"Ryan," Angela said, "Look."
I looked up and saw what she meant for me to see. The Eureka Tower, towering over Melbourne, was tilted toward the river. My brain registered crashing, grinding, and shattering sounds as the building toppled over, falling apart as it disappeared in a cloud of dust. The dust, which threaten to engulf us. I tried to lift William, who was now showing so sign of life, but George said, "Ryan, we can't do anything for him now. We need to go!"
"We can't just leave him!" I argued, but I put an ear to his chest, and found no heartbeat, and I knew that he was gone. The Assassins now had no leader. Reluctantly, I left the body behind as we ran back into the alley and back into the basement entrance where George and I slammed the doors shut right as the dust consumed the alleyway.
What I noticed when I stopped and looked around was that the light's are on, as were the speakers and tbe TV in the corner. But it wasn't showing news reports. Instead, a man's face, half hidden in shadow, filled the screen, with nothing but black behind him.
"People of Australia, I advise you listen to everything I am about to say," he began in a distorted voice, "Your military is in shambles, your government destroyed."
Gaps and groans were heard as the camera cut to that of Parliament House, rebuilt years ago, now collapsing as black smoke rose over Canberra.
"Your cities are destroyed."
The screen cut again, this time to several Australia cities. The Sydney Opera House and Harbour bridge burned as Templar landing ships flooded the harbour. The Eureka Tower in Melbourne toppled over into the river. Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide and Hobart burned as Templar invaders flooded the streets, burning homes, killing at random.
"Your country, your "great southern land" now belong's to the Templar Order. You will live by the ways we decide on, as will your children, and their children. Anyone who rebels against us will not be spared. May the Father of Understanding guide-"
The man's message was cut out by static, then the face of William Miles filled the screen.
"By the time you all see this," William began, "I will likely be dead. Since it means nothing to anyone now, my name is William Miles, Grand Master of the Brotherhood of Assassins. I recorded this message when I saw that the Templars were coming for us. I'm here to tell you to despair not, for the people who I once commanded swore an oath to never desert our cause. While your government and cities may be ruined, these can easily be rebuilt. The Templars intend to control you with fear, but do not do so, for you outnumber them by millions. If even half of us thought, we would have a chance. But united, we can crush the Templar invaders and send them back to whatever Hell they came from.
"The Assassin's are everywhere, and as long as a single one of us stand, we will never be dead. Keep your children close, train them and yourselves to fight, and I promise you all, the people of Australia, America and elsewhere, that we will never truly lose our homelands. I now ask everyone to stand up, defy the Templars, for they are mortal men who can be killed. So do not fear, only be alert, for evil is weak and cowardly and will wither and die when pressured, and good is brave and strong and will crush anything in it's path."
The screen cut out again, showing only a blue screen.
Six days later.
I shined my flashlight through the window of another burnt-out store, my gun held in my other hand. The shop may have been a bakery, but I wasn't sure. Everything inside had been turned back by the Templar bombs that had fallen on cities. I looked around. A few cars and people passed through the street, going about whatever their daily lives were now. The hot Australian sun loomed over us, making me sweat in my uniform consisting of a hood that I left down, long trousers, a navy blue long-sleeved workshirt and a black vest. My blades were strapped to my arms, my combat blade resting at my side, and a pistol holstered on the other side. I had a two-way radio strapped to my left arm, and I pulled the device out of it's holder and spoke into it.
"Nothing over here guys, I'm moving onto the next street," I said into the radio.
"We're done here too," Phillip's voice crackled through static, "We'll meet you over by the U.S Consulate."
"Understood," I replied before placing my radio back in it's holder.
The sky was paler during the day, but it was clearly the same shade of gold. We managed to find out what was causing it when we made it out of Melbourne and traveled up towards Canberra. What I hadn't been told was that the only Apple of Eden we had had been moved to Melbourne, and the Templars had recovered it when the invasion began. The Apple created a golden barrier that surrounded all of mainland Australia. With the country cut off from the outside world, the Templars moved in, terrorizing towns and cities, demolishing religious and educational material, placing strict rules such as a 7:00 PM curfew, food and water being handed out in rations, no internet or electricity and the death penalty for ANY infraction. Make of that what you will.
We were searching for refugees in a burnt out section of the central business district in Sydney, one of the ones that had been burnt to a crisp with the Apple's power. From what we'd gathered after joining the remains of the Australia bureau, Abstergo had extracted the Apple from an Assassin facility in Melbourne, somehow shot it into the sky about Australia, and caused a force field to activate that surrounded the country. For the most part, it was impossible to get through, but every day around noon it's strength would falter above major cities, and by day 2 we were receiving supply drops in cities from America, Japan and England. It was crucial that we'd get to the drop zones before the Templars did, because the civilians who had gone into hiding with the Assassins would slowly die out.
It was torture to see the country I had called home for years collapse into nothing, but this anger that I held turned into rage every day as reports of rape, torture, starvation and extreme punishment came to us from spies. I began to wonder, did the Templars wsh to rule humanity or destroy it?
I moved on. There was nothing here. If anyone had been here, they would have been incinerated in what the now called the "Culling of Australia". A block away from the U.S Consulate was the former newsroom of Seven News, now burnt to a black, leaning mass of concrete and steel. The U.S consulate was based in the 67-story MLC Center. It had survived the Culling and stood silent and empty, as if all the employees had abruptly left.
Engines roared above me, and I instinctively looked up to see the black outline of a plane. I was about to roll under the nearest burnt-out car before I saw the image printed on the bottom of the plane; the stars and stripes of the American flag.
I began to wonder if the Americans had somehow made it through when something soared up from the roof of a building, leaving a trail of smoke and fire behind it, disappearing as it collided with the American plane in a spectacular explosion. The tail of the plane fell away and disappeared behind a building as the plane spiralled down, hidden away for a maximum of three seconds before I heard a rumbling sound, and dust rose up from behind a building a couple blocks away. My radio crackled to life.
"Ryan?" Phillip's voice came though the static, "Was that one of our planes?"
"It's American," I replied, "A saw someone launch a rocket from and building and it tore the plane to shreds. I'm on my way to thew crash site."
"Be careful Ryan," Phillip urged, "We might have stumbled into Templar territory."
That was unlikely, but I kept my gun and blades ready as I ran an entire block to the crash site, where smoke rose into the golden sky. Anyone who was still in the area returned must have taken shelter quickly, because the street was deserted.
The plane's wings had been sheared off when it had gone down in the street, leaving large gashes in the buildings on either side. The plane itself seemed to have imploded as it slammed into the ground, and the walls of the plane had been blown outward as the roof fell in. Cracks ran from the plane to the sidewalk, and bits of metal and concrete littered the ground.
I turned at the sound of footsteps behind me.
"Bloody hell!" Phillip exclaimed, staring around at the carnage.
"Are there any survivors?" Ethan asked me.
" I don't know. I just got here," I replied.
"Ok guys," Ethan told us, ripping a shred a fabric from his undershirt, "Find something to cover your mouths and noses. We're going in there."
Phillip reached out to pull open the rear door of the plane when tires screeched across the pavement. I whirled around as a Templar assault squad raised there guns.
"GET TO COVER!" I shouted before diving behind a burnt out car, followed by Ethan as Phillip dived inside the plane. I peaked around the barrier long enough to see the assault squad close off the street. I looked behind me, but there was no nearby cover. We'd be shredded by gunfire if we tried to run.
We were boxed in.