Chapter 27

Shaking off the last lingering effects of being so close to so much gold, Sirren opened the trapdoor and prepared to emerge from the other end of the tunnel. Turning on the viewscreen, she verified the presence of the Velorian in the gold room. The bitch briefly turned to face her, almost as if she knew where the camera was hidden, before throwing herself against the door again. It wasn't likely that she would ever forget the face framed by that long golden hair. Objectively, one just might be able to consider that face beautiful, if one could ignore all that ugly golden hair surrounding it. But then, there was no accounting for taste; Carlos had told her that many Terran men preferred blondes, though of course he preferred her exactly the way that she was. And she suspected that a fair percentage of Arion men, both Primes and Betas, harbored secret fantasies about the golden-haired bitches, though of course, they'd never admit it.

She looked again at the viewscreen. Sirren had fought her twice before, in Texas and in Mexico. The second time, she had been certain that she had killed the bitch. Yet somehow, the bitch had survived. And the bitch had come back to kill Ferren. "You won't escape me this time, bitch," she said out loud, as the figure in the viewscreen threw herself at the door again. "This time, I will make sure that you are dead. You may have somehow eliminated Ferren, but there are four more of us. And I will have the honor of the killing blow. I will rip out your heart."

She was still thinking about just how she would kill the Velorian once she had gathered the rest of her squad together. She might even let the two males use her first, she knew that most male Primes secretly fantasized about using, and abusing, a Velorian bitch. Weakened by the gold, maybe even the Betas could get some practical use out of her. That would really be something; they had enjoyed being used by a Prime, they should really enjoy making use of the Velorian bitch. Thinking about that, she was not prepared for the sight that greeted her eyes as she emerged from the trapdoor and looked down towards the beach.

She saw a sailboat anchored in the cove. But that wasn't what caught her eye.

The other three members of her squad had their hands full with two Velorians. Two Velorians! "Stars! Who is that inside?" she asked herself, turning once again to the image on the viewscreen.

There was no mistaking that face. That was the Velorian Planetary Protector whom the Terran media had named 'Supergirl'. "But if that's her in there, who are the other two? Where did they come from?"

Forcing the questions out of her mind for the moment, she prepared to join the fray. The taller of the bitches, wearing the uniform of a Protector, was engaging the two males, while the shorter one, wearing what appeared to be an ordinary red and white swimsuit, was fighting the female, Teren.

Just then, the Protector swung her fist and landed a blow on the chin of one of the men fighting her. Sirren mentally winced at the power that she knew had to be behind the blow. The impact sent him flying, almost directly over Sirren's head, and into the house. And right into the corner containing the gold-lined room, wood and masonry erupting outwards. Sirren could swear that she felt the ground shake from the impact. But even before he hit, the Protector had turned her full attention to the other man. Grabbing him by his legs, she picked him up off of the ground and swung him around.

Using his nearly invulnerable body as a huge club, she swung him right into Teren's back as she was stalking the other Velorian. Teren staggered, the impact between two nearly invulnerable bodies being enough to knock them both unconscious momentarily.

Sirren rethought her current tactical position. She considered herself to be as brave as any other Warrior Prime was, she had proven that when she went up against the Planetary Protector, not just once, but twice. But now, there were two of them out there. And the rest of her squad was out of action, at least temporarily. Going up alone against two Protectors wasn't bravery, it was sheer stupidity. "Stars! I'm not taking on two of the bitches by myself," she said to herself, displaying the better part of valor, quickly dropping back down into the tunnel and closing the door behind her.

Opening a concealed compartment, she removed some equipment, putting them into the pouch in her cape. She then headed back up the tunnel, before turning into another branch.

The prolonged exposure to all of the gold surrounding me was definitely taking its toll on me; I was tiring much too rapidly from my futile attempts to batter my way out of the room. And it was taking me longer and longer to recover from each attempt. I had managed to break off some of the wood paneling on the door, but all that had accomplished was to expose me directly to the bare gold. And to make my shoulders sore. I hadn't even dented the smooth shiny metal. Picking myself up off of the floor, I threw myself at the door again, with no more effect than before. I bounced off of the gold, and fell in a heap onto the floor. I lay on the floor for nearly a minute, getting my breath back, gathering myself for yet another attempt, all the while trying to keep my stomach from losing its contents.

It was no use. I was having no real effect on that door. I crawled into a corner. It was worse there, surrounded by the gold on three sides. Rolling into the middle of the room, I huddled there, hugging my knees to my breasts. Tears were beginning to fill my eyes. I felt so helpless. So stupid, so incompetent, to have been trapped like this. There were Warriors Prime on the loose out there, and I was trapped like a rat. A stupid blonde rat.

Suddenly, the entire room shook again, knocking me down to the floor, and one corner started to cave in. I turned my head to see what it was, dreading some new Arion weapon that I hadn't encountered before. Or even an old one, my last experience with their Orgone generator hadn't been a very pleasant one.

Instead, I was surprised to see a large, nearly naked, male body come plummeting through the wall in a shower of wood and masonry. And gold. I immediately knew that he had to be an Arion Prime, for his body to do that kind of damage to the building. I couldn't be certain, but I thought that he must have been one of the Arions that I had seen fighting outside, before I came in here. But even with his invulnerability unaffected by the gold, he still must have hit with a lot of force, to not only break through the gold, but to knock him unconscious.

However, I wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth. I quickly picked myself up off of the floor and scrambled over the wreckage, climbing my way towards the night sky that I could see through the hole and the sweet open air. Open air and freedom. I could feel my breasts tingling as my body started to re-energize.

I had to climb over the Prime on my way to freedom. As I put got one knee on his stomach, he stirred and tried to sit up, reaching out for me. Naturally, since he was a man, his hands closed about my breasts. Even weakened by the gold, he gripped me much harder than any Terran male ever could. So weakened by the gold, more tears came to my eyes.

However, despite the gold, I wasn't in the mood for any of this shit. I immediately punched him in the face. My hand stung, as my fist slammed against something much harder than any natural substance on earth.

As much as it hurt my hand, it had to have hurt his face even more. He fell back down, and his hands released my breasts. I resumed my crawling.

Just before I made it all the way out, a hand closed about my leg. There definitely was something about my legs that seemed to draw male Arion Primes to them.

I tried to shake my leg free of his grasp. Unsuccessfully, since I was still so weak from the gold; he managed to hold on, using his greater weight to pull me back in.

Lashing out with my other leg, I kicked him in the face. Not a very particularly powerful kick, due to the gold. As I tried to kick him again, he tried to grab that leg. However, since he was also weakened from the gold, and he was still reeling from the impact and from my earlier punch, I managed to shake that leg free, kicking him in the face again. After several more kicks, I managed to break his grasp and get myself free. For good measure, I kicked him again, knocking him deeper into the room.

My breasts continued to tingle as I crawled out into the open, and sparks flew between my nipples. As good as it felt, I knew that I still had work to do. Turning back, I saw the Arion struggling to rise to his feet, the sudden exposure to the gold, not to mention my repeated kicks in the face, making him weak and wobbly. I quickly blinked my tears away and focused my heat vision on the ceiling above him, cupping and caressing my breasts in order to generate as much heat as I could, and as quickly as I could.

I knew that I wasn't generating my full heat vision, I could tell that my breasts were noticeably smaller than normal, having been drained from the prolonged exposure to the gold, but the wood paneling still burst into flames almost immediately. I kept pouring on the heat, until the gold began to melt. He screamed as the molten rivulets of the yellow metal fell on his body. He fell down to his hands and his knees as the weight of the metal built up, sapping his strength even more as the weight increased. As he tried to crawl away, I kept melting the ceiling above him, tracking him as best I could through the haze.

Through the haze, I saw some darker smoke pouring out, telling me that his body was being consumed by its internal fires. I blinked my eyes to stop the heat, but my hands continued to caress my breasts a little longer, completing the re-energizing process.

I almost jumped out of my skin at the sweet melodic voice behind me. I didn't understand it, but I thought that I caught the word 'Arion' in there somewhere. I whirled around, prepared to fight, and then froze, This blonde was no Arion. I almost thought that I was looking into a mirror. She had my face. Well, close enough to be my older sister, anyway. No, closer than that, more like my face a few years in the future. Well, probably more than just a few, given how gracefully we Velorians age. The resemblance was even closer than that between Xara and Kara, her mother, and they looked more like sisters than mother and daughter. Even closer than Kara and Lillith, and they actually were sisters. This woman was a couple of inches taller than I was, and she wore her hair slightly differently, but she could have passed for me if she wanted to.

She must have thought that she was looking into a mirror as well, for she too stopped and stared at my face. She recovered from the shock first. She opened her mouth and spoke to me. I didn't understand her, but I thought that I caught the word 'Velor' in there. And it certainly sounded like the same language that I had heard from Lillith and the other Velorians that time I had gone to Tetra. And it was in my voice. Or at least, close enough; over the phone I didn't think that even Mom could have told the difference.

I spread my hands out in what I hoped was a non-threatening gesture. "Sorry, I'm Velorian, but I don't speak Velorian," I said, in English.

Much to my relief, she understood English. In fact, she spoke it as well as I did, with no trace of an accent. Or rather, with what sounded like an American accent. "I said, That's one way to take care of an Arion Alpha. I thought you were a Velorian, the way you took care of him. But I always thought I was the only Protector here on Earth."

"I've been here all my life. I was born here. And I'm not really a Protector." I thought about what I'd just said, and what she'd said before that. Wait one darn second! What the heck was going on here? Who the heck was she? I've been in the news enough recently, but I've never heard even one word about another Velorian here.

I took a quick look around myself. This certainly looked like Earth. It definitely was not Tetra. But had I unknowingly gone through another wormhole?

"Who are you? This is my world, and I thought I was the only Velorian here." I remembered my manners just in time to introduce myself. "My name is Julie."

"Call me SuperFemme. I'm the Protector of Earth."

