Disclaimer: I do not own the characters of Sam Nishimura, Lara Croft and Conrad Roth.
Author's Note: This is a pretty chunky chapter which is about 90% description and 10% actual dialogue, but it has finally reached the point where I have the opportunity to introduce more action and, more importantly, fluff! Enjoy x
Lara reached out and pulled the door open so she could fit through it. A draft hit her in the face as she did so and she recoiled, groaning and throwing her hand to her nose. Sam was right. It stank.
Lara pulled her jacket up to her nose and zipped it so it stayed there. The smell wasn't as strong like this, but the stale stench still managed to reach her nose through the jacket. Even so, Lara entered the building, following the blood droplets on the ground. As she pulled the door back to its original position behind her, Lara realised that the opening had been her only light source; the structure had no windows. She sighed heavily and got out her phone, turning on the torch. The battery was very limited so she had a quick scan of the room before turning it off again. It was during this scan that she noticed a series of pegs nailed to the wall beside her. On the leftmost peg, a small black torch hung from a piece of string. Putting her phone away, she picked the torch up and turned it on. It had a brighter and more powerful beam that her phone, and revealed that on the next peg there was a note from Cow Blood. Lara picked it up and shone the torch on it.
I must congratulate you for making it this far, Lara. I thought you might appreciate a torch as a reward. Come along now, there's no time to waste. Sam is waiting for you.
Lara pocketed the note and swept the beam of light around the room. The room was quite large, but contained absolutely nothing. The only signs of blood were on the note that she had just found and the droplets in the entrance which had stopped abruptly about a foot in front of the door. Lara failed to see where the smell was coming from, but presumed it must be from further into the building, which meant only one thing: it got worse.
Lara walked further into the room and shone the torch in front of her. There was a door at the end of the room, but this one was completely closed. It was made of steel and looked heavy to say the least. Lara crossed her fingers in the hope that it wasn't locked- there would be no chance of her being able to open it.
Shining her torch on the stone ground, Lara walked quickly towards the door, her boots echoing madly in the dark. On closer inspection, she found the door handle to be drenched in bright red blood. Lara groaned quietly to herself, but she grabbed the handle anyway and pulled hard. The door was heavy but it opened with ease with the sound of metal scraping concrete. Lara pulled it so it was open fully before wiping the blood on her trousers. It took her a moment to remember that she was in fact wearing Sam's white jeans.
"Oh shit," Lara murmured, shining her torch on the big red stain on her thigh. "Oh well. Given the circumstances I'm sure she'll get over it."
She lifted the torch up parallel to her eyes and looked around. Over the threshold of the door stood a wooden balcony that over looked a room over three times the size of the one she was standing in. At the front of the balcony there was a waist-high fence, presumably to prevent people falling over the edge. Stepping forward, Lara found that the fence around the balcony was in fact a banister, leading down a set of stairs to her left. To her right, the fencing cornered round to attach to the wall she had just walked through. Lara leaned over the banister to her front and felt it give a little, making her step back with a gasp.
"Don't worry!" came a booming voice. "It's perfectly safe."
It was Cow Blood.
"Where are you?" Lara shouted stupidly.
"Come and find me. You're on the right track," he replied with an audible grin.
"Bloody bastard," growled, jogging down the stairs with one hand on the banister.
After about 20 steps, the stairs stopped and Lara had to jump down four feet onto a wooden platform. From here, there was another 10 steps on her right until she reached the floor. This room echoed even more than the last and there was a loud thud as Lara landed on the floor. The unexpected noise made her jump slightly, but she composed herself before continuing forward to the other end of the room. On reaching the farthest wall, Lara was surprised to find no door. She walked along the wall to see if the door was further left or right, but found only the same monotonous grey paint over plaster. Sighing in frustration, Lara jogged round the edge of the room, keeping her eyes on the wall beside her at all times, but after a full circuit, she was still none the wiser.
As she caught her breath back, she decided she had no option but to ask for help.
"How do you expect me to find you if I don't have a way through?"
There was a crackling of a microphone turning on before a voice came through a speaker somewhere.
"You must learn to have more patience. You have hardly started to look," Cow Blood replied. "Then again... I expect nothing more from a Lady or a Lord."
Lara scoffed before shaking her head. There was nothing else to say. She had to keep looking.
Lara lifted her torch up above her head so she could get a good look at the ceiling, but her beam didn't reach that high. Her only option was to go back up onto the balcony and look up from there. The balcony was just over halfway between the floor and the ceiling, so her view from it should be competent.
