Clouds stretched out in every direction across the yawning expanse of sky that presented itself beyond the porthole-shaped window by Nate's seat on the plane. Not big and fluffy clouds, but rather thin and rolling, like the spindrift on an ethereal sea. Touched with shades of tangerine and pink, they sprawled languidly in the evening sun like a lazy child in a rowboat on a Sunday afternoon, a happy collage of color in the realm where the rain never falls.
It was decidedly happier than the angsty thoughts that currently crowded Nate's mind, which stretched forward to when he would be at his and Elena's apartment. He knew he wanted to bring her something nice- something to show that he cared. But what kind of a peace offering was prescribed for clueless husbands who break their promises to their wife? Flowers? He frowned. Too cliché. A new, expensive camera? Felt too much like bribery. An "I heart Chicago" mug from O'Hare? Might as well see if they can serve divorce papers along with it.
He gave a frustrated sigh, flopped his head back against the headrest, and closed his eyes, letting his mind drift. If only I could do it over again, he thought. Maybe I wouldn't be so blind and self-centered. Remembering Sully and Chloe's advice to stop berating himself about it, he forcefully drug his mind out of its gutter of self-loathing and focused it back toward the issue of what to bring for Elena. He gazed back out at the clouds passing them by at 300-some-odd miles an hour, and suddenly he was reminded of a day shortly before he and Elena had gotten married.
They had been laying on a grassy hillside, their heads nearly touching, and staring up at the clouds as they drifted languidly overhead. Rays of golden sun shone down, and the soon-to-be couple had basked in its delicious warmth. It had been a picture-perfect day, and spending it with the woman who was soon to be his wife had kicked it into sensory overload for Nate. Looking back on it, he was almost sure he must have been sporting the goofiest grin imaginable, what with the incredible good feelings of that time.
At any rate, somewhere along the way they had started talking about Elena's home life growing up, and she ended up recounting a story that her mother would often tell her about a child who was always making terrible messes all over the house. The mother would sometimes be on the verge of insanity keeping up with the child, or so it would seem, but then every night when the mother put the child to bed she would tell them "I'll like you forever, I'll love you for always. As long as I live, my baby you'll be." It was like a mantra of sorts, that the mother would say to her child their whole life long, even into adulthood. After telling him about it, Elena had giggled and turned it on him, speaking the mother's words to him directly.
Nate smiled at the thought, and with a sudden stroke of inspiration pulled out his journal and began drawing. He drew himself, standing on a dock and facing Elena, much like they had been in Xi'an. But instead of the tension and looks of hurt, he drew the two of them holding hands, him with his head down in remorse, and her with a smile and a look- the look- of warmth and acceptance she had shown him so many times. It was difficult to draw- he had to erase her face three times before he felt like he got it right. That look of unconditional love she gave was so beautiful, so heavenly, so Elena that it was hard to transfer to paper. Finally, he finished it out with a decorative border and the words, "I'll like you forever, I'll love you for always. As long as I live, my sweetheart you'll be."
Clicking his pen off after he finished going over the lines with ink, he smiled with at least a little satisfaction that his drawing communicated the sincerity of his intentions. He carefully tore the page out but kept it tucked away in his journal, which he returned to his pocket. Reclining his chair, he folded his hands behind his head and fell into the first restful sleep he had gotten since the hotel in Athens.
"...so then he says, 'No, that's just my pharaohmones! Get it?" Cutter burst into laughter, cackling and slapping his knee, with Sully laughing right along with him.
"Ah," Sully gasped, wiping tears from his eyes as he planted his unlit cigar back in his mouth. "That's a classic, Cutter!"
Chloe, at the wheel of the jeep that they were driving through the sandy wasteland between Alexandria and Cairo, rolled her eyes but couldn't resist a small smile at Charlie's nonsense. "Oh, Charles," she sighed. "Always the life of the party aren't you?"
The jeep juddered as they surmounted a low hill and started down the other side, and their destination came into view: an grouping of square-cut stones and blocks in various states of collapse that formed a still identifiable footprint of what was once a building. Adjusting the keffiyeh around her head, Chloe squinted against the swirls of airborne sand and grit as she slowed and stopped the jeep, shifting into neutral and pulling the emergency brake. "I do believe we're here boys," she announced, and hopped over the side of the jeep. Her feet, clad in calf-high leather boots, landed decisively on the fleeting sand dunes with their irregular windblown ripples that formed in a moment and then were scattered just as quickly; plodding through the ever-moving tiny dust devils, she knelt by one of the stone blocks and delicately traced two fingers over the engraved hieroglyphics, then stood again. "Not much here," she stated blandly, putting her hands on her hips. "We're in for some snooping."
