The Underworld (The Atlas Series Book 3)

by Becca C. Smith

  She screamed at Talan: That’s Derek’s only ride home!

  He can’t die, Kala. He’ll be okay.

  He can die, over and over and over. He just keeps coming back to life and he’ll drown a thousand times over before he gets to safety! Kala’s mind reeled at the thought of her best friend being tortured for days by an endless cycle of drowning, then waking up only to drown again.

  She couldn’t let that happen.

  Kala wouldn’t let that happen.

  The fury in her grew, so intense that Kala was beginning to lose herself again. To the rage. To the fear.

  To Gaia.

  And the voice that came from deep within her, projected itself with searing rage into Oceanus’s head: If you draw your power from the water, then I will take the ocean away from you!

  Kala shot her hands out and swirling tornadoes of air formed from her palms. Bigger and bigger the cyclones grew until the water began to push away and form a cavern of air.

  The light from the XV-4250 gave an eerie cast to Oceanus’s face as he stopped his pursuit of the ship and turned to see the spectacle Kala was creating.

  It was exactly what she needed.

  Kala pushed her cyclones even farther, surrounding Oceanus, pulling him into the stadium-sized cavern of air she had created.

  In just seconds, he was cut off from the water. From his power.

  And Kala had created the domain Zeus would need to defeat his uncle.

  Air.

  Zeus’s face lit up at the terror he saw in Oceanus, now on the muddy ocean floor with Kala and Zeus.

  The Olympian spoke to Oceanus, but Kala could hear him, too: You’re going to wish she had consumed you.

  Zeus threw a raging boulder of lightning at Oceanus and it hit with frightening impact. It was as if Zeus had thrown a toaster into a bathtub and Oceanus was frying. Kala could see every detail as the glow from the Titan’s electrocution lit the entire area. Oceanus couldn’t move, his bluish skin rattled and spasmed as each shock to his system brought him more pain. Finally, the Titan lay on the ground, motionless.

  Oceanus looked like a large beached whale under a dome of black water.

  Kala’s mind slowly became her own again and she expanded her field of air to include the entrance to Hades’s cave.

  Unzipping her phase-suit hood, Kala spit out her oxygen mouthpiece and turned to Zeus. “Take down that protection spell.”

  Zeus didn’t argue.

  Kala could see in his eyes that he feared her.

  Good.

  Chapter Eight

  Kala ran over the rocks and mud to Derek and Rotoph and the XV-4250 that had landed next to them.

  By the time she reached them Rotoph had completed breaking the teleportation block. “Now Zeus and I can take down the protection spell together.” He stared up at Zeus, who had just joined them.

  The Olympian nodded and the two of them began chanting.

  Talan and Ashliel exited the ship to join them. Kala whirled on Talan, angrily. “How could you put Derek at risk like that?!”

  Derek interrupted before Talan could answer. “Whoa. Kala, I’m a soldier. I knew the risks. It was always a possibility I’d miss the boat.”

  “Not if I could help it.” Kala wasn’t letting the matter drop. “I had things under control.”

  Ashliel peered up at the blackness of the ocean above them in awe. “That’s putting it mildly.” He turned to Talan. “You said she was special. I thought you were exaggerating.”

  Kala didn’t like praise. It made her feel uncomfortable, so she turned back to Talan. “Well? Anything to say?”

  Derek stopped Talan again before he could speak, walking over to Kala so they were face-to-face. “Kala. Stop. I might have been fragile before, but I’m not now. And guess what? Even if I could die, I still would have come, because dying for a cause I believe in is what I signed up for. So stop treating me with kid gloves. Trust me, I really don’t need it.”

  Kala’s temper began to fade and the true emotion she had felt replaced it: terror. “The thought of you drowning over and over…”

  Derek nodded. “It would have sucked. Yes. But I’ve been through a lot worse.”

  Kala guffawed, “Ha! Like what?”

  “Like eating your chicken picatta.” Derek smirked.

  Shaking her head and cracking a small smile, she responded, “That was pretty bad.”

