Author's Note: Well, Tomb Raider is not a new fandom for me but this is certainly the first story that's ever been publishable.

This is set after Underworld and although I've not yet made any direct references to that story, I'm quite certain I will be, so be aware of spoilers.

Let me know what you think!

Ooh and disclaimer: I don't own Lara, Zip, Winston or Tomb Raider. Who does? Eidos? Square-Enix? Someone who's not me anyway.

The Queen herself has asked Lara to seek out a Royal heirloom buried in the depths of a Welsh mine. But what if Lara's not alone in the search for the Key to the Kingdom?

Mine Fall

Chapter One

It was a beautifully clear summer's evening, the sun only starting to sink in the sky over the hills and mountains of north Wales. The Welsh countryside was quiet despite it being the height of summertime; not too many holidaymakers wanted to venture far into the hills as the night descended.

Lara Croft, however, was not a holidaymaker and she had every intention of venturing into the high hills. Reaching her destination, she brought her bike to a standstill, silence eagerly replacing the motorcycle's throbbing engine. Taking off her helmet, she took a moment to simply marvel at the natural beauty surrounding her. She might have seen countless exotic locales in her lifetime, but Wales had a unique charm she still loved.

Zip's voice, coming over her headset, broke the quietude. He and his van-stroke-tech-centre were parked in car park five miles back down the track. “Remind me again why we're in Wales.” He sounded like an overly excited child.

“Really Zip, again?” Lara asked as she put her bike's kickstand down. “You should see a doctor if these memory problems persist.”

“Aw go on, say it.”

She sighed. “Because the Queen asked me to.”

Zip's rich laughter filled Lara's head. “Oh man, that does not get old.” He paused. “Say it again!”

Ignoring him, Lara glanced at the building nestled into the hillside; the tiny little concrete shack had a heavily secured door with a large NO TRESPASSING sign. Beyond it was a relic of a bygone wartime era: a bunker that would've housed the most important people in England had the worst ever happened.

“Have I ever mentioned how much I love your weird little country?” Zip asked.

“Many times actually, since I had tea with Her Highness.”

“Ooh 'Her Highness'. That is so proper!”

Lara reached into her backpack and pulled out the set of lock-picks she needed to open the door. “If I'd known you'd get this over-excited about it, I would've let you come along.”

“Who me, an innocent guy who's good with computers and is possibly wanted in the US for crimes they only think I committed?”

Lara snorted, unlocking the third of five huge padlocks. “Think you committed?” She echoed. “Who was hacking into the CIA just for the sake of it last week?”

“See! She'd have me thrown in jail.”

“No more than me.”

He laughed. “Good point. You are way more criminally minded than I am.”

Lara had to grin at that. “Is it my fault so many people behave badly in my presence?”

“I bet you were on your best behaviour with the Queen.”

“One tends to be.”

“Didja call her Elizabeth? Liz? Lizzy? Eliza? Beth? Er...”

“You say 'Lovely to see you Your Majesty, thank you for inviting me' and from then on call her Ma'am. Honestly,” Lara said with a mocking sigh as she unlocked the fifth and final padlock, leaving her with just the three in-built locks. “You Americans simply have no manners.”

“Hey, I got manners. I got lotsa manners.”

“Manners of speech perhaps.” The door opened and a staircase descended beyond. Lara shut and locked the door behind herself, not wanting to run the risk of a random tourist stumbling down after her – unlikely though that may be. “Let's get going.”

“Okay. What we're looking for?”

“It's a ceremonial piece,” Lara said, activating her PLS. “An old heirloom placed down here during the Second World War to stop it from being destroyed or looted. The Queen referred to it as a the Key to the Kingdom...”

“Nice.”

“...but she said she had no idea what it looked like because no record of its design has ever been kept. I believe some kind of family tradition surrounds it, but she wasn't particularly forthcoming on the details.”

“Didn't you ask nicely enough?”

“One doesn't tend to demand answers from the Queen of England Zip.”

“Yeah, yeah. So why didn't they go and get it, I dunno, fifty years ago?”

“Because it wasn't until recently that the Queen unearthed a few of her father's diaries and found mentions of its location.”

“Unearthed?”

“There was a break-in and whoever it was knew what they were looking for, because not even the Queen knew where her father hid those diaries. She knew of them and knew they were somewhere in the palace, but someone else got there first."

"Sounds like someone wasn't looking hard enough."

"The Queen's an incredibly busy person; she's probably not had the time," Lara replied.

"No spare time in over fifty years?"

Lara paused. "She didn't look hard enough."

"Hey, did you just commit treason by bad-mouthing the Queen?"

Lara chose not to answer that. "Whoever found the diaries must have had frequent access to the palace because not only did this person know the diaries even existed, they avoided security and they were in and out in under five minutes.”

“Someone broke into Buckingham Palace and it didn't get in the news? How's that possible?”

“Because whoever it was escaped with photos of the diaries. Nothing else was taken: not even the diaries themselves. The Queen is certain that the thief will be coming here, sooner rather than later. If the media got their hands on this, everyone would be trying to find the Key. It'd be a madhouse.” The staircase ended at a heavy metal door that resembled something you'd find on a boat. Lara spun the wheel and pushed the door open, finding herself in what appeared to be an airlock. Another door waited just ahead of her and she grabbed the wheel, muscles working against the stiff seal. “The Queen believed the Key was either left in the bunker or somewhere in the mines beyond. Unfortunately for us, the King was rather vague as to the exact location and hints to it being located in several places. The lack of details is to be expected though.”

