AN: I'm back! I started writing this after finishing "Tomb Raider: Genesis" which means that it was before Tomb Raider Underworld. Any similarities with that game are accidental, because this story is based on my canon featured in TR: G. This story is a bit more violent, and has a few harsher words than my previous work, just letting you all know. If anyone would like to read "Tomb Raider: Genesis" here is the link: .net/s/3514129/1/Tomb_Raider_Genesis

Starting off a few days after the end of Legend, this is "Tomb Raider: Revelations."

Tomb Raider: Revelations

Surely some revelation is at hand;

Surely the Second Coming is at hand.

The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out

When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi

Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert

A shape with lion body and the head of a man,

A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,

Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it

Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.

The darkness drops again; but now I know

That twenty centuries of stony sleep

Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,

And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,

Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

-"The Second Coming", William Butler Yeats

The Beginning

"The best laid schemes of mice and men

Often go awry"

-Robbie Burns

The Plan

8:11 A.M.

Croft Manor, Surrey, England

Something was troubling Lara Croft. She looked out her window, her hazel eyes reflecting the golden rays of an April morning, deep in thought. It had only been a few days since Bolivia, and the physical and mental bruises and wounds still affected her. Amanda Evert, once thought dead and her good friend, had sabotaged Lara's efforts to regain contact with her mother, thereby sending her into Avalon when Lara was only nine.

The idea of Avalon was a mystery to Lara. She had read about the Arthurian legend when she was at school, but her professor never focused much on this paradise-like realm, preferring to concentrate on the symbolism of the romantic stories, and the factuality of a King Arthur figure. And, unfortunately, Lara knew no experts in the Arthurian legend field. That is why she sent Alister to the British Museum. Surely in this place of esteemed knowledge there would be some evidence of the location of Avalon, the daises, and Excalibur.

Excalibur: a mystery in its own right. After having trekked all over the world to put together its pieces, Lara had discovered the power it held. A devastating green bolt would fly from it just at the flick of her wrist, and would open a sort of time portal when thrust into a dais. Yet Lara had little to no knowledge of time travel, nor of how stone swords could cast green lightning, so she contacted someone who did. Professor Henry Eddington worked at the Cavendish Laboratory at the University of Cambridge as the head of the Department for Electrical Phenomena. If anyone knew about green lightning and time and space travel, he did. It also didn't hurt that he was a bit of an Arthur hobbyist.

Lara sighed as she got out of bed. She showered, then walked downstairs into the entrance hall. The smell of bacon wafted out of the door to the right of the entrance; Zip must have been making breakfast. She walked down the corridor and took a left towards the dining hall. This room was marvelous and emitted a gold hue from the massive chandelier. Alister Fletcher was sitting in the third chair to the right of the head chair at the massive table. He was already dressed and cleaning his glasses on his jacket. "'Morning, Lara," he said, drowsily.

"Good morning," Lara replied, sitting at the head chair. The door at the end of the hall opened and Zip walked out, wiping his hands on a napkin. "Hey, Lara," he said, sitting beside Alister.

"Good morning," Lara repeated. "Breakfast smells delicious."

"I'd hope so. Spent all morning making it. Although, I don't think Winston is still alright with me in the kitchen," Zip said.

"Ah well. It was his domain for a very long time," said Lara, smiling. The door opened again, and out shambled Winston, holding a breakfast laden tray.

"Breakfast," he said, happily. He placed the tray onto the table, then fell into his seat beside Lara.

"Thank you, Winston," she said. She reached forward with her fork and speared a sausage and placed it onto her plate, along with a strip of bacon, a bit of ham, and a small plate of fruit. Winston poured her a cup of breakfast tea and added a bit of milk and gave it to Lara. "Thank you," she said. Winston nodded in reply.

They all ate for a while, speaking about the news and weather, until Lara said to Alister, "Well, no sense in putting it off any more. Have you found anything else in the Museum's records?"

"I'm afraid not," he said, taking a bite of a kipper. "There's little to no information about King Arthur there, nor is there anything matching the description of the daises. The only thing remotely similar is Neptune's trident, which bears only a bit of a resemblance to Excalibur in the light emitting from it."

"That is a shame," Lara said, her tone lower than it had been before. She had heard of Neptune's trident, a relic found in the Mediterranean. Alister was right; the only resemblance was the mysterious blue light that glowed within it, which researchers had difficulty in classifying. "Well Zip," she said, looking up at the man with his mouth full of ham. "I hope you at least have some good news."

He swallowed and said, "Yeah. The Professor sounded really interested in the test results on the sword and footage. He said to come by Tuesday at his place."

