Another Hour in the Life of Lara Croft
By Littlesilverstar, silverstar222b@yahoo.com
Everyone's favourite heroine is back to kick more ass


AUTHOR'S NOTE: After receiving several requests to do another Lara Croft
story, I have decided to oblige. This is another short story to showcase
Lara's skills and kills - and there are going to be a LOT of kills :) I tried
to capture what the personality of a woman like Lara would be like after
killing so many people, while also showing a softer side to her. Obviously, I
do not own the character of Lara Croft.

Enjoy the story!

* * *

"Don't look down," Lara Croft had to keep telling herself as she climbed
higher and higher up the sheer cliff. Normally the height wouldn't have
bothered her, but she had no safety line, no rope, nothing but her own
physical strength and skill. Talented and experienced as she was, one wrong
move would be all it took to send her plunging hundreds of feet to her death
on the jagged rocks below. It wasn't how she normally liked to do things, but
she had no choice. The mercenaries were holding the stolen artifact up there
and were heavily guarding what they thought was the only way up or down.

"Finally," she thought as the top of the cliff came into view. She placed her
leather-gloved hands on the flat top and used her considerable upper-body
strength to press herself into a handstand. From there, an elegant front
walkover put her back on her booted feet.

She paused to catch her breath. The long, dangerous climb up the cliff was
taxing even for a well-conditioned athlete like her. She then checked her
weapons - her trademark twin .45 pistols holstered on her formidable hips and
her trademark homemade longbow on her back, accompanied by a quiver of
white-feathered arrows. Preparing her bow and inserting an arrow, she headed
off through the brush and trees towards her objective.

* * *

The mercenary finished urinating into the bushes and zipped up his pants. He
turned to begin making his way back to camp - then froze when he saw Lara
standing there, not ten feet away.

To be alone in the woods with a woman like her would be a fantasy for most
men. With her slim, athletic, 5'9", 130-pound figure, Lara easily could have
been a model. Her long silky dark brown hair, neatly pulled into a ponytail,
large brown eyes, darkly tanned skin, and elegant high-cheekboned face all
added to her appeal. Her low-cut, skin-tight camoflauge pants showed off her
round, heavily muscled dancer's ass, and her little white tank top displayed
her hard six-pack abs, wasp waist, and exceptionally well-toned arms. She
wasn't wearing a bra and the outline of her firm, round, perky,
pencil-test-passing 34C's was clearly visible.

It would have been a fantasy for the mercenary too - except for the arrow she
was pointing right at his head, her bow pulled back at full draw, clearly
showing her lethal expertise with the exotic weapon, as well as her sheer
strength to draw back a bow like that all the way. He knew the only reason he
hadn't wet his pants was the fact that his bladder was already empty.

He opened his mouth, but before any sound could come out, Lara let the arrow
fly. The perfectly aimed projectile impacted him dead center in his forehead,
shattering his skull and sending blood, brain matter, and bits of bone flying
everywhere. She simply nodded at the power and efficiency of her weapon,
retrieved her arrow, and moved on in the direction of the camp.

She spotted it in a clearing a few minutes later, three tents surrounding a
large fire pit. Four men were sitting around the campfire, drinking beer and
laughing and joking loudly. An axe and a large pile of firewood sat near them.
In the distance, perhaps a quarter mile away, she could see three more
mercenaries manning a machine gun nest that covered the path down the
mountain. There was no hint of how many more men were in the tents.

"Where the hell's Simpson?" said one of the men around the fire. "He's been
gone too long just to take a piss."

"Maybe he's having a shit," said one of the others.

"Or a wank," suggested a third man. "Just the thought of Miss Lara Croft being
after you would be enough to get a lot of guys hard." Loud snickers and
guffaws came from the group.

The fourth guy looked around nervously. "What if Lara IS here, and she's
already taken Simpson out?"

The first mercenary snorted. "How would that be possible? There's only one way
up here, and the boys in the machine gun nest would blast her full of holes
the second she showed her pretty head. Simpson's probably just wanking himself
off, like he said."

"All the same, I think I'll go check on him." The nervous mercenary stood up,
grabbing a pistol and tucking it into the back of his pants.

"Suit yourself, Hamilton. But you might not like what you see when you find
him." More snickers accompanied the remark.

