Seeing my parents like that cuts through me like a knife. This is the final proof that they are actually gone and they're never coming back. Whatever tiny hope my heart had clung on to dies when I see my father's name on the inside of his watch.

I thought I'd put them both behind me. I thought I'd moved on. But I hadn't. I still haven't, not until I can bring them home and bury them. Maybe I won't feel closure, not even then, but it's the right thing to do.

My mind is still reeling and my emotions are too close to the surface for my liking, but I have to act now, while there's still a chance. I lead Sam towards the chamber. Shaw has already started. Energy washes over him and there's a sound like cloth being torn, only it's happening over and over and I swear I hear distant, echoing screams.

Three men sacrificed for his cause and four more either guarding him or waiting to be used. Do they even care? Do they think they're not expendable? Or are they paid so much that it doesn't matter to them. Either way, their fate is sealed.

One arrow, four bullets, and the odds are a lot more even. The last guard, he's a good shot. I feel the burning of the bullet as it clips my shoulder and I use that pain to fuel me. Sam is scrambling to get behind him but Giovanna intercepts her. I have to trust her. No panic, no worry, just trust in Sam to protect herself. She's done a good job so far. Even two years ago I don't think she would have made it this far with me. So I focus on the guard. He's the real danger right now. He steps too close to an artifact and the kris strapped to my thigh throbs. My eyes fall on the ruby skull.

I draw the knife and look at it. This knife craves blood, it craves death and the rending of human flesh. What happens if it gets added to the circle? Shaw already looks like he can't handle this. Rush in, slice everyone, relish it. I crave it. No. No. I'm not letting the bloodlust consume me again. I have a better idea.

When the guard stops firing long enough to see if I'm still here, I dart out from cover and throw the dagger. It imbeds itself in the man's chest. He convulses and collapses on top of the ruby skull. There's a flash of light and the crackling of electricity just before the entire chamber goes dark. One of two things should happen. Either the weapon is sated by the blood pooling in the circle, or the added power will overwhelm Shaw.

The light returns. With the glow from Shaw and from the circle returned, it's obvious that we're no longer alone. Lining the walls are a dozen of the same creatures that have hounded us since Peru. The same creatures that killed my parents and that I sometimes even see when I close my eyes at night. I hate them. I hate them so much it's difficult to think straight.

Sam gets to her feet and I pull her over to me. I shove a gun in her hand and flick the safety off. She presses her back to mine and I can feel her heart race in time with mine. I draw another knife and hold the flat of the blade against my arm. My voice is steady. Much steadier than I feel. "Trust your instincts. Whatever happens, trust your instincts."

We barely have time to exchange any other words. The creatures surge forward. I blast one to mist with a shot, but a second gets in close. I twist towards a third and Sam shoots the second. I never knew how hard it is to trust someone until now. How terrifying. How freeing. We've always had to rely on each other. In University I was Sam's rock, and Sam was the storm that shook me loose from my self-imposed emotional exile. On Yamatai she was the reason I found to survive.

After the island she became my focus, to keep me going when my mind wanted to break. I was always Sam's rock to hold on to. Sam can always rely on me to protect her but somewhere along the way she learned to swim with the current. To take control of her own fate. Now I have rely on her to help protect us both because if I have to do this alone, we both die.

I'm less my mother's grace nor my father's measured movements. He'd been clinical with his aim, each movement calculated and thought seconds out ahead of time. I've some of that, yes, when I'm the hunter in the forest. But in a melee like this I'm more Conrad Roth's brutal efficiency. Destroy them, beat them, win at any cost so long as we both make it out alive. Roth was a brawler, with fists and knives, and almost cowboy with his guns.

Sam moves like a dancer. She has the blood of the Sun Queen in her veins. She has years of clubs, years of primal, rhythmic movement. If my mother fought with classical grace, Sam fights like a modern siren. I've shown her how to shoot, I've even shown her how to fight with a knife, but I've never shown her anything like this.

