Author's Note: I started writing this before John Wick 2 was released. The in-story lore for John and the Continental is based on the first movie and some of what was in the trailers for JW2. I may add in little bits of flavor from the second movie, but I'm ignoring certain plot complications from JW2. This story is set in the same Mass Effect Universe as my other ME fanfic (Tango 'Til They're Sore), so when you're done with this one you can read that one to find out what happens next. Enjoy!
I made a lot of money I was makin' quite a mess
But they all told me money wouldn't bring me happiness
"You gotta work like a man in a real man's life
You're gonna have to take all the trouble and strife"
You gotta get up in the morning take your heavy load
And you gotta keep goin' down the long black road
ELO, "Long Black Road"
Harold was not prejudiced; he distrusted everybody equally. Even so, he liked working with aliens for the most part. He'd done jobs with turians, salarians, and even an asari or two at one time or another. Therefore, being partnered with a quarian was just another day on the job for him, even if it was the first time he'd ever set eyes on one of the suited-up aliens.
This particular quarian was named Kal'Megan, or at least that was what he'd asked to be called. He was a lot older than the usual quarian, which meant he probably wasn't on his Pilgrimage. Harold knew just enough about quarian society to figure that meant that Kal'Megan had probably been exiled from his fleet.
Harold was just fine with not knowing more. In most of his previous jobs, biographies and proper names were not to be thrown around lightly. His own true name was not actually Harold, but it was at least close enough that he would respond to 'Harold' automatically and easily. He had always been on the thin side, which made him feel some affinity for the similarly scrawny quarian. Even so, he wasn't about to let his guard down and treat the alien like a friend. They had a job to do, and that was all.
"What is this place?" asked Kal'Megan. The quarian looked a little like a study in overkill, since he was wearing disposable yellow overalls on top of his environmental suit. Harold was wearing yellow overalls as well. Their employer had given them the packaged suits and said to use them if needed. And sure enough, they had been needed.
Harold looked around, then consulted the little paper map in his hand. "This is it. Our destination. This should be where the package is." The two of them had descended through multiple levels of subways and sewers to reach this little forgotten side tunnel beneath the streets of Prague. Harold had been impressed with how easily Kal'Megan had navigated the throngs of humans in the streets above without seeming to bump into any of them, and had also been impressed with how the alien had managed to keep up during their descent.
He shone the flashlight around, looking for any obvious doors. Kal'Megan did the same, using a light projected from the helmet of his suit. "Ah!" The quarian sounded pleased. "I think I found it."
'It' was a circular door, just barely visible against the tunnel wall. There was a lot of grime and muck built up over it. Whenever it was last opened had been a long, long time ago. Harold set down his duffel bag full of tools and examined the edges. "Looks like the handle is recessed...wanna give me a hand?"
Fortunately the coveralls had integrated gloves, so the muck didn't get directly onto his hands. The two of them braced their feet against the tunnel wall and tried to pull the door open. After a little bit, there was a protesting groan and the door creaked open slightly. Harold almost expected a puff of foul air from the inside, but instead there was nothing. He looked at the crack and nodded.
"We should be able to get prybars in there." Their mysterious employer had also given them a list of tools that they'd probably need, and prying tools had been at the top of the list. Kal'Megan rummaged through the duffel bag and came up with two prybars. He handed one of them to Harold, and after a few repetitions of prying and resting they'd gotten the door just open enough to squeeze through. Harold suddenly realized that one of the reasons they'd both been chosen was for their slender builds.
"Shall we?" he asked Kal'Megan.
The quarian's silver eyes were just barely visible behind his visor, but Harold could tell they looked amused. "It's your planet. You go first."
The circular door led to a small cubical antechamber. The walls were lined with what looked like stainless steel. Two recessed bulbs in the ceiling flickered on as they entered, apparently triggered by some sort of motion detector. It was spotless, in stark contrast to the dirty tunnel outside. Kal'Megan looked around in obvious interest. "No dust," he commented. "So the air must be filtered. And they're getting power from somewhere." He regarded his coverall, now thoroughly coated with slime and nastiness from their descent. "I guess we can get rid of these for now."
Harold nodded and stripped off his own coveralls. The quarian followed suit, but managed to get a bit of muck onto one gloved hand during the removal. The alien regarded his hand in mute disgust. Harold smiled. "No worries, mate. I brought some towels, just in case." He had a small pouch at his side, and pulled out a small cloth square. He tossed it to the quarian. "You always have to know where your towel is," he added with a chuckle.
The quarian tilted his head as he cleaned off his hands. "I sense that's supposed to be a joke. Is it a human thing?"
