Family Matters, Part III: Reunions
By C. Mage
"What in the name of God are YOU doing here?" David asked, utterly amazed to see the bookish cousin he'd seen at the birthday party dressed in a tailored Armani suit, sporting a champagne glass and a gold Rolex. "And what's with the monkey suit?"
"Can't you guess? Come on, David, show me what a good detective you really are. Now, Jacob, let him be, don't give him any hints."
David looked at him and then it all clicked. "Richard never gave you that scrollcase, did he? That was a little present from you; he didn't know anything about it."
"Correct. I needed the hook to get Lara's attention and that was it."
"That map to King Solomon's mines was a fake, wasn't it?"
"Completely." Johnathan smiled, obviously enjoying himself. "The diamond was also relatively easy to get."
"Was that fake, too?"
"No, that was real. Uncut diamonds are rather easy to get in South Africa, David. I buy diamonds from Zimbabwe all the time. I just picked out a large, uncut one and used it as bait. Simplicity itself."
"Wait...let me guess. You had us bugged, didn't you? That's how you found us."
"Right as rain, David. Oh, I wager you're thinking right now, 'Rico should've known better than to let someone bug his merchandise,' correct? Well, you're right, he should've known better; under normal circumstances, that shouldn't have happened."
"...unless Rico was the one who put the bug there to begin with."
"Lara is far too trusting when it comes to her contacts. But then, you can't trust anyone nowadays, can you?"
"Not even family, apparently," David said through gritted teeth.
"Sorry, old chap, but that's life."
"You'd sell your own family out for money, wouldn't you?"
"Most of them, perhaps. The older ones, of course, would go for a lot less," Johnathan continued blithely, "but the younger looking ones would fetch quite a price. The two children, for example...you'd be surprised how much unspoiled foreigners go for in these troubled times."
"What surprises me is why. You had it all, slime. Wealth, power, a family."
"A FAMILY?? Well, strike me, David..."
"Anytime!" David snarled.
"...but you seem to have missed the whole point. Do you know what it's like to have two older, better cousins? One powerful male with everything going for him and a beautiful girl, all sunshine and joy? Dear old Lord Croft just adored his children, but despised his nephew. I wasn't as good-looking or as promising as his own children. It took me a great deal of time to realize just what my uncle wanted." Johnathan closed his hands into fists, bringing them up in front of him, level with his eyes. "POWER, David, you have no idea what true power is. The power to do anything you want, whenever you want, to anyone you want. My own parents didn't understand, those two idiots Richard and Lara didn't understand...but Lord Henshingly Croft and I understood. He tried to groom his children to take his place, but Richard was too arrogant, so Lara was the only choice. She would've gone through with it, too, but I stopped that in a hurry."
Light dawned in David's mind. "The plane crash in the Himalayas."
"Yes...only that silly bitch managed to survive, but the damage had been done. Lord Henshingly Croft had a willful, independent daughter who had none of the goals he had set for her, so he disowned her for a while. Richard was left to his own ambitions and I stepped into the picture. After the right schooling and time, I was brought into Lord Henshingly Croft's firm and I made sure that I was a success. What my ambition, drive and tenacity did not achieve, subterfuge and skullduggery did. I was making enough money to start my own firm, but I didn't care. I was working for someone who understood the benefits and goals of power and that made me happy. Then, IT happened. I was no longer a part of Lord Croft's picture."
"Let me guess. Lord Croft and Lara reconciled."
"I couldn't believe it! Had he gone mad?? I was making him into a powerful force and he was going to throw it all away for that bitch again. Do you know that I'm now worth more than his estate and the estates of all my relatives COMBINED? I can snap my fingers and I can have anything I want. I can take what I want, kill whom I want, own whatever my heart desires...but Lord Henshingly Croft was betraying himself and me by letting his wretched daughter come back into his life. I couldn't let that happen."
"So you think that things are going to be all hunky-dory once Lara's dead?" David shook his head. "Buster, you are completely insane!"
"Poor people are insane, David. Rich people are eccentric. Pardon my use of big words, just in case you have trouble following along." Johnathan walked closer to David, making sure to stay out of David's reach. "Once Lara is properly humiliated and killed, Lord Henshingly Croft will come to his senses. And things will begin growing once again, and we'll be back in business."
"Not a chance."
Johnathan walked to the window. "Let me guess. You being the gentleman-in-distress, you're doubtlessly waiting for a certain well-endowed heroine to come in and save the day, aren't you? Well, I hope she gets here soon...because you're running out of time. You see, you only have seven hours left to live." Johnathan opened the window, letting in the cool night air. "You see, the cell you're currently occupying has had some renovations made to it. Underneath the cell is a pool of water, and that pool leads to a large tank filled with some rather ferocious piranha. Red piranha, I believe. They haven't been fed for a bit, so they're only a few days away from chowing down on each other. Won't they be glad to see you fall in the morning? Of course, your legs will still be chained, so simply climbing out using them will be a bit difficult, but don't you worry. As soon as the smell of your blood hits the water, you should have about three seconds before there's a great deal more."
"You're not just insane, Johnathan, you're sick. What do you get out of all this?"
"The satisfaction of knowing that when you and Lara are gone, I'll be able to get back to business without some irritating flatfoot or a waste of female skin getting in my way. I try to take care of nuisances like you and Lara before they become full-fledged problems. That's why I stay on top."
"I've got news for you, Johnny-boy. I am a full-fledged problem to you now," snarled David. "You think you're a threat?? I've crossed paths with people that'd make you look like a schoolyard bully. That's all you are, Johnathan, a little man who only thinks he's a big man. When you get yours, you'll find out how right I am."
