The Shadow Expanse - An Unfinished Tale

Part 1

  Thomas sat sprawled in a chair wondering why he had bothered rushing over this morning. Cale had been very insistent that he come straight away, it sounded urgent, yet here he was cooling his heals at his friend's kitchen table waiting for him to return. A movement near the ceiling caught his attention and looking up he saw a small spider with incredibly long legs dancing on a web. The almost invisible web was strung up in the corner of the ceiling, he shuddered at the sight of it. He wasn't fond of spiders. His only comfort was that he was bigger.

Keeping an eye on the spider, he went over the events of this morning, once again, if only to keep himself from thinking about other things.


As the door opened he blurted out 'Okay so what's so important that I had to rush over here..., Oh it's you.' Thomas swallowed hard.

'Hello brave Sir Robin, Cale's not here. He had to go out for a moment but said to make sure you stuck around.' Grace stood in the open door. She was Cales sister. After delivering her message, she immediately turned her back on him and walked off commenting over her shoulder. 'Come in and close the door. Don't expect me to entertain you.' She pointed to a hard wooden chair by the kitchen table. ' Who knows how long he'll be.'

'What's he up to this time Grace?' Thomas asked. 'He said that I'll be witnessing history in the making today.'

'Who knows, I had to stop him from taking my hair dryer apart this morning. Take a seat.' She pointed again to the chair. 'Feel free to raid the fridge for something to drink, ... If it's still running, he's pulled everything apart for this stupid project.' She turned and started walking away.

'Where you going?' Thomas asked.

'I've got to wash my hair, bye.'

'Ha ha.' snorted Thomas, 'That's the oldest excuse in the book.' Grace stopped and looked silently at him for a moment, then she turned and walked off.

'So much for building bridges.' Thought Thomas. He waited for a moment and then wandered down the same hallway where Grace had just disappeared. He reached Cales bedroom door and looked in. The room was a mess of electronic parts, wires and other indistinguishable detritus. The only power point in the room looked dangerously overloaded. It had several power boards connected together something was wired up to a small computer by the bedroom door. It looked like Cale had disembowelled a robot. Sitting in the middle of the crazy mess was what looked like a small telescope wrapped up in tinsel. But there was nowhere to sit so he turned and walked back to the kitchen, pulled up the chair Grace has pointed to previously and waited.