THAT VERY MOMENT - EASTERN SCOTLAND

'Lovely... a 'werebitch!'' "Hahahahaha!" he couldn't stop laughing the entire drive from the docks to the home of the two experienced, trained killers the three idiots he was riding in the cab with were headed toward.

He knew the men he rode with were doomed, knew the outcome the moment he 'heard' the name Albert Winston Carter echoing in his head as the door to his 'cabin' on the ship in the Indian ocean opened.

He grinned as the imbeciles looked him over and shared - without realising it - their ignorant thoughts of both their own importance to the 'order' and of his 'disgusting' appearance. By the time this day was done, he would be considered beautiful compared to what of them they could find.

He had to suppress a laugh when the moron presently to his left hauled him to his feet off his cot and pulled him into the jet-copter for the four-hour flight to another ship just three miles off the coast of Scotland - If you never land a copter on land... no need to tell anyone who you are.

They had docked, climbed into a cab, and it was then that he had his first impression of Evan's first impression of what he was seeing back on Yamatia. That the only one who would ever know the true outcome of that fight, as well as this brief visit with the grim reaper and spouse, was a man who at twenty-three had his eyes sewn shut and ears deafened by the very men he now rode with... was amusing as hell to the orders only legit 'seer'.

He had never been indoctrinated into the 'faith'. He hadn't even been born into the order. Not that they cared. Too bad for them.

He had been a dead broke, paranoid outcast who never made any friends do to his ability to see the outcome of their relationships, schemes, extra marital dalliances... secret darknesses, and as a result was seen as a jinx, a rat, an obsessed stalker by the victimized, or all too soon murdered women he honestly tried to help; only causing them to run to the very animals who killed them for protection from the 'creep'.

He had pulled away from the loveless, ungrateful world, and into the dark shadows of sports gambling and Las Vegas underworld bosses who used his gifts to rise as far as this soothsayer could see. Money was good, but the the dreams and visions were disturbing beyond words. That all changed when, on a drunk, he had told a stranger in a casino bar the outcome of a conversation that had yet to happen between a beautiful woman seated two seats over and a man in a clown suit who wouldn't enter for two hours. Had he been sober, he may have paid heed to his vision that followed... too bad.

Three hours later he was blind, deaf, and in the back of a black sedan driving out of Las Vegas and to a ship docked just off the coast of San Diego; he would not leave it for thirty years. Yet, he would smile, knowing the fate of those who took him; and he would sit and smile, seeing his deliverer as if they stood before him, and heard the words spoken in the tearful cries of a grateful father, spoken to the avenger of his innocent daughter, "Justice... IS a woman."

The cab came to a stop in front of a small cottage sized farmhouse, sweet, serene, relaxing. What a nice place for these three ruthless idiots to meet their messy end. He smiled.

"This the place?," the first guy to die asked him sternly.

He turned and smiled, "End of the line," he affirmed playfully.

The blatant warning flew over the soon to be worm feasts head. He leaned forward and tapped the driver on the shoulder as the three got out of the cab. "Watch this Charlie... The Three Stooges Meet Death... the directors cut."

The three men walked up to the house between the knee-high stone wall lined walkway set just in front of a waist-high line of hedges, next to the small garden abutting the kitchen entrance. They reached into the small of their backs for their poorly concealed, safety set pistols.

"Relax Charlie," the blind man said with a sigh as he held up a remote detonator, "One of those chaps rigged a small little package, that is presently magnetically attached to your radiator. I hold the remote. Stupid on their part to trust me.. delusional bunch of fucks this group."

The cabbie turned, "Good for me?"

"Very. Charlie, I am a good judge of character, and that sir, you have in abundance... fret not, you'll see your Millie graduate University, marry, have kids and retire. Just stay calm, and watch."

Andria came out, smiling, carrying a pot of tea and a plate of cakes, she smiled unusually warmly at the three strange men, all reaching for their backs, and looking very confused.

The seer grinned, "Now watch Charlie... 'Moe is their leader.'"

She almost laughed aloud; here they were, standing one right behind the other on the narrow walkway flanked by the low stone wall and not one of them stepping back. She raised the pot, "Tea?" she asked politely.

The lead killer pulled his pistol, and made to point it.

She watched the gun hand and grinned, "Where do they find you twits? you have your safety on."

He looked down.

She brought the thick ceramic pot up to intercept the bridge of his nose, breaking the fragile bone connecting it to the skull, then drove her knee into his crotch as he reared back, gun still in hand.

The second gunner switched his safety off, only to get the edge of the ceramic plate of cakes in his trachea, he raised his hands to his throat, and reflexively pulled the trigger, shooting the man in front of him on the left lung through the back.

She stomped on the second mans shin and drove her elbow into his sternum, then pushed into his gun hand as she squeezed his injured throat.

