He had been on book covers and posed with fashion models; his swarthy looks the perfect complement for willowy scantily clad women guaranteed to sell product. Had been. Now he was adrift.

He had not been adrift when he was plucked out of the ocean by a passing freighter. The stars had told him exactly where he was, and if he was a little farther from home than his food and water would supply, there were plenty of fish on the way.

Adrift doesn't mean discontented. Sometimes it is a way to find yourself, search out the pillars of your life before turning back home.

Call him Sam. That's what they called him on the ship that picked him up, mid ocean, far from any sign of land. He knew where he was, but giving the delerium brought on by going beyond his supplies of water and food and the complication of no common language with the crew, they used a name close to the first syllable of his actual name.

He was young, buff, sun darkened. The news of his rescue brought the attention of book publishers who had a pacific island romance novel series. He was a perfect cover model. It brought him a measure of fame, money and girls.

It also brought him to the attention of Tun Szu the minor bureaucrat with an obsession for bringing Tikopia into the fold. Sam might just be the wedge she needed to break the unbreakable island.

To work well, a wedge must be shaped to the job. Too wide a leading edge and it must be forced into an opening, if one can even be found. Two wide a trailing edge and you risk splitting the target into pieces which cannot be used. Tun Szu set about getting access to Sam, pulling up everything she could on him. When she approached him, he had gone back to the water, staring out at the ocean, and jobs on the occasional freighter . She offered him home, with a slight catch: he would have to train to be her ambassador to the island.

to be further continued (hopefully in something less than eight years).