I own nothing. Least of all this.

1:12

I checked my total time so far: about four hours. Not bad. That put it at around three minutes per floor, plus the ground level. Just twenty hours to go, and we could ska-doo right on out of here. Thank Gallifrey I had arrived in the afternoon. I'm sure that the lack of people (well, alive ones) in the cafeteria would not have gone unnoticed. If there's one thing humans can all agree on, it's that you never skip lunch hour. This way, I hoped my shenanigans wouldn't be noticed until the next morning. As extra insurance, I had set all security cameras that I passed on a recorded loop, so that was one more concern eliminated.

I deactivated my visor. For this part, I needed to pass by under quite a lot of people's noses, and my mask would most assuredly draw attention. Attention I didn't need. After the mask, I started to button my flannel up as well. No harm in looking a little more professional, something my AC/DC shirt would probably detract from. Out came my psychic paper, and then into the same pocket as my recently (and illicitly) acquired identification. Better to keep them together, just in case.

I had almost grabbed a snack from the same place I had taken care of the Mountain Man, but hadn't, for two reasons: time constraints, and the fore-mentioned bangers and mash. I was regretting that now. For some reason, I was really craving tangerines. Any citrus-y food, really. Oh, and chocolate. Go figure. Oh well, I'm sure someone downstairs had a sandwich I could snatch. Then again, this was England, so the quality of any sandwich I found was likely to be just on the other side of edible (hey, you can't deny it).

My ruminations were interrupted by the elevator stopping.

*Ding!*

The doors opened. And out I stepped.

A single door stood in front of me. No cameras at all, not even any extra security measures beyond the ID scanner attached to the lock. I sighed. Honestly, I was hoping for something a little more exciting. Then again, this was the first floor. I'm sure things would get incredibly hard by the fifth one. And if they didn't, well, I might just have to make a complaint. I mean, really, given how long they'd been around, you'd think they would have produced a better class of criminal. On the other hand, I had yet to see any evidence of Assassins making things difficult for them. If they had been eradicated, complacency would explain a good deal of what I'd seen so far. Hopefully, complacency would go out the window after my visit. That is, if the whole organization didn't go out the window first.

My liberated ID worked like a charm. The door slid open, to reveal… cubicles. Of course there were cubicles. This was probably the side of the company that fudged all the paperwork on the things they did that they probably shouldn't be able to do. I moved forward, keeping my eyes fixed on the ground. A man stood at the entrance to one of the offices, a folder full of papers in his hand that stuck out in the aisle. I slipped a few of the documents from the file, and pretended to browse through them as I walked. No one likes to interrupt someone who's reading, especially if it looks like its important. Huh. This was actually interesting stuff. So that's where they got all the supplies for the sprayers. Never would have guessed Roman Industries existed here.

I continued walking, until I spied the door that clearly led up from the lower levels' fire exits. Into the nearest trash can went all but two of the papers, and after a quick glance for anyone watching, I slipped through the door.

No security cameras anywhere near the stairwells. There never were. You'd think they would have fixed that in two hundred years. I slipped on down. I needed to bypass the second sub-level, because that was where they kept all the nasty surprises for things of non-human persuasion. And, while I may have been human once, I'm fairly certain the lasers and spikes wouldn't give me any leeway in arguing the point. Practically no one worked on level two. It was mainly there to get rid of all the people who came around looking for things they shouldn't. Very handy, I will admit.

And of course, as there is with all bypasses, there was a small difficulty. Or, rather, two of them. A set of doors, one from level one to two, and one from two to three. Easily bypassed with my stolen card and copied retinal scan, but when I had to come running back this way like a bat out of Hell, they would undoubtedly cause a significant delay. Lockdown means lockdown for a reason. So, just as the first door slid closed behind me, in went one of my snatched papers right in between the lock and catch. I did the same for the next door as well.

Now, as much as I would have liked to do this all the way down, I was sure the security below level three would be a good deal too high for my credentials. It was an appalling display that they had gotten me as far as they did. But now, I was going to have to work to reach my intended target.

A quick sonic burst from my visor, and the fire alarm attached to floor three's emergency exit went silent. Back off came the mask, and then through the exit I sneaked. This was the storage floor, packed with all the boring files, raw materials, and rubbish. All of the really fun and exciting stuff was on the two floors below me, with level four being the interesting people working on interesting things, and level five being where those interesting things ended up once they became deadly things. Three guesses as to which level I needed to get to.

This had become a waiting game. The fourth level would write up the reports on their vicious little projects, and them bring them up here to file. The people from the first level would then come down here whenever they needed the reports for reference work. Dreadfully boring system, but efficient. And now it would work in my favor. All I needed was for one of the peons to come up from below-decks with a new file, and then *WHAM*. Lights out. They would come, I was sure of it. It was just a matter of when.