* * *

Hamilton stared in horror at the gory remnants of Simpson's head. He was about
to scream when an arm suddenly snaked around his neck from behind, cutting off
his air as well as his ability to make a sound. As he struggled desperately,
unable to reach his gun and rapidly growing weaker, he looked at the arm that
was swiftly eliminating the supply of oxygen to his brain. It was slender but
muscular, tanned a dark brown, and adorned with a studded black leather
bracelet on its slim wrist. Because his bladder wasn't empty, Hamilton
actually did wet his pants as he realized who it was.

"You were right," Lara whispered huskily into his ear. "I am here, and I did
take Simpson out. Now it's your turn." With that, she gave a quick, brutal
jerk with her lethal arm, cleanly snapping his neck.

She let the body fall to the ground, face first into the dirt, looking at the
mercenary's pistol. "Cheap little 9mm, inferior to my big .45's," she thought
to herself. Seeing a grenade attached to his belt, she picked it up and
attached it to her own. "This could be useful."

* * *

Lara crouched in the bushes, listening to the remaining men around the fire
talking loudly.

"Shit, now Hamilton's missing too. And Simpson still hasn't come back."

"Maybe Simpson WAS having a wank, and Hamilton DID like what he saw and
decided to join him. You never know who swings both ways." A snort came from
one of the others at that.

"What if Lara IS here, and she's taking us out one by one? We can't keep
having guys go off alone into the woods."

"Hah! Now you're sounding like a pussy just like Hamilton. You don't want to
go out alone because a big, scary GIRL might jump out and get you?"

"This isn't just a regular GIRL. This is Miss Lara Croft we're talking about.
Do you know what she's capable of?"

"Come on. There's no way she could have gotten past the guards on the path..."

"All right, why don't both of you shut the fuck up? I don't think there's any
way Lara could have made it up here, but all the same better safe than sorry.
Maybe there's a bear or something in the woods. Grab your guns and let's all
have a look together."

* * *

The three mercenaries made their way through the woods in single file, weapons
at the ready. From her hiding place in a tree, Lara watched and waited. When
the third man passed directly under her, she dropped, landing on his shoulders
and instantly clamping her powerful dancer's thighs around his neck. Twisting
her hips, she snapped his neck like a dry twig. She gracefully backflipped off
the corpse, landing neatly, and caught the falling body, lowering it to the
dirt slowly so it wouldn't make a sound.

She calmly inserted an arrow into her bow. Drawing the string all the way
back, she let it fly right into the second man's back. Though he was wearing
body armor, Lara's bow had such a powerful draw that the arrow penetrated it
easily, burying itself in his heart.

As the body fell, Lara was already readying another arrow. The mercenary in
the front began turning around when he heard the faint THUD of the second
corpse striking the ground. She greeted him with a lethal arrow right to his
face before he could finish turning. He never even saw what ended his life.

Lara looked at the corpses and their weapons, picking up an AK-47 assault
rifle from one and slinging it over her shoulder. After gathering up several
spare magazines and retrieving her arrows, she made her way back to the camp.
The firepit was still deserted.

She considered taking out the men in the machine gun nest next, but decided
against it. They had been obsessively watching the path down the mountain the
whole time, convinced that it was the only way anyone could reach the camp.
They had no reason to look back here. But it would only be a matter of time
before someone came out of the tents, discovered the missing men, and raised
the alarm. She had to clear the tents first.

Passing by the pile of firewood, she smiled grimly as she picked up the axe
lying nearby. Taking a deep breath, she yanked open the flap to the first
tent.

Five mercenaries were inside, two playing War from a well-worn deck of cards
and the other three sleeping. Lara brained the first card player with her axe,
smashing his skull open with a single lethal blow, then used the sharp edge of
the weapon to slit the second man's throat before he could shout. Heart
beating rapidly, she looked at the others. All still asleep.

She stood over the first sleeping man and stomped down hard on his throat with
her size 9 military boot, crushing his windpipe, grinding down cruelly with
her boot. She repeated the process for the next mercenary.

The last man stirred in his cot. He sleepily opened his eyes - then stared in
horror as he saw Lara standing over him, her right leg high over her head in a
full 180-degree standing split, showing off her extraordinary flexibility. He
opened his mouth to scream, but Lara's leg came down with almost superhuman
speed, her heel impacting his skull with tremendous force and destroying it in
a gorier mess than that of the man she had brained with the axe.

Moving on, a cold, efficient soldier performing her duty, she opened the tent
flap a crack and peeked out. Then she gasped.

She was staring directly into a mercenary's face!

Although the man's scream was abruptly cut short by the axe she planted into
his forehead, the alarm was raised. Lara threw herself into action, launching
her athletic body into a series of aerial cartwheels and whip-backs, the
no-handed tumbling moves enabling her to fire both of her pistols as she
rapidly moved towards the cover of the trees.

