The tumble rolls came naturally as I rolled between one of the brutes' legs. He tried to grab hold of me and missed completely, thank God. Rolling for a second time I watched the second brute and the third try to catch me. They each lined up, charging like cattle.
Looking at Jamal he was stunned, unsure of whether he should intervene. I looked back controlling my breathing, each breath deep, imagining time slowing down all around me. I had to get this right. Move Cass, I thought, not yet. I second guessed myself.
1…2…3. I dived out of the way - seconds before a brute crashed into the wall, dislodging the lever.
The ceiling began to move, as a brute picked up a dead soldier on the floor covered in armour. Hoisting the body up he held the ceiling in place with his strength as the others tried to stop it falling too. Climbing up on the spiked ceiling I grabbed the shield and placed it to allow the mechanism to work. The ceiling began to shake violently and started to move up. Both Jamal and I were heading towards the top slowly.
"What's happening Cass?" Jamal shouted, as the noise got louder. We felt the platform we were on shake violently beneath us. It began to crumble on the sides. Jamal slipped over the edge as the platform gave way under his feet. I held on to him, "hang on." I shouted trying to pull him up. The platform gave way causing us both to fall.
Crashing on to the floor in a heap, we coughed and spluttered. Things went from bad to worse as the floor began to crack and pull open.
"Hold on," I shouted again as we watched the brutes fall into the chasm below, screaming. I felt the ground go and I quickly dropped, holding on to the piece of floor for dear life. I hung on until I couldn't anymore.
I thought about Dad and Mom and Uncle Sam and Uncle Sully, knowing he was the only thing man I had to a grandpa. He was kind, gentle and I know I made him feel old he never wanted me to call him Grandpa.
Letting go I felt Jamal's hand grab my wrist, pulling me up before following the brutes to their deaths. Thanking Jamal, I gave him a hug and we ran back up towards the monument and out into the battlefield, darting past enemy fire and crumbling rocks - heading for the church.
Bursting through the door we saw the altar ahead each with the gold shields placed in their inlets. "Now what?" I said wondering what to do next.
The shields were mesmerising. The golden glow that shone from their designs reflected in my face. We looked at how beautifully crafted they are. The intricate detail of the lion caught my eye. It looked very expensive and could be worth money that neither of us could count up to.
"I think we need to move this altar." I said reading the story on the wall. It depicted the three houses each using their shields to open the way to the vault. Like the banks of today security was their shield, and in this case literally.
"So, how do we do that Cass?" Jamal asked looking back at the door, just waiting for uninvited guests.
"That kid, is a good question." I replied pushing the shield as though it was a button.
A button that didn't do anything…Nothing.
The shields were in place, and the altar should move exposing a route to the vault. I had read it. I knew what would happen. I thought about what I saw back at Uncle Sam's house. He had all this worked out. I so needed him right now. But it was just us, well us and the homicidal maniacs just a few steps behind the door.
The doors opened and Jamal and I stared. The young female dweller Kelyia who helped us before entered the church. She looked like she had taken on a thousand soldiers. Their blood, sweat and tears – mostly from Redd's goons - were splashed on her body. She told us we didn't have much time. And that Redd and his goons were approaching fast.
"How do we move this thing?" Jamal asked again.
I needed to think, to clear my head. Asking Jamal and Kelyia to watch the door, I needed to focus. To block the sounds of battle outside, the dying cries of Tankman's soldiers. Although music to my ears really - it was still a distraction. And I needed to focus.
I walked over to the shields and ran my fingers around the outline of the Bear. It was so beautiful, and a great deal of time had been spent crafting this truly awesome piece of decorative armour. You can do this Cass, I told myself.
But it was so beautiful. I followed the outline to the top of the shield and caught my finger on a sharp piece of metal sticking out.
"Cass, they're heading this way." Jamal shouted.
"Ow" the small pain I got made me move my finger back. I watched as the blood ran into the outline. That was it, I remembered seeing it.
"Miss they're here," the dweller shouted. Kelyia and Jamal stepped back from the door. I heard them but I was close. My mind went into some sort of trance. Thinking back to the table at Uncle Sam's place, it was a mess, just like his life choices, but I homed in on that piece of paper, that told the story of the three houses.
"Holy shit guys, I think this is it." I said excited, "we're close, it's underneath us".
The paintings of how the houses used their blood to open doors was clear to me now. It was kind of creepy, but I could see that blood was the fluidity of unity. It's blood that binds us, we all have the same colour but each of our families are infused with an essence of a warrior.
I walked over to the Lion, the first one in place and shouted Jamal over, asking him to cut his finger on the small piece of sharp metal on the shield. He looked at me as though to say…what the hell Cass!? His blood ran around the outline lighting up the shield reacting to the chemical in his blood.
The loud noise from the altar rumbled as the shield went further back into the inlet.
