#also: nadine and elena each being there and getting it

[jaggedwolf]

okay maybe chloe realizing what the final ganesha-parashurama puzzle means is up there with nate realizing how libertalia's rulers died

[lunarastrobabe]

Sam Drake x F!Reader- Thief

(Mainly Fluff. No warnings.) 

“Look Sam, just admit it, we’re lost.” You whined, folding the map back up and stuffing it into your fanny pack that was slung across your chest. The snow crunching under your combat boots as you walked, the icy wind nipping at your skin like sharp needles. The sun was out, shining across the snow making it sparkle like glitter. 

You were in Sweden chasing some leads on lost Viking Treasure, but this time with just you and Sam. Nate had a baby on the way, even though he wished he could come, he needed to look after Elena. You had both been left with an empty, unsatisfied feeling after finding Avery’s treasure few months before, but with Sam, it hit him hard the most. But being here with him, now, was all you ever wanted. You two were just friends, but he was your best friend, you could always count on him whenever you were in trouble or whenever you needed support, he was always there. You were in love with him, and you had been for a long time, all you wanted to do was tell him but never found the right time. You were hoping he already knew. 

“We are not lost, you just don’t know how to read a map.” He said in a snarky tone, walking up beside you and unzipping your fanny pack and pulled out the map again so he could take a closer look at it. 

“You’re an ass. You know I’m smarter than you.” You elbowed him in the rib. He jerked a little clutching his side with his hand. 

“Rude.” A light laugh left his lips, his breath showing from the cold, turning his head and smiling at you. “Now, lets see where we are.” He carefully scanned the map, you just watched him with a smile on your face, taking in every little detail and aspect of his skin, his hair blowing in the breeze. His hazel eyes had a glow from the suns rays, you could look into them forever, like tiny golden pools. Being in Sweden with Sam reminded you of being in Scotland with him and Nate, with Nadine’s army blowing shit up every five seconds. 

“Right, we are here. We need to get to that wooden structure over there.” His fingers pointed to the area on the map then to a building in the distance, luckily it was still standing but who knows, everything you’ve stepped foot on in the past has either exploded or fallen apart. You weren’t listening to a word he said, too busy falling even more in love with him than he already knew. He felt your eyes on him, folding the map and putting it into his sherpa jacket pocket. 

“Like what you see, hm?” He said in a seductive, husky tone purposely in your ear then pushed your shoulder gently to get your attention back to the mission. Your cheeks felt a burning sensation, either from the cold or from embarrassment for staring for so long. You snapped yourself out of it and scoffed, “You wish Samuel,” then rolling your eyes and continued walking along the path along the cliff, staying as far away from the edge as possible. 

“Alright, so what exactly are we looking for?” You asked, putting your hands in your pockets to keep warm, you were freezing, and you were sure he was too, even if he wouldn’t admit it. You looked at the ground and at every step you took, kicking snow off your boots as you went along, tucking some hair behind your ear.

“Well, it’s a very, very old viking helmet, supposedly encrusted with the finest jewels and diamonds.” A smile was brought to his face, he loved to talk about hidden treasures and artefacts, especially talking to you about it in particular. He was thankful that you’d listen to him, for hours even, sometimes he would come over to your place at four in the morning just to talk about lost cities. 

“And how much is it worth? Um, do you think?” You stopped in your tracks to look at him, the excitement was showing in him and he couldn’t contain himself. 

“Not as much as Avery’s treasure but, a great amount,” He shrugged. “I’m just glad I’m not searching for it alone.” Your chest tightened slightly at his words, you swore you could feel the love rising inside of you. 

“Me too.” Was all you could say, you just so badly wanted to tell him you loved him, that you loved every scar, every wound, every scratch and mark that covered his body and that you still thought he was perfect. 

“We should start climbing now.” You said looking up at the tall black cliff that stood before you and rubbed your hands together to keep them warm. 

“Need a boost m’lady?” He smirked, he always liked to give you the first boost, just to get a good look at your ass every chance he got. 

“Thank you, loverboy.” You gave him a flirtatious wink as he crouched down a little in front of you holding out both his hands on his knee. Holding onto his shoulders you stood in his hands and he pushed you upside the cliff, grabbing onto the first hand hold you saw incase you fell. Falling to your death into a black abyss was not on your agenda right now. Sam watched you in awe at your skills and your strength, memories of yours and his friendship from the Avery job was circling his mind, wishing he had made a move before, wishing he had kissed you back in Italy when you were in that skin tight, red dress that brought out your eyes. That night he couldn’t take his eyes off of you, almost forgetting to steal the cross from the auction. And the time you also got shot while he tried to cover you, he still blames himself for getting you hurt but you were a strong girl, and you still are and he knew that. Not realising you were at the top of the cliff already while he was drowning in his own thoughts about you, you called down to him, catching his attention. 

“Sam? Are you coming or are you going to just stand there?” You shouted down to him, he snapped from his thoughts and laughed awkwardly. 

“Yes ma’am.” Talking to himself, he ran his fingers through his hair and jumped up, climbing the cliff faster than you could but he was more trained than you at scaling high places and considering he was taller. He grunted, pulling himself up on the ledge and standing up, brushing the snow off his jeans. You felt your hands get colder, he noticed you shivering, since you were high up the wind was a little stronger and a lot more colder. Fuck, you hated winter when you weren’t inside your home, drinking hot cocoa, reading Sam and Nate’s mom’s journal by the fireplace, wondering how amazing of a mother she was to them. 

“Hey, you’re cold. C’mere.” He quickly wrapped his hands around yours before you could say anything, he brought your hands to his lips, giving them small warm kisses, his eyes looking into yours. His surprisingly warm hands making you feel safe and secure. All you could do was smile, “Thanks Sam.” You whispered, he pulled you a little closer to him by the hands, holding them to his chest. 

“Anytime darlin’,” His smile was your favourite thing about him. He removed his hands from yours and wrapped them around you holding you tight against him to keep the warmth in before resuming your quest. His chin settled on the top of your head, your ear was pressed to his chest and you could hear his heart pounding a million miles an hour. His cologne was strong, but he wasn’t wearing a lot. 

“[Y/N]?“ He felt like his chest was going to explode at what he was about to say. He was nervous, but it was a good feeling. He was sure of it. He wasn’t usually nervous around women, he was actually very confident in flirting and making moves on the girls he’d come across in bars, or on the job. He knew this was something real, something different with you.  

“Hm?” You lifted your face away from his chest and looked up at him. 

“I have to tell you something.” He pulled back from the hug, taking a seat down on the snow away from the edge of the cliff you had climbed up from. 

“Okay, is everything alright?” Your voice was full of worry, going over and sitting beside him, stretching your legs out in front of you. 

“Yeah, yeah everything’s fine, it’s just-,” He tied up the laces tighter on his boots, accidentally kicking snow at you. Brushing it away you watched him, waiting for his explanation. 

“Sam, spit it out, we got a lot of ground to cover. You can tell me anything.” You placed a hand on his shoulder, gently touching his cheek with your thumb. 

He turned to face you. Taking a deep breath, hoping you wouldn’t run away or slap him for what he was about to say. 

“I love you.” He reached over and tucked a loose strand of hair behind your ear. 

“Sam-, I-, wha-, really?” You were surprised, but not that surprised, he would always find a way to make you notice him, sometimes he’d find a way to ‘accidentally’ touch your hands or your body or compliment you at any given time. 

He chuckled, “Yeah, really.” He felt proud, he felt good about himself that he was finally able to tell you, especially in a beautiful country such as Sweden and sitting in the snow looking at the view, with a pink and blue sunrise shining over the mountains. 

You leapt over and pushed his back to the ground, straddling his body, his hands immediately attaching to your waist. Leaning down you whispered in his ear, he shivered at the feeling more than the cold ever could. 

“I love you too.” He moved his hand to your face bringing you to look at him, pushing your hair out of his face and gripping your neck gently, finally kissing you like he had been begging to do. Your tongues making contact with each other, the nicotine and breath minty taste collided with your tastebuds. Kissing for what felt like hours but was only a few minutes, he pulled back just to gaze into your eyes once again, his hazel eyes glowing with happiness. 

“Goddamn I’m a lucky man.” He sighed happily, running his fingers through your hair. 

“What can I say? A thief stole my heart.” Both laughing you went in for another passionate kiss. 

[mariinara]

HC where sam is your best friends brother?

I actually thought about making your best friend just Nathan? But, for the sake of routine and creativity, let's shake it up a bit and create another sibling– a middle Drake sister? 👀👀

-First of all, being best friends with a Drake means that you have to be wild and absolutely unhinged to keep up.

-Your best friend– who happens to be the middle sister of two impossible brothers – rarely ever experienced a dull moment.

-Since you were the same, you had no problem whatsoever with tagging along with her, wherever she might go.

-However, she was just as much of an adrenalin junkie as her two brothers, which means she very often traveled around and was usually up to her usual treasure-hunting, museum-looting, lost-city-plundering shenanigans with either her two brothers, just one of them, Sullivan, or Chloe Frazer.

-And as a woman who only had a couple of odd jobs with her, Nathan, Elena, and Sullivan for the sole purpose of being "the tech gal in the chair", you didn't tag along in most of those.

-In fact, you had a pretty stable job in a computer shop as an I.T. manager and technician.

-Sounds boring, but is quite lucrative at times.

-And, sure, you'd met Nathan. You thought he was an absolute sweetheart and a joy to be around. Sometimes, though, when he didn't listen to your advice that would prevent him from getting his neck wrung, he was positively infuriating.

-Sam, though..

-You'd heard of the infamous older brother. You saw some of his pictures with his younger sister and brother, too, but they were about sixteen-year-old photographs, taken way before he was thrown in Panama and got locked up for thirteen years..

-Sometimes, you heard your best friend talking to him on the phone, but it'd be very brief and happened once every blue moon.

-Her explanation behind the very superficial relationship was that Sam didn't really share such a strong bond with her. They almost always fought and never once did they go a day without flipping each other off at least a thousand times.

-It was because their sister was a bit more reasonable when it came to life or death. She might've been wild at parties and great at rock-climbing or swinging off a cliff, but when odds were against her, she knew when to turn back and call it quits.

-A trait that – obviously – Sam did not have.

-She loved him, though, and she would do anything for him and so would he. Anytime. No questions asked.

-In fact, whenever she asked him to send her something from Boston to New Orleans, he'd do it without hesitation and would even leave a small note saying how he'd missed her and would like to catch up soon.

-So you had a pretty basic idea of who Sam Drake was, but you hadn't actually had the privilege of seeing him in person.

-One day, however, your best friend called and invited you over to her place that evening because she was holding a huge family gathering.

-"Everyone's gonna be there!", she'd told you.

-You were always up for a good backyard barbecue party with people you haven't seen in years. You knew for a fact that when she said 'everyone', she literally meant everyone.

-Nate, Elena, Cassie, Chloe, Sullivan, Charlie, and Nadine were all going to attend and the only missing person was you– the life of the party and the most theatrical comedian in the bunch.

-So not only did your friend want you there, but everyone said that they'd come only if you did and you couldn't disappoint them.

-And there you were, standing at the head of the table in the large pergola of your friend's yard, a glass of wine in your hand as you entertained and told a story of something stupid that'd happened to you with a celebrity customer that almost cost you your career. The table shook as all your buddies roared in laughter, some struggling to breathe and others not bothering to try and sound respectable– snorting away to their hearts' content and slamming the table or sinking into their chairs.

-A huge grin played on your lips before you brought your glass up to take a sip of wine, waiting for your friends to calm down, and then, your best friend suddenly perked up, her eyes as wide as the growing smile on her face.

-"Is that..?"

-Your brows pull in confusion and you look in the direction that everyone was looking towards and you saw a tall, broad man, a duffel in one hand while the other remained in the pocket of his deep blue jeans.

-Your wine remained in your mouth a little and as he stepped closer, a sheepish smile on his face, you swallowed thickly, your eyes widening.

-"Sam!", his sister yelled, jumping from her chair to break a sprint towards him and collide against his chest, making him stumble back a little, a chuckle escaping him as he rubbed her back.

-Everyone rushed to him, giving hugs and serenading him with 'It's so good to see you's. He even picked up his twelve-year-old niece, spun her around, and attacked her cheek with kisses, telling her how much he's missed her and that he had a small gift for her in his bag that he brought back from his most recent travel.

-And then, your best friend and his sister dragged you from your frozen position, putting you in front of him.

-"This is (y/n)!", she excitedly introduced you, "Remember? I told you all about her."

-Sam paused for a second and you did your best to look confident but something about him was so alluring and knee-buckling that it was so hard not to see flustered, especially that he gave you what seemed to be a ghost of a smirk.

-"M'yeah.", he replied, shaking your hand gently, "She wouldn't shut up about you." He pointed out, making his sister pout and gently nudge his arm.

-And, then, out of nowhere, your confident demeanor was back, "I must be greater than I thought, then.", you quickly quipped, having literally no clue where that came from.

-Sam raised an interested brow, "I'll bet." He replied, his voice dropping an octave and his eyes boring into yours.

-Maybe it was the wine, but you wanted nothing more but to jump him at that very moment.

-You two broke the staring game when Nathan cleared his throat and clapped his hands, rubbing them together, "So who's up for some barbecue, huh?"

-Everyone murmured in agreement and they quickly went back to their designated seats.

-You hadn't even noticed that your hand was still in Sam's until everyone was gone from around you and you quickly pulled it away, unable to make eye contact with the incredibly handsome man before you, just sticking to looking down at the small portion of wine left in your glass.

-"C'mon and sit next to me.", Sam suddenly said, making your eyes snap up at him in surprise, "I wanna get to know you better.", he clarified, sending you a sly smirk before brushing past you, making sure that his shoulder gently nudged yours.

-You looked at him as he confidently sauntered away, your mouth agape but an amused smile still present.

-"I warn you..", you whipped your head to see your best friend grinning at you, bemused by the whole scene that'd unfolded before her eyes. She walked towards you, "He'll break your heart.", she shook her head, taking a sip out of her beer.

-A snort left you and you shook your head, "He's.. not my type..", you mutter, downing the last drops of red wine afterwards as if to wash down the blatant lie that you'd just told.

-"Mm-hmm..", she gave you a sassy look and you rolled your eyes, gently kicking her along, telling her to shut up and get a move on.

-When you made it to the table, Sam looked up at you and smiled cordially, patting the chair next to him.

-You sat down next to him, and immediately, the chattering around the table began, and you were back to being your funny, confident self, captivating everyone with your brilliant story-telling and impeccable impressions that left everyone keeling over and laughing.

-Sam was a funny guy as well. He'd throw a few comments here and there that made your stories even funnier.

-You laughed together a few times and most of the time, his eyes were on you. He'd laugh and grin and nod along while sipping on his beer sometimes, but other than that, he was fully enamored with you.

-Not only were you attractive and witty, but also funny and really passionate, which was a dangerous mix that had Sam immediately sold.

-Everyone went to get their grilling on and were shoving their faces with hotdogs. Charlie and Nathan had an eating contest while Cassie filmed it with her camera, giggling all the while.

-So everyone was gathered in different areas, sometimes joining in on others' conversations or just sticking to their own, intimate ones.

-Your best friend was immersed in a conversation with Charlie, who'd won the hotdog eating contest and wasn't as whoozy as Nathan was. Charlie also happened to be her ex-boyfriend, but they were on great terms, even after they'd broken it off.

-And there you were with Sam, on the garden swing, keeping a good, friendly distance between each other, but somehow, the looks you shared suggested otherwise.

-You told him stories he needed to hear to have an idea about who you were as a person. You told him how you met Nate and his sister and he pretended not to know any of the information you spilt. He only listened to you intently because the way you pieced your stories was so interesting and your voice was captivating and so were your over-the-top hand gestures.

-He just loved listening to you.

-And the two of you didn't notice the hours go by, only absentmindedly bidding farewell to the friends who left.

-And soon, it was only the two of you, chatting away, laughing and sighing wistfully at memories.

-"You two are so indiscreet.", you and Sam look up at his sister, who had her hands in the pockets of her hoodie, a smirk on her face, "Everyone noticed."

-"Noticed?", Sam asked, raising a brow and narrowing his eyes.

-She scoffed, "Uh, yeah. You two lovebirds are so obvious."

-"A-ha. M'kay. Good talk.", Sam gave her a wry smile, further confirming his sister's suspicion.

-"He likes you but he's too pussy to admit it.", She told you, making you chuckle, the heat creeping up your neck again to make you look down in hopes of concealing your embarrassment.

-"Shut up or else.", Sam warned, leaning forward on the swing, as if he was preparing to pounce on his sister.

