Lost in Babylon

Marco groaned. “They’ll require a chaperone, or an official KI submarine, whatever. That’ll take the fun out of it. We’ll do this fast, I promise. You will thank me!”

I stepped closer to the water. Toward the sound. An hour ago we had no Loculi, and now we have a chance at two. Two of seven.

But I stopped short. Bhegad was shouting now. Freaking out. Completely confused by what was going on. Why we were standing by the bank of a river, looking like we were about to go for a swim? Were we nuts?

I stepped back, shaking my head. We needed the KI’s support. Marco’s flight was a huge complication. A good plan was better than chaos. Just because the Song of the Heptakiklos beckoned, I didn’t mean we had to listen right this instant. “Just give me a couple of seconds, Marco,” I said.

As I turned toward Bhegad and the others, I felt a vise-like hand land on my shoulder. And I was flying back toward the water.

“Banzaaiiiiii!” Marco had us all in his grip, our feet off the ground. “Take a deep breath, hang on—and most of all, trust me!”

We had no choice. Together, we fell into the darkness of the Euphrates.

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weed-choked muck.

No wonder Marco couldn’t find the second Loculus. You couldn’t see three feet in front of your nose.

As I swam, trying to keep up with him, noodle-like shapes slimed my face. Marco was holding tight to Cass. The fluorescent strip on Cass’s backpack flashed occasionally in the dim ribbons of light that somehow broke through the water. I was getting colder by the second. With my clothes and shoes, I felt heavy like a whale.

Down … down … how far was this thing? It was practically black now. The light was way too far over our heads.

As far down as you go, you will need an equal amount of air to swim back up. It’s what I learned in summer camp. I learned to sense when I was half spent. And I was way past that. Already my head felt light and my heart seemed about to explode.

Marco wasn’t slowing a bit. Aly banged me on the shoulder. She was gesturing, urging me to go back up with her. I knew she was right. Marco was going to kill us. How far were we supposed to go? What exactly were we going to see—and where?

Ahead of me, Marco had stopped swimming. He still held tight to Cass, who was now hanging limply in the water. The two of them were silhouetted by a weird, dull yellow glow below them.

As I swam toward them, I realized I was gaining speed. An undertow.

I tried to pull back but I couldn’t. The glow was intensifying, looming closer. It was a circle of bright tiles with a center of solid black. In front of me, Marco seemed to be changing shape—blowing out to an amorphous humanoid blob, then shrinking to clam-size.

What’s going on?

My head snapped back, and suddenly I was surging into the black hole as if sprung by a giant rubber band.

As I passed through the hole, it let out a deep, threatening buzz. A halo of green-white light shot sparks from its circumference into my body. My mouth opened into an involuntary scream. I collided with Marco and Cass, but they felt porous, as if our molecules were joining, passing through one another. My left leg smacked against something hard, and I bounced away.

I was spinning with impossible speed, as if my head were in ten places at once. And then I felt myself catapulted forward, and I thought my limbs would separate into different directions.

But they didn’t. I flattened out, decelerating. The water’s temperature abruptly dropped, and so did its texture. All at once it had become clear and cool—and I was whole again. Solid. But the change had unsettled every biological function inside me. My brain registered relief, but my lungs were in chaos. As if someone had reached inside and squeezed them with a steel fist.

Aly … Marco … Cass. I spotted them all in my peripheral vision, rising. But Cass’s legs hung like tentacles, undulating with each of Marco’s powerful thrusts. Those two would reach the surface first. I pushed with all remaining strength, fighting to stay conscious. Aiming toward a dull, flat-gray surface glow above us.

My arms slowed … then stopped.

I felt myself traveling to a dream world of bright sun and cool breezes. I was floating over a field of waving grass, where a white-robed shape stood from a circle embedded in the ground.

As she turned, I could see the seven Loculi, glowing, revolving. They seemed to blend together, so their shapes merged into a kind of circular cloud.

The Dream.

No. I don’t want it now. Because I’m not asleep. Because if I have the Dream now, it might be because I’m dead.

“I knew you would come.”

The voice was unfamiliar, yet I felt it was a part of me. I knew instantly who the figure was. She turned slowly. Her eyes were the color of a clear tropical ocean, her face gentle and kind, ringed with a floating mane of glorious red hair.

Her name was Qalani.

Whenever I’d seen her, it had been in a ring of explosions, some kind of strange flashback to the destruction of Atlantis. In the Dream, I came close to death but always woke up.

Here, she had come to meet me. As always, her face looked familiar. She resembled my mom, Anne McKinley—and now, deep under the Euphrates, it was more than a resemblance. It was a beckoning, a welcoming.

“Hi, Mom,” I said.

“I’ve been waiting,” she said with a knowing smile. “Welcome to have you back.”

I couldn’t help grinning. Our old family saying! I’d blurted it out to Dad once, when he returned from a business trip to Manila. From then on, we always used it as our own private joke.

I felt strangely peaceful as she reached toward me. I would be fine. I would finally be meeting her, in a better place.

Her hand gripped my shoulder, and darkness quickly closed in.

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broke through the water’s surface. Air rushed into my mouth like a solid projectile. I sucked in huge gulps.

She was gone.

“Mo-o-om!” I shouted.

“No! Marco!” a voice shouted back.

I blinked water from my eyes. I could see Marco rising and falling on a wild current. He let go of me, swimming toward Aly, pushing her toward the bank. I could see her struggling to stand, grabbing onto Cass’s arm.

I was too far into the middle, the deeper water. I struggled to push myself high enough above the surface for a proper breath. As I went under again, I fought to stay conscious.

“Hang on, brother!” Marco shouted.

His fingers locked around my arm. He was swimming beside me, pulling us both toward the bank. His arms dug hard into the frothing current. Aly and Cass were struggling onto the shore, staring over their shoulders at me in horror.

Marco and I bounced downstream in a helpless zigzag. We careened around a jutting rock that rose up between us, forcing Marco to let go of me. Directly in our path was a downed tree. I kicked hard and up, opened my arms, and let it hit me full force in the chest. My legs swept under the wood as I held tight.

“Marco!” I yelled.

“Here!” Marco clung to the tree about three feet to my left, closer to the riverbank. We both hung there, catching our breaths. “How’s your grip, Brother Jack? Steady?”