A/N: Salutations! Long time no see, eh? Well, I suppose not for most of you seeing as this is my first Assassin's Creed fic. Anyways, Welcome to the Noia series! ('Boredom' in English) This will be a series of one-shots (and maybe a few multi-chapter installations) centered around the assassin recruits from Brotherhood. I hope you enjoy!
(See end for further notes)
Chapter 1: House of Cards
"Come one…. una… di più... Yes!" Beatrice Simoni did a small victory jig after placing two more cards onto the rather large structure in front of her.
A day off from missions and being on call resulted in a surprising amount of boredom, and she sulked around the guild all morning trying to think of something to do. The two newest recruits were out on an errand, and the only other female was on a mission in Venezia. Niccolo Ciccone, the only other assistente so far, had the day off as well, but he seemed absent to be as she could not find him anywhere when she had looked before. Eventually, Beatrice finally found relief in a deck of cards she discovered sitting on one of the bookshelves.
A steadily growing house of cards was founded on the large table that was normally used for maps, while Beatrice opted to stand so she could flit around her creation, creating additions onto its sides from time to time. She was quite proud of her creation. Beatrice had always love playing with cards with her father when she was little. It had been many years since she had done this, and she could say she was thoroughly enjoying her day off now. Beatrice smiled to herself as she picked up two more cards to add to the top of the house. Her tongue stuck out from the corner of her mouth in concentration as she slowly lowered the cards. Only a few more centimetres…
"Oi, Beatrice!"
The female assassin squeaked in surprise and flailed backwards, trying desperately to avoid knocking over her creation. Putting her hand over her rapidly beating heart, she whirled around towards the voice and glared angrily at the person who almost ruined the card house.
"Dio mio! Niccolo, you pezzo di merda!" she exclaimed. Niccolo just laughed in response, and held his hands up in front of him as a measly defence against the onslaught of insults tumbling from Beatrice's mouth.
"Whoa, calm down, B! What's the big deal?" Niccolo asked.
Beatrice huffed and strode towards him, jabbing a finger at his chest. "You almost made me knock down my house of cards! All those hours could have gone to waste!"
Truth be told, she had only spent an hour or so on the entire thing. A little lie would not hurt though, especially if it meant Niccolo feeling guilty about something, the man was too prideful to admit to anything in her opinion.
"Well sorry," he said, rolling his eyes. "Whatever can I do to make it up to you?"
Beatrice turned on her heel and walked back over to the table. She counted the cards remaining in her deck and found there were only six left. If she wanted to keep construction going, she would be needing a lot more supplies.
"Seeing as you offered so kindly, you can go find me another deck of cards," Beatrice said, not even bothering to look at Niccolo as she spoke.
"Excuse me?" Niccolo sputtered indignantly, a look of disbelief on his face. "You have got to be kidding me. If you're so desperate for more cards, you can go to the Thieves Guild and get them yourself. I'm sure they have plenty there for your stupid house."
"Not in a million years! I refuse to leave my creation alone in your presence, with the fear that you will end up destroying it," Bianca growled.
"Well I would not destroy it because it is hardly worth my time!"
"Can't you come up with a better comeback than that, stupido?"
"Who're you calling stupid, you bullheaded co- "
"We're back!"
Rafaelle Cavallari and Zaccaria Vitelli walked into the main room of the headquarters and instantly regretted doing so, as they spotting Beatrice and Niccolo fighting in the corner beside a large house of cards. The two recruits exchanged nervous glances, unsure if they should intervene or not. While on one hand they were curious to know what their two higher-ups were arguing about, they also knew that Beatrice could get very scary very fast when she was mad. Niccolo was not much better either. Although he had more patience than the latter, once he lost it, it was almost certain that things would get ugly. The recruits had just decided to slip away undetected when Beatrice spotted them and waved them over. Rafaelle and Zaccaria shared a stifled groan as they warily approached the duo.
"Morning, recluta," Niccolo greeted with a lazy grin. All of his earlier agitation seemed to have disappeared; although, an obvious tension still lingered around Beatrice.
"Good morning," Zaccaria replied. Rafaelle nodded in greeting.
"Neither of you wouldn't happen to have a spare deck of cards around would you?" Beatrice asked.
"I do," Rafaelle said, turning to heading for his sleeping quarters.
Zaccaria tipped his head to the side and asked, "What are you doing that requires another deck of cards?"
"What does it look like I'm doing?" the female assassin retorted. "I'm building a house out of cards."
"It looks more like a fortress to me," Niccolo quipped.
"Well, no one asked you," Beatrice snapped.
Niccolo rolled his eyes and opened his mouth to answer when Rafaelle re-entered the room, deck of cards in hand. He handed them to Beatrice who beamed in return.
"Thank you, Rafaelle! Now I can finally finish this thing!"
The three men all exchanged looks as Beatrice seemed to forget about their presence and returned to her construction efforts. Shrugging, Niccolo wandered off and motioned for the other two to follow. He knew full well of what would happen if any of them was stupid enough to interrupt the female assassin.
