Landlocked (Atlas Link Series Book 2) (6 page)

y the time Trevor and I joined Pike, Dr. Hill, and Sophia in the Transfer Room, I’d pulled myself together. No more whining, no more worrying. The stuff with the band could wait; SeaSat5 could not. Whatever was on the other side of this Link Piece couldn’t either.

A wooden African idol stared at me with wild, sunken eyes. The visage jolted me so much my skin crawled. I
really
didn’t expect this to end well.

I treated the idol with caution. Though I claimed my spot across from Sophia like I normally did, I watched the Piece with wary eyes. My instincts weren’t always right, but something told me to call the mission off and run as far away as possible.

I glanced up at Sophia and saw none of my worries reflected in her eyes.

It’s just you
.

“All aboard!” I shouted.

Sophia and I linked hands above the idol, each of us with one hand on the carving itself. The other three placed their hands over ours like this was some kind of team huddle.

Within moments the Waterstar map encased my mind, my vision. Cerulean lines shot out before me, connected to objects at various points in the distance, sliding past me as the route of the idol’s connection became clear. Sophia stood next to me in the hazy blue around us. She guided our travel through time like we were a chair on a ski lift headed for the top of a mountain. Then, as quickly as it appeared, the map was gone.

I blinked a few times to clear my head and to orient myself with our new environment. Our new place-time.

Darkness shadowed our immediate surroundings, making it hard to see much outside of our little group huddle. Pike shifted his gun down, something he never did, even when faced with cultures who had no idea what a gun was—something that happened more times than not. Turns out the Link Piece makers liked their connections to the ancient world. Their fascination made Link Piece travel fun for Dr. Hill and me while Trevor found the lack of technology horrific. Sophia didn’t seem to care either way, except that one time we ended up in the Scottish Highlands and she refused to speak the whole time we were there.

Trevor dropped his pistol next. Strange for him, too. I slowly looked around us.

Soldiers in forest green tunics surrounded us, terrifying-looking guns held at the ready. Those things might actually shoot lasers or plasma instead of bullets. Hey, it was the future wasn’t it?

I glanced up at the ceiling. A familiar drawing stared down at me. A Waterstar map.

These guys had their own disembarkation area. But did they have their own 3D rendering? Heck, by now they should have 4D. That’d keep Trevor busy for hours.

Someone broke through the crowd and motioned for the soldiers in dark green to drop their weapons. She had long black hair and severe facial features. She seemed to pick apart every detail about me with her eyes before moving on to Sophia, to Trevor. A shiver of unease spread through me. I couldn’t tell if she was annoyed by our appearance or confused. She came up to Sophia and me and stared at both of us for an uncomfortable length of time. She was slight, too, with an almost elf-like body that made the whole staring thing rather comical.

“You two are of Atlantean descent,” she said. Not a question. More like an accusation.

“We are students of the Waterstar map,” Sophia said, ever the diplomat I’d never be.

“But you
are
Atlantean,” the woman repeated.

“Yes,” I said.

The crowd of soldiers murmured, talking amongst themselves. Though their individual conversations remained quiet, the hum of them being spoken all at once turned into a dull roar.

Pike looked around as if he considered each one a threat. “We’re just exploring some Link Piece connections. Nothing more.” His green eyes narrowed, body stiff. I could tell he wanted to bolt, or at least stop talking.

“From the past?” the woman asked.

The skin on my arms prickled at the way she said “past,” as though it were an insult or something to be suspicious about.

Something’s not right.

Trevor nodded. “Yes.”

The woman looked to him. “You are not Atlantean.”

My breath hitched. If Lemuria and Atlantis were still at war, and if she’d accepted Sophia and me, what would she and her people do to Trevor? Even if he disowned every part of his family following SeaSat5’s hijacking, he couldn’t change his Lemurian blood.

Trevor stood his ground. “I don’t side with Lemuria.”

The woman clicked her tongue and returned her attention to Sophia and I. “I am Germay. When did you come from?”

“Somewhere in the 2010’s,” Pike supplied for us, answering my unspoken question. He didn’t trust them, either.

“When are we now?” Dr. Hill asked.

“3001… A.D., I believe you would say.”

We’re enough into the future that they changed the dating system?
Great
.

I sucked in a slow, deep breath. That’s pretty far ahead of us. Much farther than I think Dr. Hill had predicted, and definitely much farther than we’d been prepared for. We should turn around and leave before they say something that changes their past, or we learn something that accelerates our future.

“What brings you here?” Germay asked.

“We are exploring the Links in search of our missing people,” Sophia answered. “The Lemurians took them and have hidden them somewhere in time.”

“You look on the wrong side of the war, soldier.” Germay’s eyes shot to Trevor. “Perhaps you should ask this one.”

Trevor’s jaw set hard. His defection was much clearer than his attempt to deny what he was. Right now, he was as much a Lemurian as I was.

“Trevor doesn’t side with them,” I reminded the room.