Even as we introduced ourselves, we were walking back to where three other people were. One of them was standing, a golden-haired young woman. The other two, a man and a woman, both black-haired and wearing Arion uniforms, were lying on the ground, unconscious. "This is the usual way of killing an Arion Alpha." SuperFemme leaned over the man and jabbed her fingers into his chest, under his ribs.

He regained consciousness, jerking and bucking as he tried to get away from her. She slugged him in the face with her other hand, driving him back down to the ground. She then literally tore out his heart, crushing it in her hand. His body immediately burst into flames, not even his superhuman regenerative powers unable to deal with the loss of such a vital organ as a heart.

"How did you do that?" I asked. "I've never found a good way of killing off an Arion Prime. I've launched them into space. Either that, or just battered them until they died, or tried to snap their necks. And that's not easy, as I'm sure you know."

"Here. Do it like this." She rolled the unconscious Arion female onto her back with her left hand, while she used her right hand to show me how to hold my hand. Then she positioned my hand under the Arion's left breast. "Jab her right here. Go under the ribs until you find the heart. Grab it and pull, crushing it as you do so." She bent her fingers into a fist, showing me exactly what to do.

I drew my hand back and jabbed it under the Arion's ribcage. She spasmed as she regained consciousness. My hand slipped off of her chest as she sprang up to her feet.

I barely managed to block a fist heading towards my face. She blocked my punch at her face. We threw punches at each other, neither of us connecting.

As I sparred with the Arion, SuperFemme worked her way behind the Arion. She then grabbed her from behind, pinning her arms to her sides and lifting the shorter woman's feet from the ground.

I had to admire the Arion's courage; faced with two Velorians, she kept on fighting. Or maybe, it was desperation, since she knew that we had already decided her fate. Whatever it was, even as she struggled to free her arms from SuperFemme's embrace, she kicked out with her legs. A foot caught me in the stomach, staggering me and almost knocking me down on my ass.

Recovering, I approached, more wary this time. She continued lashing out with her legs, this time aiming for my head. I blocked one kick with my left arm, bringing my right hand down on her ankle, trying to get a good hold on it. A Prime might not be as strong as a Velorian was, but her leg was still strong enough to throw off my arm, especially as I was still feeling a little weak from my prolonged exposure to the gold.

As I fell backwards on my ass and lost my grip on the Arion's ankle, SuperFemme dropped to her knees, dropping the Arion onto her ass. With her legs splayed out in front of her, the Arion was unable to continue kicking me.

"Okay, Julie," SuperFemme said to me, over the Arion's shoulder. "Right where I showed you. I'd do it myself, but I kind of have my hands full right now." She smiled at me, even though I could see the effort that she was exerting to keep the Arion's arms pinned to her sides.

I got back up to my feet and again approached the Arion. She kept fighting, but couldn't get her legs up to kick me any more. I stood over them, looking down at the Arion. I could read the hate in her face, as she continued to try to escape from SuperFemme's hold. Squirming around, she managed to get one leg under her, bending the knee.

Just as she straightened that leg to send the foot towards my face, the other blonde threw herself at it, catching the foot and twisting the leg as she brought it down. She held on to it, using all of her weight to keep it twisted and pinned to the ground.

Reaching down, I straightened my fingers and pressed their tips against the Arion's chest, just below her left breast. The hate on her face changed to fear, as she realized what I was about to do. She squirmed and tried to turn away, but SuperFemme held her tight and the other blonde continued to stay on her leg. I jabbed my hand up under ribs, going for the heart.

I could feel her heart pounding as I grabbed it and pulled, closing my hand around it to crush it at the same time. As I increased the pressure, her heart pounded to try to keep her blood flowing through her veins. As I continued to increase the pressure, finally stilling the heart, her body jerked around again, her superhuman constitution trying to cope with the nonfunction of the vital organ. After a final spasm, the body quit moving and burst into flames, just like the male had done.

It really was an easier way to kill a Prime. Not exactly easy, just easier. Of course, having a real Protector pinning her arms and holding her helpless while another held her legs probably had something to do with that.

What was I thinking? An easier way to kill? An easier way to end a human life? Even if she had been an Arion Warrior Prime, who would have done the same to me without hesitation, if our positions had been reversed. Shaking my head and brushing off the gray ashes, I stood up.

Brushing off the gray ashes as she also stood back up, SuperFemme looked around. "There's still at least one more Arion Alpha around here somewhere."

"The 'Dark Supergirl'! I've tangled with her before." There was a lot I wanted to talk to SuperFemme about, but priorities were priorities. I started flying back towards the house. SuperFemme came with me, after saying something to the other blonde and sending her towards the sailboat anchored in the cove.

We searched the two houses, being very careful with the gold room. In a hallway of the house with the gold room, there was a male Beta lying on the floor, unconscious. The cracked plaster on the wall above him told us a part of the story. SuperFemme paused just long enough to rip up his shirt to tie him up, as I continued deeper into the house.

In one of the bedrooms, I found a male Beta, lying unconscious on the floor, under a wrecked wooden door, completely torn off of its hinges. The bottom half of a female Warrior Prime's uniform was lying on the door, giving me a pretty fair idea of just what he had been doing in the bedroom; I had heard enough stories both from Mom and from Karen to know that female Primes often amused themselves with male Betas. And it also gave me a pretty fair idea of just what had wrecked the door. Pulling the door off of him, I immediately saw that one of the legs was lying at an unnatural angle. My tachyon vision confirmed that it was broken, just above the knee. I quickly tied him up, after setting and splinting the broken leg. After searching the rest of the house and not finding anybody else, SuperFemme and I then went to the other house.

There were two more Betas in there, all male, one with an arm in a sling, huddled inside a room filled with Arion equipment, but they gave us no trouble, immediately surrendering as soon as they saw the two of us. We quickly tied them up as well. Of the other Warrior Prime, there was no sign.

SuperFemme then led me back to the beach and introduced me to the others, starting with a gorgeous black-haired hunk of a young man as she flew to the sailboat, putting her arm around his waist and flying him back to the beach. All he was wearing was a pair of blue and white swim trunks and a San Francisco Giants baseball cap. "This is my Arion son, Randall."

I initially tensed at the word 'Arion'. But I immediately relaxed myself. Of all the people on Earth, I shouldn't be prejudiced against Arions, the woman who had raised me since Day One was an Arion. If a Velorian like SuperFemme was willing to vouch for him, that was good enough for me.

SuperFemme continued on. "And this is his new bride, and my daughter-in-law, Kathy." The younger blonde, whom I had first taken for a Velorian, was actually not a Velorian at all, but instead was an enhanced Terran. She appeared to be a couple years younger than I was, and she was about three or four inches shorter than I was, just about the height I remembered Sharon to be. She also had a striking resemblence to Xara's Aunt Lillith, the Protector of Tetra, though she was wearing a red and white bikini, not a Velorian uniform. SuperFemme had pulled her severely injured and burned body out of a burning building. She had been forced to enhance her to save her life. The enhancement had gone beyond merely saving her life. Quite spectacularly. The next time she had seen her, Kathy was going toe to toe with an Arion Warrior Prime, just as she had been doing when I had first seen her. None of my enhancees would have lasted a minute in her place. I thanked her for the help in keeping the Arion's legs pinned while I took crushed the heart.

I listened as SuperFemme gave me a brief synopsis of how she came to be on Earth. On her Earth, not mine. She and her Arion Beta lover had been held prisoner by the Arions. They had escaped, taking a lifeboat which had brought them here. The Beta had died while giving birth to a son, whom SuperFemme had adopted as her own, only to lose him. She had only recently found him, after he had gotten engaged to Kathy.

Wait a second. I'd heard that story before. Well, not exactly the same one. But there were enough similarities to more than pique my interest. I decided to follow my hunch. "By any chance, is your name Julira?" I knew that I didn't get the proper Velorian pronunciation, but it couldn't have been too far off. When she nodded, her eyes widening in surprise, I continued on, "And Randall's mother. Was her name Joreen?"

She nodded again. "Yes. But how could you possibly have known that?"

My vision blurred as my eyes filled with tears. I hugged the golden blur in front of me. "M-mother!" I could tell that she was surprised, but her arms came around me.

I finally let her go and dabbed at my eyes to clear away the tears so that I could explain. "It was the same thing in this dimension. Only, it was you who was pregnant and died giving birth to a child. To me." I gushed out the story too fast, but she must have followed me, for the surprise faded from her eyes as comprehension dawned on her. She returned my hug, holding me as only one Velorian could hold another.

"You're my, my... You're my daughter?" Then she must have caught the other implications of my story. "Then, Joreen, she's, she's here? Somewhere?"

"She's my Mom. She raised me as her own daughter. She's probably home right now, worried to death about me. That's the way she is, always worried about somebody else getting in trouble."

She laughed, even as her eyes misted over. "Yes, that sounds like her, always worrying about other people instead of herself. And I'm sure you've given her a lot to worry about, if you're anything like me, my daughter." She wrapped her arms around me and we hugged again.

Going back to the house and sitting down in what was left of the living room, we started to try to sort things out. We were both firmly convinced that each of us was the only Velorian, Protector or otherwise, on Earth. It took us a while, but we eventually got everything sorted out. A check of a newspaper that we found in the trash, along with a quick call to directory information, showed that I was still on my Earth and that they had somehow gone through a wormhole. Or a dimensional rift, or whatever.

I immediately invited everybody to our cabin for a family get-together. They immediately accepted. Mother and I could have been there in seconds, and Kathy might have survived a supersonic flight, but there was no way that Randall could have. After another quick sweep for the other Warrior Prime, without finding her, we settled for a slow flight, Mother carrying Randall while I carried Kathy. First, I called ahead to let people know that I was bringing some guests over. We had already arranged for somebody to come and pick up our prisoners, the Army was sending some helicopters, with medical personnel to see to the wounded.

A few minutes later, we landed on the balcony and I showed my guests into our cabin. George and Steve were at a table hunched over a notebook computer, doing whatever it was that they usually did. I couldn't get my darling husband to come on vacation without bringing at least one computer with him, and my ex-jock stepfather was just about as bad.

