by Jessica Gunn
Of course you can’t. You trained them to hunt the very people who took SeaSat5.
“You have a go,” General Allen said. “Return them in one piece.”
I hid the smug smile that wanted to form as I spun to face Mara and the guys. “It’s not an official job because of what it is—which is vague, I know. I can’t explain it until we get to TAO and they clear your participation. Basically, even General Allen can’t order you to go because you’re not part of TAO, and you’re technically not on active duty. I’m asking you to join me, but you don’t have to. I’ll understand.”
They all nodded like they understood. Weyland held a hand out to me. “I’m in.”
“It’s dangerous,” I said.
He grinned. “I could die every day I live.”
I rolled my eyes though his support meant everything, our relationship coming full circle. “You’re so wise.”
“Me too,” came Josh’s answer as he stood. His eyes were drawn from sleepless nights, but they had a determined glint about them. Whatever went through his head, it bred determination to distract himself from losing a friend.
Eric and Mara stood together. It was decided.
I smiled. “Thank you.” I stuck out my hand in front of me. “Taxi up.”
“Not just yet, Ms. Danning.”
I mustered the best look of control I could possibly have sent General Allen at that moment. “Yes?”
“May I speak to you privately for a moment?”
“Sure,” I relented. I didn’t have a choice if I was taking his team from him for a few weeks. And it’d look weird to the others if I didn’t go.
I followed General Allen into the hallway, but kept my distance. He wouldn’t hurt me with the guys this close, would he?
He walked a few paces from the door before he turned around and said, “I need to speak with you regarding your growing popularity.”
My growing what? “Excuse me?”
“Your band.”
My heart thudded to a stop in my chest. You want to threaten them now, too? “Leave them out of this.”
“This is unrelated,” he hissed as if he didn’t want me speaking of our altercations in public. Tough shit. “Your rock star dreams are endangering TruGates’ mission. The more popular you get, the more recognizable your face will become. I can’t have that. TruGates is a paramilitary organization. We value anonymity.”
I fought to keep my expression neutral. I knew it’d come to this eventually, but I never expected to have to deal with it while with Josh and TruGates. I never expected Phoenix and Lobster to get so big, so fast, period. “We’ve still got a bit to go before that happens.”
“I’m just letting you know.”
Chelsea—1. General Allen—1.
Today’s fight was a draw.
helsea paced in front of everyone, waiting for General Holt to give us the green light to clear and debrief her team. They were the same people I’d seen after the first Juxe show, although one was missing. The man whose death Chelsea blamed on herself.
General Holt entered the briefing room and took a seat at the table. “So long as they sign the agreements and other paperwork, you have a go.”
Chelsea let out a breath and walked to the table. She grabbed a stack of manila folders and passed them out, introducing people as she went. “General Holt, meet Eric Talmont, Mara McNab, Josh Turner, and Adam Weyland, former Lieutenant and security officer on board SeaSatellite5.”
“I think you all know who I am,” I said to them, receiving various degrees of acknowledgement in return. The woman Chelsea had introduced as Mara scowled when our eyes met.
Ignore it, Chelsea thought. She’s pissed about the Lexi thing.
Right. This close together, we wouldn’t be able to ignore our telepathic connection. Did everyone know about my stupid decision?
“So now’s the time you get to find out what I really do for the Army.” She took a seat next to Josh. “I’ll skip back to the day I appeared on SeaSat5.” She looked to Lieutenant Weyland. “I teleported there by accident, as you know.”
“Drawn to Trevor, I believe,” Weyland said.
Awkwardness pressed onto me like a dumbbell. “She was drawn because of what had happened in Boston three months prior, when Dave attacked her.”
“How’s that work?” Eric asked.
“It’s complicated,” Chelsea said. “Basically, I found myself in a similar emotional state three months after I met Trevor, and my memories clicked. Trevor interrupted the mugging, making me feel safe. I craved that same safety three months later. My powers work based on connections, and they’d sought out that connection.”