Men swarmed out of the tents like ants, shouting, weapons in their hands. They
were greeted by the brunette hottie's bullets, lethally accurate even as she
elegantly backflipped like a pro-gymnast, her exceptional wrist strength
allowing her to handle the pistols' heavy recoil one-handed effortlessly. Male
body after male body fell to the dirt, some dead before they hit the ground,
others screaming in agony from the gory wounds left by her large-caliber
bullets. Those wearing bulletproof vests fared no better as Lara's
armor-piercing rounds penetrated their vests easily. And the mercenaries
shooting back at her found that the incredibly fast backflipping brown blur of
a woman proved impossible to hit.

Lara finished her tumbling series with a full twisting layout, vanishing into
the woods. Landing gracefully, she peeked out from behind the cover of a large
tree to examine her handiwork. She had done devastating damage, but there were
just too many of them. Seven men lay dead on the ground in pools of blood of
various sizes. A couple of them had had their heads blown completely off from
headshots from her big guns. Three more mercs lay wounded, writhing in agony.
A middle-aged medic and a teenage boy were hovering over the injured men, and
Lara wondered what such a young kid was doing out here. Five other survivors
were positioned around the camp, nervously pointing their weapons at the
surrounding trees.

The three mercenaries who had been guarding the path came running over,
assault rifles in their hands. Evidently they had left the heavy machine gun
in its emplacement because it was too much dead weight to carry.

As Lara watched, the medic performed triage, going to work on one of the
wounded while motioning for the kid to press a cloth on the bullet hole of the
second man, who had been shot in the left arm and appeared to be the least
badly off of the injured. The third wounded merc was jerking and spasming as
bright red arterial blood poured out from his body like a fountain.

A tall, heavy-set man who appeared to be the leader spoke up. "What's their
status?"

"Ormsby will live," the medic responded, pointing to the merc being tended to
by the kid. "Ford here has a chance if we get him to a hospital in time."

"And Dollinger?" asked the leader, pointing to the spasming man.

The medic shook his head. "He's gone. Lost too much blood already."

"Well, I'll put him out of his misery." The leader drew his pistol and
finished Dollinger with a shot to the head. At that, the teenage boy jumped in
fear. The boss continued. "Now that that's taken care of, we're going to hunt
that Lara cunt down and give her the gruesome death she's been begging for,
but only after we gang-rape her. Ormsby, grab a pistol with your good hand and
guard the medic. Everyone else, let's get ready to beat the bushes."

"Hold on," said a mercenary with a gray beard, the oldest of the group. "Not
the kid. He's too young for that, and that's not his job. We'll have eight
without him. That'll be enough, as long as we fight smart."

"All right then." The leader sighed. "Kid would probably chicken out anyway.
Take three men and go through the far side of the mountaintop. I'll take three
more and keep the side with the exit covered. Most likely she'll try to
escape. Let's move out, men."

Lara was already moving, formulating a plan as she ran.

* * *

"Hey! Check this out!" said one of the mercenaries. One of Lara's
white-feathered arrows was embedded deep in a tree trunk. His three companions
gathered around to look, then whipped around, pointing their weapons at the
trees nervously.

"She's got to be close," said the second man, placing his finger directly on
the trigger of his rifle.

"Maybe it's some kind of ambush," the third merc spoke up.

"But then why would she leave the arrow to be see..." A look of horror
appeared on the gray-bearded man's face as he trailed off, realizing. "Split
up! Dive for cover!"

But it was too late. The grenade came flying and landed right in the middle of
the group. Lara had once tried throwing a javelin just for fun and had been
informed that she was good enough to make the ladies' Olympic team, so she
knew how awe-inspiring her throwing arm was for both distance and accuracy.

"See you in hell, boys!" The old-timer heroically dove on the grenade. It
exploded, killing him but sparing his comrades.

"Wow. Wasn't expecting any of 'em to have the balls to do that," Lara said to
herself as she drew her AK-47 and opened up with a ten-round burst, dropping
one man dead immediately and a second wounded, screaming as he dropped his
weapon. As the last merc opened fire on her, she dodged the bullets with a
pair of standing back handsprings going into a back tuck, the same standing
tumbling pass Angelina Jolie had done in the Tomb Raider movie, readying her
rifle as she rotated through her tuck. She fired back while she was still in
the air, her physical strength enabling her to have excellent recoil control
on full auto, killing him with a well-aimed five-round burst, the bullets
ripping right through his not-so-bulletproof vest.