I crept around the walls, looking for a convenient vantage point from which to view the "down" elevator. You would not believe how inconvenient metal tube shelving can be when you don't need it. Still, I found a spot, and settled down to wait. This could take a while.

Surprisingly, it was only about half-an hour before the unlucky winner made his appearance. He was obviously in a good deal of a hurry, judging by how oblivious he was to his surroundings. Must have been thinking about how it was almost the end of his shift, and how he was going to avoid the most amount of traffic. Shame he didn't spare any thought on how to avoid my knife. That made the third glowy boy I'd killed so far. He didn't take it nearly as well as the security chief had. Further proof that Abstergo was tweaking the process for individual roles. The important people all seemed better equipped to survive an assassination, and the meatbags were obviously meant for prolonged fights.

I picked up the folder he had been carrying. What little remorse I had gradually evaporated as I read it. This twisted man had deserved much more than I had given him. Shame I couldn't drag him back from the afterlife to send him back in a good deal more pain. I closed his folder, and placed it in the right spot. His work would burn, as sure as his soul. I would make sure of it.

I hauled his body around the corner, away out of sight. I switched his ID with the one that had gotten me down here. That ought to throw them off the scent, should they find him before my plan called for it. And my new identification ought to allow me access to the rest of the place. His retinal scan had already been recorded in my visor, and now I had to make sure no one was going to discover his eyes didn't match his tags. I would have preferred an ice cream scoop, but sometimes you just gotta use what you got.

After that disturbing task was over and done with, I could finally afford to take a break. It had been a full five hours since I had gotten here, and after all I'd done, I think I deserved a little downtime. Besides, the next part of my plan wouldn't come until morning, when the bodies at the top of this glass and steel monolith were discovered. I climbed up one of the shelves, and tried to make myself as comfortable as possible. My coat I wrapped around myself, and my hat I folded into a makeshift pillow. Hopefully, it would be enough. I drifted off to sleep, my dreams filled with blood and fire.

I awoke to a loud beeping in my ear. At first I thought the jig was up, and my handiwork had been recognized for what it was. It took a minute for me to realize what it was. I activated my visor. Yep, sure enough, there it was. The little circle that showed the progress of my little experiment was full. And just in time, too. The time was currently showing as close to nine in the morning. Thirteen hours down, eleven to go. My money was that by now, they'd noticed quite a few of the people that were supposed to punch in today, well, hadn't. It was only a matter of time before they found the bodies. And then they'd really start running around like chickens with their heads cut off. That many corpses, all arranged to make it look like they'd killed themselves, was gonna have them thinking either the Assassins or the Supernatural. I pulled up the real feeds on the security cameras I'd hijacked. Yep, people everywhere. No policemen, which was good. It meant my plan was going to grab a good deal of Abstergo's own personal muscle when its final piece fell into place. That meant less trouble later.

I sat up, and swung my legs over the side of the shelf. It was halfway through the swing I realized they were both asleep. Just before they hit the shelf in front of me, in fact.

All I can say is thank Gallifrey that it wasn't top-heavy. That would have been disastrous. I slapped my legs a few times, clearly indicating that it was time to rise and shine. They tried to pull the classic "five more minutes" routine, but I wasn't having that. Finally, after much protesting, they were ready to go. I scrambled down the shelving, and then quickly over to the "down" elevator. One showing of credentials and a retinal scan later, I was heading downwards into the lion's den. Funny thing about lockdowns. They may have been picky about who they let out, but the same couldn't be said for who they let go in the opposite direction. I pulled my psychic paper from my pocket. I was going to need it for this next bit.

The doors slid open with *whoosh*, and I was greeted by… well, I can only describe it as chaos. As was usual when scientists' carefully ordered domains were wobbled in any way. Just from a quick glance, I could see three seemingly important people arguing about what to do. I decided it would be the perfect conversation to insert myself into, and started walking towards them.

The loudest of the group seemed to be the head scientist. At least, I thought he was. He was certainly acting the part.

"Ridiculous! Preposterous! We absolutely cannot evacuate at this time! I mean, we just got here, bejaysus!"

Then again, that could just be the Scot in him coming out.

"Sir, I am truly sorry, but it just can't be helped. I'm sure…"

"The only thing I'm sure of is that I'll have your job if you don't fix this! There are programs we have to run, checks we have to make, things that could, theoretically, blow this whole place to kingdom come if they don't like how you sneeze!"

"Now Doctor, I'm sure the Sergeant was simply unaware of the nature of your work." So, someone was playing the peacemaker. "Given the fact that nothing untoward seems to have occurred below the ground floor, I'm sure there's absolutely no reason the good Doctor can't deal with what he needs to before the evacuation."

