STARLA by Moxie DESTINATION: EARTH NOTE: This story takes place within the Aurora Universe, as created by Sharon Best. Starla is a Velorian supergirl without equal. CHAPTER 5: DESTINATION: EARTH So the supergirl from the stars was successful in saving the massive space station as well as the Federation's flagship from certain destruction - all within the span of a just few minutes. Over 4,500 lives saved! Despite remaining resolute in her distaste for being a Protector, Starla nevertheless felt very proud at what she had accomplished. But now, she was thinking about what her next step had to be. As Starla flew back to the starship and entered through the forcefield that maintained the environment in the shuttle bay, she was surprised to see a large welcoming party awaiting her return. Hundreds of crewmen were gathered clapping and cheering her accomplishment, and in the forefront of the crowd was Ensign Jonathan Gauger. Starla floated to a graceful landing in front of Gauger. "Starla, in my heart I knew you could do it, but actually seeing you lift that station back into orbit was something else! That was shere brute strength! You're absolutely fantastic!" Gauger's fondness for the supergirl had only grown in her absence while he was on duty. He was now solidly in love with her. (After all, how could he possibly help it?) He leaned forward to give her a kiss, but found her reception somewhat cordial, perhaps even cold. Something was wrong, but he wasn't quite sure what. Gauger was a little worried and very rattled by her reaction to him, but given the presence of the crowd, he decided to discuss it later. Instead, he delivered the message from Captain Picard, "Starla, Captain Picard wants to see you in his quarters immediately." Starla smiled sweetly and touched her hand to the side of his face. Then she cut through the stunned crowd to go meet with Captain Picard. ********** When the announcement tone sounded at the door of the Captain's Ready Room, he was sipping a piping-hot cup of Earl Gray tea and gazing thoughtfully out his viewport. "Come," he called without even turning around. "Yes, Captain Picard, you asked to see me?" Starla inquired as she entered the room. Picard still had his back to her, facing out the viewport into deep space. "Yes, Starla, please come in. I must say what you accomplished today was truly remarkable....astonishing!" "Thank you, Captain." "No, Starla, it is we who must thank you, for all the lives you saved today. My own life, as well as every hand on the Enterprise and Deep Space 9 would be gone right now if not for you," he said as he turned around to face the girl. "I'm glad I was able to help," she said with a proud smile. "But ... that raises the next question:" the Captain continued, "A very important question: What now for you?" Starla pursed her lips and nodded, "I knew we would have this talk someday." "Yes, I imagine you did," he said matter-of-factly as he walked over to sit on the couch with his tea. "Well, Captain - may I call you Jean-Luc?" (he nodded yes) "as you know, Jean-Luc, my plan has always been to return to Earth. Now I believe the time has come for me to move on." "That's precisely what I hoped we could discuss. Starla, may I ask what you plan to do when you return to Earth?" he asked. "Live, Jean-Luc just live. I hope to live, to love, and to make friends. To NOT be a Protector. I want to have fun, to laugh, to cry. I have had none of that so far in my life. I need to rediscover my genetic heritage. I want to be accepted for who I am here and here," (she said as she pointed to her head and her heart), "not because of what I've got here" (she flexed a bicep that looked humongous, even bigger than the one Picard had seen before.) He fumbled for words for a few moments as he became spellbound by her sexy, erotic muscularity. At any rate, he was relieved to hear that her intentions were not malevolent. After all, with her capabilities, she could easily affect the natural course of history, perhaps even conquer the Federation. "But Starla, despite the fact that we both come from the same basic genetic material, surely your time among my crew has shown you how tremendous the gap is between your capabilities and ours. I just don't see how what you want to do makes sense, for one thing I'm not sure the Earth is ready for you....Starla, I believe that to a certain degree, we all have a destiny to fulfill in order to maintain the universe in a sort of harmonic balance. You may not want to be a Protector, but perhaps that is what you were meant to be. I don't think you should deny your destiny out here in the stars, I don't think you should squander your talents by hiding on Earth." Starla started to get a little defensive as she heard his criticisms, "My capabilities and talents are not subject to your mystical concept of destiny any more than to the outdated concept of the Protector. Besides, Jean-Luc, certainly you realize that with my strength I am capable of coming and going whenever I like, doing whatever I like. And I will use my capabilities for whatever I see fit." Picard stood and walked to where she was standing, "Yes, of course I understand. And believe me when I say that I don't want to see you go. Heaven knows we could use your help if the Borg were to return." Then he looked in her eyes and said slowly, as a father would, "I just don't think you should deny who you are." They looked eye to eye for a few moments before she smiled and gave him a hug, said "Good-bye," and walked out the door. He walked back to the viewport to gaze again into the timeless infinity of space, and to wonder whether he had said the right thing. ********** Starla returned to the shuttle bay to find that the crowd had dispersed, all except for Gauger. She stood in the doorway and said nothing. "I figured you'd come back here," he said in a voice that echoed across the shuttle bay. She entered to walk closer to where he was standing. "You're leaving, aren't you?" he ventured, somehow certain of the answer. "Wow, not bad for someone without telepathic abilities," she feigned a joke. "Oh Jon, I never thought you'd get that close to me so quickly. And I always planned to move on to Earth, I certainly didn't plan to hurt you in the process." "Why can't you just stay here? Stay with me?" he asked. "I'm not really sure why not, I just know I can't. All I know is that this doesn't feel right, this isn't my place. I have to go to Earth to find my...my destiny." She stopped short when she realized she had echoed Picard's advice. "Why don't you join me on Earth," she offered. "That's not MY destiny," he said. "Ever since I was a boy I have dreamed of exploring space, of contacting new life forms, like you. This is where my