The wounded mercenary, groaning, tried to reach for his weapon, but a female
size 9 military boot suddenly stomped hard on his hand, breaking the small,
delicate bones there with a CRUNCH. With a cry, he looked up to see Lara
wagging her finger at him sternly. "Uh-uh."

She finished him with a swift but extremely powerful snap-kick to the weakest
part of his temple, cracking open his skull and piercing his brain with the
steel toe of her boot.

Lara then looked down at the remnants of the gray-bearded man. The grenade
hadn't left much of his body - only his head, hands, ankles, and feet were
still reasonably intact. She saluted the corpse. "From one warrior to another,
respect."

* * *

Lara observed the camp again. The medic was still working on the badly wounded
mercenary named Ford, with the kid assisting him. Ormsby's left arm was in a
sling, and he held a pistol in his right hand. The tall, heavy-set leader had
returned to camp, along with another merc, a young bald man. She wondered
where the other two were.

She got her answer a few moments later, as the two men emerged from the trees.
"Where the hell is the other team?" the boss demanded.

"They didn't make it, sir."

"What? She took ALL of them out?!"

"I'm afraid so, sir."

"Fuck." The leader began pacing back and forth like a caged animal.

"Sir, maybe it's time to clear out. Especially since Ford needs to get to a
hospital," the medic spoke up, looking up from his unconscious patient.

"Eight of us, running away like GIRLS from one ACTUAL girl? I think not.
Anyway, remember that our Russian oligarch friend is landing his helicopter
here tomorrow morning to pay us for the stolen artifact. We bug out now, we
don't get paid. Now I don't want to hear any more chickening-out talk. Got
it?"

Most of the men nodded in obedience at their leader, but the medic was still
shaking his head, and the kid looked frightened. "So what's your plan, just
wait here while Miss Croft snipes us one by one from the woods?" the medic
demanded.

The leader looked as if he was about to make an angry retort, but suddenly
stopped and began nodding. "Maybe you do have a point. I'm tired of this game
with Lara. It's time to fucking end it." He whispered to the three mercs near
him, who nodded in agreement.

The young bald mercenary pulled out a knife, grabbed the kid, and held the
blade to his throat. The medic jumped up. "What the fuck is this..."

"It's called winning," growled the leader. "All this time we've been playing
by Lara's rules, and she's been winning. Well, now it's time for MY rules."

"I won't let you..." The medic's words were abruptly cut short when the leader
drew his pistol and shot him in the head. He then shot the wounded Ford as
well. "May as well put him out of his misery too."

"No...please..." begged the boy, trembling in fear.

"Oh, don't worry. We need you alive. For now." The bald man smirked as he
continued holding the knife. He then addressed Ormsby. "You with us?"

"I'm with you," Ormsby replied, waving his pistol.

"Good," said the boss. He then shouted towards the trees. "Lara! I know you're
out there! Watching us, waiting for the right moment to pick us off! Well, it
ain't gonna happen! We have a hostage now! Now, throw your weapons one by one
into the clearing, then come out with your hands up! If you don't, this kid
will buy it like it's on sale for 19.99!"

Lara took a deep breath, looking at the positions of the men, calculating
distances as she improvised a plan. It was risky, but she had no other choice.

"I'm warning you, Lara!" growled the leader. "Start throwing them out now, or
the kid dies right here!" The bald man pressed the knife closer to the kid's
throat.

The men stared as her AK-47 came flying out to land in the clearing. "Holy
shit, it's working," said one of the mercenaries, pointing his weapon into the
trees where the weapon had come flying out.

"Hold your fire," whispered the boss. "We don't know exactly where she is.
When she's disarmed and helpless and comes out, we'll shoot her in the legs,
then rape her, then slit her throat, then sleep peacefully tonight and get our
money tomorrow." He called back towards the woods. "Now your pistols!"

One, then two, pistols came flying into the clearing. "Now your bow!" shouted
the leader. "And then come out with your hands up!"

But instead of the bow, a white-feathered arrow came flying, embedding itself
in the arm of the bald man. He screamed in pain, dropping the knife. The kid
began running for the woods. Lara nodded in satisfaction as she reached for
another arrow. She had made the perfect shot, only drawing the longbow back
partway so the arrow wouldn't hit the kid too.

This time, she drew the bow back with all her strength, ignoring the bullets
striking branches all around her. Some of the mercenaries were shooting
blindly in her direction, but the leader was aiming at the boy running away.
Lara let her arrow fly. It impacted the leader in the thigh, driving deep into
flesh and savagely cracking his femur. He dropped his weapon and fell to the
ground, screaming in agony. The kid disappeared into the cover of the trees.

