Chapter 10 - Blast From The Past
(A time manipulation with a little fantasy. Starring Altair, Ezio, Maria and OC) Altair, Ezio, and Maria belong to Ubisoft the rest are my OC's.
Two men picked her up to face the person who was laughing, he smiled from under his helmet but this man was different, instead of wearing a fully black suit like the other she had killed, his had a yellow trim on the sides of it. She figured it must represent a higher rank. "Who are you! What do you want with me!" She hissed as she struggled against the grip of the other two men. In retaliation one of the men kicked the back of her legs making her fall to her knees and grabbed her hair forcing her to look down.
"Oh, a feisty one." He laughed. "Gentlemen, you shouldn't be so rough with our guest." He chuckled some more as she heard him approach closer. "Shame you don't remember me, because I remember you all to well Redstriker." The man holding her hair had released it so she could look at him. She glared at him baring her teeth. "Come now, a pretty thing such as you shouldn't wear such an ugly mask." He placed his hand under her chin and caressed her cheek with his thumb."You may call me Vin, I am the current CEO of Vis Vinnox."
She bit his hand hard and he cried out in pain as he took a few steps back. "You mean that patheidic pharmaceutical company that failed miserably to buy out my company eleven years ago?" She smirked. "How is your father by the way? Last I heard he lost his mind when his company came crashing down around him." Rage filled his face as he punched her, forcing her head sharply to the left. Moments later she felt blood drip from her nose and lips. She watched him pace for a minute before he composed himself.
"I am here to ruin you as you once did my father! Now that I have you, it's only a matter of time before I destroy everything you hold dear." He grinned evilly at her.
"You won't hold me for long! Do you really think I came alone?" She hissed at him.
"Oh, whoever do you mean?" He started to chuckle. "Do you mean your husband, Lightning that is currently an hour away with your planes? Or are you talking about your little Assassins?" He laughed harder when he saw the shocked looked flash over her face before she glared at him again. "They are all dead now."
"Lies! They would never be killed off so easily!" She yelled at him.
"Oh, but they are. Did you not realize how quiet it is right now?" He held out his hands and looked around. "It is just you, my army of 50 and I." He smiled at her.
She was filled with dread, she knew Lightning had to still be alive. They wouldn't be able to attack him at the airport but what about Ezio and Altair? Could they have really both been killed. Had she sent them to their deaths because she neglected to give them proper gun training and asked them to leave their weapons behind? She didn't want to believe it. She was scared for the first time in many years, she vowed to never let another person die needlessly because of her again.
Three shots. Three shots was all it took to bring her back to reality and watched as Vin staggered backwards holding his left arm. The two men that were holding her down collapsed beside her. "Dammit!" He yelled and pointed at her. "You haven't seen the last of me!" He pulled something out of his pocket and throw it to the ground. It exploded into a cloud of smoke and he soon vanished.
Ezio came into her line of sight holding the gun to his side, his hands and arms where full of blood. "Where did that bastardo go?" He turned to see the shocked look on her face. "Are you okay?" He rushed over to her and started looking for a way to release her from her bindings. "How do I get you out of this?"
She came to her senses again. "There's two buttons on both side of the box on my back. Push them both and it will release me." She watched him go behind her and took a look at the two dead bodies beside her. "Your pretty good with a gun."
"It took some getting used to." He founded the box and pushed the buttons to release her. "Though it was a lot easier to kill them off with my hidden blades, a good 20 of them never saw me coming." He helped her up and gave her back the gun.
She looked around. "Where's Altair?" She asked concerned.
"I don't know. We had to separate when the bullets started flying." There heads turned to face the directions a gun shot came from and they ran towards it.
Altair recoiled his right hand in pain, the gun was shot right out of his hand. His eyes grow wide as he saw someone with yellow trim running right at him and leaping into the air only as an Assassin would do. Instinctively he triggered his hidden blade and held his hands out to the incoming attacker. He was surprised once more when the attacker sat on top of his stomach, pinning both his wrists over his head. They smiled at him, before he could do anything to get them off him, his eyes grew wide when they kissed him on his lips. After a moment she pulled back. "I've missed you."
