CHAPTER 1

SOMETHING IS DIFFERENT

All around the world people were waking up. Somewhere something had changed. They knew not what, but things were definitely different.

Sarah and Frank looked at each other as the brightness of the new day shone through the large easterly window in their shared bedroom. Everything seemed normal. The birds were singing outside in the trees. The day appeared bright and sunny, if a little chilly, yet there was something different.

The children heard their parents in the next room stirring, and gingerly crept into the room rubbing their eyes.

Sarah had had a dream last night that she was somewhere else, far, far away. She had been flying over large crystal castles of a miriad shapes and colours. She had seen herself in flowing robes. She felt she was far older than the ten years she represented as Sarah Jane Forbes.

So much time seemed to have passed in her dream, she pondered that it felt like an eternity. Was it was really only one night? Something did seem different this morning.

She looked over at Frank who was sleepily rubbing his eyes. She suddenly remembered Frank being in her dream with her. Could he really have been?

Mum and Dad were awake now. Dad turned on the radio to hear the news. Out of the speakers came the familiar voice of the news announcer. But somehow it seemed different. His voice this morning seemed cheerier. He seemed to have more of a sparkle to his words.

He churned out the same dreary bad news - someone murdered in a downtown subway, a crash on the stock market, a loss in the latest football game. Yet somehow none of it seemed real! There was something quite unrealistic about it all. It didn't seem to be registering. Even Mum seemed to notice it.

Sarah felt a drumming in her ears and knew that she was slipping away. She couldn't really focus on what was happening about her, because she felt a 'shift' in her focus. Even her brother, Frank, two years her junior, seemed to be feeling something.

She stared out the window, half expecting to see a stranger coming to the door. She knew that things were about to happen.

She walked to the front door and opened it. There in front of her stood a stranger. This was no ordinary stranger. He was tall and beautiful to look at. In fact he seemed to glow. His eyes shone like lights. He was totally clad in a silver outfit, covering all his body with the exception of his hands and head. On his feet was a pair of silver boots, which seemed tight fitted and made of the same sort of soft material as his outfit.

Before Sarah could open her mouth, she realised that what she had dreamed the night before was no dream. Parts of her dream came flooding back to her.

She remembered seeing the stranger in her dream. He had come to her and they had talked for a long time about the new realities being birthed on the planet. Sarah had felt at the time that she had an adult understanding of life, and that she knew she had some purpose here on earth. She felt that she was here to help others in some way. She knew at the time that she was dreaming that she had understood what was happening.

Now she suddenly had a very strong remembrance that this was what the stranger had come for. He had come to help her prepare, in full consciousness, for the task at hand.

A feeling of immense love and acceptance radiated from Sarah as she invited the stranger in. He seemed to know her thoughts and there was no sense of unease as she welcomed him into the home of her family.

Frank stood by with wide-opened eyes, as Mum and Dad wandered into the room in a half-daze.

Sarah introduced her new 'friend' as a guide who had come to show them how to integrate the feelings they all seemed to feel, into their lives.

Somehow Sarah had no doubts at all, that their future was assured in the hands of her own feelings, and now in the presence of this new friend.

Chris Hamilton -