Shadow of the Tomb Raider--Path of the Apocalypse

by S. D. Perry

  Lara took a deep breath, deciding where she would put her hands and feet. The outward-leaning slope was nearly as tall as she was. If she took her time she was going to fall; she couldn’t support her full weight hanging at that angle, what with gravity and all. She’d have to push off fast and scramble like one of the salamanders, swiftly, flat to the curve. There were a few divots she could use. She’d pitched worse.

  Yes, with rope and a harness.

  Fortune favored the bold, and also those who didn’t stop to think for too long while standing over a long drop. She exhaled and reached for the first holds, tightening her stomach muscles, psyching herself up for the push—

  —and she heard footsteps, floating down from somewhere above. Coming from the south, coming her way.

  Close enough to hear you. Or possibly see a reflection of light, if they were looking. Lara tapped off her lamp and was instantly enveloped by the chill dark. She hesitated, already feeling the strain in her fingers.

  Beneath her, directly beneath her, a salamander shrieked.

  Now! Go, go! Lara moved, finding the divots and cracks in the dark, her whole body pressed to the wall, telling her where to go. The echo of the scream covered the sound of her desperate climb, reaching for rocks that she remembered from when she could see, pushing off hard with every step.

  She got her right knee into a depression and threw herself forward, hands finding the flat lip of rock over her head as her boots fell away from the slope. She pulled herself up, arms trembling, as the salamander screamed again. The sound fell away fast, the creature darting back down into the maze. The echoes followed her onto a ledge. If Marin’s mapping was correct, she was in a small passage just off the main upper corridor, but she was blind and didn’t dare move. She waited on the cold stone and listened.

  No footsteps, no rustle of movement, no light. Had the walker passed by or stopped? She thought she heard a whisper of something north, but acoustics were strange underground, sound carrying clearly through some passages, distorted or muffled by others, and the Blue Labyrinth was never completely silent. There was always a backdrop of animal noises and trickling water.

  She sat in silence for a full two minutes before moving, sweat chilling to her skin. She heard salamanders crying, more faintly, and a rush of sound that she recognized as a rather large mass of bats coming or going south of her, fluttering wings and cheeps, but she heard nothing human.

  Lara finally turned on the small LED, cupping her hand over the bulbs, and took in where she was. A ledge, with several meters of low passage in front of her that curved west. Only a short duckwalk to the main tunnel, according to Marin’s notes. Assuming she remembered correctly. She thought she was alone but she didn’t want to turn on her lamp, not until she had some idea of where everyone was. Caving in the dark was not her idea of a good time. It was unnerving, despicably slow, and bruises were inevitable, but she wasn’t about to pop into the site’s major corridor with a light on when there were Trinity commandos running around. She would creep and keep the LED handy until she was more certain of the situation.

  Direct to the main tunnel, then south for about twenty meters; the first glyph room is on the west side. The mural of the rivers that had so struck Marin. There was one side passage along the way, a dead end, she thought; she would skip the first opening she came to. Along the east wall there was another short tunnel that opened over a drop, but as long as she didn’t get confused about which way she was going, she wasn’t concerned.

  Three things to see and you’re out. After the river room was the part of the tunnel itself she would need to photograph, the damaged glyphs that Dominguez had mentioned in his report… and finally, the puzzle chamber that had so frustrated him. Right in a row, laid out in front of her on the way back to Jonah.

  Soonest begun. Lara turned off the light and crouched, finding the dank walls with her hands. She positioned herself, unslung her bow, and started forward.

  * * *

  Hux had the perfect place staked out—a large room full of murals and hieroglyphs in the upper chamber, near the end of the dig’s length. The Trinity report had referred to it as the pillar room; there were several rock formations in the center of the chamber, hourglass-shaped and painted with rings of startling blue, wide enough at the base for him to duck down behind. If she walked through the main corridor, he’d see or hear her; if she came into the room, he could get behind her.

  He crouched in the oppressive blackness behind the column closest to the entrance, the air cold and stale and damp, smelling faintly of ammonia. Unless she’d flat out run from the explosion, he had to be in front of her. He’d reasoned that she’d try to come up from the lower tunnel, for ease of access to the surface, but also perhaps to search the Maya chambers, if she hadn’t already done so. She’d come to the Blue Labyrinth to find something that Luis Marin had thought important. Considering that the site had been thoroughly excavated, this important thing probably wasn’t an item. The rooms were painted with writings about the Maya resurrection, however, the very thing that was unfolding even as they played their games in the dark. She’d come for information, and from the photos he’d looked at coming in, the pillar room had been a star attraction, marked specifically for an explosive charge; there was a big one only a few meters outside the entrance. Croft would still be watching her feet when she came in, or if she walked by.

  Hux shifted his weight. This would play out in minutes, not hours, but he hoped not too many. According to the prophecy there was a storm coming. Maybe not a good time to fly.

  Also not the best time to be sitting in a flood system.

