Antar said, thinking of himself and Isabel. “How the heck did that happen? We were just holding each other to comfort each other, because we weren’t feeling well, and the next thing I knew, we kind of… dissolved or something and floated away.”

Rahn nodded. “It’s not really as strange as it looked… or sounds, Alex. The two of you didn’t actually shapeshift… you more or less failed to shapeshift.”

“You want to explain that, Rahn?”

“Well, you see, you reverted to a sort of primordial mass… something that had no form at all. You kind of… de-formed… you lost your forms… you turned into the basic components of life… you were a formless mass waiting to be formed. Do you understand?”

Isabel nodded silently.

“Well, I’m glad we seem to have headed off the problem and everyone is okay,” Max said. “And I’m glad you’re back with us, too, Mini Me,” he added to his younger double. The younger Max pointed a finger at Max from Antar and gave him a quick shock of power to the arm from six feet away. Max yelped and fanned his arm then rubbed it. “Yeah, you’re definitely back alright!”

The younger Max blew on the tip of his finger and smiled… “Just so you remember.”

“No more ‘Mini Me,’ huh?”

“You got it.”

Max of Antar nodded. “Well, I guess you have outgrown that. I’ll have to think of something else to call you.”

“Well, guys, we have one more thing we have to do,” Michael said.

Liz nodded, understanding exactly what Michael was going to say. The others all knew, too.

“We’ve got a shapeshifter to track down on our ship,” Max said for him. “Any suggestions?”

Isabel nodded. “How good is Jung-Jo at tracking shapeshifters?”

Max smiled. “Pretty good, I’d be willing to bet. Let’s find out.”



tbc

The Night The Dreams Died



One Pawgor, One Shapeshifter

Chapter 42

XLII



Jung-Jo appeared to be smiling. It was that satisfied look that only a cat truly has. But Jung-Jo had reasons to smile. Since arriving onboard the New Granolith, he had been a certifiable celebrity. Everyone wanted to pet him. Everyone wanted to walk him. Everyone wanted to hug him… especially the girls. Jung-Jo rolled over, and Maria, Liz, and Isabel rubbed his tummy while he purred with approval, with all four legs relaxed, paws hanging over limply, and a big cat grin on his face. Amy and Tess watched from the side and waited for their turns to pet Jung-Jo, too.

“If only I had been a pawgor when I was in high school,” Alex quipped, shaking his head with a grin. “Who’d have guessed! And he doesn’t even play football.”

“Well, he’s got purr-fect charm,” Max said with a wry smile. Alex shook his head and groaned. Max and Michael both laughed.

At that moment, Jim Valenti walked up, accompanied by his double from Antar. The Jim from Antar was holding a pillowcase in his hand…

“This should have Nasedo’s scent on it… assuming he has a scent. It came off of Max’s pillow. I’m hoping Nasedo touched it when he touched you, Max. Even if he just leaned over it, there may be enough of a scent for Jung-Jo to find his trail. We’ve already looked everywhere we know to look for him, but him being a shapeshifter, we don’t know for sure what he’ll look like when we find him. He could be disguised, and we could look right at him and not know it was him. He won’t fool Jung-Jo, though.” Jim patted the smiling pawgor on the side.

“Here you go, boy. Get a good whiff of this.”

The pawgor sniffed the pillowcase, seeming to understand Jim’s meaning even without Danyy being there to “translate,” then it turned around a couple of times, sniffing the air, and trotted straight over to Max. Max put his hand on Jung-Jo’s head and patted him…

“Good boy, Jung-Jo! You’re right! That’s my scent on the pillowcase. Do you smell any other scent on my pillow?”

Jung-Jo sniffed the air and walked over to Liz. Max grinned sheepishly.

“Okay… besides Liz, Jung-Jo? Anybody else?”

Jung-Jo looked around and walked over to Jim from Antar.

“I carried the pillowcase out here,” Jim said. “Is there any other smell on it, Jung-Jo?”

Jung-Jo sniffed the pillowcase again then sniffed the air in all directions. Then he sniffed the floor and headed off down the hall.

“I think he’s onto something,” Jim said, hurrying to keep up with Jung-Jo, as the others all tried to keep up. The further Jung-Jo went down the hall the faster he ran. Fortunately, every now and then, he stopped to sniff the air or the floor. Then he would be off again. He led the group straight to the glass ascension chamber.

Max passed his hand over the sensor, and the chamber opened and everyone got in with the pawgor and Jim.

“How will we know what floor he went to,” Maria asked.

“I don’t know,” Jim replied honestly. “We’ll have to stop at each floor and let Jung-Jo sniff the air I guess.”

Michael nodded. “Sounds reasonable.”

The ascension chamber went down to the cargo bay, and the door opened. Jung-Jo sniffed the air for several moments. He looked unsure at first but seemed to decide that this wasn’t where Nasedo was anymore.

“I don’t think Nasedo’s scent is fresh down here,” Jim said. “He probably smells an old scent that he knows is not as new as the one where we started out.”

“Smart kitty,” Isabel said.

Jim nodded. “Yes, he is.” Jim closed the door back and pressed level two on the control pad. The ascension chamber started up. After a moment, it stopped again and the door opened.

“Dining Room and Galley,” Jim said. “Anything up here, Jung-Jo?”

Jung-Jo licked his lips. Jim nodded. “Yeah, it does smell good. We’ll have time to eat soon, though.” Jim closed the door again.

“We can skip the living quarters on level three. That’s where we started out.”

The ascension chamber stopped on level four. “Bridge and control deck,” Jim announced as the door opened. Jung-Jo sniffed the air but did not seem to smell anything unusual. Jim closed the door and pressed the “up” button. Moments later, the chamber stopped again.

“Level five,” Jim announced. “The gardens.”

Jung-Jo sniffed, but again, he didn’t seem to pick up the expected scent. Jim closed the door and pressed “up” again.

“Well, we’ve just got the arboretum and the observatory left. If we’re going to find him, he has to be on one of these two floors. The chamber stopped again.

“Level six,” Jim announced. “The arboretum.” The door opened, and Jung-Jo sniffed the air then leapt out of the chamber, headed at a trot down the path.

“Bingo,” Jim said, hurrying off after the big cat.

The group stepped out of the glass ascension chamber onto a neat pathway that led through a small forest of trees. It was a pleasant place to go for a walk, and the crew of the New Granolith came here often, usually as couples, to walk along the paths. Everyone who had been to the arboretum had commented on how much energy they seemed to have and how well they felt after walking through the tree park. Undoubtedly, it had something to do with the fact that the air here was saturated with a superabundance of oxygen. In fact, it was the arboretum that supplied oxygen to the ship during its long voyages in space.

The path through the arboretum began and ended at the same place, so there was no need to turn around and return the way one had come. It had been designed to meander back and forth through the trees, giving the stroller the maximum possible walking distance, about a mile and a half. At a point that lay in the actual center of the arboretum, there was a gazebo with a porch-type swing; but further along on the trail, there was a small clearing where one could lie down by a clear little brook that provided water to the trees, have a picnic, or swing on a two-person swing suspended by vines from high up in one of the trees. Max and Liz knew this area well. It was one of their favorites.

But now, Jung-Jo was headed off down the path through the trees at a gallop, and everyone was running to try to keep up, which turned out to be an impossible endeavor. Jim of Antar and his local counterpart weren’t far behind Jung-Jo, but most of the rest of the group had fallen back pretty far. Everyone else followed, knowing that eventually Jung-Jo had to stop, and they would catch up again.

They reached the gazebo, but Jung-Jo had apparently blown right by here. Liz and Maria were tempted to take a rest and hang out on the porch-type swing at the gazebo for a few minutes but decided to keep going instead, mostly because Max and Michael would have insisted on staying with them so that they wouldn’t be alone here with Nasedo hanging out somewhere in the area. They already knew that they were slowing Max and Michael down, and Liz and Maria were no slowpokes themselves. Isabel seemed to have longer legs than the other girls, because she and Alex had pretty much left the rest of the group behind, but they hadn’t caught up to Jim or his double yet, much less to Jung-Jo. Amy was nowhere to be seen. Liz was concerned, but Max was pretty sure that he had seen Amy far ahead of them at some point.

As Jim and his double rounded a corner in the path, they found Jung-Jo waiting for them. But the big cat had no intention of hanging around. The moment Jim was in sight, Jung-Jo leapt off the path and made his own bee-line through the trees, heading deep into the small forest. Jim and his double followed, with Amy right behind her husband. Isabel and Alex came around the bend just in time to see the two Jims and Amy head off the path and through the trees. Alex noted the way they went and stopped momentarily.

“We better wait till the others catch up, so they’ll know where everyone went.”

Isabel nodded. They didn’t have to wait long. Max, Liz, Michael, Maria, and their doubles, along with Tess and Rayylar, rounded the corner only seconds behind them.

“They went this way,” Isabel yelled, then Alex rushed into the trees with Isabel by the hand. The others followed.

The arboretum was small for a forest. It was really more of a large arboreal park. But one could get lost there. The one and a half miles of meandering pathway through the arboretum ran through twelve acres of dense trees that one could get lost in, though eventually, walking in any direction would get one back to the path at some point or another. There was also a small brook that meandered through the arboretum, providing a source of water to the trees as well as a pleasant place for couples to stop along the path to relax and enjoy the serenity of nature… and each other. This brook ran into the trees, crossing the path in one or two places and running alongside the path briefly in another place.

Michael, Max, and the others had now caught up to Alex and Isabel, and Michael was pointing out the way Jung-Jo had gone by the trail of broken twigs and small limbs… and other indicators along the way.

“Have you been taking tracking lessons from Gray Hawk,” Liz asked Michael of Antar.

Michael smiled. “No. It’s a necessary skill in my line of work.”

Liz knew what Michael meant. He was the General of all the Armies of Antar. It was somewhat of an overblown title, of course. There was only one army on Antar. But as someone had once pointed out, if there had been more armies, Michael would have been in charge of them. And he was, after all, charged with the safety and protection of an entire planet. It was not surprising that Michael had decided to hone his tracking skills along the way.

“They went through here,” Michael said, lifting a vine for the others to go under. Then he took the lead again and continued following the trail left by the big cat and by the two Jims and Amy. After about ten minutes, Michael came to the brook. He looked both ways for any clue as to which way the pawgor might have gone, then he crossed the brook and looked around. He spotted what he was looking for, a bent twig.

“This way,” he shouted. Everyone followed. Five minutes later, they passed under an overhang and emerged into a small clearing. Jung-Jo was walking around in the clearing, with Jim, his double, and Amy following close behind.

“What do you smell?” Jim asked Jung-Jo. “Is Nasedo near?”

The pawgor stopped at one tree and sniffed it then went on to another tree. He sniffed this tree, too.

“He was here,” Jim said with certainty. “Jung-Jo smells his scent on these trees.”

The pawgor sniffed several more trees in the small clearing then sniffed a small, thorny bush. After sniffing the bush, Jung-Jo turned around and lifted his leg, soaking the bush.

“Is that what you were looking for, Jung-Jo,” Jim asked. “A place to relieve yourself?”

The cat looked satisfied.

“Okay, we all have to go sometimes. Now let’s find Nasedo.”

Jung-Jo turned around and sniffed the already thoroughly soaked bush again. It seemed to be shaking… like the leaves of an aspen. But Jim did not feel any breeze. Jim walked over to the bush and took a close look. As he did, the bush began to change. It all happened in less than three seconds. The bush became a very wet squirrel, and up the nearest tree it went, with Jung-Jo right behind.

“Man that cat can climb a tree!” Jim said admiringly.

At the top of the tree, the squirrel changed again, this time into a red hawk, spreading its wings wide and leaping into the air, heading for freedom somewhere else in the arboretum. But if Nasedo was fast, he wasn’t fast enough. Jung-Jo leapt from his perch in the tree and snatched the hawk by one wing in mid-air, landing neatly in the tree next to the one he had leapt out of. Then he scampered down that tree with the big hawk held firmly behind his two-foot-long front saber-teeth.

“Well, well, well…” Jim said, patting the proud-looking pawgor on the head. “What do we have here? A bush that changes into a squirrel that changes into a red-tail hawk? …And in our arboretum! I don’t remember us having anything like that up here.

The hawk made a momentary effort to turn back into human form, but the pawgor’s mouth was too confining.

“I wouldn’t try to do that,” Jim said. “Jung-Jo really hates things moving around in his mouth… and he’s hungry, too.”

“What are you going to do with me,” the hawk asked.

“It talks!” Jim said, feigning amazement. It did look odd, actually. Nasedo had used his human voice while remaining in the form of a hawk. But that was not really difficult for one who could change his vocal chords or any other part of himself at will.

“That’s a good question,” Jim said. “What are we going to do with him, Max?”

“I hadn’t thought about it,” Max admitted. “…I mean in the long run… we can’t leave him here on earth. After we’re gone he would find a way to be a problem again.”

“Staying on earth is not what I had in mind,” the hawk replied. “I wish to return to Antar.”

“Where you can take over the planet and become the next Kivar,” Max said. “I heard. Sorry, but that’s out of the question, too.”

Max looked at Jung-Jo. He seemed quite happy holding the terrified hawk prisoner behind his huge teeth.

“Let Jung-Jo carry him back to the third level for us. We can find a way to restrain him there… a nice little cage or something that he can’t get out of.”

“I don’t think a cage would hold him,” Michael said. “He could just become something small enough to slip through the bars.”

Max nodded. “You’re probably right. Let’s see if Rahn can help us come up with something.”

“Good idea,” Michael agreed. “A shapeshifter should know how to control a shapeshifter.”

The group looked around then headed back through the forest of trees toward the path. Once back at the path, they followed the path the rest of the way around and back to the beginning and the ascension chamber, which they took back down to the third floor. Everyone got out on the third floor, including Jung-Jo, with the hawk still trapped helplessly behind his big teeth.

Max knocked on Rahn’s door, and Rahn opened the door.

“We’ve got a present for you,” Michael said. Rahn looked at Jung-Jo and at the hawk in his mouth. He didn’t need to ask what it was. He knew.

“What are you going to do with him?”

“That’s what we wanted to ask you, Rahn,” Max said. “You’re a shapeshifter. How do you control a shapeshifter? And the other question we had… what do we do with him? We can’t lock him up forever. And we haven’t done any executions on Antar since I’ve been king. I could make an exception, though.” Max said this to let Nasedo know that he was serious.

“If he were returned to Antar, he could be turned over to the council of shapeshifters,” Rahn said. “They would make sure that he was no longer a problem. He has broken many shapeshifter laws.”

Max nodded. “I had heard that the shapeshifters have their own laws, but they live peacefully under our laws at the same time.”

“That may be in your dimension,” Rahn said. “But in this dimension, if there is no longer a king on Antar, the shapeshifters will be the only law in their community. But shapeshifter law is fair and just.”

“How do we restrain him,” Max asked. “If we need to take him back to Antar in our dimension, he will need to be restrained.”

“You could take him to Antar in this dimension,” Rahn said. “The shapeshifters here can take care of him. As for restraining him, that is more difficult. A small amount of poison from the Xiangar viper would take away his power to shift. It would be difficult… to determine how much poison to give him to remove his powers temporarily but not kill him. But it can be done. It would be a very small amount… much less than he injected into me when he bit me.”

“Can you determine the right amount, Rahn, or should I ask Varec to help you?”

Rahn thought for a few moments. “It would be best if Varec could make the calculations. That is his field… as a scientist. I will create the poison the same way J’Shalo did, by becoming a Xiangar viper. Varec can give it to him in the correct dose… enough to strip his powers… not enough to kill him.”

Max nodded and looked at Michael. Michael shrugged. “It’s the best thing, Max. What else can we do? It’s more humane than letting Jung-Jo eat him.”

Max looked at the terrified hawk in Jung-Jo’s mouth and nodded. “But then again, Michael, Jung-Jo is very hungry after that trek. It would be kinder to Jung-Jo to let him have the hawk.”

Michael nodded, giving Max a quick understanding wink. “Let me think about it. If Nasedo moves in there or tries to escape, I’ll let Jung-Jo eat him.”

“Good,” Max replied. Both Max and Michael knew that Nasedo was listening, and they were quite sure that he would be a little more cooperative if he thought he might be eaten. In the end, though, until they removed him from the pawgor’s mouth, Nasedo would be going nowhere. Jung-Jo himself would see to that.



tbc

The Night The Dreams Died



Midnight Pow-Wow
Part 1 – Rahn’s Quest


Chapter 43

XLIII



Gray Hawk looked at the red-tail hawk inside the cage in Michael’s room on the New Granolith and nodded approvingly…

“So… you put a drop of the poison of the viper on his food each time he eats… to keep him from changing into something else again… What would happen if he decided not to eat your food?”

Michael smiled. “He has a choice. He can eat… and be a bird for now… or starve. Nobody’s going to give him anything else to eat. Nasedo’s made his choice.”

Michael handed the large hawk a small piece of raw yegg meat, and the hawk grudgingly ate it.

Gray Hawk nodded. “Apparently he has. What will you do with him? Will you take him to your planet?”

Michael breathed in deeply. “That’s the big, big question, Gray Hawk. We’ve been talking about it, but no decision has been made yet.”

“You need to have pow-wow,” Gray Hawk said authoritatively. “Get everyone together… make decisions. You have many questions to resolve… and little time.”

Michael nodded. “I know. Things are getting very difficult down there for Max… well, for both of them. People camp out under the ship hoping to be healed. And the hospital sends a special car every day to take Max and his double to the hospital to heal more people. The word is spreading all over the country… even around the world! Max is helping all he can already. I think he’d heal everyone in the world if he could… but he can’t do it, Gray Hawk. He’ll kill himself. I’ve got to make him see that.”

Gray Hawk nodded understandingly. “Maybe he knows it. Maybe he just has not figured out what to do about it. You need pow-wow. Soon!”

“Yeah, I know.” Michael nodded his head with resignation. “I’ll get Max and the others together…”

“Soon!”

“Yeah… soon… today. Tomorrow at the latest.”

Gray Hawk smiled. “You can use my pow-wow room.”

Michael grinned in spite of the concerns weighing on his mind, but shook his head. “I think not, Gray Hawk… but thanks. I wouldn’t be able to get anyone to concentrate on making decisions in there with that big-screen TV and stereo system. We’ll meet here on the ship… maybe in the observatory. You should be there, too, Gray Hawk. We could use your wisdom.”

Gray Hawk raised his head, and a smile crossed his lips.

“I’ll expect you,” Michael said. “I’ll let you know the exact time as soon as I know it. I need to talk to Max and a couple of the others.”



----------



Jeff Parker flipped a burger over on the grill in the kitchen of the CrashDown and ran the back of his hand over his sweating brow. He barely noticed the figure at the window at first, but then a movement caught his eye, and he turned to look. It was a roadrunner… in the open window. The bird hopped off the windowsill and into the CrashDown, then Jeff watched as it turned into a man.

“Having trouble getting out of the ship without being seen these days, Rahn?” Jeff asked with a smile.

“It is a bit of a problem,” Rahn replied honestly. “Anyone who comes down from the ship is surrounded by people wanting to know where Max is… and when they can get healed. It’s much easier to fly out.”

“Lucky you,” Jeff said. “Too bad Max and the others can’t fly out.” Jeff smiled and shook his head. “I’m glad to see you, Rahn. I take it, you bring a message from Max?”

“Yes.”

“You know, Rahn… you were right not to reveal your, uh, special abilities to the public. Max is having a real problem right now just because he can heal people. I don’t even know what kind of problems might occur if they knew about your special ability… to shape-shift. It’s fortunate that that TV lady, Diane, is on our side and is willing to keep your secret.”

“She is very kind,” Rahn agreed. “It would be a big story for her if she revealed it. But she will not. I trust her. Max trusts her. Michael trusts her.”

“I trust her, too, Rahn,” Jeff said. “They can’t all be wrong. Besides, she’s proved herself already. What’s your message, Rahn?”

“Oh! Max and Michael would like for you and Mrs. Parker to be present at a meeting on the ship tonight at midnight. I know it is short notice, but Michael says that it is very important.”

“Then I guess I’d better be there,” Jeff said, managing a smile. “Nancy and I will be there. How do we… uh… get in?”

“Max said that he will move the ship over the CrashDown and transport you up at 10:40 tonight. You and Mrs. Parker will need to have your transport pins on you at exactly 10:40. The transporter will lock onto the crystals in the pins.”

“We’ve done it before,” Jeff nodded. Any place we should be standing?”

“Anywhere inside the CrashDown or your apartment will be okay. Just have the pins on you or in hand when 10:40 comes.”

“I’m dying to know what this is about, Rahn, but I’m guessing you have other messages to deliver?”

Rahn nodded. “It is a meeting to make important decisions about… everything. You will find out more there. I don’t know more than that myself.”

Without further elaboration, Rahn shrank back into a roadrunner again then hopped onto the windowsill; and a moment later, with only a quick look back, he flew away.

“I wish I knew how he did that,” Jeff mused to himself. “Where does all that extra body mass go… and how does he get it back to turn back into a man again? I wonder if he knows the answer himself or if he just does it.” Jeff sighed. “Too many questions, I guess.”



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Not very far away, in an upscale subdivision of Roswell, Phillip and Diane Evans sat reading the newspaper in their living room when a very persistent bird appeared in the window. At first, Phillip paid it little attention, though Diane did entertain a fleeting hope that it hadn’t hurt itself crashing into the window. She quickly decided that it had not and went back to reading the home and garden section of the paper again. The bird made another noise at the window, flapping its wings against the windowpanes and looking like it wanted to come inside. Both Phillip and Diane looked up this time, and it occurred to both of them at the same time that this bird might not be what it seemed. Diane hurried to the window and opened it, and the bird hopped inside the house. She closed the window and curtains so that no one would see, and Rahn began to transform from a bird into a man.

Neither Diane nor Phillip had ever seen this happen before, though they were aware of Rahn’s ability to shape-shift and had heard the stories of how he had appeared to Jeff and Nancy as a roadrunner before. Knowing wasn’t the same as seeing, though. Standing inside the Evans’ house just now, Rahn had transformed from a roadrunner into a man… all in one fluid motion; but somewhere in that three-second fluid motion, wings had stretched into arms, legs had grown from roadrunner-sized to human-sized, feathers had disappeared, and a human… well, maybe… at least he looked human… had appeared. Phillip and Diane stood speechless, their mouths open but no words coming out. For Phillip, especially, it was awkward. Phillip was a lawyer. But he had never defended a roadrunner that could change into a man before, and nothing had ever prepared him for this.

“Hello,” Rahn said, extending his hand politely to Diane then to Phillip.

“Hello,” both repeated back, still somewhat stunned.

“I am here because Max asked me to come,” Rahn said, initiating the conversation. “Max… and Michael… are going to have a meeting on the ship tonight at midnight… to make some important decisions about everything. They would like for you to come to the meeting.”

Phillip nodded silently, then Diane nodded, too.

“Good,” Rahn said. “Max will move the ship over your house at exactly 10:50 tonight. You must have your pass chip transport pins on you or in your hands at that time so that the transporter will recognize you and take you onto the ship. You can be anywhere in your house, but you must have the pins on you at 10:50.”

“Okay,” Phillip said simply, oddly lacking for vocabulary for the first time in his life. Diane just nodded and stared at Rahn, marveling at the seeming impossibility of what she had just seen happen with her own eyes.

“I must go,” Rahn said. “I still must speak to the Whitmans and several others.”

Diane nodded again but then seemed to shake herself out of her silence… “Oh! Rahn! I’m… I’m sorry if we seem… distracted. It’s just that… that… we’ve never seen you do that before… you know.”

Rahn smiled. “I know.” Walking to the front door, Rahn turned the doorknob, and the door opened. The ‘man’ who had just been standing in front of Phillip and Diane seemed to simply collapse and disappear, like a hollow shell caving in, as Rahn’s body simply flowed downward and changed shape… and in the place of the man stood a roadrunner. The roadrunner took three hops out the front door then took to the air, adjusting its wingspan slightly to give itself better flight capability than the normal roadrunner, which has short wings and can only fly relatively short distances. But such limitations were of no concern to Rahn. This roadrunner was a marathon flyer.



----------



Several blocks away from the Evans’ home, Charles and Gloria Whitman were sitting at their dining room table playing a game of scrabble when Rahn lit on the windowsill outside their living room window. Not seeing the Whitmans in their living room, Rahn flew upstairs and checked the upstairs windows. He didn’t really like looking into bedroom windows. It felt strangely invasive for some unexplainable reason. He wasn’t quite sure why, but it always did. This would have to be an exception, though. Rahn looked through the bedroom windows, but once again, he saw no one. For a few moments, he stood on the roof of the house, wondering how he would get their attention without having to change back from a bird into a man right out in the open where any neighbor might see. Then he noticed the garage door. There was a clearance beneath it of perhaps three feet where it had not completely shut. Rahn flew under the door then simply walked into the house through an open door from the garage into the house.

Sitting at his dining room table, Charles Whitman studied the tiny wood tiles in his hand intensely then sighed…

_ O _ _ _ U N _ E _

He placed an S, an N, and an R down, making _ O _ _ S U N N E R.

“Sunner! You know… like someone getting a tan. How many points does that give me, Gloria?”

“Roadrunner!” Gloria said, her eyes seeming to grow suddenly larger.

Charles looked at the tiles again and changed a few letters…

R O A D R U N N E R

“You’re right. That would have used all but one of my letters!” Then he picked the tiles up again and put the others back down. “I wish I’d seen it, but I can’t let you give me answers, Gloria. You’re playing against yourself again.”

“No, Charles! A roadrunner! There!”

Gloria pointed toward the living room behind Charles, and Charles turned to look where Gloria was pointing. Indeed, as strange as it looked, there stood a roadrunner in the middle of their living room.

“What the…” Charles exclaimed, jumping out of his chair. “How the heck did you get in here?”

Glancing at the open door to the garage, Charles knew. “You need to get back out of here before you mess up the carpet or something. The house is no place for you, guy. Shoo!”

As he attempted to shoo the bird back toward the open door to the garage, the bird did something that Charles Whitman never expected. It suddenly expanded and rose straight up, like Jack’s beanstalk, changing from a bird into a man before his eyes.

