25 Years Ago
May 2013
Istanbul, Turkey
If there was more for him to do then Tariq Avci would've done it in a heartbeat. He would've done more to save his parents from this predicament but he could only beg and cry for the gunmen to let his parents go.
His mother and father were pinned to the ground with guns above their heads by kids in their late teen years with the leader looking at the 9-year-old with a stern look on his face.
"Do you know where your parents kept the stuff?" he asked.
Tariq nodded. "Yes. Please, don't kill them."
"If you don't do what we say, we'll do something bad to you."
"Yusuf!" Tariq's mother yelled, "this is between us; you don't bring our son into this."
"You forced our hand in this decision!" Yusuf growled. "I would never kill a child but I didn't say I wouldn't punish him."
"Then let him go and we can talk about this."
Yusuf shook his head. "Nothing to talk about; you two have stolen an important piece of history and hid it from the world. We're here to retrieve it and give it back to the world." He looked back at the little boy. "Go find the treasure they stole or…" he cocks his gun and points it at his mother's head, "or I kill your mother and then your father."
Tariq cried. "NO!" He held up both hands in defeat. "I know what you want; I'll get it for you."
He turned around and ran for the closest behind him. It was locked but he knew what the combination was. He inputted the combination and yanked at the lock but it remained trapped.
No, the combination!
He tried again, only to find it locked again.
What was the combination?!
"I changed it," Tariq's father called out. "The combination is when Cain murdered Abel."
Tariq looked at the lock and saw only three digits. He knew the answer though.
7-4-1.
Tariq yanked the lock off successfully and quickly yanked the closet door open. When it opened, a mountain of collected artifacts fell on top of him like an avalanche and knocked him on his back.
Tariq pulled himself out of the mess and crawled back, stopping when he heard a gasp and remembering Yusuf holding his parents hostage.
"I can't believe it," Yusuf gasped with wide eyes. "You stole all these artifacts?"
"We're private collectors," Tariq's father corrected, "we paid for them."
"No one man should have all of this." He looked at his companions. "I was going to spare you but after what you've done…" He aimed his gun at the man's head and pulled the trigger.
"DADDY!"
He aimed the gun at the woman.
"NO, MOMMY!"
BANG!
"MOMMY, DADDY!"
Yusuf sighed and looked away from the bodies, hands shaking nervously. "Sabri, start collecting."
The teen holding the father down nodded before going to collect the fallen artifacts.
Yusuf looked over at the young crying boy. "I won't kill you…" He tucked his gun away. "I swear."
Tariq looked at Yusuf with a face puffy from tears.
"I'm sorry to do this but you're parents stole from the world; they were the bad people."
No, Tariq cried in his head. YOU'RE the bad guys. YOU are the devils.
15 Years Later
June 2028
"You want to take over the group?" Arda snorted with a chuckle. "Why?"
The 24-year-old Tariq looked at Arda, the man who has been by his side in the Sunni Islamic Worshippers for five years now.
"It has been my goal from the very beginning," Tariq answered. "The SIW works like a hierarchy, with one contributing to the group and rising in the ranks to lead but they are also delusional and fanatic. I think I can give them a new task."
Arda laughed. "What do you hope to achieve when you take over the SIW? Building new churches or creating a new religion?"
"Protecting the world and our people in this country."
"What?"
"My mother and father were killed by people who were seeking out treasure. My parents didn't steal them but they were still killed by treasure hunters. Turkey is home to Noah's Ark and a few other religious artifacts. How many of our people will die because of some treasure hunter trotting from country to country looking for a gemstone?"
"From my experience... none."
Tariq looked at Arda, not expecting him to understand. "Are you familiar with Nathan Drake and Elena Fisher?"
Arda went silent. Tariq took that as his answer.
"Let's say Drake is looking for... the Temple of Solomon for example and the search leads him here to this country. How many people would kill to look for the Temple of Solomon? I can't write down an answer because humans are too unpredictable but it's safe to assume that if there are no treasure hunters here, people won't get hurt in some thief's pursuit for a historical artifact."
Arda narrowed his eyes. "So this is about protecting people from falling victim, direct or indirect, of a treasure hunter. Are you sure you're doing this to protect people and not to make up for not saving your parents when you were a boy?"
Tariq didn't answer.
Arda chuckled before staring off into space, a thought suddenly occurring to him. "Why the SIW? Why not start your own gang?"
"Religious people are easier to control and manipulate."
