1 The First Obfuscation
1.1 By John Carter
Tomb Raider and Lara Croft copyright Eidos Interactive and Core Design LTD
This is a work of fan fiction that in no way challenges their copyrights.
1.1.1 Chapter One: Falling
She ran. She didn't think. She didn't have to. She twisted when needed, jumped when it was time to jump. She didn't notice the crash of the fifty- tonne block of Nile limestone behind her, didn't feel the fist-sized flyaway chunk that glanced off her left knee. She would feel that later. For now, eyes and ears and body and long developed reflex patterns fused together, the flesh machine called Lara Croft kept running.
Two-thirds the way up the central corridor of the Pyramid of Cheops, the huge blocks had stopped falling. The dust no longer shimmered and danced on the smooth stone floor. The flesh machine stopped running, and Lara drew her breath in ragged gasps.
She hurt all over. Her knee was the worst, and now she trudged up the slope with clumsy steps. So near the surface, the cool air of the pyramid's interior began to warm with the first rising of the sun. It was always that way in the desert, this time of year. The transition from night to day was never subtle. Outside the heat would strike like a jackhammer. But that was all right. Better than it never striking at all.
Almost out. She could see the sky outside framed in the exit, and the brightness hurt her eyes. There was a figure, immobile and unthreatening, silhouetted in the middle of the doorway. Von Croy. No guns, no henchmen, just Von Croy, leaning on his cane. She kept going, could see him clearly now, an old man in a dirty white linen suit, wide-brimmed straw hat casting a shadow over his eyes. There was no red glow in the eyes, now.
"Come quickly, girl, before it collapses around you!" As though called forth by his warning, a sudden aftershock tremor tossed her back from the lip of the doorway.
"You back, Werner? No more Set?" She wanted to believe, wanted to trust, she was so tired. She felt the floor start to give way. Using the last of her fading adrenaline, she willed her legs to explode in one last leap. The floor crumbled away beneath her as her fingers barely caught the bottom edge of the doorway. She grabbed and held on. Feet scrambling for purchase, she sought any sort of foothold, but there was none.
"Take my hands. I can pull you to safety!" Von Croy was reaching towards her, his stiff frame leaning forward at an awkward angle.
Lara looked up into the old man's near-frantic eyes. Oddly, she was quite at peace.
"Good to see you too, Werner". She managed a wry half-smile.
"I couldn't leave you!" As he started to reach for her hand, the tanned knuckles white with exertion, one last tremor threw him back. Rocks and a thick cloud of choking dust began pouring down into the doorway.
Lara fell. She fell for a very long time. Then she stopped falling.
Von Croy picked himself up off the sand. The doorway to the pyramid was blocked with rubble, and there was no sign of Lara. He started forward, but stopped as a last huge block of stone slammed down to seal the doorway. Inscrutably doglike, the granite face of Set stared back at him impassively. He fell to his knees and wept. The sand drank his tears greedily, and they were gone.
1.1.2 Chapter 2: Fallen
Lara Croft's mysterious disappearance in Egypt didn't take long to hit the British media. Telly and Fleet Street snapped up the tale as quickly as the peccadillo of one of Liz Hurley's boyfriends. Back in the States, this time of year was called the "Silly Season", and so it was here. The odd vanishing of Lara Croft, aristocratic girl extreme archaeologist and reputed gun slinging grave-robber, was an absolute godsend in an age when the most exciting news was another heir to Tony Blair's genetic heritage.
There were those to whom she was more than a moment's titillating gossip topic. To a man and woman in their mid-fifties, shivering in the cold wet of an English summer afternoon, after years basking in the warm glow of the Cote-d'Azure, she was a mild disappointment which could never now surprise them and make them proud. Perhaps she was a bit more to them as well, none but they could say, and they weren't saying much, even to themselves. The two watched the rain roll off the huge memorial statue to their only offspring, thought their thoughts, and left the way they had come. The other, stooped figure present nodded to them as they departed. It did not occur to them to wonder how the huge bronze statue of Lara had came to be here so quickly, or how it had managed a thin patina of verdigris in the less than two days since she was proclaimed missing and presumed dead by the Egyptian state security service. "Lara Croft, Once and Future Adventurer", the plaque on the statue's plinth said. Old Winston Jeeves, butler and keeper of the Croft family manse, rather liked that inscription, though he knew not who had commissioned it. He looked favourably on the statue, too. It was a grander monument by far than the ones to the friends of his youth who also never returned from the Egyptian sands, his mates of El Alamein, Sidi Barrani, and Mersa Matruh. He did not mind. He had not known those other fuzzy-cheeked lads long, but he had known Lara all her life. He still hoped against hope that he would know her again.
Later…Father Dunstan and Winston watched yet another BBC report on their friend's disappearance. The report made mention of the strange disaster that had stricken Cairo and the Giza Plateau, some odd storm or the other. The report also mentioned the deaths of scores of Egyptian citizens. The BBC was very thorough.
The little telly screen in the limousine then extolled the virtues of Lucozade. The Lucozade marketing folks had briefly considered renaming the drink "Larazade", but had discarded this idea, as it was felt it might not be hip to name a product after a corpse, no matter how illustrious. Bottom line, old boy, bottom line.
The pair got out of the limo, and was met at the door by another old friend of Lara's, Charles Kaine. Kaine spared a glance at the statue again. He thought he might know where it had come from, but he would not speak of that. Not tonight. Tonight they would remember their friend, different to each of them, but the same. Their bright, shining, much-loved friend. Tonight they would talk of Lara, and remember her as they had known her. This was her night. A bright actinic flash of lightning obliterated the darkness, and was as swiftly gone. Kaine had caught it, and it left an afterimage in his eyes. That was as good a metaphor as any, he thought.
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Dr. Hawi Zhawass, Undersecretary of State for the Pyramids and the Giza Plateau, Egypt's greatest archaeologist and most urbanely witty raconteur after Omar Sharif, climbed out of the Army Hummer and looked with dismay at the operation spread out before him. Go for a week on a simple American lecture tour, and everything goes to hell in your absence. The only excavation teams here at Giza in 25 years that had not been under his direction, one way or another, were making a hash out of everything he had worked so hard to preserve. He understood he had to put up with it, but it still rankled harder than anything had for a long time. Von Croy Industries had very deep pockets and very deep influence with the government. From the factories that produced copies of RheinMetall's 120mm M1A2 Abrams Egyptian-made battle tank main gun, to the Nile Delta reclamation project, to certain highly secret biological research projects, VCI was inextricably linked to the Egyptian ruling class' vision of their country as once again the undisputed leader of the Arab world.
Nonetheless, what was happening here was a horrible setback to native Egyptian archaeology and the tourist revenues it generated. This was worse than anything since the massacre of 50 of Von Croy's countrymen by Gama al- Islamiya at Hatshepsut's funerary temple Del-el-Bahari over four years before. There would be much to do that should not have to be done. Zhawass resented the time lost. Most of all, he resented Von Croy's very presence and control here.
Dr. Zhawass mastered his rage and composed his classic features. There was Von Croy, white suit, white hat, white cane, pouring over a diagram, issuing orders to the diggers over the din of the dump truck's diesel engines. Zhawass walked forward to meet him.
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Darkness. She wasn't dead, she didn't think. She was laying face down. She felt something sticky under her face, almost dry, cold. She tried to get up. She failed. The pain extinguished her consciousness again, but at least she knew, briefly, that she wasn't dead.
Again she was awake. This time she didn't try to move, not all at once. She opened an eye and tried to see any light in the darkness. This time, there was a faint green glow. It gradually became brighter, so that she could see vague forms around her. She was in a burial chamber, she could see the sarcophagus and a small stone shrine to her left, in the direction her face was pointing. Over to one side were a few small ushebti figures. The little wooden statues stood guard, soldier, handmaiden, cook, waiting to serve whoever dwelt in the sarcophagus in the afterlife. Their small glass eyes reflected the green light, but she could not see its source.
She felt numb, but remembered the pain. The numbness began to go away though. She knew her left arm was underneath her, bent forward at an impossible angle. She rolled over on her back, slowly. The pain did not cause her to black out, but she had never felt its like. She was lying in a pile of sand, with some rocks mixed in which she barely felt. She couldn't move the arm, it would not respond to her. She rose up on her right elbow, inspected the other arm. No bones broken through the skin, at any rate. She realized that she could only see out of one eye. She hoped it was still in there, just swollen shut.
Now the hard part. She would try to stand. She couldn't really feel her left leg below the knee. She looked at it in the green half-light and understood why. It too was bent crookedly at an impossible angle. Her right arm was tired. There would be no standing, not now. She lay back down on her back, and reached around to open her backpack. It took a few minutes, and it hurt something fierce, but she finally managed to extract the canteen from the pack. Took a while to unscrew the cap with one hand, but then she'd always been the dexterous one. The warm water tasted good. It was the best thing she had tasted in a long time, but she needed to save it. No telling if she could find more. She beat down the gnawing worm in her mind that told her to panic. There would be none of that, not for Lara Croft. Not her style at all. She did one more thing, and it hurt too. With a loud pop, she forced the left arm back into the ball socket of her shoulder. It still wouldn't work. As she lay back on the sand to think, the green glow became much brighter. Very much brighter. Soon all she saw was green, and her then thoughts, too, were consumed by green fire.
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Werner Von Croy was more than a little upset. Here at long last progress was being made, and now he had to stop and deal with the controlled but clearly irate little round man before him. The frustrating part was that he actually respected the state archaeologist deeply, and understood Zhawass's position. Ach. Such was life.
"Dr. Zhawass, rest assured that we will repair this damage caused by the dig even more thoroughly than the manner in which we caused it to be made. Do note that everything is being recorded and written down, and that there will actually be valuable new findings for your own team to pursue for many, many years as a result of this work. For example, hyper sound investigation techniques have long hinted at the existence of this series of tunnels under the pyramid complex, and now we are on the verge of providing positive proof of same. And as well you know, nothing will be carted away from here, no treasures of your past will join the head of Nephrititi in Berlin. If anything, the emergency has provided an opportunity for discovery that will never be again seen on the Giza Plateau."
Zhawass gestured in exasperation. "Herr Von Croy, this is all very well. You rationalize your destruction most convincingly, but we both know better. I understand your desire to recover the body of Ms. Croft, but do not pretend that she may yet be alive after two days in the bottom of the shaft. I am sorry she is dead; although I despised her methods and her use of violence in her, ahem, work. She was a most charmingly personable young lady, highly knowledgeable, and I sympathize with your loss. I also realize you are going to do what you are going to do here regardless of my remonstrations. My superiors have made this most clear to me. You are required, however, yes even you, Herr Von Croy, to have my personnel monitor and assist your activities here at all times. This is Dr. Al- Mahdri, one of my finest young assistants." A tall, strong yet mild looking man stepped forth from behind Zhawass. He actually was a very promising young archeaologist. Additionally, Al-Mahdri was also a Captain in the Egyptian Special Forces detail assigned the duty of countering foreign aid to Egypt's many indigenous terrorist groups. As such he could be expected to determine what Von Croy had been doing here in the first place, as well as ensuring no further catastrophic damage to the relics of the past occurred. Egypt's past was in large part her future. Zhawass had confidence in the young man's abilities, academic and martial. He'd saved his life twice. There were many who would see the relics of the pre- Islamic past destroyed, and Hawii Zhawass had the fatwa of more than one extreme sect on his head.
