CHAPTER I

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Antarctica

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The extreme and bitter cold of the Antarctic continent not discouraged biologist Nick Frost and his exploration team in an attempt to get samples in the depths of Lake Vostok. The drilling of the thick ancient ice layer about four kilometers thick had taken two months to complete, from damage to steel drills, which did most of the service and due to the intense cold that stiffened, snapped like glass , while the internal pressure of glacial walls of the immobilized depths. It was difficult and strenuous work also involved the removal of the cuttings and transport to the surface.

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It was not the only one interested in the content that sampling capsules reveal after perhaps fifteen million years under the ice successively compacted over that time. Lake Vostok is located at coordinates 78 ° 27'00 "S 106 ° 52'12" E, possessing an area of ​​two hundred and fifty kilometers long and forty kilometers wide shaped ellipse. It comprises an area fourteen thousand square kilometers with an average depth of five hundred meters and fully protected the Earth's atmosphere, the extensive layer of ice that covers it completely.  A real time capsule.

After all this drilling work, it is still necessary that after collection of sedimentary material and biological there care to preserve the samples in a totally isolated environment sterile, contaminant that was not in any way...

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Nick Frost worked for the Corporation for Biological Studies NOMAD, a private entity that had as its main mission to study biodiversity environments forgotten by time, so the difficulty of access to the total ignorance of existing places. At thirty, finished to complete, athletic without exaggeration, 1,96m tall, inheritance of his Viking ancestors liked to consider a new Viking times, therefore the blond and long hair usually hung from her shoulders at this particular time left them stuck in the shape of a long "ponytail", for greater mobility in that harsh environment. It was quite possible that at some point remember one of the many gods of Norse mythology in the sight of foreigners.

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Descended from a family of researchers, his grandfather had been a "Iceman" whose main occupation was based on lead expeditions to the center of the North Pole and the countless times that there was, in one of them it was in some so remote that even today not you know the true whereabouts. For the same reason, the disappearance of the grandfather he had chosen to be an adventurer, with a little luck maybe not find the remains of his ancestor. I thought that possibility...

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It was not uncommon that after the missing persons thaws in these environments reappeared in considerable preservation conditions to the point where they can be recognized and buried with dignity and his grandfather could be one of those people "lucky" for sure. I remembered the story of Ötzi, the mummy of a possible European inhabitant of the Copper Age with about five thousand three hundred years old and had been found in a reasonable state of preservation in a glacier near the Similaun mountain on the border of Austria with Italy.

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It tells the history of paleontology, that when he died, wore rudimentary clothing to protect him from the cold, with three layers of clothes made of deer and goat skin, and a lined hood fiber from the bark of linden, typical tree in the hemisphere north. It was still surprising that these things could happen and at the same time be found most often in a haphazard way, as was this particular case and true.

Nick was the curiosity of the facts to his father, a writer who despite not get much literary success, practically wrote for himself, his books addressed fundamental issues of human society, the mysteries of the world by uncovering and uncertainty if we are the First Race human on the Earth's surface, or just another cycle that repeats itself endlessly, a circle that is born, grows, thrives and is extinguished completely, or almost...

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The love he had for the profession, biology, came through the mother who was also a biologist in the area of ​​molecular genetics and also exercised the profession, but not as a researcher, gave himself up to the bureaucratic service after he realized that all his work It aimed only astronomical profits for their employers, and not necessarily the cure for the disease that for centuries still plagued humanity.

He sat on a nearby aluminum box where he was watching every movement around the ice drilling, resigned, realizing that another drill was breaking in the depths of that infernal ice. - Here we go again ... - said to the charge of drilling piling steel drills side of the drill. - It is too early to give up! - He forced a smile that had not, but he needed to animate your team that increasingly seemed exhausted. As quickly as he had forgotten the Iceman for a moment, and returned with him to thoughts.

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It considered incredible that all the time Ötzi remained frozen human history had passed him without the bother. During this period Egypt became a power echoing through time to the present day extolling his great achievements and their personalities, enslaved Hebrew people and lost the battle to Moses, and said the holy scriptures and although it was not at all indeed, he knew that the stories told or written always has some basis, so no matter if the Red Sea had been opened for the passage of the slave or not people, the case was that the story persisted for thousands of years.

