Chapter 8: Diary of a Madman
After Lara did a quick sweep of the area just ahead, and mercifully put the man that intended to attack them out of his misery, she returned to Leon's side and attempted to rouse him back to consciousness.
"Leon! Leon, please don't be dead! Wake up!" she whispered lowly as she shook his still form. A brief pause with no results, then Leon groaned and, with a racking cough that shook through his entire body, his eyes slowly slid open.
"What the hell happened?" he groaned.
"The explosion threw you into the wall. I think headfirst," Lara replied, relieved he seemed to be alright.
"That would explain my massive headache. I've got to have a concussion by now," he groused, his hand going to his head and rubbing gently as he hissed.
"Be careful with it, then. Come on, let's get you back on your feet."
Slinging his arm around her shoulders, she helped him to his feet. He staggered a bit once he was upright, but he steadied himself just as quickly.
"Okay, I'm fine. We need to keep moving."
As they pressed forward, passing the man's corpse, they heard shouts of warning.
"They're coming!"
"Guess that's our thicker security," Leon groaned.
They entered a warehouse-like room and were immediately blinded by several floodlights.
"Now! Light them up!"
"Ah, shit!" Leon growled, the offending lights making his headache worse and making it harder for him to concentrate.
"Leon, get down!" Lara cried, putting up a gun he hadn't noticed before and started firing.
"She has a machine gun! Get down!"
'Where did she get a machine gun?' Leon briefly wondered as he ducked down to avoid the incoming fire.
Several minutes, which felt like an eternity, went by as gunfire seemed to echo in the confined space, amplifying Leon's headache even more. Just as quickly as it started, it suddenly became quiet, and Lara was pulling him back to his feet.
"You hurt at all?" he asked, silently looking her over for wounds. She shook her head.
"How about you?" she replied. He also shook his head.
"But then again, I wasn't out in the line of fire." Then as an afterthought, he added, "Thanks for saving my ass. Gotta shake off this headache."
"You took a nasty blow to your head. You may be out of sorts for a bit and that's alright. Consider it payback for keeping me alive this long."
Leon chuckled and helped her loot anything of use from the many bodies strewn about before they continued on.
"Let's check through here," Lara said, pointing to a hallway to their left.
"I hope we find that console Alex mentioned here," he commented. Lara nodded in agreement.
Together, they took out a leftover guard who jumped down from the vent above them and pried open the door at the end of the hall. Inside the room, they found...
"Holy shit. Looks like this is it," Leon gasped. His throbbing head was making every little thing difficult as his concentration was very hazy.
The console, however, was so old he doubted it worked anymore. It was covered in dead leaves and, as he suspected, when Lara attempted the switch, it came off into her hand.
"Dammit!" he cursed. Lara looked ready to start cursing herself, but instead grabbed the radio.
"Alex? Are you there?"
A few seconds later, an out of breath Alex radioed back. "Yeah."
"The console's a wreck."
"Damn it."
"Just what I said," Leon stated, gently taking the radio from her. "What do we do now?"
"Well, unless you two see a Radio Shack around, you're going to have to patch it manually through the maintenance panel."
"Okay. That sounds simple enough," Lara replied.
"Almost too simple. What's the catch, Alex?" Leon asked.
"You two have to find it first. On those old towers, they installed the panels high up. I mean, way high up."
"Climbing again," Lara groaned.
"Just great," Leon added.
As they made to look for a way out, Leon found another diary. To his surprise, this one belonged to Father Mathias.
"Lara, come here," he called as he began reading it out loud.
Mathias talked about being the only survivor of his group, the others attempting vainly to escape in a makeshift boat that was quickly and ultimately lost at sea. He talked about how the storms of the island weren't random or even natural, that there appeared to be emotion behind them.
"I knew he wasn't what he was making himself out to be. He's one of them and can't be trusted," Leon growled as he practically threw the diary down.
"Sam went with him! The others have to find her and soon," Lara cried, suddenly immensely worried for her friend's well-being.
"I'm sure they will, Lara. We have to call for help right now. We have to get to that tower."
They set off down the adjoining hall where they discovered another tight walk-space filled with pipes. As Lara ducked and nearly grabbed the pipe above her head, Leon quickly grabbed her wrist.
"No! Don't touch the pipes. They's scalding hot and you'll get burned."
She nodded and they shimmied through, careful to avoid touching the pipes.
"That tower better work after all this," Lara commented.
"You're telling me," Leon agreed as they ducked under a pipe cluster.
A pipe burst a cloud of hot steam in front of them. Leon pulled Lara back just before she was hit.
"Crouch down and crawl. Maybe the lower we are, the less likely the steam will reach us."
They did as he suggested and avoided anymore bursts of steam. Lara kicked down the vent in front of them and they staggered out into...
"Snow?" Leon asked, confused. Sure enough, light flurries of snow whipped around them.
"This isn't normal," Lara stated.
"Now I wish more than ever I had my jacket. You could use one, too," Leon remarked as he suppressed a violent shiver.
They prepared to cross the bridge. They quickly noticed the only way across was a small, loose-looking beam.
"You're kidding me. This is like the tree on the cliffside all over again," Leon growled as they approached it.
"At least this looks less flimsy," Lara called back as she quickly crossed the gap and onto the bridge piece with a little hop. However, before Leon could join her, a man jumped out from behind the truck, taking Lara by surprise.
"I got one! Ah...hah! Come here!" he cried, seizing her by the waist and attempting to throw her off the side of the bridge. The moment she was in the air, Lara grabbed onto the side of the truck's bed, preventing the man from throwing her anywhere.
"Ahh! Get off! Let go!" Lara yelled, kicking him in the face and sending him hurtling off the bridge to his death.
Leon crossed the beam in three large but careful strides and was at Lara's side immediately.
"You alright?" he asked as she attempted to calm down. After a moment, she nodded and they continued on with their handguns drawn.
The next leg of their mission resulted in ducking and weaving behind several barriers to avoid enemy fire while taking down the enemies with fire of their own. The men shouted orders to each other trying to stop them as they shot, ducked, and exploded their way further into the base.
Ducking into one building structure, they discovered another of Mathias's diaries. This one talked about Mathias gathering his followers, the Solarii brotherhood, trained to be merciless killers. It also expressed Mathias's desire to take the island for himself and uncover the "true secret behind the storms". The madness in his recordings made Leon's unease grow even more.
'So that son of a bitch is their fucking LEADER. What kind of psychopaths are we really dealing with?'
AN: New chapter! I'm slowly but surely getting my writing mojo back! Thanks to all of you who support this story! Means so much!
Next time on Resident Tomb Raider: Leon and Lara finally reach the radio tower and broadcast the SOS, but soon after discover they're far from smooth sailing.
Stay tuned!