At An Undisclosed Location
Two Trinity soldiers are setting up base, loading up the ammo crates and booting up the computers. They've received word that more men will be there shortly, and a couple moments later, they decide to take it easy for a little bit as they wait for more supplies. One of them sits on an ammo crate, and anther sits in a chair. As they listen to the faint howl of the cold wind outside the cabin, the soldiers start drinking some hot cocoa. "Gettin' pretty cold here." One of them complains.
"Not too bad right now. It's going to be a lot worse pretty soon though."
Trent sips more of the cocoa, almost shuddering. "Yeah."
A moment of silence ensues, and then the other soldier, William, comes back in with a lantern, placing it on a table in front of them. "We've lost a lot of men." Will comments.
Trent sighs. "Yeah. Croft, right?"
"You bet. You seen her in action?"
"Not really. But I hear a lot of people are pissed."
"You don't know the half of it." Will remarks as he sips his cocoa.
He looks at the lantern and stares at the flame burning inside. Then at Trent. "She's taken out seven gunmen by herself and blew up a tank we were building."
"Shit, man." Trent answers back, taken aback.
"Yeah." Will remarks as he sips more of his cocoa. "I was supposed to be in charge of the site there. I watched all this happen and I evacuated the premises. It was fucking crazy."
"Did control get onto you for that?"
"Yeah. They said one more screw up and they're leaving me for Croft."
"That was your first mishap, wasn't it?" Trent asks.
Will sips more of his cocoa and answers back. "Yep. Control is really damn strict."
They sit there for a while longer in the quiet as Trent finally says something "This makes me remember a cleanup op I did recently."
"What about it?" Will asks.
"Yamatai." Trent answers in a hushed voice.
Will leans in closer to Trent, checking if he heard him correctly. "Holy shit. Are you serious?"
It's almost as if everything is instantly silenced at the mention of Yamatai. "What happened?"
Trent looks around to see if anyone heard him, but he's in a cabin with only one other person. "Well, I was the only one that made it back."
A chill seeps into the room and they both feel it. "Jesus.." Will comments, shocked.
"Four of us went on the mission. There were still people at this island. Probably didn't know they could leave. I shouldn't call them people. They were monsters."
Will is frightened, but he doesn't stop Trent. "They were eating each other. Ripping off bits of their flesh. Some of them gnawing on bones. There was blood everywhere. Some of them behind some sort of bars. And those voices… God, those voices."
"Holy fuck…" Will comments. Terrified.
Trent takes a moment before he continues. "And the smell was fucking awful. But what else I found at this hellhole was evidence of people worshipping a goddess of some sort. People saying goodbye to the lives they used to live. To the people they used to know. People going crazy. And sometimes I saw their bodies nearby with a gun in their hand."
Will sighs heavily, taking it all in and finally blurts out. "Okay. Just stop for a moment."
Will roughly rubs his face, setting the hot cocoa on a table. Not having the drive to drink any more of it for a while. Trent still holds his cup in his hands, not drinking any of it either. "What's this have to do about Lara, though?" Will asks.
Trent takes a sip of his cocoa and continues. "You heard how she came back a couple months ago, right?"
"Yeah." Will replies.
"Well, she left a journal at Yamatai detailing her experience there. One of our men found it at the shore, and it was like a warning to leave this island. She explained how everything was her fault. Getting almost all her crew killed. Going through Hell. And you could see it in her journal. Her mind was all over the place. She was a wreck. And then there'd be long stretches of time where she didn't write anything. Either she forgot, or she was going so crazy she couldn't write down her thoughts."
Will interrupts him. "Okay I think that's enough right now."
"Yeah." Trent adds. "I don't wanna talk about it anymore right now either."
Then, all of a sudden, an arrow comes whizzing through the window and knocks down the lantern as fire spreads out. The two start shouting and walk outside to see a woman perched on a rooftop, looking over them. Obscured in shadow. Her hair flowing in the wind. Her bow pointed at one of their heads. The men are about to call it in, but the next thing they know, they have an arrow in each of their heads. She puts her quiver on her back, leaping down and heading to the computers they had set up earlier, looking at the information inside. She takes a picture of it, and then she blasts it with her gun. Finally, she leaves to attend to other matters, and kill any Trinity soldiers she comes across.