“Right,” said Eric slowly, like he wasn’t sure if he believed—or understood—her answer.
“On board SeaSat5, Dr. Helen Gordon studied people with abilities like me,” Chelsea continued. “She offered to help me explore my powers, so I signed up. Then we found evidence of Atlantis.”
“Hold on,” Mara interrupted. “Atlantis?”
Weyland nodded slowly. “Yes.” His entire team turned to him, disbelief etched into their expressions. “We found an outpost in the Sargasso Sea. It was incredible. But we kept it a secret. I don’t think five people outside the crew knew what we found.”
General Holt nodded. “Only Admiral Dennett, Dr. Hill, and the Admiral’s chain of command. And myself and the others here at TAO.”
I looked to Josh, curious to see how Chelsea’s new boyfriend was handling all of this. We weren’t even to the good part yet. He kept his expression neutral, a mask. No sane person could look at Atlantis actually existing and be totally calm.
“Anyway,” Chelsea said, “the outpost was filled with artifacts, relics we’ve come to find out are actually pieces of a weird ancient technology meant to allow time-travel based on certain parameters.”
She purposely made it sound more scientific than it actually was, probably in an attempt to keep her people from running away. To keep Josh from checking her into the loony bin.
“Basically,” I said, “we had the artifacts, then the station was hijacked. Around twenty-four hours later, we knew what the war between our enemies and allies was really about.”
“Enemies?” Josh asked.
Chelsea glanced his way, concern wracking her features. “My powers make me different from you in small ways. I’m an Atlantean super soldier, someone descendant from humans who were genetically altered to have abilities that allow me to best Lemurians. Lemuria, another mythological lost continent, is the enemy of Atlantis. You’ve actually run into their people a number of times and have never known.”
“But you did,” Mara said. “That’s what that guy in the warehouse meant when he called you soldier.”
Chelsea’s eyes grew dark. “Yes. The people you believe to be mercenaries, the people General Allen sends you after, they’re Lemurians.” She looked to Weyland. “Like Thompson and his crew. Turns out that while they were bad, the Lemurians aren’t actually the bad guys.”
“What’s that mean?” Weyland asked.
“Last night Chelsea and I were sent a message,” I said. “From Dave, actually. He said Atlantis took SeaSatellite5, not Lemuria. We’ve been fooled for the last few years. Thompson’s crew was an outlier in the Lemurian’s plan, but the history he spoke is true. Lemuria had the ability to time-travel first. Atlantis wanted it. They created super soldiers to fight Lemuria for the ability to time-travel. Doing so unlocked a side effect, a key known as the Waterstar map that shows every Link Piece connection—every time-travel node—that can possibly happen. That’s why Thompson wanted Chelsea. The artifact cache was a bonus.”
Weyland’s jaw clenched. “I always thought Dave was an off guy.”
“Yeah, well apparently we’re playing for the same team after all,” Chelsea said.
“Or so he wants us to believe,” I added. “He said once we rescued SeaSat5—and him—that he’d explain everything. But…” Just say it. “So did Valerie.”
Weyland and Chelsea both looked to me.
“What’d you say?” Chelsea asked.
“That’s what I needed to talk to you about,” I said. It involves TruGates, I hoped she heard. “Valerie’s communicated with me. Her contacts second the notion of Atlantis having SeaSat5. Lemuria isn’t our enemy. And neither is she.”
Weyland didn’t say a word. He’d had no issues with Valerie until the hijacking.
Chelsea, on the other hand, pounded her fist on the table. “She disappears for two years after selling SeaSat5 out to Thompson, and you suddenly think she’s telling you the truth?”
“For what it’s worth—and it’s worth a lot—I’ve known her since we were kids,” I said, feeling a sudden desire to defend Valerie. “She hasn’t always chosen the right path, but her loyalties are clear: Lemuria, SeaSat5, and me.”
“Great,” Chelsea huffed. “Anything else you want to add in her stead?”
