I do not own any of these characters except for john, he's mine!
A/N: This is my take on how Lara and Alex met and went searching for the prayer wheels.
Chapter one, Remember when we first met?
England, Croft Manor.
Alex West stepped out of the Audi A3 and scanned his surroundings. His eyes landed on the manor in front of him, though he would find castle a more appropriate word for this. The manor was enormous, not to mention the landscape around it. It all belonged to the woman he is about to visit.
"Wow…" was all that left his mouth.
"Impressive huh?" John said.
John and Alex are friends for almost his entire life. They did almost everything together except university, John graduated, Alex stopped after two years. John had told Alex he knew a woman who might help him to recover the prayer wheels. According to John this woman has the status of a Lady, Alex immediately pictured a woman nearing her fifties who had earned her money by archaeological digs and museum exhibitions. They rang the door bell, not short after that the door was being opened by the butler, a man in his late thirties, dressed in a pressed suit, just as is expected from a butler.
"Ah, Mr White, please come in. I will inform Lady Croft about you're presence."
They were shown inside the manor, Alex's mouth flew wide open. The manor already looked enormous from the outside, but from the inside the manor seemed even bigger. The manor was also beautifully decorated, until his eyes landed on a room that was filled with at least ten computers, strange, what does a lady do with so many computers. His view on the computers was disturbed when the butler passed it, Alex watched the butler until he disappeared in what he figured was the kitchen. The American turned back to John.
"This guy takes his job too serious…" he said with a smile.
"Hillary? Nah, it might seem so but he always acts like this when there are guests."
"He still sees you as a guest?" Alex asked.
"No but you are a guest."
Suddenly John's eyes turned to a person who appeared behind Alex.
"Lara!" John said and shared a hug with his friend.
Alex couldn't believe his eyes. In front of him stood a woman who he had pictured completely wrong. Lady Lara Croft isn't a lady who almost reached her fifties, no in front of him stands a beautiful young woman in her early twenties. Beautiful brown eyes, long brown hair rested on her back and her full lips were carefully smiling at Alex.
"John, who is you're staring friend?" Lara asked.
John jabbed Alex in his side and brought the American back to reality.
"Oh…" Alex held up his hand "I'm Alex West." He said.
Lara accepted it, the touch of her hand made him feel warm inside, he did his best to hide it.
"Nice to meet you Mr West, John told me you are having trouble recovering an artifact."
"Eh…yes that's right."
"Well then, please have a seat and explain me everything."
Lara motioned the two men to sit down and when they were seated she did the same. She leaned back in her seat crossed her legs and folded her arms. Alex admired the way Lara stayed calm. Not once had they met but she seems to make him believe she trusts him completely.
"Well…?"
Oops, his thoughts got lost again.
"Oh…right…I am looking for the four elements of the-"
"Prayer Wheels." Lara finished for him.
"You know about them?" he asked.
"Yes Mr West, I've heard quite some stories about them."
"See Alex, I told you she was good." John said.
Lara eyed John and raised her eyebrow "Do you still have to tell people that I'm good?" she said sarcastic.
Alex liked it, you could tell from the way she said this that she doesn't want to impress anyone, all she did was making a joke.
"Well I had to convince Alex, he thought I was talking about some fifty years old lady who only cares about money."
This time the raised eyebrow went to Alex. Alex immediately felled embarrassed and aimed angry eyes at his friend. When he looked back he saw Lara smiling at him.
"I'm sorry to disappoint you Mr West." She said.
"You didn't disappoint me Lady Croft, a beautiful woman like you're self could never disappoint me." He did his best to talk himself out of this situation
The smile on Lara's face faded slightly, though Alex could see she did her best to keep it the way it was. She was certainly not pleased by his flirting, Alex is a quick learner and decides not to do that again.
"So…" he changed the subject back to the prayer wheels. "What exactly do you know about the prayer wheels?"
"What exactly do you want to know?"
At those words Alex pulled out a picture and handed it to Lara.
"I can't find anyone to translate it."
Lara looked at the photo, it was a picture of a codex. She narrowed her brown eyes and ran her fingers over the marks on the codex. Her lips curled up in a smile.
"It's written in Ancient Chinese, I can make out a few words but it's a little blurry on the picture." Finally she moved her eyes from the picture and looked at Alex "If you can show me the real codex I can have it transl-"
Before she could finish her sentence Alex jumped up "Yes…yes." He said exiting. "I will come back tomorrow and bring the real codex."
Lara frowned and looked at John, John just raised his shoulders.
"Don't look at me, I've never seen him so exited before."
"I'm sorry, it's just, I've been looking for some progress for three months, and now finally someone is willing to help me."
"Well then," Lara said as she stood up from her seat "I guess I see you tomorrow Mr West, say around 3 pm?"
"Ok, 3 pm is good. And please Lady Croft, you can call me Alex."
They walked back to the front door.
"I will…Alex." She replied, Alex had hoped her to say he could call her Lara, but it seemed those words stayed out.
Alex and John were shown out, they stepped inside the Audi and drove the car away from Croft manor.
Lara smiled as she saw Hillary emerging from the kitchen, in his hands was a tray occupied with two cups of tea. He looked confused when he saw that Mr White and his friend were already gone. As she passed him, her hand reached for one cup. She winked at him and then continued her way to the library. For a moment there, she thought to hear him cursing, but she must have misheard it, Hillary almost never curses.
With the cup of tea in her hands, Lara entered the library. Bryce, her tech, was still busy with fixing the telescope. When he saw her approaching Bryce stopped working for a while.
"Back already, wasn't it great to see John again?"
Bryce is an absolute fan of the man. He seems to think John and Lara are a perfect couple. She's glad that they both think of each other as friends.
"Yes Bryce it was really lovely, but my interest went more to the yank who was with him." She replied after a sip from her tea.
"Oeh, was he nice?"
Lara sighed "Bryce…this man is looking for the prayer wheels, that is why I am interested in him, not because of the way he looks."
"So you do think he is-"
"Bryce…I am not warning you again. Go back to you're work."
Like a soldier he saluted Lara and dove back under the telescope. Lara walked behind her desk and dropped herself in the chair behind it. She started thinking, can she really trust this man. It might be a friend of John but that doesn't mean she can trust him. He acts like a true American, especially the flirting. Men constantly try to flirt with her, Lara has gotten used to it.
"Why did Mr White leave so early?"
Lara moved her head up and saw Hillary standing in front of her
"Because there was nothing left to talk about Hilly, his friend Mr West will come back tomorrow with a codex that leads to the prayer wheels."
Hillary frowned "The American? Are you sure you can trust him?" he asked, sounding rather worried already.
"No." she replied dryly. "That's why I offer him a deal."
"A deal?" he asked again.
"Yes a deal, if I am going to help him, I want there to be something in it for me too."
The butler winked at her "Don't be too greedy Lara." He said smiling.
"I'm never greedy Hillary," she said as she took a final sip of her tea "now bring me more of this delicious tea." The tone in her voice sounded sarcastic.
"Yes Milady." He said and elegantly bowed at his employer.
Her lips curled up in a smile as she watched her friend exit the library. The smile grew even larger when she heard a loud bang followed by a lot of cursing from Bryce. She looked in his direction and saw him rubbing his head. The cursing continued for a while but Lara paid no further attention to him, her thoughts were lost in a book with the title The four elements of the Prayer Wheels.
So what do ya think, is it good? Please review I want to know what you think of it.