destiny lies," he said as he pointed out the shuttle bay into deep space. There was an uncomfortable silence between them as they realized the inevitable. "Well, that's it then," he offered, "this is good-bye." Starla reached her hands out to his hips and lifted him a few inches off the ground like a rag doll. Then she pulled him closer and they shared a long, meaningful kiss and one final hug. As she set him back on the ground she said, "How about until we meet again?" and touched her index finger to his lips. He forced a weak smile as she turned and floated gracefully out of the shuttle bay. Gauger realized how fortunate he had been to get to know this remarkable supergirl from the stars, even if just for a few hours, but that didn't make her leaving hurt any less. Oddly, his mind remembered an old song as she faded from view: Some people live their dreams, Some people close their eyes, Some people's destiny passes by. There are no guarantees, There are no alibis, That's how our love must be, don't ask why. It takes some time, God knows how long. I know that I can't forget you. As soon as my heart stops breaking, Anticipating, As soon as forever is through, I'll be over you. ********** Starla flew in the direction of the wormhole that would transport her directly to the Terran solar system. As she approached the energy portal, a cloud of energy and dust began to swirl at the mouth of the wormhole. "These things always give me the creeps," she thought to herself, "but I guess they're worth it. Otherwise it would take forever for me to get to Earth." Just as she entered the wormhole, the third Cardassian fighter reappeared and opened fire. It was trying to avenge the deaths of the Cardassians on the fighters Starla so handily disposed of earlier. The torpedo entered the wormhole right behind Starla and exploded. The shape of the wormhole focused the resulting energy flux and caused a shift in the time-space continuum, creating a time warp. Starla began tumbling uncontrollably through the worm hole as the years melted away...2300...2200...2100...2000. Just then she impacted the ground in an awesome explosion! ********** Just north of the Bakersfield turnoff, the large crater in the median of I-5 in California smoldered in the dusky shadows of a brand new sunrise. The berm of loosed dirt which encircled the thirty-foot crater rose about six feet above the surrounding ground. Twenty feet down in the base of the crater a pair of legs pointed up towards the sky. Although normally a busy interstate, at the moment this particular stretch was deserted. Starla woke up a few minutes later stunned and aching all over, "man, I wonder if this is what a hangover feels like?" She climbed out of the crater, dusted herself off, and sat in the nearby grass as she looked around to get her bearings. She wasn't sure where she was, but it looked like she was right between two fairly large roads. "Could this be Earth?" she wondered. She turned and began to walk up the road, her head still spinning slightly from the impact. She looked directly at the large yellow sun that hung on the horizon like some low-hanging fruit. She zoomed in her eyes until it looked so close she could touch it. There were intermittent large dark areas on it, and periodically a plume of fiery gas would spew forth as the sea of seething plasma of ionized gases burned at over 150,000 degrees Fahrenheit. It was a primitive, violent young star, and charming in its own way. A few seconds later a vehicle going the opposite direction on the other road sounded a horn. When Starla looked, several young boys were waving at her. Evidently, the sight of a gorgeous bikini-clad girl strolling up the interstate is not normal for 6am. "Well,this definitely doesn't look like the 24th century, but at least they look Terran," she thought. Just then she was passed by a large bus. It seemed like everyone on this planet was moving faster than she was, so she picked up the pace to a leisurely 100 mile per hour jog. At that speed she soon caught up with the bus that had just passed her. It was a yellow and black Mears Motor Coach tour bus carrying tourists from Southern Califormia northward to see Seattle and Vancouver. She ran up along side the bus, matched its speed, and very slowly began to pass it. She glanced up and waved to one passenger who was actually awake at this early hour, who could not believe his eyes. An extremely fit looking girl was passing the speeding bus on foot, and she didn't even look winded! When she reached the driver, who gawked shamelessly at her, Starla got a crazy idea. So she let the bus slowly pass her, while the driver and passenger continued to stare at her. When she had reached the middle of the bus, she reached down with her right hand and lifted it into the air while she continued to match its speed. The bus lurched only slightly while she found a good grip and balance point. When the drive wheels were lifted from the pavement, the engine began to rev for a moment until the stunned driver realized what was happening and shifted into neutral. When he looked in the side view mirror, he saw a gorgeous young girl smiling proudly as she ran down the highway, his bus resting on her right hand while her left hand crooked a tremendous bicep muscle. "Lordy Jesus," he said as he slackened his tie, he had certainly never seen anything like her before. He gripped the wheel with white knuckles as he was simultaneously frightened and turned on by this amazing girl. Starla broke her pose and gradually she began to increase her speed. 100....200...300...400...500...600 miles per hour. In a few moments, she was sprinting down the highway with a Greyhound bus resting on her right hand. At that speed, the countryside passed by in a blur, the billboards looking like slats in a picket fence. She weaved her way through the sparse traffic that periodically blocked her path, sometimes running out on the emergency lane to pass. The paint on the front of the bus began to bubble from the heat, caused by the friction of moving through air that fast. After seven or eight minutes, they began to gradually slow down, and finally stopped. In the side view mirror the driver could see the girl gently set the bus wheels back on the pavement. She walked up the side of the bus and looked up at the driver, who was peeking out the window as he cowered slumping in his seat. The girl was slightly out of breath, her generous breasts rising and falling as she caught her breath. Starla smiled and winked at him. Then she turned and ran on up the road, and streaked out of sight in four or five seconds - just like the roadrunner on that kids cartoon. The driver stared in disbelief down the road where the girl disappeared into the