The leader and the bald man were in too much pain from the arrows embedded in
them to shoot. Ormsby and the two unwounded men were still spraying the
position she had formerly occupied with bullets as Lara swiftly moved through
the trees.

"You see her?"

"I don't see anything!"

"Maybe we already got her..."

As Ormsby spoke, Lara rose up from behind him like an apparition and
decapitated him with the razor-sharp blade of the axe that was still
thoughtfully lying around. She was ready to reach for his gun, but she didn't
need it. At the sight of the brutal beheading, the two unwounded mercs dropped
their guns and began running away in pure terror. They didn't get far. The
first received the axe in the center of his back from Lara's perfect throw.
The second let out an unearthly howl as her arrow pierced right through the
body armor on his back. He fell to the ground, twitching, mercifully expiring
a few seconds later. She let out a high-pitched warrior cry at the thrill of
the kill, a scream that made even several animals and one kid watching from
the woods tremble.

As for the leader and the bald man, they were both quivering in mortal fear as
they lay painfully on the ground. Both had also both pissed and shat their
pants. Lara smirked icily as she approached the bald man first.

"Please, I was just following orders..." he begged.

She snorted. "That's the best you got?" She savagely kicked him in the groin
with her steel-toed boot, sending his testicles back up somewhere into his
body. Then, a single punch to his jaw from her leather-gloved fist knocked him
out.

She turned on the leader, who was whimpering. "Please! I'll give you the
artifact! I'll give you all the money! I'll let you..." He trailed off as he
came to the icy realization that his begging would have no effect.

She didn't even speak. She simply stomped on his groin with her big black
boot, grinding down hard, putting all of her 130 pounds into it, utterly
annihilating his testicles into paste. Ignoring his extremely high-pitched
screams, she kicked him in the side several times, breaking a rib with each
kick, then smashed her knee into his face, releasing a massive spray of blood
and knocking him unconscious.

She looked around at the scene of utter carnage she had created and pumped her
fist. She then called out to the woods.

"It's okay, kid! You can come out now! I've taken care of the big bad men!"

The kid emerged from the trees and made his way over to her. "T...thank you
for s...saving me, M...Miss Croft."

She gave him a warm smile. "No problem. And please, call me Lara. What's your
name?"

"M...Mikey."

"Well, Mikey, how the fu..." She caught herself, not wanting to swear in front
of someone so young. "How the heck did you end up in a place like this?"

Mikey seemed to have calmed down somewhat, as he no longer stuttered. "I ran
away from home when I was 15. Mom was a heroin addict, never even knew my dad.
You know how it goes. These guys promised me adventure. I did chores for them
and they gave me a small cut of the money."

She touched his shoulders, looking down, as he was two inches shorter than
her, noting how he seemed both aroused and intimidated by her touch. "Did they
hurt you?"

"The leader and some of the other guys beat me sometimes when they got mad.
But the old guy, the one with the gray beard, he always treated me fair. He
kept the others from hurting me too much. But even with the beatings, I never
thought they would go so far as to hold a knife to my throat like that..." He
turned away, ashamed of his tears, and came face-to-beheaded face with
Ormsby's decapitated head. At that, he began vomiting.

Lara waited for him to finish, then handed him a towel to wipe away the mess.
"Sorry about that," he said.

"You have nothing to apologize for. Any normal person would react that way.
I'm abnormal because after so much killing my emotions have been dulled."

"I was watching from the woods," said Mikey. "You were impressive and
terrifying at the same time."

"I learned long ago that I could either be the predator, or be the prey," said
Lara slowly. "I decided I wasn't going to be the prey. Speaking of which..."
She pointed at the two unconscious mercenaries. Mikey's eyes widened.

"You can watch or not," she continued. "After what you've been through, I
won't judge one way or the other. Heck, you can finish one of them if you
want."

He stared at the casual way she talked about killing.

"Sorry. After so many years of my lifestyle I guess I've become a cold-blooded
bitch. I just look at it like, I hunt animals whose only crime is being
delicious. When it comes to killing evil people, I don't hesitate at all
anymore."

"Don't apologize, Miss Cr...I mean Lara. They need killing. There's nothing
cold-blooded about it. But I'm not...I'm not mentally ready for doing
something like that."

"I understand," Lara nodded. "Believe it or not, I was like that when I was
your age. Which, by the way, is...?"

