information to the atoll. She was pleasant enough, but there was something faintly repellent about her. It might have been her sallow skin or her bulging eyes, but I now remember she had a barely detectable fishy smell. Afterwards, we ate at the hotel restaurant and celebrated our arrival in one of their rooms.
The next morning we toured the town, seeing the old Spanish fortifications and the Japanese gun emplacements from World War II. Then we visited the Lidudubniap waterfall and the Nan Madol ruins. Those were most interesting. According to the tour guide, millennia ago a mysterious race of people built artificial islands offshore in the lagoon and then placed buildings on them. From a distance they looked like they were built of wood logs, but up close we were astonished to see that the "logs" were made of stone! Basalt in fact, according to the guide. Most of the buildings were modest in size, but several were quite large, and one was huge. No one knew who the people were or how they could have cut and shaped the "logs" or assembled them, but Ponape legend told that a race of demons called the saudeleurs built the ruins. They were described as being some kind of cross between humans and octopi, and they supposedly worshipped a sea-god named Katoluha. It all sounded pretty farfetched to me at the time, but then any mythology did then.
When we returned to the hotel, we discussed the possibility of staying an extra day to do some snorkeling, but we quickly decided against it. We were eager to get to the atoll and we could always do our diving there. When we weren't busy with other activities. So we checked out of the hotel, spent the evening buying supplies, and slept on the boat.
Early next morning we set sail. We left through the Pehleng passage and turned south before going east around the island. Once we were out into the open ocean, for the first time during the trip so far we used the engine continuously instead of just for maneuvers. It was a waste of fuel, but we wanted to get there as soon as possible. We sailed due east for a day and half before we sighted a small collection of coral islands. The atoll was only a mile in diameter, and the largest island covered barely a third of the circumference, but it was lush with vegetation and there was a Polynesian bungalow as promised. The lagoon was crystal clear, all the way down to the bottom, and the water turquoise in contrast to the deep, dark blue of the surrounding ocean.
We made a quick tour of the islands. With the exception of two others, all were simply exposed mounds of coral of various sizes, and those two were barely a quarter of the size of the main island and had only a few coconut trees. What surprised us, however, was that on each of these two islands was a structure almost identical to the ones we saw at Nan Madol. We were tempted to stop and investigate, but again we were eager to get settled in and begin what we came to do, and we would have four weeks to do whatever exploring we wished. So we headed straight across the lagoon towards the main island. I'm convinced now that had we not done so, we would never have seen the tower otherwise.
Vicki stood on the prow as I steered. We had by this time stripped down to bathing suits, and Vicki had removed her top. I watched her standing up there, as she stared out ahead of us. She was gorgeous, and this trip had improved her. She was tall and slim, trim and muscular from her daily workouts, and she had a rich, golden tan unmarred by bathing suit shadow. Her legs were long and shapely, and her magnificent rear was accentuated by the thong bottom she wore. As she shifted position I occasionally caught sight of a swell of breast. She was most proud of them. They were not large, but they were firm, plump, and erect, and sufficient for me to fill my hands with. She had cut her red-bronze hair short to be more comfortable in the tropical climate, but it swayed and bounced with each slight movement. Though she had her back to me, I could easily picture her strong, beautiful features in her round face.
Suddenly she turned and waved at me. For a moment I didn't notice, because while she wore sunglasses like myself, I was imagining her gold-brown eyes. Then I heard her shouting.
"Joshua. Joshua! Hard to port! To port!"
Snapping out of my daydream, I spun the wheel frantically as Vicki gestured vigorously to the left. The ship lurched toward that side, and I saw her stare off to starboard, her eyes following something as it past. I looked as well, and saw a thin pinnacle about three feet high sticking up out of the water. I looked at Vicki in astonishment, but she just smiled and shrugged before turning back towards the front.