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Greece had achieved glory days in the hands of Alexander of Macedon, Achilles, Helen and other personalities also passed by Aristotle, Socrates and Plato, among many that came to mind him as lights went out and lit fast, but just as others succumbed to time and other civilizations, Greece was no different from any of them. Rome ascended centuries later and formed a thousand-year empire, however, Ötzi was still asleep in frozen sleep in the Italian Alps without being noticed, while most of us just turned powder in that it was born, lived and died without leaving tangible traces , except those bound for destination account or wiles perpetuated their names in the history books.

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Continued careful will slow and monotonous boring, but also knew it was the best technology available to them and the rush was the enemy not only of perfection as well as science, knew it ... He looked at the sky and could see the bright moon as a cheese Swiss looking at him, there was one of the things that pass by time and humanity without being disturbed. Because the Moon was created when a very young age a time schedule, recalled the story; He asked his father to arrange you a wider slice of tree trunk he could find and did not disappoint, in less than two weeks he was given a circular wooden slice with 1,20m in diameter and ten centimeters thick.

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To everyone's amazement, no one had any idea to what it would do unless it was to make some sort of old vehicle still would need a couple for this and it was not the case. Possibly a table top for studies, but only he, the future biologist, had different plans for the strange and peculiar object, that would be your Time Calendar. After so long was still posted on the wall of his room at his parents' house in Drammen, near Oslo in Norway.

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With all the care and talent he possessed at the time, was fifteen only mustered up thin and soft sandpaper and quietly began to polish one side, the one that seemed most appropriate to what he would do and had no hurry to leave so smooth, it was impossible to see any kind of ripple that was. He let his hand continuously walked and over again for that soft surface, I felt satisfaction that the fine dust slip through his fingers without any resistance.

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Provided a place to put a huge slice of wood that was now completely polished and smooth, wiped with a damp cloth and then immediately waxed it with a mixture of animal wax whale oil and so that the wood stay darker and more visible concentric rings, had the desired effect without doubt.

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- Dad, how old do you think this tree had before being overthrown? - I wondered if at least be close to the estimate of required time.

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- From the size of this wood slice you both took the trouble to polish, I believe that at least two hundred years! - Smiled to see the enthusiasm of the child with that big piece of wood in the middle of the living room, on the coffee table. Occupied almost all free space. - But still I do not know what you want with it all! - Was curious and knew he did not reveal to him, at least not yet, it was not like you only show the result after it's done, that experiment would be no different.

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- Well, it's not what I expected, but will have to do! - I said furrowing her eyebrows a little.

He waited almost two days for the oil to completely infiltrate the wood and were absorbed leaving only the dark tone that really pleased him. He went to the office where his father used to write, could have saved a few minutes if I had asked just what you were looking, but gave up work to look for himself, it was more than just finding what he wanted, was a holding unknown location and harsh, his father did not tolerate things got out of place, this learned to always leave everything as it had found. Finally there was the case with adhesive labels.

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He sat close to his mother, Martha Frost, who enjoyed a scientific book with some relevance to him at the moment not interested, it was about botany, more precisely the naturalist Charles Darwin and anything on a ship called the Beagle which traveled around the world, only later recognize the real importance of such literature.

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- Mother! Can I interrupt for a moment? - He did not wait for her to give consent and handed him a packet of labels with a black pen thick tip.

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- Apparently I do not have much choice is not it? - She smiled at her son, was the one who had the courage to bring the world and still with some difficulty, but it seemed, the complications had been overcome. I thought that with so many diseases on Earth was almost a miracle that the human race was still alive. - What happens now? - I was as curious as the father of the young Nick Frost on the other side of the room watched in silence, while making some notes.

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- I need you to write in some of these labels relevance of things that have happened in the past, let's say ... Five thousand years! Can it be like this! - His eyes glistened for what was then the anxiety to find out what are the historical revelations that his mother would make him. - I like your letter ... - he added. Much more than that, he wanted to preserve something of his mother for an indefinite time, if possible for eternity.

