TERRA (The Elements Series Book 2)

by Tracy Korn

  Stow it! Get out of my head!

  "I just stepped wrong back there," I say before I realize it, then kick a shard of limestone from my path as Liddick's head dips in the dim light and his laughter echoes in my ears.

  "Be careful," Arco answers, squeezing my shoulder, and Liddick brings his hand to his mouth to camouflage his idiotic chuckling with a pretend yawn.

  Crite, you can't just barge into my thoughts whenever you want like that, I shout in my head, but he just keeps fighting his laughter.

  You have to learn to control what you're sending me. I'd be chum if you heard all my unfiltered thoughts, he thinks again, finally pulling himself together.

  How do I control them? I ask, and he just smiles and shakes his head again. What? How do I do it?

  Sorry, Riptide. You're going to have to figure that one out on your own.

  I try to think of something to say to him that will neutralize the anger I feel rising in me, but Arco's arm suddenly drops from my shoulder, and my frustration with Liddick gives way again to another wave of the same anxiety I felt from Arco before. Now what? Ugh, this is exhausting! I think, then close my eyes in a long blink when I hear Liddick again.

  You know he doesn't understand what he's picking up from you, right? He thinks you're tolerating him because he can feel that gap you have for him…the one that I—

  Get out of my head! I'll handle it, I say, cutting him off, and this time, he doesn't reply. I lace my fingers behind my neck as we move through the tunnel, which twinkles with white and yellow specks all around us, and I wonder, out of all the things we have to deal with right now, how Arco can be worried about the way I may or may not feel about him? Isn't he taking point on this entire trek, driving himself insane with responsibility? Aren't there much bigger issues at stake than if I love him or not? I mean, he's had all these years to decide how he feels, doesn't he understand that I should get more than a few days?

  My heart starts to hammer in my chest as the pressure of this ridiculous expectation presses down on me. What does it mean, anyway? Is love that feeling of being safe like I thought at first? Maybe that's a start, but I can't believe that's all there is to it. Before I can stop myself, the words are out of my mouth.

  "How do you know?" I ask abruptly, looking up at Arco and slowing down so there's more space between us and the others.

  "What?" He startles, then slows his pace to match mine.

  "How do you know you love me?"

  His eyes soften in the warm glow around us as he looks at the ground for the answer, and the corner of his mouth pulls back just enough to make the dimple in his cheek appear.

  "I've probably asked myself that same question a thousand times," he says, letting out a breath and taking my hand again before looking at the lights above us, and the cold knot in my stomach starts to thaw again. "The best answer I could come up with was that no matter if you ever found out or not…or if you felt the same way or not, I'd still feel like all I wanted to do was make sure you were happy and safe." He smiles quickly at me, then looks forward again and hooks his thumb in the dive suit rigging loop at his hip. "So I guess somewhere along the way I figured that must be what love is—just wanting to do everything you could for somebody even if you didn't get it back. I mean, if you do, that's perfect then, but it's not really about that." He pauses, then laughs under his breath. "Or, I don't know. That could just be what I've been telling myself…"

  Just then I see who he is again, how brave he is just to admit all of this under a thin layer of nonchalance as he leaves the unfinished sentence hovering in the air between us.

  "To make it easier? If you don't get it back, you mean?" I ask.

  "Maybe…" he finds my eyes for just a second before continuing his explanation to the path at our feet. "What else could hang on like that except love, you know? Eventually, you have to stop holding out so you can get on with your life and all, and I guess it's the idea of actually having to cross that bridge that makes it…hard sometimes," he adds after a pause. "But telling myself hey, at least I'm capable of feeling like that for someone? I guess it's easier then because it wasn't all for nothing."

  I can only respond with awe at the insight he seems to have about a question that is so baffling to me.

  "Arco, how do you have this all figured out when I've had so much trouble even knowing where to start?" I ask after a second. The smile lights in his eyes before it shows on his lips as he grips my hand again, then winks.

  "Years of practice."

  CHAPTER 8

  The Falls

  "Hold up!" Ellis's voice filters back to us, but it sounds pressed and flat under the sound of the rushing stream, which after a few hours of walking, is louder than ever. Somehow a breeze has also kicked up, and the sweat on my upper lip begins to cool.

