A bit of background and some aerial combat

When they reached the mouth of the cave-corridor hybrid, it was the first time in as long as she could remember that Lara had been surprised by grass. But while the hills of the narrow, deep valley in which the tomb was located had been nothing but cliffs and somewhat smelly silt when she'd entered it back in the present... or future, they were now a bleak shade of green courtesy of the equally bleak weather that was early summer in the North Atlantic. Which meant that the island had been around for a while, probably years. Yet she'd found no mention of it back in her time. Had it gone unnoticed and sunk again?

“Sniper!” Sterling's cry interrupted Lara's taking in of the landscape, though it did prepare her for the ensuing rattle of submachine gun fire as he blasted off a burst that struck the rifle-wielding figure positioned on the summit on the other side of the valley, making him yelp as he slumped down, out of view and rendered harmless, judging by the puff of quickly dissolving pink mist left where his head had just been.

Acting on instinct, Lara took a step forwards, spun round and aimed her gun upwards, firing as soon as she saw the black-clad figure up above clutching a potato masher-type grenade. The three rounds that she got off struck him in the thighs and stomach, prompting him to drop the grenade as he toppled backwards. A few seconds later, during which Lara had kept aiming her gun upwards while Sterling scanned the rest of the valley for any more sign of trouble, there was an explosion as the grenade went off.

“Looks like we can relax for the moment,” Sterling lowered his gun, and smiled at Lara, “Good thinking there, looking up like that.”

“It's where I would have been if it had been the other way round,” Lara replied, “Of course, it's not exactly cricket...”

“But then Jerry doesn't play cricket, does he? Come on...”

“You've got some transport?” Lara asked.

“Yes. In the meantime, feel free to glance skywards ever so often and keep your eyes peeled for engine noise,” While they talked, Sterling was leading the way up the slope and out of the valley.

“I take it von Sterbe didn't come here by boat.”

“That wouldn't be nearly ostentatious enough for the Third Reich,” As he looked back at Lara over his shoulder, there was a gleam in Sterling's eyes to go with his dry smile.

“This wasn't your first run-in with him, was it?”

“No, ever since '33, we've met on a few occasions,” Sterling said, “Our introduction was him nicking the khanda of Rajenda Chola and leaving me on a sinking ship off the Andaman Islands.”

“Rajenda Chola... he was an Indian conqueror, wasn't he? And a khanda's an Indian sword.”

“I'm impressed,” Sterling's next smile was warmer and friendlier, “Yes, he conquered Ceylon and much of the Malay peninsula. von Sterbe was convinced he was able to do so due to his Aryan blood.”

“Naturally.”

“Anyway, I managed to build a rudimentary raft and get to India,” Sterling explained, matter-of-factly, “From there, I hopped on a few planes, and caught up with von Sterbe in Vienna and got the sword back.”

“Right,” To Lara's ears, Sterling made it all sound surprisingly easy, “You crossed the Indian Ocean on a makeshift raft?”

“Only a small part of it, Lara.”

“Of course.”

“It's easy, really. All you need to know is which way is west and how to build a mast and weave some sails out of seaweed.”

“Yes, sounds like a piece of cake,” Lara couldn't tell whether or not Sterling was pulling her leg. He did sound completely earnest, however.

“But really, enough about me. I take it you're an archaeologist too, Lara.”

“Yes.”

“Any relation to Lancelot Croft?”

“My great-grandfather had a brother by that name,” Lara replied. Like a lot of the younger brothers of the Croft family down the years, Lancelot Croft had become an academic. The reason why she knew a bit about him was that in light of her chosen profession, the fact that he'd been a professor of archaeology at Oxford had been brought up on more than one occasion.

“Great-grandfather's brother? He never seemed quite that old to me.”

“Well, he was the youngest in the family. You studied under him?”

“Yes, until he disappeared.”

Lara nodded. Family legend had it that Lancelot had last been seen in the foothills of the Andes in 1928, having organized an expedition to locate a missing Inca city.

The conversation between them faded after that, Lara and Sterling instead moving on in silence, both keeping a keen eye on their surroundings.

