Sunday, August 19, 2012

What I might want to write into a story someday

Hey, guys, Condor here again!  I haven't written anything in a few days because my creative muse has been on a bit of a hiatus as of late.  I think the Raw 1000 Review took more out of the tank than expected.  Still, I do want to keep writing blogs, if only to entertain myself (and hopefully whoever reads this religiously, God help you (see what I did there?  Yeah, me neither)).  Self depreciating humor aside, one of the hobbies that I enjoy besides video games is writing.  I have done this mysterious thing called "RP", short for "role-play"ing, on various forum-based websites for the past two years, and the subject matter has been one of three things: Harry Potter after the book series concludes; vampires, werewolves and other supernatural entities in human form; and, in one instance, an extension of the movie "The Breakfast Club".

Granted, these days on the interwebz, anything and everything has some sort of following, and lord knows there are RP sites for just about anything one's heart desires.  The group that I am a part of seems primarily to hover around Harry Potter, which was admittedly a phenomenal book series.  The movies?  I haven't seen any but one, and that was the first one.  I also enjoy the notion of weilding some sort of power beyond my own as a human being, as we all do from time to time, I'm sure.  So why is this blog entitled the way it is?  Well, I needed an idea for a new blog post, and I wanted to get creative with it, so without any further delays, this is something I might want to write in a story one day...

Our kind has been hunted since ancient times, simply because our enemies do not understand the world like we do.  We know that the world is an illusion, a figment of the imagination, that nothing is true, but everything is permitted.  The Word of Man has always been twisted to benefit the few and oppress the many.  Great works have been written, the means behind those works, or the agendas of the men that wrote them, lost to history and time.  But not to us.  Not the Assassins.

The year is 2012, and things look pretty bleak for us.  Most of us are in hiding, trying to stay out of the watchful and ever-present gaze of Abstergo and their Templar minions.  Some of us have already been exterminated, as in the case with the Denver compound.  However, in Italy, subject seventeen, Desmond Miles, was able to escape Abstergo's confines after they found out what they wanted from him.  He was penned in for execution, but Lucy Stillman had other ideas.  She and the other Assassins in her unit trained Desmond to hone his abilities via The Bleeding Effect, though the gruesome side effects of that transition have more and more been taking their toll.

I should know.  I'm one of the worst cases.

There are times when I do not believe that I am human, that I am a supernatural entity being held together by a force I neither understand nor care to.  The personalities of my ancestors shift within me seemingly every hour, and during intense periods of stress, I become schizophrenic, expressing ideas and battle plans and interrogation tactics from several different identities over several different periods of time within minutes of each other.  Hell, we're all schizos, because our jobs force us to to.  At least that's what I believe.

At this point, my name is irrelevant.  I gave myself the codename Subject 23 because that's what it feels like being an anonymous Assassin.  Plus I just have a fascination with the number.  It's all over relligious texts and premonitions.  I'm a lone wolf.  I do not operate out of a unit of Assassins.  I still receive my orders from the higher-ups, but usually it's because I'm in and out of other people's bases.  Even my fellow Assassins that I congregate with do not fully know me or understand me, but rather than resent it or even vilify it, I embrace it.  I embrace being anonymous, nameless, inconspicuous.  By not having an identity, I receive an identity.  I am Subject 23, or just 23 for short, and tonight, I've been ordered to kill someone.

It's raining outside in Chicago.  The raindrops are nice and thick, but are low in number.  My hooded sweatshirt is pulled over my head, white gloves covering my hands so that I don't leave fingerprints.  The hidden blade is concealed within the sleeve, though it will not pass the scrutiny of a metal detector.  Good thing I decided to get in through the roof.  Some bigwig with ties to the RNC, the mob, and especially the Templars.  I was given a name, but names are irrelevant in my line of work.  They are to me.  All I study, all I understand, all I remember is the face.  The dull, empty, cow-like eyes.  The hooked nose.  The trembling lips.  Even in a still photo, I can see the fear radiating from the expression on his face.  He knows he's going to die, and he's going to die to my blade.  For the cause.  For the sake of freedom.  For God knows why anymore, all I know is that I've been told to kill this man, and I'm going to do it because of that fact, and that fact alone.