  Perhaps the storm was already raging overhead, hail and lightning crashing down, rivers swelling… He wouldn’t even know, buried down here in the earth as the waters gathered force and barreled ahead, filling all the empty spaces. A fanciful thought, but then, he was in a cave, with bats and mushrooms and randomly screaming trolls. He wondered what they were. Frogs, perhaps; they were known to scream. He hadn’t heard any in the upper levels…

  Somewhere to the south, there was a rustle of movement, a bare whisper of sound. Not repeated.

  Hux breathed evenly, the HK VP9 ready to fire, grips warm in his hand. Sixteen rounds of armor-piercing safety tips. He rested his finger lightly on the guard. If Mitchell was tracking her, he might lose his shot—Mitchell was scary-lethal, a full-on sociopath—but he was pretty sure the diminutive blond would do the same as him, set up shop somewhere and watch. Sergei and Ace would probably keep sweeping, assuming they were still alive. Sergei followed orders and Ace was too macho to creep around in the dark.

  There. Footsteps, moving quickly from the south.

  Hux rose to his feet as light smudged the air—and then his radio chirped, signaling that someone wearing a helmet was in range.

  He dropped down again, listening as the figure got closer, adjusting his position from the shadows that were cast into the room. Whoever it was paused at the charges, then stepped quickly and lightly past. They tapped off their light before passing in front of the opening to the room where he waited, not acknowledging that he was near.

  Mitchell. Anyone else in the Dozen would have spoken. She’d joined Harper’s team three years ago, just after Hux. A couple of guys had tried to strike something up—she was chesty, with big gray eyes and a pouty mouth—but had stopped the day after her first live performance, when the Dozen had gone in to quell a workers’ rebellion in an undeclared zone outside of Russia. Mitchell had sliced and diced villagers like she was dancing, smiling a little bit the whole time until her hair dripped with blood like in that old movie about the psychic prom queen, staring out from a mask of red. She’d been in Harper’s top three ever since. Hux had his own proclivities, he wasn’t one to judge, but Mitchell was something else.

  And yet you’re overshooting, my dear. Presumably, Ace and Sergei—well, Sergei, at least—had found a way past the exploded charges and were still working the lower tunnel as assigned. If Croft w
as down there they’d catch her or push her to Harper. The commander would also get the shot if she tried to come out through the maze… But the main strip of the dig was the fastest way back to the drop site. She’ll have to cross me first.

  Hux checked his watch. Still plenty of time before they had to report. He settled back in, his thoughts of proclivities leading him to imagine how it was going to happen. She’d walk into the room, and he’d step out behind her, jam the semi’s barrel into her back. He’d disarm her and then strike her down, power coursing through his muscles, and then he’d wrap his hands around that narrow white throat, squeezing, watching the tiny blood vessels in her eyes burst while she flailed at his big, strong hands with her tiny white fingers…

  He shifted again, trying to accommodate his excitement at the fantasy. He’d broken out in a light sweat. It had been too long since he’d exorcised his own personal demons. He was Harper’s right hand when it came to operations, stresses built up… He deserved the opportunity to release some of that energy, and who better to receive than Lara Croft? Harper had the right idea about her: she was a menace to the cause and should have been taken out long ago. Her continued existence mocked the lives of the men she’d murdered.

  Also, killing her would feel really, really good.

  Hux didn’t realize he was wearing his own tiny smile. Almost show time, he could feel it, could feel her getting closer to him. She wouldn’t get past.

  * * *

  Lara viewed the chamber through flashes from the camera, snapping off a dozen shots, wincing at the brightness. She hadn’t come across anyone since climbing up, but was extremely aware of every move she made, and the light struck her as loud as a scream.

  I have to get this, though. The mural was magnificent— some artist or artists had painted a complex river system across the chamber’s sloping walls, the water twining through hills, the ocean to one side. Glyphs ran along the waterways, numbers and directional markers. She could understand why Marin thought it important.

  Except there’s no way to know if this is a map from life or something a priest envisioned. And some of the glyphs have been overwritten. Even assuming it was accurate and was meant to represent what she was looking for, what were the chances that the rivers hadn’t changed course in a thousand years? And none of the mountains represented were crowned, nor were they detailed in any way.

  She didn’t stop to ponder. Still getting used to the darkness after the flash, she used the LED to take her back to the chamber’s entrance, then turned off the light and waited. As on her careful walk to the chamber, she heard nothing, saw nothing. The silence was profound.

  It was at least fifty meters to the section of tunnel with the hieroglyphs Marin had told her about. About twenty meters past that was the final chamber she needed to see, the puzzle room. That had a charge in front of it. From there, she wouldn’t be far from a connecting tunnel that united the upper passages. She’d decide which exit to use when she got there. Someone was undoubtedly guarding the chamber where the tunnels met, but she might be able to draw them out.

  Fifty meters.

  There’s nobody here. Use the light; you can run quietly if you can see.

  Anybody sticks their head into the hall, they’ll shoot you down.

  Yes, and the longer it takes you to get through, the more likely someone’s going to come along.

  She compromised, squatting down to roll up her pants leg and stick the small light into the top of her sock, the bulbs barely showing through. Enough to see where she put her feet.

