I forgot time and space. I saw only 386 that pale, smiling face and those great dark eyes. Then, strangling, I tore myself from her embrace and shot to the surface.
Coughing, I cleared my lungs of the water I had inhaled. I was weak and shaking when I finished, but my head was clear. The grip of the strange fantasy that had gripped me was shaken off.
Mercer was bending over me; speaking softly.
“I was watching, old man,” he said gently. “I can imagine what happened. A momentary, psychic fusing of an ancient, long since broken link. You, together with all mankind, came up out of the sea. But there is no retracing the way.”
I nodded, my head bowed on my streaming chest.
“Sorry, Mercer,” I muttered. “Something got into me. Those big eyes of hers seemed to tug at threads of memory ... buried.... I can’t describe it....”
He slapped me on my naked shoulder, a blow that stung, as he had intended it to. It helped jerk me back to the normal.
“You’ve got your feet on the ground again, Taylor,” he commented soothingly. “I think there’s no danger of you losing your grip on terra firma again. Shall we carry on?”
“There’s more you’d like to learn? That you think she can give us?” I asked hesitantly.