I held up a forestalling hand to everyone else to let them know that they should drop back out of hearing range and wait for a moment so that Kalana and I could converse privately.   Since they were almost right on top of us they saw my signal clearly enough. When everyone had dropped back a few paces, I turned to her, "OK.   What's up?"

   She had a very troubled look on her face as she said in a demure tone, "I perceive well that this needs must be.   Howsoever that be, afraid I am that I be not able to do as this plan do call.   As you mayhap can perceive never have I been --"

   I didn't want to do it.   But it was the only way.   I couldn't have her getting cold feet on me at the last moment.   I didn't have time to change the plan and I couldn't think of a better distraction on such short notice so I said, cutting her off, "Kalana!   It's the only way!   Don't make me have to do it for you!   I know you wouldn't like that!"   Then I softened my tone somewhat. "And I wouldn't like that either.   I have grown very fond of you these past few days."   And then I hit her below the belt again, as it were.   "Besides.   Do you want to remain an outcast the rest of your life?"

   It was the old one two punch.   And just like every time else, it worked again.   Kalana gave me a very brave, very determined smile and said, "If needs must then who am I to argue the tides of history against?   Understand you must -- I shall not glory in it!   Now.   Shall this distasteful, needful thing we attend?"

   I sighed inwardly in relief, went back to where the others were waiting and whispered that every thing was OK.   They came forward with me and joined Kalana.   Now it was time!   We put it into motion.

     I gave Weslee the hand signal on his big hairy arm and he lit up the night over the shrine, letting loose two controllable floaters which had spotlights dangling beneath them.   With the remote control he guided them until he had Father Logis and his group of thugs spotlighted and then he stopped them.   The stage was set for Kalana and Perki.

   It didn't take long for the group guarding the shrine to look down from the sudden appearance of the lights in the sky over them.   Kalana and Perki made sure of that.   Dancing out into the light over the impromptu stage, accompanied by the sweet, haunting music coming from the loudspeakers built into the floaters, they went into their seductive dance.   As I stood and watched I thought that Kalana, despite her protestations of modesty, was a natural.   The sort of moves Kalana was making was either well taught or just came naturally and I doubted that Kalana had been taught.   Perki, of course, had had lots to practice.   Swaying and gyrating in their diaphonous costumes -- costumes that left just enough to the imagination -- they had the eyes of everyone there riveted on them.   Then they took the dance a step further.   As the music skirled into a more frantic, exotic, almost wail they both began to slowly remove bits of their costumes.   This elicited catcalls and hoots and just general yells of encouragement.   I noticed that even Father Logis could not refrain from joining in.   But why wasn't he suspicious?   It had seemed reasonable to believe that seeing Kalana this way --when he never had -- would be to be enough to drive all reason from his mind. At least that was what I had banked on and it seemed to be working just fine.

   They girls did not react in a hurry to the encouragement.   The plan called for them to take their time and whip everyone into a frenzy so that they would be completely engrossed by the time the next part of the plan would begin.   Instead they very slowly removed the bits of clothing, flinging those bits at the small crowd.   Finally they both were down to g strings and pasties.   They extended the moment as long as they could by strutting, pirouetting and doing every thing they could to jiggle the "merchandise" to get the crowd completely maddened with lust. Then when it looked like it was either disrobe themselves or have it done for them they stripped completely naked, doing a very lewd dance for a few moments afterwards, spinning slowly around so that every portion of their anatomy was fully revealed, making certain that everyone there was thinking of absolutely nothing else and would be all the more aggravated to be interrupted.   (And also making certain that no one's attention would be diverted anywhere else -- like looking around and spotting me and Weslee when we were ready to move in.)   I waited until the last second when it looked like it was either a: the crowd rushing the "stage" or b: intervening, and THEN I cued Roliti.   The second act of the distraction was DEFINITELY now at hand!

   Pretending to be shocked and incensed (who knows -- maybe he was just acting a little?) Roliti rushed out onto the "stage" and interposed himself between the girls and the maddened crowd of men.   Addressing Kalana first, he shouted, "Sister!   Have you leave of your senses taken?   What means this brazen, sluttish display?"   Quickly turning to Perki he got right in her face, "Methinks you the wayward influence you be!   How darest this way my sister you do corrupt?   Fairly flushed with righteous indignation he turned on Father Logis next, "Father! I implore you!   How and why this you did countenance?   Mad too have you gone?   Of a surety this behavior I understand not!   By what reason were you satisfied?"

