Archive of Our Own

Coming in from the cold

When you and your friend-turned-enemy-turned-reluctant-ally are transported to a ruined monastery in Nepal far of the beaten path and have to walk back to civilization for miles with only each-other for company, you inevitably strike up conversation, leading you both to take a long hard look at yourself and each-other respectively.

“We were both too stubborn to ever admit when we were wrong, even back then.”

“It took us years, two dead loved ones and massive property damage to figure out that causing those who hurt us pain wouldn’t make the pain go away.” Lara gave a mirthless chuckle at that, Amanda tagged her own point on “Don’t forget it took an ancient megalomaniacal daemon-woman almost destroying the world to really get us to stop, otherwise we both would still be at it.” Her gaze turned sombre and the humour that had played on her face due to the utter absurdity of the previously described situation disappeared, giving a slightly weaker follow up “Or one of us would be dead.” The many times they had fought, both verbally and not, since Bolivia all those years ago came back to the forefront of their minds, the times Lara had shot at Amanda or Amanda had people shoot at Lara, the times Amanda had invoked the Entity of the Wraithstone, Kazakhstan, Peru. When Lara had held a gun to Amanda’s head and demanded answers, then pistol-whipped her and told her “Every minute you still live is a gift.”, after she had gotten them. “It wouldn’t make either of us feel better, no matter who won. It wouldn’t bring Allister back, or James.” Lara spoke again, breaking both out of their ruminations of near-misses and moments where one of them had thought they were dead for sure.

“After the… dig in Bolivia, I hated and resented you for so long, it was all I could think about when thinking about you. There was this one question… well several questions but all related burning in my mind: “Why didn’t you come look for me? Should I ever have trusted you? What would make you hate me so much, that you’d leave me for dead? Did you even mourn me, or did you just move on with your life like I never existed, like I never meant anything to you?”” Lara winced at the accusations, she knew, ever since Rutland had told her in Peru that Amanda was alive, that the latter would hate her for leaving her behind, for giving up on her. In a way she had hated herself from that moment, but when she tried to talk to Amanda when they met again, face to face, in that old Soviet research facility in Kazakhstan, her old work partner blew her of. Amanda didn’t want to talk anymore then, she just wanted Lara to stay out of her way. She shouldn’t have been surprised at that, since she had been very good at staying out of Amanda’s way all those years. Still, now was her chance to tell her side of the story, maybe get rid of some of her guilt and answer some of the questions Amanda had just told her about. “I did mourn you, I mourned you and everyone else we lost that day.” Lara began “When I learned you were still alive, I was soo happy, the first thing I wanted to do was to hug you and tell you how much I’ve missed you.” Amanda snorted a laugh at that, but Lara kept going “I wanted to make sure Rutland wasn’t lying, so I went to the old dig-site in Bolivia, for the first time since the cave in. I looked for… your body. I did find one of your shoes though, so if you want that back, I believe I still have it.” Amandas chuckle at that was more genuine this time, but she didn’t interrupt Lara’s explanations. “I didn’t really think about why I never went to check earlier. I guess… it just hurt so much to think about you and the others, the good moments we shared. When we were still so young and thought we were invincible, that some lifeless rocks were never going to keep the future greatest archaeologists in the world away from making their first ground-breaking discovery. Then Black Smoke… and all went to shit.”

Instinctively, Amanda’s hand went to the Wraithstone hanging from her neck, and she carefully stroked the odd object “It’s really odd to describe how I feel about them, The Entity, no one ever asked, not even James. To everyone else I am just this “cool magic lady with a pet daemon”, but… I feel conflicted. If I hadn’t found it, taken it, I would also have died there. But they killed so many of us. I don’t know why they didn’t kill me, why they kept me safe, kept me alive, got me out. Sometimes I feel guilty, accepting the help of someone who killed so many of our friends. But… having them, having the Stone, it’s exhilarating, I had almost forgotten how it felt like to be without it before you took it from me in Peru. I imagine you felt something similar when you put Excalibur back together and trashed us with it, or when you got the whole Mjolnir set together to electrocute thralls and Natla.” The memory of the crazed Atlantean finally getting her comeuppance brought a small smile to both their faces, and Amanda continued “Those didn’t have a mind of their own though, did they?” Lara shook her head at that, “Well that means that even talking to you, who were there in Bolivia when we first met them, you don’t, or can’t rather, fully understand how this feels. Without conscious thinking, the Stone, the Entity, want to keep me safe, stop a fall that would kill me, stop me from drowning even when I’m out cold. We don’t so much talk as feel each-other, when we’re scared or… angry like when I got them to help me go all-out in Peru” she swallowed “after you killed James.” Lara winced again being reminded of that moment and now thinking of how she had felt when the replica had shot Allister right in front of her, she couldn’t help herself from saying the same thing to Amanda as she had said on the day that it had happened, when Amanda was still holding Rutland’s dying body in her arms: “I’m sorry Amanda, I really am.”

