I don't own Tomb Raider or anything else in the franchise.

Please let me know what you think.

- This story is set in an alternate continuity to the 2018 movie. In it Lara's down on her luck so much she turns to crime because she doesn't have any alternative.

Tomb Raider.

Turning to Crime.

When she saw the bills lying on the floor of her small, dingy flat, Lara Croft's day became just a little bit worse. She bent down, ignoring the pain in her back after she had just spent hours and hours sitting on a bike, riding around London delivering food or whatever the company she was with wanted her to deliver, and she picked them up and opened one of them up.

Lara sighed.

It was as she had thought, and as she looked at the electricity bill, Lara felt sick to her stomach although her natural stubbornness refused to let her mind, which was logically telling her to do something different with her life for a change, instead of acting like a little kid who had run away from home. Although that wasn't too untrue since she had left her home.

She was going to be cut off. Again.

Lara wouldn't have been concerned otherwise since she had managed to survive on her own in tighter spots than this, but the business had been doing very badly recently and all the tricks she had normally resorted to in order to make ends meet had just simply dried up. There were no last-minute races where the prize was a large bun, no new job opportunities, no rescue. She was on her own.

Lara picked up her pizza and walked into the flat and she sat down on the sofa and began to eat. It wasn't much of a sofa; it was just a half of one that was half sofa, half pile of old junk held together by sticky tape and black bags, although where it had come from and what it had been through, Lara didn't even want to know.

She placed the pizza box on the sofa and she went to a drawer and took out the dusty cardboard box full of candles and took out her pocket lighter; she wasn't a smoker, but she did know people who were, and it was always a courtesy to give them a light if they needed it. In any case, it often led to a nice little favour in the future, although they turned out to be rather small favours than the big ones she would have preferred.

The candles were nothing but a collection of stubs of half-melted wax, but their wicks were still viable. She lit them up and returned to the sofa where she began to eat her meal. As she munched on the slices, she took out the newspaper she had brought with her out of her pocket and she began to read through the pages slowly to draw out the meal she was eating, to make the pizza last longer.

Lara picked through the paper slowly so she could reach the job pages to find an advertisement she could apply for, but at the same time, she took the opportunity to find out what was going on in the world. But she was reading through the pages too quickly, not bothering to pay more than the barest few seconds glancing at the stories of celebrities going through this relationship or some stupid marriage which would probably end up in a divorce in a year or so.

Lara had read it all before. It never failed to amaze her with just how stupid people were. Celebrities got married all the time. They divorced just as quickly, hooked up with someone else, someone better looking, or something along those lines. When she finally got to the job pages, Lara scanned each one rapidly. The first few required qualifications Lara simply had because she hadn't bothered going into any higher education. She had essentially just turned her back on the family, her ancestral home, and essentially everything her father had built up for her when he didn't come home.

Lara closed her eyes. She had essentially been a teenager for so long she had forgotten what it meant to be an adult. When her father left and he never came back to Britain following his trip to God knew where, she had essentially….dropped out of life. She had refused to go into higher education, something she regretted now because it would have opened up so many doors for her.

Then again, she regretted so many things. She knew she had only herself to blame since she had turned her back on her father and the mystery of his disappearance, but she had stubbornly ignored her problems, turned her back on everything she had known.

Lara opened her eyes again and looked around the flat. She had the keys to move back into Croft Manor. They were a sort of way out, but she had never used them even though she had promised herself when she had first left home and entered the lifestyle her dad would never have approved of in a million years. She knew it would have been tough at times, but she had always promised herself if it became too much, she would then go home as nothing had happened.

But each time she had hit the ground, money had been tight, she had always arrogantly turned away from the opportunity to go home and make a better life for herself, no matter what she promised herself. Indeed, her luck had always won in the end, so there hadn't been the need. In any case, she had always been wary about accepting her inheritance. She still believed her father was still alive, somewhere.

But he hadn't been seen in years, and even now Lara was doubting the truth. Even so, she had still refused to return to Croft Manor.

But now…

Lara closed her eyes again and continued reading through the ads. She would never understand why the adverts for jobs in newspapers were aimed strictly at those with college or Uni degrees. It was like the editors were deliberately ignoring people who didn't have the same opportunities for gaining qualifications like Uni students who boasted having three degrees or more.

Her mood grew worse as she continued looking from one ad to the next, in the end, she only got halfway through before she gave up and pushed her pizza box away and ran her hands through her hair while she looked at the ground between her legs in frustration. It was no good. She was just going to have to swallow her pride, and stop being stupid. She was a Croft, it was time for her to act like one for a change.

Lara sighed and she looked up again and decided to finish her meal, a sense of nausea in her stomach while she thought of returning to a house she hadn't been to, never mind lived in for years. She hadn't been in the house for a long time, she had no idea if her family retainers had been keeping watch over the place, or if anyone had stolen anything and news hadn't reached her simply because they had believed she wasn't interested. Somehow the thought hurt more than the feelings of loss she had for her absentee father.

She pushed those thoughts aside and picked up the newspaper again. She wanted to find out what was going on in the world. She ignored all the articles about politics, whether they were in Britain or in other countries, she didn't give a damn. But then something caught her eye.

Is that…an opportunity from heaven, or what?

It was the story of a burglary. Apparently occurred in the early hours of a morning, while the family slept. They snapped the lock, forced their way inside. Stole everything precious. Got out. No one knew anything.

Lara would normally not be interested in a burglary since she hadn't really even bothered thinking about them. But now…..

Could I become a burglar?

As soon as the surprising thought popped into her brain, Lara jumped since she had never considered turning to crime before just to survive, but as she thought about it, she realised how…right it was in her mind.

Face it; you've got nothing; your precious job is a dead end. Why hold on to it? Also, take some responsibility and stop this living in a fantasy world. Go home.

Lara knew her inner voice was right.

She had been in denial all this time. She had run away from her old life, hoping to find something better, but what had she achieved? Nothing. She lived in this poxy, dingy flat. Her job was pathetic, the pay was awful, and the hours were sometimes long.

She accepted the truth. She wanted to go home. She needed to go home, and yet, the thought of burglary was not far from her mind. What if she became a burglar, but lived in her manor? Who'd suspect her?

A smile crossed Lara's face. She looked at the bills, snorting in disgust. Hopefully, in a few days, she would straighten everything out, and she would change her life around. For good.