Karen was setting the table for dinner. As we walked in, Mom came out of the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron. "Okay, my little one, what stray puppy did you bring home this time?" She looked over at Karen and winked. "Last time, you...."

She looked back at me and over my shoulder at the woman behind me, and did a double take. Her hands came up to her mouth. "Julira? Is that really you, Julira?"

"Joreen? It really is you."

As Steve and George started to get up from their chairs, and I got out of the way, the two older women met in the middle of the room, coming together in a collision significantly harder than anything Steve had ever encountered on the gridiron.

"Oh, Randa, I thought I'd never see you again," Mother said, burying her face in Mom's raven tresses.

"Julira, you're the only one who's ever called me that," Mom's voice answered, from somewhere inside Mother's golden hair. I later learned that 'Randa' was a Velorian term of endearment, sort of like 'sweetheart'. They held each other close, whispering in each other's ear. I tried to eavesdrop on them, but they had switched to Arion.

As shocked as I had been to finally meet my 'Mother', that was nothing compared to Mom's joy at meeting her former lover. After all, I was only the second Velorian in Mom's life, 'Mother' was the first.

The two former lovers hardly broke their embrace when Kathy and Randall entered. Then, after the introductions, there were more hugs, as Mom hugged her 'son', Karen hugged everyone, especially the young Arion man, and the men shook hands.

As Karen set the additional places, I threw on some clothes, grabbed some cash, and made a quick trip to a nearby shopping center. Landing on a vacant loading dock, I went around to the front and into a liquor store for a couple of bottles of champagne. Walking around to the back again, I leaped up into the sky for the return trip.

It was quite a festive and joyous dinner. I had my whole family with me. My Arion Mom and my Velorian mother. My Terran stepfather and my Terran husband. My Arion Prime cousin. My Arion Beta brother and his wife, my Terran sister. What a crazy and mixed-up family, as Mom had said on more than one occasion.

Though Mom and Mother didn't seem to be too hungry. At least, not for food. They kept looking at each other, even as they told us their stories. After all, it's not every family that has to explain how a Velorian woman has an Arion Beta son, or an Arion Beta woman has a Velorian daughter.

I already knew most of one half of the story, and had heard a part of the other half. Still, it was fascinating to hear it all over again. The parallels were incredible. So were the differences. After all, there were some significant differences between Randall and myself, and we certainly hadn't grown up the same way.

And there were some things about myself that I hadn't heard before. Things that I was too young at the time to understand, or even to remember. Like the man who had nearly become my stepfather. Long before Steve entered Mom's life. I wracked my memory, but I just could not remember a thing about Brian, besides what Mom had already told me about him. Though as Mom continued with the story, I remembered Brian's sister, 'Aunt' Brenda, and Brenda's daughter, Beverly, who was only a year older than I was.

Brian was also the man who had gotten Mom into the FBI in the first place. I hadn't heard that part of the story before.

Joan knew that Brian liked her; she could still remember how he had looked at her, that time he had seen her exercising naked. And he was always so nice and kind to her, getting both her and little Juliree, now called Julie, set up with proper identification papers. Not to mention the way he had also arranged for his sister to help look after the two of them.

Yet, there was still more than a bit of aloofness in his manner.

Was it because she had told him that she wasn't from this planet? Did he see as non-human, somehow? Was she not a person in his eyes, like the little furry four-legged creatures that many of the people here kept? Pets, that was the word. Were she and little Julie mere pets?

Or was it her physical strength, obviously so much greater than his own? She recalled the surprise, almost fear, on his face when she lifted up the side of his car so that he could repair it. She almost regretted having done that. But if she hadn't, then he couldn't have effected the repair.

She knew that she couldn't bring up the subject with Brian. Eventually, she managed to turn a conversation with Brenda into that direction. "Do you think Brian likes me?" she asked, as they were washing diapers.

Brenda stopped and stared at her. "Like you? He's crazy about you."

Crazy? Wasn't that a mental condition? Was that it? Was there something wrong with him? She stopped and put a hand up to her mouth. "Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't know there was something wrong with him." She regretted having said that, as soon as Brenda's eyes opened wide. Her regret turned to horror as Brenda threw her head back and started to laugh.

Brenda finally controlled her laughter enough to speak. "Oh, there's nothing wrong with him that hasn't been wrong with every man since Adam." Joan tried to remember who Adam was, even as Brenda continued. "It's obvious he loves you."

Joan was stunned. "He, he does? But, but he's never told me that."

Brenda smiled at her. "Of course not. He's a man." She then momentarily closed one eye, in a gesture called a wink. "And he's my little brother." She finished folding up the diaper before continuing on. "Let me have a talk with him, before dinner tonight." Brian had been joining them for dinner at least twice every week, and he was coming over that evening.

Joan took care of the two little girls, while Brenda got her brother to help with preparing dinner. After dinner, Brenda took her husband with her to tend to the girls, leaving Joan and Brian to clean up. And to talk.

It was that evening that she told him that little Julie was not actually her daughter. Not by blood, at any rate, but instead the daughter of a dead lover. Having learned what the natives thought in general of same-sex lovers, she had refrained from mentioning that her lover was Julie's mother, not the father. She didn't even try to explain that Julie had no father. Instead, she only said that both of Julie's parents were dead.

Curiously, he seemed to be relieved at this revelation.

After that barrier had been crossed, others quickly followed. Only one remained, and that one might have been crossed as well, if Brenda hadn't returned to the kitchen at that precise moment, interrupting a passionate kiss.

There was a definite change in their relationship after that evening. A definite change for the better, in her opinion. And in his, if his responses were any indication.

I also learned about the pet name Mother had given Mom. It certainly explained Randall's name. His 'mother' had chosen to name him after his mother's pet name, while my 'mother' had named me after my mother's real name.

But as fascinating as the stories were, I could tell that everyone had other thoughts on their minds, as well. It was obvious what the two primary storytellers were thinking of. Karen kept looking at the only male Arion in the room.

I suggested that we call it a night and go to bed. I knew as soon as I had said it that I shouldn't have used the word 'bed'. That started up a whole new discussion, as people suggested who was going to share which bed with whom.

It was clear the Mother and Mom were going to be together tonight, even Steve knew better than to raise any objections when Mother took Mom in her arms and flew off into the night. That still left three other women, and three men. At least the numbers came out right; it didn't look like anyone would have to sleep alone tonight.

We had already discussed my trying to enhance Randall. Since we didn't know how long they would be here, we decided that I should try it as soon as possible. That meant tonight. Much to Karen's chagrin, it was obvious that she'd been hoping to corner the lone Arion man tonight. And Kathy wanted my darling husband, to see what an enhanced man was like. That left Steve for Karen. Not exactly a consolation prize, for either one of them.

As Mother took Mom in her arms and floated out of the room, Kathy suggested that we dress appropriately for each other, since we were each going to be with someone other than our usual partners.

"You mean, we should wear nothing at all," Karen said, making it clear what she thought the term "dressing appropriately" meant.

None of us wanted to dress formally. Or anything even remotely fancy. So we ended up settling for swimsuits for the women. The men chose to stay as they were. I stayed in my modified Arion uniform, merely throwing on a tee shirt over it.

Kathy grabbed her suitcase and went with Karen up to her room to change.

A couple of minutes later I went on up to see how they were doing. As I walked into the room, I almost felt as if I had just walked into a picture out of a Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue.

My enhanced Terran 'sister' had on a very thin and sheer white one-piece swimsuit, wetted so as to be even sheerer, so sheer that her large beautiful breasts may as well have been uncovered, while my Arion 'cousin', sitting down at her feet, had on a tiny yellow bikini that didn't cover much of her large beautiful breasts.

"So, are we ready to face the men?" I asked, tearing my eyes away from those four beautiful feminine mounds to look up at their beautiful faces.

"Bring them on!" my cousin answered, getting up to her feet.

"I wasn't asking you, Karen. I know you're always ready for a man." I smirked at her, and she stuck her tongue out in reply. I turned to the blonde. "How about you, Kathy? Are you ready to be unfaithful to your husband, on your honeymoon?"

Her smile disappeared momentarily. Then it was back, brighter than before. "Well, since he's going to be unfaithful to me, I guess I'm going to have to be, too. As long as I get him back afterwards, Julie, and in one piece."

"Don't worry, you'll get him back. As good as new, maybe even better," I winked at her. We weren't sure whether my enhancement would do anything or not. From what they had told us, Kathy had already apparently enhanced him slightly. Both 'Mother' and Mom were surprised that an enhanced Terran had been able to enhance anybody, let alone an Arion. But we decided that it wouldn't hurt to have me try. I had already enhanced one enhanced Beta, maybe I could enhance another.

Somewhat surprisingly, Randall had been the most reluctant one in the group. And I could understand why. Here he was, on his honeymoon with a beautiful young woman. Then they get caught in the Bermuda Triangle, and end up on a parallel world. And now, another woman, a beautiful one, if I do say so myself, wants to get him into bed with her. All the while his new wife takes another man to her bed.

Actually, that might have been the clincher. Kathy was certainly curious, almost eager, to see what an enhanced man was like in bed. And he had seen enough of our family to know that we took sex a little more casually than they did.

And, with both his Velorian 'Mother' and his Arion 'Mother' all but encouraging him, he had finally capitulated. But I knew that I was still going to have to be careful with him, and take it slow, in order to overcome his reluctance.

Our men were already used to having different partners. Since Steve's wife was already occupied, he had agreed to partner Karen. The big hunk definitely had a thing for black-haired musclewomen. And my darling husband hadn't seemed too reluctant to experience another beautiful blonde; I knew from personal experience that he'd always had a thing for beautiful busty blondes that could bench press pickup trucks.

I linked arms with both of them. Arm in arm in arm, we went out to meet the men.

Kathy looked down at the man in her arms. About Randall's age and height. And there, the similarities ended.

She normally liked a little more meat on her men. While he didn't exactly look as if he was starving to death, he was quite thin. Not the big muscular hunk that Randall was, though he was handsome in his own way.

