[ WP ] A woman finds the tree of life , but not in time to save the one she loves .

Rachel could hear the stomp of feet in the distance as her and Dan slid down the muddy embankment. When he slammed into the bottom Dan began to cough violently. A faint taste or iron entered his mouth. Rachel leaned down to lift him back to his feet. 
 
 `` Come on brother, it's only another half a mile or so to the lake.'' Her voice was quivering and nearly broke. Dan did n't even need that much to know she was worried. 
 
 They were so close to the tree now that the taste of life nearly drowned out the taste of blood. He could feel the toxins pulsing through his veins, slowly sapping his energy. 
 
 `` We'' ll be able to take care of that Council poison soon enough.'' Rachel turned to look back up the embankment as her brother began to stumble forward again. She walked along beside him. `` I do n't understand why they want to keep this from the world so badly that they would kill for it.'' 
 
 Dan coughed again and then stopped. `` Sis, I do n't know if the world is ready for this. We are careless enough even with our fragile mortality, given eternity we may destroy more than we create.'' 
 
 Rachel turned and looked into the pallid face of her brother. She wanted to admonish him but she knew there was some truth in his words. She turned from him and continued to pick her way through the dense forest. `` Maybe the world is n't ready for eternity, but I'm also not ready to lose you.'' 
 
 After another half a mile of hiking, punctuated by the occasional spat of coughing, brother and sister found themselves standing in a clearing. The trees around them seemed to back away and bow inward as though towards a king upon his throne. In the center of this noble circle sat a small lake with placid and brilliantly sparkling waters. Emerging from the center of the lake like the hand of God himself was a tree, a tree with branches that reached up to unseat the clouds and claim the sky as its own. 
 
 Rachel ran forward as quickly as she could with a dying brother in tow. Blood leaked from the corner of his mouth as the Council's poisons begin their final March upon his heart. But they had finally arrived at the center of the world, at the last bastion of immortality in a frail and fatal world. The tree of life rose before them with leaves that waved as though summoning them home. 
 
 They walked into the shallow waters at the edge of the lake and could feel a ticklish electricity flow up their legs, like wounds healing themselves of mortality. 
 
 Rachel turned to look at her brother and could see a grin slowly spread across his pale face. `` Drink.'' She said. `` Drink and live.'' 
 
 Together they knelt in the water as though at the very alter of God. Leaning down Rachel could see her reflection in the water. She already seemed more alive, ready to live for eternity with her brother. She lifted a handful of the waters of life to her mouth and begin to drink, and as she did so she heard the thunderous report of a rifle. She turned to look at her brother and could see that his hands were dropping away from his face, as a small shower of water fell back into the lake. His eyes were wide, and his lips were dry. Rachel could feel a hand grab her chest and twist as her brother's body fell forward into the lake. She knew that it should have made a sound but silence rang too loudly in her ears. 
 
 She began to scream as she saw the blood begin to sully the holy waters. She crawled, violently splashing as she tried to reach her brother, only to be yanked away by the gloved hands of Council agents. They pulled her back unto the shoreline and held her thrashing body as still as they could as they bound her hands s behind her. 
 
 Marshall Thurman, clad in the black body suit of a Council field agent, slowly walked over to Rachel as she struggled in her binds. She spit at his feet as he towered over her. 
 
 `` I'd love to threaten to kill you for that, but that would n't be particularly meaningful anymore.'' He cracked a devilish smile. `` I ca n't even say that you'll be seeing your brother soon.'' 
 
 Rachel felt her rage boil over. `` I'm going to kill you, you son of a bitch. You can lock me up as much as you want, but I have all the time in the world to find a way out, and when I do you are dead.'' 
 
 Thurman laughed. `` True, you are going to have some time on your hands, but I am going to let you in on a secret.'' He knelt down and stared into Rachel's burning eyes. `` You are n't the first to drink those water.'' 
 
 Laughing again, he stood up and shouted for the other agents to take her away. Rachel could feel her stomach shrivel as she was dragged away from the lake. She could see Thurman pull Dan's body from the water. She wanted to shout to her brother but she knew he would never hear her voice again, and she would never again see his face for as long as she lived.