After walking up the first ten steps, Lara had to walk back down a few after realising she would need a running jump to reach the other set of stairs. After jumping up and grabbing hold of the staircase, Lara ran to the top of it and shone her torch around the ceiling. There was nothing to be seen. The ceiling looked exactly the same as the other four walls. Lara also checked the floor only to find the same result. In desperation, she slowly turned her hand around to scan each wall up at a higher level. Everything looked the same apart from a narrow strip on the wall to her right. At the upmost point of her beam, Lara could see a small area of wall that hadn't been plastered over. It was still grey, but slightly lighter and had a rough, concrete finish. Lifting her torch an inch higher, Lara found a wooden door embedded into the wall just above it. The strip of exposed wall must have been where a platform to the door once stood. Now there seemed to be no way to get up there.
"I suppose I'm meant to be going up there," Lara murmured, half to herself, half to Cow Blood.
"That's right. But I'm sure you'll find that easy. You're a Croft after all," Cow Blood hummed, saying the last part in a Yorkshire accent.
"Don't you dare say that!" Lara yelled loudly, immediately recognising the imitation of Roth.
Cow Blood barked a laugh.
"You don't deserve to quote him! Nothing you say will ever be half as intelligent or meaningful as what he said to me. Roth was a good man. Don't you dare disgrace his name by using his words," Lara shouted powerfully.
'You're a Croft' had been Roth's favourite saying. He had often said it to Lara in moments of distress and hopelessness. Lara had always shook her head at him and rolled her eyes, denying that being a Croft meant anything to her. But it did. It always had. And she wouldn't be where she was right now if Roth hadn't reminded her of that.
There was no response from Cow Blood, so Lara looked around to find a way up to the door. The wall to her left had nothing to grab hold of, and the wall to her front was too far away to reach even if it had. Lara turned so she faced the doorway that she had originally come through, and found that there was a wooden ledge, about five foot long, only three feet above the doorframe. She smiled in relief. Lara pulled herself up onto the banister that joined onto the same wall and balanced on it carefully. It wobbled and creaked as she shifted her weight, but there was no other way to reach the ledge. Lara unzipped her jacket so she could put her torch between her teeth before bending her knees, readying herself to jump up for the ledge. After a mental count to three, she kicked off hard, the banister breaking and falling to the floor as she did so. This shortened her jump, but she managed to grab the ledge with one hand and pull herself onto it. It was just wide enough for her feet to stand side by side on, so she leant against the wall in order to keep her balance.
Taking her torch back into her hand, Lara looked down at the banister she had just broken before looking back to her own height. As she had hoped, there was another ledge similar to the one she stood on, only four feet away and a foot above her head. She put her torch back in her mouth and prepared herself to jump again, but it was harder jumping from such a narrow area. Lara bent her knees and leaned forward before leaping up and grabbing hold of the next ledge. Thankfully, this one was wider and she was able to stand with her feet a good distance apart. Lara approached the edge of this piece of wood and found that she was only a couple of metres from the corner where this wall joined to the adjacent one which held the wooden door. Unfortunately, she struggled to find another ledge to jump onto. It was only after a thorough search with the torch that she noticed something sticking out where the two walls met. Lara leaned forward as far as she dared and found that there was a small square piece of wood protruding from the corner. It was no more than a foot each way and was far too small to Lara to stand on. She doubted she would even be able to reach it at a grab, but it was obvious that this was the way she had to come.
"There's no way I can make that jump," Lara sighed, shaking her head. "The ledge is just too small, I can't be sure of my accuracy."
"Have faith, girl," Cow Blood chuckled, imitating Roth again.
This angered Lara so much that more adrenalin kicked in and, despite the drop of over ten feet below her, she pushed off with all her might and stretched out her hands as far as they could go. Her hopeful grunt echoing loudly around her, Lara soared through the air and managed to clutch on to the square with the fingers of her right hand. As she did so, her body swung to the right, hitting her back hard against the wall. Lara's torch plummeted to the floor with a deafening crash.
"Bugger!" she yelled, looking down as the light went out and she was plunged into darkness. Lara held on to the ledge desperately and lifted her left hand up to get a better grip. Once both of her hands were gripping as firmly as they could through the moisture of blood and sweat, Lara pulled up her feet so her toes pushed against the wall. She was sitting back on her own strength; the stance wasn't ideal, but it was all she could do for the moment.
"How the hell can I get some light?" she whispered in a sort of angered growl.
"Good question," snarled Cow Blood. "That was the only torch I had provided for you. I was under the impression one would be enough. I should've known better with you privileged children."
"Oh shut up and help me out. You're the one who wants to play this bloody game but that's not going to happen if I die, is it?" Lara yelled back.
"You make a very good point there, Miss Croft. So you're telling me you would like some light to help you out?"
"Yes!"
As soon as the word had left Lara's mouth, the room was filled with blinding white light and Lara lost her grip with her left hand as her reflexes used it to shield her eyes. At the same time, her feet slipped and she was left holding on with one hand. She dangled dangerously, but managed to reach up and seize the ledge once again, her eyes still squeezed shut. After a few moments, Lara fluttered her eyelids as an attempt to open them and she managed to keep them open a couple of millimetres. She gave it another few seconds before letting her eyelids fully peal apart. Lara blinked a couple of times, then focused on the area in front of her.
