The Throne of Flame: Chapter Seven


The night dwelled on in a dreary manner, inching towards day. A lone shape sat perched atop a building that overlooked New York. The moon shone down upon them, but instead of illuminating them, it only added to the contrast that darkened their features. The night was waning away, and they would soon need to retreat back to their base. Annoyance was really the only thing that kept them awake; the final execution for their plan had been compromised.

They had been watching Julien for awhile by that point in time. Weeks, staking out in the big apple and keeping tabs on the king's behavior. It wasn't that they were taking their sweet time in getting the job done, really, or that they were seeking out a more effective method, or even that they were stalling. It was that the whole issue really wasn't interesting, and it was sort of nice to spend some time off otherwise in the big city.

The assassin held no personal vendetta against Julien, not really. Sure, the lemur was annoying when around others, but in his own company he was generally very quiet. Unless he was dancing, of course, but very few danced in silence. Even so, Julien was rather a blank slate to the assassin. They were entirely neutral to the lemur king, unlike everyone else who knew him. He was a walking controversy.

The Malagasy lemur politics had no effect on them, personally, even though that was what the person who hired them had in mind. Apparently Julien needed to be taken out and replaced so that social order within the lemur kingdom back in Madagascar could fall back into place. Not that they knew anything about it. At first, they failed to see how Julien could even so much as rule a kingdom from how far away he was, but it later became evident that he had a messenger pigeon.

He would meet up with the Madagascar blue pigeon once a month on a designated night, when the sky was darkest - and after his two lackeys had tired themselves out from dancing - and they would exchange news. The blue pigeon would tell Julien what was currently happening in Madagascar, and Julien would tell the blue pigeon what he wanted done about it, or any new policies he wanted to add. It was a slow process that required a lot of work on the pigeon's part, but the assassin surmised that it was sneaky enough that it kept Julien out of harm's way for awhile. His radical behavior would have been targeted much faster, had the king remained in Madagascar.

Though almost none Madagascar even used the term 'Socialism' to define what was going on (nor did they even know that such a policy existed), anyone who kept up with the Malagasy politics and kept a keen eye on what the king was doing could understand that they were going through a period of serious change. And, much like the assassin's boss, some were very disapproving of change, particularly in government. Especially when that change caused a significant decrease in wealth for the already wealthy.

The lemur government was in a state of wavering quality, what with with dissenting opinions at every turn. Much of the older, more conservative lemurs hated the Socialist ideologies that were being put into place. Them, and any lemur who had a higher position. Those that were sincerely loyal to the king and those that were more liberal heavily guarded Julien's intentions, however, even though no one was entirely sure what was going through the perplexing king's mind. Despite coming off as incomprehensibly dumb, the truth was that he was an enigma to all those who took the time to analyze him. Very few did, and even fewer spoke up about it, but they were quickly shot down by those who were used to King Julien's more easygoing antics.

After all, it was practically a universally known fact (to anyone who knew of Julien) that he was an idiot. And that was being nice, all considered. Their boss had used much more colorful language to describe Julien, some of which might have been a tad bit more on the unnecessary side.

But it wasn't that he was smart. It was that it was simply difficult to figure out what his, no matter how unintelligent, thought process was. Why would a king want to push Socialism into play? Was he truly selfless, or was he honestly more of an idiot than anyone had previously known?

The idea of a Monarchy diminishing so that the lower class could get rights was unfavorable to the upper class, particularly those that were heavily invested in the economic value of their previously Capitalistic government. In order for their Capitalism to thrive, they needed a strong output and input, and neither was really being had. Their output was a meager collection of fruit, and some fauna only found on Madagascar, and their input mostly consisted of medical supplies for the witch doctors and whatever could be scavenged from crashed boats.

The secondary was, of course, entirely incidental and could not be relied on - not that it truly mattered. They had everything they needed to survive right there on Madagascar. The upper class wanted more, of course, but such was the plight of Capitalism. The one who had hired him had said that the lemur population needed a firm, monarchist leader, and that leader could not be Julien. Not when Julien focused so heavily on social issues and equal rights.

The assassin didn't particularly care for any of that political rubbish. It was a great bore to them.

Still, the trip to New York itself was nice. Definitely much warmer than their actual home, even with the most modern, expensive heaters. It was loud, too, with the constant movement of city folk. There was so much to do, so many sights to see, and even though the residents experienced it on a daily basis, it didn't seem to shake the wow-factor New York truly held.

