Eagle's Wings
Chayse Sequence
A.N.: I just read the new Nightwing comic (SPOILERS ON IT FROM HERE ON OUT!), and got the idea for this fic. The concept was something I've been messing around with for a while, but the new comic and Dick's focus on the future rather than the past really cleared the way for it. This'll be an AU for both Nightwing and Assassin's Creed, especially for AC, so I've put a presentation together on my facebook page that'll hopefully explain it. If you have further questions, leave a review or PM me. Enjoy!
"Where to?" the man asked as a young woman hopped into his cab. He couldn't see much of her face, but her jacket was memorable enough. The hooked beak of her hood, pulled low over her eyes, he couldn't place in his memory, but it made him squirm all the same. The red diamond over the beak was matched by the bands seemingly hand-sewn over her upper sleeves and the pockets.
"Anywhere, really. I just need to talk to you," she replied, checking surreptitiously out the window. He furrowed his eyebrows, but put the meter on and drove away all the same.
"I don't talk to anyone without knowing their name." Whatever reaction he'd been hoping for, it wasn't muttering out "Chayse," while she glanced at his info card in the back.
"Like the Australian guy from House?"
"With a Y, sure." He took a left into down town, where a few police cars were huddled outside an apartment complex and there was a smell in the air that put his teeth on edge. Familiar in the worst way, which was pretty bad for someone with memory loss.
"What'd you need to talk to me about?"
"I was in the bar, the other night, and couldn't help but overhear your conversation with that redhead." He cringed; that was the last thing he wanted to talk about, and a total stranger the second to last person he wanted to discuss it with. "I wanted to offer you some help in getting your memories back."
At that, he slammed on the brakes, majorly ticking off the guy behind him. Momentary shock over, he kept up with his pace.
"I appreciate the offer, but I don't want my memories back. It's my life and I don't want it controlled by the past."
"Bullshit," she replied, lips pulled in a sneer. "You don't have to acknowledge the past, you can repress those memories for years, for all I care, but I've never met anyone who didn't want to know their own fucking history." She leaned back in the seat, pushing her hands into the triangular pockets and continued. "'Your life,' what a crock'a shit. You're breaking into people's houses and sleeping in the cab you drive for a living-" She leaned forward, pulling back her hood so he could see her face for the first time, wearing a vaguely judgmental expression. "So tell me: how's 'your life' turning out for you?"
He pulled over and braked hard, making her bang her head against the plastic divider.
"Out. You don't have to pay, as long as I never see your face again." Oh, she was ticked. She circled around the back of the car and looked like she was ready to break the window if he didn't roll it down first.
"You were, and still are, a great fighter. Sooner or later, muscle memory's gonna kick in, you'll get antsy, and then what? You put on a dorky track suit to beat on addicts? Get busted reenacting Fight Club? You think you're a new man, now? Screw 'new,' how about new and better? Stand for something that isn't a game of pool or single diner waitress." He held her stare, and she huffed. "Here's your fucking pay." She growled the last line before chucking loose change at him through the window. He had to admit, that last move almost had him out of the car after her.
Almost.
No, what actually got him out of the car and chasing after her was the realization that she hadn't had a backpack on her when she got in, and the subsequent realization that his trunk was open. How she'd gotten it open without his noticing in the time it took to get around the cab he wasn't sure, but he didn't dwell on it for too long.
Once Chayse realized she was being, well, chased, she put on a sprint and dove into the next alley, making him skid so he didn't miss the turn.
A dark figure slipped out of sight on the brick wall ahead, and he wasted no time clambering over it, just in time to see her veer right, back in the direction he'd driven from.
She wasn't making any new turns, and it struck him how fast he was running. And how good it felt, closing in on her, GOD, he loved this. Like a breath of air when you're drowning.
He hadn't realized he'd been following on autopilot until he ran face-first into a wall. He checked and, sure enough, she was scaling the side of a rundown church building in the less populated area of Bludhaven.
With no small effort, he hauled himself up the two story (minus the steeple) building onto a part of the roof that was somewhat flat-ish.
"Told'ya. Muscle memory." She tossed him his backpack with a shit-eating smirk.
"Doesn't prove anything." With that and not even a goodbye, he hopped off the roof, sticking the landing much to his knees' protest, and walked slowly back to his cab.
"Somehow, I don't think he'll just up and join us," Chayse said, walking up to the Mentor, only to blush when she realized she was on the phone and hadn't been paying attention. She blushed redder when she listened in and realized it was one of those calls.
"I'll see you tonight, yeah?" she asked with a voice that just dripped with sensuality. "I love you too. Bye."
"When's Will gonna be back?" Chayse asked conversationally, as if she hadn't just eavesdropped on a damn near phone sex session interlaced with a grocery list.
"In about fifteen minutes. How'd the mission go?"
"Shit, for the most part. But I'm pretty sure his façade cracked. It might be easier to get through to him next time." Maria nodded. "What do you even want with him?"
"If he's not Nightwing, he might prove a good addition to the rite. And to the order," was her calculated answer.
"Uh-huh, sure. That's totally it."
"That's it, honest," she insisted.
"Then why, pray tell, didn't we propose this before he got fucking shot?"
"It wasn't in him to do what we do. He took down secret societies every other week; I doubt he'd have responded well to being recruited by one. Now, who knows? Anything's possible."
"Riiight…"
"By the way," Maria plowed on. "You're our top priority in the animus next week. We located an ancestor of yours on your mother's side: Margaret 'Peggy' Taylor, a World War II spy for the allies. She killed a Nazi at a dinner date."
"Damn."
"Yep. Rest up and get started in the morning."
A.N.: I don't know if this seemed out of left field, but I wanted to write it, anyway. Let me know what you think in a review. Thank you for your time.
