Lara Ravel

Pathologic 2=

Lara Ravel is a young woman who owns the Shelter in the Knots District.

Description
"A clever, dedicated and proud young woman. She’s still grieving over the recent loss of her beloved father. She looks you straight in the eye at almost all times—with a gaze that is fierce, nervous, and demanding. If she does lower her eyes for a while, she will raise them back. She’d try to smile (with a corner of her mouth), but the can’t. She just isn’t a smiler. This has to look touching, not malign. Living alone in an empty house, she’s gradually awakening from her torpor and preparing to leave the town—to join the army field force and begin her vendetta."

- From the game's design documents

A driven and compassionate woman, though weighted down by grief after the death of her father, Captain Ravel.

Background
Lara is childhood friends with the Haruspex, Grigory Filin (better known as Bad Grief), and Stakh Rubin. The four of them used to disappear for weeks at a time, and used to have a hideout in the Warehouses district. Though people used to wonder at her spending time in their company, she was a willing accomplice, at times tempering them, but at others encouraging.

Little is known of what she did during the time the Haruspex was away. By the time of his return, Lara lives in the north of town, in her family mansion. After the death of her father, she has sealed the rest of her house and occupies only one wing of her childhood home.

Haruspex Route
"My path was called "A Home for the Living." Kindness guided me, but I could have never known I was to meet my father's murderer."

As one of three childhood friends the Haruspex thinks of when he returns to the Town, Lara first welcomes him with concern tempered by a certain reserve. She lets him rest and while he does so talks with people in the northern parts of the Town to spread the word that he had nothing to do with Isidor's death. She wakes him so he can investigate sounds of someone rummaging inside the house, at which point he encounters the Changeling who broke in. When he informs Lara of her presence, she'll say to let her be, and that she'll provide care for her later if needed.

The next day she is seen in Stanislav Rubin's Apartment along with Rubin, having tried to calm him down. She enjoins the Haruspex not to take up his father's inheritance, speaking of Isidor's actions during the first outbreak of the Plague where he walled off the entirety of the Crude Sprawl.

Not long after, she can accept the Haruspex's offer to get the four childhood friends together at the Apple Basket, one of their childhood meeting spots. If he succeeds in inviting Bad Grief and Rubin, she will be present with them at night by a fire. Despite the Plague turning the Town on it's head earlier in the day the friends still gather at the Apple Basket near midnight. Lara voices concerns about how the Plague will affect the Town, and acknowledges the Haruspex's role in holding them together.

On the first day that the Hospital is open, she can be found there along with Rubin, and she expresses her desire to be useful and help. As events unfold, Lara opens up her house as a shelter for the healthy homeless people in order to help protect them. While establishing her shelter, she inquires about the water supply around Town. A patrolman misunderstood Lara's concerns, and led a mob to destroy the water pump in front of her home. She requests the Haruspex's help by having a water barrel brought to her home, but should he agree, he will only be able to provide an infected barrel, bringing the infection to the Flank.

After the arrival of military forces with Commander Alexander Block, Lara charges to the Town Hall to murder him, believing him to be responsible for her father's death. It is only with the Haruspex's intervention that she is not arrested or murdered for her actions, and he escorts her from the Town Hall back to the Shelter. If she is not stopped, she is executed during the night, and a soldier in the Town Hall will give the Haruspex her confession letter the next day.

In the Diurnal Ending she can be found on top of a Stairway to Heaven with Bad Grief and Rubin nearby. She offers to help take care of the Haruspex's children.

In the Nocturnal Ending, she flees the Town with many of the Utopians and Humbles.

The Marble Nest
Lara died prior to the events of The Marble Nest.

Spoken Dialogue

 * → See Lara Ravel/Spoken Dialogue

Description
"Appearance: Lara has a beautiful face with high cheekbones, like a french actress. She has big dewy eyes the color of prune, long thick eyelashes, soft lips, a small nose with a slightly turned-up tip. Her hair is long, black and wavy. Lara’s physique evokes the feeling of languish and tenderness. She has a beautiful purring voice. Her gestures are very fluent, she has a light step. Usually Lara wears white clothes, altogether she seems black and white: white skin, white clothes, dark lips, dark hair and dark eyes.

Pose: Looks through a glass of wine over the light.