And, Kathy reflected, why should Julie be attracted to muscles on a man anyway? When a thousand bodybuilders and weightlifters between them couldn't come close to matching her strength?

If Julie had married him, he must really be a special man. And he had felt different from other men, she had noticed as she had carried him to the bedroom.

Laying him down on the bed and sitting down next to him, she quickly pulled his shirt off of him. His muscles, though not large, were well defined. She reached out with a hand and ran her fingers across his chest.

Yet, as hard as his muscles were, his caresses were much lighter than Randall's were. While Randall had at least the strength of five men, that was his Arion Beta background. The man with her now was an ordinary human. Or at least, he had been, before Julie had worked her magic on him. The same magic that she was now trying to work on Randall.

She was surprised at just how hard his muscles were. Much harder than even Randall's were, and he had the hardest muscles she had ever felt on a man. Except for that one Prime she had fought, and that didn't count. She had been too busy fighting for her life at that time, and she had almost died in the process. She probably would have, if it hadn't been for SuperFemme's timely arrival.

His chest felt as if it had been carved out of marble. No, it was harder than that; she could dig furrows in marble with her fingers. She pressed harder with her fingers, hard enough to make Randall wince. Yet, George showed no signs of discomfort. Instead, he half closed his eyes and reached up to stroke her breasts with his own fingers.

She knew that she wanted to feel more of his body, to get a better idea of what Julie just might be able to do for Randall. Especially to the most important part of his body. She quickly undid his belt and removed his pants and his shorts. She knew that whatever reluctance she might have had was not shared by him, he was quickly completely erect.

Reaching out, she closed her hand around his large cock. It too felt harder than marble, even as it pulsed and throbbed in her hand. She knew that she had to have it. To feel it deep inside of her. She quickly slipped out of her swimsuit.

Sliding a hand under his back, she lifted his body up to hers. She felt her breasts flatten against his chest. Mmm, Randall's chest had never flattened her breasts like this.

For the next few hours, she completely forgot about Randall.

"You know, Randall, I've never made love to a Beta man before," I told him as I laid him down on the bed and started taking off his clothes.

"I've never made love to a real Velorian, either, he replied, reaching up to stroke my breasts before pulling off my tee shirt over my head. He then started trying to remove my modified Arion uniform. As I had anticipated, even with his enhanced Beta strength, he was unable to slip it off of me.

"We're not all that different, are we?" I slipped out of my uniform and leaned over him, my large breasts dangling just inches from his face.

"I wouldn't exactly say that." His deep blue eyes were all but glowing with their own inner light as he reached up with his left hand and cupped my breast. Even as big as his hand was, it couldn't quite completely surround my mound. But he was able to squeeze it with so much more force than any of my other recent male lovers had been able to do. "Kathy is so completely unlike any other woman I've ever been with. It's hard to even imagine what somebody like you or Mother would be like," he whispered. I placed my hands over his, pressing his hands even harder against my breasts, until the look on his face told me that I was starting to cause him some pain. I immediately removed my hands.

As he resumed squeezing my breast, I softened my body. Then, as he continued to squeeze, I flexed my chest muscles, firming up my breast, pushing his fingers outward. Then I softened myself again, letting him press his fingers into my soft flesh again.

I was really quite impressed with him. None of my lovers, at least none of my male lovers, had been able to squeeze me that hard. Well, except for Meelek, who had raped me up in Alaska, and those Primes I had raped in Kentucky while under the influence of Orgone. But they didn't count; I certainly didn't include them among my numerous lovers. That hadn't been love, that had been rape, plain and simple. One way or the other.

Carefully wrapping my arms around him, I gently lifted his large body up to mine. "Let me know if I'm hurting you," I said, as I started rubbing his broad muscular chest across my breasts. I knew that I could be more physical with him than I could be with an ordinary Terran, though not as physical as I could be with my darling enhanced husband. At least not until I could enhance him, if I could do it after what Kathy had already done for him.

I laid him back down onto the bed and laid myself down on top of him. My lips quickly found his. Maintaining the kiss, I rolled us over, laying him on top of me. I then guided his head down to one of my breasts. It was clear that he'd had plenty of practice with Kathy, as his large strong hands kneaded my breast with all of his strength. It really felt good to have his strong Arion hands and his mouth working over one of my breasts. So good that I quickly wanted even more of him.

Lifting him off of me, I laid him down on the bed beside me. Quickly throwing a leg over him, I straddled him and lowered myself down onto his throbbing shaft. His large hands came up, cupping my breasts and fondling them with all of his Beta strength.

Randall did feel some guilt. He was cheating on his new wife. And on their honeymoon, of all things. Not to take anything away from Kathy, but this young woman was the embodiment of his earliest and deepest fantasies.

Ever since he could remember, he had had a crush on SuperFemme. In a way, it had been a bit of a disappointment to learn that SuperFemme was his foster mother. That had eliminated any possibility of a sexual relationship with her.

Julie was just about a dead ringer for SuperFemme. Not too surprising, considering that Julie was this dimension's SuperFemme's daughter. And not just an ordinary daughter, but a parthenogenic daughter, practically a clone.

Again, not taking anything away from Kathy, but he knew that there was nothing in the world he wanted more than to make love to the young blonde woman with him.

As she mounted him, he reached up and cupped her large full breasts, squeezing them with all of his strength. All thoughts of Kathy vanished from his mind as Julie's long shapely legs began their powerful rhythmic pumping.

Randall and I may have had totally different experiences growing up, but there were some things we shared.

However, there was one thing that I knew that he had never experienced before. I rolled him off of me, disengaging his mouth from my nipple. Lightly flexing my calves, I rose up off of the bed. Rolling over to be directly above him, I smiled down at him. "I bet Kathy's never done anything like this." Reaching down, I slid my hands under him, lifting his body up to mine.

Spreading my legs while keeping my calves flexed to keep us airborne, I took him in midair, my hands on his hips pumping him in and out of me, using his entire body as a huge dildo. He first wrapped his arms around me in order to hang on, but at my suggestion, he changed his grip to the two large handles that I have on the front of my chest.

Mother brought Mom back just in time to help me with breakfast. The men were still sound asleep, and Karen and Kathy were just beginning to stir. Not that I was completely fresh myself, but as the resident Velorian, I had my duties as the hostess.

Mother actually ended up doing most of the work. She and Mom apparently hadn't spent all of the night making up for lost time, for there was a couple of big bags of pancake mix, and cartons of eggs, and other ingredients. Mother dug out an old waffle iron that had been buried under the sink, which looked as if it hadn't been used in years.

She put in way too much oil into the pancake mix, along with some vanilla. And some Jack Daniels, of all things. I'd never seen anybody mix some whiskey into pancake batter before. More than just some, actually. After I cooked up the first batch of bacon, Mother commandeered the bacon grease, using it on the waffle iron, along with butter. Lots of butter.

When she plugged the waffle iron in, we learned why it hadn't been used in years; the heating element was broken. But she wasn't about to let a minor detail like that stop her from making her special waffles. I saw the violet beams shooting out from her eyes, as she began using her heat vision to heat up the waffle iron.

The delicious aroma wafting out of the kitchen was enough to finally rouse the men from their exhausted slumber. By the time that they emerged, shaved and showered, Kathy already had the dining room table set. Mom was bringing out the second mountain of waffles, as Mother stayed in the kitchen making more. After cooking the bacon, Karen and I were preparing the coffee and the orange juice.

There was no doubt as to what was the main course that morning. The waffles were fantastic, with either honey or with maple syrup. Or plain. Much too rich, but fortunately, we didn't have to worry about counting calories. At least, the women didn't. Mom and I had never made waffles like this before, but it was clear that at least Mom had eaten similar waffles before. We both made sure that we learned the recipe, asking Mother a few questions, even as we continued to stuff our faces.

I would have thought that there were enough waffles to feed the entire Denver Broncos football team. Yet, by the time we finally pushed back our chairs and started to clear the table, nothing was left but a few measly crumbs. All of the coffee and the orange juice were gone as well, used to wash down the waffles.

After breakfast, Mom checked with the authorities to make sure that our four prisoners would be secure while they were transported to our facility at Fort Carson in Colorado. We were afraid that one or more of us Supremis would be needed to guard them, but we decided to keep them here in solitary confinement for a couple of days, before we escorted them back to Colorado.

Mother and I then flew Mom and Karen out to the island to search the place more thoroughly. I really didn't know what to look for, though Mother and Mom certainly had some ideas. And Karen, having been an electronics and communications specialist, immediately pounced on the equipment. Some of it had been destroyed during the fight, but much of it was still intact. If nothing else, it would provide her with spare parts. We arranged to have it all shipped back to Colorado, where Karen, along with Mike and Rob, could try to make use of it.

We also collected all of the Arion clothing we found. If nothing else, we could make spares for the one uniform that I did have, since Mother didn't have any spare Velorian Protector uniforms that she could give me.

The gold, we decided to have shipped back to Fort Carson, where they could build a cell or two to hold Primes, if we ever captured any of them alive.

Mom, as the one least affected by the gold, went into the gold room to explore. It was she who found the concealed trapdoor in the floor. At least, that explained how the 'Dark Supergirl' had gotten out of there. I mentally kicked myself for not having found it while I was trapped inside.

The gold still had enough of an effect on her, she was unable to lift up the trapdoor. Somewhat reluctantly, Mother and I went inside. I was definitely feeling queasy from the gold, but I tried to ignore it, knowing that Mother was feeling it just as much as I was.

Even with two Velorians working on it, we couldn't open up the door. If two Velorians couldn't open it, how could one Prime? We couldn't answer that until Mom found the switch that released the catch. After that, it was a simple matter to open the trapdoor. There was a steel ladder leading down into the dark depths. Still feeling a little queasy from the gold, we descended. Mother led the way, followed by Mom, then Karen, and then yours truly bringing up the rear.

