[Name]'s POV
"Well we can't stay here- we gotta move," Sully says.
"How?" Chloe asks, and I run a hand through my hair.
"Our only hope is to find the crypt entrance," I say, and Charlie starts to stumble towards me while I walk towards the wall with the three pillars.
"Great. Any ideas?" Sully asks us.
"Well, Charlie was onto something- I just don't know what," Nate says while looking at our drugged friend.
"The Wand of the Magician..." Charlie states, and holds his head.
"Without his journal, we're never going to find it," Harry mutters, and I look at the symbols on the pillars.
'Balance. One black triangle on the left pillar, a white triangle on the right pyramid, and both on the center one. The entrance is the middle pillar' I realize and my eyes widen.
"The middle pillar. That's the entrance. The duality of light and dark," I state while the others join me.
"The Middle Way..." Cutter groans and I walk up to the middle pillar and push it, making it move back slightly.
"A hand would be nice." I look over my shoulder, and Nate and Harry help me push the pillar back through the wall. We enter a dark room with a path down the back and Cutter refuses to come in.
"It's okay, Charlie. C'mon, Mate," Chloe helps him inside, and Nate pushes the pillar shut once everyone's in the room.
"The way up and the way down are one and the same," Charlie says, and I nod my head.
"Yeah?" I question while pulling out my flashlight- the others using torches as their light source.
We walk down the path, and I help Charlie through the tight space in the wall and out through the other side. "There's another passage up ahead!" Nate tells me, and I nod.
"Go on ahead. I've got Charlie," I tell the rest.
They nod and walk through the crypt, and I rest my hand on Cutter's shoulder as he stares at the last passage we need to go through. "You've got this C. Just one more," I tell him when he turns around and goes to punch me.
I jump out of the way and drop my flashlight putting my hands up in a defense position. "Charlie! Calm down!" I cry out as he pushes me back against the wall and grabs a skull from behind me. He goes to slam the skull into my head, but I move out of the way and push him away from me, not wanting to hurt my friend.
"C'mon. I don't want to hurt you, C," I say while sliding out of the way as he tries to charge me. "It's me, Charlie. It's [Name]," I say and his fist connects with my left eye.
I push him away from me again, still not wanting to hurt him, and he keeps coming back to attack me. "I'm not going to hurt you," I tell him while continuing to dodge all of his attacks. Charlie suddenly stops attacking and he looks down. I cautiously start to approach him with my hands out to show I won't hurt him, "It's okay, C. I promise I won't hurt you."
Cutter looks up before rushing forward and pushing me back against the wall. He grips my throat and starts choking me and I grab his arms and try to pry them off me. "C'mon Charlie," I whisper as my vision start to fade in and out.
I hear a few sets of footsteps enter the room and Chloe shout, "Charlie. You're killing her!"
Cutter doesn't let go of my throat and I begin to gasp for air, my friends voices starting to get extremely frantic. The pressure around my throat suddenly disappears and I slump down to the floor, coughing violently when three people kneel down next to me. "[Name]. Love, look at me," Harry says and I look up at him, Nate, and Chloe.
"My God..." Chloe mumbles and Nate gently touches my neck.
"How bad is it?" I ask with a raspy voice, and he frowns.
"You'll definitely have bruises from where his fingers were. You're eye is swelling up, too," he tells me, and I nod while sitting up.
"Up you go, darling. Slowly," Harry says while helping me onto my feet.
"You all right, kiddo?" Sully asks, and I nod my head.
"I'll be fine," I smile slightly, and he ruffles my hair.
We all look at Cutter who stands by the opposite wall, staring at us. His eyes flicker to mine and he frowns, "[Name]... I'm so, so sorry."
I walk over to him, despite the protests from Nate and Harry, sending him a smile. "I forgive you, C, you we're drugged. Though you try it again and I won't hold myself back next time," I tell him with a smirk. He chuckles and we exchange a short hug, before I look at the others, "Now let's go."
Nate, Sully, Chloe, and I start to walk through the last passage and I look behind me to see Sully forcing Charlie to go next, figuring him to be wary of him after the attack. Charlie squeezes through the passage, joining us on the other side, and Sully comes through last.
"[Name], you dropped this so I picked it up for you," Chloe tosses me my flashlight.
"You're the best," I tell her while shining it down the path.
"Damn right I am." I chuckle at her pride, and we drop down off the ledge of the path to the floor below us. We run down the path and into a circular room with a large globe in the center. "This is more than just a crypt," Chloe says while we look around.
"Yeah, the whole damn room looks like some kind of ancient device," Sully responds and I hum, glancing over to Nate and Harry who make their way up to the second floor.
"We need to get it spinning," I state while looking down to the channels in the floor, "I bet if we can get water through these it will do the trick."
Nate and Harry light some torches on the floor above, making light shine down through the statues on the globe. "What happened?" Nate calls down to us.
"Some kind of projection showed up on the globes. They're marking positions on it," Chloe responds and the two guys run off.
I walk around the room for a bit when I spot Harry and Nate on the other side of a dry pool by some cranks. They turn the cranks and the water fills the pool and starts traveling through a channel in the ground. My two friends swim over and join us and Cutter and I help them out of the water.
"You wouldn't have liked it back there, love. There were spiders," Harry tells me while running his hands through his messy hair, styling it back.
"Eck, I hate those things," I stick my tongue out in disgust.
