Tomb of the Khan

by Matthew J. Kirby

  David looked up at her, and she waited a moment. Normally, they went to the Animus corridor together, but this time he just folded his arms. She rolled her eyes and walked away, leaving him alone with Natalya.

  “You said you don’t trust Abstergo,” he said.

  “I don’t.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I know they have a hidden agenda. There are things they don’t tell us. But that’s a long way from killing someone.”

  “But Monroe said—”

  “Monroe had his own hidden agenda. I wouldn’t trust him any further than Abstergo. So let’s just wait and see what happens. Okay?”

  David refused to answer that.

  Natalya rose from the table. “You coming?”

  “I’ll be along.”

  “Okay.” Then she threw away her garbage and left the lounge.

  David sat for a few moments longer, and then, because there didn’t seem to be anything else he could do, he got up and followed the others toward the Animus corridor. When he reached his room, Victoria was there.

  “David,” she said. “Good to see you. I understand you had a little adventure last night.”

  “Yeah,” he said, his body suddenly flush with cold panic. How much did she know?

  “The security guard told me he found you walking into a wall. I’m concerned, because somnambulism and other sleep disturbances might be Bleeding Effects.”

  “Oh, really?”

  “Yes. We will have to watch you closely. It may even be necessary to lock the door on your room at night until we can be sure you’re safe.”

  That sounded very sinister to David, but Grace and Sean would probably say it was for his own good. “I don’t know if I want my door locked.”

  “Only temporarily,” Victoria said. “I’ve also ordered the security footage pulled from last night, just so I can see what was going on for myself.”

  David’s panic escalated, raising his heartbeat with his alarm. “Really?”

  “Nothing to be embarrassed about,” she said. “I just don’t want anything bad to happen to you.”

  Once again, it was all about Owen, and Javier had to sit back and watch as Griffin monitored his friend in a shiny new Animus. But that was fine. That’s how it was, which was why he had needed a break from Owen. Javier just had too much of his own stuff going on to deal with Owen’s stuff as well. But in this situation, that didn’t really matter. It just was what it was. He couldn’t stay mad at Owen anyway. Javier felt as if he owed him.

  But that didn’t mean he wasn’t bored out of his mind, just sitting there, waiting.

  Rebecca had left a few hours ago. There were apparently a couple of cars in the nearly collapsing barn outside, and she had taken one of them, probably heading off on another Assassin mission of some kind. That left another car, and Javier was seriously tempted to take it and go for a ride.

  But where?

  They were hiding out in the middle of nowhere for a reason. The Templars were after them, and they were seriously outnumbered. Javier had begun to think that’s basically what it meant to be an Assassin; always on the run, always in hiding, often alone.

  In a way, that was how Javier had felt for most of his life. In third grade he’d realized he was different. By seventh grade he’d given it a name. A lot of the time between and since had been spent hiding the fact that he was gay from almost everyone, and feeling very, very alone. Things had gotten better after he’d come out to his parents and his brother, and now that he’d come out to Owen, a bit more of that aloneness had gone away. But he didn’t think he would ever be fully rid of it. There would always be a kid inside him who felt as if he was faking it. Just pretending to be like everyone else.

  “You hungry?” Griffin sat at the computer console where he monitored Owen’s simulation.

  “Yeah,” Javier said.

  “There’s a mini fridge in that corner over there. Rebecca probably stocked it.”

  Javier got up from the crate he’d been sitting on and walked over to check. He opened the door, letting out the cold and the hum of its fan, and inside found a supply of vegetables, along with some tofu products boldly claiming to taste like turkey and cheese.

  “Rebecca a vegetarian, by chance?” Javier asked.

  “Yeah, why?” Griffin said, turning around.

  Javier just nodded toward the fridge.

  “Ah, crap,” Griffin said.

  A box of groceries on top of the fridge held a loaf of sprouted wheat bread, so Javier made himself a not-turkey-and-cheese sandwich.

  “You want one?” he asked Griffin.