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I looked at her askance recording in his memory all traces of the perfect face, pale and smooth, now had forty-five, a few wrinkles that once existed not begin to be present in the corners of the eyes and on the forehead as she wrote something on small labels he had given her, her arched eyebrows insinuating a radiant light face. I loved the mother of a very different way of how he loved his father, Eldar Frost in this particular case there was an imbalance of feelings, but love for her was serene and sweet, quiet and very tender. No less loved her father, but defiantly as both lived together became a mixture of dispute space and approach cautiously, like two males of a species delimiting their spaces.

 That was their safe haven, the calm and the storm together in one place and he was the mediator of these two unruly and conflicting elements.

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- How many do you need? - She smiled again realizing that took the candy from the mouth of a child.
- Maybe thirty? - Was not sure of the amount had not counted the rings inside the wooden buckler, but find a way to fit the maximum of events that could.

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- Let's see ... Five thousand years ago, is not it? - Gained time to think about historical events of the human race. He did not realize that her husband had come close in the hope of being invited to participate in the game, for some reason, he felt attracted to that experiment.

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- Can I participate? - She said in a low voice, fearing be deleted.

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- Of course my love! Sit down here and help us tell the story of the human race through the ages! - Martha always came out in his defense. They laughed once more have found something in common to do.

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- The birth of Christ! This may be the first? - Was the father who took the joke.

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- Yes you can! And no need to ask, let's just write the labels! - Nick Frost would make the best and most beautiful time clock that would never see in their lives.

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- The siege of Troy! We can take advantage and put the estimated dates, is not it a good idea, Nick? - The mother also begins to have fun with all that movement.

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- Yes, Yes! The story of Helen and Paris. This will be even better than I had planned! - Took the first labels and aligned on wood without even paste them.

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- Alexander the Great and conquer the known world! 356 BC - said the visibly excited father.

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- Second World War! 1945! - Nick remembered best of newer things and that were required in the classroom.

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- The Crusades! 1100 A.D.! - Again the father was a suggestion, the mother was more focused on doing a good letter writing labels.

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- The Great Discoveries, Century XIV! - Nick smiled satisfactorily, always wanted to be a browser, those well adventurers. Perhaps a pirate...

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- Fire of Rome, Nero! 68 A.D. - Martha wrote before any of them could say anything and looked at them severely.

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- My turn! - Then he smiled then to everyone's satisfaction. - The Black Death in the fourteenth century! - I was a biologist and had to leave something of their knowledge that child labor.

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- The arrival of man on the moon! 1969! - Eldar still pondering matters intervened without even listening to what the others said.

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In a few minutes a lot of fun and with the help of parents, Nick had not only thirty historical events of relevance, but at least fifty in all, spread across the wooden wedge.

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- What will you do then, darling? - The mother ran her hands the silky hair of the child gold color noting the interest he had in group efficiently the whole sequence of events written on the labels.

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- Now I can make my time schedule! I'll paste the labels from the center, which would be the oldest age of the tree and to arrive until the edge using the rings as markers... - still arranged the classification as historical dates. His parents looked at each other for discovering that the child had a magnificent idea to be able to tell the time, to tell the truth it was so that he himself could be located in space and time in which he lived. - After step a layer of varnish or resin over if you can buy and hang on the wall of my room! - I was satisfied, and became even more when his parents began to help with glue.

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Everyone wanted to participate in that single moment.

Was awakened thoughts of distant childhood to hear the screams of the men who still pierced the thick layer of ice that would take them to the sleeping Lake Vostok in the depths of that inhospitable glacier, he had no idea how long he had been rambling about his past. The charge of the drill, Victor Orloff, ran to where he was and with a broad smile that obtained the absolute success gave him the good news.

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- We managed to Dr. Frost! - Hugged him tightly, almost causing the Nordic giant come out of the ground. - The drill was free under the ice, it means that we have reached the water in the lake in liquid form! - Was still elated to have done a thorough job and that had taken months to get to that moment.

