Assassination Part 1 Chapter 7

'So you've finally accomplished your mission Ryder.' The elder said, inspecting his cigar carelessly. Jaye rolled his eyes at the man.

'Uh huh. That mean I can be on my way now?' He said, and the elder gave him a look that said "shut up". 'No?'

'While what you've accomplished is certainly astounding; a resounding success that you surely couldn't have accomplished alone, there are just a few issues we'd like to address before we reach our verdict.' The elder took a long puff from his cigarette. 'Firstly, we're well aware that our dear Hanazawa here helped you every step of the way. That's a violation of the agreement, as our instruction was specifically "you and you alone" if I recall correctly.'

'I forced her to do it.' Jaye replied immediately, and the elder shook his head.

'We both know she did it of her own accord; don't lie to us.' He said. 'That being said we expected this outcome, and all things considered it's a rather small issue. What is not a small issue, however, is this.'

The elder waved a hand, and a door opened on the side. Jaye grimaced internally as he saw the familiar furry ears of the woman he'd been ordered to kill and had clearly prematurely declared her death. The henchmen forced her to her knees before them, and she raised a deathly glare to the boy before her.

'You lied to Varian; you were tasked to kill this traitor and you didn't. That violates a sacred rule of our organisation; you repay every debt you owe. He helped you, and you lied to him. What's more, by refusing to kill a traitor, you act directly against the Council. And that is punishable by death.'

He waved his hand once more, and the henchmen seized her by the chin. With a resounding crack, he wrenched her neck around, and the life drained from her eyes as Khylia collapsed to the ground. Jaye turned away from the lifeless woman, neck broken, blood flooding her eyes as her ruptured arteries filled her head with blood. He glared back at the Council, folding his arms across his chest.

'By sparing her, you have accomplished nothing. Normally you would be sentenced to death for a violation such as this, but the gravity of the task you completed warrants a second look.' The elder grinned widely at the boy, twirling his cigar in his hand. 'Your life is owed to us; so rather than take it, you will continue to serve. Under the council. That is your penance, and your mercy.'

The room remained in silence as the woman's body was dragged away, and Jaye shook his head at the act of cruelty before him. He placed his hands behind his back, raising an eyebrow at the councilmen.

'Do you have anything you have to say for yourself?' The Elder asked, and Jaye shook his head.

'No, frankly I expected this outcome from the start. I'm sorry.'

'You think you will be forgiven?' The elder hissed, and Jaye rolled his eyes at the old man.

'I wasn't talking to you.' He said, and Indigo glared at him. He turned his eyes to her, smiling sadly. 'This isn't fair to you, but these are the cards I've been given, so I'm going to play them.' He turned back to the elder. 'I go out on my terms; not yours.'

He smiled at them, opening his mouth. He lifted his tongue, revealing a blinking red light under it. The guards around the table started, going for their weapons, and the boy pulled the light out of his mouth. Hitting the blinking red button, the room shook violently as numerous explosions went off at the same time. Adhered to the ceiling, the plastic bombs he'd obtained during his mission sat hidden away in the darkness, sending rubble hurtling down to where he stood. Smiling at the girl, he watched as Indigo lurched forward to him as the stones fell, yanked back by the guard standing next to her. He felt his feet go out from under him, the floor collapsing beneath him, and he fell through and into the darkness below. The dust cleared slowly, revealing the hole that led only to inky blackness of the waterway below. The elder slowly clambered out from beneath the table, his face bristling with fury.

'Find him! Don't let him escape!' He hissed, slamming his ringed fingers down onto the wooden tabletop. 'I want his head!'

'There's no sign of him.'

'No blood either; he must have got away.'

'The blood could have washed away in the water; we're going to have to clear that rubble first to be sure. Either way, he took the brunt of an explosion; he can't have gotten far.'

Jaye held his breath quietly as the voices faded away from him, walking stealthily through the water to distance himself from his pursuers. Hidden in the shadows of the waterway, he peered quietly around the edge of the stone wall, ensuring that they were gone, before sliding down its rocky surface. He clutched the locket pressed against his chest; grateful that it had survived the fall. Having encased himself in ice during the fall, the rubble had fallen around him, leaving him a convenient way out once he'd hit the bottom. After that, it was an easy matter to simply crawl out, then turn his ice back into water to let the rubble fall naturally around the area. Thanks to the waterway there would be no evidence of his ice shield, so they were far less likely to believe that he had remained uninjured from the fall, or that he had survived to begin with. Still, he needed to ghost his way out of there, and hopefully survive long enough to find a way to either convince them he was dead, or another way to get them off his back. He flicked open the locket quietly, running a finger down the faded photograph that was all that he had left of his best friend.

