The collective sound of splashes followed Kristina, who was now holding a flashlight under the water. "Everyone, check your oxygen meter." She spoke inside the oxygen mask that covered her entire face, her back against the hotel's opening to the deep sea.

It was at this moment that Lucas submerged himself under the water. Though he closed the lid of the hatch, he did not lock it, so they could only push it up to climb up once again. He followed what the others were doing, his right hand was holding the oxygen meter.

"Are we ready?" Lucas asked as he swam closer to Kristina and his men.

His three minions made an 'okay' hand sign while Kristina barely nodded. Kristina attached her flashlight to the overhead of her mask before swimming down where the opening was upon seeing that they were now ready to embark on the Lost City of Mayan.

Kristina looked back as she inched herself closer to the gaping hole. She pointed her index finger down before she turned around again. Her action earned her a series of nods from the group of men.

'The hatch, it is too dangerous for it to be left half-open.' The lingering thoughts of Kristina

Nice and slow, she urged her body down. 

The sound of her heartbeat and the bubbles escaping her diving mask swayed the water like a lulling hymn of the dark hue of the deep. Kristina, who was leading the group of mobsters, held the corners of the passageway that would lead them to the site of the Lost Mayan City.

Every four strokes, Kristina would look back at the men following her. "We will be entering the underwater site of the Lost Mayan City the moment we swim beyond this passageway. Stick to me no matter what happens."

 As per standard operating procedure, Kristina spoke beneath her diving mask, the echoes of the bubbles and the oxygen intake resonating in her voice.

On cue, the four men trailing behind her their respective okay signs, making Kristina nod. She kicked her fins, leaving an array of bubbles in her trail.

The moment her torso left the premise of the hotel's last stronghold, Kristina's jaws locked. The veil of icy blanket cloaked her suit. Diving into the depths of the underwater excavation site never failed to make her heart pound. The deeper she led the four men in, the darker it became. 

And the farther Kristina kicked her fins, the colder it became. It was as if the thousand-year-old city was welcoming her with pure malice.

Though the lights placed by the hotel's maintenance were situated at every nook and cranny of the excavation site, Kristina could somehow imagine the darkness that took every inhabitant of the Lost Mayan City. A year ago, the ancient scriptures her team discovered about the vain and corrupt Mayans.

The strokes and kicks of her hands and fins brought Kristina to the switch that controlled all the other lights of the underwater excavation site. She placed her right foot on the button before turning to the four men behind her. 

"Ready?"

"Do it and don't ever think of luring us to the maze," said Lucas, who was now beside Kristina. The latter could only nod her head before she pressed her foot on the stirrups. Her action elicited a ringing vibration that lasted for a good fraction of a minute which stirred the stagnant water before bigger lights turned on.

"Woah!"

"Oi. That is some awesome shit!"

"Wow!"

Sebastian, Rogelio, and Bernardo respectively gasped their profanities as their heads tilted, their widened eyes now wondering the splendor of an ancient relic around them. Kristina could not help but curl the corners of her lips upon hearing such blatant praises to the sinful city of Mayans.

Kristina could understand what the men were feeling. Even Kristina could still get amazed from time to time during her patrols. Who would not be awestruck when bombarded by the ruins of the city? To Kristina's east, where the damaged streets of the town were, the cobblestones were almost one with the sea bed.

"Let's go." Kristina nudged her head to the eastern side of the ruins. Passing through stones that were once great buildings of the lost city, Kristina could almost hear the anguished screams of the dying Mayans as the sea swallowed the magnificent city. She could imagine cries though it was impossible.

Screaming people, falling stone houses, shattering statues, and the hymn of death, Kristina could imagine the scenario just by passing by the city of ruins. The eerie sensation was always there whenever she swam in this water. Perhaps it was a warning from the stench of death that got buried with the city and its people.

"What are you doing?" Lucas pulled Kristina's shoulder sharply.

She almost dropped the red line made from a thin cable. A frown lodged deep between Kristina's brows. "I will tie the other end of this." Kristina lifted her hand to show the roll of cable to Lucas. 

"To that light" She pointed at the most prominent light nearest to the switch. "So we won't be lost at the graveyard. The city square is fine, but we will be lost for the first ten seconds when we enter the catacombs."

Lucas pressed her right elbow one more time before he let go of her, inching her body farther. Kristina could only shake her head as she continued tying it into a sheepshank knot. "We need to get moving."

"Señorina, did an earthquake make this city crumble underwater?" Bernardo, who was swimming behind Kristina, asked her. His eyes wandered around the ruins and the small fishes around them.

"The scriptures tell the historians that hired my diving team and me about the story of a seaside city inhabited by corrupted and vain people. They tried to make themselves immortal. They think that they can resurrect their dead loved ones with their vanity. And so, they made numerous sacrificial altars around the city." Kristina pointed to the stone tables around five mossy columns on her right and left that they swim by.

