SERPENT'S EYE SEED

Sofia's re-emergence, standing on her feet once more and holding a splinter of the Serpent's Eye, ushered in a fresh tide of terror to overwhelm meROTtering cave. Distorted, nightmare face, lips snarled with rage, was an omen of evil for the objects' power even in decay. The whisperings, thinned yet again, appeared to trail in her wake, an ebony army propelling her onward. "Sofia." Luca yelled, his voice rending into a scream among screams of tumbling cave. "Let it go. It's over." Sofia laughed once more, crystalline, shattering silver laughter, echoing off the tumbling cave. "Over? Never over, brother. The Serpent's blood runs within me too. And this." She spun the glinting shard, the surface of the obsidian breathing soft, evil light. ".this is just the beginning." That art is poisonous," Bianca cautioned, staring at the pulsating obsidian. "It will kill you." "Death is cheap price for power," Sofia growled, glaring at Luca, who was taunting her. "You stole it all from me. Now I'm going to steal it all from you." Their ground underfoot trembled and a massive rock hurtled in through the portal. Their course of action was being destroyed at high speed. "We have to leave, now!" Dante yelled, spurring them into motion. But Sofia stood her ground, her eyes burning with an unholy light. The shard of the Serpent's Eye seemed to be amplifying her rage, imbuing her with a desperate, reckless power. 'You're not going anywhere," she snarled, extending her hand towards Luca. A wave of dark energy emanated from the shard, crackling through the air. Luca's head reeled with blinding pain, contamination and darkness consuming him. The whispers collapsed into a howl, attempting to shred his mind, to utilize the pieces of attachment to the Serpent's blood Marco had mentioned. He backed away, palms on temples, fighting against the deadly force. Bianca and Isabella moved forward to shield him, blades against Sofia. "No, Sofia," Isabella begged, her own voice breaking on prayerful tears. "This is not the answer. Don't let it take you." Sofia did not hear, though, her own face contorted into a snarl of rage. The shard radiated, and another wave of dark energy poured over them, shaking the cave on impact. "She's going to bring the whole place down on us!" Dante yelled, firing a burst of shots at Sofia, attempting to shatter her focus. Sofia deflected the bullets with a wave of her hand, the dark energy coursing around her like a shield. She was drawing directly from the unstable shard, using its destructive energy. 'Run!" Luca gasped, pushing Bianca and Isabella towards the collapsing entrance. 'I'll hold her off." No, Luca!" Bianca growled, refusing to yield to him. "We are together!" Isabella wrapped her arms around his arm. But Luca was aware that they didn't have time. Sofia, driven by fury and the savage energy of the shard, was a bomb ready to explode. He had to divert her, give them time to escape. Adrenalin-charged, he attacked Sofia, and pulled out his own gun. The tiny room was a chaos of frantic action, the sound of gunfire amidst the roll and mad screams of Sofia. Luca dodged the rage of a man willing to fight for his life, avoiding Sofia's inebriated fists and springing out of the path of shattering shards of black energy blasts. This was not how he would be a winner, he thought, but perhaps he could get her angry enough so, give his friends some space. Combat, Luca noticed a decaying support beam next to Sofia. Their final hope, an afterthought, struck him unexpectedly. He jumped out of it, pulling Sofia towards the decaying beam, the cave trembling all around them. Final hope, he shoved under the beam. The shock resonated through the weakened structure, the beam creaked, snapping loose in tension. Sofia, caught off guard for a moment, backed off. "Sono esatto!" Luca bellowed, sweeping his arm out over the doorway as it collapsed. Bianca and Isabella didn't delay. They dragged Dante along and struggled through the collapsing passageway, stone and rock shattering into ribbons behind them. Luca turned back to Sofia, her gaze fixed on the creaking beam with a combination of rage and growing terror. Bits of broken glass in her hand glared malevolently, their quivering light. "You idiot!" she cursed, lashing out once more. But the beam fell between them, a dense wall of rubble and stone. Luca battled through what was left behind, the cave coming down on top of him. He half-fell onto the comparative security of the dirty floor of the valley, coughing and with dust in his eyes, Bianca and Isabella pulling him out from under the still-falling wall of rock as it came down. Dante was already laying down covering fire for their withdrawal. They didn't feel safer until they were well beyond Serpent's Lair that it blew, its wave of destruction crashing behind them. They had emerged victorious, but at an odious cost. Sofia, driven by her zeal for vengeance and tainted by the Serpent's Eye, was still out in the world, loose cannon waiting for some trigger to fire her. As they struggled to breathe, a thrill of perception ran through Luca. Marco's dying words stuck in his mind: "The blood of the Serpent still runs in me." Sofia wasn't only half-carrier of the relic; she was a vessel for the bloodline, a sprout of the old power now seeding. Their struggle had just begun. Just got interesting. The Shadow Syndicate's masters and its raw source of strength were destroyed, but the Serpent's blood, corrupted and brewing with a desire for revenge, remained to taint Sofia's veins. And she would do everything within her power to claim her corrupted legacy. Destroying the Lair hadn't banished the darkness to the basement; it had merely unleashed its venom onto the streets. Their hell's soul was only just starting the last war.