DISCLAIMER: I do not own Lara Croft or Tomb Raider. I am not making money
with this work of fiction.
Only to be archived at Fanfiction.net and "Lara Croft's Tales of Beauty and Power". All other sites please email me first at siirma6@surfeu.fi to gain permission.
Tomb Raider: Prevail
by Heidi Ahlmen (siirma6@surfeu.fi)
Chapter 1
Enjoying the luxury of waking up in her own bed for a change, Lara Croft streched under the blanket and her toes poked out from underneath. The chilly air of her bedroom hit her feet and felt uncomfortable. Winston usually opened the window at about ten in the morning and after that, on most mornings, went shopping to a nearby London suburb. Surrey, where Lara housed her inherited mansion, was located just outside Greater London.
Lara checked her alarm clock. The digital numbers read 10:23. So it was after ten in the morning. Lara noticed she had forgotten to set the alarm.
She was running terribly late.
Jumping out from bed, she mentally thanked herself for choosing suitable clothes the day before. She quickly pulled off her king-size T-shirt that she usually slept in - keeps you warm both at home and in a tent, and slipped into her long, dark skirt and a matching silk blouse. She struggled a minute with the blazer, and took a look at herself in the mirror. Good enough.
She ran to her chest-of-drawers, and pulled out a hairbrush along with some rubber bands and made a quick plait, holding the bands in her teeth while braiding.
After grabbing her car keys and wondering if she still should take her motorcycle, Lara ran downstairs - and back up to recover her lipstick. In her beedroom she took some time to check the thermometer. Five degrees minus. Without hesitation, Lara grabbed her car keys. It was no weather for the bike. Then she rushed downstairs, and mentally braced herself for the London traffic.
An hour later Lara arrived in her nominal job homebase - the British Museum. Taking a look over her shoulders to ensure noone was trying to sneak in after her, Lara dialled the key code, heard the office wing entrance door click open, and went in. After patting the snow off her long trenchcoat she walked down a well-lit office, passing small rooms housing archives, computers and desks. She dug out a nametag describing her as a curator of the museum's department of Egyptian antiquities specializing in funerary practices - when she had been employed years earlier they had spent painstaking hours trying to figure what to call her - as Lara never spent much time in the museum itself, rather than recovering artifacts for it. She didn't even have a desk. Not that she wanted one.
Continuing her walk towards a set of elevators she pinned the name tag to her blazer.
She had received a phone call the previous day from the museum director Garret Graham, inviting her to a meeting at eleven sharp the next morning. In Lara's opinion he was a boring but frank man, but he did his job well and had earned his employees' respect during his twenty years at the museum. He was in charge of Lara's off-budget hunts. 'For the good of the museum', he always said.
Lara met him at the lobby, and they began walking towards his office.
"So, what's the big news this time?" Lara asked, smiling secretly. Something was up, she could tell.
Garret opened a door to her, letting her to another corridor.
"I think we have a job for you." Lara's mouth opened, prepared to ask something. Garret raised his hand to silence her.
"I know you'd like to know more right away, but there's something you need to know first. You will be working with someone this time."
Lara took a silent minute to adjust to the thought. "I know it's not my usual way, but if the person in question is competent, I could take it under serious consideration." Politeness always worked in quietly dismissing unpleasant things, she'd learned.
Garret's expression changed.
"I'm terribly sorry, but this time the partner side is not optional. In all honesty - we need the money. If you'll take the job you will be paid well. I suggest you take it - we don't want the kind of publicity that would ensue if you didn't - 'museum mascot leaves the house in trouble'."
Lara's face hardened and she stopped to eye Garret suspiciously. "I am not a museum mascot. Let me guess. The person in question is a small-time archaeologist, wanting to repress all rights of mine towards whatever the discovery in question is. You know I don't work that way, Garret dear."
"It's not quite like that, I can tell you. Your work has always been considered valuable here. I apologize for my earlier expression. "
Not granted, Lara thought secretly. In all honesty, she was getting a bad feeling about all this.