horizon. As he looked out the front window he noticed that the bus was resting in front of the roadsign for the turnoff to the Kettleman State Recreation Area. He did a double-take and checked his watch. His bus had just covered over 80 miles in about 8 minutes! He rubbed his eyes and reached in his pocket for a couple Tylenol. Man, the guys on the bowling team would never believe this one! ********** The exertion from running had helped Starla recover from the disorientation and dizziness she felt due to the impact when she fell out of the wormhole. As the warm California morning began to come into full bloom, she decided to see the sights from the air. She swooped up into the sky and flew westward with the sun at her back. She marveled at the sights, sounds, and smells of this new land. This had to be the fabled Earth, her newly-adopted home and the point of her genetic origins. Everything was so lovely and so different from anything she had ever seen before. Perhaps now she could find her place, to be truly accepted, to fit in. The sky was so blue. She soared into the sky and floated through a puffy white cloud. The land below was so green and lush compared to the planet she grew up on, which was actually more like the Moon than anything else. The grass, the trees, the flowers, everything was so alive. As she flew she frolicked and corkscrewed through the sky as she periodically rolled over on her back and then back to her stomach again. The terrain was so interesting from the air, to see the mountains, valleys, meadows, and a patchwork of colors. Even from several thousand feet, her superior vision could see rabbits, skunks, bears, wildcats, birds, turtles, snakes, frogs, bugs, and just about any other form of life you could think of. She strained her eyes to look ahead and saw a large body of water that stretched as far as she could see. She gently flexed her glutes to generate Mach 3 flying speed until she reached the Pacific Ocean. "Magnificent...how truly magnificent," she thought to herself as she soared high above the waves, shimmering in the morning sunlight. It looked so tranquil, so graceful. And she loved that wonderful salty smell. In the depths of the ocean her tachyon vision picked up a huge variety of sealife. She periodically saw mist and spray from rock outcroppings and the waves as they crashed onto the rocky shoreline, and decided to investigate. So she swooped down until she was just a few feet above the waves and turned for shore at Mach 2, a large rooster tail forming in her wake. When she reached the shore she slowed and banked northward. She took her time now and followed the shoreline, flying between fifty and one hundred feet, doing a little sightseeing of Big Sur as no Terran could. Periodically some sea spray would catch her, the cold salt water feeling so invigorating on her sensual body as it evaporated in the morning sun. Starla's heart was singing. She was finally home. ********** After an hour or so, Starla heard some beautiful sounds that were coming from a large compound on the hill overlooking the ocean. She decided to take a closer look and did a fly-by at 5000 feet. It looked like a restaurant or something. She skirted back along the mountainside just above the treetops and silently approached a large patio overlooking the ocean. She floated up over the railing and quietly landed in a corner. It was a lovely setting. A young man with an apron came over and said, "Hi, I didn't see you come in. Welcome to the Phoenix cafe. Would you...like some lunch...or something?" the young man fumbled for words has he tried to abosorb the girls overwhelming beauty. "...or..are you just looking around?" "Just looking around, I guess. What's that I'm hearing?" "Oh, those are the windchimes downstairs in the shop," he said, pointing to the steps. "Thanks," she said as she smiled shyly, her dimples deeply indenting her cheeks. As she walked away, the young man did a wolf's whistle in his mind and admired her unbelievable tight ass as her firm glutes swung up and down. She walked up and around some Byzantine steps that lead through some lovely gardens. The many people she passed did a double take, first to see someone in a bikini, and second, because she was so beautiful. Finally, she came to the shop entrance and shyly walked inside. A charming older woman with white hair said from behind the counter, "Hello, welcome to Nepenthe. Can I help you?" Starla smiled and after a pause said "I guess I'm just looking." The supergirl browsed for a half hour, examining the unusual art and gifts in the store. She caused quite a commotion thoughout the store as people commented on her dress and physique in hushed tones. She strolled into a book section and began to scan the titles with her super vision. found one in particular that intrigued her: Taking Care of Our Mother Earth. "Aha, so this IS Earth," she announced out loud, as everyone in the store stared at her, trying to figure out what that meant. She gradually made her way to the back of the store to a small porch overlooking the ocean. Here Starla found what she had been looking for: a large selection of very artistic, handmade copper windchimes. Their tone and timbre sounded so relaxing, it was as if each tone had its own shape and color. As the wind gently blew, it seemed to select which ones to sound, different combinations, different successions, different rhythms, different colors and textures. She had stayed on the porch enjoying the chimes for over an hour, when she noticed a puff of white mist from the water off shore. A quick magnification of her tachyon vision revealed a small pod of grey whales off the coast doing their annual migration. After a hasty exit from the shop, she leapt into the sky and flew toward the blowholes she had seen. There were two adults and a calf. Starla flew above the water examining their physiology while they swam. She could sense their thoughts at a very primitive level, not really telepathically, but there nonetheless. The calf was newly-born, and the mother was teaching her to feed. Moments later, the three began to sound to the deepest depths of this part of the ocean, and Starla decided to swim with them. As they toured the bottom of the Pacific Ocean at depths far below what would crush a normal Terran (Starla was obviously capable of safely going much deeper than the whales), the supergirl delighted in swimming with her newfound friends. Through use of her amazing capabilities, Starla had casually witnessed what no other human had ever seen. After eight minutes the whales were running out of air and turned towards the surface. Starla was a little disappointed, since she could have stayed down there indefinitely, but she decided to