"You hate a lot of things," Chloe chimes in, and I deadpan.
"Yeah, yeah," I mutter, and sulk over to the crank that'll let the water flow through the one channel, into the channels around the globe.
Cutter goes to the other crank and we turn it and watch as the water flows through the channels, making the globe lower and spin. "It worked. It started to spin," Chloe smiles and we walk over to the globe.
"It looks like those light projections might line up with the land masses," Sully points out and I touch the globe and spin it until the lights hit the correct spots on it.
The globe raises up and something spirals down from the ceiling and stops on the second floor of the room. "Let's check it out," I shrug, and we jog up a flight of stairs and across the path into the the tube-like structure.
The six of us run up the spiral staircase and into an ancient crypt. "All right, we're looking for a knight's tomb, just like the one we found in France," Nate says and I nod.
"He should be buried with the other half of the amulet."
"[Name]'s right." Nate nods and the room we're in lowers.
"Then let's find a tomb," Harry says, and we walk to the back of the crypt and find the knight's tomb.
"Is that it?" Chloe asks, and I nod.
"It's just like the one we found in France," I tell her while opening the lid of the crypt to reveal a dead body and the other half of the amulet, "Here it is."
I grab the amulet, turning to Nate, "Nate, your journal."
He hands it to me and I flip open his book and place the amulet piece by the one I drew. "And with the inscription complete..." Cutter trails off with a grin.
"We know exactly where to go in Yemen," Nate says, and I nod.
"I will hold onto that," Cutter takes the artifact out of my hand and tucks it in his jacket pocket.
"All right, lets get the let out of here," Harry says, and we turn and start to walk back through the crypt.
"Keep looking. They have to be here somewhere," we hear Talbot say, causing me to groan.
"They must've followed us," I mutter, and Chloe nods.
"Well, we better hope there's another way outta here," she sighs and we walk towards another part of the crypt when a draft hits.
"There's a draft over here," I say while starting to push on the stone wall.
Cutter helps me and we push the wall forward until it crumbles and crushes an agent outside. "Ah... thank you very much, I'll take that," Charlie says, and takes the gun from the hand of the dead agent.
We run outside where the sun is just starting to rise, and we stop at the edge of a canyon in the ground where Talbot and a few agents stand on the other side. We pull out our guns and aim it at the agents and Talbot- the men also having their weapons trained on us.
"Drop your weapons," Talbot orders, and I smirk.
"Not happening, asshole," I tell him and he raises his eyebrows.
"Well, then. What a dilemma. We seem to be equally matched. Until the rest of my men show up, that is."
"We can wait," Sully says, and I chuckle.
"Or we can kill you now," I state when Cutter drops his arm with the gun and starts shaking his head.
"Oh no... guys-" Chloe says when Cutter turns and aims his gun at me.
"Oh, Goddammit," Sully groans and I continue pointing my gun at one of the agents ahead, glancing at the barrel of Cutter's gun a few inches from my face.
"Now, that changes things a bit, doesn't it? Now, drop your guns," Talbot orders again.
"Why don't you go fuck your-" Nate starts when Talbot looks at Charlie.
"Cutter, shoot her. Shoot [Name]."
"Wait. Just stop, okay?" Sully says and tosses his gun off the ledge of the ground we're on. Chloe, Nate, and Harry do the same and I grit my teeth.
"No," I snarl and Talbot scowls.
"Shoot her," he tells Cutter.
Charlie smirks, "My pleasure," he says and turns and shoots Talbot in the chest.
I chuckle and shoot the the other agents before we all start running for the tower. "Why on earth did you drop your bloody guns?!" Charlie yells to the rest while we run inside a tower and up the stairs.
"You could've given us a bloody wink or something to tell us your plan, mate!" Harry calls back.
"Well I didn't expect any of you to give up quite that easily, did I?" Cutter responds, and we climb up a ladder at the top of the tower.
Harry, Sully, Chloe, and I jump off the top of the tower and onto some wooden planks below, and when Nate jumps down the planks start to break. "Shit! Cutter won't be able to make this jump," I say while we stare at our friend on the top of the tower.
Charlie looks at us and gestures us to wait before turning around and facing Talbot and his men who showed up. "Holy shit he's still alive!" I whisper-yell.
"You didn't get very far, did you now? Hand it over," Talbot demands with a smirk.
"Piss off," Charlie responds and one of the guards hits his back with the butt of the gun.
We watch as Charlie falls to his knees, and I glare up at Talbot and his men. "This is unbearable," Chloe whispers and Talbot takes the other piece of the amulet from Charlie and chuckles.
Another person joins Talbot on the rooftop and she laughs, "Oh, Cutter. I had such high hopes for you," Marlowe says, and I scoff.
"Yeah, right," Cutter rolls his eyes and she looks at him.
"It's true- you had potential. Now... well, it's funny how things work out, isn't it? You betray my trust... and now we find ourselves here."
Kate strikes a match and stares at the flame while Talbot's men spread gasoline on the rooftop. "As if it were in the cards all along," Kate says and tosses the match into the gasoline. Charlie stumbles back and looks off the edge of the rooftop, then at the fire behind him.
"Charlie, mate, don't!" Harry shouts, and we watch as Cutter jumps down to the ground below.
"Charlie!" I cry out and we make our way down to the ground and over to him.
