Tomb Raider (Top Cow 1999 series) # 3

 By Mark Rodriguez

Lara Croft is on the hunt for the legendary Medusa Mask on the behalf of some very dangerous men. Her search led her to Nepal and a man named Taj. Taj gets shot by an arrow before he can tell her anything. Her butler Compton tells Lara to run as he's also hit by an arrow. Suddenly Lara is grabbed and dragged into an alley with a knife pressed up against her throat!

The issue opens as Lara explains how she was paid by Paris D'Arseine to find the Medusa Mask, and currently Compton was hit by an arrow and it looks fatal. Lara is being held at knife point and feels she is soon to follow. 

Lara is able to backhand the guy in the face and then kick him in the stomach. She runs towards Compton but is surrounded by arrows. The man grabs her again and tells her to get back before they turn her into a pin cushion. Lara recognizes the voice as someone that once made her heart melt in a past time she'd rather not acknowledge. She turns to face the man, who turns out to be Chase Carver, the only person almost equal to her when it comes to finding things.

Carver asks Lara what she's doing there, and she tells him that she was looking for him. Carver pulls Lara into the alley to avoid the arrows and flirts with her. Lara reminds him that there are assassins trying to kill them both. Carver pulls Lara in for a kiss and says he better get that out of the way since they're both in mortal danger. Lara threatens to break his bones if he tries that again.

More assassins start arriving and Lara and Carver run into some ruins. Lara asks if he has a plan as she doesn't work well with an audience. Carver reminds her of the time they took a midnight swim at the hotel pool during a trip to Jamaica. He says he'll take the expressions of the busload of nuns that saw them to the grave with him. Lara says if he repeats that story that will happen to him sooner than he thinks. Carver finds a door and they duck inside.

Lara says there are only ten assassins, and they should be able to fight past them. Carver says this isn't a comic book and they're all heavily armed and ready to kill. He asks if she remembers his motto. Lara says it was 'Run away, run away and live to love another day". Carver is glad she remembers. Lara makes a face and says she remembers it too well.

Lara and Carver try to find another exit but the assassins break their way in. Lara says the time for running is over and she pulls out her dual pistols and starts blasting. 

As they fight, some of the assassins start spilling gasoline and one of them has a lighter. The duo notice that the assassins have started a fire. Carver aims his gun at one of the barrels, thinking they'll have some sort of liquid that will help put the fire out. Lara tells him not to shoot since the barrels are full of kerosene, but it's too late. The entire place goes up in flames. As they run out Lara asks Carver if he has any bright ideas. He decides the next call is hers.

Lara and Carver run upstairs but the fire has reached there as well. They try to go for fire escape but the assassins are already firing arrows there. Carver takes off his belt and decides they can ride one of the power lines down, like a zipline. Lara says this is crazy. Carver says it works in the movies and he'd rather die from a fall than from seared lungs. Carver goes for the zipline while Lara hangs on to his waist. Carver's pants starts to fall, which in term makes Lara fall. She says this doesn't happen in the movies. Lara falls, but manages to do some mid-air flips and hopes for the best. She lands in a farm truck that has a bunch of pigs and hay. Lara sees the pigs and comments that she didn't know that Carver brought the whole family with him. 

Later on, Lara and Carver are at a hotel as he apologizes for what happened. Lara says his apologies were worthless back then and time hasn't inflated their value. He asks her to think about what they meant to each other, and Lara reminds him of the bones she threatened to break.

Just then Constable Akham arrives and Lara asks him if he found Compton's body. Akham says they only found the charred remains of the kerosene warehouse, but no signs of Compton, Taj or the people that attacked them. Lara says someone must have taken Compton's body. Akham will come back if he has more information.

Lara feels terrible and Carver says he knows what Compton meant to her. Lara says he has saved her life countless times, and he was the only family she had left after the plane crash that took her parents. Carver asks if there's anything he can do to make her feel better. Lara says it's time he tells her about the Medusa Mask.Carver asks how she knew and Lara explains it's the reason she was looking for him.She found his calling card in the sunken galleon. Lara says Carver has the mask, and he says he might or might not.

Lara grabs Carver and blames him for what happened to Compton. She says he will not leave the room until he tells her everything about the mask. Carver tells Lara to calm down and says he could use her help. He didn't find the mask in the underwater wreckage but he did find a note in a bottle that explains a lot of things.

The person that wrote the note says it has been three weeks since madness has taken over the crew. Some sort of evil force drove them to murder the captain, the passengers and the rest of the crew. The author says he decided to flee the ship since some force is compelling the people aboard to kill each other. He says he won't leave without the treasure. The man escapes on a life boat with a treasure chest, leaving the ship and its crazed passengers to their fate. This means that the person that wrote the note stole the Medusa Mask and it never went down with the ship.

Carver says the man was named Henri Triplette and says he thought the case would be cold until he heard legends of a small English ship that arrived in China with a single French sailor that was searching for a key. Carver thinks if they can find that key, they can find the mask.

The key they are looking for is a marker of rocks  that was built around 1200 AD. Supposedly it points the way to eternal peace, tranquility and freedom away from evil. Lara admires the view, which reminds her of Compton. Carver says they can give him a proper burial after they found the key. Lara says he makes it sound as if it was so easy when she suddenly sees a huge marker that looks like a key in front of them. 

Carver says an avalanche cleared the way earlier that week so he sent a guide to check it out. Lara says if that was true the guide could have found and stolen the mask. Carver says it's unlikely since the guide would have been too scared of the 'evil spirits' there. Lara remarks that the guide couldn't have been too scared of evil spirits if he was working for Carver.

Following the direction where the key was pointing led them to the side of a mountain covered in markings. Carver thinks they were just left by people sharpening their knives. Lara points out that all of the markings are made of three lines, and the lost sailor's last name was Triplette. Lara starts to push against the side of the mountain and tells Carver to help. As they try to push this particular slab in the mountain, Carver says there could be anything on the other side of it. The slab gives way making Lara and Carver slip forward, as they both fall into a pit.

My Thoughts-

So this issue introduces Chase Carver, who sounds like either a former partner or former lover for Lara Croft. One that she regrets at that. He does sound pretty full of himself and keeps calling her all sorts of pet names and even comments on her butt a few times. Lara isn't having it, and makes several threats, but she knows she needs him to find that Medusa Mask. I can only assume he swept her off her feet whenever they first met until she found out what he was really all about.

They're kind of an odd team but they can keep up with each other and both seem to have experience in getting out of tough fixes. Probably what bothered me the most about him is when he tried to get her into bed while she was still grieving over the only family she had. Real smooth there, you creep.

Other than that the issue is full of action and explosions, and thanks to what Carver dug up on that last survivor of the shipwreck, they have a new lead on finding the mask. I wonder where the next of this journey will take them.

When looking back, I realized I covered the first issue of Tomb Raider in 2022, and the second issue in 2023. As this year winds down, I'll try to get into some more issues so the reviews of this Top Cow series doesn't seem to be some sort of annual thing. 

I also saw this cool ad for a big crossover between our favorite Tomb Raider as well as Fathom and Witchblade. In fact it seems Lara has teamed up with Sara several times. I might have to track those issues down, and hopefully not review them once a year.