The Atlas Paradox

Nico wakes up because Parisa is at his door. She has seen Gideon, she tells him, but hadn’t realized he was so powerful. She nearly killed him, and she asks Nico whether Gideon is a good person. Nico tells her yes—but adds that Gideon is also dangerous because he’s so powerful.

They lay on his bed, and he tells her that he originally joined the Society to help Gideon, but the library hasn’t helped him. Parisa tells him that when Gideon was dying, he thought of Nico. She kisses him, and he realizes he’s in a dream. He thinks it’s Gideon, but Parisa has brought him there. When he wakes up, he texts Gideon and arranges to see him soon, in his dreams.

Libby is with the physical doctoral students in the basement at LARCMA. In 1989, medeian studies are relatively new, and she has been there for months, moving their studies further with her knowledge. She’s waiting for a time when she can ask them for help with her problem. When she sees Gideon, she realizes that she has fallen asleep. Even though he talks about getting her back to her own time, she still thinks he’s just a dream figure. He tells her she needs to find a power source, and when she wakes up, she has an idea.

She mentions wormholes to the other students, and they’re disparaging, except for a woman named Belen, who mentions ley lines. Libby realizes that she should work with Belen and follows her out of the room. She bumps into a student who looks like a teenaged Ezra but brushes past him. In the elevator, she asks Belen to get a coffee, and Belen tells her that she’s in the nuclear program, studying fission. Libby broaches the topic of her own research into amplifying existing energy sources. As they talk, Libby keeps catching glimpses of dark, curly hair that looks like Ezra’s.

Callum realizes that although Atlas invited him to the gala, he doesn’t want Callum to go. He tells Atlas that he has decided to do his independent study on the effects of depression on telepathy, an attempt to hurt Atlas. However, as he talks about it, he realizes it’s a good topic, especially for an empath like him.

The night of the ball, Callum and Parisa go together. He briefly sees Atlas and follows a woman, Dr. J. Araña, to Atlas’s office. Callum can see that she’s angry with Atlas but is holding back. As she leaves, she bumps into Callum. Atlas speaks to him telepathically, and Callum shares what he knows from Atlas’s dossier—that he killed his other classmates.

A beautiful woman asks Ezra where the bathroom is and asks his name. He says it’s Ezra, even though he intended to lie, and he realizes that she’s the telepath, Parisa Kamali. He sees Nico as well, who doesn’t recognize him because he has disguised himself with magic. He came to the ball only to show Atlas that he has powerful friends.

Atlas approaches and makes it clear that he knows Ezra took Libby and that she’s at LARCMA now. Ezra replies that he knows Atlas has found a way to trick the archives and reminds him that he’s not a god. After Atlas leaves, Ezra reflects on his own desire to defang the Society—not destroy it—by removing Atlas and the initiates.

Just as he’s about to leave, Tristan sees him. They know each other from having met on the Society’s grounds when Ezra was time traveling. He realizes that whatever Tristan’s power is, illusions don’t work on him. Tristan offers his assessment that the Forum is the same as the Society. Ezra replies by adding that it’s also open and transparent, which makes all the difference. He thinks about Libby but doesn’t regret what he has done. He knows that Tristan is already part of Atlas’s plan and wonders if he should kill Tristan.

Atlas tells Tristan that he needs to find another way to access his powers, beyond his life being threatened, because they’re running out of time—the library will need to use his powers soon. He reiterates that they’re all, as Society members, at the service of the library. Atlas believes that Tristan has a new type of power, greater than a physicist like Nico, and can manipulate quanta. He believes that a balance exists between matter and antimatter—and that this balance enables the creation of life. Dalton’s research looks into chaos and whether it’s ordered after all. Tristan sees a strange glitter in Atlas’s eyes and wonders whether he’s mad.

Atlas believes that their abilities point to the possibility that this isn’t the only universe—there may be other versions. Tristan, via his power, may be able to answer that question because he can see quanta in a seeming void—if so, he can locate them within the multiverse. Atlas wants to find out but keep it a secret, in accordance with the Society’s mandates. He tells Tristan he’ll do nothing with the information, but Tristan doesn’t believe him and starts to question Atlas’s motives.

Weeks later, Tristan still doesn’t know what to do with this information. With Libby missing, it feels as if part of him is missing as well. At the ball, he decides there’s no point in hating Atlas. After he talks with Ezra, Nico asks who he was talking to but still doesn’t recognize him. Nico tells him that he knew an Ezra, Libby’s ex-boyfriend, and Tristan reacts, not having known the man’s name before. They figure out that Tristan encountered Libby’s ex on the grounds and then again at the ball. Although Nico says that Ezra’s power is boring, Tristan suggests that he may be a time traveler.