-But she ignored him and kept her eyes on you, "Remember what I told you..~", she taunted before stretching and looking at Sam, "You stayin' here?"

-Sam glared, "Do I have any other choice?" He asked in a "duh" tone.

-She yawned and nodded, scratching the back of her neck and stretching tiredly, "Okay, well..", a deep sigh left her as she moved her arms around to stretch her muscles, "I'm turnin' over."

-You cleared your throat and gently smacked your thighs before getting up, "I, uhh.. better get goin', too.", you sent Sam a warm smile, "It's gettin' kinda late."

-He looked up at you with his starry, puppy eyes before standing to tower over you, wiping his hands against the sides of his thighs, "Yeah, uhh..", he paused for a second, "Want me to walk you?"

-Yeah, you did. And you almost approved before you closed your mouth again and closed your eyes, breathing out a soft chuckle at your own ridiculousness, "No, I.. came over here in my car.", you told him and he nodded, his lips pursing to a thin smile.

-"Ugh, get it over with!", his sister complained, looking back and forth between the two of you, irked by the palpable tension in the air.

-Sam quickly sent her a death glare, "Do you mind?", he warned behind clenched teeth.

-She rolled her eyes and backtracked, "As if me leaving's gonna grow you any balls..", she mumbled, but Sam completely heard her and shook his head in dismay as you chuckled at their antics, watching her walk towards her front door and slip inside.

-When you looked back at Sam, his eyes were already on you and you smiled at him while he reciprocated it with a slightly awkward one, "Guess this is the part where I ask you out, huh..?", he spoke lowly, scratching his cheek and averting his gaze from yours for a second.

-You tilted your head, "Guess so..", you pushed your hand in your pocket and pulled out a pen, "Gimme your hand."

-Sam raised a brow but did so anyway and you grabbed his hand, turning it so you could see the back of it and scribbled down with the ink on his skin.

-"There." You let go and he looked at his hand, smiling when he found that you wrote your phone number, "Call me."

-He chuckled as he looked back up at you, "Will do."

-You paused for a second and, just to make up for the time you weren't going to be together in, you stood on your toes and pulled him in, planting a gently, chaste kiss on his cheek before pulling away, smiling at him warmly when you saw his fingers gently ghosting the area where your lips pressed against his skin.

-"See you 'round.", you winked at him and backed away, turning around to leave.

-Sam watched you, almost bewitched by the way you made him feel. His eyes followed you intently and took note of everything: the sway of your hips and your curves and legs and everything.

-But, suddenly, he called out for you when he remembered something, stopping you in your tracks. You looked back at him, raising a curious brow, "What'd she tell you about me earlier?"

-You paused for a few seconds, a smirk playing on your lips as you realized what he was referring to, "Nothing.", you waved him off, "Just don't break my heart!", you jut a finger at him, playfully warning him with a glare that caused him to chuckle.

-"No promises."

-But he'd be lying if he didn't admit that anyone who'd break your heart would be a complete and utter ungrateful idiot.

Tags: @missdictatorme , @the-drakeboys , @the-winchesterboys , @samdrakeftw , @easy-and-steady @s4mdrake , @writer-jamie , @hrgnm , @purplezebra68 , @elledrake , @misslongcep

[my-watch-begins]

Seeing someone.

Pairing: Sam Drake x Reader.

Words: +2000.

Warnings: implied smut, cursing, angst.

Uploading this before I can regret how bad it is.

