A Song of Spiders

Chapter 7 - Shadows

‘Rachel!’ shouted Karma. She ran over and hugged her friend while they both grinned. Dex came over too and Rachel hugged him.

‘What happened to you?’ said Karma. 

‘Attempted murder by be-movie.’ Rachel replied.

Dex was a little breathless after the hug. Seeing her, he thought how Rachel was too beautiful to be real. Like a be-movie princess. His mind had gone blank.

Karma nudged him playfully. ‘Tongue-tied as usual, eh?’

Dex looked away at Cabot and the spell was broken. He managed to say ‘I really didn’t expected to see you here. Not that big into asparagus on the Titanic then, eh?’

‘Well, I am actually a history fan, I just have other roles shall we say. And that was all a way to get time to talk to Karma’ Cabot said with a small, apologetic smile.

Cabot stepped over to Tommy and they shook hands warmly. ‘Come on board, my merry band of outlaws.’ he said.

As they moved along the carriage, the train moved slowly out of the station. They walked along in a line to the next carriage then all settled in a dining car around a couple of tables. 

"We got your message Rache, we were following your clues at the Library, that's when the Inquisition tried to toast us.' said Dex.

Rachel looked stricken. 'Oh no, if I had realised it would have put you in danger, I would never have told you.' She turned to Karma. ' Why did you get Dex involved?'

'Well, I couldn't not, he saw the clue too and then the Inquisition picked him up and I knew we were being watched. It was safer to bring him along.' said Karma.

'Bring me along. Thanks Karma.' said Dex.

'What clues are these Rachel?' said Cabot.

'Well, I didn't actually leave clues. You guys just found this stuff on your own? I had been receiving messages, from some hackers I think. I was going to check them out before I told you. They were leading me to some interesting information about the church. But I guess the Inquisition copped on and caught me. '

'It seems we need to talk. I'll need to know more about these hackers.' said Cabot. 

He thought for a moment then added ‘The attacks on Rachel and these two here leads me to believe the church is starting to feel threatened. They are getting too close. I think we have to move forward our plans and attack the pope as soon as we can.’

Tommy said ‘Sooner the better. First they murdered our parents, and now those bastards tried to kill my little sister. She's the only family I have left Cabot. Then they locked her up in that orphan's slave prison. I want them hurting bad.’

‘So you know about who your parents were. What happened to them?’ said Dex to Karma.

‘Killed in the Roamer pogroms in '76. Gone but never forgotten.’ she said shortly. There was a hint of anger in her voice.

‘Wait a minute,’ said Dex, ‘if they wanted to kill us, why the investigation into Rache’s disappearance when they knew only too well where she was?’

‘It was a smokescreen. They were using it to get into Time Tours and root out any other enemies of the church. That’s how they identified you two.’

‘Oh’. said Dex.

Cabot leaned forward and said ‘OK, let’s get a plan togeth--’ he was interrupted by a screeching alarm filling the carriage. The trains jolted to a stop. All the men jumped up. Cabot said loudly over the noise. ‘Tommy, you and your men get out of here. Rachel, you take Karma and Dex further up the train. Keep them safe. I will come find you when we have this under control, whatever it is.’ He headed off.