Johnathan frowned. "Jacob, kindly teach this moron a lesson. I'm going back up to the party. Don't kill him, Jacob, just hurt him some. I want him to live long enough so that Lara, if she does get here, will be able to watch him become fish food." He walked back upstairs, ignoring the grunts Jacobs made as he kicked and beat at David's body. After all, one must rise above such petty concerns...by leaving it to those who enjoy the work more. Johnathan smiled as he left the "wine cellar" and rejoined the party in progress, thrown for some well-to-do members of Parliament, not to mention some Arab and Iraqi concerns. He walked up to the podium and the curtain behind him pulled aside, revealing the attractive forms of twelve women, one of them a member of the missionary group he had encountered the week before. The other two were still being conditioned through pain and some very unorthodox pharmaceuticals. "Now, then, gentlemen and ladies...what am I bid for the lovely young Japanese here? Lovely, never soiled, and the tender age of fifteen. She'll make a fine man or woman very happy indeed. Opening bid is twenty-five thousand dollars."
Business as usual.
Lara lowered the binoculars. "Something's not right here."
"You mean, besides the fact that I came along with you on this?" Jackie asked as he lay prone next to her.
"You didn't have to come, you know. Not you, not the rest of them." Lara thumbed back to the crowd of stuntmen and stuntwomen dressed in black and carrying various weapons.
"Stunt people are crazy, Lara. What other kind of person willingly jumps off a building or tries to jump onto a train while riding a motorcycle?"
"And your excuse?"
"I do my own stunts."
Lara sighed. "This isn't a movie, Jackie...real guns, real bullets, real psychos with sharp objects."
"Trying to intimidate a stuntman, ex- or otherwise, is a lost cause. Now how do we get inside that place?" He pointed across the dunes to a palatial mansion surrounded by a wall populated by turbaned gunmen.
"We don't. Tell everybody to fall back." Lara backed down the dune and headed for her dirt bikes.
Jackie followed, a bit confused. "Don't tell me you're giving up."
"Not by a long shot."
"They why aren't we going in there?"
"Because David's not there."
Jackie stopped. "Lara, I'm sure that somewhere in your next few sentences is an explanation, so don't keep us all in suspense." The other members of Jackie's stunt entourage approached Lara and Jackie with questioning looks.
"Simple. There's a lesson I learned while in university. 'What looks like a duck, quacks like a duck and walks like a duck is probably a duck...unless it's a goose.'"
"I don't get it," Carol said, pulling off her hood.
"The trail left by the men who took David led straight to here. There was no doubt in my mind who was responsible; there were clues all over the place where David crashed."
"So?" said Asagi, one of the other stuntmen.
"That's what bothers me. It's too neat, too perfect. A blind man could've followed the trail back to this place, which makes me wonder if the man who owns this place is even connected at all with what happened. If David were here, I'd know exactly what he'd say...'Lara, if an alibi has the feel of a suit of armor, there's something wrong."
"So what do we do?"
"We dig deeper. Who knows about the guy who owns that place?"
"He is Al-Assid Hussein...he claims to have kinship with the leader of Iraq." Khalid, the Tuareg, turned and spit to his left. "He is an arms dealer, a slaver...the bastard son of a flea-ridden, diseased camel and a drunken whore."
"Charming. Would he have taken David? As a slave, or as anything else?"
"No. He hates Americans with a passion. He would've killed any Americans he found."
"Right. So who would benefit if he were to be attacked? Who would gain from his misfortunes?"
Khalid considered, then suggested, "It could be the Moroccan Tiger."
"Who?"
"A foreigner who started up operations years ago. He controls the illegal trade of Western Africa."
"Western..." Lara turned to the west, and stood there for a few minutes. Then he turned to Khalid. "Where does he usually operate?"
"Hard to say. He has operations in Rabat, Casablanca and Marrakech, but he travels a great deal. Hard to pin him down. Why the sudden interest in him? Do you think he has David?"
"Maybe. One thing is for sure, some one went to a lot of trouble to get us to go in the wrong direction. If I'm right...then we've been had. Jackie, do you have friends in Cairo?"
"Why?"
"I need a favor from you...I want to set up a stunt."
Johnathan finished his drink and checked his watch. I wonder how the dear boy is doing? I'll have to take a look. "If you'll excuse me, Mr. Morales...our little talk must continue tomorrow. I have to attend to some personal business." With that, he went back down to the dungeon to look in on David.
As he looked into the cell, he tsked softly, "My my, David...you are a mess."
Johnathan wasn't exaggerating. David's left eye was swollen shut and his nose had been broken. Blood clotted on his face and neck. His clothes covered the other bruises. He looked up slowly and spat, "...you shit sonuvabitch...!"
"Now, now, now, David. Don't be such a poor loser. Honestly, I don't know what Lara ever saw in you...one little beating and you lose all composure. A shame." Johnathan grinned. "But don't worry. It'll all be over in five hours and the pain will be gone. Oh, it'll get worse first, but it won't take TOO long for your body to give up."
"...when I...get out of here...!!"
"SPARE me your pitiful little whining, your threats. Take it like a man. That's what my father always said to me when he chastised me for not meeting up to his expectations. 'Take it like a man, you little bastard. Prove to me that you're really my son.' But, to be honest, his most memorable words were the ones he said to me just before he died. 'Thank you for the tea, son.' Those were the last words he ever said to me and I'll always remember them." Johnathan's face took on a sentimental smile. "Right before the poison in the tea took effect, anyways. Well, David, I must say that it's been fun. For me, anyways. I'm going to go upstairs and get some rest in my nice feather bed with two young African slaves to keep me nice and warm. Say hello to the rats for me." Johnathan walked upstairs a few steps, then stopped. "But to show that I'm not all bad, I'll send down some food a little later. Maybe in a couple of hours. After all, the condemned man is allowed a last meal."
David was silent. He turned away and curled up to rest, to save his strength. As he rested, he allowed himself a smile. Jacobs had given him a serious going-over, but David had faked the amount of pain he was truly in and let Jacobs think that David wasn't able to put up much of a fight.
He shifted slightly, rewarded with pain, but not the kind of pain Jacobs would've hoped for. No major bones were broken, no open wounds. David knew that his nose was broken pretty bad and he couldn't see with his left eye at all. Ah, well...I wasn't that pretty to begin with, he told himself half-heartedly, then thumbed his watch to wake him in just over an hour and thirty minutes.
The chance to eat was not something David wanted to miss.