It was a rough tunnel, carved out of the solid rock, probably by the Primes. As was to be expected for Florida, it was pretty damp down there. It was just like something out of a bad movie, complete with water dripping down from the ceiling. At least, there were no rats scurrying around our feet. Fortunately, the further we got from the gold room, the better we all felt. There wasn't much light down here, which caused some problems for the two Arions, until Mother found a switch that lit up what looked like a television screen. We saw that it was a surveillance system of some sort, as it displayed the interior of the gold room. There was another screen at the other end of the tunnel, as it emerged near the beach, the trapdoor at this end concealed by the brush.

Turning and looking back, I saw that the tunnel had been shielded somehow, so that when I used my tachyon vision, I couldn't see it. That immediately set Mother and Karen looking for the equipment that did the shielding. They found it in the basement of the building. Unfortunately, Karen said that it was one of their smaller devices, not useful for shielding anything much bigger than that tunnel was.

We looked again for the other Warrior Prime, the one I was convinced was the same 'Dark Supergirl' with whom I had tangled before. Even though we knew how she had gotten away, we didn't know where the 'Dark Supergirl' had gone. By now, she could be just about anywhere in Florida. Even though we had more of the Arion communicators like the one that Mother had used to find the island, we were sure that she wouldn't be on the same channel any more, if she even had a communicator with her. If I was in her position, I'd go half way across the country before calling for help.

Afterwards, we went to the Army base where our prisoners were being held. They were being held under armed guard, in separate cells in the stockade to keep them from comparing notes. Mom started the initial interrogations, but didn't learn much. Apparently, not even the presence of two Velorians was enough to loosen their tongues. We did learn that there had been five Warriors Prime assigned to this group, which meant that there was still one on the loose; we had killed three on that island, and Mother had killed one on another island before stumbling across their base. A female, and the squad leader. I was sure that she was the 'Dark Supergirl'.

At least, we didn't learn much until we got to the fourth Beta. He was the one that we had found first, unconscious in a bedroom and with a broken leg. As we entered his cell, I heard Karen behind me gasp. Turning my head to look at her, I saw a look of recognition on her face.

Surprised, Bilvek looked up at the sound of the door opening, to see two blonde women entering his cell. Even in the native clothing, he had no doubt that they were Velorians. Stars! Two Velorians! They had been sent down to the planet to take out one Velorian. How were they supposed to deal with two of them?

What was even more surprising was the two black-haired women who followed the Velorians. He immediately recognized them as Arions, Betas by the look of them. He didn't recognize the older, taller one, he was certain that he had never seen her before. But the younger, shorter one....

This one, he recognized, just as she recognized him. The cute young half Prime with whom he had worked with in communications. They'd enjoyed a good working relationship, but much to his chagrin, it had never gotten beyond that. Unbidden, her name came to his lips. "Koren?" he asked.

The older Arion said something that he couldn't quite catch to one of the Velorians. The Velorian took Koren's arm and the two of them left the cell, leaving him with the other Velorian and the older Arion.

"Who is he?" I asked Karen, when we had left Mom and Mother alone with the prisoner.

She started babbling something in Arion, until she saw the look of incomprehension on my face. "I'm sorry, Julie," she switched back to English. "His name is Bilvek. He's a communications tech. I worked with him on the ship."

The opening was too good to resist. "And just how closely did you work with him?"

She blushed briefly but brightly, before she regained control. "I just worked with him, Julie. I didn't sleep with him."

"Hmmm. He's male, nothing obvious wrong with him, and you didn't get into his pants. What was wrong with you, my little Arion cousin?"

"Julie!" She blushed a deeper shade of red. "He was my supervisor."

"Hmmm, I know of a couple of engineers back home who've been in bed with their supervisor. With their Arion supervisor." I couldn't resist one final gibe. "With their former hooker supervisor."

She blushed again and tried to slap me, I caught her wrist before she succeeded. "Julie! Get your mind out of the gutter. And out of bed. I know it's hard for you Velorians, with your one-track minds, but try."

She was having too much fun taking what I always say to her and turning it back on me. I tried to cover my blush by feigning a return slap at her cheek. When she brought up an arm to block it, I went below it and grabbed her breast, giving it a squeeze. Before she could retaliate, and feeling the gaze of the guards watching us out of the corners of their eyes, I released her and stepped back. "Okay, back to business. So just what do you know about this guy, Bill?"

"Bilvek," she corrected me. "He's a communications tech, just like I was. He's not a bad sort, at least for an Arion," she grinned at me. "My brother liked him, too." Her voice faltered and her eyes misted a bit at the mention of her twin brother, Korek. I shared her grief, if it hadn't been for his help, I might never have gotten away from Meelek's trap, up in Alaska. But then, she controlled herself and continued on. "In fact, he was my immediate supervisor, just before I came down to LA. I think he wanted to be more, but he never tried to force anything on me. He knew I was half Prime, and too strong for him to try anything."

"Do you think you could get him on our side? You know, use your charms on him?" So far, none of our other Arion prisoners had shown the slightest inclination to join us against their former colleagues. Mom and Karen were still the only Arions on our side, excepting Randall in Mother's dimension.

"Maybe. I know I wouldn't mind having him on our side." She grinned at me. "Or on his back, either." She looked thoughtful. "I'm not sure if we can trust him, though. I remember him mentioning doubts about whether we should be invading this planet. But I don't know if he was baiting me into being disloyal, so he could denounce me."

Mom seemed to have gotten the same idea. She gave the officer who had accompanied us strict instructions that this particular prisoner be given the best of care for his injured leg. She and Karen then had a quick conversation in Arion, with Mother listening intently. The two Arions then returned to the cell for another talk with the prisoner. Mother and I stayed outside, with the officer and a guard to keep us company.

Mother didn't say a word to me, but she threw me a quick smile, and then turned to face the guard. I couldn't see her face, but from his reactions, I knew that she had to have hit him pretty hard. With a full Velorian smile.

I couldn't let that challenge go unanswered. I turned to the officer, a young redheaded lieutenant whose nametape read Reynolds, and gave him my best and sexiest smile. By unspoken consent, both Mother and I kept our pheromones under control. However, my officer still lost all military bearing, as his knees threatened to give out. I took a peek and saw that there was something in his pants that was trying its best to salute me.

Mom and Karen weren't in there with the Arion prisoner for very long. Mother and I had only gotten started flirting with the two men, when they emerged. We left the two weak-kneed men and returned to our cabin, the two Velorians leaping up into the sky carrying the two Arions, as soon as we were out of sight.

We knew that we could use all of the help we could get in combating the Arions. They had the technological advantage over us. And they certainly had me outnumbered. Mother wouldn't be here long; she had her own Earth to Protect. Mom and Karen could handle some of the Betas, but the only weapon we had available against the Primes was still yours truly. If we could get even one Beta on our side, even though he wouldn't be of much help in a stand-up fight, his technical expertise certainly wouldn't hurt our cause.

Of course, there always was the possibility that he was a mole, sent down to infiltrate our operations. They might suspect that Karen was working with us, and deliberately picked somebody that she knew.

Mother told us that on her Earth, not one single Arion had defected. Randall didn't exactly count, since he had never been with the Arions in the first place.

That afternoon, and over dinner, we heard more about Mom's early years on Earth. And about my early years, even though I naturally didn't remember any of it. There were more things I had never heard about before. Certainly I had never heard about how Mom's relationship with Brian had ended.

Joan had been working with Brian more frequently. His 'secret weapon', he often joked. Even though she had been trained as a nurse, her Arion military training, not to mention her enhanced Beta strength, made her a superb unarmed fighter.

Not for the first time, she was glad that Velorians, unlike Arion Primes, didn't manifest their incredible powers until puberty, or shortly after, probably at about sixteen of this planet's years. She'd had nightmares about trying to take care of an infant Prime, with strength far exceeding her own. At least this way, she could leave little Julie under Brenda's capable care.

Brian had convinced his supervisor to allow her to work with him. She'd needed to reveal her Arion abilities to him in order to get his approval, though once he'd seen them, he'd wasted no time in hiring her.

A small team of handpicked instructors took her through an accelerated training program. They were able to skip most of the physical work, allowing them to concentrate on the procedural issues.

To hide her special abilities, she was given the innocent-sounding job title of 'Research Assistant'. That allowed her to travel with Brian to the trouble spots, without raising too many eyebrows. Though this time, they weren't travelling very far, just up to Cheyenne, Wyoming, only a couple of hours by car.

As he rushed toward Brian, she stepped forward. As he went by, she caught his left arm, wrapping her right arm around it to immobilize it. As he spun around, her left hand delivered a blow to his right arm, knocking his gun out of his grasp. Her arm then went to the back of his head, forcing it down towards the ground.

Bringing her left knee up, she smashed his face against it. At the last moment, she remembered to refrain from using all of her enhanced Arion strength, instead using just enough force to knock him unconscious.

Dropping the limp body, she looked around. There was nobody else in sight; apparently the man whom she had just disabled was the only lookout on this side.

Brian was at the warehouse door, listening. Grasping the doorknob, he tried it. As they had suspected, it was locked. However, it had been designed to keep out Terrans, not enhanced Arion Betas. Motioning him aside, she grabbed the doorknob and turned. The knob refused to turn. Adjusting her grip, she tried again.

The lock still held. "Oh, Julira, why couldn't I have gotten a little more of your strength? This door wouldn't have slowed you down at all," she thought to herself, though she knew that she was being selfish. Julira had increased her strength ten-fold, which was well above the average for a Velorian enhancement of an Arion Beta, making her about fifty times stronger than the man at her side.

She was about to try again, when she heard something from inside. The sharp staccato sound of gunshots!

She knew that they needed to get inside as quickly as they could. Abandoning any thoughts of stealth, pushing Brian aside, a little more roughly than she had intended to, and taking a step back, she kicked at the door. The door cracked, sagging inward on its hinges. One more kick, and the door was down. She quickly dived through, rolling to absorb the impact as she hit the floor. Brian was right behind her.

She stayed crouched on the floor for a couple of seconds, in order to let her eyes adjust to the dark. There was more gunfire; despite the echoes in the confines of the warehouse, her sensitive ears told her that they were coming from somewhere off to her right.

