Chapter 9

Lara groggily sat up after a nearly sleepless night. She glanced over to the fire. Hot coals and ashes were all that were left, along with a little smoke. Lara stamped out the remains of the fire, gathered her things and headed back to the waterfall.

Before entering the tunnel, she decided to think about the final answer outside, where she could breathe. She positioned herself outside the entrance, made herself comfortable, then stared down at the last phrase of the riddle, looking for meaning in every word. "Every first character spells...spells..." The brunette hung onto that word. "Letters spell words, so character must mean letter." She looked closely at each phrase of the riddle. "Seek past the only face of the clock tower. Starts with an S. Near the lake on a trail through the trees and rocks. N. At the time of the sunrise. A. Keep counting every k. K. Every first character spells out the key. E." Lara set the riddle down and put the letters together in her mind. "S-N-A-K-E. Snake...Could that be the answer?" She immediately jumped to her feet and ducked into the opening of the cliff face.

Before continuing down the tunnel, she dug her dual pistols out of her pack and strapped them to her waist. She wasted no time lighting a torch and entering the tunnel. When she reached the door, she carefully wedged her torch into the wall and crouched down.

She brushed her fingers along the final piece of the mechanism. "Every first character spells out the key..."

"Lara!" She zipped around and trained her pistols on the voice behind her. Her eyes widened.

"Hey, whoa, it's just me." A man stood before her, his arms slightly raised. The torch gave off just enough light for Lara to see that it was Alex. She let out a sharp sigh and holstered her weapons. "What the hell is he doing here?"

"How long have you been here?" she demanded, with a touch of anger in her voice.

"I just got here last night. I-"

"Why are you here?" Alex looked away.

"I couldn't...couldn't let you..." He sighed. "I can't bear the thought of you going in there alone, once you figured it out."

"I told you, I'll be fine."

"I can't let you go alone." Pain struck her soul when she heard the words she didn't want to hear.

"Don't follow me anymore! Go home!"

"Lara, I-"

"Go!" She refused to hear anymore. "I can't let anyone risk their lives for me anymore!" She screamed the unspoken words in her mind.

"I came here to help you!" said Alex, raising his voice a little. "Please, Lara, let me help." Lara sighed.

"Look, I appreciate it, but I can handle myself, Alex." Alex stepped towards her.

"I know you can, but I'd feel better if I went with y-"

"Alex, just go!" interrupted Lara sternly, looking away. She couldn't face the pain in his eyes. "Please..." she begged quietly. "I don't need a hero."

"I'm sorry, Lara...be careful." Lara listened to his footsteps fade behind her. Once it was silent again, Lara peered behind her to ensure that Alex had left. She felt guilt rise up inside of her, but shoved it back down and turned back to focus on the task at hand. She entered her answer in the slots.

Suddenly, the whole door began shaking and sliding into the floor, leaving another opening into another dark tunnel. Lara grabbed her torch and drew one of her pistols as she moved into the next passage. This passage sloped slightly upward. As she kept moving, she started seeing a light ahead of her. She crept towards it anxiously. "I guess father never found the entrance. He would have figured it out in two seconds." She extinguished her torch and holstered her weapon as she reached the opening.

The sunlight nearly blinded Lara as she finally stepped out into the open air. Shielding the sun with her hand, she looked ahead. Concrete walls creating three paths lied before her. She hastily glanced around, happily concluding that she had found the labyrinth. She examined the blue sky above her. "Where the hell am I?" She wondered in bewilderment how on Earth no one has found this place. She lowered her head back down to face the paths before her.

She took a deep breath and strode forward, deciding to try the middle path. The path quickly ended with a path both to the left and the right of her. Lost in amazement, she took the left path, not caring about where it led. She went around a few twists and turns, exploring its environment. She halted after a couple of minutes and stared all around her with joy in her heart. A feeling of uneasiness quickly replaced the joy she felt.