“Rahn!” both Charles and Gloria exclaimed at the same time, recognizing their unexpected visitor.

“Rahn what in the world are you doing here,” Gloria managed to ask, finally finding her voice again.

“Hello.” Rahn replied shyly… almost apologetically. “Max and Michael would like for you to be present at a meeting tonight at midnight on the ship to determine what is going to happen to all of them. If you can be there, you should be ready at 11:00 precisely here in your home. It doesn’t matter where in the house, but be ready and have your transport pins on you or in your hands. Someone will transport you up to the ship at exactly 11:00. Will you come?”

Gloria looked at Charles, and Charles shrugged. “Well… yeah, sure, I guess so. If they think it’s important, I guess it must be. So I guess we’ll be ready for them… when they come. It’s got something to do with Alex, too, doesn’t it? I mean… what’s going to happen to Alex… depends on what they decide in this meeting…?”

Rahn nodded. “I don’t know what will be discussed at the meeting, but I believe you are probably correct.”

Charles nodded slowly. “We’ll be ready, Rahn. Tell them we’ll be there.”

Rahn smiled understandingly then reverted to a roadrunner as they watched. It happened so fast that neither Charles nor Gloria was really sure exactly how it had occurred. Both of them saw it, but like a scene that one has to rewind and watch over and over to try to understand, Rahn’s sudden transformation left them baffled. The roadrunner promptly ran out the door into the garage, ran under the garage door, then took to the air.



----------



“Damn! I missed him again!”

The not-yet-thirty but clearly exercise-challenged and overweight longhaired man swung the broom again; and yet again, the bird nimbly leapt over the broom as the broom came down with a whack on the floor. Puffing from exertion, the exhausted man fell back into a nearby armchair, as another man nearby laughed hysterically and shook his head, apparently enjoying the spectacle.

“You’ll never get that bird, Jennings. He’s too quick for you.”

Jennings held the broom out at arm’s length toward the other man.

“Here, you get him then.”

“Maybe I will, Van. Just watch. You’ll see how it’s done.”

The other man, who was fiftyish but in decidedly better shape than his younger colleague, took the broom and walked forward toward the roadrunner. The roadrunner watched the approaching man warily but seemed surprisingly unconcerned by his approach.

The older man sauntered over to the side a bit, acting nonchalant but intending to corner the bird and back it into a niche that it could not move around in freely, thus limiting its ability to escape when he brought the broom down. Believing that he had the bird in the right place, Bob Stern raised the broom slowly, still pretending not to look at the roadrunner. Then he turned and swung the broom suddenly.

It was to no avail. The roadrunner hopped over the flying broom as though it were all a game. Van Jennings, lying sprawled in the armchair, smiled and chuckled.

“Way to go, Bob! You really showed him who’s who!”

Stern grimaced. “I’ll get him, though, Van. No stupid bird’s gonna make an ass out of me!”

Jennings made a weak braying sound and chuckled. Stern ignored his colleague’s oblique barb but clearly seemed to bristle. Bringing the broom down three times in swift succession, Stern succeeded only in getting the roadrunner to hop, duck, and hop again. The broom never even came close to striking the nimble bird. Stern stopped and leaned on the broom for a moment then picked it up and began swinging wildly as though he expected to catch the bird in the air and bat it out the window on the other side of the room. The roadrunner ran from one side of the room to the other, jumping over the broom several times but never getting hit. Stern was beginning to tire when the door to the room beside them opened and a lady looked in…

“What the dickens is going on in here guys? It sounds like you’re beating each other up!”

Sprawled over his chair, Jennings smiled and waved dismissively toward Stern.

“Bob’s trying to catch a roadrunner that got into the studio somehow. He’s not having much luck.”

“Oh, and I guess you did better, Mister ‘I’m-having-a-heart-attack, I’ve-got-to-sit-down! Wheeze! Cough!’”

“What roadrunner?” the lady asked, opening the door all the way.

“This one,” Stern said, unexpectedly turning suddenly and taking another swat at the long-legged bird. The roadrunner easily avoided the broom again, but this time it leapt right into the arms of the lady who had just entered. She appeared startled but managed to maintain her composure, looking first at the bird on her arm then at her two colleagues.

“Well, I’ll be danged! Looks like he likes you, Diane.”

“Yeah… I think so, Bob,” the lady agreed.

“Hold him there, Diane, and I’ll grab him.”

Diane turned to the side, ignoring Stern’s advance. “Leave him alone, Bob. He came to me. I’ll take care of him.”

“Pshhhhhhhh…” Bob sighed, letting the air out of his lungs dejectedly. “Alright. Throw him outside… or put him in a cage or something if you want to keep him. We can’t have a roadrunner running around in the station distracting everyone.”

“I’ll worry about that, guys. I don’t think the boss will mind. You guys can help me by getting the ads all scheduled for next week if you haven’t done that yet. ”

Stern and Jennings looked at each other and shrugged. They knew that Diane was right. The boss would not question anything she did. Diane had the closest thing to “star status” that the station had ever known. Stern walked out of the room, and Jennings managed to push himself out of his chair and follow.

“Alright,” Stern said. “We’ll leave you alone with your bird.”

Jennings snickered, as Stern closed the door behind them. Diane checked the door then looked around the room. She opened the back door to make it appear that she had gone outside with the bird… just in case anyone came back in to check, but instead, she opened a closet door and stepped inside, closing the door back behind her.

Diane looked at the roadrunner sitting calmly on her arm.

“Okay, you’d better be what I think you may be or I’m going to feel really foolish bringing you in here.”

The bird hopped onto the floor and transformed into a man in front of her. Diane gasped, less from the shock of the sudden transformation than from the sudden reduction in space inside the tiny closet. She found herself face to face, literally, with Rahn. Blushing a bit, Diane stammered, trying to figure out what to say to the man standing right against her in a closet that was now too small to even move in. She felt like they should be dancing… or hugging… anything but talking.

“Rahn, what are you doing here? I’m happy to see you, believe me. I’m just a bit taken aback by the… the unexpected closeness. You could have been killed showing up here like this!”

“Not by those guys,” Rahn said confidently. “They couldn’t catch me even if they had me in a cage.”

“Well, you may be right about that,” Diane conceded, with a smile that Rahn probably couldn’t see in the darkness of the closet. “But what ARE you doing here, Rahn?”

“I came to ask you to come to the ship tonight at midnight. Max and Michael are having a meeting to discuss their future here, and your presence is needed. Dan Klein should come, too, if you know where we can find him.”

“I think so,” Diane said uncertainly. “What… where do I go to get on the ship?”

“Max will bring the ship to you… at your house. You should be ready at 11:10, with your transport pin on you. Someone will transport you up to the ship from your home. It won’t matter where you are in the house.”

Diane nodded. “It must be pretty important… to be so sudden.”

“Yes,” Rahn agreed. “It is important. The future will be determined tonight… their future… our future… maybe your future, in a way.”

Diane nodded again. “I’ll get in touch with Dan. Do you want him to be at my house, too, when you come for me?”

“That would be good,” Rahn said.

“I’ll be there,” Diane said. “Dan will, too… I think.”

“Good.”

“Rahn?”

“Yes?”

“How are we going to get out of this closet? I can’t move.”

“I’ll fix that,” Rahn said, grinning slightly to himself in the darkness. “Goodbye, Diane… till tonight. Thanks for protecting me from those two guys.”

Diane smiled. “Protecting YOU, Rahn? I was protecting THEM. I thought they were going to have heart attacks from the exertion. You shouldn’t tease them like that.”

Rahn laughed then transformed back into a roadrunner. Diane opened the door and peeked out of the closet then quickly walked to the back door with Rahn on her arm. She held her arm up in the air, and Rahn spread his wings and leapt into the air.

“Dan and I’ll see you tonight, Rahn,” Diane whispered, as the bird disappeared into the distance.



----------



At the army base, General David Strickland had just left his office, the office that had once belonged to General Hawkins. As he walked down the hall in the underground bunker, a roadrunner flew overhead. The lieutenant beside him noticed the bird…

“We probably ought to close off the entrances to the bunkers better. We keep getting bats and birds in here. It’s a good thing they can’t tell anyone what they’ve seen, huh?”

Strickland smiled. “Well, we can’t close it up that tightly, Anson. We’re underground. We need the air circulation. I guess the birds and the bats are just something we’ll have to put up with. They seem to know how to get back out anyway. So far they haven’t been a problem.”

“No sir. That’s true,” Lieutenant Anson replied.

General Strickland stopped and thought for a moment. “Anson… was that a roadrunner?”

“It looked like one, sir. I’m not sure, though. It flies pretty well to be a roadrunner.”

Strickland nodded. “Yeah, you’re probably right. You know, Anson, I think I forgot something in my office. You go on ahead. I’ll catch up with you later.”

Anson turned and politely saluted the General then walked off. General Strickland watched as Anson rounded the corner, then he turned around and walked back toward his office. As he put his key in the door and turned it, Strickland sensed a presence beside him. Turning quickly, he found himself looking at Rahn, whom he recognized from the ship.

“Where did you come from?”

Rahn smiled. “It’s a bit hard to explain. I have a message for you.”

Strickland nodded. “The roadrunner that I saw in the hall… That was you, wasn’t it?”

Rahn appeared flustered and momentarily unsure what he should say. He had never revealed his shape-shifting ability to Strickland. He had never even revealed his ability to his captors in all the years he had been held on the base before he had escaped… before Strickland had become a general.

“It’s okay, Rahn. I’ll keep your secret. I probably know better than you what would happen to you if it got out. I heard rumors about a special roadrunner. I’ve got lines of communication. Some of them keep track of miscreants like Judge Lewis. He’s been telling everybody that some of the aliens can change into other things… like snakes or roadrunners. But no one trusts Judge Lewis anymore. I store all these little tidbits and details up here…” Strickland pointed at his head. “for future reference… if needed. Sometimes even the rantings of a madman can turn out to have relevance… if one is open to seeing it.”

Rahn nodded. “I should have guessed that Judge Lewis would figure it out. Do you think anyone else will believe him?”

Strickland shook his head. “No. We’ve pretty much told the press and everyone that anything the judge says can be considered for its source. He’s untrustworthy. And his experience in the desert has left him… um… let’s say, susceptible to hallucinations and imagined happenings. It’s not really to protect you that we don’t want anyone believing the judge, Rahn. It’s because he has too much classified knowledge… things we don’t want anyone else knowing. Judge Lewis had sources, including Culpepper and others, and he was fairly good at storing every little bit of information he heard –intentionally or on the sly- in his head.”

“You seem to be pretty good at that yourself,” Rahn said.

David Strickland smiled. “There are things that can be learned… even from a cretin.”

“I’m glad you’re on our side,” Rahn replied, smiling. “You’ll be a very good general.”

Strickland smiled. “It’s a challenge. But I’m giving it my best. What did you want to tell me, Rahn?”

“There is going to be a meeting on the ship tonight… at midnight. Max and Michael want you to be there, because you are our friend. They need to decide some things about our futures and the futures of the others here.”

Strickland raised his eyebrows. “The others meaning… Max Evans… Isabel Evans… Michael Guerin… Angie Lee?”

Rahn nodded.

“And does that also include Elizabeth Parker, Maria DeLuca, Alex Whitman… and the sheriff’s son, Kyle Valenti,” Strickland asked.

“It may,” Rahn said. “I don’t know for sure, but I suspect so.”

Strickland nodded. “And the sheriff and his wife, Amy…”

“Probably,” Rahn replied. “We are all at a crossroads right now. There are things happening that have made it necessary for us to have this meeting… to make decisions.”

Strickland nodded again. “Maybe more than you know, Rahn. Like I told you, I have lines of communication, and I store every little detail up here.” Strickland pointed at his head again. “I’m not sure about this information yet, but I’ve heard some very troubling rumors from a couple of my sources recently. I wasn’t going to say anything until I had confirmed it and knew more of the details, but you should know what I know. It’s only an unconfirmed rumor right now, understand, but a couple of very good sources have told me that the 9th Circuit Court, in San Francisco… that’s California… has been meeting in secret the last few days. They cover much of this area of the country, including Arizona and most of the west coast. If my sources are right, the purpose of these meetings was to decide how to ‘best allocate an indispensable resource currently located in the area of Roswell, New Mexico.’”

“What… exactly… does that mean,” Rahn asked.

“Well, it could mean a lot of things,” Strickland replied. “Or maybe nothing at all. But I have a dreadful feeling that it does not bode well for you… and especially for Max… the one who can heal.”

Rahn paled. “Would they harm Max?”

Strickland shook his head. “I don’t think that’s their intention. I suspect that the 9th Circuit Court has decided that it has the responsibility for determining who Max heals and when he heals them. If this is the case, it could mean that Max would become essentially… a slave… a permanent ward of the court… controlled by them… no longer free to make decisions about things like… leaving. You see what I’m saying?”

Rahn nodded. “They’re afraid we’ll leave and take Max with us… both Maxes. They want to make sure that does not happen. And they want to control who is eligible to be healed and let the court… themselves… determine the priorities.”

“That’s what I believe, Rahn. I told you, it’s all only guesswork and rumor right now… I could be wrong.”

“But you are very good at piecing puzzles together, David Strickland. If you think this might happen… it is enough for us to be concerned about it. Max will want to know. Michael needs to know, too. It should be discussed at the meeting tonight. Can a court in San Francisco do this?”

“That is not clear, Rahn. The state of New Mexico is in the 10th Circuit Court’s jurisdiction, not the 9th, although some of our neighboring states, like Arizona, are in the 9th; but there is some indication that the 9th Circuit Court may believe that it can obtain legal jurisdiction over the ship and its occupants in some other manner. I thought you would want to know.”

“Take this transport chip pin, David Strickland. Keep it on you somewhere. At 10:30 tonight, the ship will pick you up. The transporter will recognize the chip in the pin.”

“I’ve used it before,” Strickland said, turning the pin over in his hand. Do you want me to be here… in my office?”

“You tell me where it would be best to find you,” Rahn said. “That is where we will go.”

Strickland nodded. “It might be best if it were somewhere else. This area is too protected… and too watched.”

“I suspected that,” Rahn said.

“Can you pick me up from my home?”

Rahn nodded. “That will not be a problem.”

“23 Benwood Aircraft Circle. It’s three miles north of the base just outside Roswell. From the air, you can easily spot Benwood Aircraft Circle. It has a small airstrip through the center of it. A lot of our residents have private planes. My house is on the east side of the strip, second house from the north end of the runway. Can you remember that?”

“Of course.”

“Good. I’ll see you at 10:30 then, Rahn.”

“Thank you,” Rahn said. He looked at Strickland for a moment then decided that David Strickland could be trusted completely. Without any warning, Rahn shrank suddenly, becoming a roadrunner once again. David swallowed, and his eyes opened a bit wider.

“Amazing. I wish we had more time to get to know each other, Rahn,” he whispered, leaning over and offering the bird his hand. The roadrunner hopped onto Strickland’s outstretched index finger, then Strickland raised his hand into the air… and Rahn flew away.



tbc


Coming Up: Part 2 – Decisions

The Night The Dreams Died



Midnight Pow-Wow
Part 2 – Decisions


Chapter 44

XLIV



The midnight sky over Roswell twinkled with hundreds of thousands of stars, most of them visible on this clear dark night from the New Granolith’s lofty position in the sky, and the view through the ship’s observatory dome was striking. The observatory of the New Granolith comprised most of the uppermost level of the ship, and the clear, one-way view dome that covered it allowed anyone inside this level to watch the stars and planets go by while the ship was traveling through space. On this night, however, the only visible movement of the stars was their incessant twinkling in the midnight sky. It was a sight that every person present had spent some time appreciating already; but now, with the meeting about to start, it became a peaceful… and strangely appropriate… backdrop.

There was plenty of room in the observatory. Even with everyone present and with the large table that had been brought in for the special meeting, it was not at all crowded. The large, oversized Antarian sofa that Michael and Maria so loved still sat against the back wall. On another side of the room there were a couple of special seats with various long-rang vision devices through which one could view the distant heavens in comfort. But one needed only to look up… or in almost any other direction… to see the skies through the huge dome that covered most of the level above and all around the observatory. It felt a bit like sitting on a large, mostly exposed, platform in the sky… until the lights were turned up inside, giving some sense of enclosure to the meeting’s participants.

“This meeting is opened,” Max stated simply, bringing the meeting to order. Everyone turned to look at Max, anxious to hear what he had to say.

Max looked around the table. All those invited appeared to be present. Directly to Max’s right, at the head of the table, sat Michael and Gray Hawk. Liz and Rahn sat on Max’s left. Along the left side of the table, Max saw his and Liz’s younger doubles with Jeff and Nancy Parker, her parents. Beside the Parkers were the younger Michael and Maria with Maria’s mom, Amy, and her new husband, Sheriff Jim Valenti, followed by Kyle Valenti, Phillip and Diane Evans, Isabel, Alex, then Alex’s parents, Charles and Gloria Whitman. At the far end of the table were Diane Casey, Dan Klein, and General David Strickland. Beside David Strickland sat a guest, one still referred to by most of the crew simply as “Eagle One,” since he and Dan Klein had led two squadrons of fighter jets to secure the reservation when it had been under attack. Moving back around to the right side of the table, Max saw Jim from Antar sitting across from his younger double. River Dog sat on Jim’s right with Tess, Tess’ husband, Rayylar, and Angie Lee. To Jim’s left were the rest of Max’s crewmates, Isabel, Alex, Maria, and Varec.

Seeing that everyone was present, Max smiled and continued… “I called this meeting because we have recently encountered a few problematic situations. It’s nothing that we can’t handle, of course… if we’re prepared for whatever may come and we stick together…”

Michael nodded silently but rolled his eyes a bit. Max ignored Michael’s not-too-subtle visual attempt to tell him that he was already forgetting his agreement not to “candy-coat” or underestimate the dangers they might be facing. But both knew that there were important decisions to be made tonight… decisions that would likely affect the lives of all those present, not just the “aliens” in the group.

“As everyone here probably knows by now,” Max continued, “Max… your Max, that is… and I… have been spending a great many hours each day healing sick and injured people at the hospital in Roswell. Up till now, we’ve only had to heal local people and those who came to us, but the word has been spreading around the country and… I suspect… the world, and we know that if we don’t prepare now or if we don’t find a way to avoid what we think is coming, we may find ourselves in over our heads.”

“I have a suggestion,” Dan Klein said.

Max nodded toward Dan. “Go ahead, Dan. What is it?”

“We can put out the word that your powers to heal people have been depleted. You know… tell the press that your powers have been all used up… You can’t even get a kink out of a muscle anymore. If the press spreads the word…”

“They won’t buy it,” Michael said with certainty. “People would want to see it for themselves. The press would want us to prove it. Even then… people would always suspect that we had lied to them, and Max would be accused of being self-centered and unconcerned about others if it ever came out that it really was a lie.”

Dan shrugged. “Yeah… you’re probably right.”

“Hey! I didn’t say it was a bad idea, though,” Michael replied quickly. “I’m thinking about it… with a few little adjustments. But we have to be realistic. People are going to be suspicious of our motives and suspect that they’re being lied to if we say something like that.”

“Maybe you could say that their powers are getting progressively and permanently weaker every time they heal so many people without resting for several days in between,” Maria suggested. “I mean… if you convince people that Max may lose his powers totally if they continue to abuse the two of them, people won’t want their powers to go away, so maybe they’ll give them a break, you know…”

“Hmm… in other words, we kind of tell people that they’re killing the goose that laid the golden egg,” Michael mused.

“Yeah. That’s sort of it,” Maria agreed.

“Might work… it’s an angle. Max?”

Max shrugged. “It might come down to that. I don’t like having to lie about it, though.”

“You wouldn’t really be lying, Max,” Michael retorted. “Not much anyway. I mean, face it, if the problem keeps growing at the rate it has been, they really are going to kill the goose that… the goose that heals them.”

Max smiled.

“You think that’s funny?” Michael asked.

Max shook his head. “I was just picturing that imagery… You know, a goose… healing people.”

“Well, you can’t lay golden eggs, Max,” Michael said with a touch of exasperation. “…Unless you’ve been keeping something from me.”

There was a low round of laughter around the table. Max reddened slightly and smiled sheepishly. “You’re right, Michael. I didn’t mean to make light of it.”

“I know,” Michael conceded, then he turned again to the group around the table. “The problem, as Max and I see it, is that now that everyone knows what Max can do, they’re going to expect him to do it… and if he doesn’t, we’re not going to be welcome here anymore… any of us. That goes for our doubles, too, especially his, and they have to live here. This is their home.”

“Maybe,” Max replied quietly. “Maybe not.”

Michael nodded solemnly. “Right. That brings us to the other thing we discussed… if it comes to it.”

Max took a deep breath and looked around the table again at each one there. “We have discussed it among some of us, and we feel that the time is coming… very soon, I fear… when staying here may not be an option. I’m talking about for some of those who live here, not for me or my crew. We will be going back to Antar in our dimension soon either way. But my double here… and maybe some of the others… have to make some important decisions tonight. This is very sudden, I know, but it’s not as rash as it may seem. Just tonight, we learned that a circuit court in San Francisco may be planning to place my double and me under some kind of court restriction where the court would decide who we heal and when… and we think this would mean that we would also not be free to leave the court’s jurisdiction without the court’s permission.”

“In other words, EVER,” Diane Casey said, bristling with indignation. “If that happened, you’d be a virtual slave, Max… both of you. Are you sure of this information? San Francisco… that’s the 9th Circuit Court. They don’t have jurisdiction in Roswell. New Mexico is in the 10th Circuit Court’s jurisdiction.”

“It comes from some very reliable sources,” General David Strickland said, responding to Diane. “I have personal, uh, sources close to the court. Over the past three days, the court has been meeting in secret to decide what they have termed, ‘how to best allocate an indispensable and unique resource currently located in the vicinity of Roswell, New Mexico.’ What does that mean to you?”

Diane frowned and thought about it for several moments. “Probably the same thing it means to you. But… how do they expect to get away with it? We’re not in their jurisdiction here.”

“I don’t know that,” General Strickland said, shaking his head. “But the sources were quite convinced of the court’s intent. Maybe there is someone else here, though, who may have more answers for us.” David looked straight at Eagle One, and the “guest” nodded slowly.

“It hasn’t been officially published by the court, General. There’s nothing that I can do about it until the court makes some kind of official adjudication… or at least admits it. I have heard the rumor, but the 9th denies it.”

“Then, it’s not so?” David Strickland asked.

“I didn’t say that,” Eagle One replied. “It’s probably a denial of convenience.”

“In other words, a bald-faced lie,” Diane Casey retorted angrily.

Eagle One smiled. “Well, yes… and no. The denial could be based on the phrasing of the question as it was put to them by my staff. Courts and lawyers, you know. Anyway, if any detail of the question they were asked was slightly wrong, the court would simply issue a blanket denial of the entire question. What I can tell you is that I’ve been watching them closely, and when they do tip their hand, I’ll be on it.”

“But can you do anything about it,” Liz asked. “I mean, with all due respect to you, Sir, I know a little bit about poli’ science and sociology and how these things work here. I graduated from high school here in Roswell… Well, okay, not HERE… but in Roswell… in a different dimension, but I think it’s pretty much the same. I got an ‘A’ in Political Science.”

“You got an ‘A’ in everything,” Maria interjected.

Liz blushed slightly, but Eagle One smiled and seemed impressed.

“She’s right. I cannot simply overrule the courts… though there are a few things that I can trump them on. I won’t know about this case until they decide to spring their ‘decision.’ But I’ve had my legal experts researching it already, and I am quite sure that legally there is no precedent for such an action and little likelihood of succeeding if a court without jurisdiction attempts to circumvent a court with jurisdiction. It’s rather complicated, but jurisdiction is important here.”

“I imagine that’s why they’ve been discussing it for three days,” Dan Klein said. “They’re trying to find a way to stick a decision outside their jurisdiction. Maybe the 10th Circuit Court is in on it with them.”

Eagle One shook his head. “I had that checked out, too. I can’t be a hundred percent sure, but it doesn’t appear that they are.”

“How else could they hope to make it stick?” Dan asked. “We need to ask ourselves that. When we find the answer to that, we’ll probably know what they’re up to.”

“Or…” Michael said. “We could just leave… now… today… or tomorrow at the latest… without saying anything… with both Maxes onboard. Then there’ll be nothing for them to decide.”

Diane Evans gasped, and her hand went automatically over her mouth. “Max? Leave…? And go where? Where would he go?”

She knew that the answer would not please her. Wherever the New Granolith was going, it would be taking her son away from her if he went along. But Diane was also aware of the problems Max was facing because of his ability to heal others, and she knew that it was getting worse, not better. Something WAS going to have to be done… soon.

“Does he… Does he have to go away… to some other… you know…?” Diane couldn’t quite bring herself to say it. “Can’t you find a way to fix the problem and let him stay here?”

“We’re not going to take him away against his wishes, Mrs. Evans,” Michael said, shaking his head. “If it comes to it… and right now it’s only on the table for discussion, because we’re just looking for options, not saying that it has been determined already… it will have to be his decision to make. And you will have to help him make the right decision.”

“Don’t say that. I can’t ask him to go away and… leave us.”

“Running away isn’t an answer,” Phillip said, agreeing with his wife. “We’ve always taught our children not to seek out trouble or invite it but not to run away from it either. They can come to us. We’re here for them. In the end, they have to stand on their own two feet, but you can’t just turn and run from your troubles. You have to face them… defeat them. Only then can you be free of them.”

“I’m sure that Max and Isabel know that they can come to you for anything, Mr. Evans,” Michael replied. “But… were you able to help them on graduation night?”

Phillip choked up, and Diane began to cry softly. Both of them felt like a dagger had just been run through their hearts, as memories of Max and Isabel being shot dead by commandoes at their graduation came flooding back into their minds… and with those awful memories, came the feelings of utter, horrible despair that had overcome them at not having been able to save their children or help them in any way.