   Father Logis assumed his own stance of righteous indignation, getting right back in Roliti's face, "Methought myself that this behavior did not disprove the red haired one of a circus performer being.   Upon my immortal soul I did think that there a following act would be.   Your sister a slut not be!   Therefore, obvious it seemed that there must a hidden meaning be!   Of a surety I the hidden agenda did wait upon.   Be assured!   Had this further gone without the appearance of a jest a stop I would have put to it!"

   Roliti wasn't buying it.   He came right back at the priest, "A liar and a scoundrel I name you!   Upon my faith this the most feeble folly be!   Had you but admitted a man simply being, with a man's weakness attendant, then upon those words I would have heeded   Say you sire I am wrong?"

   The priest spluttered with rage unable to speak coherently at Roliti's accusation. The men standing behind the priest began to mutter ominously and began to crowd in closer as if they were sure that the whole affair was going to descend to fisticuffs and they were going to either help or at least get a good "ring side seat".   The girls for their part stood there still naked, making no attempt to cover their nudity.   In fact they made a few choice comments to both Roliti and the priest in an attempt to further ignite the situation.   Tempers grew even hotter and the men and the priest crowded even closer to Roliti giving back as good as they were getting.

   I judged the moment was right.   Weslee and I, armed with stun guns, crept silently up behind the crowd facing Roliti, staying in the dark shadows behind them.   When we were as close as we could get without attracting someone's attention that they were being approached from behind, we pulled the triggers, getting all nine of them almost simultaneously.   They never even knew what hit them.   I hated to leave any of them alive -- especially Father Logis -- since we were now going to surely become hunted fugitives as soon as the stun wore off.   But I could see no real justification for killing any of them.   Had they been manifestly Anunnaki that would have been different.   And Weslee and I had been armed with more lethal weapons had that been the case.   I doubted though, that an Anunnaki would be that turned on by any human -- or Tuatha for that matter! -- woman without seeing any reason to fake such a thing.   It had been obvious that our real foes were not here.   And since they would all be out for over an hour anyway, we had bought, at least, ourselves the time to investigate the fiery chariot.

   The obvious first step was to get some light on the subject.   I asked Weslee to move the floaters over towards the huge object in the dark behind where we were standing.   It was obviously the fiery chariot and I wanted to inspect our prize.   We obviously did not have the luxury of waiting for daylight.   By then I wanted to be long gone and well hidden.   Weslee complied with my request, once again employing the remote.

   When the spotlights were in positions that fully illuminated it I stepped closer and began a walkaround.   Weslee and Perki joined me.   Understandably Kalana and Roliti hung back.   They had seen it before and it had nothing but bad memories for them anyway.   Out of the corner of my eye as I looked back and realized they wouldn't be joining us just yet, I saw Kalana looking slightly sick and quickly shrugging into the dress that Roliti had obviously retrieved for her when my attention was elsewhere.   (Obviously Kalana's career as a strip tease artist had met an early death!)   I also noticed that Perki had not bothered to get dressed again and that Kalana was looking at her like Perki had betrayed her somehow.   I couldn't resist grinning behind Kalana's back.   It was funny how Kalana could do it when the situation demanded it, but how being naked wasn't OK otherwise!   Then my attention was fully riveted on the object that was before me.

   It was not a design I had seen before.   It didn't look like your classic flying saucer.   Nor did it look like one of those crude rockets from the early days of the Saturn project.   It didn't even look like the Annunnaki shuttle I had seen -- like the one that had landed in my yard and started this whole thing with Perki and Weslee.   ( I wondered then why Roliti and Kalana called it a fiery chariot.   I was to get the answer to that later.)   Instead it looked like a bluish black, baby sized, square headed whale with wings at it's sides and back taking the place of fins and a tail.   It was about 70 feet long and about 24 feet wide.   Where eyes would be on a whale -- the middle side of it's face -- it had rectangular portholes.   What looked like the whale's open mouth was in reality a boarding ramp and an entrance into the interior.   I thought Jonah in the Whale's belly would have been a more apt description of her father's abduction, but I supposed after a moment's thought that they probably didn't have that tradition here -- despite their ostensible Christian-like culture, since they would hardly have had a Jonah.   However they were familiar with modes of conveyance like wagons and I could see where if you stretched a point or two that it could be called a chariot: after all it would be more believable to think of a chariot traveling in the sky (if magic was involved somehow) than a wagon since a chariot was obviously much faster than a wagon and, obviously, a chariot was much more powerful than a mere, clumsy, boxy wagon.   So what else could it be?   I turned to ask Kalana and Roliti a couple of things I should have asked them earlier: why was the fiery chariot here in the first place and how had it got here? (Again I say, this hero business is not all it's cut out to be.   There are far too many details and most of them SHOULD be obvious, but aren't always -- due to too many distractions, mostly)   But I didn't get the chance then.   Weslee interupted my chain of thought.