Charlie groans in pain and it doesn't take much to tell he broke his right leg. "Ah! Shit! Bollocks!" he swears and we carefully roll him onto his back.
"[Name], Harry, Nate- look at this," Chloe says and grabs something from Cutter's jacket pocket.
"A tarot card," I murmur and Harry looks at it.
"What does it mean?" he asks and I run through my memory until I remember what it is.
"The Tower card is an indication for disaster," I explain when we hear Talbot giving orders.
"We can't stay here," Nate says, and Charlie looks at us.
"Just leave me the gun, I'll kill those bastards," he says and I shake my head.
"Not happening. We're getting you out of here," I say, and Nate and Harry help Charlie up before Sully takes over and assists him.
"Cover us," Sully states, and I pull out my sniper rifle and aim it at the ground below.
"How is that possible? I shot him right in that disgusting nancy boy waistcoat. You bloody saw it!" Cutter complains, and I take out the agents when they peek from cover.
"My guess is he had on a bulletproof vest," I respond, and Nate, Chloe, and Harry rush down the stairs and pick up a gun that some of the agents I killed dropped.
They start shooting at the agents in their line of sight, and I take out the ones that started crossing the drawbridge door. I jump down onto the ground below and run over to a stone block by the drawbridge door, shooting the men inside the room on the balcony.
Nate, Harry, and Chloe rush inside and kill the three men who are taking cover on the floor, and I follow Sully, who's assisting Charlie, inside. "Help me with the door!" Chloe shouts, and I run over and help her pull it open.
Sully helps Cutter outside first, and the rest of us follow after them, slamming the door behind us. "Look out! There's more of 'em," Sully announces, and I take cover behind a stone block and prop my sniper rifle on it. I take out the heavily-armored agents and the men with shields, leaving Nate, Harry, and Chloe to deal with the rest.
"Head for the gatehouse! I'll cover you!" I shout, and a grenade is thrown towards me. My eyes widen and I pick up the explosive and toss it over the walkway, so no one dies.
I snipe a few more agents with my sniper rifle, before running across the walkway and up the stairs, joining my friends. "Down this way," Nate shouts and we run into the tower.
I exchange my rifle for my pistols and I work with Chloe, Nate, and Harry to kill the agents on the stairs. We make our way down and out through the gate- towards the entrance to the castle. "We need to get the hell out of here!" Harry shouts while Nate and I pull open the doors.
We walk outside and I look around and spot a tour bus. "The bus. We're taking the bus," I announce quickly, and we casually walk over to the bus, walking up the steps and taking a seat inside.
"I got this. You kids take care of him," Sully tells us while setting Charlie down and getting into the drivers seat.
"Shit, here they come," Harry scowls, and Sully starts up the bus and starts driving away from the building and Talbot's agents.
"Looks like we lost 'em," Nate says once they're out of our sight.
"All right- I'll find someplace to ditch the bus," Sully responds, and I plop down in a seat.
"You doing all right, C?" I ask him and he looks at me.
"Oh, yeah. Fabulous," he responds and Chloe sighs, taking a seat beside me.
"That was too close," she tells Cutter, and Harry looks at him.
"He'll be fine." Flynn grins, and Chloe shakes her head.
"No, I mean the whole thing. It just isn't worth it, you three. Let this one go."
"No, no, no, no- you can't just give up. If you let these bastards win- after this," Cutter starts and gestures to his broken leg, "I will never bloody forgive you three."
"Then don't you worry, C. We definitely won't let them win, if that's what you want," I tell him and Chloe frowns.
"What is it with you? What are you, Nate, and Harry trying to prove?" she asks me and I shrug.
"Absolutely nothing. I'm just trying to help my friend find his relative's long lost treasure, and grant Charlie's wish," I tell her and she looks at Nate.
"And you?"
"I'm not trying to prove anything," Nate says and she rolls her eyes.
"Right," Chloe sighs and looks at Harry, "and what about you, Flynn?"
"I'm just here for the fun of it, and hopefully some riches as well." Harry smirks and I chuckle.
"So what's the plan, kids?" Sully asks Harry, Nate, and I.
"Guess we're going to Yemen. You up for it?" Nate looks at Sully who smirks.
"'Course I am," he responds with a chuckle.
"We gotta find a quick way in. No bloody hassles," Harry states, and my eyes lighten up as a grin appears on my face.
"I know someone who can help," I say, and the three guys look at me.
"Who, love?" Harry asks, and I smirk while pulling out my phone and clicking on one of the contacts.
"Hello!" a friendly voice chirps.
A smirk comes to my face, and I hold my phone up to my ear while facing the others, "Elena."
~two days later~
"Oh geez, I always forget how warm it is in this part of the world," I mutter, feeling the hot sun beating down on my face.
"Well, we are in a country with a desert climate," Harry points out and I give him the 'no shit' look.
"I'll quickly be sweating," I mumble while adjusting the long sleeves of my [F/C] shirt and wiping some sand off of my black jeans.
Silly's chuckle hits my ear and I look at him as he says, "Elena Fisher, Foreign Correspondent."
I look over when my close friend giggles and walks over. "Hey, Sully," Elena says and he goes to hug her, but she stops him.
"No, sorry, that's sorta frowned upon here," she explains to him.
"Oh, right," Sully nods.
"You three boys can hold hands though," Elena points at Harry, Nate, and Sully, making them chuckle.
