Anna — The Tomb Raider (442 photos) (Patreon)

She used to treat every dig like a clock. In before the heat peaked, map what she needed, and be gone before the jungle had a chance to settle into her clothes. The teal crop top and the short shorts were practical then — light, easy to move in, easy to ignore. The holster stayed on her thigh because it was useful. She didn’t think about how either of them looked once she was alone on the trail.

Somewhere between one ruins site and the next she stopped packing light. She started staying out later. The paths she walked got slower. She would pause where the lanterns from the last camp still reached, rest a hand on her hip, and glance back over her shoulder like she was checking whether anyone had followed. Most nights no one had. She stayed there anyway. The top would cling when she breathed. The shorts would ride higher on her thighs. She left them.

It wasn’t that the work had gotten harder. She still knew how to read a map and how to keep her footing when the ground turned soft. She just stopped pretending the job was the only reason she was still out there. The holster pressed warm against her leg when she shifted her weight. The fabric of the top stuck to the small of her back. She would stand there longer than she needed to, freckles showing under the thin sheen of sweat, ponytail loose against her neck, and decide she wasn’t ready to head back yet.

Anyone who caught up with her would notice she didn’t look surprised. She never turned all the way around at first. Just looked over her shoulder, half-lidded and unhurried, like she had already accepted that the night was no longer about finding anything. The ruins were still out there. She still knew how to reach them. She simply hadn’t decided she wanted to finish the walk, and for now the quiet stretch of trail, the heat, and the way everything clung to her were enough reason to keep going a little slower than she used to.

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