"Are you going to teach them to use guns and whatnot?"
"Once I provide a reasonable explanation for switching tactics and using guns, they'll understand and I will use a process to make sure I only have loyal people under my thumb. These people want a reason to believe they're doing God's work. I don't believe in God or anything apart of Sunni Islam but as long as they do, they are loyal to me."
"Are they expendable to you?"
Tariq shook his head.
"Am I expendable to you?"
Tariq patted his friend on the back. "You've been my friend for a long time, Arda, the best I could ever ask for; you're like a brother to me. The only way you're expendable to me is if you betray me."
Arda sighed in relief. "The day I betray my brother is the day I fall into the pits of Hell."
Tariq shook his head and thought, I don't believe in Hell.
Present
Tariq and Arda caught up to their Sunni Islamic Specialists and stayed in the back as they watched the battle play out.
"We've been set up," Tariq growled upon seeing the Overlord trucks plowing through his men, "Overlord."
Arda looked down and ran a hand across his forearm, where his Overlord tattooed serial number was hidden by his sleeve.
"We so got to get out of here!" Tyler exclaimed.
"No shit!" Derek cursed back.
Alec's spray of bullets had to be stopped when the fires jumped from the truck and nearly engulfed him. The Overlord soldiers backed away from the flames and kept their distance while they kept on firing.
Derek ran and tripped over a fallen soldier from their side. He picks himself up and looks for the window that Cassie, Bethany, and the Priest managed to climb out from earlier. Upon finding the window, he points at it and calls out for Tyler and Alec to regroup.
The fallen soldier Derek tripped over was revived when the stench of gasoline and fire awoke him. His vision was blurry from suddenly rising from his slumber and he couldn't tell if it was dark because his eyes were closed or because of the black smoke beginning to spread. Once he saw the orange flames, however, he knew the answer to his question.
The window the trio climbed out earlier about twelve feet in the air and a tall object like a shelf was required but Cassie used her grappling hook to lower herself and the others down. Derek desperately looks for the shelf they climbed earlier but it fell over. In his hasty attempt to lift it up, he felt someone touch his shoulder and nearly pulled the trigger when he saw Tyler.
"I'll give you a boost," he shouted over the gunfire. "I have to secure the VIP first!"
"I'm not leaving you!" Derek shouted.
"You're a highly valuable person, Derek, your mother would kill us if she knew that we failed to protect you."
"And she'll kill me for not protecting you!"
"Go home to your mother!" Tyler insisted. "She went from a rectangle to a circle and back to a rectangle; you deserve a mother like that!"
"What the hell are you talking about?!"
"Get out of here!" Tyler ordered once more. He pressed his back to the wall and cupped his hands together. "I'll give you a boost."
Derek hesitated before looking back at the Overlord soldiers and Alec. He turned back to Tyler and shouted, "You and Alec better escape."
Tyler nodded. "Yes sir."
The warehouse is on fire? Cassie question, briefly distracted from her brawl. Her eyes went wide with realization. The warehouse is on fire! Derek!
Cassie ducked, barely avoiding a punch to her temple, and moved around her muscled foe to grapple him from behind. She puts him in a headlock but he grabs her by the waist and bodyslams her.
Cassie gasped. "Don't think I'm a ragdoll just because of my size."
"Benden kısa olduğunu bilmiyordum," the hooded muscle erupted in a dry voice. He picked up Cassie by the hair and reeled his arm back, only to get socked in the face. He blocks a punch from Cassie and punches her in the jaw.
The Priest fell to the ground, accidentally hitting Bethany and pushing her into the open. She scrambled to her feet and quickly jumped inside the back of the jeep and kept her head.
The Priest flips the soldier off of him but he immediately kicks the Priest in the jaw with the sole of his boot and climbs on top of him. He begins punching him several more times in the jaw before picking him up and slamming his fist into the door of the jeep.
The Priest caught an incoming fist but was slow to react when the soldier kicked him in the stomach.
When the soldier went for a second kick, the Priest caught him around his knee and tackled him to the ground so he was on top.
Cassie elbows the hooded muscle in the face and punches him. She was slow to duck her head in time when he punched her and ended up hitting her forehead and knocking her to the ground.
Cassie climbs to her feet and uppercuts the hooded muscle in between the legs. This time, she got a reaction out of him. With the hooded muscle folded downward, she uppercuts him and sends him staggering back.
The Priest put both hands over the soldier's mouth to try and block his air supply until he went unconscious but the soldier kicked him off with both feet before diving in and putting the Priest in a headlock.