"Hey Elena," I smile, and we hug each other, earning a confused look from Sully.
"It's accepted to see affection between people of the same sex in public, but affection between two people of the opposite sex should be kept in private. Yemen's values are more conservative so we will respect that," I explain to clear up the misunderstanding that seemed to occur.
"Anyway, against my better judgement..." Elena starts and holds out four permits, "these permits will get you through most checkpoints."
We each take one of the permits with our name on it, hooking it onto our belt loops. "Great," Nate grins.
"Oh, and I shouldn't be worried about what's in those bags, right?" Elena asks us, and we chuckle.
"No. Of course not," I say, sending a glance over my shoulder to see Harry and Nate holding Sully's hands, the latter looking done with the two boys.
"Look it's a father on vacation with his two adult sons," I snicker, and Elena and I link our arms together and walk towards some double doors.
"All right, remember- you're journalists now. So, try and act respectable," Elena reminds us, before unlinking her arm and looking back at three three guys who are placing their permits on their belts.
"Think you boys can handle that?" I ask, and they chuckle and nod.
Elena and I playfully roll our eyes, and she opens the door to the airport. We go through all the checkpoints, before Elena leads us out of the airport, glancing at us, "So, what exactly are you four reprobates up to?"
"Sightseeing. You know, all the typical tourist things," Harry responds while we walk on the stone sidewalk.
"Right. So that explains the big rush," Elena states, and Nate chuckles.
"We're just here for some historical research," he tells her, and she glances at me.
"No cursed treasures?"
I shake my head.
"No diabolical warlords?"
I shake my head again.
"Okay... whatever you say," Elena chuckles and leads us over to a red jeep, resting her hands on the back of it, "This is our car."
"Now tell me, what is the real reason you came to Yemen," she states, and Nate sighs.
"We finally proved it. Drake lied about his route through the East Indies. Four hundred years ago, he came here," Nate says, and points at the ground.
"Why?"
"That's what we're here to find out," Harry says, and I face-palm.
"She meant why are we so obsessed with Francis Drake and the ring," I explain to the guys.
"I'm just worried," Elena tells us, her eyebrows furrowing with concern.
"We can take care of ourselves, all right?" Nate frowns, and she closes her eyes.
"I'm not talking about you three. I know you guys can handle yourself, but..." Elena trails off and looks at Sully who sits in the front seat of the jeep, smoking a cigar, "he would go to the ends of the earth for you and [Name]. Just don't ask him to."
Nate's face scrunches up in confusion and I rest a hand on his shoulder, "Nate, I love Sully, he's the only person I have left that I consider family, but he's not able to do everything he once was able to."
Nate doesn't respond, and I sigh and pull him into a hug. "It sucks that life works the way it does, but if we want to spend as much time with Sully as possible- we have to keep things easy for him," I whisper into his ear as he wraps his arms around my waist, "I'm here for you, Nate. I always have been and I always will be."
"Thank you, [Name]..." Nate whispers and I pat his back before pulling away from the hug.
"We should get going," I state, and Elena gets into the drivers seat of the jeep.
Nate, Harry, and I get into the bed of it, and the two guys sit on one of the seats while I sit on the floor. "If you could just drop us at the edge of the city, that would be great," Sully tells Elena.
"Not a chance- you four are my responsibility now. I'm not taking my eyes off of you," she laughs, before starting up the jeep and driving down the road.
~
"If you're trying to pick up Francis Drake's trail, we should head to the old quarter," Elena explains while leading us down a path, stopping halfway.
"Ahh, so this is the new part?" Harry asks and Elena nods.
"It's all relative. The city was founded at least three thousand years ago," she explains and turns around, leading us down some stairs and into the city, "All right. There- you see that tower up ahead? That's where the old city starts. So, we need to make our way over there."
"Then let's go," I state, and we start walking through the city.
"Salaam," Elena and I say at the same time to a fruit merchant.
He greets us back and Nate's eyebrows furrow, "When did you learn Arabic, [Name]?"
"Before I ran into you in Peru a few years ago, I spent a lot of my time in some of the Middle Eastern countries. Actually, one of my bigger treasure finds was in Egypt," I chuckle slightly.
"Through here, you four," Elena waves us over. We follow her through a gate and down some steps when she glances back at us, "All right, now I need you all to be on your best behavior."
Harry smirks, his eyes twinkling with sarcastic undertones, "Bollocks. I was planning on causing some trouble."
Elena narrows her eyes and Flynn chuckles and pats her shoulder, "That was a pretense, lass."
"Well, anyway, I'm serious. The police have patrols everywhere, and we don't need to arouse any suspicions," Elena warns us.
"Understood," Sully states, and we walk into the market.
"We're just gonna cut through the market," Elena explains, and I look around the lively city, greeting some people with a smile.
We make our way through the market when the street we need to follow appears blocked off. "Huh. Okay, it looks like they've got the street blocked off. I'll go see what I can do. You four stay put," Elena says, and walks over to the two police offers standing by a gate, blocking the path.
"What was the big find in Egypt you mentioned?" Sully asks and a small smirk comes to my face.
"Treasures that used to belong to Cleopatra," I shrug nonchalantly, "Got myself a lot of money from that find. I think I made five-hundred million from that find, it might've been more."
"So you were able to finish what your mother started," Nate says with a soft smile.
"Yeah. I was," I respond, a sad smile coming to my face.