"So, who is this much-talked about partner then? Seems like you've got a job stacked here that might be too much for me alone, huh?" Lara remarked more bittersweetly than necessary.
Garret laughed. They had arrived at his office door. He dug out his keys to open it. "No, it's just that... Anyway," he said while opening the door, "Come and meet your about-to-be-partner. Dr. Ross, meet Dr. Lara Croft."
Lara entered Garret's office.
The face of the person sitting in Garret's guest chair was not unfamiliar to her. It was Josephine Ross.
She was roughly Lara's age, dressed very informally. She wore dark blue jeans, and a wide-cleavaged black top with a dark violet unbuttoned blouse. Her little-over shoulder-lenght hair was braided, as was Lara's, but a lot tighter. Generally she looked like a field archaeologist, but Lara knew better not to let the posture betray her. Josephine's appearance was as self-assured and obstinate as ever. She was slightly taller than Lara, but not as slim. She had a fine figure, and she was attractive in a very original, a bit rough way. Josephine smiled at Lara, who didn't smile back.
The two women eyed each other for a split second.
Lara turned in her heels at a speed only possible for a lady, and walked out of the office, buttoning her coat. Garret jogged after her.
"Garret, the next time you are planning on wasting my time, please inform me in advance so I can decline politely on the phone," she spat out, sounding in her own opinion perhaps a little too indiscreet.
Lara continued walking, Garret following after her.
"Now what seems to be the problem?" He sounded a bit annoyed.
Lara stopped and turned to face him. "I am not working with her. You can take your job and give it over to someone else."
"Have you met before?" Garret asked, feeling dizzy by the sudden changes of the atmosphere.
"Have we met before?" Lara snapped. "Yes, we have. Thrice, in fact. That woman is one of the most self-disillusioned, dishonorable, and unpleasant people I have met. Last time we met in Chicago, it ended in an altercation."
Garret didn't buy it just yet. Fingering a pen in his pocket, he stopped Lara by tapping her on the shoulder.
"Let's just... Can't we at least go in and have a decent conversation? You know as well as I do that the work in the Great Hall is swallowing more money than we ever anticipated. Dr. Ross has found traces of a possible discovery that would help in bringing big funders to the museum."
"I'm quite familiar with the financial situation. I work here, unless you'd forgotten," Lara reminded. Even though I only spend some ten days here a year and my car park square is always taken when I drop by.
"So you understand the need for this find? Lara, will you please consider it?"
Considering is far from actually taking the job, Lara thought, and followed Garret back to his office.
Garret stopped to look at Lara from under his thick brows before reopening the door.
"Now, let us do this properly." He let Lara in. She stopped at the doorway. Josephine rose from her chair.
"Dr. Ross, meet Dr. Lara Croft." Garret introduced more formally than necessary. The woman offered her hand for Lara to shake. She did so, suspiciously.
"Lara; Pleased to meet you again," Josephine said politely.
"Josephine; I honestly wish I could say the same," Lara said, smiling graciously. She sat down to the only guest chair in the office which Josephine had obviously reserved for herself. Josephine remained standing.
"So, what brings you here so soon after Christmas?" Lara asked, eyeing her counterpart suspiciously.
They indeed had met before. They had attended Chicago university the same time, the only difference being that Lara had written her senior thesis two years prior to Josephine and Jean-Yves. Josephine had always seemed to think - and made pretty damn sure everyone knew her opinion - that Lara had gotten through everything too easily. Lara had heard that Josephine had had high hopes of becoming the youngest summer dig curator in the museum history, and had been very bitter about Lara beating her by becoming a curator during her first summer. She hadn't shared the story with Garret, as he was an 'international contacts' fetishist, and would have forced Lara to keep up with Josephine. It would have been a real burden, so Lara had conceitedly decided to shut up about their acquaintance. Eversince Lara left Chicago, whenever they had met, it had ended in catastrophy. Dr. Josephine Ross seemed to be the one and only person in the world capable of making Lara lose her temper completely. Once she had caught herself screaming at Josephine at a museum banquet, with eight hundred pairs of eyes staring at her. Josephine had called her a grave robber with a lousy knowledge of egyptology - all that just to provoke her. And Lara had fallen into the trap.
