Notes: Once again, apologies for the lack of updates. I went through and did some proofreading and minor grammatical edits to all the previous chapters.

Warning: Church is an asshole (which we kind of knew anyway...), and maybe a little ooc in future chapters. And there's a bit of homophobia here, and it will be worse in the coming chapters. It IS the 1700's after all...


Chapter 29: Everyone Hates Ben


Shay was (mostly) back on his feet by the time Charles and Weeks returned to Boston. As Haytham had suspected, they found nothing of use and Charles got himself a nasty case of frost bite. Not that he really cared. He knew it was a waste of time. That meant they were done with Boston for the time being, and that was as good as finding an abandoned gold mine as far as he was concerned. Shay, on the other hand... To say he was being a bit sullen would be a gross understatement. He was hardly thrilled to leave the sailing to Gist and the Morrigan's crew, and even less enthusiastic about having Ben, Thomas and Charles on board. He spent most of the first few days sulking about on the deck, or asleep in his cabin when he ran out of the energy it took to behave like an irritable woman.

"Shay, exactly what the bloody hell is your problem?" Haytham nearly snarled on the third day. Shay looked up at him from where he was sitting propped up with his back to a stack of crates full of tobacco.

"I don't have a problem, not really." Shay grumbled. "I just feel like shite and I'm tired o' layin' about like a dead thing."

"I thought... Never you mind." Haytham replied with a sigh and sat down beside him. The weather was finally starting to break, and it was warm enough for the crew to abandon their thick woolen scarves. Spring was near. Though, to be fair, it hadn't been a particularly harsh winter. Soon the streets of New York would be full of merchants, and the chill still hanging in the air would be a distant memory. "You will catch cold staying on deck." Haytham admonished Shay, tiring of his silence.

"Nonsense, I need some fresh air." Shay complained as he watched Ben and Charles nearby out of the corner of his eye. Haytham had been mostly ignoring the pair of them, but they were starting to worry him a bit. They had done nothing but bicker since the incident with Laurent. Liam had even cryptically warned him that Ben might not have the Templar's best interests at heart, not that it was particularly any of his concern. Perhaps he should have taken it more seriously. Uncertainly, he glanced at the Assassin in question, who was lounging against the railing nearby and staring at the open sea before them with a bored look on his face. The others weren't happy to have him around, either. ...But they had learned to grudgingly respect him.

"Keep an eye on those two for me, Shay." Haytham said, nodding in Ben and Charles' direction.

"Already have been, Sir." He mumbled in reply as Haytham left him. Cautiously, he inched his way closer to the suspicious pair and made a show of mingling with a group of the crew members that were milling about. He strained to hear them, to no avail. Just as he made to sneak closer, he felt a hand on his shoulder.

"Come with me," Gist whispered so that only he could hear. Wordlessly, he followed Gist through the hatch to his cabin in the Morrigan's hold. Both of them checked to make sure there wasn't anyone nearby to eavesdrop and seated themselves on the edge of a large ammunition crate.

"You need to keep your eyes on our boy, Benjamin." Gist said flatly. "And... With all due respect, keep your shite together, Sir."

"Pardon?" Haytham asked, frowning. "What is he up to?"

"He doesn't exactly approve of your relationship with Shay, and he has been rather vocal in voicing his opinion that you aren't fit to lead our rite – that the order isn't your priority, and we can't trust your judgment to be sound. The others are a bit sympathetic to his ranting, well, except for Charles and Thomas." Gist told him flatly, devoid of his usual jovial tone and flair for the dramatic. "Frankly, you need to be more cautious. That crisis you had when Shay was injured... It didn't do you any favors in proving them wrong. This sort of thing it... It's not right by most folks. You need to remember that. I'd give Shay this talk, but I think we both know he'd tell me I'm barking at the moon, and to kiss his arse."

"I suppose I will have to remind Church of his bloody place. Again." Haytham grumbled.

"It is a valid concern." Gist commented. "If you found yourself in a situation where the only way you could keep a piece of Eden out of the Assassins' hands was to leave Shay behind, possibly to die, could you do it?"

"You say that as if you think he would abandon me in a similar situation. He would not." Haytham snapped tartly.

"No, he wouldn't. But he isn't the one the others are looking to for leadership." Gist pressed.

"I would find a way. There is always a way." Haytham growled and stormed out of the cabin.

He couldn't. He would never leave Shay like that. ...Which meant Gist was right. Maybe he wasn't fit to lead them anymore. Once again, he was forced to choose between his devotion to the Order and someone he loved. Back on deck, he looked to Shay who had seemingly fallen asleep where he sat. He thought of Ziio, and how being with her would have meant leaving the Order. It was the same thing all over again. He couldn't have both, even though Shay was a Templar. ...And maybe his judgment wasn't sound. He'd simply frozen, been incapable of a single coherent thought when Liam appeared carrying what appeared to be Shay's corpse. Miserably, he sat on the edge of another tobacco crate near Shay's sleeping form. Once again, he had no choice but to face the reality that he had to end it. He stole a glance at Shay, who twitched slightly in his sleep – tormented by some foul dream or other.

"I can't do it." Haytham said aloud, and found his way to Shay's cabin. He couldn't let go. He would never be able to live with himself if he did. Not this time. Shay needed him, and even though he loathed to admit it, he needed Shay. Shay grounded him and gave him strength. Pushing him away was not an option. Already, a plan began to form in his mind of how to convince the others that they had broken it off – that they'd made a mistake and planned on pretending it never happened. ...While they remained lovers in secret. He pondered over a million and one different excuses to feed the others as a light knock on the door snapped him out of his thought.