It was unfortunate that they couldn't exactly do more while there, being that they had to keep their presence on the down low. Even more so than usual, when the only factor was that animals weren't conventionally welcome to join in human activities. Their assassination mission was a very, very quiet one.

Their normal boss - not the one who hired them for this job, but the one who they worked for on a regular basis - was under the impression that they and their other teammate, who was thankfully hired for the assassination job alongside them, were handling a security breach in one of their safe houses. They had managed to convince their boss that only the two of them really needed to check it out. Child's play, especially with their technical know-how.

It wasn't nice though, lying to the boss like that. There was a system of trust in their team, and the two of them who were keeping quiet about the mission didn't like breakint it. But still, the reward for this kill job was too great, and part of the deal was keeping quiet about what they were doing. If their boss found out, the deal would be off. That aside, their boss had a strict moral compass and definitely wouldn't approve of offing Julien, no matter the political intentions behind the endeavor. It was unfortunate that the entire team couldn't accompany them, but they were lucky that they weren't the only one working on the case; it made it feel that much less boring and lonely.

Even though their partner wasn't particularly talkative, they were useful, and the two had known each other for quite a lengthy period of time. It made it that much easier to glide through the secret mission, even if they had sort of lollygagged throughout the first few weeks. It wasn't their fault, though. The blue pigeon was hard to track down, even with their expertise.

If anyone could have done it, though, it was them, and they did. Their partner recently had sent them a message explaining that the blue messenger pigeon had been taken out. That was the first step in their plan, which meant the second phase could be executed. Murdering King Julien. And boy, were they ready to take him out and get their share of the cut.

Unfortunately, the operation had been compromised when the penguins came by.

Normally, they wouldn't have been partial to taking them out too, but they recognized those penguins. They'd worked together once, even if under odd and unpreferred circumstances. But the idea of killing them, that was something that wouldn't leave the assassin with a clean conscious, nor would it go unnoticed. One missing lemur was one thing, but the entire penguin habitat? Not only would the zoo catch onto that much quicker, but even their boss would find out some way or another that their previous comrades had met an untimely demise. This could invoke an investigation (most likely would), and then they would be found out.

Sure, they knew that the penguins were staying at the same zoo, which was kind of a bizarre turn of events in itself, but the assassin had gotten the impression that the penguins hated the lemur king just as much as the one who hired them had. The fact that they were so quick to not only rescue but also pursue the attacker came as a great surprise, a factor they hadn't thought of. They should've known, though. The penguins were very inclined to be of help to others who couldn't help themselves, much like another animal task force.

Still, that threw a wrench in the gears of their operation. After some critical inspection, it appeared that the leader penguin, Skipper, had taken it upon himself to personally keep an eye out for Julien's safety… Which, for the two assassins, was far from ideal. They wanted to get rid of Julien, quickly and methodically, without being caught. Skipper complicated the mission way more than it needed to be.

The assassin wasn't sure how to deal with this. They'd spied on Skipper, to see how he handled the situation and if they could manage to catch Julien alone, but no dice. Skipper was more of a hawk than a penguin, watching over Julien like the king's life was his own. The assassin felt stumped by this. Suddenly, the whole mission seemed futile.

At least, it did, until Julien was almost killed by a venom filled dart.

A venom filled dart that the assassin had nothing to do with.

Their partner was still overseas, coming back from where they'd located and taken out the blue pigeon, so it couldn't have been either of them, which of course, could only mean that a third party was responsible. Someone else was trying to kill Julien at the same time as them. They were fairly positive that their hirer hadn't gotten anyone else for the job, which meant it was someone entirely unrelated to their whole operation.

That aside, they couldn't imagine who would've been confident enough to use a spring trap filled with deadly venom. Either they didn't care if it hit someone else, or they were smart enough to calculate exactly where Julien would be standing during the duration of his stay in the otter cave. Maybe it was a mix of both carelessness and intelligence.

Odd, but if it got the job done, then it didn't particularly matter. It wasn't a matter of who killed Julien, it was simply that he was to be killed. They and their partner still got paid, so long as he was taken care of, which meant a nice thick wallet for new and expensive technology on the front lines. They would sit back and watch the fireworks for a little while, until either Julien died or it became apparent that this new assassin was useless. Whichever came first.

Still, they couldn't help but wonder... Who else wanted the lemur king dead?


Sorry for the late update. I think I'll start updating every week instead of every other. I hope that's okay with you all.