Universe: Uncharted

Characters/Themes: Elena, Nate, Sully, Harry Flynn (mentioned, not actually in story himself); hurt/comfort, family, friendship, revenge, fighting, avenging, caring

Note: Went away this weekend so wrote this on the way to and back from the place in the car. It's alright I think but got a bit deeper than I originally wanted it to be, whoops. But hey, I tried. Oh yeah and ps: idk if Nate's left-handed, and don't particularly care a lot. I just put it in bc it worked with what delirious Nate is like. At least, my version. Sorry kid but you're just too great to hurt.

"Are you sure we aren't too early?"

Nate rolled his eyes at his wife's fussing. "Go get drinks," he said, with a nod towards the back of the mostly-empty pub where the bar was. "Sully'll be here in a minute, okay. Don't worry!"

Elena sighed but nodded and got up, glancing back once as she headed in the direction Nate had indicated. He nodded encouragingly, and she smiled at the dork of a thief that was her husband.

Now by himself at their table, Nate idly checked his phone for any missed calls. There was a day-old text from Chloe that was mostly question marks (he had asked her a question about relics before realising she wouldn't know anything, and hadn't bothered to reply to the 'wtf' he got back) but nothing else interesting. He heard someone behind him and sighed without looking around, slipping his phone back into his pocket.

"Sully, that's not very-" But he didn't get to finish the sentence with 'subtle', due to the minor distraction of being hauled out of the seat and turned around to face a couple of men, both looking rather bothered by Nate's existence.

He blinked at the guy who was holding him by the shirt. "Um, can I help you?" he asked pointedly.

The guy's expression twisted into rage and his response was to kick Nate from him into the table, upending it and causing both the table and the treasure hunter to crash to the ground. Everyone - which luckily wasn't many people - in the vicinity immediately ceased their chatted and turned in an ominous silence towards the commotion.

Nate winced as he picked himself up from the ground and faced the men again. "That's not really an answer, is it?" He began to take a couple of steps back towards the men, fists raised, but before any punching could commence, he was interrupted by a kick to the back of his knees from someone behind him, forcing him to the ground in pain.

Then, to add insult to injury, the first man stepped forward and punched Nate in the face. He felt his nose crack and blood start streaming down.

"Ugh, shit," he muttered, and spat out some blood, pretending to weaken already. Then, as the men closed in again, he sprung up and tackled man #1, throwing him to the ground and smashing a convenient beer bottle on his head.

Consequently, man #3 grabbed him from behind and as he struggled to get out of the vice-like grip, man #2 stepped forward as well and was about to give Nate a hell of a kick, but was inexplicably interrupted by a shout from behind him.

"Hey! What the hell do you think you're doing?"

The man paused and turned around to see Elena standing a couple of feet away with her hands on her hips, expecting a very relevant reply, if the expression on her face was anything to go by. Unfortunately for the men, she wasn't about to get one.

"None of your business, lady. Just a little vengeance," the man growled, dismissing her by turning back to the important task of punching Nate.

Elena cleared her throat loudly to get his attention again. "That's my husband you're about to beat the shit out of, so it is, in fact, my business," she pointed out. Apparently the news that Nate was married was somewhat confusing.

There was another moment of silence as man #2 blinked at Nate, perhaps imagining him as a domestic husband, and exchanged a doubtful glance with the man who was holding him.

For his part, Nate waited for a second until man #1 started to get up, rubbing his head, then suddenly lunged forward out of man #3's grip, and swiftly dealt a kick into the rising thug's face, downing him again, then threw himself into a punch at man #2, who still seemed rather stunned by Nate's breaking news.

Nate broke the guy's nose like he had done to him, then spun around to tackle the third guy as the second one joined his pal on the floor. But the last enemy hadn't been so distracted by mere domestic discoveries, and greeted Nate's face with a knuckle-cracking punch which had him staggering, holding his now very broken and bleeding nose.

The guy drew back to land another punch but was intercepted by someone grabbing his arm. He turned in anger to be faced with the equally pissed off expression of Victor Sullivan.

"Bad move," Sully warned, and kicked the man in the back of the knees, mimicking what he had done to Nate earlier, before shoving his head down onto a still-standing table, leaving him a groaning mess on the floor.

Sully dusted his hands off casually and looked at Nate. "Hey, kid. Nice party you got goin' here. Not exactly what I was expected, to be honest," he commented, "don't know why though."

Nate shrugged. "Well, you know me. Ever popular." He flashed his friend a grin.

"It's not home time yet, boys!" Elena called from the other side of the pub, and both men instinctively glanced down to see the thugs getting up to fight again, though with a lot of dramatic grumbling.

Sully sighed and shook his head as though disappointed. "And here I was thinking they had brains for once."