   "Doc!   We did it!"   He did a little jig for for joy and then, settling himself somewhat, went on, "Waddya say we take right off right now and kick some Annunaki butt?"

   Roliti joined the chorus, "Yeah, Doc!   As said you, Let's Doooo It!" And he and Roliti started for the ramp as if they were just going to jump right on board and take off right now.

   "Boys!   Boys!!"   I called them back.   Reluctantly they rejoined me.   When I had their undivided attention, I held up a forestalling hand, "Think about it a moment!   I know you're flushed with victory, but think a moment or two!   We haven't even been on board yet.   We don't know if it will fly.   We don't know what sort of armaments it might have.   We don't know if we'll have to make any modifications or not!"   Weslee gave me a sheepish look.   Roliti gave me a crestfallen look.   After a moment I went on, remembering what I had just been about to ask. "I know we don't have a lot of time here, but I need the answers to a couple questions first.   I know I should have asked these questions earlier, but a lot was going on and I got distracted and it didn't seem that important at the moment.   Anyway, why is this thing here and how did it get here?" I looked expectantly at Roliti and Kalana waiting for one of them to answer.

   Kalana answered, after settling her garments about herself a bit more securely, "Tis a cruel mystery remain.   Upon a time it did appear whole.   Father Logis to the gods presenting did lay claim, upon his importunance.   Howsoever, Roliti and I bethought ourselves the gods did by reason mock us.   Crushed we were whence we saw not father only the chariot came.   And Father Logis we believed not by reason of the god's improvidence.   What say?   Why so the chariot came whence no purpose it did serve to appear thus?   Of our father the vessel bereft could naught any succor provide.   The right did Roliti and I claim as heirs the removal of the mockery.   Over ruled we were.   An infirmity piercing our hearts until this day it did abide."

   Well that more or less explained the how and why.   Of course it left a lot of unanswered questions.   And that took us right back to square one.   We were still going to have to take it and see what we could do with it, answering the questions -- hopefully! -- as we went.   And the obvious next step was to enter it.   But not quite as overenthusiastically as Roliti and Weslee had been prepared to do.   It looked innocuous sitting there in the spotlights with it's ramp down so invitingly, but did we know for a fact that it WASN'T booby trapped?   Of course it wouldn't be when the pilgrims came to pay hommage, in fact the ramp might not even be down then -- to increase the mystery -- but Father Logis and his gang of thugs had been there long enough to have done something like that before we arrived.   I explained that to Weslee and Roliti.   Roliti looked even more crestfallen.   But Weslee was as smug as a bug in a rug -- to slightly fracture a metaphor.   "What are you so smug about?" I asked sternly.

   By way of silent and still smug answer he pointed to Perki.   I turned to look at her.   She had that look on her face when she is travating.   Her face seems to glow from within, but it's almost like an optical illusion or something seen from so afar that one is not sure one is seeing anything for sure.   It also lights up her blue eyes so that there seems to be bluer depths there than normal.   It's like looking into twin windows that are showing another world.   And yet every time she does it there is a slightly different effect, shades of subtlety.   The probable cause of that, as near as I can figure, is that reality is so malleable that her reaction and perception have to account for this malleability by compensating in whatever way she needs to.   And somehow that effects my perception.   (The net effect of that is that I think I have to describe it somewhat differently every time since I am never quite sure how I described it before.   Maybe it was the same, maybe it wasn't.   So if there is a slightly different description -- or even a major one -- of the phenomena in another place in these journals that is why.   You see, her travating even effects you too -- just reading this!   Eerie, huh?)

   Suddenly Perki blinked.   Turning to me she said, "I just thought I'd save us some time.   There are no Annunaki on board.   And better yet I feel/taste/hear no bobby traps.   it is safe to board.   However beyond that I can get nothing.   We'll need to go and see with our eyes to get that information."   Then she gave me her usual sweet smile, waving me ahead of us all as if I were some conquering king and it was my due.

   I played along and began to enter.   But I didn't go with no reservation -- despite her travating -- this was our best card!   Would it be good enough?