He squeezed the trigger even harder as she forced his elbow up and back, till the barrel was aimed toward the man standing behind him, shooting the bewildered man through the right eye.

She them sank her fingers into the second man's throat, as she wrenched the gun free and shot the first man then the second in less than three seconds.

As the bodies slumped to the ground, she dusted her hands and retrieved her plate and pot from the hedge, "No thank you would have sufficed," she sighed with a wicked grin.

The seer tapped Charlie again, "See Charllie, no problem. Now, I don't want to further alarm you, but in three seconds a large-caliber handgun will be being pressed to your head... now."

"Sorry Charlie," Albert said coldly as he pressed the barrel of his Desert Eagle forty-four Magnum to the cabbies right temple, "Friends of yours?"

"They were with me," the seer said happily, "but tell me, what 'friends' would do this?" He removed his black sunglasses to display his scarred over, joined eyelids, "deaf to. I appreciate it... but it's meaningless to say sorry for something you aren't responsible for." he said without prompting.

Albert was speechless, lowered the gun.

"We tracked your son's transmission from Yamatai; when these three don't return, they will send more; you may not get killed, but they will kill whoever they need to keep themselves secret. If you want the innocent to be spared... you need to 'die'... To THIS life."

"Any suggestions?" Arthur asked as his wife walked up.

"Running a bed and breakfast. I happen to know a quaint little place in Surrey... named Abbingdon. What say you? Winston?"

"What of Evan and Lady Croft?"

"Your boy is in love, and that love will not abandon him. She is magnificent, and soon will become something more."

"What?" Andria asked as she strode up, one of the three assassins handguns in her cautious hands.

"A legend."

...

YAMATAI

The thing was small for what it was supposed to be. A meer six feet at best, thin waisted, huge teeth, and claw like hands and howling excessively 'Werebitch'. It's slathering jaws red with blood on its dagger length teeth; it wasn't hungry... it was mad.

He tried every weapon he had, to no avail. It ignored anything up to a forty-five caliber slug, and even then, any wound healed almost instantly. "Too stupid to understand bullets eh? Lot of that around here."

It snarled and slathered as it stalked up to him.

"Honestly... don't you have an ogres leg to hump? Why not act like the other dogs and roll over and play dead? You pathetic mutt!"

He and Lara had made pretty short work of the other wolves. He had baited the initial pack to help train her what he called 'Flow', a style of multi target suppression/assassination that enhanced instinct by engaging the fight or flight response to a heightened degree and utilized adrenaline to do so by putting oneself intentionally in marginally controled dangerous situations.

He had done it all his life; and he felt she would be a natural... he couldn't be more right. It was working; she was amazing; barely one so much as bit her. Then THIS showed up... another Peter Nolan classic horror movie reboot. Fuck this island of misfit monsters.

It looked at him, and laughed.

"Fuck you Fido! Here... fetch!" he snarled and grabbed a thick tree branch in his powerful hands and swung at its face.

The beast effortlessly raised it's forearm and splintered the wood, sending a shiver through Evan's arms.

"Right," the Brit muttered, "plan 'B'"

"Evan!,"Lara shouted into his earpiece,"They scattered! I did it, just like you said. I just need to find you. We can... "

"'L'," he said softly, "go. Take the ashes and get out of here. I'll get an extraction through another... "

The beast moved closer, clenching and relaxing its massive fists as it's wounds closed.

"NO! You lying bastard!," Lara shrieked in rage and pain,"YOU Promised!"

"'L', please, just go..."

"You are getting off this island! With me! I don't need another martyr, I need you!"

"'L'... I love you... run. It's a werewolf. I... I can't kill him."

Three words, spoken so coldly, with such dark certainty, it was as if from another in her voice, chilled his killer's soul, 'SHE' was coming, "Than I will."

He turned to the thing before him and raised his voice, "L it's a... Please, just go." No response.

It raised it's claw as he glared back and lifted a fragmentary grenade, "DO IT! YOU MUTT! YOU'RE GONNA CHOKE ON IT!"

An arrow tore through it's upraised wrist.

Both man and beast stared at it, then saw the fuse burning.

Evan rolled out of the blast radius as the dynamite strapped to the arrow exploded, taking the beasts massive clawed hand off. It shrieked in agony; even as it's hand grew back.

Evan had blindly rolled over into a ravine... some twenty-five feet down.

The beast turned to face the source of the injury.

Lara stood stone-like, her eyes unwinking, unafraid, stared at the beast, another exploding bolt drawn back, "Hi," she said without emotion.

The beast looked confused, uncertain... scared

"I am not losing another man to this place! Especially NOT him. Now, doggy, what say I teach you a new trick... 'BEG'."

The beast lunged...

STAY TUNED!