  “Yeah, undercooked chicken with an unmentionable sauce. I was puking capers for three days.” Derek laughed. “Now, no more yelling at lover-boy over there, got it?”

  Kala gave him the stink eye and lightly punched him in the gut. “I’ll drown you myself, dick.”

  Talan finally chimed in, “I saw you were in danger and I just reacted. I’m sorry.”

  A pang of guilt washed over Kala. Talan was always looking out for her and she always seemed to be chastising him for it. But it had been only days since Jack died. Since Kala murdered him. So, to have another man be completely in love with her, made her angry. She couldn’t explain it, but it was how she felt.

  BOOM!

  The ground shook from the noise. From the expressions on Zeus and Rotoph’s faces, it appeared the protection spells had been demolished.

  Zeus confirmed it as he said, “It’s done. You can use your little suit there, but you can teleport now.”

  “I’m not good enough at it yet and I don’t want to teleport into a rock or something,” Kala said in offhanded dismissal of Zeus’s nagging. “We needed to break the spell in case I need back up – which I won’t – but it’s nice to have the option.”

  Turning to Derek, she gave him a look that stated quite clearly she didn’t want an argument. “Go back with Ashliel and the boys. Talan will try and teleport to me once I’m in the Underworld.”

  Derek shook his head in wonder. “I’m still not used to you using words like ‘Underworld’ and being serious.” He reached down and gave Kala a hug. “Take care. And get out of there as soon as you possibly can.”

  “Oh, I will. I don’t plan on staying.” Kala hoped that was a true statement.

  Walking over to Talan she tried to reassure him with a small smile. “You think you can find me?”

  Talan held his feelings back as he nodded. “Yes. I’ve put the word out to Asmodeus as well. My sources say he’ll help.”

  Cryptic, but Kala knew it was hard for Talan to talk of Asmodeus. She didn’t want to admit it in front of Talan, but it gave her a measure of comfort that Asmodeus might show up in the Underworld. If anyone could get her out of an afterlife, it would most likely be the king of the Demons.

  “Well, then, let’s do this.” Kala used her holo-GPS to locate the exact place of entry that coincided with Turner’s satellite projections. She nodded to the black dome of water above them. “I have no idea how I did that, so I have no idea how long it’s going to last. I’d get back inside the ship if you don’t want to suddenly have a hundred tons of water fall on top of you.”

  Without another word, Kala pulled the tight hood back over her head and zipped it up. Activating her phase-suit, she dropped into the ground. Once her body was inside the rock and sand, Kala had to mimic swimming to pull herself down farther since there was no momentum otherwise. Before her eyes was a blackness even darker than the ocean had been. She had no idea how far down the cavern was but, surprisingly, a part of her was enjoying this time in the ground. Kala had learned that as a result of having Gaia in her veins, being immersed in the earth rejuvenated her. The phase-suit felt like a barrier separating her from her true home.

  She realized then that that was how she had created the giant bubble of air in the ocean. Kala had drawn from the earth and created a pocket of it in the depths of the ocean. Though water covered over seventy percent of the earth’s surface, there was still ground beneath, which made Kala strong as long as she was on the planet.

  But the Underworld? That was a different story. She didn’t know how her Gaia powers would work there, if they’
d work at all.

  Kala broke through the ceiling of the cave without notice, dropping ten feet to the ground. It wasn’t a graceful landing, but at least she wasn’t injured. She pulled off her hood, letting it rest behind her neck.

  Surveying her surroundings, Kala was definitely in the right place. She could tell by the lack of stalagmites and stalactites in her vision. But, since there was no sign of Hades, she was obviously in the wrong part of the grotto.

  It was a large cavern, moisture covering every surface of its rough-hewn rock and walls. There were over a dozen openings leading to different parts of the cavern. Kala wasn’t sure which one led to Hades. Walking over to a tunnel on the far left, Kala marked her spot by placing a small rock in the middle of the entranceway. If she was going on a hunt, she’d need to remember where she had been so she wouldn’t re-trace her steps.