She had no reason in the world to work with this woman.
Josephine shifted her weight from one leg to another. Once Lara Croft, always Lara Croft. Most likely only interested in what she could benefit from all this.
Garret decided to reply. "It has been known for centuries that a kingdom often addressed as the Kingdom of Kush once existed in Africa. You are aware of the theory, I assume?" he asked Lara.
Lara looked at Josephine. She wished Garret wouldn't have placed it as a question. Of course I know about the kingdom. What am I, a gardener or an archaeologist, for Christsake.
"Yes. It was located in the Sudan, once part of Egypt."
Garret nodded. "Dr. Ross has found evidence that in 1938 an American archaeologist discovered the unrobbed tomb of a pharaoh's grand vizier and his wife. He tried to sneak the treasure out of Africa, but the ship carrying it sunk most likely near Senga Bay, in Lake Malawi."
Lara lowered her eyebrows.
"Lake Malawi? Why on Earth would they sail the artefacts across the Malawi? Assuming they tried to smuggle it, they would have chosen Cape Town or Lagos."
"Josephine?" Garret asked for help.
She flashed a smile which to Lara seemed rather self-conscious. "It would've been too obvious. There were a lot of Brits in Cape Town at that period, and they were keeping track of all possible cargo coming in and out of the city. Seems like Lara has forgotten her 1900's history a bit."
Lara bit her lip. Here we go again.
"If this is such a big discovery, why won't you go get it yourself? What am I needed here for, as I don't obviously even know my history?" Lara asked, slightly annoyed. It seemed that Garret was, indeed, wasting her time.
"I thought you'd like a nice little trip to Africa," Josephine said, a little too innocently to disarm Lara's suspicions.
"Seriously? I didn't assume you ever think," Lara snapped, realizing how ridiculous she sounded. Bickering like children. Get a grip, Croft.
Garret eyed her, not quite knowing what to say. There was obviously little chance of a successful journey. Unless Lara's mood suddenly changed into something willing to accept the challenge of working with Dr. Ross.
"Dr.Ross can't obviously spread the news around, as it would only end in a world-wide treasure hunt. She has found an independent funder who has a condition to his financial aid, isn't that right?" Garret asked politely.
Josephine nodded. Must this man always get a confirmation to everything he says? she wondered to herself. Josephine didn't like uncertain people. She had always imagined Lara to share the opinion but Lara did seem to genuinely like him.
"For some reason, he, meaning the funder, has promised to take care of all possible costs, but with the condition that we work together. I have no idea of his motives, but this is the deal." What am I doing here? She won't take the job, Josephine mused to herself.
"Or, it might be that you're just dying to find out what I do and how. Let me tell you, that was an intriguing story, but I have no desire to work with amateurs," Lara said in a bittersweetly overpolite tone.
Garret laughed. "Lara, your modesty is breathtaking."
Josephine's mouth had turned to an indifferent, half-angry line. Why does * she* always think she's the only one whose time is being wasted?
"I came here to offer you a fair half of a major scientific discovery. If you're not interested, then we come to a tie. No working with me, no treasure for either of us. I thought that grave robbing was your thing, no matter what the target."
"I know you've always thought of me very highly. So please cut the crap."
"I might think that you're a hell of a luck bag and only a shadow of an archaeologist, but I need this discovery. So does this museum. I'm not in obligation to say please, but I just would."
God bless the yanks. Soon she's going to tell me she loves me like a sister, Lara sighed to herself. Begging never worked on her, but she didn't have any jobs underway and frankly, she hated the thought of spending the whole January mooning around at home.