"You did it Cass," Jamal said excited by what he had made possible.
The rumbling continued as the altar moved back revealing a small gap. I got on my hands and knees to look through and decided whether we could get through it, but it was too small – we couldn't all fit. We needed to move the altar further back.
Jamal moved to the second shield and once again used a finger to allow the blood to run through the wreath outline. This time nothing happened. "Cass, nothing's happening."
"Oh shit, you're right, we need…the wreath it's not your blood." I shouted Kelyia over. Praying she was the key to the wreath, "can we try your blood?" I said unsure if my words fell heartedly on her ears.
To my surprise, she did. We watched as it reacted to the blood and lit up once again. The shield moved into place and the gap got bigger.
BANG – the wooden doors exploded as Matvey appeared firing the huge devastating KS-23 shotgun. "You killed the door," I said scoffing.
Kelyia hurtled towards Matvey and unsheathed her knife, hoping to punch a hole in his neck. Matvey threw her off him like swatting a fly with a rolled-up newspaper, grunting at his accomplishment. He started walking towards us.
"Cass what now?" Jamal panicked asking.
What now, was exactly what I was thinking. It was obvious that we needed Alexandra, Jamal's sister, but unless by some miracle she teleported to us, we were shit outta luck.
The gap had to do, I thought looking at the distance between the floor and the hole. Looking at the bodies that needed to fit through it – could it be just enough space to get three kids down it?
Jamal wrapped his finger in a small cloth. We slowly stepped back, with Matvey inching closer towards us. Guiding my hand, I signalled to Jamal to climb down through the hole first. It was his only chance. He dropped to the floor and rolled through.
Another grunt from Matvey, followed by a louder one.
"Nice one Kel," I said watching Kelyia dive on Matvey's back and once again trying to attack him. She managed to cut his face as he threw her off him again. Grunting, he stomped towards her, picking her up as she cut his hand. He dropped her to the ground and turned his attention towards me.
"Kel come with us," I shouted reaching out towards her, hoping she still had some strength in her. Matvey tried to pick her up, but she rolled out of his way and grabbed my arm as I pulled her closer towards me. Tankman began stomping his huge monster feet trying to catch Kelyia rolling.
"See you later big guy," I said before rolling into the gap. Having got through the space we looked back knowing Tankman was never going to fit.
Getting up and dusting ourselves off we walked down a ramp before hitting a corner. The glow from the torches was bright, someone had built a secret passageway leading us to somewhere, the vault I was hoping.
"Are we safe Cass?" Jamal asked.
The tenacity of Tankman meant we weren't safe. I said that I bet he's up there now trying to break open the statue so he and his soldiers could flood in and wash us all away.
"We need to hurry," I said following the torches burning - guiding a route down further into the ground. I knew it wouldn't be long before we were interrupted as we picked up the pace following the winding path.
"Hey thanks for saving us back there," I said to Kelyia, she smiled and tried to shake my hand weirdly. She had seen it done before but hadn't quite gotten it right. I showed her how and smiled. I asked her what happened to everyone and hoped they were still alive.
She told me that many had come to try to claim what was hidden in the vault. The path seemed to go on forever and it got more and more hotter as though we were walking towards the centre of the Earth.
Jamal couldn't stop thinking about Alexandra, and I couldn't stop thinking about Mom and Dad. Were they on the way, where were they? The ceiling began to rumble above us. Bits of dust sprinkled on us like fine rain. "They're blasting their way through."
The path veered to the right into a darkened room. It was so dark, I mean really dark, you couldn't see your hand in front of your face. "We need to be careful." I said.
We could see the glint coming from some silver armour. I could smell oil and saw a small stream of it running towards the centre of the room. Removing one of the torches from the passage I lit the floor. The fire ran towards three huge torches as they lit up the room showing what we had found.
"Holy shit," was all I could say. The vault was full of gold, silver and many other valuable metal trinkets. The spoils of war littered the room. Why this hadn't been found yet was unbelievable. One thing I was certain of we were going to be rich having found Yashimata's gold. We walked around the now lit room and looked at the amount of solid gold coins, chalices and various jewellery. Walking around there appeared to be a number of skeletons lying on the floor, each with bullet holes in them. I touched what was left of their uniforms that had been a diet for rats and maggots.
"They died here," I said removing the skull from one of the dead soldiers. It had a large bullet hole in the centre right between his eyes. Moving further in the room, it got darker and another area to light again.
Using the torch, I lit the oil again as it ran around the room. The room lit up showing the unclaimed treasure. There were even more bodies - everywhere. We walked towards another body as his uniform looked different.
"What happened to them? Did they kill each other over who would claim the treasure." Kelyia said. Her eyes lit up when she saw a gold chalice. She walked towards it.
