Atlas (The Atlas Series) (16 page)

“Fantastic,” Kala muttered. Normally, Kala would never be so disrespectful to a senior officer, but the last two days had made her a little immune to decorum.

Unfortunately, General Clifton wasn’t very forgiving of that fact. Kala felt his hand grab her neck as he reached forward and threw her onto the chair. “You will address the General as ‘Sir’ or ‘General’.”

“Yes, sir,” Kala responded. She wanted to break Clifton’s neck, but a part of her agreed with his anger. Kala was proud of the fact that she was a good soldier. She didn’t like it when she lapsed back into old habits.

Turner didn’t seem fazed by Clifton’s actions, nor by the fact that Kala hadn’t given him a title of respect. He was far more interested in hooking Kala up to his newest toy. He placed the helmet on her head and Kala instantly felt her brain buzzing.

“Whoa,” she said. Her teeth started rattling.

Turner turned a knob on one of the computers and the vibrating lessened enough for her teeth to relax. “Better?” he asked.

“Yes, sir,” Kala responded. But
no
would have been more truthful.

“This is my domain, General,” Penny pushed her way next to Turner.

Turner looked like a kicked puppy, but didn’t argue. “Of course, Doctor. I’m just excited to see my baby out for a test run.”

“Your
baby
needs to be monitored by a professional or you’ll put this girl into a coma.” Penny examined the machine and the monitors next to it. “I’ll run a few tests and we’ll see if she’s had any damage from the phase-suits.”

Kala was watching Penny fiddle with the machine when everything went black.

Kala wasn’t unconscious, it was like she was blind, but at the same time she knew she wasn’t.

“Can you hear me, Kala?” Penny’s voice sounded in the darkness.

“Yes,” Kala responded. She felt like she was in a dark room rather than simply going blind. She could feel herself standing in the blackness. Dark, like an interrogation room or somewhere else in the Compound. Kala wondered if Penny had lied to her before and really could teleport her. Maybe Penny had teleported her to some dark lair that she could never escape from. At least Asmodeus gave her a skyline to look at.

With a snap of the fingers, the space lit up to reveal a whole lot of nothing. It was brighter, but like a grayish-white fog all around. Kala could see her own body, but then was startled to notice that she was slightly transparent. Penny appeared in front of her. She was also somewhat translucent.

“We’re in this machine of his,” Penny said in disgust. She was obviously referring to General Turner, but Kala could tell she didn’t like him very much.

“Do they know we’re having this conversation?” Kala asked.

Penny looked at Kala like she was a total idiot. “Of course not. That man doesn’t know how this machine works. I don’t like all this technology he’s building, it’s dangerous.”

“More dangerous than Demons or Malaks?” Kala found that she wanted to defend the General. It felt like an “Us versus Them” situation,
Us
being humans and
Them
being whatever the hell Penny was.

“Of course not, but that’s the point isn’t it? With all of the General’s
toys
, he has the potential to do some real damage. I wouldn’t be surprised if his death was your mission, or at least a future mission. Speaking of which, do you have your mission yet?”

Here we go
. Kala thought to herself. She knew Penny must be dying to know what the new Atlas was supposed to do this time around. She probably was expecting to be a part of Jack’s missions and help him make the world a better place or whatever. Kala knew the last thing Penny expected was to be in some kind of brain machine trying to fish out information from a stranger.

“Nothing yet,” Kala lied. “When is that supposed to happen anyway? I mean, I only have two days, right?”

Kala pushed too hard. She could see that Penny knew she was B.S.’ing her.

“You already know,” Penny accused, demanding furiously, “What is it? Tell me!”

Though Kala knew neither one of them were really there, she still took a step back, thinking fast, trying to cover her flub. “I said I don’t know.”

“I may not know what your mission is, but I can tell you with certainty that if you don’t do it, this world as you know it is over,” Penny said with finality.

Kala groaned. “Yeah, yeah, but what does that really mean anyway? A new disease? War? Been there, done that, and the world ended up being just fine.”

“You stupid fool.” Penny shook her head. “Those events that you think the world survived? Those are the moments in time where certain Atlases thought like you did. They didn’t do their job…”

Kala interrupted, “And see? We recovered. Humans are resilient like that…”

Penny came face to face with Kala, fury in her eyes. “Those events occurred after the countdown had expired, yes, but if the Atlas hadn’t finally snapped out of it and performed their duty, those horrible things that you’re so proud of surviving were only the beginning. Imagine what would have happened if the Atlas had done nothing?”

“You don’t know, that could have been the worst of it. No one will ever know now,” Kala rationalized. She just couldn’t accept that the
world would end
if she didn’t kill Jack. It didn’t make any logical sense. Not like anything that was happening made any sense. Even the stuff that was
real
like this machine she was strapped into had a surrealness to it.

Still, Kala knew she’d have to at least pretend to go along with Penny in order to get her off her back. Before Penny could enter into another tirade, Kala stopped her. “Fine. I’ll do it. I don’t have to tell you what it is though, do I?”

Penny visibly relaxed. “No, of course not. So you do know what your mission is?”

“Yes,” Kala confirmed. “And I’m assuming you’re not trying to have Jack kill me anymore?”

Penny nodded, “For the time being, yes. But others of my order will not agree, if they can’t persuade Jack to kill you, they’ll send others. People they deem more worthy of the title. People who won’t flinch at their duty.”

“You don’t know what they want me to do,” Kala said before she could stop herself.

“It’s always something unthinkable. That’s the nature of the curse.” Penny actually looked sympathetic.

“And why do people volunteer for a curse?” Kala asked sarcastically.

Penny smiled. “Because you’re a hero now. You’re saving the whole planet every four days. Some people like being heroes.”

Like Jack.