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- If this is true we cannot remove the bit yet! We must position ourselves a containment chamber around the hole so that there is no sort of contamination whatsoever! - He looked toward the drill site realizing that the latest drills were being taken, ran as he could, but in vain. All work expected and the result could be committed to one fatal error.

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- What the Hell, Sven! - Sven Urland was another member of his team and as he Norwegian by birth and have approximate ages, and his right arm in command of the expedition, was more than aware of the containment and safety procedures to be taken in any excavation. - Where is the containment chamber? - I was angry with such academic failure of their team. This proved to be inexcusable at the time, would no longer be relevant with absolute certainty, after the events that would follow.

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- Sorry Nick, we were so excited after so long that only thought about taking the samples, nothing more... - Sven had a vast mixed beard gold and black and appeared to be slightly lower than he understood perfectly the subject question, just did not make sense to have forgotten the main reason for which was hired, it was the security of the samples.

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The last hollow drill down on the ice camp prospecting and drilling with a loud metallic noise, the sample they needed was inside, supposedly in great condition, but would be the only one dark mud too thick and coarse was throughout around the object and soon had to be absolutely sure that the hole in the depths again to close by compressing the ice exerted on the sides. Nick had hoped that the lake water was not contaminated by anything of the drill tip except for surface and which was properly prepared and sterilized. On the other hand, also not wanted vapors or gases of any kind and contained by millions of years in those depths loose stay in the atmosphere, the effects that could be catastrophic and devastating.

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- Isolate the sample and to make sure, that is not contaminated by any foreign agent! - The words were quite severe and harsh; his name was a scientist and sponsorship of their employers who were involved, no one else. The sample should be transported as quickly as possible to Vostok so that the studies were initiated procedures. It took a few hours until everything was ready.

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Anton Pavlov paleontologist admired the interior of the large glass box 1.5m wide by 2.0m long, with glasses of 2 cm thick and 90 cm newcomer drilling field. Inside was the only sample taken from deep in Lake Vostok, unfortunately for all other samples or even sending an independent probe as they had planned into the glacial lake was no longer possible, at least until they decided to make a new attack prospecting.

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This required another drilling and more demand time and money and that there was no certainty of the lake is completely sealed and unscathed from external agents. He hoped the presence of Nick Frost to give you start opening shows collector capsule inside the glass box. Unlike other more common capsules that simply picking the material to be analyzed later, this new equipment was specialized in collecting samples in hard to reach places that could not suffer contamination from external environments.

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It was essential that when the capsule was opened was free of any type of contamination that could be a full understanding of the ancient world and the conditions under which the planet was in at the time that sample was produced and already forgotten by time. The whole environment inside that box would guarantee them that. It was scientific fact that the deeper layers of ice imprisoning the weather conditions in the form of air bubbles of thousands of years ago when the freezing, a natural and very simple process, the snow rushing on the ground or a river brushing her precious liquid and at some point due to low temperatures is solidified.

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After this happened, the successive layers of snow falling on the local compacted over thousands of years that soil until it formed a compact ice sheet of spectacular size and hardness and that was the case in which that sample had been collected, with difference in the extensive ice layer there was a lake in liquid state and possibly had bacterial life within it. It had been nearly twenty four hours from the sample collection and preparation to examine it.

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- Are you ready for what we will find out then? - Nick who had just arrived interrupted thoughts coworker.
- Yes! Just waiting for you as the legitimate guiding the research takes the first step! - Anton moved closer to the great biological containment box, noticed that Sven that always accompanied the biologist, and made a routine check of the containment apparatus.

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- Make sure there are no leaks, Sven, otherwise we will lose the sample or contaminate the external environment so I open the box! - Nick still gave the security orders, this time with greater severity.

- Everything is ready Nick; the vacuum test did not show any leak or rupture, you can open the sample whenever you want! - Was initiated sample opening procedure harvested in the depths of that icy world, under the guidance of Nick Frost.