I step to the side, shooting past Sam at a target while she covers the other direction. Still they come, swarming us and crowding us but there's no slash at my back, and I allow none to reach Sam. There's a brief lull and I have time to think. Is my mother's spirit helping Sam? Are my father and Roth guiding my hand? Or is this just us in synch, two souls bound as one?

The last of our ammunition is spent. Our guns click uselessly. Black mist rises at our feet, spreading and filling the whole of the chamber. Sam's gun clatters to the ground and she whispers, "Jesus."

"Sam?"

"If this is some kind of 'we're gonna die so I have to confess how much you've always meant to me' thing you can stuff it."

Chuckling, I shake my head. "No. I just wanted to tell you you've...You're... I'm proud of you."

She grins tiredly. "I might have picked up some moves from an expert."

My ears are still ringing, but I face Shaw and Giovanna. It doesn't look like he's handling the power very well. I don't know if it's the extra blood or the mist or just all the artifacts gathered in one place, but Shaw's is pale and drawn. He's lost much of his weight and his skin hangs off his bones like his loose suit. There's something whirling around him. It's like a torrent of souls surrounding him and I'm positive I can't enter the circle. The Kris is in the guard's chest still, but I can't reach it past the torrent.

Maybe I can try reason. I so rarely get to try reason. "Shaw, stop this! It's killing you!"

His voice sounds like gravel under a boot. "I can see…. everything...!"

Sam throws up her hands. "You're trying to take too much! A container only holds so much!"

Shaw just stares off into nothingness. Perhaps he's looking into the abyss. The grouned rumbled and I glance around. It's like we're no longer inside that temple ruin. Stretching high above us is the night sky, with it's countless stars. It's beautiful, unpolluted by city lights. The constellations don't look quite right though. It's not that they're the wrong hemisphere.

It's the wrong time. The ground grumbles again. We don't have much time. There has to be a way to disrupt this, a way to stop Shaw from gaining this power. Sam's words come back to me. A container only holds so much.

"Sam, you're a genius!" He's drawing from the skulls and the other artifacts, and now the Kris is added to that and it's almost too much for him. But he's not drawing from Himiko. The sword of the Sun Queen is laying on the ground where Giovanna last dropped it.

She notices where my eyes go, and we both move at the same time. I dive forward, elbowing her aside and grasping the hilt. I smash it into her head and charge towards Shaw, dropping the sheathe as I go. There's no wind to stop me here, but something still pushes me back. I can hear the screaming better now. A dozen languages, most of them long fallen out of use. Himiko is cursing in my head. I can hear the kris, truly hear him for the first time. A man, and the things he's done are the stuff of nightmares. I'm sickened by how I let that thing use me.

Shaw panics. He holds his hands up to me and I feel a pressure in my head. His voice is raspy. "What are you doing? Stop! This is mine!"

"Like any other old man you're clinging to power for the sake of power. It's not yours. It's not mine, or anyone's!" The sword cuts through his chest with unsurprising ease. It should have been harder. It should have made me feel worse, but it's like severing a string. One moment he's alive, and there's power coursing through him and the next he's gone. The power flows through me instead. Lightning cracks, a loud bang that echoes through the chamber and Himiko is released into the torrent of souls.

My body convulses as I'm lifted into the air. There's a cacophony of voices, the same ones as before but they're so clear now. The sound of water rushes in my ears and I'm filled to the brim and then overflowing. There's too much, too many thoughts and it's all too fast!

I quickly lose hold of myself. Of Lara Croft. My dreams and my life wash away in the flood but I can understand so much more. Ten thousand years of history cascade before me. Countless questions answered in an instant. I see the rise and fall of empires. First discoveries. The collapse of Atlantis and the seeding of a people throughout the world. The birth of myth and the passing of legend. Mesopotamia, China, Greece, Persia, India. They turn through my mind like the pages of a book. Nok, Ghana, Egypt, Peru. Excalibur and the hammer of Thor. The lost city of Z. A thousand more stories and histories from every corner of the earth.

