They arrive at a military base in the middle of the jungle. It’s highly organized and fully loaded with jeeps, tanks, jets, helicopters and many mercenaries. There are drills and exercises being ran, helicopters departing and jets landing.
They stop at a large warehouse in the middle of the base. Tina gets out of the SUV with her armed guards and leads Sully and his team inside. They cross the main floor of the warehouse where there are people sending and receiving shipments of automatic rifles, handguns, grenades and other military gear. She leads them upstairs into a large office. The office is very simple that’s neat and clean with a large conference table in the center. It’s occupied by one man sitting at a corner desk, looking over some papers.
Tina greets the man with arms wide open and says, “Sancho. Dear brother.”
Sancho puts down the papers, smiles at Tina and says, “Hermana.” He gets up and greets her with a hug and kiss on the cheek. Then he gives Sully and his team a curious look and asks, “You’ve brought me a gift?”
Tina smiles back and says, “I have.”
Reluctantly, Sully walks towards Sancho to shake his hand, but is blocked by his guards. Sancho stops his guards and says, “It’s alright. He’s an old friend.”
The guards stand aside as Sully continues towards Sancho, shakes his hand and says, “Good to see you again Sancho. It’s a been a long time.”
Sancho pulls him in for a bear hug and says, “Too long old friend. Keeping yourself busy?”
Sully says, “You know me. Always working on the next payday.”
Sancho rolls his eyes and says, “Always.” He looks at Sam and asks, “What happened to you?”
Tina says, “He’s the one who hit Enrique.”
Sancho says, “Oh, so you deserved it?”
Unenthusiastically, Sam answers, “Maybe.”
Curiously, Sancho says, “You look familiar. Have we met before?”
Again, Sam unenthusiastically answers, “Maybe.”
Annoyed, Sancho sharply turns towards Sully but calmly says, “Sully…”
Sully quickly says, “Let me introduce you to Sam and Jesse. They’re good friends of mine.”
Sancho asks, “Friends? Teammates? Work Colleagues? In search of something valuable?”
Again, Sam unenthusiastically answers, “Maybe.” With no hesitation, Sancho slaps him across the face, knocking him to the ground.
Sancho cheerfully continues as if nothing is amiss and asks, “Don’t you have a brother? Jason…Hayden…?”
Painfully, Sam groans out, “Nathan.”
Sancho says, “That’s right. Nathan. Where is your brother Nathan?”
Sam slowly stands up and says, “He…uh…took a detour.”
Sancho asks, “A detour? To the next payday?”
Cautiously, Sully says, “Sam…?”
Sam says, “We don’t know where he’s at.”
Sancho says, “Hmm.” He nods his head towards the table and says, “Take a seat gentlemen.” Tina closes the door while the team sits down at the conference table.
Sancho takes his seat at the head of the table and says, “A new military force has invaded my territory. I don’t like it, so I decided to send them a message asking them to leave. Scouts were sent out to get their locations, numbers, strengths and weaknesses.
“We targeted the train station first. It should’ve been an easy down, but their resistance was stronger than we anticipated.” He pauses to rub his head and exhales deeply, then continues to say, “In fact, it was too strong and we were forced to retreat.” He raises both hands in the air and in a booming voice says, “The Great Sancho Oeste, forced to retreat. How funny is that?” He laughs for a heartbeat, then is serious again and says, “Never, I mean NEVER have I EVER been forced to retreat.” He pushes away from the table, walks around in a circle and sits back down, crosses his hands and calmly says, “So, I called all of my commanders in to a meeting and demanded an explanation, but they gave me a fairy tale instead.” He rubs his face with both hands and slowly starts laughing again. “They tell me about unusually large strong men, that are light on their feet.” His laughter grows until tears roll down from his eyes.
Sancho continues to says, “Oh my god *haha* but then *haha* then one of my commanders says, ‘He’s concerned’.” His laughter grows contagiously and Jesse is tempted to join in, but Sully grievously shakes his head to silence him.
Sancho continues to laugh and says, “I would be concerned too *haha* if I knew I was about to die.” Then he makes a hand jester of a pistol, points it at Jesse’s head, pulls the trigger, laughs even harder and says, “But *haha* I said *haha* I said to myself, *haha* ‘I’ve gotta hear this *haha*. This is gonna be good’.” His laughter stops and an eerie silence settles in the room.