Harry gives my shoulders a reassuring squeeze, when Elena walks back over to us and sighs, "All right, it's no good. They're not letting anybody through. Let's try over here. I know another way around."
She leads us around a corner and through an alley to a gate with a sign that says 'tourist hotel' on it. Sully tries to open it, before sighing and stepping back, "Dammit, this thing's locked."
I look into the shop to the right of us and politely gesture for the man's attention, before asking if he can open the gate. He smiles and nods, before walking outside his shop and unlocking the door with a key.
"Shukran," I thank him, and he holds the gate door open for us.
"Good think we have [Name] and Elena here," Sully chuckles while we walk through the open gate and up the stairs.
"Damn right you are," I say with a smirk.
"Okay, up here," Elena states, and we reach the top of the staircase, before walking back into a small courtyard-like area.
"Ah, great, more cops," Sully mutters as we look at the gate that we need to walk through to get to the main street.
"Yeah, looks like we're not getting through here, either," Elena says, and I spot a ladder on the wall of a building.
"Since we can't go through, let's go over," I say while climbing up the ladder and onto a platform where a pipe from a metal box leaks water.
I climb onto the metal box and pull myself onto the platform above, climbing up the metal box on that platform. I jump up and grab the railing of the balcony above me, pulling myself over it and landing on the wooden floor.
"You four coming?" I ask, and Harry scratches the back of his head.
"Give us a second, love. We're not as fast of climbers as you are," he states, and I lean against the wall and wait for the others.
A minute or two later the rest join me on the balcony, and I push off the wall. "We can go this way," I point to a door, and we walk through the door into a hotel hallway.
We make our way up some stairs and Elena looks around nervously, "I don't think we should be in here."
"Ah, we're just cutting through. Just don't break anything." I wave her concern off, before leading them down a hall lined with windows and into a shed where gardening equipment is kept, "Yeah, here we go."
A smile comes to my face and we jog up some steps and climb the ladder onto a rooftop terrace. A plane flys low over our head and I look around at the traditional and newer buildings in the city.
"See- down there," Elena points out to some buildings, "those buildings would've been hundreds of years old even when Francis Drake was alive."
I look down at the ground below when I spot Talbot, "Are you fucking serious," I whisper and the rest follow my line of sight.
"Talbot," Nate says, and Elena looks at us.
"Who?" she asks, and Talbot turns and faces the building we're in and pulls out a notebook.
"He's got Cutter's notebook," Harry says with a frown.
"What?" Elena asks and we back up from the railing, "Wait, Charlie Cutter?"
"No time. Sully can explain everything. [Name], Harry- let's go," Nate says, and Sully tries to stop us, but we jump over the railing of the building and land on a platform below us.
"We should try to corner him, I'll stick to the rooftops," I say before jumping off the platform and grabbing the stone trimming on the side.
I scale the wall up to the rooftop above, staying low and running in a crouched position along the roof. Talbot walks through a path that goes through a building and I watch as he comes out the other side and walks over to a door on the building across from me. I stand up, taking a running jump off the roof, landing on the one covering the building he's inside.
"Shit, I hope I didn't lose-" I start when I see Nate get thrown through a window, "Oh boy..."
Three of Talbot's agents surround my long time friend, and they go to attack him when Harry comes up behind one of them and snaps their neck, leaving Nate to fend off the other two. I stand on the edge of the roof before jumping off and hitting one of the agents necks when I land on the ground. His neck snaps from the force and he falls to the ground and slams his skull into the ground, blood spilling out onto the cobblestone street.
"Please say you at least got the journal!" I cry, out and Nate smirks and holds the book up.
"Good job, mate," Harry says when some agents drop down from the rooftop.
"Goddammit," I mumble and grab a wooden stool, smashing it into one of the agents heads.
He stumbles back and holds his head when I roundhouse kick him in his temple, sending him into a wall. He slumps to the ground- dead, and I spin on my heel and block the fist of another agent. I smirk and grab his arm, flipping him over my shoulder. He lands on the ground and I crouch over him and land several blows with my fist to his face until he finally stops moving.
I stand up when someone wraps their arm around my throat and puts me in a chokehold. Another agent appears in front of me, and I push off the ground and kick him in the chest. My feet touch the ground again, and I turn my head towards the agents sideways so I can get air into my airways. I raise my arm up and elbow the agent holding me several times in his ribs and abdomen before using my heel to kick his knee. His leg gives out and he falls, losing his hold on me. I place my foot on his throat and press down until his face starts going red and he stops moving.
"Is that all of 'em?" I ask when Harry slams the head of the last agent into the wall.
"Let's hope," Nate mumbles when we hear our names being called out by two people.
"Come on!" Sully waves us over, and a small crowd that formed makes a path so we can get past them.
"Okay, this way," Elena says and we follow her along a stone walkway, running down some stairs and through a stone corridor.
We run down some more stairs and into another corridor with rugs all over this place, before making it outside. "Hey- through here," Elena pushes open a door, and we walk inside before she shuts it behind us, "Is somebody going to fill me in here? Who are those guys, and what does Charlie have to do with all this?"
"Cutter was working with us on this one," Nate says and Elena looks at us.
"Wait, 'was'? He's not-"
"He's not dead. Him and Chloe aren't dead," Sully tells her and her jaw drops.
"Chloe too?!"
"Yeah, but they both bowed out when C broke his leg," I explain to her.