I trace the lineage of a priestess from a sunken empire to the Sun Queen and all the way to Sam.

Someone breaks the circle. I drop like a lead weight, landing on the ground as the threads I'm following rush away from me. It's gone! It's all gone! My voice sounds like it it is coming from someone else. Foreign to my ears. Echoey. "No..no! I saw everything!"

I try to lift my head, blinking away tears. Out of my periphery, I see Giovanna moving. She's nudging the artifacts out of the circle, breaking the spell, ending the ritual. Beneath the golden skull she places an artifact I haven't seen before. It looks like a carved dragon.

She chants something. There's the crack of thunder and then I'm being flooded again. I catch a name in the current. Fiammetta. Giovanna's sister. Amanda's lover. Giovanna is trying to bring her sister back. Through me. But Fia is resisting. She wants this about as much as I do. I can't see her face, but I can hear her voice. I can hear her pleading. The energy of her soul whirls around me and through me, exposing everything to both our eyes. All that I've done, the people I've hurt and the shadows that hound me. I try to focus on the dragon perched on the ancient throne. I try to fight.

Help me free me.

How? If I destroy the artifact you could cease to exist.

It's okay. I'll be okay. Tell her I'll be okay.

All my strength is taken by the effort to retain myself. Its nearly impossible and after being exposed to countless secrets I'm almost afraid I've lost myself. But if I can get to the dragon I can destroy it. "She doesn't…want this."

I don't know if Giovanna hears me. If she does, she ignores it, raising her voice in the same ritual that Mathias had once tried on Sam.

"Giovanna, stop! She doesn't …" Pain lances through my chest and hammers pound inside my skull and I can't think of words anymore. I hear my voice screaming, but it sounds far away.

Blood spreads on the front of Giovanna's jacket. The point of a sword pushes out from her chest. Giovanna grabs onto it, her voice fading with a sickening gurgle. She slides off the sword, and onto the ground in front of the throne. Sam is standing over her, the sword in her hand. She stares at it, then at Giovanna's body. I can't read what's in her eyes. She throws the sword away and rushes to my side. "Lara! Lara can you hear me? Is it you?"

I sag against her, exhausted. "You saved me. Does that make us even?"

"You get to save me next time."

"God, I hope there's not a next time." I pat her hand. "Help me up. There's still time to free all of them. While the residual energy is still present."

"How?" Sam lets me lean on her. My strength is returning quickly, but I let her mother-hen me. After what she did… she needs to focus on something else. There's a great deal of difference between killing someone at a distance and stabbing them through the back.

"Smash the lot of them."

"I thought you said that would be bad?"

I smile and nudge her towards one of the skulls. "I learned a few things while she was trying to tear me out of my own body. If we destroy the artifacts here, their souls will be free. Though to be blunt, many scarcely deserve that peace."

Sam kicks the sapphire skull into the wall, shattering it. "Don't care, smashing them all. And I'm going to enjoy it."

I let her work out the past year of frustration on the artifacts and walk to the throne. The golden skull seems to regard me with curiosity and some familiarity. I hesitate. There's still so much I could learn. It's on the tip of my tongue, the edge of my memory. Vast knowledge has passed out of reach but I can still reclaim it. The skull beckons. There's a way. There's always a way...

"Shit…" Before I'm intoxicated further, I smash it with my axe, then pick up the dragon figurine. "All this history lost. But it should never have been found. Be free, Fia."

"Put her down!"

Amanda has the sword now. It no longer hums or buzzes with energy. The act of shoving it into the circle has finally rid us of the Sun Queen, but it's no less sharp. She points the sword at me. It's shaking in her hand and she has a familiar look of desperation in her eyes. "Put her down."