Personality: A generous and kind girl who tends to give more than she takes. She emits some inner warmth and shares it with those she likes. There’s a mark of tragedy on her generosity, as if she is giving away presents she chose carefully for someone who never got use of it. Her house is reputed to be the coziest and happiest place in town. It’s an honor to become Lara’s friend. Maria Kaina respects her and Capella is fond of her. Lara is perceptive when it comes to giving gifts. It seems like some inner force helps her guess one’s dearest wish. However, once she finds a clue of that mystery, Lara stops and doesn’t move further, keeping that secret. She is very feminine. One wants to protect Lara, pay her back at least a bit of what she gives away with her neverending wasteful generosity."

- From original Pathologic character concepts 

Lara took an active part in countering the Sand Plague, trying to make the fight with the Plague easier for others. When she found out about children looting caches with "shmowder", Lara made sure to stop them from getting their hands on the poison. She volunteered to test the old medicine along with Yulia Lyuricheva and Anna Angel.

While very widely liked, not everyone cares for Lara. Specifically, Aspity shows a great deal hatred towards Lara, calling her a liar. Yulia Lyuricheva expresses feelings of dislike towards Lara's philosophy and outlook on the world.

Background
"She is a woman devastated by grief. All the gifts that she is so happy to give away are, fundamentally, offerings to a dead person. She favours the living with something the dead have no use for. [...] Her philanthropy is almost reprehensible. She pities everyone she comes across, for she knows they will all die just like her dearly departed. She sees a corpse in everyone she looks upon."

- Yulia Lyuricheva

Lara's father was a military officer that once lived together with her in the Ravel home, which was built by the Olgimskys. Little is known about the circumstances of Captain Ravel's death — he was executed after the battle at the Karstov Fords, but the public reason for this remains unknown.

Portrait Quotes
"She's the kindest person I know. Lara has taught me how to give presents, which is an intricate art in and of itself. The first thing she cares about is other people; the last is Lara Ravel herself. She lives for her friends. I also was fond of her father. The year before last he volunteered as a Fourth Army captain. Yes, I mean the Fourth Army."

- Capella's take on her

"After Captain Ravel was shot during the battle of Karstov Fords, newly-orphaned Lara turned her father's house into The Shelter. The house that's been built by Olgimsky in exchange for... a favor. She is both sensitive and sensible; a rare combination in our neck of the woods."

- Stanislav Rubin's take on her

Bachelor Route
Lara’s good intentions often would have consequences she didn’t foresee, such as in the failure of her House of the Living. On the second day of the epidemic, Lara wanted to create a 'House of the Living', an isolation ward. Lara found an empty house which she intended to make into a shelter. However, this plan didn’t succeed as the house she had chosen was already infected. After requesting the Bachelor investigate, he declares the house unsafe.

On the day the military forces with general Alexander Block in charge arrive, Lara attempted to assassinate Block. However, half the town already knew about her plan, as everyone was aware that Lara was searching for a small gun. The exact reason for Lara’s actions is unknown, but she reveals that she knew he had her father executed.

"Perhaps she believes that he represents a kind of universal evil? An ultimate annihilator who has arrived with the only purpose of reducing the town to rubble. If only he was killed, Lara thinks, it would provide us with a much needed delay. After all, the medicine was already researched, she thinks... Was it, though?"

- Yulia Lyuricheva's speculation

Changeling Route
"I had to do it to protect the… privacy of certain information. The good name of a certain person… and most likely the life of another one depend on it. Surely that's reason enough? Forgive me, it's uncomfortable for me to talk about it."

- Lara Ravel, regarding the House of the Living.

Lara decided to turn her mansion into a shelter for her friends and people who would help her with the arrangement. She wanted to make the House of The Living safe enough that one could survive a month living there without leaving the place, which would protect them from the Sand Plague. After her friend, the Harpist, told her that the Shelter is too small to hold everyone interested in staying there, Lara diverged from her rule of letting in everyone in need and decided to limit it to twelve people.

In the Humble Ending, she offers to sacrifice her life to the Changeling to save the town, along with the rest of the Humbles. Her crime of attempted murder places her under Clara's charge as one of the town's sinners, and Clara convinces her to join the sacrifice.

Lara asks how many people she can help with her blood. She finds strength in knowing that even the most active life would not have been able to save as many as would her death.

Spoken Dialogue

 * → See Lara Ravel/Spoken Dialogue