Medallion of sight 6
I want to apologise for taking so long to update again! I am still alive I'm just trying to work on an original piece and it's taking over my mind!
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Previously: A gasp of breath somewhere to his right dragged him over and he found Nate gripping to a tiny piece of driftwood choking against the water the surrounded him. A sudden darkness began to creep in around the edges of Sully's vision and a cold horror swept down his spine. Nate was losing consciousness. Trying to get nearer to his protégé proved useless as Nate's head slumped down onto the driftwood and the darkness swept in.
There was no sudden jolt back into consciousness. Very dim light illuminated the area around Sully and he could only just make out his hand. He couldn't see Nate anywhere, panicking slightly he took deep breaths and waited for the light levels to increase. Either he was still in Nate's memories or he was back in the tent and the lights had just burned low. After a long pause the light levels increased again and Sully was able to make out sand beneath him, and he could hear the sea. Finally the light increased enough for him to make out Nate sprawled on the beach, the single piece of driftwood under his left arm and a vulture eyeing him hungrily. As his protégé slowly came back to awareness, rubbing the sand from his eyes and pushing the driftwood away from him, Sully laughed a little, the situation was in no way funny, but he couldn't help but feel utter relief. Nate had survived!
After several minutes of struggling to even raise his head, Drake took in his surroundings. Looking at the vulture with tired eyes and muttering "Get outta here", he slowly managed to make it to his feet, taking deep breaths and lacking his normal grace. Looking at the buildings in front of him, he huffed out a laugh, "How convenient". Following his gaze Sully realised that Nate had somehow drifted back to Yemen, the exact city that they had been in. Well I'll be go to hell muttered Sully. Moving with a noticeable limp and audible breaths Nate started to make his way towards the city. Waving at the locals that hadn't even bothered to help him "How's it going?"
It took him a long time, weaving through the city like he was drunk, but he eventually made his way to the safe house, pushing open the door and then leaning on the wall, using the wall to support himself he stepped into the room towards a stunned Elena. Quickly hanging up the phone she practically ran towards Nate engulfing him in a hug, and she quickly became the only thing holding him up. "Nate" she said in pure relief, "Hey…" was the tired response, "I thought this was frowned upon" Elena laughed in relief just like Sully had found himself doing and another grin spread over Sully's face. "Shut up" responded Elena but the smile on her face took the harshness out of the words. Pulling out of the hug but keeping her hands on his shoulders to help support and probably convince herself that he was there. She studied his face no doubt seeing the lines of exhaustion and the drooping eyelids. "I really thought you were gone this time"
"Nah" Nate shook his head, body sagging a little with the effort and Elena reached a hand up to his neck. "Are you okay?" Completely ignoring the question Nate put a hand on Elena's shoulder, "Is…a…is Sully?" Again the older man was touched, here Nate was on the verge of collapse and he was asking about Sully. Elena lowered her eyes, "He's alive" the relief of Nate's face warmed Sully's heart and he smiled. He already knew it all worked out in the end but he liked seeing the two of them interact, especially when they were talking about him. The two of them were special to him and he hoped once they got back to Yemen, that they would work it out. "But they've got him" Nate stopped his movement further into the safe house and turned to look at Elena, "What?" and there was that panicked look again "Where?" "There in a convoy headed into the desert" No thinking about it for more than a second Nate made for the door "We gotta go. Only making it about two steps before his legs gave out and Elena was the only thing holding him up. "Whoah- whoah oh, no" keeping him upright she leaned him against the wall. "No it's not, it's not that simple" she helped him over to the sofa. Nate falling sideways onto it with a small grimace of pain. Before quickly shutting the door, left open after Nathan's dramatic entrance. "They got at least 2 days head start on us. So we'll never catch up"
She moved to sit next to Nate who was pushing himself up again. "We gotta try". "Listen, I've got a plan" Silently cheering on Elena as she stopped Nate from trying to leave again Sully was intrigued to see how they were planning on catching up to them. And adding the time frame to his mental clock. Nate had been with the pirates and in the sea for two days. "But we're only going to get one shot at this" Nate perked up at little at the word plan and looked to where Elena was moving stuff off the table. "Okay".
"They're loading up a cargo plane at the airport. They're going to make a supply drop to the convoy."
"We gotta be on that plane"
"Exactly" Nate dropped a little lower on his arm, eyes looking at the back of Elena's head. "You do realise that means parachuting in right?" she turned to smile at him "We've done it before" causing both of the m to laugh, "Not well".
