TOMB OF LIFE

TOMB OF LIFE

CHAPTER 3

Lara awoke with a splitting headache, she tried to sit up but quickly stilled her movements when she felt faint -- her hazel eyes were squeezed shut, her features contorted with pain. She lay like that for a few more minutes trying to catch her bearings. Eventually the pain began to wane and her eyes slowly fluttered open. She wasn't quite sure what she was seeing at first, it seemed like she was amid a void of darkness but what were those bright spots in the distance – stars?

Lara sat up and that's when she realized she was clutching something – her magnetic grapple. She distinctly remembered that it had been sucked into the vortex before she too had been pulled in. She did not even recall having retrieved it. However her first order of business was to figure a way out of this mess. Tapping her headset she spoke into it. "Zip, Alistair, can you read me?" She repeated the question several more times but silence greeted her in response. She figured it was worth a try but had suspected that they wouldn't be able to hear her if she was indeed where she thought she was – another dimension or another world.

Suddenly a viewer screen visualized in the void and Lara watched fascinated as alien creatures were displayed. It seemed some sort of arena match was taking place. She saw two humanoid aliens squaring off against each other in what seemed to be some type of battle ring. What Lara found most interesting, were the two open portals that were behind the wall on either side of the ring and a third tall and lanky alien that seemed to be on the outside of the arena holding some type of control device.

Lara's attention was drawn back to the arena when she saw one of the aliens easily defeat the other by ripping its opponents head off. The victor was a purple skinned demon with rippling muscles and a face that resembled a Minotaur. She could hear it roaring in victory and was hoping not to have to go up against it when suddenly the floor fell out from underneath her. Lara landed with a thud into the arena facing the Minotaur. Wasting no more time she quickly pulled off her backpack and began to put together the pieces of Excalibur – a powerful artifact reminiscent of King Arthur's sword. Grabbing the Ghalali Key she held it over the sword and watched as Excalibur was re-forged and not a moment too soon – the monster attacked.

Flipping backward Lara was able to avoid a vicious claw that would have shredded her chest in a bloody mess -- she then performed a counter attack by swiping the sword at the creature and sending a green energy beam towards it. The creature flew backward and hit the wall beyond seemingly stunned.

Now that she was granted a slight reprieve she turned her attention to the wall and flicked the sword several times sending green blast waves at the structure. It cracked and eventually gave way. She heard something like an alarm begin to go off inside the room – realizing that she had to act quickly or lose her advantage she grabbed her backpack and headed for the opening she had just created.

On the outside she found the tall creature with the device standing outside – it seemed to have a surprised expression on its oblong face. Lara flicked Excalibur and its resulting energy beam barreled the creature over. Grabbing the device the creature was holding she headed to one of the open portals. A part of her realized she wouldn't be able to work the device to figure out how to get back to her dimension – when she thought to turn back to attempt to question the creature she saw a score of monsters heading towards her. Without further ado she quickly jumped through the open portal.

Meanwhile – in the epicenter cavern on Gaia – two ShinRa officers stood around quite literally bored to tears having had to guard an empty room for days. "This is getting ridiculous," One of them said to the other.

"Yea well, this pays the bills," The other man with sandy brown hair replied.

Suddenly the air in the room became very cold – both men glanced at each other nervously, and when a swirling portal appeared they grabbed for their weapons and aimed it at the disturbance. They were completely surprised to see a woman come flying through with a large sword attached to her back.

Lara hit the ground with a thud and glanced up to find two men wearing uniforms and helmets pointing guns at her. She raised her hands in surrender but this lasted for all of 5 seconds before she realized her pursuers were coming through the portal. "They're coming!" She yelled and watched in horror as one of the creatures jumped out and grabbed hold of the sandy haired officer who cried out as he was impaled by a sword like appendage. Lara pulled her pistols and began to shoot at it, but the creature's skin was one tough hide – most of her bullets were being deflected by it. The other soldier began to do the same but his bullets had the same effect. She would have to use Excalibur but not with the soldier standing so closely.

