AUTHOR'S NOTE: Sorry, I've been kind of stuck lately. This isn't too long a chapter, but… Oh well. Felt guilty at not updating, at any rate. So… here we forcibly go. No action here, next chapter please. I just noticed my mistake about the Henshingly/Richard Croft thing. For my benefit, can we leave it at Henshingly??? Thanks…

Finally, God does exist, and there is only One God. This is fiction for a reason. All praise, power and glory be unto Him!

PLEASE REVIEW!!!!!!!!!

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The Illuminati were still pounding on the door.

"Maybe I should repeat what I said, Lara. Everyone wants to change the world. Think about it. Whatever you do in life is a subconscious effort of that. Animal activists want more animals. Doctors want more stinking people alive on this overcrowded planet. Jailbirds- well, jailbirds will be jailbirds.

"Think of this as normal, happy human behavior, Lara."

I couldn't believe my ears.

"I mean, look at yourself. Crawling around in the dirt digging up the past. Yes, I know that's fascinating at first. That, and the beauty of first youth…" He sighed. "But let me tell you, daughter dear," he continued, tone becoming more definite, face growing hard, "This particular subconscious effort… well, let's just say it's ineffective. Very."

"And why would that be?" The words slipped out of my mouth.

"Like I said, you're trying to piece together yesterday. But whatever happens, Lara, yesterday will never return. Never." He spat his last words out vehemently. "Everything else jumps on the bandwagon. Everything else – life. People." He stopped suddenly, grimacing almost as if a fly had flown into his mouth and he was debating whether to swallow it or to spit it out.

He spit it out. "Even your mother, Lara."

It was like something tearing in me. A tall, beautiful woman with flawless ivory skin and long flowing dark hair, smiling confidently – someone whom I knew only by name, not memory – my mother.

I'd never known her.

Henshingly hid something of a smirk. "Back to you, my darling. Why are we salvaging these faint traces of things that will never come back? Why?

"Thus, I began to dream, to dream of a whole new world… far better and more beautiful than the old one could have ever been. My world. And how? Power. Power, Lara, is the root of all… Illuminati." He laughed at his feeble attempt at humor. "And to have power, I needed… well, power is really something only a god would possess, Lara.

"And this is really where those pieces of yesterday come into play. I told you that people died moved on, don't they? You certainly did. But let me tell you something – a god doesn't. He 'lives' on in his cracked temples, 'dead' without the proper respect of his people – without them, he is nothing. Power doesn't take sides, though, and if, just if, one could believe in old gods just to tap into that source of power… it'd work. Why should it not?

[I HOPE NO ONE IS CONFUSED AT THIS POINT. IF YOU ARE, DROP ME A REVIEW. I'LL TRY TO EXPLAIN EITHER VIA EMAIL OR IN MY NEXT POST.]

"I knew I would have to pretend to be dead, so everyone would just move on and I'd have the best kind of privacy while I accomplished my task. I'd still need a bunch of people running errands for me, of course. Some were useless… some of my agents were very effective, though, take Manfred Powell for instance. He led your first expedition, didn't he? With a certain Alex West?"

"He told me he was freelance," I said as neutrally as I possibly could, trying not to betray how I felt. He'd almost been like a father to me, not to mention mentor.

~*~ I PROMISE TO HAVE THE FINDING OF PIECE WITH LARA AND ALEX IN THE NEXT CHAPTER. I MIGHT BRING POWELL IN. ANY SUGGESTIONS? ~*~