How long has she even been here? I don't know how much of this she's watched but she can't possibly want to bring Fia back by sacrificing someone else. "Amanda, she's being tortured in this thing. She doesn't want this. We can set her free, but you have to let her go. The only way to bring her back is by sacrificing people. Is that what she'd want? To kill people and steal someone else's body?"

"Give me the dragon. Just give Fia to me. I'll figure it out. There has to be a way." She advances closer, and I move to put the throne between the two of us. There's that crevice behind it, hidden in the shadows and I nearly fall into it. My position is suddenly more precarious than it had been just a moment ago. I'd forgotten about that chasm.

"I'm sorry." I throw the figurine against the wall. It shatters. Relief and thankfulness flood the chamber, and then Fia is gone. Screaming, Amanda rams herself into me. My feet slip on the edge of the crevice and we fall.

I catch the lip with my left hand and grab Amanda's right wrist with my other. There's a gaping darkness beneath us, stark contrast to the rage and heartbreak on her face. My arms ache, and she's still holding onto the sword. "Amanda, hold on!"

Madness and grief burns in her eyes. "You killed her! She was all I had left and you killed her!"

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry about Fia but she asked me to! It's what she wanted. To be free, to move on to the other side. You'll see her again, but not today. Do you understand me? Let go of the sword and use me to climb out!"

Sam's head appears above us. "Amanda, you've got us. Lara's right, you need to let yourself grieve and move on."

"We can help you." That's easier said than done. It took me a long time to accept what happened to the Endurance crew. They'd haunted me for months and sometimes that old pain still returns but Amanda needs to let herself go through that. I start to pull her, but she's completely dead weight. "Work with me a little."

Amanda looks down into the darkness, and when she looks up at me again there's resolve on her face. "You're just like her. No fucking wonder I..."

"We need to climb up. I can't hold on, I need you to help!"

Sam disappears from view. "Hold on, I think I can find a rope!"

Amanda seems to realize that we're not going to give up on her. I'm not going to let go and I'm going to keep prodding her until she helps me save her life or we both fall. "You've got this perfect life with this perfect wife. You took that away from me. Remember this, Lara. Every stolen moment with Sam, every breath you take is a gift from me."

She swings the sword up and then Amanda is falling, gone out of sight and I'm left holding her hand. I let it go, so stunned I almost lose my grip on the crevice too. I could have saved her. She didn't have to do that!

She didn't have to do that.

Lara's face fades into the darkness. I fall forever. At least it feels like I do. It's too dark to see what I've done to my arm. I can still feel it. Even move my fingers. But that's just the shock talking.

I'm not expecting the impact or the cold water. It sweeps the sword away but I'm too busy trying to claw for purchase, to grab hold of something. It's exhausting work. Maybe I should just give up. Fia's gone. Lara...just thinking of her face fills me with spite and loss. Lara's an idiot for caring. I'm an idiot for caring. I hate her I hate her I hate her.

A hand grabs me by my good arm and pulls me out of the water. A voice whispers in my ear, but I'm too busy vomiting up water to understand what it says. There's a softly glowing light here as I drag myself to my feet. My right arm is in agony. I don't need to see it to know what I did and I try not to look at it. But I'm supposed to be dead.

"Oh child. It is not yet your time."

A figure steps out of the darkness, holding the sword of the Sun Queen. A woman with skin like brass or bronze, garbed in a form-fitting gown the colors of the sunset. Symbols are painted or carved into her body, and her face is angular, almost inhuman. She has hair like silver-spun gold.

She stretches bat-like wings high towards the vaulted cavern, then surrounds me with them. She presses the tip of the sword under my chin to force me to look at her. She's clearly the source of the glow, and within the winged cocoon the shadows dance on her face. She takes my right arm and it starts to itch.

I mean to look, I'm enraptured by her eyes. They're like staring at the moon. Her voice is like honey and whether she's speaking in my mind or to my ears I can't tell."Tell me all about this new world of yours. I've slumbered a very long time."

((The End..But don't worry, there's an epilogue and Lara and Sam will definitely return after that!))