follow them back to the surface anyway. When they reached the surface all three whales jumped from the water in a spectacular triple-breach. Starla also flew from the water, telepathically told her friends good-bye and continued her trip northward along the Pacific Coast. She continued her flight, sometimes paralleling the coastline, sometimes flying directly over the rocks and spray, sometimes skirting the treetops. She came to a large break in the coastline forged by a large bridge and turned inland, skimming the waves of San Francisco Bay. After a quick fly-by of the city, she retraced her entrance under the Golden Gate Bridge to the coast, but vowed, "I'm going to have to come back to explore this city some more." After another hour of flying she reached the entrance to the Russian River and decided to follow it inland. Starla was captivated with how lush and green Earth was, and the beauty of the trees and mountains. She also reveled at how serene and tranquil the river was. After following the meandering river inland for around 20 miles, she turned northward and flew over the Armstrong Redwoods State Reserve. She skirted the treetops with her arms out at her side, rocking from side to side so that first one hand, and then the next, would brush the top branches. Armstrong Redwoods State Reserve has some of the last pristine big trees in the coastal area, and Starla found it quite beautiful. She decided to land and walk around a bit. "I feel so wonderful under this yellow sun, but also a bit different. I wonder if my strength is affected by it?" she wondered. As she walked through the rough forest terrain, she did not let anything deter her progress. First, she walked right up to a redwood sapling about a foot in diameter. She reached her hand around the sapling and uprooted it in an easy, swift motion. After a few more steps a greater test confronted her, a tree with a three-foot diameter. With a single sweeping motion, she placed her left hand on the right side of the tree and cleared the tree away with one hand. The fell to its side with roots exposed. Becomming a bit more confident of her strength under this yellow sun, she spotted a mountain face and went to where there had been a rockslide. In the center of the rubble pile there was one boulder about as big as a small house. She levitated herself over to the tremendous stone and found a good grip. With a very easy effort, she easily lifted it, in fact, she practicvally lobbed it into the air by accident as she drastically overestimated the resistance that would be placed on her strong arms. As a final test, she walked over to a huge tree with a 10-foot diameter. She looked up at its towering height and marveled. Using her tachyon vision to scan underground, her baby blues revealed an extensive root system reaching at least 100 feet underground. She put her arms around the ancient tree in a kind of hug and wondered, "Could this be a mighty sequoia?" Given the large diameter of the tree and the spacing required for her ample breasts, her arms couldn't get very far around it. Her pectoral muscles began to firm and swell as she gently began to flex her arms inward, and bark began to crunch and chip from around her hands. Then, convinced that she had an adequate grip, she gently began to lift upward. She had used very little of her strength when she began to hear creaking and popping sounds from the ground beneath the ancient tree. Then with a sudden impatient burst of what represented just a fraction of her strength, she snapped the huge tree from the ground, holding it between her powerful arms, large sinewy roots snapped cleanly in two. "Oops," she thought. She had not meant to actually uproot the giant tree, but her strength was just too overwhelming. "Well, it looks like little ole' Starla is mightier than the mighty sequoia. I guess that answers my question about my strength. I must be even stronger than before because of the effects of this yellow sun." She set the tree down ("timber!") next to the deep hole she had created, brushed her hands together to dust them off. Then she raised her incredible arms into a double bicep pose, and marveled herself at the strength that existed in those throbbing muscles. She continued through the woods, moved by its primitive beauty, until she came to Lake Sonoma. She followed along the coastline for a ways, until she decided to investigate a sound her exceptional hearing noticed in the distance. Starla swooped up in the sky and hovered just above the treetops. Then, with her long-distance eyesight, she zoomed in on the source of the sound: it was a young man chopping wood about a mile and a half away on the other side of the lake. She flew to near where he was and silently landed between a stand of trees. ********** Derek Morgan had HAD IT with women. His longtime girlfriend, Adina, had just broken up with him, despite the fact that he was generally recognized as the best looking guy in school. As a varsity letterman in football, basketball, baseball, weightlifting, track, golf, and tennis, his prowess as an athlete was beyond doubt. His sexual prowess with the women was also a well-known fact, as narrated by his post-game activities each Friday night with Adina, who was the head cheerleader. In addition, Derek was a top student, maintaining a 4.0 average in a schedule overloaded with AP (college preparatory - advanced placement) courses. In short, Derek seemed to be a natural at just about anything he tried. All of that made Derek a prime catch for someone like Adina, who didn't really care about Derek. Adina only cared about how his stock was rated by her friends. He was a senior, a letterman, and a hunk. What more did she need to know? But Adina had said that Derek wanted to spend too much time doing boring things, like discussing current events or something he had read. Sometimes, he even went to the library without a school assignment, actually going just for fun! Hell, she even called him Brainiak once, while she twirled the ends of her hair and smacked her gum. They simply weren't compatible. That's why she had decided to break up with him. About the only thing he would miss about Adina was her body. (He certainly wouldn't miss their "stimulating discussions".) Adina had the best body in the county, and she knew it. She was strong ahnd firm, like a fitness competitor. In fact, she once entered a fitness contest down in San Francisco and actually won it. Her muscular legs and firm butt were her main strengths, and when she worked out faint ridges appeared on her abdomen. But her upper body was firm, and not very muscular, to Derek's regret. Oh, how he had wished for her upper arms to be as well-developed as her thighs. Derek's main problem with