Eventually, after about ten more minutes of walking up and down across the rough, dreary landscape, Sterling stopped to overlook another valley, this one wider and shallower than the one with the tomb. Looking down, Lara could spot a camouflage net suspended over a strangely familiar shape.

“You flew here?”

“Got in last night,” Sterling nodded, “and decided to wait till this morning. Of course, then I woke up to the sound of...”

“A mechanical whirr of a set of bloody great big engines?” Lara's interruption was prompted by the same noise that was also forcing her to raise her voice slightly. And it was steadily coming closer too.

“Blast. Yes it was. Come on!” Now hearing it too, Sterling started racing down into the valley, his hand grabbing Lara's to pull her along.

By the time that they'd reached Sterling's plane – a sleek, twin-engined machine painted dark green and with gold details – the bulky, cigar-shaped figure of a Zeppelin was lumbering into view, sailing in towards the valley at an altitude of a couple hundred yards. Silver-coloured and absolutely massive as it was pushed forwards by four engines, the Zeppelin had its rudder painted bright red and emblazoned with the familiar black swastika in a white circle.

“Good thing it's a two-seater!” Sterling said of his plane as they scrambled onto the right-hand side wing, Lara going first.

“Otherwise I'd have to sit in your lap!” Despite the circumstances, Lara simply couldn't resist making that drive-by comment before diving into the back seat.

“...Yes,” Sterling groaned, then gathered himself and jumped into the pilot's seat. Moments later, the engines roared to life and the pair of four-bladed propellers started spinning. The Zeppelin was almost directly above them now, announcing its presence through a bomb that landed a bit too close for comfort, as evidenced by the pieces of sod that pelted against side of the canopy.

“What do you say, Lara,” Sterling cried out over the penetrating sound of the engines as the plane started to move, “Should we get out of here before they've gotten their aim in?”

“Good idea!”

The floor of the valley was surprisingly even, but the take-off was still a pretty bumpy affair, one not made any less uncomfortable by the bombs exploding around them. Still, they got airborne, and Lara celebrated that by glancing up at the Zeppelin where it now was to their rear after they'd outpaced it.

“Bugger!” Hooked up underneath the belly of the Zeppelin was a biplane fighter that was suddenly unhooked, dropping into a sweeping dive that had it coming straight at them, “Sterling, we've got a bandit on our tail!”

“I really don't think I can outdive him at this altitude!” Sterling cried out a joke, just as they swept over the other end of the valley with so little clearance that it was fortunate he'd raised the wheels already.

“Left!” Acting as spotter, Lara got Sterling to bank left just in time to avoid the hurl of machine gun fire from their adversary.

“This plane of yours isn't armed, is it?!” Lara asked, while the enemy biplane came out of its dive and set itself up to make another run at them from behind.

“Afraid not!” Sterling replied, “In most countries, it would be a bit of a faux pas to show up with a bunch of Brownings strapped to your wings! Hang on, I've got an idea!”

“I hope it's a good one!” Strapping herself in, Lara could feel the plane climb upwards while Sterling performed a long, hard turn, at the end of which they were heading back towards the Zeppelin.

“Bugger...” Lara muttered underneath the roar of the engines running on full throttle as Sterling straightened out their course.

“I jolly hope this works!” Sterling's cry came to Lara as from a distance, preoccupied as she was with hoping that the rapidly approaching Zeppelin wasn't using hydrogen for lift. Behind them, the enemy fighter lined itself up for an attack, only to have to hold off for fear of hitting the Zeppelin, on top of which there was a small platform with several people on it, servicing a pair of machine guns.

“Sterling!”

“I see them, Lara!” Sterling cried out, just before the machine gunners started blasting away at them, and turned into a half roll that meant that their fire went wild before he was suddenly sweeping along the top of the Zeppelin on a path that would end with them smacking into its top rudder.

Sterling darted to the right at the very last second, narrowly missing the rudder. Their pursuer wasn't quite so lucky, and behind her, Lara could see the tip of its left wing hit it, the impact knocking the plane off its course and almost tearing the rudder in two.

Sighing with relief, Lara looked back at the descending Zeppelin whilst Sterling raced them away from it.