“I’m… I’m sorry,” Michael said with heartfelt sincerity, feeling a lump coming up in his throat. “I’m not implying that you ever didn’t do your best to keep them safe. I’m saying that you really did… and it just didn’t matter. There are things that this world is just not ready for. Your son… and Isabel… aren’t truly of this world. None of us are. Everyone knows it now. I’m not saying that Max and Isabel have to run away… yet. I’m looking for options. But we have to keep that option open, too. It’s… well… looking more and more like the best option… for several reasons.”

“I’m a lawyer, Michael,” Phillip said sternly. “If a court… anywhere… tries to put restrictions on my children… because of what they are… I’ll take them to… take them to…”

“Court?”

“Court… yeah.” Phillip ran the back of his hand over his eyes then put his arm around Diane and pulled her to him.

As everyone else sat in total silence, Max picked up the conversation again.

“Michael… and I… will be leaving here soon with the rest of our crew. We haven’t decided yet to take anyone from here with us when we go. We’re exploring all the options available, and that is one option that is available. As Michael said, it would have to be Max’s decision… if he decides to go with us. In any case, these things need to be decided in this meeting… tonight. Once we are gone… there will be nowhere for Max… or Isabel… or anyone else here… to turn to. You will have to defend yourselves or be at the mercy of millions of possibly misguided people… and maybe even the courts… if it comes to that.”

“And there is another matter to discuss,” Michael said softly. “Nasedo.”

Max nodded. “Right. Nasedo is a shape-shifter… He’s dangerous. We can’t leave him here. We need to take him back to Antar, in this dimension, where he can be handled properly by others of his kind.”

“Not all shape-shifters are dangerous,” Rahn interjected defensively. “Most of us are good.”

Max nodded again. “Rahn is right. And it just illustrates the problems we face here. People are afraid of anything that they can’t control or don’t understand. I didn’t mean to imply that all shape-shifters are dangerous just now, but the language I used did just that. If we can’t control our own fears… if we let them come out… even accidentally in such little ways… how can we expect a whole planet of… earth people to stay calm and reasonable. The trouble is, it doesn’t take a lot of people, only a few people with illogical fears, to cause a great catastrophe. The men who shot some of you at graduation here were only a handful of people who did not represent the majority, but the result was still disastrous. It’s a hard lesson… one that we learned, too.”

“But do you always run from your problems, Max?” Phillip asked. “Isn’t there danger on your planet? What do you do when there’s danger there? What did you do with that guy, what was his name… K… Ki…?”

“Kivar,” Diane offered for him.

“Yeah… Kivar. Did you run from him? Or did you face him and win your planet back… in your own dimension?”

“You’ve found out a lot about us,” Max said, a bit surprised at the extent of Phillip’s knowledge of a subject that Max had never really talked about to anyone here.

“I told you… I’m a lawyer. I have a way of… snooping… getting little details.”

There were a few chuckles around the table, and Phillip smiled just a bit.

Max nodded. “We talk when we don’t realize it. Little things that we say…”

“…can be pieced together… if someone is really listening,” Phillip said, finishing Max’s thought for him.

“Yeah, exactly,” Max conceded. “You’re my father alright.”

Again there was a chuckle heard around the table.

“Well… anyway, you’re a lot like my father… in my dimension. He could hear a few words and put together a whole plot from them, too. And he occasionally got it right. It made being a teenager kind of nerve-wracking… sometimes.” Max smiled, letting Phillip know that he meant this in a light-hearted way. Then he became serious again…

“We can face danger when there is a reason to… and a need. It was necessary to face danger to take back our planet… to return the rightful king to the throne… and to save my people from Kivar. But is it really necessary to stay here on earth… if there is a reasonable alternative? It’s not even our planet… not really. Rahn found out from Nasedo that Antar, in this dimension, is no longer ruled by Kivar. He was killed by one of his slaves, and random factions that cannot seem to get together dominate the planet at the present time. The return of their king now could make all the difference. If Max and Michael here have the same feelings of destiny and calling that Michael and I had that led us to return to our planet and defeat Kivar, they may never have a better chance to reestablish their rightful place on Antar than now. We can’t decide this for them, though. They will have to do that themselves. Stay… or go. It’s in their hands.” Max turned and faced the younger Max and Michael. “…Your hands.”

“Go,” the younger Max said quietly. Michael nodded emphatically… “Go.”

Max smiled. He knew what their decisions would be before he ever asked. This Max and Michael were a little younger, and they lived in a different dimension, but they were still Max and Michael. Max never had any doubt what their answer would be. Neither did Michael… especially since they had gotten to know them. The two pairs were far more alike than different… in almost every respect. Max and Michael knew that this meeting was really about giving their doubles the opportunity to make the decision to return and retake their planet. All the problems they faced here on earth were only secondary. Even the court, if it was indeed plotting something sinister, could not have actually forced them to leave earth. But retaking their rightful place on their own planet was something deeper. It was a calling. Max and Michael had felt it once themselves. They had every reason to believe that their doubles felt it, too.

From the start, Gray Hawk had understood what this meeting was about, and he had kept silent and watched how it played out. He had been there when the ship had crashed on that day in 1947. He had seen the aliens and their urgency… the urgency to save their royal family… and their planet. He had no doubt that that urgency was still there… somewhere… in these two young men… the fruit of the aliens’ efforts that day. And as much as he did not want to think about it, he suspected it might be in Angie Lee, too. But he wasn’t sure.

“Max?” Diane whispered softly, her voice breaking. “Where would you go? Would we ever see you again?”

Max laid his hand on top of his mother’s hand and then squeezed it comfortingly. “I don’t know… I… I hope so… I just don’t know. But we have to do this, Mom. It’s something that I can’t explain. It’s… our destiny.” Michael nodded in agreement. Max turned back around to look at Liz, and the look on her face struck his heart with all the force and effect of an exploding supernova. His heart almost stopped… until by sheer force he willed it to beat again. He realized quickly that this was going to be harder. Liz. How could he leave Liz… after all they had been through together? Liz. Liz whom he had carried when she was paralyzed… danced ecstatically with, lost in emotion, in Gray Hawk’s home after Rahn had healed her… shared his feelings, his hopes, his love, HIS LIFE with… all but promised to marry. Liz. For the first time, since his Antarian double mentioned the possibility of taking him to Antar, Max faltered.

“I… I can’t…”

Max reached out to Liz, and she took his hands. The look on her face, in her eyes, in her whole being screamed, “STAY,” but her voice betrayed her.

“You have to go, Max. It’s what you’ve always wanted. It’s what you were always meant to do. You don’t have a choice. You’re the king of… of all those people. You heard what he said. Without you, they’re fractured. They need you and Michael… even if Kivar is gone… maybe even more now that he’s gone. Without you… without you… they… Without you…” Liz choked up in spite of her most noble intentions… “Without you… I… I can’t…”

Max put his arms around Liz and pulled her to him, holding her close in his embrace… close to his heart.

“I won’t leave you, Liz… if that’s the choice…”

Liz buried her face against Max’s chest then reached up and kissed him gently…

“Go, Max.”

“But…”

Liz put one finger over Max’s lips. “Go. I’ll go with you.”

Max sat there, momentarily speechless, then the truth struck him… This is what was meant to be. His double was married to Liz in their dimension… and they lived together on Antar. Their children were born on Antar. Their home… was Antar. Max looked at Liz, and a new feeling of profound love filled his heart almost to overflowing.

Michael watched as Max and Liz cemented their decision together then swallowed hard and looked at Maria.

“Hey, E.T., you don’t think I’m letting Liz take the vacation of a lifetime while I stay here, do you?”

Michael smiled, his mind a confused jumble of caution and concern and yet, oddly, somehow, relief.

“Besides…” Maria said, “I’ve kind of gotten attached to you. I think I might actually like you… just a little bit…”

Michael nodded, understanding Maria completely, then he leaned over and kissed her on the lips. As they separated, a few moments later, he looked at her with that endearing lopsided smile…

“Whatever I did to deserve you, it must have been really something.”

“It was,” Maria said. “You let me into your heart. I don’t think you ever did that with anyone else before.”

Michael shook his head. “No, I didn’t. Only Max… and Isabel. We had to stick together. But no one else. No one else ever… till you.”

Maria smiled and kissed Michael again.

Max looked at Isabel, who was clutching their mother tightly by the arm without realizing it.

“Max… don’t. Don’t ask me that. How can I leave everything I’ve ever known… everyone I’ve ever loved. Mom and Dad are… are all I’ve got!”

“You’ve got Max,” Max said, referring to his younger double. “And Michael.”

“I don’t want to have to choose… not between them or Mom and Dad,” Isabel said.

“I’m sorry,” Max whispered almost inaudibly, “but you are going to have to make a choice… to be with one or the other. If they go… and you stay… you’ll be alone here. I mean, you’ll still have Mom and Dad, but Max and Michael… will be gone. They won’t be there to help you if you need them.”

“I… I’ll get by… with Mom and Dad… and my friends. I’ve got Alex… and Maria…”

Isabel stopped suddenly, as it dawned on her that she might not have Maria anymore. Maria had just said that she was going wherever Michael went. Isabel swallowed. That would hurt. She couldn’t believe that she felt this way about anyone, but she did. The time she and Maria had spent just trying to survive together in the caves had changed something in Isabel. Maria had saved her life. They had been close… like sisters… almost like twins. They had depended on each other… totally… for survival… and for comfort… for so long. Losing Maria now would hurt… a lot. But she had Alex, and she had her parents. As long as she had them she would be okay in the end. Of this she was certain.

“I have to stay, Max. Mom and Dad need me. And there’s Alex… I… I…”

Max nodded. “Okay. Just think about it for now. If that’s your decision, we won’t try to make you to change it. But be certain that it’s the right decision, because after we’re gone… you know…”

Isabel nodded, holding her mother’s arm on one side and Alex’s on the other, attempting to convince herself that she didn’t want anything more. Being alone with Alex had always been enough for Isabel. As long as she had him… and the stars above… she could find happiness anywhere… anywhere… at all…

Isabel turned to Alex, and her lips moved, but nothing came out. She looked up at the thousands of visible stars through the dome above them. Alex looked up with her…

“Which one do you think it is, Iz?”

Isabel shook her head. “I don’t think you can see it from here, Alex. It’s too far away.”

Alex nodded, reading Isabel’s feelings like an open book. “How long do you think it’ll take us to get there?”

Isabel looked at Alex and shook her head. “I don’t really know.” Then she laid her head against him, and he put his arms around her, cradling her head against his chest with one hand.

“Maria?” Amy said, her voice shaking, betraying her feelings, “You can’t just run off to God knows where… some other planet… some other galaxy. You’re still just a child, honey!”

“I’m not a child, Mama. I’m out of high school already. I’ve been through more than most people go through in ten life times already. This is something I have to do, Mom. I want to be with Michael. Besides, when you were my age…”

“You’ll be leaving me,” Amy cried.

“Mom,” Maria scolded. “Turn off the tears. I know you. I learned it from you, remember?”

“They’re not fake,” Amy said, wiping her eyes and showing Maria the teardrops on her hand.

Maria hugged Amy. “I know they’re not, Mom. But you’ll survive. You’re a survivor. Besides, maybe we can come back to see you someday. Max and Michael have this big spaceship in their dimension… my Michael and our Max can get a big spaceship, too. Max is the king.”

“Oh, I know that,” Amy conceded, shaking her head. “But I don’t want to see you go away so far. Couldn’t you just go to Texas or somewhere first? Somewhere where I don’t need a spaceship to come see you? I don’t think my Jetta will make it to Antar.”

“Maybe Isabel can give it some of her special mojo, Mom. She’s good at that. Trust me! You should have seen what she did to your car before!”

Amy smiled. “If it’s all the same, I think I’ll wait for the spaceship.”

“Good choice, Mom.”

“Or…” Amy’s eyes got suddenly brighter. “Jim and I could come with you!”

Jim’s mouth fell open, and he looked at Amy. “Oh, no! I’m just getting earth used to having me around. I wasn’t cut out for space travel.”

“Your double said that, too,” Max noted. “But now he lives on Antar and considers it his home.”

“All the same,” Jim said. “I like to keep my feet on solid ground.”

“You mean like right now?” Michael asked.

“Yeah.” Jim thought about it a moment and realized that he was several thousand feet in the sky at this moment… inside a spaceship.

“Okay, but that’s still the earth down there under me.”

The younger Max smiled and joined the conversation. “Actually, it would probably be better if all the parents stayed here for now… on earth. We don’t know exactly what we’re going to find on Antar when we get there. After everything is running the way it should be, I should be able to send a ship back for anyone else who wants to come at that time. Or we can just come back to visit… if there’s not a problem with the court.”

“The New Granolith has invisibility capability and other stealth features,” Max of Antar said. “Varec can give you the specs, and you can build one of your own if you want. Nobody else needs to know that you’re here then if you come back. You’ll have to find Varec on your planet and get him to supervise the building of the ship for you. He’s the best. I don’t know anyone else who can do what he’s done with this ship.”

The younger Max nodded. “That would be great.”

“Lizzie,” Jeff said, putting an arm around his little girl, “Are you sure about this?”

Liz smiled and nodded. “I’ve never been more sure about anything in my life, Dad.”

Jeff nodded. “I won’t stand in your way, then, Lizzie. You belong together. That’s not easy for me to say; I want you to know that. But after all you’ve been through together… you and Max… and the others… I don’t think I should stand in your way now. Maybe you could email me occasionally. Do they have Earthlink on Antar?”

Liz smiled.

“That was Alex’s joke,” Michael said. Alex asked us that in our dimension when he stayed on earth the first time we left to return to Antar.”

“I guess things are the same everywhere,” Alex mused. “They just get moved around a bit.”

Tess walked up to Angie Lee and asked her the question that Angie Lee had been expecting.

“Are you coming with us? You’re from Antar, too. You can return home if you want to.”

Angie Lee looked up at the sky through the huge observatory dome and sighed, then she looked at Gray Hawk. She smiled and put her arm around Gray Hawk, then shook her head.

“I am home, Tess. Grandfather and I are home here.”

Tess smiled. “Well, no one on earth knows about your powers to create visions and mind warps, and they don’t know that you’re one of us, so you’ll probably be okay.”

Angie Lee nodded. “I want to finish college, then maybe someday I’ll marry a great guy and we can come to Antar for our honeymoon.” Angie Lee looked at Kyle, and Kyle smiled.

Tess laughed. “You just may be able to do that. But be careful, Angie Lee. You must hide any hint of your powers. No one here must ever know that you are one of us. The dangers for you are too great if they ever find out.”

“I know,” Angie Lee agreed.

“Kyle?” Tess said. Kyle understood the question.

“I’m staying here.”

“Why did I just know that?” Tess asked, winking at Angie Lee. “Have fun on Antar on your honeymoon, Kyle… you, too, Angie Lee.”

Kyle grinned but reddened just a bit and nodded, glancing at Angie Lee, who was smiling even more now that Kyle had confirmed that he was staying, too, and all but confirmed his intentions with regard to Angie Lee.

“Well, some things aren’t the same,” Max said. “In our dimension, Kivar destroyed the earth, and Kyle, Michael, and I were the only ones who escaped and made it to Antar… until we went back to earth’s past in the New Granolith and Alex here saved the world with his guitar.”

Angie Lee looked at Alex and raised her eyebrows. “I’d like to hear how that happened some time.”

“Maybe sometime I’ll tell you,” Alex said, grinning.

Diane Casey walked up to Max and looked him in the eyes. She started to speak but then thought again about what she would say.

“Yes,” Max said. It was an answer, not a question.

“Yes? Yes, what?”

“Yes, Diane, you can go with us. You’ve always known that you belonged out there somewhere, you just didn’t know where until now.”

Diane appeared stunned. “You can read my mind? I… I didn’t know.”

Max smiled and shook his head. “No. I don’t read minds. That’s what our Diane in our dimension said to me a long time ago. She and you had different jobs, but other than that, you’re like two peas in a pod. I just figured…”

“Amazing,” Diane said in a stunned voice. “Those were the very words I was going to say.”

“And some things are the same,” Max said.

“Max,” Varec called out from across the room. “There’s a message coming in on the vidscreen.”

“Turn it on,” Max said. Varec turned the large vidscreen on, and everyone sat back down in their seats and looked at the screen. A man came on the screen, but Max didn’t recognize him.

“Citizens of the planet Antar… greetings.”

“Thank you,” Max said. “What can we do for you?”

The man smiled, but Max thought that somehow the smile looked suspiciously… well… smiley.

“It’s not what you can do for us, Max. You are Max, right?” It’s what we can do for you. Is the, uh, the other Max there, too?”

“That would be me,” the younger Max said, stepping in front of the camera.

“Ah, there you are! Yes!”

“What are you offering,” Max asked.

“Well, we are very grateful for all your efforts to help others on our planet… especially by rebuilding the Mesaliko Reservation and, uh, healing all the people that you have healed.”

“It was our pleasure,” Max said politely.

“Well, some of us want you to know that it has not gone unnoticed, and we want to return the favor to you in our own small, humble way.”

“Thank you,” Max said, waiting to hear what the man was going to say.

“I want you to look at something. I’m putting a picture online for you to see.” The man disappeared, and a picture of a large estate on a river appeared. The house was beautiful… and huge. And the land seemed to go on forever. Max guessed that there were sixty prime acres… many of them on the waterfront.

“It’s beautiful,” Max said.

The man reappeared. “It’s yours. All you have to do is move in. We thought you might like to have something big enough for all of you to move into. There are thirty bedrooms, thirty baths, and a special guesthouse where someone’s parents could live if they wanted more privacy, or you could use it for… whatever. If you like horses, we’re going to give you six horses… and a groomsman and stableman to take care of them. As I said, it’s all yours, Max! All you have to do is move in! There’s even enough land to park your spaceship on.”

“Where is it,” Liz asked.

“Thirty-five miles out of Billings.”

“Montana,” Diane Casey said, her breath catching in her throat. She reached up and muted the outgoing audio for a second. “That’s in the 9th Circuit Court’s jurisdiction.” She turned the audio back on.

“It’s beautiful,” Max said again.

“Max, it’s a cage,” Michael said, muting the outgoing audio again momentarily. “You can’t be seriously considering it!”

“I’m not, but it’s gorgeous. I’ve never lived in anything like that.”

“Okay, it’s a gilded cage,” Michael corrected with exasperation. “A cage is still a cage, Max.”

Max sighed. “Yeah, I know. Once we were in there, we’d be their prisoners… with the law keeping us inside. Don’t worry, Michael. I’m not falling.”

Michael turned the audio back on. “Thank you… uh, I don’t think we got your name.”

“Jeffers… William Smythe, Esquire, at your service.”

“Well, Mr. Jeffers, as I was saying, we appreciate the offer, but we’re going to have to turn it down.”

“You can’t be serious! Think about what you’re giving up!”

“We already have,” Michael said.

The man on the vidscreen appeared flustered. Obviously, he was not prepared to be turned down and didn’t quite know how to reply. “I… I’ll have to get back to you on the matter. I need to speak to the other, uh, benefactors and give them your response.”

Max nodded and turned the vidscreen off.

“Well, there you have it,” Dan Klein said. “That’s what their plan is. Get you into their jurisdiction then slap the cage door closed.”

“I can’t believe the gall,” Diane spat, not mincing any words.

“But now that I know what they’re up to,” Eagle One said, “I can get my legal staff working on it and see what can be done… legally.”

“There’s no need,” Michael of Antar said. “We’re outta here! In the morning… Tonight if everyone’s ready. When they come back with another offer we’ll be long gone already.”

Eagle One nodded thoughtfully. “Still… I think I need to have my staff look at this offer. The guy on your fancy TV was right about one thing. We DO owe you a big debt of gratitude. There’s nobody who would deny that. Maybe this ‘offer’ could backfire on the, uh, ‘benefactors’.”

“Maybe,” Michael agreed. “But it’s safer to take off and not have to worry about it.” Michael’s concern wasn’t for himself but rather for the safety of everyone on the ship, especially Max, and he felt a similar obligation to protect their younger doubles. Protecting others was Michael’s job… and his life.

“Give me 48 hours, Mister Guerin. They can’t touch you as long as you’re in New Mexico airspace. I may be able to make lemonade out of a benchful of lemons.”

Michael looked at Max, and Max shrugged and nodded.

“Okay, Mr. President,” Michael agreed. “Forty-eight hours. Then we’re out of here. Is everyone okay with that?”

Michael looked around the room, and everyone nodded.

“Forty-eight hours.”



tbc


The Circuit Court’s plan hits a snag they never expected.

The Night The Dreams Died



A “Major” Snag


Chapter 45

XLV



“Are you ready for this, Mom?” Maria asked.

Amy looked at her daughter and smiled. “Honey, I’ve had some practice. The question is, are YOU ready?”

Maria nodded and grinned. “I’ll never be readier, Mom.”

“You look so beautiful, sweetie! I think I’m going to cry.”

“Mom, don’t! You’re mascara will run! Just smile and think about you and Jim.”

“Yeah… yeah,” Amy agreed, realizing that Maria was right. But that didn’t make it any easier when she looked at her daughter… her baby… standing there in her wedding dress. Maria was getting married! Amy still couldn’t get her mind to totally accept that, though she had already given in to the reality. As for herself, technically and legally, in every way, she and Jim already were married. Reverend Garrett had married them at her memorial, when everyone thought she had died in the “accident” that General Hawkins staged to cover her planned “disappearance.” But Amy had outfoxed the General. Then she had walked in on her own memorial… and on some very surprised guests… mad as a hornet with its wings clipped after walking back from the base without her car under the hot desert sun; and somehow, standing there covered in sweat and desert dust, she had wound up getting married to Jim… “because the preacher was already there.” But later she had promised herself and Maria that she would have a “real, traditional” wedding, with Maria present, once they were all safe again. Now seemed to be that time… at least if it was going to be a real earth wedding with a real earth pastor officiating.

Only a few feet away from Amy and Maria, Vera Taylor, the nurse Jeff Parker had hired to take care of Liz while Liz was in a coma… and for a while after that… was checking Liz over carefully and sniffling.

“Is it okay if I cry? I don’t care if my mascara does run. You look so… so…” Vera paused and sniffed again. “You’re so beautiful, Elizabeth!”

“Just Liz, Vera. I’m still just Liz… especially for you.”

Vera smiled at Liz lovingly. “For two months, I knew you only as a pretty little girl in a deep sleep who might never wake up. Then you woke up and you were a SWEET, pretty little girl who never complained about anything even though your legs… and even your arms, at first… were paralyzed, and I pushed you around in a wheelchair and fed you. But you refused to give up or ever feel sorry for yourself. Now look at you! You’re so… so all grown up and beautiful and… and you’re walking again. I can’t get over it.” Vera picked a napkin up off the table beside her and wiped her eyes with it.

“Aw, Vera…” Liz touched a hand to Vera’s cheek affectionately. “You had a lot to do with it. If I hadn’t had you when I needed you… I don’t know what might have become of me. You encouraged me. You never let me be sad. You took me for rides in the park in my wheelchair. And when Judge Lewis stole my diary and I started yelling for help, you came running ready to take him on all by yourself.”

Vera chuckled. “Your little friend, Alex, and Sheriff Jim got him first. Your little friend packs a pretty good punch for a little guy.”

Liz laughed. “Yeah. Alex is not so little, though, Vera. He’s getting married, too.”

“I know,” Vera said, attempting to nod while shaking her head at the same time. “But to me you’ll always be my children.”

“I think I like that,” Liz said, smiling.

Now in her early fifties, Vera never had children of her own. She had once planned to, but her fiancé died in Vietnam when they were both young, and she never found another that she could love the way she had loved him, so she became a nurse and dedicated herself to helping children who needed her. It provided a sense of fulfillment and an outlet for the nurturing soul inside her.

A short distance from Liz and Vera, Isabel sat in front of a mirror. She looked radiant. It had taken Isabel longer than the others to realize that going to Antar was what she really wanted, even though she would be leaving her parents for no one knew how long. But she knew that she would see them again in time. Max and Liz and Michael and Maria had already said that they were going. This left Isabel in the difficult position of having to make a choice… whether to go with them or stay with the parents she had come to love on the planet that she already felt was her home. It was the sudden realization that she could be happy anywhere… as long as it was with Alex… that changed her mind. She looked up at the stars then looked at Alex. Alex saw the change come over her face… and he knew. Without missing a beat, he merely asked if they could see Antar through the New Granolith’s observatory dome and how long it was going to take them to get there. It wasn’t necessary to say anything more. In some strange way, Alex didn’t have to say anything more… and neither did Isabel. They were going. It was as simple and plain to see as that. And there was one other thing that they didn’t have to say… They were going together, as a couple. Now, less than twenty-four hours later, Isabel sat in front of the mirror, in her wedding dress, carefully touching up her hair, as Diane Casey assisted her.

It was a testament to the Antarians’ technology… albeit the Antarians in another dimension… that tailor droids on the New Granolith were able to produce so many beautiful wedding dresses in a matter of less than twenty-four hours… and do it to the specifications and in the pattern that each bride had chosen. No one was complaining about the shortness of time to prepare, though. Everyone knew that within another twenty-four hours they might no longer be anywhere near earth; and Reverend Garrett, who had been asked onboard the ship on very short notice to officiate, was not expecting to make a trip to Antar.

As the girls put on their final touches, the door opened, and Tess looked in. Liz, Maria, Amy, and Isabel all looked like they were ready, and Tess smiled. “Everything’s a go, girls. It’s showtime… as soon as you’re ready.”

Liz looked at Tess and nodded. “I’m ready, Tess.” Liz walked toward the door, with Vera helping her with her gown. Maria followed with Amy, and Isabel and Diane followed Maria. The girls all managed somehow to crowd into the ascension chamber together, and Tess took the chamber from the third level up to the fifth level. There, the chamber stopped, and the door opened. An anti-grav sled was waiting for them. The sled had actually been designed for use by the harvester droids… to assist them in moving large quantities of vegetables, fruits, and sometimes other items around the ship, but it had been spruced up and shined, and seats had been added for the occasion. With everyone onboard, the sled moved off slowly down the trail through the gardens. A minute and a half later, the sled stopped, and Tess got off. Then she helped the others off.