Sancho drops his voice to a whisper and says, “So, he tells his story, The story was about an ancient Incan group called The Librarians. The Librarians built two libraries: ‘The Library of the Sun’ and ‘The Library of the Moon’. ‘The Library of the Moon’ held all physical knowledge they’d developed and ‘The Library of the Sun’ held all the psychic knowledge. All the books, tablets and scrolls in ‘The Library of the Sun’ were made of gold because gold was best for holding psychic energy. Men from all around the world would come to study and store their secrets in ‘The Library of the Sun’. Over time it became known as ‘The Room of Gold. The Librarians used their psychic abilities to protect all that was within it, including the patrons.
“Over time, golden orbs of light were seen floating around the library. They were small and playful at first, but then grew large and dangerous. The Librarians’ noticed patrons were disappearing or found unconscious in odd places. These orbs of light would drain the energy of patrons and as a result, they grew larger. Eventually they all joined together becoming one large terrifying light.
“So, The Librarians had a conflict of interest. They had vowed to protect everything in The Room of Gold, so that would mean protecting the light, but the light was hurting people, so they had to choose. Some librarians wanted to protect the light and others wanted to protect the patrons, but eventually all agreed to protect the patrons…so it was believed. They set a trap to imprison the light, but those who wanted to protect it, betrayed their brothers and fed them to the light instead. When the betrayers were discovered, a great battle ensued and many died. In the end the betrayers were defeated and ‘The Library of the Sun’ was sealed with the light inside.
“The betrayers called themselves ‘The Knight Lights’ and remained loyal to the light. They tried to free the light many times using manuscripts stolen from “The Library of the Moon”. Eventually they were banned and were left to wander the forest. Legend says that they still roam the forest looking for children-.”
Tina says, “Bad children.”
Sancho says, “Bad children, so they can feed on their energy. It’s the energy of children that give them their special abilities. It was the same story my grandma told me whenever I was misbehaving.” He smiles at Tina, then continues to say, “I always believed that crazy old woman.”
Tina says, “I didn’t.”
Sancho says, “That’s why she didn’t like you.”
Tina says, “She liked me just fine. You were just a spoiled brat.”
Sancho says, “Well, I was her favorite.” Tina rolls her eye as Sancho continues to say, “Then I grew up and stopped believing in her crazy stories. And now, she’s come back from the grave to haunt me. I wanted to see for myself. I wanted to know if these childhood stories were true. So, I lead the next attack against their military compound. They call it a palace, but my scouts have seen too many soldiers coming and going from that place to believe that.
“I lead the attack with 1000 men and I saw for myself. Large men, with super strength and super hearing. We thought we were sneaking up on them, but they heard us coming from a mile away. It was a slaughter. 1000 against 100 and only 193 returned.” He looks intently at Sully and asks, “I was forced to ask myself. “‘What’s really going on? Could these stories be true? Could there really be a beautiful light and a room of gold filled with treasures from all around the world?'”
Tina laughs and says, “With super humans that eat children.”
Sancho smiles and says, “Of course it’s not true…but then look who wanders into my territory on another treasure hunt.” He leans back in his chair and asks, “Where is Nathan Drake?”
The team is silent.
Sancho turns to Tina and asks, “Did you search them before bringing them in?”
Tina says, “No.”
Sancho turns back to Sully and asks, “Sully?”
Sully is about to crack, when Sam says, “Sully, don’t you dare.”
Sully says, “He’s got us Sam. Game over.” He reluctantly pulls out the map and slides it to Sancho. He opens the map and looks it over. Sully continues to say, “We don’t know where he’s at. They’ve got him, but we know where he’s going.”
Sancho says, “I’ll make you a deal. I’ll help you save Nathan for a percentage.”
Sully says, “How much?”
Sancho says, “60%.”
Sam says, “What?!”
Annoyed, Sancho says, “Fine. 70%.”
Sully says, “Do we have a choice?”
Sancho says, “Of course not. I was just being polite.” He turns to Tina and continues to say, “Tina, I want you to personally handle this. Take your best men and be ready to depart within the hour. We have a lot of ground to make up so take the osprey.”
Tina nods and says, “Come on boys. We’ve got work to do.”