Atlantis Unleashed (4 page)

“Mom,” Keely interrupted, marveling that her mother hadn't seemed to take a single breath during the barrage of questions. “Mom, yes, I'm home and I'm fine.”

She knew from experience not to answer individual questions, or the conversation would never veer back on course. “But how about you? How's your arthritis? How's Dad?”

“Well, we're fine, honey. But Daddy's worried about you, especially since we haven't heard from you in so long. Have you been suffering any from . . . your condition?”

Guilt mixed with pain bit into Keely. Somehow her parents could always cut her the deepest, even though they meant well.

Especially because they meant well.

“Mom, you know my
condition
is not a disease. I'm just a little bit psychic. When I touch objects, I get impressions—Mom, we've been over all of this for years and years.”

There was a silence on the phone, and then the quiet sound of sniffling, as though her mother were trying not to cry. Again.

Keely wondered how many other daughters caused their mother such heartache simply by existing, but tried to shove the thought away when the acid in her stomach lurched its way up to cyclone force.

“Do you still have to wear those gloves to avoid touching anything? Have you seen Dr. Koontz? He says if you'd try the hypnosis again—”

“No, I'm never going to see Dr. Koontz again, Mom. He thinks I'm crazy. He refused to believe me, even when I gave him proof by reading that pencil holder his son made for him.”

“That wasn't very nice, Keely. Making up stories about his poor little boy locking his sister in the closet,” her mother said, voice chiding.

“It wasn't a story, and if you'd watched him closely when I told him my vision, you'd know that he'd suspected his son of bullying for some time. Anyway, I couldn't go back even if I wanted to. Dr. Koontz fired me as a patient.”

She hadn't known shrinks could do that—fire people—but evidently they could. Like most people who'd seen her “talent” up close and personal, he'd never wanted anything to do with her again. Maybe some irony there. Even the shrinks thought she was a freak. Maybe she didn't need to go there, even in the privacy of her own insecurities.

She hoped he'd at least gotten his son under control.

“Can I talk to Dad?”

“Well, he's, um . . .” Her mother's voice faltered. “He's having a little nap.”

Right. The lump in Keely's throat was suddenly back, and bigger.

“Dad's never taken a nap in his life, Mom. Couldn't you at least try to come up with something believable?”

“Keely, you know that he loves you. He just doesn't know how to deal with your . . . your problem.”

“Right, Mom.” She tried to keep the bitterness out of her voice but could tell she was failing badly. “My problem. Well, hey, I need to go. Hundreds of voice-mail messages to return, letters to answer. You know, from the people who
do
want to talk to me.”

“Keely! That's not fair. You know I'm always so happy to hear from you.”

Keely softened. “I know, Mom. I was thinking I might come by for a visit this week. We could drive up to—”

“Oh, honey, this isn't a good week. We, ah, we're just so busy. I'll call you this weekend and we'll have another chat, okay?”

“Right, Mom. Okay. This weekend. I—” Keely's voice faltered, but she took a deep breath and forced the words to come. Forced herself to say the words to the mother who didn't even want to see her. “I love you, Mom.”

“I love you, too, baby. We'll talk soon.”

After she hung up the phone, Keely put her head down on her arms, there on her dusty desk, in the middle of her silent office, and finally gave in to the tears.

Present day, the Void created by Anubisa,
goddess of Chaos and Night

Justice floated in a dark dimension composed entirely of pain, his mind cannibalizing his memories for some sense of himself. Viscous as a thick, murky potion conjured by a dark sorceress, the pain surrounded him, taunted him, buffeted him, and cradled him until he no longer existed other than as a supplicant, a slave, an unwilling participant in a twisted and torturous game.

His consciousness had dwindled down to the barest pin-prick of flickering light. He knew his name, knew he was Justice in a vastness of injustice, knew that his sacrifice had saved others whose names had long been torn from his mind. But nobility was as nothing against the pain; the pain ate nobility, consumed strength, devoured pride. Ate the Body until what was left of the Body burned in acid rebellion against the Mind. The Mind screamed and howled, silent shrieks of protest against an unyielding evil that licked his blood, feasted on his terror, and laughed a dark, breathless humor of longing.

But the memories flashed, taunting him with their evanescence. First, a glimpse of the beginning. There was the cavern, and then there was after. After had been when the pain began. Of that, at least, he was sure.

She sat on the edge of the bed, which sank perceptibly, as though the sheer force of the fury and death that rode her soul added weight to her slender frame. Almost against his will, he touched a lock of her mass of hair that hung down to her hips. Or maybe it
was
against his will. Maybe she was manipulating him so expertly that he didn't even realize it.

Knowledge shot Justice into consciousness even as pain ate the memory. So he'd cooperated? Had pretended to desire her? His skin tried to crawl off of his body at the thought.

At what point did evil permeate one's soul? Lie down with dogs . . . So what if you lay down with dog goddesses? Visions of mutant fleas the size of mountain lions eating his liver did nothing to reassure him of his sanity, but the brief flare of black humor reminded him of someone.

Of something.

Perhaps of himself?

But sanity dwindled, and his brief return to lucidity faded under the pain. He was Justice, and he had been buried in the pain for years or centuries or millennia—or merely minutes?—but the pain existed outside the reality of time until only the insanity of stretched and tortured perception remained.

But the flickering point of light that was all that remained of his Being waited and watched and plotted. Because he was Justice and—no matter the eons of time that passed before his time finally came—Justice would be served.

As if to reward the courage flying in the face of utter futility, hope crouching in the shadow of utter hopelessness, a window opened into the darkness and he saw through the shadows to a face. The face was Other, not his face, not his mind, not Justice. The face was Female, but not evil. Not female death or destruction or despair. As he watched the face, watched
her
, entranced by the vividly green eyes that shone so brightly they cast a shimmer of light into his eternal darkness, his vision expanded to include her upper body and her hands, which touched something at her throat.

A wooden carving?

She held it up and pressed it against her lips, even as tears shimmered in the emeralds of her eyes and slowly traced a path down her cheeks.

Suddenly the flash of recognition struck him, nearly enough to yank him back to sanity. The carving was a small wooden fish, an oddly shaped species somewhat like a clownfish, but one he'd only seen in the very depths of the ocean. They clustered near the base of the dome covering Atlantis and seemed to entertain the children who loved to watch them.

As he had, in long ago, far more innocent days.

No landwalker would have seen that fish. So none could have carved it. Whoever she was, she held
his
carving. As he watched her cry, alone and silent, a single, crystalline tear dropped onto the carving she still held to her lips. Somehow, even though it was impossible, he felt the pain of it dig into his chest.

Impossible or not, the carving connected them. He shouted out some wordless noise of longing or loss or loneliness, and through whatever magic or hallucination that swirled between them, she heard him.

Just for an instant, she gasped and blinked those beautiful eyes and seemed to stare straight at him.

Then as the vision or mirage of her vanished and he was plunged back into the darkness but not into the despair, he realized one undeniable truth.

She was
his
.

Or she was a figment of his imagination. Suspended alone in the unending dark, Justice began to laugh.