Germay’s eyes still rested on Trevor. “We shall see.” She broke her gaze from Trevor and looked to the rest of us. “Come with me. We’ll meet with the Council to see what we can do for your search, and to send you home.”

“You’re willing to help us?” Pike asked, doubt evident in every single syllable he spoke.

I agreed. This was way too easy, way too straightforward. That same feeling I’d had when looking at the African idol gnawed into the lining of my stomach like bad Chinese food.

“We help all travelers who stumble here on their search for something more,” Germay supplied.

Except, you can’t cross over the exact same Link twice, unless you have a different Link Piece with which to do it—thereby making it not the
same
Link, just a trip between the same two points. And even then, there had to be some temporal or geographical differential. Therefore, how many Pieces connected here, to this very spot? And, more importantly,
why
?

I turned to Pike and, from the wideness of his eyes, it was clear he also couldn’t believe it—we’d finally agreed on something.

We were being played. Big time.

I hung back with Major Pike as Dr. Hill and Sophia talked to Germay on our way to the Council’s chambers. We didn’t speak, but my proximity to him, the irony of my falling into step alongside Pike’s long, military strides, spoke volumes.

When Trevor and I had first come to TAO, Major Howard Pike hadn’t exactly liked us. Then I proved my worth with a gun… in that I could aim it better than most of TAO’s soldiers, even if I refused to use the weapon unless absolutely necessary. Pike and I didn’t take to each other like I did with Captain Marks. Pike’s a severe man, hardened by years of combat. He was also one of the very few soldiers at TAO. Many of the scientists were civilian-contracted, like on SeaSat5. Only the small team of engineers and the handful of security guards were actually Army-bred military officers. Which made me question how Pike got assigned to TAO in the first place, something I knew I’d never find out.

Pike had put us through training hell, which didn’t mesh well with me. But what had really put a wedge between Pike and I was the first anniversary of SeaSatellite5 being taken by Lemuria. I’d shown up to a mission half-plastered. We’d traveled anyway, with a prominent TV archaeologist in tow, trying to keep him from spilling the Atlantean beans he’d been so luckily shown. Me being a tipsy-idiot-bitch was
probably
—almost—acceptable. But me being a bad shot for the first and only time in my life was absolutely not. A stray bullet had struck Pike and the TV archaeologist had almost died because of it. That was twelve months ago, and I was still regaining his trust.

But now, walking in time with him, I sensed the missing trust rebuilding itself. I couldn’t be sure Sophia read the situation the same way as us. Maybe she was just playing along with the role Germay wanted us to play. But I was sure Trevor and Dr. Hill didn’t pick up on the eerie feeling in the air. Like the atmosphere here was thinner, barely enough to breathe, while being electrified at the same time.

We came to a stop outside two large marble doors. Germay knocked quietly and someone opened them from the other side, revealing a large chamber with a tiny table on the far end. Silence echoed. The only disruption was the noise of Pike’s even breaths beside me, a calming technique I recognized from our training days. Being stuck inside a large room filled to the brim with people who appeared to be Atlanteans, or at least people who sided with them, didn’t sit well with either of us. Why? We were allied with Atlantis. That shouldn’t have been a problem, and yet something slimy crawled down my throat. Even as strangers, Germay should have treated us like allies, without suspicion.

Sophia turned to me, one eyebrow lifted in question. I answered her with a quick motion of my eyes toward Pike, to the room at large, and then back to her. Sophia’s nod was almost unseen. She sensed it, too.

“Welcome!” came a loud voice from the far end of the room. “What brings you visitors to our time?”

Dr. Hill stepped out and explained our research regarding Link Pieces, how the Waterstar map had led us here, and about our search for an Atlantis-allied vessel.

I didn’t really listen. My eyes traced a path along the walls, laden with gold on the bottom and stripped bare of adornments on the top. The ceiling arched wide and high, encasing a large room that had only a single, open window perched high at the center. If clouds flew above it, I could pull water down if need be. Probably.

I shifted my gaze, trying not to make it obvious I’d scanned the hall. I wanted more ways out of here than through the door in which we came. It didn’t look like that was going to happen. Not that it mattered. One touch to the others and I could have us out in seconds if Sophia worked the transfer back.

Something washed over me, causing my skin to break out into goose bumps beneath my heavy fatigues. I stood still, not letting on that something had happened. Sophia turned to me with wide, scared eyes. The second my goose bumps shifted into fire scorching my skin, I missed a step and stumbled, crying out. Why weren’t the others affected by this too? Just me and Sophia. Me and—

Not good. Not good at all.

Guards moved in around us, drawing their weapons. Sophia nodded to me, and we spun on the ones closest to us, lunging at them. Pike reacted and brought his gun up, but it was too late.

The second either of us connected with a guard, the burly men threw Sophia and me back to the ground as if we were the size and weight of a child’s doll. My breath rushed from my lungs when I smacked against the ground. I had just enough time to force air into my lungs before guards descended upon us, slapping our wrists together with restraints.