Late autumn was pleasant. Leaves of rich gold and lush auburn swirled throughout balmy gusts, beautiful yet a pointed reminder of winters approaching assault. The sky held a brilliant blue, clouds faint whispers of vapor.
Lara lay there on the ground, eyes fixed on the sparse scape of the sky above her. A few tattered journals adorned the grass around her, the breeze lazily flipping pages. Her chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm, hands toying with the rough sward beside her.
Upon her return home, there had been many adjustments. Even before her return there were decisions made… decisions she had to make.
Yamatai had been both a blessing and a curse. She could see that now, certainly not before. The sacrifice of those she set off with would forever haunt her, but it would not break her. Though a horror indeed, the immense fountain of knowledge Lara had gained through the misfortune of the Endurance and its lost crew had changed her. She came into her own, to survive.
To survive.
"I don't think I can do this."
"Sure you can. You're a Croft, after all."
Lara shut her eyes slowly, keeping her breathing even. Given the circumstances, she felt she was handling herself rather well now. Just over a year after the ordeal, and she could even sleep through most nights.
She saw a physician once their rescuers docked at the next port; it was insisted that they all did. Both she and Sam remained hospitalized for a few days after, Reyes and Jonah with little besides scrapes. Lara stitched and watched for signs of severe infection, Sam exhausted and dehydrated. Resting, watching one another with half-lidded eyes.
"…You look like a rag doll I had in the third grade." Sam smiled half-heartedly.
Lara's left hand went to her right shoulder, running her hand down until reaching the faintest feel of a scar.
"I'm just glad I still have my arm." Lara said lightly, gingerly moving her arm. She smiled at Sam reassuringly. "It doesn't hurt."
Sam made a genuine snort of laughter. "Morphine. It's the shit."
So many questions had been asked those next few days. Questions, assumptions, accusations… So many people talking about what they couldn't possibly know. Eventually the reporters were shut out. In time the authorities grew disinterested. Historians bombarded them all for information, worse than the reporters. Lara had been saddened not to share their entire experience, horrifying as it was, but no one would think them sane if they knew. It was agreed before they even touched soil not to share a word on the specifics of Yamatai. More pointedly, the mysticism surrounding the place. They kept their stories short. Hostile weather and men stranded from years passed plagued the island like a sickness. That was bad enough and anything more would likely be considered ravings of lunacy.
"How do you explain your escape?"
Sam shrugged. "We just… we must have gotten lucky. A break in the storm."
The reporter was smug. "I've never heard of a break in those storms near the Dragon's Triangle."
Reyes' eyes narrowed. "And I bet you're so green you never heard of it until a month ago."
Lara felt a smile tug at the corners of her mouth. She never fully appreciated Reyes' short demeanor until after all the trouble. It certainly gained them some peace.
Over a year and these memories as fresh as the day they happened. To no surprise of course. But to feel as hardened as she felt now, only to feel a wave of weakness when remembering just how much a struggle they endured. A psychologist was an option Lara did not favor, but obligingly visited for three months as a favor to Sam. Three months of revisiting the things she had to do, the people she had to lose, the people she had to kill. And it sickened her. Eventually she kept to herself, reclusive in her estates in Abingdon. She hadn't talked to any of them since; almost ten months of books and thoughts, plans to go out and see the world for what it might be… But no interaction, save for the family housekeeper, Winston. While supportive, she was thankful for his remarkable talent for leaving her be when she desired it. She assumed he perfected this art with her father.
She was thinking frequently of him as well. And Roth. They were close, and the memory of Roth's final act was one of the things that did rob Lara of sleep. That and how much she wished she should have really listened to what her father said over the years.
Was it healthy? Probably not. But if only a little, it made her feel in control. However a growing feeling of restlessness was knotting itself into Lara's stomach.
Opening her eyes, she sat up, head tilted to the sky. She could hear the leaves tumbling along the stone walkway not far from where she sat. Book after book, journal after journal… She could feel an increasing distaste in how stationary her life had become.
Maybe, just maybe… It was time to do something about it.