Lara looked out the window of the plane. "I can see the lights of Casablanca. Is everyone ready back there?"
"Ready! You sure you've done this before, Lara?"
"Well, once," she yelled over the engines of the cargo plane, "but I was at gunpoint at the time! Alright, gents and ladies, remember...this is the real thing! Anybody who wants to back out now, just don't jump! I want everyone to make sure..."
"Aw, will you give it a rest, already??" yelled one of the stuntmen in the back. "This is the kinda shit I LIVE for!!" The others cheered their agreement.
Lara turned to Jackie. "They are crazy!" she said with the hint of a smile.
Jackie grinned and gave her a thumb-up, then went to the cockpit to confer with the pilots. As Lara belted herself in, she turned to Khalid. "Is this where the Tiger lives?"
"No, but I have family here who say that there have been planes flying in and out, charter planes. That means rich people and that can only mean a party thrown by the owner of the house over there." He pointed through the window to a gathering of lights high above the town, overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. "And the Tiger, curse his name, enjoys letting people know how powerful he is."
"Just for asking, what's the Tiger's real name?"
"No one knows. The only certainty is that he is a foreigner."
Lara nodded. A red light came on and Lara yelled, "We're nearing the drop point! Everybody get ready!"
Up in the cockpit, Jackie heard Lara's declaration and turned to the pilot. "We need to get in quiet. Can you try gliding us in?"
"Pal, I'm a pilot, not a magician. But I can make things easier for us. Take a look at our three o'clock."
Jackie looked out the window and saw the lights of another plane. "What's that?"
"Egypt Air Flight 504. We're angled to come over just as they're on final approach. I go to 60% power, give us plenty of flaps and we sail over, our engines masked by their engines."
"Is that difficult?"
"Depends on what you mean by difficult. If you think that half-gliding a monster this big without pitching into the ground is difficult, then, yeah, it's difficult. Just take off. I'll take it from here."
Jackie nodded, heading back into the cargo area. The pilot put his hand on the throttle and cycled it back, going to 30% flaps and hanging on for dear life.
The door opened and Lara looked down to see the collection of lights just below. She held a fist high, then dropped it as she leaped out the door, stuntmen and stuntwomen leaping in her wake.
The two hours passed by all too quickly. A young, attractive woman in an exotic dress and five-inch heels came down the steps, carrying a tray with some food steaming on it. She was raven-haired and blue-eyed, but there was something in the way she walked that appeared forced, as if it was an effort simply to push aside air by walking. Her face was stone and her gaze was as cold as the golden collar around her neck.
She went to the door and opened it, stepping inside. The figure inside the cell was not moving and she set the tray next to the matted patch of hair on the stone. Suddenly, a strong hand snaked out and grabbed her by the arm, pulling her down. The other hand clamped around the woman's mouth before her scream could escape.
"Don't make a sound, lady." David hissed. "I promise not to hurt you. Do you understand?"
The woman nodded.
David slowly brought his hand away. If she wanted to scream for help, she either couldn't or wouldn't. She looked at the man and gasped a little at the sight of his face. "What is your name?" David asked through swollen lips.
"M-M-Marla," the woman stammered.
"Nice to meet you, Marla. My name's David." His voice was calm as he regarded the woman. "Looks like I'm not the only prisoner here."
"I am not a prisoner. I am a slave. People are prisoners. Slaves are slaves." Her voice cracked, showing an Australian accent.
"Tell you what...how'd you like to get out of here?"
"There is no way out except death for a slave," she said almost automatically, and David got the distinct impression that the sentence must have been drilled into her head to create such an automatic reaction.
"I don't believe it. No security is perfect." David looked up at the stairs. "They'll be expecting you to go back up. If you help me to get out of these damn chains, I'll help you escape...and I don't mean by killing you."
"I must go." Marla stood up.
"Remember what I said, Marla...I'll help you if you help me."
The slave stood up and left the cell, closing the door and walking back up the stairs. David turned to the food and was about to dig in when he smelled something odd. He took up the plate and smelled it. The food smelled normal enough. Then what...? he mentally asked himself, then saw something about the eating utensils that brought him to full alert.
They were a flat, metallic silver. He looked closer at the knife without picking it up. "'Stainless steel,' huh? They why no chrome finish?" David brought his nose down to the knife and sniffed. You sonuvabitch...you didn't poison the food, you poisoned the eating utensils! Whatta sense of humor...
With that, David picked up the food and began the unlovely but satisfying task of eating an entire meal using his fingers.
Up in the master bedroom, Johnathan watched David with some satisfaction of his own. The two women with him, both gorgeous Nubian women, watched with the pretense of interest. They learned a long time ago that it paid to reflect, or at least appear to reflect, the jaded tastes of their owner.
Johnathan, dressed in a silk bathrobe and smoking a long cigarette, smiled. He figured that David would detect the poison in time. He just enjoyed the sight of David Connors dining like a Neanderthal. Just like the caveman he is, Johnathan mentally snickered. The big question is, should I stay up until David drops into the feeding frenzy, get some sleep and wake up later, or just sleep through it and catch the recording later?
Johnathan decided to have some fun with his slaves and get some sleep. After all, I can always watch the recording...that way, I can slo-mo the good bits.
Lara was impressed with Jackie's skill with parachuting. He must be good, to land on that guard like that. Good, or extremely lucky. "We've got to find David," she said urgently as the others landed nearby.
Jackie looked around at where they had all landed.. "Looks like the top of some sort of warehouse or hangar. I can't see an airstrip nearby, so maybe there's a helicopter inside. Lou, Chuck, Darla, check it out."
"Alright..." Lara hunched down to lower her profile and the others followed suit, closing in on Lara to hear her better. "Now, we've got to keep this extremely quiet. There's a great deal of automatic weapons down here," she picked up the weapons belonging to the two unconscious guards on the roof, "if they're all armed like these two were. We can't afford to have them turn this place into a replay of the OK Corral gunfight."
"Don't worry." Jackie grinned, tapping his chest. "Kevlar."