She turned to look back the way she came, feeling the earth tremble slightly below her. The ground she had just walked on had cracks quickly spreading across it. Loose pieces of earth began to break apart and fall into a deep abyss. Lara turned and ran before the ground beneath her could give way. It didn't take long for the crumbling earth to catch up to her. Her legs pumped faster and faster as the growing abyss tried to take her life. She hung a quick right and the cracks followed her. As she kept running, she realized that the pathway ahead began falling apart and moving in her direction. Lara had no choice but to keep running towards it.

As her space to run shrank from both directions, Lara caught another path to the right in the corner of her eye. Just as both of the breaking paths met, Lara leaped for the path to the right. She landed safely, almost losing her balance. She looked back, collapsing against a wall. The ground behind her had completely disappeared, leaving a black pit.

Lara took a moment to catch her breath, then continued down the current path. "What was that?" Immediately after wondering this, Lara found herself on the ground. She looked behind her to see a root sticking up out of the ground. Lara sighed and slowly scrambled back to her feet. The instant she took another step forward, another root shot out of the ground and grabbed her foot, causing Lara to spin around and tumble on her back. Before she could get up this time, another root wrapped around her foot and pulled. Lara shook her foot, trying to break free, but it was no use. The root effortlessly dragged the shocked archaeologist through the labyrinth.

Lara eventually equipped her axe from her belt and plunged it into the ground, not wanting to find out where the root would take her. As she held onto the axe, she felt her limbs stressing from the root's struggle to keep pulling her. Lara slowly reached toward her pistol, attempting to ignore the tearing pain in her other arm. She finally reached the gun and shot at the root several times. It released right away and shriveled like a welting flower.

Lara wasted no time to get back on her feet. She dashed forward and desperately sprinted through the twists and the turns of the maze, ignoring the stinging cuts on her elbows. After a while she slowed to a stop to analyze her situation. "This place seems so alive..." Her mind shifted to the thought of the root that latched onto her foot. "This place is alive," she concluded. "And I have to get out of here." And with that, she set off again, not daring to look back. "Just keep moving."

However, it wasn't long before Lara stopped at an intersection, squinting at something up ahead. As what seemed like a cloud of black dust drifted closer, her ears picked up a buzzing sound. "That can't be good..." She took a different path and kept her pace. The buzzing sound grew louder. Lara squeezed her eyes shut, resisting the urge to glance behind her. She suddenly felt a pinch in her neck. She grasped the spot with her hand and cried out as she struggled to keep running. She finally whipped her head around and came into contact with a swarm of over-sized locusts. One buzzed up against her arm and sunk its jaws into Lara's flesh. The same pain she had felt in her neck appeared in her arm. She pushed herself onward, obtaining a few more bites before the swarm finally diminished. Or so Lara thought. The buzzing sound returned to her ears just as she hit a dead end. She clawed at the concrete wall in disbelief as she turned her head to face the approaching swarm. "No. No. No. No. This can't be happening!" She glanced back at the wall, searching for any way out. "Come on. Think!" She tightened her grip around her climbing axe. An idea suddenly came to mind.

She quickly swung her axe into a small gap in between the concrete slabs of the wall, and pulled herself up off the ground. She climbed up and over, landing on her feet on the other side. She stood up straight and took off again.

Although the threat of the locusts were no longer a concern of Lara's, another obstacle arose. The concrete walls of the labyrinth began collapsing behind Lara, causing her to stumble uncontrollably as she ran. The path of destruction soon caught up, hurling large pieces of concrete down at Lara. She shifted left and right, dodging the portions of the walls raining down.

Despite her efforts, the ground shook horribly. Unable to support the ongoing avalanche, the earth beneath Lara gave way. Lara used the last of the strength in her knees to jump for the unbroken path in front of her. She caught the edge with both hands. Before she could pull herself up, the path ahead of her cracked and broke apart, casting her into the dark pit below.

Instead of falling to her death, however, Lara found herself sliding down a slope. She stumbled, struggling to slow down. Small beams of light flashed past her as she went down. The slope finally cast her in a pitch black hole.

Lara landed with a splash, discovering a small stream of water flowing slowly beneath her.