The Underworld (The Atlas Series Book 3) (26 page)

“I don’t know how to make it light,” Kala admitted.

“Yeah, but you’re the one
making
it dark.”

Kala didn’t know how to respond to that, so she simply said, “I’m not doing it on purpose.”

“Oh. Phew. You scared me for a second. I got this, hang on.” The voice sounded like a teenager, Kala realized. Maybe she was about to face a teenage version of herself. It made sense. She was fifteen when she met Owen and Linda, and they had changed her life. Was that what this coma was going to be?
This is your life, Kala Hicks.
She certainly hoped not.

Suddenly an entire landscape appeared all around Kala, from utter darkness to standing in a giant oak forest. It was stunning, filled with rich colors of greens, browns, yellows and blues. Kala could actually feel the heat from the sun as it filtered through the leaves on the trees. This was quite an upgrade.

But what struck Kala as odd was the fact that she’d never been to this location before. Why would her mind invent an oak forest?

Standing in front of her was indeed a teenager, but she was definitely not a younger version of Kala. Kala had never seen this girl before in her life. She stood about Kala’s height, with chestnut brown hair and gray eyes, and didn’t look older than seventeen or eighteen. She was very pretty.

Something about the girl made Kala pause. The girl had power. Kala could sense it immediately.

And, in that instant, Kala knew she wasn’t talking to an imaginary friend, she was talking to someone real. Someone like Roberta who had the ability to head jump. Someone even more powerful than Roberta, it seemed, since Turner’s wife hadn’t shown up yet.

Out of military habit, Kala was immediately on the defensive.

The girl viewed her “oak tree” landscape handiwork and smiled. “This place always does the trick.”

“You’ve been here before?” Kala asked carefully.

The girl nodded as if reflecting on a familiar thought. “My grandmother taught me how to create environments like this when I’m in a dreamscape. This one in particular helped me out in a really hard situation.”

“Coma?” Kala inquired.

“Buried alive,” she answered.

“Yeah, that’s worse,” Kala acknowledged.

The girl shifted awkwardly. “So, you’re in a coma I’m guessing?”

Kala sighed, starting to feel at ease with the girl despite her military training. “Yeah, can’t seem to snap out of it.”

“I’m Chelsan, by the way,” the girl said, holding out her hand. Kala shook it.

“Kala.” When their hands made contact, Kala almost jumped back from the shock. Images raced past her, too fast to comprehend. It felt as if Talan was showing her a future vision or his memories. Kala tried to slow down the pictures so she could translate what she was seeing, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t do it.

Chelsan yanked her hand away with a shocked expression, too. “Whoa.”

Kala stumbled a bit from the sudden disconnection. “What was that? Are you a Grigori or something?”

“A what?” Chelsan eyed Kala with confusion.

“It’s a type of angel. Are you a Malak then? Or Demon? Or god?” Kala was sure the girl had to be some kind of supernatural being to not only have the power to visit Kala’s head, but to make her see visions like that.

“Um…” Chelsan appeared very uncomfortable at where the conversation was going. “You know none of that is
real
, right? And I’ve never heard of a
Malak
either
.
”

Examining Chelsan’s expression, Kala was reminded at how she had felt when first confronted by Atlas. Kala had thought it was all a dream. Whoever this Chelsan girl was, she obviously had never had contact with the supernatural world.

“Malaks are another kind of angel,” Kala explained. Then she shook her head. “I didn’t believe it at first either,” she began carefully, “but if you’re not supernatural, how are we seeing each other?”

Chelsan appeared to be weighing her answer. “I guess I’m a little supernatural, but it came from science and magic, not gods and angel stuff.” Then, without judgment, she asked. “Are you telling me
you’re
one of those things?”

Kala nodded. “I’m Atlas.” It felt weird to say to a stranger, but somehow Kala knew it was the right thing to do.

“As in the Greek god who holds up the earth?” Chelsan clarified. “But you just said your name was Kala.” She seemed genuinely confused.

“I’m both. I became Atlas.” Kala shook her head at the absurdity of her statement. “You think I’m crazy.” Kala didn’t blame the girl. She’d have thought she was insane, too, if their places were reversed.

Chelsan shook her head. “No. If I told you about my life, you’d think I was crazy too.” Then she asked thoughtfully, “So what does that mean, you’re ‘Atlas?’ Are you supposed to be in the North Pole keeping the planet spinning or something?”

Kala sighed in frustration. “I wish it was that easy, although thinking about it, that probably wouldn’t be that easy.” She re-focused. “I have to keep the balance of good and evil in check or the world will literally crumble.”

“Whoa. I thought my life was hard,” Chelsan replied.

There was no sarcasm or disbelief in the girl’s tone, which made Kala realize that Chelsan must have had it pretty rough as well.

“Why do you think you’re in my head?” Chelsan genuinely wanted to know Kala’s thoughts on the matter.

“What do you mean?” Kala was confused. “You’re in
my
head.”

Chelsan eyed Kala as if to see if she was serious… Then she understood that Kala was telling the truth.

“Nope,” she said, “you’re in mine. And that’s saying something. I have blocks up the yazoo that my grandmother taught me and she’s pretty good at this stuff. Maybe it’s because you’re Atlas? I’ve never had to block out a
god
before.”

Kala was still reeling from the fact that she wasn’t in her own brain. It made a strange kind of sense. If she was in a coma her spirit was free to roam anywhere it wanted. Apparently, it wanted to jump into some poor girl’s head. “It sounds like I need to meet your grandmother.” Kala thought the next best thing would be Roberta. Maybe she could teach Kala more about this whole
head-jumping
process.