Rising up to her feet and taking one of Brian's hands in hers, she began working her way in that direction, remaining close to the rows of crates for the cover that they afforded. The gunfire stopped, depriving her of guidance.

As she approached the end of a row, she heard some voices, too low for her to make out the words. Not recognizing the voices, she crept closer.

Just as she was about to peer around the corner, her sensitive ears heard another sound. It came from behind her. From somewhere behind Brian.

She whirled around just in time to see a man peering over a crate, and raising his gun, pointing it towards her and Brian.

She reacted instinctively, without even thinking about which of them that gun was aimed at. With one hand, she pushed Brian down to the floor. Her powerful legs propelled her over Brian, and over the crates, straight at the gunman.

Just before she reached him, there was a loud BANG, practically in her ear. There was a sharp pain in her chest. She tried to check her leap, but her right arm failed to respond. Her left hand smashed into the man's face, followed a fraction of a second later by her left shoulder smashing into his chest.

Her lack of control caused the blow to be harder than she had intended it to be. The coroner later would find it impossible to determine whether he had died from having his ribcage crushed, or from having his neck snapped; either event would have been instantly fatal.

She rolled clumsily up to her hand and knees. Looking around herself, she saw Brian crawling towards her. She tried to meet him, but her right arm gave out, pitching her down to the floor on her side.

She passed out from the pain just before Brian reached her side. As a result, she didn't know that her actions had caused enough of a diversion to let the other FBI agents capture the remaining gunmen.

She was also unaware of Brian carrying her out to his car, laying her down in the back seat, to rush her to the hospital. She was passing in and out of consciousness as Brian drove.

My Honda 250 died on Interstate 80, almost ten miles before reaching Cheyenne. Of course. The damned thing probably knew it couldn't find anywhere less convenient than out in the middle of the Wyoming prairie. I had just tanked up less than two hours ago, so I knew that it wasn't the gas. Twenty minutes of fiddling narrowed the problem down to the magneto, so I locked my bike and tried hitching with my luggage, if one can dignify a duffel bag by so fancy a name. After an hour or so of watching the cars go by, one finally stopped on the other side of the interstate. Naturally, it was a cop. As he crossed the median and pulled up a few feet away from me, I read the words, "To Protect and Serve" on the side of his car. I stood up as he walked toward me, reaching for my wallet. He ignored me for the moment, looking at my bike instead.

The cop sauntered once around the bike and me and finally said, "You better have a good reason for riding this riceburner on my highway, hippie."

His words didn't make sense. I was only a month away from my last haircut. I was wearing my Army-issue field jacket over an Army-issue fatigue shirt and a pair of jeans. No beads, no sandals, no unusual painting on the bike, just a couple of dings and scratches. None of the usual symptoms of the "Turn On, Drop Out" culture.

"If you give me a ride into town, I'll have it towed off your highway, how's that?"

The cop looked at me sharply and altered course to stand a few feet in front of me. He adjusted his sunglasses and asked, "You got any cash on you?"

"A little," I said, "Why?"

"'Cause if you don't have at least twenty in your pocket, you're a vagrant with a smart mouth. You a vagrant, hippie?"

"Nope. I'm not a hippie, either."

"That bike's got a Texas plate. Prove it belongs to you. License and registration."

I produced both and waited while he called it in. A few minutes later another cop car pulled up and parked ahead of us. The two cops had a conference and told me that I was going to be searched. "For reasonable cause," said one of them. There was no point in objecting, and it probably would have made matters worse. About midway through searching my duffel, they found the metal lunchbox in which I kept my personal effects. With Gestapo-like efficiency, the one who found it opened it and dumped its contents out on the grass. He pawed through the remnants of my brief Army career and held up my Combat Infantry badge.

"Well, looky here. Unless he stole this thing, we got us a real live war hero."

"You a war hero, boy? Or did you steal that CIB badge off a real one?"

I was tired from a day's riding and I was tired of them. "Why don't you read the paperwork in the top of the lunch box and see for yourself? Then maybe we can get me into town before the shops close. I don't want to leave my bike out here."

The one with my badge laughed. "We ain't through searching you yet. We might even search you twice, just to make sure you don't have drugs on you."

"The only way you'll find drugs is to put them there yourself," I said, "And if that's what you're thinking of doing, forget it." I recited their names and badge numbers from memory. "Don't create a personal issue. Personal issues are the worst kind. They just sit there and fester until something's done about them."

The cop with the CIB in his hand stood up and came over to me. "Are you threatening us, hippie war hero?"

"Not me," I said, "Never. That's illegal. Besides, if you threaten someone, they know to watch out for you. It only makes it tougher to get your revenge."

"Hey, Davis," called the other cop, "Look at this." He held up my papers. The one named Davis went to have a look. After a moment he said, "Well, that checks, doesn't it?"

The game was over. I repacked my stuff and the first cop gave me a ride into town. He dropped me off at a motorcycle shop and left. There were no apologies from either cop, not that I had expected any. I made arrangements to have my bike retrieved and the shop owner gave me a ride to a nearby motel after he closed up. The place was on the fringe of an industrial area and had the typical assortment of bars, quick-food joints, and hookers. I cleaned up and went to the Denny's for dinner, after which I opened my battered copy of Alas, Babylon. It was good to be sitting on something that wasn't moving, and near a coffeepot. I read and watched the world go by through the window.

Motion caught my attention in the parking lot of the bar next door. A very agitated guy was staggering to his car, so drunk he was bashing his legs on bumpers. He fell once between cars and bashed his head, as well, but that didn't stop him. Weaving to his feet, he used the other car for support as he fished through his keys, apparently not finding the one he wanted. He finally just leaned over and opened the unlocked door and climbed in, where he fussed with the keys some more in the dark. I put my book in my pocket and started outside with the idea of trying to talk him into either taking a cab or sleeping it off in his car. When I heard the car start I hurried a little faster.

He revved the engine a few times as I jogged across the parking lot. When he saw me coming, he shot me the finger and floored it, shooting straight out of the parking lot and into the street. He hit the brakes too late, slamming to a halt against the curb on the other side of the street, but that didn't stop him for very long. He backed up, cut the wheels hard left, and straightened the car in the direction of the interstate service road. I was running flat-out by then. He grinned at me again and shot me another finger, then floored it again, burning rubber and accelerating quickly. I stopped running and headed back to the motel as I watched him barrel down the street.

There was a stop sign at the intersection, and I know he saw it because he had to swerve to avoid it, but he didn't stop or even slow down for it. Instead, he was stopped by a car coming from the right. The car he hit was literally torn almost in half. Everything from behind the door post to the front bumper was crushed and wedged under the drunk's car and the rear half slammed back along the side of the drunk's car. The whole spinning, mangled mess dragged to a stop on the grassy embankment just beyond the street.

When I got to the wreck, the engine was still running, even though the wheels weren't spinning. The drunk had gotten out and was wandering around the front of his car. I ignored him and ran around the passenger side to see if anyone was still alive. By some miracle there was a woman who appeared to be uninjured lying face down on the grass just ahead of the ripped-open car's rear half. One look at the crushed and mangled driver told me not to bother about him, but I reached far into the wreck and checked him for a pulse anyway. Zero.

Something flashed near my face.

Looking through the missing windshield I saw fiery droplets dribbling on the crushed remains of the dashboard and smelled burning plastic. There was a whoomping noise above as something under the hood of the drunk's car caught fire. I turned my attention to the woman. As I checked and found her pulse, the drunk was leaning past a foot-long protrusion of sheet metal to look into the front seat of his victim's car.

"Hey, asshole! Wake up and look at what you done to my car, asshole! I'm gonna sue your ass off!"

I didn't think about it. I just tapped his shoulder, and when he began to straighten up, yelling, "What the fuck do you want?", I simply moved him about a foot to his left and shoved hard. He screamed as the metal protrusion he'd been avoiding entered his chest with a sound like a knife being driven into a ripe melon. His face turned to me in shock. I looked back at him and said, "Nothing, I guess. Sorry to have bothered you."

I left the drunk impaled on the shard and went back to the woman. Her eyes were open. She'd probably seen me shove the drunk, but she said nothing. Oh, well. As she feebly struggled to roll over, I helped her, and that's when I saw the blood on her chest. It looked as if she'd been shot, the front of her white tee shirt, what was left of it, was soaked with blood. She was trying to say something, but couldn't quite gather enough breath to speak. I ignored her efforts and grabbed her ankles, dragging her a fair distance from the wreck in case it blew up.

The fire that had begun under the hood of the drunk's car dribbled down into the car below and soon spread to fill the interior with roiling flames and smoke as fabric and plastic burned. The fire trucks and ambulances must have been based in the area because they arrived rather quickly, but not quickly enough. The first truck was still half a block away when the drunk's car's gas tank exploded. A ball of flame enveloped both cars and lifted the rear of the drunk's car about ten feet, slamming it back down on the rear half of the other car. That set off the other gas tank, creating a second fireball. A wave of intense heat passed over us as the flatter fireball from the second explosion almost reached us.

The woman was looking up at me. "Who? Who are you?" She had finally gathered enough breath to speak, though her voice was barely a whisper.

"The name's Ed. Now hold still." Without bothering to ask her permission, I pulled up the remains of her shirt. I saw that there was a field dressing on the wound. "There's nothing more I can do," I pulled down her shirt. "But help is here. I'm going to tell them to get right over here, okay?" She nodded weakly. I got to my feet and ran towards the ambulance, waving my arms to get their attention. "One survivor!" I yelled, pointing in the woman's direction. They saw her and drove the ambulance right up the hillside to her position, followed by a fire truck and two cop cars. I walked behind the other fire truck that had parked itself to block the intersection. Everyone's attention was on the flaming wreck, so I walked into the small crowd of onlookers that was assembling. It wasn't long before a cop showed up to tell us to move farther away to keep the equipment clear. I took the opportunity to begin walking back to the motel.

She had seen death before, many times. Working in field hospitals, especially where Arions were fighting, that had been an unavoidable occurrence. But this was different.