"Run!" Lara shouted to the man reaching for her sword but it was too late. She watched horrified when another creature came through the portal and threw a bladed weapon at the man which decapitated him instantly. Drawing on her reserves Lara swiped Excalibur at the creatures and saw them be blasted back to the rock wall. She quickly pressed some buttons on the device she had stolen from the creature hoping something would happen. To her relief and dismay the portal closed but the two creatures she had blasted were already on their feet. Realizing she may be in over her head she turned and ran out of the cavern.

--

Tseng sat in President ShinRa's office along with Sephiroth and Rufus himself giving a weekly briefing of their respective departments. "There are a couple new cadets I've had my eye on that I think will make good Turks with the proper training," Tseng was explaining.

"Who do you refer?" Sephiroth asked. When Tseng replied with two names, Sephiroth was pleased they were not the ones on his list that he knew would make good SOLDIERS. Sephiroth disliked the fact that Tseng recruited new Turks from the ranks of the SOLDIER trainee's but he tolerated it because it was what the President wanted – the Turks were his personal guard and he deserved the best of the best.

Suddenly Tsengs phone began to ring. "They knew not to call me unless it was absolutely urgent," Tseng said confident that his men would not call while he was in a meeting unless they really had too. Tseng flipped over the phone and answered it.

Rufus and Sephiroth knew instantly that the Turk had received bad news when his grip tightened on his chair handle. "I see – and they are both dead?" Tseng's conversation lasted another thirty seconds before he flipped the phone closed. "It seems we have a problem in the prediction cave. I think the portal opened and something came through which killed the guards we'd left there."

"By Shiva…" Rufus exclaimed.

"Did they find what did it?" Sephiroth asked.

"No, I'm heading down there to handle the investigation myself," Tseng stated getting to his feet.

"I'll come with you," Sephiroth offered.

Both bowed to the president before leaving the office.

About thirty minutes later – Sephiroth stood in the geological cavern with Tseng and two other Turks. "There are three sets of prints here," Sephiroth said indicating the two clawed prints that were most likely monsters.

"Three – how do you figure?" Cissnei asked.

"Two creatures and one human," Sephiroth pointed at a print of a rugged sole. "This is not the print of the standard issue soldier boots."

"Oh, so three creatures but one was wearing boots," Reno chuckled, he sobered instantly when Sephiroth gave him a withering look.

"I'm glad you find this so amusing Reno." He dismissed the silly redhead and returned to studying the prints. Since the only bodies here were from our own people then its safe of assume that the one who made these prints and the creatures got away." Sephiroth and his team had arrived in time to see the severed body parts of the two soldiers before they had vanished – returning to the Lifestream.

Tseng flipped open his phone and issued the necessary orders to get a search underway for the aliens. "What do you make of all this?" Tseng asked Sephiroth after he had flipped his phone closed.

"I'm not sure," Sephiroth replied wishing that Gast was still alive as he was the only one who had experience with what he had read about the portals on the prediction wall. Other scientists could read the predictions as well but Gast had infinite knowledge for he had been studying it the longest. Sephiroth only hoped that they would be able to overcome this danger without too much loss of life. It didn't help that the geological stratum was so close to Midgar – the creatures could be in the city right now. "I'm going to personally head the SOLDIER unit that will be searching Midgar," Sephiroth stated before leaving the room.

--

Night had fallen on Midgar, yet the streets were still bustling with activity from local parties to clubs and bars offering customers a taste of their night life. Cloud Strife steadily maneuvered Fenrir, his beast of a motorbike through the city streets making his way back to the 7th Heaven. He'd had a long day of deliveries and simply wanted to get home and jump in bed. He hoped Tifa wouldn't grill him anymore about attending the ShinRa party for he simply wasn't up to it.

Cloud was interrupted from his thoughts when he heard screaming coming from an alleyway. Fenrir's hidden compartments immediately extracted allowing Cloud to retrieve his Ultima Weapon from one of the slots. He then turned down the alley heading towards the screams. He found a scaly green monster with sword like appendage limbs attacking two young men. Cloud launched off Fenrir and flew towards the creature sword in hand. The creature instantly deflected the blow with its sword appendages which threw Cloud back a few feet. Cloud split Ultima Weapon into two blades then went on the offensive once more. The creature blocked him expertly and threw him back once more which landed Cloud in the middle of the street. The spiky haired blond rolled away just in time to avoid being run over by a speeding car.