"That's not the bloody point. If they start shooting, we lose the element of surprise and David will most likely be killed."
The rest of the group nodded. "So what do we do?"
"Strictly hand-to-hand combat. I want a low body count, here. Kill only if you have no other options." Lara took out her binoculars and scanned the area, activating the nightsight function. "There's a main building, surrounded by an extensive garden, statues of naked men and women...a courtyard with a huge fountain, no end to our boy's opulence..." After scanning for a few minutes, Lara lowered the binoculars. "I count thirty men, all armed with automatic weapons."
"Fair odds. There's twenty of us," said Morgan, a stuntwoman known for working with Ming Na Wen. "So how do we proceed?"
Lara looked at Jackie, then at the unconscious guards. "Jackie?"
"Yes?"
"What size are you?"
Jackie grinned. "I get the idea."
"Not yet, you don't. Everyone, I need to know if you all trust me."
They all looked at each other, then nodded. "We're with you all the way," said Morgan.
"I'm glad to hear that. Ladies, take off all your clothes."
"So I tell her, 'Hey, if you don't want to show me what I want to see, you can fucking WALK home!"
The other two guards laughed at that. "That's a good one, Reg! What happened next?"
"Let me put it to you this way...she didn't walk home." Reginald, an ex-Special Forces who went rogue a few years before, grinned and took a drag on his cigarette. "I'm telling you, she was sweet. She had..."
"Stow it, Reg. We've got company." Dio hefted his Uzi and stood in front of the gate as a large truck rolled up. "Check and see if we've got deliveries tonight." He raised his hand and the truck rolled to a stop in front of the main gate. Dio walked up to the driver's side window. "Alright, mate, where's your pass?"
"Emergency delivery! We've got some cargo in the back that needs to get in quick. Orders from the top."
Dio squinted. "What kind of cargo?"
The driver raised his cap, obviously in a hurry. "You know...CARGO. Go to the back and see for yourself."
Dio called the third guard over. "Antione, follow me. Reg, watch this guy." The two men walked to the back of the truck and pulled the flaps aside. Their eyes widened as they saw that there were ten naked women tied up in the back. As Antione stared at the frightened women, Dio jumped down and ran to the front. "Mister, you've got a lotta balls making an unscheduled delivery. However..."
"Yes?" the driver asked worriedly.
"You can leave the truck here and your name, we take them in and you get paid after we make sure that the boss okayed this little transaction."
"What about my money??" the driver demanded.
Reginald raised the Uzi. "You want to do business with us, pal, you toe the line."
"Meanwhile...Reg, watch this guy. If he tries to stop us, shoot him. Antione and I are going to have a little fun with them first."
"What about me?"
"You'll get your turn...there's about ten of them and three of us. You think you'll be able to handle that?" Dio turned to Antione. "Let's go get some."
The driver, dressed in work coveralls and cap, got out as the two guards went to the back of the truck and got in. Reginald looked at the driver, then something caught his eye. "Hey."
"What?"
"Anyone ever told you that you look like that Chink in the movies?
"You mean, Jackie Chan?" The driver grinned. "Lots of people say I look like him."
"Oh yeah?" Reginald lowered the gun a hair.
Before Reginald knew what hit him, his jaw was forcefully relocated and he dropped to the ground, stunned. Jackie went low and gave him a few more punches to make sure that he was out, then ran to the back. As he rounded the bumper, he saw the bodies of the two men unceremoniously dumped out the back. They hit the ground like dirty sacks of clothes and did not move.
"Is everyone decent in there?" Jackie asked.
Lara poked her head out. "I'd say we're much better than simply 'decent'..." She looked down at the guards. "Pigs."
"Are they dead?"
"No," Morgan said from inside, "but I wouldn't lay odds on them fathering children anytime in the future." A wounded moan substantiated the statement and Jackie gave him a kick to keep him quiet.
"Yeah, ever get ganged up by a half-dozen angry stuntwomen capable of at least one martial art technique each? It's not pretty." Morgan poked her head out. "Alright, everyone's dressed."
"Good. Jackie, you, Theo and Morgan get into the guards' uniforms. Do be so good as to escort us in and drive around a bit. Bang on the ceiling of the cab when we get to a place where some of us can drop out and go to business. We should be able to hear it over the sound of the engine."
"Hey, Lara...there's some stuff in the back of this truck you should take a look at." came Leung's voice.
Lara walked to the back and pulled out a penlight, shining it at the labels on the box. She grinned. "Oh, this is just TOO good."
"What is it?" Jackie asked.
"Dynamite. Three boxes' worth." She opened one of the boxes and looked inside. "Great Heavens above..." she breathed.
"What??" asked Morgan, worried.
"This dynamite isn't very new."
Morgan came over to see the red sticks packed in sawdust. Minute beads of clear liquid appeared here and there on the sticks. "What's that stuff?"
"The dynamite is sweating...meaning that it's rather unstable. A good sneeze could set it off."
"Let me take a look," came another voice, a woman with a thin wiry build. "I used to be an SFX jockette." She walked to the boxes and looked inside. "They're not that bad. In fact, these could work for us. They don't have any blasting caps or primacord here."
"So how can we use them?"
"Sneeze, maybe?" That remark earned Jackie quite a few sour looks.
"Let's get going," Lara insisted. "Jackie, you drive. The rest of you, leave those things alone. I am quite fond of praying to God, but I am in no hurry to speak to him face-to-face just yet."
At that moment, David was wondering what he was going to say to God if he didn't get out of there before feeding time. David had a feeling that he was going to be rather embarrassed standing in front of the Big Guy.
The discarded dishes and silverware lay where he'd left them and he could feel some of his strength returning, but unless Marla came back to help him, the next meal in that cell was going to be supplied by David instead of to him.
He checked his watch. Only thirty minutes left.
The truck rolled up to the front door. As two of the four guards around the ostentatious double doors walked out to flank the truck, they raised their weapons carefully. As they saw the uniforms of their comrades from the gate, the guns lowered. The truck came to a stop and the driver opened the door, then fell out, a strangled moan coming from his mouth.
