Tomb Raider Forever

Hang On Tight

"What did I tell you?"  Lara said with a satisfied smile on her face.  The last rays of sunlight lit up her eyes before the sun slipped down behind the mountains to the west.  A gaping hole in the jungle undergrowth lay in front of her, seemingly bottomless.

"Ok, ok."  Duke nodded in acceptance.  "News flash:  You're a genius.  What else is new?"

Lara had reasoned that the final altar would be of equal altitude to the previous altar they had found buried beneath the earth.  And here it was, or at least here was a hole in the ground exactly where the altar was supposed to be.

"Two high and two low."  Duke twisted his lip in thought.  "Wonder what that's all about."

"We certainly won't discover the reason standing up here, now will we?"  Lara poked at him playfully.  "Shall we?"

She produced two sets of climbing gear from her pack and grabbed a couple of small stones from the ground.  Looping one rope around her slender waist, she helped Duke fasten his own rope and secured them to a large tree near the hole.  Testing the line, Lara backed toward the rim of the abyss and leaped down, keeping her descent smooth and controlled.  Duke lowered himself down in a series of awkward drops, not used to repelling.  In a few minutes they were in complete darkness.

"Let's see..."  Lara clicked on the light at her waist, illuminating the shaft around them.  "We ought to be close."  She angled the beam down, but the light revealed nothing but a continuing shaft leading into impenetrable darkness.  She fished out one of the stones she had picked up and dropped it.  A few moments passed, then a few more.

"Ummm..."  Duke frowned at Lara as the seconds turned to minutes.  "I didn't hear anything."

"Me neither."  Lara swallowed.  "Well now, this is a problem."

"Just once it would be nice for things to go smooth."  Duke grumbled, shifting his feet impatiently on the rock of the shaft.  Then he noticed it.  "Hey, Lara..."

"I know, I know."  Lara nodded, angry at herself.  "It's just a hole in the ground, but I assumed that it had to be the next altar.  I should have checked to see if..."

"No, Lara, look around."  Duke gestured to the circular shaft around them.

"Oh."  Lara said breathlessly.  The stone around them, for a meter above and below their current position, was carved with the same style as the other ancient ruins.  "Wait, now this can't be!  We're INSIDE it!"

"I don't get it."  Duke shook his head.  "This is it?"

"I believe so."  Lara nodded, gesturing around them.  "It's as though someone took one of the altars and curled it up, like rolling up a magazine!"

"Well that's pretty stupid."  Duke chewed his lip.  "Wait, how are we gonna..."

Lara kicked off the rock surface and spun to face Duke, her legs wrapping around his waist as they collided.

"Woah, carefully, baby!"  Duke grunted, gripping the rope hard.  Then he saw the look in Lara's eyes and sighed.  "Ok, ok, let's do this.  Man, this is gonna be awkward."

"You say awkward,"  Lara grinned, setting her feet against the shaft wall.  "And I say exotic.  Hold on tight to your rope, I'm going to need to let go of mine to... well you know."

Duke nodded, and spun them around so that Lara was pressed securely between him and the rock wall.  Lara let go of her rope, using her legs to hold on to Duke while she quickly reached down and unzipped her shorts and pulled them down just enough.  Then she unzipped Duke's jeans and...

"Am I losing my appeal?"  Lara asked, arching an eyebrow as she took out Duke's flaccid member.

"Hell no, baby."  Duke shook his head vehemently.  "I'm just a little... distracted."  He glanced down over his shoulder at the bottomless darkness beneath them.

"Don't tell me you're afraid of heights!"  Lara blinked in surprise.  This was a man who had fought off a small army of alien lizard-men.

"I ain't afraid of nothing,"  Duke growled in irritation.  "I just don't like heights."

"Why didn't you say anything when we climbed that mountain?"  Lara asked.

"Look, I can handle heights, I'm not freaking out on you here."  Duke shot back, his eyes still looking down at the abyss.

"As you would say, I'm not asking whether you will freak out, but whether you can get your freak ON."  Lara teased him playfully, knowing she was being unfair.  "You didn't have any problems on the mountain alter, as I recall."

"Yeah, after we were on solid rock."  Duke objected.  "Not... hanging over a bottomless pit."

"If I know you, this shouldn't be a problem for long."  Lara pressed close against him and began grinding against him, her wet nether lips moving on his groin.

She was right.  A few strokes of her hips, and Duke's manhood had awoken, growing long and hard up between her spread legs and pressing up against her slit.

"There now, what did I--"  Lara's words ended in an abrupt scream as their ropes suddenly went slack.

Duke's massive arms shot out instinctively, his fingers digging into the carved symbols on the shaft walls.  Lara's arms wrapped around his neck and she dropped onto his cock.  The familiar but no less amazing sensation mixed with the sudden terror shooting through her, causing her to involuntarily clamp down hard on him.

"Oh, HELL YES!"  Duke grunted, feeling Lara squeeze him tighter than he could remember, and she was always very, very tight.  For moment, he forgot that he was hanging from his fingers above a seemingly endless abyss.  "Damn, babe!  Woah!  Now we have got to do this skydiving someday!"

"The bloody hell happened to our ropes?!"  Lara hissed, looking up at the quarter-sized circle of blue-sky above them.  Suddenly the distance to the surface seemed much, much farther away.

"Maybe the knots you tied came loose."  Duke suggested, but seeing the expression of Lara's face he quickly amended:  "Or maybe the tree gave out."