Elena's eyes narrow and she crosses her arms over her chest, "He broke his leg?"
"He's lucky he didn't break his fucking neck, after a bloody fall like that," Harry points out and I nod in agreement.
"He's fine," Nate assures her and I watch him flip through the journal.
"'Course between that and burning to death, I would've jumped too," I state with a shrug.
"Who wouldn't? It's either die in a bloody fire or try to save yourself, but most likely break a bone," Harry agrees with me.
"You two aren't helping," Nate shakes his head, and we shut up.
"All right- just tell me- what you're really looking for," Elena says with a small head shake.
Nate turns around and looks at us, gesturing to the well we're by, "Uh... this."
My eyes widen when I see the secret entrance we needed to find. "What's the fucking luck," I grumble, and walk over to the well with a grate covering it.
"Good job, Elena," Sully says and Harry clicks his tongue.
"We shouldn't go down there without something to defend ourselves with," he states and I nod in agreement.
"Go talk to the rug merchant we just passed," Elena says, and the guys give her a confused look while I face-palm.
"Guys, use your brain. They can't just have a shop here that sells guns. The guy's not really a rug merchant," I sigh and the guy's mouths form an 'O'.
"I'll go get the guns," Sully says, and walks over to the door.
"Just watch yourself out there," Nate says while the Sully opens the door.
"Yeah, don't want to have to come and save your ass again," I joke, and Sully chuckles.
"Yeah," he says, before walking outside.
"Now, you three. 'Historical Research' my ass. This is about that Marlowe woman, isn't it?" Elena asks and I nod.
"Yes. But- look at this," Nate says and pulls out the deciphering disk and his map, "we finally got it. And it's just like we said. That- led to this. And this- led us here."
"To a hole in the ground," I grin while gesturing at the hole.
"Such a glamorous life we lead," Harry says and Elena sighs.
"Hey girlie, if you don't want to be apart of this you can walk away," I smile kindly at my friend.
"I don't think I really have a choice in this. Plus- I don't like walking away." Elena smirks and Sully walks into the room with two pump-action shotguns.
"Shotguns?" Nate asks while Sully hands Elena one and keeps the other for himself.
"What are we? Chopped liver?" I ask with a chuckle.
"He only had two, and I don't have much cash on me." Sully shrugs and I deadpan.
"At least I have my daggers," I mutter and pull them out of my bag along with my holster, "I should have just found a way to sneak the guns on the plane."
I strap on my holster and put my daggers in the strap on the inside of each of my thighs. "How'd you even get the guns into the other countries?" Nate asks and I smirk.
"I have my ways. They're not legal, but since when was anything I do really legal," I shrug and everyone deadpans.
"I mean- she has a point," Harry says, and everyone nods hesitantly.
"All right, now let's get this cover off the hole," I rub my gloved hands together with a grin. The five of us lift the grate up and toss it to the side before staring down into the dark well. "Secret entrance time." I fist-pump the air, and hoist myself over the ledge of the well- onto the ladder.
"Secret entrance to what? What's down there?" Elena asks and I shrug.
"A demon for all I know. Guess there's only one way to find out," I grin and slide down the ladder, dropping down and landing in a sandy hexagonal pit. I look around, determining it's safe, before looking up the ladder I came down, "Come on down!"
Elena, Sully, Harry, and Nate come down the ladder, looking around the room. "It's just a cistern, kids. You sure this is the right place?" Sully asks, and we step out of the pit and walk around the room made of stone.
"Yeah... it's gotta be," Nate says and I look at the pillars with holes in the middle of them, big enough for someone to put their arm in.
"So what was Sir Francis Drake doing all the way out here, anyway?" Elena asks and I look over my shoulder at her.
"He was on a secret expedition for Queen Elizabeth," I tell her while examining the pillars.
"He was looking for the lost city of Ubar," Harry adds on.
Elena's eyebrows furrow and she hums, "The Atlantis of the Sands?"
"Yeah," I nod my head.
"Under this city," Elena states.
"No- no, it's in the middle of the Rub' al Khali desert," Nate explains, and I extend my arms out to my side.
"And this place tells you how to find it... supposedly," I laugh while looking down at the the stone tiles on the floor with images engraved in them, "Wait a minute... Nate let me see that map."
Nate takes the folded map out of his back pocket and hands it to me. I unfold the map and flip it around, smirking when I see a sketch of the pillars in the room with symbols that correspond with those on the tile. "He must have sketched this when he was down here," Nate says while looking over my shoulder.
"Are you going to be able to find the secret entrance?" Harry asks and I smirk.
"It'll take some deciphering, but I should," I tell him when I notice one of the walls in the room has some words in Enochian script scratched into it, and I look back at Nate, "Nathan! You need to decipher this since you have the decoder."
Nate pulls out his ring and the deciphering object. He uses the decoder, the mechanism rings moving to different letters. "The Moon will show the way," Nate reads and I purse my lips when I remember one of the symbols carved into the tile.
I jog over to the tile with the moon on it and hold out the map, turning until the sketch on the map lines up with the three pillars in front of me. "This is it! Harry, Nate, go to those two columns over there. I'll take this one," I say, and we each take a spot by the pillar I assigned us to, "Now just reach in and find the lever. We'll pull on the count of three."
We insert our arms in the hole in the pillars and Nate starts the countdown, "One."
I grip the lever in the pillar as Harry says, "Two."