the women was that he seemed to always wanted more. He was good at practically everything he did, and he expected his women to be the same. The problem was, the ones he knew weren't. In addition, most of the girls he knew were somewhat superficial. They lacked the interest or ability to have a meaningful discussions with him about the variety of topics he found interesting: classical art, the plight of the American Indians in the 1800s, taoist philosophies, cosmology, modern arcitecture, and jazz music. Derek's interests were so varied, as were his talents, that he was sort of a teenage renaissance man. Most of the girls he knew were only interested in the latest fashions in this month's Cosmo. So Derek was standing there on the bank of Lake Sonoma chopping wood and muttering under his breath about his lacking social life. Starla floated silently over behind a rock outcropping about five yards away from Derek and peeked over the top. The shape of the rock made an effective screen so that Starla could only be seen from about the neck up. For several minutes, she watched him chop and mutter, chop and mutter, chop and mutter. Starla immediately noticed that he was good looking. His strong upper body was pumped up from the exertion of chopping wood. She found his persperation exciting as she watched it drip off the angles of his muscular body that glistened in the mid- morning sun. He was not built like Gauger, not nearly that big. He was more built like a decathlete, with muscles a little too big for track. Finally, she decided to reveal her presence and announced, "Hey, who're you talking to?" Derek spun around startled, and finally spotted her head peeking out above a rock wall. "How long have you been there?" "About ten minutes. Who're you talking to?" she repeated. He judged her to be about a freshman or sophomore age. "Nobody. I'm just griping. Where'd you come from? Are you camping here?" Derek noticed for the first time how beautiful the young girl was, and tingled at the sight of her. Her eyes seemed to glow from within the most beautiful bluish tint, they practically looked like old- style christmas tree lights glimmering in ths shade of the trees. And that smile, oh man. She had the cutest dimples he had ever seen. And her teeth were so white, providing quite a contrast against her darkly tanned skin. Derek felt himself practically melt at the sight of her, and he could only see her from the neck up! "...uh, yeah. I'm camping at the other side of the lake," she said hesitantly. "My name is Derek. What's yours?" "I am called...Starla," she announced proudly, but in an odd kind of way. "Are you upset or something?" "Yeah...I mean, no...well, yes I am," Derek fumbled for the right words as he took in her beautiful face. "Girl problems." "But you are a boy. What do you mean by that?" Starla asked innocently. "I mean I just broke up with my girlfriend, Adina. But its okay, we really had nothing in common anyway. It seemed like we could never have a decent conversation." Starla looked puzzled, so he tried to explain. "Like just the other day. I was trying to talk to her about this book I was reading by Gore Vidal about Abraham Lincoln, and she was totally disinterested. She said it was "too historical and stuff" and asked what class I had to read it for. I had just gotten to the part about the Emancipation Proclamation and his motivations for doing signing it into law. I thought it was pretty cool, but she sure didn't." Starla replied, "Well I've read that book, and I think that was a pretty good part, too. Lincoln agonized over that decision. But I also found it interesting to read the letters he wrote during the Civil War. He was absolutely tormented during that period." Derek was so shocked he nearly dropped the axe. "You've read that book?" "Well, sure. Hasn't everybody?" "Well, no. In fact, I had to order it from the library at Stanford. Where'd you get a copy?" "I...uh...I borrowed it from a friend." In fact, it was one of the files she scanned from the Enterprise's computer library. They discussed the book for more twenty minutes and Derek became more and more excited at finding someone to talk to about meaningful things. Their conversation then branched out into world history, politics, and music. Derek began to think she knew even more about the topics than he did (which she did, of course). They spoke for hours, and all the while Starla stood behind the rock wall. While they spoke, a bond began to form between the two who eventually would become lovers. He had found someone who was at least his intellectual equal (actually superior, although he didn't know that yet), and he was totally enamored with her face, her smile, and her eyes. He didn't know what the rest of her looked like, but he didn't care. He was discovering that Starla was beautiful on the inside. (Wait till he gets a load of her outside!) For her part, Starla, had found an extremely good looking guy who was smart, too. And the best part, was that he didn't even know what she looked like, didn't know about her body's strength, didn't know about her heritage as a Protector. Starla sensed that he liked her more and more, and knew that the seeds for love were being planted. Finally, the sun began to set. Derek could not believe how the time had flown by. He had really enjoyed being with this girl. "Look, I've got to go. But I obviously didn't get all my wood chopped. I'm staying in my folk's cabin down Rockpile Road, next to Smith Creek. I'll have to come back tomorrow to finish up. Will you come meet me here again?" he asked, hoping above all just to see her again. Starla just nodded and smiled. She wouldn't miss it for the world. With that, she ducked below the level of the rock wall and flew just a few feet off the ground through the woods ducking the trees. Within just a few moments she was several hundred yards away. Derek ran to the wall to see where she had gone, but found nothing. That night both young people replayed the events of the day, and dreamed about their newfound friend. For once, each felt like they had made a real connection with a member of the opposite sex. The next day virtually the same thing happened again. Derek went to chop more wood. Once again, Starla appeared over the rock wall and did not reveal the rest of her remarkable body. She wanted Derek to be impressed with her mind first before he got even a glimpse of the rest of her, that would just confuse the issue. They talked for hours, again spending the day together. And it ended the same way as before, too, with them promising to meet for another day and Starla swooping through the trees and escaping before he could see where she had gone. And their dreams of each other were getting better and