Atlas (The Atlas Series) (9 page)

Because, without denial, what was she
really
saying to herself? That she had to kill Jack in order to save the world? Maybe this was how all serial killers start. How many times had she read about some psycho who thought they were on a mission from God to kill and murder? Too many. So either her subconscious brain was telling her to kill her boyfriend or some divine fate was. Either way, sanity didn’t look like a viable option for Kala.

A knock at the door brought her out of her downward spiral.

Derek.

He must have rushed over after their phone call. In fact, knowing Derek, he had probably been parked out front the entire time.

Kala rushed to the door ready for the hug that she knew she needed.

But when she opened the door…

It wasn’t Derek.

It was the woman from outside Jack’s apartment.

Chapter Eight

Kala was so stunned she didn’t move. The woman wore her wavy black hair down today, which only brought out her high cheekbones and chiseled face. Her blue eyes stared at Kala with annoyance. A part of Kala wondered if this woman was just another part of her crazy train. After all, the hallucinations
did
start with her glowing blue eyes.

“Are you going to let me in?” The woman looked agitated, giving the impression that the last place she wanted to be was anywhere near Kala Hicks.

“I’m still deciding if you’re real or not.” Kala decided to be honest. If this woman really wasn’t real, then Kala was simply talking to herself anyway.

“Really? You’re one of those?” The woman shook her head at Kala.

Kala wanted to punch her just because it would make her feel good, in fact…

PUNCH!

Right in the nose.

And it felt great.

To Kala’s surprise the woman didn’t try to tackle her to the ground like she’d secretly hoped. One thing that always made Kala feel better was a good fistfight. But this lady wasn’t biting.

“Are you quite done?” the woman asked, annoyed.

Kala shrugged and held her hand out for the woman to enter.

After sneering in disgust at the state of Kala’s abode, the woman said plainly, “It’s time to get your things in order. Do you have any family you’d like to say goodbye to? A will? Anything like that?”

On instinct Kala reached into a kitchen drawer and pulled out her Beretta, pointing it at the woman. The silencer wasn’t on it, so a shot would definitely alert the neighbors, but Kala wasn’t about to let this ridiculous woman take her down. Albeit, it was the nicest way anyone had ever threatened Kala’s life, which just made it all the more strange.

“Get out before I hurt you,” Kala warned.

“Oh relax, I’m not going to kill you. I physically can’t. But Jack is and he’s on his way over.” The woman said it so matter-of-factly that Kala almost missed the part where she said that Jack was coming to kill her.

Kala dropped her gun to her side in shocked confusion. “Wait. What?”

“This whole thing was an unfortunate mistake. Jack is the Chosen One, not you. You killed the Atlas, which is why you are the Atlas. Once Jack kills you the burden will fall on him. But unlike you, he’s prepared for it,” the woman said with an air of arrogance. “He’s trained his whole life for this moment and you stole it from him. So, really, it’s your fault you have to die.”

Kala lifted her gun once more, wanting to shoot this lady just to keep her from talking. There it was again, this whole Atlas thing. She closed her eyes tightly and opened them quickly, hoping the woman would disappear. Kala’s brain could not wrap around any of this as truth. It was just too much. Too weird. Too insane.

“Jack would never kill me,” Kala said. She was surprised to hear the desperateness in her voice. The images of what she’d seen on the television still played in her head. If all this was true, then killing Jack was her “duty” as the new Atlas, whatever that meant. But there was no way she would ever hurt Jack, and Kala was positive there was no way he could hurt her either.

The woman laughed. “He’ll do what he’s told. The only reason I’m here is because I fell for his sappy plea to let you say good-bye to your family and put your affairs in order, yadda yadda. If it were up to me, he would have killed you in your sleep this morning and been done with it.”

Kala couldn’t seem to grasp everything that this woman was saying. All she knew was that insane-o lady wanted her dead and wanted Jack to do it. “Who are you?” Kala decided to ask finally.

This appeared to catch the woman off-guard as if she didn’t introduce herself that often. “Penny,” she said after a pause, then she looked at her watch impatiently. “If Jack doesn’t get here promptly I’m afraid I’ll have to take you to a safe house until he can kill you. You’ve made quite a mess in your wake.”

Kala leveled her gun. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”

Penny apparently had had enough of Kala and her gun. She walked over to Kala and made Kala pull the trigger straight into her forehead.

BAM!

After the gun fired, Kala dropped the Beretta in shock. Why would this woman want Kala to kill her?

But instead of a dead body, Penny stood in front of Kala with the same indignant look on her face. The newly made bullet hole closed up and healed before Kala’s eyes as the bullet popped out of Penny’s head, falling to the floor.

Penny shook her head. “I can’t be killed, so don’t bother trying to threaten me. It’s annoying.”

A strange screeching noise sounded from outside Kala’s apartment. Kala turned to the window wondering what on earth would make such a sound.

Penny’s face went pale. “Asmodeus.”

Kala turned to Penny. “What’s Asmodeus?”

“Not someone I ever want you to meet. You’ve really screwed things up, you know? If you hadn’t blabbed that confession to your superior and whined about seeing the countdown, then we could have kept this whole thing under wraps. But now both sides know who the Atlas is. Know who
you
are. That’s never happened before. EVER.” Penny was beside herself with anger, but Kala noticed it was more than that. Penny was terrified.

Kala had zero idea of how to respond to any of this. The screeching sounded again and it chilled her to the bone. Whatever this Asmodeus was didn’t sound friendly.

“I may not be able to kill you, but I’m sure as hell not going to sit around and wait for my boyfriend to kill me.” Kala punched Penny as hard as she could and made a run for the door.