Time for me to throw a wrench into that plan.

"Actually, ma'am, it appears something untoward has occurred."

They all swiveled to face me, the Doctor, the Sergeant, and the… Peacemaker. Who was currently wearing the face of the very deceased Leader.

So, the Templars were into either resurrection or cloning. Both very bad for me.

I'd figure something out. For now, the plan came first.

"And what might that be, Mister, uh….."

"Commander, actually." I held up my psychic paper. "Commander Winchester. I was called in privately by Mr. Rikkin to investigate if anything… unpleasant had happened below level two."

They relaxed at that, my fake credentials and name dropping doing the job marvelously. I slipped my paper back into my inside coat pocket.

"And I am afraid that something unpleasant has most definitely happened. Sergeant!"

He snapped to attention. "Yes, sir!"

"At ease. I find myself in need of your assistance. Doctor, you have until I and the Sergeant return to put things in order."

"But…"

"No buts, I'm afraid. The evacuation must go ahead, and now there is some degree of urgency to it. Ma'am, I appreciate your efforts to smooth things over here. If you would kindly continue to do so, I would very much appreciate it. I'm sure the doctor will gladly take all the help he can get. Sergeant, with me."

I turned to go.

"Wait one moment, Commander."

I paused. "Is there a problem, ma'am?"

"No, not as such. Forgive my curiosity, but, just exactly what did you find that merits this response?"

I took a minute. It was never a good idea to spout out a prepared lie. Invariably makes it seem a bit suspicious.

"...It seems, ma'am, that at least one person made it to level three before he met his... demise. And as to what, exactly, caused his death, I find myself... unable to tell. And I don't like things I can't explain. That's all the information I'm able to give at this time."

PM nodded (no way I was calling her Peacemaker the whole time. Too many syllables). "I understand, Commander. On your way."

"As you say, ma'am. Sergeant!"

"Coming, sir!"

I began to walk towards the elevator I had so recently come down, the Sergeant at my heel. I couldn't have that, I needed him at my side for the next part. I couldn't bypass the lockdown without using my mask, but the Sergeant could. Perks of being part of security.

"No need to follow behind, Sergeant. I'm not one to stand on ceremony."

"As you wish, sir." He picked up his pace.

"How long have you been here, Sergeant?"

"Around five years, sir."

"Ever seen a dead body before?"

"...No, sir."

"In that case, I think you had better go first. Best if you clear the way for me to focus on the deceased."

"...Understood, sir."

We reached the elevator doors.

"After you, then."

The Sergeant swiped his ID, and leaned down into the retinal scanner. There was a *Ding*, and the doors slid open.

In we stepped.

The Sergeant reached forward, and pushed the up-arrow button. Just as the doors slid closed, my eyes met those of the PM. There was a brief flash of...something. I would have called it recognition, but it felt more like she was...remembering something I had reminded her of. Whatever it was, I had no more time to process it. The elevator jerked, and then up we went.

"If you don't mind me saying so, sir, we are alone now."

I looked sharply over at the Sergeant. "If you're coming on to me son, I'm afraid I don't swing that way. I appreciate the thought, though."

That obviously flustered him. Good.

"...No, sir, that's...I didn't mean…"

"S'alright, son. I was just messing with you. Now, what did you really want to ask?"

"...Well, sir, I have to know, is there a reason you didn't tell the others exactly you found the body? I mean, how it looked?"

"...Because, son, I lied. I know exactly what killed him. Knock around America as long as I have, and eventually you'll find out things you shouldn't."

"..Should I know?"

"...Probably not. But I'm at least going to tell you this: not all angels are on the side of Heaven, and not all demons are from Hell."

"Pardon, sir?"

"The..man, whoever he was...he was the recipient of quite the smiting. The kind that only an archangel can give."

If it was possible to turn even paler in the elevator's light, the Sergeant managed it.

He swallowed. "...An archangel, sir?"

I nodded. "Archangels, the Devil, Heaven, Hell, they all exist son. And if I had gone in there talking about the likes, they would have either called me crazy, or, worse, they would have convinced themselves they could reason with it."

"...I'm tempted to go the first route myself, sir."

"Can't blame you, son. Took me three years for enough evidence to pile up to convince me. But it is what it is, and if there's an archangel loose who thinks it's good fun to leave bodies lying around looking like they committed suicide, then you can be sure there will be no reasoning with it. And that's not even the real thing we need to be worried about."

"...And what's that, sir?"

"If an archangel can go through fifty floors of people, and not leave a trace of its presence, then why did it feel necessary to smite one man in particular? That, Sergeant, is what we should worry about."

The elevator jerked to a stop.

The doors slowly opened.

I gestured. "After you."