So, finally, here we are. My next Uncharted story starts now, although… it is one tragic beginning. You would be doing yourself a disservice by not reading all current chapters of Uncharted: Seekers of the Lost and Uncharted: Memories before reading this as this is a sequel to Uncharted: SotL and Memories. It lets you connect with newer characters.
This is a far more depressing story then Seekers was, so be prepared. It has much more darker themes that will be revealed to you in this chapter. This is a very dark tale I'm telling.
Keep following Memories if you are already, I'm still going to be posting more there as characters such as Harry and Donnie need some more screen-time.
Also, excuse if I did this opening segment wrong. I have no idea how one shops for wedding dresses.
Uncharted: Missing
By Obrusnine
Last updated: November 24th, 2012 fD
(ED: Basic Edit / RW: Rewrite / fD: First Draft / FD: Final Draft)
Chapter 1: Tragedy
"The loss of a loved one turns our life upside down. Our world as we knew it has changed and those changes require that we in turn adjust to a new normal." –Unknown
Nathan Drake walked along the myriad hangers of white wedding dresses with his wife Elena on his arm. Their daughter Iria walked along before them looking very happy as she grabbed dresses that were to Nate indistinguishable from each other.
"That one is pretty." Elena said as Iria grabbed yet another and placed it over the already large pile draped over her arm.
"Thanks Mom." Iria said. Elena nudged him on his side.
"Oh… yea, very pretty." Nate said re-assuming attention. He smiled at his daughter and was happy that she was happy. She was just turning 22 and here she was getting married to her childhood friend Donnie. He remembered back to when she was just a small beautiful baby in his arms and smiled even more brightly.
Iria scowled at his obvious lack of attention.
"What?" Nate asked. "Sorry, I just don't see how they are so different to each other."
"Did he act the same way when you two were getting married?" Iria asked.
"Pfft, unfortunately." She replied. "The remarriage was even more entertaining..."
Nate scratched his head grinning at her obvious use of sarcasm.
"Yea, you just sit there being a pretty face." She said.
"Hey, I'm not pretty, I'm handsome. Iria is pretty." Nate replied indignantly.
Iria walked up and used her free hand to pat him on the shoulder.
"Sure Dad, whatever you say." She said. It was Nate's turn to scowl this time. Just as he usually did when annoyed, he reached up to his neck and thumbed around the shard of glass that was from the Holy Grail. He had shattered the Holy Grail 22 years ago after deeming it too powerful to be used by anyone.
After drinking someone's blood from it, the user was immediately granted the ability to control the movements of anyone he or she could see. This caused him to bring up uncomfortable memories of Jason Tepla, the previous leader of the now defunct order of the Knights-Templar. They had been obliterated by another secret order called the Seekers of the Lost, except, they were still very well running as far as he was aware.
He didn't really know of course. It had been several years since he had seen the orders apparent leader Clara Hopkins. His now deceased father, Harold Drake, had been a spy for them before he was shot by Jason and then finished off by his father figure Victor Sullivan, who had passed only a short while after when they had been collecting another powerful artifact… the staff of Moses which granted the user control of the elements.
The final artifact was still out there somewhere. He still had control over it, but he had resolved never to use its power. The Ark of the Covenant granted the ability to make anyone affected by the user love them. He had not found any reason to destroy it as he had the Grail and Staff, having sawed the ladder in half and still was in possession of his own half while the other was still in the possession of the Seekers.
Still, those days were long past, and he didn't find himself thinking much about it anymore. Instead he watched as Elena followed Iria into the dressing room as she tried on wedding dresses. They were getting married in a week, although Nate had always thought that Donnie should be the one wearing the dress… as Iria took more after Nate then she did her mother Elena.
He entertained the funny thought in his mind until the door opened and he was distracted by his daughter. He smiled as he saw how beautiful his daughter looked in the wedding dress. No matter how tough she was, Nate knew she was also beautiful… at least, in his eyes. But he supposed he didn't exactly have fair judgment of that considering he was her father.
"I like that one." Nate said. Although, he was really trying to get out of the situation he was in as he did not really like this dress picking thing. He'd only come along because Iria had begged him to, and he never refused her if he could.
Although Iria was not usually the one to emphasize her beauty, she twirled in front of the mirror and looked at Nate.
"Well Dad, how do I look?" She asked.
"Beautiful as always honey." He replied. "You'd look beautiful in anything."
She giggled as she usually did. He'd always thought that that giggle was very cute. He grinned at her as she went to try out another.
A few hours passed before Elena and Iria finally settled on a dress and purchased it. It was stored in a large plastic bag shaped to the dresses form before they got out and headed to the van. Nate leaned back and relaxed after such a long time of waiting for them as he turned on the car. As Iria sat in the passenger's seat and Elena sat in the back, something finally seemed to hit her.
"Holy crap, I'm getting married." She said. Nate laughed.
"Yes you are." He said. The put his hand on her shoulder before he started driving.
"Honey, don't worry. You'll be fine." Elena said. Iria just blinked and bit her lip nervously.
When they arrived back at the Mansion, where Iria was staying at the moment as she prepared for the wedding, she still seemed to be in shock. Still, she mechanically left the car as Nate shut it off and climbed out as well. She walked up to the house ahead of them eyes forward.
"She's acting like you when we were getting married the first time." She said. "It took a bit to hit you, but then… bam."
They stepped inside to find Iria holding Nate and Elena's latest child Timothy. He was now six years old and very cute. Donnie's mother Marion had been taking care of him as she quite frequently did and then smiled at them as she started to head out.
"Well, got to get back." Marion said. She grinned with excitement as she stepped out of the door and headed for her own car. Nate walked ahead and took his son from his daughter's arms.