He and Nate simply exchanged a look and nod, then simultaneously attacked each man closest to them while Elena easily dodged man #1's lunge towards her and replied with a hard kick to the stomach, making him double up in pain.

The resulting fight didn't actually last that long, but it was a good thing that the few members of the public had made themselves scarce, Nate thought vaguely as man#2 bodily picked him up and threw him at a wall.

He hit hard and groaned as he picked himself up off the floor again, for the third time that night alone. Not to mention ever other time enemies decided to use the whole throwing-overhead thing. He again faced the advancing thug.

Sully had his own work cut out dealing with the third guy, who seemed to have some sort of superhuman build. For his part, he had no idea what their quarrel with Nate was, but attacking his kid wasn't okay and required a little intervention.

Though maybe not quite this much, Sully reasoned internally as he dodged yet another heavy punch and landed one of his own in the guy's stomach, like Elena had. Then without missing a second, he twisted around to grab a weapons from a close table - which turned out to be a heavy wooden menu stand - and smashed it over the thug's head in an attempt to stop him for a minute.

Elena glanced around at the smash and smiled in grim satisfaction as man #3 went down, hopefully for a nice long while. She turned back to her opponent and moved out of the way as he made a grab at her again. The guy seemed to be pretty unstable after taking a bottle to the head, Elena mused to herself as she watched his fall past her and crash into a table, upending it and smashing a few long glasses over himself for good measure.

Smirking, she glanced over to Nate to check how he was holding up, and her satisfied smile froze on her face as she caught to unmistakable glint of a blade.

"Nate! Watch out!"

He jerked his head up at Elena's scream, and the guy saw his chance. Lunging forward, he put his force into the blade and landed it to the left of Nate's stomach. For a minute, time seemed to slow. Nate's eyes widened in shock and he stumbled backwards, hands going to the knife embedded in his side.

The man who stabbed him seemed to be in a similar stunned state. He took a couple of staggering steps backwards too, staring as Nate tried to catch himself with a hand to the floor as he collapsed.

Silence was cut by Elena's scream of "NATE!" as she saw him go down, and without thinking ran straight over, ignoring the guy standing there.

Sully immediately took in the situation, and hurried over as well. He grabbed the stunned guy and shook him by the shirt, glaring. "Who sent you, you song of a bitch?" He practically yelled, angrier than Elena had ever seen him. She tried to ignore the man's spluttering at the sudden threat as she shushed Nate's gasps of pain and eased the knife out. She wasn't totally sure at all that was the right thing, but her hands were shaking and she was terrified and there was so much blood already.

"We... we just came... Drake, he..." the guy stammered hopelessly. Sully growling and took one hand off the thug to take his gun in hand and point it threateningly.

"Why did you come?" Sully demanded, weapon's muzzle pressed at the guy's temple. He struggled weakly, rather terrified now, and barely stammered out "Harry Flynn... we heard... it was Drake's fault."

Sully had heard enough. He took a step back and slammed his pistol into the man's head hard enough to knock unconscious, and maybe even kill, he didn't even care right now. Shoving the gun back into its holster, he turned to the other two and crouched beside Elena.

She was desperately pressing a cloth she had found to the knife wound. Sully looked in fear as it almost immediately got saturated in blood, with so much more covering Nate's side and now Elena's hands. He swallowed and tried to gather himself, take control of the situation, glancing at Nate; slumped against the wall, far too pale and breathing shallowly in pain.

Trying to collect himself, Sully caught Elena's eye and saw his terror reflected. "Okay, kid, let's just take a look," he said with exaggerated calmness, trying to influence the other two to not panic. Elena nodded, and moved a little so he could check the wound. Carefully he pulled the cloth away and took a quick look at where exactly the knife had pierced.

"Alright... okay, we can work with that," he muttered, gesturing for Elena to keep putting pressure on it. She folded the cloth a different way, trying to find a less soaked side, and pressed it hard onto the wound, making Nate try to curl in on himself and practically whimper in pain as she tried to shush him.

Sully put a hand on Nate's shoulder, making the kid look at him, eyes glazed. He forced a strangled laugh as he focused, and cringed. "Crappy way to go," he choked out, managing a grimace that was probably meant to be a smile of sorts, breath hitching in pain.

"Hey, hey, don't talk like that, it'll be okay," Elena said soothingly before Sully could speak, but her undertone spoke of fear. She cast a terrified glance at Sully, needing him to take charge, to sort it out.

He nodded to himself, thinking out a plan. "Okay, son. It's okay," he murmured under his breath, rubbing Nate's shoulder. He swallowed his own fear and carried on. "It's off to the side, so maybe didn't get anything important. We're gonna get you out of here, get you fixed up..."

Elena let a sob escape her, biting her tongue to keep quiet as Sully talked. She had to keep it together, just for now.