  She nocked an arrow and ran low. The seep of light allowed her to pick up the pace considerably. A sudden salamander chorus stopped her once, mid-run; then the sound of rocks tumbling sent her crouching down to cover the soft glow of the light. But the sound was distant, north, and she thought it might have come from the tunnel below.

  Lara reached the glyphs carved large on the tunnel wall, set into a grid. Ancient Mayan was read left to right, top to bottom, in columns of two. There was no way to avoid using the flash, unless she meant to copy them down by hand. She stepped back from the wall and held up the camera. The flash strobed brightly, dazzling.

  Walk, path, stars…

  Most of the rest of the glyphs were damaged, unreadable, until the end—reveal message? Water seepage had eroded the carvings through the middle, not a trace that they’d ever been there.

  Not much of a key. No wonder Dominguez had been frustrated.

  She moved on toward the puzzle chamber, then stopped to listen. If the commandos were moving in, they weren’t close. It seemed likely that they had fallen back to the northern exits to wait.

  But they could have done that in the first place. The conversation she’d overheard had laid out pretty clearly that they’d been eager to find and kill her, but the number of searchers had to be small or she would have heard them.

  Silence. She took a step—

  —and heard the echoes of pebbles rolling down a slide, the sound coming from the north. Something was moving in a chamber large enough to echo, far ahead. It was either the passage that connected the tunnels, or the last big well, a nearly vertical drop down into the heart of the labyrinth.

  You’re almost out, and either one is well past the puzzle room. Get the pictures.

  She couldn’t see the opening in the dim light of the LED, but Lara knew she was close. There was only the charge to look out for, and she started scanning the tunnel floor well in advance. The tunnel curved slightly east. The trap housed a substantial charge, placed to dump the top two tunnels into the maze, to bring an end to any curious cavers or enemies of Trinity. The last big charge was just at the entrance to the top tunnel. Trinity’s need to keep secrets was pathological.

  She spotted the opening first as she came around the curve, a low arch. She realized she knew nothing about the room, except that it contained something written in code. Apparently something Trinity really didn’t want her to see, if they were ready to chase her through a maze.

  Or they’re on the offensive, and this site is just where they happened to catch up with you. With a prophecy actively unfolding and Marin’s involvement, maybe they’d just decided to curb her meddling permanently.

  Lara stopped, searching for the pressure plate among the dirty stones in front—

  —and smelled something, a slight difference in the standard miasma of cave smells, just for a second. Beneath the dirt and wet and minerals, the guano and decay.

  Sweat.

  Lara ducked down and put out her light, then backed up a step, shifting quietly. A man’s sweat. Someone was in the chamber, perhaps just inside, waiting.

  Shit. She couldn’t walk in without a light, not with the trigger trap so close to the entrance. She could run past the chamber, jump the charge, but whoever it was would come out after her, fire loose down the passage and undoubtedly get lucky. Even if she could outrun rounds, after that, her only options were to jump into a vertical well or try her luck getting through the chamber where the tunnels emptied out at the front, where others were likely waiting. Neither were good choices.

  And it means not even seeing the puzzle. God damn them. She needed to get into that room, it was vital, her entire reason for having come. She needed to be done here and on her way, and she couldn’t move because some murderous asshole was in her way.

  Unless.

  How well did her ambusher know the Blue Labyrinth? If she could get him to follow her back south, the tunnel curved enough that she’d have a short window of time in which to run. And across from the room of rivers was a passage that opened abruptly to a drop.

  He chases you, you hit the deck, bring up the semi…

  She could do it. If she pulled it off, this would be over in less than a minute. Lara backed up farther, already committing to the insane plan.

  Bait him. Make him mad.

  She secured her bow and slid the heavy .45 off her hip, then reached down and turned the LED on, thin blue light across the top of her b
oot. She backed to the tunnel’s curve and cleared her throat, raising the .45 and flipping the safety. She could barely see the edge of the chamber’s entrance.

  “I’m not coming in,” she said. “And if you come out, you’re dead.”

  There was a pause so long that she was starting to think she’d imagined that whiff of sweat, when a low, deep voice spilled out into the passage. Frighteningly calm.

  “We’re holding your friend, and your pilot,” the man said. “Unless you want them killed, you’ll surrender immediately.”

  Something about the way he said surrender was creepy. She jumped on the inflection, her only insight into the stranger, and readied herself to run.

  “Radios don’t work down here. You can’t order anything. You’re powerless. And you think I’d surrender to a man like you?”

  When he spoke again, she could hear the strain in his voice, the carefully controlled anger beneath a forced amusement.

  “So you’re going to stand there all night, little girl? You’ve got things you want to do. People you care about. Me, I’m in no hurry. But if you walk away, what’s going to stop me from putting a bullet in your back?”

  She waited, as if thinking, counting down from ten— then turned and ran south, making plenty of noise.

  The man was after her in a beat. She heard the thump of his boots coming down past the charge, saw the rocks ahead of her blur into sight as a light snapped on, hidden by the curve. She pounded down the tunnel, leaping through the flickering dark, pumping with her arms. The writing on the tunnel wall flew past, a bounce of light from the man’s torch passing over the ancient glyphs. Lara picked up speed; it was a straight stretch—

  Bam-bam-bam!