"Get off him!" Redstriker yelled pointed her gun at the person in yellow trim.
Altair looked up to see Redstriker and Ezio standing a few feet away. He looked back at the woman sitting on him and he licked his lips, he recognised her voice but he couldn't remember from where. She was staring back at them, still pinning his wrists to the ground, a moment later she sat up. "Do you always greet someone that saved your life twice by holding a gun to their head?" She took off her helmet.
Redstriker looked at her confused. "Who are you? Speak sense before I kill you."
"I was the one to convince the other two jets that you were dead when your plane crashed into the water and I was also the one to shoot the guard in the head before they had a chance to fire at you. As to who I am, Altair here knows." She had frowned when she saw the confused look in his face. "What? How dare you forget me!"
She punched him in the chest and Altair did his best to defend off the onslaught of other punches, something in his mind then clicked. "Wait!" She stopped with one hand fisted in the air. "Your the woman from Jerusalem The one that stood in for Robert de Sable!" This seemed to infuriated her more.
"What! After the hell you put me through on Cyprus, all you can remember is me filling in for that bastard." She begun her onslaught of punches on him, again he tried his best to defend against her as she still sat on him.
"Stop! Why would you betray them and help us?" Redstriker asked and lowered her gun when she stopped beating on Altair.
"Because I was never truly with the Templars, I was just buying my time before I could find the Assassins and now I have."
"Your Maria, aren't you!" Ezio spoke up.
"How do you know my name?" She asked puzzled.
"There was a picture of you on one of the Codex Pages, I thought you seemed familiar." He saw her get off Altair and he got up.
"How do we know your loyalties lie with the Assassins?" Redstriker asked. She tensed and held up her gun when Maria reached into her jacket.
Maria held out her other hand. "Relax." She pulled out a stack of papers. "For starter, I have the Codex Pages."
They all stared at her amazed to what she held in her hand, Redstriker put the gun in the holster and walked over to retrieve the other one that laid on the ground. The adrenalin from the fight was wearing off and bent down to pick the gun up. She felt dizzy and fell to her knees and her hands in the snow.
Altair and Ezio saw her fall and ran over to her. "What's wrong?" They knelled down next to her.
She held up her hand. "I'm okay, I used up to much energy using all those fire attack." She didn't have enough energy to even lift her head. "All I need is some rest and I'll be fine."
Ezio motioned for Altair to help him get her on his back. "Let's get back to the car before we freeze to death out here." Ezio said as he walked in the direction they had come from.
Redstriker fell instantly a sleep. The only thought were of Lightning and Vin's chilling words of him being dead echoed in her mind. She thought of all the ways he could have died, she hadn't head from him since she called him before entering the cave. She started waking up. "Lightning?" She asked half a sleep. She opened her eyes and was confused to see that she was in her plane. "Where's lightning?" She asked more alert. She saw Altair get up from his seat and placed his hand on her forehead. She was more confused to see she was sitting in the right back seat of her plane.
"Your husbands flying the plane behind us with Ezio, he doesn't trust me so he has control over both planes." She looked behind her seat to Altair standing next to Redstriker. "Is the fever gone?"
"It is." He said before going back to his seat.
Redstriker pushed off the blanket she was wrapped in and stretched. "How long have I been a sleep?"
"Four hours, we are half way to Striker National." Maria informed her. "Would you care to take over the controls, if your feeling up to it?" She inquired.
She gave a nod. "Yes, though I expected to wake up still in Italy." They switched seats.
"Lightning wanted it to be that way but because they planes where only allowed to be there for three days so we were pushed to take off." Altair stated and watched Maria take her seat. "What happened to you?"
"What do you mean?" Redstriker asked as she punched in a nine digit code to regain control of the plane.
"As soon as we got you back to the car, you were feverish and shacking pretty badly."
"It's a side effect from using to much energy. It's basically your body going into shock and having a hard time to function properly causing it to work overtime giving you a fever. Your body will shut down and make you sleep to conserve what energy you have left. Depending on how much you used, you could be a sleep any were between a few hours to a full week. If left unchecked it can also be deadly but that's often not the case."