Elena turned away and Nate took the moment to gather his strength again "Okay, I could really use a glass of water and then we outta get going"
Hoping that Nate did not set out after him in the state he was in, Sully silently urged Elena to do something. "No, no no no no" she grabbed his arm stopping him from leaving the sofa. "My contact at the airport says that the plane isn't taking off until dawn. In the meantime, just, try a get a couple of hours sleep." Nate sighed at this and Sully wasn't surprised when Nate shook his head trying to lever himself up again. "I don't think that's a good idea" Elena reached out and pulled him back down again the fact that she could prevent him from getting up testament to Nate's weakness at the moment. "C'mon alright" Elena murmured. Easing Nate down to lie on the sofa with his head in her lap, with another small grunt of pain Nate complied. "He'll call if anything changes".
Thanking whatever deities were real, Sully settled down on the floor watching the couple on the sofa. Thanking every possible deity for keeping these two people in his life.
"You were really going to do this all on your own huh?"
"For Sully? – Yeah" Smiling at that Sully couldn't help but think of when he'd first met Elena, fishing both her and Nate out of the sea after the ship they were on exploded. He hadn't realised it until now but the two of them were quite close, Elena's life was by no means as tough as Nate's had been but he'd become a surrogate father figure for both of them, and he could see that the two of them were willing to risk their lives to save him.
"I like the way you think" replied Drake, his eyes already closing of their own accord, voice scratchy from exhaustion and sea water. "I know" was the gentle reply, as she moved one hand to stoke Nate's hair. "No I mean that's…" unable to complete the sentence, Nate eyes drooped a little more and Elena smiled, continuing to card her hand through his hair. "I know what you mean" Reaching back with one hand, Nate grabbed Elena's hand that wasn't in his hair, the hand with the engagement ring on and clasped it in his own. "I'm sorry" he whispered. Before giving into the exhaustion entirely. Sully following him down into the darkness of sleep, barely hearing Elena's faint "I know".
When Nate next woke, his head was still in Elena's lap and Sully grinned at the pair of them. Jolting suddenly into full awareness, Nate sat up like he'd been shocked, waking a dozing Elena in the process. The ride to the airport was pretty fast after that and Sully hovered above the car as it drove down the road. Into the airport and right up to the fence before coming to a stop.
"There it is" stated Elena. Parking the car, Nate gave her a silenced pistol. "Okay, here" Before the two of them got out. "Man… I don't want to have to use this" "I know, but we have to do this quietly. They catch us sneaking onto that plane, we're dead".
The two of them quietly made their way into one of the hangars and slowly began making their way towards the large cargo plane that had been illuminated in the distance. The two worked well together, despite not having seen each other for several months. Using a car to boost Nate out of a window and then clearing out a warehouse full of Marlowe's guys, dressed in desert gear. Knowing that they only had a limited amount of time before the plane left, seemed to make Nate and Elena work even harder, pushing themselves to their limits as they snuck their way closer to the plane.
Reaching the last fence that barred their way they stopped, "All right, looks like it's a straight shot from here"
"Yeah"
"I'm gunna, I'm gunna climb to the top and then and then help you over"
"Alright" "Keep me covered" "Okay" Sully watched as Nate climbed up the fence not even hesitating before he dropped down the other side. Not sure whether Nate deciding to leave Elena behind was a good choice or not, Sully decided that it must play out okay seeing as Nate hadn't said anything about Elena being dead. He watched as they held hands through the fence, Drake managing to convince Elena to stay behind. He could see the emotion of the scene and almost felt bad intruding. It was obvious the two still had feelings for each other.
Nate's final run to the plane was just as dramatic and dangerous as Sully had thought it would be. With generators exploding and twenty odd guys shooting at him. Without Elena turning up at the right moment in the jeep, Nate wouldn't even had made it. But made it he had, and as he clung on the landing gear, the plane left the floor and Nate and the wheels were retracted into the plane.
Nate crawled through the under vents on the plane, stopping once he reached a safe spot and spending the next couple of hours looking at his watch and lost in his thoughts. Unable to tell what he was thinking Sully had no choice but to sit and wait with him. He couldn't talk, Nate wouldn't be able to hear him. So he sat and waited. When Nate finally looked at his watch and moved off, Sully was almost relieved, he had never seen Drake as still as he had been for those few hours. The vents were tight and Sully was glad that neither of them were claustrophobic. He'd barely gone more than a few metres before he was seen by a guard standing above an exit vent who heaved Nate out by the scruff of his neck and slammed him into the floor. Before grabbing him again and shoving him up against the wall. Unable to reach the floor, Nate's legs kicked but a quick, hard punch to the face stopped him struggling, bringing a hand up to cradle his face Nate was blind to the man reaching for the cargo-door switch. Only when the noise of the ramp lowering and the wind from outside hit him did Nate even notice.