The two guards rushed over and called for assistance to the other guards. Before the other two guards could get to the truck, however, they were met by five women, all holding Uzis. The lead woman, Morgan, held a finger in front of her lips and whispered, "Shhhhhhhh."
The sounds of six brief, but powerful impacts came from the driver's side of the truck. Lara jumped out as Jackie came from the other side of the truck. "Feels good not to need to hold back."
"Glad you approve. Gentlemen, drop your weapons, or you'll be shot. Quite often, I'm afraid."
The guards dropped the Uzis.
"Kick them over here."
They did so, sour looks on their faces.
"Congratulations. You get to live tonight. Alright, let's get these boys tied up." Lara claimed two of the Uzis and smiled as she held one in each hand. "Spread out. Hold off on actual use of those guns until absolutely necessary. And for God's sake, be careful."
"Come on!" Morgan whispered and those that had not jumped from the truck before it had reached the front doors now piled out, ready for action. She picked up a radio from one of the tied-up guards. "Collect these from the guards. Split up into groups and give one to the leader of each group. Switch them to channel....sixty-three. Use them only when you need to. If you hear any chatter from a male, switch to the next channel. We don't know which channels the guards use and we don't want to tip our hands just yet."
"Hurry!" Lara hissed. "We don't know how much time we have until we're discovered."
"Go!" Morgan and the others disappeared into the gardens.
Lara turned to Jackie. "Looks like it's just you and me."
Jackie nodded, then went to the door. "Let's go!"
David heard steps coming down the stairs and looked up to see Marla cautiously coming down. She was dressed more sedately, wearing a black blouse and pants with tennis shoes. "David?"
"Still here." David sat up. "I've only got a few minutes left!"
Marla ran to the cell door and opened it quickly, then ran in and started unlocking his leg cuffs.
"Thanks for coming back," David said gratefully.
"You'd better be right about this, David," Marla said in a cold voice, "I still don't know why I'm doing this. We're going to get caught as soon as we leave the dungeon." She pulled open the first cuff.
"Then why are you doing this?" David returned gently.
"I don't know." said Marla. David could see that she was crying softly "God, look at me...I didn't think I had any tears left after being a slave for all these years." She removed the other leg cuff and went to work on the cuffs on David's wrists.
"How long?"
"I don't want to talk about it, not now. I'll tell you about it later, once we get out of here. IF we get out of here." Marla had just opened the cuff on David's right wrist when they both heard a sound from behind the right wall.
The sound of gears grinding.
Marla turned to David, but before she could say a word, the floor below them fell away.
The guards at the security station were a little busy.
They had started their shift by "tasting" the charms of a slave woman that, despite Johnathan's strict rules, had enticed the guards into leaving their screens for an hour. After a heated bout of passion, both the guards were a bit slow getting back to their station.
When they did, they had a surprise waiting for them.
As they walked in, the two guards saw that there was a truck at the gate and the security camera in the dungeon was pointing at the sight of two people dropping into the pool below…and one of them was the slave they had molested!
"Luke! Get on the phone to the Boss! Tell him..." His voice trailed off as he felt a gun barrel poking the back of his neck. Luke turned around to see his friend being held at bay by two strangers, a man and a woman, dressed in the clothes of the missing guards.
"Get away from the phone!" Jackie ordered. Luke backed away slowly as Lara came in, looking at the scanners.
Camera 17, marked "PIRANHA POOL," held her riveted to the screen. "Oh, my God! DAVID!!"
David gritted his teeth as he gripped the length of chain tighter, equally tightening his grip on Marla's wrist. He had just managed to grab her when they fell, holding her only a few inches over the surface of the water. Drops of blood from David's wounds dripped into the water, and he could see small, fast-moving shapes zeroing in on them. "MARLA! HOLD ON!"
"I...can't..." Marla said, nearly dropping into the water when David tightened his grip. "Let me go...I'm only a slave...!"
"Either...we both go..." David ground his teeth against the pain and started pulling Marla up. "...or nobody goes!!"
Marla grabbed David's torn pants. The patch she held ripped away and she fell back. She looked down and saw the water churning under her as the piranha were driven into a feeding frenzy by David's blood.
"CLIMB!" David ordered. Marla looked back up again and started to pull herself up by using David's clothes and body as a ladder. When she grasped the lip of the pit, David began to pull himself back up and out of the pit. The pain in his back and arms reached incandescent levels just as he threw a leg up over the lip of the opening and managed to shove himself up to level, firm stone.
Marla leaned over him, cupping his face. He wasn't moving and his breathing was shallow. "David? David...say something...!"
Lara turned back to the guards, venom dripping from her lips. "TELL ME WHERE THAT ROOM IS RIGHT NOW." She raised the guns and shoved each barrel into each of the guards' mouths, chipping teeth. "OR, BY HARRY, I"LL BLOW YOUR GODDAMNED BRAINS OUT!"
Jackie was taken aback by Lara's impromptu rendering of Linda Blair in THE EXORCIST and wondered just what Lara would be capable of if pushed to the wall...and found himself a little afraid of the concept. And Jackie Chan was not one who scared easily.
"Ah ca tawk wif a gu' i' my mouf..." Luke said.
"Try," Lara said coldly.
"David!! Say something!" Fear crept into Marla's voice.
"...something...." David whispered tiredly.
"David!!" Marla threw her arms around David in relief.
"Ouch...!" David said, wincing. "Careful, Marla...my ribs aren't what they used to be. As in healthy." David got up, nearly falling to his knees, then getting up again.
"I'm sorry! I'm...just glad to know you're alive."
"Me too..." David's voice stopped as he heard gunfire from outside. "Uh oh."
"What's going on? It sounds like we're under siege or something."
"We are...and I think I know by whom. Come on!" David took Marla's hand and they ran up the dungeon stairs.
"Damn!" Lara looked around as she saw the guards breaking into a run, cocking their Uzis. "Looks like our cover's blown!" She picked up the radio from her belt. "Morgan, Carol, report!"
"Heavy resistance...we've taken out twelve of them silently, but one of them got lucky and noticed us."