Also, are we still in love with Sam Drake? because sign me the fuck in.

~~~

Sam quietly took a drag out of his cigarette and leaned on the rim of the sliding glass door that gave to Nathan's back yard. Even if Elena wasn't pregnant, they wouldn't let him smoke in the house. 

Behind him, his family, accompanied by Sully, Chloe and Nadine were chatting, sharing the amusing inconveniences of their last trip. He had gone to have a smoke just as the conversation turned back to his usual least favorite subject. Dating. He's always submitted his stories with a lucky lady that just gets to spend a night with him, but his family has never heard him say that he strucks on non-suggestive conversation with other women. 

"It's about time you start seeing someone" Sully said, taking a sip of his glass.

He smirked to himself, he was starting to regret was he was going to do next. 

"Oh, I'm seeing someone" he turned around, leaning again on the door.

"Really?" Nathan asks with peaked interest.

"Yeah" he shrugs nonchalantly "we see each other out and about almost every day" 

"I don't think that's the kind of seeing Sully meant" Chloe chimed in with a twist of her eyebrows, not really believing Sam was that oblivious. 

"Oh… well, I've also seen her naked if that's the kind of seeing we're talkin' about" 

"Well, who is she? Why isn't she here?" 

Sam smiled a little at his little brother's enthusiasm, he bent down to squash the butt of his finished cigarette on the floor, then tossed it in the nearby trash can as he walked to the table. 

"Well, she's not here because she's kind of…" he fumbled a little in his thoughts, then nodded and made a stopping gesture with his hands "I'll explain, she's been my neighbor for a few months, she moved here to start fresh, she's had some big disappointments in her life, she's trying to find what to do with herself… I guess that's why I liked her when I first met her in the bar around the block from the apartment. We get taking, we get drinking, she's a beast at bar games, and we just hang out with eachother from time to time. I go to hers for dinner, she comes to mine for a movie or just a drink. She's got a lot of things on her mind, most of the time I do too, and we just talk" he finishes with a shrug.

"And the naked part?" Chloe teases.

"Well, that always comes later. After a couple of months of being just friends, she starts to reciprocate some of my dumb pick-up lines, and we just… make out in the bar parking lot one time- but" he quickly stops any kind of comment that may come from that confession. "But, when we get to the apartment, and it's maybe time to do something else… she just says that she likes me too much, and that she can do that to me. I was a little shocked because everything seemed kind of normal, but I still ask you know, what does she mean by that" he links his hands on the table and looks at them "she says that she's never really been in a relationship, she doesn't know how to act, she doesn't really know what to do when someone cares for her, she's been alone and fending for herself her whole life… and that it sucks because she really likes me, but doesn't know what to do about it, and she would probably ruin my life" he smiled, remembering how you'd tore your eyes from his, not wanting to let him see you cry, you had your arms crossed, leaning on the rail on the opposite side of the door to his apartment, Sam had his keys dangling from his fingers, ready to open the door. 

"I'm just-" you began "not that fun to be around, I have these days when I just can't talk to anybody, I close off, I'm just so used to being on my own that I don't know how to act when people care. And I just know that I'll at some point hurt you and I can't do that to you. Not after how you've been with me" you finally settle your eyes on him, inhaling quickly in a little sniff, you really hated to cry in front of people, or just looking weak in general, but Sam had been the only person so far who'd allowed you to open up that side of yourself. 

"Well" he said with a little smile of his own, then stored his keys again in his jacket pocket. "Since we're airing our faults, I'll tell you mine" 

He walks the short step to you, placing his hands on the rail on either side of you, leaning down to match your eyes with his at your height. 

"I'm selfish, I find it easier to be by myself because then I don't have to take into consideration what other people want, most times I'm only looking out for myself, and in the rare times when I am teaming up with someone, it takes a lot of me to give up on something for the greater good. Some might say I am making up for time I lost, which to be honest is true. I want to travel, my body physically starts to itch if I'm in the same place for a while, and I'm not sure if I'm ready to settle down if that means I have to stop doing what I want to do" 

You let out a breath in a quick chuckle, and turn you head to match his eyes with yours again. 

"I would ruin you" you confessed. 

"Well" Sam tilts his head with a playful smirk "been ruining my own life for a while now, about time someone else does it for me" 

You bite your lip, trying to hold back a chuckle, but instead all you can do if soften your gaze, completely letting down that barrier between you two. You had leaned in quickly to crash his lips with yours, his hands land on your ribs to pull you in, making you tiptoe to match at least a bit more with his height, then he rounds his arms around your waist, making you cling onto his neck with your arms and deepen the kiss to a more like the one you two had shared pressed against the back of Sam's motorcycle.

Sam quickly had to shake his head to avoid his mind going to where it always went every time he thought about you. He lifted his eyes to look at the expression on his friends faces, seeing that they were all more than interested to know who was the person who could make Sam Drake day dream about them.

"So, we start seeing eachother, she's not like my girlfriend or anything, I mean- I don't know, maybe she is. But she's at my place one of these days and she sees a picture of Nathan and I, and she goes-" 

"Where do you know Nathan Drake from?" You say taking the picture and looking at it with a frown, Sam has Nate on a playful chokehold as they both laugh for the camera. 

"Where do you know Nathan from?"  He pushed. 

"I asked first" you reply with a little tug of your eyebrows, Sam sees that you're quite serious about this, so he stops beating around the bush. 

"He's my brother" 

"Your brother?" You repeat in a high pitch tone, frowning even more. "How the fuck? Where did you even come from, since when he's had a brother?" you leave the portrait back and let out a sigh "you always think I'm a little dramatic but this is exactly what I'm talking about when I say the universe has it out for me" you declare, then place a hand on your hip and sigh. 

"You are being dramatic" you chuckle humorlessly, then shake your head. 

"Just say my name to you brother, or to Sullivan-" you motion at him to let him know that you actually know everyone he knows "they're not going to be one bit happy knowing that we're together, and… I don't want to separate you from your family, I mean I didn't even know you existed, so you must've been away for a long time for them not even mentioning you" 

"I was" he confirmed "Nathan will understand" 

"Umm, no?" Nathan says with the biggest frown he can pull "you're dating (F/N)?" 

Nadine chimes in, asking for your full name, then chuckling in disbelief. 

"You better run far away Drake" Nadine murmurs with a tilt of her head, leaning over to grab the bottle of Scotch Sully had pulled out halfway through Sam's story.

"Now, listen-" he begins, quickly lifting his hands in front of him. 

"She almost got us killed, multiple times" Nathan interrupted.

"She pretended to work for me and another client, stealing the artifact we were after, she's double crossed everyone she's ever been involved with"

"She almost got Elena killed in Nepal, she was working with Lazarevic" Nathan said even more than offended. 

"Well" Chloe lifted her finger to stop him "actually, I was there, and she was under contract with Lazarevic, but to her defense, she kind of helped us at the end" 

"Double crossing Lazarevic" Nadine interjected. 

"He deserved to be double crossed" Chloe defended again. 

"Look Sam" Sully sighed when he saw that things were getting a little bit out of control "the (F/N) we know is an historian with a mean right hook and pretty fucking good aim, works under contract, hired help, doesn't stop until the job is done. Now you say you've meet a different one, that's fine, I'm glad she's turned around." 

"Yeah, and we also don't really have a saying in your life, you can date whoever you want" Elena was the most reasonable out of the bunch, and she, like Sully, was able to look at things a bit more objectively.

"I know. But I also don't want you to hate her" 

"That's going to be tough" Nadine replied. Sam thought that you and Nadine must've really gone after eachother for a while. 

"We can all try though. Right?" Elena asked, emphasizing more on Nate. He just gave her a defeated look and shrugged one shoulder. 

"Yeah, sure, we can try"

Elena's eyes land on the girls next to Nate, Chloe gives her a nod, and Nadine reluctantly agrees with giving you a chance. 

"You better bring her back next week before that job in Brazil" Elena warns, Sam nods with a smile. 

Upon returning to the apartment, Sam fishes both his phone and his keys, opening the door at the same time as he opens your contact, he closes the door behind him and writes a quick text. 

"You awake?" 

He heads to the bedroom, taking off his jacket and laying it on the bed, the phone vibrates in his hand, and he quickly reads the message. 

"I am, get your ass over here" 

He smiles and turns on his heels, finishing the keys from his pocket again, he opens and closes the door of his apartment and walks around ten feet to the door of your apartment, changing keys, he opens the door and enters. 

He throws the keys on the kitchen table and heads over to your bedroom. 

"And here I was wondering if you could be louder" you complained as soon as you watched his figure appear on the door, marvels at the sight of you. Face down on the bed, white tank-top, sheet barely covering your legs, arms disappearing under the pillow you were resting your head on. 

"I wasn't making noise" he defended. 

"I heard the door of you apartment smash closed, that's how loud you were" 

You eye opens just as he's sitting on the bed, he had undressed quickly. Laying on the bed with just his boxers, he moved over to your side and pulls the sheet to cover himself up to his chest. 

"Had fun?" You ask, closing you eye just as he places his hand on your head, quietly tracing little circles in your scalp.

"Yeah. Talked about Brazil mostly" you hum and feel his hand leave your head to lay on top of your shoulder blade, you hear him sigh, and think he's about to fall asleep, but could somehow still feel his eyes over you.

You move to lay on your side, squinting your eyes open. 

"What?" You ask, seeing that he was wide awake and staring at you. His hand sneaks under your pillow to grab your own, pulling it from it's hiding place and leading it to his lips. 

"Nothin', go back to sleep" he commands. You give a little smirk and raise your upper body on your arm, you twist your eyebrow inquisitively at him "I told my brother about you" he confessed. 

You quietly roll your eyes and let yourself fall on the bed again, your hand slip from his to rub the sleep out of your eyes. 

"And what did he say?" You ask wearily. 

"That he wants you next week for dinner" 

"So his memory is even worst than I thought" 

"No, they just agreed on giving you a chance" 

"How nice of them" you say with sarcasm, resting your hand on your chest, looking up at the ceiling. 

"It'll be fine, you're a charmer" you chuckle, turning your head to face him, he smiles tenderly and leads his hand to rub your cheek, then hooks his fingers on the back of your neck and pulls you in, moving himself a bit forward to kiss you. His thumb runs up and down you jaw for as long as he paints your lips with little kisses, and once he pulls back to take a big breath, you sneak your face on the crook of his neck, easily your favorite place on Earth. 

"You are coming right?" He asks after a few minutes of just holding you to his chest, running his hand side to side of your waist.

"Yeah" you nod in the little space you have on his neck, then let out a sigh in pretended annoyance "the things I do for a dick" 

[maki-matsurra]

Hi! I saw your post about writing requests, so could you write something for Chloe x Elena (as romantic ship) from Uncharted videogames please. Thank you! Have a nice weekend!

Hello! Thank you so much for the request Sweet! I’ve actually never heard of this ship before until now, so this is gonna get interesting! 

I’ve decided to use a scene from The Lost Legacy, but instead of Nadine being there, it’s Elena, also, Elena and Nate ARE NOT married in this one-shot, so she can be all Chloes! ^^ 

I hope I did you justice! Enjoy! 

Downtown Halebidu

Summary: After a big climb, Chloe and Elena share a heartfelt moment. 

Genre: Angst, but most fluffy fluff

Warnings: Small mentions of homophobia

Word Count: 1120

Want to send in a request? Start here! 

Two ladies began to clear their path through the woodland's passage, gaping at the old stone structure standing proud and tall in the distance. It was nobody other than Elena Fisher, and Chloe Frazer.

"Welcome to downtown Halebidu," Chloe said to Elena with a smile before continuing. "The last known resting place of the Tusk of Ganesh."

"Wow..." Was all that the blonde could murmur out, putting her hands on her hips as Chloe rested her arms behind her head, breathing out. She before long positioned her head to the side in confusion as she kept on gazing at the structure. She soon hummed and ventured into her pocket for the ancient disk.

"What?" Elena questioned as she turned to look at the Australian. Chloe held the disk up to the structure. "Doesn't it look like there's a dam or something between the two Ganesh statues?"

The reporter leaned in closer, her chocolate brown colored eyes not leaving the disk as she looked between the two. Chloe took the time to look at Elena's face, she couldn't resist the opportunity to acknowledge how beautiful she was. Even back when they initially met in Nepal. Just the way strands of golden blonde hair stuck to her face were simply ravishing, and her aroma of sweet roses made the raven-haired lady's heart skip a beat.

"Must've been eroded by the falls." Elena conjectured, making Chloe jump back into reality as she thought back to the structure. "So how do we get in?" Chloe questioned.

"Hang on." Elena looked at the statues more closely, bringing in her binoculars. She smiled. "Yeah, look at the crown." She said, handing the binoculars to the raven-haired woman, who gladly accepted them and peered through them. "It's not wear and tear."

Getting a good look at it herself, the Australian agreed. "You're right. Maybe it was a watchtower?" She asked as she handed the binoculars back to the reporter.

"Bet that's how the Persians got in."

Chloe took a gander at the structure for a couple of more seconds before dismissing it to go get a spot to plunk down. "I have heard about this place for sooo long." She sat down on a close-by rock as she took out the Ganesh figure, gazing at it with a little grin. She let out a chuckle. "I can't believe I'm actually looking at it."

"You should take a picture. Send it to your dad." Elena took a look at Chloe with her own grin as she kept on glancing around. Chloe faltered, her grin falling, she marginally shook her head. "Great Idea."

"What, he one of those dads who can't work a computer?" The blonde-haired girl chuckled, still smiling. "Just take a picture, show it to him in person, then."

Chloe winced once again as she peered down this time, her voice shockingly tranquil. "No, it's a-- just a few decades too late for that." Chloe streaked a little smile as she set the figure back in her pocket. Elena looked at her confused for a couple of seconds before a look of horror flashed all over as she marginally covered her mouth.

"I'm so-"

"Oh. Oh god, please no. It's fine." Chloe hindered as she got back on her feet, chuckling. The exact opposite thing she needed was any grievances on this journey, particularly with Elena. The raven-haired lady took a full breath prior to motioning towards the structure. "Shall we, uh, head over to Halebidu?"  

Elena took a look at the Australian. She knew what a forced smile looked like, and Chloe had one on her face right now. Usually, the girl was so peppy, continually having some sort of quips. It was one of the reasons why Nate loved her. She peered down at her brown climbing boots as she pondered educating her concerning her dad, however she ruled against it, she gazed upward, met with Chloe's crystal blue eyes, and dealt with a calm; "Yeah."

 Against all odds and after about an hour and thirty minutes of walking and climbing, somehow the two make it up to the sculpture, remaining on an edge. The two watched out at the lovely mountain landscape, not believing their eyes. Before long a little breeze began to push them back, the two clutched each other for help, they took a gander at one another and chuckled.

"Worth it?" Chloe cocked an eyebrow as she looked at the reporter with a smile. Elena nodded. "Definitely. It's beautiful."

Chloe looked at her, before looking out into the mountains again. "Yeah."

The two remained silent, soaking in the scenery, stealing glances at each other when they were not looking. Elena took a silent breath and soon closed her eyes, turning towards Chloe.

"My dad," Elena hesitates but got Chloe's attention as she looked at the blonde-haired reporter. "My dad...didn't like me too much because I was gay."

Chloe took a look at her with wide eyes, not accepting what she was hearing. Elena was gay? She generally thought she had a thing with Nate, or even that camera fellow she took a chance with her life to save in Nepal. Chloe referenced quickly before that she was Bisexual, however, Elena has never talked about her sexuality or her father as of recently.

"He never approved of my beliefs as mom did, so he would always shut me out. So I-... I know what it's like to not have a dad." Elena finished. Chloe took a gander at her, incapable to state anything as she was excessively stunned, not just at the news Elena dropped on her, yet just as her beauty in the daylight, this made the reporter shake her head at her. "Now, this doesn't mean I know what it's like to have a dead family member but I-"

"Shut up," Chloe said as she delicately held her cheek and kissed her. Stunning the poor girl as she tensed up. Elena consistently thought Chloe had a thing for Nate, not her. She didn't generally consider the reality of her being a love interest to her. Nonetheless, with how delicate and warm her lips were, and how they fit perfectly against hers, it didn't matter. It all made sense to her.

They separated after a couple of seconds, having a quiet discussion between them. Just them. They grinned at each other as at long last, Elena acknowledged where they actually were. "Now," She looked down, re-adjusting herself as she looked back up at Chloe with a smile. "How do we get off this thing?" 

Chloe smiled back and turned as well. "Follow me. Oh, and we're continuing this."

"Oh, we're definitely continuing this."

[vroenis]

Lost Legacy Exemplifies Naughty Dog’s Cultural Crisis

There’s a discussion about Ocean’s 8 that positions its existence around whether or not it's necessary as a counterpoint to the Ocean’s reboot - the Ocean’s Cinematic Universe - if you will (what a world we live in) - that it was only made as a gender flip of the reboot that spawned two sequels, three films in total cast almost entirely with men.

My perspective is that as much as I generally enjoyed the Ocean’s reboots for what they were, Ocean’s Eleven should have been a cast entirely with women in the first place.

The heroes we both need and deserve.

Massive spoilers for the original 1960 Lewis Milestone version and the Steven Soderbergh one in 2001 of Ocean’s Eleven - Soderbergh’s flip is of-course that they get to keep the money at the end so that they have to potentially give it back in the sequel he knew he’d be able to make, whereas I doubt Milestone knew he’d ever get a sequel back in the early 60′s so the rub for film-making back then is to burn the money at the end. Nevertheless even for the early 2000′s, the boldest of moves would have been to cast it with women, not to be progressive but also to be progressive, tho that’s still an absurd thought that to cast women is progressive - but to be smart. Ocean’s 8 is a fantastic film, deftly written, paced, acted, shot and edited. Would the world have responded to it in like-kind? I know how *I* would have responded to it, I think you can answer for yourself how societal cultures may have responded at any point from 2001 thru to now. In any case, I have Ocean’s 8 on blu-ray. I love it.

A reader asked me whether I’d played Uncharted: The Lost Legacy after kindly reading through my bludgeoning of Uncharted 4, and seeing as they were patient enough to endure that blood-letting, I felt I owed them and probably Naughty Dog the time of day to give Uncharted-And-A-Half a chance, and I’m really glad I did. Fair warning, there’s a lot I didn’t like about Lost Legacy, and there’s going to be some more pain - a lot of pain. I don’t think any of my tumblr audience is quite on the rest of my socials, but anyone who’s connected to me anywhere else on the Wire was subject to my frustrations as I played thru the game on Saturday, including the blurred image of my Google Keep notes I took while playing the game in preparation for this journal. I keep notes now.

Nevertheless, I can say that on the assumption that the Uncharted series is wrapped, or at least in the narrative arc with these characters as we know them, that Lost Legacy is easily without question my favourite Uncharted game by far.

On that assumption that Uncharted is more or less done, now’s as good a time as any to take a top-down look at the franchise as a whole. I know I already did a fair bit of that in the last piece, but some broader thoughts on what the series does and says have solidified while playing Lost Legacy, and I’ll discuss them as a lead-in to my thoughts on the game.