Having given up on intervening, seeing as he could neither touch nor communicate with anything or anyone, Sully had to resist the urge to run to Nathan's aid. And simply watched. Both Nate and his attacker were looking at the ramp as it lowered and turned to look at each other at the same time. Nate reading the intentions of the other and shaking his head, quickly reaching for his gun, the bigger man grabbed it from his hands and smacked him across the face with it, before letting it drop to the floor. Peeling Nate off the wall he started walking towards the ramp.
"No no no no let's talk about this." Said Nate. Thankfully the man threw Nate down the ramp, letting him get to his feet and not just dropping him off the edge. By now Nate seemed to be experienced at fighting bigger men and quickly dropped the larger man to the floor. Clambering back up the ramp, Nate glanced behind him and saw the man getting back to his feet. Moving towards one of the supply crates Nate struggled with the parachute cord. The force of it finally being released sending him sprawling backwards into the wall of the plane. The crate flew backwards, smashing into the larger man with crushing force. From his place on the floor Nate yelled "Thanks for flying with us" over the wind, before turning to look at the rest of the cargo from the plane, unbalanced from the rear hatch being opened the contents of the plane had started sliding backwards towards Nate. "Oh crap no" he mumbled under his breath.
Trying to dodge all the falling crates proved to be impossible and Sully couldn't hold back the "Nate!" as the younger man flew backwards out the plane, just managing to catch hold of the cargo netting on one of the vehicles attached to the plane by a thick cord. A particularly brave man from the plane leapt out, shooting towards Nate as he did so and grabbing the netting in front of him. Holding on with one hand and shooting with the other, the man continued his assault on Nate. Suddenly glad that Nate was on a moving surface, with high velocity winds, Sully watched as all the bullets went wide. Allowing Nate to climb up the netting, after a brief moment of disbelief at the man's actions, and pull the man off, grabbing his gun in the process. Climbing up the remaining netting Drake got himself to his feet on the ramp of the plane.
The plane itself wasn't in a good state, there was a fire on the right side and all of the cargo had come loose and was sliding with the pilots desperate attempts to regain control. Fighting through the remaining men on the plane, Drake tried to make his way to the controls. The fire was spreading along the right wall of the plane and Sully knew without a doubt that the plane was going down. Once again the mantra of, Nate survives, I know Nate survives, going round and round in his head. Nate wasn't even halfway through the plane when the pressure got to the hull of the plane and a section of the wall on the right side exploded outwards, sucking the remaining men and several cargo boxes out. Nate's cry of "Oh God!" was distorted on the wind as he tried to grip the floor to prevent himself from getting sucked out too. With the deafening noise of metal grinding on metal the front section of the plane was ripped from the cargo bay and with a scream of terror Nate was blown out into mid-air. The plane falling downwards leaving a trail of smoke and flames behind it. Sully found himself hovering again, and despite his earlier reticence to intervene he found himself trying to grab Nate. Nate however had other plans and was lucky or skilled enough to slam into a supply crate that was also falling. Managing to cling to the cargo netting, he spun uncontrollably for several seconds, but did manage to grab the parachute cord and pull it. The jolt of the parachute slowing the descent of the crate, almost knocking Nate off.
Finally landing roughly in the middle of the desert, Nate fell off the crate rolling to a stop before pushing himself to his feet and making his way towards the wreckage of the plane in the distance. "Oh this is not good, okay gotta keep my head, I'll just head to the wreckage and see what I can find. Maybe some water… something"
He scoured the wreckage for almost an hour, only managing to find an AK-47 with a half empty clip. No water and no food. There was nothing in sight in any direction. Nate was well and truly screwed.
"Perfect" he muttered, seemed like he knew he was screwed too.