She continued. "But one day, a disaster happened. Some historians believe that the ancient gods made it happen, punishing the evil citizens of the seaside city of Mayan. The entire city sunk with all the people in. Nobody survives to tell the tale. Only the remains of this ruined city narrate the story long forgotten even by the Yucatan nomads."

"Witchcraft is a devil in disguise, lassie, I tell you." Sebastian was the first to break the silence, followed by the ominous truth beyond the beautiful ruins of Mayan.

"Nature is a bitch," said Rogelio with a grunt. Though his answer was sarcastic, his answer was the closest thing to reality.

Kristina could only nod her head. She was still anxious about the men who knocked her cold a few hours ago. Kristina planned to lure them while she would send a distress signal. At the eastern part of the excavation site, there was an air pocket wherein the hotel management utilized to make it an emergency area for the divers to lack oxygen during exploration or if they met a grievous wound.

She only needed to bring them there with the pretense of checking their tanks when in fact, she would take the sat phone to contact the hotel's security team.

After all, the biggest treasure was not inside the excavation site. Only the statues could be called treasures left on the site. But Kristina could not possibly tell that to them now.

"Shit! What is that?"

Kristina's train of thought flew away upon Rogelio's sudden shriek beneath his diving mask. A swirl of bubbles surrounded him as he flailed, knocking his arms onto Kristina's back, and making her stumble for a minute. Had it not been for a pair of arms that hugged her waist, pulling her back, she would have hit the statue at her left side.

Lucas snapped at Rogelio. "What is it?"

Lucas's arms were now gone from Kristina's waist as if nothing had happened at all, yet it left Kristina with a new impression of the Russian mobster leader.

 'He is not so bad at all,' Kristina thought as she stared at the wide shoulder breadth before her.

"I swear I saw something big moved from over there, boss!" Rogelio aimed his harpoon gun at the blind spot dark corner of the catacombs they were venturing.

Upon hearing Rogelio's voice, Kristina pushed Lucas away from her way and swam right in front of the aimed harpoon. 

"Stop! It was just a mako shark at best. The mako shark is not harmful since it's a tame one. Rodolph is one of the hotel's marketing ventures. If it is not a shark, then you've seen a dolphin's shadow since the hotel has two, so put that harpoon down."

"You swim with a fucking shark?" Lucas pulled Rogelio's harpoon gun down while his attention remained fixated on Kristina. "All this time, my men and I are swimming in the territory of a predator? Are you fucking kidding me, woman?" Lucas now aimed the gun he took from Rogelio at Kristina's face.

On instinct, Kristina raised her hands to her head. She showed that she would not fight back even when they were on her turf. "They are harmless. I promise." 

She emphasized the words that would matter as her gray-colored eyes met a pair of cobalt ones. Kristina did not flinch from the intensity of the stare, but she was afraid that the pounding of her heart would give away her plans for the mobsters in front of her.

Lucas pinched the tip of the harpoon to the center of her chest. "If those fucking fishes dare attack my men, I will have your hide in return. You get me?"

Kristina swallowed the clog in her parched throat as she nodded her head frantically. But a looming question hovered in her mind before she resumed the leading position, what was Rodolph doing there? 

Mako sharks hated the deep, dark, and cold waters, but what was he doing in the catacombs? Usually, Cindy and Sandy, the two bottle-nose dolphins, would accompany her to the site. But where were they now? No hint of a dolphin's noise nor their flailing flaps could be heard aside from their breathing through their tanks and the bubbles following them.

It was eerily silent.

Somehow, Kristina knew that something was going on at the back of her mind.

"You are such a lassie, Rogelio. You gotta grow some balls, you know." Sebastian followed his statement with a chuckle which Bernardo answered with a burst of soft laughter.

"Shut up, dickhead," Rogelio spat.

Kristina did not pay them attention. She continued rolling the cable line as she swam with the help of her fins.

"Where are you taking us? This place is nothing but graves here." Lucas was now swimming side by side with her. In Lucas's left hand was a harpoon gun of his, while in his right hand was a flashlight that he also brought with his men.

"To the – Aaah!" Kristina's words turned into a full-blown scream when the seabed shook. "No! An earthquake? An aftershock?"

 She tilted her head and swam higher, only to pull Lucas back. His hand pulled the bottom part of her tank. "What are you doing? If this is an earthquake, I need to call the management. A minute interval could bring a whole lot of difference, sir. So. Let. Me. Go!"

"Aaah!" Kristina screamed again when a statue fell from above her.

"You are one stubborn woman who has a death wish!" Lucas yelled back, his hands now encasing her shoulders. Her chest and his were connected as if he was hugging her. He had to shout to let her hear him since the entire ruins of Mayan were crumbling down.