First ever fan fic after reading through so many! Thought I'd start off with a brief recap of what happened to refresh everyone's memories and when I say 'brief', I mean 'ridiculously long'. I will write the next one asap to get the ball rolling. Let me know what you think!

The spacious, cavernous room was quiet. Stone statues, a reminder of a time gone by lined the walls. Dust particles floated around, and the heinous stench of blood lingered in the air, ready to hit the nose of those unsuspecting. A myriad of figures stood in the middle of the room, all brandishing a variety of weaponry. In the centre of the group two more figures stood back to back, also bearing their own weapons. One bore two pistols, the other a pistol and what resembled a discus with blades retracting from all sides.

On the ground of the temple lay several bodies scattered about, either bullet ridden or with gashes in their necks from the bladed discus. The two figures in the middle of the group, although battered, bruised and covered in a small quantity of what looked like blood, throw each other a quick glance, almost as if they were silently communicating to one another what they had planned out many hours ago.

11 months ago…

Usually after several fierce battles, any typical human that didn't know what they were getting into would have practically retired from adventuring- after all having to save the world at the cost of ones life would drive oneself to near insanity or death if you were unlucky enough.

Not Lara Croft though.

This adventurous heroine has battled enemies who danger to varying degrees; from Atlantean mutants, animals of all shapes and sizes, to people with malicious intent. Right now however could be considered almost the same. Usually going it alone with the help of her trusty tech geek and butler back home, many adventures alone meant they could easily tailor everything to her requirements. From weaponry to gear and appropriate clothing for the multitudes of differing climates, it seemed like every continent on Earth was her playground. From time to time however, she has had to think on her feet, with varying degrees of success.

So, when everything decides to go pear shaped, they resort to Plan B and this particular situation definitely calls for it. After what could be considered tragic, circumstances in Egypt, hell happens to follow her and those she knows and loves wherever they go. Thus when trouble comes knocking at her one time friend and mentor Werner Von Croy's door, life takes a most surprising turn for one and all. Despite raiding a variety of tombs and desecrating various other sites of archaeological discovery, life in the country's newspapers and magazines haven't bothered her one bit, even though she is looked down on for her 'misbehaviour'.

So when the Monstrum comes by with his calling card, Lara finds herself under suspicion and at the centre of a mystery that dates back years before she was even born. So what is a girl like Lara to do when she is being chased down by the law?

In her own words - leg it.

Her first port of call was to visit a woman named Margot Carvier in Paris and retrieve Werner's notebook, with the result of her having to make a hasty retreat via a window. Hiding out in a disused tram, she ventures out to question all and sundry about a man called Bouchard and his whereabouts. Finally, after walking almost all over, she is finally pointed in the right direction, making her way to a café and speaks to the only member of staff available, who after a few choice words and her patience lost; he gives her a retrieval job. On the way, she notices a suspicious person running out of the alleyway leading to the back of the club, hopping onto his motorcycle and speeding off. Brushing off the odd feeling she got from him, she ventures inside the club, and after half an hour of taking out guards positioned in the club, she finds her prize and makes her way back to the café. After handing the item to the staff member, he points her in the direction of the graveyard and Bouchard's hideout.

Travelling through the rat infested sewers, she eventually finds him and they have a brief, almost unfriendly chat. Concluding that they both need something in return; he tells her that if she delivers some documents to a contact of his, she should be able to get what she needs – weapons. After what seemed like an unfriendly situation involving an older gentleman on her way through the door, she finds the counter area destroyed and behind it, the owner dead. She leaves the documents on the counter and, after rifling through the dead mans pocket for the code to the room housing the guns, she enters, only to find that the door has closed on her and an explosive device is set to go off. Glancing around, she finds her escape – a trap door leading down to a pipe ending near the river. Running like the hounds of hell were at her heels, she dives out and extinguishes the flames that had caught her after the explosion. What she didn't know was that a familiar set of eyes was watching her.

Making her way through the underground, she finds herself in the Louvre. Traversing as stealthily as possible through the museum, she makes her way to Carvier's office, which has similar information that Lara found in Werner's notebook. Finding out all she has to, she helps herself to the archaeological dig taking place underneath the museum. After confronting more guards and gathering more information, she makes her way further on and into a hall with entrances to several areas and a skeletal warrior brandishing a sword and shield. Gaining the necessary painting from a ghostly guardian hours later, she travels back to the museum under siege. Almost near the end she finds her mystery man relieving her in the most interesting way of the painting she worked hard to get her hands on. Giving chase to the stranger, they both make their way to the exit in an alleyway only to be knocked out and, upon waking, finds her newest unnamed acquaintance gone, a dagger left behind and Bouchard helping her up.