"Damn!" Lara took cover behind a column as a group of guards opened fire on her and Jackie. "Anyone hurt?"
"Nothing a year in the Bahamas couldn't fix!"
"Right! Hold your positions and just let them come to you."
"No worries there. Out."
Lara turned to Jackie, who was hosing the group of guards, forcing them to take cover. "We've been discovered, Jackie, and we've still got to find David!"
"If he's still alive!" Jackie yelled, taking cover as the guards returned fire. Bullets chipped into the stone and plaster of the columns.
"He's alive, Jackie! He's harder to kill than you think!" Lara turned and ran from her hiding place. When the guards came out to shoot at her, Lara sprayed the area with deadly accuracy, somersaulting into the air and still shooting. All but one of the guards were hit and they fell back. Lara landed and skidded around, facing the last guard.
Faced with twin Uzis, the guard dropped his gun and raised his hands. "All right, all right!! I give up!"
"The devil you say," Lara snarled, jumping at him and Uzi-whipping him with both weapons. The guard dropped to the ground, unable to wake up for hours.
Jackie whistled in appreciation. "Now I KNOW you weren't exaggerating..."
"LARA!" came a voice from above and she and Jackie turned to look up.
Lara's mouth opened in shock as she saw her cousin, Johnathan, spectacles askew, standing at the top of the stairs. "JOHNATHAN?? What in the name of all that's holy are you DOING here???"
"The answer to that, dearest cousin, is rather simple." Johnathan pulled out a 9mm pistol and pointed it right at her. "I'm killing you."
Lara was frozen in shock, her mind unwilling to believe that her own cousin, particularly one she'd always thought of as reserved and unassuming, was about to kill her. Jackie turned as he heard a door open behind him.
Then Lara saw the flash as Johnathan's gun went off and felt the near simultaneous impact to her left side. She dropped to the ground, surprised. She'd been shot before, but there was no pain this time.
Johnathan looked down at Lara with a smile as he pulled the trigger, then his smile curled into a scowl. "DAMN YOU!!" he yelled, firing twice in the direction of the group, then decided that now was as good a time as any to escape. He ran to the other side of the balcony and turned left, moving down the hall at high speed.
Lara looked up to see David cradling Marla in his arms, Jackie standing over the both of them as the gunfire continued outside. "David...what...?"
"Come on, Marla...hold on...dammit, hold on!" He held the woman tight as blood poured out of the hole in her chest.
"...hurts...David...?" Marla looked up at David and raised her hand to his face slowly.
"I'm here, Marla. I'm here." David squeezed his eyes shut, then blinked tears away.
"...couldn't...let you break...your promise..." Marla coughed and a spot of blood flew into the air. She smiled. "David...?"
"Marla, hold on, you're going to be just fine." He looked up at Lara as she examined Marla then looked up at David, shaking her head.
"...free..." Marla whispered, then shuddered. Her eyes closed and her body went limp as what was once Marla left her.
"Marla? Marla?!" David begged.
"David, she's gone." Jackie put a hand on David's shoulder. "There's nothing we can do."
David's head rose to look up once again, and the fire in his eyes threatened to boil the tears on his cheeks. "Oh yes there is," he growled, standing up. "We're getting everyone we can out of this hellhole and then I'm going to break that bastard Johnathan in HALF!"
"No you're not."
David turned to look at Lara. "Don't tell me you're protecting him! Marla took the bullet he shot at you!"
"Don't be absurd, David. You take care of the other prisoners here. I'm going after Johnathan."
"But..."
"Don't 'but' me, Dave. I need you to help the others. Not even Jackie has the experience you have in this situation, and you're in no shape to run after Johnathan. Besides...he's my cousin. This is a family matter now."
David grudgingly nodded. As Lara picked up her Uzis again, he said, "Promise me you'll get that sonuvabitch!"
Lara turned back to look at him. In the smoke and the dim light of the room, Lara Croft looked cold and lethal. "That's a promise, David." Then she ran up the stairs and took the hallway she'd seen Johnathan take.
"All RIGHT. Jackie, come with me. I think I know where the other slaves are kept."
"Be careful, David, you look horrible and there's probably more guards ahead of us," Jackie said cautiously.
David picked up an Uzi and some spare clips from the fallen guards. "GOD, I hope so..." he said, acid dripping from each word. "I feel a pressing need to work out some aggressions."
Stupid bitches, Johnathan thought as he ran out to the balcony, then thumbed the hidden switch behind the vase on his left. Why must women like Lara Croft always be the banes of my existence?? Why can't they just stay in their proper places, serve when they're supposed to and DIE when they're supposed to?? He felt the balcony lower to the ground. Off in the distance, just under a mile away, he saw his private heliport and the helicopter waiting there. As he saw the blur of the rotors in the dim light, he smiled. All I need to do is get to England first...from there, I can have all the resources I need to make sure that Lara Croft never lives to tell her side of the...
His thoughts trailed off as he saw a fast-moving trail of smoke fly towards the helicopter and a blinding flash as his private ride blew into a million pieces. "Bloody...HELL!" he exclaimed, turning back to the house and seeing a figure in a window with a large tube in his hands.
David leaned into view and waved to Johnathan as Jackie dropped the Stinger missile launcher. "HI, JOHNNY! NICE ARMORY YOU'VE GOT UP HERE! BE A REAL SHAME IF ANYTHING HAPPENED TO IT...!!!"
"THAT was fun!" Jackie said in awe. "So that's what firing a real missile launcher is like. You're right, David, it is a lot different from a movie prop."
"BASTARDS!"
Johnathan yelled, then realized that he had bigger problems than simply losing
a fifty-million-dollar arms shipment. He caught a glimpse of Lara Croft running after him, and at that point
in his life, Johnathan was more worried about his older cousin that he ever was
about a few militia skinhead groups. His mind raced as he looked for a way out, then saw a truck off to his
right. Johnathan smiled as he made for
the truck. That cunt may be able to
out-shoot me, but she can't run faster than a truck!
