(One day, Lara up and disappears, and Sam can't find her. No one listens. It's like she never existed. Until the day Lara came back, and made Sam an offer.)
Lara's gone one day. I wake up and roll over, and the other side of the bed is cold. She's gone for a day, and then two. No one knows where. I call up Roth and then I call the police but I get the runaround from them. It's like she's gone missing and no one cares but me. They say she's probably gone off on an adventure, and they don't understand. She would have told me. We would have argued, she would have convinced me to stay behind, I would have talked her into coming with me.
Or she would have at least left a fucking note. But there's nothing, just an empty space in bed and this gnawing fear in my gut that something has gone horribly wrong. Days and weeks and months and I'd say she'd only existed in my mind if it wasn't for the undeniable presence she'd left behind. Her journals and her papers, even her pendant are still here.
I start to see things. Like I see her out of the corner of my eye one day. But when I look she isn't there. I think I'm losing my mind. I feel like I'm being watched and Lara isn't here to protect me. But she's out there, she has to be. I research. I look for any mention of her on the internet, or in news articles. Sometimes, I find something suspicious, but then it's gone. It gets purged. Alex says he's never seen anything like it. And then one day I get a phone call.
Alex is dead. He hung himself. That's bullshit. Suddenly it feels like I'm next.
I have this dream like I'm drowning. Something is pulling me under water, and something slimey is trying to crawl it's way down my throat. I claw for the surface, I can't even scream and I'm panicking and crying and then a hand grasps mine and pulls me out.
We're moving. I'm in a car and as I blink the sleep out of my eyes I see Lara's concerned eyes, staring at me. I hit her, it's kind of weaksauce, but she'd left me! "Lara! Where the hell have you been?"
"I'll explain later." She brandishes a knife. "But you're in extreme danger and it's all my fault."
"Lara, what are you-OW!" She fucking stabs me in the arm, but before I can yell at her she's holding up some kind of squiggly...thing. Like a bug. It's the most disgusting thing I've ever seen. "What the fuck what the fuck Lara what the fuck what the fuck what the actual fuck?!"
She throws it out the window and then wraps my arm in a bandage. "It's a tracker. They implanted it in you while you were sleeping. They knew you're important to me so they've just been waiting for me to come to you, and I got sloppy."
"Who is they?"
"We don't have much time. They've already killed Alex." Lara's voice wobbles. "And Roth."
"I knew it! I knew Alex didn't hang himself! Lara tell me what's going on!" I grab her by the hair and yank, my voice growing more shrill and desperate as everything boils over. "You've been gone for two years! I thought you were dead! And the police they just...laughed it off and did nothing and every time I dug I got the runaround! Now people are dying and there are creepy crawlies inside of me and I just..."
Lara grabs my wrists and squeezes until I let go of her hair. "The world is a lie, Sam. I was given a choice. To continue to live the illusion or to see what's really out there. How could I possibly say no?"
"Why didn't you wait for me?" I must have sounded plaintive and pathetic, because Lara kisses me.
"There wasn't time. And I thought I was protecting you. But I've come to give you the same choice I had. Ignorance, or knowledge." Her expression grows grim.
"Isn't ignorance bliss?"
Lara's smile is tired. Weary. "Yes. What's on the other side is a hard life. No shopping, no luxuries. A war."
I don't want to believe her, but the truth is in her eyes. "I don't understand."
"Do you remember when you were trying to get me into that game you liked? The one with the elves and the orcs and so on?"
"Yeah?" I sit up, finally, and press a hand to my aching arm.
"And you said that you thought it would be really awesome to live in the simulation? What if I told you you already are. Living in a simulation."
Lara's gone insane. That's the only explanation. "...this simulation sucks. Why can't I fly, then? Because I'd totally fly in my own simulation."
"I can fly."
Lara tells the driver to stop the car, and we all get out. We're in some kind of parking lot. It's abandoned, grown over. It looks like there's been no people around for years. Something kind of flickers out of the corner of my eye. But nothing is there.
"Did you see that?" Lara puts a hand on my shoulder. She and the driver are both wearing leather. Lara has on an ankle length trenchcoat, all shiny black. Underneath is a black tanktop, combat boots, and black camo cargo pants. I catch several weapons strapped to the inside of her coat. "That's a glitch in the Matrix."
"A what in the what?" I glance at Lara but she's suddenly standing behind me. I hadn't even seen her move.
"This simulation. It's called the Matrix. Most of our species is plugged into it, living fake lives not unlike the lives our ancestors used to lead." Lara sifts through her pockets, and pulls out a container. Inside are two pills, one red, and one blue. "Red pill, and you join me on the other side. Blue pill, and you forget everything I've told you. You'll.." She hesitates, then it's like a steel rod goes down her spine. "You'll even forget me. You'll go on, living your life, as though I'd never been a part of it."
"Fuck that. No! I don't want to know what I'd be like without having met you. Give me that red pill. What is it? E? LSD? I've done worse."
Lara chuckles, and trails off when I glare at her. "Are you sure about this? There's no going back. And trust me, part of you will wish you'd taken the blue pill."
"Can you really fly?"
Lara's arms thread around me, and the next thing I know we're up high in the sky. This isn't real, this isn't happening, but there we are, me clinging to her but I'm not afraid that she'll let go. Mostly I'm afraid that I'll wake up.
"What will it be, Sam?" Her lips move against my ear. "We don't have much time before they find us."
The pill tastes like crap and has a hard time going down. The last thing I see before I black out is Lara staring at me. There's a new kind of hardness in her eyes. I wonder at what she's seen, I wonder if I've made the right choice.
My body jerks, and there's liquid in my lungs. It's warm, and disgusting, like laying inside of soup. There are tubes in me, attached to me, things in my spine and down my throat. I gag, fighting panic as I claw my way out of the water and nearly throw up once I get the tube out of my throat.
It takes a moment for my eyes to adjust. I'm shaking, in shock I think. My muscles are stupid weak. But none of that matters as I take in what I'm seeing. I don't know what I'm seeing. Miles and miles of red shells. Containers. Coffins. Eggs. There are people in them. thousands of people.
I don't get a chance to understand before I'm flushed out of my little egg and tumble downward. By the time I'm able to orient myself I'm struggling to not drown. But then something wraps around me. There's a blinding light and I'm lifted out of the water (Oh my god I hope that's just water).
Inside the ship (it's a ship right? I swear to god it's a ship), it's cold. Or maybe I'm just adjusting to life outside the egg. Someone leans over me with a blanket. "L...Lara?"
"Shh, Sam. It's me. We got to you just in time."
She looks different. Her hair is really short, like a buzz cut and fuzzy. She's paler, and all of her scars are gone. But her eyes are the same, and she kisses my face like I'm the most precious thing in the world to her. I start sobbing. "What the hell, Lara, what the hell."
And then the most horrible thing occurs to me. I life my hand to my head. "YOU DIDN'T TELL ME I WAS GONNA BE BALD, LARA!"
She lets out a short, relieved laugh. "Well, I was afraid it would sway your decision."
"Damn right it would." I latch on to her as she lifts me up. "So...what now…?"
"We're going to clean you up, and then get some food into you, and introduce you to the crew. And after that..." She leans her cheek against the top of my head. "Have you ever wanted to learn kung fu?"
