Chapter 4: Secrets
"Oh my God. This must be a dream, an illusion of some sort." But it wasn't, the face staring back at Lara from the mirror was genuine. A wolf's face, with a small glint of humanity in its configuration. Lara raised her hand up to her mouth, only to find a strange sort of paw in its place. It was shaped like a human hand, but was covered in fur and had pads on the fingers and palm. What shocked her most, though, were the menacing claws that accompanied each fingertip. She stepped back from the mirror and fell back on the floor. A sharpshooting pain rocked her as she realized that she had landed on something foreign to her, a tail. Now officially scared stiff, Lara slowly raised herself to her newly configured feet.
"Excuse me, is anyone in there? We heard screaming!"She heard someone yell from the other side of the locked bathroom door.
Oh no! I can't let anyone see me like this! She screamed in her head as she picked up and threw away the remnants of her new dress, so as to leave no evidence, and then felt a sort of secondary instinct kick in. She ran towards a vent on the ceiling clumsily, tore the cover off, and began to crawl through the ventilation system just as the group outside managed to break the door down.
"Are you sure you heard someone in here?" Mr. Dumonds asked the man.
"Of course I'm sure. It sounded like someone was being tortured in here!"
"Well I don't see anyone, so everyone can just calm down and go back to the party." Mr. Dumonds reassured as everyone cleared the bathroom. After they were gone, he turned his attention to what appeared to be a torn off vent cover and looked up to see the open shaft on the ceiling. "I knew Lara didn't want to be here, but I didn't think she would be that desperate."
The forest, 2 miles from Croft Manor
Lara was running like she never had before, at speeds that she didn't realize she was going. She began to slow as the situation she was in began to hit her again. She was a monster, a hideous creature straight from a horror movie. She couldn't go back home, not like this.
I want to be me again, not this hideous thing! She buried her lupine face in her hands and cried softly, but soon stopped when she felt the cold breeze on her skin. She looked at her hands and laughed gleefully at the discovery that they were normal again. She then felt her face, also finding it back to normal. She got up and made her way back to Croft Manor, which now seemed like an eternity away.
Morning, Lara's Bedroom
Lara slowly opened her eyes to find herself in her room. Though her memories of the night before were blurry, possibly from her exhaustion, she made out a few bits and pieces, including her transformation. She giggled at herself, considering it another weird dream, until she looked under the covers.
Good Lord! She was nude, something she would never ordinarily be, especially when asleep, which meant... "It was real. It was all real. I really became a....a...." Before she could finish that statement, she heard Winston's voice on the other side of the door.
"Lady Croft, are you in there?" She immediately ran into her closet and threw on some clothes. Winston slowly entered the room. "Lady Croft!"
"I'm in here Winston!"
"Oh thank goodness. We've been worried sick. When you didn't call for me to come get you we'd thought something had happened to you."
"Well I....just decided that I'd had enough of the gala and decided to come back. I apologize for not telling you I was home but I was so exhausted that I just fell asleep." She lied as she walked out of her closet with a basic t-shirt and sweatpants on.
"That's a new look for you Lady Croft." She knew that Winston was suspicious, so she decided to change the subject.
"Again, I'm sorry for not informing you of my plans. I didn't mean to make you worry."
"No apology needed, now if you'll excuse me, I must prepare breakfast." With that, he left, closing the door behind him. Lara mentally slapped herself for lying to him. She hated lying, but no one could ever find out what happened. She walked over to the mirror and surveyed herself. Though the clothes she was in weren't very flattering, she saw that everything else was in order. Millions of questions still rocked her mind. How did this happen? Why did it happen? Why did she become a monster. Her mind flashed back to the reflection she saw last night, realizing that although she looked remarkably different than usual, she could still somehow tell that it was her face and that it didn't exactly look freakish or horrifying, in fact she classified it as a sort of exotic sort of beauty. She snapped out of that thought after hearing Alister yell for her from downstairs. She decided to change her clothes to something a little more 'her' so the boys wouldn't get too suspicious.
When she got down the stairs, she saw Zip and Alister in the computer area. Alister motioned for Lara to come look at something.
"You found something?"
"Indeed I did. The ruins you found the stone in may have been built by a previously believed mythical tribe known as the Jolegayans. Legend says that the tribe was extremely small but immensely brutal military strategists. Some even attribute them to the disappearance of the inhabitants of Machu Picchu."
"I've never heard of them before."
"That's because barely anything is known about them. The only known artifacts that hint at their existence is an ancient parchment with a description of a Jolegayan military formation and the stone you found."
"What exactly is the stone?"
"From what I can get, the stone supposedly holds some sort of mystical meaning to them. Though it doesn't say exactly what, it does say that after building the temple to house it, they killed the ones that designed it so no one could ever get to the stone."
I wonder if....NO, it couldn't be! "Are you sure it doesn't say what exactly the stone is?"
"I'm afraid so, though it must have scared them quite a bit to go to such lengths to keep it hidden."
Of course! This all started after I touched the stone. That strange sensation, staring at the moon. I felt the same sort of awe while staring at the moon at the gala last night. It must be the stone. Which means.....
"Alister, do you mind if I take the stone. I'd like to do a little 'examining' of my own."
"Of course, but be careful with it. You wouldn't want to break it."
Actually.......
Lara's Bedroom
Closing the door to her room behind her, she glared at the stone in her hand, intent on solving her problem. She grabbed one of her climbing picks from her equipment closet and set the stone on a table. She brought her hand up, pick in hand, ready to destroy the accursed object, but she couldn't bring her hand back down to do it. It just quivered there, like the hand was unwilling to harm the stone. Then she felt the pain from last night, only this time solely concentrated in her hand. She looked up to find that her hand had changed into the hand she saw in front of her face the night before. She dropped the pick and her hand quickly changed back to normal. She did have to admit that while it did hurt, it didn't hurt quite as badly as last time. She looked back at the stone, knowing now more than ever that it was the cause of her problem. But before she could do anything else, she got a call from downstairs.
"YO LARA, I just got a call from the Smithsonian, they want you to retrieve something for them in Siberia!"
Oh wonderful, exactly what I need. Taking a final glance at the stone, she walked over to her closet and prepared for her expedition to Siberia. As she closed the door, a faint glow emanated from the stone.
Finally got an update in. Sorry for the delay and I hope you enjoy. Review also, if you would be so kind.