Again - this is going to be riddled with spoilers for Uncharted: The Lost Legacy and most likely the entire Uncharted series, so if you’ve not played them and are interested in doing so, or don’t want to see them heavily critiqued, please stop here.

The first game was released in 2007 and was apparently in development for roughly three years. What was happening up to and around 2004 to 2007? September 11 had happened in 2001, the world was at war in the Middle East in Afghanistan and second invasion of Iraq had begun in 2003, Hurricane Katrina happened in 2005 - the same year the IRA ended armed conflict in Northern Ireland, 2005 saw the outbreak of H5N1 Avian Flu - topical right now. There are so many more, I can’t list them all here - lots of momentous events that in some way or another highlight community awareness in some way - that’s probably a bit of an obtuse statement but hopefully it’ll string together in a sec. What struck me and a bunch of my friends odd about the first, then the second and then somehow every Uncharted game since, is that Naughty Dog seem to choose an ethnicity for their antagonists and scratch the surface of “what if this element of their cultural violence is bad”, but then leave it so shallow that it remains a caricature and comes off as casually and carelessly racist. The first game frames the theme around Nazis, but the actual enemies are anything but. Yes, they’re intended to be mercenaries, but they’re hardly nondescript, they’re absolutely of very specific ethnicity.

From the second game onward, Naughty Dog seem to want to make use of real world settings and do some nuanced research on actual sociopolitical conflict and I always feel uneasy about how its presented. Lost Legacy begins much the same way and I worried about the tone going in. An active war-zone in India as gravitas to your setting that is then almost completely abandoned until the very end? This is my problem with how the writers treat setting in Uncharted. They use very real conflicts that have real-world consequences for people in which actual lives are lost to inject gravity into their narrative and then quickly discard it for the sake of shenanigans once the wise-cracking starts when the tone shifts gear and the characters themselves take centre-stage in the foreground.

Here’s the thing.

The character’s are enough. I *love* these characters. Their story is fantastic. Nadine’s and Chloe’s story was the best and most cohesive of the entire series. Also it only took me roughly six hours to play thru and I only feel like half of that was wasted! That’s still probably being too generous but I’m grasping for positives, here. Still - I don’t know why the senior production team has never had confidence in the core of their product which is the charm of their characters and the play dynamic - Uncharted is primarily about *seeing* and *doing* - for the most part, unfortunately, separately.

The dialogue between Chloe and Nadine is extremely interesting, it is absolutely the best thing in the game, yet it keeps getting interrupted by stupid gameplay beats due to poor timing of rolling up on level locations. Uncharted 4 was supposed to have locations hidden around levels where you could engage in dialogue between characters but I barely found them - why hide such interesting content in your game?? It’s completely absurd. Then the only few I did find were between Elena and Nathan altho I really don’t think those were meant to be hidden, and they were so poorly written and I hated them so much, I didn’t care to discover any more. Again - no disrespect at all to Nolan North and Troy Baker whom I absolutely adore and respect, but I didn’t find anything engaging or interesting *at all* about the brother narrative. I didn’t care one bit what that nonsense was about. What about Sully? Where’s Sully’s story?? I’m just so - so glad we got a story for Chloe, and that at least Nadine got some great screen time too as a part of it and that it all presented so well.

Before I continue to praise what went well, there are a few things I can’t let pass. While the driving has thankfully improved and controls quite well now, the exclusion of a minimap or GPS HUD element is interesting. I’m fairly certain it’s intentional as to not detract from the game’s clean, cinematic look, to not break immersion, but this just generates a horrific breakdown in actual player experience for me. Without any navigational assists, I constantly got lost and stopped every 20 meters to check the map, frequently driving into dead-ends, off cliffs and past where I wanted or needed to go. The game isn’t a 30 hour open-world experience with distinct and varied landmarks the player will familiarise themselves with and learn to navigate by, for the most part the level is fairly homogeneous in object geometry.

Some of the puzzles take far too long to mechanically execute, in particular the smashy-slashy statue block jumpy stupid whatever it’s called one and the sliding shadow motif. It doesn’t matter that neither actually takes too long once you know the solution, it’s that they feel long and then are actually over-long and also not interesting to mechanically execute. This is due mostly to clunky character animation and animation smoothing, and part of Naughty Dog’s overall obsession with being cinematic which is something I’ll return to towards the end of this piece, something which has been a strength but will ultimately be to their detriment. While cinematic visuals might be a benefit for traversal, it’s something that absolutely does not suit puzzle-solving. In the example of the statue-block puzzle, the hard reset each time the player is hit means laboriously jogging all the way back to the beginning and starting again - it’s just poor puzzle design having to begin again from a full reset. There’s no satisfaction in having to remember the whole thing and while I didn’t look up the solution online, I’m willing to bet many people will have just dialled up a clip on YouTube and copied it without figuring it out themselves. This is a failure of connecting what’s satisfying about moving in your game and what’s satisfying about solving puzzles, something Crystal Dynamics understood far better in the Tomb Raider reboots, in particular the second outing (Rise of) with their much more environment-centric puzzling.

The sliding shadow puzzle just simply takes way too long to jog around the space, then clip onto the hot-zone for each lever, wait for the animation to lift it, wait for the animation for the pieces to slide, rinse, repeat. Once you know what you have to do, it’s overly frustrating actually having to do it.

It brings me to a weird quirk of design where the puzzle designers perhaps don’t understand something that the environmental designers do. Maybe they didn’t get the same little notes in the Slack channel, or Trello board or Teams pin or whatever. Uncharted level-design has almost no back-tracking, less in each successive game, and it’s almost entirely absent from Lost Legacy - you’d have to look closely to realise you’re navigating the same area you came in thru and almost always moving over it in a different way that’s been modified - now it’s flooded, now there’s a bridge, now you’re swinging or leaping or climbing where you weren’t etc. I feel like this is the Hidetaka Miyazaki Souls/Borne effect of level design in which environments are designed to be both realistic and practical.

Great! Good for the level designers. Did the puzzle designers not get that note? Maybe they did. I need to stop thinking that every poor optimisation is a symptom of ignorance - that’s bad form on my part. What’s more likely is it’s a symptom of either bad leadership, poor tool implementation, lack of time or too narrow or strict an observation of representative vision - by which I mean - they can’t change the way the characters move or animate just for puzzles, because it has to be consistent with the cinematic representation of the game as a whole - and that sucks lemons. It means the overall play experience suffers for the sake of the overall cinematic experience except executing a puzzle isn’t cinematic unless it’s expansive...

Like the positive example I’ll give of the light reflector room. Shoplifted from Uncharted 2′s giant knife that has Nathan climb all over a giant knife, Lost Legacy’s light reflector room has slightly less climbing but is a much larger space, more impressive and a much better example of good puzzling in Uncharted. It’s not difficult to solve but again (I think again?) I’ll argue that you don’t come to Uncharted for difficult puzzles - you don’t come to Tomb Raider for difficult puzzles, either. 

The puzzles in these games should be mostly environmental because they feel good solving them, and solving them should be more about the doing - the playing - and the playing should be moving - running, jumping, climbing etc.

Both the giant knife and the reflector room are a joy to execute because they’re fantastically realised - large cavernous environments that aren’t annoying to navigate, that give you time to appreciate both the scale of the spaces and the details the designers and artists have put into them. Lost Legacy’s is more impressive because you do a lot more puzzling and spend much more time in its vastly larger space, culminating in combat that usually I would be ho-hum about, but I guess exhibits more animation and destruction tech which while scripted, is still impressive nonetheless given how extremely difficult it is to have interactivity still occurring.

I have a few things I want to mention before I begin to wrap up, given it’s going to be a very long wrap - I’d say I’m taking cues from Joseph Anderson but I’ve always been this verbose.

The medallion puzzles were excellent, in part perhaps because they felt like the closest thing to the Tomb Raider reboots’ challenge tombs. Some of them were silly and lazily implemented, the worst offender being you just had to shoot mans and get the medallion from the lock-box that the mans had put it in (pfft), but the best ones were integrated into the environment such that you may well have walked past or thru areas that were puzzles before you knew what they were. This brings up one of the most interesting things I’ve been turning over for quite some time now. Ben Croshaw aka Yahtzee aka Zero Punctuation may have first mentioned “chest high walls” in his first Gears of War video, but it may well have been an Uncharted game. I don’t remember but he will have thrown in mentions of all the generic cover-shooters as a catch-all for how the environments immediately telegraph that Combat™ will happen. It’s a particularly astute remark and speaks volumes of video game design - developers always seem to have very specific design language to separate traversal, combat and puzzling. While I clearly don’t care for combat most days, and yes - I do acknowledge there are some practical concerns for combat that can’t be avoided, I always envisaged design that blurred the lines between puzzle and environment so that you never quite knew what was and wasn’t a puzzle. Everything should be the puzzle. In some senses, Cyan’s old Myst games were a bit like this but in a very rudimentary and crude way - sure, they’re quite old now, but even those had very clear not puzzle areas. It’s a complex and subtle subject, but something of a study of games like Fireproof Games’ The Room would be in order. Understandably smaller scale, but the thinking behind it is definitely adjacent.

Final notes - the young Indian girl in the prologue has amazing animations that you’ll miss entirely unless you swing the camera yourself. A whole team of people or a single animator has spent hours on those animations - that a director or team leader hasn’t forced the player to see and appreciate them is a disservice.

Every section where you have to do something under pressure like run from mans shooting at you or dash through a lengthy section of crumbling cave network etc. is a horrible play experience of not knowing where to go. They’re trying to inject excitement by applying pressure but there’s no clear guidance and no dependence on player skill, so you end in bizarre fail-states due to going in completely the wrong direction that glitches cameras or scene time-outs resulting in check-points and the whole thing just doesn’t scan as a cinematic experience. I hate hate hate them - you’re subject to the same musical swell that’s supposed to be like a movie only to fail again and it comes off as b-grade and pathetic. Every game has had this problem and it is just straight bad design.

Three? Four? Games in a row, Naughty Dog have recycled; 

being pursued on foot by an armoured vehicle crashing through level geometry while you have to run and occasionally shoot/fight mans, 

driving down a shanty-town on a hill pursued by an armoured vehicle - perhaps the same one as previous scene

a big chase scene of lots of vehicles jumping from vehicle to vehicle shooting and/or punching mans that may or may not include...

a train combat sequence where you start at the back of the train and work your way to the front of it shooting mans as you go

This lacks creativity at this point. I think duplicating these once each - so you do them twice total across the franchise is fine, but they hit the same beats in the same way - exactly - every time they appear. It just strikes me as Naughty Dog just not knowing what else to do. At one point, I think it was in Uncharted 4, when driving down the shanty-town on the hill, I literally had a brain-fart not knowing which game I was playing because I swear we did it in 2 and 3. Did we do it in 3?? Look, I don’t know. But it’s getting old. At least we didn’t do it in Lost Legacy, but we did the train and I’ve had enough. I’ve had enough of doing the same things in the same way. It could have been a train but it should have been in a way that just wasn’t just another Uncharted train. It hasn’t worn thin, it’s worn out.

Overall, the games look great... but playing them feels like they’re stuck in PS2 and early PS3 era philosophies, like Naughty Dog haven’t evolved and don’t realise that people’s brains function much quicker and can process more, or that the media we consume, the games we play function at a higher level and we can digest more, we’re capable of processing higher functions. I’ve been playing Ubisoft’s The Division 2 and enjoying it more the more I play, much to my surprise. I understand the intent behind the gameplay is extremely different to the single-player experience of Uncharted, however there are some parallels in what it achieves animation wise;

The Division is also a cover shooter but of-course as a multiplayer, open-world live-service game, its intent is to telegraph to the player that the entire environment is a permanent play-space in which to always be playing. It utilises an information-rich GUI that is an always-on system with button icons telling the player what button to press over what surfaces to snap to, vault over, climb up, run to (and snap to cover), open and loot, interact with etc. I don’t know if these can be turned off but I like them on. It’s a pretty amazing feat that almost every environmental object has been mapped as a snap-to-cover and/or climbable object. For this reason, the character movement in Division is pretty quick and snappy, however it still manages to have a decent degree of natural human kinetics in the character rigging which is amazing. This means if you move-off from standing still, there’s a slight delay as your “weight” shifts, same if you change direction. When I say “snap” to cover, it’s not actually instantaneous, your character makes a movement and takes time to do so, yet it’s still not sluggish. Somehow the developers have worked at fine-tuning a balance between not-instant, but not too slow.

This is something that even in Lost Legacy, I feel Naughty Dog simply can’t do. The animations are decent during play - they’re outstanding during cutscenes (we’re getting there), but character models have a really awkward relationship with the environment. They clip awkwardly with ladders and buttons and wheels - with puzzles and levers - getting the grappling hook to prompt is again better than Uncharted 4 but still not ideal. I had far fewer glitch-outs than 4 too, which was a significant improvement, but I still had to animate back and forth a few times to get into hot-zones appropriately and with character kinetics not quite right, it wasn’t exactly easy.

And again to be fair, this stuff is suuuuuper difficult. I don’t mean to talk about this stuff like it’s cooking instant ramen. It’s so freaking tough. Rigging and mapping interactive character models has to be one of the most stupendously difficult things a developer has to do - making it work with all that scripting, getting it to play nice with all those assets and lines and lines of coding for the full experience. I have so much respect for game developers and what an astronomical task it is. So when I say I prefer one development team’s product over another’s, I don’t mean to say that the other team is absolute garbage - there are so many things that might contribute to that final product and we have no idea what’s been going on at Naughty Dog. If the team leaders and producers say they’re happy or even if they don’t, and the decision is made to ship, there’s nothing more they can say or do.

If there was one thing I absolutely loved about this game, it was the two main characters and the story that was told about them. I can excuse the main text as the catalyst that brought them together - even to the point that it’s a story about Chloe ultimately deciding what’s important to her. My issue with this comes full circle with the setting being in a real world conflict. There’s a bit of white savour complex in there in that Asav might be the narrative’s antagonist, but he at least is local. It’s not clear exactly what Chloe’s ethnicity is and I’m not here to judge what her stakes are in it because clearly her character has a sense of home and place in India, but she certainly also has a complex sense of being an outsider. So the point is not to judge, but the game also is unclear on its positioning other than she’s the heroic vehicle of deliverance. See what I mean about theme? This is what I mean by you could have just as easily written almost an identical story about Nadine and Chloe, with very similar interactions, tension, redemption and resolve - even with an antagonist, conflict and a happy ending, but either treated real sociopolitical issues with better care or not set your game in them at all. I’m all for setting games in the real world, but if you’re going to do it, do it right. I’m not the person to ask.

I need to be careful not to direct that criticism at the base-level developers nor at Claudia Black who is the manifestation of Chloe’s voice because she does an amazing job of bringing her to life. The casting of Laura Bailey voicing a black South African Nadine was much more awkward given Nadine’s ethnicity wasn’t decided when she was cast - again that’s on Naughty Dog’s leadership, but I won’t knock Laura Bailey for it. It’s easy to say she should have resigned, perhaps she should have, that’s an economical question only Laura can answer and I’m sure it’s not an easy one. Suffice to say, VO work isn’t lucrative.

What a side-track.

I don’t think I ever cared about Nathan. I think I always cared about Elena, and not because WAIFU and also not because WHITE KNIGHT or whatever other bullshit reasons stupid alphagamerz will spit from their frontheads. Elena’s just more interesting, probably because Nathan is written like a design document and Elena’s written like a human being. Naughty Dog want to create a game about adventuring with lush expansive environments, shooty mcshooting and light puzzling. They want it to be cinematic and unrivalled in its quality and they have the smarts to build the tech around it, with Sony’s help. Backed by Sony money, they take VO seriously and do a great job at creating that cinematic experience, coupled with some above-par for video games narrative writing. The problem this introduces for me is Nathan’s raison d'être has to justify everything - action, tension, stupidity...

Nathan Drake really is the design document.

I feel like he’s just the unfortunate side-effect of being central to the game, and it’s typical of my character to just not dig the focus of things and get into subtexts a whole lot more. Often I get into things in the periphery, things adjacent - I don’t love or hate Shakespeare or for that matter Baz Luhrmann but Romeo + Juliet ‘96 is an amazing film and not at all because of the eponymous Romeo and Juliet and again, not for Leonardo di Caprio (spit!) or for Claire Danes (she can stay) but the absolutely divine cast of supporting characters (John Leguizamo will live in my heart forever oh baby).

That Nathan makes stupid decisions is already something that turns me off. That he makes poor decisions because... he’s an orphan? Because... he was bullied? Because... his brother left him? This is why he’s not transparent with his wife? Actually, he’s quite realistic. Except the people like him I’ve known in my life aren’t heroes - they’re pathetic or unreliable or abusive or dangerous. Elena is an adult. She’s not perfect either and that’s also great because neither am I. As a side character she has the conceit of being more nuanced, but as the contra to Nathan, she’s also mature versus his childishness. OOOOAAAAH EVERYONE LOVES A LOVEABLE MANBABY OOAAAH COMEON LIVE A LITTLE EVERYONE’S GOT A LITTLE CHILD STILL IN THEM SOMEWHERE yea fine, I get it, like I’ve said before, yes - he embodies the recklessness and playfulness in us, but that’s a confusing position for a game that frequently tries to ground itself in real world conflict to be taking. You’re reducing him to that but injecting complex and nuanced characters like Elena and now eventually both Chloe and Nadine? I’m telling you now - any male that doesn’t know when it’s appropriate to grow-up, when the time to set aside the playfulness and be TRUTHFUL AND TRANSPARENT WITH HIS PARTNER is a dangerous person and FUCK THAT NOISE. Nathan, as much as I do absolutely - make no mistake - adore Nolan North’s voicing - ends up being another Homer Simpson - as long as you laugh at his stupidity, you’ll excuse it, and you’ll excuse the hurt that’s done by it, and that shit doesn’t fly with me. His redemption was not earned. I say again - Elena should throw him into the sea.

