Geoff Nelder

“Yellow Fin Tuna?” yelled the red-faced tourist, his riotous-red Hawaiian shirt bursting over his belly. “We hired this boat to catch shark.”

El Capitan, USA

Shouting instructions to avoid the hole, Oqmar sent the eager Kur back into the cave. No wildcat screeched out of the entrance this time. He too, felt uneasy, last night when Hanra’s mad crone of a mother muttered incomprehensible incantations over a simmering evil-smelling pot while throwing him malevolent glares.

Face down, yet paradoxically with the wind in her face, Kallandra knew her night was about to be disturbed by another sphere dream. Determined to deny her muscles to conspire non-functionality, she used all her willpower to lash out. More awake than asleep she raised herself on elbows to see that Derek had already sought sanctuary elsewhere.

"Claude, I have an urge to walk on the sphere – stop me."

Tabitha Wish could hear the dinner bubbling and hissing in the kitchen, forcing her to abandon her tenacious viewing of the CNN channel.

Kallandra read the update note on her iPaq as she and Claude reached the pale green door leading to the Special Mission Meeting at the Johnson Space Centre, a day late.

Five days since the spheres emerged.

    20,000 years before present.
    On the East bank of the Red Sea.

    From the air, she couldn’t accept what she’d seen. On foot, the obscuring trees conspired in her denial.