Part 35 (2/2)
Leaving Cyrus Harding in charge, the two suited up in undersea garments. Surrounded by warm water, they steadied their footing on the sandy bottom. Nemo reached out to clasp Caroline's gloved hand. The pair moved like fairy dancers in slow, graceful motion.
As they explored, the final barriers between them seemed to melt away. The ancient paths and their own tortured histories of loneliness, tragic mistakes, and paths not taken now merged with the present into one magical moment frozen in time.
Everything they had endured or experienced in their lives had brought them to this point. They were together now now with the future ahead of them. Life was filled with opportunities, a story of love and adventure yet to be written. Regrets over what might have been were washed away by the warmth of the current. with the future ahead of them. Life was filled with opportunities, a story of love and adventure yet to be written. Regrets over what might have been were washed away by the warmth of the current.
Time had cast its veil of poignant splendor over this ancient place, a reminder that the past was not a thing to fear, but an essential part of the present and all that was yet to come. Walking together, they ventured through the sunken city, treading where no one had gone for century upon century.
It was only the first of many wonders they would experience together.
DEDICATION.
This book is for CATHERINE, who has been an intelligent, insightful, hardworking, and all-around delightful companion on many of my fictional ”extraordinary voyages.”
Jules Verne's characters could not have hoped for a better fellow adventurer.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.
During the researching, writing, and editing of this novel, I have valued the insights, suggestions, and expertise of a great many people, including my agents Matt Bialer and Robert Gottlieb at the Trident Media Group, John Ordover at Pocket Books, Diane Jones and Diane Davis Herdt at WordFire, Inc., friends and/or fellow authors Erwin Bush, Steve Baxter, Piers Anthony, Harry Turtledove, and of course my wife, Rebecca Moesta Anderson
ABOUT THE AUTHOR.
Kevin J. Anderson is the author of nearly 100 novels, 48 of which have appeared on national or international bestseller lists; he has over 20million books in print in thirty languages. He has won or been nominated for the Nebula Award, Bram Stoker Award, the SFX SFX Reader's Choice Award, and Reader's Choice Award, and New York Times New York Times Notable Book. Notable Book.
Anderson has co-auth.o.r.ed eleven books in the DUNE saga with Brian Herbert. Anderson's popular epic SF series, The Saga of Seven Suns, is his most ambitious work, and he is currently at work on a sweeping fantasy trilogy, Terra Incognita, about sailing s.h.i.+ps, sea monsters, and the crusades. As an innovative companion project to Terra Incognita, Anderson co-wrote (with wife Rebecca Moesta) the lyrics for two ambitious rock CDs based on the novels. Performed by the supergroup Roswell Six for ProgRock Records, the two CDs feature performances by rock legends from Kansas, Dream Theater, Asia, Saga, Rocket Scientists, Shadow Gallery, and others.
His novel Enemies & Allies Enemies & Allies chronicles the first meeting of Batman and Superman in the 1950s; Anderson also wrote chronicles the first meeting of Batman and Superman in the 1950s; Anderson also wrote The Last Days of Krypton The Last Days of Krypton. He has written numerous STAR WARS projects, including the Jedi Academy trilogy, the Young Jedi Knights series (with Moesta), and Tales of the Jedi comics from Dark Horse. Fans might also know him from his X-FILES novels or Dean Koontz's Frankenstein: Prodigal Son Dean Koontz's Frankenstein: Prodigal Son.
His Web site is .
Look for these and other digital works by Kevin J. Anderson: .
RESURRECTION, INC.
In the future, the dead walk the streets-Resurrection, Inc. found a profitable way to do it. A microprocessor brain, synthetic heart, artificial blood, and a fresh corpse can return as a Servant for anyone with the price. Trained to obey any command, Servants have no minds of their own, no memories of their past lives.
Supposedly.
Then came Da.n.a.l. He was murdered, a sacrifice from the ever-growing cult of neo-Satanists who sought heaven in the depths of h.e.l.l. But as a Servant, Da.n.a.l began to remember. He learned who had killed him, who he was, and what Resurrection, Inc. had in mind for the human race.
CLIMBING OLYMPUS.
They were prisoners, exiles, p.a.w.ns of a corrupt government. Now they are Dr. Rachel Dycek's adin adin, surgically transformed beings who can survive new lives on the surface of Mars. But they are still exiles, unable ever again to breathe Earth's air. And they are still p.a.w.ns.
For the adin adin exist to terraform Mars for human colonists, not for themselves. Creating a new Earth, they will destroy their world, killed by their own success. Desperate, exist to terraform Mars for human colonists, not for themselves. Creating a new Earth, they will destroy their world, killed by their own success. Desperate, adin adin leader Boris Tiban launches a suicide campaign to sabotage the Mars Project, knowing his people will perish in a glorious, doomed campaign of mayhem-unless embattled, bitter Rachel Dycek can find a miracle to save both the Mars Project and the race she created. leader Boris Tiban launches a suicide campaign to sabotage the Mars Project, knowing his people will perish in a glorious, doomed campaign of mayhem-unless embattled, bitter Rachel Dycek can find a miracle to save both the Mars Project and the race she created.
BLINDFOLD.
Atlas is a struggling colony on an untamable world, a fragile society held together by the Truthsayers. Parentless, trained from birth as the sole users of Veritas, a telepathy virus that lets them read the souls of the guilty. Truthsayers are Justice-infallible, beyond appeal.
But sometimes they are wrong.
Falsely accused of murder, Troy Boren trusts the young Truthsayer Kalliana...until, impossibly, she convicts him. Still shaken from a previous reading, Kalliana doesn't realize her power is fading. But soon the evidence becomes impossible to ignore. The Truthsayers' Veritas has been diluted and someone in the colony is selling smuggled telepathy. Justice isn't blind-it's been blinded blinded.
From an immortal's...o...b..tal prison to the buried secrets of a regal fortress, Kalliana and Troy seek the conspiracy that threatens to destroy their world from within. For without truth and justice, Atlas will certainly fall...
GAMEARTH.
Book 1 of the Gamearth Trilogy By Kevin J. Anderson It was supposed to be just another Sunday night fantasy role-playing game for David, Tyrone, Scott, and Melanie. But after years of playing, the game had become so real that all their creations-humans, sorcerers, dragons, ogres, panther-folk, cyclops-now had existences of their own. And when the four outside players decide to end their game, the characters inside the world of Gamearth-warriors, scholars, and the few remaining wielders of magic-band together to keep their land from vanis.h.i.+ng. Now they must embark on a desperate quest for their own magic-magic that can twist the Rules enough to save them all from the evil that the players created to destroy their entire world.
GAMEPLAY.
Book 2 of the Gamearth Trilogy By Kevin J. Anderson The Gamearth Trilogy continues. It was written in the Rules-Save the World! Over the past two years, a group of four players had given so much to their role-playing world that it had developed a magic of its own. The creatures, warriors, sorcerers, thieves-all had come alive. And now there is an odd connection between the gamers and their characters, splitting into factions to determine the fate of the Game itself and both the inside and the outside worlds.
GAME'S END.
Book 3 of the Gamearth Trilogy By Kevin J. Anderson The finale to the Gamearth Trilogy. It's all-out war between the players and characters in a role-playing game that has taken on a life of its own. The fighter Delrael, the sorcerer Bryl, as well as famed scientists Verne and Frankenstein, use every trick in the Book of Rules to keep the world of Gamearth intact while the outside group of players does everything possible to destroy it.
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