“We wait here until they start to play ‘Here Comes The Bride.’ Then you will each march to the edge of the pond and stop in front of Reverend Garrett. Your escorts will be here any minute…”

As Tess spoke, Jeff Parker, Phillip Evans, Jim Valenti of Antar, and Rahn came up behind them. Tess turned and smiled.

“And here they are! You guys ready?”

“To marry off my daughter?” Jeff Parker asked. “No way! But she’d never forgive me if I didn’t now.” Jeff winked at Liz, and Liz smiled back. “I think we’re ready,” Jeff said.

Tess moved Jeff into position with his daughter, Liz, on his arm. Then she positioned Jim Valenti of Antar next to Maria, since Maria’s mother’s new husband, the younger Jim, who was Maria’s stepfather now, was getting married himself… to Amy. Jim and Amy were officially already married, of course, but Amy was keeping her promise to Maria… and besides, she wanted this herself. Tess then positioned Phillip Evans with his daughter, Isabel, and finally, she put Rahn with Amy and handed each girl her bouquet.

“I am to give you away,” Rahn said to Amy.

Amy smiled. “It’s an earth custom, Rahn. Somebody has to do it.”

“I know,” Rahn replied. “It is the same on Antar.”

“Really?”

Rahn nodded.

At that moment, everyone turned to look, as someone else appeared behind them on the path.

“Angie Lee?” Liz exclaimed, looking the new arrival over. Omigod! You’re… you’re getting married, too? …you and… and Kyle? That’s great! That’s so cool!”

Angie Lee grinned and nodded shyly. “Grandpa and I talked it over, and he understands. We have to do this.”

“Besides,” Gray Hawk said, walking up on the side and taking Angie Lee on his arm, if I don’t get them married and into their own place soon, I’ll never get to watch what I want to watch on my new TV that Michael got for me.”

Liz smiled, and everyone laughed.

“Kyle likes it, too, huh?” Maria asked.

Tess nodded. “Grandpa is taking this philosophically. He says he’s not losing a granddaughter, he’s gaining a TV.”

Everyone laughed again. Gray Hawk, who normally managed to appear stern and sober on any occasion, even cracked a small smile. He had actually grown fond of Kyle and enjoyed having him around, and Angie Lee was more than a guest to him, she was family. But he knew that that arrangement was not meant to continue… at least in his house. Angie Lee had to leave the nest. All of nature did it. Little birds spread their wings and felt the wind under them… and the next thing, they were jumping out of the nest. If they waited too long, the mama bird sometimes encouraged them with a little push. Gray Hawk knew nature well… and he respected it. He knew when the time had come, and he knew that it had.

Everyone looked up suddenly, as strains of “Here Comes The Bride” drifted through the air. Liz looked at her father and nodded, and Jeff swallowed and walked forward with Liz on his arm. As they rounded the corner and marched toward the waterfall, they saw people seated on both sides of the path around them. There were actually quite a few guests present considering the extremely short notice. Liz marched down the “aisle,” on her father’s arm, smiling radiantly; when she reached a point about half way to the waterfall, Maria began her walk on the arm of her stepfather’s double, Jim of Antar. She, too, was smiling radiantly, as were the others. Isabel followed, on her father’s arm, then Amy, on Rahn’s arm. Angie Lee marched down the aisle after Isabel, on Gray Hawk’s arm. Each bride started her walk when the one before her reached the half-way point.

Liz stopped beside Max, who was waiting for her, along with the other grooms, at the edge of the pond. She turned around and stood with him, facing the guests. Maria followed, taking her place beside a very dapper-looking Michael, then Isabel marched down the path to the edge of the pond and smiled at Alex, as she, too, turned to face the guests beside her future husband. Amy followed next, stopping and turning to face the guests with Jim, then Angie Lee marched down the aisle and stood with her future husband, Kyle, who had managed to slip into the lineup at the last moment before the brides’ march had started.

Liz glanced at Max and smiled, and Max smiled back at her. He looked so handsome all dressed up. The tux he wore fit him absolutely perfectly. But of course, it would have, since it was made for him. Liz thought that she had never seen Max look quite so handsome, which was saying a lot, because she had never seen him at any time when she thought he didn’t look handsome. It was just natural for him. He couldn’t help it. Max, for his part, had watched as Liz walked down the path, in absolute awe of her beauty… and something else. He had loved her when she could walk… and he had loved her when she couldn’t. But now, as she marched lightly, even gracefully, down the path toward him, her smile lighting up her face, he realized that the joy he was seeing in Liz was a reflection of her love for him… and every step she took became a step deeper into his heart.

Maria looked at Michael and felt exactly the same feeling that Liz felt toward Max. To Maria, Michael was too handsome to be legal. It made her heart leap knowing that Michael was hers and she was his… and soon, they would be joined in name as well as in heart and soul. Michael had never really opened his heart to anyone outside of his own little “alien” group… but that was before Maria. Maria was special… and never more so than right now, as she walked toward him down the “aisle,” looking more beautiful than he could ever have thought possible.

Alex had that special smile on his face and that sort of indefinable sparkle in his eye. It always got to Isabel right where she lived. She didn’t know why, exactly, but she couldn’t help it. It reduced her to jelly inside. What she couldn’t understand was that Alex worshipped her as the closest thing to a goddess that he had ever met. To Alex, just the fact that Isabel, who could have had any guy she ever wanted, had ever gone out with him at all was a miracle. That she was marrying him now was something he dared not even try to figure out. He might wake up and find out it was all a dream.

Jim was ruggedly handsome, and Amy had always been attracted to him… ever since as far back as she could remember… but the attraction had been mutual, too. Still, as fate or whatever would have it, they had both married someone else, and it hadn’t worked out. Now they were both getting a second chance at happiness together, and both of them knew that it was right.

Angie Lee didn’t know what it was that she liked about Kyle… maybe it was just everything… his good looks, his wit, the way he looked at her, the way he kissed her. One thing she did know, though… she wanted to spend the rest of her life with him. Kyle knew it and wanted it, too. As a fairly popular school jock, Kyle had been used to the girls gravitating toward him. He could have probably had almost any girl in school, and he knew it. But he didn’t want just any girl. At one time, he thought he wanted Liz. But her heart wound up being “alien-abducted.” Now he was actually glad. He hadn’t known Angie Lee then. Angie Lee was different than any other girl he had ever known. Angie Lee captured his heart the way Max captured Liz’s, but Kyle suspected that good old human hormones and feelings had more to do with it than any alien powers.

Reverend Garrett cleared his throat, as the sound of “Here Comes The Bride” suddenly stopped. He looked around at the brides and grooms and at the guests gathered in seats along the sides of the path. They were surrounded by roses and flowers of every imaginable type and color. In fact, some of the flowers in the New Granolith’s vast gardens may have actually been unimaginable. Reverend Garrett was certain that he had never seen some of them before. Behind him, a waterfall dropped over some large rocks, from a height of around fifteen feet, into a large, clear, sandy-bottomed pond that reached a depth of about thirty feet near the falls. All together, it was a beautiful picture… the serene, clear pond with its cascading waterfall behind him and the colorful flowers all around. The only thing missing from this idyllic picture seemed to be the bluebirds.

As Reverend Garrett looked around, he noticed that a pink-rose bush on his left and a red-rose bush on his right had, at some point while they were standing there, changed into pure white roses. Max just smiled.

After rubbing his eyes and looking again, Reverend Garrett decided that it was best not to question, and he raised the little ceremony book in his hands and addressed the guests…

“Dearly beloved, we are gathered today to celebrate the unions of these four… uh… five couples who have professed their eternal, undying love for each other and their desire to partake willingly and joyfully of the blessed rite of matrimony. Marriage, some would say, is a partnership. But it is much more than that. Truly, marriage takes what was once two and makes it henceforth and forever one. The five couples before me today are here to say… before God… and before all those present here in this… in this, uh… garden… that this is their wish. What God chooses to join together, let no man tear apart…

Maxwell Evans… do you take this woman, Elizabeth Parker, to be your lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, in sickness and in health, as long as you both shall live?”

“I do.”

“Elizabeth Parker, do you take this man, Maxwell Evans, to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, in sickness and in health, as long as you both shall live?”

“I do.”

“Who gives this woman away?”

“That would be me,” Jeff Parker said.

“Is there a ring?” Reverend Garrett asked.

“It’s okay,” Liz whispered to Max. “I know there wasn’t time.”

Max looked past Liz and made a nodding motion and a quiet whistle. Suddenly, there was a commotion in the gardens, and people began to whisper and gasp. From the other side of the pond, a very large cat… with two huge tusks… appeared and then trotted over to Max. It almost looked like it was smiling. Reverend Garrett took a couple of steps back and gave it plenty of room. Max reached down and looked at a collar around the cat’s neck, then he removed something from it. It was a small box. He opened it and removed two rings.

“Liz, I give you this ring as a symbol of my intentions… my intention to hold you forever here in my heart and my intention to make you my wife.” He slipped a diamond ring onto her finger. “And I give you this ring…” He slipped a gold band onto her finger. “As a symbol of my undying, eternal love.”

“Then by the power vested in me by the state of New Mexico and God above, I declare that you are husband and wife… You may kiss the bride,” Reverend Garrett said.

Max held Liz and kissed her, as Liz slipped one hand behind Max’s head and returned the kiss joyfully.

Reverend Garrett gave them a respectful amount of time and then ahem’d.

“Sorry, Max. There are others who want to be married today.”

Max nodded and smiled.

Reverend Garrett moved to Michael and Maria.

“Michael Guerin, do you take this woman, Maria DeLuca, to be your lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, in sickness and in health, as long as you both shall live?”

“Yeah, I do.”

“Maria DeLuca, do you take this man, Michael Guerin, to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, in sickness and in health, as long as you both shall live?”

“I do, too.”

“Who gives this woman away?”

“Me,” Jim of Antar said.

“Is there a ring?” Reverend Garrett asked, glancing at Jung-Jo cautiously and stepping back again just in case. Jung-Jo trotted over to Michael, and Michael removed a second small box from the collar. He opened it and removed two rings.

“Maria, I was nobody until I met you. You gave my life real meaning. Just as this diamond may once have been a piece of carbon, you changed me and made me better for it. I give you this ring so that you will always remember that you did that for me and I love you for it.” Michael slipped the diamond ring onto Maria’s finger. “And I give you this gold band so that you will always know that, just like this band is a circle and has no end, our love will have no end either.”

“Then by the power vested in me by the state of New Mexico and God above, I declare that you are husband and wife…” Reverend Garrett said. “You may kiss the bride.”

Maria smiled, as Michael took her in his arms and kissed her passionately. Reverend Garrett looked around for a few moments and took a deep breath, then he tapped lightly on Michael’s back.

“Ahem.”

Michael smiled at Maria as he released her, and she smiled back at him.

Reverend Garrett moved on…

“Alex Charles Whitman, do you take Isabel Amanda Evans to be your lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, in sickness and in health, as long as you both shall live?”

“I do.”

“Isabel Amanda Evans, do you take this man, Alex Charles Whitman, to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, in sickness and in health, as long as you both shall live?”

“I do.”

“Who gives this woman away?”

“I do,” Phillip Evans said.

“Is there a ring?” Reverend Garrett asked, stepping back without looking this time. Jung-Jo trotted gingerly over to Alex, and Alex smiled and patted him on the head then removed a third little box from the collar. He opened the box and removed the two rings.

He slipped the first ring onto Isabel’s finger. “Isabel, like the stars in the sky, let this ring always speak to you of our love, because as long as there are stars in the sky, my love for you will never die… and when there are no longer stars in the sky, my love for you will still shine on.” Alex slipped the band onto Isabel’s finger. “And this gold band is my heart. It has no beginning and no end. It just is… and so shall our love be… forever.”

Reverend Garrett smiled, then he realized that it was time for him to speak again.

“Then by the power vested in me by the state of New Mexico and God above, I pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss the bride.”

Alex kissed Isabel, and she kissed him back with passion.

Reverend Garrett moved next to Jim and Amy, and he suddenly realized who they were. Remembering the ceremony at the memorial, Reverend Garrett glanced at his book. “Will I, uh, be needing this,” he whispered.

Jim nodded and smiled. “We’re doing it the long way this time.”

Reverend Garrett nodded. “James Valenti, do you take this woman, Amy DeLuca Valenti, to be your lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, in sickness and in health, as long as you both shall live?”

“I do.”

“Amy DeLuca Valenti, do you take this man, James Valenti, to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, in sickness and in health, as long as you both shall live?”

“I do.”

“Who gives this woman away?”

“I believe I have that honor,” Rahn said proudly.

“Is there a ring?” Reverend Garrett asked.

Jung-Jo trotted over to Jim. Reverend Garrett forgot to step back this time, but then he realized that he felt safe enough right where he was. Apparently, this saber-tooth tiger… or whatever it was… was not afraid of him and did not show any signs of being aggressive. Jim reached down and looked at the collar around Jung-Jo’s neck, then he removed the fourth small box, the one with his name on it. He opened it and removed two rings.

“Amy, this is what I should have had the sense to give you a long time ago.” Jim slipped the diamond ring onto Amy’s finger. “And this gold band is pure and beautiful… and endless, like my love for you will be.” Jim slipped the band onto her finger.

“Then by the power vested in me by the state of New Mexico and God above, I declare that you are husband and wife… You may kiss the bride,” Reverend Garrett said.

Jim kissed Amy, and she kissed him back. Then Reverend Garrett moved to the final couple…

“Kyle Valenti, do you take this woman, Angie Lee, to be your lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, in sickness and in health, as long as you both shall live?”

“I do.”

“Angie Lee, do you take this man, Kyle Valenti, to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, in sickness and in health, as long as you both shall live?”

“I do.”

“Who gives this woman away?”

“I do,” Gray Hawk said sternly.

“Is there a ring?” Reverend Garrett asked.

Jung-Jo trotted over to Kyle, and Kyle removed the final box, which had been added to Jung-Jo’s collar at the last moment. Kyle opened the little box and removed the two rings from it.

“Angie Lee, this diamond ring is like my love. Like this diamond, my love for you is pure… in truth and in intentions.” He slipped the diamond ring onto her finger. “And this gold band will never tarnish. Just like my love for you, it will shine forever.” Kyle slipped the band onto Angie Lee’s finger.

“Then by the power vested in me by the state of New Mexico and the will of God above, I declare that you are husband and wife… You may kiss the bride,” Reverend Garrett said.

Kyle pressed Angie Lee to him and the two of them kissed each other passionately. Reverend Garrett watched for a few moments then shrugged, deciding that since there were no others to marry, he would let them be. Eventually, they had to come up… even if it was only for air.

Reverend Garrett looked at the big cat in front of him and reached out and patted it on the head…

“You make a pretty good best man. You didn’t lose a single ring.”

Jung-Jo turned his head and looked at Reverend Garrett, and the Reverend could have sworn that the cat smiled at him.



----------



After the ceremony, the newlyweds changed their clothes then joined the guests in the galley, which had been nicely decorated for the reception, considering the short time available. But the Antarian group had given it their best effort while their younger doubles had been choosing wedding dresses and rings and getting measured for tuxes. The droids onboard made the wedding dresses for the brides and the tuxes for the grooms. The individual grooms chose the rings they liked, which were then purchased from a local jeweler with funds mostly provided by Max from Antar. It was Antarian money, but the jeweler wasn’t complaining. It was gold… and probably collectible besides, due to its rarity.

Deputy David Cotter sauntered up to Jim and nodded. “I guess you were serious after all, huh, Jimbo! You’ve married Amy twice now! You think it finally took?”

Jim smiled. “It took the first time, Dave. This was something Amy wanted to do for Maria… and for her, too. The wedding at her memorial was legal, but you know… well… it’s the circumstances. She wanted to be able to say we planned it and didn’t back down.”

“Well, you didn’t back down, Jim. You’re married for sure!” David laughed.

“That’s okay, Dave… someone will catch you one of these days… then you’ll see what it’s all about.”

“No, no! Not me, Jimbo! I’m too much of a wildcat.”

“That didn’t keep me from lovin’ Jim,” Amy said, walking up behind Deputy Cotter at that moment. “In fact, it’s one of the things I like about him.”

Jim grinned. “There you go, Dave. See? Your days are numbered.”

Dave nodded good-naturedly. “Well… congratulations, Jim. I think you’re a lucky guy.”

“Thanks, Dave. Yeah… I am.”

Nearby, Jeff Parker hugged Liz and kissed her. “I’m gonna miss my little girl.”

Liz grinned. “Your little girl’s grown up now, Daddy. She’s already gone. But I’m here.”

“You’re still my little girl, Liz. You’re just… well… my grown up little girl now.”

Jeff turned to Max. “Be good to her, Max. Take good care of her.”

“I will.”

“I’ll give you the list when I’m finished making it,” Jeff added.

“List?”

“Yeah. All the things you promise to do to make sure my little girl stays happy.”

“Oh, Daddy!” Liz scolded. “Daddy’s kidding you, Max.”

Jeff shook his head, but Max smiled.

“Don’t worry, Mister Parker. I’ll make her happy.”

“He will, Daddy,” Liz added. “Trust me… I mean, him.” Then she turned to Max and kissed him. “You do, you know, Max.”

Phillip Evans walked over and congratulated Max then gave Liz a kiss on the cheek, then he struck up a conversation with Jeff. Max took advantage of the interruption to excuse himself and disappear… with Liz… over to where Michael was standing.

“What’s it like having a father-in-law now,” Michael asked, noticing Max talking with Jeff Parker.

“You should know.”

“No. I’ve only got a mother-in-law.”

“You’ve got Jim,” Max reminded him. “He’s your father-in-law now.”

Michael swallowed. Somehow that fact had not yet occurred to him.

“But Jim’s cool,” Max said. “He’s okay.”

Liz smiled and winked at Max. “Yeah, at least Jim probably won’t write up a list of things you have to do to keep Maria happy like Daddy says he’s going to give to Max.”

“Oh, Amy already did that,” Michael replied. “Did Mister Parker have you sign it, Max?”

“Sign it? No! It was a joke!”

“Amy made me sign it… in triplicate. She gave me one copy, She’s keeping a copy, and she’s putting a copy in a bank vault.”

Max started to chuckle then broke out laughing. “Amy would!”

“Well, I’m her only child,” Maria said, grinning impishly. “She’s just trying to look out for me.” Maria kissed Michael. “But I don’t need a copy, Michael. I know you’ll keep me happy.”

“Did Gray Hawk make a list of things you’re supposed to do to treat Angie Lee right,” Liz asked Kyle, who had just walked up. Kyle shook his head.

“He doesn’t need to. He knows I’ve seen his tomahawk.”

Angie Lee winked at Liz and smiled.

Max turned around, hearing someone call his name. Varec waved at him from the other side of the room, and Max from Antar was with him.

“We’d better see what they want, Max said. Michael nodded, and the two of them, together with Liz, Maria, Kyle, and Angie Lee, walked over to where Varec and Max of Antar were.

“There’s a transmission for all of us in my quarters. We need to take it in private. Follow me,” Max of Antar said. He turned and walked out of the galley, and the others followed.

“Alex and Isabel are on their way. I spoke to them right before I called you.”

“Who is it,” Michael asked.

“I don’t know yet. We all have to be there.”

The seven of them took the ascension chamber one floor up, to the living quarters on the third floor, then they walked to Max of Antar’s room. Liz and the other Antarian members of the group were already there. So were Alex and Isabel of their own group.

“What’s the big secret,” Michael asked his Antarian counterpart.

“Let’s find out,” Michael said, passing his hand over a sensor. The vidscreen came on.

“Eagle One!” Kyle whispered, using the caller’s code name.

The caller looked up at the screen. “Oh, good! I see you’re all here. First, I guess I should say, congratulations! I understand that there were some weddings on your ship today.”

“Yes, sir,” Max replied. “We invited you, but your staff said that you were tied up.”

“That’s true. Sorry I couldn’t make it. But I took the liberty of accepting the 9th Circuit Court’s offer for you.”

Max looked at Michael, and both of their mouths dropped open.

“I thought he was on our side,” Michael said to Max.

Max shrugged. “I thought so, too.”

“Here’s the deal,” Eagle One continued. “If you remember, I told you that I might be able to make lemonade out of some lemons you had been offered…”

“You said out of some lemons on the bench, I believe,” Michael corrected.

Eagle One smiled. “So I did. Anyway, I found the trump card I was looking for, so we can all have lemonade if we like… sweetened with plenty of sugar!”

Max looked at Michael, and Michael shrugged.

Eagle One continued. “Even though we could appeal to the Supreme Court if the 9th Circuit tried to illegally restrain your movements, that would take some time, and it was best to avoid a bad situation to start with, so I talked it over with General David Strickland, and we decided on a strategy that will make you impervious to any rulings that would attempt to legally or illegally restrain you. General Strickland has agreed to this. Both of you, Max Evans and Max of Antar, are as of this moment, majors in the U.S. Army.”

Michael looked at Max then at Eagle One. “I wasn’t planning on enlisting, sir. As you said, I may be leaving here soon anyway.”

Eagle One waved his hand dismissively and nodded. “I know. It’s alright. The two of you will be your own unit… wherever you go. It’ll be an undercover thing. Actually, you’ll be free to go wherever you please. It’s just a way to protect you from any hastily drawn up laws that wouldn’t be legal anyway to keep you here. No circuit court can make any law that would restrain the free movements of a special operative in the armed forces. They can’t touch you.”

“Do they know this,” Liz asked.

Eagle One smiled. “Not yet. I intend to tell them myself… right after they’ve given you the keys to the estate. It’s my little wedding present. Okay, it’s their little wedding present really, but that’s a technicality.”

“We, uh… we… appreciate it, sir,” Michael replied, “but if we’re leaving, we won’t be needing the estate.”

“Well, I was hoping that we might convince you to return sometime… of your own free will, of course. There are many of us here who really do appreciate you and want you here. And we certainly do owe you a lot. If you accept the offer, you will always have the estate in Montana to come to whenever you come back. It’s a very secure estate, and it’s in beautiful countryside. Most of us in this nation would love to see you take the estate and give us some hope that one day you may return… even if it’s only for a visit.”

“And the 9th Circuit?” Max asked.

Eagle One smiled. “They’ll get over it.”

“Sounds to me,” Liz said, “like their plan just hit a ‘Major’ snag… Major Max Evans, that is!”

Maria nodded. “Do I get to pick my own room?”

“There are thirty to pick from,” Eagle One said. “Pick two… heck, pick three or four. You’ve got thirty bedrooms, thirty baths, a guesthouse, horses… and acres and acres of private countryside and woodlands… Oh! And a river with lots of trout!”

Max smiled and looked at Michael again. “It is a beautiful estate.”

Michael nodded and looked at Maria. “Maybe we could spend a couple of nights there before we go, I guess. What’s a couple of more days? You think your mom will be impressed, Maria?”

“How could she not be?”

Michael smiled. “Yeah, right! How could she not be, right? I’m gonna take real good care of you, Maria! She’ll see!”



tbc

Coming up: After a relaxing six-day honeymoon in Montana, the group sets its sights on Antar, and the Antarian group makes plans to return home to their own dimension once their younger doubles are safely settled in on their Antar.

The Night The Dreams Died



The 9th Key Before Good-bye


Chapter 46

XLVI



“Whoa!” Michael said, pulling in the reins on his large black stallion. The younger of the two Michaels dismounted gracefully, as though he had been born for horseback riding. Then he gave his steed a couple of pats on the side, as the horse bent down to drink from the cool, clear waters of the river. Beside him, Max dismounted lightly from his own horse at the same time.

“Are you sure you guys never rode a horse before we came here,” Jim asked, agilely dismounting from his own horse, a large white stallion. “I never saw anyone take to riding the way you two have the last few days.”

Michael shrugged. “What’s so hard about it? You just sit there and pull the reins the way you want to go. The horse does all the work. You say ‘Whoa’ to stop and ‘Giddy-up’ to go. The only thing you’ve got to do is be able to sit there and not fall off.”

“Not everyone takes to it quite as easily as you and Max, though, Michael. You’re naturals.”

“Well, look at my double over there. He rides like a pro.”

“Yeah, well, he’s ridden before, though… on his planet. They have horses there, too. I think he told me they call them something else… and they look a little different… but they’re still basically horses… well, about like a zebra would be a horse. You know what I mean.”

“I haven’t fallen off yet,” Amy said, stepping easily onto the ground.

Jim smiled and raised his eyebrows, and Maria slid off of her own horse and shook her head with a grin. “You really ought to learn to ride a horse, though, Mom. Jim offered to teach you.”

“Yeah, I know.” Amy patted Jung-Jo on the head. “But I don’t have so far to fall if I fall off of Jung-Jo.”

Liz laughed and patted her own horse then rubbed its head. “Well, at least the horses are finally getting used to Jung-Jo. The first time you brought him out, all the horses headed for the hills… with us on them.”

“I said I was sorry about that, Liz. Who’d have known they’d be afraid of Jung-Jo!”

“Yeah, who’d have known,” Maria repeated, grinning and winking at Liz. “I thought horses and alien saber-tooth tigers were real pals.”

Amy puckered her lips and looked at Maria menacingly. “I know when I’m being made fun of, young lady. You’re not too big to be spanked, you know.”

“Yeah, right!” Maria laughed. “You’ve gotta catch me first.” Maria hopped back onto her horse and shook the reins. “Giddy-up!” The horse took off at a gallop toward the woods. Amy watched for a few seconds then climbed back onto Jung-Jo’s back, which was just high enough for Amy’s feet to be about two feet off the ground.

“Giddy-up, boy!”

Jung-Jo turned his head around and looked at Amy.

“You know what I mean! Go catch Maria! We can’t let her make fun of us like that. Come on!”

Jung-Jo trotted off toward the woods.

“Faster, Jung-Jo! You can do better than that! Maria will be all the way back to the house before we catch her at this rate.”