  The Assassin seemed to think about it a moment, and finally nodded with a bit of a scowl, so Javier made a second sandwich and brought it over.

  “He’s in the Mongol war camp,” Griffin said, pointing at the code scrolling across the screen, and the image of Javier’s ancestor sneaking around the tents. “Want to pull up a chair and watch?”

  “I’m good,” Javier said, returning to his crate. He didn’t want to watch. He wanted to do. Something real, not a reenactment of an ancient memory in the Animus. “How much longer do you think he’ll be in there?”

  “No idea,” Griffin said, his sandwich already half gone. “Your friend Monroe didn’t exactly leave us a road map.”

  A map would’ve helped before Monroe dragged them into this secret underworld. Javier thought back to that first time in the Animus, back when Owen had hoped he could use his genetic memory to prove his father’s innocence. That kind of proof wouldn’t exactly be admissible in court, so it wouldn’t do any good legally. But then, Javier didn’t think it had ever really been about the courts. Owen had something to prove to himself.

  That gave Javier an idea for something he could actually do. Something that would really help Owen, while giving Javier a chance to do something important. He still had a lot of gear in his leather jacket from their escape earlier that night.

  “I need to go for a walk,” he said.

  Griffin barely glanced over his shoulder. “Not a good idea.”

  “I’m going crazy, man. I just need some air.”

  Griffin grunted.

  “There’s nothing out here for miles.” Javier got up from the crate. “I won’t go far.”

  Griffin finally turned around to face him, looked him in the eye, and said, “Fine. Be back in twenty. Don’t make me come looking for you. I have a simulation to run.”

  Javier nodded and walked up the stairs, leaving the high-tech Assassin hideout for the haunted house above. He had no intention of returning in twenty minutes, but there wasn’t anything Griffin would be able to do about that without leaving Owen stranded in the Animus. Griffin would probably be furious, but right now Javier wasn’t really concerned about that. This whole deal had always been more Owen’s than his.

  Upstairs, it was still pretty dark out, the house a creaking framework of rusty nails, splinters, and dust. Javier left through the front door, careful to close it behind him so the electronic lock engaged, and then marched straight for the barn.

  A wind had picked up, stirring the trees and tall grass. Javier pulled up his cowl, dug his hands into his pockets, keeping his elbows tight against his torso and his head down. When he reached the barn, its wide doors groaned open, revealing the plain sedan inside. The next issue would be the keys. Javier had no idea how to hotwire a car, so he hoped Assassin getaway protocol meant the keys would already be in the car.

  They were, right under the mat at his feet.

  He climbed in and turned the ignition, then pulled out of the barn, keeping the headlights off as he passed the house. He almost expected Griffin to come charging out the front door at any moment, but the Assassin didn’t show, and Javier eased down the long dirt drive. A hundred feet away from the house, he switched on the headlights, gave the car some gas, and drove back toward the city.

  The police warehouse wasn’t even really guarded. A couple of blue uniforms stood on duty at the doors, but Jav
ier didn’t plan on going in through the front. He wasn’t even sure this wouldn’t be a complete waste of time, but he wanted to do something for Owen to make up for the years he’d more or less abandoned him without any explanation.

  A chain-link fence topped with razor wire surrounded the warehouse, while security cameras at the corners of the building and fence swept the area. Javier used his crossbow pistol to take out the nearest cameras. Then he scaled the fence and vaulted himself over the razor wire, landing easily on his feet.

  From there he raced up to the wall of the warehouse and climbed. At first, the experience felt like it had in the memories of Cudgel Cormac, scaling the buildings of New York City. But now, in the real world, and only a dozen feet up, things got hard. Javier’s fingers grew tired, and his muscles quivered. He froze, clinging to the vertical face, and looked up, the nearest window still another twenty feet above him. He wasn’t going to make that.

  A moment later, his grip slipped, and he fell hard to the ground. It seemed the Bleeding Effects had limits, and now his right ankle hurt.

