For a second I vomited in my own mouth; it was all I could do to keep from retching.

I saw the pond ahead … actually what I saw was a grove of ten-foot-tall cattails and a black-and-yellow–striped largemouth bass that leapt out of the water to catch a mosquito the size of a catcher’s mitt.

The path that surrounded the pond was composed of wood chips, and I followed it to the left as instructed. A smaller version of the wooden front gate appeared fifty yards ahead. Behind me, I could hear the spider-women’s legs tearing through the jasmine shrubs and knew it was going to be close.

Bursting through the redwood doors, I barely avoided the bark-flesh grasp of a deformed human hand the size of a Volkswagen Beetle. Looking up, I saw a ninety-foot oak tree, its upper trunk encompassing something that vaguely resembled Bella Maharaj’s face.

And then I was falling, sliding on my buttocks down the slippery spinach-green slope of an elephant ear leaf, one sixty-foot heart-shaped sheet of genetically enhanced Mother Nature depositing me into the cradle of the next as I plummeted twenty stories in thirty seconds before the ride ended in a sudden brilliant blast of pain.

Chapter 29

29

Knowledge becomes evil if the aim be not virtuous.

—PLATO

Vanilla sway … vanilla sway … vanilla—

“Huh!” I opened my eyes.

I was on my back, lying on an examination table. Disoriented, the room spinning, I was close to panic when my fiancée leaned over me, her dark hair cut short like she wore it on Oceanus, her sensuous thick lips smiling lovingly at me.

“Andie? Please tell me I’m awake.”

“Baby, you’re awake and you’re safe.”

I smiled. I giggled. I tried to sit up—but my head didn’t take kindly to the gesture and I had to lay back down again, the room still spinning.

“Take it slow, Ike, you’ve been unconscious for quite a while.”

“I guess I have, haven’t I? Andie, I had the most bizarre dream. I dreamt I woke up in Oceanus twelve million years in the future. The moon had been struck by the asteroid that passed by Earth while we were frozen, and everything was different. GOLEM went nuts, cloning all the women’s DNA, using it to genetically engineer some seriously freakish beings.” I raised my head just enough to assure myself Andria’s jumpsuit had human legs and feet, then laid back down, a smile stretched across my face.

She smoothed away a strand of hair from my forehead, then kissed me gently on the lips. “You gave us all quite a scare. Thankfully, the Creator was able to save you.”

“Wait … what?” My heart seemed to cramp, my body trembling. I attempted to sit up again, only to discover my wrists and ankles were strapped to an aero gel surgical light table. “What the hell is this? Get me out of these restraints!”