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The metallic and shiny cylinder stainless steel eighty centimeters long and fifteen centimeters wide had a screw cap of the same diameter at one end, the other only a hole was closed by back pressure impact when the sedimentation Pickup lake bottom. It would be necessary to open the screw cap so that the entire contents were dumped on a sort of concave glass bowl slightly larger than the metal tube.

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The two apertures on a side of the glass allow the arms to be inserted within the chamber protected by a kind of rubber gloves fixed on the edge. With the care and the necessary experience to have done this procedure dozens of times, Nick thrust his arms in rubber gloves will prey containment box and with a single twisting motion, unscrewed the lid.

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It did not take much effort to make the content inside the leave cylinder to the basin, the gravity-in charge of this issue and quite easily. Interestingly there was mud on the inside; a viscous liquid of sharp green color much like seaweed filled completely the bottom of the basin of collection of material for study. There was no water in the collection which was very strange for that depth and purpose of search, the assumption was that it was a freshwater lake, perhaps time and the organic sedimentation decomposing have created that undefined mass that he and his colleague work would soon unveil next.

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- What do you think Anton? Decaying organic material and mixed with water? - Nick was curious to know the opinion of his colleague.

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- I do not believe! If that were the case, I think we would have found oil and not that green and undefined composition! - The estimate was that the Lake Vostok could be sealed for at least twelve perhaps fifteen million years would be enough time to be other chemicals that would give evidence that probability.

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- Is it me or green and gooey thing is moving? - Sven leaned a little more on the glass chamber to see better. The two scientists who led the experiment did the same.

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- No, you're not wrong! Something moves within that liquid thick and uniform, which is not water... - Anton saw a worry line on Nick Frost's forehead.

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Biologist took an acrylic spatula that was inside the chamber and open with slowness rather green and thick viscous liquid, the spatula did not return whole, he had melted the part that touched that strange substance taken from the depths of the prehistoric lake.

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- This is not right! There should not be any sulfur element in these conditions and further showing that cohesion! - Nick realized that the liquid remained uniform and regular; it was like a single mass. Water also behaved as well as other elements, but that, in a very specific way, approached more of mercury properties. - Anton, a review by the spectrometer and see what the results we found for this substance! If something is nonstandard let me know! - Withdrew to search Nadja Romanov, although he had the surname of the Russian royal family, had no kinship. It took some time to find it was not the right time, but it was later than supposed.

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- Nadja! - She found her into the bedroom to gather for a moment imagined that was not fully dressed. She even turned around with the blouse just take over his chest stuck between the arms. The pale skin contrasted with black hair over her bare shoulders.

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- Nick! What a fright! - Blushed suddenly making the cheekbones stay slightly red, then he thought then that he and I could have gotten a few seconds later when she had no option to cover the body, it would have been very interesting, I thought, but it was not habit he went to the accommodation where they used to sleep at that hour.

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- Sorry... I was not intended... - I had not been able to fully divert the eyes of the top and bare the beautiful woman ahead of him. Twenty-five years, brunette with long, straight hair and light green eyes that contrasted nicely with the color of red lipstick she wore, long legs, but plump and shapely, was not low, perhaps 1.70 m and large breasts, but not exaggerated. That he had noticed on other occasions and that at that time they were absolutely trapped against his chest by the shirt and arms crossed Nadja Romanov.

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- What brings you here at this time and so suddenly? - I was still curious and while some malicious thoughts passed through his mind. He was breathing with some difficulty by being in his presence almost as desired. The place where were confined for months, could be very lonely sometimes, or often...

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- Do not worry we talk tomorrow! Again sorry for the interruption ... - I turned away from turning back to her "guard down" and could finally relax. I imagined that the blush on her cheeks was the difficulty her breathing with his own chest pressed by the arms so vehemently.

Nadja sat on the bed letting the blouse finally fell on her lap covering her legs, she looked down and saw the breasts themselves, had nothing wrong and maybe it was the part he liked most in his body, but did not seem to attract Nick Frost. He lay still dressed in the rest of the clothes and covered the body until the head, did not know if he wanted to wake up the next day. - "You are a perfect woman Nadja! Never let say to the contrary... "- thought before falling into a deep sleep.