Nadine ends up being a fantastic character, even if she’s given less narrative time, she’s a great example of her behaviour telling more story in contrast to Chloe getting to reveal her past and it’s nice to see them play off one another. I feel Nadine and Chloe as characters hit great story beats in ways Nathan didn’t get to with pretty much any of the other characters in four games - not Sully, not Elena, not his brother, not even Chloe - all told, we never actually get any back-story on Nathan and Chloe and I think we’re better off for it because I don’t care.

Having a quick squiz around tumblr reveals the obvious and rampant shipping of Nadine and Chloe and I couldn’t be happier. I think Naughty Dog knew what they were doing. There were so many moments. Those moments were for us. I think they were subtle enough that the fragile manbabies would have missed them but there’s no fooling us. Some of the babyboiz would have been seething thru their mouthbreething hairmouths and I’m sure probably took to the internet but that’s OK, they can remain unfucked incels for the rest of their lives or worse, serviced by whatever unwashed creatures want to dare fondle them in the dark. The elephant ride and that whole conversation was almost enough for me to forgive the absolute disaster that was Uncharted 4. It was given enough time to breathe, it was absolutely beautiful, and just when you thought they were going to terminate it and apologise for making things too awks, it concludes just perfectly and you get a phone picture that doesn’t have Nadine in frame, yet her presence in that picture is definite, pervasive and emotional. Again, some people may have completely missed it and maybe it chalks up to life experience, but as completely contrived as an artefact of complete fiction as that whole sequence might be, it was one of the most wonderfully tender moments ever created in a video game and I wonder if it makes the whole affair worth it.

In the Uncharted 4 piece, I threw in a few barbs about the most meaningful interactions, and in Lost Legacy, what I really loved was Chloe taking photos of things she thinks are beautiful and interesting on her phone, and feeding the elephant - these were the most meaningful interactions in the game. I love that the photos on the phone didn’t serve any gameplay utility at all, they were there because her character wanted to document her travels, because she thought what she was seeing was cool, and any time in the game, you could pull out your phone and look at what you’d seen. It was such a good and important decision to have the very first picture to be the Indian girl in the market, as that rather than the local conflict, does more to ground you and Chloe as a character in the setting. The game never forces you to look at it as a reminder, but you know it’s there.

I did steal these from the internet, sorry - so if they’re yours, let me know and I’ll be happy to take them down - this one in particular, seeing as it’s a photomode capture. I should have taken my own but I don’t do photomode caps on my first play-thru and there’s no-way I’m replaying this ever again.

It took five games for Naughty Dog to finally get some decent character writing, but a part of me still feels they couldn’t have existed without all the dross of the other games. There’s this immense amount of back-story and labour both the developers and the players had to slog thru to get to this point, and I feel as tho we get here and there’s just too little to show for it. I still really enjoyed the story that was told, the sense of character I felt, but a lot of that was contingent on the Uncharted universe in situ. Lost Legacy feels like a combining of all of Naughty Dog’s narrative motifs - the earnest redemption, the moment of tenderness and connection centred around peaceful animals - it’s a greatest hits of Naughty Dog in the best way possible because each narrative beat hits perfectly. I’m glad I played it with two characters who endeared themselves so much to me, that I truly cared about.

I’ve spend a lot of time praising the strengths of writing for at least Lost Legacy, but for each thing I’ve enjoyed about at least these two characters, there have been so many things I’ve been critical of. I feel like in order to get to the tiniest bit of enjoyment, I had to suffer thru so much. Honestly I don’t know if it really was worth it. It’s hard to know given that who I am now and where my tastes are and have developed as a consequence of my experiences, and I definitely would not replay any of those games again - so where does that leave me? I can’t go back and play The Last Of Us and I absolutely won’t play the second game, I just can’t do Naughty Dog games now, I don’t have it in me.

Naughty Dog have spent the better part of two decades developing tech for visual fidelity specifically for the Playstation hardware platforms (PS3 and 4). They’ve also been doing it by overworking their staff, many of which have left out of frustration or necessity. The problem they face is that as industry tools in general improve, there will no gap between games developed by Naughty Dog and any other contemporary studio from a visual perspective. Make no mistake - the Uncharted games are absolutely chock-full of objects, geometry and animation - somehow miraculously so on the Playstation platform in comparison to other games with the exception of other first-party and exclusive games receiving similar support from Sony such as Guerilla Games’ Horizon Zero Dawn and Sucker Punch’s forthcoming Ghost of Tsushima. There are probably other similar examples for the previous generation on PS3.

Yes, there’s a certain style of game Naughty Dog create as far as narrative goes but because it’s becoming more cinematic, that style is judged more and more by cinematic standards and at best it’s barely semi-professional aside from the outstanding voice work. There are few striking visual motifs that set Naughty Dog games apart from a design perspective, and the gameplay and mechanical constructions that once distinguished them at least a little from others are ever diminishing at increasing rates - more-so as their work practices make the level of quality they set out to achieve ever more unsustainable.

Lost Legacy encapsulates a lot of what I feel about video games as a whole at the moment - as an industry and as a culture. It’s a snapshot of a culture that’s achieving wonderful, beautiful things that are in ways huge - immense, yet somehow can feel so small in comparison to some of the challenges it faces. It’s an industry and culture experiencing a period of great upheaval, where after years upon years of malpractice, terrible things somehow still endure. It’s a space where sometimes it feels like a battle to find the tiniest shred of beauty buried in the dirt and ash, and there doesn’t seem to be an end to the frustration that working thru it brings about while grass-roots labourers continue to be burned.

Like many things in life, both at my age and at the level I guess a person gets to at the exposure rate of a thing, I’ve cut back a great deal on my engagement time with video games, so I’m a lot less patient with the functions and mechanisms of a game. There’s a labour element of video games that I feel developers might think is somehow necessary and there’s a component of that which is true, just not quite in the way they think it is, and it takes a unique frame of thinking to break out of traditional design to understand it. Again I’m not saying there’s anything special about how I understand games - there’s nothing at all original in my thoughts - I’ve shoplifted them wholesale from a hundred other people back from when I used to read Gamasutra and even now when I read designers and the people I follow and talk to on Twitter etc. There’s also absolutely nothing wrong with traditions and the people that enjoy them - just because they’re not my thing any more doesn’t mean they’re bad. It just means I’ve moved to something else and I shouldn’t engage with them.

That, I think, is what I’m waiting for. Kentucky Route Zero, Howling Dogs, Dear Esther, Everybody’s Gone To The Rapture, a whole bunch of others - these are the games I feel are pushing past the boundaries of tradition. Then the moments Uncharted takes itself out of its traditions - Nadine and Chloe’s elephant ride, Chloe’s phone pictures, Elena and Nathan’s house tours especially as Cassie - that’s when I think now you’re running! Run with it! Look, I’m still playing The Division - I’m still moving and shooting and enjoying it.

But we can do so much more. Many developers are doing more. We as an audience need to play more All of us together need to do and play more.

(The epilogue is me figuring I talk a lot of shit about AAA games and nary a word about KRZ, Howling Dogs, Dear Esther and the rest and I get it, but oooooo howdy is it really difficult for me to talk pragmatically about games I actually love)

[trickkombowerskru]

Who I Write For

Okay so due to the influx of new followers I’ve been getting I’ve gotten asked a few times if I still write for X or if I write for -insert fandom here- So this post is for all of you guys to know the long list of characters and the few ships I write for in alphabetical by fandom order now less!  Oh also a note for newer followers if you leave a comment on one of my posts Tumblr doesn’t let me respond with this blog, just my main so for future reference when you get a reply from @purplezebra68​ it ‘s me (I made the name when I was like 13 shut up)

IT 2017

Henry Bowers (including adult Henry)

Victor Criss

Patrick Hockstetter

Belch Huggins

All the gang (Like a set of hcs with each of them in a relationship or situation separately)

Poly!Bowers Gang (A combo of any number of the boys you want with the reader, even all 4 if that’s what you want)

PatHen (If I like the prompt enough)

IT Chapter 2 

Bill Denbrough

Mike Hanlon

Ben Hanscom

Eddie Kaspbrak

Beverly Marsh

Richie Tozier (Romantically with male readers only, but platonic fem readers are fine)

Stanley Uris

All The Losers Club (Same as the Bowers scenario)

Poly!Losers Club (A combo of however many Losers you want with the reader, hell even all 7 with the reader if that’s what floats your boat)

Benverly (If I dig the prompt enough)

I only do the adult losers

The 100

Emori

Bellamy Blake

Octavia Blake

Monty Green

Jasper Jordan

Harper McIntyre

John Murphy

Raven Reyes

Bellarke (Like the other ships I am picky about prompts)e

Also I would be down to do poly  x reader scenarios with any of the characters here

The Flash

Barry Allen

Ralph Dibny

Killer Frost

Cisco Ramon

Caitlin Snow

Snowbarry (Same drill as the other ships)

Again I would be down to do poly x reader scenarios with any of the characters here

Bloodline

Nolan Rayburn

Black Mirror

Ryan “Trick” Trebecki

Mrs.Fletcher

Julian Spitzer

13 Reasons Why

Zach Dempsey

Supernatural

Castiel

Charlie Bradbury

Jack Kline

Claire Novack

Dean Winchester

Sam Winchester

Team Free Will (As in any prompt with the whole team)

Umbrella Academy

Allison Hargreeves

Ben Hargreeves

Diego Hargreeves

Klaus Hargreeves

Vanya Hargreeves

Stranger Things

Robin Buckley

Jonathan Byers

Steve Harrington

I’ll do poly x readers for anyone here too in fact I already have done a basic one for Robin and Steve

Uncharted

Nathan Drake

Sam Drake (including 19 y/o Sam)

Rafe Adler

Harry Flynn

Elena Fisher

Chloe Frazer

Nadine Ross

Misc

Adam (From Being Charlie)

Alexander (From Everyday)

Alec (From I See You)

Boots Conley (From Inherent The Viper)

Casper Galloway

Rodrick Heffley

Freddy Klein

Leo Strange

Dean Taylor

Snowbird (A crackship that my friend and I created between Raven Reyes and Caitlin Snow)

AU

The 100 Arrowverse (Some Arrowverse characters traveling into the future where they meet 100 characters that are their descendants)

Supernatural IT (Team Free Will getting transported to Derry)

[miatlazar]

“Your mother was the most brilliant historian I have ever met” || 🎮: Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End (Naughty Dog)

Will there be a time when I stop being a pain in the ass constantly talking about Sam Drake? Probably not. But in itself, I love to analyze the construction of the characters and their psychology, and Sam was not going to be less.

We agree that Sam’s behavior towards Nathan isn’t good, although none of the characters of Uncharted is characterized by doing things always right. And that’s what gives the richness to the game, they all are good and bad according to the spectrum in which you look, what makes you doubt even what is “good” and what is “bad”. This interests me a lot, so I’ve tried to apply to each character the criteria of the alignment charts, finding that, as round characters they are, they change a lot throughout the franchise - Nate is a great example of that. But hey, we were talking about Samuel Drake!

Samuel Drake hasn’t undergone such a drastic evolution yet, since, for me, he’s in the first stadium in which Nate was when we met him in Drake’s Fortune; he’s a chaotic neutral. We all can agree Samuel is a chaotic character, he’s not interested and does not get any benefit being lawful, so he would not even contemplate the option of being true neutral. Total chaos, ladies and gentleman.

Although I don’t see him especially interested in doing evil, he isn’t interested in doing good either; he is simply interested in his purposes and anything which directly affects him, which is only his brother. We are talking about someone who only has himself and his brother, who after living in first person a multitude of tragedies it could be logical he doesn’t give a shit what good or bad happens in the world, while he can continue enjoying life as I had not managed to do until that moment.

His actions can be considered ‘good’ from his perspective and Nate’s, if he would have agreed with his purpose in the beginning without being manipulated (since, in itself, there is nothing wrong with wanting to honor your mother’s legacy), but it is also considered 'bad’ because of the negative consequences that led to, just to mention they’ve kill hundreds of people, even in self-defense, including Rafe. And, of course, at the end of the day their mother’s legacy doesn’t stop being a selfish motive.

I also have to say that, precisely because Sam doesn’t enjoy doing evil unless there is no other way (I think he could agree to the motto “ the end justifies the means”), has a moment of redemption at the end of the game, when he doesn’t mind dying as long as his brother is still alive. Also in The Lost Legacy we can see how he begins to change his thinking when seeing that Chloe decides to leave to chase for the train carrying the bomb, he tells Nadine he thinks Chloe is right - I think Nadine, in fact, it’s true neutral.

In short, as a chaotic neutral Sam’s interests are his own, but paradoxically these interests are not for him but for his brother - Sam wouldn't do anything that just benefits him and hurts his brother intentionally, but he could be wrong as he was and later realize Avery’s treasure could have ended with Nate, which is why he asks him  to leave at the end.

Sam wants good for him and those who he cares about, and eventually, I think he will evolve towards a more open sense for the good of the world. Nate was a chaotic neutral at first, becoming a chaotic good and then, perhaps, he has become a neutral good along with Elena. We also see Chloe evolving in The Lost Legacy as a chaotic good (“I’m tired of walking away”), and Sully … Sully maybe is the only one who truly stays as a chaotic neutral.

But, in any case, although Sam hurries all kinds of plans to get away with it, it is always on the basis that he adores his baby brother. But that is already for another post ;)

[a-jynx]

Lost in the Heart & at Sea;  Prologue: More Male-ish

Summary: Sam and Nathan Drake finds themselves running in circles when they catch wind of a new treasure that was supposedly lost to the sea; the Diamond of the Pacific, a ring that was meant for Captain Jules wife. With enemies at every corner, they’ll need all the help they can get... Including, inside jobs. How will Sam and Nathan react when they figure out who Y/N really is? How will Sam react when she shows him sides of her no one else has seen? 

Pairing: Sam Drake x reader; mentions Nathan Drake, Elena Fisher, Victor Sullivan, Nadine Ross, Rafe Adler, 

Warnings: Cursing, blood/violence, gun violence, implied smut, angst, testing fate/loyalty, major injury, 

Notes: This is the first Uncharted Series I have ever attempted, so, I apologize now if it turns out horrible :) I’ve taken a strong liking to the Drake boys once again, and I don’t plan on seizing up hopefully! However, I will still take request for SPN, and other shows/video games! Send an Ask and you’ll be added to my drafts to be written! :) 💖

Enjoy! Feedback is appreciated! 

“Do you remember what you’re being paid for, Y/N?” Nadine whispered as I took a slow sip of champagne, smacking my lips together before glancing at her. “Of course, Nadine. You protect Mr. Adler, I protect the cross. Simple as that.” I tugged at my bottom lip as she nodded, seeming pleased I hadn’t forgotten such a simple assignment -- then, again, it seems she was used to losing artifacts. I finished my glass before hunting down another server, replacing my empty glass with a filled one, I noticed that Mr. Adler was whispering to Nadine, who quickly nodded her head for me to come over. 

“Yes, boss?” I murmured against the glass as Rafe took a second glance at me, his brows furrowing as he took in my appearance, then my outfit. Nadine and I both decided that a dress would’ve been too problematic, for either of us, so I opted for a simple pale black suit that barely showed off my... Assets while Nadine took the sleek emerald jumpsuit. “Who’re you, again?” Mr. Adler asked, waving one of his ringed fingers towards me as I cocked a brow, straightening my back in the process. “Y/N L/N, sir. I work as Ms. Ross’s right hand with anything she’s assigned too. I’m also a translator, guns maid, and bruiser if and when needed, sir.” I listed some of my qualities as Mr. Adler nodded, seeming impressed as he turned back towards Nadine, who wore a proud looking smile. “This is the GIRL you promised, correct?” 

“That’s right. Y/N and I decided that if a fight were to break out, or... The competition was to arrive, she would defend the cross while I protected you. She also decided to add a bit to the role, and it turned out to be more... Male-ish than we planned.” Nadine smirked as Rafe nodded, seeming pleased with the work we had put together earlier that day. I smirked as I thought about how I probably looked -- a young, light-hearted soul who just wanted to bet all of their lunch money on the best treasure this auction could give! My body covered in fine silk while my thick hair was slicked back into a loose bun. Yeah. I look more man-ish than woman-ish. Suddenly, Rafe turned and narrowed his eyes before grabbing Nadine’s bicep, causing her to snap her head towards him before following his gaze, to which I did the same. 

“Victor Sullivan... Shouldn’t he be in a retirement home somewhere?” Rafe hissed before taking a gulp of champagne and moving towards the older gentlemen. I frowned, not recognizing the name as I stepped over to Nadine, she side-glanced me. “Who?” 

“Victor “Sully” Sullivan, he’s one of Nathan Drake’s... Friends, per se. And believe me, if Sullivan is here, Drake isn’t far behind.” She sighed before moving towards the men as I stood back, watching with narrowed eyes. Nathan Drake... Now, that name is familiar. Readjusting my bowtie, I quickly moved towards the small crowd of treasure hunters before stopping next to Nadine, who sent me a smirk as Sullivan took a glance at me. 

“Hello, I don’t believe we’ve met,” he paused, taking a drag of his cigar before holding out his hand, blowing out the thick smog from his lips. “Victor Sullivan,” I grabbed his hand, flexing it somewhat before giving it a firm shake. “Adam L/N,” I grumbled, wanting to keep the male cover that I had established. Nadine gave me a quick glance as I dropped his hand, I shot her one back as she smirked lightly. Suddenly, glass crashed to the floor in front of us, causing Nadine and me to grow wide-eyed before glancing to Mr. Adler, who now stood with his index finger jabbed into Victor’s chest, yet he seemed unfazed. 

“Get in my way, I might just have to kill you.” Rafe spat, the clear anger causing me to frown before glancing towards the stage as Nadine frowned at Rafe. “The auction will begin shortly.” A woman’s voice echoed through the fancy stage, making Rafe back off of Victor some as Nadine and he moved to the other side of the room, mingling as they went. 

“You’re not going with them?” Victor asked, causing me to glance at him, shrugging gently as I scoffed. “I’m not their dog. They can mingle while I stick around to get drunk.” I chuckled deeply, attempting to keep the gravel in my voice as Victor gave me a glance, up and down, up and down before nodding in approval. “Yeah, don’t I know that feeling.” He laughs lightly, taking another drag as I gently sighed before excusing myself and moving towards the stage. The plan was simple. Rafe would bet the highest bet, and get the cross, that was it. All Nadine and I had to do were make sure nothing happened to him, nor the cross -- simple as pie. Well, until someone shut down the lights. 

I heard the clatter of one of the server’s platters, making me growl and flinch as the emergency lights snapped off. The woman was trying to calm the people as I glanced over to Nadine and Rafe, I noticed Rafe was having a fit. Turning back to the stage, I went wide-eyed; the cross was gone. 

“Dammit.” I sighed before glancing around the room, suddenly noting that one of the doors were cracked open. Setting my jaw, I quickly ran towards it before stopping as I picked up one of the thick black bowties that the server’s had been wearing. Glancing up, I quickly took down the hallway before taking down the long hallway. I slowed to a halt when I noticed that the study quarters had been forced into; the door smashed and splinters everywhere. Narrowing my eyes, I stepped through the mess of wood, frowning as I noticed one of the large windows were open. “You’re not getting away that easy,” I growled, moving towards the window, only to hear the floorboards creak in agony behind me. Glancing over my shoulder, I hissed as I dove back from a large globe that had barely missed my face. Stumbling back, I clenched my fist as I noticed it was one of the more... Attractive waiters; I hadn’t caught his name. 