Chelsan’s face revealed that she wasn’t quite sure if Kala meeting her grandmother was such a good idea. “Um, my grandparents are an acquired taste. Are there more of you? Gods, I mean?” She seemed curious.

“Unfortunately. Zeus and Cronus are dicks, and so are the Titans, but some of the Olympians don’t seem as bad.” Then Kala added. “I’m sorry I hijacked your head. I have no idea how that happened.”

Chelsan seemed impressed at the mention of the Titans and Olympians, then she turned thoughtful. “Well, usually, the way it works is: you have to think of the person whose head you want to jump into.” Then she shrugged. “But you don’t know me, so I’m not sure, either.”

Kala considered it for second. “That’s so strange. I was thinking of Zeus.”

Chelsan shrugged. “Well, I’m definitely not him. What
exactly
were you thinking about him?

Kala contemplated, “I was thinking about how he had lied to me about a prophecy of a girl…” She froze.

“What is it?” Chelsan picked up on Kala’s sudden mood change.

“This might sound weird, but would the phrase
the one that knows death
apply to you at all?” Kala asked, scared of the answer.

She didn’t need Chelsan to respond. Kala could see from the paler shade of white Chelsan’s face turned that the phrase definitely meant something to the girl.

“I control dead things,” Chelsan confirmed. Her voice was small, as if admitting this to Kala might put her in danger.

Kala was terrified to ask her next question, but she plowed ahead despite her fear, “What year is it?”

Chelsan hadn’t been expecting that. She tilted her head to the side and replied, “2321.”

Before Kala could respond, she was being pulled out of the forest at lightning speed. Trying to hold onto anything she could, Kala grasped only air as her body flew into the darkness once more.

If Kala hadn’t died already, she would have thought she was dying now since she saw a light at the end of the black all around her. Instincts kicking in, Kala steered herself toward the glowing beacon, knowing it was the right thing to do.

The closer she was to the light, the brighter it blazed, until Kala was on top of it. Not stopping for a second, Kala jumped as if she were leaping into the sun itself…

DAY FOUR

Chapter Nineteen

Kala woke up gasping for air. Her head yanked to a halt as she realized she was hooked up to one of Turner’s brain machines and the wires had been pulled taut from her leaning forward.

“We got her!” Turner’s voice beamed beside her.

Finally catching her breath, Kala ripped off the suction cups attached to her head and took a moment to view her surroundings.

Derek, Owen, Talan, Roberta and Turner were with Kala in a small room that housed the brain machine and a small computer station next to it.

It was comforting not having a ginormous group of Grigori and gods hovering over her.

And these five were the people she trusted most in her life right now.

Derek was the first to help Kala unhook the rest of the equipment fastened to her. As soon as she was free her arms wrapped around her best friend in a tight hug. “I missed you too,” Derek chuckled softly in her ear.

Kala pulled away, smiling. “You have no idea.” Then she asked Owen. “Where are the Olympians? And how the heck did Cronus get into the Compound? Especially after the damage Rotoph caused him.”

Owen answered, “The Olympians are here and secured. Ashliel is trying to help them locate the rest of their brood. No one seems to know where Zeus’s offspring are. Cronus used whatever strength he had left and took advantage of our massive teleportation, essentially hitchhiking in with us. But there’s no way he can get in here anymore. Hera is making sure of that.”

Roberta added. “We were quite worried about you. I tried to travel into the machine to pull you out, but you weren’t there. Your essence was somewhere else. We were afraid Cronus hid it somewhere and we’d never get you back.”

That thought was frightening. “He could do that?”

“We honestly didn’t know,” Turner answered. Obviously, we were mistaken.”

Roberta added, “It wasn’t until Talan tried to reach you that we were able to pull you back.”

Kala’s eyes met Talan’s. “Thank you.” Then she addressed the group. “I somehow managed to jump inside the head of the girl from the prophecy.” Admittedly, Owen and Talan were far more impressed by this news than the human side of the room, but seeing as
prophecies
were new to Derek and the Turners, Kala wasn’t surprised.

Talan asked, “From the future?”

Kala nodded. “She said she could normally block out people from jumping in her brain, but somehow I got through.”

This idea seemed to excite Roberta. “I’ve been trying to perfect that technique for years, but there are still flaws. I’d love to pick her brain.”

“Considering she’s three-hundred years in the future, I don’t think that’s possible,” Kala said.

Owen stepped forward, taking over the conversation. “We’ll have to talk more about this later. You only have an hour to complete your Atlas mission.”

“What?!” Kala’s head flew up to see the clock.

0d 0h 59m 34s.

“Holy crap!” Kala’s heart raced. “I don’t even know where it is! And Cronus and Hades are supposed to be there! As in already
captured
! How is that going to be possible?”

“Slow down,” Talan tried to calm her. “Just tell us about the vision and we’ll help you.”

Kala knew that Talan already had some knowledge of the task since she had described it to him briefly when her memory had been wiped by the River Lethe. Carefully, Kala told the small group every detail of her vision. She didn’t want to leave anything out, hoping that someone would pick out an aspect that Kala may have overlooked.

After she finished, Kala asked Turner, “Do you think that room is here in the Compound?”

Turner looked as if his brain was moving a mile a minute. “We need to keep this between the six of us. Harry can never hear of it.”

Kala was not expecting that kind of reaction. She knew Turner didn’t trust Clifton and neither did she, to be honest, but the way Turner had just expressed himself led Kala to believe he had a motive she wasn’t recognizing. “Not a problem, but why the secrecy?”

Turner looked over at Owen and Talan as if he was unsure if he could confide in the Grigori.

Kala tried to assure him, “You can say anything in front of them.”