The young Egyptian and the old German made their polite and perfunctory greetings. Zhawass turned to Von Croy again. "Herr Von Croy, I will leave you now, and I really do hope you find that for which you seek. I was not present for the events that led us to this point, and I have read your deposition to my government.
I suspect you know much more than you have told. Be aware, Herr Von Croy, that as I scientist I always seek the logical explanation, the factual truth behind every mystery. Be also aware that as an Egyptian, I know that much more lies behind the façade of what science holds sacred. The stench of ancient evil is still lingering about you, though I sense you believe it to be gone. Dig as deeply as you think advisable, but do not dig too deep. You may not care for what you find."
"One last question for you, one I note was not addressed in your previous deposition. What of my French associate, Dr. Jean Yves Delacourt, head of the team excavating the ruins of Alexandria and the research director of the dives at Herakleion? He seems to have gone missing, and he was last seen with you. I would very much like to talk with him. There is some concern that the storm has damaged certain sites we had wished to investigate. Do you know where I might find him, Herr Von Croy?"
Von Croy shook his head. "Jean-Yves was, shall we say, an associate of brief acquaintance to me. He left my company shortly before I came here, too late to help Ms. Croft. I am sorry, I cannot help you, Dr. Zhawass. I thank you for your frank concern, and again I assure you that we shall set to right any damage done here. Auf Weidersehen, sir."
Zhawass left, and Von Croy turned back to his work. His new "aide" observed with interest. Von Croy felt the young man's gaze bore into a space between his shoulder blades. He shook off the feeling, and called for the chief of the diggers.
1.1.3 Chapter 3: Floating
1.2 Lara looked about her in utter amazement. She'd seen the Nile, seen the site of Thebes many, many times before. She'd never seen it like this. Across the river from her on the East Bank, the Temple of Karnak shined brilliant white in the midday sun. From here she could even see the brightly painted reliefs of the gods, the sun sparkling off the golden caps of the obelisks. The leonine figures in the Avenue of Sphinxes gleamed with the colorful fletching of their elaborate stone headdresses. On the Nile itself, little fishing boats and larger boats with both lateen sails and oared vessels with rectangular sails went about their business of fishing, commerce, and travel.
She looked down at herself, at the smooth, unbroken skin of her arms and legs. In place of her usual shorts, leotard, and boots ensemble, she wore the long dress of thin, finest Egyptian cotton common to women of high stature in the early 19th Dynasty. She was neither hungry nor thirsty nor tired, and nothing hurt.
She was standing in the garden of an estate, judging from its size and the workmanship of the stone walls that of a very important personage, if not an actual Pharaoh. Seated on the limestone rim of a pool of clear water was an Egyptian man in the traditional loincloth. His head was shaven clean including eyebrows, and he could have been anywhere from thirty to fifty years of age. The pattern on his elaborate neckpiece and the kohl around his eyes proclaimed him to be not of the royal, but rather the priestly class. His head was turned towards Karnak, looking where she had looked moments before. He then turned to her and spoke in perfect Oxford English: "An amazement, is it not? You have never seen it in its once-ago glory. My Lord Horus permits you now, Lara Croft, to behold that which you have only seen in dreams, as you have served him well in the struggle with his cousin, uncle, and brother, Set the Destroyer."
Lara was momentarily speechless. She looked into the man's dark eyes. She had seen these same dark, bottomless eyes staring forth from a mask of gold and obsidian. Semerkhet. High Priest of Horus, falcon headed sky god, son of Osiris and Isis, patron of the Pharaohs of this very Egypt.
"Am I dead, then, truly, priest?"
The man shook his head. "No. You are ka, your spirit, mind, the essence of what is really you, is here. Your shell in the world of your present remains living, but only you can determine for how long. Look."
The priest waved his hand, long-fingered and strong, over the surface of the pool. Lara could see an image of herself as she last remembered, lying on the ground of the pyramid's deep chamber. Lara didn't like the way she looked. She looked like a broken doll. There was much dried blood and many livid bruises on her body. The image vanished, and the water was clear again, sparkling in the day's light.
"I could only speak with you by bringing you here, to where my Lord Horus has made a place for me, his servant, and where he rewards you with a glimpse of what was. Soon you must go back to your shell. It is preserved for now, the green light you see protects it. Should it be within you, you may yet rise from that tomb and go forth again by day. It is not for me to say this, only you may determine your path."
Lara's brow furrowed. This must be delirium. "What do you mean, only I can determine whether I live or die? The matter would seem out of my control. And though I am very thankful for it, why does Horus reward me in any way? I freed Set from his sleep, and I was unable to prevent him from sending your god "back to the stars".
The man looked at her without pity or condescension, but addressed her in the tone of teacher to pupil: "Your ka will not be destroyed. You have won the game of senet, and your heart has weighed true on the scales of Truth. Your ka is not food for Ammit, Devourer of Souls. If you live, you live. If you die, you may stay here, or go wherever your people go. If oblivion is your choice, then you may cease to be, depending on what you yourself believe."
"As for myself, I served Horus well, better than any other in the time when the Gods walked and flew among us. He has given me this place and these people, who I talk with, laugh with, and live with, though in truth I am alone here in this teeming city of Thebes. I still see to his affairs, when needed. Before you, it was not needed for a long time." Semerkhet smiled a rueful but not unfriendly smile.
"You will examine your life and your purpose, Lara Croft. You must do this so that you may decide if truly you deserve life, or the death you have so often dealt out to others. It is not for me to say this. As for my Lord Horus, he knows that it was your thoughtlessness that freed Set into the world of your now. He also knows that you could have chosen to flee the consequences of your action, or that you could have chosen to serve and rule with Set in a world of the damned and dying. You chose to make right again what you had made wrong. He gives you then this opportunity for your own life. What you do with his gift is up to you."
Lara considered the man's words. This delirium was something different, if delirium it was. She really hadn't thought much about motivations and the like. A girl did what a girl had to do. It had seemed simple, before.
"Well, then, Semerkhet High Priest of Horus, I suppose I'd best get on with it. Send me back there and we'll see what we will see. Before you do, though, is it perhaps possible…"
Semerkhet smiled again and interrupted her. "Yes, Lara, it is indeed possible that you may see more of the world I knew in my life. In your mind I see a tale of your people's bards, we will use that as the vehicle of our trip." The priest stood up and walked over to her, and reached out with his deeply bronzed arm. "Take my hand, Lara, and let us see what there is to be seen". Lara reached out her own hand and took his.
They rose above the city of Thebes, and she felt the warm breeze in her face. Below, the people of the city went about their affairs, the oxcarts of grain trundled their way down the streets. Soldiers drilled in their fortress, bronze spear tips gleaming and dancing as they practiced their evolutions. Workers in the great fields of grain threshed and collected golden sheaves of wheat. The palace of Pharaoh bustled with activity. A golden chariot drove down the wide avenue to the center of the complex, pulled by six beautiful horses of purest white, their plumed maned heads borne proudly on arched necks. Lara could just see a man with the great headdress of Lower and Upper Egypt stride tall and confidently to meet it, servants and children strewing rose petals in his path.
Then the pair banked away to the Nile, towards Karnak. In the reeds on Nilus' lush and verdant banks, the sons of Sobek the Crocodile god slid from the banks and into the dark green waters. Further out near the middle of the river, a huge daughter of Hapi the Hippopotamus goddess breached the waters, her huge pink mouth with its white peg teeth gaping open for a breath of air after a long slow stroll on the bottom of the river.
Now they reached the great Temple of Karnak itself, vast and grand and brilliant white, flying down above the Avenue of Sphinxes, soaring up to just miss the tips of the great obelisks. Circling over the Sacred Lakes and the houses of the priests and servitors beyond, they came back over the Eighth and Ninth Pylons, and over the Great Hypostyle hall. They ducked underneath the columns and flew down the hall, now bright with color and alive with the chanting of the priests, rich with the smells of offerings of incense. They flew into the opening doors of the Temple of Amun, and watched the priests open the doors to the sacred shrine of their god. Then they flew out again, over the Temple of Mut Sky-goddess, and to the southwest towards Luxor. Shortly away from the Temples, they alit on a small hillock overlooking the Nile.
Lara looked at Semerkhet and smiled a great smile. It had been long since she had smiled this way, without the raised eyebrow of irony or the thin tight lips of defiance. Her smile was the smile of pure happiness, and she couldn't remember the last time she'd had one of those. Semerkhet smiled back at her, released her hand and stepped back.
"Thank you, Priest. Whatever comes, I have seen what I always wanted to and never thought I could. The cost, whatever it may finally be, is worth it. Time for me to go, now, I think."
"You are welcome, Lara Croft, impetuous daughter of Thoth. You have rendered myself and my Lord Horus great service, and we are pleased that you are pleased. It may be that we will not meet again. In the trials to come, Anubis Guardian of Tombs will keep the field of your trial safe. You will meet yourself, and you will decide. Go then, strong and brave one, and find what you will find. I hope that you find life."
Lara's vision faded, and then she was back in her broken body on the floor of the tomb.
1.2.1 Chapter 4: Debating
The green light wasn't as bright now, and she could see the colour difference in her visitor's clothing now. Harsh-faced Lara had pulled broken Lara up into a sitting position, roughly and with no regard for her wounds. Now harsh-faced Lara was sitting in front of her, crouched on her haunches, arms crossed beneath her chest. Dandy balancing act, that. Harsh-face looked with contempt and disgust at Broken.
"Well, you've really made a hash of it, haven't you? Never gave a damn for anything but your own little urges of the moment, your own lust for revenge, for possession of things you never made, for your own hide. Look where's it gotten you.
Gasping your last in yet another dark place free of any human joy or sorrow for millennia. Now very well, I'm to ask you a few questions, you're to answer, and then I can go back to my nothingness and you can go on to yours. Let's begin, shall we?"
Harsh-face stood up and began to pace the chamber floor. "What gave you the right, what infinitely wise power invested you with life and death authority over your fellow humans? I don't mean all the folks who've come gunning for you for whatever reason; every creature on this ball of rock is programmed for self-preservation. Who made you the executioner of the rest of them? The guards doing their jobs in the places where unbidden you came to take what they were charged to protect? Why did those objects, scions, daggers, artifacts, have the ability to make human life meaningless to you? Or is human life just meaningless to you anyway? Are you the only "real" person in the world, hmmm? Is that it? Is everyone else just a meat puppet, there to help or to hinder, an obstacle to be leaped with a pair of 9mm slugs?" Harsh-face walked over to Broken and put her face inches away from hers. "Answer me, Lara. Why are you like this? Give me one good, justifiable reason that you are above everyone else, top of the food-chain."
Broken Lara looked up in the other's flashing brown eyes. She felt sweat rolling down her face, down her neck. It was much too hot in here, much hotter than a place so far underground should be.
"I did what I had to do. If I didn't kill those people, I would not have gotten what they were guarding. If I didn't get those things, they would have been used to kill far more people, in most cases. Those people knew what they were doing when they got those jobs. They expected to kill or be killed if their jobs needed doing. I was just better at than they were."
Harsh-face stepped back and looked down. "That's rationalization, you know. In fact, that's a load of tripe. You haven't answered my question. You have one last chance to do it now: What makes you better than the ones you kill?"
Lara thought. She hadn't thought about things like this a great deal. She always simply did what needed doing at any given time, in any given situation. She looked up at herself, at her interrogator. "Nothing. Nothing makes me better than them. Some were probably much better people than I. Some weren't. I did what I did, and I ended their choices for them. I can still make my own. I had no right to do it, but being sorry for it now won't change a thing. That's all the answer I have for you. Now get on with the rest of it or let me die."