  The tunnel walls were like the cave, wet and cold rock with crags and crevices that Kala was sure some kind of deep-water critters lived within. Not that creepy-crawlies bothered her; she just didn’t feel like having anything jump out at her at this particular juncture in life. It was bad enough that she was lower than the deepest part of the ocean searching for an Olympian god who had been given Titan-anesthesia for the last few millennia.

  Reaching the end of the tunnel happened quicker than Kala expected. It opened to a small five-foot by five-foot space with no sign of the sleeping god. Backtracking to the original cave took even less time. Kala repeated this process, searching each corridor and marking them with rocks as she went. It was difficult not to become frustrated after exploring her eleventh tunnel. She had held a bit of hope on that last one since it had been at least half a mile long. But it only opened out onto a small pool of water that seemed as if it belonged in some kind of treasure hunting movie where Kala would find the lost jewel of something-or-other.

  Only three more corridors to go. Kala knew that this place must be some kind of Titan-hideout, and it amazed her to fathom how much of this world Kala knew nothing about. Even before learning about the supernatural, Kala had always found it fascinating that so much of the planet was unexplored. Of course, she hadn’t expected to be the one exploring it, but in a way, Kala was glad she was. She still wasn’t ruling out the possibility that she was in a coma somewhere and this was all a dream.

  Returning to what Kala referred to as the main cave hub, she noticed all the rocks she had used as markers were gone. It took a few seconds to process, then Kala was instantly on guard. If she didn’t move them, someone else had. Someone who either didn’t want her finding Hades – or just wanted to mess with her. When it came to supernatural beings, it could be either. Not one to dwell on changing circumstances and the fact that she had no way to remember which way to go, Kala surveyed the room with a soldier’s eye.

  If someone was there, they could be lurking just out of view in any one of the tunnel entrances. Kala moved to stay close to the walls so she wouldn’t be an obvious target.

  Even though her gun was empty of bullets, she pulled it out from her phase-suit and carried it as if it was locked and loaded. Only Kala needed to know that she had no ammunition. Sidling the walls, Kala examined the tunnel openings one at a time, leveling her gun as she faced each entrance.

  Nothing.

  Just as Kala was about to relax and explore what she thought were the last three tunnels, a woman’s voice came out from behind her. “Hello, Kala.”

  Spinning around with her gun in hand, Kala aimed the firearm at a woman standing in the center of the cave. She was stunning, with long auburn hair that rested all the way to the small of her back and a face with strong, angled features that made her appear Native American. The woman dressed in a deep forest green pants suit and looked as if she could both run a fortune 500 company while at the same time blend into a forest as if she were half elf.

  Kala jiggled the gun in the woman’s direction. “Just stay right there. Who are you?”

  Probably another Titan, Kala inwardly groaned. But as she wracked her Atlas memories to recognize this lady, she was coming up with nothing.

  The woman examined Kala knowingly. “You can put that toy away. It’s not loaded and Roberta’s bullets wouldn’t hurt me even if it was.”

  Dropping all pretense, Kala holstered her weapon inside her phase-suit. “Are you with the Turners? How did you get down here?” As soon as the words spilled out of Kala’s mouth, she knew it was a ludicrous idea that any human could be down in these caves.

  “You know who I am.” The woman eyed her with a slight smile.

  Kala was about to say that this lady was crazy, but instead found herself saying, “Gaia.”

  Gaia nodded, impressed. “You’re the first being I’ve let see me in thousands of years.”

  Gaia.

  Standing in front of her.

  Real.

  Mother Nature herself.

  Instead of saying something profound and meaningful, Kala muttered, “Everyone thought you were asleep.” Such intelligence.

  Gaia raised an eyebrow in contemplation. “It was easier to let them think that. The truth is, I despise them all and wanted nothing to do with any of them.”

  “I can definitely relate,” Kala agreed.

  Gaia laughed. “I know you do. That’s why I’m showing myself to you after all this time. You’re special, Kala Hicks. The only one of my children who has any sense.”

  “Wait. What?” Kala did a double take. “Atlas is your grandson not your child.”

  Gaia stepped up to Kala and placed her hand on Kala’s cheek. “Atlas is my grandson, but you are my child.”