Later, Tristan suggests that he and Nico go north to find a power source strong enough to get Libby back. They begin traveling to the Highlands but are attacked by two people with magical powers in a London train station.

The next morning, Nico brings Callum outside to where Tristan is waiting by a car, a captive inside. After the initial attack, as they drove toward the Highlands, they were attacked every few hours. Finally, they decided to question one of the attackers and wanted to use Callum’s empathic powers to get information from him. Callum tells them that their captive is a witch, which means he has magical powers but hasn’t gone to university and so isn’t a medeian.

The captive is with the Metropolitan Police, who are working with the Forum and receive notification whenever the initiates leave the grounds. Adrian Caine, Tristan’s father, is responsible for the hit on Tristan. When they return to the house, Parisa and Reina join them to discuss Tristan’s theory about looking for power sources to bring Libby back. Reina knows of a few places in England and Scotland, such as Callanish Circle, reputed to have power. Nico returns to his room, where he meets Gideon in the dream realm. He tells Nico that Libby is in Los Angeles, now in 1990.

Thanks to Callum, Reina now has the books that the archive previously denied her, which all concern gods saving the world when humans have failed. About a week after the ball, she overheard a conversation between Dalton and Parisa. Dalton was angry, not knowing if he could continue his research now, and Parisa argues that he let her in, which makes him just as responsible. After he leaves, Parisa says that she knows Reina is listening. She tells Reina they’re all being used by the library, which is sentient and is tracking them.

After that, the house is quiet for weeks, although tension grows between all the initiates. Reina begins to be ashamed of her plan to stay in the library and hide from her power rather than learn to use it. She tells Callum that the archive should be used as a means for change. She finds it meaningful that in the age of humans, the Anthropocene Era, she was born with the power to speak to nature, and she thinks that she’s meant to shift the balance of power and resurrect the natural world. Callum agrees to work with her, and although she’s nervous about the alliance, there’s balance in it: Her power is about the natural world, while his is about the human world.

Parisa keeps dreaming of when Gideon grabbed the Prince and escaped the tower. When she awoke next to Dalton, he was in extreme pain and the Prince was emerging from his body as a shadow. She can feel something happening to the house—it’s still sentient but now also feels alive. Atlas arrives, and Dalton says he has seconds to stop the house from becoming animate.

Later, Dalton tells her that the Prince is his ambition, which Atlas separated and contained. The Prince created the animation of Libby without Dalton’s knowing it—in fact, he didn’t known about the Prince at all, something that Atlas ensured. Every time Parisa visited the Prince, she made him stronger, so in the end, she helped him escape. Atlas has imprisoned him again, but they don’t know how long he’ll be contained.

Parisa talks with Atlas about Dalton and his research on the creation of the world, and Atlas warns her not to engage with Dalton. She knows that Atlas wants her to stay at the Society and work with him, but she won’t. Outside Atlas’s office, Dalton is waiting for her. He’s more of an amalgamation of himself and the Prince, closer to his true self. She reflects that when they sequestered the part of him that made the archives nervous so that he could do his research, they lost the good qualities of the Prince as well.

Libby and Belen are in the basement of LARCMA, researching ley lines. Libby falls asleep and dreams about Ezra and Gideon. When she wakes, she asks whether Belen has looked into Callanish Circle, in Scotland, as an energy center and wonders where that idea came from. She goes to her apartment and, looking out the window, sees someone with curly black hair standing outside. When she looks again, he’s gone, but she feels like Ezra is haunting her.

Libby arranges for them to travel to Callanish Circle, and Belen is excited, thinking that their research will help her develop her reputation and credibility. Libby feels guilty—she needs Belen’s help but doesn’t know how to explain her situation. That night, they arrive in Scotland, and Gideon appears in Libby’s dream. He tells her that someone is coming for all of the initiates, and she replies that she knows—it’s about the end of the world—and she thinks of Ezra. When she wakes up, Belen is awake too. It’s evening and too late for them to travel.

Belen tells her that she said the name Ezra in her sleep, and Libby tries to tell their break-up story in general terms. Belen reveals that she has done some research on Libby and thinks Libby is running away from an abuser. They kiss, and Belen confesses that she has a crush on Libby. Libby feels the same way but realizes that she can’t act on it. In the days that follow, they travel to Callanish Circle. When they finally arrive, a man is there with them, in the center of the circle—it’s Tristan Caine.