Harsh-face looked back down at her. "So you don't know why you did the things you've done, other than it was expedient. No delusions of goddess- hood, then. Well, that's a start, a damn poor one, but a start nonetheless. Next question: There are people, oddly enough, who care a great deal for you, over and above the desire to get into your unmentionables. Why do you suppose that is? Now, it doesn't matter if you deserve their loyalty and friendship or not, for they choose to give it. That is their decision, not yours. Neither of us have ever been ones for false modesty, what is it about you that inspires this, other than a pretty face, a sharp wit, and a sweetly voiced turn of phrase?"
Broken Lara thought about that one, too. She really didn't want to. Always troubled her, somehow, that other folks should care about her. Even the old friends like Dunstan and Winston, who'd known her as a young girl and would be expected to. Even Charles Kaine, and probably Jean-Yves, who almost certainly loved her in the way men love women. These things she could understand. She could understand the admiration of her mind, her talents, too. True, she didn't really deserve this other sort of friendship some few had for her. She'd saved their lives at the risk of her own a few times, but that was just the way she was. They'd done the same for her. Just something friends did. She appreciated and cherished her few friends, but resented the fact that she felt that way, sometimes. Just didn't seem right, somehow.
Harsh waited a moment longer and then spoke: "Well, cat's got your tongue, has it? I'm going to have to answer for you, thrust it right in your face so you won't miss it, and see if you can deal with it: They love you in spite of yourself. They ask for nothing from you, expect nothing of you. You don't feel that's wrong or odd, but it does make you very uncomfortable. Not due to any low opinion of yourself, obviously. So why, then, great loner though you are and your friends accept you to be, why feel the revulsion at what you know you enjoy and value?"
Lara didn't really know what the other was talking about. What was that supposed to mean? It was true, though. She knew it. How it could be relevant to whether she lived or died she did not understand. "I am what I do. I didn't ask for any of them, but I can't do without the few friends I have. I suppose I use them. They know I'm using them, and knowing they don't mind. I don't understand why. I would do anything for them if it were the right thing to do. But I cannot understand why they do it for me…"
She was angry, now. She didn't want to talk about these things. All it did was show she didn't have complete understanding and control over everything in her life, and proved nothing else. Why bother with it? "Lara. Me. Whatever you are. Just go to hell. Just bugger off and go to hell. I'm going to try to drag myself out of here one way or another, and if I don't make it, fine. If I do, fine. The only thing we have established is that I don't know everything there is to know about the world, or myself, and I already knew that. The purpose of this useless psychobabble eludes me, and I'm done with it."
Harsh-faced Lara looked down at her. The face was not harsh, now, and displayed a slightly wistful, knowing expression. "That's what you needed to understand, Lara. You'll find it useful, later, if you live. There are things you will never know, understand, or need to forgive about yourself and what you do. And there's nothing you can do about it. Nonetheless, you still have to try to understand these things. And that's it. No great revelation. Goodbye. You'll be out of this place shortly." The other Lara faded away and was gone.
She felt the heat. The green light again grew stronger, and she could feel nothing but its fire. Then it was gone. Tired still, but no longer broken. Bruised, but not crippled. She got up. She stretched out her arms, her legs, and loosened up. There was a doorway ahead she had not seen before, crumbling mud bricks partially blocking it. This was the way out. Wouldn't take long.
She took a few light sticks from her pack and slung the canteen over her shoulder, still had a few sips of water in it, although she wasn't thirsty right now. She took out the map inside the pack, and wrote on it with her grease pencil, and placed both items back inside. She threw aside the mud bricks, popped the light stick, and carefully laid her backpack at the entrance to the tunnel. She looked at for a moment, and started out on her way.
Behind her, in the corner of the room, the little ushebti figure's eyes no longer glowed green.
Chapter 4: Flight
Von Croy was going over the diagrams of the Great Pyramid's galleries and the new additions they had found when the digger ran up to him and told him they'd found something, something important. He rushed forward and followed the man to the new shaft entrance. The wheezing old diesel controlling the makeshift elevator coughed under the strain of the two men, but held. Dr. Al-Mahdri rushed over to the pit, too late to spy on him. Von Croy looked up at the man's chagrined face and doffed his hat in mock salute.
Von Croy entered the tomb chamber. A small one, but so far beneath the resting place of Khufu the owner would have been an important person. Time to find out about that mystery later. The digger handed him Lara's backpack. Von Croy remembered it well, remembered exactly when and where Lara had found it. He opened it. Inside, on top of the ammunition, medkits, and many small articles Lara always stuffed inside this her lucky talisman, was a note. Written in the unmistakable handwriting of his one- time apprentice and adversary, it said simply, "Werner". Von Croy raised his head up in triumph. She had left this here for him. She was still alive, and could not have gone very far. "Ve've found her!"
The digger thrust his torch into the passageway where the mud bricks lay in disorderly heaps all about. Von Croy went over and looked inside. He saw boot prints in the dust. He would follow her tracks, the passageway went up at a fairly steep angle and it would not be very far to go to the surface. He could make it that far. He had made it this far, nein?
Captain Dr. Al-Mahdri heard Von Croy's echoed exclamation of triumph from the top of the shaft. He pulled out his cell phone and made a brief call, then slipped away unnoticed to the road leading into the dig site.
**************************************************
Lara pushed the manhole cover aside, barely, and peered up carefully from the sewer. The tunnel under the pyramid debouched into the network of sewers underneath the new tourist hotels outside the Pyramid complex. Someone had clearly known of the tomb chamber's existence and had gone to much effort to build the well-camouflaged gimbel-mounted door that led to the sewers. Dusk was falling over the modern scene before her, no pedestrians or vehicles were anywhere in sight.
A cold metal object pressed against the back of her neck and she heard the unmistakable click of an automatic pistol safety disengaged. "Please do not make any sudden movements, Ms. Croft. I do not intend to harm you, but your reputation is one of the shooting first and asking of questions at a later time. Climb out of the hole, and place your hands upon the top of your head, fingers interlocked, please."
She did as the voice advised, and did not move. The street was empty. She felt the brace of pistols removed from her holsters. The voice spoke again. "Please turn around, Ms. Croft." She turned and saw a man she recognized from a lecture series at Oxford by Dr. Hawii Zhawass, head of the Egyptian government agency in charge of the Giza sites. "You're….Dr. Hakim Al-Mahdri, Dr. Zhawass's research assistant! I remember your presentation on the Tombs of the Aphis Bulls at Oxford. It would appear you are bit more than you seemed, although the presentation wasn't very bad, actually."
Al-Mahdri smiled and said; "So very kind of you to remember, Ms. Croft. Time is limited. Dr. Zhawass has some questions, and perhaps some answers, for you. Come, let us go." Out of the side street came a white Toyota Range Runner, the most common sort of vehicle outside the cities of the Arab world. Once inside, Lara saw the driver was wearing the same black uniform as Sgt Aziz, the wounded man who had sacrificed himself to destroy the monstrous reptilian sending of Set in the City of the Dead.
"Your team put up a good effort against the creatures of Set…how many nights ago, now? The one man, Sgt. Aziz, was very brave. He could have escaped, but died in the performance of his duty."
Al-Mahdri looked at her and handed her pistols back, but kept the magazines. "That was two nights ago. Yes, Aziz was a good man, the best. I thank you for assisting him. Neither Dr. Hawass nor I fully understand what happened, but we know you and Von Croy to have been catalysts for the events then. Soon we will be at Alexandria. Until then, you may wish to try and get some sleep."
Lara settled back and looked out at the barren countryside. The moon was coming up. She closed her eyes. If they wanted to kill her for some reason they would have already done so. Might as well get a bit of shut- eye, then. Soon the gentle hum of the Range Rover's tires lulled her to sleep. She did not dream.
She awoke to the acrid smell of cigarette smoke. Al-Mahdri closed his Zippo lighter with the flick of a practiced wrist and put it in his shirt pocket. "We are here." The pair got out of the vehicle and walked up the steps of the Museum of Alexandrian History, headquarters of the Egyptian state Antiquities bureau in the area. Looking out to the sea, she saw the site of many events of the days past. The fresh salt air smelled very refreshing after the smoke of the soldier-scholar's French cigarette.
Dr. Zhawass was waiting in the museum's offices overlooking the harbor. With him were several more black uniformed Special Forces commandoes. Al- Mahdri began to look more comfortable in their presence, indicating that he might have been expecting trouble. Zhawass arose from the ancient cracked- leather chair in greeting. "Ms. Croft, hello. I remember you of course from my lectures at Oxford. I am glad to see you have escaped the death I certainly expected to claim you when I became aware of Herr Von Croy's efforts to find you at the bottom of the pit in the pyramid. I am not only glad, but very much surprised, as well. To what do you attribute your miraculous escape?"
Lara considered a moment and said; "I attribute my escape from death to an odd green light that restored me to health when I should by all rights be dead. Dr. Zhawass, let's not fence about here. I came here and broke your laws rooting about for a trinket I wanted, the Amulet of Horus. I released the ancient "god" Set, or whatever he really is, into the world. I put him back in a place I hope he will never escape from again. After that, I nearly died, didn't, and really don't know what is going on beyond that. I would very much like to go home now, because I don't think I'm going to go looking for anymore adventures for quite a long time, if ever.
You provide me passage outside of Egypt, agree not to press charges, and I'll answer your questions the best I can. That's all I have to offer."
Zhawass sat back down and motioned her to a seat. "Very well, then, we shall, as my American colleagues say, cut to the chase. I have long known that the mythology of my forbears was more than superstition and legend, I have felt myself echoes of things that should not be, in the ruins and tombs to which I have devoted my life. I did not believe that these things could impact the present to any great extent. My government has put me in charge of determining how to best prevent these things from harming our country in the future. As I am not particularly well qualified to perform this job outside of an attempt to research and understand the threat from our past, Dr. Al-Mahdri and his men provide the defense against the humans who would use these supernatural phenomena for their own purposes. Herr Von Croy was one such, and from what I can gather his disbelief led him to be temporarily controlled by the force you have laid to rest. He is no longer considered a threat, for now."
"Although there are many unresolved issues, only one thing seriously troubles me at this time, the whereabouts of Dr. Jean-Yves Delacourt. He cannot be found, and his flat here in Alexandria appears to have been ransacked. Despite our differing areas of concentration, he and I frequently commiserated together and he spoke of you often and fondly. Herr Von Croy disavows any knowledge of his whereabouts, but admits to have seen him during the late excitement. Do you know what has become of him, Ms. Croft?"
Lara shook her head sadly. "No, I'm afraid I don't. Von Croy, when possessed by Set, kidnapped Jean-Yves to lure me into a trap. I freed him and escaped. I don't know what happened to him after that, but like you I would very much like to know. He and I are…close. He is one of my very best friends, he taught me much of what I know about Egypt. I want to find him, too." She was afraid for Jean-Yves.
Certainly no fighter or adventurer, he would surely have tried to find her himself no matter the cost, there at the bottom of the pyramid where she'd thought she'd die. He never came. He must be in great trouble, if not dead. She didn't want him to be dead, not after all this, after all they'd gone through together.
