Chapter 1: Discovery

It happened in fifth period. One moment, Mr. Williamson was lecturing on convection currents. The next, the world was shaking.

Kim all but fell out of her chair as the air filled with screams. Mr. Williamson was the loudest of all, shouting to take cover under the desks. Crashes echoed through the classroom as a frame fell off the wall and books fell off the shelves. Kim jumped as a ceiling tile crashed down on top of her desk.

Just as suddenly as it began, it was over. But Kim's head was still spinning, and panic that wasn't hers flooded her mind, deafening in its intensity. She cringed, already feeling the migraine. She didn't move until water started flowing under the door. Mr. Williamson immediately ordered everyone to evacuate.

Kim happily obliged, this time her chest seizing in panic of her own as she thought of her two best friends. Her class was fine, if shaken (literally—heh). But who knows what had happened to the others?

The minute she was outside, Kim rushed to find her friends. They had only been a few classrooms over, and everyone was flooding out the doors while the fire alarm wailed, hurrying the evacuation.

"Kim!"

"Over here!"

Kim whirled and let out a breath she hadn't known she was holding. Her two best friends were waving, clearly shaken and a little bruised but none the worse for wear. Kyra had a cut on her cheek and there was dust in Raegan's hair. But they were both okay. And now Kim could summon the control to silence the panicked shouting that was giving her a migraine.

"Thank God you're okay," Kim breathed, embracing her two friends. Raegen tried and failed to resist; he never could.

"Not like we've never experienced an earthquake before. I mean, this is California," Kyra said, waving off Kim's worry once she released them.

"Not to mention the San Andreas fault is barely fifty miles from here," Raegan pointed out with a smirk.

"Nerd," Kyra said, shaking her head.

"And proud of it." Raegan puffed out his chest.

"Ray, you're covered in dust," Kim said with mild disapproval.

Raegen shook his blond hair out like a dog, creating a shower of plaster dust that drifted to the grass. Then he glanced toward the school. "Do you think we'll get to go home early?"

"Probably; my classroom was flooding by the time we got out," Kyra said.

"Mine, too. I 'heard' that one of the water mains broke," Kim replied.

"Can you 'hear' anything now?" Kyra asked. "Confirmation, maybe?"

"I could, but I just barely managed to shut it out. Would you want to listen to this mess 24-7?" Kim gestured vaguely at the crowd of gossiping and panicked students. Their voices were so loud that the trio could barely hear each other.

Kyra winced. "Sorry. I forget that you can't just switch it on and off."

"I wish. Then I wouldn't have to listen to Jessica swooning over Marcus from across the school every day." Kim grimaced in distaste. "It's awful."

Raegan winced in sympathy. "Yeah. She's bad enough when she talks. I don't even want to think about what goes through her mind."

Kim was about to reply when the loudspeaker crackled to life. "School is canceled for the rest of the day due to flooding from a broken pipe. Buses will arrive within the hour. Travel safely and use your common sense—there may still be aftershocks."

The principal's voice echoed across the school grounds, but the second half of his announcement was almost lost amid the cheering. Kim rolled her eyes.

"I repeat," the loudspeaker continued, "school is canceled for the rest of the day. Buses will arrive within the hour. The school will remain closed until its safety can be verified. You will be informed when you can return for your belongings. Further details will be released as they come."

The trio exchanged a glance and then shrugged, ignoring the sudden outburst of protest. Then they headed around the school to begin the walk home. Neither Raegan nor Kim had their house keys, but Kyra did, and they were always more than welcome at each other's houses, seeing as they grew up on the same street together.

For fun, they took a detour around by the old playground. It was right on the edge of a wooded area near the not-so-nice part of town and had been more or less abandoned for years, falling into disuse once the new and fancier one was built in their neighborhood eight years ago. But Kim, Kyra, and Raegan still liked to hang out there, since it was the playground they'd grown up with. Now that they were in high school, though, they usually just sat on the jungle gym and gossiped.

When they arrived, though, they let out a gasp of dismay. Where there used to be a wooden play castle was a huge crack in the ground. It went right through the entire playground, revealing water pipes and electrical lines now dusted with wood chips. The jungle gym hung off the edge of the crack.

"The earthquake canceled school but destroyed our hangout? Where's the justice?" Kyra exclaimed dramatically.

"Easy, Ky. Our climbing tree is still intact." Raegan pointed to an old, gnarled oak tree right on the edge of the woods, its twisting branches forming benches and stairs, perfect for climbing or perching. Old, decaying boards were nailed to the tree, evidence that a few people had tried to build a treehouse there years ago. The missing or broken boards proved their failure.