It's ironic.  We've spent our entire existence trying to convince the people of the world to think for themselves, to have their own opinions, and to seek out their own destinies, yet here we are, in the trenches in a centuries-old war that will never end, following orders just like the Templars intend the people to do.  We've had it explained it to us that the paradoxes existed as two things, opposite in every way, simultaneously.  I don't buy a word of it.  Practice what you preach.  That's what I was taught.  Maybe my forebears were all rebels.  Maybe it's just my natural distrust.  Whatever the reason, I still obey.  Is it out of respect?  Fear?  I'd like to think not, but you always fear what you don't understand.  And there's a hell of a lot I don't understand, even after all my experience.

No time for that now.  Guards in the hallway.  Guys with wives, kids, families, but targets nonetheless if they get in my way.  I prefer not to be seen at all, only killing who needs to be killed.  Silently, almost imperceptibly, I infiltrate the facility.  Senses are maxed out, Eagle Vision kicking in pretty hard.  My path is laid out for me, threat assessments seem to update by the second.  There is nothing of machine origin in my body.  Bionic implants are starting to become more of a reality these days, but for me, it's about using one's senses and nothing else.  Ghosts of people from past lives threaten to break my concentration, but so far, no dice.  I'm in the zone.  And now, I'm in his office.

Fairly large, typical bigwig surroundings.  Putter in the corner, with golf balls and a shot glass being used for the hole.  Mountain of paperwork on his cherry wood desk.  Leather chair with 15 different massaging options.  And my target, staring out a window into the rainy night.  His reflection shows a different face than the one from the dossier.  It is resolute, dignified.  Mournful, but accepting of the fate that awaits him.  It is as if he's been expecting me.  No, scratch that, he has.  No tangible sense can detect that.  This is the kind of stuff you just feel, and for an instant, I hesitate.  Is it a trap?  No, no it's not.  SWAT would have surrounded the place if it was.  There's no one here except a few guards and us.  Why is this so easy?

He answers it for me.

"I've sinned," he tells me, without moving an inch.  "I need to perform my pennance."

I stand up and start walking up to him.  He does not move.  "You know what that means," I say matter-of-factly, with no emotion.

"Yes.  I'm prepared."

I nod, respecting the man's courage.  Odd, usually I don't feel this way.  I have no feelings, I have no emotions.  I am a machine.  I am an Assassin.

His next words hit me so hard I begin to question everything I've ever known.

"It won't make a difference.  Your masters are lying to you."

I stop, processing his words, blade already drawn.  They lied to me?  How?  I've been lied to before, it's part of the job.  Simple things.  Even some complex things, like why we do what we do.  But the cause?  Are they lying about the cause?

Enough of this.  He's the one lying.  He sighs impatiently.  I take it as my cue.

The blade bites through his spinal cord.  I put my hand over his mouth so he doesn't attract attention.  He goes limp.  Blood spatter on the window, no one seems to notice.  It's too stormy out.  I lay him on the floor, hands over his heart.  I close the eyelids.

"Rest in peace."

I take a moment to reflect.  I turn my head to my right, and look up.  Security camera.  How could I have missed it?  Son of a bitch, it was a trap.  And I fell for it.  Alarms start going off.  Air duct nearby, I dart into it.  I crawl as fast as I can.  Voices shout instantly, disctinctly.  They discover the body.  They start searching for me.

Doesn't matter.  I've found my way out.  I head for the sewers.  Out of sight, out of mind.  I hear a beep in my ear.  Headset.  I was on radio silence, but no need to be now.  I flick the switch.  A voice comes over the speaker.  "Is it done?"

"Yes," I reply.  "Target eliminated.  Got spotted by a camera, Templars are gonna be all over it."

"We know.  We didn't see it in our schematics when we first briefed you.  Someone planted it."

"Your masters are lying to you."

"Planted?  Who?"

The silence over the radio is deafening.  That it would take this long to respond to a simple question leads me to believe that I am being set up.

"We don't know."

I breathe out of my nose sharply in disbelief.  They know everything.  That's how they behave, how they operate.  How they could miss a detail like that makes no sense.

"Then you don't know me," I shoot back.

I rip the headset from my ear, place it on the ground, and smash it under my heel.  No one tries to call out to me to stop.  No one asks "what do you mean?".  They were planning this.  Why, I don't know, and right now, I don't care.  I have no idea where they hole up for meetings or whatever, but I do know where their subordinates work.  Most likely they're being told I've gone rogue.  Technically, I have.  But I obeyed their orders in spite of what we as Assassins were taught, and now I'm paying the price for it.

But not before they do.

As always, Keep it Condor!

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