Chapter 1
Several years later. An alien seed
Julia had torn herself away from the text of the new science fiction novel and looked into the distance. She sat on the terrace overlooking the garden, swaying in a hammock. A laptop on her lap, a breeze playing in leaves and flowers, small tireless bright hummingbirds and butterflies – everything was pleasant to the eye! Here was Julia's "secret garden", a sanctuary of peace and inspiration, a place where her novels were born.
The terrace was in a garden, enclosed on all sides by the powerful walls and tall trees of her husband Scott's fort-house.
While her husband was breaking the waves on his beloved white catamaran "Albatross 2", his wife in the "secret garden" was creating new worlds and unseen fantastic heroes.
Julia's books became a consolation, joy, a new reality for her. She and her husband had no children. From the outside, their marriage looked quite happy, they felt good together. But apart from each other, they were also not too bad. Everyone had their own world of favorite things. Scott had the sea. Julia had her novels.
Julia lived far from her Russian friends and their families. She was meeting with them, only when Scott himself was organizing a joint boat trip or inviting all of his friends to their fort-house for a barbecue… Julia herself did not strive for communication and enjoyed working on her novels in solitude.
Today Julia was feeling somehow strange. She could not concentrate on working on the next novel. Julia from the very morning seemed to see and hear everything around in a different way. All sights, sounds and smells seemed to intensify and interfere with her.
Suddenly Julia stopped swinging in the hammock. She had started to feel very nauseous; the whole world began to revolve around her. Julia grabbed the edge of the hammock, but could not get up. The laptop crashed from her knees onto the terrace slabs, and the light around suddenly shut off…
When Julia woke up, she was in a hospital ward under an IV. Nearby sat Scott, a huge overgrown red-haired Briton, with a sailor's skin hardened under the sun and wind, in white T-shirt and shorts, in which he went on another fishing trip with tourists in the morning before.
It seemed it has passed a long time, because it was dark off the hospital window.
Julia felt extraordinary weakness, her head was heavy, and in her mouth – an unpleasant bitter-sour taste.
“What happened? How did I get here?” she asked.
“Julie, don't worry, it's okay! I found you unconscious in the garden. But it's okay! We will have a child! And pretty soon! Well, isn't that a miracle? I love you so much!” exclaimed Scott.
He wanted to kiss his wife, but she dodged and his lips touched her cheek and her neck. Julia felt bad again, a wave of nausea with renewed force rose to her throat. Scott just squeezed her small hand and gently smoothed his short, wavy reddish-brown hair.
“Hold on, love!” he continued. “The doctors said everything's fine. You just need rest and sleep. All vitamins and walks - I'll provide you with everything! Any caprice of yours!”
The next day, Julia returned home and insisted on a separate bedroom. She changed a lot overnight. As if she had transformed - or was Scott already looking at her with different eyes? She was quite subdued. She was constantly nauseous.
Scott was very worried, but did not tell anyone about his wife's pregnancy because of her own request. Only the medical staff of the hospital knew about the petite white pregnant woman with severe case of toxicosis.
Then Julia suddenly started bleeding from the uterus. Her gynecologist insisted on hospital observation. Julia felt so bad that she only subdued to obey.
The doctor could not determine the duration of the pregnancy. The size of the fetus turned out to be something strange, Julia was also confused about the duration of gestation. Then ultrasound showed that the fetus was too large and childbirth's impossible without surgical intervention. Julia was too petite for a child of this size. It was a boy, and very big one! Scott was not particularly surprised as he was a giant himself. A sense of guilt imperceptibly crushed him over. Scott reduced his sea trips, stopped communicating with friends.
Of all the Russians, the programmer and “war broad” Zina was the first to notice changes in the behavior of Scott and Julia. Sensitive and observant, Zina was always keenly interested in the life of all friends on the Island. Although Julia was not too sociable, she was still a sweet young woman and a very good writer. A couple of books have already been published and sold quite well. Julia wrote a little naive, but dashingly twisted novels with elements of fantasy. And Zina read everything she found, and did not forget to praise her friend after every new publishing.
Of course, Zina discussed everything with her husband and her always like-minded fellow, angular and impetuous IT specialist Den. And now again Zina immediately shared her thoughts with her husband. They both tried to find out from Scott what had happened. After all, Julia had completely vanished, and they had seen much less of Scott. He also was answering very vaguely to any direct questions. The red-haired giant looked somewhat confused. But he only mumbled, that Julia felt a bit unwell and preferred some solitude and peace for now.
Ever-jolly Roger, the red-nosed owner of the legendary tourist complex named after him, was aware of everything, that was happening on the Island. It was he who hinted to the Russians about Julia's difficult pregnancy. That's how the news spread among all the Russians living on the Island.
Julia’s baby was born via an emergency caesarean section. Julia lost a lot of blood and almost died. She took long time to recover from the surgery. There was no breast milk. For several days Julia was in a borderline state between life and death, and then fell into apathy, which doctors called postpartum depression. She showed no interest in her husband or even her child.
Finally, Julia asked to see her son. The newborn baby was a swarthy, large boy with a slightly oblong skull and huge cat or lizard eyes – the eyes had a vertical pupil! Julia suddenly remembered this unique deep look from the past. This helpless infant gazed at his mom with the eyes of the alien – of Golden Zandolie. It couldn’t be! Zandolie's dead, Marley's dead. Where was this from…?
Julia looked at her son, who finally closed his terrible eyes and fell asleep. She was swaying him slightly, secretly wishing, that he would not wake up for a long time. She could not bear the terrible power of that gaze. Horror finally fettered her entire small body, already exhausted by a sudden and rapid, such a strange pregnancy.
Scott was seeing his son only asleep so far and was rejoicing with might and main. Such a large and such a long-awaited son! He would teach him everything! Together they would go out to sea, fly in the sky, hunt, jet-ski, fish…
Julia was the first to tell Scott that their son had a rare cat eye syndrome, as soon as she returned home with her son. Scott at first did not attach much importance to her words - he was just glad, that everything ended well, that his wife and son were both healthy and finally at home!
They named their son Ray - as planned, in honor of Scott's father.
But when Ray woke up and looked at Scott for the first time, Scott immediately recognized those vertical pupil eyes – the cold, squinting gaze, the Golden Zandolie gaze.
No, these were just old fears. So many years have passed! And the spirit of the evil alien just stuck deep in their psyche. Perhaps this rare syndrome happened to be in their son. So what?!
Scott's and Julia's frightened looks met. Tears streamed down her cheeks… Scott hugged them both, Julia and Ray. Damn you, Golden Zandolie!
…Julia