"Yes?" He called, quickly stashing his journal that he'd left on Shay's desk. He didn't worry about Shay reading it, he respected Haytham's wishes for him to leave it well alone. Though, truth be told there wasn't anything in there that the other man didn't already know. Haytham bit back a curse as Liam walked in, shutting the door behind him.

"Here to remind me that I have lost the trust of most of my men?" Haytham asked with a hint of venom.

Liam heaved a sigh and sat in the chair opposite the desk. "No, I don't care if your happy little circus falls apart. I'm only after these smugglers because Shay asked for my help, and I owe him for the shite I've put him through. He probably wouldn't even have been on your side if I'd listened to him after Lisbon." Liam told him irritably. "But, I do care about him – which you know damn well. I just wanted to remind you that you'll be shakin' a cloth in the wind if you hurt him."

Haytham glared daggers at him. "I will find a way to fix this." He said, just as Shay walked in without knocking. Both Haytham and Liam swore under their breath and tried to hide the guilty expressions on their faces. Shay frowned and looked first at Liam, and then at Haytham.

"If you were havin' a bit o' fun you could've invited me." He said with a pout, and sat stiffly on the edge of his bed.

"Whore." Haytham groaned.

"I doubt you have yet seen just how much of a whore he really is." Liam said with a smirk. Shay threw the spare compass he had sitting on his bedside table at Liam's head. He caught it deftly and dropped in on the desk, chuckling under his breath.

"By the way, I can have a guess at what you're talkin' about. Ben's been spewing shite about how we can't trust you since I got shot. Don't worry about it too much. Charles has been tryin' to talk him down, and John more or less told him to shove it up his arse – that it en't any o' their concern as long as we do our bloody jobs. Jack outright laughed at him." Shay explained, and Liam nodded in agreement but stayed silent.

"True, but how much can they trust me if you are my priority and not the Order?" Haytham replied.

"The way I see it, it en't about pickin' one or the other. I don't think you'd sacrifice any o' us just to stop the Assassins' plottin'. You don't have to win every battle, as long as you can fall back, lick your wounds and strike back twice as hard. They know that, and they know you'd risk a hell o' a lot to save any o' their arses if they get into trouble – not just mine." Shay told him, as if it should have been obvious. "Besides, Ben's just bein' a bottle head. Some of the rot that's come out of his mouth is just... I en't goin' to repeat it."

"He has a point, you've got to admit that. I'm goin' back out there before that lot starts thinkin' we're conspirin' against them. ...Or doin' somethin' untoward." Liam interjected and vanished from the cabin.

"If you even think of commenting about that not being a bad image, I will shoot you in the cock." Haytham hissed once Liam was out of earshot. Shay gave him a wry smile.

"Youare the one who said it, boss." He retorted with a sly wink.

Haytham cleared his throat and glared at him in mock annoyance before replying. " Absolutely not."

"Spoilsport." Shay pouted. "At any rate, what's on the agenda when we get back to New York, Sir?"

"Hopefully we can get back on the smugglers' trail, and Liam thought he might be able to use one of Achilles' old contacts to get a lead on who the woman you saw was." Haytham replied. "Either way, we need to get to the bottom of this."

Shay didn't reply immediately, he glanced out the window with a far away look in his eyes and shook his head. Haytham watched him curiously. Normally Shay was an easy read as far as emotions went, but right then he couldn't make heads or tails of what was going through the man's head. Something wasn't right, though. That much was obvious. He always managed to drop the subject, and sometimes outright vanished from the room when the conversation came up. It wasn't typical behavior for him, to say the least – unless it was something he really didn't want to deal with. Obviously, Haytham saw the unspoken response immediately for what it was. Fear – not the typical kind, naturally. Shay didn't really have any concept of fear in the conventional sense as far as Haytham could tell. No, the thing that terrified him the most was that he wouldn't be able to carry out a task assigned to him. It was something Haytham had only seen on a few truly rare occasions, namely right before he had to kill Hope and later, Liam.

"Something is bothering you." Haytham noted, somewhat surprised he chosen to stay where he was rather than flee from the cabin to avoid the inevitable.

"It's just... I don't think what I saw was real. It can't be. She's dead. She has to be. I can't... I can't do it again. It was hard enough then..." Shay said flatly in a tone so carefully devoid of emotion that Haytham saw through it in a flash. "She is dead." He repeated, as if he needed to remind himself.

"Who, Shay?" Haytham pressed. "Why have you never mentioned before that you actually recognized this woman before? She damn near killed you!"

He only shook his head. Haytham sighed in irritation. "No, I killed her. I think... I wasn't thinkin' straight. I lost too much blood. He had an accomplice, but it couldn't be her. I was seein' things. I killed her – I had to. At least, I like to tell myself that. Doesn't help me sleep any better, though." Shay mumbled somewhat incoherently.

"Damn it, Shay." Haytham groaned. "Tell me."

"Hope. I saw Hope." Shay told him, and something in Shay's eyes told Haytham that he was lying to himself this entire time, trying to recall it differently. He was right, though. He must have imagined it. Hope was certainly dead, ran through the heart with his hidden blade. Shay had even managed to attend her makeshift funeral. Well, in a sense. He'd been hiding on a nearby rooftop. But he had been there.

"That is not possible." Haytham reassured him.

"I know that, but it's drivin' me mad. ...That she would be the last thing I see." Shay insisted.

"Aside from Liam, she was the only one you were all that close to." Haytham replied with a shrug. "People see all sorts of odd things when they have near-death experiences."

"I need some air." Shay mumbled and finally made a bid for freedom. Haytham didn't stop him as he limped out of the cabin. He didn't worry, not really. He knew he would he wake up in the middle of night as Shay somewhat clumsily tried to sneak into their bed. That was all that mattered.


Barking at the moon – pointless ranting

Shaking a cloth in the wind – to be hanged

Bottle head – idiot

Spoilsport – a killjoy