COLLIDESCOPE Chapters 1-4 FREE SAMPLE

Chapter 2

The present — 2078

"Come on, baby," coaxed Kandas Phara, running his hand through his wavy, black hair, a wide, indulgent smile on his face.

Kandas stood in the Ultra testing lab at Reane Designs in central London, watching his project come to life.

Before him in the expansive lab was a raised, fortified platform and upon the platform a modest house structure was taking shape from an intriguing material. Beaming rods of light, pale pink in colour, extended and manoeuvred in complete flexibility, bent, coiled, curved and straightened, reduced and expanded as the house was constructed.

The rods of beaming pink light progressed, steadily growing and building into the house structure, automatically forming double or triple layers for reinforced support and then continuing on in the construction.

Kandas grinned giddily to himself, his brilliant, brown eyes twinkling from behind the safety goggles on his face as he watched the ascending structure of pink, flexible beams of light. The front door frame of the house had just been completed and the material extended on in its build work.

Kandas walked forward to the growing, reaching house, climbed onto the platform and stretched out a hand towards the top of the door frame.

"Kandas," came a firm, reproving voice over the communications system in the lab.

The smile on Kandas's face curved even more into a lopsided one as he turned around. He faced the lab control room, built at an elevation of a few feet for improved viewing. The control room looked out onto the lab through a floor-to-ceiling observation window and within it Suranne Flank, executive board member at Reane Designs, stood with her arms crossed as she watched Kandas. A design tech specialist sat at a console beside her and intermittently moved his gaze from a wide screen before him to Kandas and the rising light structure in the lab.

"Suranne darling," smiled Kandas. "This isn't a risk. I've used my hands on it before."

Suranne tensely exhaled as Kandas held a device up to the top section of the door frame. It gently clamped onto the frame and a blue light appeared and swept round in a small circle around the section of the door frame within the device. Kandas reached to the section and gently but firmly pulled down at the centre of the horizontal beam. He moved his hand to a panel on the device and swiped on it; another circle of light swept round but this time in green, then disappeared and Kandas dislodged the device from the door frame.

He stepped back from the structure. The result of his action was a door frame with a small dip in the shape of a small 'v' in the middle of the top horizontal frame. The material of light had continued its constructing work uninterrupted by Kandas's interference and was forming the base frame of another room to one side of the house.

Kandas turned to Suranne, the light of the structure casting a beaming glow behind him; his smile was even more playful than before. "Just a little fun at the potter's wheel," he grinned.

Arms crossed, Suranne stared back at Kandas, her wary expression unchanged.

Kandas turned away from Suranne and back to the structure. And then he lifted his gaze upwards, towards the roof of the lab. A black, metal gallery ran all the way around the silver-grey, densely proofed lab, just below the roof. On the gallery, high up and directly above Kandas, stood Madhuri Phara, Chairwoman of Reane Designs and Kandas's wife.

Madhuri leaned forward over the gallery railing as she watched Kandas on the ground level of the lab. Another warm smile dimpled Kandas's defined, deep brown cheeks as he looked back at Madhuri. Madhuri inhaled a breath and smacked a tense finger against the railing. She looked over at the steadily building house; the pale pink glow from the structure's material reflected in her green eyes and illuminated her smooth, oval, light brown face.