Lara Croft: Origins

Chapter IV: Awakening

Chapter IV

     I awoke to the sudden shudder of the ship. It was as if it were trembling in fear. It was a horrible, the boisterous sound of metal shrieking as if in pain.

     I sat up in my bed and pulled the earbuds I'd had on from my ears. I slid my legs over the side of my bed only to be thrown against the floor. The shrieking of the ship continued; speeding up along with my heartbeat.

     I stoop up and put my arm against the wall of my room for support from what would on the mainland be considered a level 5 earthquake on the Richter scale. I walked to the doorway to see what was going on outside, or perhaps inside. I paused to take a look at my reflection, my long brown hair in a ponytail down my back with small hairs down my neck. I'd planned on a haircut before the trip but Sam said it could wait till after the trip. I had taken a picture of us together smiling in a photo booth. I took it and placed it in my pocket. Just then an alarm blared and a red light turned on and began to spin.

     The alarm was rushing me, warning me of something. I didn't know what it was, but I had to find out.

     I opened the door, alarms ringing, ship shrieking. I stepped into the hallway and looked right. I was greeted by a tsunami flooding the hallway with so much speed and force that I felt like a deer caught in headlights.

The water probably filled the hallway in a matter of seconds but it felt like minutes, my adrenaline sharpening my senses like the only tools I could use to escape this disaster. Time slowed so much it stood still. Regardless the water came.

• • • • •

I swum to the top of the hallway where a small layer of oxygen was rapidly being filled. I took a breath. I propelled myself in the direction of the current. A doorway with a flickering EXIT sign a few meters in front of me was beckoning me towards it. My oxygen was depleting. By the time I reached the doorway my oxygen was at about 85%. As I grabbed the door the water quickly grew shallow for a very terrible reason. The ship was leaning at an awfully crooked angle.

I climbed up the hallway similar to the way you'd climb a steep hill. I saw the hallway bend down at a horrible angle. Then, followed by the dreadful sound of shrieking metal,  the ship began to break down the middle. The weight was too much for the ship's frame and it had collapsed on its own weight. The hallway was ripping apart before my eyes. The other half almost twenty feet away. On the other half through the thunder, and shrieking and rain I heard Roth on the other side, beside other ship members, shouting my name, "LARA.... JUMP!" They were one floor below mine. I took in the night. Cloudy night sky, thunder, rain, the sinking ship.

     I looked back over my shoulder, the water rising up the hallway. I took a few steps back. I ran fast as time went slower, I jumped farther then I'd ever jumped before, almost as if my life depended on it (oh wait, it did). Those were one of my last thoughts as I jumped between the two ship's halves. Roth held out his hand to me. I reached for it. I caught Roth's hand. Time went back to normal.

     I stood there, hanging about 40 feet off the sea's surface. And then my hand slipped from his, the damned rain making me lose my grip and I fell. I blacked out as soon as I hit the water.