✖ CDC

[onlysurvivors]

CHARACTER INFO.
✖ Character Name: Croft, Lara
✖ Canon: Tomb Raider (2013/Reborn); immediately after leaving the island
✖ Character Appearance: Here, here, and here. Right-hand model of the latter two pictures is more accurate to how the CDC will find her.
✖ Character Age: 21
✖ Pick A Number: 22 or 222

✖ Canon Setting: Lara comes from a world very like our own – in fact, almost exactly like it. She has an iPhone, works with a camcorder, knows who Gordon Ramsey is, and has been (dragged out) to clubs. Her world’s history is our own history, evident especially by the artifacts Lara finds peppered throughout the island of Yamatai, ranging from 16th century Portuguese tin coins to records from German scientists during the second World War to cuddly children’s toys that can’t be older than ten years old.

However, Lara’s world also allows for an ancient queen to possess shamanistic powers – something Lara herself is a complete skeptic about at first – and furthermore transfer her soul from one host body to the next. It is unclear how long the “Sun Queen” Himiko performed this ritual, only that it effectively allowed her to live and rule Yamatai for what she thought would be forever. The first and last queen of Yamatai.

This queen held the power to control the very weather itself, apparent in the ever-changing climate of the island Yamatai. Lara has seen herself the sky go from beautiful, radiant sunshine to unforgiving rain, thunder, and lightning the very next moment. This makes it so that anyone who happens upon the island, intentionally or otherwise, can never leave. Rescue planes are shot out of the sky by lightning, ships are smashed into pieces against violent waves – and, having seen it for herself, Lara is eventually made certain that these accidents are anything but, and there is an actual force intentionally keeping her and her shipwrecked friends on the island.

There’s also the Stormguard, an organization of samurai warriors who have served the Sun Queen since she first came into power. These forsaken warriors are a little less human and a little more monster by the time Lara confronts them, and it’s unclear whether or not they are undead soldiers, reanimated for the Sun Queen’s continued purpose, or if due to her power they are merely immortal until outright killed. Many of the Solarii cultists speak of the Stormguard performing dark rituals and eating other captives of the island, and Lara has seen her fair share of disgusting in the Stormguard stronghold, but no actual rituals take place where she can see them. There are also the larger Stormguard, known as the Oni, and their enormous size and inhuman strength makes them a terrifying enemy indeed – and let’s not even talk about the torture.

It is unknown as of yet how many other supernatural things exist in Lara’s version of Earth 2013, but considering the history of the franchise, it’s a safe bet that she’s going to see a lot more crazy during her time as an archaeologist. Thanks to her experiences on Yamatai, it’s likely she’ll be more inclined to believe as much, too.

✖ Character History: Wiki link

✖ Character Personality:

Having been raised by wealthy and successful parents, up until her expedition Lara Croft led a fairly charmed life. Both of her parents were archaeologists who raised her to appreciate the history of the world she lived in, occasionally taking the young girl along for their excursions. As it is, the necklace she wears every day as an adult is of a pendant she found on one of these digs, her “first find” at five years old. Her enthusiasm for culture and history has stayed with her since then, even after the disappearance of her father on one of his own expeditions. If anything, it made her even more determined to seek out the mysteries of the world, find uncharted land, and make new discoveries.

To this end, Lara is known to take her studies very seriously. She decided to attend college via her own means, renting an apartment for herself and working several odd jobs in order to afford living on her own. These jobs – including at least one bar – taught her a variety of things from first aid to helping her become a more hardworking, grounded person, whereas other people coming from money might not see things quite the same way.

But Lara has always been one to appreciate hard work, evident in how extensive her education has been. At only twenty-one years old, she is fluent in a variety of other languages, including but not limited to German, Japanese, and Chinese. Her childhood interest in history and culture has led her to be extremely knowledgeable about much of the world and is typically able to recognize just what era artifacts such as coins, ships, or daggers come from and what purpose they may have served. During school, Lara all but embodied the definition of bookworm. While her best friend Sam says Lara isn’t always so serious, she also claims that Lara has to be “dragged out” to clubs to socialize. It’s not that Lara doesn’t enjoys the company of others or has trouble making friends, it’s that she simply takes her studies more seriously than the average university student. Lara is also fond of more adventurous hobbies, including archery, hiking, and self defense training.