This was not some nameless casualty. This was somebody she had known, somebody she had come to love. "Why does everybody I love have to die?" she asked herself. First, there had been the Arion doctor at the hospital. Then there had been Julira.

And now, Brian. He and his sister had been so helpful, helping her get adjusted to life on this new planet, and in helping her to care for little Julie.

She dreaded having to face Brenda. Yet, she knew that she could not avoid it; she wasn't about to go anywhere right now, and she could already hear Brenda's voice, talking with the policeman stationed to stand guard outside her hospital room.

She knew that it had to hurt, to lose her brother in the same way that she had lost her father. She could still remember how it had felt to lose Julira; she never went a day without remembering little Julie's mother. But to lose someone of your own blood....

The door opened and Brenda came in, followed by her husband. Before Joan could say a word, Brenda was by her side, taking her hand. "Joan! Jeff and I came as soon as I heard. I, I...."

Joan couldn't move her arm very far, but she closed her fingers about Brenda's hand, remembering not to use her enhanced Arion strength. It was hard to talk with the tube stuck in her mouth, but she made the effort. "Brenda, I, I'm sorry about Brian." She could barely recognize her own voice; it sounded like someone else's.

Brenda acted as if she hadn't heard. "Joan, are you all right?"

"I, I hurt. But the doctors say I'll live." They also said that they couldn't believe that she had survived this far. She knew that if she had been a Terran, instead of an Arion Beta, an enhanced Arion Beta at that, she would be dead already. Fortunately for her, the differences had not been noticed during the emergency surgery.

She tried to focus on the person who was not in the room with them. "Brian. I, I...." She could not put her thoughts into words. "I, I'm sorry."

"It wasn't your fault. Brian knew what he was doing. And he loved what he did. He's so much like Father in that way." Joan recalled that Brenda's father had been a policeman, and that he had been killed in the line of duty. "Brian's dead, and we're not." Brenda dabbed at her eyes with a handkerchief. "I already cried my tears for him on the drive up here." She put her handkerchief away and took Joan's hand again. "You're not dead, and you're not going to die yet. Julie needs you."

With a start, Joan realized that she had almost forgotten about her infant daughter in her concern for Brian's sister. If both Brenda and her husband were here, then who was watching over the children? "J-julie? Wh-where is she?" She forced herself to remember Brenda's baby. "And Beverly?"

"I left them with Betty." Betty was a neighbor, with a boy of her own, between Julie and Beverly in age. They often looked after each other's children, so Joan knew that the girls were in good hands.

She kept replaying the incident in her mind. There must have been something that she could have done. Something, anything, even if it meant letting the criminals get away. But no matter how much she wracked her brain, nothing presented itself to her. Even when her supervisor told her that there was nothing that she could have done differently, that it wasn't her fault, it didn't ease her guilt in the slightest.

She did the only thing that she could do. She threw herself into her work. She had failed Brian. She would do everything she possibly could do to avoid failing again.

There wasn't much anybody could say, when Mom had finished the story. Mom and Steve had their arms around each other. Kathy and Randall were holding hands; as a cop, I was sure that Randall knew what Mom had gone through. As the wife of a cop, I'm sure Kathy also knew what Mom and Brenda had gone through. Karen was probably thinking about her twin brother, who had died after freeing me from Meelek.

Mother tried to lighten the mood by asking to see Mom's chest, where she had been shot. As if Mother hadn't seen enough of Mom's bare skin last night. I knew, from repeated personal observations, that there were no scars there, or anywhere else on her body, for that matter.

Looking down, I saw that I was holding my darling husband's hand tight, squeezing hard enough to crush steel. Even as enhanced as he was, I knew that it couldn't be too comfortable for him. I immediately relaxed the pressure, though I didn't let go of his hand completely. I then turned to Mom. "Did you ever find the guy who pulled you out of the wreck? Ed, was it?"

"One of the firemen described him to the police. It turned out that his motorcycle had broken down just outside of town. He was staying at a motel across the street from the crash. But by the time we managed to send somebody over to look for him, he had already left. It took a while to track him down. He had gone to Europe and was wandering around over there for a while."

I couldn't resist the opportunity. "Did you ever find him to thank him properly?"

"Julie!" There was more than one exclamation of shock from around the table. I didn't think that my darling husband said a word, but I felt his hand tightening about mine.

I held up my other hand in surrender. "Okay, okay." The noise subsided.

Mom was the first to speak, looking at Mother. "She's definitely your daughter, Julira."

Mother laughed, looking at Mom and myself. "That's strange. I was about to say the same thing about her and you, Joreen." Mom joined her laughter. So did everyone else.

Never one to settle for half measures, I pressed on. "So, did you find him?"

"No." Mom looked thoughtful for a moment. "Apparently, he was working for the CIA. As far as we were able to determine, he got involved in one of those wars of liberation in Africa. As far as we know, he never came home. So no, I never met him again, to thank him for saving my life."

That was a real bummer. It put a real damper on the conversation, as everybody resumed eating in silence. It made me sorry that I had brought up the subject. I tried changing the subject a little. "So, what ever happened to Brenda and Beverly? I remembered Bev in grade school, but not much after that."

"I think you were about eight or nine when Brenda remarried. She moved out to California with her new husband, and we kind of fell out of touch after that." I could tell from the look in her eyes that she was planning to look up our old friends, once we got back home.

By bedtime, my enhancement of Randall still hadn't taken. Not that we were certain that it would at all, since Kathy had apparently enhanced him some already. There was no point in my taking him to bed again, other than for our pleasure.

Karen still couldn't persuade Kathy to let her have the Arion man for the night. Not that I could blame Karen for wanting him, I certainly had enjoyed the previous night. But then, I couldn't blame Kathy at all either; they were on their honeymoon, after all. And I really couldn't blame her; Randall was quite delightful. That left Karen to settle for Steve, not that she seemed too unhappy about it. I though about offering to swap with her, but after listening to Mom tell us about Brian, I decided to stick with my darling husband. Not that I was complaining, mind you.

I didn't think that anybody had any complaints about their partners. Everyone certainly looked happy when we gathered for breakfast, though the men did look more than a little tired. But then, that was the usual state of affairs in my family. Another batch of Mother's delicious waffles quickly fixed that, though I had to help out, taking turns with my heat vision, since nobody had bothered to get a working waffle iron.

Tonight, it was Mother's turn. She told us about how she had lost track of Randall. after placing him in an orphanage, thinking that it was something similar to a Velorian creche, where Velorian children were raised, until parents could be found for them. How she came back after a long battle in space, only to discover that Randall had been adopted, and that a fire had destroyed the orphanage, and the adoption records.

Nearly twenty years elapsed, during which time she had never stopped searching for her 'son'. He had grown up and become a policeman, wanting to use his Beta srength to do some good in his world, much as Mom had done in ours.

After a battle with two Arions, Mother had pulled Kathy out of a burning building and enhanced her to save her life. Kathy had woken up in a hospital, completely unaware of what had happened to her. She had started to realize that something quite wonderful had happened to her. Fortunately, she had met Randall while still in the hospital. He had been able to coach her in the use of her enhanced strength, drawing on his own experiences growing up as an Arion Beta, though he hadn't known that that's what he was at the time. It hadn't taken much time for them to fall in love.

Kathy had been helping Randall track down a drug dealer, when they ran across a pair of Arion Primes, or Alphas, as Mother called them. Fortunately for them, Mother had arrived on the scene just in the nick of time. That had led to a very joyous family reunion. Kathy and Randall had gotten married this past winter, after she had graduated from college, and gone to work as a newspaper reporter. Mother had been Kathy's maid of honor, though of course, most of the people there hadn't known that she was the groom's 'mother'.

"Do you remember the band we had at the reception?" Randall asked his bride.

Kathy put her hand up to her forehead and groaned. "I've been trying to forget that. That trumpet player! And that bandleader was totally crazy! What was his name? Tommy? Something like that."

"Toomey," her husband supplied. He quickly explained that a friend in the police department had recommended the band. "And like the fool I am, I went along with it."

"That trumpet player wasn't your fault," Kathy said as she took his hand, though she didn't sound too terribly sympathetic. Then she smiled. "And you're not that big of a fool. You married the right girl, didn't you?"

"But it was my wedding. It was my responsibility to make sure everything went well."

"I thought that was the best man's job." Randall's police partner had been the best man. "Or my father's, since it was his job to give me away. Your real responsibility started after we left the reception." Her grin would have done justice to a Velorian. Her Arion husband's cheeks reddened a little. I remembered our wedding night; if theirs had been anything like ours, he probably hadn't gotten much sleep.

The two newlyweds, with a few comments from Mother thrown in, told us some of what the band had done. Or at least, what the trumpet player had done.

Apparently, the trumpet player had already been a little juiced, even before they broke out the champagne. He kept hitting the wrong notes, even when he got the right song.

"At first, it was kinda funny. I thought it was just a part of the act."

"I'm sure that's what the bandleader wanted us to think. He played off of it, trying to make us think that the guy was just pretending to be drunk. He yelled at the other players just as much, so he wouldn't appear to be picking on just one guy."

"At the same time, he was busy trying to look down the front of the girl singer's dress."

"I thought that was just a normal part of the act."

"Not just down hers, either. Your gown, too, Kathy. And my dress. Men usually don't bother to look at my face. Their eyes seem to go automatically go to my chest." I knew exactly what Mother was talking about. And I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world.

"But he did a pretty good job of trying to pretend that there was no problem at all with the drunk. He was actually managing to pull it off, too. At least, at first."

"He tried hard not to show it, but I could tell he was getting more and more frustrated with him, getting angrier and angrier. I can't imagine he was happy to have one of his musicians show up for a gig drunk."

Finally, the bandleader just told him to sit it out. That just gave the trumpet player an opportunity to try to dance with some of the guests. Typical of band members, he wasn't a great dancer, since there's no music when they're not playing. He probably wouldn't have been a good dancer, even if he were stone sober.

