TITLE:	Working Vacation - Part II (2/3)
AUTHOR:	-Andy- ( see2go4me@yahoo.com )
RATING:	15C
STATUS:	Posted
DISCLAIMER:	This is a derivative work. All characters belong to Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, Fox Television, Eidos, and others. I don't own any of them, just the plot and words gluing my story together.
SUMMARY:	Sometime even big girls need a little Faith
SPOILERS:	All seasons of BtVS. Tomb Raider: post AoD
DISTRIBUTION:	tth, atbvs.creative, and my blog fanfic pages. Anyone else, e-mail me please.

For one of the few times in her varied and checkered life, Lara Croft couldn't quite decide how to deal with someone. Said someone being the young woman sitting across from her at the small diner on the outskirts of North Salem, NH who was on her third helping of the diner's breakfast special. She'd dealt with a lot of unusual people during her long career but there was something different about this one that she couldn't quite pin down.

Other than a few stray comments about the local inhabitants and directions to the diner they were now eating in, Lara had not gotten any real information out of her since they'd left the site, not even a name. Lara, on the other hand, found herself being quizzed about the creatures that had been guarding the caves Pandora's Box had been hidden in. It bothered her that this woman knew who she was and apparently even knew some things that weren't public knowledge.

And she didn't think even Bryce was good enough to dig up information about someone with the description she could give him of her. He was liable to become comatose in shock if she even tried. Dangerous, dresses in leather, and 'deep sexy voice' where not things normally stored away in the government records and police files he would need to search. Maybe she'd been caught by one of the cameras?

"You were lucky last night." the woman said, finally setting down her fork and signalling the waitress for more coffee.

"What do you mean?"

"If the wind had been blowing in a different direction they would have found you up in that tree. That little super-hero outfit you were wearing might be good for a lot of things, some of which are probably even legal, but it doesn't mask your scent."

"How do you know that?" asked a puzzled Lara.

The woman tapped her nose. "Even I could smell you, and as nice as other people might think you smell, the company you were keeping last night would have just been annoyed at the interruption and would have shared their feelings with you." She frowned. "And they aren't exactly the touchy-feely type. More like the 'suck the marrow from your bones' type."

"Why were you there last night?" Lara asked, not really expecting an answer and ignoring the confusing marrow comment.

"I have some business to discuss with your friends. You'll want to stay away from there tonight. Might get a little messy." Lara shivered at the predatory look that crossed her face at that moment.

"And if I go there anyway?"

"Up a tree will probably be the safest place." She grinned. "Just make sure you take care of the smell this time."

"And where will you be?"

"Where the action is." She pulled a business card out of a pocket and quickly wrote something on the back of it before handing it to Lara. "Have your geek boy put copies of all the stuff from last night at this address. Before lunch so someone can take a look at it. Without editing it, as raw as possible."

"What are you going to do with it?"

"Me? Nothing. I know enough to ask the experts. My geeks will take a look at it and tell me what I need to know for tonight." She stood up, threw a couple twenties on the table and sauntered out into the morning sun, leaving Lara staring at the simple business card that, in addition to a small embossed hourglass symbol on the back, now obscured by an Internet address, had three lines printed on the front: "Faith", "Special Projects", and an e-mail address.

Lara didn't bother heading back to her hotel, instead finding a local Holiday Inn with the intent of catching a few hours sleep while Bryce and Hillary investigated her mystery woman. Hopefully the information she'd sent them after breakfast along with all of the information gathered by the sensors at the site the previous night would be enough.

Lara slept fitfully, her slumber interrupted by dreams of strange women dressed in leather watching her intently. After several hours of this, more exhausted than when she'd started, Lara crawled out of bed to call Bryce and Hillary to check their progress.

"What can you tell me about her?" Lara asked with an encouraging tone.

"Nothing much really." Hillary answered. "That just isn't enough to search with."

"That wasn't nothing!" Lara could hear Bryce complain in the background. "I'm sure it'll lead somewhere."

"It's not enough!" Hillary hissed back at him. Lara could tell they'd been arguing for a number of minutes about the value of what they'd discovered.

"Okay, what did you discover that counts as nothing much?" Lara ground out, her exhaustion making it harder to keep a sense of humour about Hillary and Bryce's perpetual bickering.

"Go ahead..." Hillary muttered to Bryce.

"Well... the e-mail address? It's for a research company in Cleveland, Ohio." Lara thought Bryce sounded like an over eager puppy. She couldn't see him but she could just imagine the expression on Hillary's face.

"And?" Lara prompted.

"That other address? It might be at another research company in London. I couldn't get any further than that." Bryce sounded embarrassed to Lara's experienced ear. "They've got very good security."

"In other words, they caught you before you had a chance to look around?" Lara chuckled.

"Yes..."

Lara heard Hillary in the background again, prodding Bryce to tell her what had happened to his computer when they discovered him attempting to hack into theirs.

"Okay. You came give me details later, if they are important. Anything else? Did you get a picture of her?"

"No." They both answered before Bryce continued, "You can tell someone else was there from the energy scanner but they don't show up anywhere else. She must have seen you setting up the cameras and microphones."