"How are you doing Timmy?" Nate asked him.
"Daddy!" Timmy responded. "I built 'dis huge tower from these things Mary called "Legos"."
Nate smiled.
"I bet you did." He said.
"Well, I think I need to calm down a bit. I'm going to go read in the library for a while." Iria said as she headed up the stairs.
A few hours passed uneventfully as day turned into night and Nate climbed into bed. Elena meanwhile clicked on the baby monitor for Timmy as she had just put him to bed and then climbed up next to him; she rested on his outstretched arm.
"Something tells me the next week is going to be very tiring." He told her.
"Definitely. These wedding preparations are crazy and we haven't even scratched the surface." Elena said. "Donnie's family wants it to be the best possible."
"It'll be a far cry from our wedding. Just small and relaxed is what I prefer." He replied.
"Me to. Although, hardly anyone was at our wedding." She said.
"You do have a…" Nate started to say. He was interrupted as suddenly something came over the baby monitor.
"Mommy, I can't sleep, can you come and read me a bedtime story?" Timmy asked. Elena sighed and sat up.
"I can take this one if you want." Nate said.
"No, don't worry about it." She replied. She left. Nate, bored, went to sleep as Elena's voice poured over the monitor.
Several hours later, Nate heard two bangs close by. He sat up and looked around.
"What the hell was that?" He asked himself. He looked at the clock. It had been four hours and Elena was still missing from where she was supposed to be in bed. He stood up from the bed and put on his slippers before stepping out into the dark hallway. "Hello? Elena? Where are you?"
Suddenly, there was a noise that would end up scarring him inside for the rest of his life. Two gunshots rang out in the direction of the library, and he heard a scream he recognized as his daughters.
"Iria!" He said to himself. He ran to a small drawer and quickly extracted a loaded 9 millimeter pistol before sprinting over in the direction of the library. Five men were inside holding pistols with sound suppressors attached. There were two dead bodies on the floor and Iria popped out from behind a desk to fire at the men, but they all fired at once, and Iria was thrown back onto the floor and rolled. "No!"
He started firing and three of the men went down, but two more sprint and jumped through the glass window. They were only on the second story, so they could easily roll out of the fall with no injury. He wasn't concerned about them though, he ran over to his daughter, she was coughing blood onto the ground and three bullet holes were in her chest.
"Iria. Oh god." He said. "No, this isn't happening."
He tried to press down on her wounds and stop the bleeding, she gasped in pain.
"D-Dad… I tried…" She said.
"You did fine." He said. "You killed two of them, you held your own. Hold on, we're going to get you to a hospital."
"N-No." She said. "I'm… I'm finished. They took Mom… Mom and Timmy. You… you have to go after them."
"They'll be fine; if they took them they don't plan to kill them. I can track them down later." He said. His fear and tension were reaching new heights as she coughed out more blood.
"No Dad. The nearest hospital is twenty minutes away; I'm not going to live that long… already lost… too much blood." She said. He could see she was telling the truth, but he denied it as tears poured from his eyes. A pool of blood was already forming under his daughter.
"Come on Iria. Don't die on me. Don't die." Nate said.
"Dad, that's enough." She said. "You take care of them. Tell… Donnie… tell him I loved him. I loved him so much. You go after Mom… you tell her I loved her to. Harry to…"
"Please Iria…" Nate said.
"I love you Dad." She said. "Don't… don't let this ruin you."
"I love you to Iria." He said. She raised her bloody hand and put it against the side of his face. He put his hand on top of hers as he felt her strength ebb away. She smiled weakly at him… and then life faded from her eyes and her hand fell from his grip. "NO!"
He stood up, he heard the sound of engines turning on outside. Grief was immediately replaced by anger and a thirst of revenge, and he screamed as he followed the men who had killed his daughter out of the window. The terrain around here was unstable and the trucks were not all-terrain, so as the trucks started to drive away, they drove slowly.
There was no time to get to his van, and he raced for the horse stables they owned for a method of transportation. Memories raced through his mind as he thought of his now dead daughter and everything seemed to go in slow motion as he ran.
He remembered holding Iria as a baby 22 years ago… his beautiful daughter in his arms knowing that he would never let go of her. He had lied to himself that day. He had let her go. He remembered other things as well. He remembered teaching her how to shoot, talking to Donnie and then having her laugh at the aftermath, taking her out for her first beer on her 21st birthday…
This was so wrong. It was so wrong. He should've died, not her. She was innocent. He was a criminal. He couldn't think of who would be evil enough to kill his daughter in his head. Why had they come here? Why would they kill her?
He would think about this later though. He made a new promise to himself now. He promised himself that at any cost, he would avenge his daughter. No matter what. He got to the stables and he climbed onto a horse. It turned out to be Harry's favorite, Oscar. Iria had always been afraid of the horses, so she didn't have a favorite herself.
Still, this memory tore him apart inside even more as he made Oscar take off after the vehicles. As he managed to get into range of them, he opened fire with his pistol screaming.
"I'll kill you!"
Suddenly though, a blond head poked out of one of the windows of the trucks and he saw Elena and he stopped firing at the vehicle.
"Nate!" She yelled.
"Elena!" He yelled back. Suddenly, a gunshot rang out and Oscar collapsed underneath him and he rolled as he hit the ground hard. He quickly got up and tried to run after the vehicles on foot. "ELENA!"
But they were too fast, and they disappeared from his sight.
"Elena… no…" He said. He dropped onto his hands and knees and let his tears free. "Iria…"
He looked up at the sky.
"NOOOOOOO!"
It really hurt me to write that… Read and review…