Amanda was currently wiping tears from the corners of her eyes that had made her cheeks sting even more in the cold, she wanted Lara not to notice that she was crying, but with a heavy snowfall and there being nothing else to look at but each-other and indeterminable flurry of snow, that was impossible. She tried to put on a firm voice, tried to hide the hurt she was feeling, but it still rang through “It doesn’t really matter. Being sorry doesn’t bring anyone back, hurting those that hurt you doesn’t bring anyone back. Still out of courtesy: I am sorry too… about your mom. I didn’t know what was in Avalon when I told her to pull out the sword, maybe… maybe if she had just left it in, the device would have just deactivated and… we’d all have been fine.” Lara was in pain at that memory, she had lived it twice, once as a nine-year-old girl here in Nepal, having her mother taken from her in a flash of blinding white light after she had activated this ancient stone device, and once as an adult that fateful day in Peru talking to her one last time, just making her more confused, afraid about her nine year old daughter. That same day when Amanda had told her that the ring wasn’t an explosive device but a transporter, she had had hope she never thought possible, journeyed across the world once more until it ended in Helheim, in a third and final disappointment and heartache “You don’t need to make excuses, Amanda. I mean what you said then, when it happened, gave me hope I never had, such precious hope that I could see her again…” now it was Lara’s turn to swallow “Like you said, from all we read, why would we think Avalon, the mythical, paradisical rest of king Arthur himself would turn out to be such an Atlantean hellhole. It hurt so much…” now it was her turn to spill tears, and again she too tried to hide them, “Having to shoot this thrall, this mindless monster wearing my mother face. I looked for her, I found her but she was gone, she had been gone for so long.” Barely being able to control her emotions the English archaeologist sniffled and gave a short sob. Forgetting for a moment that the woman before her had shot at her multiple times, forgetting that they had spent months chasing each-other across the globe, looking for the raiment of the Norse god Thor and his mythical hammer, forgetting all the history of hurt they had, Amanda saw again the same hurt young woman she had met in college when Lara had first told her of the tragic fate of the late Lady Croft, her first and most traumatising encounter with the supernatural. So, like then, Amanda put a hand on Lara’s shoulder, and when that wasn’t rebuffed, pulled her into a hug. “You never should have had to go through that. Hell, neither of us should have had to go through what we went through. You are the strongest woman I have ever met; you never know when to quit and you always stand up for what you believe is right. I don’t know what happens when we die, I don’t even know what to believe any more about an afterlife after what just happened, but I am sure that no matter what, no matter where they are now, you parents couldn’t be more proud of who you are, how you were able to keep going despite everything.” They spent quite a few heartbeats in that hug before the culmination of all the years they had experienced since they last did something like this hit them again. Lara was the first to address the unusual nature of their predicament: “OK, this was really nice but now this hug feels wired.” “Agreed.”, her American colleague responded curtly, “We should probably end the hug.” “Probably, for the best” they both took a step back at the same time. They both took a deep breath of the cold, Himalayan air and waved their hands around, arms outstretched downward, as if to shake of any residual awkwardness.

“We should probably keep going.”, Amanda tried to get the conversation back in motion “Yes, you’re right. Do you still want to… talk or should we just shut up and keep going?” the Brit responded. Having readjusted her heading to the direction they were going in previously, Amanda walked (or rather limped because of her injured ankle) on, giving her reply while already facing away from her former-friend-enemy-one-time-ally (they really needed to come up with a shorter way to describe their relationship) “We should keep talking, I mean once we hit civilization we probably go our separate ways and hopefully never cross paths again. Anything we have on our chest; we should say it now before it festers and turns into another murder-revenge-fantasy.”  Lara sighed before following the blonde, catching up quickly on both her good legs and keeping about half a meter behind Amanda, while thinking over the latter’s words “Murder-revenge-fantasy”, what a way to put what they did. Amanda probably first had those after Bolivia, Lara followed up after what she learned what Amanda had done to her home while she was in Ghana, and both probably figured out some plans after their last confrontation in Peru. Then the time they started running into each-other again looking for the way to Avalon, Amanda had mentioned offhandedly that the only way to have the glove Lara had already activated to work for her was to kill the latter. They seemingly always wanted what the other had, like pre-schooler’s who never quite grew up. Only now they had way more means to make what they want happen.