She asks him to drive her to Werner's apartment to gather information on the Lux Veritatis, a secret group of warriors whose intention was to bring down a black alchemist called Eckhardt. Unknowingly, she enters the apartment, only to be attacked by a cleaner that had been hired to …ahem… 'clean up' Lara. Fending off her attacker, she answers his phone, only to have Bouchard asking if she has been taken care of – to his disappointment he hears a rather threatening reply. He takes off to Prague, with Lara in pursuit to find out more about a contact that Werner was helping called Vasiley – only to find that he too had been a victim of the Monstrum. After talking to a rather hesitant but informative reporter, she decides to take an unguided tour of Vasiley's property. She finds more information on the engravings and paintings, a cult called the Cabal, a race of hybrids called Nephilim and strangely enough, Bouchard who ends up dead. She goes back to the intrepid reporter who gives her access codes to the Cabal stronghold, he drives her there.

She finds the warehouse heavily guarded, the biological research facility heaving with flora and fauna and the one person she thought she'd never see again – the same person who decided to take the touchy-feely way of silently convincing her that she didn't need the painting. After showing him the dagger he left, he traps her in the airlock until his return, much to her chagrin and goes off to explore the Sanitarium, encountering patients who'd been experimented on and a creature one patient described as the Black Angel.

Coming back to the airlock, not knowing that one experiment followed him back, he finds Lara gone, only for her to drop down from above, kick his gun out of his hand and shoot the follower. Swapping pleasantries, they decide to go their separate ways to retrieve the last painting and shard. Travelling through an aquatic research area and back to dry land, she once again fights off undead skeletal warriors that guard the way to the fifth and final Obscura painting. Swimming through the water, she finally gains access to the main area and is lifted out of the water via a platform. What she sees is something that no other person would want to see – Eckhardt, Gunderson (Eckhardt's military lackey) and an unconscious Kurtis, with Eckhardt gloating about her success with the painting they failed time and time again to attain.

He makes her an offer – Kurtis for the painting. Seeing no other viable solution to the situation with out any harm being dealt, she sees it through, throwing the painting to Eckhardt, and Gunderson pushing Kurtis to the ground. Eckhardt orders the release of one of his most valued colleagues and Cabal member Boaz who had earlier been fed to one of the floral creations. Muller, who was in charge of the Biological research, was also pushed over the side to be fed on by the creature. Having each others back for defence, Kurtis gives Lara a boost to a platform higher up and throws her the shards, who argues that it should be him who deals the final blow. He says he will take care of Boaz to buy them some time, only to kill the creature that subsequently rips out of its former body and gets shot down by Kurtis once again. What came next however was not expected – with the creature's final breath, it stabs Kurtis, who falls to the ground seemingly dead.

All the while Lara makes her way through Eckhardts lab and onto a dead end. After Eckhardt makes his presence known, a fight ensues, with him making full use of his powers. After downing him with 2 of the shards, she whips the third out of her backpack only to be ambushed by Karel, another of Eckhardt's colleagues, who snatches the shard out of her hand and stabs Eckhardt himself. He then reveals that not only has been helping her all along, pulling the strings of the events that had taken place, he is also a Nephilim and shape shifts into Bouchard, Luddick the reporter Lara spoke to in Prague and finally, Kurtis. Not being able to believe what she's seen, he offers her a place in the new world he intends to create; something she turns down, citing that she is unable to trust him due to the many deaths of those around her.

One final battle ensues. Lara rushes over to Eckhardt's body to retrieve the Sanglyph, a glove made from the five metallic parts hidden in the paintings. Running up to the platforms Karel hovers over, she jumps to the Sleeper placing the glove onto it, swinging on the various cables to get to the ground and making a dash out towards the nearest exit while the Sleeper explodes taking Karel with it.

Finding nothing but Kurtis' chirugai and blood on the floor, she picks it up, only for it to seemingly come alive and direct her to another exit and possibly Kurtis…