Chapter 7: Blood Ties part 3

I don't own anything. Resident Evil belongs to Capcom and Tomb Raider belongs to Core Design, Crystal Dynamics, and I think Square Enix. The only thing I own is the changes made to the stories of the Tomb Raider games/comics and Resident Evil games/comics/CG movies, the Government branch S.P.E.L.L., the person that has taken over Kathrine Warren's life, and Rose Warren. This story also will be bloody, violent, and have cursing. It's rated T for Teen.

Country: United Kingdom, State: England, City: Surrey, Place: Croft Manor, Area: Study, Month: November, Day: Thursday 16th, Year: 2000, Time: 21:37 BST…

Lara walked through the upper door and turned to the study door. She took a breath to calm her nerves as she walked into the room. Upon entering another memory came to the forefront of her mind as she walked toward the safe.

"Dad, what do you keep in there?" Young Lara had asked curiously.

"Nothing too important, Lara." Her father had assured her. "Estate business and such."

"If it's not important, then why bother putting it in a safe?" Lara had asked her father.

Her father had chuckled. "I should know better than to try and pull one over on you." He sighed. "There is something important in here…and it's for you, should you need it someday."

Lara sighed now as she stood before the safe. Paper with the code in hand. "Well, let's hope you came through for me, dad…" She lifted her finger to the number pad. "Okay, found all the clues…let's see if I can figure this out…"

She pushed 5, 4, and 9. The safe clicked and she was able to open it.

"That worked!" She smiled and pulled the safe open.

Inside she found a clay imprint of her hand from childhood. She smiled at it. It was nice to know her father felt this was important enough to lock up. But it wasn't what she was looking for. She did find another cassette tape. Another swap and she listened to her father's words.

"I am numb...it is taking all my willpower to hold back the overwhelming grief.

Amelia's plane...crashed in the mountains. She died alone in the snow, waiting for me to find her and Lara. Oh god, not her, not now! I cannot accept it.

Life without her is too painful to imagine. I know what must be done...and I am resolved. I am going to bring her back. Perhaps this is why I am here. Perhaps this is fate - a test of my faith in the truth I've sought for so long.

Roth will fight me on this, but...I can't face Lara...I can't look into her eyes unless I try- I must try to bring Amelia back. The Monks are preparing the Elixir now...and then we will see if all my years of hunting this truth was for nought."

"Dad...oh no. What did you do?" Lara breathed, but then rewound the tape and played it again. "What do you mean 'and me'? I wasn't there. Right?" She wondered, trying to understand this new information.

She put it away and moved an unpublished manuscript for a book her father had been writing. She knew that wasn't going to help.

"Damn…this isn't it either." She huffed. "I was certain there had to be a will in here." She sighed then spotted one final paper. "Wait…what's this?"

She picked it up and found this folded paper was seemingly blank. She sighed then it hit her. The last two times this happened. What her father did to make her mother feel at home. What he had done for her birthday.

"Dad must have left this for me! It has to be important!" She breathed then took off for the library.

She nearly threw herself off the ladder before running to the fireplace. She lifted the paper, begging for this to work. Sure, enough there it was. The invisible ink from her birthday map.

"A hidden message!" She cheered brightly then flipped it around seeing lines. "What are these strange marks? They have to be some kind of clue…"

She then noted the folds. Carefully she turned the paper so that the line connected in an optical illusion. She saw they looked like hieroglyphs. She turned the paper back and looked at the map. It looked like the wine cellar. She folded it up and ran for said cellar. Once there she looked at the map and saw one of the wine shelves was circled.

She walked to that shelf, the second one from the basement's entrance. She pushed it aside and saw it had hidden another number pad. She kneeled and pulled the paper again. The childhood simplified glyphs staring at her. She understood then. The numbers they corresponded with. They were 142, the 14th of February. Her birthday was the code. She jolted as a brick wall groaned and rumbled on the northeast side of the cellar. The wall slid inward then to the side, revealing a hidden hallway and lights flickered on, powered on some other source than the main manor.