"Sort of. It's from a piece of human literature." Harold then considered the only other exit from the antechamber. This was a larger door that almost looked like it led to a bank vault. It had a large, circular wheel in the center. Beside it was...it couldn't be. "A keypad?" he said aloud. "Just how old is this place, anyway?"
Kal'Megan reached into one of his own side-pouches. "I guess I should open my envelope, then?" They'd each been given one, with specific instructions. At the first impasse, the quarian was to open his envelope. When they reached their destination, Harold was to open his own and much larger envelope.
"Go for it."
Sure enough, the quarian's envelope contained just a small piece of paper with a ten-digit code. Harold carefully tapped it into the keypad and wondered to himself what they could do if the keypad was simply broken due to age. He didn't have to worry. There was a cheerful little 'beep' from the keypad, and a green flash. The door gave a soft clanking noise, and then swung open with a gentle whine of servos.
"I'm guessing this place is at least a hundred years old," said Harold. "Probably older. It's amazing this all still works."
"It was built to last, for sure," said Kal'Megan in an almost hungry tone. "I'd love to get a teardown crew from the Fleet in here to see how they did it." Harold let the mention of the Migrant Fleet pass without probing further.
Cautiously, the two of them moved into the next room. Harold's first impression was that the room was very cold. The decor was...strange. One half of the room was clinical and sterile, lined with tile and occupied with various bits of machinery. The largest of these was a huge horizontal tank that was covered over with condensed frost. The other half of the room was more like the library of some wealthy country gentleman, and consisted of rich wood paneling and leather. A large wooden table and wardrobe were the two main pieces of furniture in this half. Harold walked forward and ran one hand over the table. It was made from real mahogany. The tabletop was a single large piece of it. Harold let out a silent whistle. This table alone could let him live like a king for a year...if he could somehow get it out of here.
The whole room was well-lit and filled with a soft hum. Harold turned his attention to the tank, which was the apparent source of the room's chill. "I'm betting this is our target."
Kal'Megan nodded. "I'm not taking that bet. Should we open your package, then?"
Harold pulled out the bulky manila envelope he'd been given. Upon opening, he found a smaller but still bulky package inside, along with a neatly printed note. The inner package had 'DO NOT OPEN YET' in large letters on its outside. He laid that on the table and read through the note. He could tell that the quarian was dying to know what the letter said, just from the jittery way the alien tapped his foot.
"Well?" said Kal'Megan finally.
"It's instructions for thawing that," replied Harold, and jabbed one thumb at the frosted tank. "Along with a couple of things to say once the occupant is up and about. We're also supposed to give him this." Harold pointed at the envelope on the table.
The quarian stopped tapping his foot. "Occupant? There's somebody in there? Could they still be alive?"
Harold shrugged. "There's one way to find out." He moved over to the tank and found another keypad on its side. He entered the code from his note and was gratified to see 'ACCEPTED' appear on the little display above the keypad. There was a soft whir of fluids moving, but no other sound he could detect.
Meanwhile, Kal'Megan had moved behind him and was examining the other components next to the tank. Harold flinched a little when the quarian opened his omni-tool and began waving it at the various bits of machinery.
"Careful, man!" he said, a little louder than he'd intended. "I don't want you hacking in and messing up the thawing procedure."
Kal'Megan made a placating gesture with his free hand. "I'm only doing passive scans, don't worry. Besides, I think this stuff is way too archaic for me to interface with anyway."
"I hope you're right. I wanna find out who this is." Harold leaned forward and tried to scrub the accumulated ice off of the tank's window. He could just make out a dark form inside. Whether it was human or not he couldn't tell. There also appeared to be some sort of nameplate above the tank's window. The ice on the plate yielded a bit to his removal attempts, although there was still some ice obscuring some of the lettering.
"Bab Ya," he said aloud. "Maybe it's a baby yak?" He laughed at the notion of going to all this trouble to freeze a yak.
"What's a yak?" asked Kal'Megan.
"It's a big Earth animal, sort of like a very hairy cow."
"Ah, I see. What's a cow?"
Harold ignored the question and attacked the nameplate again with his sleeve. The last of the ice finally gave way. "Baba Yaga. What the hell is that?"
Kal'Megan tilted his head as if staring into the distance. Harold figured he was calling up some information and reading it on his visor. "The name Baba Yaga corresponds to a figure from human folklore. It's from a place called Russia, apparently. The tales were of a demonic figure used to frighten children."
"The boogeyman," said Harold, almost to himself. He regarded the dim form in the tank and shuddered. He tried to tell himself it was due to the chill in the room.
"Keelah!" The outburst from the quarian pulled his attention from the tank.
"Problem?"
"No, I was just surprised is all. This thing here-" Kal'Megan indicated a squat cylinder next to the tank, "is a nuclear reactor."