“Later,” I said. I wasn’t going to tell her, in front of her TruGates friends, that their commander was out to kill them. To kill Chelsea, at least. If she was here, she was safe. That was all that mattered.
“Can we back this up to the guy in the warehouse?” Mara asked. “He knew what you were.”
Chelsea nodded. “Yes, but I had no idea what would happen, or why we were sent to that warehouse.”
“But you did,” Mara accused with a snarl.
Chelsea jumped at the sudden volume in Mara’s voice. Josh’s fists clenched.
“No. I didn’t,” Chelsea said.
“Yes. You. Did.” Mara’s words came out through clenched teeth.
Chelsea swallowed hard. The others sent questioning glances their way.
“Mara, cut it,” Josh said.
Mara fixed Chelsea with a look that said they’d finish the conversation later, then glanced to me. “So what do you mean when you say you know where SeaSatellite5 is?”
“You really mean ‘when,’ don’t you?” Weyland asked. He never knew the extent of what we found because he left after the hijacking. All he knew was Thompson and his guys had powers like Chelsea, and that Chelsea was a super soldier.
Chelsea nodded. “Yes. We always thought the Lemurians had them, but we didn’t know to when they took them. Now we know Atlantis is to blame. Dave’s message gave us the pieces we missed.”
“So you want us to, what?” Josh asked. “Travel through time with a rescue contingent of soldiers to reclaim SeaSat5?”
Chelsea’s eyes pleaded for understanding. He grinned. Only then did she say, “Yeah.”
“Do you have a backup plan?” he asked her. “A way to get home?”
“That part is a bit more complicated,” she said.
“But we’re working on it,” I said.
“Well then,” Josh said. “Guess we’d better get to work.”
“Before we do that, I’d like to speak with Trevor and Chelsea in my office,” General Holt said.
We both nodded and trailed behind the General to an adjoining room.
He shut the door behind us and stood with calm poise. “While you two are civilians it is widely understood the two of you have the most extensive knowledge of SeaSatellite5 while having simultaneous TAO clearance. Would you agree?” he asked us.
This felt like a trap, or too good to be true.
You’re not wrong, came Chelsea’s thoughts. “Yes, probably. Except maybe Lieutenant Weyland.”
General Holt nodded, then sat behind his desk. We sat in leather chairs facing him. “I can’t place you solely in charge of the rescue mission due to your civilian status, and even if you were to enlist, everyone in my command would out-rank you.”
“You mean yourself, Major Pike, and the MP at the door,” I said. He nodded. “I don’t think either of us has any plans to ever enlist, sir.”
He sighed and folded his hands together. “Major Pike will lead the rescue mission, officially.”
“But unofficially?” Chelsea asked.
“You both know how this goes,” he said. “You both have worked with the military long enough to get it. And as much as I respect Major Pike, he won’t know what we’re walking into, not on a structural level. There are a ton of challenges ahead, and if we manage to find the crew, it is unlikely Captain Marks will trust a non-familiar face in the wake of everything. I’d love more than anything to just put Chelsea in charge of the whole thing, given her work with TruGates, but the brass would have a cow.”
I rubbed my nose to hide my amusement at General Holt’s rare show of informality. “So what are you saying?”
“Major Pike has agreed to let Chelsea call the shots, and both of your expertise where SeaSatellite5 is concerned will weigh-in more than on normal Link Piece missions. You two will formulate the plan of attack, everything from how many people you think we’ll need, to how this will go down. But only as far as SeaSatellite5 is concerned. TAO’s troops can handle the breach of the Atlantean compound, but as far as the station goes, only the two of you know the condition it was in when she was taken. Additionally, I’d like to operate under the assumption of a worst-case scenario.”
General Holt sighed thoughtfully. “My main concern isn’t the actual act of rescue, but how you’ll return afterward. We don’t know that a Return Piece will be available, much less if it’ll be big enough to take back the entire station and everyone on board. So you two will run that show, but Major Pike will have final and full say.”