  Javier wasn’t going to give up, though, so he scouted around the walls of the warehouse until he found a loading dock and a back door behind the building. An older electronic keypad secured the lock on the door, but Javier smacked it with one of the EMP grenades, and it clicked open.

  Inside the warehouse, rows and rows of shelving towered over him, each filled with boxes of different sizes and shapes. A quick glance at some of the labels on the shelves and Javier learned they were organized by date and case number. He knew the rough date of the trial for Owen’s dad, but not the case number.

  So he got as close as he could, using the information he had, and checked the labels on each of the boxes, climbing up and down the shelving units. It took about forty-five minutes before he located the right one and pulled it from its stack on the shelf.

  Back on the ground, he set the box on the floor and opened it. Inside, he found orange evidence bags containing DVDs of security footage, shell casings, and more than six inches of reports and files. He hoped there was something in there to bring Owen some closure, one way or another.

  “I’ll check this way,” a woman said from a far corner of the room.

  Then footsteps.

  Javier snatched up the box and rushed in the opposite direction as quietly as he could, ducking and dodging among the rows toward the loading dock. When he got there, a uniformed cop was standing in his way. Before he could react, Javier rushed him and rammed him with his shoulder, and they both went down on the ground. The cardboard box of evidence crumpled, but Javier held on to it and leapt to his feet, racing out the door and toward the fence.

  “Over here!” the policeman shouted behind him. Javier glanced back, and saw the man in pursuit, his hand on his sidearm.

  Javier reached into his pocket and pulled out a smoke grenade, which he hurled to the ground behind him. The explosion choked the air for fifteen feet, giving Javier the chance to stop and load his crossbow with some sleep darts. As soon as the cop appeared, Javier shot him, and a few seconds later the officer went down.

  The fence lay another ten yards away, but Javier wouldn’t be able to climb it with the box under his arm. He had to get through it.

  More voices shouted behind him, the other police officers catching up.

  Javier had one explosive grenade he’d never used before, and he had no idea if it would do the job or blow him up in the process. But he pulled it out of his pocket, threw it at the fence from as far away as he could, and then dove to the ground.

  The explosion rang in his ears and threw gravel and dust over him, and a few tiny fragments struck the back of his head. They stung, but didn’t do any damage, and he climbed to his feet as the smoke finished clearing away.

  A narrow opening flared outward in the fence, possibly big enough for him, but possibly not. He ran for it, his only shot, pushing the box through ahead of him, and then wriggled through.

  His jacket caught on the mangled wire, but he ripped it free and raced toward the car. A short distance from it, he tossed another smoke grenade, just in case any of the police in pursuit could spot him, and then he charged the rest of the way.

  When he reached the vehicle, he threw the door open, heaved the box across into the front passenger seat, and then jumped in. A moment later, he raced away, checking his rearview mirror for flashing lights. Sirens wailed from some distance behind, no doubt heading for the warehouse. None of them seemed to be chasing him.

  Even so, his heartbeat didn’t slow, and his breathing didn’t settle down, until he’d reached the highway heading out of town. As he drove, the sky to the east bloomed with the first light of dawn. By the time he reached the haunted Assassin house, he’d been gone for just under three hours, and the sun was up.

  As he parked the car in the barn, he wondered what Griffin would do to him when he got inside, but he grabbed the box of evidence and went to find out.

  It turned out Griffin was already standing on the porch, arms folded, fury in his eyes.

  “Have you been waiting there this whole time?” Javier asked.

  Griffin looked ready to spontaneously combust. “I’ve been tracking you since you left, you little punk. You think you can steal my car without my knowing it?”

  It occurred to Javier that this was a man who regularly killed people, and that it might be smart to adopt a more conciliatory tone. “Sorry,” he said as he approached the Assassin. “I didn’t—”

  Griffin grabbed him hard by the collar of his jacket and wrenched him in close. “You don’t know how thin the ice is beneath you. Do you want to tell me what you were doing at a police warehouse?”