"Shit," said Harold. "Are we in danger? Should we-"
"No, it looks to be well shielded. But the little bit of radiation signature I can pick up...this thing runs on fissionables." The quarian sounded as if he'd uncovered a stone axe. "It must be as a backup, in case they lost power down here."
Harold considered for a bit. "Well, that makes this place more than a hundred years old, I guess. Probably closer to one hundred and fifty, maybe?"
A large section of ice slid off of the tank's surface and onto the tiled floor. Harold thought a bit more. "Whoever this is, they predate humanity's first contact. So they're definitely human. And they won't have any translator installed, so they won't understand you. Let me do the talking, okay?"
John Wick dreamt of swimming in frozen seas. His body was large, coated with protective blubber, and utterly suited for his environment. Hunger churned in his stomach, and he chased the small black winged forms that were his prey. His teeth were large and sharp. The crunch of bones and the coppery taste of their blood in his mouth revitalized him. He was a mighty leopard seal, a dangerous predator...
No. He was a human. The dream drifted away as his memories began to rise. He was not a leopard seal, but he was indeed a dangerous predator. He had survived for decades in an exclusive lifestyle where the average lifespan could be measured in a few years at most. He had killed and kept killing until, out of nowhere, he had found love. But it had not lasted. He had lost that love and then, horribly, he had lost any hope. John had extracted his pound of flesh for the loss of that hope and then somehow kept going. There had been more killing after that. He had never even thought about turning a gun on himself. The world would have to kill him, and he would give it every opportunity to do so.
And yet somehow he kept surviving. He was a man hungry for his own death, but that hunger could not be sated. Then Winston had come to him with a proposition. Dear Winston, who was the closest thing to a friend he had. The man who was the jeweled bearing upon which John's life turned.
The Organization that was behind the Continental Hotel had access to technology far beyond that available to the common man. And John was an asset that was far too valuable to leave banging around on the streets in search of death. In the future, the Organization might have need of him. So he could go into a dreamless sleep until that need came and he would be resurrected. And if he never woke up due to the vagaries of luck, that was not the same as suicide. John's own sense of honor could be maintained.
John had agreed to the procedure. But now he felt irritation. Winston had promised him a dreamless sleep, but here he was dreaming of being a seal of all things. And then he realized that the dream meant he was waking up. Resurrection was at hand. He was cold, but could feel warmth rapidly returning to his body.
There were a couple of nearby voices. He cracked his eyes open and saw vague forms moving near him. He mentally gathered himself and made ready to move.
Kal'Megan had helped Harold get the human's body onto the table and wrapped up. The nearby cabinet (what Harold had called a 'wardrobe') contained several sets of clothing as well as several large blankets. The wardrobe had been hermetically sealed and filled with inert argon gas, just one more sign of the planned longevity of this bewildering place. From what Kal'Megan had seen, humans simply didn't build to last like this. Once again, he wondered to himself just who was behind this place.
The human they'd pulled out of the tank was now wrapped in one of the blankets from the 'wardrobe'. His eyes were closed, and his face was peaceful and still. There was a fringe of black and neatly-trimmed facial hair on the human's jaw and upper lip. Kal'Megan was still getting used to facial hair. It was one of the few truly unique characteristics of the human race, and it still creeped him out a little bit.
The human's build was rangy and more muscular than his own, or Harold's for that matter. But it was still not as musclebound as the Alliance military types that Kal'Megan had run into previously. The man's back had some human script and patterns etched permanently into his skin. Harold had mentioned that this was called a 'tattoo' and that it wasn't really in fashion anymore.
"So how long should we wait?" he asked Harold.
"Until he wakes up. We're getting paid well to wait," Harold leaned forward and regarded the human from the tank. "Besides, there's a lot I wanna know. Who the hell is this guy? Why go to all this trouble for one man?"
"I would say part of the reason for our payment is to keep our curiosity in check, wouldn't you say?"
"Maybe." Harold straightened up and turned away from the table. "But still-"
The human from the tank moved faster than Kal'Megan would have thought possible. He sat up and wrapped one arm around Harold's neck, then jammed the other behind Harold's head. The slender human gave a startled croak, and from the color his face was turning Kal'Megan figured that he wasn't getting any air. He thought about moving forward to assist his comrade, only to be rooted to the spot by the glare from a pair of dark, almost black eyes.
"Who are you?" rasped the man from the tank. "Where am I?"
"Friends! We're friends!" said Kal'Megan hurriedly. He saw confusion in those dark eyes and realized that, although he had the necessary translator hardware to understand the man's speech, the reverse was not true. He held up his hands and hoped it looked un-threatening.
The figure before him was clad from head to toe in some sort of close-fitting outfit. At first John thought that this meant that the future had seen some sort of nuclear war. Maybe the suit was to protect against radiation? But then another look at the figure told him that might not be the case. He saw that the figure had three-fingered hands and toes, not to mention knees that bent the wrong way. Whoever this was, they weren't human.