Jung-Jo picked up his speed… considerably. For a moment, Amy wondered if she’d made a mistake, but she really did want to catch up to Maria… so she leaned forward and held on tight. It was a competitive moment that might have over-reached just a tad, but Amy was kind of enjoying the breeze in her face and the seemingly effortless speed that the large cat was able to so easily attain. It was a smoother ride than a horse, she was pretty sure. Jung-Jo ran swiftly into the woods and down the trail that Maria had gone down, which led back toward the house. Within twenty seconds, Amy spotted Maria. Maria looked back and coaxed her horse to go faster, but Jung-Jo was still gaining on her fast. That’s when it happened…

The squirrel leapt out of the way of Maria’s horse then tried to cross the path again behind her, but Jung-Jo was closing the gap too swiftly. Unable to get out of the way quick enough, the frazzled squirrel leapt straight up, coming down on Jung-Jo’s head, leaping over Amy, then using Jung-Jo’s rear haunches as a sort of springboard to leap for the nearest tree and safety. It was something that Jung-Jo could not ignore.

The squirrel raced up the tree, probably moving faster than it had ever moved in its life, and Jung-Jo headed up the tree right behind it. Somehow, Amy managed to hang on for her life, her legs wrapped around Jung-Jo’s body and her arms around his neck.

The squirrel reached the top of the tree and, with its pursuer breathing hot breaths on its fluffy little tail, leapt to the top of the next nearest tree. Jung-Jo followed, sailing through the air as though he were endowed with invisible wings and a springboard. The squirrel leapt from that tree to another, then another, sailing rapidly from tree to tree, trying to shake the big cat, but Jung-Jo was always there, close enough to have grabbed it if he had tried hard enough.

At some point, Jung-Jo either tired of chasing the squirrel or became aware of Amy’s screams, because he paused on a large limb and looked back at his rider, who was now draped over his back tighter than a piece of Saran wrap around an apple. At about this time, Jim, Max, Michael, Liz, and Rahn rode up beneath the tree on their horses, followed closely by the Antarian group. They looked up at Jung-Jo, who was standing nimbly on a branch about fifty feet up, high in the tree.

“Amy, you’re supposed to stay on the path,” Jim yelled, seeing that she was unharmed.

Amy bristled a bit, but after a quick appraisal of her situation, she closed her eyes and buried her face in the long hair on Jung-Jo’s neck.

“Jim! Just get me down from here!”

“You want him to jump?”

“NO!” Amy yelled back. “Just… just… You can climb down… right, Jung-Jo? Nice kitty? You can do that, right? I’ll just keep my eyes closed till you’re back on the ground again.”

Jung-Jo seemed to understand. He dropped nimbly from branch to branch until he was close enough to the ground, then he leapt smoothly the rest of the way. Jim reached over and pried Amy loose from Jung-Jo’s back.

“You’ve got to let go, Amy… if you want to get off.”

“I want to get off,” Amy said in a hoarse whisper, “but I’m having a little trouble with the letting go part.

Jim pulled Amy loose then hugged her. “You’re okay. I’ve got you now.”

“Yeah, you’ve got me now, Jim… but where were you when I was leaping from tree to tree on that… that… giant, flying… tree frog?”

“Jung-Jo?”

“Whatever.”

“He wouldn’t have let you fall,” Michael of Antar said.

“That’s right,” Jim of Antar agreed. “Jung-Jo knew you were hanging on. If you had fallen, he would have grabbed you.”

“Oh, well, that’s just peachy to know, Michael! I’ll keep that in mind… but I’ll keep my feet on the ground from now on, thank you!”

“Sounds like a good plan to me,” Jim agreed.

“Jim?”

“Yeah?”

“Horses don’t climb trees, right?”

“Never.”

“I think I’m ready for you to teach me to ride a horse.”

Jim laughed. Amy looked at Jung-Jo, but then her look softened. “Oh, it’s alright, Jung-Jo. I understand. I just wasn’t made for that ‘Me Jane, you Tarzan, we swing through the trees’ stuff… You understand, right?”

Jung-Jo seemed to smile.



----------



Back at the house, after a dinner that consisted in part of trout that Jim and Max had caught in the river earlier that day, most of the couples migrated into the grand parlor to read, play games, or simply chill out and relax. Night was starting to fall, and they could hear the crickets chirping in the nearby woods through the open windows. Though it wasn’t winter, the evening air was unexpectedly cool, and Liz and Maria had started a fire in the fireplace. As Max and Michael walked into the room, the girls pulled them down next to them in front of the fire. Alex and Isabel and several others soon joined them. Everyone was totally enjoying the relaxed moment, and even with all the people who were there… including the doubles… the house was not at all crowded. The rooms were huge and airy, and the estate had a sort of unspoken charm and elegance to it. Plus… there was no shortage of places where a newlywed couple could find privacy, with all those rooms and all those acres around them plus the attics, the guest house, and who knew what else. In fact, Michael and Maria had already found a fair number of private places… for their own private knowledge only.

Looking around at everything again, Max smiled approvingly. “You know… I almost felt sorry for that judge when he gave us the keys and the deed and then found out what the president had done. ALMOST, that is… if I hadn’t known what they were planning for us.”

Michael glanced around the room. “Yeah! You were right, Max. It is a nice estate.”

“But if we had fallen for their plan, we would be their prisoners in here now…” Max sighed.

Michael nodded. “We got lucky.”

“I think it was a little more than luck, Michael,” Liz said. “You were smart enough to smell a trap and avoid it… and we had some help from someone in a position to help. And things just came together.” Liz looked around and smiled. “I’m going to like having this place. I hope we CAN come back… you know… now and then.”

“I think that can probably be arranged,” the younger Max agreed. “Once I’ve got my throne back and Antar is secure again.”

Max’s double from Antar grinned… “You’ll like the royal palace. If it’s like the one on our Antar, it’s even bigger than this estate. But I’ve got to admit, there’s something relaxing about this place. It’s bright and airy. I like it.”

“And Jim’s already started teaching me to ride a horse,” Amy said. “Michael’s right. It’s not so hard. You just have to remember ‘Giddy-up’ and ‘Whoa’ and be able to sit up straight without falling off.”

“Unless it’s a preacher’s horse,” Jim said.

Everyone looked at Jim, and Jim smiled craftily. “What? You never heard about the preacher’s horse?”

Amy shook her head. “I have a feeling you’re going to tell us, though.”

“Well… since you asked,” Jim said…

“You see, there was this country preacher who traded his horse in on a used car. ‘There’s just one thing you need to know about this horse,’ the preacher told the car dealer. ‘When you want to go, you have to say ‘Hallelujah,’ not ‘Giddy-up.’ And to stop, you have to say ‘Amen,’ not ‘Whoa.’

The car dealer nodded. ‘That doesn’t sound so hard.’ Deciding to test the horse out after the preacher was gone, the used car dealer climbed onto it and said ‘Hallelujah.’ The horse took off at a gallop. The car dealer then yelled ‘Amen,’ and the horse came to an abrupt stop. Starting to enjoy himself, the car dealer said ‘Hallelujah’ again, and the horse took off again. The car dealer rode the horse all the way through the town and into the countryside. After about thirty minutes, he noticed that he was riding toward a cliff. Alarmed, the car dealer yelled, ‘Whoa, horse!’ but the horse didn’t stop. Becoming more alarmed, the car dealer tried to remember what the preacher had said to say to make the horse stop. At the last second, he yelled, ‘AMEN!’ and the horse stopped… right at the edge of the cliff. The car dealer peered over the horse’s head at the long drop over the cliff, then he settled back into the saddle, wiped the sweat from his brow, and with a sigh of relief, said, ‘Hallelujah!’”

Liz and Maria groaned, and Amy threw a sofa pillow at Jim, but everyone laughed. It was one of those nights when everything was good. Life was good. Corny jokes were good. The hot chocolate and marshmallows were good… as long as you didn’t accidentally get one of the cups that was half filled with Tabasco sauce… or if you did, you were at least half Antarian. Liz looked at Max and smiled, and Max kissed her. Yep… life was very, very good.



----------



It is said that all good things must come to an end, but Liz knew otherwise. The memories made in the last six days would live on in her mind, and she was sure that the others felt the same. For six wonderful days, they had enjoyed the “honeymoon estate,” but they all knew instinctively that it was time to go. The younger Max and Michael were actually feeling drawn to Antar and couldn’t wait to set out. The group from the other dimension was anxious to return home to their own dimension, their own planet, and their own families. Even the younger Liz and Maria had to admit that they felt just a tinge of something drawing them into the stars. They would miss earth… and their parents especially… but they felt good knowing that they would see them again in time. They were married now. Alex and Kyle felt it, too. It was something that they couldn’t explain, but it was calling to them. Plus, it was an adventure… an adventure in a new life… with new partners. It just seemed so entirely “right” somehow. Gray Hawk had never had any doubts. The baby birds grow up, then they stretch their wings, then they fly away. Some just fly away further than others. But in the end, they make new nests with their own chosen mates… in new places. There was something familiar to it all, even in the vastness of galaxies and dimensions.

Appropriately, the parents had stayed in Roswell while the newlyweds enjoyed their honeymoon… except for Amy and Jim. Amy and Jim were newlyweds themselves, and the group never even considered not bringing them along. They all knew that Maria and Michael were resourceful enough to handle having them there… and, indeed, Maria and Michael had proved to be amply resourceful. In the end, it hadn’t been necessary, though, because Amy and Jim were more preoccupied with each other and with enjoying their own honeymoon than with interfering in Michael and Maria’s lives. Besides, for the first time, Amy knew that her baby really was all grown up now and deserved her happiness… and her privacy. Amy had allowed Maria and Michael that pleasure for six days, but today, Maria and Michael were leaving… and Amy and Jim were not. Today, Amy was once again a concerned mother.

And she was not alone… all the parents were there. They had come to say good-bye. Max and Liz had called them the day before to let them know that the time had come.

Now, with the New Granolith hovering in the sky above the estate, Amy hugged Maria one last time, sniffing and wiping tears from her eyes.

“I’m really going to miss you, baby. I don’t know how I’ll ever get by down here without you. I always thought you’d be… somewhere near… at least where I could call you now and then on the cell phone, you know?”

Maria looked at Michael, and Michael looked at Varec, who was standing nearby, waiting for the couples to join them on the ship. Varec shrugged slightly. “I don’t know. I guess it could be done. It would be kind of like what we did in our dimension to the FBI’s special unit with the cable TV thing. We could send a tiny light beam to earth, bouncing it off of different stars. I’d have to work out the problem of your phone company’s charging, though. We can’t charge it to the FBI’s special unit this time.”

Maria laughed and sniffed a couple of times. “Yeah, that would be some heavy-duty roaming charges!”

“You’ll work on that, though, won’t you,” Amy said to Varec.

Varec nodded. “I’ll see what I can do. I’ll try to arrange something… if I can… before we leave to go back to our dimension. Maybe, if my double is there on Antar in this dimension, I can get him to finish it for me.”

“I’ll hold you to that,” Amy said, giving Varec a kiss on the cheek. Then she looked at Michael. Michael prepared himself for Amy to tell him to take good care of Maria, treat her right, and make her happy… but Amy didn’t say it. Instead, she just kissed Michael on the cheek and hugged him.

“I will,” Michael said. Amy smiled.

Nearby, Jeff and Nancy Parker were taking turns hugging and kissing Liz and giving her all the fatherly and motherly advice they could think of before she left.

“I’ll be fine, Dad! You don’t need to worry. Max will take good care of me.”

Jeff touched Liz lightly on the nose… “Lizzie, Honey, worrying is a right that all parents are granted. I think it’s written on the back of your birth certificate or somewhere… and notarized.”

Standing beside Jeff, waiting for another turn to hug Isabel after Diane was finished with her, Phillip Evans nodded. “If it’s not, Jeff, I’ll have it added for you… legally.”

Jeff smiled. “See, Lizzie. We’re allowed to worry. It’s the law.”

Liz smiled and hugged her Dad again. “Well, okay, since it’s the law. But just remember that Max is taking good care of me. I’ll be fine. And I’ll be back. I don’t know when, but I will.”

“We’re counting on that,” Nancy said, kissing Liz again. “We’re totally counting on that.”

As Nancy spoke, not far away, Charles Whitman handed Alex his guitar. “I thought you might want this, son.”

Alex took the guitar and nodded. “You know me pretty well, Dad. Thanks!” Alex leaned the guitar against the wall and squeezed his Dad’s hand then hugged his Mom for several minutes.

“I’m gonna miss you guys. But I’ll think about you a lot. Somewhere out there in the stars, I’ll be playing my guitar and thinking about you.” Alex smiled and looked at Isabel then sneaked his arm around her and pulled her close. “Isabel and I will be thinking about you.”

Gloria smiled and touched Isabel on the cheek. “Take good care of my boy, Isabel. I know he’ll take good care of you.”

Isabel returned the smile and nodded. “I know he will, too, Mrs. Whitman. I will.”

“You can call me Mom now, Isabel. Mrs. Whitman sounds so formal, don’t you think?”

“Okay,” Isabel agreed… “Mom.”

Gloria smiled and looked at Charles. Charles kissed Isabel on the cheek then put his arm around Alex one final time. “You never liked me to do this, Alex, but I really need to put my arm around you and just hold you right now.”

“It’s okay, Dad, because I just realized… I really don’t mind anymore.” Alex put his arm around his dad then put the other one around him and hugged him.

On the other side of the room, Diane Evans finally managed to corner Max, who was busy getting everything and everyone ready to leave. She didn’t know it, but Max had actually allowed himself to be cornered. A big part of him wanted… even needed… to belong, though a small part of him still held out for total independence. Max, unlike his sister, Isabel, had never felt entirely a part of the Evans family. Max had a keen awareness of his own difference… his own unique destiny… his unknown life on his unknown world. But now more than ever… Max NEEDED to belong. Maybe it was because he was leaving. He suddenly realized what he had had… what his earth “parents” had given him… shelter, food, a real home, but most of all, unconditional love. It’s not that he hadn’t known this before… or even that he hadn’t appreciated it. It just had never really, truly registered. Not the way it did today.

Diane put her arms around Max and was surprised that he didn’t try to pull away. Instead, he looked at her… then he put both arms around her and hugged her back. Phillip placed his hand on Max’s back and smiled. “We’re going to miss you… Son.”

Max turned to face Phillip. “I’m going to miss you, too… Dad. You, too, Mom.”

Diane smiled. “I still keep thinking I’m probably going to wake up some morning and find out that this whole thing about my children being aliens… the space ship… everything… was just a crazy dream. What was it Ebenezer Scrooge said… or was it his partner, Bob Marley? ‘It may have all been just a piece of undigested pizza.’ You know what he meant, Max… a crazy dream.”

“Close enough,” Max said, laughing. “You know what… Mom? Sometimes I have the same feeling.” Max shook his head. “But it is real, Mom. All of it.”

“I know,” Diane said, giving him a final kiss. “I know.”

Nearby, Jim stood looking at his son, Kyle, and nodding.

“Well, son… I guess you’re really married now, huh?”

“Just as married as you and Amy, Dad.”

Jim nodded. “The two of you are really gonna do this? You’re going to Antar?”

“Yeah,” Kyle replied simply. “Angie Lee and I have to go. She needs to know where she came from, and I… well, I need to be with her.”

“Well I can’t say I’m tickled about your leaving, Kyle, but… I understand. You will be back someday, right?”

Kyle nodded. “You know it, Dad. Just keep watching the stars.”

“I’ll have to buy that telescope that old man Witherspoon was trying to sell. It’s supposed to be pretty good, he said.”

“I don’t think you’ll be able to see Antar with it, Dad. I don’t think any telescope is that good.”

“Not Antar, Kyle. The stars. One in particular. One that’ll be heading back towards earth after a long trip out in space.”

Kyle grinned and nodded. “Keep watching, Dad. You’ll see it. I promise.”

Jim smiled and put one arm around his son, pulling him close.

“Take care of yourself, Kyle… and take care of Angie Lee, too. I want to see you both back here again safe and sound someday.”

“I promise, Dad.”

Standing behind Angie Lee, Gray Hawk smiled and nodded at Jim. Then he reached one hand out to Angie Lee. She put her hand in his. Then she stepped forward and kissed him.

“I’ll think about you every day, Grandfather. Like Kyle said, look up at the stars. Just look up. I’ll be there.”

Gray Hawk nodded slowly. “Jim? Can I look through your telescope… sometimes?”

“Any time, Gray Hawk. We can watch together. Hey, we’re kind of related now!”

“Hm,” Gray Hawk muttered quietly. Jim wasn’t sure if that was good or bad, but then Gray Hawk smiled and nodded.

Max handed his father, Phillip Evans, the keys and the deed to the estate. “Dad… take care of these for us while we’re away, okay?”

Phillip nodded. “I’ll put them in the vault at my law office. They’ll be there waiting when you come back, Max.”

“I know,” Max said, then he smiled. “If you or any of the other parents would ever like to use this place… you know… for an occasional retreat or whatever…”

Phillip looked around and smiled. “Yeah… I just may do that, Max. Your mom and I could use a little get-away. She’s been after me forever to take her some place private… like this.” Phillip nodded. “We may at that. I’ll tell the others. That’s mighty generous of you, Max.”

“Naw. I just think somebody should get to enjoy it, since we won’t be here. And I can’t think of anyone better than you and Mom… and Jeff and all the other parents. Jim and Amy might want to come up here again sometime, too. But be sure you tell Amy to stay on the path this time. Galloping through the treetops isn’t allowed.”

Phillip looked at Max with a puzzled expression, and Max smiled. “It’s an inside joke. I’m sure she’ll be glad to tell you about it if you ask.”

Phillip nodded. “Normally, Max, I wouldn’t want to get Amy started on something that sounded like it might take a lot of explaining, but in this case… I’ll make an exception.”

A voice behind them made Max and Phillip turn around.

“Everything’s ready,” Varec said. “We can transfer everyone up as soon as you’re ready, Max.”

Max looked at Phillip then at the others and nodded. “Well, there’s no point in delaying. I think everyone is ready. We’ve all got our pins on.” He looked around and the others nodded their agreement.

“We’re ready, Varec.”

As Max turned around again, his mom kissed him. Then suddenly he was gone.

In the estate, the parents now stood alone. Their children had begun their new lives… and their greatest adventure… together.



tbc

The Night The Dreams Died



The Departure


Chapter 47

XLVII



Maria smiled in silence, as Michael wrapped her in his arms and rocked her; and both watched silently from the huge dome of the New Granolith’s observatory as the blue orb called “earth,” which had once been their home, grew ever and ever smaller. Nearby, Liz looked at Max, and Max smiled and hugged her. Liz sighed and leaned her head against Max’s chest. Beside them, Alex and Isabel held each other and wondered at what lay ahead, and Kyle and Angie Lee watched in awe, as the earth finally became just another distant star in the sky. It was a solemn moment for those who were leaving earth for the first time. The life that they had once known was ending, and a new one was beginning. Of course, some things would still be the same; they still had each other. But almost everything else would be new. New… and unknown. The thought was at once exciting and sobering. There wasn’t much to be said.

But if there was little to be said, there would soon be plenty to see. The couples discovered that they were fast approaching what appeared to be another planet. Liz recognized it right away. And perhaps surprisingly, Michael did, too…

“That’s Mars… the red planet,” Michael asserted authoritatively. “It has that reddish color, because the surface is full of iron oxide.”

Liz smiled and nodded but appeared surprised. “Yeah, that’s right! How did you know that?”

Michael gave Liz a sort of smirk. “I did attend class, you know… well, sometimes I did. I was there the day they talked about Mars. It looks just like the pictures. It’s one of earth’s two nearest planets… Mars… and Venus.”

Max had long ago noticed that Michael tended to absorb and remember anything that had to do with the stars and planets. Unfortunately, Michael did miss quite a few science classes, but the lectures he was present for, he could probably recite word for word… even now.

It had taken only twelve minutes for the New Granolith to travel the forty-eight and a half million miles to Mars, and that was at sub-galactic cruising speed, a small fraction of the speed that the New Granolith was capable of. Now, almost as quickly as Mars had appeared, it was disappearing again in the distance behind them, becoming a smaller and smaller reddish dot… then finally only a distant star, as the earth had done before it.

With earth and Mars no longer in sight, the group finally left the observatory and joined their Antarian doubles on the bridge of the control deck. The view from the bridge wasn’t quite the 360-degree view that the observatory had offered, but it was awesome nevertheless. The bridge had a very large partial surround window for the pilots to see through.

Approximately 342 million miles and just over forty minutes after passing Mars, the New Granolith found itself approaching another planet… Jupiter. And again, the younger Michael was the first to identify it…

“The largest planet of earth’s solar system… Jupiter. It lies 483.6 million miles from the sun and has an equatorial diameter of 88,729 miles, compared with earth, which lies 92.9 million miles from the sun and has an equatorial diameter of just 7,926 miles. It takes 11.86 earth years to make one Jupiter year.”

“I take it you were in class the day they talked about Jupiter,” Max said with a grin.

“I showed up for class when I wanted to,” Michael grinned back. “When the teachers were talking about something interesting, not something boring.”

“Like Ulysses?” Maria asked.

“Yeah… like Ulysses,” Michael replied, nodding. “Don’t knock it unless you’ve read it.”

“Michael, you’re special,” Isabel laughed. “You know so many insignificant little details about some things and you’re so totally clueless about others.”

“Like I said, don’t knock it,” Michael smirked. “Albert Einstein refused to memorize his own phone number, because he said it would take up space in his brain that he could better allocate to other things… and he could always look his phone number up in the phone book. I just save my brain space for more important things, like Einstein. Who needs to muck it up with a lot of boring crap like dissecting frogs or economic theories?”

Isabel laughed and nodded. “You may be onto something, Michael.”

“Well, I’ll tell you one thing,” Alex said. “They didn’t teach us that there were this many moons around Jupiter. I’ve already seen more than forty.”

“Yeah… There were supposed to be only fourteen according to our science book,” Michael agreed. “But I remember Mr. Munson saying that some new ones had been discovered since the book was written.”

“A lot of new ones apparently,” Alex agreed emphatically. “It’d be kind of cool to explore some of them, but they’re probably made up of hot poisonous gasses or something and we’d all die as soon as we stepped out of the ship.”

“Some of them may be,” Michael concurred.

Standing nearby, Liz from Antar looked at Max of Antar, and her mouth dropped open…

“Max… do you think…?”

Max didn’t need mind-reading abilities to guess what Liz was thinking.

“Well, this dimension has been like ours so far… mostly. It could be, I imagine.”

“What could be?” the younger Michael asked.

“It could be that there is a small moon that you can explore,” Michael’s Antarian double replied.

“Well, I was thinking of something else,” Liz said breathlessly, looking at Michael then back at her Max for support.

“The spheres?” Max asked.

Liz nodded. “They could be there, Max. It would solve so many of their problems. I know I couldn’t use our spheres in this dimension, but if this dimension has its own spheres…”

Max appeared to think about it for a moment. “Yeah… it would solve some problems alright… and they just could be there. There’s only one way to find out, though.”

Max looked at Varec. “Varec, do we have any oxygen pills left onboard?”

“I can make some. It would take about an hour.”

“Good. Make them,” Max agreed. “I think we have a little moonwalk ahead of us.”



----------


The New Granolith sailed into Jupiter’s gravity field… past moon after moon of different sizes and consistencies, slicing through clouds of colored gasses and brilliant shifting lights. After twenty-seven minutes of searching, the ship hovered over one moon, one that was quite small but looked comparatively benign and inviting. Max brought the ship down and set it firmly on solid ground. Then he smiled…

“Welcome to ‘Michael’s Moon.’”

Thirty minutes later, Max lowered the ramp from the cargo bay, and the “moonwalkers” started their long trek down the ramp to the surface. Alex checked his breathing. He wasn’t. The fact is, the little moon had only a very tiny amount of breathable air on it… not enough to sustain life as we know it. But more importantly, its atmosphere was not poisoned or injurious to life as we know it either. The difference in the oxygen needed… in fact, all of the oxygen needed… was supplied directly into the bloodstream by the two time-released oxygen pills Varec had given each of them ten minutes before opening the cargo doors. These pills would last for several hours. This meant that the body had no reason or need to breathe, so it simply stopped. For the most part, not breathing wasn’t very noticeable unless one thought about it. The urge to breathe is brought on normally by the build up of carbon dioxide in the blood as oxygen levels become depleted. With oxygen being continuously supplied, however, there was no CO2 build up; and therefore, no urge to breathe.

The younger couples walked down the ramp first… though perhaps ‘bounced’ would be a better description. Maria and Liz took great pleasure in leapfrogging over each other as soon as they felt the extra spring in their steps brought on by the light gravity. Pretty soon, everyone else was leaping and bouncing with them. They discovered that it was possible to jump twenty or thirty feet high and forty or fifty feet forward with very little effort. For the moment, though, no one was quite brave enough to test the limits of the moon’s gravity. In the back of each one’s mind was the thought that possibly… just possibly… they might jump too high and not come back down again… simply float away into space. It wouldn’t have happened, but no one present wanted to find out. Max allowed the newer moonwalkers to jump and bounce around like this for about ten minutes, enjoying themselves in their new surroundings, before setting about business and gathering everyone together for the trek they were about to make.

The Antarian group knew this moon well. They called it “Michael’s Moon.” Michael of Antar found this moon in the other dimension. He proposed to Maria on this moon. And… he found the diamond that he later had set in Maria’s engagement ring on this moon. He still did not know that the diamond he found, and that Maria now wore, was the “crystal” that Maya, JoLeesa, and Andya’s space skimmer had lost over 12,000 years before, stranding them on this tiny moon and starting a saga in Antarian history that was only discovered when Maya’s diary and pictures… and the all-important spheres… were found in a cave on this moon and brought back to Antar. The Antarians in the group had every reason to believe that if historic events unfolded the same way in this dimension as in theirs, the spheres might be on this moon, too, in this dimension. It was an exciting thought.

“Michael’s Moon” had a total circumference of only two miles, so the other side was only about a mile away, and the New Granolith disappeared very quickly over the horizon as the group walked and bounced along toward the lost cave, led by Max and Michael of Antar.

In more than one way, the younger couples were reliving what their Antarian counterparts had gone through before them in their dimension…

“You know what, Max,” Liz said, turning to Max as they walked, “You make me feel like I’m on top of the moon!”

Max smiled. “Yeah. Me too. And we really are, huh?”