Zhawass reached into the pocket of his somewhat incongruous-looking safari vest and pulled out a yellow envelope. "There is one interesting thing our men found in Dr. Delacourt's apartment. It is a receipt of some kind delivered two days ago, a receipt-----"
A loud explosion and the sound of automatic weapons fire from downstairs interrupted his words. The Egyptian commandos rushed out of the room, unshouldering their MP-5 submachine guns on the run. Lara yelled to Al- Mahdri; "My pistol clips!" He drew them forth from his pocket, met her half way across the floor, and pressed them into her hands. "Stay here. Protect the doctor." He spun about and ran out the door after his men.
Lara seated the rounds in the clips by rapping them sharply against the heel of her boot, slapped them home in the magazine wells, and charged the slides in succession. This took her less than 5 seconds. "Get away from the window!" she yelled to Zhawass. The older plump little man scurried away to the corner of the room opposite the outer wall with surprising nimbleness. Lara crouched and rolled over underneath the window and cautiously poked her head up to look outward and down to the street below. No surprises there, unfortunately. A figure on the street below, wearing the same black robes and head coverings as Von Croy's former minions, leveled a RPG 7 grenade launcher, favorite of terrorists from Bonn to Bangkok for over two generations. Lara stood straight up and fired both her pistols down at the man. The heavy .45 slugs sprayed glass down on the street in brilliant coruscating confetti, but through this she watched the rounds find their mark.
At moments of extreme conflict and struggle the human mind does one of two things. For the inexperienced, blind panic and paralysis of the senses is sometimes but not always the result. For people like Lara Croft, time perceptions dilate and everything becomes very clear. There is no slow motion movie playing in the brain, everything is just plainly visible where an outside observer would see a confusing blur of events. Lara saw the rounds catch the man in the throat and chest, saw his body begin to fall backwards to ground, and saw the rocket grenade leave its launcher and climb towards her. She released the tension in her knees, dropped in a crouch to the floor, pistoned her strong legs upward and executed a perfect backwards leap. Zhawass watched in awe. He'd never seen anything quite like that before. Lara hit the ground and continued her backwards somersault as the grenade caught the eave of the roof above the window and exploded. The flash of light and thunderclap explosion blew chunks of plaster and dust into the room.
Close one, she thought. Lara grabbed Zhawass's shirt by the back of the collar and shouted into his ear. "Come on! There may be others, we'll take our chances elsewhere! Follow me and keep low!"
She ran out of the room, body bent over, staying to the wall behind the banister overlooking the central display room below. The fighting was moving inside, and she could see the black uniformed men firing from the cover of the larger stone exhibits at the black robed men doing the same other side of the large room. One of the Egyptian commandos lay awkwardly splayed out near the bottom of the steps. She grabbed the stubby little black MP-5 submachine pistol from the dead hand of its former owner, checked the magazine, and stuffed another clip from the corpse's ammo pouch into the cargo pocket of her shorts.
Lara saw Al-Mahdri changing magazines and yelling into a cell phone wedged between his cheek and shoulder, from behind the headless trunk of a sizable statue of Cleopatra as the goddess Isis (she'd always been a bit skeptical of that particular identification of the piece). Darting out towards him, firing on the run, she saw more of the black robed figures enter the room, one crumpling in a hail of bullets before he could clear the doorway. As she crouched next to Al-Mahdri, he yelled in her ear; "We need to hold out for just a few more minutes. This is going to be over very soon!"
She looked backwards to see what had become of Dr. Zhawass. The little archeaologist crouched behind a stone block, holding a folding stock AK-47 over the top; firing short blind bursts towards the enemy. Pretty fair form, too.
Suddenly the black robed figures began to fall back in pairs, firing as they went, out the large doorway to the street. A rapid rhythmic thumping and the clatter of tracks on cobblestones rose above the fading din of gunfire. The commandos, sensing victory, came out from behind cover and poured fire into the backs of their fleeing foes, dropping several more.
"Come on, Ms. Croft, but carefully." Switching to Arabic, Al-Mahdri yelled to Dr. Zhawass to stop firing. The trio cautiously made their way to the front door. About five surviving commandos in black were effusively greeting nearly twenty soldiers dressed in khaki fatigues, helmets, and holding assault rifles. One was firing over his head into the air and chanting with delight. Lara looked down one end of the street and saw the bodies of many black robed figures in various stages of completeness. Yes, the streets ran red with the blood of the unbelievers this day, at least from the standard Islamic point of view. Lara wondered how many of these dead were worshippers of Set, and how many simply worshippers of money and violence. They worshipped nothing now.
At the other end of the street an American designed armored personnel carrier sat, engine idling. The 20mm rapid-fire cannon in its squat turret had shown the black robes the errors of their ways. "Built under license in this very Egypt, Ms. Croft, and your taxi to the airport as well". Zhawass looked comically cocky, holding the AK-47 with the barrel over his shoulder. "What? You look surprised. This old man has been a soldier before. Thirty-two years ago, to be sure, and most of that time in an Israeli prisoner of war camp, but I do know what to do with one of these things."
Lara almost chuckled. "I've seen that you do indeed, Doctor. These were Von Croy's men, but he has given up his fight for Set. Who were they working for, and why did they want us, want me, dead?"
Al-Mahdri walked over to one of the black robed bodies and unwound the headgear from its face. A blonde Caucasian face rolled upwards, dead blue eyes staring sightlessly at the sky. "We know they are no longer in the employ of Herr Von Croy. As to whose employ they were in, we shall find out in due time. And now, Ms. Croft, it is time for you to leave Egypt." Lara joined the pair and walked to the rear of the armored vehicle. Aside from the sound of soldiers talking, nothing could be heard in the street but the whine of the servomotor lowering the vehicle's passenger compartment ramp.
****************************************************
Werner Von Croy looked out the window of his private jet as it began to taxi off the runway. He'd never found Lara, the Egyptians had done that, he supposed. He knew she'd made her way to the surface, because he'd tracked her all the way from the bottom of the Great Pyramid to the open manhole cover on the street of New Giza. She'd be able to take care of herself. She always had been.
He didn't blame himself for the destruction he/Set had wrought, but he might have if she had died. That, at least, was some comfort. More comforting was the freedom he felt from hate of her, after all these years. She was only a girl then, after all, and despite the years and her undoubted precocious intellect, he rather thought she would always be a girl in some ways.
He pulled out the paper with his name written on it, in her strong but irregular hand, and read it again:
Werner-
Glad you're yourself again, no more Set. Glad you're yourself before Cambodia again, too, and wiser than you were then. I saw it your eyes. I'm sorry for the pain of all these years, but you being you and me being me it could never have been any different.
I'm afraid I'm not much wiser myself now, but it's time for me to try to become so. I'm going home if I can, for a time, and sort some things out. I won't have the Iris for much longer, or the scion, or the dagger of Xian, or the rest of them. They're going to a place where the likes of you and me and nobody, including James Ballard who has found so many deep things, will ever be able to find them again. It's for the best, I think.
Perhaps we'll meet again someday, Werner. Take care.
Lara
Perhaps so, Lara, perhaps so, he thought. He lay the letter down and picked up the international edition of the Times. The so-called "tech stocks" were rising rapidly in the American NASDAQ and on the DAX again. Imbeciles. What did they know about "high technology"? Werner laid that paper down, too, and closed his eyes.
Epilogue: End of the Beginning
Home. Croft Manor. Lara glanced up at the huge statue of herself and smiled. Not a bad likeness, if a tad melodramatic in pose. She hadn't told anyone she was coming. Scarf and drab dress purchased in the duty- free shops of the Cairo Airport concealed her identity from a press that had almost forgotten about her in the three days of her "death" anyway. A bit of a relief, that. There was a car in the circular driveway, however, a Fiat of the sort one rented from Heathrow airport' many rental agencies.
She pressed the brick in the proper way to allow her entry if she ever lost her keys. She opened the door and stepped inside. "Winston?" No answer. She flicked on the lights. She went over to the portrait of Hugh, first Lord Croft, elevated to the peerage for his inestimable service to the Empire in the realms of wool and cotton production and distribution. Reaching under the frame, she clicked a button and the portrait swung forward, revealing a small safe. She opened it, 02 right, 14 left, 68 right, and back to zero. Probably should change that one day, if she stuck around here much.
She reached inside and drew out one of the two Browning H-35 9mm automatic pistols there. Father's pistols. She'd hated to leave the .45s behind in Egypt, but these would do, and she had more history with them anyway. She drew back the slide and rode it forward, so that it made little sound when the round was chambered.
She walked over to the secret study, the room where she kept her dragon's hoard. This room, where she had silently gloated over her prizes, each and every deadly little bauble, each dread talisman of power. The lighting fixture door release was already thrown, so she quietly pushed the door open and walked inside.
There was a fire cheerfully burning in the fireplace. A somewhat portly man sat in the big overstuffed leather chair of her grandfather. "Hello, Jean-Yves" she said.
Jean-Yves Delacourt arose with a look of disbelief and joy on his pudgy Gallic face. He seemed to expand, his eyes lost glistened brightly as happiness replaced gloom on his countenance. "Lara! You ARE alive! Oh, I am so very very glad to see you, we had feared you lost forever!" He began to walk towards her as he spoke. "The rest have left, your noble servant Winston is back in Ireland, they will all be so happy to know you are well! I---" He stopped as he saw the pistol in Lara's hand, pointed at him.
"Not another step closer, Jean-Yves, old friend."
"But…Lara, why the pistol, I am your friend, you know that!" His look of joy was replaced by one of confusion and hurt. Very good, Lara thought. He'd always been very good, and she'd never known it.
Lara removed a yellow envelope from a pocket of the dowdy dress. "Go have a seat, Jean-Yves." He did as she directed. "The Egyptians found this in your apartment. Western Union delivered receipt. A receipt from a Birmingham firm specializing in the casting of monumental bronzes, primarily for American war memorials. A receipt for shipment of one such statue to this very address, on an order placed six months ago. Why, Jean? Why the betrayal? Why the planning? I can understand the statue, that would be a gesture you'd make, if you could afford such a thing, which I didn't think you could. Why these things, and for who? I know you're not working for Von Croy." Lara's voice was calm and hard, just like Lara herself had always striven to be. She felt the tear running down her cheek but ignored it. Her vision was clear.
Jean-Yves seemed shrunken now, diminished. " I am very glad to see you alive, you know, my dear friend. I did not want to have a part of this, but I had no choice. You may kill me if you wish, but I cannot tell you everything. As you know, I am not a brave man. The fate that awaits if I tell you would be far worse, quite literally, than mere death." He looked up into Lara's eyes; his own filled with pain and self-loathing.
"Von Croy and Set are not part of the things that seek your life, and more than your life, Lara. They were known by…. those I am associated with, and the actions that happened in Egypt were known to them. Everything worked out as planned. Set came into the world, Horus came and was prevented from staying, and you locked Set away where he can never again return. The only part of the plan that did not work, of course, is that you did not die. I have been tortured every day that we have known each other for some time, now, my dear Lara. I am truly glad that you are indeed alive, and if I pray for anything now, I pray I unwittingly helped you live instead of kept you from living. I cannot tell you anything else. Please kill me now, Lara, for I have always loved you and I do not wish to remain alive."
Lara looked down at Jean-Yves, and pointed the pistol between his eyes. Clicked off the safety. Placed her practiced finger on the trigger.
She lowered the gun.
"Get out, Jean-Yves. Get out now and go."
He rose unsteadily and sighed. "I am sorry Lara. I truly am. Goodbye, my dearest friend." He walked out. She heard the car door open, the engine start, and listened until the sound of the engine faded away.
Lara put the pistol down, sat in the chair still warmed by its last occupant, and placed her head in her hands. She cried for a long time.