Many hours later, it had become early evening and the sun was just beginning to sink below the buildings of Roma. Niccolo, Raphaelle, and Zaccaria had all managed to avoid the main room in which Beatrice and her card house, which was most likely a castle by now, occupied.
"We have not heard much from Beatrice in a while now," Zaccaria commented after looking out the window to see the street lamps being lit. "Do you think she's OK?"
"She's probably fine," Niccolo grunted as he scrubbed at a very persistent smudge on his blade.
Raphaelle turned his head to look at them from his place on the floor. "She fell asleep a while ago."
Zaccaria's brows rose in question. "Really?"
The other man nodded and went back to his meditation. Zaccaria heard the sound of leather against fabric, and turned to see Niccolo strapping his now clean hidden blade to his arm. After releasing the blade experimentally a few times, he stood and sauntered over to the archway leading to the main room of the headquarters.
"Where are you going?" Zaccaria asked.
"I want to see how big that house of cards is now." he answered smirking. "Care to join me?"
"I would not go if I were you," Raphaelle piped up from the floor. "That invitation has danger written all over it."
"Nonsense! I only wish to admire the skills of my partner."
Sighing, Zaccaria stood and walked over to Niccolo. "I will probably regret this decision, but I too am curious to see what Beatrice managed to build."
As the two men strolled into the next room, they could hear a soft snoring coming from the far corner. When they rounded the small wall, they both had to stop and do a double take as they came face-to-face with an enormous, card edifice. Zaccaria stared, his mouth hanging open, as Niccolo quickly regained his composure and slipped around the side of the table. He snorted loudly as a hand flew to his mouth to muffle the rest of his snickers. Blinking and shaking his head, Zaccaria snapped out of his trance and joined Niccolo, almost laughing out loud at the sight. Beatrice had somehow managed to fall asleep with her head resting on her arms on the table as the card structure made an arch over her sleeping form. Her hair fell around her shoulders and face, but it did nothing to cover the drool spot on her arm.
"Hey, recluta, watch this."
Zaccaria looked to Niccolo, and found, to his horror, that the other man had shuffled close to the table and shifted a little ways away before suddenly jerking his midsection to hip check the table. All at once, the structure on the table shifted and collapsed, causing cards to fly every which way. Beatrice jerked awake, her head hitting the arch above her as she straightened in the chair she sat in. This only served to cause more problems, as Beatrice's chair flew back when she abruptly shifted her weight. Zaccaria jumped back to avoid being hit by flailing arms, and glanced at Niccolo in bewilderment as the other man stood clutching his stomach and laughing his head off. Was he not scared of the rage he was about to experience?
"Cazzo!" Beatrice exclaimed loudly from her place on the floor. Her head snapped up to shoot a murderous glare at her fellow assistente, which only served to amuse him more.
"Oh, B! You should see your face right now! Impagabile!" Niccolo laughed breathlessly.
"Figlio di puttana! I will have your head, Ciccone!"
Zaccaria caught Beatrice around the waist before she could throw herself at Niccolo, and he tried desperately to hold her back; although, despite her petite size, she was quite strong. However, instead of using the time to run, Niccolo just continued to laugh at the raging woman.
"S-signora, please!" Zaccaria pleaded, struggling to keep his grip on Beatrice.
"Niccolo, you stronzo! Come and fight me like a man!" she screamed at him. She then suddenly turned on Zaccaria and started mercilessly kicking at his shins. "And you! Why did you not stop him, idiota?!"
"Mi dispiace, Beatrice, but I-"
Zaccaria was cut off as Beatrice landed a blow on his stomach. She managed to wriggle out of his grip and shove him towards Niccolo. Said man was too busy laughing to notice the new threat, and they both ended up falling to the ground. Rubbing his head, Niccolo grumbled under his breath, only to stop when he heard the sound of cracking knuckles. He and Zaccaria looked up to see Beatrice standing over them, giving them both a look that could kill. Not even a second past before they scrambled to their feet and hightailed it away as fast as they could.
Beatrice took chase and shook her fist after their retreating forms, yelling, "Get back here and fight me like, cowards!" as Niccolo and Zaccaria burst through the door of the headquarters and onto the streets of Roma.
As silence fell upon the interior of the headquarters, Raphaelle could only shake his head and wonder what fate would befall the two unfortunate assassins.
A/N: Oh boy, looks like Niccolo and Zaccaria are in for it... Shoud've listened to Raphaelle, eh? So, what'd you think? Like it, hate it? Let me know! Also, feel free to drop a prompt! I have a few more ideas, but I would love to hear some ideas from you guys! I will also be updating my profile with the characters from this story, just to keep track of them all. All of them, save Niccolo, all have names from the actual game. I surfed through a few forums to get the names, and mixed around some of the first and last names, but I kept Beatrice Somoni since it seemed like everyone had her. XD Also, excuse my horrible Italian, haha.
Please read and review!
CMilk out!