"And where had you thought we should start, Dr. Ross?"
Only to be archived at Fanfiction.net and "Lara Croft's Tales of Beauty and Power". All other sites please email me first at siirma6@surfeu.fi to gain permission.
Tomb Raider: Prevail
by Heidi Ahlmen (siirma6@surfeu.fi)
Chapter 1
Enjoying the luxury of waking up in her own bed for a change, Lara Croft streched under the blanket and her toes poked out from underneath. The chilly air of her bedroom hit her feet and felt uncomfortable. Winston usually opened the window at about ten in the morning and after that, on most mornings, went shopping to a nearby London suburb. Surrey, where Lara housed her inherited mansion, was located just outside Greater London.
Lara checked her alarm clock. The digital numbers read 10:23. So it was after ten in the morning. Lara noticed she had forgotten to set the alarm.
She was running terribly late.
Jumping out from bed, she mentally thanked herself for choosing suitable clothes the day before. She quickly pulled off her king-size T-shirt that she usually slept in - keeps you warm both at home and in a tent, and slipped into her long, dark skirt and a matching silk blouse. She struggled a minute with the blazer, and took a look at herself in the mirror. Good enough.
She ran to her chest-of-drawers, and pulled out a hairbrush along with some rubber bands and made a quick plait, holding the bands in her teeth while braiding.
After grabbing her car keys and wondering if she still should take her motorcycle, Lara ran downstairs - and back up to recover her lipstick. In her beedroom she took some time to check the thermometer. Five degrees minus. Without hesitation, Lara grabbed her car keys. It was no weather for the bike. Then she rushed downstairs, and mentally braced herself for the London traffic.
An hour later Lara arrived in her nominal job homebase - the British Museum. Taking a look over her shoulders to ensure noone was trying to sneak in after her, Lara dialled the key code, heard the office wing entrance door click open, and went in. After patting the snow off her long trenchcoat she walked down a well-lit office, passing small rooms housing archives, computers and desks. She dug out a nametag describing her as a curator of the museum's department of Egyptian antiquities specializing in funerary practices - when she had been employed years earlier they had spent painstaking hours trying to figure what to call her - as Lara never spent much time in the museum itself, rather than recovering artifacts for it. She didn't even have a desk. Not that she wanted one.
Continuing her walk towards a set of elevators she pinned the name tag to her blazer.
She had received a phone call the previous day from the museum director Garret Graham, inviting her to a meeting at eleven sharp the next morning. In Lara's opinion he was a boring but frank man, but he did his job well and had earned his employees' respect during his twenty years at the museum. He was in charge of Lara's off-budget hunts. 'For the good of the museum', he always said.
Lara met him at the lobby, and they began walking towards his office.
"So, what's the big news this time?" Lara asked, smiling secretly. Something was up, she could tell.
Garret opened a door to her, letting her to another corridor.
"I think we have a job for you." Lara's mouth opened, prepared to ask something. Garret raised his hand to silence her.
"I know you'd like to know more right away, but there's something you need to know first. You will be working with someone this time."
Lara took a silent minute to adjust to the thought. "I know it's not my usual way, but if the person in question is competent, I could take it under serious consideration." Politeness always worked in quietly dismissing unpleasant things, she'd learned.
Garret's expression changed.
"I'm terribly sorry, but this time the partner side is not optional. In all honesty - we need the money. If you'll take the job you will be paid well. I suggest you take it - we don't want the kind of publicity that would ensue if you didn't - 'museum mascot leaves the house in trouble'."
Lara's face hardened and she stopped to eye Garret suspiciously. "I am not a museum mascot. Let me guess. The person in question is a small-time archaeologist, wanting to repress all rights of mine towards whatever the discovery in question is. You know I don't work that way, Garret dear."
"It's not quite like that, I can tell you. Your work has always been considered valuable here. I apologize for my earlier expression. "
Not granted, Lara thought secretly. In all honesty, she was getting a bad feeling about all this.