The End
1.1 By John Carter
Tomb Raider and Lara Croft copyright Eidos Interactive and Core Design LTD
This is a work of fan fiction that in no way challenges their copyrights.
1.1.1 Chapter One: Falling
She ran. She didn't think. She didn't have to. She twisted when needed, jumped when it was time to jump. She didn't notice the crash of the fifty- tonne block of Nile limestone behind her, didn't feel the fist-sized flyaway chunk that glanced off her left knee. She would feel that later. For now, eyes and ears and body and long developed reflex patterns fused together, the flesh machine called Lara Croft kept running.
Two-thirds the way up the central corridor of the Pyramid of Cheops, the huge blocks had stopped falling. The dust no longer shimmered and danced on the smooth stone floor. The flesh machine stopped running, and Lara drew her breath in ragged gasps.
She hurt all over. Her knee was the worst, and now she trudged up the slope with clumsy steps. So near the surface, the cool air of the pyramid's interior began to warm with the first rising of the sun. It was always that way in the desert, this time of year. The transition from night to day was never subtle. Outside the heat would strike like a jackhammer. But that was all right. Better than it never striking at all.
Almost out. She could see the sky outside framed in the exit, and the brightness hurt her eyes. There was a figure, immobile and unthreatening, silhouetted in the middle of the doorway. Von Croy. No guns, no henchmen, just Von Croy, leaning on his cane. She kept going, could see him clearly now, an old man in a dirty white linen suit, wide-brimmed straw hat casting a shadow over his eyes. There was no red glow in the eyes, now.
"Come quickly, girl, before it collapses around you!" As though called forth by his warning, a sudden aftershock tremor tossed her back from the lip of the doorway.
"You back, Werner? No more Set?" She wanted to believe, wanted to trust, she was so tired. She felt the floor start to give way. Using the last of her fading adrenaline, she willed her legs to explode in one last leap. The floor crumbled away beneath her as her fingers barely caught the bottom edge of the doorway. She grabbed and held on. Feet scrambling for purchase, she sought any sort of foothold, but there was none.
"Take my hands. I can pull you to safety!" Von Croy was reaching towards her, his stiff frame leaning forward at an awkward angle.
Lara looked up into the old man's near-frantic eyes. Oddly, she was quite at peace.
"Good to see you too, Werner". She managed a wry half-smile.
"I couldn't leave you!" As he started to reach for her hand, the tanned knuckles white with exertion, one last tremor threw him back. Rocks and a thick cloud of choking dust began pouring down into the doorway.
Lara fell. She fell for a very long time. Then she stopped falling.
Von Croy picked himself up off the sand. The doorway to the pyramid was blocked with rubble, and there was no sign of Lara. He started forward, but stopped as a last huge block of stone slammed down to seal the doorway. Inscrutably doglike, the granite face of Set stared back at him impassively. He fell to his knees and wept. The sand drank his tears greedily, and they were gone.
1.1.2 Chapter 2: Fallen
Lara Croft's mysterious disappearance in Egypt didn't take long to hit the British media. Telly and Fleet Street snapped up the tale as quickly as the peccadillo of one of Liz Hurley's boyfriends. Back in the States, this time of year was called the "Silly Season", and so it was here. The odd vanishing of Lara Croft, aristocratic girl extreme archaeologist and reputed gun slinging grave-robber, was an absolute godsend in an age when the most exciting news was another heir to Tony Blair's genetic heritage.
There were those to whom she was more than a moment's titillating gossip topic. To a man and woman in their mid-fifties, shivering in the cold wet of an English summer afternoon, after years basking in the warm glow of the Cote-d'Azure, she was a mild disappointment which could never now surprise them and make them proud. Perhaps she was a bit more to them as well, none but they could say, and they weren't saying much, even to themselves. The two watched the rain roll off the huge memorial statue to their only offspring, thought their thoughts, and left the way they had come. The other, stooped figure present nodded to them as they departed. It did not occur to them to wonder how the huge bronze statue of Lara had came to be here so quickly, or how it had managed a thin patina of verdigris in the less than two days since she was proclaimed missing and presumed dead by the Egyptian state security service. "Lara Croft, Once and Future Adventurer", the plaque on the statue's plinth said. Old Winston Jeeves, butler and keeper of the Croft family manse, rather liked that inscription, though he knew not who had commissioned it. He looked favourably on the statue, too. It was a grander monument by far than the ones to the friends of his youth who also never returned from the Egyptian sands, his mates of El Alamein, Sidi Barrani, and Mersa Matruh. He did not mind. He had not known those other fuzzy-cheeked lads long, but he had known Lara all her life. He still hoped against hope that he would know her again.
Later…Father Dunstan and Winston watched yet another BBC report on their friend's disappearance. The report made mention of the strange disaster that had stricken Cairo and the Giza Plateau, some odd storm or the other. The report also mentioned the deaths of scores of Egyptian citizens. The BBC was very thorough.
The little telly screen in the limousine then extolled the virtues of Lucozade. The Lucozade marketing folks had briefly considered renaming the drink "Larazade", but had discarded this idea, as it was felt it might not be hip to name a product after a corpse, no matter how illustrious. Bottom line, old boy, bottom line.
The pair got out of the limo, and was met at the door by another old friend of Lara's, Charles Kaine. Kaine spared a glance at the statue again. He thought he might know where it had come from, but he would not speak of that. Not tonight. Tonight they would remember their friend, different to each of them, but the same. Their bright, shining, much-loved friend. Tonight they would talk of Lara, and remember her as they had known her. This was her night. A bright actinic flash of lightning obliterated the darkness, and was as swiftly gone. Kaine had caught it, and it left an afterimage in his eyes. That was as good a metaphor as any, he thought.
***********************************************
Dr. Hawi Zhawass, Undersecretary of State for the Pyramids and the Giza Plateau, Egypt's greatest archaeologist and most urbanely witty raconteur after Omar Sharif, climbed out of the Army Hummer and looked with dismay at the operation spread out before him. Go for a week on a simple American lecture tour, and everything goes to hell in your absence. The only excavation teams here at Giza in 25 years that had not been under his direction, one way or another, were making a hash out of everything he had worked so hard to preserve. He understood he had to put up with it, but it still rankled harder than anything had for a long time. Von Croy Industries had very deep pockets and very deep influence with the government. From the factories that produced copies of RheinMetall's 120mm M1A2 Abrams Egyptian-made battle tank main gun, to the Nile Delta reclamation project, to certain highly secret biological research projects, VCI was inextricably linked to the Egyptian ruling class' vision of their country as once again the undisputed leader of the Arab world.
Nonetheless, what was happening here was a horrible setback to native Egyptian archaeology and the tourist revenues it generated. This was worse than anything since the massacre of 50 of Von Croy's countrymen by Gama al- Islamiya at Hatshepsut's funerary temple Del-el-Bahari over four years before. There would be much to do that should not have to be done. Zhawass resented the time lost. Most of all, he resented Von Croy's very presence and control here.
Dr. Zhawass mastered his rage and composed his classic features. There was Von Croy, white suit, white hat, white cane, pouring over a diagram, issuing orders to the diggers over the din of the dump truck's diesel engines. Zhawass walked forward to meet him.
****************************************************
Darkness. She wasn't dead, she didn't think. She was laying face down. She felt something sticky under her face, almost dry, cold. She tried to get up. She failed. The pain extinguished her consciousness again, but at least she knew, briefly, that she wasn't dead.
Again she was awake. This time she didn't try to move, not all at once. She opened an eye and tried to see any light in the darkness. This time, there was a faint green glow. It gradually became brighter, so that she could see vague forms around her. She was in a burial chamber, she could see the sarcophagus and a small stone shrine to her left, in the direction her face was pointing. Over to one side were a few small ushebti figures. The little wooden statues stood guard, soldier, handmaiden, cook, waiting to serve whoever dwelt in the sarcophagus in the afterlife. Their small glass eyes reflected the green light, but she could not see its source.
She felt numb, but remembered the pain. The numbness began to go away though. She knew her left arm was underneath her, bent forward at an impossible angle. She rolled over on her back, slowly. The pain did not cause her to black out, but she had never felt its like. She was lying in a pile of sand, with some rocks mixed in which she barely felt. She couldn't move the arm, it would not respond to her. She rose up on her right elbow, inspected the other arm. No bones broken through the skin, at any rate. She realized that she could only see out of one eye. She hoped it was still in there, just swollen shut.
Now the hard part. She would try to stand. She couldn't really feel her left leg below the knee. She looked at it in the green half-light and understood why. It too was bent crookedly at an impossible angle. Her right arm was tired. There would be no standing, not now. She lay back down on her back, and reached around to open her backpack. It took a few minutes, and it hurt something fierce, but she finally managed to extract the canteen from the pack. Took a while to unscrew the cap with one hand, but then she'd always been the dexterous one. The warm water tasted good. It was the best thing she had tasted in a long time, but she needed to save it. No telling if she could find more. She beat down the gnawing worm in her mind that told her to panic. There would be none of that, not for Lara Croft. Not her style at all. She did one more thing, and it hurt too. With a loud pop, she forced the left arm back into the ball socket of her shoulder. It still wouldn't work. As she lay back on the sand to think, the green glow became much brighter. Very much brighter. Soon all she saw was green, and her then thoughts, too, were consumed by green fire.
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Werner Von Croy was more than a little upset. Here at long last progress was being made, and now he had to stop and deal with the controlled but clearly irate little round man before him. The frustrating part was that he actually respected the state archaeologist deeply, and understood Zhawass's position. Ach. Such was life.
"Dr. Zhawass, rest assured that we will repair this damage caused by the dig even more thoroughly than the manner in which we caused it to be made. Do note that everything is being recorded and written down, and that there will actually be valuable new findings for your own team to pursue for many, many years as a result of this work. For example, hyper sound investigation techniques have long hinted at the existence of this series of tunnels under the pyramid complex, and now we are on the verge of providing positive proof of same. And as well you know, nothing will be carted away from here, no treasures of your past will join the head of Nephrititi in Berlin. If anything, the emergency has provided an opportunity for discovery that will never be again seen on the Giza Plateau."
Zhawass gestured in exasperation. "Herr Von Croy, this is all very well. You rationalize your destruction most convincingly, but we both know better. I understand your desire to recover the body of Ms. Croft, but do not pretend that she may yet be alive after two days in the bottom of the shaft. I am sorry she is dead; although I despised her methods and her use of violence in her, ahem, work. She was a most charmingly personable young lady, highly knowledgeable, and I sympathize with your loss. I also realize you are going to do what you are going to do here regardless of my remonstrations. My superiors have made this most clear to me. You are required, however, yes even you, Herr Von Croy, to have my personnel monitor and assist your activities here at all times. This is Dr. Al- Mahdri, one of my finest young assistants." A tall, strong yet mild looking man stepped forth from behind Zhawass. He actually was a very promising young archeaologist. Additionally, Al-Mahdri was also a Captain in the Egyptian Special Forces detail assigned the duty of countering foreign aid to Egypt's many indigenous terrorist groups. As such he could be expected to determine what Von Croy had been doing here in the first place, as well as ensuring no further catastrophic damage to the relics of the past occurred. Egypt's past was in large part her future. Zhawass had confidence in the young man's abilities, academic and martial. He'd saved his life twice. There were many who would see the relics of the pre- Islamic past destroyed, and Hawii Zhawass had the fatwa of more than one extreme sect on his head.