Lara saw Johnathan turn to his right. Where the hell is HE going? she asked herself, then saw the truck parked out in front of the house. She grabbed the radio and barked, "Morgan! Did you leave the keys in the blasted truck??"
"Yes, why?"
"Damn!!" Lara threw away the radio in frustration and churned her legs faster.
Johnathan got to the truck and smiled, turning the ignition key. The truck rumbled as it turned over, then caught. Fortune smiles, he thought, backing up the truck and throwing it into first gear.
Lara came up behind the truck as Johnathan shifted into second, sweat beading on her as she pushed her tired muscles more demandingly. At that moment, she didn't care about anything except making Johnathan pay, and pay dearly, for what he'd done.
BUT
TO DO THAT, I'VE GOT TO CATCH THAT BLASTED TRUCK!!
Johnathan shifted into third and the truck moved away from Lara with a burst of speed.
NO!! Lara mentally screamed and jumped for the tailgate, arms outstretched...
And missed.
David and Jackie found the slave pens, but what they found in the pens made them want to retch. The cells nearest the door were filled with attractive women of all races and ages. Jackie saw the blank looks of a group of thirteen- and fourteen-year olds and grimaced, cursing in Chinese.
David found the "training pens" and stopped. Inside were thirty women of varying ages strapped into some sort of harness that kept them trapped and their bodies open to whomever wanted to exercise their twisted fantasies on them. Many had the look of the terminally drugged and some even looked up at David with a lecherous smile as he approached. "...want some, handsome...treat you right..." they murmured. As David saw one smiling with missing teeth, he staggered to a wall, leaned against it, and threw up.
Jackie had seen some serious situations before in Hong Kong, but even HE was feeling sick. The smell of yesterday's lust and urine did little to help. "Jesus...!!" he said in horror.
"No carpenter's son had anything to do with this...try the other direction..." David said queasily. "Come on. Let's get these women out of this pit."
And the sound of men promising freedom, the trance for most of the women broke as they realized that David and Jackie weren't down in the slave pens for the same reasons as their other "visitors'. Many started to cry, beg and plead, even as their cells were unlocked and their shackles broken. Few wore anything, and Jackie had to scramble to get some blankets and clothes for them from some of the adjoining rooms. As he helped the women cover themselves, Jackie took great pleasure in tossing the provocative clothes and lingerie into a pile, then dousing them with oil from one of the oil lanterns and setting them ablaze. "David, how are we going to get all these people out of here?"
"Call the authorities."
"Most of them are probably paid off."
David frowned. "Never a good cop around when you need one. Alright, Jackie, go back to the guards' station one floor up. Radio to anyone with a cargo plane or anything we can use."
"I know a couple of people in Florida that does large charter planes. They may even have a passenger plane or two."
"Call 'em. Get them over here."
"It'll take a few hours."
"Do it. Tell them we've got free jet fuel over here they can use for the return trip. That'll get their attention."
"Where do I tell them to land?"
"There's an airstrip out there somewhere, otherwise they would need some alternate way of transporting all their loot. Find it."
"If it's out there, I'll find it." Jackie ran to the door, then turned. "Where do I tell them to land?"
"Tell them to look for the burning mansion on the coast," David replied. The women cheered.
"Finally!" Johnathan shifted into fourth gear. "Now all I have to do is take care of my alibi and get rid of Lara and I'm home free."
"Sorry to disappoint, DEAR cousin," came a female voice from behind him, "but I think you might have some difficulty on both counts."
Johnathan turned and exclaimed in disbelief, "LARA!"
Lara was hanging off the tarpaulin cover of the truck, her legs still dirty from the rough ride she'd taken when she'd missed the tailgate, but grabbed the bumper instead. After pulling herself up, Lara had noted the bruises and scrapes on her leg, but put them aside. "Johnathan, give it up! There's nowhere you can go that I won't find and catch you!"
"Go to HELL, 'dear cousin'!" Johnathan steered the truck against the right side of the road, forcing the side of the truck against the foliage of the trees. After a few seconds, he pulled away and looked at the rear-view mirror on the right side.
Lara was gone.
Jackie went back to the hangar. It didn't take him long to see the handiwork of the stuntmen who stayed behind; there was a small pile of moaning bodies trussed up with duct tape right behind the main doors. As he went inside, he saw a smashed guardhouse and lots of brass bullet casings on the floor. It didn't take much for Jackie to realize that the guards had been firing in all directions. He caught some movement out of the corner of one eye and spun around to see Asagi spring down from his hiding place on top of one of the forklifts.
"From the look of you, Jackie, you've been busy."
"Our work isn't over yet. We've got to find where the airstrip is. David thought it might have been camouflaged."
"He wasn't kidding. I discovered this when I was turning on the lights." Asagi led Jackie over to a large switch. "I haven't found out what THIS switch does, but I don't think it's a self-destruct trigger. Want to do the honors?"
Jackie reached up and pulled the large switch down. There was a flash as the metal contacts met, then a shuddering sensation from the floor. The two stuntmen ran outside to see the gardens pulling aside, parting to reveal a length of concrete.
"Now I know how Moses felt," Jackie quipped as he saw a long runway rise into place. Asagi laughed, then heard a CRUMP and turned to see explosions rocketing out of the windows of the mansion, starting from below and spiraling up the floors.
"Maybe it WAS a self-destruct trigger," Asagi breathed in awe as he watched the explosions systematically decimating the structure.
"No...I think it's David getting some resentments out on the house. See if you can contact the others, get them over here as fast as you can." Jackie looked up at the Boeing 777 parked in the middle of the hangar. "And see if any of them know how to fly this thing. From what I saw, we're going to need all the transportation we can get. Since the owner won't be claiming it, I can use it to pay off a couple of pilots in Florida. They should be happy to trade some airlifting for some free jet fuel and a free passenger plane, don't you think?" Jackie winked.
"Jackie...you're having far too much fun. By the way, what is your publicist going to say when he finds out that you've been 'freelancing'?"
"What makes you think I'm going to tell him? I may be crazy, Asagi...but I am not stupid. I'll just tell him I took a short vacation."