Jack was definitely more suited for this job than she was. Kala was never interested in being a hero. She enjoyed being one of the good guys, but being part of an elite military team was more for the excitement rather than the good. And let’s face it, some of the things they had done were questionable. There were a few missions that Kala definitely felt like she was on the wrong side of things. But it was her duty…

Her duty.

Wasn’t this her duty now?

No
. Kala pushed aside her thoughts. Killing Jack was a line she didn’t want to cross.

“Now what?” Kala asked.

“Now I wake you up out of this contraption and give you a clean bill of health,” Penny answered.

“Before you go, who exactly are you if you’re not a Malak or Demon?” Kala decided she’d try again to find out who or what Penny was.

“It’s complicated, another time. Time to wake up.”

Kala opened her eyes to see the same group of people standing around her chair. General Turner was beyond excited as he looked at all the read-outs on the computer screens. Kala wasn’t sure he knew what he was reading, but he appeared thrilled at the results.

Penny pointed out a few wavy looking graphs to Turner and Clifton. “As you can see here, there’s no brain damage. There is nothing here to show that Ms. Hicks has had any kind of episode.”

General Clifton eyed Kala with venom, then turned to Penny. “So you’re saying she’s of sound mind?”

“Yes, General, Ms. Hicks is fit for duty,” Penny said confidently.

“Soldiers!” General Clifton pointed to the four men behind Derek and Jack. The four men marched forward. “Execute the prisoner.”

Chapter Sixteen

Kala was too stunned to respond.

Derek wasn’t.

The man turned into an enraged animal as he threw the two men closest to him aside like he was parting tall grass in a jungle. The next two guards whirled around to fight their opponent.

General Clifton pulled out his gun and aimed it at Kala’s head. “Time to say good night, sweetie.” Clifton pulled the trigger.

BAM!

The gunshot blasted from the gun, but Kala didn’t feel the impact.

That’s because Asmodeus suddenly appeared between her and the bullet. The bullet fell harmlessly off his back.

“Miss me?” he smiled at Kala.

“At this moment, yes, I definitely missed you.” Kala had to give it to him. Blocking a bullet gave him some mad credit in her book.

“I couldn’t let that ass be the next Atlas, he would actually enjoy doing horribly vicious things. Wouldn’t you agree, Pandora?” Asmodeus looked up at Penny.

Pandora
? Kala wasn’t sure if she had heard correctly. After all, Derek was making a meal of the remaining soldiers, causing a lot of noise and mayhem.

In the middle of it all, Turner didn’t look upset. Instead, he stared intensely at Asmodeus. Kala guessed teleporting wasn’t in his realm of science yet, and deflecting bullets with his skin well… let’s just say Turner looked beyond intrigued.

Kala felt Jack’s hand in hers and he pulled her away from Asmodeus. Apparently, Jack didn’t like Asmodeus touching his girlfriend, let alone being her savior.

Asmodeus, on the other hand, didn’t like the fact that Kala only had eyes for Jack. He reached out to touch Kala’s shoulder.

Kala knew with certainty it was to teleport her away. As tempting as it was to leave the Compound clean, Kala didn’t think she could manage an escape from Asmodeus’s clutches again. Malak-distractions aside, the guy was too powerful. She jerked away before he could touch her.

Clifton unloaded his entire bullet cartridge in Asmodeus’s back. The bullets deflected off his skin like pebbles hitting a wall, the shells clattering to the floor like a musical symphony of clinking.

Asmodeus whirled around to face Clifton, annoyed. “You done, little man?”

General Clifton was at a loss. He looked genuinely shaken. “What kind of material is that shirt made of?”

Though everyone could tell it was a cotton t-shirt, the concept it being supernatural never entered Clifton’s mind. He assumed Asmodeus was wearing some kind of super fabric that would deflect bullets. Kala guessed that Clifton probably thought Asmodeus’s teleporting skills were from a rival country’s technological advances as opposed to the King of Demons popping in to take her away.

“97% cotton, 3% lycra,” Asmodeus said as if he were in a commercial. Then without warning he lifted his hand and Clifton lifted with it. Asmodeus flicked his wrist causing Clifton to fly backward and slam against the wall with crunching impact.

Even Kala had to flinch at the sound. General Clifton slid to the ground, out cold.

Derek knocked out the last two guards by smashing their heads into the wall simultaneously. Kala was always amazed at how strong the guy was! Her heart sang with joy at his loyalty to her, but it sank at the same time, knowing that he would now be a fugitive like her.

Asmodeus turned his attention to Kala like she was the only one in the room. “You ready to leave, my love?”

“I’m not going anywhere with you,” Kala responded, though she wasn’t sure how she could stop him.

“And don’t call her ‘your love’,” Jack practically snarled.

Kala loved the fact that Jack was jealous, but she didn’t love the fact that Asmodeus could pop Jack’s head like a grape if he wanted to. Her only ray of hope was the fact that Asmodeus knew her mission was to kill Jack, so that made Jack somewhat safe.

“You’re not taking her, Asmodeus,” Penny stepped in front of Kala.

“And
you’re
going to stop me?” Asmodeus didn’t seem concerned at all.

“Yes,” Penny answered with such authority that Asmodeus paused. Penny turned to Kala. “Remember, you promised to fulfill your mission. I’m trusting you.”

Guilt much? Kala simply nodded, though she was lying.

Then Kala saw a look of confusion on Asmodeus’s face as Penny’s eyes glowed blue. Penny leapt forward, wrapping her arms around his chest. They both disappeared in a flash.

It was so sudden that no one in the room moved.

Kala didn’t know what to do next. She was now officially an enemy of the state and she was pretty sure Derek and Jack were, too.

Jack appeared to be having the same thought process as Kala as he looked at Turner, waiting for him to respond.