'I'm going to do it Mina. I'm going to find a way. I'm going to do what you tried to do; and I'm going to do it for you.' He whispered, clutching the locket within his fist. Tucking it back into his shirt, he traced the path he'd planned to get out, wading quietly through the water to where his freedom awaited. He paused as he thought he heard a familiar laugh ring out, reverberating through his eardrums and his head, but he pushed it away as he focused on his objective. Knowing the boy was gone, he was determined to escape. He was determined to live, to truly live again, not just survive. Whatever it took.

Outskirts of Vale

The body hit the floor with a meaty thump, the RHKD locket falling with a clatter to the floor around the body's neck. Jaye picked it up, flicking it open, raising his eyebrow at the faded photograph inside.

'Wow, more convincing than I thought it'd be.' He mused, letting it fall back down. The fake body provided was better than he thought he'd get, and with a little bit of defacing and a replica of his fingerprints, they'd have a perfect fake death scene ready to be served. Malachite grinned at the boy, flicking her fan shut.

'Well the boys do take pride in their work.' She mused, picking at her fingernails. Jaye nodded at her holographic figure through the scroll.

'I figured this was probably just some complicated ruse to kill me.' He said, adjusting his newly retrieved sword and shield slung over his back. 'I did in fact destroy over half your organisation anyhow.'

'Water under tha bridge.' Malachite waved away the boy's concerns dismissively. 'Better for both of us to remain a little more… discreet. And this gives me the perfect excuse to do it. Seem a bit suspicious if the largest criminal information network just sort of… vanished for no reason. But considering word'll get around that you killed our leader, that won't be a problem anymore.'

'Well in that case I supposed I did you a favour.' The boy grinned, and Malachite gestured at the fake body before him.

'Favour repaid.' She hissed. 'Now get along before some Faction person comes along and ruins the whole thing.'

'We're even then Malachite.' He said, swinging his legs over the bike and nodding to her. 'Thank you.'

'It's just business kid, don't make it personal.' She waved him away. Jaye slid his helmet on, revving his bike into gear and shooting straight out of the kingdom and into the distance. She watched him leave, flicking her fan open once more. 'See you soon little birdie.'

Flashback over

'So Malachite helped you fake your death? No wonder you made it out of the city.' Kamina said, shaking his head. 'Spiders really aren't anyone to mess with if you can't scrap with the best.'

'Well there was a reason killing the Spider was such a big deal at the time. Not really hard to kill Malachite now though; just that no one really sees the need for it.'

'So the reason the Spiders are now located primarily in Mistral is because of you?' Artemis scoffed. 'Wow, you really mess up everyone's lives huh.'

'That I do. Especially my own.' Jaye said shaking his head. 'Too bad that fake body didn't really fool them for long. And so I went on the run from there; hit up a bunch of my safehouses and pulled as much cash and equipment as I could. Killed a bunch of assassins that they sent after me, and the rest is as you know it.' He waved a hand dismissively at the group huddled around him. The girls of his team were giving him tearful looks, while Kamina had of course elected to join in the cry fest, while the twins draped across their bed were too busy looking bored to care. 'Any other questions?'

'Yeah I got one. Why couldn't you have just died for real and saved us all that trouble?' Apollo scoffed, and Jaye flipped him off. He yelped as the girls pounced on him, burying him in a group hug. Kamina cried unabashed, joining in the dogpile and slapping a hand into the now extremely disgruntled boy's face.

'This is extraordinarily uncomfortable.' He groaned, swatting Kamina's hand away. Ruby wrapped her arms around him, and he patted the girl on the back, raising a skeptical eyebrow as he realised the other pair of arms wrapped around him were Weiss's. He groaned as he patted them on their backs, trying to appease the girls who were way more affected by his story then he thought they'd be. 'Oh come on, this is getting ridiculous.'

'Oh are we doing a group hug?' A voice rang out from the doorway, and Jaye craned his neck up to see Penny standing in the doorway. He shook his head vigorously as he saw the excitement rise in Penny's face, and he screamed aloud as she ran over to the group. 'I want to do a group hug too!'

Needless to say, the ex-assassin was then crushed by the extraordinarily heavy android girl, and his funeral was anything but impressive. Jaune appeared in the doorway.

'Hey guys, training's already started so I came to get you-woah what's happening here?' He glanced over the group, noting the boy's face below that said "I'm crushed halp". 'You okay Jaye?'

'Jaune do me a favour.'

'Yeah sure, whatddya need?'

'Could you just stab me real quick? Like right in the face? I'd very much like to die now.'

And that's the end of this flashback filler series. I'm sure a bunch of people have plenty of things to say in reviews like "oh lmao you writing side stories for your main story no one reads omegalul" and probably my favourite which would be "oh you're copying John Wick what a wank". To which I say, why do you know I have a main story and that this is related to it hmm? Secretly love reading my content now do you hmm?

Crapshit aside, I'm chilling till season 9 comes out, so I might do another in the future if I decide to explore more of the events that I talked about before like the Ironwood assassination attempt. Thoughts for another time.