Penny was too fast. She was already blocking the door before Kala could reach the knob. Kala went for another swing, but Penny grabbed Kala’s fist before it landed.

“I’m trying to help you,” Penny scolded.

“You just said you were basically babysitting me until Jack came to take me out,” Kala accused incredulously.

Penny tilted her head in grudging agreement, “Well, temporarily help you until he gets here.”

Kala shook her head in frustration and tried to shove Penny aside using one of her Aikido moves, but Penny was inhumanly strong. She pushed Kala to the floor.

The screeching again, but this time sounding just outside the window.

Penny pulled Kala to her feet. She placed Kala behind her body protectively. This whole situation was completely surreal. For someone who claimed to want Kala dead, Penny was certainly acting as if she wanted to save her.

“Does this Asmodeus want me dead too?” Kala asked. She found that she wasn’t really scared. It felt like she was in combat and under attack. Nothing felt more natural to her. It was when Kala did her best thinking.

Penny on the other hand was shaking with fear. “No, he wants you to fail. He wants the world to end.”

Kala was sure this sentence would scare most people, but to her it was information on how to survive the upcoming attack. Whoever this Asmodeus was, he didn’t want her to die. Not yet anyway, Penny on the other hand was counting down the minutes until Jack arrived to kill Kala. So Kala’s choices were, Asmodeus, Penny or Jack?

It wasn’t a question: Jack. This Penny girl might think Jack would kill Kala, but Kala knew Jack. He’d never let anything happen to her.

Taking advantage of standing behind Penny, Kala picked up the discarded gun and shot seven rounds into the back of Penny’s head. Kala knew it wouldn’t kill the woman, but she was sure it was give her at least a few seconds to escape. Penny dropped to the floor from the shock and probably pain of it.

Kala ran out the door and into the hallway at breakneck speed.

And sure enough, apparently healing fast, she heard Penny scream her name in rage.

Running down the exit stairs four at a time, Kala was surprised she didn’t tumble to her death. The screeching penetrated through the walls and Kala began to know real fear. She’d been in countless combat attacks, but there was something about that sound...

It wasn’t human.

Penny’s pursuing footfalls thudded down the stairs above Kala. Kala knew Penny would be on her in seconds. Hitting the bottom floor, Kala pushed open the exit door and ran into the alleyway that lay between her apartment complex and the one next door.

The screeching was deafening outside. Whatever it was, it was close.

Asmodeus.
Whatever
or
whoever
that was.

Kala ran past her neighbors, who had run out of the apartment building thinking the noise was some kind of fire alarm. At least now she knew she wasn’t making it up in her head, unless her hallucinations included imagining confused neighbors. No, Kala had survived her whole life trusting her instincts. And her instincts told her all of this was happening. She just wasn’t sure what “all of this” actually was yet. Oh how she wished for the simple stress of countdown clocks!

Jack’s car squealed to a halt in the parking lot. “GET IN!” he screamed at Kala.

Kala looked behind her to see Penny running out of the apartment building. When she saw Kala, her eyes flared blue.

Uh oh
. Kala gulped. What was worse was how Penny was looking at Jack. I guess she didn’t like the fact that Jack had come to rescue Kala and not kill her. Kala couldn’t resist being smug.

As she opened the passenger door to get in, Kala smiled at Penny triumphantly.

Penny screamed in outrage and started to charge the car.

Kala slammed the car door shut as Jack hit the gas full throttle. Looking back through the window, Kala nearly gasped as a blur of black smoke completely engulfed Penny, followed by the screeching.

It appeared that Asmodeus was going to have to satisfy himself with Penny for the moment.

Flipping back around, Kala looked at Jack. He turned to her and his smile was slow and meaningful.

He simply said, “We need to talk.”

Chapter Nine

“That’s an understatement,” Kala replied. She took a deep breath to steady herself, adrenaline pumping through her veins a mile a minute. It felt as if she had just cheated death, the biggest rush there was. Kala knew she needed to calm herself enough to process what was happening.

“What happened to you when you killed the President?” Jack asked.

Kala had been ready for explanations not questions, but the question jarred her a bit. If what Penny had said was true, then Jack had been preparing to kill the next Atlas his whole life and Kala had taken that away from him.

“I’ll share all the details after you tell me what you know. That Penny girl says you have to kill me. Are you going to kill me Jack?” Kala needed to see his response. To see if Jack was who she thought he was.

Jack didn’t hesitate. “Never.”

Kala took a few seconds to take that in, then she nodded. “Tell me what you know.”

“Let’s get somewhere safe first.”

They drove the rest of the way in silence.

Kala took the trip as a breather to think about everything that had happened to her. She still couldn’t quite grasp that what she had seen with the President was real, but so far everything that she’d witnessed made her come to some kind of truce with herself that she’d listen to Jack with an open mind. The one thing she didn’t want to think about was the fact that, if all of this was real, then her “mission” was to kill Jack. That was not something Kala could do. Ever. So ultimately that meant she was going to fail. She just hoped that failing didn’t mean what the President said it would mean: world destruction.

And, now that she was really thinking about it: WTF? Some screeching smoke monster named Asmodeus just engulfed an annoying woman named Penny that somehow can survive a round of bullets to the head. Kala guessed it wasn’t any more farfetched than being an ancient Greek god that was saving the planet every four days, but still... Looney bin time.

After about a half hour of driving, Jack pulled into a diner on the outskirts of town. There wasn’t anything special about the restaurant, it looked almost comforting to Kala after the ordeal she’d just been through. Large glass windows wrapped around the rectangular-shaped buildings and an old seventies style neon sign simply said: Nora’s Diner. Kala didn’t know who Nora was, but she had to be nicer than Penny.