“I remember the first time you let me see inside your thoughts so that I wouldn’t be afraid. I saw what you felt… what you REALLY felt… about me. I couldn’t believe you thought I was beautiful… Me! Liz Parker! …Small town girl from nowhere! Now look… I’m Mrs. Liz Parker Evans… happiest girl in the… in the whole universe!”

Max grinned. “Well, I did have to get killed and have my DNA brought all the way across seven galaxies to find you… but it was worth it! I’d do it all again…”

“Would you?”

Max nodded. “In a heartbeat!”

Liz looked at Max and beamed; then she kissed him.

“Our Michael proposed to Maria right over here… by this rock,” Max of Antar explained to the group. “We call this ‘Make Out Lane.’ I’ll let you figure out why.”

“And over on that side of the moon,” Michael said, pointing in the direction of Jupiter, “there’s a rock that Max and Liz sat on watching Jupiter. We call it the ‘Kissing Stone.’ Anyone want to guess how that one got named?”

The younger Maria smiled and kissed her Michael. Then Michael pulled her down onto the rock beside him.

“Maybe I can’t propose to you here, Maria, since we’re married already, but we can, you know, consolidate our love again here.”

Kyle grinned impishly. “Well, if you ask me, I think you guys should wait and get a room, myself.”

Michael kissed Maria then looked at Kyle. “Don’t get your hopes up, Kyle. We’re not giving away the lessons you need here. You’re still gonna have to get Angie Lee to show you how.”

“Oh, like you think I don’t know?” Kyle retorted.

Michael smiled but said nothing.

“I know!” Kyle said emphatically.

“He does,” Angie Lee said, vouching for him. “He knows. He figured it out.”

Kyle turned several shades of red. “Let’s talk about something else, okay?”

Michael grinned. “Whatever.” Then he kissed Maria again. When they opened their eyes, after a few minutes, Michael turned Maria’s hand over and placed something in it. She opened her hand to look. It was a large uncut diamond.

“Where did you get this?” Maria gasped.

“I found it back there by some rocks and picked it up when we were walking here. I know you’ve already got a diamond ring, but we can have this one set for you as a kind of, you know, remembrance about our time here on this moon. It can be our moon, too.”

Maria wrapped her arms tightly around Michael and kissed him passionately. With the pills Varec had given them, breathing wouldn’t be necessary.

Max knew what this place meant to Michael and Maria, so he made no attempt to rush them. Besides, he and Liz would want to visit their own special site before they left this moon. It faced the huge planet of Jupiter. The view was awesome… and to Max and Liz, very romantic.

Soon, however, the group was once again on its way to the cave; and after a short ten minute walk, they were there. The cave was hidden from view in a small depression that might easily have been missed or overlooked. It was a coincidence that Jim Valenti and Kyle had found it while exploring the moon in the other dimension.

Turning on their lights, the couples followed Max and Michael into the shaft that led downward deep into the interior of the small moon. The depth of the cave inside the moon had probably been all that had saved fifteen-year-old Maya, Andya, and JoLeesa from being killed 12,000 years before when their little moon, the smaller and closer of earth’s two moons at that time, was hit by a meteor that knocked it out of earth’s orbit and sent it floating off into space to eventually be captured by the gravity of Jupiter. Unable to return to earth after the meteor strike, because their space skimmer had lost one of its crystals and didn’t have enough power to counter the forces of the rapidly decaying and increasingly irregular orbit of their little moon, the girls eventually found themselves on a frightening ride through space that they believed would end in their deaths. It almost did… except for the intervention of an unexpected rescuer, Shaqor Niseel, the young prince from a distant planet called Xarius, who was on a trip with his father and grandfather to another part of the galaxy when they found the girls. That might have been the end of it, but as fate would have it, these three girls were much more important than anyone at the time knew; and their lives would prove to be intertwined with those of our heroes, especially Liz.

The group walked deeper and deeper down into the shaft of the cave. About half a mile into the little moon, the shaft suddenly opened up into a huge and very high room. This had been Maya, Andya, and JoLeesa’s secret hideaway, where they had been when the meteor struck. Max, Michael, Liz, Maria, and the other Antarians in the group looked around the huge room. It was exactly as they remembered it in their own dimension. Would the spheres be here, too? Did Maya, Andya, and JoLeesa, in this dimension, ever come to this little moon? Did they find this cave and make it their special hideaway? Did they ever even come to earth in this dimension 12,000 years before with their parents, who were xenobiologists learning about animal life on distant planets? If everything happened… only if everything happened… then maybe…

Liz of Antar walked over to the far wall of the huge room and ran her hand over the wall. She wasn’t sure of the exact spot where the hidden niche had been cut into the wall, but she tried to feel it. Anyone else would not have been able to… it had been sealed by 12,000 years of time. There were no longer any cracks around the opening. It was a solid wall.

Liz’s hand stopped over one spot on the wall…

“I think… this may be it. I’m not sure.”

Michael and Max began to dig and probe around the area, searching for an interior crack line around the secret niche in the solid stone wall. They soon found the crack. It was there. After several minutes, they had retraced the original cutout area around the secret compartment, then they removed the piece that served as the door. Max reached into the wall and carefully removed an old book, Maya’s second diary. He placed it into a sealable container that they had brought from the ship just for this purpose. The diary was fragile. The pages could not be opened until they could be reconditioned on Antar. Any attempt to open them now would destroy the diary… it would literally crumble into dust. The special container would keep it safe until it could be reconditioned.

Max reached in again and took out another object. This one looked like a baby’s bracelet, but it was unusually ornate and beautiful. Reaching in again, Max found a third item. It was a beautiful box made of something that looked like oak, but it wasn’t the slightest bit deteriorated. They opened the box. Inside were four smooth, round balls that looked like steel but were much lighter. Each was slightly smaller than a golf ball, and each one sat cradled in its own special holder in the box.

“Bingo!” Michael said, as Max of Antar handed the box to the younger Liz, his wife’s double from this dimension.

“I believe these are yours, Liz.”

Liz looked at Max curiously but took the box in her hands.

“It’s beautiful… but what is it, Max?”

“You’ll see.”

Max reached into the box and took out one of the spheres. He placed it in Liz’s hand and took the box back to hold it for her.

“Speak to it, Liz.”

Liz looked at Max and smiled warily. “What am I supposed to say? It’s just a steel ball.”

“Ask it what it does.”

Liz looked at Max again, and her smile faded, turning into stunned seriousness.

She looked at the sphere… “What… what is your function?”

At first, the sphere seemed to do nothing at all, but then it began to glow with a bluish aura and floated out of Liz’s hand. Liz stepped back automatically but then slowly edged forward again. That’s when the sphere spoke.

“I am the sphere of location. My function is to locate.”

“Locate… what?”

“Anything that you wish to find or that you have lost.”

“You can tell me where anything is?”

“I can.”

Liz was unsure what she should say and finally just whispered, “Okay… Thank you.”

The sphere settled back into Liz’s hand. Max replaced it in its compartment in the box and handed Liz another sphere.

“Ask it.”

Liz held the sphere up. “What do you do?”

The second sphere began to glow almost immediately with a greenish aura then floated out of Liz’s hand.

“I am the sphere of visions. I will show you anything that you wish to see.”

“You can show me anything… like what?”

“Anything you wish.”

“Can you… show me… my dad and mom… right now?”

The room shimmered, and a vision appeared. Liz clearly saw her parents, who at that moment, were flying back to Roswell from Montana. Liz swallowed in amazement. She looked at the image for several moments and reached out with her hand as though to touch it, but it wasn’t really there. It was a vision. Liz started to reach for the sphere to place it back in the box, but something in the look on her mom’s face made her stop. Then she saw it on her dad’s face, too. It scared her. It wasn’t right. Suddenly, the plane pitched to one side, and to her horror, the people on it began to be tossed around wildly.

“What’s the matter?” Liz cried. “What’s happening to them?”

“I cannot answer that,” the sphere replied. “It is unknown to me. I merely see.”

Liz watched in near panic as the plane began to plunge downward. She barely noticed Max of Antar holding the third of the four spheres.

“Try this one, Liz.”

“Max! This is no time!”

“Try this one. Now!”

Liz held the sphere in her hand.

“Ask it if it is the sphere of protection, Liz.”

“Are you?” Liz asked.

The sphere rose from her hand and glowed with an amber glow. “I am the sphere of protection.”

Liz didn’t need any further prodding. “Can you help the people on that plane? What’s happening to it?”

As Liz watched, the plane leveled out again and began to fly smoothly. The passengers, who appeared to have been suddenly and unexpectedly thrown around, settled back into their seats. Bags from the bins above had fallen out into the aisles.

“They will arrive safely.”

“How did you…? What did you…?” Liz stammered.

“There was an explosion on the craft. It lost parts.”

“What parts?”

“The tail… and a wing.”

Liz gasped then looked again at the vision. Somehow, the plane was flying… with one wing and no tail.

“It will arrive safely,” the sphere repeated.

“What are you?” Liz asked. “What kind of power am I being given?”

“The power that Shaqor Niseel gave to MayaSabriena. I belonged to Shaqor Niseel. I was given to MayaSabriena to protect her. I answer only to her now… or to her rightful heir and descendent.”

“Descendent?” Liz repeated. “You mean… then… I’m…”

“You are.”

“Omigod,” Liz said softly. “I didn’t know.”

Liz placed the sphere of protection back into the box. “Will the plane be okay if I place you back in your box?”

“Yes.”

Liz wiped her eyes and took one last look at the vision then replaced the sphere of visions in its holder in the box, too. There was one sphere left. Liz removed it from the box and held it in her hand.

“What is your function?” she asked shakily.

The sphere glowed with a pure white aura and floated from Liz’s hand.

“I am the sphere of the portal.”

“Portal? Like… a door? To where?”

“Anywhere you wish to go.”

Liz paused for a moment. “Can you… can you put me on that airplane… with my parents?”

“No.”

Liz closed her eyes and sighed heavily.

“But I can open a portal for you to go through. You will be where you wish to go.”

“On that plane?”

“If that is your wish.”

“It is!”

As soon as Liz said this, something that looked like a wall of smooth water appeared in front of her. She touched it, and it rippled. Then she swallowed hard and stepped directly into it… disappearing.

Liz looked around her. People were crying. Jeff looked stunned as he held Nancy and tried to reassure her. He could see that the wing was gone on his side of the plane. Only a tiny stub remained… certainly not enough to fly with. Jeff knew this for a fact. How could he explain this even to himself… much less to anyone else? As he wondered about it, a hand touched him on the shoulder. Turning around, Jeff saw Liz standing there. She smiled.

“It’s going to be okay, Dad. Everything is going to be okay.”

Nancy looked up at her daughter and gasped. “Omigod! Liz? How…?”

Liz kissed her mom on the cheek. “Never mind how, mom. Just believe me. It’s going to be okay.”

Nancy nodded and wiped the tears off her face with Jeff’s sleeve.

Liz looked around the plane at the other passengers and smiled at them reassuringly. “It’s going to be okay. The plane will land safely. Everyone’s going to be okay.”

A woman in the seat beside her pulled on Liz’s sleeve, and Liz turned around to look at her.

“Are you an angel?”

Liz smiled but didn’t answer. The portal reappeared at that moment, and Liz stepped through it.

The woman leaned over toward Jeff. “That was an angel.”

Jeff nodded and smiled. “I know.”

Twenty minutes later, the plane landed. Those who were willing to continue on were placed on another plane, as mechanics and officials began to pour all over the damaged craft, shaking their heads in stunned amazement and looking over and again at the pilot as though he were at the very least Superman.

An officer patted the pilot on the back. “You had to have had some divine help with this one, Ken!”

“It was an angel,” the lady said, walking up behind them. “We had an angel on our plane.”

Back in the cave again, Liz placed the sphere gently back into its cradle in the mysterious box.

Max of Antar smiled and handed Liz the box back. “I guess you can visit your parents whenever you want to now. We need to find the original diary and the camera first, though. They should be over there in that corner of the cave somewhere. Then we need to be on our way to Antar.”

“There’s something I need to do before we go,” Liz said. “Can the sphere of the portal go into the past?”

“Actually… I did that once,” Liz of Antar said. “It can go into the past, but it doesn’t work interdimensionally.”

“Can the sphere of visions see into the past?”

Liz of Antar nodded.

“Good. Then I need to go somewhere,” the younger Liz said.

“Go where?” Max asked.

“Actually, WE need to go somewhere,” Liz corrected.

“We?”

Liz nodded.

Max looked at Liz questioningly… “Where?”

“Vietnam… August 18th… 1966… 5:05 PM… their time… Long Tan, northeast of Ba Ria, Phuoc Tuy Province. There’ll be a heavy thunderstorm, so we’ll need raincoats… and the sphere of protection.”

For several moments, no one spoke. There was only a stunned silence in the cave.



tbc

The Night The Dreams Died



An Angel’s Mission


Chapter 48

XLVIII



Max, Michael, Isabel, and even Maria were looking at Liz as though she had just lost all grip on reality. In fact, that was pretty much the essence of what Michael said when he finally spoke…

“Did I hear you right, Liz? Viet Nam… in the ‘60’s? There was a war going on then! Even I know that! Going back to be in that war would not be my idea of a good time!”

Liz shook her head. “Maybe we won’t have to fight. I’m not suggesting we stay there for any length of time or that we change history or anything… for the most part.”

“Okay, Liz,” Maria said cautiously, “When you say ‘for the most part,’ that just makes me think that you do intend to do something like changing history or something. You can’t go back and change a war, Liz. It would be… It would be… well, I don’t know what, but it just shouldn’t be done.”

“I’m not going to change anything… much. Just one little bitty thing.”

Everyone stared at Liz, waiting for an explanation. Liz swallowed and nodded.

“You remember Vera… my nurse… and what happened to…”

Max understood immediately. “My God, Liz… You want to find her fiancé?”

“Why not, Max? We can do it! We can go back there and warn him right before he got killed. We know where he was and when and how it happened. All we have to do is stop it. We can bring him back here to Vera.”

“But won’t that cause problems,” Kyle asked. “I mean… Vera will be… what… fifty something and her fiancé will be like nineteen or whatever. There’s kind of a generation gap there.”

Liz deflated for a moment with a groan, but her mind had an answer almost before the air was out of her lungs.

“It’s not a problem, Kyle. We’ll just SAVE him. He can return to Vera in their time. They’ll both be the same age then. They can get married… have a family… and live happily ever after.”

“And she’ll never be your nurse,” Kyle said, thinking about all the possible consequences.

“That’s right,” Alex agreed. “Vera may have been responsible for you surviving while you were in a coma. If your dad had got someone else to be your nurse… maybe someone who was secretly on the FBI’s payroll… or just someone who didn’t care as much as Vera did… you might not be here now. You could cease to exist, Liz. I’m not saying you WILL, but you could.”

Liz closed her eyes for a moment and nodded. “Vera’s not the only reason I’m still alive… but she’s certainly a very big reason. And you’re right. If I break ANY of the links in the chain…”

“You could die,” Kyle said somewhat bluntly, but Liz understood… Kyle, like Alex, was only being concerned for her safety. It was a major conundrum. If Vera married her fiancé in their time, she would never become Liz’s nurse. That was almost a given. And that might mean disaster for Liz. On the other hand, bringing Vera’s fiancé to her in the present time would, as Kyle pointed out, be awkward because of the age differences. She would be old enough to be his mother at the very least. Liz sighed deeply, frustrated but not defeated. She refused to be defeated. This was simply too important to her, and she was not going to let it go so easily.

“It’s possible there may be another way,” the Liz from Antar said, turning to her Max. “Max, you remember in our dimension when you and Michael went back to earth and back in time to rescue Maria, Isabel, and me and you met your younger doubles in the past? You wound up merging together with your doubles after you left earth. It happened to you and Michael… and later to Kyle… Maybe Vera would, too…”

“Yeah, I know what you’re saying,” Max agreed, “but it might not work the way you’re thinking. Her younger self would probably merge with her older self and she would just be the older Vera that we know now.”

“But she might be younger after they merged,” Liz insisted. “I think you were.”

Max smiled. He always thought that he had felt younger after the merge with his younger self, but the difference in age between the younger Max and himself then had not been very great. He was actually somewhat surprised to learn now that Liz thought he had seemed younger afterwards… even if it could only have been by a few years.

Max shook his head, then he looked at Varec.

“Don’t ask me,” Varec said quickly. “I don’t have any idea. My guess would be that if the Vera from this time and the Vera from that time got together in the same timeline they would become one in the older Vera’s body… but that might not happen until their timelines crossed. In other words, there might be two Veras for thirty years or more… until time returned to the present year. Then they would become one. That is what happened to you, Max… and to Michael and Kyle. You became one after your timelines crossed… when you were returning to your own time in the New Granolith.”

“This is so confusing,” the younger Liz groaned. “Why can’t it be simple? I just want to give something back to Vera after all she’s done for me.”

The younger Max put both arms around Liz and hugged her, gently wiping a tear off of Liz’s cheek with his thumb and kissing her. “We understand, Liz. We’ll figure something out.” Max’s Antarian double nodded in agreement.

Liz steeled her resolve and looked around her at everyone there. “We’ll take Vera back with us to the past. Then we’ll find her younger double in that time. We can figure out how to get them together later. We go save Andrew first.”

Kyle raised his eyebrows and smiled ever so slightly. “Are they going to share him, Liz… or will one be his mother and the other one his wife?”

“I’ve made up my mind, Kyle. You can’t change it.”

“What if Vera doesn’t want to do it?”

Liz stopped for a moment in her tracks. “I… I never thought of that. Of course she’ll want to do it. She loved him.”

“But does she still love him… that much,” Kyle asked.

Liz nodded. “Vera doesn’t know that I know it, but sometimes when she’s napping, she has dreams… about him… about back then.” Tears started to flow down Liz’s cheeks. “She never married, you know.”

Kyle nodded. “I’m… I’m sorry, Liz. I didn’t mean to…”

“It’s okay,” Liz said, wiping the tears away. “We’re going to fix it.”

In the cave, there was only silence. No one was going to disagree.

Liz took the sphere of the portal out of the box and held it up in front of her.

“Does anyone here not want to go along?”

“What? And be left here on this little moon?” Alex asked with a smile and a twinkle in his eye. “I’m volunteering for service, Liz.” The others all nodded. “Me, too,” Kyle agreed. “I’m with you.”

“We’re all with you,” Maria said. “Let’s go save Andy’s cute butt.”

There was a bit of laughter, then Liz raised the sphere. “Take us to the ship’s bridge, please.” Instantaneously, the friends found themselves back on the bridge of the New Granolith.

“Now can you take our ship and all of us back to earth?” Liz asked, holding the sphere up again.

“It is done,” the sphere answered. Everyone turned and looked out the window to find that the ship was sitting directly over Roswell.

“Holy…” Michael muttered. “That was fast!”

Liz held the sphere up again, but Michael interrupted…

“Uh, Liz… just a note of caution here… from personal experience. Use the sphere of visions first to see where she is and what she’s doing. Popping in on people suddenly and unexpectedly can be… well… surprising. I know. I did a lot of travel recently using our Liz’s spheres. And another thing… be very specific about where you want to go. Generalities sometimes lead to some unpleasant surprises. The sphere can’t read your mind. And I think that one sphere, the portal one, has kind of a warped sense of humor. At least ours does.”

Liz nodded and picked up the sphere of visions. “Show me Vera, please.”

In the mist, Liz saw Vera cleaning the counter in her kitchen. Liz put the sphere of visions back in the box and took the sphere of the portal out again. “Take me to Vera… please.”

A smooth, mirror-like apparition appeared in front of Liz. She stepped into it and disappeared, leaving momentary ripples in the air before the apparition disappeared, too, behind her.

Vera turned around to pick up a brush just in time to see Liz step out of thin air. In her surprise, she dropped the brush. Liz picked it up and handed it back to her.

“Oh, my goodness! Where did you come from, Liz? You weren’t there just a minute ago.”

Liz smiled. “I’m sorry, Vera. I didn’t mean to startle you. It’s a little bit of a long story. We were on our way to Max’s planet… you know, Antar… when we found these spheres that can take me instantly anywhere I want to go.”

“Something from your husband’s planet?” Vera asked. “I could use one of those.”

“I don’t think they came from his planet. But you can use mine, Vera. There’s something I really wanted to ask you, though. I mean… I know the answer, but… well, I need to ask you. It’s kind of… unusual.”

Vera smiled. “With you, Liz, almost everything has been unusual. I’ve learned to expect it. What is it you want to ask me?”

“If you could… if you could go back in time… and change something in your past…”

Vera gasped, and her eyes began to well up with tears.

“You’re… you’re not thinking what I think you’re thinking, are you, Liz?”

“If you’re thinking that what I’m thinking about is changing what happened on August 18, 1966… Yeah.”

Vera opened her mouth but nothing came out.

“I’ll give you time to think about it,” Liz said.

Vera shook her head. “I don’t need to think about it, Liz. I’m just… too stunned to know what to say. Of course I would do it. I would march into hell to get Andrew back… even just for one day.”

Liz closed her eyes for a moment. “We may be marching into hell… in a very real way, Vera. I’ve kind of read some things about Long Tan since I met you… the battle, the rubber tree plantation and all. It WAS a kind of hell.”

Vera nodded. “What do I need to do, Liz? I’m ready.”

Liz held up the sphere, and it floated from her hand, glowing with a pure white glow. “Take us to the ship, please,” Liz asked politely. Then, remembering Michael’s admonition, she added, “…to the bridge… on the New Granolith.”

The mirror-like wall of smooth, watery ether appeared. Liz took Vera by the hand and they stepped through it together.

The other Liz’s sphere in the other dimension had never caused Liz any trouble whatsoever, but for unknown reasons, it seemed to take a perverse delight in playing games with Michael. It never did anything that would harm him, but it did teach him very quickly the benefits of being specific… very specific. Michael had once asked to be taken to someone, and that person happened to be in a boat on a river. He didn’t specify that he wanted to be in the boat with this person, and he wound up in the river. He had always imagined that the sphere was laughing silently as he climbed into the boat, soaking wet, but he knew that it could just as well have been totally innocent. After all, the sphere could not have known that he wanted to be IN the boat. And it did take him to the person he requested. There had been other incidents, too. But it had never done anything like that to Liz. And as far as Michael knew, it had never done anything like that to Diane either, and she had used the sphere extensively, with Liz’s blessing, to travel back and forth from Antar to earth with her husband, Dan Klein. Still, Michael felt that it was only fair to warn the younger Liz. It might prevent some embarrassing or awkward moments for her. During Michael’s travels, another Liz had once used the sphere to find Michael and had wound up popping in on him when he was standing in the men’s room of a restaurant on earth; but again, the embarrassed party then had been mostly him. Liz had taken it totally in stride. He always wondered how the sphere knew and just what it had against him.

On the bridge of the New Granolith, the portal opened and Liz and Vera stepped out. Vera looked around at her new surroundings. She recognized them. She had been on the bridge before, including the day of Liz’s wedding.

“Where are we… your ship, I mean? Did we go to Antar?”

Liz laughed. “No. But I guess we could have. The ship is back over Roswell right now.”

“That was incredible, Liz! We just walked into that… whatever it was and came out in a whole different place. You think I could get one of these things?”

“I don’t think there are any more, Vera. I don’t know. But you can use mine anytime you want.”

“You’re sweet, Liz. But I was only joking. If I popped into a store or some other public place out of thin air I’d have more explaining to do than I could handle.”

“It CAN be hard to explain,” Michael agreed.

“Okay, let’s make a plan,” Liz said, determined and anxious to get down to the task at hand. “I think Max and Michael and I should go through the portal, find Andrew, and bring him back here to the ship.”

“It might be better to let the portal take the new Granolith there,” Max of Antar said. “Our Michael and I can then go down and find Andrew.”

“Not without me,” Liz said. Max knew better than anyone not to argue with the younger Liz. She was, after all, his wife’s double.

“This is something that our group needs to do,” Liz said to Max of Antar. “Why don’t you and your group stay on the ship and protect us from up here. You know the ship and its systems better than we do.”

Max nodded. “I don’t like letting you walk into danger like that, though, Liz.”

“I’ll have the sphere of protection… and you up here protecting me.”

Max couldn’t argue with that, but he still felt uneasy about Liz going into danger with only the younger Max and Michael with her… and the sphere. Then again… with the sphere in their possession, they might have better protection than the ones left on the ship. Max wasn’t really worried about the ship, though. It had plenty of stealth systems and protective devices. It wouldn’t even be seen by anyone on the ground.

“Alright. The three of you can go… with the sphere of protection. We’ll watch from the ship.”

Liz smiled and raised the sphere of the portal in her hand. “Take this ship and everyone in it to Long Tan in Vietnam, please… and back in time to August 18, 1966… about 5 o’clock PM. Leave the ship in the sky above the area where the battle is going on. It’s a rubber plantation.”

There was a short pause of about six seconds before the sphere spoke. “It is done.”

Silence came over the bridge, as everyone looked out the huge anterior window. There was a flash of lightning, then another. Rain was falling in torrents all around them. It was impossible to see the ground… or anything else for that matter… through the window. The clouds were dark and hung low in the sky.

“We came out in the middle of a friggin’ hurricane,” Michael exclaimed.

“It’s not a hurricane,” Liz said. “It’s just a bad thunderstorm. We’re going to need some raingear.”

Max of Antar hurried to get some protective, waterproof gear from the New Granolith’s supply room for the younger Max, Michael, and Liz. Each of them put it on. Then Liz held up the sphere of the portal. She paused, then put it down and picked up the sphere of visions. It floated from her hand, glowing with a greenish glow.

“Show me Andrew McClane please,” Liz said.

A mist appeared, and in it they saw a young man crouched behind a small rise with some others. He was soaked from the rain, and his hair hung down over his forehead. He was wearing a military outfit and carrying a rifle, but he had no specific raingear.

Vera reached out as though to touch him, but it was only a vision.

“Is that him,” Isabel asked. “He looks a lot like Michael.”

“I was just thinking the same thing,” Alex said.

“He doesn’t look like Michael to me,” Maria said. “Well… maybe just a little bit, but Michael has kind of a… I don’t know what… a different… something.”

Vera smiled at Maria and nodded. “I was thinking the same thing about Andrew.”