"That worked!" She smiled and walked over tucking the clue into her back pocket

She stepped inside as light after light flickered on. She nodded as she knew she was right, clearly this section was connected to a different power source. The secret door closed. She flipped a nearby switch and yanked her hand back. She had been shocked as it short circuited. Letting her know that not everything was well preserved.

"Damn…" She hissed shaking her hand. "Locked in. I'll have to have this fixed too. I hope I'm not trapped in here." She took out her cellphone and frowned. "I doubt a signal could get out for help." She slipped the phone back into her pocket as she turned and started following the path of lights, more lights turning on as she walked. It was both scary and nice to not need her torch. "Hmmm… some kind of motion sensor?"

'Did dad build all this just to keep his research safe?' She wondered as she walked.

At the end, she found a doorway and stepped into the hidden research room. The lights came on and it was like stepping into the acarological version of the Batcave, minus the bats hanging out over head. Tables full of artifacts, shelves of file boxes and books. Papers everywhere. Tools for analyzing things. Everything in here was her father's, everything in here could help her in so many digs. Could maybe even help Kat piece together her past life. Could help Sam with her powers. Hope. That's what this room gave her.

She walked to one of the tables and found the missing renovation page from the electrical wiring of the house. She understood why this was taken. It was to help her father build this room. This secret base of operations. But it also showed a hidden crypt somewhere in the house. On another table she found yet another tape. She frowned at the label. "The Ritual".

"It's over. I have done all that I could, and my Amelia is still cold and dead. Roth first scowled at my designs, then he pleaded with me not to go through with the ritual. Not because he feared it might work, but because he feared what I might do when it failed.

And it has failed, there is no doubt in that. I prepared everything according to my research. When I dropped the stone into the elixir and held it to her lips, I thought, for the barest moment, that it had worked. The hour was midnight, and my pocket watch stopped inexplicably...there was a charge in the air, like the moment before a lightning strike.

For a heartbeat, I imagined that my life was being drawn from me as one empties a glass, in order to be poured back into Amelia. I would have welcomed death if the last thing I saw were her eyes, clear and alive again.

But the moment passed. Amelia is still dead, and I was no Orpheus. We will return to the manor and lay her to rest. I own her that much."

"Oh Dad...part of me wishes you had succeeded." Lara whispered and put the tape player away. "You brought her home. She's here…somewhere."

She walked away from the table and found another letter. One form her uncle. She was a bit shocked by how angered his handwriting looked. She lifted it and read it.

Richard,

I tried to see you in person, last week, but your manservant hustled me away like some common tout peddling silverware. He told me you are heartbroken, and you are not yet ready to see visitors. He tells me you blame yourself for her loss. Well, to that I say: You had damn well better.

I hope it hurts. I hope every moment of your life from this day forward is a ringing echo of loss. I hope you live just long enough to feel that pain grow when you hoped it would diminish, because you earned it. You stole Amelia from us. You ruined her reputation and poisoned her mind with a fantasy for children. In the end, you might as well have chocked the life from her with your own hands.

Do not contact me again, ever, but you must make arrangements for the future of your daughter. The trauma she supposedly witnessed must be looked into and treated accordingly. Have you considered perhaps it would be better if you followed Amelia sooner rather than later? As Lara's legal guardian, perhaps I could erase some of the damage you've already done to the poor girl. If not, I will do everything in my power to see to it that the Croft name is forgotten.

Lara deserves better than you. So did Amelia, and so do we all.

Atlas.

Lara was both angry and confused. "Uncle Atlas won't stop until the Croft name is ruined. I have to find a way to get him out of my life." She shook her head, feeling a small headache starting. "But what is he talking about? What trauma?"

She looked to another table and spotted the crowbar. She plucked it up looking it over as she tried pushing the thoughts away. She could defiantly use this. She looked around and saw another letter on some boxes. When she picked it up, she saw the ware on it. It had been opened and folded again and again. But she saw who it was from she felt cold suddenly. Her mother, to her father. Her mother's last words, to him.

