Landlocked (Atlas Link Series Book 2) (5 page)

he briefing ticked by as minutes turned into hours. Calculations based on the Waterstar map projected we would land sometime hundreds of years from now, meaning we’d be interacting with our direct future—something potentially more dangerous than screwing up the past.

“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” said Dr. Hill. “Until this morning we had no idea the calculations projected so far.”

General Holt’s jaw set hard. “You were the one who piqued interest in this particular piece to begin with.”

Dr. Hill nodded. “Yes, because the fact that it’s from the future gives us a higher probability of finding the pieces we need to get to SeaSatellite5.” The closer to the future we got, the closer to SeaSatellite5 we might become. In the very least, there’d be a higher probability of another cache of Link Pieces, like the Sargasso Sea outpost.

“How does that work again?” Chelsea asked around the hair-tie in her mouth. She was in the process of pulling up her long hair. Damn the length looked good on her. It tamed down her appearance from the wild firecracker I’d met in Boston years ago, but it made her more alluring and intimidating than ever before. Downright sexy.

“There’s a higher probability that our future descendants have amassed a collection of Link Pieces than anyone closer to our time,” Dr. Hill explained. “And odds are they’re all together in one place.”

Something bitter slicked my mouth. “Wouldn’t bringing anything back, especially more than one piece, mean risking a grandfather paradox?” You know, the whole “go back in time to meet your grandfather, accidentally kill him, and now you and your own father don’t exist”
thing
.

“Exactly why I think we should scrub the mission,” Dr. Hill stated. “Just because our calculations say there’s something there, doesn’t mean there is.”

My eyes swept to Chelsea, who looked like she was about ready to condemn Dr. Hill.

“Then let’s not bring anything back,” she said. “Let’s just go and check it out. There’s a very narrow window of pieces that can be used to connect to SeaSat5’s current place in time, but we don’t know exactly what they are and we need to. It couldn’t hurt to look.”

I was sure my jaw slid straight down to the table.

Chelsea shot me a look. “If we’re worried about creating vast alternate dimensions into which we could fall on our way back to our own home-time, we wouldn’t be doing this at all.”

“Chelsea’s right,” Sophia said. “The Atlanteans wouldn’t have used Link Pieces if that was the case. If they were advanced enough to figure out time-travel, they would have also discovered any consequences and either corrected them or discontinued the practice altogether.”

“There’s no way of knowing that for sure,” Dr. Hill interjected. “The Link Pieces are one-way.”

No one spoke for a few moments and when it looked like no one would, General Holt filled in the silence. “The mission is a go. If the original calculations are correct, the risk is worth it.”

Various nods and drawn faces filled the table.

“You will depart in one hour,” said General Holt.

When our group assembled in the Transfer Room forty-five minutes later, Chelsea was nowhere to be seen. Pike’s icy gaze drilled into me, waiting for an explanation I didn’t have. I wasn’t Chelsea’s keeper.

Pike’s stare held fast.

I sighed. “I’ll go find her.”

I backtracked into the hallway en route to the elevator. Two floors and a few turns later, I reached her quarters. She’d left the door open an inch, like she’d rushed in and didn’t care. I knocked softly on the frame, but her answer wasn’t to me.

“I know, I know, Sarah. I’m sorry,” she said as she flopped onto her bed. I peeked in through the crack. She had her fatigues and sidearm on, ready to go. “I have a feeling this dig isn’t going to be as quick as I thought.”

The audible half of the conversation paused while Sarah, Chelsea’s sister, responded. Chelsea ran her fingers through her hair, bangs flipping through her fingers at awkward angles, and sighed.

“I can’t control the length of digs,” Chelsea said. “Believe me, I wish I could—” Another break where Sarah interrupted her. “Well, that’s because earlier today the outlook was in the band’s favor.”

She closed her eyes as Sarah spoke. I wanted to back off, give her a few seconds of space. She knew we were late, evident in the way her foot tapped along the floor. But calling Sarah now to warn her we might be late coming back was probably better for Chelsea than if she’d called Sarah a day late.