The man whose neck he had a hold of was dressed simply, in pants and a long-sleeved shirt. His captive croaked and feebly tried to pry his arm away from his neck.
"Sl'Sithah! Ne'tata!" said the suited figure. He held up his odd-looking hands higher, as if to emphasize he didn't hold a weapon.
John decided they weren't a threat at the moment, and let go of the man's neck. The man coughed and backed away as if trapped in a cage with a tiger.
"Easy, buddy," said the man. "My name's Harold. This fella here is Kal'Megan. He's a friend. We're both friends, sent to wake you up. I guess."
"You guess? You don't know for sure?" John was not about to take anything at face value.
"We were just told where to go, and we didn't know what to do until we got here. Speaking of which, this is for you." The man held out a thick, sealed envelope.
Harold watched the man from the tank open the envelope. Inside was what looked like an OSD, which the man regarded with some curiosity. There was also a neatly printed note along with another note that looked much older. The older note was printed on yellowed, almost crumbling paper. The man read through the older note first, and it looked as if he was almost going to weep after finishing it. Then he went over the newer note, and his face became impassive again. He set them all aside.
"It says there should be clothes for me."
"Oh, yeah." Harold indicated the wardrobe. "In there. It all looks to be in order. There's also a case of some sort on the floor."
The man nodded and moved over to the wardrobe. He was seemingly unconcerned about his nudity. From the way the man moved, Harold realized he was lucky to have just a sore neck. This man could have killed him without effort.
"So, ah, what's your name?" he asked, trying to sound casual.
"John." The man pulled out a black suit and laid it on the table. He then retrieved some underclothes and began to dress himself.
Kal'Megan was pressing himself into the far corner as if trying to escape through the wall. "Is he going to kill us? Maybe we should get out of here."
John glanced curiously over at the quarian. Harold decided to step in. "Ah, my friend is just wondering what the note said, is all. We weren't told much, like I said."
"Your friend is alien, I'm assuming?" replied John. He was knotting a black tie into place.
"Um, yeah. I guess you were put under before we found the Mars ruins, and before the First Contact War."
"Hmm. So our first contact with aliens resulted in a war, eh? I see some things never change." John seemed almost amused as he said it.
"The war wasn't with his people!" Harold was desperate to keep things calm. "He's a quarian, we met them after that whole deal. There are a lotta different species running around...shit, I just realized how much you have to get caught up on."
John finished knotting his tie. "I'll find it all out in due course. How do I look?"
"Um, I think you look fine, but I'm not an expert in fashion. We're in kind of a sewer, though. I don't think that suit will be very nice for long."
John smiled and reached into the wardrobe. He pulled out another yellow disposable coverall, just like the ones Harold and Kal'Megan had worn getting in here. "I'll manage."
Harold nodded. "Okay, great. I guess if you don't need us anymore, we can get going?" his voice trailed off hopefully.
John fixed him with a level stare. "Not yet. You still need your payment."
"Payment?" asked Kal'Megan. "We were supposed to get paid the rest when we got back. What is he up to?"
Harold held up a hand to his colleague, hoping to look confident. But the almost robotic look in those black eyes did not fill him with hope. "No worries, Kal. We're all friends here, right?"
John pulled a black case out of the bottom of the wardrobe. He unlatched its lid and swung it up. The lid was facing both Harold and Kal'Megan, and the human couldn't see what was inside the case. John gave Harold one last glance, and then his hand darted like lightning into the case.
Harold thought about throwing himself forward and trying to stop his own death, but somehow he knew that wouldn't help. He flinched as he heard a loud slap. At first, Harold took it for a gunshot. But then he realized that he didn't have a hole in him. John had smacked a black velvet bag onto the surface of the table, and now he pushed it forward towards Harold.
"That's for you," said John. He then pulled another similar bag out of the case and did another smack on the table's surface. "And this is for you," he said to Kal'Megan, and pushed the second bag in the quarian's direction.
Harold took his bag with shaking fingers and opened it. There were ten coins inside. They were ornately carved in an unfamiliar pattern, and made of a dense yellow metal that could only be...
"Gold," said Kal'Megan, who had also opened his bag. "These are solid gold!"
John smiled. "I don't need a translation to know what he just said." The dark-haired human nodded at them both in an amiable manner. "This is a bonus, in addition to your agreed-upon payment. When you both get back, you'll get the rest of your payment in standard credits. But these..." he indicated the two bags. "I highly recommend you keep them. They are worth far more than just their metal content."
"What can you buy with these?" asked Harold.
John's smile faded. "Death. You can buy death with these. Now if you'll excuse me, I have someone to see."