My love,

It is silent. So peacefully silent now. Even after the madness and chaos of the crash, I can't help but still wonder at the beauty of these mountains. I understand the magic that drew you here. Please know that...I feel no pain in this moment, that I kept our girl safe. Only immense sadness. Sadness that I couldn't see your smiling face once more...that I'll never meet the wonderful woman that our daughter will become.

There is so much to say, but I'm tired. The sun is setting. The cold of night will overwhelm me. I know I will fall asleep soon, and likely never again awaken in this world. I am using the last of my heat to keep Lara warm. I'm...scared, Richard. What lies beyond? You know I've always struggled with faith. So...I'm holding on to yours for now. I'm holding on as best I can, my love. Become the father Lara deserves. Know that I will live on in her.

Lara shook. She had to stop and start. This…this was painful to read. She leaned on one of the metal tables, trying to push the tears down. If this hurt her like her chest being ripped open, how bad was it for her father?

"I can't imagine what Dad felt reading this letter from Mum. I can barely read it without the grief overwhelming me. I hope he came to eventually see Amelia in me. She was brave to face death." She whispered to herself. "But…she didn't face death alone…"

She looked at it again, gently putting it down. She could remember being cold. She remembered lights. She remembered yells. She remembered fear. She remembered warmth. Nothing else when she read this. Why did she remember this? What did this mean? She was home when her mother's plane crashed. Wasn't she? Everyone said she was home. No one told her otherwise…

Was this confusion she was feeling what Kat had felt? When she realized she was reborn in a world of fiction? When she started remembering her Valkyrie days? Or when she started to forget things?

"God, what have I forgotten?" Lara asked the air.

She put the letter down and searched the room again, trying to distract herself. She found another tape from her father. Another swap, she gave a listen.

"The renovations are proceeding in secret. The work crew Roth hired for the job have been paid handsomely to keep the details of the job out of the records, so I'm fairly confident no word will get out about what I'm doing.

I've been careless with presenting my findings - attracting all the wrong sorts of attention. Roth thinks I'm being paranoid by building this secret vault, but I know I'm being watched. My work is too important...and potentially too dangerous...it can't fall into the wrong hands.

I need a secure place to keep it all safe."

"Dad must have seemed paranoid to Roth. But I understand why he built this vault." She muttered sniffing as she put the tape away.

She also found a switch in the room. Flipping it had gasped as a black light turned on and the main lights turned off. Black light ink lit up, glowing in the blue tones.

"Amazing…" She breathed. "Even in here dad went out of his way to hide his findings."

She also saw a sun shaped compass plaque. She walked over, pulling it from the back wall.

"'This is the Croft Universe…our knowledge is to the east, our respite is to the west, our future is to the south, and our past to the north.'" Lara read from it. "Our past is to the north…Could there be something else beneath the Manor?"

She looked to the wall that the plaque covered. A lot of cracks were there. She knocked on the wall, pressing her ear to it. Hollow? She backed up and raised her barrowed crowbar. She swung it into the wall, breaking open some of the cracks. She then swung again, breaking off a huge chunk. She could see darkness and bits of wood beams shoring up a tunnel? This had to be a secret path. She hit one more time to hook the curve of the bar into the side of the hole she had started and pulled with a yell. Part of the wall fell open, giving her a thin open path into the darkness.

She side stepped into this new room, clicking her torch on. She looked around, she felt like she had broken into the other side of the basement. She walked to the locker in front of her and pulled it open with the crowbar. She needed to find her mother and father's wills. She needed to find every answer she could. This had to help her trigger her memories of what happened, a childhood trauma that she locked away.

With a whining groan, the doors popped off their rusted hinges. Inside on a shelf was a letter. She picked it up. It was an old letter from her younger self to her father.

Hi Dad!

So...I know I only just returned to school, but when can I come out to the dig site again? It's just so boring here! We're doing all the stuff I already read last summer. I always end up staring out the window and thinking about our expeditions. And then I'm yelled at for daydreaming.

I promise I'll be good and not disturb you and just work wherever you tell me. I just miss it, dad... and I miss you.

The nightmares aren't as bad when your home…

Lara closed her eyes thinking hard. "I don't remember writing this, and I don't remember the nightmares I clearly mentioned...I do remember being bored in school though." She nodded slowly before putting it back.