"So, who is this much-talked about partner then? Seems like you've got a job stacked here that might be too much for me alone, huh?" Lara remarked more bittersweetly than necessary.
Garret laughed. They had arrived at his office door. He dug out his keys to open it. "No, it's just that... Anyway," he said while opening the door, "Come and meet your about-to-be-partner. Dr. Ross, meet Dr. Lara Croft."
Lara entered Garret's office.
The face of the person sitting in Garret's guest chair was not unfamiliar to her. It was Josephine Ross.
She was roughly Lara's age, dressed very informally. She wore dark blue jeans, and a wide-cleavaged black top with a dark violet unbuttoned blouse. Her little-over shoulder-lenght hair was braided, as was Lara's, but a lot tighter. Generally she looked like a field archaeologist, but Lara knew better not to let the posture betray her. Josephine's appearance was as self-assured and obstinate as ever. She was slightly taller than Lara, but not as slim. She had a fine figure, and she was attractive in a very original, a bit rough way. Josephine smiled at Lara, who didn't smile back.
The two women eyed each other for a split second.
Lara turned in her heels at a speed only possible for a lady, and walked out of the office, buttoning her coat. Garret jogged after her.
"Garret, the next time you are planning on wasting my time, please inform me in advance so I can decline politely on the phone," she spat out, sounding in her own opinion perhaps a little too indiscreet.
Lara continued walking, Garret following after her.
"Now what seems to be the problem?" He sounded a bit annoyed.
Lara stopped and turned to face him. "I am not working with her. You can take your job and give it over to someone else."
"Have you met before?" Garret asked, feeling dizzy by the sudden changes of the atmosphere.
"Have we met before?" Lara snapped. "Yes, we have. Thrice, in fact. That woman is one of the most self-disillusioned, dishonorable, and unpleasant people I have met. Last time we met in Chicago, it ended in an altercation."
Garret didn't buy it just yet. Fingering a pen in his pocket, he stopped Lara by tapping her on the shoulder.
"Let's just... Can't we at least go in and have a decent conversation? You know as well as I do that the work in the Great Hall is swallowing more money than we ever anticipated. Dr. Ross has found traces of a possible discovery that would help in bringing big funders to the museum."
"I'm quite familiar with the financial situation. I work here, unless you'd forgotten," Lara reminded. Even though I only spend some ten days here a year and my car park square is always taken when I drop by.
"So you understand the need for this find? Lara, will you please consider it?"
Considering is far from actually taking the job, Lara thought, and followed Garret back to his office.
Garret stopped to look at Lara from under his thick brows before reopening the door.
"Now, let us do this properly." He let Lara in. She stopped at the doorway. Josephine rose from her chair.
"Dr. Ross, meet Dr. Lara Croft." Garret introduced more formally than necessary. The woman offered her hand for Lara to shake. She did so, suspiciously.
"Lara; Pleased to meet you again," Josephine said politely.
"Josephine; I honestly wish I could say the same," Lara said, smiling graciously. She sat down to the only guest chair in the office which Josephine had obviously reserved for herself. Josephine remained standing.
"So, what brings you here so soon after Christmas?" Lara asked, eyeing her counterpart suspiciously.
They indeed had met before. They had attended Chicago university the same time, the only difference being that Lara had written her senior thesis two years prior to Josephine and Jean-Yves. Josephine had always seemed to think - and made pretty damn sure everyone knew her opinion - that Lara had gotten through everything too easily. Lara had heard that Josephine had had high hopes of becoming the youngest summer dig curator in the museum history, and had been very bitter about Lara beating her by becoming a curator during her first summer. She hadn't shared the story with Garret, as he was an 'international contacts' fetishist, and would have forced Lara to keep up with Josephine. It would have been a real burden, so Lara had conceitedly decided to shut up about their acquaintance. Eversince Lara left Chicago, whenever they had met, it had ended in catastrophy. Dr. Josephine Ross seemed to be the one and only person in the world capable of making Lara lose her temper completely. Once she had caught herself screaming at Josephine at a museum banquet, with eight hundred pairs of eyes staring at her. Josephine had called her a grave robber with a lousy knowledge of egyptology - all that just to provoke her. And Lara had fallen into the trap.