Eager to follow in her parents’ footsteps, soon after graduating Lara sets out on the S. S. Endurance and crew to make her mark on her own expedition to find the lost kingdom of Yamatai. Several of the crew is made up from people Lara had worked with in the past, including Conrad Roth, a friend of her parent’s. Lara has benefited greatly from Roth’s tutelage, learning basic survival techniques from him ranging from navigation and rock climbing to scavenging for food – and what is edible and not. After her parents’ disappearance, Roth is the closest thing Lara has to a family anymore, and as such she deeply values him as a guardian and mentor, as well as a friend. Throughout her time on the island of Yamatai, Lara countlessly recalls things Roth has told her in the past, with reminders to concentrate, trust her instincts, and most critical of all: keep moving.

It is all of these blossoming qualities that are key to her survival once she and the Endurance crew shipwreck on an island within the dreaded Dragon Triangle.

Right from the start, Lara’s will to live is enormously apparent – in fact, one of the first things she’s forced to do on the island is to essentially set herself on fire in order to escape her first predicament. Starting out, Lara is somewhat unsure of what she is capable of – while she has always stuck to her ideals and hasn’t had trouble speaking her mind, evident by her arguing with senior archaeologist Dr. Whitman even before coming to the island, she starts out on the island completely alone and is reluctant to do what she needs to do in order to meet up with the rest of the group. She begs Roth over the radio to come rendezvous with her instead, but ultimately with his encouragement, Lara braves the wilds of the island on her own, scavenging for weapons and food as she makes her way across to find her friends.

When things take a massive turn for the worse, Lara is forced to defend herself not only against the harsh environment of the island (and its vicious wolf packs), but to take arms against men who would not hesitate to kill her if given the chance. The initial turning point for Lara is her first kill, terrifying and devastating enough as it is for a twenty-one year old woman, but only made worse by the fact that she knows that one wrong move in the encounter could have cost her her own life. She does her best initially to stay out of combat with the unrelenting cultists that swarm the island, but in the end it becomes clear that she must take up arms, arrows and shotguns and whatever else she can find – doing whatever she must in order to survive.

The island’s tombs and landscape alike require Lara to think quickly on her feet – oftentimes it’s not so simple as going in from one door and leaving out another. She often has to improvise or take drastic measures (like setting fire to herself as previously mentioned, or the environment around her) in order to over come obstacles. This ingenuity is possibly the largest factor in her survival of the island – with her having to escape being strung up not once, but twice, and evade certain death on numerous occasions just by being able to expertly guess which tool to use when. And she is definitely a woman who appreciates her gear and is constantly looking for ways to improve them. For example, coming across rope gives her the idea to fasten arrows that will allow her to climb and zip-line to places she wouldn’t have been able before. Lara is also able to use scraps and salvage found around the island to add minor adjustments to her weapons, making them more efficient and more powerful.

Luckily, most of her time spent on the island is merely traversing it, and indeed Lara has the option to explore some of her surroundings when not fighting for her life. She’s pleased to find ancient tombs and artifacts – she’s briefly thrilled that she was right back on the Endurance, that this really is the lost kingdom of Yamatai after all – as well as finding old records and accounts from people who had traveled to the island from World War II to as far back as she can imagine. Despite the heavy burden and danger of the island, Lara is still an archaeologist at the end of the day, and any opportunity she has to discover something new is exciting to her, and may perhaps be just the sort of break from the action that she needs.

Several times throughout her “stay” on the island, Lara has to reassure herself, often times aloud, telling herself to just keep moving, that she can do this – “this” being anywhere from scaling a rock wall to escaping a collapsing hillside fortress while being chased by centuries old creatures and insane cultists alike. The more ordeals she comes up against, the more she triumphs over, and as a result the growth in Lara’s self confidence is incredible, a far cry from the girl who had, with a shaking voice, asked Roth to come and get her while she was alone.

On the island, Lara is shown to be somewhat slow to trust new people, even at the beginning when the inhabitants had yet to show their true colors. She’s immediately skeptic of Mathias (who introduces himself as a teacher in his least crazy moment on the island), but any minor trust issues she may have had skyrocket once the firefights begin. Even Dr. Whitman, an archaeologist Lara had deeply respected and been thrilled to work with, does some pretty sketchy things, and Lara has zero problem writing him off and isn’t subtle about it in the least.