  "Is that thunder?" Dez raises her voice over the low rumbling that shoots through the ground into my knees, which causes echoes all the way up my spine.

  "Can't be thunder," Avis says, then stops walking altogether and looks over his shoulder at us, his expression blanched. "But waves can sound like thunder."

  No one says anything else at first, and I wonder if he's trying to be funny. Finally, Joss starts to laugh.

  "Waves? We're a little far south for surf, aren't we?"

  Avis meets his eyes, presses his lips together, and nods slowly.

  "All right, look, the drop is just ahead, so let's keep moving," Arco says as the roll we've just felt starts to dissipate.

  The walls and ceiling around us seem to get brighter, denser with glow worms as we approach our checkpoint. After a minute, I start to feel a fine mist collecting on my face, which instantly chills in the growing breeze.

  "Is it raining?" Ellis wipes his face with his hand and pulls it back to examine. Tieg clicks his shoulder lamp to its high beam, illuminating the rest of the cavern.

  "It's a waterfall," Arco says, his words dropping to the bottom of my stomach like an anchor. Joss and Jax turn their lamps on the highest beam too, and in the increased light, the stream we've been following widens until it drops off like it has found the edge of the world.

  "Is that where we have to go?" I ask as my stomach lurches.

  "How do we get down there?" Myra's voice is too calm and too quiet, like she wants to stay perfectly still so the answer can't actually find her.

  "Do we even have to go down there? What does the sweep map say?" Jax questions, crossing to Tieg to look at his Nav console.

  "That's the route," Avis says, projecting the blue holographic image of the tunnel we've just come through and the drop ahead of us, which leads to another short tunnel at the bottom of the falls. Avis takes a big breath, then turns to examine the wall as another rumble pushes up under our feet, vibrating my bones. Arco closes his arms around me until the shaking passes.

  "Avis! Structural?" he calls out over the growing roar, but Avis's answer is almost inaudible under the noise.

  "It's stable! No cracks…at least not yet! We should move!" he answers, trying to pace his words so they fall in between the rumbles of the little earthquake. Arco releases me when it's over, then clicks on his shoulder lamp.

  "Are you all right?" he asks, putting his hand on the small of my back as we walk toward the mist just ahead.

  "Yeah…" I say, trailing off when I notice the waterfall isn't as big as I thought it would be given the echoing growl of it, which must be an effect of the cave wall acoustics. It's only about 15 feet across, and when I click on my lamp, I can see the cascade bottom out into a small lake below us.

  "That drop has to be at least a hundred feet!" Jax says, looking over the edge.

  "Ripley, back up…" Liddick warns, and I hear the panic beneath his calm, even words. A cold spear stabs through me as I register his tone and look up, but I'm a second too late—one second too late to shout to Jax or to reach for him. His foot slips in slow motion, and then everything is in slow motion, especially my legs, my words, my whole trajectory is instantly suspende
d in this viscous, confining air. I'm screaming in my head, telling him to hold on, that I'm coming, but no words come out. In desperation, I look around for someone closer to him to help, and in the second I take my eyes from my brother, everything warps back to speed. I fall through the space between us, the thickened air now a luminescent, surreal haze as the ground rises up and knocks me back into the moment.

  "Jax!" I scream, having tripped and fallen on the hard, stone ground now that my legs work again. I claw at it to pull myself forward until my feet catch up and move under me. Hands grip my arms and haul me up as howling crosswinds hit my ears and force my voice back down my throat, where it is muffled inside my head. I call to him again. "Jax!"

  "Ripley!" Arco yells over the falls as he maneuvers me behind him, all of us scrambling to get as close as we can to the edge of the water.

  "Back up! Stay out of the current!" Avis shouts, shining his high beam lamp in our faces.

  "Jazz, back up!" Tieg's voice comes from my left as I push my way in front of Arco back to the edge. I can't tell where Jax is as I frantically scan the water below us, at least until I'm whipped around from behind.