The whole room was lit up from the four ceiling corners. Lara squinted up at them and found that they were carefully positioned stage lights. How she hadn't noticed them before she didn't know.
"Better?" Cow Blood asked.
"Perfect," Lara lied, gripping the wood tightly so her knuckles turned white.
She lifted her body up again so that her feet were pressed against the wall like they had been before the lights came on. Looking up, Lara was able to find her next checkpoint: another ledge, this time made of steel, barely bigger than the one she currently hung from. It was only a foot higher and two feet across, but this would prove to be a hard jump from the position she was in. Lara sighed hard and let herself think it through.
Just use your feet against the wall. Kick off with those and push away with your right hand. You can probably just about make it.
"Good idea," Cow Blood said suddenly.
Lara paused, assuming she had spoken aloud before realising she hadn't.
"What?" she asked, frowning.
"Oh nothing," he replied. For once he didn't sound like he was grinning. He had made a mistake.
"Did you just hear what I was thinking?" Lara asked, frowning harder.
"Do you really have time for this, Miss Croft? Your girlfriend is awaiting you."
Lara hated to agree with him, but he was in fact right. This was something she would have to pursue later. For now, she must concentrate on getting through the next leap.
Concentrating hard, Lara got into position for her jump. She let go of the ledge with her left hand and leaned to her left so her upper body was facing the steel outcropping. Her eyes narrowed and her teeth clenched and before she knew it, she was cutting through the air. Her left arm pointed out like a ballerina's, but her legs thrashed in an ungainly manner as she attempted to thrust herself forward like a long jumper. As Lara neared the ledge, she pulled both of her hands forward to grab on, but she underestimated the height and the jutting bone on her left wrist collided hard with the edge of the steel block. Her left arm flinched back in shock and pain and the room echoed with the raucous crunch that her wrist had made, followed by her screams of agony.
Despite the sudden shock, Lara's right hand was still in the correct place and she managed to keep a firm enough grip on the block to pull her feet up like she had before. It took a minute or two, but Lara managed to recover from the initial pain of the blow to her wrist. The throbbing was still intense and she knew she had broken a bone, but there was nothing she could do about it now. If only she had The Bag with her.
Although Lara was dangling from a steel ledge in intense pain with cow blood and now her own blood smeared across her clothing, she managed to find a positive: the ledge was much bigger than it had seemed. From the previous ledge, the steel had had light shining along one side, causing it to seem half the length and width of its actual size. On discovering that the block was much bigger, Lara was able to gradually pull herself up and stand on the steel, facing the wall. The wooden door was only an arm's length away, but Lara immediately knew why she hadn't been able to see the steel ledge earlier: it was the exact same colour as the wall and would have looked completely 2D from the balcony.
"Finally," Lara muttered, cradling her wrist and looking up the door.
This, however, wasn't going to be as easy as it seemed. Lara would have to pull open the door with her left hand, something that seemed impossible due to the stabbing pain in her wrist. Not only that, but she would also have to lean over and use her left hand to grab onto the threshold of the door, thus leaving her full body weight to rely on the same hand.
Thinking all of this through didn't put Lara off getting through the door, but she knew the pain would be close to unbearable. To try and give her wrist some more support, she put the top of her v-neck t-shirt in her mouth and took another part with her right hand before pulling sharply. The shirt ripped with ease and she pulled a strip from it, leaving her with an open top over a white vest.
"Sorry Sam," she sighed, looking at the strip of top before wrapping it round her injured wrist. Lara secured it with a hair slide, wincing slightly as the movement made her wrist twinge, before stepping to the edge and looking at the door. With her right hand pressed securely against the wall, she leaned over and took the door handle in her left hand. She pulled the handle down tentatively and in consequence felt a sharp stab in her wrist.
"Fuck it," she muttered, before yanking the handle down hard and pulling on the door.
Lara yelled loudly through gritted teeth; the agony was excruciating, but she had managed to get the door open. After cradling her wrist and biting her bottom lip for a few moments, Lara had to recalculate how she was going to get through the door. Her original plan of falling onto her left hand and pulling the rest of her body over would not work- any attempt of bearing weight on that hand could only end in disaster. Instead, Lara turned her body so her back was against the wall, the door on her right hand side. She pressed her back firmly onto the wall before stepping out with her right foot, placing it securely onto the threshold of the door. Next, Lara leaned over as far as possible and grabbed the doorframe with her right hand. Then in one swift movement, she pulled the frame and swung her body round, landing in the entrance with a low thud.
The room was pitch black for about 3 seconds.
"Well I suppose you have made it," Cow Blood said.
A small, sickly yellow light came on in the centre of the room. Underneath it sat Sam.