"I'd assumed that. I would never have known she was there if she hadn't been waiting for me." Lara replied. "Go ahead and wrap up all of the sensor data and put it where she asked."

"Are you sure about that Lara?" Hillary asked hesitantly.

"Yes. And Bryce..."

"Yes Lara?"

"Keep looking at the sensor data. If you find anything interesting let me know. And if you have a chance, see if you can find a connection between those two companies."

"Will do."

"I'll talk with you both later." and with that Lara put away her phone and went back to bed in an attempt to get a few more hours of sleep.

After a quick lunch and after checking in with Hillary, Lara spent the afternoon down near Boston. Hillary had found a small firm that specialized in personal stealth technology that was willing to provide her with a few items to enhance the ability of her body suit to mask her presence. They'd agreed with Faith's casual assessment that it needed to mask her scent, something they were able to accomplish with a few modifications.

Happy with the results, Lara headed back to the site. She wanted to take a look around during daylight. As she drove there she contemplated the size of the population implied by the amount of local traffic. The site had seemed so isolated the day before. But here was evidence to the contrary. She obviously wouldn't be able to use her preferred gun configuration at the site if it became necessary without attracting undesirable attention.

There wasn't anything at the site to indicate the previous nights' activities. If she hadn't seen it and her equipment recorded it, Lara wouldn't have believed the earlier reports.

The diner was busy but Lara had no desire to go elsewhere. She wasn't here for the food. She wasn't really surprised when she was joined by Faith just as she was about to order. The woman just grinned at her and when Lara was done ordered several of the evening's specials for herself. Looking her over, Lara couldn't figure out where it all went if she ate like that all the time.

"Like what you see?" Faith purred in her low voice, startling Lara.

"You're not my type." Lara snapped back. Two could play that game she thought, though she wasn't sure exactly if they were playing from the same deck.

Faith shrugged off her reply with a sexy grin that disturbed Lara with its intimacy. "A shame. It could have been fun."

Okay, whatever the game had been it certainly wasn't what she'd thought and there really wasn't time to figure it out, Lara thought before addressing the woman sitting on the other side of the booth. "Were your people able to get anything from the information from last night?"

"They were a little jealous of your toys but there really wasn't much there." She pulled several photographs from a bag Lara hadn't seen earlier. "But these were very helpful."

"You found someone who could translate that?" Lara asked. It wasn't a language Lara was familiar with and Bryce had been mystified by the strange markings. None of his usual translator programs had worked.

"Yes." She half winked at Lara. "My geeks said they'll give you something to translate it with if your geek stops trying to hack into their computers."

"I'll see that he gets the message." Bryce could be stubborn about such things but Lara didn't think he would object in this case.

"Good. Otherwise they'll probably visit him in person." She looked at Lara with a slight deadly grin. "Not something I would encourage. Even I stay out of their way when they are in that kind of mood."

At this point, before Lara had a chance to respond, their food arrived, effectively ending any conversation.

Faith directed her to park where she had the previous night, stating that it was best if they walked in. After grinning and commenting about Lara's taste in stealth-wear in the same low, sexy voice from the morning, she gave Lara some privacy for several minutes so she could get into her body suit.

She watched for a minute as Lara fitted low profile silencers to her pistols. "Those aren't going to do much good unless you have silver bullets. And even silver isn't going to kill them. It'll just slow them down."

"What will?" Lara asked, raising an eyebrow before loading her pistols with the special silver rounds Hillary had sent her.

"These babies need something more personal." she said, pulling her knife from a hidden location and testing the edge. "Let's go find you another tree." And with that Faith hid her knife again and headed towards the site without looking back to see if Lara was following her.

"You can watch but you need to stay in that tree." She firmly told Lara after watching her check her equipment. "I know you like being in charge but this isn't your normal situation. This is my party. And I'm sure there are a few people who would be upset with both of us if you got yourself killed."

Lara grimaced in annoyance but there was something about this young woman that kept her from arguing about it. "Okay. But you owe me an explanation when this is over."

"Not a problem. If we're both alive tomorrow I'll explain everything." With that comment hanging in the air, she disappeared into the trees.

Thinking about it later, Lara wasn't sure what really happened that night. It had seemed to happen the same as the previous night, up until when the figures standing around the altar began to chant. It was at this point that they were interrupted by the appearance of Faith in their midst.

She said something to them and there was a quick and brutal fight that Lara was too far away to see clearly, with Faith the only one standing at the end.

"You can come down now." she called over to Lara.

Lara was surprised at what she found. A slightly bruised and battered Faith was leaning against the altar. Whatever she had been fighting was gone, leaving a faint odor tinged with ozone behind.

"Where did they go?"

"You know how it is." Faith gave Lara a grin that sent shivers up and down her spine. "The bad guys run away when they lose. They won't be back."

"And that's it?"

"Yes. Short and sweet." Faith stretched, hissing in obvious pain. Apparently it hadn't been as simple as she was claiming. "Why don't we pack up your toys and get out of here. You can drop me off at my hotel on your way north. Your ghost problem is taken care of. Enjoy the rest of your vacation."

"And you?" Lara asked curiously.

"Places to be. Potential damsels in distress to rescue." and she stretched again, this time in that blatantly predatory manner Lara had noticed earlier that was halfway between sex and death.