I love a mystery. In fact, i believe that it’s the mystery in comics that fuels my compulsion to collect as many as possible. It’s not so much the actual finding out, but more the excitement of speculating with fellow fans as to what the outcome might be, and of waiting to have the next issue in my trembling hands. I enjoy the idea that what I am beholding is an important part of comic book history.That being said, one might understand our approach to the opening pages of issue #1. We kind of intentionally dropped right into the meat of the story in order to immediateley achieve this feeling of anticipation for what comes next, while at the same time effectively conveying the sense of confusion being felt among the characters.For all of these reasons (and just because) Joe and I never intended to tell this story from the beginning, but without spoiling to many cliffhanngers we wanted to try to clarify just what in the hell is going on.

Dr. Mellinda Bellini is a world renowned archeologist hired by a mysterious yet powerful business tycoon to search in a very odd place for a very odd artifact, the so-called amulet of forever. Something about the nature of the assignment and a connction it might have to her ongoing research lead Mellinda and her neice/assistant Niobe to the ruins of a temple buried in the earth and covered by the ocean for millenia off the coast of Italy.Right out of the shoot we find Mellinda and Niobe finally stumbling upon the long sought after amulet. Niobe, the precocious,young thing that she is, reaches right out and grabs that amulet. This promptly transports her to what seems like another world or time, where she encounters the spirit of an ancient civilization. So Niobe is put in the know about how once upon a time there was this ancient mermaid species created as the result of a major catastrophe, then destroyed at its developmental peak, and also that it can’t be such a good thing that the spirit of said civilization has been reawakened out of the amulet.None of the characters involved with the story thus far had any idea that all of this was about to go down ,hence the chaotic feel to the opening of the book (sucked you right in, didn’t it?). So now we are left to find out who this green guy is who apparently appeared about the same time that Niobe dissappeared, and why do these military types give a hoot about the amulet of forever anyways?Thanks a lot for sticking around for my not-so-mini rant and our not-so-conventional story telling, and I only hope that we have been able to give back a fraction of the excitement given to us over the years by the hard working men and women of the comic book world. Here’s to much, much more to come.?