I looked at the uniforms and realised they were years apart, in fact they were hundreds of years apart, this wasn't just Yashimata's treasure this was a place to store all treasure.
"Wait!" I shouted to her, "don't touch anything."
Kelyia stopped reaching out towards the chalice as she heard me shout. She looked back and asked why not. If I was right, I think the treasure is cursed.
"Cursed, how?" Jamal asked me, wondering why Kelyia wasn't allowed to have a piece of treasure for herself. "You mean if I take it, I'll be killed?"
It was more than that. I showed Jamal and Kelyia the bullet holes in the different soldiers, they didn't shoot each other, then shot themselves. "I think they went crazy after touching this stuff, it's cursed."
"Good job I didn't touch it then," Kelyia said pleased that I saved her from making a grave mistake.
"This isn't what Redd's here for," I said moving closer to the back of the room. We saw a blue glow coming from another passage. As we entered an object encased in a glass box bobbed up and down bathed in a strange light, as though it was keeping it in place.
"It's the stone of Eve" I said looking at the crystal.
"I thought it was red?" Kelyia said.
"Like many artifacts in the world only read about, depiction is often subjective." Looking at the large crystal it appeared broken, parts missing. "It's likely that some other colour was used in Drake's jewel." I said out loud.
I peered closer at the bobbing gemstone and thought I could see my father through the Stone of Eve. I felt in a trance and had an outer body experience. I watched as Dad and Uncle had disabled everyone in the meeting hall. They seemed to be fighting against some woman. I didn't recognise her. But I couldn't believe what I was seeing, I tried to shout but they couldn't hear me. They seemed to be in a vault just like this one.
"Jamal…it's…your sister," I spoke softly recognising her from the description of the young Romanian girl he'd given so many times.
SMASH – the glass container broke as Tankman's gunfire shattered the glass causing me to snap out of the trance. Part of the Stone of Eve flew off from the blast. I grabbed it as Tankman loaded up for another shot removing his helmet.
"You really are annoying girl," he said pointing the weapon at the three of us.
"And your boss is going to kill you for breaking his priceless artifact," I shouted making a beeline for the exit. Matvey's gun fired again and again. Bullets ricocheting off the treasure as we ran as fast as we could.
Unfortunately, the exit was surrounded by goons. There was no way out. Putting my hands up, I surrendered. There was no escaping their clutches. Matvey walked towards us getting ready to slap me across the face.
"Stop," Redd shouted. He emerged from the darkness. "Well done Ms Drake you found the entrance," he said signally a mercenary to pick us up. "Be careful with that one," Redd pointed at Jamal.
My goon wasn't gentle. He picked me up. I kicked at him, but it was no use. We headed back to the room where the Stone of Eve lay. The crystal was beautiful. Redd held it above his head, as though it was a trophy won in a soccer game.
"Do you know what this is?" Redd asked me.
"A new conversation piece for your home of the psychos," it was always a good time for jokes. I knew what it was having read about what it could do. Someone had planted pieces of parchment with riddles and the like trying to lead an inquisitive adventure to this place.
Just a fragment of this gem marked the beginning - the genie in the bottle - it could grant wishes beyond your wildest dreams. Redd smiled congratulating me on my knowledge.
"Why is it blue?" Jamal asked me.
"It's blue because it comes from the tears of the frozen. When Eve was cast out, she wept frozen tears. Drake's jewel was infused with other alchemical properties causing it to be red. But we all bleed the same colour, so what may be different on the outside, is very much the same on the inside."
Redd held the crystal up and touched his forehead with it, "I have the stone of Eve in my hands." He shouted as though he was summoning a demon. The room began to shake, and we knew a wish had been granted.
"Maaa, raaa," the sounds coming from inside the room were sounds evil in nature, as though an army of the dead was rising.
"What is happening?" Redd shouted hoping to have the item in his possession grant him something he had longed for. The noise of the dead got louder, and we could hear clanking of metal. A skeletal hand reached for one of Matvey's soldiers. Firing at the reanimated skeleton bits of bone splintered off in all directions. But it didn't stop the creature from coming to life. The undead soldiers were rising from the ground and ready to once again do battle.
"I didn't wish for this," Redd shouted as more noises came from outside the room.
This was my que, my time to shine.
"You don't have the power, you need someone who can wield it, you're not worthy." I shouted over the loud noises.
"Neither are you, you don't have the power either. Only one with the blood of the ancients can use such…" Redd shouted back realising what had happened.
He was right, no one had the power other than the chosen. The power wasn't just in the stone, it was in the right person to use it. Drake had his companion who had the ability to turn the tide of war, and we had ours.
"No, I have." Jamal said holding the fragment I gave him. Redd looked angry, much more than I had ever seen before. The room began to swarm with soldiers. I headed towards the stone and wanted to get another piece of it. I reached for another piece and ran towards the exit with Kelyia and Jamal by my side. Entering the treasure room, Kelyia's people had joined us. She looked at me telling me to go and get out of here.