It’s unlikely Lara was so skeptical of people before Yamatai, as one of her most defining traits is the value she places in her friends and crewmembers from the Endurance. She’s determined from the onset to rescue as many of them as she can, even if it means putting herself in direct danger. Lara is nearly killed at several points trying to keep her friend Sam safe (and indeed, many of her actions on the island relate to Sam’s safety) and she even tries her best to save a complete stranger, a pilot who tried to rescue the wreck survivors. While the latter attempt at a rescue is unsuccessful, it shows that despite having to become a killer in order to survive the island, Lara does not believe in sacrificing any one person for the sake of anyone’s goals. She says as much to Roth, plain and simple, that she cannot be the sort of person who chooses to let an innocent person die.

Sometimes the choice is made for her, however. Lara winds up being the sole witness to the slaughter of the majority of the Endurance crew, including close friends such as Grim and Alex. The death that hits her the hardest, however, is Roth’s own, especially as he deliberately took an axe in the back that was intended for Lara. For a brief time, Lara feels completely lost without him and wishes she had been killed instead – and while the former insecurity does go away, Lara’s survivor’s guilt is sure to haunt her for a very, very long time. Even after she and her friends are able to escape the island, it’s considerably likely Lara will have developed PTSD based on the horrors she experienced. During her stay, it’s clear she only really ever sleeps when she’s utterly exhausted and after they’ve all escaped, instead of being around the friends she fought so hard and practically changed her entire self to protect, she’s off alone, studying and mentally preparing for the next big adventure… just so that she won’t have to focus on the aftermath of this one.

The Lara who lands on the island with the Endurance crew is not the same Lara who survives it, that much is clear. Where she had been timid and unsure, she is now strong, confident, and cunning, exceedingly capable of taking down anyone or anything who dares interfere with her and her friends’ chances for survival. She will fight back if necessary and she will do so with considerable expertise.

It’s best just to get out of her way.

✖ Character Powers: Lara lacks any “superpowers” you might find in comic books, but is any bit as powerful as… well, any other twenty-one year old woman who rock climbs, hikes, and does archery for fun. As a member of the Sisters of Artemis archery club and thanks to Roth’s careful training, Lara is exceptionally skilled with a bow and arrow, preferring the weapon over many of the “more powerful” ones she comes across in her travels across the island. … Except for maybe the grenade launcher, because grenade launcher.

To expand on that, Lara is a fairly good shot when it comes to firearms as well, and throughout the game uses various pistols, semi-automatic rifles, and shotguns with varying levels of success. And practice makes perfect of course – as does Lara’s knack for knowing how to improve her weapons little by little with salvage she finds. Lara will literally make due with whatever scraps she can find.

Lara is also a very good puzzle solver and critical thinker, capable of picking out important clues and tools in the environment around her where someone else might completely overlook them. This is actually a game mechanic that the player may utilize, but the story covers it as good instincts and a fine grasp of navigational skills.

CHARACTER SAMPLES.
✖ First Person POV:
✖ sample oo1 & part 2
✖ sample oo2
✖ sample oo3
✖ sample oo4
✖ sample oo5

✖ Third Person POV:

In retrospect, surprising a woman who’d just been forced to kill close to a hundred, if not several dozen more armed men (along with one zombie queen) in order to escape from a hellhole of an island with her life was a huge mistake on Agent Zak’s part. But he was always one for flashy entrances, and watching the candidate – Lara Croft, twenty-one year old female human from Earth – expertly take out two of his six security detail before they even knew the arrows were flying? That was exactly what had brought him here.

It would be a shame to have to kill her after all that hard work researching her. C’est la vie.

“I’m just here to do a little business, Lara,” Zak tries from behind his cover – literal cover, from the deck of the ship that had rescued Lara and her friends only fourteen hours prior. His other security details, as well as Lara, had done the same thing, but it only served to increase the tension tenfold.

“Who the hell are you?” shouts Lara, sheer anger and panic plain as day in her voice. She thought the killing would be over, she thought they were safe now. She should have gone below deck to get help, not just let her arrows fly, but – that has been her world for days. Eliminate the threat before they can eliminate her… or worse. And how do they know her name? Aside from Mathias, the Solarii ever referred to her as anything other than “the girl,” or “the outsider.” These people couldn’t possibly be leftover cultists who had escaped the island as well… could they? Here to finish the job, possibly, and that thought alone shakes Lara to her core.