"I'm eighteen."

"You look younger than that."

"I know. I get that a lot. Um...if you don't mind me asking...how old are you,
Miss Lara?"

She told him and he stared. "Wow. You REALLY look younger than that."

"Thanks. I get that a lot. Well, let's get down to business. Are you ready?"
She took his hand affectionately. Her forearms were larger, darker, and far
more heavily muscled than his, and as she watched him look down and compare
the two, she could tell that he was turned on by the fact that hers were
bigger.

"Ready as I'll ever be, Miss Lara."

* * *

When the two mercenaries woke up, they saw Lara standing over them, her
trademark pistols re-holstered at her waist. Mikey stood a few feet behind
her, watching nervously. The begging for mercy began immediately, but was
swiftly silenced when Lara drew her guns, shooting the bald man in the stomach
and the leader in the kneecap.

Ignoring the screams, she emptied both of her pistols into the bald man, the
large-caliber bullets utterly destroying everything in their path. His body
quite literally looked like Swiss cheese when she was finished.

"How are you, Mikey? Enjoying the show?" she called out.

"Y...yes," he stammered, trying to reconcile his natural desire for revenge on
those who had hurt him with years of conditioning by society that revenge was
a wicked sin.

"It's about to get better." Lara turned on the leader. "Yours will be even
bigger. REALLY big." He suddenly noticed that she had dragged over the
massive, heavy machine gun and began quivering.

She cartwheeled over to him and ripped off his pants and underwear. She kicked
him hard in the gut to stun him, then positioned him on his hands and knees,
ready to "receive" from behind.

"Part of this is for Mikey. But to be honest, it's mostly for me and the way
you were planning to rape me. Now you're going to feel what it's like to be
the one who gets penetrated," she whispered.

"No, please," her male victim croaked out, but was silenced when she began
ramming the massive gun barrel up his ass. She taunted him as she shoved it in
further and further, using her strength to force it deeper. "That's it,
wanker. Take it up the arse like the bitchboy you are. Hmm, this is going in
pretty easily. You're very loose, actually. Have you done this before? Do you
like being the catcher? Do you like taking a nice big cock up the arse?"

"Oh my God, I'm losing control!" she mocked him. "Sorry if I shoot too
soon...Do you know how many guys have said that to me? Heh heh heh. Well, now
the roles are reversed. Oh, I just can't hold it back any longer! I'm going to
cum! I'm going to shoot!"

And shoot Lara did, pulling the trigger, pumping three or four rounds into his
ass. That was more than enough. The huge bullets from the massive machine gun
simply shredded his entire body into paste. She looked at what was left of the
once feared mercenary leader and smirked. "So was it good for you too?"

She looked over at Mikey, her expression softening, watching as he simply
stared for several more minutes. Finally, he walked over to her and said,
"Thank you, Miss Lara. You set me free."

She gave him her trademark warm smile. "You're very welcome. Now let's take a
look at that artifact!"

It was in one of the tents, an ancient Egyptian statue of a cat, made of solid
gold. "Damn, imagine how much we could get for this thing!" exclaimed Mikey.

Lara gave him a look.

"Sorry. I guess it'll take some time for the mercenary mentality to go away."

"It's okay. Anyway, the museum will pay me a large reward for returning it,
and I'll give you 20%."

"Oh, Miss Lara, I wouldn't feel right taking that from you..."

"After what you've been through, you deserve it. Anyway, you'll be on your
own, and you'll need something to get you started in independent life.
Remember, I'm already rich."

"Thank you, Miss Lara."

They went back outside, enjoying the cool breeze and the crisp mountain air.
"So what happens now?" Mikey asked.

"Well, our Russian oligarch friend who wants to buy the stolen artifact will
show up tomorrow morning, and I think I have the perfect greeting for him,"
Lara replied, pointing to the massive machine gun. "A gun like that will take
down a helicopter easily. Want to stay for the show?"

"Absolutely," said Mikey. "I love girls with guns just like any other
red-blooded male."

"Excellent. In the meantime, we can spend the night here. The tents are still
up and there are plenty of supplies. And I can pop your cherry if you want."

He stared. "First, how did you know, and second, how are you so..."

Lara laughed. "First, no offense, but it is kind of obvious, and second, I can
be so casual about sex because I've done so many guys. And also girls. Same
reason I can be so casual about killing. I've lost count of how many I've done
in both categories, in fact."

Mikey smiled shyly. "I would love that, Miss Lara."

They walked into a tent, arm in arm.

THE END

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