Rebuilt Anew 1.2

By Asynca

It was uncomfortably stuffy in my room when I managed to finally wake up, and by the ambient warmth I was able to guess that I'd missed morning completely.

As I turned over my foot brushed something solid, and I remembered rather abruptly that I wasn't alone in my bed. I opened my eyes slightly and watched her chest rise and fall, realising with some surprise that she was actually asleep. It hadn't occurred to me at all that she would need to sleep; I needed to stop thinking of her as some sort of bionic human and recognise that despite her astonishing athleticism, she was just flesh and blood.

She stirred while I was watching her. I wondered if she were dreaming, and, if so, what someone like her would dream about. Although I suppose it hardly mattered what she dreamt about, unless she was dreaming about throttling me and happened to be a sleepwalker.

I accidentally woke her up when I turned onto my back. Her eyes snapped wide open, and she stared vacantly at me for a moment. I inhaled sharply, half expecting her to lash out at me.

She didn't. "I didn't mean to startle you," she murmured, her breath tickling my cheek. It felt disconcertingly intimate, at least until she told me bluntly, "I've discovered why you sleep alone."

I raised an eyebrow her.

"Nightmares. We're about to discover if I bruise easily or not."

Well, that was certainly a surprise: I didn't remember anything I'd dreamt at all. "I've half a dozen guest rooms if you do."

She shrugged lightly. "Safer, perhaps, but far less interesting than watching you fret like an infant." There was that twinkle again.

I contemplated kicking her out as a matter of principle, but I wasn't too happy with the idea of her wandering my house in the middle of the night. At least with her in my room I knew where she was, even if I wasn't fast enough or strong enough to stop her if she decided that the key to her inner peace was to kill me.

Additionally, there was the point she had raised last night. "Why would you volunteer to be my guard dog, anyway? Is it some sort of genie complex? I've freed you and this is how you intend to repay me?"

She smiled faintly. "No." Since she seemed content to leave the conversation there, I gestured at her to encourage her to elaborate. "I've spent my life so far as a slave. Now I find myself free, I feel useless." She looked toward me. "I'm not a whole person with a family, a history and a culture. I own nothing, am I nobody. I'm just a modified copy of you, and even you view me as some sort of monster. "

"Gosh," I exhaled at length, considering the weight of what she'd said. "That sounds depressing."

She didn't look particularly depressed, however. "So I might as well be useful while I figure out what is to become of me."

I looked back at the canopy of my bed. "Then it would be rather cruel of me to refuse to let you, wouldn't it?"

When I looked back at her, she was smiling at me. "What would you have me do?"

I looked over toward the window.

***

Just standing in front of the charred rubble made me feel exhausted. The explosion had sent debris for literally acres, and I was second-guessing my bright idea of picking through it myself before we brought in the land moving machinery.

Beside me, the other Lara had been surveying the landscape. "I'll get the larger pieces of stone and put them out the front of the property for the trucks."

I turned to her. "We're only supposed to be combing the debris, not clearing the yard."

She looked impassive. "So you comb, and I'll clear."

Whatever made her feel useful, I supposed, so I nodded at her. She shot off towards the perimeter of the yard in a dead sprint. I watched her disappear behind what was left of the hedges, and then turned my attention to my own task.

There was just so much rubbish. Most of it was completely unrecognisable; I wasn't even able to discern if pieces of marble and wood were fixture or furniture. Smaller items like silver cutlery and burnt artwork weren't worth salvaging. I'd hoped I'd find Father's telescope set, or really anything from his new study, but I didn't.

It wasn't until I'd moved much further away from the house that I found anything important at all. I almost stepped over it thinking it was just another cracked slab of foundation, then I noticed the engraving and stopped in my tracks.

My dearest Amelia, it read, rest in peace, wherever you are. –Richard.

It was the gravestone Father had commissioned when he'd finally come to terms with the idea that Mother was dead. I remembered the day with painful clarity.

I crouched in front of the stone, tracing the chiselled words with my fingertips. A sudden, incredibly unwelcome memory of my mother, face half-rotten, consumed me. My breath caught in my throat. I shot her, I thought, I shot her, and I didn't even try to save her. I wondered if I'd just waited, if I'd somehow found the thrall stone and said those words to her... I wondered if like my Doppelgänger she could have been a sentient, rational being again. Even if she could have been, would she have still been my mother? I felt ill, and seconds from tears.

"I can put that one inside, if you wish."

I inhaled sharply in surprise, wrenching my hand away from the stone. I wanted to yell at her to leave me alone, but managed to smother that urge. It wasn't her fault she'd seen me find the stone, or seen my reaction to it.

I stood, turning to her. "No, I think it's best that..." The words died on my lips as I saw over her shoulder.

The whole yard was completely clean of any sort of wreckage; all that remained was ash stained gravel and uneven ground. My jaw must have fallen open.

"I ran out of big stones," she offered by way of explanation.