Naturally, Kathy, the bride, was his first victim. "I thought he was going to ruin everything," she said. "He just couldn't keep his hands off of me. Even with all those cops around. I even slapped him. Not too hard, but believe me, I was tempted to just haul off and knock him into next week."

"Toomey was running around like a chicken with its head cut off, trying to control the trumpet player and to keep the rest of the band going, along with everything else. He was in charge of the lights and the sound. He was MCing the whole thing, making sure the buffet line was orderly, trying to get us all drunk, handing out business cards to everybody trying to line up other gigs, and all that."

"It was almost comical, watching that bandleader. He was busier than a one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest."

"No, he didn't have too much time to spare for the trumpet player. I was just about ready to have the guys arrest the jerk for drunk and disorderly. Not the bandleader, the drunk."

"What did you finally do with him?" Steve asked. He'd had some experience handling drunks at parties.

"I took care of him," Mother said.

"Took care of him how?" I had a fleeting vision of a trumpet player crushed and stuffed into his instrument. But I knew that a Protector couldn't do that to one of her protectees, no matter how much of a jerk he was. Certainly not for being a jerk at a wedding reception.

Mother must have read my mind, for she looked right at me as she continued. "No, no, nothing too drastic. Give me some credit, Daughter. I simply got him to dance with me. As the maid of honor, it wasn't too difficult." She smiled at me. "And a Velorian woman usually doesn't have too much trouble getting a Terran man to dance with her. A nice slow dance, with our arms around each other. I let him lead me into a corner, and then I gave him a quick little hug, and he went out like a light."

"I thought he had just passed out drunk," Randall picked up the story. "We simply left him in a corner to sleep it off. He still hadn't woken up by the time the two of us were ready to leave."

"At least, he didn't disrupt things any more," Kathy smiled at her husband. "He slept right through the cake cutting and all. Even the garter and bouquet tosses. Though that bandleader was starting to get a little frantic, wondering if he was ever going to wake up."

"Naturally. What did you expect, Kathy? When I put a man to bed, he doesn't come out until I'm ready for him to." There was laughter all around, led by Mom.

"I told some of the guys that if he still hadn't woken up by the end of the reception, to haul him off to the drunk tank to sleep it off." Randall smiled back at his wife. "I didn't want an arrest at my own wedding reception." He grinned. "At least, not until I was safely out of there with my new bride, on the way to our honeymoon."

"So what happened?" I wasn't sure who asked, there was more than one of us.

"I timed it just right," Mother said. "He woke up just as the party was breaking up."

"So, are you going to have that band play at your anniversary party?"

"Julie!" Kathy looked shocked that I would even suggest such a thing.

Randall laughed. "Maybe." He took his wife's hand, and looked into her eyes. "For our fiftieth anniversary. But not a year before."

I thought back to my own wedding and reception. I was glad that things had gone off without a hitch. But then, with Mom's FBI friends and with Steve's Broncos teammates, nobody else was about to cause any trouble. If someone had, I don't know what I might have done. I don't know whether I would have shown as much restraint as Kathy did.

We then got into a brief discussion about the various dimensions, and the Earths in them. It was obvious that Mother was not from the same dimension that I had visited, fighting for Tetra. As far as she knew, she was the only Velorian on her Earth. There were no Scribes on her Earth. She had never heard of Kara, nor of Xara. She had never heard of Tetra, and its Protector, Lillith.

We finally managed to pry the long-separated lovers apart that night. Since everybody was impressed with how Kathy had taken to Mother's enhancement, including Mother herself, we had decided to try to have Mother enhance Karen.

That caused another scramble for partners. But it was a short scramble, as Mom, Kathy, and I each ended up with our own respective husbands, since Mom wasn't about to take her 'son' to her bed, as much as she might have wanted an Arion man for a change.

And Kathy still wasn't about to give up her husband. From the way that she was acting, I suspected that my enhancement had begun to take effect, sometime after they had retired the previous night.

Midnight found Sirren walking through a small city. She had slowed down to avoid drawing notice to herself, even though it meant that she would take longer to get through to the open country beyond.

She was walking along a deserted street when a hand reached out of an alley, taking hold of her arm. The hand was attached to a large dark-skinned man. She barely stopped in time to avoid running into the knife that the man held in his other hand, waving it in her face.

She knew that there was absolutely nothing that he could do to her that she didn't allow him to. Upset at the delay in her travels, she was just about to strike out, knowing that she would never need to strike a Terran more than once to kill him. However, she checked herself at the last possible moment.

She had been on the move continuously all day and night, she could use a brief rest. Any dalliance with a Terran male would necessarily be a brief one; not even Carlos had been able to keep up with her very long, and this man was shorter and slimmer than Carlos was.

She let him pull her deeper into the alley. Releasing her arm, he grabbed the front of her blouse. She grabbed his wrist and pulled his arm away, the thin cotton blouse tearing in his grasp. Closing her other hand on the knife blade, she twisted it out of his hand, crushing the blade before throwing it away.

He struggled, trying to free his trapped wrist. Balling up his other hand into a fist, he swung it at her face. She smiled as she saw it coming, tensing her neck muscles. He screamed in pain as half a dozen bones in his hand broke against her delicate cheekbones. He screamed again when she tightened her grip, breaking the bones in his other wrist.

Putting her right arm around his waist, she held him while stripping off his pants with her other hand, before ripping away her own skirt. He swung away at her face with his fists, damaging his hands even more, without doing anything to her besides ruffling her hair a little.

Spreading her legs, she pulled him to her. She stifled his continuing screams by putting her left hand on the back of his head, pulling his face down to hers, letting him get a good whiff of her pheromones, before smothering his mouth with hers. She didn't even realize that she had broken some of his teeth as she forced her tongue into his mouth.

Despite his pain and his fear, her Arion pheromones were having their usual effect on the male. Even with his injured hands, he was able to tear open her blouse, to begin caressing and fondling her breasts. She pushed his face down to her breasts, forcing her left nipple into his mouth, again without realizing that she was breaking off some more of his teeth.

Lowering her right hand to his ass, she pulled him into her. She began stroking herself with him, lowering her left hand to his back, pressing his chest against her breasts.

Feeling her climax approaching, she stroked herself harder and faster, holding his body tighter against hers. As she reached her climax, necessarily a minor one, considering her feeble partner, her body shuddered. His body crumbled, his hard male ribcage crushed against her soft female breasts, his blood splattering both of them.

Stars! Coming down off of her peak and looking down at herself, she realized that she would need new clothes. But for now, she would have to make due with what was available. She quickly stripped off the man's jacket, putting it on herself. The bloodstains were barely noticeable on the black leather, other than for the smell, which she would just have to ignore.

She quickly stepped out of the alley, to resume her interrupted journey.

She had gone over a mile, before she realized that she should have done something about the body, instead of simply leaving it behind. A simple blast of her heat vision could have vaporized the body, leaving nothing that could possibly be traced to her.

In the morning after breakfast, not waffles this time, Mother and I flew out to a deserted island. She proceeded to give me a crash course on Velorian fighting techniques. There definitely were some differences from the Arion techniques that I had learned from Mom and Karen. Most of the differences were based on the fact that we could fly. I had learned some of them on my own, the hard way, at the school of hard knocks, but this was different, having a real Protector teaching me.

By the end of the day, I was pretty sore, though naturally, I wasn't even bruised.

I can't say the same for the island, however. It almost looked like a battlefield, which in a way, it had been. There were craters in the ground. Rocks had been smashed. Trees had been knocked over, their trunks splintered.

It had been a lot of fun. Tiring, and a bit painful, but still fun.

I exchanged a Velorian embrace with my mother. I exchanged one with Kathy. I then hugged and kissed my 'brother'. Mom hugged all of them. Karen spent a little too much time hugging and kissing the Arion man, until his wife tapped her on the shoulder and rescued him. Mother and I then flew Kathy and Randall back to their rented sailboat, still anchored where we had left it.

As we approached, I saw a faint green glow. Not quite the green glow of Orgone, this was something different.

Mother apparently saw it also, for she landed on the beach instead of on the deck, setting Randall down on his feet. I landed beside her, putting Kathy down. "What is it?" I started to ask, turning towards Mother.

"Stay back, Julie," she told me. "As much as I'd love to have you with me on my Earth, your Earth needs you more. As does your Mom." With that, she put her arms around the other two and lifted off to the boat. Then, she came back to me. "That's the beginning stages of a dimensional rift," she told me, gesturing back to the green glow surrounding the boat. "I suspected it was something like that which brought us here." She told me a little bit about the things, that they couldn't be controlled. At least, not by us. The Ancient Ones apparently could, using them to transport Protectors from one dimension to another, almost like wormholes transport Protectors from one world to another.

We shared another long Velorian embrace. Tears filled my eyes, as my heart finally realized that this probably was the last time that I would ever see my Mother. Even through my tears, I could see that her eyes were also filled with tears, as we each held the other's breast with more than enough force to crush steel.

She finally broke off, reaching up to my face and wiping away my tears with her fingertips. "Give my love to Joreen," she said, and headed for the boat. "And behave yourself, my daughter, Júliá Terra," she added, using the formal Velorian name which she had given me, taking into account the fact that I was born here on Terra, not on Velor.

"I will, Mother," I replied, waving as tears filled my ears again. Just as she landed on the deck with her son and his wife, all three of them waving back at me, the green glow intensified, completely engulfing the boat and blocking out the sight of my new family. When the glow faded, they were gone. Just the calm smooth surface of the water, not even a single ripple to indicate that the boat had been there at all. "Good bye, Mother," I said, as I wiped the tears out of my eyes and leaped up into the sky to fly back to the cabin and my other family. This was to be our last day of our week in Florida, as well.

It had been a very memorable week.

I remembered Sharon telling me that the Ancient Ones might send someone to help me in my time of need, just as I had been sent to Tetra when Lillith needed all of the help that she could get. But I had thought that I would see my new friends, like Xara and Sharon. I had never suspected that I would see my mother.

Yes, it had been a very memorable week. It had been a week that I would remember for the rest of my life.