“Ah, because of the tradition: it's supposed to be passed on from one monarch to the next so they keep the Key's location quiet until they're passing it on.”

“Indeed."

"And the King didn't get the chance to pass the Key onto his daughter.”

"Which is why we're in Wales."

“But if the Queen thinks there's some determined thief looking for it, why aren't the government sending some secret service goons?”

“The Queen wanted a more delicate touch.”

“And so she sent you?!”

“Ha ha.”

The door opened, stiff hinges screaming, and Lara stepped into the bunker, the air as stale as any of the tombs she had explored. It had been designed as a place of shelter for not only the Royal Family but also top politicians in case of bombings during the Second World War and, later, the Cold War. In front of her was what looked like a London Underground station, the Royal Insignia in place of the usual circular logo. A set of train tracks to Lara's left disappeared into a gaping pitch black tunnel. The Queen had explained how the train tracks ran all the way into London, the private rail network connected to the nearest mainline by a small tunnel hidden from the public. Dusty Union Jacks hung limply from the arched ceiling, coated in decades of dust. They did absolutely nothing to cheer up the grim grey walls. Lara pulled the bunker's schematics, graciously provided by the Queen, out of her backpack, refreshing the layout one last time in her mind. The King's diary had referenced a few rooms in this place as being possible places for the Key to be. If there was nothing here, it would be down into the mine. She tucked the map away and strolled deeper into the bunker.

Zip whistled. “Wow, talk about grim,” he said as Lara headed down a long grey corridor. She passed through a set of large doors, the hallway carrying on into the darkness beyond. “I'm getting cabin fever just looking at it.”

“Not the cheeriest of places,” Lara agreed.

“Did they really think that if a nuke went off in London they'd be able to get all the way out to north Wales?” Zip asked, sounding somewhat incredulous. “That's a helluva long way to go.”

“I suppose they thought there would be clear warnings and they would have time to move people here,” Lara said. “And who would think to bomb rural Wales?”

“Yeah, who's gonna play target practise with sheep?”

“Then there's the mine this place is built into. It goes incredibly deep: plenty of room to expand if everyone started to get cabin fever.”

“Mines,” Zip gave a knowing laugh. “No wonder the Queen wanted you to look for the Key.”

Eventually a door emerged from the darkness, the grey concrete replaced by reinforced glass windows. It was the security hub, a room still full of outdated technology; something that delighted Zip to his technogeek content. “Go on,” he begged. “Bring some of those babies home!”

“Don't you have enough toys?” Lara asked, gazing at the processor that took up an entire wall. She turned, the headset's camera sweeping over numerous other dead computers. Zip ooh'd and aah'd, much to her amusement. “Besides, an iPod shuffle has more memory than this lot.”

“Yeah, but some of that stuff is beautiful! Talk about history! Come on Lara...”

“How exactly do you expect me to drag any of this home on my bike?” She looked at one particularly bulky old fashioned PC, the glass screen lost amidst the wood and plastic surrounding it. She tapped a few keys on the keyboard but nothing happened; the power was completely out. “And don't say there's room in your van because we both know there isn't.”

“I knew you should've taken the Jeep.”

“Do stop pouting.”

Zip gave a melodramatic sigh.

Lara headed back into the corridor and finally came across another stairwell. There was a lift next to it, but without the power it was merely a cage suspended above a black abyss. Lara opened the stairway door and once again began heading down.

“There's gonna be air down there, right?” Zip asked, sounding concerned.

“Stale but breathable,” Lara confirmed.

“Good, 'cause I don't think the ventilation system will be online any time soon, not if those computers are all totally dead.”

The stairs came to an end and Lara stepped out onto a new floor, this one with convenient signs posted outside every room. The corridor had everything from kitchens and mess halls to lounges, bedrooms and shower blocks. Even if there had been electricity to light the bunker up, this was a cold and impersonal place, designed for function and not comfort.

“Man, they really thought the Queen would live down there?” Zip asked. “It sure ain't the palace.”

“Perhaps that's why it's been locked up for so long,” Lara commented. “Maybe she wanted something a little less foreboding.” She glanced into a militaristic dorm. “It is a little hard picturing her down here.”

“And I guess this Key thing isn't anywhere?”

“Not yet. I doubt the former King just tossed it in here.”

“No, he tossed it in a mine.”

“Wonderful!”

Zip gave a long-suffering sigh.

It was another few floors of empty store rooms and dead machines before Lara could safely say the Key was not in the bunker. At the very bottom of the bunker she located the hatch that led out into the mine. She got through and found herself in a long shaft, her torchlight miserably inadequate against the darkness. Fresher air wrapped around her, chilling her. Though it was summer outside, Lara was grateful she had dressed for colder weather and she zipped her brown jacket up a little higher. Then she was heading down the shaft, deeper into the Welsh hills.

“Dunno how long I'll be with you. I'll have to see if I can boost the signal. Might take me a little while but I'll be back,” came Zip's voice, awash with static.

“All right.”

“Oh hey, wait a minute Lara. Didja take a canary?”

“I'm not doing any actual mining.”

“Doesn't mean there won't be gas.”

“Then I shan't light any matches.”

TBC..