That brought a question to Lara’s mind she had thought about ever since her double had tossed Amanda: “When the replica came to my home to take the Wraithstone back for you, did you order it to kill Allister and torch my home?”. The American flinched and stopped turning to face her accuser. She herself had asked for honesty so she owed her once-friend that much “If I told you no on both counts, would you even believe me?”, she asked. The answer came with a thoughtful, sceptical look: “I could believe either answer just as much. I am sure that if you had wanted that, Natla would have let you have your way, but I also know now that the replica answers to Natla, not you so it might have been just her who wanted that. It would be so easy for you to lay all the blame on a dead woman, so I do want the truth, Amanda.” Amanda was somehow ashamed and looked at her feet in the ankle-high snow as she spoke: “I did send it to get my stone back, yes. I didn’t tell it to avoid any collateral damage, but I also didn’t give it orders to kill anyone. Did it talk to you, before it shot Allister?” Lara was surprised that Amanda could still feel guilt and shame so she remained calm as she responded “No. Smirked at me, taunted me, wearing my face. But didn’t say anything. It was so gratuitous. Allister was no threat, he was trying to get out of the burning building, he had no weapon. And she just shot him, from a few feet away. Contemptuously. Like his life didn’t mean anything at all.” The keeper of the Wraithstone answered in a small voice, like a schoolgirl in-front of a scolding principal “I’m sorry for that Lara. That wasn’t supposed to happen, but in many ways, I am responsible.” She turned her face up from the snow laced ground and spoke on, uncaring for her obviously wet eyes: “I dug Natla up, I thought I could use her, an actual contemporary source for so many of the great mysteries, I thought I could finally get ahead of you… But I was the one being used, because of me digging her up and letting her make a servant for herself, just so I could have my treasure back, she was almost able to destroy the whole world. You tried to warn me, but I was too petty, too jealous, too hateful to listen.”

Now it was Lara’s turn to provide comfort, she didn’t know why she cared about this woman who admitted to being partially responsible for the death of her best friend, but care she did. “Hey, look me in the eyes.” She spoke while having both hands placed on Amanda’s shoulders. The latter was straining to keep from bawling her eyes out at the guilt of having helped a self-declared goddess almost accomplish planetary omnicide. Still, she managed to meet the brunette’s gaze. The British archaeologist spoke softly, steadily to keep her former friend from spiralling further: “You did help her, but you didn’t know what she would do. I once helped her, years ago, also not knowing her true intent. I got to drop a near-mountain of lava on her, hoped she was dead. Would I have believed you, if you had told me then, not to trust her? If we had had the history we have now? Why? I mean after we hurt each-other so much, you had every right to be suspicious of me. And hey,” at this she gave the blonde a playful smack on the shoulder before going on “You came around as soon as you knew her game. You helped me save the world; I couldn’t have done it without you. I mean it Amanda.” At that, Lara got a small, genuine, smile from her once-friend, and for a moment saw that it truly was the same woman she had once so diligently worked with, who she had shared insight and theories with, with whom she had been excited for revelations together. Even here in a snowstorm in Nepal, at below freezing temperatures, she saw the woman she had last seen in Bolivia, about to make their first joint breakthrough, about to become national (hopefully international) headline news. This hurt her, to see overlayed with someone you spited, hated, many times wanted to strangle, someone you had had such a deep, meaningful friendship with. This was harder for Lara than when she thought Amanda had died in the cave-in. This meant that it was real, it really was the same woman. It wasn’t a lie, some grand scheme involving digging up her dead friend’s corpse and giving some grand performance (or using a replica, since she unfortunately now knew that such means existed), trying to abuse her trust and grief. This meant that because she failed her good friend once, she lost that friend in another way than death. And then, bitter and vengeful, Amanda had wanted her to hurt. And hurt they both had.

Lara wanted to get away from the accusations that were making them both tense up so much that they lost valuable time stopping and keeping the other from having breakdowns (of grief, guilt, resurfaced traumatic experiences). She was still curious though: “I am still sorry how this started, how we fell apart. I would like to know: How did you get out, back then at the dig in Bolivia?” “I don’t want to talk about…” Amanda closed her eyes for a second “That.” Having pulled herself together after having the metaphorical weight of a burned childhood-home dropped on her; Amanda once again set forth “We should seek shelter, I don’t know how much daylight we still have. I really don’t want to open that wound but… you were here before once; do you know of any caves?” Her British counterpart tensed up trying to remember the most harrowing journey she had ever undergone, and it was at the ripe old age of nine. Cold—Scared—Alone—All-alone. Two people had survived the plane-crash, only one of them made it to the nearest town. One scared, nine-year-old girl, trekking from the monastery where she and her mother had first taken refuge across the snowy wilderness. Somehow, even now she was scared just thinking about it. She remembered the setting sun as she huddled up in the end of a cave, hoping praying that some rescue party would find her before any predators like snow leopards or yetis did. Well, they had each-other now, she had her guns and Amanda had the Wraithstone (probably, she had no idea how long that thing took to recharge) they could take turns keeping watch. She estimated the location of her first shelter based on the angle of the setting sun and its relation to the cave’s mouth, keeping in mind it had to be reachable with the speed and stamina a nine-year-old girl could provide in a day, (they were faster, even with Amanda’s limp) and took the lead, keeping a pace that her colleague could manage. To their mutual relief, (and mutual surprise) the managed to find the shelter. It was probably the same, but everything looks so different when you are no longer that small or even as scared as you were then.