“Well, he could be Michael’s brother easily,” Angie Lee said. “I see a lot of resemblance. And he’s cute.”

“Now that I’ll agree with,” Vera said, smiling.

Liz held the sphere of protection up, and it floated from her hand, glowing with an amber glow.

“Please provide protection for Max, Michael, and me while we rescue Andrew.” Then she held up the sphere of the portal. “Please take Max, Michael, and me to Andrew.”

The mirror-like wall appeared, and Liz stepped through it, followed quickly by Max and Michael. As she stepped out, a tremendous thunderclap exploded and a bright flash momentarily blinded her. Then something hit her hard. Liz tumbled to the ground, rolling from the force of the hit. She came to rest on her back, looking into a face that did look eerily, though not exactly, like Michael’s.

“By jingoes, girl! You could ‘ave got yer’self killed out there! Where in the name of God did you come from? You don’t belong ‘ere! It’s London to a brick that no digger that didn’t ‘ave kangaroos loose in the top paddock would be waltzin’ Matilda out there in the rain with mortars bein’ shot at ‘im… or her… as the case may be.” He looked Liz over. “Are you with the nurses unit? ‘ow did you get out ‘ere anyway?”

Liz stared into the young man’s face, too stunned to speak.

“I ‘ad t’ grab you kinda hard t’ pull you t’ safety. Sorry ‘bout that ‘n’ all. I ‘ope yer not hurt.”

Liz shook her head. At that moment, two more people jumped into the pit behind the small rise. It was Max and Michael.

“Are you alright, Liz,” Max asked, breathless and clearly worried.

“Yeah… I’m fine. I wasn’t hurt. I’ll be okay. It just… surprised me. That’s all.”

Andrew nodded. “No worries. She’ll be apples. Where did you blokes come from? You’re no’ with D Company.”

“Why are you talking like that crocodile guy,” Michael asked, ignoring Andrew’s question.

“W’at crocodile bloke, mate?” Andrew asked.

“Oh wait, forget that.” Michael shook his head. “He probably hasn’t been born yet… or he’s still a baby or a little kid.”

Andrew stared at Michael for a moment then nodded. “Shell shock. You’ve gone drongo. It ‘appens, mate. We can get you fixed up when we get back to the base at Nui Dat… if we get back.”

“Well, that’s kind of why we’re here,” Liz said. “You won’t be going back to the base, Andrew.”

“’ow do you know my name? What do you mean, I wo’ be goin’ back?”

Liz took a deep breath. “This is going to sound crazy, I know, but we’re not exactly from around here.”

“Well, I Know yer no’ from our regiment. You talk funny.”

“You’re the one who talks funny,” Michael said. “Are you Australian or what?”

“Aussie, mate… from Oz… fair dinkum! We all are,” Andrew replied. “Down Under… The Lucky Country… Don’t you know that?”

Michael shook his head. “I didn’t know any Australians fought in Viet Nam. Or was Viet Nam an Australian thing in this dimension?”

“Yer worse shocked than I thought,” Andrew said. “Or did you get yer ‘ead clocked, too? Here, le’ me see.”

Michael pulled back. “There’s nothing wrong with my head. The Viet Nam war was between the United States and the Viet Cong and some other Vietnamese.”

Andrew nodded. “Charlie’s out there. “Who do you think’s lobbing those mortars at us?”

“Charlie?”

“The VC… Viet Cong. Don’t you remember anything, mate?”

“Oh… yeah.”

Liz nodded. “Michael, this is D Company, 6th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment. They were here, too. They’re our allies.”

“No joke? I never knew… I mean, I knew you were our allies, but… I never knew you fought in Viet Nam.”

“Fight!” Andrew said. “Present tense, mate! We’re in the figh’ right now! ‘ow do you think yer ‘ead got hurt?”

“My head didn’t get hurt,” Michael insisted. “I’m just from the future.”

Andrew smiled. “It’s okay, mate. I’ve been there.”

“To the future?”

“No. ‘ad me ‘ead clocked.”

“My head is just fine!” Michael insisted emphatically.

“Good onya, mate! Keep sayin’ that. It’ll ‘elp you get well in a tic.”

“Andrew,” Liz said, interrupting him, as she ducked down to stay under the merciless barrage of automatic weapons fire and mortar shells coming from the trees not far away. D Company seemed to be surrounded. Andrew took the occasion to fire off several shots in the direction the mortars had come from then settled back behind his bluff to reload.

“Andrew, we came to get you,” Liz said. “We’re taking you out of here… to Vera.”

Andrew turned and looked at Liz with a shocked look. “You know Vera?”

Liz nodded.

“Well… I… I don’t know how you know Vera, but I’m no’ leavin’ ‘ere. I’ve got me mates to think of. I’ve got me country to think of. Sixteen of me mates ‘ave carked it already today. They need me righ’ now more than ever. I canno’ just abandon them.”

“I know,” Liz said, touching Andrew on the shoulder. “But you can’t stay, Andrew. You’re going to… you’re going to… get killed.”

“’ow would you know that?”

“Michael told you… we’re from the future. We know everything that happened here… everything that’s going to happen here.”

Andrew looked at Liz, and a look of concern came over his face.

“How many of me mates will die today, then… if you really know these things?”

“Seventeen from D Company die… and one from the 1st APC Squadron… before B Company comes to your aid and together you finish off the enemy out there.”

“Ah, well, you see then! One more of me mates is still going to cark it. ‘e’ll need me. ‘ow can I leave now even if you are what you say you are?”

A thunderous explosion suddenly came from a stand of rubber trees in the distance, and Andrew glimpsed a flash of light heading in their direction. He shoved Liz down hard to protect her and leapt from his knoll, his rifle blazing, knowing that they were directly in the path of the oncoming mortar shell. But there was no time to escape. Perhaps he hoped against all odds to shoot it out of the air, as impossible as that would have been; but whatever motivated him, time suddenly just stopped. The mortar shell, which had been screaming toward him, suddenly hovered still and silent in the air only six feet away. Andrew looked around. None of his mates were moving. Time just seemed to have come to a standstill… but not, it would seem, for everyone.

Liz stood up, then Max and Michael stood up with her, and they walked to where Andrew stood. Andrew turned and looked at the mortar shell hanging in the air. He reached out and touched it. It made him shiver. He tried to pull it out of the air, but it wouldn’t budge. It was locked in time. Andrew turned and looked at Liz again…

“I’ve… I’ve touched death. Who are you? Did you do this?”

Liz nodded. “Seventeen, Andrew. Seventeen die here today from your company. Sixteen have died already…”

It began to dawn on Andrew what Liz was saying. “You mean… I’m the one.” Andrew touched the mortar shell again. “It’s coming for me, isn’t it?”

Liz nodded.

“I’m number seventeen.”

Liz nodded.

“My God… What should I do?”

“You’ve already given your country and your mates all that you have to give, Andrew… all but one thing.”

“My life?”

Liz nodded again. “There is nothing more that you have to give them… nothing more that you CAN give them. But you can live. You and Vera can live… together. Do you love her?”

“What kind of question is that? Of course I love her! I would die a thousand deaths for her!

“Then will you live for her?”

Andrew looked at the mortar shell suspended in time again then back at his mates. The mortar shell was heading directly where he had been crouched behind his small ridge. Sixteen of his company had died already today. If he did not die, sixteen would be the final tally… at least, the real final tally. Who could tell what the records would say if he should disappear. But if he refused to go, the real final tally would be seventeen of his company killed there that day. Andrew nodded.

“I’ll go with you.”

Liz smiled and raised her hand. She opened her fingers, and the sphere of the portal floated up, glowing with a pure white glow in the falling rain that was frozen in time around them like everything else.

“Please take Max, Michael, Andrew, and me to the bridge of the New Granolith.”

A shimmering, mirror-like essence appeared in front of them. Liz held out her hand to Andrew, and he took it, then she stepped into the portal. Andrew stepped through after her, still holding onto her hand. Max and Michael followed them through immediately, as behind them, time suddenly resumed. One second later, a huge explosion blew a twenty-foot wide crater in the ground behind the ridge that Andrew had been using for protection. When the others searched for him later, there was nothing to be found. That day, the records recorded seventeen deaths from D Company at Long Tan.

On the bridge of the New Granolith, it was another story. Life was being celebrated… the life of one Andrew McClane, a 19-year-old Aussie “digger” whose time had finally NOT come.

Standing nearby, Vera smiled from ear to ear, but she knew that it was not the time yet. No one knew when the right time would be, but that didn’t much matter right now. Andrew was alive! Andrew looked around at the smiling faces on the bridge. He looked at the instruments, the huge anterior window, and all the strange things that were almost unimaginable to his mind. And he looked at Vera.

“You look like someone I know.”

Vera smiled. “Who would that be?”

Andrew shook his head. “I… I’m no’ sure. You look quite a bit like… my Vera… only older. Beg yours, an’ I ‘ope you don’t mind me sayin’ so, but for someone… you know… older ‘n’ all… you’re somethin’ of a spunk. I guess it’s ‘cause you look like my Vera.”

Vera grinned. “It’s probably coincidence. A lot of people tell me I look like someone they know.”

Vera knew that her younger double was alive in this timeline. Andrew would… indeed should… go to her. Vera wasn’t sure where this would leave her, but she felt in her heart that it was the right thing. She was old enough to be his mother… almost old enough to be his grandmother. It would have to be enough, hard as it was for her heart, to just know, for now, that he was alive and safe.

Andrew yawned. “I didn’t realize how nackered I am. Do you think I could push up some zeds… just for a few tics?”

Liz looked at Vera.

“He’d like to take a short nap. He’s exhausted,” Vera said.

Liz smiled. Max answered for them. “I’ll show you to a room. Will you be interested in eating with us later?”

“Reckon, mate! I don’t require much sleep. An hour or two will be sufficient. I am a bit hungry. All I’ve ‘ad today was a dingo’s breakfast.”

“What’s a dingo’s breakfast,” Alex asked.

Andrew smiled wearily. “A yawn, a leak, and a lookaround… nothin’ t’ eat… no brekkie. Like a dingo wakin’ up, you know.”

Alex laughed.

Max led Andrew to the ascension chamber then to a room on the 3rd level, where the living chambers were.

“I’ll have someone give you a holler when it’s time for dinner, Andrew. We eat in about three hours.”

Andrew nodded wearily and smiled then thanked Max and closed the door. Meanwhile, on the bridge, Liz was laying plans to get the younger Vera from this timeline onboard with her future self and Andrew.

“Liz, what happened down there,” Michael asked. “I saw you get knocked down on the ground when you stepped out of the portal. I thought the sphere of protection was supposed to protect you.”

Liz nodded. “I guess it did. Andrew wasn’t trying to hurt me; he was trying to save me. He didn’t know that I had the sphere to protect me. I expect the sphere knew that he wasn’t a danger to me. Anyway, I wasn’t hurt. And when that mortar shell was fired, the sphere stopped time so that we could escape. It did its job, I’d say.”

“Yeah… I guess it did at that,” Michael agreed. “You never told me that Vera’s fiancé was Australian. How did she ever meet him?”

“Vera grew up in Australia, Michael.”

“She doesn’t talk like him. She talks like us.”

“She’s lived in Roswell for more than thirty years… since shortly after Andrew was killed. She learned to talk the way we do. She was born in Roswell, though. Her parents moved to Australia when she was four.”

“Oh.”

“Michael, tell Max when he comes back that I’ve gone to get Vera… the one from this timeline.”

Without waiting for any argument or opposition, Liz held up the sphere of the portal. “Please take me to wherever Vera Simpson is… the one from this timeline.”

The portal appeared, and Liz immediately stepped through it. She stepped out on a beach on the Australian coast. Not far away, a young woman about Liz’s own age lay on the sand under the shade of a small bluff. Liz approached her and looked at her. She was quite pretty… and young. Liz knew in her heart that this was Vera. Noticing someone standing there, the young woman looked up…

“Hi!”

Liz smiled. “Hi! I’m Liz.”

“I’m Vera. Glad t’ know ya.”

“Can I sit down?”

“Sure. Help yourself. Are you American? You don’t sound like an Aussie.”

“Yeah,” Liz replied with a smile.

“Me, too. But I’ve lived here all my life almost… since I was four. Where you from? What state?”

“New Mexico.”

“Yeah? Me, too! My parents were from New Mexico. I was born there, but now I’m a fair dinkum Ozzie… that’s Aussie to you,” Vera laughed. “A dinky-di. That means the genuine item here in the Down Under… The Down Under, that’s Australia, the Lucky Country, Oz… You know, Ozzie… Oz. We have a lot of groovy slang in Oz.”

“Don’t I know it,” Liz agreed, nodding.

“Are you new here, Liz?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, you’ll learn to understand Strine… that’s Australian… if you’re here long. It grows on ya.”

Liz nodded. “I know. I’m getting quite an education already, believe me.”

Vera laughed.

“Why did you come Down Under, Liz? Are you on vaca… you know, vacation… holiday?”

“No, not really. I sort of have some business here.”

“Ooh! Business! You look a little young to be a bizzo! What do you do?”

“Ummmm… you wouldn’t believe me, Vera.”

“Try me.”

“Okay. I’m going to be the new queen… on my husband’s planet. He’s the king there.”

Vera giggled. “You’re right. I don’t believe you. But you’ve got a nice fantasy life! Why are you really here?”

Liz looked Vera straight in the eyes… “for Andrew.”

Vera was quiet for several seconds, then she rolled over to face Liz directly.

“What do you know about Andrew? Andrew’s my fiancé. I think you should know that. He’s not interested in other girls, Liz. He loves me… and I love him. When he finishes his time in Vietnam we’re getting married.”

“Oh, I didn’t mean… don’t get me wrong, Vera… I don’t want to take Andrew away from you.”

Vera seemed to relax, then she smiled. “It’s okay, Liz. I’m sorry. I’m just a worrier these days with Andrew away in war ‘n’ all. I know he’ll come back to me, but… I worry about him all the time. You know?”

Liz nodded. “I know.”

Vera looked at Liz again, and a serious expression came over her face. “Tell me again how it is you know Andrew, Liz. Did you meet him somewhere? It must have been before he went to war, of course.”

Liz took a deep breath. “Vera, I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell you that ever since I got here… and I still don’t know how. I think the best thing would be if I just show you.”

Liz took out the sphere of the portal. Vera sat up and looked at it curiously. “What is that?”

“You’ll see,” Liz replied. The sphere began to glow with a pure white glow and floated out of Liz’s hand. Vera gasped in surprise.

“Please take Vera and me to the bridge of the New Granolith,” Liz said softly. Almost instantaneously, the portal appeared. Vera jumped up and backed away reflexively but then edged cautiously toward the apparition to have a look at the mirror-like, ethereal surface hanging almost invisibly in the air. She touched it with one finger and it rippled.

“Liz?”

“Come on. I’ll explain it to you, Vera… on the other side.” Liz held out her hand, and Vera, eyes wide, took it hesitantly and stepped through the portal with Liz. She wasn’t sure why she did it. It might have been pure curiosity. It might have been because, for some reason that she didn’t yet understand, she trusted Liz. It might have been because Liz invoked Andrew’s name. But whatever it was, Vera knew immediately that she had taken a fateful step. When they stepped out of the portal, they were no longer on the beach. In fact, Vera was pretty sure that they were no longer even in Australia. She looked around, in a state of something between awe and shock. She looked at the control panels, the window… the town below.

“Where ARE we, Liz? That’s not Oz down there.”

Liz smiled. “No, it’s not, Dorothy.”

“Huh? Oh, right!”

Liz laughed. “And that’s not Kansas down there, either, Vera. We’re in a spaceship. Right now we’re over Roswell, New Mexico.”

Vera nodded. “That’d be right! So those stories are all true then… about Roswell, I mean?”

“Well… actually… kinda… yeah,” Liz admitted.

Vera stared out the window at the town below. “So you really are… going to be a queen on your husband’s planet?”

Liz nodded. “If everything goes right.”

“You married an alien?”

Liz smiled. “I guess so. But he hides his antennas under a hat, and he keeps his third eye closed whenever he’s around me so I won’t feel weird… especially when we’re making love.”

“Crikey!”

Liz giggled. “I’m teasing. He looks just like us. Actually, he’s part human… and VERY cute. You’ll meet him… as soon as he gets back to the bridge.”

“Oh, well… who cares if he’s an alien, I reckon… so long as he’s a spunk,” Vera said with a wink.

“That’s right,” Liz nodded emphatically. “And he’s definitely a spunk. That does mean he’s a cute guy, right?”

“Too Right. A guy… or a girl, either one. A good looker.”

“That’s what I thought.”

As they spoke, Michael, Max, and the older Vera came into the room. Seeing Michael, the younger Vera gasped. Then she immediately relaxed again.

“Oh, you’re no’… Just for a tic, I thought you were…”

“Andrew?” Liz asked softly.

“’ow did you know? Oh, right! You knew Andrew.”

“I’ve been told… by some people… that there’s a resemblance,” Liz said.

“Well… now that I look at ‘im, not so much,” Vera insisted. “Maybe… in the hair… and the eyes… and the build… generally speaking. But he isn’t Andrew.”

“That’s what I told them,” Maria said, walking in on the conversation and taking Michael by the arm. “This is Michael. He’s my husband. I’m Maria. I take it you must be Vera?”

“Glad to meet ya,” Vera said, smiling.

“And this is my husband, Max,” Liz said, indicating Max, who was standing beside her now.

“Oh! The three-eyed bunyip,” Vera said with a grin. “Glad to meet ya, too. So you’re His Nibs, huh?”

“Bunyip?” Max asked.

“Yeah, that’s a sort of mythological monster that inhabits the billabongs,” Vera said.

Max looked at Liz, and Liz smiled.

“What does ‘His Nibs’ mean,” Max asked.

“The boss. The big bloke at the top. You know,” Vera replied.

Michael chuckled. “Yep! That’s His Nibs alright!”

Max gave Michael a stern look, and Michael chuckled to himself, obviously enjoying it very much.

“Actually,” Vera said, “Liz was quite right!”

“I’m a three-eyed… what-is-it… bunyip?” Max asked.

“No. You’re a spunk.”

“I can’t wait to find out what that is,” Max said.

“It’s a good looker. A real cute bloke… or girl.”

Max smiled. “For a three-eyed billabong monster, you mean?”

Liz giggled and kissed Max. “For the guy I married and love more than anything in the world or the whole universe! The three-eyed monster thing was a joke. But as for the spunk part, I’m sticking to that.”

Max smiled. He knew Liz had been teasing. And he would have loved her even if he had been a three-eyed bunyip. Fortunately for everyone, he wasn’t.

Vera walked over to her older double. “I don’t believe I met you yet. I’m Vera. You remind me a bit of me mum… She’s… well…”

“I know,” the older Vera said, “Both of your parents… when you were fifteen. You’ve lived with an aunt since they died in the boat accident.”

“You know a lot about me!” Vera said, unsure how to take it and feeling just a bit offended.

“The older Vera smiled and nodded. “I know about your aunt, too.”

The younger Vera stared at her older double. “ ‘ow could you know that? What do you know?”

“She’s… well, I don’t like to say it, because she did give you a place to live and food to eat, even if it was the leftovers… but she isn’t the nicest person in the Lucky Country.”

“No… she isn’t,” the younger Vera agreed. “But like you said, she gave me a roof and tea. Not very willingly, I guess, but she was me dad’s sister. Then again, she wasn’t his real sister, though. She was adopted, so she wasn’t related, you know, by blood.”

“But your grandparents gave her a good home and love and everything they gave their other children,” the older Vera said. “She should have given you that much.”

“It’s no’ important,” the younger Vera said. “I can make it on me own. Besides, when Andrew returns, ‘e’s taking me away. We’re goin’ t’ be married.”

The older Vera nodded understandingly. “I thought that once… But then my fiancé died in the war and didn’t come back… and I left my aunt’s house one night in the middle of the night and went to America. You know, she never even looked for me. I could have been dead. I think she was just happy that I was gone.”

“Sounds like my aunt,” the younger Vera said, beginning to show a great affection and affinity for the older woman. “We share so much in common.” She put one arm around the older woman to comfort her and smiled through misty eyes. “I’m so sorry about your fiancé! I feel like… I know you somehow. We’re both so very much alike the two of us.”

“Yes… we are… and maybe you do,” the older Vera said, “…better than you think.”

“How do you mean?”

“I mean that… I am you, Vera… only about thirty-eight years in the future. I came back in time to find you… and Andrew.”

For several moments, the younger Vera stood motionless and silent, staring at the older woman. In some way, she knew that what the older woman had said was true. Then her mind shifted to Andrew.

“Oh, God! Andrew! What you’re sayin’ then… Andrew never… never came home from the war? No! Don’t tell me that! Tell me he’s okay! Tell me he’s alive! Please!”

“I’m okay.”

The words came from the entrance to the bridge room. The young Vera spun around quickly, recognizing the voice. In less time than it took to blink once, she was in his arms.

“Oh, God, Andrew! I was afraid you mi’ not come back to me.”

Andrew held Vera tightly and soothed her, running his hands up and down her back and arms, kissing her, hugging her, caressing her.

“You know what the hardest thing was bein’ away at war, Vera? Not bein’ able to ge’ a good pash from me fiancée, that’s what.”

Vera nodded and took his face in both of her hands lovingly. “I’ll make up for it, Andy.” Then she kissed him… long and passionately.

“That’s a pash,” the older Vera said, smiling. Liz smiled back and raised her eyebrows. Angie Lee was fanning her face with her hand. Maria was just grinning.

But Liz realized that, for one person present, at least, the present situation might be unexpectedly torturous, despite the happy face that was being put on. Certainly, the older Vera… the very one Liz had hoped to help in the first place… could not possibly NOT be conflicted, at the very least, as she watched her younger double kiss her former fiancé, unable to touch him herself… unable to tell him that she loved him… unable to rejoice with him at his being alive. It was a situation that Liz hoped to correct as soon as possible. But how to do it was still uncertain, and even more uncertain was the question of whether or not any actions they took now would have the desired effect.

Liz looked at the woman who had been a nurse and a friend to her and suddenly felt a deep feeling of sympathy for her. Vera recognized it immediately.

“Oh, Liz… Don’t be sorry. I knew from the start that this wasn’t going to be easy. But it’s okay. The important thing is we got Andrew back alive and safe. Even if I never get to hold him… just that he’s alive… and happy… that by itself makes it all worthwhile to me.”

“But you deserve to get him back, Vera. He’s your fiancé!”

“He’s HER fiancé, Liz. Look at them. It’s the right thing for them.”

“But… but, Vera…”

“No, now don’t give me any ‘buts,’ Liz! Besides, remember that she is me… and I am her thirty-eight years from now. You see, Liz, I figure that in thirty-eight years her memories will be my memories, too. If I have to wait that long, well… I’ve waited that long already. I guess I can wait another thirty-eight years.”

“No.” Liz shook her head emphatically. “No, that’s not the way it’s going to be, Vera. It’s just not…”

While they were talking, Liz hadn’t noticed that Andrew had walked over to her and the older Vera. He was still holding the younger Vera by the hand. The older Vera smiled at them, and Andrew returned the smile…

“I heard you talking when I was coming in. I don’t completely understand what I heard, but I know now why you looked so familiar to me… and… well… why I felt… attracted to you… in spite of our ages. I don’t know how all this happened, but I do know who you are. Did you think I would never figure it out, Vera? How could I not? You’re a beautiful woman. You’re beautiful young… and you’re still beautiful older. You’ll be beautiful fifty years from now to me… if we’re both still alive then. It’s not just because of your looks that I love you, Vera… it’s because… it’s because you’re you.”

Vera’s eyes misted up, and she choked for a moment.

“Oh, Andrew… I love you, too. You know that. And I always will, till the day I die… and longer if that’s possible. But you were meant to be with someone young… like you. It’s only right. You can’t be with both of us…” Vera laughed at the thought, but it was a sad laugh. “It would be hard to explain… and besides, she wouldn’t want to share you. I know. She’s me.” Vera put one hand on Andrew’s cheek and kissed him on the other cheek lovingly. Andrew closed his eyes.

“Well, you’re right about one thing, Vera. I do want both of you… but not separated like this. I want ONE Vera… and I want ALL of her. You see, there is only ONE of you for me. You can’t go on living in two times at once, Vera.”

“But if there’s nothing that can be done about it, Andy… we will have to accept that reality.”

“Maybe not,” Liz said. “Our theory is that if we return to the future that we came from with Andrew and both of you with us, At some point in time, as we’re going back, the two of you, Vera, will become one.”

“But the question is, which one,” the older Vera added sadly. “That’s a risk that you cannot take, Andrew. You could wind up with an old woman for a bride.”

Andrew looked at the younger Vera holding onto his hand. She was beautiful, young, and vibrant. He looked at the other Vera. She was still beautiful… and vibrant… but not so young anymore.

Vera nodded. “You see, Andrew. Time takes its due. You could go with us back to the future, but you… and your fiancée… would be taking a terrible risk. Or you can stay here in this time and have the certainty that the two of you can be together for the rest of your lives… and you won’t be risking having to be married to an old woman.”

“And what will happen to you then,” Andrew asked. “If I stay here and marry Vera, will I no’ be changing your future, too, Vera?”

“It may be for the better, Andrew… if you’re in it.”

“That is one possibility,” admitted Varec, who had come into the room moments before. “But it is also possible that there will always be two separate Veras if the two of you go separate ways in different timelines. Your timelines will never cross, because you will always be thirty-eight years ahead of them in time. As they get closer to our present, you will be getting further away from it… further into the future.”

“Then I’ll stay in this timeline,” Vera said. “If I stay here, in thirty-eight years there will be only one of me… right?”

Varec nodded. “That is probably true… but you will be ninety-six years old. If you were a Nogi-K’ya… or even a Xarian… I would say that would not be a problem. But you are human.”

“Thank you, Varec. I never thought of that as a handicap before,” Vera sighed dejectedly.