The young Egyptian and the old German made their polite and perfunctory greetings. Zhawass turned to Von Croy again. "Herr Von Croy, I will leave you now, and I really do hope you find that for which you seek. I was not present for the events that led us to this point, and I have read your deposition to my government.
I suspect you know much more than you have told. Be aware, Herr Von Croy, that as I scientist I always seek the logical explanation, the factual truth behind every mystery. Be also aware that as an Egyptian, I know that much more lies behind the façade of what science holds sacred. The stench of ancient evil is still lingering about you, though I sense you believe it to be gone. Dig as deeply as you think advisable, but do not dig too deep. You may not care for what you find."
"One last question for you, one I note was not addressed in your previous deposition. What of my French associate, Dr. Jean Yves Delacourt, head of the team excavating the ruins of Alexandria and the research director of the dives at Herakleion? He seems to have gone missing, and he was last seen with you. I would very much like to talk with him. There is some concern that the storm has damaged certain sites we had wished to investigate. Do you know where I might find him, Herr Von Croy?"
Von Croy shook his head. "Jean-Yves was, shall we say, an associate of brief acquaintance to me. He left my company shortly before I came here, too late to help Ms. Croft. I am sorry, I cannot help you, Dr. Zhawass. I thank you for your frank concern, and again I assure you that we shall set to right any damage done here. Auf Weidersehen, sir."
Zhawass left, and Von Croy turned back to his work. His new "aide" observed with interest. Von Croy felt the young man's gaze bore into a space between his shoulder blades. He shook off the feeling, and called for the chief of the diggers.
1.1.3 Chapter 3: Floating
1.2 Lara looked about her in utter amazement. She'd seen the Nile, seen the site of Thebes many, many times before. She'd never seen it like this. Across the river from her on the East Bank, the Temple of Karnak shined brilliant white in the midday sun. From here she could even see the brightly painted reliefs of the gods, the sun sparkling off the golden caps of the obelisks. The leonine figures in the Avenue of Sphinxes gleamed with the colorful fletching of their elaborate stone headdresses. On the Nile itself, little fishing boats and larger boats with both lateen sails and oared vessels with rectangular sails went about their business of fishing, commerce, and travel.
She looked down at herself, at the smooth, unbroken skin of her arms and legs. In place of her usual shorts, leotard, and boots ensemble, she wore the long dress of thin, finest Egyptian cotton common to women of high stature in the early 19th Dynasty. She was neither hungry nor thirsty nor tired, and nothing hurt.
She was standing in the garden of an estate, judging from its size and the workmanship of the stone walls that of a very important personage, if not an actual Pharaoh. Seated on the limestone rim of a pool of clear water was an Egyptian man in the traditional loincloth. His head was shaven clean including eyebrows, and he could have been anywhere from thirty to fifty years of age. The pattern on his elaborate neckpiece and the kohl around his eyes proclaimed him to be not of the royal, but rather the priestly class. His head was turned towards Karnak, looking where she had looked moments before. He then turned to her and spoke in perfect Oxford English: "An amazement, is it not? You have never seen it in its once-ago glory. My Lord Horus permits you now, Lara Croft, to behold that which you have only seen in dreams, as you have served him well in the struggle with his cousin, uncle, and brother, Set the Destroyer."
Lara was momentarily speechless. She looked into the man's dark eyes. She had seen these same dark, bottomless eyes staring forth from a mask of gold and obsidian. Semerkhet. High Priest of Horus, falcon headed sky god, son of Osiris and Isis, patron of the Pharaohs of this very Egypt.
"Am I dead, then, truly, priest?"
The man shook his head. "No. You are ka, your spirit, mind, the essence of what is really you, is here. Your shell in the world of your present remains living, but only you can determine for how long. Look."
The priest waved his hand, long-fingered and strong, over the surface of the pool. Lara could see an image of herself as she last remembered, lying on the ground of the pyramid's deep chamber. Lara didn't like the way she looked. She looked like a broken doll. There was much dried blood and many livid bruises on her body. The image vanished, and the water was clear again, sparkling in the day's light.
"I could only speak with you by bringing you here, to where my Lord Horus has made a place for me, his servant, and where he rewards you with a glimpse of what was. Soon you must go back to your shell. It is preserved for now, the green light you see protects it. Should it be within you, you may yet rise from that tomb and go forth again by day. It is not for me to say this, only you may determine your path."
Lara's brow furrowed. This must be delirium. "What do you mean, only I can determine whether I live or die? The matter would seem out of my control. And though I am very thankful for it, why does Horus reward me in any way? I freed Set from his sleep, and I was unable to prevent him from sending your god "back to the stars".
The man looked at her without pity or condescension, but addressed her in the tone of teacher to pupil: "Your ka will not be destroyed. You have won the game of senet, and your heart has weighed true on the scales of Truth. Your ka is not food for Ammit, Devourer of Souls. If you live, you live. If you die, you may stay here, or go wherever your people go. If oblivion is your choice, then you may cease to be, depending on what you yourself believe."
"As for myself, I served Horus well, better than any other in the time when the Gods walked and flew among us. He has given me this place and these people, who I talk with, laugh with, and live with, though in truth I am alone here in this teeming city of Thebes. I still see to his affairs, when needed. Before you, it was not needed for a long time." Semerkhet smiled a rueful but not unfriendly smile.
"You will examine your life and your purpose, Lara Croft. You must do this so that you may decide if truly you deserve life, or the death you have so often dealt out to others. It is not for me to say this. As for my Lord Horus, he knows that it was your thoughtlessness that freed Set into the world of your now. He also knows that you could have chosen to flee the consequences of your action, or that you could have chosen to serve and rule with Set in a world of the damned and dying. You chose to make right again what you had made wrong. He gives you then this opportunity for your own life. What you do with his gift is up to you."
Lara considered the man's words. This delirium was something different, if delirium it was. She really hadn't thought much about motivations and the like. A girl did what a girl had to do. It had seemed simple, before.
"Well, then, Semerkhet High Priest of Horus, I suppose I'd best get on with it. Send me back there and we'll see what we will see. Before you do, though, is it perhaps possible…"
Semerkhet smiled again and interrupted her. "Yes, Lara, it is indeed possible that you may see more of the world I knew in my life. In your mind I see a tale of your people's bards, we will use that as the vehicle of our trip." The priest stood up and walked over to her, and reached out with his deeply bronzed arm. "Take my hand, Lara, and let us see what there is to be seen". Lara reached out her own hand and took his.
They rose above the city of Thebes, and she felt the warm breeze in her face. Below, the people of the city went about their affairs, the oxcarts of grain trundled their way down the streets. Soldiers drilled in their fortress, bronze spear tips gleaming and dancing as they practiced their evolutions. Workers in the great fields of grain threshed and collected golden sheaves of wheat. The palace of Pharaoh bustled with activity. A golden chariot drove down the wide avenue to the center of the complex, pulled by six beautiful horses of purest white, their plumed maned heads borne proudly on arched necks. Lara could just see a man with the great headdress of Lower and Upper Egypt stride tall and confidently to meet it, servants and children strewing rose petals in his path.
Then the pair banked away to the Nile, towards Karnak. In the reeds on Nilus' lush and verdant banks, the sons of Sobek the Crocodile god slid from the banks and into the dark green waters. Further out near the middle of the river, a huge daughter of Hapi the Hippopotamus goddess breached the waters, her huge pink mouth with its white peg teeth gaping open for a breath of air after a long slow stroll on the bottom of the river.
Now they reached the great Temple of Karnak itself, vast and grand and brilliant white, flying down above the Avenue of Sphinxes, soaring up to just miss the tips of the great obelisks. Circling over the Sacred Lakes and the houses of the priests and servitors beyond, they came back over the Eighth and Ninth Pylons, and over the Great Hypostyle hall. They ducked underneath the columns and flew down the hall, now bright with color and alive with the chanting of the priests, rich with the smells of offerings of incense. They flew into the opening doors of the Temple of Amun, and watched the priests open the doors to the sacred shrine of their god. Then they flew out again, over the Temple of Mut Sky-goddess, and to the southwest towards Luxor. Shortly away from the Temples, they alit on a small hillock overlooking the Nile.
Lara looked at Semerkhet and smiled a great smile. It had been long since she had smiled this way, without the raised eyebrow of irony or the thin tight lips of defiance. Her smile was the smile of pure happiness, and she couldn't remember the last time she'd had one of those. Semerkhet smiled back at her, released her hand and stepped back.
"Thank you, Priest. Whatever comes, I have seen what I always wanted to and never thought I could. The cost, whatever it may finally be, is worth it. Time for me to go, now, I think."
"You are welcome, Lara Croft, impetuous daughter of Thoth. You have rendered myself and my Lord Horus great service, and we are pleased that you are pleased. It may be that we will not meet again. In the trials to come, Anubis Guardian of Tombs will keep the field of your trial safe. You will meet yourself, and you will decide. Go then, strong and brave one, and find what you will find. I hope that you find life."
Lara's vision faded, and then she was back in her broken body on the floor of the tomb.
1.2.1 Chapter 4: Debating
The green light wasn't as bright now, and she could see the colour difference in her visitor's clothing now. Harsh-faced Lara had pulled broken Lara up into a sitting position, roughly and with no regard for her wounds. Now harsh-faced Lara was sitting in front of her, crouched on her haunches, arms crossed beneath her chest. Dandy balancing act, that. Harsh-face looked with contempt and disgust at Broken.
"Well, you've really made a hash of it, haven't you? Never gave a damn for anything but your own little urges of the moment, your own lust for revenge, for possession of things you never made, for your own hide. Look where's it gotten you.
Gasping your last in yet another dark place free of any human joy or sorrow for millennia. Now very well, I'm to ask you a few questions, you're to answer, and then I can go back to my nothingness and you can go on to yours. Let's begin, shall we?"
Harsh-face stood up and began to pace the chamber floor. "What gave you the right, what infinitely wise power invested you with life and death authority over your fellow humans? I don't mean all the folks who've come gunning for you for whatever reason; every creature on this ball of rock is programmed for self-preservation. Who made you the executioner of the rest of them? The guards doing their jobs in the places where unbidden you came to take what they were charged to protect? Why did those objects, scions, daggers, artifacts, have the ability to make human life meaningless to you? Or is human life just meaningless to you anyway? Are you the only "real" person in the world, hmmm? Is that it? Is everyone else just a meat puppet, there to help or to hinder, an obstacle to be leaped with a pair of 9mm slugs?" Harsh-face walked over to Broken and put her face inches away from hers. "Answer me, Lara. Why are you like this? Give me one good, justifiable reason that you are above everyone else, top of the food-chain."
Broken Lara looked up in the other's flashing brown eyes. She felt sweat rolling down her face, down her neck. It was much too hot in here, much hotter than a place so far underground should be.
"I did what I had to do. If I didn't kill those people, I would not have gotten what they were guarding. If I didn't get those things, they would have been used to kill far more people, in most cases. Those people knew what they were doing when they got those jobs. They expected to kill or be killed if their jobs needed doing. I was just better at than they were."
Harsh-face stepped back and looked down. "That's rationalization, you know. In fact, that's a load of tripe. You haven't answered my question. You have one last chance to do it now: What makes you better than the ones you kill?"
Lara thought. She hadn't thought about things like this a great deal. She always simply did what needed doing at any given time, in any given situation. She looked up at herself, at her interrogator. "Nothing. Nothing makes me better than them. Some were probably much better people than I. Some weren't. I did what I did, and I ended their choices for them. I can still make my own. I had no right to do it, but being sorry for it now won't change a thing. That's all the answer I have for you. Now get on with the rest of it or let me die."