“Well, well, well, I see someone wants Avery’s cross... How bad are you willing to get hurt for it?” The man hissed as he sat the cross on the shelving, making me smirk. Rolling my tongue over my lips, I moved towards him, quickly throwing a left hook and sweeping my leg under his own before whirling around and proudly smirking as he groaned. 

“Don’t know. Depends on how well you know how to fight.” I spat, reaching up to grab the cross, only to be brought back as the man’s arms wrapped tightly around my chest, making me groan from the pressure on my breast. He suddenly dropped me, confused. He went to say something, but I quickly swiped my leg under his once more, only to stand and yank my Beretta from the pocket inside my blazer. “Alright, now, stay down...” I spat, keeping my gun trained on him before reaching up and grabbing the cross. Flexing my hand around it, I smirked before slowly backing up towards the door. 

“Y’know, they’ll just use you then throw you away right!” He shouted after me, causing me to halt in my actions as I glanced over my shoulder, seeing him slowly stand with the help of the large oak desk. I snarled, lifting my gun higher as I kept the cross tight in my grip. “What did you say?” 

“I said, they’ll just use you then throw you away -- throw you right to the sharks if you will. You can’t trust them,” 

“Oh, and I’m supposed to trust you? You’re a thief!” I spat, my hot-headed nature quickly peering through. I took a step back as he moved forward, keeping his hands in front of him, showing he was no threat but... But, I knew better. “I’m not the one holding the goods, right now, am I?” He smirked as I scoffed, my grip on my gun faltering some as I took another step back, not wanting to test the waters too much. “God, you think this is some... Game, don’t you? You’re nothing but a small child.” 

“I could say the same about you, my friend.” 

“I’m not your friend.” 

“Sure you are, just tell me your name and we’ll be the best of buddies. Braid each other’s hair even!” The man laughed as I narrowed my eyes. He really believes that he’ll walk out of here alive with these lame lines. I scoffed, rolling my eyes slightly as I shook my head, some of my hair falling into my eyes. “All you need to know is this, my friend,” I paused, hissing the same words he said before. “If I see you again, I won’t hesitate to shoot.” 

“Noted. Now, can I have my cross back-” 

“Y/N?! Y/N, did you find the- Sam?” Nadine skidded to a stop, whipping out her gun as the man before me, Sam, quickly held up his hands again. “I take it you know him.” I slowly drop my gun, keeping it my grasp as I showed the cross to Nadine. “I thought he was dead.” 

“What can I say... I’m full of surprises.” He winked as I narrowed my eyes, making Nadine glance at me before turning back to Sam with a smirk. “So, where’s your little brother, Samuel? Lost among the rooftops?” 

“How am I supposed to know that, huh, Nadine? But, I would love to be properly introduced to your friend here -- he seems like a great guy.” He smirked as Nadine frowned, glancing at me as I pursed my lips, he was starting to pop off smart remarks and it had my blood boiling. “Adam. Adam L/N.” I spat as Nadine turned towards me, holding a questioning look in her eyes as I shrugged her off. 

“Well, Adam, Nadine... I’d love to stay a bit longer but I’ve really gotta bounce out of here.” He sighed, showing as if he were really upset to be leaving. I stood a bit straighter as he smirked, making me grow wide-eyed as I glanced back, only to be slammed in the back of the head by a heavy force, my vision instantly going black... 

To be continued... 

Well, that’s the first chapter of my new Uncharted series... I honestly like how this chapter went, but it’s a bit short. However, I’ll hopefully make ch. 2 longer, but I really hope this does well because I have plans for it :)  But, if it does end up flopping, I guess I could separate write the scenes I have thought about then make those drabbles/one-shots 🤔 

Anyway, let me know what you guys think! Feedback is appreciated! 

Tags are open, as well as requests! 💖

[chloe-gayzer]

chlodine 26 and 33!pls!

26) How do their friends feel about their relationship? Their families?

Alright so for Chloe's side, it's all her found family and friends. That includes Nate, Elena, Charlie, and Sully. I'm not counting Sam because, while he's a friend, she hasn't known him anywhere near as long.

But Nate was definitely... Nervous, when he first found out. But I also think he wouldn't do anything stupid about it. Not in his traditional sense, at least. Because while I think Nate is a huge idiot, he at least tried to form a sort of truce with Nadine in 4. I think seeing her with Chloe would be a weird emotion for him for a few reasons. For one, he's only seen Nadine's anger and militaristic approaches. Sully might've told him more, since he knows Nadine better, but that's not much. But I think he'd also have heard Chloe before being told who her new partner and heard her absolutely ecstatic about it all. Talking about how much she enjoys the relationship and whatnot. So learning it's Nadine is a bit of a shock to him, but he knows she would never let Chloe get hurt.

Elena would prrrobably just be super happy for Chloe. Nadine is a catch and she knows that. Chloe also talks to her more often than Nate so she hears all about the romantic crap Nadine does for Chloe. Hell, she’s probably a little envious from time to time.

Charlie is happy for Chloe! And completely unsurprised it’s a woman who got Chloe to settle. Sully is the same way.

Nadine’s family is basically just her dad. Thato Ross. And he loves Chloe! He thinks she’s a good match for Nadine and enjoys when the two visit him. Immediately decides Chloe would be a great wife for NAdine (he’s right).33) What kind of presents do they get each other? Do they only do it on special occasions?

I feel like Chloe has absolutely no self-control when she sees something she thinks Nadine might like. It’s why there’s a stuffed animal rhino that’s big enough to lay on in their apartment. It’s also really soft. It’s also why there’s an entire bookshelf of animal-themed books in their living room. Everything from “Amazing Animal Facts” to “Dinosaurs: The Most Complete and Up to Date Encylopedia”.

Nadine, on the other hand, has more self-control. She’ll get gifts, but it’s a good deal rarer than Chloe getting her gifts. Her’s are more thought out than spur-of-the-moment. She knows while Chloe enjoys physical items, she’s a big fan of experiences so she might find something for them to do together, or if she gets the courage up for it, she might buy lingerie (for Chloe, or for herself for Chloe to enjoy). She will buy books though! She gets Chloe all sorts of history and anthropology books. She genuinely enjoyed watching Chloe take a pen to a Hoysala book and mark exactly what was wrong, a western idea from a biased anthropologist, or that was from a completely different culture.

[kingkirkwall]

feelings about Samuel Drake: in this essay i will -

It's very hard for me to reconcile the warring feelings I have about Sam, especially considering some beautiful moments during Uncharted: Lost Legacy. I adore many of the moments I had the priveledge of experiencing when Sam was introduced to the Uncharted story.

It’s quite difficult to integrate a character so “late” into the story - especially one that was already surviving quite well without his existence! Amy (and I’m sure many more Naughty Dog creators responsible for writing Sam) did a fantastic job with ensuring that his character wasn’t paper thin - they managed to make him into a surprisingly complex person, and one that I cannot sift down into an easy-to-understand motivations. (Does that suggest they had ideas about him long before development of U4 started?)

This is probably one of those uh yeah water is wet moments, but I am a bit amazed at the complications that come along with adding such a complex character like Sam to the Uncharted story. I know that part of the problem is that Sam didn’t exist before U4, so integration would have always been difficult, but I have So Many Questions.

I find that I hold fury within myself when I think about his character.

It begins with the fact this: After Rafe helped Sam get out of prison, there is a 0% chance that Sam did not track Nathan down the first opportunity he got.

Why didn’t Sam reunite with Nathan immediately?

Why did he come up with the Alcázar story when he did choose to reunite with Nathan?

I can only make attempts to rationalize these questions into a few answers: (which in the end always lead to more questions)

1. Sam found out that Nathan got married, and was retired from the adventurous life in a white picket fence happily ever after

How did he react to this? Was he happy for Nathan? Sad that he missed it?

Did he decide that Nathan was better off without him?

Did he decide he didn’t want to cause any trouble for his brother’s current life by turning up alive?

He also discovered that Nathan’s life without him had been full of adventure that he missed out on - along with the fame of being The Nathan Drake who found the lost cities and treasure on these adventures.

“I called some of the old contacts... they tell me some pretty crazy-ass stories.” - Sam Drake

How did he react when people told him about everything his brother had lived through?

Did Sam feel cheated, like his chance at having a life like Nathan's had been stolen from him when he was imprisoned?

Was he jealous of the life Nathan had built in his absence?

“‘Nathan Drake is a legend.’ You know, I shot the man who told me that.” - Rafe Adler

In a Game Informer interview, Troy baker described some of the issues that Sam struggled with in U4:

"...There’s circumstances that happen in our life that sometimes you’ve defined your life by the best or worst moment in your life, and you’ve never quite moved on from that. But then the other people in your life have....Sam has never really quite moved on, but Nate has. And he’s found Elena, he’s found Sully, he’s found his calling...”

He goes on to describe the jealousy he knows that Sam struggled with specifically in regards to Nathan:

“...There’s something that happens when you see that younger brother that’s just a little bit more charming than you, just a little bit better-looking than you, is a little bit more talented than you; can run faster, easier, jump higher, better: I think that’s Nate. I think Sam, before Nate - he was the golden child, he was good, he had it down. And then up comes this thing that surpasses him....In reality, anything that Sam can do, Nate can do better. But I don’t think Sam would ever acknowledge that.”

Jealousy or not, we know Sam believes that he and Nathan were destined for greatness.

“Nathan, we were meant for this. And I promise... You and me together? We're gonna go far.” - Sam Drake

Was he still holding on to a younger man's desperate promise that he made to his little brother to carve a place into the world for them to belong to?

Did he feel like Nathan had trapped himself into monotony when he retired and settled down? (And that he was freeing Nathan from a passionless life?)

Was it because he knew that so much of Nathan's amazing life had already slipped through his fingers?

Was he afraid he had missed out on getting to see his little brother grow up?

Was he afraid that if he had just asked him to come with him, Nathan would say no?

2. Whatever the root of his motivations, Sam obviously decided that it was a necessary evil to lure Nathan away from his current situation, and he knew that the Alcázar story would work. When Rafe pays Nathan the courtesy of unravelling Sam’s lies, he reveals that Sam had been free for the last 2-3 years, and implies that a majority of that time was spent working with Rafe trying to find the Gunsway treasure.

“He spent the last two years tracking down the second St. Dismas Cross. And you know what? He did it all with me.” - Rafe Adler

Again, why did Sam wait three years to tell Nathan he was alive?

What made him change his mind about allowing Nathan to continue to believe that he was dead?

Did he get bored with working with Rafe, strong in his belief that it was his and Nathan’s destiny to find the treasure together?

(Regarding some of the nice moments we see in U:LL, specifically the opportunity of seeing a bit more development in Sam's character since we saw him last at the end of U:4 : Obviously, Sam and Nadine have a pretty hateful relationship towards each other for the majority of the game. (And they have every reason to.) However, Nadine chose to swim back down with a brick to break open Sam's handcuffs so he wouldn't drown. Sam chose to pull Nadine away from the spray of Orca's bullets. They both chose to accompany Chloe to stop Asav's bomb.

These examples of undeniable character development are written in such an interesting blink-and-you'll-miss-it kind of way. You could argue that even though Sam and Nadine hated each other in U:LL, they wouldn't have really let themselves allow the other to die in cold blood, however:

Nadine threw Nathan out of the office window at the Rossi estate in U:4, and if Nathan wasn't literally made out of luck he would be dead

If Nathan had not pulled Sam's arm away, Sam would have killed Nadine

Not to mention many of the other times the brothers Drake and Nadine Ross could and would have killed each other trading blows and bullets during U:4

3. In the flashbacks to Nathan’s childhood, we see undeniable older sibling hero-worship that Nathan has for Sam, even in spite of his knowledge of Sam’s shady activities and his frustration at being left behind while Sam is out of the orphanage. It’s likely that even after Sam’s apparent death, this hero-worship lived on within him.

When exploring Nathan’s office early in U:4, we have the opportunity to see a tiny glimpse of the depth of emotion that Nathan carries with him associated with his brother. Nathan can’t even make himself look at the photograph. We as the audience will only get to experience the weight of Nathan’s grief in this brief moment during a second playthrough (and in the intimate moment of them taking the photo in the first place)

Nathan kept the picture, and has had it the whole time

What did he do every year on the anniversary of Sam’s death? Or on Sam’s birthday?

Did Nathan’s survivor’s guilt cause him permanent damage? (Also, does he suffer any forms of post-traumatic stress?)

Did Elena figure out that he was grieving, or at least come to terms that he had a secret he was keeping from her?

Did she learn to leave him alone with it?

Did they ever fight about it?

Did she ever forgive him for not telling her?

Sam’s most defining characteristic is his love for Nathan.

The core of the fury that I hold for Sam is kindled with the knowledge that he sat down and decided to build the lie he was going to tell his brother. He knew he could achieve it, he knew that Nathan would believe him, and he knew that even after being dead and gone form Nathan’s life for fifteen years, he knew he still had power over him, enough that it wouldn't even occur to Nathan that Sam could be lying to him.

How can someone rationalize this to be anything but deliberate cruelty?

In the same Game Informer interview mentioned above, Nolan North describes Nathan’s feelings about reuniting with Sam during U:4 :

“Sam is a mysterious part of his past. He thought he lost his brother. He doesn’t know, so now for [Sam] to show up, it’s almost like seeing a ghost. First there’s that mistrust, but then it warms up and it’s - I think, for a time, it’s his chance at redemption; his chance to get Big Brother back - family. The true theme through all these games is the idea that, of family, and his, you know, he’s made his family. He’s been doing his life for so long, he’s gotten settled into his life with Elena, and when you throw something into the mix after so many years, and [Sam’s] back, it’s heart-wrenching. They didn’t part under bad circumstances. They just parted.” 

Did Sam take the time to think about what would happen if Nathan eventually found out he was lying, and the irreparable damage it could do to their already fragile relationship?

Once he realized that Nathan planned on lying to Elena, he appeared to be perfectly fine with not interfering with that plan (at least until she was standing in their hotel room). Did Sam seriously consider the consequences of allowing Nathan to believe that Alcázar was still a threat?

“I left my life for you!” - Nathan Drake

I’m not going to blame Sam for almost ruining Nathan’s marriage: In allowing Nathan to think Alcázar was a real threat to his life, I’m sure Sam wasn’t helping, but deliberately lying to Elena about what he was doing and how much danger he was in was Nathan’s own mistake.

In Conclusion: I think Sam’s character is fantastic and he makes me so angry because I understand that it’s likely I will never get answers to a lot of these questions. C’est, also some ending thoughts:

Why do Sam and Sully have such a negative relationship to each other when they meet for the first time again in U4?

Where the hell was Sam during the time that Nathan spent in Cartagena, when he met Sully? Does his absence imply that they parted ways for a while on purpose? When did they start working together again?

How does Sam feel about the paternal relationship Nathan has with Sully?

How did Sam convince himself to lie to Nathan? How did he twist himself into someone who could?

Let’s be real about this: It wasn’t just one lie. It was Many Big Lies that had to be deliberately placed in order to sell the (un)appealing narrative. This is different than lying to a mark or a contact, this is Sam lying to his little brother, arguably the only living person Sam has ever loved. How could he do something like that? He can’t possibly be as much of an idiot to think that this line of action wouldn’t have serious consequences?

Was it worth it?

[unchartedblogposts]

Now with Sam and Nadine, it's funny how I seemingly keep getting harassed about my opinion about Nadine's sexuality. They have their opinion and I have mines. And fetishstation? Look, people have weird fetishes, I don't know if I have one. But in my novel, you will see some sorts. Whatever... When a woman is involved with a man sexually, even though she is involved with another woman (either sexually or not) that makes her a bisexual. Even with a lesbian (Ellie) decides to earn a living, her goal is rob someone who stole her money- she lays up with him, that makes her now a bisexual, even though she remains mentally hating men and their ways. Nadine goes both ways. Majority of her partners, whatever is was sexually or not- were male. You have to listen to the conversations that Chloe and Nadine had. First of all, I love the non-canon pairing. It's not all about two people of the same race anymore, there are different colors of love. We don't have to be bound by one race. Nadine is a good example. If she wants a man of any color, especially if he got that big money, she is coming after you. I haven't seen one White Female came up and challenged her. And you can't say Chloe. She is not really focused more than Nadine. She is currently retaining her sexual energy. She has already dealt with his brother. I'm not saying Sam is above willing to pursue that chance- his mindset majority changed since he got out, but his focus is on Nadine Ross. They can deny it, but you can't argue or debate with fans that are not OG Uncharted fans. Plain and simple. They clearly haven't watched the gameplay or played Uncharted 2. If you don't get pairing of Sam and Nadine, then you should of stopped at Uncharted 2, sell everything related to the rest of the Uncharted- yes, even Lost Legacy! I can show you a presentation and they will still say,

"NUH-UH, NUH-UH -- IT'S NOT POSSIBLE! I WON'T BELIEVE IT!"

Nathan, Chloe, Harry. - Uncharted 2

Sam, Nadine, Rafe. - Uncharted 4

Nathan and Elena - Uncharted

Sam and Nadine - Uncharted 4.5: Lost Legacy

Like it or not, it's bound to happen. Even as I write it. Even if it don't, I could see a very strong friendship and partnership, even Orca said himself before Nadine shot him dead. Not friendship, but partnership. His focus is Nadine, her next victim is Sam. You remember when they was in Madagascar? Sully and Nate was having a conversation, when they was complentating of promising Nadine a cut of the treasure- and Sully ended that convo. She likes her money upfront, AND YOU THINK SAM WASN'T LISTENING?! It took me three or four times watching it, the last chapter, Chapter 22- A Thief's End -- the next thing you know, he's speeding off in a boat, full of treasure. I started looking into it- the third or fourth time- after Jameson sold off the company to Nate and Elena and she gave him a golden coin, and there was a lot more. How did that happen? There may not be an actual theory of how that happened. But I made my own. Nadine knows he has that power, that money. And she is coming after him, he knows that. And you think Chloe didn't have a part in this? Of course she did. Whatever she was conversating with Chloe, she was relying information to Sam, every chance she got. By time they got closer to him, he was in position. He knew. But Nadine started catching on. She also knew but she kept moving forward. Nate was the ringleader in this, Sam was on board, and Chloe was the to execute the plan. In Lost Legacy, in order for them to set their plans on each other, set traps on each other, get what they want- they had to control their anger and get on their good sides. Chloe was the one that got the process moving quicker. You got to pay attention to symbolism. Chloe brought them even more closer together. But Nadine had a trick for her, Chloe didn't know that she would fall in love also. It was too late by then. Sam had already won. A very competitive person. His plan went into the final phase when his eyes were set on Nadine as soon he got out. Whatever he did, she was on board. I don't get why they are denying it, they probably already had sex! And not just one time in a single day! Two years, come on- it is not like he was holding out for that special person. (That is not true, but think about) Sam gives me Major Don Juan energy, more experience than his brother, Nate is just a rank lower, regardless how much he got some while Sam was in jail. By looking at their past, viewing all the gameplay, they were wild, fucking animals. When I theorize, I don't like to go that deep into their previous and current lifestyle. He's been doing good the majority of that time in jail. Idk. Outside connections are beneficial. Life happens. When you take that sexual power away from someone like him, it changes you. You think of all the wrong shit you done and learn to control your sexual energy. I can't tell you too much of what he has been though while in jail, I want to reveal that in my third installment of my version of Uncharted series. He's been holding it in. Most likely... She also gives me Female Fatale vibes. You ever hear the stories of a very powerful man being brought to his knees by a very powerful woman? But yet, she is bound to him. And Chloe even gave you a clue of how they would impact everyone around them, "like a house on fire". When I hear that, even if it was two male friends- it scares me. Are they planning to burn the whole city down or something? They are right about something about Chloe and Nadine, but these two have a secret that no one knows. I'm beginning to think Sam Drake has a experience in the military field. It's what they have in common. Might not been in the service for as long as Nadine, but gained enough, massive knowledge than a average militant. He served a couple of years, similar to Sully. I CANT say what happened... And they was showing to you guys. I'm telling you when and how, even if you ask one of your family members that served in the military, they won't tell you all. There are secret signs of communication.

