Astral Legacy Book 1

2

Kale opened his eyes and sat up in his bed, the dog was laying beside him as it often did. He stretched his back and wiped the sleep from his eyes before getting up out of the bed. He stretched and looked out his window to see that the day was typical of late May. The sun was shining, and he could hear a faint breeze blowing through the window that was propped up a bit to keep the room cool. He remembered the evening that he had and quickly headed into the hall. He could see the mans form laying with his back to doorway under the blankets on the bed.

"Okay, yup. Not a dream." Kale went back into his room and grabbed his phone off the headboard of his bed and looked at it again it was ten thirty. There were already text messages from Miranda asking if he was awake and had he seen the light in the sky last night. He already knew it wouldn't be a good idea to speak to anyone about what happened, he held his phone in hand trying to think of some reason to stay off the radar. Man, I was in bed at like 9 last night. I think I'm coming down with strep. Stay away. Kale ended the text message with a green sick face emoji and sent it off.

No problem good buddy. Feel better. The reply came back quickly, that would keep him relatively undisturbed for the next few days while he figured out his situation. He flicked open his Facebook app and scrolled through his timeline. Several people were posting pictures and video of the ship crashing, luckily even with high resolution camera's it was still all a shaking mess. A couple of pictures were shared of the actual site of the crash and there was nothing but the scuff marks for the most part. Kale flipped through the pictures and came to a shot of where he had found Kershala. There were black ashes on the rock and on the ground along with his dried violet blood. He began to wonder how much blood Kershala could loose and still be okay. Reading the comments told him that no one would be able to tell what it was anyway, and most people seemed to think it was oil or something. Kale breathed a sigh of relief knowing that no one was going to be looking for anything other than what they found at the site. He put his phone in his pocket, grabbed a change of cloths out of his suitcase and headed to the bathroom.

Almost trying to act like it was just any other day he started his shower and put on his morning music playlist. He stripped down and jumped into the shower the barely warm water jolting him out of his morning grogginess. He made it quick not wanting Kershala to wake up and just leave without telling him. He still wasn't sure of their intentions, but he wanted to be present when they woke up. He lathered up quickly and rinsed the soap from his body all in one motion. He sat for a moment to let the water run over him before getting out, toweling off and getting dressed. Kale went downstairs deciding that he'd cook something for breakfast and give Kershala time to sleep.

As he walked into the kitchen he turned on the radio by the fridge that was already tuned to a local easy listening station. He turned on the coffee maker and it bubbled to life. Then he headed to the fridge for some eggs, something he had almost every day for breakfast. He fired up the stove top and heated a pan than cracked four eggs into the pan deciding to do up enough for two in case Kershala was hungry. The song that was playing ended and a radio DJ began to speak.

"In local news today, it appeared as though a meteorite crashed into the forest last night. Many of you posted your videos to our page some good some bad. We had someone head back there today but no one could find any meteorite, if anyone got there before us and has it send us a snap of it. Cus we'd like to see it. Who knows maybe it just got up and walked away." The DJ prattled on about some other local stories that were generally disinteresting. The local community college was done it's semester and the return of some university grads. Kale couldn't help but laugh to himself at the "got up and walked away" comment. Another song started to play.

"If you only knew." The eggs were starting to sizzle from the heat and Kale gave them some attention making sure they cooked properly, and it wasn't long before they were done. Kale plated up the eggs and threw the hot pan into the sink he poured water over it releasing hot steam into the air. "Hm." Kale poured himself a cup of coffee and put some sugar in it. Then decided he would see if Kershala wanted to eat. He did his best to balance the two plates in one hand and with his coffee in the other hand he headed back upstairs into the spare room. He sat one of the plates on the table next to the AI core then put the other on the dresser by the door. "Hey Kershala," he said calmly, "just wanted to see if you were hungry." Kershala didn't move and the AI seemed to be at the very least not paying attention as neither of them responded. He sat and looked at Kershala for a moment, at some point he had taken the shirt off Kale had given him to wear and he was mostly uncovered by the blankets on the bed now as well. There was a beautiful vulnerability about him that was becoming increasingly more obvious to Kale. Something about the mysteriousness of him was alluring. Aside from the fact that he was physically beautiful, there was a softness there that Kale had never really came across in a man before. It had been a long time since he was attracted to a man maybe even several years since anything serious had come along. Kale shook his head. "Okay, bring it back." Kale sat next to Kershala on the bed and tapped the AI core. "Are you in there?"