better. "She could be the one," Derek thought. They continued this pattern for a week. Each day, Derek would go to chop wood and wait for her to arrive. And each day, Starla would pop up from behind that rockpile, not exposing herself. They talked in depth and shared their intimate feelings. They were becoming soul mates. Now, a little mystery is good in a woman, but Derek was beginning to get really curious why Starla stayed behind the rocks. So the next day when they met, he asked her to come out and sit in the shade with him while they talked. When she said she'd rather stay where she was, they debated it a bit. Finally, in a huff and very frustrated, Derek walked away to a rock pile. "Come on', babe, come out here with me, I think I love you" he whispered under his breath. Starla, of course, heard him and, without reading his mind, sensed it was a critical time in their relationship. She also knew he was really attracted to her for who she was inside, not how she looked outside. She knew now was time to make her play; she bit her lip and hoped it worked. Derek was skipping the small flat stones and across the waters of Lake Sonoma. Starla floated up from behind the rock wall and landed silently behind where he was standing. She stood with her hands on her hips in the classic supergirl pose, her tan skin so dark in the morning California sun. She watched Derek throw one more pebble: skip, skip- skip, skip, ploop. "Ahem," she cleared her throat, and he spun around. Derek's eyes nearly popped out of his head, and he had an instant hard- on. A goddess was standing before him, straight out of his dreams. And on top of it was the beautiful head of his newest friend. Derek could hardly fathom the beauty he beheld. Starla stood there barefoot in a stark white bikini that contrasted her dark tan so much. His eyes roamed up and down her body in disbelief. He stared at her legs so strong and shapely. God, her thighs and calves looked awesome. Her powerful hips narrowed in to a slim waist, fronted by a strongly- muscled abdomen. Her upper body curved away from the tiny waist in a V- shaped outline, her deltoids and strong shoulders providing the top two corners. Capping it all off were the two most perfect breasts Derek had ever seen: large, round, well-defined, and so firm they seemed to not be hindered by gravity. She was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen - even more beautiful than anything he had ever dreamed about (which was really saying something!). "Well?" she smiled at him so enticingly. "Uuhh", was the best response he could muster. His blood pressure was beginning to rise. Starla could her his heartbeat pounding. "What?" she wondered if something was wrong, if she had misjudged his reaction to her. "OH GOD!" "WHAT!? Talk to me Derek. Use your lips to form words. Turn on your brain," she joked nervously. "Starla, its not my brain that's turned on right now." "Really?" she said, secretly sighing in relief that he liked what he saw. "Duh. You're a goddess. Why didn't you let me see the rest of you until now?" he asked angrily. Starla paused and looked down, and then said quietly, "Because I wanted you to see there's more to me than my muscles and my body. I wanted you to get to know ME first." He stepped closer to her and lifted her chin upward so they made eye contact. "Starla, before today, I already thought you were the most remarkable and wonderful girl I had ever met. I've enjoyed getting to know you so much, I think you're a very special person." Starla smiled broadly, "I think I love you, too, babe". Then she pointed down to a flat boulder about four feet across and said, "Mind if I take a turn?" He shrugged with a confused look on his face since had no idea what she was talking about. She reached down and put her hadns around the 400 lb. boulder and lifted it more easily than Derek had lifted the pebbles. Derek's mouth dropped open as he saw her muscles flex powerfully to accommodate the weight, "What the..." Then she turned towards the water, and threw it across the surface of the lake, making it skip twenty or thirty times until it impacted the opposite shoreline with an explosion of sand. "HOW IN THE HELL..." Derek was still struggling with Starla's muscularity, he had no idea of her immense strength or other capabilities. "Not bad for a beginner, huh?" Starla toyed coyly with him. "Can...can you do that again?" This time she picked up a boulder evene larger than the first - naturally it was still practically weightless to her strong muscles - and hurled it skipping across the lake. Derek's mouth was gaping open. "Now, how about this." He followed her over to a redwood tree that had fallen across the lakeshore that was about forty feet long and four feet thick at the trunk. She stood at a point roughly midway down the length fo the tree and reached down with her hands. He stood behind her admiring the view as she bent over, only halfway noticing what she was doing. When she had one hand positioned on top and the other on the bottom of the tree, she casually lifted it overhead, causing it to creak and groan as it stressed on each side of the balance point her hands made. Derek coughed at how effortlessly she lifted the tree, it must have weighed over ten tons. Was he seeing things? Little did he know, so immense was her strength (even in a non-aroused state), that a ten-ton weight felt to her powerful arms about like what half an ounce would feel like to a normal Terran. He slowly circled her, marveling at the powerful curves of muscles flexing far beyond the boundary of what he could have ever rationally dreamed was possible. Her body was absolutely outrageous, even though this paltry amount of weight scarcely made her large muscles flex. Still, it was enough to give him the mother of all hard-ons. He returned to the front of her, and looked up at the massive tree she held casually overhead. Then she pulled her right hand away and supported the entire tree with only her left hand. "Its not actually much weight for me, but it still feels good to exert myself even just a little every once in a while," she said smiling as she began pressing it up and down. Then, she slowly began to crook her right elbow as she flexed a bicep the likes of which Derek had never seen. She savored his reaction as it slowly grew from a baseball, to a softball, to a grapefruit, to a cantaloupe, all the while pressing the tree up and down with just her left arm. Derek was so astounded it looked like his eyes would pop out of his head, and his mouth might hit the ground. Even so, he had no idea the magnitude of power that mammoth muscle contained. "Mmmm, I just love flexing my muscles. Do you like them, Derek?" she asked. Derek was suffering