"Three," I state and we pull the levers.
Nothing happens for the first few seconds when a wall in the room suddenly lowers. "I'll be damned, it worked," Sully rests his hands on his hips and chuckles.
"Let's just hope for no spiders... or guardians... or descendants," I shiver at the thought while walking into the secret passage.
"Okay. So, why the big secret all these centuries? What did Elizabeth expect Drake to find?" Elena asks us.
"That's the fun part, lass. We don't know exactly," Harry smirks while walking beside me.
"Most likely treasure is my guess," Nate adds on from the other side of me.
"Though of course, it's never that simple, is it?" Elena asks and Sully scoffs.
"Rarely," he grunts making me chuckle.
"And those assholes in the black suits- they're looking for the same thing, I suppose?" Elena questions, and Sully nods.
"Yep, they're Marlowe and Talbot's men," he tells her and we run into a circular room with an opening ahead of us. We go to make our way towards it when it shuts and two statues move and use spears to block the door.
"What the hell..." Nate trails off, and two doors open on our left and right.
"Pick your poison," Sully says and I do 'Eenie meanie miney mo' in my head before walking over to the left path. We jog up the stairs and I look at the symbols on the wall in the room we walked into.
"Weird. What kind of symbols are those?" Elena asks and Harry shrugs.
"Never seen anything like it," he responds, and I walk over to the mechanism in the middle of the floor.
The door we all walked through shuts and I turn around and frown, "I guess this is a test."
Nate looks around, and points at all the gears scattered around, "The gears are scattered all around the room. If we can collect them we can probably get that mechanism to work."
"Let's hope we figure it out," Elena sighs, and I climb up one of the pillars in the room.
I grab the beam that runs from the pillar to the wall, and I climb over to the other side of the beam, before jumping and grabbing the metal bar ahead of me. I climb to the next bar and swing over to the wooden beam, pulling myself onto the other side. I start climbing to my left and my eyes widen at what I see in front of me.
"Hey- this screen depicts the images!" I smile brightly.
"What can you see?" Nate asks, and I sigh.
"One looks like a cross, and the other has four circles- kinda like the holes on a button."
"The same symbol is on some of these gears," Harry tells me and I tilt my head.
"These symbols seem to be rotating in opposite directions to each other," I say before climbing the rest of the way across the beam and dropping to the platform below.
"What the hell's that supposed to mean?" Sully grumbles, and I find a gear on the platform with a cross on it. I push it down so it falls, before I jump down and pick it up.
"Now let's see where this goes," I murmur when I see that four more gears are by the wall with either circles or a cross on them.
I examine the gears that are already in the wall, then the one in my hand and the other four on the floor. 'Let's hope I put these in right' I hum before placing them in the wall, corresponding to size and the pattern. I walk over to the mechanism in the middle of the floor, grabbing one of the bars and pushing forward. The gears on the wall spin and the two large stone circles above them flip, making me grin.
"You did it, darling," Harry says, and wraps an arm around my shoulders.
We watch as the circles turn and water comes down from the wall and flows through the channels in the floor to a door behind us.
Harry drops his arm from around my shoulders and the door opens. We run down the stairs and back into the room we were in before. One of the statues moves the spear away from the door, but the other one stays. "Are you so sure that it's treasure they're after?" Elena asks, and I shrug.
"Let's just say we're hoping. Now, it seems to get that other statue to unblock the door, we need to solve the puzzle that's through the other door," I respond, glancing at the door on the right side of the room.
"Let's do it," Nate says, and we run through the open door and up some stairs onto a landing with floating body parts in the air.
"Well this is quite a cheery sight," Harry chuckles while him, Nate, and I walk down some stairs off the landing.
"It definitely is," I say with a playful eye roll.
"All right, you guys wait up there," Nate tells Sully and Elena as the door to the room closes behind us.
"Hey, these body parts look like if they're moved they'll form the image to make sense with the one on the wall," I point out and we walk into the middle of the room where a staff is.
"[Name], let me see your lighter," Nate says, and I take it out of one of the pouches on my belts and hand it to him.
He flips open the top and flicks the lighter making a flame appear, before lighting the candle on the staff. The light shines through some glass on the staff and hits the wall, and Nate shrugs and picks it up. The stairs we walked down retract back and Harry sighs, "That's not good."
I look around at all the holes in the floor the staff could fit in, losing myself in thought. We move around the room when I realize what the floating body parts are meant for. "Nate let me see the staff," I say while adjusting my position. Nate hands me staff and I look through the scope on the staff. The flame light hits the body parts and I move around until the light forms a man about to stab a spear through the statue on the wall.
I smirk and place the staff in the hole where I'm standing and the floating body parts move and make it look like the statue got stabbed. The statue moves its arm, and water starts pouring out of a hole on its chest and spreads around the walls of the room. The water pours down from the walls into channels in the floor and the stairs open out along with the door to the room.
"We did it!" I exclaim, and Nate, Harry, and I join Elena and Sully back on the landing.
"We should head back to the main room," Elena says and we run down the stairs into the main room.
The second statue moves its spear that was blocking the door, and the door opens up. "C'mon," Nate says, and we jog through the open door and down the corridor to a path over a cliff.
"Did Francis Drake ever find that lost city that he was looking for?" Elena asks, and Nate shakes his head.