[vaguely-concerned]

UNCHARTED THE LOST LEGACY REACTIONS

- fsaldfsldfsdljfsaj It’s. So. Gay!!!!! Holy shit!!! Like at several points my sister — less prone to picking up on these things than I am — turned to me and went “So they’re in love, right? They’re ending up together?” and I just squeaked and waved helplessly at the screen because… what other explanation can there possibly be at this point. Every time they touch each other’s shoulders or reach out to steady each other my soul leaves my body etc

I hope the end of the elephant scene is foreshadowing that there’ll be a trilogy and they’ll get together and adopt a kid and gore anyone who tries to mess with them (Chloe is already That Mom taking pictures of every damn thing, it’s written in the stars)

- tfw Nadine starts calling Chloe by her first name *promptly dies, happily*

- We are so completely two for two on picking the games that perfectly suit my tastes because Uncharted 3 is a parental substitute/father figure story and The Lost Legacy is a partners becoming Partners falling in love story and those are literally my two most aching narrative weaknesses

- I LOVE that Nadine is That Animal Nerd Girl from your class (“Monkies!”), except also a stone cold killing machine when she needs to be. I wonder if we got to know more about her relationship with her dad in U4? Because from her assumptions around Chloe’s father it sounds like she really loved him, making it all the more painful that she feels like she ‘lost’ his life’s work on her watch :(

- The fact that Nadine took approximately two hours to go from ‘who the hell is this hothead madwoman trying to get us both killed’ to completely charmed by Chloe’s whole being is… truly amazing, inspiring, I feel the warmth of the Iris flowing through me

- Chloe’s weird-ass expressions are everything. Her face moves like… three times as much as it needs to and it’s glorious. At first I thought it was the facial animations in general that were a little off but then they introduced other characters and no — no, they all look very plausible, it’s just Chloe’s features being made of rubber lol. (I actually found some of Asav’s animations to almost be too realistic, to the point of being creepy. Also just b/c he’s a creep)

- I was sort of afraid that I wouldn’t like Sam, but as it turns out… he’s a useless piece of shit disgrace to humanity and a sleazy catastrophe of a person and it’s the funniest shit I’ve seen in my life ha ha, I have accepted him and whatever the hell it is he thinks he’s wearing. I can’t BELIEVE Nate is the responsible, more well-functioning brother, what the fuck

(also the people around Nate crime-babysitting his brother now that he’s out of the business is HILARIOUS, I hope they stay true to this direction of comic relief)

- The contrast of Chloe’s father losing himself to the obsession… while Chloe is here to save a friend… and ends up saving a whole C I T Y while simultaneously being saved by/saving her future wife… I cri

- One thing that is so great about Naughty Dog games is the way they subtly carry themes of interconnectedness and co-operation —  the main characters are very seldom alone and when they are it’s to set up the contrast to when you’re with the companion characters, to make you really appreciate the desolation. It makes the characters feel so alive and real that they need each other and interact among themselves as well as the environment.  

(actually I’m also playing The Last Of Us right now and istg Joel’s intention to not get attached lasted all of, like… half a day, well done buddy)

(It’s also good fodder for characterization — contrast Chloe’s repeated refusal to accept Nadine’s help until they get closer to Nate, who is his own weird squirrely collection of abandonment issues and emotional repression but relies on his friends, even clearly expecting Sully and Elena to be there when he reaches out for them… wait no… I am now very emotional… I’m so glad Nadine and Chloe are partners, may they have many years of saving each other’s beautiful butts and helping each other through character development)

- “I looked it up on Wikipedia. Like a normal person” dfahfkdhasklashd I love her so much

- Chloe is such a great character; this cynical, sarcastic, caring mess of a woman has a special place in my heart. There are some scenes where you can practically hear her run screaming to get away from her own feelings and that is very hashtag relatable, and despite her reputation as a backstabber she DOES come back to save her friends time and time again. (Nadine having to drag her out of the train carriage with Asav because even two hundred meters away from plunging to her doom she HAD to get a final sarcastic, thematically appropriate jab in was  e x q u i s i t e )

The scene where Nadine has left and she’s making her way on foot messed me up because she doesn’t even seem hurt, just quietly resigned, like ‘well what did I expect’, thank GOD these girls are so in love that their estrangement lasted all of half an hour and ended in saving an elephant

- The game mechanics are so much better in this one! I even accept the vehicle parts, even though driving in video games is literally my primordial enemy and I usually hate it with my every cell. Being able to actually take out a whole area with stealth was a godsend and surprisingly fun, because the gun fights can be the least inspired parts of this series sometimes

BTW both Chloe and Nate have one particular stealth attack that always makes me laugh my ass off where they jump up on someone like a little monkey from behind and snap their neck and it’s weirdly cute. You don’t even have to be in real stealth, it’s enough to melee a dude from behind when *he*, specifically, didn’t see you coming, so like in the middle of a roaring gun battle you can jump up like ‘maHA’ and do it, adorable  

- This game made me realize just how little I actually know about hinduism. Welp time to read up on it enough to not be a complete idiot ha ha

[compassicn-blog]

rumors. fame. scandal. sex. revolution. cake. the baroque atmosphere of versailles is a staple to the way the wealthy and the well-bred live their lives. parties, big hair, luxurious gowns and feasts for days. no one can deny that those in france are living the life they were born to live. and those weren’t blessed enough to be born in france, travel to versailles to get a taste of just how much sweeter the french life can be.

the tag for this verse is gv. ( rumors cake and revolution )

this is based in france in 1778 !! if you’re having some trouble picturing what france at this time looks like i’d suggest taking a look at the movie/trailer/edits of: marie antoinette (2006) !

your character does not have to be from france, they just need to currently be in france, but of course flashbacks are more than welcome and those can take place anywhere !!

your character needs to have a purpose for being in versailles. they coule be french royalty, a guest of the french royalty ( which would mean they are of some noble or royal standing from a different country ) or some sort of french nobility. you are also welcome to apply for staff or other positions like a personal guard, a war general, etc.

your characters name might need to be adjusted slightly in order to fit their status or where they are from. for example my character elena gilbert would become something like elena gabrielli if i wanted to make her italian.

of course french monarchy positions are welcome but it’s pretty much first come first serve so there will only be one queen and one king of france. though you could definitely join as a princess, duchess, prince, duke or any other noble position from france.

i know the titles can be quite difficult to figure out, especially since some websites are contradictory in what they describe so if you have any questions feel free to ask me and we can figure it out together.

everyone in this verse needs to be human !! a few face claim repeats ( for twins ) is okay but it has to be approved by whoever applies for that face first.

activity checks will be done like every 2 weeks or so ! so please be active in the tag whenever you can !

within the first few days of joining please post a brief biography about your character ! this is very important ! even just bullet points is fine.

oc’s and mutli muses are more than welcome. we do not have to be mutuals.

i will most likely cap the ladies and gents at 20 each, depending on how many apps come in !!

♔ to join.

please message / IM or submit the following information to me ( @compassicn ) :

        ( 1 ) character name, age, face claim.         ( 2 ) characters title/occupation & country of origin.         ( 3 ) url, mun name & age.         ( 4 ) skype username if you would like to be added to a group chat.

♔ the members.

daughter of the duc de dauphiné, elena gibeault, 20, nina dobrev. ( @compassicn​ / nicole, 24 )

duchess of scotland, bella swan, 18, kristen stewart. ( @freesiaveined / hales, 23 )

daughter of the earl and countess of ireland, lady in waiting, cheryl blossom, 17, madelaine petsch. ( @fatalfemmed / hales, 23 )

prince of france, pierre (last name adjustable according to monarchy), 33, richard speight jr. ( @lostcne / ethan, 19 )

noble woman of france, beauty, 17, young natalie portman. ( @youriinquisitorialness / rachel, 25 ) 

daughter of baron maurice of france, belle petit, 18, emma watson. ( @lowkeyfurrie / nadine, 23 )

[theclarkystuff-blog]

Uncharted 4 : A Thief's End

When I got my first PS3 in 2009,  Uncharted:Drake’s Fortune would be one of the first games I bought for the system which was being championed as one of the best games the PS3 had going for it at the time. While I found it to be an enjoyable Indiana Jones or Tomb Raider style affair it had a number of faults ranging from too many bland shoot outs, bullet sponge enemies terrible six axis controls for throwing grenades and inconsistent performance.Uncharted 2 and 3 would go on to fix many of the problems UC1 suffered from while displaying much better visuals, level designs, combat and overall polish, Naughty Dog,  who already had much critical acclaim already with the Crash Bandicoot and Jax & Daxter series was steadily rising up to become one of the greatest game studios in the industry before the time it released it’s PS3 swan song and later PS4 remaster, The Last Of US, it’s masterpiece written and directed by Neil Druckmann alongside Bruce Straley (director), both of whom had worked on previous Uncharted games in various roles. By the time Naughty Dog would get around to making its first real game with the PS4 specs in mind it would turn out to be a different affair not only in hardware  but in which series creator Amy Hennig would have no input due to leaving the studio and development of Uncharted 4 completely changing after departure of it’s director, Justin Richmond, who had also directed previous entry Uncharted 3 : Drake’s Deception. Druckmann and Staley would direct the next entry with the writing being handled by Druckmann and Josh Scheer. 

Getting straight into this game we get an opening very similar to that of Uncharted 2, being thrown into the middle of chaos trying to overcome a hugely dangerous situation to then be thrown to the very start of this story, to find out how it is that Nathan Drake has ended up in this mess. As we are introduced into this entry we learn of two new things in Nathan Drake’s life, he had tied the knot with series front woman Elena Fisher, moving into a regular boring life of which he misses the adventure and excitement of old life, and the sudden re-introduction of his long lost brother, Sam Drake, a brother nobody has ever mentioned before in this series yet everybody seems to know now? Well okay. The big motivator in the plot we are giving is that Sam owes a debt to drug lord Hector Alcazar, a debt which can only seemingly be paid off with the treasure of infamous pirate Henry Avery, to which Nate is happy to throw away his 9 to 5 and lie to his wife to go to his life of monkeying around and dodging bullets. The start of the game seems to move somewhat at a slower rate compared to its predecessors, as we move between stories explaining what events lead to Sam Drake ending up in a Panamanian jail and that displaying what life Nate has at the present, which involves us doing his day job, going to the office, getting dinner and playing Crash Bandicoot on his old school PlayStation 1, while I can easily see an influence from The Last Of Us story telling I begin to wonder if this is appropriate for an Uncharted game, both games being very different from each other but lets roll along with the punches. 

The controls for the game are much the same as the have been for the previous games, using dual analogs to aim, d pad to change weapons, face buttons being used for jumping and climbing, hand to hand combat, activating items or pulling switches, we are introduced to a new mechanic early, for which mostly comes across as a hook shot, this which will allow Nate to swing off posts or branches, climb down safely to lower platforms or catch onto safety posts after a jump, this new item helps keep the game-play feel fresh. The direction this game seems to take is to avoid the familiar gunfights as much as possible get us to use stealth as much as possible during a heist at an illegal auction, an auction in which we will meet the true protagonists in this entry, Rafe Adler and Nadine Ross, the Drake brothers previous financier and a hired mercenary who are also both interested in finding Avery’s treasure first. The stealth mechanics in this game follow usual rules seen in other games which means avoid light, create distractions, tread carefully, limit noise, hiding in long grass,  it isn’t until Chapter 8 before the game starts to feel like a traditional Uncharted game again, bringing in a mix of its usual platforming which requires you to find a path around landscapes and close shave gun battles, although again at this point the game will try and push us to use stealth again, with some of its most open and biggest level designs in an Uncharted game a few handy mechanics are added which will allow you to highlight enemies to make them easier to spot as they move around on patrol. While many will probably be able to do this game without so much as leaving a hint of themselves behind I suck at this and have to resort to shooting out against various units, while I appreciate that the game can accustom to both styles of play and get away with it, I think now it maybe nice to go back into this game more experienced and try it without having to murder so many people so at least it lends itself well for being able have difference and various playthroughs, yet again another mechanic I noticed which seems to have been lifted and applied from The Last Of Us again.

Getting to the middle of the game I felt like the pacing of the game has been plod with run around quests it feels like which ends up leading us to maps of maps taking us to Scotland and Madagascar before reaching  Libertalia and New Devon, where the game feels like it gets a second wind and picks up pace, not that I am trying to write off all of the second act as bad but between levels which feel like they are padded with this huge level design and various vehicle sections which feel like they are only meant to keep us busy for a while, in-between some of these badly placed sections though are some great moments, such as climbing up the clock tower and the car chase really help make up for these moments, but the well crafted story and well delivered dialog by the cast help keep the game interesting, we are given a story which tries to focus on Nathan Drake as a human with a life and a future, rather than one of him being a superhero who goes around stealing, murdering, escaping deathtraps, charming women who happens to be the only good guy around when others are trying to steal cursed artifacts which may happen to be more deadly than valuable, we instead get given an Uncharted story that says in his fictional world maybe the relationships in which he has built are more valuable to him personally than discovering an ancient civilization or buried treasure, perhaps a train of thought that is spurred on as he progresses on this quest or perhaps with having Sam back in his life and realizes what he had missing in his life for the past 15 years. Towards this part in the game we are giving another mechanic and item to aid you in climbing, using this you can stab into certain climbable surfaces which in turn will allow Nate to pull himself up to another hand hole to progress his climb, while this yet again could be seen as another design to prolong the game I found this a welcome addition as yet again like the rope, it keeps the game fresh to the point I wish it was introduced sooner in the game so I could use it more, but I guess I cannot level a complaint at this mechanic as it does exist. 

In getting to the final act of this game I feel it is hitting its peak with a great use of familiar game-play, well designed levels to solve puzzles and platform in and story telling, I do happen to miss what I feel are normal ticks in the Uncharted series, no longer do we have a cursed treasure that brought down or helped raise an ancient civilization or the desire of group of explorers which turned out to hold some super natural power which required it to be hidden, instead we get a focus on character development and story with scenarios from previous Uncharted games feeling like they have are being revisted here again, with similar jungle settings and certain characters joining you again, reminding you of the growth these characters have gone through in how they handled a situation and how they handle them now,  yet again another quality which seems to have come from The Last Of US.  While the final battle with Rafe is a cool fight it feels disappointing we never get what I feel is a true battle with Nadine, the game builds her up to be a bad ass and for what you feel could be an interesting battle with her but are only given 2 short punch ups with her throughout the entire game, while we know she will take a leading role in the new Uncharted - Lost Frontier I feel there was a missed opportunity to shine a better light on this new character by giving a chance to show off her supposed full combat skills but I guess she will be better defined later on. The game ends on a nice note which leads up open to all kinds of possibilities with it hinting at new adventures with Sam and Sully or with a much younger and new protagonist, we know upcoming DLC turned full game entry Lost Legacy will expand on Nadine and  Chloe Frazer in their own adventure should help cement the idea that despite Nathan Drake’s adventuring days being behind him, the Uncharted series may go full steam ahead.

While I have a positive experience with Uncharted 4, feeling that it is a great entry into the series, better than Uncharted 3, I feel that this game lacks some of the polish that Uncharted 2 had. This game has a fantastic mix of old and new ideas but while I can see Naughty Dog must have been excited to escape from the limitations the PS3 has began to present them, some of this game feels like it has been made big for the sake of big rather than being a consistent and well paced package, while I am sure a lot of positive parts from this game will be recycled into upcoming titles in the series it leaves me in some comfort that ND have already confirmed that LL will be a much shorter game than UC4, in turn I hope it can be more focused. Art design in this game is perhaps some of the best I have seen in a game, with so much attention paid to how rooms are laid out, with pictures, furniture, plants, stone and various others painting a wonderful and lived in environment  and some fantastic lighting and water effects which beautifully illuminate areas with torch or sunlight or even reflect the world around it, I do feel a little bummed that despite there best efforts the game cannot hit 60 frames per second in single player, instead focusing on maintaining a full 1080p rendering resolution, while some people are of the opinion that the frame rate is usually tied to just visuals I have often found games running at 60fps tend to offer better input response or feedback, while this maintains a solid enough 30fps there are moments it may drop once and a while I have read on a PS4 Pro at the framerate is a solid 30fps, I feel as though I should also point out at this point the online multiplayer for this game does run at 60fps although the game will render at 900p resolution, losing some of the detail normally seen in the single player. My other gripe is a wish that for aiming the game doesn’t use the built in gyro at all, a shame as games that tend to support gyro aiming usually end up with a system better for aiming than relying on a second analog, but these complaints are merely focusing on stuff not in the game rather than anything that is really at fault with the core gameplay. Naughty Dog delivers another fantastic video game and slow wave goodbye to its previous poster boy Nathan Drake that proves this studio are more than capable of delivering great games with a well rounded story with deep characters, while not perfect it is a solid overall product if not one of the best games available for the PS4. I have given an opinion on the multiplayer side of this game as I have not tried it due to not having a subscription to PSN+ but as a single player experience, I felt that I got more than enough value from this game.