  "Listen, listen…" Arco says, looking straight into my eyes, but all I can do is shake my head at him.

  "No. No…I have to get him. I have to go," I repeat as reality dawns on me. I hear my voice saying the words, but they can't be mine because I feel like I'm already halfway down the falls. I'm already landing in the water below and diving, surfacing and diving again until I find Jax.

  "Jazz, listen!" Arco's fingers press into my upper arms, his grip tightening until I feel a twinge of pain when I start pushing against him in an effort to get free. This makes me see myself back here at the ledge instead of down in the water, held in place instead of swimming in search of my brother. Reality explodes inside me again, and there is only one thing I feel, one thing I see. I need to go after Jax.

  "Arco! Let me go!" I finally yell, and before I realize what I'm doing, I drive my shoulder into his chest to break his hold. He stumbles back, loosening his grip just long enough for me to take two large steps in the opposite direction, then one more before the ground falls away and the orange light envelopes me.

  The roar of the falls pours into my ears until I feel like I'm filled with sand under the weight of it, and in the pockets of clearing haze, the glow worms start to look like they're shooting stars—streaks of light against the darkness as the mist from the water rises in clouds all around me—and for a second, it's like I'm flying up instead of falling down.

  When everything stops, it stops hard. There's no water any more, no mist on my face, no rumbling—only rolling and tumbling until even that stops abruptly when I'm tossed against a soft wall and then land in a thud on the also soft ground. There is no sound of rushing falls in my ears, but in the broken, golden haze all around me, I can still see the water crashing.

  "Jax!" I shout, my voice loud in my ears, bouncing back at me like I'm inside my closet at home playing hide-and-seek with him like when we were kids. I raise my hand to push the wet strands of hair from my eyes only to jam my fingers into my helmet, which has somehow deployed. I press the comms button on my collar, and the deluge of Arco yelling my name against a jumble of voices in the background floods in.

  "I'm all right!" I shout over them all, and for a second, everything is still again. I turn on my shoulder lamp, which must have gone out in the jostle. It just ricochets off the haze in every direction, so I turn it off again and try to stand, but just fall to my knees again. Underneath my hands, I feel smooth, rubbery material. What the…?

  "Jazz! We're looking for a way down to—" Arco's voice is ragged until Dez's slices through it in a sharp scream.

  "Liddick!"

  I look around wildly even though I know it's pointless in the blanket of opaque light. My heartbeat climbs into my throat one deep, heavy beat at a time when I hear him in my head, then realize why Dez screamed.

  Do the fish glow down there, Rip? Liddick thinks, and my stomach falls.

  Crite, you chutz…I reply with the ghost of a thought as a thick, cold dread spills over me, freezing me in place. He jumped.

  Liddick doesn't say anything else, and I take a shallow breath because it's all I can manage as an ache spreads in the pit of my stomach. I close my eyes against the muted glow all around me, and everything inside begins swirling as I sit completely still, lost between the second of realizing that Liddick has really jumped from the ledge, and the second where I might confirm what I fear most. I shake my head against the pull that he's gone, that Jax is gone because I can't lose them…I can't lose them. The current of fear just widens under my sternum the more I resist, and my heart starts hammering a weighted toll that reaches up and wraps all around me, then drags me down.

  CHAPTER 9

  Descending

  The distant buzzing starts building in my ears over everyone's combined voices, resonating until I feel it vibrating my skull. I squeeze my eyes shut against it, then force myself to take a long, slow breath, hoping if I can just stay calm and tune out everything else, she'll be there to show me what's going to happen again.

  Vox…I think, though there's nothing except noise and the growing pressure of it inside my head in reply, even when I call to her again. Vox!

  Panic rises in my chest because I don't understand. Isn't that buzzing the sound of Azeris's open channel? Didn't we just figure this out? I force my eyes open and squint through the orange, mottled light around me to scan for Jax and Liddick, then turn my shoulder lamp back on in the hopes it might help them see me. I have to do something…I can't just sit here.

  "Can you hear me?" Jax's voice suddenly comes through my helmet comms and jolts me out of my paralysis. "Wh—! Get off!" he yells a second later over what sounds like a struggle, which cuts out just as quickly.