Harsh-face looked back down at her. "So you don't know why you did the things you've done, other than it was expedient. No delusions of goddess- hood, then. Well, that's a start, a damn poor one, but a start nonetheless. Next question: There are people, oddly enough, who care a great deal for you, over and above the desire to get into your unmentionables. Why do you suppose that is? Now, it doesn't matter if you deserve their loyalty and friendship or not, for they choose to give it. That is their decision, not yours. Neither of us have ever been ones for false modesty, what is it about you that inspires this, other than a pretty face, a sharp wit, and a sweetly voiced turn of phrase?"
Broken Lara thought about that one, too. She really didn't want to. Always troubled her, somehow, that other folks should care about her. Even the old friends like Dunstan and Winston, who'd known her as a young girl and would be expected to. Even Charles Kaine, and probably Jean-Yves, who almost certainly loved her in the way men love women. These things she could understand. She could understand the admiration of her mind, her talents, too. True, she didn't really deserve this other sort of friendship some few had for her. She'd saved their lives at the risk of her own a few times, but that was just the way she was. They'd done the same for her. Just something friends did. She appreciated and cherished her few friends, but resented the fact that she felt that way, sometimes. Just didn't seem right, somehow.
Harsh waited a moment longer and then spoke: "Well, cat's got your tongue, has it? I'm going to have to answer for you, thrust it right in your face so you won't miss it, and see if you can deal with it: They love you in spite of yourself. They ask for nothing from you, expect nothing of you. You don't feel that's wrong or odd, but it does make you very uncomfortable. Not due to any low opinion of yourself, obviously. So why, then, great loner though you are and your friends accept you to be, why feel the revulsion at what you know you enjoy and value?"
Lara didn't really know what the other was talking about. What was that supposed to mean? It was true, though. She knew it. How it could be relevant to whether she lived or died she did not understand. "I am what I do. I didn't ask for any of them, but I can't do without the few friends I have. I suppose I use them. They know I'm using them, and knowing they don't mind. I don't understand why. I would do anything for them if it were the right thing to do. But I cannot understand why they do it for me…"
She was angry, now. She didn't want to talk about these things. All it did was show she didn't have complete understanding and control over everything in her life, and proved nothing else. Why bother with it? "Lara. Me. Whatever you are. Just go to hell. Just bugger off and go to hell. I'm going to try to drag myself out of here one way or another, and if I don't make it, fine. If I do, fine. The only thing we have established is that I don't know everything there is to know about the world, or myself, and I already knew that. The purpose of this useless psychobabble eludes me, and I'm done with it."
Harsh-faced Lara looked down at her. The face was not harsh, now, and displayed a slightly wistful, knowing expression. "That's what you needed to understand, Lara. You'll find it useful, later, if you live. There are things you will never know, understand, or need to forgive about yourself and what you do. And there's nothing you can do about it. Nonetheless, you still have to try to understand these things. And that's it. No great revelation. Goodbye. You'll be out of this place shortly." The other Lara faded away and was gone.
She felt the heat. The green light again grew stronger, and she could feel nothing but its fire. Then it was gone. Tired still, but no longer broken. Bruised, but not crippled. She got up. She stretched out her arms, her legs, and loosened up. There was a doorway ahead she had not seen before, crumbling mud bricks partially blocking it. This was the way out. Wouldn't take long.
She took a few light sticks from her pack and slung the canteen over her shoulder, still had a few sips of water in it, although she wasn't thirsty right now. She took out the map inside the pack, and wrote on it with her grease pencil, and placed both items back inside. She threw aside the mud bricks, popped the light stick, and carefully laid her backpack at the entrance to the tunnel. She looked at for a moment, and started out on her way.
Behind her, in the corner of the room, the little ushebti figure's eyes no longer glowed green.
Chapter 4: Flight
Von Croy was going over the diagrams of the Great Pyramid's galleries and the new additions they had found when the digger ran up to him and told him they'd found something, something important. He rushed forward and followed the man to the new shaft entrance. The wheezing old diesel controlling the makeshift elevator coughed under the strain of the two men, but held. Dr. Al-Mahdri rushed over to the pit, too late to spy on him. Von Croy looked up at the man's chagrined face and doffed his hat in mock salute.
Von Croy entered the tomb chamber. A small one, but so far beneath the resting place of Khufu the owner would have been an important person. Time to find out about that mystery later. The digger handed him Lara's backpack. Von Croy remembered it well, remembered exactly when and where Lara had found it. He opened it. Inside, on top of the ammunition, medkits, and many small articles Lara always stuffed inside this her lucky talisman, was a note. Written in the unmistakable handwriting of his one- time apprentice and adversary, it said simply, "Werner". Von Croy raised his head up in triumph. She had left this here for him. She was still alive, and could not have gone very far. "Ve've found her!"
The digger thrust his torch into the passageway where the mud bricks lay in disorderly heaps all about. Von Croy went over and looked inside. He saw boot prints in the dust. He would follow her tracks, the passageway went up at a fairly steep angle and it would not be very far to go to the surface. He could make it that far. He had made it this far, nein?
Captain Dr. Al-Mahdri heard Von Croy's echoed exclamation of triumph from the top of the shaft. He pulled out his cell phone and made a brief call, then slipped away unnoticed to the road leading into the dig site.
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Lara pushed the manhole cover aside, barely, and peered up carefully from the sewer. The tunnel under the pyramid debouched into the network of sewers underneath the new tourist hotels outside the Pyramid complex. Someone had clearly known of the tomb chamber's existence and had gone to much effort to build the well-camouflaged gimbel-mounted door that led to the sewers. Dusk was falling over the modern scene before her, no pedestrians or vehicles were anywhere in sight.
A cold metal object pressed against the back of her neck and she heard the unmistakable click of an automatic pistol safety disengaged. "Please do not make any sudden movements, Ms. Croft. I do not intend to harm you, but your reputation is one of the shooting first and asking of questions at a later time. Climb out of the hole, and place your hands upon the top of your head, fingers interlocked, please."
She did as the voice advised, and did not move. The street was empty. She felt the brace of pistols removed from her holsters. The voice spoke again. "Please turn around, Ms. Croft." She turned and saw a man she recognized from a lecture series at Oxford by Dr. Hawii Zhawass, head of the Egyptian government agency in charge of the Giza sites. "You're….Dr. Hakim Al-Mahdri, Dr. Zhawass's research assistant! I remember your presentation on the Tombs of the Aphis Bulls at Oxford. It would appear you are bit more than you seemed, although the presentation wasn't very bad, actually."
Al-Mahdri smiled and said; "So very kind of you to remember, Ms. Croft. Time is limited. Dr. Zhawass has some questions, and perhaps some answers, for you. Come, let us go." Out of the side street came a white Toyota Range Runner, the most common sort of vehicle outside the cities of the Arab world. Once inside, Lara saw the driver was wearing the same black uniform as Sgt Aziz, the wounded man who had sacrificed himself to destroy the monstrous reptilian sending of Set in the City of the Dead.
"Your team put up a good effort against the creatures of Set…how many nights ago, now? The one man, Sgt. Aziz, was very brave. He could have escaped, but died in the performance of his duty."
Al-Mahdri looked at her and handed her pistols back, but kept the magazines. "That was two nights ago. Yes, Aziz was a good man, the best. I thank you for assisting him. Neither Dr. Hawass nor I fully understand what happened, but we know you and Von Croy to have been catalysts for the events then. Soon we will be at Alexandria. Until then, you may wish to try and get some sleep."
Lara settled back and looked out at the barren countryside. The moon was coming up. She closed her eyes. If they wanted to kill her for some reason they would have already done so. Might as well get a bit of shut- eye, then. Soon the gentle hum of the Range Rover's tires lulled her to sleep. She did not dream.
She awoke to the acrid smell of cigarette smoke. Al-Mahdri closed his Zippo lighter with the flick of a practiced wrist and put it in his shirt pocket. "We are here." The pair got out of the vehicle and walked up the steps of the Museum of Alexandrian History, headquarters of the Egyptian state Antiquities bureau in the area. Looking out to the sea, she saw the site of many events of the days past. The fresh salt air smelled very refreshing after the smoke of the soldier-scholar's French cigarette.
Dr. Zhawass was waiting in the museum's offices overlooking the harbor. With him were several more black uniformed Special Forces commandoes. Al- Mahdri began to look more comfortable in their presence, indicating that he might have been expecting trouble. Zhawass arose from the ancient cracked- leather chair in greeting. "Ms. Croft, hello. I remember you of course from my lectures at Oxford. I am glad to see you have escaped the death I certainly expected to claim you when I became aware of Herr Von Croy's efforts to find you at the bottom of the pit in the pyramid. I am not only glad, but very much surprised, as well. To what do you attribute your miraculous escape?"
Lara considered a moment and said; "I attribute my escape from death to an odd green light that restored me to health when I should by all rights be dead. Dr. Zhawass, let's not fence about here. I came here and broke your laws rooting about for a trinket I wanted, the Amulet of Horus. I released the ancient "god" Set, or whatever he really is, into the world. I put him back in a place I hope he will never escape from again. After that, I nearly died, didn't, and really don't know what is going on beyond that. I would very much like to go home now, because I don't think I'm going to go looking for anymore adventures for quite a long time, if ever.
You provide me passage outside of Egypt, agree not to press charges, and I'll answer your questions the best I can. That's all I have to offer."
Zhawass sat back down and motioned her to a seat. "Very well, then, we shall, as my American colleagues say, cut to the chase. I have long known that the mythology of my forbears was more than superstition and legend, I have felt myself echoes of things that should not be, in the ruins and tombs to which I have devoted my life. I did not believe that these things could impact the present to any great extent. My government has put me in charge of determining how to best prevent these things from harming our country in the future. As I am not particularly well qualified to perform this job outside of an attempt to research and understand the threat from our past, Dr. Al-Mahdri and his men provide the defense against the humans who would use these supernatural phenomena for their own purposes. Herr Von Croy was one such, and from what I can gather his disbelief led him to be temporarily controlled by the force you have laid to rest. He is no longer considered a threat, for now."
"Although there are many unresolved issues, only one thing seriously troubles me at this time, the whereabouts of Dr. Jean-Yves Delacourt. He cannot be found, and his flat here in Alexandria appears to have been ransacked. Despite our differing areas of concentration, he and I frequently commiserated together and he spoke of you often and fondly. Herr Von Croy disavows any knowledge of his whereabouts, but admits to have seen him during the late excitement. Do you know what has become of him, Ms. Croft?"
Lara shook her head sadly. "No, I'm afraid I don't. Von Croy, when possessed by Set, kidnapped Jean-Yves to lure me into a trap. I freed him and escaped. I don't know what happened to him after that, but like you I would very much like to know. He and I are…close. He is one of my very best friends, he taught me much of what I know about Egypt. I want to find him, too." She was afraid for Jean-Yves.
Certainly no fighter or adventurer, he would surely have tried to find her himself no matter the cost, there at the bottom of the pyramid where she'd thought she'd die. He never came. He must be in great trouble, if not dead. She didn't want him to be dead, not after all this, after all they'd gone through together.