"Well," Sully began with gusto. "I've got nothin' better to do. At least until tonight, and then I saw some fine looking ladies in that hotel we got." He fished in the pocket of his shirt- a brown and tan version of his typical Havana which he claimed was for desert camouflage- until he produced his lighter, and tried in vain to light his cigar in the gusty winds blowing across the barren landscape. Finally he gave up and returned both cigar and lighter to his pocket.
Chloe pulled her phone from her pocket and saw she had a new message. With a couple swipes of her finger, she unlocked the screen and then pulled up her texts. It was Nate.
Did u all make it ok?
Smiling at his concern, she quickly wrote back: All present and accounted for. And you?
Cutter was wandering through the ruins with Sully, rambling on about something to do with ancient Egyptian history and mythology. Her thin smile remained, even growing in warmth a bit as she watched him move, the sun shining off his balding head, his leather jacket beaten and weathered and collecting more patina with each adventure that he undertook. Another message dinged in and she glanced down.
Glad to hear it. I'm in a cab and heading home. I'll either let you know how it goes or you'll see my obituary.
Keep me posted.
She shook her head at Nate's humor, and with a short confirmation that she would keep him up to speed with their findings she slipped the phone into her back pocket and stepped into the ruins. "I think Nate's wishing he was here," she announced. "He keeps texting to make sure we're going to let him know how things go."
"It's all for show," Sully said. "He doesn't actually want to be here. He swore he'd never go back to Alexandria, and I think he pretty well means to stick to that."
"Oh?" Chloe arched an eyebrow curiously. "What happened here?"
Sully chuckled knowingly. "Ah, it's a long story, but has to do with a terrorist organization and a sailing yacht. I'll explain it when we get back to the hotel tonight."
"Before or after you see the fine looking ladies?" Chloe asked idly, finding herself enjoying the easy banter.
Another chuckle. "Well, that remains to be seen..."
"Fraser," Cutter called abruptly. "Come look what we got here." He was kneeling in front of one of the sections of wall that still had a couple rows of stacked blocks to its name, and Chloe hurried over to and knelt next to him. He pointed at some images carved into the block, which showed a man with the horns of a ram standing before the dog-headed god Anubis, and then the man being weighed on a set of scales. In the third section of the picture it showed him with Shu, the latter of which seemed to be emitting a beam of light, which was shining on the ground.
"Well, well," Chloe said with a smirk. "At this point, it doesn't take much to know who the guy with horns is, and here he is with Anubis... god of the underworld." She rested her elbow on her knee as she contemplated. "What do you say we have to go down?" She began to brush the sand away from the base of the blocks.
Charlie worked with her to clear away the centuries of grit, and called out, "Give us a hand, Sullivan? I think that 'stache of yours probably doubles nicely as an industrial push broom."
"No respect, I tell you," Sully grumbled, squatting down next to them. He watched for a moment, then asked dubiously, "So, what is it we're looking for?"
"Well," Chloe began, "it's like Nate says: When push comes to shove, find something to push," she paused as her fingertips brushed against the edge of a stone that was protruding at the base of the wall, "or shove." Sweeping both palms out and away from the block, she cleaned the rest of the sand away to give a clear view of the object. "This looks like a fine candidate." She felt around the stone and then began to push, gently at first, but then with more force until it slid back into the wall with the sound of rough cut stones grinding against each other. The stone slid until it hit something, but Chloe could see the edge of a lip just below it, and she used her fingertips to pry the stone down until it dropped into the recess thus revealed. Some more grinding noises came, and then the heavy wall blocks slid backward on a track, revealing a dark stairwell below.
Chloe stood and tugged on the lapels of her olive drab jacket. "One gateway to the underworld, now open."
"One might even say..." Sully began, a mischievous glint in his eye.
"...open sesame," Cutter finished. He scoffed, then added, "Because this is finally the right place for that."
A low, breathy whistle was the wind that sifted its way down into the tunnel from the surface, lifting Chloe's bangs and tickling the back of her neck. For the thousandth time that day, she blew the loose strands of hair from her face and vainly tried to tuck them behind her ear and inside her keffiyeh as she played the flashlight over the tunnel ahead. They had only been walking in it for maybe five hundred feet, but already she felt swallowed by the dark, just like the occasional rats or spiders that scurried away from the beam of light. And she knew if she felt that way, then it must be doubly so for Charlie. On that thought she turned to face him and walked backwards, careful to point the light at the ground so as not to blind him and Sully.
"How's it going, partner?" she asked cheerfully, smiling reassuringly.
Surprisingly, Cutter seemed almost distracted, and not acutely aware of the constriction of the underground tunnel. When he spared her a glance it was as if he was lost in thought, and he answered simply, "Good."
Caught off guard by the dry, non put-on nature of his response, Chloe tried again, "Doing okay in this tunnel?"