Taking a deep breath, Sully continued. "We'll get out of here, go to the hospital - no arguing, kid," he added as sternly as he could to inject some illusion of normalcy into his voice. Nate huffed a short, pained, laugh.

"Don't think I will, for once," he tried to joke in reply, speech slurred and tight with pain and exhaustion. Sully forced a smile. "You'd better not." He positioned himself on Nate's right side to support the kid.

Elena took Nate's hand and pressed it against the cloth on his side. "Here, hold that. I'll - I'll go get the car," she managed to say shakily. He just nodded wearily, eyes closed again. But as she made to stand up, he grabbed her bloody hands with his free one.

"It'll be okay," he whispered, meeting her eyes. Elena swallowed and nodded, unable to speak. Then she tore herself away and hurried out the empty pub, past the unconscious men and destruction, tears obscuring her vision.

Sully watched her go before turning back to Nate. "C'mon, kid. Don't pass out on me yet," he said as Nate barely managed to stand up even with support.

He huffed out a wheezy laugh again, coughing, as they made their slow way to the door. "Wouldn't want you to strain yourself, old man," he gasped out, attempting something of a smile. Sully bit his lip.

"Shut up, kid. You'll be okay." Nate would be fine. He had to be.

Elena glanced up when the door to the hospital room opened. She smiled at Sully as he quietly slipped in and put a finger to her lips before pointing to the bed where Nate was sleeping peacefully.

Sully nodded and closed the door silently behind him. He walked over to where Elena was sitting at the bedside and gave her a brief smile that lacked his usual glimmer before giving Nate a once over. "He okay?"

She stood up and patted his arm, indicating to now vacant seat when he looked at her. He sighed and accepted her offer, sinking down onto the cushion, rubbing his eyes. The night had been long and hard for both of them and not at all what Elena had planned when she suggested a quiet evening meal with just the three of them.

"He woke up about half an hour ago; asked where you were," she answered Sully's question. He raised an eyebrow, waiting for her to conclude. "Then tried to get up, remembered what had happened - I think - and asked me if you'd ever let him hold a map again after Peru." She watched in relief as Sully smiled fondly at his kid's erraticness.

Nodding to himself, Sully replied, "wasn't just Peru, that's just an example," and flashed her a grin that told Elena her little family would be fine. her expression relaxed too into a smile back and she sighed, just watching Nate breathe for a moment.

"Oh yeah, then he drifted off again muttering about could Flynn please express his dislike of left-handed people some other, calmer, way," she added for sake of amusement. Sully's face darkened for a second, and Elena winced. Mentioning Harry Flynn wasn't a good thing to do.

Nate's conflicted reaction was one side, but Sully took a much more vengeful view of the subject. Not only did Flynn betray, get locked up, threaten and eventually shoot his kid - as well as trying to kill Elena with his suicide bomb - but now Flynn's goddamn 'friends' had ambushed and attacked Nate without him even doing anything.

The fact that the stab wound was mere inches above the faded gunshot scar couldn't be a more stark reminder of Nate's real vulnerability when it came to trust and enemies. Thankfully, there were two people who would stand by his side and catch him whenever he fell. He had terrified the hell of both Sully and Elena when he passed out on her in the car as they drove off.

Then there was what felt like hours waiting in fear, trying to reassure themselves and each other that Nate would be okay. He had to be. Their family was small and incredibly precious. They had almost lost each other too many times. None of them should have to be alone again now they had one another.

So Elena nudged Sully and inexplicably smiled. "Hey. That bastard's dead, remember - though still causing trouble, I guess. Anyway, we're for Nate, aren't we. He and his macho bullshit isn't going anywhere while I can help it," she said firmly.

Sully stared at her for a moment, then smirked. "Shoulda called it you'd be done with that in five minutes," he said with a chuckle, shaking his head. Elena grinned.

"Are you two talking about me... again?"

They both looked around expectantly at Nate's murmur, and at lat Sully smiled properly. "Hey, kid. How you feeling?"

Nate shrugged and winced, still half asleep. "Like I got stabbed?" he replied in a questioning way. Given all the painkillers and other drugs he'd been having over the past few hours, it wasn't surprising he couldn't really feel anything. Elena rolled her eyes with a smile.

"Not even awake and being a wise-ass," she retorted, but affectionately, and patted his head like a child. "You're still delirious. Go back to sleep."

He smiled, closing his eyes, drugs and exhaustion already pulling him back under. "'kay, sure thing... would really appreciate it you guys made sure no other crazy people find me for a bit."

Elena bent down to five him a quick forehead kiss. "Go to sleep," she repeated. "We'll be here when you wake up."

"Don't worry, son, we're on it," Sully added quietly as Nate drifted off again and Elena stroked his hair gently. They stayed with him for the rest of the night and next day, and Nate wasn't really surprised any more about how much he was relying on it.