from a hormonal overload, and he began to feel light-headed. Moments later, his eyes rolled back in his head and he fainted. Before he could fall onto the rocks, Starla grabbed his shirt with her right hand and held his feet a few inches off the ground while she continued pressing the tree with her left hand. "Well, that's not quite the reaction I had expected, but maybe its a good sign," she thought to herself. And so began a very unusual courtship. He, finding someone of substance like no other (and with a superhuman body, to boot), and she, finding someone who unconditionally accepted her for who she was inside. The two of them falling so much in love. ********** Derek stirred a bit and sighed, "Ummm." Moments later, Derek's head, which had been slumped over to one side, righted itself. He looked around with fuzzy eyes to get his bearings, unsure of what he had just seen. But he gasped in surprise when he saw Starla was still holding the huge tree overhead with only one hand. He was startled and instinctively tried to back away, but realized he could not. Her arm was holding his body up in the air so that his feet were not touching the ground. He paniced and began to kick and squirm. "Hold on there cowboy," said Starla, realizing what had happened. "Here, let me put you down." She gently lowered him to the ground, and then laid the huge tree back on the rocks and returned to the face him with her arms on her hips. "HHHHH...how did you do that??" he stammered. "Well, I'm pretty strong. I guess we need to talk some more. Care to have a seat?" she said as she motioned towards a boulder the size of one she had just skipped across the lake. He sat down cautiously, never taking his eyes off her. "Let's see, where should I begin? First of all, I guess you realize that I'm not from around here. I come from a planet called Velor. I am human - my genes were based on human genetic material - I'm just not Terran. We have been genetically bred to enhance several capabilities beyond what you probably think is possible." "How did you get so strong?" he asked. "Well, that's a little complicated. First of all, Velorians are the strongest race of sentient beings in the Universe. We are all bred to be pretty strong. I am bred from a class of people called Protectors, who are the strongest of the Velorians. My mother, Vanella, was five times stronger than the strongest of all the Protectors, and I am many times stronger than she was. I'm pretty confident that I'm the most powerful being in the universe," she said with a sweet smile that belied the ramifications of her explanation. Derek shook his head and buried his face in his hands, he was having a hard time comprehending all this. "Were you hatched or something?" "No, I was actually born naturally, but that's not normal for a Protector. But since my mother was in exile at the time, I wasn't raised on Velor. And planet I was raised on was a giant, and the heavy gravitation made my muscles grow larger than normal to compensate." He looked up at her, really trying to understand. "Well, how strong are you, anyway?" "Until recently, I really didn't know since it had not been objectively measured. For now, let's just say that I've never found my strength to be lacking for any reason. If I told you more than that, you wouldn't believe me." Derek sat silently, he did not know what to say. All he knew is that the longer he sat there looking at her, the more aroused he became. "I've got an idea," Starla said. "A lot of your wood chopping time has been spent getting to know me. Why don't I help you catch up a little." He tried to hand her the axe, but she said, "Uh, that's OK honey, I don't think I'll need that. She walked to the middle of the large tree that she had just been pressing. Derek watched as she held out her hand like she was getting ready to give someone a karate chop. With a single chop, she cleaved four-foot tree in half with her bare hand. Derek's jaw dropped open again. Then she made another cut about two feet down. She took the two foot long piece of tree trunk and set it on its end. Then she effortlessly used her powerful hands to split it into eight triangle- shaped logs. She turned around to see Derek's reaction to what she had done. "Don't faint on me again," she joked, "I like having you watch me." "Not half as much as I enjoy watching you," he muttered lecherously under his breath. "Just so you know, I could easily hear that comment," she reported without turning around. Derek's mouth snapped shut in surprise. After about three minutes, she had "cut" three cords of wood with her bare hands. "How much should I do?" she asked. "That's enough for now, but if you really want to help some more, maybe we can cut some more tomorrow." "Sure," she said, "this is easy." They proceeded to load up Derek's truck and trailer. When they were done, they hopped in and headed to Derek's cabin. As they drove away, he looked across to her and admired her shapely body in the seat next to him. Sunlight was shining in the sunroof and making her hair shimmer so beautifully. On the way to the cabin, Derek's truck got a flat tire. They pulled over to the side of the road and got out. "Damn, what a pain," Derek said as he got out, "and just my luck, I don't have a jack." "I honestly don't think that will be a problem," said Starla. She went to the back of the truck and unhitched the trailer. Then she went to the flat tire and hand-loosened the lugnuts, which creaked loudly as her strong hand loosened them. Then she went back to the rear bumper and used one hand to lift the back of the truck into the air until the rear wheels were a couple feet off the ground. "Here, let me be your jack." Derek took one look at her powerful bicep casually holding up the rear of his truck, which was full of her hand-chopped wood, and said, "God, I love it when you do stuff like that!" "Then I'll have to do this kind of thing more often. Now how about getting out the spare." Derek unlatched the spare from the undercarriage and rolled it around to the side of the truck. His truck had big nobby tires, so they were pretty heavy. "Hmmmf," he strained to lift it up. "Here, babe, can I help?" Starla asked. She reached down and put her index finger through an opening in the hubcap, and then lifted the heavy tire with just a finger. "Just help guide it onto the axle," she offered. In another minute or two, the tire was changed and Starla eased the truck back to the ground. Just then, another pickup came around the corner. "Oh no," said Derek. "Its the Thompson boys. They pick a fight with me everytime they see me. Our parents own competing wineries." The dilapidated truck skidded to a halt, and two, shall we say, rather unsophisticated young men got