  "Jax! What's happening? Where are you?" I scream, but he doesn't reply. "Jax!"

  "Can you see him?" Arco says over the comms, his voice sounding boxed like it's coming through clenched teeth.

  "No!" I answer, my eyes darting everywhere until I notice the white fabric casing from my suit's impact kit still attached to my toe caps. Scraps of this are all that was left of Arco's kit when the Leviathan imploded on him, I think, realizing now that mine must have triggered just before I hit the bottom of the falls. "My kit deployed! How do I get out of this bubble so I can go after him!? Jax! Can you hear me?" I call, pushing at the translucent, rubbery walls around me as my heart pounds in my ears. Liddick! I think, trying to keep back the wave of dread pushing over me again.

  "There's a button on the inside left cuff of your dive suit sleeve, Jazz—push it twice," Ellis says, and I fumble for it. "How close are you to the fissure on our sweep map?"

  "I don't know, I can't see anything from where I am. How are you getting down here?" I ask, remembering again that Arco's suit no longer has an impact kit.

  "We'll find a way, just stay on comms so we don't lose track of you, all right?" His voice is still clipped and tight, and I press my teeth together against the guilt I feel welling up inside me for shoving him when all he was trying to do was keep me safe. I swallow hard, then sigh in relief when I finally find the impact kit button at my wrist and push it. The bottom of my bubble gives way immediately, and I fall into the water. The beam of my shoulder lamp shoots wildly in all directions, but I still can't see anything except opaque white channels of bubbles under the surface. I need to get out of here, I think as my heart pounds in my ears, muffling some of the increasing, high-pitched ringing as I swim toward a wall that seems to waver in the haze when I catch a glance. Is that still Azeris's signal?

  "Jazz? What's happening?" I hear Arco's voice in my helmet. "Are you still all right? Did your kit retract?" I can't answer him at first because it's too hard to swim and talk, and by the time I get to the edge of the water, his voice is desperate. "Jazz!"

  "I'm OK!" I finally answer, catching my breath, "I'm getting out near the fissure opening—
can you see it? Can you see Jax? Something took him Arco!" I say, trying to get to my feet to raise my arms in a signal wave, but my breath is forced out in a whoosh as I'm grabbed from behind and pulled backward. My shoulder lamp clicks off when I start kicking, but it doesn't help loosen the grip. "Let me go!" I yell, forgetting that no one outside my helmet can hear me.

  "Jazz! OK, that's it…" Arco says over the comms, immediately followed by Avis's shouting.

  "Wait five seconds until I get the rest of the vertical terrain map! You don't have a kit!"

  My heart jumps into my throat as I realize Arco might swan dive off the cliff without thinking, just like Liddick, and I can't get the words out fast enough.

  "Arco, stop!" is all I manage to yell in reply before the grip tightens around my stomach again, squeezing off my words just before I stop hard against the rock wall.

  "Are you OK!? What's happening!?" Arco shouts over the comms, but I can only get out the first syllable of a response before I'm cut off again.

  Stow it! Liddick's words are loud in my head—louder than the squall of voices in my helmet yelling at Arco, and louder than the buzzing in my ears, which is now as strong as it was back in the cave after I saw Vox in my dream.

  "Liddick!" I gasp, throwing my arms around his neck when I see him in the dim orange light. "It's all right, don't jump! It's Liddick!" I call back over the comms, hoping Arco hasn't done anything stupid yet. Liddick moves me back so I can see his face again, water dripping over his forehead as his eyebrows dart in. He brings a finger to his lips, and I narrow my eyes at him, confused about why he's wet if his kit and helmet deployed—which they had to do, or he wouldn't be standing here—and how can he hear me through my helmet without wearing his any more?

  "He's there? Is he OK?" Dez asks on the cusp of a sob. I try to answer her, but Liddick starts again before I can get the words out.

  Finally, you hear me…just be quiet and still, he thinks scanning everything around us, but I only see the milky orange mist rising from the foot of the falls and the iridescent rock near us, which is speckled with glow worms whose brightness washes in and out in the haze.