She looked around and saw only a ladder on the back wall. She was surprised to see that it led her back to the library. From there, she dashed round back to the wine cellar. She ran to the lockers in there and got to work prying them open. She ripped the first open to find it empty. The next one however, had a letter. It appeared to be more of a diary entry from Winston.

Lord Croft is resolved to seal the West Wing of the manor. I've tried to talk sense into him, but he will not be swayed. And to make matters worse, I believe his experiences in Tibet have only further fueled the fire of his obsession. He's now up at all hours in his study, researching god knows what.

And poor Lara...she is so confused. Too young to understand the tragedy that has befallen this great house. She was there and she remembers nothing. Even the nightmares are fading.

My dearest hope is that Lord Croft will emerge from his grief and embrace fatherhood and the love of his daughter. But I fear he may give in to his obsessive nature...that which Lady Amelia tempered in him so well.

In any case, I will be a rock for young Lara. She will never sense tragedy and sorrow in me - only the love and support she deserves.

"Winston was my rock...always had a smile on his face, never letting on that something was wrong." She sighed as she put it down. "He knew what happened to me and kept it from me. Then again…I guess I never asked."

She paused as she pulled out the plaque she'd found. Then she recognized it. The compass on the floor of the foyer. This looked just like the indentation. With a gasp she ran for it. Jumping upstairs, hugging walls as she turned corners. Once she was in the room, she walked slowly over to it, suddenly doubting her thought process. She walked around so her back was to the front doors. She put the plaque into place, then looked around.

"Our knowledge is to the east, our respite to the west, our future is to the south, our past is to the north." She quoted. "The library is on the east side of the house, so is the study and that secret room." She said as she looked to the east of the hall. "Mum's room, other bedrooms, and recreation rooms are to the west side of the house." She muttered as she looked to the west wing of the house. "Then the front doors are behind me to the south…" She looked behind her. "So…the past is…" She looked slowly to the stairs. "There…"

She climbed the stairs to the center landing, where the west and east stairs met in the middle. The wall before her was bare. It seemed inconspicuous. She walked closer and ran a hand over it. It felt like the other walls of the house. Knocking, however, she heard the same hollow sound as the wall that linked the secret room to the basement.

She raised her crowbar and swung at the wall. A hole was made about the size of her fist, plaster and bricks were broken away in a cloud of dust and drywall. The sound of the stones hitting stairs on the other side drove her on. She swung again, putting more of her body weight into it. This time the hole was as big as her chest and once the dust cleared she could see inside. She needed to get through, she just knew this was the right path. She sank the crowbar into the wall and kicked at the lower half of the wall as she pulled with the hook of the crowbar. This double action sent ruble from the broken wall falling into the darkness in front of her and pulling bits of drywall out onto the floor at her feet. Letting the dust settle she could see that she had made a large enough opening to this latest in a long line of secrets.

She slipped through the hole and clicked her torch back on. Moving down the stairs she noticed that the walls and the stairs were made of red and gray bricks. The walls had indentations with Candle sticks in them, she didn't want to light them as she was not so sure of the ventilation of this place. At the bottom she stepped onto a dirt floor. She moved forward slowly, taking note of the roots from trees that were sticking down from the roof and the walls where they had pushed through cracks and gapes in the bricks. She jumped when a drop of cold water splashed on her head. She could see the moisture coating the walls. She reasoned that she must be outside of the Manor. Up ahead she could see what might be a balcony and tall statue of an angel.

"Incredible…" She breathed once she got closer. "This crypt was here all along."

She saw a black glint to the left of this entry to the crypt. There was a niche where someone could place an urn of ashes or flower vases. But the black glint she saw was another tape. She picked it up and put it in the tape player, partly hoping this was the last as she was out of pockets.

"I expected a sort of crushing finality to grip me when we returned to the manor, to lay Amelia to rest. Indeed, once the last of my funereal duties were performed, I fully believed that I would crumple to the ground next to her and expire, not from grief, but succumbing to the terrible exhaustion of the last few weeks.