But why continue fighting against her if they’ve been able to escape the island? That’s what each of the Solarii had desired the entire time; why bother pursuing her? “What do you want from me?”

“I’m just here to talk,” is the reply, which is bull shit. No one suddenly appears out of nowhere in the dead of night with six armed soldiers with them for a nice chat. But the man continues, “I have a question for you.”

Lara doesn’t dignify that with a response, barely even moves from behind her cover. Zak isn’t entirely surprised at that one, given the woman’s case file, so he moves ahead unperturbed.

“Do you want to see your father?”

The question comes from so far out of left field that Lara is momentarily stunned. This—this can’t be someone from the island. No one knows her there, not where she came from or anything of the sort, let alone who her father was. … Is? What are they trying to say here? Is he alive? Have they found him? And what of her mother?

More lies. It has to be. … But Lara has… seen things now, things that should be impossible actually come to pass before her very eyes. An immortal band of samurai warriors, terrifying once-men who prey on and torture the living, and a queen who passes her soul from one host to the next… in addition to her shamanistic command of Yamatai’s relentless storms. All myth… at least, until now. And that has opened her eyes to the possibility of other supernatural forces at work all around the world – like her father always claimed. Could it really be that these people know him and where he could be?

Like hell. She needs more information first. “Who are you?”

To his credit – and perhaps the alarm of his security detail – Zak comes around his cover into plain sight, arms raised to show he means no harm. It’s time to appeal to Lara’s humanity; he knows despite the things she’s seen and done, there’s still enough of that left. “I’m Agent Zak with the Cosmic Demolition Crew, or CDC if you’d prefer to save a few seconds. I plan to be one hundred percent honest with you.” Which, well, more like ninety percent, since he has a feeling if he tells her the CDC has been watching her actions on Yamatai but not interfering? He’s pretty sure he’ll get an arrow to the face, and it’s bad enough she’s already killed two officers. “The thing is, Lara, we have one hell of a job to do in a short amount of time, and we believe you might have the skills to help us out with that.”

Lara still hasn’t come out from behind her cover, but since that means she isn’t aiming for him, that’s probably a good thing. She does interrupt him in the middle of his spiel, however, as he kind of expected her to do.

“What ‘job?’ What do you—”

Doesn’t mean he isn’t going to interrupt her right back. “You tell me. You’re some kind of researcher, aren’t you? Fast learner, all that? What do you think something called the ‘Cosmic Demolition Crew’ does?”

Lara scoffs. What the hell is this supposed to be, a trivia game? These bastards come aboard her ship and demand her to spell things out for them about their own organization? … But whoever this Zak is, he doesn’t seem like he’ll be any more forthcoming with information, so Lara thinks on his words for the moment. The one that sticks out the most is “demolition,” of course, but these people don’t exactly look like hard hat wearing blue-collar workers. They’re armed besides, with weapons she doesn’t recognize. “Cosmic” is what’s throwing her off; is that merely a fancy way of saying they’re working on a large scale? Surely they couldn’t actually have anything to do with the UKSA, or NASA, or anything similar. Could they?

She has half a mind not to answer him. “Wild guess is that you belong to an organization that destroys… something, something massive. You’re all heavily armed, so you’re not merely concerned with tearing down buildings.”

“Try planets.”

Well. That would explain the “Cosmic,” if it made any modicum of sense. Zak is quick to keep talking though. “Unreal, right? It’s not like we just appeared out of nowhere on a boat in the middle of the ocean equipped with a bunch of space guns or anything.” The way he says it reminds her, bizarrely, of Alex, but any response she may have made dies in her throat when he continues, “That we haven’t fired, mind you, unlike some people.”

It takes her a moment or two of recovery before she’s able to respond, trying to sound as sure of herself as she can. “Just because you haven’t fired yet doesn’t mean you won’t.”

“Can’t deny that. You see, Lara, I think you’ll come to appreciate how honest I’m being with you. The CDC isn’t based on Earth because we’re not from here, and frankly, we don’t give a damn about this hunk of rock either. We are contracted to destroy planets; all kinds of planets, really. They could be uninhabited, but sometimes they’re not – and that means Earth could be the next item on the To-Do List for all you know.” Pause for effect. “So if you weren’t paying attention before, you really ought to do us all a favor and start now.”