“The temperature is going to drop even further, we’re adequately dressed, but we still run a few risks.” Lara stated as they prepared to start resting until the sun had risen. (it would be too risky to travel in the dark, besides there would be more predators) “I understand what you’re getting at. I doubt you like this any more than I do, but I agree: We’ll have to try to ball together, legs and arms around centre of heat, mutually using what the other radiates of.” Amanda concurred while slowly lowering herself to the snow-covered ice that formed the caves floor, trying to avoid straining her injured ankle. They both new the hug had been wired; this was going to be even more wired. But they both also loved to have full use of their digits so that’s that: cuddling with the person who had tried to kill you at least three different times. Having gotten as physically comfortable as possible and thus as emotionally uncomfortable as necessary, they still had to schedule out watch rotations. “Did you always produce this much body heat or are you running a fever?” came a sudden and quite awkward question from the bundle of humans. ”I have a pocket Hell-daemon around my neck that has a vested interest in me not dying of exposure, so yes I am warmer than average. You should be happy.” Came a somewhat offended reply. “You never finished describing your relationship with them. What’s closer: friend, dog, slave, lover” the last was met with an indignant snort before an actual response cut of the listing “Wild animal you met that wants the same thing you want, not communicating like a human would, not trained like a dog is. Like a deer you see in the forest or a boar, you leave them alone they leave you alone, somehow you help each-other. I don’t really understand what they get from me, maybe they care because I took the stone out of the wall and allowed them to leave the cave. Anyway, this is like our huddle here: useful and don’t think too hard about it.” “Understood, we’ll keep watch in four-hour shifts, I’ll take first watch. If your smoky pall runs out of juice, you can wake me for backup.” “Hopefully there’ll be no yetis, good night.” “Night.”

The next evening, in an infirmary, in a small Nepalese town not really on-the-map:

“We should probably talk about what this is, what we are.” Amanda prompted, sitting on a cot, using her index fingers to alternatingly point at her former-friend-once-enemy and herself “Traumatized, stubborn archaeologists with horrible luck and near infinite murderous abilities.”, Lara offered a description to gain enough time to figure out where she had her former classmate and excavation-partner stood. “Some of the few people who know how exactly some myths and precursor civilizations are real, the only people alive now who have seen Arthur’s Excalibur and Thor’s Mjolnir in battle.” Amanda continued in the similar vein, also raking her mind for descriptions that didn’t take up a whole sentence. “Not-enemies?” Lara offered, holding out a hand, Amanda rose to her feet and took the offered hand with both of her own “Not-enemies.”, she confirmed. “So, what do not-enemies do?”, Lara asked. Her new Not-enemy looked thoughtful for a moment before she started making suggestions “Tell each-other where they are “digging up the past”, so they can avoid each-other.” The brit nodded continuing the sentence “With a wide radius, preferably staying out of the country, ideally out of the continent.” She then put her own suggestion forward “Not go for unannounced visits to one-another, whether in homes, hotel rooms, boats, campsites.” Amanda did want to add a caveat to this though: “Unless the not-enemy is seriously injured and in need of medical attention and their not-enemy is the closest human being.” “Unless that, sure.” Lara assented. The brunette then thoughtfully put forth a sentence for her first not-enemy to complete: “When a not-enemy sends you a friendship request on a social media channel you…” Amanda gave her thoughts on the (quite-possible) scenario: “You accept so that you can keep tabs on them.” Lara nodded at that, before having an epiphany and blurting it out: “That reminds me, we should exchange contact information so we can tell each-other when we are working and where, as to not run into each-other.” They both immediately set to task, there were several seconds of silence before one of them spoke up again “How would you feel about getting greeting cards from me?” Amanda asked her traveling-companion while writing down some of her own contacts on a sticky-note next to the hospital bed. Her travel companion, who was doing the same from the cot she had been assigned responded “Fine, I’d say, maybe mostly amused. Greeting cards are fine for birthday’s, holiday’s we both observe, congratulations for awards.” Amanda stopped scribbling for a moment to look at the brunette and asked her, somewhat surprised: “You still remember my birthday even though you thought I was dead for more than half a decade?” “Well, I have a good memory with dates, and we did celebrate it together several times.” Lara responded not stopping her own writing. “Well, I’m touched.” The blonde responded in a half-genuine-half-sarcastic manner, before continuing the writing she had halted.