"Splendid!" Lara said, clapping her hands together.

"I thought so," Zip said with a smirk as he took a gulp of orange juice.

"Right," Lara continued. "Alister, I want you to double your efforts. Get as much information as you can on Avalon, Excalibur, and any previous histories of weapons with powers similar to the sword."

"Back to the grindstone then," he said, getting up. He thanked Zip and Winston for the breakfast and left the room.

"I figured he'd leave us with the cleaning up," Zip said, rapping his fork lightly against his empty plate and glaring at the immense amount of work to be done. Lara laughed a little and stood to clean up. Winston looked up at her, his eyes suddenly alert.

"It's alright Ms. Croft, I have it," he said, supporting himself using the arms of his chair as he made to stand. His arms were wobbling uncontrollably.

"It's fine, Winston, we'll take care of it," Lara said, gently pushing Winston back into his seat. "You just finish your food. Zip and I will take care of the cleanup today." Winston's face paled.

"Well, summon me if you need anything," he said, turning back to his food. Lara and Zip cleaned up the food and the table. Winston continued to offer his help, until Lara relented and said that he could water the indoor plants. Zip returned to his workstation, saying he would continue to look for footage on the sword. "But first," he said as he opened the door in his workstation by several highly technical-looking instruments, "I have a couple new things to show you. They just came in." He pulled out two silver suitcases and put them on his cluttered desk. He opened the first to reveal, surrounded by black foam, what Lara thought was her magnetic grappling hook, but with a relatively small metal rod emitting from it, and a slightly larger spool. The rod had a red light at its base, and three compartments around its body. "This," said Zip as he lifted the disc from the foam, "is your new grappling hook. It has all the features as the magnetic one, but press this button on the spool and…." Here Zip pressed a red button on the disk, and out popped three hooks on the rod. "Now you have a standard grappling hook. Merry Christmas." He pressed the button again to deactivate the grappling hook and placed it back into the suitcase.

"Very nice," said Lara, crossing her arms, expectantly.

"And now for my next trick," continued Zip. He opened the second case and revealed two blue canisters with a red stripe in their middles. In the middle of the stripe was the yellow and red caution triangle with the forever unfortunate black stick-figured man, this time suffering from what appeared to be an explosion. Zip did not take the two canisters out this time. "These you'll have to be careful with," he said.

"You say that like I never am," said Lara in a mock-injured voice.

"Right, you're the epitome of cautiousness. Okay, these are incendiary grenades. But, they have a special liquid inside that blows the fire all over the place, like a Molotov Cocktail, but on steroids."

"Splendid," she said, turning to leave.

"Just don't let the cops catch you with 'em," Zip called after her. She chuckled.

Lara changed into her blue gym clothes and began to work out in her gym. After several minutes of swinging, climbing, and scaling, she sat in the alcove above her gym pool, letting her legs swing over the edge. She rubbed sweat from her brow and looked out the high windows on the other side of the gym. It was a windy day, and the passing clouds would interrupt the otherwise perfect light of an April afternoon. She wondered if her mother could possibly be seeing this in Avalon as well. The thought made Lara's chest tighten. She had been so close to saving her mother, so close to touching her for the first time since she was only nine, so close to fulfilling her urge to discover what caused it all, what began her life's work, only to have it taken away by Amanda.

Amanda: the thought of her made Lara's breathing quicken and her fists tighten. It was hard to believe that she was friends with her once. Her heart began to race, and she felt her arms lower automatically towards her pistols. She could have killed her and exacted revenge. But no; it was not right. She couldn't have done it. Her heart was not black as Natla had said so long ago. She had killed men before, but that was only in self-defense. She had killed Larson because she had to; otherwise Natla would have taken over the world and begun the Seventh Age, whatever that was. But Amanda: Amanda was weak. She couldn't do anything more to ruin Lara's life. So Lara let her live. It was the right thing to do. With her out of the way she could find her mother.

She went over the plan in her head. She would talk to Professor Eddington, who would hopefully know about the sword and its powers. He would give her an idea of where to look for Avalon, maybe even the locations of any daises left in the world. Afterwards she would hunt for that dais until she found it. Then, she would enter Avalon and rescue her mother. Yes, it could work. No, it would work. It had to. She had suffered so much in the past few days that she had to be rewarded by now.

"It'll work," she muttered. She slid off the alcove and into the pool. She swam through the hidden tunnel and into the recreational pool. She grabbed a towel, dried herself off the best she could, and headed for the shower. When finished, she sat in the center of her bedchamber, listening to music and looking out the high windows onto that April day. "It'll work," she said once more, and drifted to sleep.