Any guilt Lara might’ve had from killing some of Zak’s men beforehand is instantly stripped away. These people are dangerous, even if what they say about working on a planetary scale isn’t true. As much as she values her bow, she wishes like hell she had even one of her pistols on her. “You’re insane.”

“Eh, it’s a paycheck. And before you get too upset, just know that killing me really won’t help your situation at all. If these guys don’t take you out – and they will – there’ll be others to finish the job. The only mercy you’ll receive is a quick death without having to watch your planet burn around you, knowing you could have done something to save it.”

Shit. Shit, what is he even saying? Even if she starts fighting back now, she’s outnumbered by armored soldiers carrying weapons she doesn’t even recognize, and now they’ll be anticipating a counterattack from her. And who’s to say he isn’t bluffing? After Mathias’ ranting and raving, his thirty year search to find a new vessel for Himiko turning out to be the honest truth of the mystery behind Yamatai, could Lara really afford not to take every possibility seriously?

The choice, as usual, is made for her when Zak goes on. “That got a little heated, didn’t it? We’d much rather have your cooperation than your corpse. I’ll make it simple: you agree to come with us and assist our mission, and we’ll spare Earth. You can say no – with words, not arrows, and we’ll let you walk away, of course, but we don’t think you’ll do that.”

Whether he means her not responding with violence or not saying no, he’s right. There’s no way Lara could risk annihilating the entire planet just to save her own skin, if she even lives through this encounter to see if they’re truly capable of that kind of power.

“And I wasn’t spouting nonsense earlier,” Zak continues, as if he hadn’t expected her to respond straight away anyhow. “We have the means to return your father to you, safe and sound, just for agreeing to help us with our cause. Think of it as a bonus incentive, without any catches or drawbacks. Wouldn’t that be nice? Daddy finally coming home?”

“Don’t patronize me,” Lara snaps, but after a moment she finally comes up from behind her cover, bow poised, loaded, and aiming right at Zak’s throat. He doesn’t seem concerned, however, like he knows damn well she isn’t going to fire.

It’s infuriating, really. “You’re telling me that if I come with you, you won’t destroy Earth? You can make that decision, just like that?”

“That’s why they sent me down here.”

“And my father—”

“Dr. Richard Croft, yeah? Alive and well in our custody.”

The agent really does know him. Knows Lara. She relaxes her bow. “So Earth, my father—”

“Deal in a nutshell is that you get both of those set free, so to speak. All you have to do is say yes, come with us, and be ready to fight.”

More fighting, more killing. With an organization that specializes in destroying planets, Lara supposes she really shouldn’t be surprised. She had wanted another adventure, hadn’t she? Any of the mysteries left uncovered in the world, she wanted to find them, make sense of them. She wanted to keep going, just keep moving as she had been since first setting foot onto that damned island.

She just thought she’d have more of a choice as to where she would go next.

Smiling like the businessman he fancies himself to be, Zak asks one final time, “Do you want to see your father?”

It’s not the only question she’s answering, Lara is all too aware of that, but in the end, she responds.

“Yes.”

CHARACTER ITEMS.
✖ Pick a Team: Red.

✖ Mission Freebie:
x Her father, famed archaeologist and adventurer Richard Croft.
x If there are chances for other mission freebies down the line, rest assured she’ll also be requesting her upgraded equipment, or any of the Inventory items listed below that she may not be able to bring.
x Then if possible, throw in Sam’s camcorder. It’ll keep her homesick focused if she remembers what she’s fighting to protect, as always.

✖ Personal Item or Weapon: A fully upgraded competition bow with quiver full of arrows, assuming they can all be taken together? The quiver will have two dozen arrows inside of it.

✖ Character Inventory:

x Two (2) spaghetti strap tank tops, one blue, one white, with the blue one speckled with blood and torn to shreds
x Pair of brown cargo pants with two extra pockets, also covered in blood and ripped in several places
x Sturdy brown combat boots
x Hairtie
x Belt
x Rope necklace with jade pendant
x Watch
x Competition bow
x Quiver w/strap
x Two dozen (24) arrows
x Archery gloves
x Lighter
x Two-way radio
x A worn journal
x Two (2) ammo pouches, empty
x Belted Holster (originally held her pistol, now holds…)
x CDC issued Compact Gauss Gun
x CDC issued duffel bag w/new inventory inside
x {To be requested later} Climbing axe
x {To be requested later} Rope