"Doesn't matter right now."  Lara shook her head.  "Get to work."  She reached behind Duke's back and gave his solid glutes a slap through his jeans.

His fingers digging into the stone, Duke spread his legs to sides, bracing his boots as best he could.  With his limbs fully extended, he could not manage proper thrusting so that just left him with...

"Oooh..."  Lara moaned as Duke began churning his hips, working his cock around inside her.  "Duke!  Oh, right THERE!"

"Yeah, that's right.  You feeling this?  Mmm!"  Duke grinned, watching Lara's mouth open wide as she let out a long, sensual moan as his cock rubbed just the right spot.  "The Duke knows what he's doing."  He laughed, covering Lara's lips in a deep kiss as he continued grinding into her.  He felt Lara's sheath grip him tightly, her hot flesh moving against his hard, solid length.

Lara's moans echoed off the walls of the dark shaft, punctuated occasionally by a deep grunt from Duke as their bodies writhed together against the curved vertical stone surface.  Duke kept a steady, confident pace, not giving a thought to the fact that one slip of his fingers and they would both plummet to their doom.  All he concerned himself with was Lara's hot, wet vessel wrapped tightly around his throbbing cock and tasting her full, luscious lips.  Her enormous breasts pressed against his hard chest, and he cursed the layers of clothing that separated their bare skin from rubbing together with that delicious friction he craved.

Arching her head back, Lara smiled as Duke moved his lips down to her throat, licking up and down her slender neck while she savored every sensation.  She luxuriated in it, feeling Duke's cock working around inside her, his lips on her skin and his powerful body pressed against hers, holding her safe above certain death.  Lara had spent so much of her life hanging by her own fingertips over certain death, when a single mistake could spell disaster.  She had come to be completely self-sufficient, and was proud of it.  But now, here, with this man she could trust, she let herself just relax.  It was a novel sensation, and utterly divine.

Duke could feel Lara's total trust radiating from her every kiss, every caress.  Duke Nukem was a tough guy, and a player.  He couldn't have kept track of his sexual conquests if wanted to.  Beautiful women had always been plentiful and willing, but they were in it for a good lay... Hell, the best lay of their lives, but a roll in the hay is just a roll in the hay.  Duke knew that he and Lara had been screwing the daylights out of each other for days, and the sex was out of this world, but that wasn't really the point.  That wasn't why he was sleeping so soundly at night, or why he smiled every time he saw her face in the morning.

"All right...nnngh....I'm... OH!  Almost there!  Oh, oh yes!"  Lara gasped, her fingers digging into Duke's shoulders.  "Oh, Duke!"

"Uungh!  Right there with you, babe!"  Duke grunted, churning hard into her to finish off.

Lara rested her chin on his shoulder as they came together, moaning into his ear as her womanhood began to spasm around his convulsing cock.  Duke's entire body shook with pleasure, his loins pouring his seed deep inside Lara's vessel.  It wasn't the most intense orgasm they had shared, and the sex had been tame compared to some of their previous escapades, but this climax lasted a long while, their bodies both shuddering in unison as waves of ecstasy flowed through them.

"Wow."  Lara breathed, looking into Duke's shades as the last spasms subsided.

"Yeah."  Duke agreed.  "Y'know, we're getting pretty good at this."

"We're not too shabby."  Lara admitted with a grin.  She took a deep breath and spoke her mind.  "Duke, do you think we... when this is over..."

"Yeah."  Duke nodded, a smile spreading across his rugged face.  "Yeah we could give it a shot."

"Good."  Lara felt her cheeks grow hot.  She glanced up at the darkening circle of sky above.  "We best get out of here first.  Save the world and all that."

"Hang on tight, babe."  Duke shifted his weight slightly in preparation for their ascent and felt a cool draft that brought him up short.  "Oh, hey could you zip me up first?"

* * *

With a mighty heave, Duke pulled himself up after Lara onto the tangle of grass and vines around the edge of the hole.  The climb had been arduous and there had been a few times when Duke was sure he was about to fall to his death, but with Lara's keen climber's eye, they had managed it in good time and with a definite lack of falling to their death.  Night had fallen before they reached the surface, but a full moon was casting more than enough light to see by.

"Bloody hell."  Lara cursed, picking up their climbing ropes and studying the end in the bluish moonlight.  The ropes had both failed, but the ends were not frayed.  "These were cut."

"Those alien bastards!"  Duke growled, grabbing his shotgun up from their gear and moving in front of Lara, scanning the dark and silent jungle.  "I don't see nothing."

Lara whipped out her pistols, pressing her back against Duke's and glancing around for targets, squinting at the darkness between the trees.  "Nothing at all."

"What gives?"  Duke asked, frowning.  "They could of just shot us in there.  Why cut the ropes?  What are they waiting for?  Christmas?"

"I haven't the slightest."  Lara shrugged, holstering her pistols and swinging her pack onto her shoulders.  "But we need to get to the central pyramid as fast as we can.  That was the last altar, and whatever weapon you are hoping to find must be there."

"Let's kick some alien ass, baby."  Duke worked the pump on his shotgun and they moved out.

* * *

It had been a risky gambit, cutting the ropes.  But the alien scout's plan had worked.  He knew the male was strong and the female was a good climber, and they had both survived just as he knew they would.  And now they were hurrying back to the primary objective with great speed.  The alien would be sparred having to watch the two of them mating yet again, making their awful moaning sounds and coupling their ugly bodies together in their hideous manner.

"They are returning."  He gurgled into his communication device.  "Mobilize all forces.  Prepare for the attack!"