He had immediately reverted to his preoccupied look as soon as he answered the first time, and when he met her eyes again he seemed nearly agitated at having to interrupt his train of thought. "I'm fine," he insisted. "Why do you ask?"
Chloe shrugged. "I just know this isn't usually your thing. You know: small, enclosed spaces?"
There was a gleam in Cutter's eye as he looked directly at her and answered, "This isn't about me. It's about Nate. I'm doing this for him."
Chloe's eyes went wide. She stopped suddenly, and Cutter unsuspectingly collided with her. Even Sully barely managed to stop in his tracks before making it a three-car pile up. "So your claustrophobia is just- just gone?"
Still looking her in the eye, Cutter shrugged as if it was nothing. "Oi, not gone. I just 'aven't thought about it. Nate needs us. He'd be here if he could, but he can't. And he needs us to do this."
Chloe searched his features for any sign of wavering to say that it was all just a show, that beneath that cool exterior he was just as afraid of small spaces as ever, but she saw nothing but steely resolve. And if that wasn't the bravest thing she'd ever seen or heard, then she didn't know what was. Her heart fluttered for a moment before she got a hold of herself and spun herself around to keep walking. "You're right. It's good he can go. He pushes himself too hard."
There was a small silence, and then Cutter spoke again. And again, his voice was low and smooth. "I don't think so. Push himself too hard, that is. It's 'is destiny. If he didn't do it, I don't think anyone would, or maybe even could. Maybe he won't do it forever, but I think there will only ever be one Nathan Drake, and he'd better do what he came for."
The words hit Chloe like something profound that she didn't even quite understand herself, and she slowed her pace, glancing back over her shoulder to see if Cutter had mysteriously been abducted by aliens and replaced with some wizened philosopher, but Charlie's hard-cut features were still the same they always had been.
And then he noticed Chloe looking at him, his eyes went wide, and in an instant the contemplation was replaced with his usual snarky wit. "Don't tell him I said that, of course," he said. "Cocky little bastard doesn't need any more help with his ego."
Chloe smirked. "Not a word."
It took Nate five times of reaching for, and then retracting his hand from, the door knob to actually gather the courage to turn it and step into their apartment, but he finally did after taking a steeling gulp of air and setting his jaw determinedly. He had recited what he wanted to say to Elena about a hundred times in his head- not because he was trying to hand her some scripted and half-assed apology, but because he was scared stiff that his brain would short-circuit or his emotions get tangled up and he would trip over his own tongue and say something stupid. All he knew was that if he could only get one thing right in his life, it would have to be saying sorry for all the dumb things he did wrong.
He stepped into the living room and was met with darkness and the silhouettes of familiar objects that were distinguishable from the shadows: The brown corduroy couch, the little tabletop lamp, the ancient TV set... He flicked on the lights as he called out timidly, "Elena?" Getting no reply, he walked slowly into the kitchen, then the hallway to the bedroom, turning on lights as he went. Each step he took was carefully and quietly placed, as if he was treading in someone else's home and didn't want to disturb them. Passing the bathroom, he saw the little sailboat shaped nightlight faithfully glowing, like a lonely sentinel over the oft-deserted residence. The bedroom was equally vacant, and Nate frowned, letting out a quiet "Hmph". Putting one hand on his hip, he mused aloud, "Must be out somewhere. Shopping, maybe. Or maybe something for her job."
He walked back toward the kitchen, aware of every time a floorboard creaked as he stepped on it, and of every time he thought he saw something move out of the corner of his eye. The silence was deafening. It unnerved him.
Back in the kitchen, he noticed a couple grocery bags in the trash that he knew had not been there when they left for Greece- Elena was meticulous about not leaving loose ends when they were leaving for an extended period of time. Everything else in the house seemed impeccable though. As he looked around, not one thing seemed out of place.
Except for that piece of paper.
Noticing for the first time the folded sheet of stationery on the kitchen counter, he crossed the room in two steps and picked it up. In the warm but dim light of the partially illuminated home, he saw, in oh-so-familiar penmanship with sweeping lines and curving arcs, the unmistakable handwriting of Elena. Her delicate script spelled out a single word on the front of the folded letter.
Nate
His heart rate quickened, his palms grew sweaty, and he swallowed compulsively. With trembling hands he opened the paper and slowly swept his eyes across the lines of words, each neatly and patiently scribed with the deliberation and care that only she could give.
He was about halfway through when his eyes grew too watery to see, and his knees suddenly felt very weak. His legs trembled and gave out, and he fell against the refrigerator and slid down it onto the floor. Sitting on the linoleum with knees bent and feet flat, he crossed his arms over his knees, buried his face in his shirt sleeves, and for the first time in many years he surrendered to the hot, bitter tears that stung his eyes. His body convulsed as he sobbed silently into the fabric of his T-shirt and the streams of grief coursed freely down his cheeks.
And he was alone.