Zhawass reached into the pocket of his somewhat incongruous-looking safari vest and pulled out a yellow envelope. "There is one interesting thing our men found in Dr. Delacourt's apartment. It is a receipt of some kind delivered two days ago, a receipt-----"
A loud explosion and the sound of automatic weapons fire from downstairs interrupted his words. The Egyptian commandos rushed out of the room, unshouldering their MP-5 submachine guns on the run. Lara yelled to Al- Mahdri; "My pistol clips!" He drew them forth from his pocket, met her half way across the floor, and pressed them into her hands. "Stay here. Protect the doctor." He spun about and ran out the door after his men.
Lara seated the rounds in the clips by rapping them sharply against the heel of her boot, slapped them home in the magazine wells, and charged the slides in succession. This took her less than 5 seconds. "Get away from the window!" she yelled to Zhawass. The older plump little man scurried away to the corner of the room opposite the outer wall with surprising nimbleness. Lara crouched and rolled over underneath the window and cautiously poked her head up to look outward and down to the street below. No surprises there, unfortunately. A figure on the street below, wearing the same black robes and head coverings as Von Croy's former minions, leveled a RPG 7 grenade launcher, favorite of terrorists from Bonn to Bangkok for over two generations. Lara stood straight up and fired both her pistols down at the man. The heavy .45 slugs sprayed glass down on the street in brilliant coruscating confetti, but through this she watched the rounds find their mark.
At moments of extreme conflict and struggle the human mind does one of two things. For the inexperienced, blind panic and paralysis of the senses is sometimes but not always the result. For people like Lara Croft, time perceptions dilate and everything becomes very clear. There is no slow motion movie playing in the brain, everything is just plainly visible where an outside observer would see a confusing blur of events. Lara saw the rounds catch the man in the throat and chest, saw his body begin to fall backwards to ground, and saw the rocket grenade leave its launcher and climb towards her. She released the tension in her knees, dropped in a crouch to the floor, pistoned her strong legs upward and executed a perfect backwards leap. Zhawass watched in awe. He'd never seen anything quite like that before. Lara hit the ground and continued her backwards somersault as the grenade caught the eave of the roof above the window and exploded. The flash of light and thunderclap explosion blew chunks of plaster and dust into the room.
Close one, she thought. Lara grabbed Zhawass's shirt by the back of the collar and shouted into his ear. "Come on! There may be others, we'll take our chances elsewhere! Follow me and keep low!"
She ran out of the room, body bent over, staying to the wall behind the banister overlooking the central display room below. The fighting was moving inside, and she could see the black uniformed men firing from the cover of the larger stone exhibits at the black robed men doing the same other side of the large room. One of the Egyptian commandos lay awkwardly splayed out near the bottom of the steps. She grabbed the stubby little black MP-5 submachine pistol from the dead hand of its former owner, checked the magazine, and stuffed another clip from the corpse's ammo pouch into the cargo pocket of her shorts.
Lara saw Al-Mahdri changing magazines and yelling into a cell phone wedged between his cheek and shoulder, from behind the headless trunk of a sizable statue of Cleopatra as the goddess Isis (she'd always been a bit skeptical of that particular identification of the piece). Darting out towards him, firing on the run, she saw more of the black robed figures enter the room, one crumpling in a hail of bullets before he could clear the doorway. As she crouched next to Al-Mahdri, he yelled in her ear; "We need to hold out for just a few more minutes. This is going to be over very soon!"
She looked backwards to see what had become of Dr. Zhawass. The little archeaologist crouched behind a stone block, holding a folding stock AK-47 over the top; firing short blind bursts towards the enemy. Pretty fair form, too.
Suddenly the black robed figures began to fall back in pairs, firing as they went, out the large doorway to the street. A rapid rhythmic thumping and the clatter of tracks on cobblestones rose above the fading din of gunfire. The commandos, sensing victory, came out from behind cover and poured fire into the backs of their fleeing foes, dropping several more.
"Come on, Ms. Croft, but carefully." Switching to Arabic, Al-Mahdri yelled to Dr. Zhawass to stop firing. The trio cautiously made their way to the front door. About five surviving commandos in black were effusively greeting nearly twenty soldiers dressed in khaki fatigues, helmets, and holding assault rifles. One was firing over his head into the air and chanting with delight. Lara looked down one end of the street and saw the bodies of many black robed figures in various stages of completeness. Yes, the streets ran red with the blood of the unbelievers this day, at least from the standard Islamic point of view. Lara wondered how many of these dead were worshippers of Set, and how many simply worshippers of money and violence. They worshipped nothing now.
At the other end of the street an American designed armored personnel carrier sat, engine idling. The 20mm rapid-fire cannon in its squat turret had shown the black robes the errors of their ways. "Built under license in this very Egypt, Ms. Croft, and your taxi to the airport as well". Zhawass looked comically cocky, holding the AK-47 with the barrel over his shoulder. "What? You look surprised. This old man has been a soldier before. Thirty-two years ago, to be sure, and most of that time in an Israeli prisoner of war camp, but I do know what to do with one of these things."
Lara almost chuckled. "I've seen that you do indeed, Doctor. These were Von Croy's men, but he has given up his fight for Set. Who were they working for, and why did they want us, want me, dead?"
Al-Mahdri walked over to one of the black robed bodies and unwound the headgear from its face. A blonde Caucasian face rolled upwards, dead blue eyes staring sightlessly at the sky. "We know they are no longer in the employ of Herr Von Croy. As to whose employ they were in, we shall find out in due time. And now, Ms. Croft, it is time for you to leave Egypt." Lara joined the pair and walked to the rear of the armored vehicle. Aside from the sound of soldiers talking, nothing could be heard in the street but the whine of the servomotor lowering the vehicle's passenger compartment ramp.
****************************************************
Werner Von Croy looked out the window of his private jet as it began to taxi off the runway. He'd never found Lara, the Egyptians had done that, he supposed. He knew she'd made her way to the surface, because he'd tracked her all the way from the bottom of the Great Pyramid to the open manhole cover on the street of New Giza. She'd be able to take care of herself. She always had been.
He didn't blame himself for the destruction he/Set had wrought, but he might have if she had died. That, at least, was some comfort. More comforting was the freedom he felt from hate of her, after all these years. She was only a girl then, after all, and despite the years and her undoubted precocious intellect, he rather thought she would always be a girl in some ways.
He pulled out the paper with his name written on it, in her strong but irregular hand, and read it again:
Werner-
Glad you're yourself again, no more Set. Glad you're yourself before Cambodia again, too, and wiser than you were then. I saw it your eyes. I'm sorry for the pain of all these years, but you being you and me being me it could never have been any different.
I'm afraid I'm not much wiser myself now, but it's time for me to try to become so. I'm going home if I can, for a time, and sort some things out. I won't have the Iris for much longer, or the scion, or the dagger of Xian, or the rest of them. They're going to a place where the likes of you and me and nobody, including James Ballard who has found so many deep things, will ever be able to find them again. It's for the best, I think.
Perhaps we'll meet again someday, Werner. Take care.
Lara
Perhaps so, Lara, perhaps so, he thought. He lay the letter down and picked up the international edition of the Times. The so-called "tech stocks" were rising rapidly in the American NASDAQ and on the DAX again. Imbeciles. What did they know about "high technology"? Werner laid that paper down, too, and closed his eyes.
Epilogue: End of the Beginning
Home. Croft Manor. Lara glanced up at the huge statue of herself and smiled. Not a bad likeness, if a tad melodramatic in pose. She hadn't told anyone she was coming. Scarf and drab dress purchased in the duty- free shops of the Cairo Airport concealed her identity from a press that had almost forgotten about her in the three days of her "death" anyway. A bit of a relief, that. There was a car in the circular driveway, however, a Fiat of the sort one rented from Heathrow airport' many rental agencies.
She pressed the brick in the proper way to allow her entry if she ever lost her keys. She opened the door and stepped inside. "Winston?" No answer. She flicked on the lights. She went over to the portrait of Hugh, first Lord Croft, elevated to the peerage for his inestimable service to the Empire in the realms of wool and cotton production and distribution. Reaching under the frame, she clicked a button and the portrait swung forward, revealing a small safe. She opened it, 02 right, 14 left, 68 right, and back to zero. Probably should change that one day, if she stuck around here much.
She reached inside and drew out one of the two Browning H-35 9mm automatic pistols there. Father's pistols. She'd hated to leave the .45s behind in Egypt, but these would do, and she had more history with them anyway. She drew back the slide and rode it forward, so that it made little sound when the round was chambered.
She walked over to the secret study, the room where she kept her dragon's hoard. This room, where she had silently gloated over her prizes, each and every deadly little bauble, each dread talisman of power. The lighting fixture door release was already thrown, so she quietly pushed the door open and walked inside.
There was a fire cheerfully burning in the fireplace. A somewhat portly man sat in the big overstuffed leather chair of her grandfather. "Hello, Jean-Yves" she said.
Jean-Yves Delacourt arose with a look of disbelief and joy on his pudgy Gallic face. He seemed to expand, his eyes lost glistened brightly as happiness replaced gloom on his countenance. "Lara! You ARE alive! Oh, I am so very very glad to see you, we had feared you lost forever!" He began to walk towards her as he spoke. "The rest have left, your noble servant Winston is back in Ireland, they will all be so happy to know you are well! I---" He stopped as he saw the pistol in Lara's hand, pointed at him.
"Not another step closer, Jean-Yves, old friend."
"But…Lara, why the pistol, I am your friend, you know that!" His look of joy was replaced by one of confusion and hurt. Very good, Lara thought. He'd always been very good, and she'd never known it.
Lara removed a yellow envelope from a pocket of the dowdy dress. "Go have a seat, Jean-Yves." He did as she directed. "The Egyptians found this in your apartment. Western Union delivered receipt. A receipt from a Birmingham firm specializing in the casting of monumental bronzes, primarily for American war memorials. A receipt for shipment of one such statue to this very address, on an order placed six months ago. Why, Jean? Why the betrayal? Why the planning? I can understand the statue, that would be a gesture you'd make, if you could afford such a thing, which I didn't think you could. Why these things, and for who? I know you're not working for Von Croy." Lara's voice was calm and hard, just like Lara herself had always striven to be. She felt the tear running down her cheek but ignored it. Her vision was clear.
Jean-Yves seemed shrunken now, diminished. " I am very glad to see you alive, you know, my dear friend. I did not want to have a part of this, but I had no choice. You may kill me if you wish, but I cannot tell you everything. As you know, I am not a brave man. The fate that awaits if I tell you would be far worse, quite literally, than mere death." He looked up into Lara's eyes; his own filled with pain and self-loathing.
"Von Croy and Set are not part of the things that seek your life, and more than your life, Lara. They were known by…. those I am associated with, and the actions that happened in Egypt were known to them. Everything worked out as planned. Set came into the world, Horus came and was prevented from staying, and you locked Set away where he can never again return. The only part of the plan that did not work, of course, is that you did not die. I have been tortured every day that we have known each other for some time, now, my dear Lara. I am truly glad that you are indeed alive, and if I pray for anything now, I pray I unwittingly helped you live instead of kept you from living. I cannot tell you anything else. Please kill me now, Lara, for I have always loved you and I do not wish to remain alive."
Lara looked down at Jean-Yves, and pointed the pistol between his eyes. Clicked off the safety. Placed her practiced finger on the trigger.
She lowered the gun.
"Get out, Jean-Yves. Get out now and go."
He rose unsteadily and sighed. "I am sorry Lara. I truly am. Goodbye, my dearest friend." He walked out. She heard the car door open, the engine start, and listened until the sound of the engine faded away.
Lara put the pistol down, sat in the chair still warmed by its last occupant, and placed her head in her hands. She cried for a long time.
The End