“You don’t understand,” Soren gasped. “I already opened it. Just a crack. I felt it—the end of everything. The death of the first cell. The scream of the first lung.”
“You understand this isn’t a trinket, Lara,” said her ally, the disgraced MI6 agent Kessler, from the opposite seat. “If the legend holds, it doesn’t just contain hope and despair. It contains the first breath of every living soul. The original template of mortality.”
They descended into the dark. Kessler’s flashlight caught a mosaic floor that rippled with heat. Lara knelt, pressing her palm to the stone. “Geothermal vents. The whole island is a furnace.” She pointed to a series of bronze pressure plates. “Step there, and the floor opens to magma. We follow the serpent’s path.” “You don’t understand,” Soren gasped
Gunfire erupted. Kessler took a round to the shoulder, went down. Lara moved like smoke, pistols spitting fire. Two mercenaries fell. She vaulted the obsidian pillar, kicked Dorian’s rifle aside, and drove an elbow into his throat. Soren grabbed the box.
Her eyes went white. She convulsed, dropped the box, and fell. I felt it—the end of everything
Soren smiled. “Then it’s also the cure. And I intend to weaponize the cure.”
She picked up the container and walked toward the seaplane without looking back. The Cradle of Life could wait. But the box—the box would sleep again. For a little while. “If the legend holds, it doesn’t just contain
The moment Soren’s fingers touched it, the floor groaned. The serpent’s path of pressure plates reversed. Magma hissed through new vents. Lara grabbed Kessler and hauled him toward a side tunnel. Soren ran the opposite way, box clutched to her chest.