We reached the main island with no further incident and weighed anchor just offshore, then furled the sail. When we had stowed all the gear we were no longer going to need for awhile, we looked at each other. There was no need to say a word, we both knew what was on each other's mind. We quickly shed the last of our clothing and packed it away. We had no intention of wearing any clothes as long as we stayed here. We then laid a blanket on the forward deck, spread suntan lotion over every inch of our bodies until we were glistening and slippery, and got immediately to work.
It was the best sex we had had since we were first married. We seemed to have boundless energy, and in this private place we abandoned all inhibitions. When we were dating, we preferred to make love on one of our boats; that way we could vent our passion fully. After we were married, however, we sold the boats to purchase a condo. Unfortunately, our neighbors were light sleepers and often complained about the noise we made. As such, we were forced to moderate our actions. Now, for the first time in years, our bodies writhed in frenzied rapture and we cried our ecstasy loudly, in tones that rang out across the lagoon. Our ardor did not weaken and our manic fervor lasted well into the night, when finally we exploded with an intensity that convulsed us, and we collapsed exhausted into each other's embrace.
Vicki soon fell asleep in my arms, her head on my chest just under my chin, but I lay awake for a little while afterward, gazing up at the night sky. I had lived in a city all my life, so I never really looked at the stars. Here they were so clear they blazed forth like brilliant diamonds, and there were hundreds of them. The Milky Way stretched across the heavens like a diffuse, dusty path, and meteorites frequently crisscrossed it. Vicki's warm weight felt good on top of me, and I held her close. I felt a comfortable warm afterglow of drowsy pleasure that settled within me, weighing me down towards sleep. I remember thinking, This is what Heaven must be like. Then I closed my eyes and let myself drift off to sleep, as the boat rocked gently beneath us.
From "The Price of Folly"
Dimitri Karishnikov stared at the hunk of grayish-black rock that sat on the exam table in the middle of the laboratory. As chief of security for Dis, Avernus colony's one and only city, part of his job was to keep it under close surveillance, but he found it difficult to maintain a disinterested attitude. Its potential excited him too much.
If pressed, though, he would have admitted that it didn't look like much, not at first glance. It was oblong in shape, approximately a meter tall, a half-meter wide, and a third thick, with a dull metallic sheen. One point of interest was that it had a geometric shape, but since it followed no regular form, it could still be dismissed as a natural crystalline formation. Which everyone did at first. It wasn't until the surface had been acid-washed, to remove the outer layer of patina in preparation for metallurgical examination, that its one truly significant feature had been revealed: a smooth, polished surface covered with coded designs.
The importance of that discovery had not been lost on him, or the six other people in the room. In the three centuries since mankind had first stepped off into space, not a single hint of another technologically advanced, space-faring culture had ever been found. That evidence constituted the Holy Grail of space exploration, and both the Terran federal government and the multiplanetary corporations offered huge rewards as an incentive to find such evidence. The people who could prove that a high-tech alien culture did exist somewhere Out There would become rich beyond the dreams of Midas himself.
Dimitri glanced at the three people who stood alone at various places along the walls. He exchanged nods with two of them, a man and a woman who were members of his own security force; the thir
d, another man, was the technician assigned to the lab. They wore the same plain synth-cotton jumpsuits worn by everyone on Avernus, and they were so much alike in physical appearance they could have been clones. None of them stood taller than a hundred and forty centimeters, and they each had spare bodies and pale, almost dead-white skin, with platinum blonde hair cut very short. Aside from minor variations in facial features, the only way to distinguish between them was by how they decorated themselves. Each wore several pieces of distinctive jewelry and sported unique body art. On top of that, the lab tech had painted his face in rainbow hues, and the female guard had dyed her hair neon pink.
Dimitri himself stood off to one side of the room with two of the other inhabitants, and all six of them watched the seventh as she slowly circled the table, examining the artifact in a casual manner.
"She's been at it for almost an hour now," whispered Cecil Owen. Dimitri glanced at him. He served as chief administrator for the Avernus colony, and though he decorated himself in the same manner as