Uncharted: The Girl Who Changed Me (High School AU)

A Small World After All

7 years later...

Something I realised once I left school is that times seems to speed up, at least in my own eyes. Next thing I know, I'm 25 years old, living in my own apartment and travelling around the world searching for the next big treasure. It wasn't a bad way to live, since being an adventurer was what I wanted after all, but I felt like something was missing. I just didn't know what. 

But something happened one day, which made me realised what I was missing the whole time. 

It was early morning, so obviously I was sleeping. Suddenly, my mobile phone rang. It took a while to adjust my eyes before checking the time. It was 9:00 am, which to me was an OK time to call someone. I then picked up the phone. 

"Hello?" I answered tiredly. 

"Hi. Am I talking to Mr Nathan Drake?" the person asked.

"Yeah. Why?"

"You called a few days ago about attending the expedition with the film crew?"

"Yeah?" I quickly sat up from my bad after hearing this. I had called a news network after hearing they were doing an expedition to a forest in Spain in order to hopefully record the discovery of an ancient treasure there. Of course, once I heard that, I wanted to be a part of it.

"Well, I talked to the person in charge with it and he said that would be wonderful."

I felt like getting out of my bed and jump and scream with excitement, but I tried to keep my cool.

"That's amazing! Thank you so much!" I said excitedly.

"No problem. Is it possible to come to the office tomorrow to sign a contract?"

"Yeah, yeah. That's fine."

"Great. I'll see you tomorrow, then." We said our goodbyes before I stopped the phone call.

 Then I jumped out of my bed and screamed with excitement.

Forgetting I was living in an apartment. In the morning. 

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2 weeks later, I had travelled to Spain, where the expedition was taking place, a couple of days ago. The network had already paid for my hotel expenses, which was nice. 

It was the morning again, around 10am. We had already started the expedition yesterday and had already uncover a few clues. I had offered to work them out and tell my findings when expedition resumes, which would be around 12pm at least. 

I was in the middle decoding a sort of message when I heard the door knock. I placed the object on the table and headed to the door, unlocking it. 

"You can come in." I said, as I walked back.  

"No, it's OK. I'll just talk through here." A woman's voice requested. It was a weird request, but for some reason, I went with it.

"O..K then. Can I help you?" I asked, standing near the door so I could hear her.  

"Well, I'm part of the expedition and I came to say that the time for the expedition has changed to about 2pm."

"Oh, OK. At least, it will give me some time to solve these clues." I mentioned.

She laughed. "Yeah, I guess."

I then realised something. "Hey, I don't think we meet yesterday, didn't we?"

"How would you know that if you can't see me?" she asked confusingly. 

"Well, for one, I can't remember hearing your voice." I mentioned.

She giggled. "That's true. I was with the other group."

"Ah, I see. Makes sense. So, what's your name?" I asked. There was a silence for a bit.

"Hey, you're still here?" I asked with concern.

"Yeah. Just..... You might want to open the door." I was confused for a bit before I complied and slowly opened the door. 

When I did, it felt like the world had slowed down, coming to a halt. 

"It couldn't be." I thought. "I just couldn't..."

"Elena?" I said with disbelief. 

She smiled and nodded. "Hey, Nate. Long time no see." I didn't say another word as I pulled her close, pulling her in for a hug. It felt like forever since I last saw her and out of all the places she could have been, she happens to be at this expedition. 

Guess she was right, it is small world after all. 

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It was around 8pm and another day of the expedition had pass. We found more clues regarding our mystery treasure, so we were getting close. Once we had wrapped up, I invited Elena to my hotel room to a bit. I wanted for us to catch up on all the things that has been happened to us. 

"...Once we found it however, it turns out it was actually a statue." I was telling her about a time a small group and I were looking for El Dorado, only to find out that it wasn't a city but a statue. 

Elena laughed. "Wow. That must have a surprise."

"Defiantly. But in the end, we were looking for El Dorado and that's what we found." I gave her a bottle of J2O before sitting next to her on the bed, while a J2O of my own. 

"So, how are Sully and Sam doing?" Elena asked.

"Honestly, I haven't seen them for a while, but last I hear of them, they were doing fine."

"That's good. Kinda miss them." she mentioned before drinking her J2O.

"Yeah." I replied. I stayed silent for a while, realising how long it has been. So much has changed all these years. The silence must have concerned Elena as I felt her tapping my arm. 

"Mmm? Yeah?" I said, showing obvious signs that I was in a daze.

"You're alright? You went silent for a bit." she asked with concern. 

I sighed before looking at her, straight in her eyes. "Listen, I know you must have been busy with your career. I know becoming a journalist is not easy. But still, you couldn't even leave me a text or something? I called you so many times, but nothing."

"I know. I should have. I'm sorry. I..."

I grabbed her arms, still looking at her eyes. I needed to say what I had to say. I wanted to for so long.

"Listen, I missed you. I missed you so much. For a while, I knew there was something missing in my life, but I didn't know what it was. Now I know. It was you. You mean so much to me. You made me realise so much back at high school and it's because of you, I'm where I am now. I always hoped that one day, I could see you again. To tell you this. To tell you...."

I loosened my grip on her arms and moved my hands into her, holding them tightly. I looked down before looking up and closing my eyes. 

"To tell you.... I love you." I didn't want to look at her, afraid about what would happened. I felt her hands letting go of mine. I felt a sense of wanting to run away, fearing that I screwed up. The fear got the better of me, so I opened my eyes. I saw she was still here.

"Look, I..." Before I could say anything, she grabbed me, pulled me close and kissed me. It was a quick one, but I was still shook from that.

"I love you too, Nate. I hoped that I could see you that too. It really is a small world, huh?"

I smiled as I pulled her into a hug. "Yeah, it really is." We pulled apart and I kissed her. To me, nothing mattered anymore. She was here with me and it was all I ever wanted.