The hours watching Nate struggle through the desert felt like days to Sully. The kid was starting to stumble as he walked, his strides were uneven and he wasn't walking in a straight line anymore. He'd also started talking to himself again. When Sully saw the well in the distance his first thought was that it must be full. Nate survived the desert, he made it to the convoy and rescued Sully. So the well must be full and the convoy must sweep past in a couple of hours allowing Nate to catch up. But then Sully remembered what Salim had said, he'd met Nate in an abandoned town, half dead from dehydration and fighting off more of Marlowe's goons. The disappointment in Nate's face had Sully kneeling in front of the kid talking to him despite knowing that he wouldn't be heard.
"Don't give up now, kid, you hear me? You get out of this, I know you do, things may seems shit right now but you make it" Throwing down the now empty bucket of water, Nate turned around and carried on walking. Night fell slowly and Nate seemed no closer to being anywhere. He looked up to the sky, observing Nate do the same, "Alright…where are you Sully?" Nate's voice was almost defeated, "Where are you?" He paused studying the stars again, titling his head to other angles trying to remember the map of stars they'd found. "Ah come on Nate" Sully, could see the younger man getting frustrated with his inability to navigate. "Okay, there's Orion, there's the big dipper….ah shit. Should have been in the navy"
The next day dawns, and Nate has been moving all night. Stopping several times to try and catch his breath. The sun was barely above the horizon the next day, and Nate was down on his knees slowly crawling along. Sully was trying to help, but being unable to touch Nate all he could do was listen to his protégés ramblings as he slowly moved along.
"I don't know who I'm talking to. I'm exhausted" looking up something on the horizon made Nate drag himself to his feet. "Sully" turning at the sound of his name, Victor half expected Nate to be looking at him but instead he was looking into the distance. "Thank god".
There was nothing on the horizon, Sully could clearly see that. But he followed Nate anyway, worry at the fact that Drake was seeing hallucinations eating at him slowly. Stumbling down a sand dune. Whatever it was that Nate had been seeing obviously vanished as they both found themselves back at the well from the day before. Berating himself before moving on Sully found himself again following as Nate tried to move through the desert. At around midday the younger man collapsed in the shade under a rock and curled in on himself. Half afraid that Nate has laid down to die. Sully found himself pacing. Leaving no footprints in the sand as he waited for Nate to get up again.
It took a couple of hours, and Sully was glad that at least Nate hadn't been in the sun all day. By nightfall, several clouds covered the stars and any hope the Nate had of using them to navigate were dashed. "I just gotta keep…." Sully looked up at Nate when he didn't finish his sentence, it was clear that he was getting worse by the minute. "Keep what Nate?" he asked "Oh god" slowly plodding forwards, each step seeming to sap the last reserves of his energy, Nate carried on talking to himself. "Just want to lay down, can't lay down" two more steps and Nate fell forwards, unconscious before he even hit the floor, and Sully knew only blackness once more.
When Nate regained consciousness sully found himself standing over him, trying despite the fact that he didn't really exist in this time to shelter Nate from the glare of the sun.
"Nate" he called gently, not really expecting a reply, "Sully" "Nate" he called again trying to see if he would get another response "Sully". Unable to believe that Nate could see or hear him Sully decided to say something that wasn't his name, just in case Nate was hallucinating again. "Wake up" "Help me" unable to stop himself Sully responded as he would have done if he was real "Come on, give me your hand" Obediently Nate reached up and Sully felt the warmth of his skin under his fingers. Heaving him to his feet he wondered why, he had been allowed to touch Nate, there had been so many other situations that his help would have changed the outcome of things.
"I've been looking for you, I couldn't find you, I don't know how long I've been out here" Sully noted how much Nate sounded like the younger version of himself from Cartagena. Almost childlike in his relief to have found Sully. "I think" Nate looked up again, and Victor knew straight away that whatever had given him the ability to get Nate on his feet had passed. The kid's eyes looked straight through him and the quiet "Sully?" that followed had him reaching forwards to try and reassure the younger man. "Sully…" And just like that Nate was on his own again.
For several more painfully long hours, Sully had to endure, Nate stumbling, crawling and dragging himself through the desert. Hovering above the scene, and being dragged on by Nate's presence Sully couldn't bring himself to watch and just let himself float along. Occasionally he would catch a muttered word or phrase but other than that Drake was silent.
When the village finally appeared in the distance Sully felt like screaming. This must be the abandoned town that Salim was talking about. Nathan must be nearly in the clear. Running towards it with a sudden burst of energy seemed to take the last out of Nate and his mumbled "Please don't let that have been a mirage, oh shit, it's a ghost town" was the last Nate said before falling down the dune and rolling to a stop at the bottom.