Chapter 2

She dreamed of the beach on the Praetor ship as she did every night. This time, her visit felt different, somehow. For one, Miranda wasn't there, waiting for her visit. There had been other times when Mira had been 'doing something else', and had to be called, but each time Murielle knew that this was Miranda's space. Today, no ... This night, the beach was ... empty. The part of Miranda that kept this little space alive was missing.

"Mira," Murielle whispered, knowing that, if her sister was here at all, she would hear. "Mira, I'm here. Please come."

There was no response – not the slightest movement of awareness against her mind – nothing.

'She's not here!'

"Praetor, where is Miranda?" she asked, knowing that the Praetor was always there, recording everything as it always did. But there was no answer from the Praetor, either.

"I'm asking you a question," Murielle shouted, her foreboding making her angry, "and I expect an answer. Praetor, where is my sister? Why isn't she here?"

'She is not here because this is no longer part of her awareness.'

"What? Murielle cried out. "Explain!"

'Miranda has withdrawn from this location. She has erased it from her memories, as she has the others whom she feels betrayed her.'

Murielle fell to her knees, unwilling to believe that her sister would ever erase her from her thoughts. 'What about me?' she asked, unable to vocalize that dreaded question.

'She remembers you, but you do not exist in her present environment.'

"How is that even possible?" Murielle asked, tears falling down her cheeks. She always seemed to cry whenever she was here. It was beginning to feel natural. This dream beach was the most depressing place she'd ever been.

'She remembers you as a child, ' the Praetor explained. 'She sees herself as a child, and has occluded all her memories of later times.'

"Alright," Murielle sighed, not quite ready to give up on her sister. "I'll see her as a child, then. Wherever she is in her mind, my mind, whatever ... Take me to her."

The beach faded. Murielle found herself standing at the door to her living room – in the house where they'd spent their younger years with their parents – before the Denver fires and that horrible, ill-fated escape by train.

Two little girls ran down the stairs, screaming at the top of their lungs. Murielle almost didn't recognize them. It was her and her sister, of course. They stopped and stared at her in awed silence.

"Hello," Murielle said, bending forward as she tried to figure out which twin was which.

"We're not allowed to talk to strangers," one of them said.

"So you'd better leave," the other chimed in.

Murielle laughed out loud as she recognized herself and her sister. "Which one are you?" she asked the one in pigtails, not remembering which of them wore pigtails so their parents could tell them apart. "Murielle or Miranda?"

The twins looked surprised, and looked at each other, then back to her. "Who're you?" they both asked in unison.

"That's a good question," an adult voice chimed in from across the room. "Who are you?"

"I'm..." Murielle began, then froze. The woman who had spoken was Miranda, no longer young, but middle-aged. "These are your children?" the words spilled out of her mouth. 'Boy! The Praetor really messed up on this one! These children aren't Mira and me – they're hers! These girls would be my nieces if we'd been permitted normal lives instead of growing up in a time when the world was ending... '

"Yes, they are," Miranda replied, standing up straighter as though to appear more formidable. "And I asked you a question. Who are you? And how did you get in here?"

"That's two questions," Murielle quipped. "The Praetor let me in here."

"What?" Miranda asked, looking confused. "The who? Look! I think you're in the wrong house. My name is Miranda Stephens. You must be looking for someone else. So now, I'll ask you to leave."

"Stephens?" Murielle asked, almost laughing. "Oh, no! You married Darrell Stephens?"

"What?" Miranda asked, her turn to look astonished, now, and a bit angry. "Yes, I did. Why do you find that funny?"

"Because he was a four-eyed little dweeb and you couldn't stand him," Murielle laughed. "And now you're dreaming that you actually married him!"

"How..." Miranda began, then stopped as recognition tried to share her face with astonishment. "Who ... You ... You're ... Murielle?"

Murielle smiled and shrugged her shoulders. "Last time I looked..."

"But..." Miranda began to weep. "You died – when we were children. There was a terrible accident – a train wreck. I lost my parents ... and ... my twin sister ... you."

"No," Murielle gently shook her head, wondering how she was ever going to get her sister to realize that she was the one who had died. "I'm alive."

In an instant, they were in each other's arms, crying and kissing each other hello. "But you look so young! What did you do to yourself?"

"Just good living, I guess," Murielle explained, then decided to tell her at least part of the truth. "Plus, I met a vampire, and she made me immortal. I don't age."

"Yeah, right," Miranda replied, a strange smile on her face. "So how did you survive the train wreck? I woke up in a hospital and was told everyone in my family was dead."

'So that's how you worked out this little fantasy of yours – everything went back to normal after the train wreck – except that I was killed as well. Well, maybe I can help you remember... '

"I wandered," We wandered... "in the woods, finding and eating berries and drinking water from streams. I..." We... "found a lake. A vampire lived in a city beneath the lake, as she made me..." made us... "immortal."

"That's impossible!" Miranda exclaimed. "First off, there's no such thing as a vampire, plus – a city beneath a lake? That's preposterous! Besides, you were only seven years old. If a vampire made you immortal, you'd still be seven!"

"She waited until I grew up," Murielle shrugged. "I began to demonstrate special mental powers, and she wanted to preserve them."

"Special what?" Miranda sneered. "Now I know you're a loon. You're not my sister – my sister is dead! You ... You're some kind of imposter – somebody trying to destroy my life! You don't even look like me!"

Chapter 3 »