“I know how important the show is,” Chelsea whispered. “We’ll all rehearse together. I just won’t be there Tuesday, okay?”

Today was Saturday. She planned to be busy until then?

A beat passed in silence until Chelsea pouted and pulled her cell phone away from her ear. She rocked forward and placed her elbows on her knees, sitting on the bed and letting her head fall into her hands.

I knocked on the door again. Shitty timing, but we had to go. Chelsea lifted her head, brushed some hair behind her ear, and looked up at me.

I nudged open the door to pop my head in. Her room was too neat. Not that Chelsea was a messy, unorganized person, but everything had been set to perfection. Her spotless desk matched her bed that’d been made with precision. The only things on her floor were the instruments she’d bought to replace the ones lost with SeaSat5. Someone obviously hadn’t slept last night.

Although I already knew the answer, I asked, “Everything okay?”

The hand holding her cell phone flew up as she rolled her eyes. “Dandy.”

“What was that about?” I didn’t bother hiding the fact I’d overheard.

Chelsea’s eyes betrayed her calm response. “We’re supposed to be playing Juxe in Jersey and Philly in a month as a relatively unknown band. Sarah and Kris want everyone to practice all the time, but with the back-to-back missions we’ve had lately, going to that temple so many times… Pike said this will be a short one, but I have a bad feeling about it.”

“Juxe?” It sounded familiar, but I couldn’t place it.

“It’s a big tour, goes coast to coast,” she said. “We were only able to get into two show dates, but Jersey and Philly are places we haven’t played yet, so…”

I pushed the door open and stepped inside her room. “You guys will get to practice. You have leave time after this mission. We all do. You guys are better than half the bands there.”

A smile edged her lips, but it was laced with a sadness she couldn’t hide. “I’m afraid this job’s producing a conflict of interests between the band and me. Two years ago it didn’t matter, but now…” She shook her head and looked away. “If forced to choose, I can’t say which I’ll walk away from.”

Could she honestly leave TAO and our mission behind before we found SeaSat5 and the crew? “What do you mean?”

“Neither of these things— the band, traveling through time— were what I wanted to do. Becoming a rock star was an accident, a byproduct of Sarah and the band’s dreams. I can’t let my sister and best friends down. I don’t have it in me to walk away after years of building this with them.”

“And what about Captain Marks?” I asked. “Freddy? Christa?”

Chelsea looked to me. “You and TAO are going to find them someday, with or without my help. I may be able to go up against the Lemurians because of my powers, but the calculations you make with the Waterstar map… Trevor, you’re brilliant. You’ll find the missing Link.”

I chuckled. How could I not find it funny we thought so oppositely about this? “My 3D rendering would be nothing without the progress you’ve helped TAO make.”

“Don’t you ever think it’s all just a bit ridiculous?” she asked.

Okay. Maybe not so dissimilar after all. I sat down beside her and took the risk of wrapping an arm around her shoulders. She laid her head against my chest. Her reaction confused me more than the risk I took to get it.

“Those were my thoughts the other night, after we got back from the bar,” I confided.

“Sometimes I wish we never found that cache of Link Pieces in the Sargasso Sea.” Her words were barely louder than a whisper, but said with the weight of a thousand stones. “Everything was fine until then, and you know it.”

It wasn’t, really. Everything had started when Chelsea showed up. Valerie, my old colleague and partner in all things Lemurian back then, started threatening to bring the war to SeaSat5 the second Chelsea had teleported on board. If Chelsea hadn’t appeared out of nowhere, I would have never gotten the chance to meet her again or work beside her on SeaSat5.

But if Chelsea hadn’t shown up, things would have still been blissfully boring, and in a few years, I would have been making video games for the masses, not rendering a map for the military.

I didn’t say anything back. She didn’t need to know that sometimes I wish I’d never walked out the Franklin’s alleyway door at all.

I kept quiet and pulled her closer to me, clinging onto the moment as they were few and far between these days. The smell of her shampoo lingered on me even after we met the team for Launch.