Devestation

The sun started to rise and woke me up rather annoyingly, I looked over to my family and saw most of them were already packing getting ready to leave. We started on our journey once again. My legs were getting tired of this constant up trek. In the British Army most of our hikes were on flat land, which I had grown used to but that was SO not like this. Whew, I sighed. I should really work out more.

"There it is! We found it!" Rick yelled out knocking me out of my thoughts.

"The gate way of Shangri-la." Evy breathed out rather impressed with the old building that was barely standing with a rickety bridge linking us to the old structure.

"Go, girl, go. You're free. Go, Geraldine. Live free." Jon started yelling at his yak. Releasing her harness and letting her wander off. I smiled to myself, my brother really was something. Lin started running across the bridge. Really testing the old architecture there aren't we? Alex ran after her having no respect for his own life. I slowly took the first steps behind my husband onto the bridge, I was terrified of heights and refused to look down and just focused on the back of my husbands head wondering when the last time we had kissed was. It had been a while, I would save it until we were out of this mess. Finally, I made it across and saw Alex was setting down his case. Tori, Evy, and Jon jumped off the bridge onto solid land behind me.

"What did you do now? Rob an armory?" Rick asked as he walked up to Alex.

"Have you ever seen a Walter P-38?" Alex asked Rick as they continued through this chest, of which he had told us was necessary to bring. Rick was the same way, I didn't need anything because I knew between the both of them, they would have us covered.

"It's pretty anemic, compared to a peacekeeper." Rick retorted, pulling out his old revolver.

"Well, it's not about size, Uncle Rick. It's about stamina." Alex tried to tell him. I rolled my eyes, wondering when Rick had rubbed off so much on Alex. They always shared some special bond.

"You want power? I give you the Thompson submachine gun. 50 rounds of power." Tori jumped into their conversation. Looking into her Dad's case and stealing the gun out. She smiled at me, proud of herself.

"The Tommy is good, Tori, but the cocking mechanism always jams." Alex told her smiling at her with a sparkle in his eye, acting like this was his element. I guess since Ardeth wasn't around so much Rick must've took over in the fathering department. Didn't bother me.

"Here, check out the Russian PPS. personal assault weapon. Now this, is the future right here." Alex continued puking his knowledge all over my husband. I scoffed. Going to go stop them from starting another 'my horse is bigger than your horse' argument.

"You know it's experience that wins today, it's not all about fire power." Rick told him a twinge of neglect in his voice that Alex wasn't as interested in his older weapons as he used to be.

"Boys, if I may? Do we have a plan for the Emperor?" Jon jumped in ignoring their previous conversation. Evy stood next to me, not happy with their antics.

"Yeah, we're gonna hit him high, hard, and fast and smash him like a Ming vase." Rick said still peeved about Alex.

"And if that doesn't work?" Jon continued pushing.

"We go to plan B." Rick said. "Plan B! You go upstairs, you blow up that gold tower thing. You light it up, and blow the guy sky high." I smiled, Jon would finally be getting some action.

"Me?" Jon asked rather appalled he would even muse about including him.

"Well what did you expect Jon?" I laughed.

"You shouldn't have questioned Rick." Evy picked up for me adding salt to his emotional wound.

"Hey dad!" I heard Tori bump her way back into the conversation.

"What?" He asked expecting Alex had said that.

"If the explosion won't kill us, the avalanche will." She shouted to him annoyed he would snap at her. Rick in all honesty deserved this. I smiled proudly at Evy.

"You got a better idea?" He asked her calming down a little.

"Yeah I do, I set the ambush with a long range rifle, we..." Tori started but got cut off by her uncle. I would be having a conversation with each and everyone of my family members when this was all over about the neglect and utter wave off of Victoria.

"Long range that's better." Jon mused interrupting their conversation again.

"Gotta get close to him, Uncle Rick, then we can finish him off with Lin's dagger." Alex jumped his opinion into the mix.

"Look, I'm sorry, I just don't put too much faith in your girlfriends magic dagger." Rick said accentuating the word magic. I smirked as I pulled out my guns, ammo, and knives from my side bag.

"Okay, she's not my girlfriend." Alex told Rick going on defense.

"You say that now, but I still don't trust her." Rick said back to him. Tori smiled in the background of the gaggle.

"Well I do, so you should trust my judgment, okay?" Alex told him. Evy decided it was her time to clamber in.

"Look, Alex, we have killed more mummies than you can imagine. I think Rick knows what he's talking about. But of course we do value your opinion." She told him putting a hand on his shoulder. He brushed her off and Rick stayed quiet.

"You put down one Mummy, mom." Alex tried with her. I was about to smack his fucking face again if he disrespected her one more time.

"Yeah, same Mummy, twice." Rick added putting up two fingers for emphasis.