Kyra sighed. "I guess there's that." She carefully crossed the space between where they stood and the tree on the other side of the playground, then deftly hauled herself into the lower branches. Kim and Raegan followed, avoiding the smaller cracks that crisscrossed the clearing. They climbed onto their favorite branches and made themselves comfortable.

The damage to the area was more obvious from their higher vantage point. The big crack that toppled the play castle was much wider than they'd thought originally. The smaller cracks that branched out from it formed a pattern that made it look as though a section of the ground was about to give way at any moment.

The tree shook.

"Quit it, Raegan," Kyra complained.

"It's not me."

"Or me," Kim said before Kyra could ask.

"Then—"

"It's an aftershock!"

The tree shook harder, and they clung to the trunk for fear of falling out. Kim held onto the rough bark like a lifeline, her eyes squeezed shut. She cursed herself for choosing the highest branch.

An earsplitting crack split the air right as the tremors stopped.

Choking on the dust in the air, Kim opened her eyes and shook the leaves and dirt out of her hair. Then her eyes went wide.

The section crisscrossed with cracks had given way, falling into a deep cavern. But it wasn't just a hole in the ground. It was—

"Is that a tunnel?" Kyra asked in shock. She scrambled down from the tree for a closer look.

"Kyra, wait. It's not—"

"Aah!"

Kyra fell right through the ground in a cascade of dirt and sod.

"Kyra!" Kim and Raegan scrambled down the tree to kneel around the hole Kyra had fallen into. It wasn't as deep as Kim had first thought, but it was still at least a ten-foot drop.

"I'm okay. Just—" Kyra broke into a coughing fit. "Ugh. Dirt everywhere! Just a little bruised." The dirt at the bottom of the hole shifted and Kyra's head broke through.

"Can you stand?"

"What do you see?"

Kyra carefully stood up and looked around. "It is a tunnel! It looks like it heads into the woods one way, and back towards the school the other way."

"That's great and all, but can you get out?"

"Um…" Kyra looked up at them sheepishly. "A little help, maybe?"

It was too far to reach in and grab her hand. Kim looked around for a long branch and found one not far into the trees. She lugged it back and lowered it down toward Kyra. Then she braced herself, and Raegan wrapped his arms around her waist to steady her. Kyra grabbed the branch and, with an immense effort, Kim and Raegan managed to haul her out.

Kyra climbed over the edge of the hole, gasping. She was absolutely filthy, covered in dirt, dead leaves, and bits of grass, and her legs and arms were littered with small cuts.

Kim fell backward and tossed away the branch, then blew on her scraped-up, stinging palms.

"You girls all right?" Raegan asked.

"Yeah." They both nodded. "A hot bath and a few band-aids and I'll be fine," Kyra added.

"Then let's go home."

"But the tunnel—"

"We can explore it some other time, when we're certain the ceiling won't collapse on us," Kim said dryly.

Kyra laughed sheepishly. "Yeah, I guess you're right."

"She's always right," Reagan quipped, grinning.

***

It was a week before the school was deemed safe enough to open up again. The water pipes were repaired, as were the few broken ceiling tiles and cracks in the plaster walls. It wasn't a relaxing week, though; there were about half a dozen minor aftershocks in the few days immediately following the main quake, and Kim's parents were tense.

The morning of the first day of school after the earthquake, Kim's dad solemnly pulled her aside and handed her a rectangular box about the size of her hand. Eyes wide, Kim ripped the box open and gaped at the shiny new smartphone that lay inside.

"I—but—you said I had to wait until Christmas!" Kim exclaimed. Her old flip phone had broken a month ago, so she'd been making do without.

"We know, but...after the earthquake, we wanted you to have a way to contact us in case of emergency. When the school called last Tuesday and said they were sending everyone home, we expected you back much earlier than you were," Dad said.

"We panicked," Mom added, a little sheepish but her eyes still scared. "But now, we have a way to contact you, and you have a way to contact us."

"We only have two rules for you with this," Dad said. "First, you tell us right away where you're going if it's not school or a previously agreed-upon outing, and call us immediately if you think you're going to be late. And second, you have to keep your grades up—if your schoolwork suffers because you're spending too much time on social media, we reserve the right to confiscate the phone until your grades are back where they're supposed to be. Deal?"

With wide eyes, Kim nodded. "Deal."

