Introduction
The dreams began shortly after my mother died. Each day, the intensity and violence of them grew to the point where I was afraid to sleep.
Finally, I called Kate for help. Kate and I had been through a great deal together. First we were friends, then lovers, then friends again.
She listened to me describe the dreams and the feelings they elicited. Then she suggested that I have a complete physical exam. The very idea was terrifying to me, though I didn't know why, but Kate convinced me that the first thing we needed to do was rule out any physical cause for the dreams.
She called Dr. Jason Alexander, a friend of hers, and he agreed to meet us at his office that same night. After the exam I asked Kate about her relationship with Jason. She told me how she had saved his daughter's life by being a bone marrow donor.
The next day Jason called saying that he needed to redo one of the tests. Kate and I agreed to meet him at his office.
While I was showering in preparation of meeting Jason, one of my "dreams" took over. I guess I must have screamed because I remember Kate running in and helping me up from the shower stall floor.
By the time we arrived at Jason's office, I was beginning to understand the dreams. The dreams were the result of mental barriers in my mind collapsing. Shortly after my birth, my mother, Miktra, erected barriers in my mind. All my life she had reinforced these mental barriers to keep my true identity a secret. The gill slits that were growing on the upper left and right quadrants of my torso added to the evidence that I was not a native of Earth.
We drove to Jason's in silence. Once there, I attempted to explain what was happening--at least as much of it as I knew.
Kate was unable to accept the fact that I might be from another planet. She and Jason had words over her inability to accept this truth and she stormed out.
Jason drove me home and told me if I needed anything to call him.
Days later, after no word from Kate, I contacted Jason. He said he hadn't heard from her since the night she stormed out of his office. He offered to come over and between us, we would call everyone she knew. Certainly someone had seen Kate in the past two days.
While preparing a pot of coffee for us, I heard a news story about a woman fished out of the river that morning. The police were asking for help in identifying her. I glanced up at the television. Staring back at me from the screen was a picture of Kate.
I directed Jason's attention to the television, but by the time he turned around, the image was gone.
Jason reminded me that if the government found out about me I would be whisked off to some lab somewhere to become the object of various, no doubt unpleasant, experiments. He volunteered to go to the police and verify whether or not the dead woman was Kate.
He suggested that it might be best if I went to his New England estate, as the case was already receiving media attention. Once the connection between Kate and Jason's influential family was made, it would only get more intense.
I was in no condition to deal with the press or the police. I was still recovering from my mother's death and now, my lifelong friend, a woman I would trust with my life, was dead. On top of which, I was in the process of learning I wasn't even from Earth. I accepted Jason's offer of sanctuary.
I arrived in New England in a mental fog. The entire time I was there the fog never seemed to clear. I was only there a couple of days before Jason spirited me off to a private island--an island owned by his father's corporation.
I remembered thinking it was odd that I hadn't had a single dream while I was in New England. I don't remember dreaming the first night on the island either. After that the dreams returned. I began to put the puzzle together and as my knowledge of who I was grew, so did my suspicions about Jason's motives for helping me.
I managed to secretly contact the mainland and with the help of an old friend, Danny, I escaped from the good doctor's tropical laboratory.
Once back on the mainland, I had Danny arrange for a meeting with Detective Dave Johnson, the detective investigating Kate's murder.
Meanwhile, Jason contacted an old college buddy and called in a favor owed him since their college days. Alfred Randolph Dillon was Director of the Southeast District Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and if Jason exposed his secret, his career and his family would be destroyed. Director Dillon assigned two men to find me. Their only instructions were to find and capture me, unharmed.
Detective Johnson had an innate dislike for Jason, so convincing him that Jason might be Kate's killer, didn't take much.
After Dillon's thugs nearly beat Danny to death in an effort to extract information about me from him, Johnson and I decided that the first priority was to get Dillon out of the picture. A shot in the dark regarding the blackmail Jason was using to get Dillon's cooperation convinced Dillon to reassign his men. I suggested that he might serve his own best interests if he were to investigate Kate's murder with Jason as his number--one suspect.
With Dillon out of the picture, Detective Johnson and I set up a sting. Disguising his voice Johnson called Jason and told him that for seven million dollars, he would deliver me to him. Jason agreed. The price was high but he knew if he could manage to duplicate my gills, he'd get his seven million back and then some.
I knew that as soon as I finished dealing with Kate's murderer, I'd be leaving Earth. The spacecraft my mother and I came to Earth in was waiting for me beneath the sea, but first there were some loose ends I needed to tie up.
Tracie had been living with me when the dreams first began. After a week of no sleep and my irrational behavior, she left. For the past two weeks I'd been ignoring her phone calls but I wanted--no, needed to say goodbye. She agreed to meet me.
I had nothing to lose so I told her the truth. With my gills to back up my claim of being from another planet, she soon understood, as well as any human could, what I had been going through.
After a night of making love, I tried to lull her to sleep so that I could quietly sneak away without a tearful goodbye, but Tracie refused to fall for my ploy and insisted on going with me. I agreed to let her fly with Detective Johnson and me to the island where we planned to expose Jason as a murderer.
As soon as we got Jason to confess to Kate's murder, three other officers came out of hiding and arrested Jason. At first he was speechless, then he sneered and said that even if we made it to trial he would never be convicted. His lawyers would claim entrapment and his so-called confession would be thrown out. On top of that, he reminded me what would happen if my true identity were discovered.
On my home world of Nedamla, I am the ruler, which means that when necessary, I am judge, jury, and executioner. I decided that I wasn't going to leave Jason's fate to the vagaries of the American justice system. With the advantage of surprise, I managed to wrest a gun from one of the officers and using it to hold them at bay, I dragged a handcuffed Jason out to sea and drowned him. I left his carcass to feed the sharks...
)
Dorak Deanna has come home to claim her birthright. Home, to a planet she remembers only through the implanted memories of her mother, Miktra. Home to a planet still occupied by the same Empyrean forces that forced her departure nearly thirty years ago. The Day of Ascension is fast approaching and the Empyrean Governor of Nedamla grows more fearful of Aneesha's Prophecy with each passing day. Especially since each day seems to bring another unexplained, violent death of at least one of this soldiers. Yet the Empyror refuses his requests for more troops, assuring him that since Aneesha's child was killed during the invasion, there is no heir to ascend to the throne. By accident Deanna discovers she has the ability to communicate, with at least one Nedamlan, by using only her thoughts. Is it possible that there are others among her people with this ability? Perhaps it will be the secret weapon she needs. Even with the ability to mind-talk, how can one woman turn a population of women, known for their pacifism, into warriors? And if she and her warriors take Nedamla from the troops now occupying her, how will they maintain their freedom? The Empyror has more than enough troops to simply send another invasion force. As if fighting the Empyre weren't enough to worry about, Deanna has another problem--she has fallen in love. Will Deanna fulfill Aneesha's Prophecy? Can she return her people to a time when they were fierce warriors, asking no quarter and giving none? Will Jorsta agree to join with her?