“Well, has anyone thought of this,” Andrew asked. “I ‘ave officially gone walkabout from me unit. Now that I am back in Oz and no’ with official leave papers, I will either be cactus or AWOL. I could try telling the army that I was taken by a spaceship that came from the future, of course. Maybe they will believe me. But I do no’ think so. If I am discovered, it’s London to a brick what my fate will be. I may ge’ out of prison in time for your ninetieth birthday, Vera. How can I offer you a life under these conditions?”

“I… I didn’t think of that,” the older Vera said apologetically. “Andrew, I’m so sorry.”

“No, do no’ apologize, Vera. If you had not come, I would be cactus, bloody oath, so I consider the alternative quite reasonable, and I am grateful to all of you for saving me, but I must be realistic. I canno’ live in Oz now that I am gone walkabout from me unit.”

“What will you do,” Maria asked.

Andrew sighed deeply and looked at the young Vera, who was still holding onto his hand. Vera nodded understandingly and smiled…

“I think what Andrew is saying is that we will be going with you… to the future.”

Andrew smiled at Vera and kissed her. “Will you be okay… if we go?” he asked.

Vera nodded. “She’ll be apples, Andy. We’ll be together you and I… no matter what. It’s the ONLY thing that’s important.”

“But what if you become… older, Vera?”

Vera looked into Andrew’s eyes. “Would you still love me… if I did?”

“Too right! Do you even need to ask?”

Vera shook her head and smiled. “No… not at all. That’s why I’m ready to go with you… even if it’s back of Bourke and beyond the black stump.”

Liz smiled and looked at the older Vera. She was smiling, too. Clearly, Liz’s nurse and friend was happier about this turn of events than she was willing to admit. She would never have agreed to let Andrew risk his happiness to go to the future with them for her sake, but now that had all changed. Andrew was right. If he stayed in Australia, and was discovered, he would be considered a deserter and would almost certainly go to prison. No amount of trying to explain what had happened would be believed. It might allow him to spend his sentence in an insane asylum, but it certainly wouldn’t permit him to have the life that he and the younger Vera both longed for. Their only real hope for happiness was to go.

Liz held the sphere of the portal up in her hand and opened her fingers. The sphere floated from her hand, glowing with a pure white glow.

“Please take this ship and everyone in it back to Roswell in the time that we came from,” Liz said.

There was, as before, a brief pause, but it was slightly longer than the six seconds that the sphere had taken to send the New Granolith back to the past. This time, the pause was closer to fifteen seconds. It was long enough for Liz to briefly begin to wonder if something had gone wrong.

“It is done,” the sphere answered. Liz exhaled with relief and looked at Andrew. He was still holding the young Vera by the hand. Liz turned around but didn’t see the other Vera, her former nurse, anywhere. She looked back at Andrew and his fiancée. They were embraced in a kiss. Liz smiled and shook her head… “Now that’s a pash.” After several long moments, the two separated, and Andrew’s fiancée smiled at Liz. It was a smile that Liz recognized. Liz smiled, too, and arched her eyebrows.

“I’m afraid to look in a mirror, Liz. Tell me the truth. Am I… you know…”

“Beautiful,” Liz said. “You’re totally beautiful, Vera.”

“She was always that,” Andrew said, beaming.

Liz nodded in agreement. “She was, wasn’t she. Can you handle being nineteen again, Vera?”

Vera grinned. “A part of me never stopped being nineteen, Liz. But I admit, some part of me feels a bit odd.”

“Must be the pash,” Liz replied with a grin.

Vera looked at Andrew and smiled broadly. “That could be it, Liz. I’ll need to test that theory for a while. Andy and I may need a lot of time in private…”

“For the benefit of science,” Andrew said, finishing the thought for her.

“For the benefit of science,” Liz nodded with a wink. “Come on everyone. Let’s not get in the way of science.”

Maria smiled in agreement, then everyone left the room, leaving Andrew and Vera on the bridge alone with an incredible view of Roswell visible from the bridge’s huge anterior window. But at the moment, neither of them was paying any attention to anything outside.



----------



“Take good care of Vera,” Max said, extending his hand to Andrew. Andrew took it and shook it, then he turned to Liz and hugged her. “I will. No worries, your majesty.”

Max smiled. “We can lose the ‘majesty’ stuff, Andrew. I’m just Max here.”

Andrew nodded, as Vera hugged Liz and kissed her warmly.

“Liz, how can I ever, ever, ever thank you…?”

Liz beamed. “You just did, Vera. I just wanted your happiness. That’s all I ever needed.”

“Well, you succeeded beyond your wildest imagination. I want you to know that. You’ll always be special to me, Liz… to both of us.”

“Awww… you’ll always be special to me, too, Vera… both of you will. If you hadn’t been my nurse when I was in a coma, I probably would have died. So I really do owe you everything.”

“That’s right,” Max added. “And I want you to know that you have my eternal gratitude, too, Vera.”

“It was nothing… It’s just who I am. Besides, Liz was a big inspiration to me. She’s special, Max. Take real good care of her.”

Max nodded and smiled. “You know it.”

Andrew nodded, too. “Well, I’m certainly glad you have such good connections here, Max. Your president was able to give us a complete identity… and using our real names. We’re citizens… with a history and everything. We can live freely here in this country, and I can give Vera all the things I always dreamed of giving her. We’ll raise a family, and if we have a girl, I promise, we’ll name her Liz; if it’s a boy, we’ll name him Maxwell.”

“I’m honored,” Max said in total sincerity. “After thirty-eight years, no one is going to think that a nineteen-year-old was in Vietnam in 1966… even if he has the same name… so we felt that it would be okay to keep your real name. Vera had an identity here already, but we had to invent an explanation for the age difference. That’s why we said that she’s the other Vera’s niece and was named after her, and that the other Vera moved to another state and left her niece in charge of her affairs here.”

“I appreciate that, too,” Andrew said. “I am very happy to be able to keep my real name. You and your president… and your friends on the ship… have all been so very wonderful to us. Will we ever see you again?”

Max smiled and nodded. “I think you can count on it. Now that we have the spheres, we’ll be able to return often, and I’m sure that Liz, especially, will be using them a lot.

“I hope so,” Andrew said. Vera nodded… “I do, too.”

Liz hugged Vera and Andrew one final time then asked the sphere to take her and Max back to the ship. Once on the ship, Liz raised the sphere and made one more request…

“Please take this ship and everyone in it to Antar and place it in orbit around the planet.”

“It is done,” the sphere said after only four seconds. Liz, Max, Maria, Michael, Angie Lee, Kyle, Alex, Isabel, Varec, Rahn, Jim, Amy, Tess and the other Antarian doubles, and Diane Casey all looked out the New Granolith’s huge bridge window. And below them, they saw a planet… with a golden sea.

The Night The Dreams Died



The King Returns


Chapter 49

XLIX



Max stood on the bridge of the New Granolith, both arms around Liz, and together they stared at the golden orb below. They had no idea what to expect. They knew no one there. And yet… it was magical… mysterious… even alluring in some strange way. It promised hope, joy, love… and mortal danger. But whatever the future held for Max and Liz, whatever their fate was to be, it would happen here… because this was Antar…

And its king had returned.

Kyle watched the planet slowly rotate below the ship then prodded Max jokingly, “Do you think they’ll have a welcoming committee for us, Max?”

Max shook his head but managed a slight smile… “I hope not. It probably wouldn’t be the kind we would want.”

Rahn nodded his agreement. “At least Kivar won’t be there, though.”

“That is a good thing,” Varec agreed, addressing himself to the younger group who would become the rightful leaders of the planet in this dimension, “But a planet that is struggling with warring factions can be dangerous, too. You must not become complacent or let your guard down.”

Rahn closed his eyes for a moment, searching his thoughts. “We should turn Nasedo over to the high A’Dak of my people. Perhaps we should go there first. My people are very independent and are not likely to have designs on the king’s throne, so they will not be affected by other fighting on the planet. It will be safer among them.”

“Safer sounds good to me,” Alex agreed, smiling.

“I thought your people were reclusive, though,” Maria countered. “I thought they didn’t like outsiders.”

Rahn nodded. “That’s true. They don’t. But they will not kill you until after I have explained who you are and why you are here.”

“Oh, well, I feel a lot better knowing that, Rahn,” Alex said, arching his eyebrows noticeably. “I would hate to get killed anonymously.”

Rahn shook his head with calm reassurance. “They will not harm you.”

“I hope you’re right,” Kyle retorted in an ominous tone but with a grin on his face, feigning more concern than he actually felt.

“I am.”

Rahn looked out the large window from the New Granolith’s bridge and pointed at a valley that they were passing over…

“There. That is my home… between those two mountain ranges.”

“It looks beautiful,” Liz said, “and peaceful.”

Rahn nodded, actually exhibiting a rather unusual amount of human-like emotion as he watched his valley pass beneath the ship.

“That mountain range on the north side is called Tybar-Ly’an. The one on the south is Cy’lax-To’a. The valley between them is called Ke’cje-ka-Ly’a… the ‘beautiful home.’ It is peaceful and calm. A clear, swift river runs through it, and the high east winds above it are considered a special treasure by our people.”

“The wind is considered a national treasure?” Alex asked, somewhat incredulous.

Rahn nodded. “By the Ke’cje… my people, who are shape-shifters, yes, the high east winds are a treasure. They are not just any winds. They are always there… they are always smooth… they are always dependable… they are always warm and strong… and enjoyable.”

“The winds?” Alex asked.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

Rahn smiled. “Perhaps I will tell you sometime… if the high A’Dak allows it… and if the time seems right.”

Max noticed that they were once again approaching the valley, having made a complete orbit of the planet already. He looked at Liz then at the others… then at his double from Antar in the other dimension. Everyone nodded.

“Okay, then… we put the ship down in the valley,” agreed the older Max, who was, of course, the actual captain of the ship. “Any place particular, Rahn?”

Rahn pointed. “That area is the most remote, and there is room for the ship there. We can walk from there to the main population center. We will only have to walk over two small mountains.”

“Or we can use the sphere,” Liz reminded him.”

Rahn nodded. “That is also possible, yes.”

Max of Antar motioned to Michael, and each took his respective place in one of the two pilots’ seats. Max, then Michael, passed his hand over several sensors, causing them to glow, and the ship began to descend toward the valley below. Slightly less than thirty seconds later, the ship was momentarily lifted into the high east wind and swept along with it, but the ship corrected itself automatically and was almost immediately back on track. Moments later, it came to a stop just above the ground. Max looked at Michael, and Michael nodded…

“I think you’re home, Rahn.”

Rahn swallowed and looked outside, his face now unmistakably betraying something strongly akin to human emotions…

“Over fifty of your earth years… almost the same number in our years… I have not seen my home. Most of that time, I was a prisoner in a dark, isolated cell below your army base, and only a few people knew that I was there. There was no one to help me. I thought that I would spend the rest of my life there… being prodded… being examined… sometimes being tortured… until you came and found me.” Rahn smiled and looked at the younger Max and Michael then at Liz, Maria, and Isabel. “I owe all of you my life.” Maria noticed that there were actually tears in Rahn’s eyes. It was something she had never seen before. She doubted that any amount of torture ever would have brought a tear to his eyes, but this was something else… not sadness or pain. Rahn was home.

Max put one hand on Rahn’s shoulder and smiled, and Rahn smiled back through misty eyes…

“We should go! We need to find my people.”

Max nodded then turned to Michael… “Do you have the cage… and Nasedo?”

Michael held up the cage with the hawk in it. Max nodded then looked back, as something came up from behind him and rubbed against his hand. It was Jung-Jo.

“Yeah, you’re right, boy, I guess you should go with us, too. We can’t leave you here all alone, can we?” Max looked at Liz, and she smiled and raised the sphere in her hand…

“Please take everyone here… and Jung-Jo… and the hawk in its cage… to…” Liz hesitated.

“T’an-Ke’cj,” Rahn said.

“T’an-Ke’cj.”

The portal appeared, and everyone stepped through it, some singly, others in pairs. They stepped out into what appeared to be a town square, and Liz looked around. Immediately, she knew that she was going to like this place. It had all the pleasant atmosphere of a mountain resort. It was shady, it was clean, it was visually appealing in every way… even the temperature was mild and pleasant. There were many people around, but everyone seemed to be relaxed and unconcerned… even about the sudden arrival of a fairly large group of outsiders in their reclusive society… and even about the presence in their midst of Jung-Jo, a pawgor, a predatory species the very name of which brought heart palpitations to nearly everyone on their planet… everyone, it would seem, but the Ke’cje.

Max turned to Michael, Rahn, Varec, Maria, and the others present… “We need to make some plans, guys… about where we go from here… and what we tell anyone about what we’re doing here… or who we are. We need to be in agreement on all the details until we know what we’re facing.”

As the rest of the group talked, the younger Liz walked down the clean, well-manicured walkway away from what was probably the center of the square, a large sort of kiosk near which she and the others had materialized. She stopped at the edge of a clear pond that appeared to be stocked with some kind of ornamental fish that reminded her of the Japanese koi fish that she had occasionally seen back on earth. But these were not koi fish; that was plain to see. They were… well… alien. The pond seemed to go all the way around the large two or three-acre park in a complete circle, like a mote. One could cross over it at any of several locations by walking over a quaint footbridge. Liz looked up and noticed the tree beside her. It was covered profusely with small pinkish-white flowers that were not at all unlike the blossoms she had seen on cherry trees in Washington D.C. in the springtime. There appeared to be a fair number of these trees lining many of the walks, in fact. Liz took a deep breath and her whole body seemed to relax, bringing a smile to her face.

“It’s the fragrance of the flowers on the trees…”

Liz turned around to see who had spoken.

“It’s the flowers… They have a relaxing fragrance,” the lady said.

Liz nodded. “Yes… they do, don’t they!” She smiled at the lady. “I’m Liz! Hi!”

“Liz? You’re not Ke’cje. Where are you from?”

“I’m from… well, far away… another planet actually.”

“I guessed that,” the lady said. “Antarians never come here.”

“I can’t imagine why not,” Liz said, spinning around two or three times, enjoying the purest air she had ever breathed and the subtle, sweet fragrance of the tree flowers. She breathed in deeply. I would never want to leave here.”

The lady smiled. “That is how we feel. And others would, too. Fortunately for us, we are isolated… protected… by some very, very steep terrain on the other sides of those mountains. The mountains are beautiful and peaceful on the valley side, but on the outside, they are dangerous and impassable.”

“How do you get out, then… or back in,” Liz asked.

The lady smiled and held out her arms. For just a moment, they extended outward and became wings. Then just as quickly, they returned to normal… that is, Liz assumed that arms were normal for these people anyway.

“So you fly! That’s the only way to get in and out of here, isn’t it?”

The lady nodded. “The only way. Can you fly, Liz?”

Liz shook her head and smiled at the question.

“Actually, I just began to walk again recently. I’m afraid flying is far beyond my abilities.”

“You could not walk?”

“No. I was paralyzed.”

The lady seemed to be confused. “So you could not walk?”

“It was because of an injury. I couldn’t move my legs… or even my arms at first.”

“How did you… Oh! You must know an Antarian healer.”

“Well… yeah, I do,” Liz agreed, “But he couldn’t heal me. He did try. I don’t think I got your name.”

“I’m sorry. I am Ta’lan-Nya-Shxhida. But you can just call me Ta’lan.”

“Ta’lan-Nya-Shxhida,” Liz repeated with surprising accuracy. “I’m really glad to know you. Omigod! I just realized… you’re speaking English! You should be speaking… well… something alien… shouldn’t you?”

The lady smiled. “I’m not speaking English, Liz… if you heard the words as they are, you would not recognize them.”

“But I AM hearing English… when you speak.”

“Yes. But the actual sounds would be alien to you. I made a mental connection between us. Don’t worry. It won’t harm you. It merely allows you to understand me. I am speaking in my language, but your mind can understand my words in yours.”

“Like mental telepathy?”

“Sort of… only with words. We just understand each other.”

“Cool. I mean… that’s really great!”

The lady smiled. “I understood the meaning. Why are you here, Liz? Why are your friends here? They are your friends, aren’t they?”

Liz nodded. “Actually, one of them is my husband. That would be Max. We just got married. It’s a long story, Ta’lan. Max came from Antar… in a way… well, sort of…”

The lady smiled, and Liz realized that she wasn’t making much sense.

“I’m sorry! I meant that Max…”

Liz stopped for a moment, realizing that perhaps she should not be telling anyone whom she had just met and knew so little about too much about them, but something made her feel that she should tell Ta’lan everything. For the briefest moment, Liz realized that this compulsion to tell all might have been brought on by the mind power of Ta’lan-Nya-Shxhida herself, but that idea seemed to melt away, and she forgot why she had been concerned.

“Max was born on Antar, but he was murdered. His DNA was taken to earth -that’s my planet- and combined with human DNA. On Antar, his name was Zan.”

This name had a definite impact on Ta’lan, who gasped softly.

“King Zan?”

Liz nodded. It wasn’t precisely that she was unable to keep secrets anymore. It was simply that she had forgotten that she should keep them… or even that they were secrets.

“Max has returned to take back his throne.”

“I see,” the lady said. “Well! That is… unexpected.”

“I heard that your people govern themselves and are not interested in Antarian royalty and government affairs.”

“Yes, well… that is partly true, Liz. We are isolated and self-sufficient, but it’s not true that we do not care about Antarian government affairs. We are Antarian, too, though we do not generally refer to ourselves as such. We prefer Ke’cje. It defines us… and it allows us to define all others on this planet, the non-Ke’cje, by calling them Antarians. But in a real sense, of course, we are Antarians, too.”

Liz nodded. “But would a Ke’cje try to take over the throne?”

Ta’lan laughed. “Not likely! We are loyal subjects of the king, but the Ke’cje are fiercely independent, too. We are happy where we are.”

“Well, I know one Ke’cje who has other ambitions and a desire for the throne,” Liz said… “Nasedo.”

Ta’lan shook her head thoughtfully. “I know no Ke’cje named Nasedo.”

Liz pointed at Michael, who was standing far up the walk, holding the hawk’s cage, as he and Max discussed what to do next. Ta’lan looked at the hawk in the cage and knew instantly that it was J’Shalo.

“What did he do?”

“What didn’t he do?” Liz asked. “That would be the question. He did some kind of thing to our minds while we slept. If Rahn had not saved us, we would all have died. Nasedo wanted to take over the throne of Antar now that Kivar is dead, and he needed us out of the way.”

Ta’lan nodded and sighed. “J’Shalo is not like most Ke’cje. He is… different. I know. He is my husband.”

Liz gasped. “He’s your… You mean… you’re married to him? I’m so sorry! Oh, God! That didn’t come out right, did it? I’m so sorry, Ta’lan! Omigod, and we’ve got him in a cage!”

Ta’lan shook her head and held up one hand to stop Liz from apologizing. “It’s okay. I kind of like him there. I may decide to keep him there… at least for a while. And as for marriage… well… that is the understanding of the word that your mind gives it, Liz. Marriage, as you know it, is not exactly right. But we are… well, WERE… together, yes.”

“Were?”

Ta’lan nodded. “J’Shalo ran off and left this valley… left Antar… and left me… to find something for himself out there somewhere. But J’Shalo could never find contentment anywhere. I doubt that he found it out there either.”

Liz shook her head.

Ta’lan nodded. “Perhaps he will be content as an alien bird. How are you keeping him like that?”

“A little poison from a Xiangar viper every day… just enough…”

Ta’lan raised her eyebrows then nodded. “Yes, that would work. I don’t know why I never thought of it.”

Liz winced but smiled to herself. “Come on, Ta’lan! I’ll introduce you to my husband and the others… and we can give you your husband back.”

Ta’lan smiled and nodded. Liz took Ta’lan by the hand and led her toward the others. Max saw them coming and stopped talking. Then Michael looked, too. Then the rest of the group looked up and noticed that they were about to have company; and the conversation came to an abrupt end, as Liz walked up with Ta’lan by the hand.

“Ta’lan-Nya-Shxhida… this is Max, my husband… and this is Michael and Maria…”

Liz continued through the group, introducing each one until she got to Rahn.

Ta’lan smiled. “Welcome home, Rahn. We have missed you.”

Rahn nodded and smiled, too. “I’ve missed my home and my people, too. Thank you.”

“That’s right!” Liz said, “You probably know each other already, don’t you!”

Ta’lan nodded.

“Liz was telling me that you have returned to reclaim your throne, Zan. Welcome back.”

Max looked at Liz, and for a moment his eyes reflected a mixture of bewilderment, disbelief, hurt… and, Liz thought, anger. But mostly bewilderment. Max shook his head but gave Ta’lan no immediate answer.

“Do not blame Liz,” Ta’lan said, accurately assessing Max’s feelings. “It is the flowers on the trees. Their fragrance gives everyone a feeling of well-being. We, the Ke’cje, are accustomed to it and can tolerate it, but outsiders become somewhat giddy and talkative. They forget that danger even exists. It is not their fault… It is not Liz’s fault. Once they have breathed the fragrance, everyone talks.”

“That is true,” Rahn said, vouching for Ta’lan’s word. “The flowers are a wonderful thing… for the Ke’cje. “The Ke’cje have no natural enemies, but if we did… and they came here… they would tell us everything and give themselves up happily.” He motioned toward Jung-Jo, who was licking Ta’lan’s hand adoringly.

Max instantly put his hand over his nose without thinking about it. Michael closed his mouth, which had been open, and began taking smaller breaths. Kyle practically stopped breathing… but had to breathe again, as his face began to turn red. Alex, for some reason, seemed to take the whole thing in stride. It might have seemed that he was more resigned to whatever fate held for them, but it wasn’t that. The fact is, deep down inside, Alex trusted Liz more than he could explain why. He understood that the flowers had made her talkative and that they had made her say some things that she would not otherwise have said, but he felt strongly that Liz still would not have betrayed them… even after breathing the narcotic-like fragrance of the flowers. Liz had to have trusted this person very deeply for some reason that even she probably did not yet understand. Perhaps she never would. But if Liz trusted her, even while under the influence of the flowers, Alex was certain that they could all trust her. He just didn’t know why. In some way, Max seemed to realize this, too, but his face still had a bewildered look.

Trying to help defuse the situation and also to limit any information that this Ta’lan-Nya-Shxhida might be able to get from them, Kyle tapped Max on the shoulder and said, loudly enough for Ta’lan to hear… “We still have to keep our appointment with the high A’Dak, Max. Perhaps we should be going.” Then he turned and smiled at Ta’lan. “It was nice meeting you, Miss Sh… Shh… uh…”

“Shxhida,” Ta’lan offered with a smile. But call me Ta’lan. It will be easier for you.”

“Ta’lan,” Kyle agreed, nodding. “Anyway… Ta’lan… as I was saying, we are very happy to meet you, and we’d love to stay and talk, but we’re on our way to see the high A’Dak, and we don’t want to keep him waiting. He’s a very important guy.”

Ta’lan smiled. “I’m afraid the high A’Dak is over-rated in your mind, Kyle. The high A’Dak is only another Ke’cje. We are all equal here.”

Rahn tapped on Kyle’s shoulder and smiled. “Kyle… Ta’lan-N’ya-Shxhida is the high A’Dak.”

For a very long moment, Kyle stood motionless… and oddly speechless.

“You can breathe now, Kyle,” Angie Lee said, noticing that his face was turning red again.

“I am breathing, Angie Lee. I’m just trying to dislodge my toes from my tonsils without causing major injury.”

Angie Lee laughed.

“I’m so sorry, Ta’lan,” Kyle whispered abashedly. “I didn’t know… I guess I made a fool of myself, huh?”

Ta’lan shook her head. “I will forgive you… if you will tell me why there are two Zans… and two of some of the others with you. Did the plan to recreate you result in twins, Zan?”

Max shook his head. “The other ‘me’ that you see here is from another dimension. He already took the throne back in his dimension. The other ‘doubles’ are from his dimension. They came to help us out, because we were in a bit of trouble on our planet with the FBI and the army… well, with some secret units within those agencies anyway.”

“I see,” Ta’lan said. “And how did you get back to Antar?”

“With them… with our doubles… in their ship.” Max looked at Ta’lan searchingly. “So you’re the high A’Dak… Then you’re sort of the queen of this valley?”

Ta’lan laughed. “Not exactly! I am more like what you would call a governor… or perhaps a mayor. I am only the leader of my people, the Ke’cje. And even that can change. The others only need to convene a council to change the high A’Dak at any time. As long as they are happy, I will probably be their A’Dak.”

“That has been for many years already,” Rahn noted… “and it will be for many more years yet to come, I am sure.”

“Rahn is one of my biggest supporters,” Ta’lan said with a smile. “So you are here to retake your throne, Zan? You never answered.”

Max nodded cautiously. “That would be the plan. We came here first to return J’Shalo to the high… that is, to you… and to bring Rahn home.”

Ta’lan smiled. “Thank you for bringing Rahn back to us. He has been gone for too long.”

“Not by my choice, though, I assure you,” Rahn noted.

“Well, you are here now, Rahn,” Ta’lan said, taking the cage with J’Shalo in it from Michael, “That is what is important.”

Ta’lan looked at the large hawk in its cage and smiled, but J’Shalo did not appear to be as happy. Even in his hawk’s face, the frustration was plainly evident. Unfortunately for J’Shalo, there was absolutely nothing he could do about it.

“Come,” Ta’lan said, motioning to Max and to the others. “We can go to my house… to discuss your return to Antar… and how the Ke’cje can help. It will be a good thing for our people to have the real king on the throne again. Our valley is isolated and safe, but the rest of Antar needs stability. You must provide that for them again, Zan.”

Max nodded. “So Antar has become a dangerous place, Ta’lan?”

Ta’lan smiled. “It was dangerous enough for you when you were killed, Zan. It was dangerous for Antarians when Kivar was on the throne. And it is dangerous now that Kivar is gone, because there is fighting for control.”

Max nodded.

Ta’lan looked at Michael and smiled. “I see you have brought Rath back with you. That is good. You will need him. It is even better that you have brought two Raths.” Ta’lan looked at the others in the group, especially Jim Valenti from the other dimension, and she nodded. “They are not all Antarians… but it is a good army. Not very large… but obviously devoted. I think you will have a chance… with a little help.”



tbc


Coming: A throne for the taking, an old enemy… and a sad good-bye, as the other group leaves for home in their own dimension