The Priest inserted his fingers between his throat and the soldier's forearm and attempted to pry his arm away from his throat. The soldier resisted and squeezed tighter with every fiber in his being. The Priest considered digging his nails into the soldier's arm but his tic to bite his nails made his nails dull and less sharp.
Is this how it ends? the Priest wondered. Strangled to death?
He looked over to his left to see Cassie continue to fight the hooded muscle and saw a 6x6 truck coming in their direction. Reinforcements coming to try and surround them from both sides no doubt and kill both Drake and the hooded guys. Now he was on the clock.
He remembered what he did with the brass knuckles he snatched off the thug from earlier and pulled them out of his pocket and put them on his fist. He kicks the soldier in the groin, escaping his grip, and does a one-eighty and punches the soldier square in the face, dropping him flat on his back.
Bethany, who was peeking half her head up from the jeep, saw her uncle punch the soldier with the brass knuckles and went "Wow, uncle."
He turned around and saw the 6x6 truck getting closer and closer. He looked around to find a weapon and found something that was even better: The rocket launcher the thug had when climbing out the jeep. He runs to pick it up and aims it at the 6x6, making sure Bethan was clear of the backblast, waiting for it to get close before he squeezes the trigger.
The 6x6 truck went up in flames like a firecracker and flopped on its side before skidding to a halt.
The explosion distracts the hooded muscle long enough for Cassie to jump on the hooded muscles back and put him in a headlock. She wrapped one of her arms around his throat while the other arm went for his mouth and she strangled and smothered with all her might.
The hooded muscle flips Cassie over his waist and punches in the back of the head so hard that her forehead bounces off the ground, unaware of a second 6x6 truck coming, picking up speed with the intent of running both of them over.
"What did you do?" Bethany exclaimed. "You blew them up!"
The Priest said, without looking at his niece, "God will understand."
The soldier he knocked out earlier regained consciousness in time to see the Priest blow up his comrades and grab him from behind and suplexes him. The Priest hit the ground headfirst and went limp on the concrete ground.
Bethany panicked and looked around the floor of the jeep for something she could use. She grabbed the first item she could find.
The soldier picked up his fallen pistol and aims it at the downed priest. As he was about to pull the trigger, the sight of Bethany in the corner of his eye made him face her.
"God will understand," the 13-year-old declared.
She swung a tire iron down on his forehead as hard as she could. The soldier's eyes went wide and his body seized up. He went falling on his back with the gun discharging as soon as he hit the flat ground, the gun pointing in the direction of the incoming 6x6 truck.
The driver of the 6x6 was laughing hysterically at the thought of running two people over and just as he was about to make his targets, the lights went out.
The stray bullet from the tire iron soldier's gun hit him in the forehead. He fell back against the seat with his foot-stomping on the gas, making the vehicle go faster.
The hooded muscle decided that now was the time to finish Cassie. He turned around, picked up Cassie's fallen gun, aimed it at the young woman and-
WHAM!
The 6x6 truck strays into the hooded muscle's path and runs him over before plowing into the middle of the battlefield and tipping over on its side.
Cassie chuckled. "This is why you always look both ways before crossing." She picks herself up and retrieves her M4 carbine, which the hooded muscle dropped before he was made into roadkill.
Blake regained consciousness and pointed at the SUVs still a walking distance away. "Let's get to the SUVS!" he shouted. He helped the Priest pull Bethany out of the jeep and carry her to the SUV. Cassie provided covering fire as she caught up with him. Once they made it to the SUV, the Priest and Bethany climbed in the back while Cassie got in the passenger's seat.
"Where are the others?" Cassie asked Blake, who assumed the role of the driver.
Blake turned the keys. "We have to get you guys out first!"
"What about the others?"
Blake plugged the key in the ignition. "Tyler and Alec are professionals; they have been in combat before."
"So has Tom Hanks in Saving Private Ryan; we're not leaving without Derek."
Blake shifted gears. "That's a big negative, Drake."
Cassie unbuckled her seatbelt. "You drive out of here, I am staying behind for Derek-"
A hand slammed on the windshield in front of her, causing her to jump in her seat and see Derek at the passenger window, covered in black ash.
"DRIVE!" he shouted.
Cassie quickly rolled down the window and grabbed Derek by the back of the hair and yanked him in as Blake took off.
A/N: Next origin chapter will be Burak and Leyla.