"Oh and don't forget the Scorpion King." I told all of them, proud of that accomplishment. We would not just glaze over that. It cost me my life last time. Alex walked away from us. I walked over to Rick's case grabbing a machine gun to use for the inevitable fight. I then walked into the city while Tori stayed with her father.

"Hand me the green wire, will you, please?" I heard Evy ask Lin near the golden tower. I walked up to her, I knew Tori would be alright with her dad, he would help her get her ammo in her guns and be prepared, we taught her that a while ago. She knew but it was nice quality time for her and her dad.

"Are you sure, you know what you're doing?" Lin asked Evy.

"Of course, she's done this a hundred times." I told Lin scaring her as I walked up behind her holding the gun in my hands. Looking for a place to hide later and get a good advantage for shots. It was a good idea to get a feel for this building. I walked back towards the entrance near a pillar.

"Let's give them a warm O'Connell welcome." I heard Rick whisper as he walked forwards a little more ahead of me. Our assailants reached the bridge.

"Fire!" Rick gave a short order. I did as I was told. It was a very long time since I'd seen him give orders like this. It was almost refreshing. I shot multiple men and saw one fly off the mountain. I laughed inside enjoying this battle more than I should.

"Bazooka!" Rick yelled to us as I spotted the rocket launcher. I moved away from my pillar and to another spot near the stairs to get away from the blast, I ran up the stairs knowing there was a higher vantage point that would hopefully give me some advantage. We needed to take care of those bazookas. I started shooting their launchers as Alex, Rick and Tori did the same still down near the entrance. Evy followed me up the stairs and almost ran past me, I grabbed her arm and pulled her next to me. She held her gun at the ready and fired with me. A big explosion followed and soon there were many less bazookas then we started with. I smiled as I spun around changing my view from one balcony to the other that overlooked the inside the structure. I saw my husband, daughter, nephew and brother all down on the ground. I started making headshots to their enemies taking them out one by one. I had some sniper training so I was covered in the department and from what I was seeing Evy was doing very exceptional herself.

"Fall back! Move, move, move! Time to go to plan B, blow up the tower." Rick yelled as more soldiers flooded into the city.

"Actually, I'm a little bit concerned about plan B couldn't we just change that to plan C?" Jon yelled to Rick as he was cowering behind him.

"Just make it go bang. I'll cover you." Rick told him as he looked Tori in the eyes, they shot side by side at their enemies. As more and more soldiers moved up the stairs my attention was taken away from my family and onto my own little problem. I shot them, taking them out until I ran out of ammo, which was almost immediately. I quickly reloaded the gun while Evy kept us covered from dying. Once I was done, I quickly took over because I heard her gun click, she needed to reload and fast.

"My last one." She told me as we moved around the top balcony. I reached in my pocket to help us out,

"GRENADE!!!" I shouted unclipping the pin and throwing it at the people attacking us.

I headed back down some stairs with my sister in step behind me quickly running to get to where Rick and Tori were. We reached the bottom. I noticed Lin was yelling some gibberish into the sky. I take it back she was nothing like me. I ran over to where my husband and daughter were hunkered down behind some stones. I heard thuds overtake the gunfire the ground shaking beneath me, oh god I wanted nothing but to be far away from here at this moment in time. These GIANT white fur balls were running full speed towards us.

"Abominable snowmen??!!!" Rick yelled from his spot on the ground, very confused as they ran through the gateway to the city.

"The Tibetans' call them Yeti." Evy yelled at him. Lin started speaking to them in an unknown dialect to me. They then ran off rather quickly with a very angry expression on their faces.

"She speaks Yeti?" I heard Jon question as he was hiding somewhere behind us. The soldiers got thrown many different directions as the Yeti took over our fight for us, giving us a moment to breathe.

"Why do I always, have to save the day?" I heard Jon ask to himself as he climbed out from his hiding spot to crawl forwards. I followed Jon as he was only a couple feet in front of me. I was on my belly crawling in the snow, it was to say the least uncomfortable. Snow was going up my shirt and I was already cold, so that really didn't help. My gun was strapped around my torso so I wouldn't lose it while I was crawling. When I reached Jon I squatted next to him giving him the best cover I could while he tried to light the wire Evy had set up with dynamite and explosives upon the golden tower. I watched him slowly as I realized he would need to go faster in order to get it to light.

"C'mon Jon faster, we don't have all day." I yelled at him as he struggled with the lighter.

"I did It! Oh, no... I did it." He yelled in success to me. I smiled at him realizing he was freaking out now and I needed him to get the fuck out of here.

"Time for a retreat, I think." I told Jon as we were still on the ground. I helped him to his knees before we noticed a Yeti in front of us.