The creature now went on the offensive forcing cloud back until he had been backed into a wall. The creature attacked again pitting its strength against Cloud in a battle of wills to see who would be the first to waver – Ultima Weapon and sword appendage locked in tight combat.

Suddenly – the creature was blasted off Cloud and landed in a heap next to a garbage pile. Cloud glanced around to find Genesis, Sephiroth and Angeal heading towards him. Genesis was about to blast another fireball at the creature when Sephiroth stopped him.

Angeal pulled Cloud to his feet while Genesis gave the blond a quick smile. Sephiroth ignored Cloud and walked towards the creature. It was still alive as he could see the limbs twitching. It was quite an ugly beast and it smelled. Suddenly the creature began to move with vigor – in a flash Sephiroth impaled it with the Masamune, his seven foot long katana sword. When he withdrew the sword, there was a fine coating of purple blood smeared across the tip.

"What the heck was that?" Cloud demanded, a scowl marring his handsome face. "ShinRa cooking up experiments to get us all killed?"

"It's nothing like that, this creature is not of this world," Angeal explained.

"We need to keep this quiet. Cloud, as someone who once worked for ShinRa I expect to have your full co-operation," Sephiroth said pinning steely green eyes on the blond.

"You won't get shit from me until you tell me what's going on?" Cloud returned, his Mako blue eyes narrowing.

The ShinRa clean up crew arrived at that moment to bag the body of the dead alien. "Get it back to the ShinRa labs immediately so they can hopefully learn something about its species before it returns to the Lifestream," Sephiroth ordered the head of the clean up crew. He turned his attention back to Cloud when his phone rang. He saw Cloud roll his blue eyes when the general reached to answer it.

"Sephiroth, its Tseng," Came the voice through the receiver. "We found one of the alien creatures – it's dead."

"Good work," Sephiroth replied.

"We didn't kill it, we found it dead. There was purple blood pouring out of it," Tseng replied.

"Yes, this one bled purple as well."

"We found some traces of human blood too, well at least it was red -- we're going to have it analyzed. It's possible that whoever killed it did not remain unscathed."

"The unknown person who came through with the creatures," Sephiroth surmised.

"Possibly, but one other thing – it's been dead for over an hour."

"How is it possible that it hasn't returned to the planet?"

"We're guessing it's because these things aren't native to our universe," Tseng explained.

"Alright, we're going to keep searching for that other person I'll talk to you soon," Sephiroth flipped his phone closed and gazed at his companions.

"I'll help you look, provided you explain to me what the heck is going on," Cloud snapped. He hated Sephiroth but recognized that there were bigger things at play here and that perhaps they should work together this once.

Sephiroth nodded, Cloud was not his favorite person but he was grateful that the younger man was not going to make a stink about the situation just because they were not on the best of terms. Chances are they would need to work together to get the matter resolved.

Meanwhile in the basement of an abandoned apartment complex, Lara rested as she contemplated her situation. She had managed to take out one of the creatures that were chasing her but not before it got a piece of her. She was grateful for her medical kit that she carried with her always in her trusty backpack as she was able to patch herself up right quick. The slash had struck her on the right shoulder which left a huge tear in her tan colored shirt. She had already disinfected the wound and bandaged it and was now feeling the numbing effects of a couple of painkillers.

She had intended to take out both creatures before they could harm anyone else, but found that she had needed the cover of the city to aid her with her fight against them. When the first one had injured her, she realized she would be in no shape to take on the second and felt an extreme amount of guilt having led the dangerous creature to a civilized area. She only hoped that their population would have the means to defeat it quickly before it did too much damage.

Lara sighed – what had she gotten herself into? She still had the portal device she had seen the tall creature using before her arena battle, but was now leery of using it afraid she may call forth more creatures to her position and she was in no shape to take on any of them at the moment. She knew she would eventually have to use the device once more to find a way home but planned to do so after she had a good nights sleep. Using her backpack as a pillow she lay down on the paper cluttered floor and drifted off almost immediately.