Asagi looked at the burning mansion. "SOME vacation, Jackie."
"Yeah, I liked it, too."
Johnathan laughed as he stepped on the gas. "Looks like you're not nearly as tough as you say you are, Lara Croft."
Then the windshield spiderwebbed as a length of chain smashed into the safety glass.
Johnathan swore as he swerved, but Lara was on the top, not the side. She hauled back with the heavy chain she'd taken from the back of the truck and nailed the windshield again, caving it in. Johnathan felt the flying glass and panicked, running the truck to the right again and taking a road leading down to the beach by mistake.
As soon as Lara saw the beach coming up, she recalled what a speeding truck would do when it met loose, dry sand. She also recalled the truck's cargo. "Ta ta, cousin! I'm sorry to hear that you won't be able to make it to my next birthday party!!" With that, she leaped off the roof of the cab into the waiting branches of a tree, then slid to the ground and watched the truck barrel on.
Johnathan blinked through the rush of air and glass, trying to see and dearly wishing he hadn't switched from his usual glasses to contact lenses the night before. He barely saw the expanse of sand coming up at him, but when he did, it was too late to turn.
"YAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!" he screamed as the truck jumped the curb, flying into the air for an impressive twenty feet, then landing hard as the front bumper met the sand and stopped the vehicle dead in its flight. Johnathan was hurled through the broken windshield and landed hard, breaking his neck and paralyzing him irrevocably.
However, he stayed alive long enough to see the truck roll over on top of him and feel the heat of the explosion as over fifty sticks of sweating TNT blew both him and the truck to small bits.
As it turned out, though, he should've been glad for the excess heat before he died. Considering where he was headed, it was only fair that he should get properly prepared for the conditions of where he would be spending the rest of eternity.
Lara watched the explosion with a great sense of satisfaction, but she couldn't help but feel a little sorry for Johnathan, wondering what sort of life he must've had to let his perceptions of the world get so twisted. But it didn't last long. As the fire baked the sand into dirty glass, Lara Croft knew that Johnathan was never forced into becoming what he was. He chose his own path, she reminded herself.
Then she remembered David, Jackie and the others, and turned her back on the carnage to travel the long miles back to the mansion.
EPILOGUE
"OUCH!" The cry echoed through Lara Croft's home.
"Lara, you big baby, will you settle down!" David sighed as he changed the dressing on Lara's legs, applying some antibiotics and disinfectant ointment. "If I don't apply this stuff, your legs aren't going to be healed in time for your lecture at Oxford. Now, do you want to stand up in front of all those people looking like you borrowed a mummy's legs? Not the image you want to project while lecturing on Ancient Nippon."
"Nag. OUCH! David Connors, you did that on purpose!"
"Look, it's either this or the iodine. The burning, stinging iodine."
"Look, just do something to take my mind off this," Lara said irritably.
"Alright. I just got a call from Jackie's publicist. The rest of the movie is going well, and it looks like OPERATION CONDOR is going to pull in some big bucks. He also says that Jackie wanted to say, 'I wish I could've been able to use most of the other combat scenes.' Jackie's publicist didn't know what that meant."
"Did you tell him?" Lara managed a smile.
"What, that Jackie risked his life and his career for people he barely knew? That wouldn't do much for the guy's heart, you know."
"Who, Jackie?"
"No, the publicist." David grinned.
"How are the others?"
"Well, the women we found in the slave pits are being reunited with their loved ones. It's not completely good news; some of the parents and relatives can't deal with the reality of what happened or what the women went through. Some of the women are being shunned by their friends and relatives, as if it were their fault they got kidnapped and put into slavery. However, I put a call in to some reporters I know in New York. They say they'll run the story, leaving our names out of it, of course."
"Of course." Lara winced as she felt the gauze reapplied.
"They say that the stories might get enough media attention that others will contribute money to help these discarded women get on their feet again. I gave them an account number they can use for the fund."
"Really? One of my accounts?"
"Whaddya think I am? One of mine!" David looked hurt, but then, Lara had taped up and bound up his own injuries only minutes before. "I even put in some money to start it off."
"Why, Dave, you softy, you. I'll put in some, myself. What about our 'partners in crime'?"
"It's a good thing the Stuntpeople's Union of Hollywood is a good sport about fourteen of their best stuntwomen put in the hospital with REAL gunshot wounds. Otherwise, we'd have a billion lawsuits on our hands. The ladies are doing just fine, in fact, I've got calls from eight of them asking to join us the next time we go on an expedition, Jackie included. They're thrilled."
"Oh my. We'll have an entourage."
"Don't get me started on that." David secured the bandages. "There. You're done."
"Good. Any more of that torture and I'd be crippled." Lara took her crutches in hand and raised herself up.
David sobered a little. "Talk to your dad yet about Johnathan?"
"No."
"You're going to have to tell him sometime."
Lara didn't answer. She walked to the window and looked out at the gardens. "I'm not looking forward to this, you know."
"Yeah, I can tell. It's all going to come out sooner or later."
"He's an old man, Dave. The shock could kill him."
"That's up to God, Lara. YOU have to do the right thing...and you know it."
Lara sighed. "I know. David?"
"Yeah?"
"Will you...will you come with me when I tell him? If nothing else, for moral support?"
"You already know the answer to that."
Lara turned to David. "You've given up a lot for me, David. Your business, your home..."
"My hormones," David added jokingly.
"I just keep asking myself, David...when does Cinderella's carriage turn back into a pumpkin? When are you going to leave me?"
David stared at her. "Lara, I'm not going anywhere. The only way I'm leaving is if you tell me to leave." He turned back to the sunset in the graying sky. "And I haven't heard you say that yet."
"And you won't, David."
"Things change, Lara."
"Yes, Dave, they do." Lara leaned closer and put an arm around David, taking care not to squeeze his bruised ribs. "But sometimes, despite all odds, they improve and get better. Maybe we weren't the starry-eyed people we were when we first met, but I'd like to think that we're a little wiser now...and a little closer."
David didn't answer, but Lara saw his smile growing in the fading light.