Instead, as the mausoleum stone slid into place, I felt...a sort of peace and energy, one that I confess caught me entirely off guard. This was not the terminus of our story, and I was fool to think so. Her body may be gone, but her spirit still resides here, in the manor, in me, in Lara. Her soul is forever twined with mine, and death is just...a momentary interruption. I walked out of that cold quiet into a sunlight that burned my eyes, and I have ever been more sure.

Death is not the end, and there is work yet to do."

"This is where it all started...our family obsession. Well, now it's time for me to complete our work." Lara said as she backed up.

She turned to the crypt and walked down the stone steps into the stone room, she was surprised to see several torches lit in sconces around the area on most of the pillars lining the walls. This room that had been hidden from her was the family crypt. This was why there were no tombstones on the grounds, though there was plenty of room. The walls had plaques of her long dead family members and ancestors. Vases lined them for flowers or maybe even offerings to her family for the afterlife.

Stepping to the floor of the room, she stared at the stone sarcophagus in the center of the room. The large statue of the angel standing guard over the family but mostly of this sarcophagus. It looked like a woman rested on top, her head resting on a pillow, a sheet over her legs. Behind it was the statue of an angel, ever watchful of the family.

"My god…" Lara breathed staring at the sarcophagus. "Can it be? Dad, you did bring her home..."

She walked toward a pedestal that was alongside of the sarcophagus. On it rested an envelope, she carefully opened it and gasped at what it was. With a hand to her lips she blinked to clear the tears from her eyes as she read the letter over.

My Dearest Lara,

It is difficult to write this, knowing these may only ever be words on a page to you. I wonder if you will remember my voice. Will you remember the way we used to play and laugh? Will you remember me comforting you when you were sad or scared?

Know that I'm still with you Lara...my energy, my love, it's within you. It always will be.

Use that energy to pursue your passions in life. Never let others determine your journey. You become who you are through your choices, through the love you give and promises you keep.

I hope you are happy, that you are loved and successful in whatever it is you choose to do. I am proud of you, my darling.

Remember me.

With all my love, your mother.

"I can't believe this..." Lara gasped as tears ran from her eyes freely. "Oh Mum...I am happy. I am loved. I'll always remember." She swore to the sarcophagus.

Swearing to her mother as she leaned on it. Crying for her at her grave for the first time. Sinking to the floor and clutching the letter that contained her mother's last words to her chest. She finally was able to feel the grief for losing her mother and for the time they would have shared that was forever stolen from her.

Country: United Kingdom, State: England, City: Surrey, Place: Croft Manor, Area: Grand Hall, Month: November, Day: Saturday 18th, Year: 2000, Time: 12:12 BST…

Lara sighed with a yawn as she came down the stairs. The carpets had been replaced, clean and not ragged or patchy. Replicas of the old ones. Fixed up couch and love seats by the now cleaned-up fireplace. New decorations on the coffee table. She frowned though. There was something on the floor by the door.

"Hmm, what's this?" She asked as she walked over and kneeled, picking it up. "A letter…" She looked at it then opened it.

Lara,

I have received the notarized affidavit confirming Amelia's grave and the discovery of the burial crypt within the Manor premises. While I can't fathom why your father would hide your mother's fate from her own family, I cannot deny that any legal claims I may have had on the estate are now null and void.

Croft Manor and the remainder of your father's assets are now yours in perpetuity, to do with as you wish.

If there comes a time when you require assistance in managing the estate, I hope you will consider contacting me to retain my services.

Sincerely,

Your Uncle

"I've been so focused on defying my uncle, of fighting to keep his hands off this Manor, that I never realized how much this place actually means to me." She sighed as she looked around the grand hall that had been cleaned up, since she walked in a week ago. No longer was there dirt or leaves on the floor. "Since I've been here, I can feel the presence of my mother and father. I sense the entire history of my family and the deep roots we have in this place." She began walking up the stairs. "I want to honor my parents…I want to honor all of my ancestors. The Croft Family maybe all but destroyed, but I will make our name and our home great again." She swore as she walked around the house, happier at the cleanup job she'd done so far and taking note of what to do next.

After all. She would have visitors coming soon…