"It's already activated and programmed with the home number and our work numbers. I imagine you'll fill the rest of the contacts quickly," Mom said with a faint smile.

"Thank you!" Kim exclaimed, finally recovering from the shock. She hugged both her parents, then grabbed her backpack. "We'll probably take the long way home!" she called as she hurried out the door.

"Be safe!"

Kim waved again in acknowledgment, then turned and hurried down the street.

At the corner, she was soon met by Kyra and Raegan. On the way to school, she eagerly showed them her new phone and put their numbers in.

"Man, I'm so jealous!" Kyra lamented as she pocketed her own smartphone. The screen was cracked and the corner was chipped from dropping it two months ago. "My dad said that as long as I can still make calls, I don't need a new one!"

"Both of yours are still better than mine," Raegan said dryly, showing his old-model blackberry phone. "I've got my sister's hand-me-down now that she's off at college with a 'real job.'"

Kim smirked at the audible air quotes in his voice.

"I don't think Mom's figured out she works at Hooters as a bartender," Raegan added, rolling his eyes. The other two snickered.

At school, all anyone could talk about was the earthquake. Mostly, it was complaints about how school wasn't closed for longer. Barely any classwork got done, and they had an earthquake drill during seventh period.

At least the students took the drill seriously now.

Kim breathed a sigh of relief when the final bell rang. Like every day, she had a headache from the ceaseless chatter in her mind. She'd been able to hear other people's thoughts since before she could talk. At first it had been mostly impressions—images and emotions that a two-year-old could actually comprehend. But over the years, it grew more complex. Now, if she concentrated, she could basically experience the world through someone else's eyes. Kyra had been kind enough to be her guinea pig for those experiments. Raegen was the one who grounded her when things became too much.

No one else knew.

It was Kim's normal, but she wasn't naive enough to think everyone could do it. When she was a kid, not quite understanding her abilities, everyone had just thought she was a natural empath—the non-mystical kind anyway. Kyra and Raegan knew because they'd been her best friends practically since birth. They didn't have secrets from each other.

"So, when are we going to check out that tunnel?" Kyra asked, grinning as they left the school building behind.

"I did tell my parents we'd take the long way home," Kim replied, returning Kyra's grin with one of her own.

"Good thing I brought a flashlight, then," Raegan added.

"Ray, you're too good to us," Kyra said, smirking.

They were in luck; no one had disturbed the old park in the last week. It was old and near the edge of the woods, in a run-down part of town. It was doubtful the city would do anything about it, and it had already been mostly abandoned for years. The only people that went there anymore—besides Kim, Kyra, and Raegan—were college kids on crack during their breaks from school, after dark. Everyone else hung out in the trees surrounding the golf course on the other side of town, or in the abandoned lot a few blocks away from school.

The jungle gym had all but fallen into the huge crack in the ground, now in pieces. Half the roots of their climbing tree were exposed thanks to the hole in the ground that Kyra had fallen into. They went quite deep—deep enough to make a precarious ladder the bottom of the hole.

Exchanging a grin, hearts already pumping with adrenaline, the trio carefully climbed down the tree roots into the hole.

"Whoa. This is sick," Ragan whispered, looking up at the circle of light above them. "I feel like Indiana Jones on another treasure hunt."

"Just hope there aren't any snakes down here," Kim quipped, grinning.

"Snakes! Why'd it have to be snakes!" Kyra quoted, laughing.

They could see the tunnel on either side, one side heading into the woods, like Kyra had noticed, and the other side angling in the general direction of the school. But there was quite a bit of debris to be moved before they could get through.

"Are we sure this is a good idea?" Raegan asked, shining his flashlight deeper into the tunnel that led toward the woods. The walls and floor were packed dirt from what they could tell—not exactly an encouraging thought. They were also barely wide and tall enough for them to walk in single-file. "There's still a slight chance of an aftershock, and I really don't feel like being buried alive."

"You're not chickening out, are you?" Kyra asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Nope. Just making sure we're ready and willing to go all in."

"Let's go," Kyra said, taking the flashlight from Raegan and then taking the lead.

"Hey!" Raegan hurried to catch up, with Kim right on his heels.

She decided not to mention that both of them were mentally hesitating.

The tunnel seemed to angle southeast, toward the highway. It also sloped further down the farther they went. It also grew cooler, and damp. The walls slowly widened and transitioned from dirt to stone, rough-hewn but too regular to be natural.

They walked for perhaps half a mile before coming to an abrupt dead end.