  “I went for Owen.” Javier jostled the battered box. “This is the evidence they used against his dad.”

  That seemed to cool some of Griffin’s anger, and he let go of Javier. “Get inside. We’ll deal with this later.”

  Javier followed the Assassin back inside, down the stairs, into the basement. Owen still lay in the Animus chair, and Griffin went back to the computer console without saying any more. Javier took the box over to the table and sat down to look more closely at what was inside it.

  He took everything out and spread it over the surface of the glass. The evidence bags were easy, but the files took some reading and organizing. There were crime scene reports and photos. There was an autopsy report on the bank security guard. There were witness statements, and transcripts of interviews and interrogations. Financial statements. Javier laid it all out and stepped back, rubbing his chin.

  “Doing the wrong thing for the right reasons is still the wrong thing,” Griffin said behind him.

  “I’m not sure how to take that, coming from a guy who kills people. And the truth is that I’d do it again.”

  Griffin nodded. “I know you would. That’s the problem. What if you’d been caught? Arrested? What if they followed you back here?”

  “They didn’t.”

  “You’re smart enough to know that’s not the point.”

  “And I’m smart enough to not get caught.”

  Griffin stepped up to the table and scanned all the evidence. “The Assassins have a Creed,” he said quietly.

  They were a secret society. Of course they would have a creed. But Javier refrained from offering a sarcastic response, because he could sense how seriously Griffin took what he was saying.

  “Three Tenets,” the Assassin continued. “Stay your blade from the flesh of an innocent. Hide in plain sight. Never compromise the Brotherhood.”

  “Okay,” Javier said. “Sounds … simple.”

  “Not so simple you didn’t violate the third Tenet tonight.”

  “I’m not a member of the Brotherhood.”

  Griffin nodded. “Not yet. But you’ve become a part of this war whether you like it or not, and eventually you’ll have to choose a side. I’d like to think you’d choose ours.”

  “You know,” Javier said. “Monroe warned us all about t
his.”

  “About what?”

  “They said that you guys and the Templars would try to recruit us.”

  “He was right.”

  “He also told us not to choose a side.”

  “Well, you may not have that choice.”

  Javier smirked. “Thought the Assassins were supposed to be all about free will.”

  “I’m aware of the irony. But you’re not ready for that yet.”

  “Ready for what?” Javier asked.

  Griffin ignored him and returned to the computer console. Javier shook his head and went back to studying the evidence. Owen had always maintained that his father had been set up somehow. Framed or something. But it was hard to argue with the gun they found in his dad’s car that matched the bullet that killed the guard. It was hard to argue with the fingerprints at the scene. It was hard to argue with the gambling debts that gave his dad one hundred and sixty-seven thousand dollars of motive. Javier didn’t want to believe it, and he would never say this to Owen, but the truth was that he probably would have voted guilty, too.

  But he shook that thought out of his mind, assessed the table again, and nodded to himself, feeling pleased. When Owen finished the simulation, he could take a look at all this for himself. There had to be something here that Javier was missing, just like the jury had.

  He grabbed a kombucha from Rebecca’s mini fridge and took his seat back on the crate, watching the back of Griffin’s head.

  A few minutes later, that shaved head leaned closer to the monitors. “Your boy’s in trouble,” the Assassin said.

  Javier got up. “He is?”

  “His ancestor is.”

  Javier crossed the room and looked over Griffin’s shoulder. Javier saw Owen’s ancestor, that Chinese Assassin, racing through a camp of large tents, an actual army of Mongol warriors chasing after her.

  “Any sign of the prong?”

  Griffin clenched his jaw. “Yes.”

  Natalya had to admit that David had unsettled her. She’d never been completely comfortable with Abstergo and the Templars, but she hadn’t even suspected they would kill anyone, especially not kids. Maybe in the past, but in the modern world that sounded too much like wild conspiracy theory talk. What David claimed to have heard seemed unbelievable, but it did strengthen some of Natalya’s own private doubts. Those doubts lingered as she waited in her Animus room.