She had no reason in the world to work with this woman.
Josephine shifted her weight from one leg to another. Once Lara Croft, always Lara Croft. Most likely only interested in what she could benefit from all this.
Garret decided to reply. "It has been known for centuries that a kingdom often addressed as the Kingdom of Kush once existed in Africa. You are aware of the theory, I assume?" he asked Lara.
Lara looked at Josephine. She wished Garret wouldn't have placed it as a question. Of course I know about the kingdom. What am I, a gardener or an archaeologist, for Christsake.
"Yes. It was located in the Sudan, once part of Egypt."
Garret nodded. "Dr. Ross has found evidence that in 1938 an American archaeologist discovered the unrobbed tomb of a pharaoh's grand vizier and his wife. He tried to sneak the treasure out of Africa, but the ship carrying it sunk most likely near Senga Bay, in Lake Malawi."
Lara lowered her eyebrows.
"Lake Malawi? Why on Earth would they sail the artefacts across the Malawi? Assuming they tried to smuggle it, they would have chosen Cape Town or Lagos."
"Josephine?" Garret asked for help.
She flashed a smile which to Lara seemed rather self-conscious. "It would've been too obvious. There were a lot of Brits in Cape Town at that period, and they were keeping track of all possible cargo coming in and out of the city. Seems like Lara has forgotten her 1900's history a bit."
Lara bit her lip. Here we go again.
"If this is such a big discovery, why won't you go get it yourself? What am I needed here for, as I don't obviously even know my history?" Lara asked, slightly annoyed. It seemed that Garret was, indeed, wasting her time.
"I thought you'd like a nice little trip to Africa," Josephine said, a little too innocently to disarm Lara's suspicions.
"Seriously? I didn't assume you ever think," Lara snapped, realizing how ridiculous she sounded. Bickering like children. Get a grip, Croft.
Garret eyed her, not quite knowing what to say. There was obviously little chance of a successful journey. Unless Lara's mood suddenly changed into something willing to accept the challenge of working with Dr. Ross.
"Dr.Ross can't obviously spread the news around, as it would only end in a world-wide treasure hunt. She has found an independent funder who has a condition to his financial aid, isn't that right?" Garret asked politely.
Josephine nodded. Must this man always get a confirmation to everything he says? she wondered to herself. Josephine didn't like uncertain people. She had always imagined Lara to share the opinion but Lara did seem to genuinely like him.
"For some reason, he, meaning the funder, has promised to take care of all possible costs, but with the condition that we work together. I have no idea of his motives, but this is the deal." What am I doing here? She won't take the job, Josephine mused to herself.
"Or, it might be that you're just dying to find out what I do and how. Let me tell you, that was an intriguing story, but I have no desire to work with amateurs," Lara said in a bittersweetly overpolite tone.
Garret laughed. "Lara, your modesty is breathtaking."
Josephine's mouth had turned to an indifferent, half-angry line. Why does * she* always think she's the only one whose time is being wasted?
"I came here to offer you a fair half of a major scientific discovery. If you're not interested, then we come to a tie. No working with me, no treasure for either of us. I thought that grave robbing was your thing, no matter what the target."
"I know you've always thought of me very highly. So please cut the crap."
"I might think that you're a hell of a luck bag and only a shadow of an archaeologist, but I need this discovery. So does this museum. I'm not in obligation to say please, but I just would."
God bless the yanks. Soon she's going to tell me she loves me like a sister, Lara sighed to herself. Begging never worked on her, but she didn't have any jobs underway and frankly, she hated the thought of spending the whole January mooning around at home.
"And where had you thought we should start, Dr. Ross?"