"Don't think so... seems like he only came this far, then turned back and headed home," he responds and we make it to a rock wall with a ladder on it.
"And concealed everything about this little detour?" Elena asks.
"Pretty much," Harry states with a nod.
"Have you stopped to ask yourself why?" Elena questions and I chuckle while climbing the ladder.
"At this point if we discover the passage to hell or a demon, I won't be surprised. So, no, I'm not going to question why," I respond while jogging over some wooden planks and into a hexagon-shaped room with a path leading down.
"You have a death wish," Elena sighs and I grin.
We make our way into the room at the bottom and Sully and Nate grab torches while I shine my flashlight around the room. "Looks like some kind of ornate brazier," Nate says while walking up to the object in the center of the room. He lights it with my lighter, and the sphere on top moves until light shines through it onto the ceiling above.
"Well I'll be go to hell..." Sully trails off and Elena looks up in awe.
"As above, so below," Harry, Nate, and I say at the same time.
"This is some kind of celestial map," I state while examining the map.
"That makes sense. The Arabs used the stars to navigate the desert- just like sailors on the ocean," Sully says.
"That's right. So, you could use these constellations to find the lost city?" Nate questions him.
"If I had a sextant, sure. I didn't do all that time in the Navy for nothing, y'know."
"And here I thought you spent the whole time looking for that basket act," Nate snickers, and Sully scoffs.
"The what?" Elena asks, and Sully looks at her.
"Ahh, never mind," he chuckles, and shakes his head.
"You think you could remember this?" Harry asks Sully who looks up at the ceiling.
"Well, yeah- but we oughta copy it down, don'tcha think?"
Nate shakes his head, "No, I really don't recommend that."
"Look at this," Elena states, and we flash our lights to where's she's looking to see faces of horror in the stone on the wall.
"They seem cheery," Harry states when a very familiar sound fills my ears.
"Oh fuck..." I trail off and we back away from the walls and stay in the light as the killer spiders come out of the mouths of the faces and from the way we came in.
Nate and Harry take the torches and sweep them across the ground to keep the spiders away while Elena and Sully use their shotguns. "Why are there so many of them?!" I cry out while grabbing a torch stick and lighting it on fire, tossing it into a pile of the spiders.
"Who knows!" Nate shouts, and we make it down the path to a partially opened door.
"We gotta get this door open more," Sully says and Harry and I try to lift it from the bottom, but it doesn't budge.
"Let's see if we can get it open from the other side," Elena says, and her and I crawl under the small opening.
"Can you two hurry!" Nate shouts when Elena and I find the switch. We open the door, and the three guys run through, before we shut it behind them.
"I've had more than enough of those damn things," Sully frowns and I nod in agreement.
"Hey- look at this," Nate says, and we look around the room with writing on the walls.
"'Let not the world deceive thee with its beauty'," Nate reads one of the walls and I stand beside him.
"'It is the dream of a dreamer, a mirage of the desert'," Harry reads the next part.
"'The cup of death will be filled for thee'," Sully says, and nods his head, raising his eyebrows slightly in surprise, "It's all in English."
I read the rest of the writing on the wall, before turning to face the others, "It must've been Drake."
"Okay, so, let me get this straight- Drake sails thousands of miles looking for this 'Atlantis of the Sands', and when he gets this far- what he finds here is enough to make him turn around, sail home, and hide all evidence of his voyage," Elena says and I nod, making her look at us like we're crazy, "But you- you're going to keep going, aren't you?"
"Uh, yeah," Nate responds like it's the most obvious thing.
"For what? For 'treasure'?"
"Honestly, I was just here to help out Nate, grant Charlie's wish, and hopefully find a treasure, but now- now, I want to find out what Francis Drake decided to try and cover up," I say with a grin.
"I'm in it for the fun of it all, and the possible treasure," Harry answers truthfully.
"But haven't you won. You know where the city is and Marlowe doesn't. Why can't that be enough?" Elena asks, before turning around and walking away.
We follow her out of the room and down the corridor into the cistern. I start walking towards the well entrance when a smoke bomb is dropped down. "Take cover, it's an ambush," I say while taking cover behind one of the barriers.
'I need a gun' I frown and one of the agents comes out of the smoke and starts to walk past me. I pull out my dagger and sneak up behind him, slitting his throat and taking the AK-47 from his hand. I smirk and shoot at the agents who drop down from the well into the sandy pit, while the others grab guns and shoot at the agents hiding behind the pillars and barriers in the room.
I pick up two Para .45 pistols off dead agents along with a few grenades, before pressing my back against a pillar. I continue to shoot the agents who make their way down, and the smoke starts to get worse. I pull the pin on one of the grenades I took, tossing it into the sandy pit. The bomb explodes and all the shooting stops, the smoke clearing out.
"That's all of 'em. We need to find a way up though," I say while dropping the guns and grenades in the pit.
"I'll give you a boost up, love," Harry tells me, and he boosts me into the air.
I grab the edge of a pillar and jump off it, grabbing the metal bars on the well. I climb around it and move over to the ladder, before hitting part of it and sending the rest of it down to the ground.
"Thanks," Nate calls up to me, and I climb the rest of the way up the ladder.
"We can't take the guns out onto the streets so just toss them," I tell my friends, and they toss their weapons, before we walk back into the market streets.
"We gotta make ourselves scarce- before any more of 'em show up," Sully says and I sigh.
"Then let's get out of here."