Maria look over to see Altair resting his chin in his hands with his eyes closed. She watched him confused, she wondered why he would do that. The idea of him flying throw the sky like a bird should have him in a great mood. "Altair... What year was it before you came here?"
"1195." He said without opening his eyes.
She frown. "That's the same year we crossed paths again." She sighed. "A matter of weeks was the difference between you knowing who I really am, how unfortunate." She watched him not say a word or open his eyes. This was bothering her, she knew he should be over joyed at the thought of flying. He often talked about how much he liked birds, how they were free to do as they pleased, how they could fly from one place to another without a care in the world, how they had no responsibilities, no regrets, nothing but freedom. She looked out to see the sun setting over the sea, it was so beautiful. She continued to watch it for sometime, then she understood. She looked over to Altair again who hasn't changed position since they last spoke. "Does this mean I have to teach you how to swim and help you get over your fear of water again?" She said casually. She was amused to see him tense with a genuine look of horror over his face. She was surprised and scared soon after when he had jumped out of his seat and was now holding his hidden blade to her throat. She had forgotten how bad his temper used to be.
"How do you know such information!" He yelled at her. "I would never share such information with anyone!"
"I... Sort of guessed and you did share that kind of information with me." She was trying to choose her words wisely.
"Impossible! Why would I do such a thing!" He continued to shout.
"Because...I'm... Your wife." She said reluctantly. She was relieve to see him take a few steps back with a shocked look on his face his mouth gapping open. After a moment he frowned again and looked madder then ever.
"That's a lie! I would never do such a thing!" He said glaring at her.
"How dare you call me a liar! We had our wedding in Limassol, it was to commemorate Cyprus for being the Orders first of many Assassin strongholds, I was more then happy to marry you because I loved you and it was your idea!" She had slammed her hands on the arm rests and glared back at him just as angry.
"You sound married to me." Redstriker laughed. "I understand why he got so upset when I asked him if he wanted to leave the plane and stretch his legs when we were on the aircraft carrier."
"Shut up! I don't have a problem with water!" He hissed.
"Enough Altair. Sit down and relax, everyone fears something, that's what makes you human." Redstriker said calmly.
"I'm the Grandmaster! I fear nothing!" He shouted once more before he sat down rather roughly. He adjusted his hood and was massaging his head in his hands. He was trying to process the over load of new information that he just heard. After an hour he had come back to his sense and was feeling rather embarrassed from his behaviour. He hadn't changed his position and was still massaging his scalp, the more he thought about it, the more plausible it seemed that he could have married her. He did secretly want to meet her again for another battle, though an argument wasn't the kind of battle he had in mind. A few minutes more passed before he straightened and he let out a heavy sigh. "I'm sorry I snapped, you just caught me off guard. Can we please keep this to ourselves?"
"I caught the Grandmaster off guard?" She teased him but that only upset him again as he tensed and glared at her. She waved her hands in front of her. "Altair, I'm kidding! We'll keep it to ourselves, won't we Redstriker?"
She waved from behind the chair. "Don't worry about it."
He sighed again before relaxing a little in the chair and closed his eyes. The past few weeks had been rather stressful for him. He had gotten very little sleep because of the weird dreams, not that he feared them but more that it bothered him to a point that he would stay up thinking about why he was having them at all. Then there the activities and parties, Christmas, New Years and even his own birthday kept him busy. Today was no less taxing on his body and mind either with all he had just learned and witnessed in the past three days. He was starting to relax at the thought of being back in his room and hopefully getting a nights sleep. Thinking of the house had made him frown, three days. His been gone for three days. He groaned in agony, three days for Thorn to have come up with another plot to keep him on his guard.
Maria was surprised to hear the pained groan come from him. She looked him over carefully and noticed the faint bags under his eyes. He also looked a lot thinner and remembered he was never one to eat a lot when he was stressed. Then again he was never one to eat much of anything either till she made him to eat more and he eventually started too. She amused that she had the advantage if knowing him more then he knew himself.
Christmas, New Years and Altair's Birthday are all stories that can be read in Blast From The Past Side Stories.