I stepped in. Immediately, a Harley-shaped bulldozer hurtled into me, almost sending me flying back into the corridor.
“I missed you so much!” She flung her arms around me and squeezed tight. This time, I knew exactly what to do. No limp-arm syndrome here. I pulled her close and hugged her hard, stopping just short of crushing her.
“I missed you, too,” I murmured into her shoulder. “So friggin’ much.”
She pulled away. “It’s so good to see you, Finch. Seriously, after you disappeared from the Jubilee mine, I almost lost my mind. Everyone was pretty glad when I finally got word from Ryann that you were okay. I went a bit militant for a while.”
I chuckled. “What’s new? I blame the special-agent uniform.”
“Hey, I like this uniform.” She stared at me like she couldn’t quite believe I was real.
“That’s part of the problem. You’ll have everyone saluting next.”
Her eyes turned suddenly sad. “You look like crap, bro. Haven’t you been sleeping?”
“Not really.” I’d popped two more pills before I came back, to keep the gremlins behind enemy lines. But I could still feel them nagging away, trying to wiggle through. Like mental fruit flies that I couldn’t get rid of, no matter what I did.
She looked concerned. “You’re not doing well, are you?”
I shrugged. “You know me. I’ll be fine, I’ve just got a lot on my plate.”
“Are you going to tell me what exactly is on your plate?” She ushered me over to the stools by the main workbench. I sank down, letting out the kind of weary groan you’d expect from an octogenarian trying to get out of an armchair.
I hesitated. “Didn’t Ryann tell you?”
“She told me you were on a job for Erebus, that’s it. I tried to get her to say more, but she said you’d explain when you were ready.” Harley put her hand on mine and curled her fingers around it. “What’s going on with you, huh? You can tell me. Whatever it is, I’m here for you.”
“I know…” The “but” hovered in the air between us.
“Actually, I’ve done some research into Erebus myself. I know you told me not to get involved, but he’s got you by the balls, Finch, and I couldn’t just sit here and do nothing. I wanted to try and find something, anything, to… well, get your balls free, if that’s not super-weird of me to say.”
I gaped at her. “You haven’t. Tell me you haven’t.”
“I’m your sister and you’re in trouble. Of course I wasn’t going to listen to you.” She squeezed my hand tighter.
Panic rushed through my veins, piggybacking on my twitchy anxiety. She’d been researching Erebus? Why hadn’t she listened? I’d more or less begged her not to do anything about it, and she’d gone ahead and investigated anyway. Then again, I’d have been a class-A hypocrite if I laid into her about it. If she were in my position, I’d have done exactly the same thing, swooping in to try and save her. In fact, I’d already done that.
I’d snapped at Erebus just this morning about being transparent, when I was leaving my own trail of frustrating breadcrumbs for my sister. Knowledge had power. And, maybe, the best way to keep Harley safe was to give her the bigger picture. Then, she might understand the danger everyone I cared about was in. And that might be enough to stop her from digging deeper and traveling into even more treacherous waters.
“You need to stop looking into Erebus,” I said. “I’ll tell you what’s been going on, but you have to promise not to keep investigating on your own.”
She peered at me cautiously. “How can I promise that if I don’t know what you’re going to tell me?”
“You just have to.” I sighed. “Please, sis. Trust me on this.”
“I can give you a conditional promise.” Why do you always have to be so stubborn?
“Unconditional, or I can’t tell you the truth,” I insisted. “Lives are at stake if you don’t. Namely, yours.”
Her gaze darkened. “Okay… then, I guess I promise.”
“Unconditionally?”
She bit the inside of her cheek. “Fine. Unconditionally.”
“Here’s the short version.” I took a breath. “Erebus is planning something huge. I don’t know what—I really don’t—but it’s big. I don’t know what Garrett and Saskia told you about the Jubilee mine, but Erebus got himself a nifty little meat suit from the Fountain of Youth hidden there, which is now drained and buried under all that rock. Now, he’s looking for Atlantis.”
“Atlantis?” she gasped. “Why Atlantis?”
“Oh, you have no idea how many times I’ve asked that question. It’s literally on repeat in my head, like I’ve been Atlantis rick-rolled.”
She gave a nervous smile. “Erebus isn’t spilling the beans?”
“Erebus never spills the beans. So, I have no idea why he’s looking for Atlantis, but I do know he’s not on the same psychotic trail as my mother. A shred of good news in a mountain of crap. He says none of this has anything to do with enslaving humanity, and, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I believe him. It seems… personal, somehow.”
“How can you be sure?” She leaned forward on her stool, no doubt having Elysium flashbacks. I could almost see the memories of Katherine’s cracking face flitting across her eyes, oozing black goop.
“The human body gives it away,” I replied. “It took him a lot of scheming to get it, and it’s giving him a few glitches. Glitches he’d already prepared for by sending me across the globe, picking up Ephemeras. If he wanted to lord it over humans, he’d have done it already. He’s still powerful enough to make it happen, so we’re not dealing with Katherine Mark 2.”
Harley’s mouth gaped like a beached fish. “So, Erebus is… human now?”
“Well, human hybrid is more accurate,” I replied. “He’s got most of the Child of Chaos juice, but he’s run into some limitations now that he’s all fleshy.”
“Is that what the Ephemeras were for?” That was the beauty of Harley—she always asked the right things.
I nodded. “I didn’t know why I was collecting them at the time, but most of the trips I took for him involved finding rare Ephemeras from ancient magicals. They’re basically like his premium unleaded, to fuel his human body and make the limitations less of a problem for him.”
“Is that where you’ve been? Searching for more Ephemeras?” She kicked her foot anxiously against the workbench.
“No, Erebus tasked me with finding Atlantis. That’s what I’ve been doing.”
She took a shaky breath. “Did you find it?”
“Yeah, I did.”
“You found it?! It’s real?” Her eyes bugged. “I mean… how did you find it? How do you even go about finding a mythical place like that? Atlantis is the biggie, right—up there with El Dorado and Shangri La, and all that legendary stuff?”
“Oh yeah, and that, my sweet sis, is a pretty long story. Let’s just say I had to go into an altered state of mind for it. A bit like Euphoria.” I wasn’t deliberately keeping the monastery from her; I just didn’t have the energy to go into detail. My body felt like lead, and the more I spoke, the more I sensed the uprising of the gremlins. Besides, the specifics didn’t matter.