"What happened to the stone?" Jamal asked seeing how dark it was.
"It's dead now," I said smirking, knowing it would require to be powered up once again. Jamal realised I had given it to him to save us. It didn't take a genius to understand how this would be powered up again.
As we ran through the littered bodies of mercenaries and dwellers it was total chaos.
Running up the ramp and climbing out of the now much larger hole, Jamal and I returned to the courtyard and the monument that led to the depths below.
"So, what now Cass?"
"Now we bring everyone to us." I smiled and handed Jamal another part of the Stone of Eve. He smiled back and knew exactly what I wanted. He took my hand and held it tight. Connecting his thoughts with mine. I pictured Dad and the others in that other vault. Wondering what they were doing.
"Cass, how do you think this is going to work?" Jamal asked.
How I thought this was going to work was irrelevant, it needed to work. But the Earth was ruled by science. Everything had to be explained. It was impossible for a person to be in one place and then another hundreds of thousands of miles away in the blink of an eye.
I thought about how the world uses time, how it uses physics. Was there a way to see past the omnipotence of mother nature? Could she be manipulated to cause an effect in a way that could teleport a group of people across the world?
A flash of white light appeared in front of me. Dad rolled into view along with the others I saw in the Stone of Eve. Dad ran towards me giving me a great big hug. I tried to hold back the tears.
Uncle Sam approached me and gave me a hug too, checking to make sure I was okay. I smiled at him and asked where my mom was. Dad said she was safe with Uncle Sully.
"Well little brother what next?" Uncle Sam said as he looked at Jamal. His eyes looked like he'd seen dollar signs. It was obvious he was happy to see us but there was something else going on behind his thoughts.
I thought about what Jamal had said and there was some worry about what was going to happening next.
"Nathan, how do we get the stone?" Uncle Sam shouted. "Chloe's sacrifice, Nathan, what now?"
I had heard of the name before, and I remembered seeing it in Uncle Sam's place on a piece of paper. She seemed to be a friend to my dad and uncle who may have given her life to save them so Dad could get to me. I thought about Uncle Sam and his condition wondering if he had given up the want to cure his illness.
"Cass are you alright?" Dad asked looking me over, holding me one second, pushing out his arms the next and bringing me back in. He asked about the cries of soldiers being attacked. I held on to him tight and asked him where he'd been.
"Cass what have you been doing?" Uncle Sam asked.
The little girl I knew as Alexandra appeared near Uncle Sam as she saw Jamal and recognised him. They both ran towards each other expressing how much they missed one another.
"Dad, Redd Fisher has the stone," I said explaining to him we needed to get out of here. There didn't seem to be any other way to go. "We've gotta get out of here, Redd can't have both of the maps together."
Dad had a look in his eye, as though he wanted to finish this. With both maps in our possession. We needed to escape and find the location to the garden and its veritable power in opening the entrance to Eden.
"Where is the stone Cass?" Uncle Sam shouted, "is it here?"
His voice sounded angry and saddened at the same time.
"It's back there," I said watching Uncle Sam slow down.
"We need to get it." He demanded.
I knew why Uncle Sam wanted the stone so badly, I knew it was his last hope. Had he told Dad about his condition? I wondered.
"Forget it Sam. We've got Cass back. I'm done." Dad said looking into my eyes.
"Dad, the Stone of Eve can let you have anything right?" I said wondering why we even needed the stone.
"You only get one wish, once you have it it's gone, the stone needs recharging." He said looking over at Jamal.
"Yeah, I know but why not ask to be transported to the Garden of Eden." I said.
"Um, right, yeah I guess you could do that." He said laughing.
"Nathan, we need that stone, are you coming?" Uncle Sam demanded an answer.
"No we need to get to South America," Dad said, "we need to get to Dead Island."
"Sounds like a great place to visit," I said smiling.
I told him about the incredible 'James Bond' submarine and that it was here somewhere near a sunken ship. We just needed to get one of the motorised boats out to it.
Uncle Sam cocked his gun and pointed at Dad, "I'm sorry Nathan, we can't go." he said as Redd and his men came towards us.
"Sam what the hell are you doing?" Dad shouted as Matvey and his soldiers tied our wrists.
"Well done, Samuel, you've brought me what I asked for." Redd said walking over towards Dad. "Nathan Drake. Still alive. I thought your sister would have taken you to see your maker."
"She's not my sister," Dad said. "Aren't you due a stroke soon?"
Redd punched my dad across the face.
"Still cracking wise eh," Redd said looking at everyone and how helpless we were. "Let's go. It's a long trip."
Thank you for reading this. I'm really sorry it has taken this long to get the next chapter out. We'll continue the adventure next time – see you soon.