"I'm on your team, I'm a team player! One for all. All for me, kinda thing. The dynamite! All that dynamite we should... uh, get out of here." He stammered out his words. I pushed him forwards to the Yeti, hoping it would take him to safety. I ran towards the beginning of the tower and met up with Rick, Alex, Tori and Evy. The Emperor, wait I didn't realize he was already here. But regardless, he didn't look too happy, he grabbed an icicle. As he did this the ground beneath us started to form into inverted icicles.

"Whoa! Back off!" Rick directed us. Evy started running far away and up some stairs with Tori behind her getting out of the way. The mummy let out an exceedingly loud yell and the yeti's started to retreat behind us. The Emperor started climbing the tower to put the diamond on top. Before I knew it I was running back past my family and right towards the mummy.

"Mom! Mom, what're you doing?" Tori yelled at me a strain in her voice. As I had started forwards, Rick grabbed my arm giving me a look that I could only see as don't make me resurrect you again. I nodded quickly before flailing my arm out of his grasp as I started to climb the same tower on the other side.

"Over here! Over here!" Alex started yelling as he saw Tori's face, a look of utter terror covering it. He pointed his gun in the air and shot off some rounds to try to distract our friend. He sent a fireball in his direction. I finally reached the top and started firing my machine gun at his stupid disfigured face. My rounds quickly ran dry. Suddenly, the ground beneath me turned to ice and I slid off the tower and back to the ground. I noticed the mummy aimed a fireball at me, I quickly got to my feet and started to run towards the stairs for cover. Just as quickly as I got there I was thrown off my feet and my back slammed into the stone. I could feel my ribs cracking underneath me at the force and a huge pain immediately in my lungs. I wheezed for air. But it felt like I was drowning, exactly like on the barge. I quickly reached into my jacket for my Sekhmet knife. Everyone else was distracted by the diamond pointing the way to the pool of eternal life. I stabbed the knife between my third and second rib, the blood pouring out gave me instant relief. I could breathe again. I couldn't move though, there was no way. I couldn't pay much attention because of how much pain I was in but I briefly saw Tori unwinding some dynamite and throwing it at the mountain, probably wanting to cause an avalanche to get the emperor to stop. I got up to my knees trying not to disrupt my already broken body as I saw the emperor get ready to throw a sword at Tori.

"RICK!" I yelled with the power I had left. I saw his blurry figure run towards her. He got stabbed through the chest, my entire being froze, fuck.

"NOO RICK!!" I yelled, before I collapsed again back on the snow. The tears came quick as I started sobbing from my pain and from my husband getting stabbed.

Tori's POV

"Dad! Dear, God. Hold on dad, please, please hold, I'm sorry dad, I just couldn't resist." I told him. I looked into his eyes as he laid in my arms struggling to breathe.

"I'm alright, it's okay, I've been in worse scrapes than this." He smiled at me then stopped abruptly as the pain overtook him. He was trying to ease my emotions, nonetheless, my eyes welled up with tears.

"Avalanche!" I heard Uncle Jon yell. Alex was immediately at my side trying to pull us both away from the snow that was quickly coming at us. However, my dad wasn't moving, it would injure him more. The snow was stopped momentarily by the emperors powers as I struggled to get my thoughts together and sorted out. I needed to do something.

"Help!!! Help me!" I yelled my voice straining and breaking as I was trying to collect my break down.

"Josephine!" I heard my aunt yelling slowly growing more and more distant as I focused on my father.

"Please, help me!" I said again clutching Alex's coat in my hands grabbing onto him as if he was my lifeline. His arms went around me holding me to him as the snow and yeti covered us.

"I'm over here, please, somebody help us!" Alex yelled from beside me.

"We're over here! We're over here!" I picked up for him my voice growing hoarse as it burned from yelling.

"Alex?" I heard Aunt Evy's voice getting closer.

"Mom, we're down here!" Alex yelled to her.

"Alex! Victoria!" She yelled once she found us. The Yeti popped out of the snow like a daisy and light flooded my vision.

"Oh, my God!" They got thrown to the ground beside us. Dad was very pale looking, he lost a ton of blood.

"We've got to take him to Shangri-La now, it's our only chance." My aunt continued.

"Hey folks we have a bit of a problem over here." I heard my Uncle say as I climbed out of the hole we were inside. Alex got picked up by the Yeti with my dad in his arms. I looked over to Jon to see him carrying my mother in his arms, she had passed out. Blood surrounded the snow she was on top of and the yeti that covered her was also carrying remnants of her blood on his fur, there was a knife in her side underneath her third rib.

"Oh my god." My hands covered my face, this was unbelievable. I couldn't handle this. My aunt was in front of me in seconds hugging me as silent tears fell down my face. Alex quickly jumped out of the Yeti's arms.

"Alex." Aunt Evy said.

"Jon, let's get going, they both need immediate attention." My aunt said solemnly as she handed me off to Alex. He held my face close to his chest stroking my cheek and wiping my tears away. It gave me some comfort in this devastating situation.