[a-jynx]

Lost in the Heart & at Sea; Chapter Two: Glasses & Lost Intentions

Summary: Sam and Nathan Drake finds themselves running in circles when they catch wind of a new treasure that was supposedly lost to the sea; the Diamond of the Pacific, a ring that was meant for Captain Jules wife. With enemies at every corner, they’ll need all the help they can get… Including, inside jobs. How will Sam and Nathan react when they figure out who Y/N really is? How will Sam react when she shows him sides of her no one else has seen?

Pairing: Sam Drake x reader; mentions Nathan Drake, Elena Fisher, Victor Sullivan, Nadine Ross, Rafe Adler,

Warnings: Cursing, blood/violence, gun violence, implied smut, angst, testing fate/loyalty, major injury,

Notes: This is the first Uncharted Series I have ever attempted, so, I apologize now if it turns out horrible :) I will still take request for SPN, and other shows/video games! Send an Ask and you’ll be added to my drafts to be written! :) 💖 A/N: So, the guys did go after Henry Avery’s treasure, but in this fic, it turns out to be a bust -- for now! I’ve decided to add a few things to the storyline about Avery and my own pirate, Jules! :) So, enjoy! 

Enjoy! Feedback is appreciated!

After a few hours of regrouping, Nadine and I slaved over those stupid coordinates, only to find out that Jules was as sneaky as Henry Avery had been... Captain Jules had three different ships, each with different names, destinations, and we couldn’t figure out which ship held the stupid diamond. 

“Nadine, this is ridiculous! We’ve been sitting here for hours and we’ve barely achieved with finding where that stupid diamond is!” I growled, pushing myself away from the desk as Nadine followed my movements, frowning. Stalking away from her, I shoved open the balcony doors and plucked out my cigarettes, yanking one of the sticks out and planting it between my teeth with a sigh. 

“Thought you were trying to quit..?” I could hear the slight teasing in her voice as I scoffed out a laugh, slowly reaching up and tugging the stick from between my pearly whites. “I only give it strength by lighting it, smartass.” I half-grinned as she hummed, moving closer and leaning against the balcony next to me. “Y/N, I want you to know that... I’m glad you’re still by my side.” Nadine whispered, causing me to furrow my brow and glance towards her. She held a soft smile on her lips as I stared at her, waiting for her to continue. “I’ve been partners with the cruelest of people... Ones that would murder for the hell of it, ones that wanted me to take all of the dirty work off of their hands, ones like Rafe that... Look, I just want you to know that I appreciate you still being here.” She sighed, shaking her head as she spun on her heel, leaning her elbows against the cool metal as I nodded, reaching over and clasping my hand around her shoulder. 

“Nadine, you’re going soft on me,” I grinned as she huffed, shouldering my hand as I laughed, tapping my unlit cigarette against my finger with a small smile. “Besides, I wouldn’t leave you behind... You’ve given me too much in this stupid life.” I shrugged, placing the cigarette back between my teeth with a light sigh. Nadine had found me searching for work, and with my background, she said I would be perfect -- at the time, I thought she was insane, turns out I was completely right. 

“Y/N, listen, I--” Suddenly, our hotel room was thrown open, causing us both to grab our guns and point towards Rafe, who was grinning like the Chesire cat himself. “God, Rafe are you insane?! We could’ve shot you,” Nadine hissed, holstering her pistol with a grunt as I sighed, allowing the cigarette to hang loosely from my lips. 

“Well, good thing you didn’t,” he stepped towards the desk, looking over what we had gotten so far as Nadine and I walked slowly back in, I turning and closing the door with a hefty slam before making my way to the mumbling man. 

“So, we’ve got three leads that each could potentially have the diamond? Nadine, come on, you’re better than this.” Rafe hissed as he spun towards us, his eyes locking onto her as she glared towards the ground. I nearly snapped the cigarette in half as I clenched my jaw. “It’s my fault,” I offered, stepping up and removing the stick from my lips as they both turned towards me, each with furrowed brows. 

“What?” 

“It’s my fault. I... I went exploring earlier and then I came rushing back, only to end up passing out from too much sun. I left the work to Nadine and she worked with what I could translate once I woke up.” I sighed, straightening my back as Nadine stared wide-eyed at me. I didn’t have to lie. She knew that just as much as I knew that. But, I wasn’t going to let her fall, at least not without a little cushion. Suddenly, my head snapped towards the right making me flinch at the sharp sound as I rolled my tongue, feeling a hint of blood spurt from my lip. 

“You are paid to work.” He hissed through clenched teeth as Nadine stared with wider eyes, her lips slightly parted as I rolled my jaw, slowly turning back towards him with a tight lip. “Not to vacation. Not to have fun. You lost Henry Avery’s cross back at the Rossi Estate, don’t make the same mistake here with the Diamond of the Pacific.” Rafe growled as he snapped his fingers against my already burning cheek, making me jump slightly before nodding. “Yes, sir. I’m sorry for my inconvenience to your work, Mr. Adler.” 

He shifted back, reaching up and smoothing a few hairs that had fallen from his slick head. A swift nod towards me, he shifted his gaze towards Nadine who slowly narrowed her darkening eyes at him, I reached up and pinched her bicep making me drop the face. “Write down everything you’ve come up with, we’ll be leaving in an hour.” 

“Fine.” Nadine bit as he glared towards her, only to click his tongue before turning and began to leave our room. Just as he was about to shut the door, he looked over his shoulder at me and rolled his tongue over his bottom lip before huffing, “I expect better from you, Y/N.” He gave our hotel room door a slam making me send a glare before reaching up and saluting off, flipping up my middle finger. “Yes, sir, jackass.” 

“Y/N,” Nadine snickered, before glaring at me with the face of a disapproving mother. I chuckled and shrugged before moving towards the table, scribbling down the three different coordinates, handing them off to her as she quickly placed them into her jeans’ pocket. “You didn’t have to do that.” I gently shrugged my shoulders, frowning as I stepped around her and towards my bag, digging through it as I mumbled to myself. 

“You would’ve done the same, besides you were giving him that look that read, ‘momma bear.’” I grunted as I tossed my bag off my bed, moving towards my larger luggage with a huff before digging through it as well. “Y/N, seriously, you had no idea how Rafe was yet you took his scolding for me, even though I’m a big girl now and can do it myself.” Nadine continued her rant as I sighed with a grunt of anger, suddenly Nadine appeared beside you with a pursed lip. “What are you looking for?” 

“My aviators! I had them yesterday, and when I went to the market, and I had them on when I came back!” I groaned, before scrubbing a hand over my face. “No, you didn’t.” 

“What?” I turned towards her as she shrugged, crossing her arms. 

“You didn’t have them on your face or your head when you came barreling in here. And you’ve already ransacked half our room, so it’s safe to say that you lost your aviators, darling.” Nadine sighed as I groaned loudly, a pain breaking through my heart as I turned on my heel and flopped onto my bed, resting my palms against my face as she shook her head. “You’ll survive one day without them.” 

“Nadine, you’re kidding, right?” I gaped at her with wide eyes. “I’m not willing to go out into the sun without them! Besides I paid good money for those.” 

“Yeah, money that you stole.” 

“Hey, it was still money that I earned.” I shrugged, pushing myself off of the bed as Nadine shook her head again, trying to hide her grin as I sighed, marching out of the room with her close behind me. “Cheer up, maybe the market or somewhere will have some new ones you can buy?” 

“I...Yeah, hopefully.” I frowned before stuffing my hands into my shorts’ pockets, leading Nadine into the elevator and frowning at my reflection in the silver doors. I looked strange without them. I had grown accustomed to having those stupid shades practically attached to my face. They hid the dark bags that would carve their way under my eyes after nights of research, or training. They also hid the fear that would reflect through me... They hid my past. They were just a part of me, and now, I lost them. 

“Y/N, you’re staring at yourself... You also look conflicted.” Nadine muttered as I shrugged, nibbling on my bottom lip as she turned towards me, leaning against the cool metal back wall with an arched brow. 

“It’s just... I’ve grown so used to seeing my glasses on me, and now they’re just suddenly gone. I feel weird -- naked.” 

“You didn’t feel this way back at the Rossi Estate,” Nadine remarked as I scowled. 

“That’s different.” I groaned. 

“How so?” 

“I couldn’t see myself for most of that night, and besides, I would’ve been wearing my aviators if you would’ve let me,” I commented back as she rolled her eyes making me huff.  

“You’re pouting over losing sunglasses, Y/N... I’ll buy you a new pair, alright?” Nadine struck a deal as we exited the elevator, walking briskly through the lobby as I glanced around, keeping my head down as I felt less confident. Suddenly, a certain flowery pattern caught my eye, causing me to slow my march before narrowing my eyes yet the corner of my mouth ticked upwards. 

“Flower boy..?” 

“Y/N! Come on, they’re waiting on us!” Nadine shouted through the spinning doors, catching a few of the other guest's attention, including flower boy’s and the men sitting by him. I quickly turned my head, moving through the doors and jumping into the jeep that had Rafe at the wheel once again. He was already flooring it before my ass touched the heat smothered leather. 

“Sam, who was that?” I turned back towards Nathan, clearing my throat as I shrugged gently. “No clue, pretty cute though.” I murmured, bringing one of our maps up to my face, only to glance down at the aviators that rested against my chest while neatly hanging from my v-neck’s collar. 

“Yeah, well, she seemed to be studying you, you sure you don’t know who she is?” Sully chimed in as Nate continued to glare at me, attempting to study me as Aviators had done just a few moments ago. “Are you guys just going to keep harking me on some girl that was checkin’ me out or are we going to find this treasure?” I bit, huffing air out of my nose before shaking my head, pushing myself up from the seat and traveling towards the spinning doors. 

“Where’re you going, now!?” Nate yelled after me as I waved my hand over my shoulder, turning my head and shouting, “smoke break!” Pushing through the door, I quickly pulled out and lit one of my cigarettes, sighing out the smoke as I watched her disappear down the street in the jeep -- wait, is that? I went slightly wide-eyed as I quickly ran down the hotel’s driveway, narrowing my eyes as I reached up, blocking out the blazing sun with a huff. It was the same jeep from the Rossi Estate... 

“Shit,” I muttered through the cigarette before inhaling more smoke, blowing it out I dropped it to the concrete and twisted my foot over the ashes before quickly jogging back inside. Glancing over my shoulder, I turned back and went silent as I noticed Sully and Nate were murmuring to each other, making me frown before slowly walking back over. 

“Sam, I think we got a lead,” Nate quickly jumped up, moving towards me while gesturing towards a folded piece of paper. I furrowed my brows, gently unraveling the page, my brows shot up. “Uh, Nate, this is none of our handwriting, nor is it Captain Jules.” 

“I know, I know, but... Look at those coordinates. They’re so close, closer than the ones that we have. This could be a big break for us.” Nate grinned, the enthusiasm seemed to pulsate off of him as I chuckled, glancing at the coordinates once more. “Okay. Let’s go get us a diamond,” I sighed as Sully joined us, his eyes narrowed at me as I glanced up at him, swallowing thickly as Nate began to ramble on about what gear we would need and what we should be expecting since someone else is looking for the Diamond of the Pacific. 

“We can meet up in a few, go grab yourselves some packs and I’ll find us a boat.” Sully waved as Nate nodded, moving back towards the table to gather our things. I moved to help him, but Sully quickly side-stepped, blocking me from moving any further. I couldn’t fight off the frown that quickly replaced my tight smile as Nate moved back towards the elevator, still mumbling to himself. 

“What the hell, Sul?” I slightly growled, this causing the older man to deepen his frown. “I should be the one asking that, Samuel. What the hell is going on with you?” Sully tested, making my brows shoot up as I scoffed. Just play it cool, Sam. 

“What’re you talking about? There’s nothing going on with me.” I snapped, however, Sully only glared at me. “Yeah. Sure. And I was born last night.” 

“Sully,” 

“Sam.” Sully’s voice suddenly held a sharp edge, making me instantly shut my mouth as I frowned. “Whatever is going on, you better keep it to yourself... Nathan has given up too much for you already, so, don’t make him regret it.” Sully hissed as he took a step back before turning on his heel and moving towards the slowly returning elevator. I stood there in silence, my mind racing as I frowned, reaching up and rubbing a hand over my forehead with a growl. 

“Fine, Victor... I’ll keep it to myself for now.” I hissed, stuffing my hands into my pockets before glancing down at the Aviators that rested against my chest. I had forgotten about them for a second... The corner of my lip twitched up as I reached up, carefully unfolding them as if they were made of glass. Glancing over them, I slowly rested them on my face before shrugging. They’ll be safer here until tonight... 

I flinched as another explosion went off, covering my ears as I slowly stood from where Nadine and I were crouching; I grimaced at the chaos. Beautiful caves that were sculpted and carved by the sea itself now were crumbling around us, the flourishing nature clawing for it last breathe before fluttering to the cluttered cave floor. 

“Nadine, this is insane,” I hissed as we followed by Rafe and Nadine’s other men. I felt uneasy with their hands on their AK’s and sniper rifles -- what was the need for so many men, and so much firepower? “Y/N, I... We just need to get through this job, then it’s retirement... Okay?” Nadine tried to smile, but I could see she was just as uneasy as I was. 

“Yeah,” I whispered, glancing ahead of us as another explosion went off, my body almost physically shaking as I shook my head, tugging my hair into its loose ponytail again. “Through this job.” 

After hours of searching, we ended up with nothing but an empty shipwreck and carts of old, ruined books, maps, and clothes that were scattered around the ship. A few skeletons proved that they used to be part of Captain Jules crew, their cracked jaws and knocked out teeth showed that easily... Once, we arrived back, I felt today’s weight suddenly resting upon my shoulders. Everything has seemed to go wrong until... Now. 

“Nadine! I’m running down to the market for a little, need anything?” I hollered from the other side of the bathroom door, keeping an ear open for the shower as she called back, “no! And don’t come rushing in here like a mad man again!” I chuckled before slipping on my sandals and making my way towards the elevator. I cursed under my breath as I saw the doors closing. “Hey! Hold that!” The man inside quickly looked alive as he stuck his forearm out, keeping the doors from shutting as I jogged inside, grinning as I blew a few bangs out of my eyes. 

“Thanks, I didn’t feel like taking the stairs.” I chuckled lightly, about to reach over and press the lobby button, only to see it lit up. “Yeah, I know how you feel. Stairs are not my friend after all these years.” The man lightly laughed, a wide grin on his face as I smiled to myself, nodding. I couldn’t help but glance over, one hand held a small notebook while the other worked to write whatever he was thinking. My eyes slowly went down the hand that held the books’ spine with care as I smirked. Another cuffed man. 

“Not to intrude, but I see you’re cuffed, let me guess... Honeymoon?” I grinned as he snapped out of his thoughts, glancing towards me as he furrowed his brows before turning his hand and looking at the golden band with a grin. 

“Oh! No, no -- uh, no honeymoon.” 

“Oh, well, did you steal the band too?” I arched a brow, thinking back to Flower boy and his fake cuff. The man laughed loudly as my brows shot up, confused by the sudden burst. 

“Steal a wedding band? Where’d you get that one?” He snickered as I bit at my lip, twisting it into a smile as I shook my head, crossing my arms over my chest. “You’d be surprised. I’ve met a few men who’d happily be married to a woman that didn’t know they existed.” I stated, matter-of-factly. The man smirked, nodding before closing his book and slipping it into his back pocket. “It’s not that strange, hell, my brother’s done it once or twice whenever he loses one.” 

“Brother...?” 

“Oh, uh, yeah! I’ve got an older brother that’s here on the island with me. So stay clear of him, he might pickpocket you.” He teased as I rolled my bottom lip between my teeth. So, Flower boy’s got a little brother... Interesting. “He doesn’t sound too threatening -- I mean, he steals wedding bands, remember?” I quipped as the elevator dinged, signaling that we were able to leave. We both stepped out and moved towards the exit, I couldn’t help but noticed the small pack he had on his back. 

“Do you rock climb?” 

“What?” 

“Oh, it’s just you happen to have all the gear a rock climber would have, and I hear they have an excellent course near the ocean; gorgeous view, really.” I grinned as I stopped, leaning against the wall as he chuckled, reaching back and rubbing the back of his neck. 

“I wouldn’t doubt it, and... I wouldn’t call myself a rock climber, per se.” He grimaced as a blaring horn came from outside, making us both look towards the door. I couldn’t help but laugh. “I take it that’s your ride?”

“Oh, trust me, in Italy he was 10x’s worse.” The man shook his head as I grinned, watching as he made his way outside towards the man in the jeep. I sighed before pushing through the doors myself, making my way back towards the beach with a slightly racing heart. What if he didn’t show up..? What if he’s some guy that wants to kill me? I frown while making my way down through the rocks, looking around as I realized the hotel had brought torches out and lit up the beach for their guests. 

“How romantic.” I snickered, kicking off my sandals and moving towards the edge once again. Resting my hands behind my back, I sighed gently as I watched the sun slowly disappear. 

“Fancy meeting you here, stranger.” I snapped around, a soft smile pulling on my lips as I giggled about how far he was from me. “Hey, there Flower boy... What’s wrong? Scared?” 

“Of you knocking me back on my ass..? Yes, horrified.” He chuckled, stuffing his hands into his jeans pocket as I glanced at him, only to gasp as I reached forward, only to have his hand catch my wrists. 

“My glasses! You found them -- why’re you wearing them?” I slightly growled, my defense already on its break as he shot up a brow, taking his other hand and slowly removing the glasses, examining them. 

“These are yours?” 

“Yes!” 

“How do I know you’re not lying?” 

“Wha- just give me my glasses, Flower boy!” I slightly growled, using my other hand to try and grab the glasses, only to have him raise them above his head, making me slightly gasp. “Ah, ah, where are your manners? Someone who returns something should usually get a reward.” He tsked, while slowly dragging my arm closer, trapping it between our chest as I glared at him. 

“Ha, reward?” I scoffed, glancing up at him through my lashes as I realized the twinkle of playfulness glittering in his dark hazel eyes. I couldn’t help but break out into a grin. “You’re playing a dangerous game with me, Flower boy.” He smirked, slowly bringing the glasses down and pressing them to my face, brushing a loose bang behind my ear, almost caressing it as I stared at him through my safely returned glasses. 

“Well, Aviators, you almost made me lose my true intentions.” He tsked as I narrowed my eyes, feeling his hand slowly release my wrist and glide further up, our fingertips brushing together. “Oh, and what were those?” I teased, biting my lower lip as all of my training seemed to fly out of the window. My heart pounding against my ribs and my fingertips buzzed against his as he slowly reached up with his other hand, dragging it across my shoulder. My pulse quickened beneath his warm touch, my eyes fluttered closed when suddenly I was spun in the sand, my back slammed against his chest while his arm trapped my throat. My hands flew up to scrap and pull at his forearm, only for me to halt as I felt the heavy pressure of a gun pressed against my humming temple. 

“My intentions are to find out why the fuck you’re working for Rafe Adler and Nadine Ross, Aviators, or should I call you Adam?” 

To be Continued... 

AHHHHHH~ sorry, lost my composure! Okay, okay, so I’m actually so excited that this chapter is finally out cause yay?! I hope you guys enjoy it, and please know that everyone who has messaged me, reblogged, or liked this series you’re giving me so much confidence 😭💖 

Also, I have an announcement that will be up and out in a few days~ still working out the kinks of it all, but all I know is that I’m more than excited for it! Besides that, I hope you enjoy and I’ll see you all later 💋