Touché. We didn’t know how the Atlanteans even took SeaSat5 to begin with. It’s possible the Atlanteans manufactured Link Pieces like Germay’s people, if that’s how it worked. My thoughts swarmed, trying to get the details right. Germay was wary of me, which made her Atlantean. So the Altern Device must have been, too. But she said we looked on the wrong side of the war, right? That was when we thought Lemuria had SeaSat5. But they didn’t.
So were Germay and my mother lying? Or did Germay and her people regret taking SeaSatellite5 all those years ago?
“Manufacture?” Chelsea asked.
“Huh?”
She pointed at my head. “Your thoughts.”
“You two are still telepathically linked?” General Holt asked.
We both nodded. “Yes.”
“What did you mean by manufactured Link Pieces?” Chelsea repeated.
I cast General Holt a glance. Chelsea had a lot to catch up on. “That’s what the Altern Device was for. It fused connections with objects to form Link Pieces. We can’t move things as big as SeaSat5 normally, so they must have fused the necessary connection with a massive crane or something. Germay’s people were trying to use our connection to SeaSat5 to make a Link Piece that’d bring them there.”
She blinked then looked up at the ceiling. “I missed a lot, didn’t I?”
She hadn’t the faintest idea. But I could start now. “There’s something else. Something Valerie wanted to tell you herself, but…” I glanced at the wall behind which the TruGates team sat. “I don’t think she’ll have time to come here before we rescue SeaSat5, and I think you should know now. And General Holt, you should know, too.”
“What?” Chelsea asked.
“Valerie’s been in hiding because she’s a Lemurian connected to SeaSatellite5,” I explained. “And people know who she is. Someone’s been hunting Lemurians. Valerie said there’s something else, too, something that puts you in direct danger, Chelsea.”
“Shit,” she said as she slid back into her seat. “General Allen.”
“Yes,” I said.
“How did Valerie know?” she asked.
“Her contacts said TruGates is a front for someone to hunt Lemurians out in the open.”
“He’s after me, too,” Chelsea said. “That’s who…” She gave me a meaningful look. “You know.” Hurt me.
My heart shattered some when she thought it.
“Is there something I need to know about?” General Holt asked her.
She let silence grow between us before she said, “It can wait u
ntil after we rescue SeaSatellite5.”
“Can it?” I asked her.
She thumbed in the direction of her friends. “They don’t know, so it doesn’t matter. I’m safe here and it can wait. They’re not involved. They’re just pawns, like we were.”
“Why would TruGates hunt Lemurians?” General Holt asked.
I shook my head. “I don’t know. Valerie only said that they were, that Chelsea was in danger, too, and that she’d only talk to Chelsea about it.”
“So get in touch with her,” Chelsea said. “Bring her here, or tell me where to meet her.”
“Can you handle that?” I asked her.
“As long as she doesn’t come at me, I won’t have to handle anything,” she said.
“With your permission, General?” I asked.
He nodded. “We’re drowning in empty holes. We’ve thought for so long we were on the right side of this war, only to discover we aren’t. Now we’re faced with enemies from all sides. If Valerie has the answers that piece together the truth, then bring her in.”
“She said to have you take us to the Franklin once I told you,” I said to Chelsea.
“How will she know to meet us?”
I shrugged. “She said she’d know.”
But how, I had no idea.
he Franklin, for the first time in my life, felt nothing like home. The menacing walls crowded me, enclosing me in a cage with a wild, frenzied crowd. I’d worn a hat to try fending off anyone who might recognize me. I knew it was foolish. Of all the places to attempt inconspicuousness, the venue in which Phoenix and Lobster had rose to fame was not one of them.
I led Trevor up to the bar and sat facing the crowd at a table without a light over it.
“You said she’ll know?” I asked him.
He nodded. “Somehow.”
I relaxed into the chair and we waited. Finally, a head of red hair I knew so well joined our table. Valerie pulled over a chair and sat right next to me like we were the best of friends. We might have been if not for the pesky hijacking thing that stood in the way. “Valerie.”
She smiled. “Hey, girlie. Long time no see.”