  “But… dumpster,” was all that came out of Kala’s mouth.

  Gaia let her hand drop and her eyes were distant from the memory, seemingly full of regret. “That was unfortunate, but human waste was the best way to hide my scent on you. I couldn’t let Cronus find you or even know you existed. I’m sorry for that.”

  “But I was human.” Kala couldn’t seem to wrap her head around what Gaia was telling her.

  “Yes. Because your father is human. I rather like your kind. I’ve been living among them since I separated from my children and grandchildren. As stupid as humans can be, it’s nothing compared to my offspring.” Gaia wasn’t holding back her feelings about her family, Kala noticed – then Gaia’s eyes met hers again and they were alight with pride.

  “I’d never been able to have a human child before you. It was quite a surprise. I knew I couldn’t keep you, but I made sure someone found you in that dumpster. It took years, but eventually your essence beamed like a beacon to anyone who was looking. Fortunately, only the Grigori were looking.” Gaia sighed. “That’s their job, finding extraordinary humans and bringing them to their full potential. Owen saw your light and found you.” She smiled. “I was so happy it was Owen. He was always one of my favorites. When Rotoph helped the handful of Grigori escape two hundred years ago I was pleased that he was among them.”

  Gaia’s words flew over Kala like butterflies she couldn’t catch.

  Kala knew she had a piece of Gaia inside of her, but she had just thought…

  What did she think?

  Kala realized in that moment that she hadn’t thought about how Gaia was in her at all. She had just accepted it and used Gaia’s powers whenever she could. But her mother? It was overwhelming. Emotions threatened to boil over. Not only had she found her mom, but Gaia was the mother of all the Titans and grandmother to the Olympians!

  Kala’s regained her composure – then scrunched her face in disgust. “So, Cronus is my brother? That’s awesome.” She couldn’t hide the sarcasm if she tried. Then another thought hit her, “And Zeus is my nephew? No wonder I want to punch him all the time.” Kala continued her rant, “And what does it mean that I swallowed my other nephew?”

  Gaia gently touched Kala’s arm to focus back on her. “You’re only half related to them, if it makes any difference. You’re still half human as well.”

  “Even now tha
t I took over Atlas?” Kala was happy to finally ask someone who had answers. Devouring Atlas may have made her immortal, but if Gaia was her mother… maybe she always was.

  “You’ll always be half human no matter how many of my offspring you consume. But I don’t recommend it, it can be an uncomfortable experience. Uranus forced me to consume my children, but eventually I let Cronus free and he… took care of my husband.”

  “Wait a minute. Stop right there. Are you saying I can un-consume Atlas? Like spit him out or something?” Kala’s head was reeling. Could that really even be a possibility? Letting Atlas out like the annoying gnat he was? Even before she heard the answer, Kala already felt a pang of devastation. If she could have released Atlas in the beginning, then Jack died for nothing.

  Kala was surprised that she felt instant relief when Gaia shook her head. “You are my daughter, but you’re not me. No. Atlas is dead, you can’t spit him out. But his memories and powers are inside you for good. When I look at you, Atlas is you.” Her eyes twinkled with amazement. “You’re something new, Kala Hicks. That’s why I had to see you.”

  More thoughts raced through Kala’s brain. “So, my father is a human?” When Gaia nodded, Kala responded, “Can you tell me who he is?” Being in a cave under the ocean talking to her mother for the first time, who happened to be the mother of the gods and asking about her father, was beyond surreal for Kala.

  Gaia took a deep breath and slowly shook her head. “I’ll tell you someday, but not today.”

  “Do I know him?” Kala asked.

  “No. But he doesn’t even know you exist and he knows nothing of who I really am. I haven’t seen him since I found out I was pregnant with you. I was so shocked and scared of who you would become I took you as far away from him as possible. As you’ve figured out, I don’t exactly have a great track record with having decent children.” Gaia tilted her head in thought. “But that might have more to do with Uranus being their father. Your dad was a good man and seeing who you are today, I may have gotten it right this time. I just need you to be patient. Can you do that?”