out. Actually, they were rednecks that looked like something right out of the movie "Deliverance." One of them had a tire iron and the other had a blue aluminum baseball bat. They were obviously looking for a fight. "Starla, honey, watch out for these guys. They have a vendetta against our family, they think we're trying to put them out of business. The last time I encountered them I got a few broken ribs." "Then why don't you let me handle this, OK?" she said with a playful smile. "Well, what do we have here?" said the ugly one as he walked towards the bikini-clad Starla. "My name is Starla," she replied and put her hands on her hips, looking gorgeous, but very powerful. "What are you some kind of muscle freak?" he said smiling and exposing yellow teeth. He grabbed her hand and tried to pull her towards him, but naturally Starla wasn't going anywhere. She just stood there like a statur while he tugged at her arm. Derek, however, felt protective and jumped forward shouting, "NO, LEAVE HER ALONE!" Just then the uglier brother took the tire iron and swung it at Derek. Starla reacked out and caught the iron bar with her hand, stopping it cold in the air. Then she held it in front of her and slowly curled it in half, and then in half again, and then in half again, as all the men watched her in awe. She crushed the iron in her hand until it squished out around her fingers. Then she grabbed the uglier brother by the shirt and threw him into a ditch fifty feet down the road. "He's lucky I didn't throw him into orbit," Starla announced without an ounce of humor in her voice. After watching this, the ugly brother with the baseball bat decided it was time to act. He swung as hard as he could at her, but once again, Starla easily caught the bat with her hand. Then, she flexed her left bicep into a tremendous cantaloupe-sized bicep. "Oh shit!" was all the Thompson brother could say. Holding the aluminum bat in her right hand, she swung it down hard across the peak of her massive, meaty bicep with a THUD. When she held the bat up for all to see, it looked like someone had tried to wrap it around a telephone pole. Three-quarters down the shaft it had a flattened, crumpled, rounded-out area in the middle of a 45 degree bend. She handed it back to the Thompson brother. "Well, I guess that tactic won't work. Got any others?" she said with a challenging smile on her beautiful face. He ran back to the truck and fired up the engine. Then he floored it and raced towards Derek and Starla to run them down. Derek turned to run away when he noticed Starla holding her ground. Before he could react to pull her from the path of the truck, she stretched out her hands ahd stopped the truck in its tracks. Thompson floored it and the engine screamed. The tires spun in place and smoke rose from the pavement, but Starla did not budge. In fact, she didn't even appear to be straining. Then a few seconds later, she pulled one hand away and flexed her huge bicep again, and continued to hold the truck in place with just a single hand. Thompson knew he was outclassed and decided to retreat. But before he could, Starla took her free hand, made a fist, and crushed it down onto the truck's hood and into the engine. The rear wheels of the truck bucked off the ground from the impact. The engine sputtered to a stop as steam rose from the hole her fist had made. Then, in a fairly graceful move, she lifted the entire truck overhead. Thompson had seen enough, so he opened the door, jumped out, and ran up the road towards his brother. Starla grabbed a handhold on the front and rear frame of the truck as she held it overhead. "Hey Thompsons, you forgot this piece of trash," she shouted out. As they turned to face her, they could see her calmly folding the truck in half with her massive armstrength while the steel frame screamed in protest. Derek was absolutely amazed to see such an awesome display of strength. Then, with a relatively easy motion, she heaved what used to be the truck into the air and launched it up the road. It tumbled end over end and crashed within a few feet of the Thompsons, before it bounced and rolled down into a ravine. The Thompson boys looked at her for a moment, and then turned and ran up the road. "I guess that takes care of them for the time being," she said. "Starla, I'm glad you're on my side," was all Derek could think of saying. "I am most definitely on your side," she said. ********** Starla and Derek held hands in the truck for the remainder of the trip. When they reached the cabin, Derek said, "Mom and Dad have gone back to the vineyard for a day or two so we have the place to ourselves, which is good, because I'm not sure what they'd think of you or your outfit." The cabin was an A-frame structure right on Smith Creek. It had porches on the upper and lower levels of the front and back, and knotty pine paneling. It was a very warm and comfortable vacation house that was very casual and tastetfully-decorated, but which a middle-class family could not typically afford. Derek took Starla's hand and they bounded into the cabin like they were the teenagers that they were. They were barely in the front door when Starla grabbed Derek's hand and spun him around. She jumped into his arms and kissed him deeply. Derek was not ignoring the kiss by any means, but he was surprised at how light Starla was, she didn't feel like she weighed anything at all. Now, Starla was not a small woman by any means, at five and a half feet tall and with lots of muscle, Derek expected her to weigh a lot. But, she didn't. "Hey, what's going on here?" he asked as he removed his hands and demonstrated that she would not fall. Starla unwrapped her legs from around him and floated up into the air to the level of the second-floor loft. She pointed her legs straight down and held her arms out at her side while she performed a few turns and then floated back down to Derek's level and wrapped her legs back around his waist. "Satisfied? Can we get back to business?" she asked sarcastically. "Starla, you can fly?...." he said before she planted a big kiss on his lips. Derek felt incredibly aroused by Starla's body and awesome displays of strength, but he was also a little shaken up by this alien thing. Derek carried her over to a large dear-skin rug that lay on the floor near the fireplace. "Why don't I make a fire?" he asked nervously as he peered over her shoulder at the fireplace. Starla turned around and looked at the log in the fireplace. Then she projected a beam of energy from her eyes at the log, which instantly ignited into the perfect crackling log. Derek looked on, constantly amazed by this supergirl. "Any other distractions?" she asked impatiently. "None." Next Chapter: Getting to Know You