"Well, that's boring," Kyra grumbled.

"Wait." Raegan moved forward, putting his hand on the blank wall and inclining his head toward it. "I don't know how, but I don't think this is actually a dead end."

"What do you mean?" Kim took the flashlight from Kyra and shined it around, looking for an outline or something on the wall.

"Looks like a blank wall to me," Kyra stated.

"Maybe this really is Indiana Jones," Raegan said, a note of awe and excitement in his voice. "There must be a puzzle to solve, or a secret lever or something."

"That would be cool," Kim said. Stepping up beside Raegan, she began slowly running her hand along the wall, feeling for irregularities. Raegan, grinning, copied her, but going in the opposite direction.

Kyra rolled her eyes, but joined them.

After a few minutes, Kim felt an irregular depression in the wall, just a little bigger than her hand, at almost exactly shoulder-height.

No sooner had her hand slid completely into the depression when a rush of heat surged through her body, like a hot wind. Something briefly glowed red-gold, then there was a scraping sound.

"Uh, did you guys hear that?" Kyra asked, shivering.

"I—"

A moment later, the wall in front of them, previously unremarkable, slowly scraped open.

Eyes wide, the trio stepped back as two stone doors scraped inward, releasing a blast of hot, stale air choked with dust. Coughing, they stumbled backward until the doors were open completely.

"Whoa."

"What triggered it?" Kyra asked.

"My hand slid into a slight impression in the wall," Kim supplied. "A perfect fit, actually."

"Mine, too," Raegan said.

"And mine," Kyra added. "You don't think—"

"A three-person lock?" Raegan wondered aloud. "That's unusual."

"Well...are we going in?" Kim asked.

"Duh. We've come this far," Kyra said.

"We've opened a freaking secret door. Of course we're going in!" Reagan exclaimed. He took the flashlight from Kim and took the lead.

The new tunnel continued for quite a ways. Oddly, the air grew warmer as they went farther in. At one point, Kim was sure she could hear rushing water above them.

Then a loud, rhythmic ringtone made all of them jump.

Fishing for her new phone, Kim fumbled it out of her pocket and somehow hit the button to silence it.

Her hands shaking, Kim managed a tentative smile. "Ha. Didn't think there would be cell service down here," she quipped.

"Who called you?" Kyra asked.

Kim pulled the phone back out and, after some false starts, finally managed to pull up her missed call log.

She cringed. "My parents. Mom, specifically." Then she saw the time. "Damn! It's nearly six!"

"Seriously? We haven't been gone for two hours yet, have we?" Kyra asked.

"Well, we left school about four, and it always takes about twenty minutes just to get to the park. I'd say we've walked...two, maybe three miles, from the school to here? Plus we were going slowly, and we did spend a while at the hidden door…" Reagan shrugged. "It's easily been at least that long."

"Crap. We usually do get home before five, even taking the long way past the park," Kim said, cringing. "We'd better head back. I only just got this thing; I don't want to get grounded already."

"We'll be faster next time," Kyra said. "Maybe this weekend we can take the whole day to explore."

"Sounds good to me." Raegan shrugged. "Guess we'd better hurry, though. And you should probably call your parents back," He added with a grin.

Kim shuddered. "I can hear them now. 'Kimberly Ann Myers! Just because you have a cell phone now doesn't mean you're allowed to be out all hours of the day!'" She imitated her mother's voice.

Kyra and Raegan snickered. Kim gave them a dirty look and hit redial.

"Kimberly!" her mother exclaimed. "What happened?"

"Sorry, Mom. I accidentally hung up. Still getting used to the phone, you know," Kim answered, gesturing to her friends to start walking. "I did say we were taking the long way home. I lost track of time. We're on our way back now."

Kim heard her mom exhale forcefully. "I'll let it go this time because you're still adjusting to having the phone. But make sure you keep track of time and call us if you're running late!"

"I will, Mom. Promise."

"Be safe, but hurry home please."

"Yes, Mom."

They said their farewells and hung up. Kyra and Raegan were snickering.

"Oh, shut it," she retorted. "Come on; we've got a long ways to go."

They picked up the pace, though the slight incline meant they were panting and achy by the time they reached the secret door. They leaned on the wall to catch their breath, and the door suddenly scraped shut behind them.

The trio jumped, then hurried along once the door was shut once more. But they exchanged a look, silently promising to pay closer attention to how it worked next time—because there was no doubt in their minds that they'd be coming back.