Here's the promised update. Enjoy! :)
19th of April, 2012. Scotland.
Shaun was experiencing something rare – a tea break. It was unfortunate that he could no longer stand the stuff after pouring into teacups for the biggest arseholes on the planet - so instead he poured himself black coffee and practically inhaled the liquid in case a high ranking employee happened to look into the grotty little tea room that was frequented only by the staff who basically served as keyboard fodder. It wasn't likely, but Shaun wasn't ready to take the chance. He just needed to stop moving for a while – to stand still and collect the thoughts that hadn't had the chance to flow properly and had stacked up in the back of his head like the leaflets stuffed in the letter box and littered all over the floor of the house that hadn't been lived in years.
Luckily, the official lunch wasn't for another quarter of an hour, so Shaun forced himself to drink his coffee slowly and ground himself again. The room was nasty and unclean – the wallpaper was peeling, the mugs were dirty, and Shaun was sure that the coffee and tea machine was around before he was even thought of, let alone conceived. And he wasn't even going to think about what looked like milk lurking in the jug, which was busy growing its own ecosystem.
Right.
This is what he knew:
He was the captive of the Templars – and as an Assassin, this wasn't the best of predicaments.
After being beaten into an inch of life, he was forced into what had to be the most humiliating job of his life so far. And he wasn't even being paid.
He had almost escaped with Rebecca, but they'd run into the biggest Templar of them all – Warren Vidic – and thrown into a prison that almost caved in on them later on and he was dragged away from her in cuffs, pretty sure he'd never see her again.
He stopped there – his heart was in his throat and the coffee couldn't get past it. He forced himself to move on.
And he'd been given a note and a snatch of hope by the guy he hated most in the world who he'd never trust for all the tea in china and wouldn't even consider spitting on him if he were on fire.
His conclusion was this: I have no hope whatsoever.
With Desmond in the Animus with no hope of ever coming out and Lucy probably locked up somewhere else in the building, he had no hope of building an effective plan to get all them out of there. And the guards, he was sure, wouldn't let him anywhere near Rebecca if they could help it.
Rebecca.
His throat constricted. Goddamn her.
Shaun knew very well that any sane human being couldn't give over their physical beating heart to another, but he would give over this mythical metaphor of a representation of what he felt about her to her if she ever wanted it. Although that in itself was an unlikely thing to happen – he'd probably never see her again.
Did the Order know that they were trapped here? Shaun had the uneasy feeling that they did know – but they just weren't doing anything about it.
Shaun had never felt more hopeless in his life. It was a hollow feeling – like all that he was had been sucked out of him, just leaving a Shaun shaped shell.
He took a sip of his coffee, and at the same time remembered he hated the stuff.
A second later, the door opened, and he jumped out of his skin, staring with wide eyes at a puzzled looking woman in the doorway. Shaun, after calming down slightly, noted that she was probably reasonably pretty under all that makeup and that her roots needed a bit of touching up – there was brunette under the blonde. She was smartly dressed too – so not keyboard fodder.
Oh shit.'I'll put the coffee back and get to work – '
'What're you on about?' The woman asked, her accent Scottish through and through. 'I'm not gonna' shoot 'ya! You drink the rest of your coffee, I just came in for one myself.'
'Oh.' Shaun was taken aback. 'Thank you. Thank you very much.'
'Nah, its no problem. I've seen the way that McDonald scumbag treats you.' She walked past him and left the scent of perfume in her wake – she pulled a face when she inspected the milk. 'I think I'll have my coffee black.' She muttered, and reached for a mug, and she pulled a face again. 'Actually, I'm not that thirsty. I don't even like coffee that much anyway.'
Shaun smiled nervously. 'Same, really. I'm just, uh, sick of tea.'
She smiled sympathetically. 'I can imagine, poor love.' She reached out and touched his arm – and it was then Shaun noticed something very strange.
She had a missing finger on her right hand – and when he looked up and met her eye, she was giving him a very serious look.
His eyes widened.
'I'm the receptionist. I think you have something to ask me.' She whispered – but not in a Scottish accent – a pristine and wonderful one that suggested a life time time of private education and surrounding oneself with books for all of one's adult life. And best of all, it was a Cambridge one. Shaun would've cried, if he wasn't so shocked. His eyes widened.
'Its you– '
'Shhh!' She whispered, her eyes widening. 'You mustn't let on!'
'But – but is help on the way? Are they coming to get us out? To be frank, I've wondered what you lot were doing about it – '
'Yes, help is on the way! It'll just be a while getting here, that's all.'
'Oh that's – wait, how can I even trust you? You could just be some sneaky Templar trap!' Shaun hissed, backing away from her.
'Do you want to take that risk?' The receptionist hissed back at him. 'Reject my help if you want, but it won't help your situation one bit. Or Miles', or Stillman's, or Crane's.'
Shaun didn't say anything. It seemed to him that the possibility of escape was dangling in front of him like a worm that seemed to have a string growing out of its back.
'There're things going on in this place that you don't know about. This isn't just using Miles' DNA to track down the POE, this is about something much bigger. If you want out of here alive, you have to trust me.'
What did he have to loose, really, that he hadn't already lost?
He took a deep breath. 'Alright,' He said. 'What's the plan?'
'Nothing solid yet. I've got a worker in on the plan now. He'll let you know when to come back here.'
'Its McDonald, isn't it?'
'I can't say anything – '
'It's McDonald.'
The receptionist glared at him. 'Alright, it's him.'
'You can't trust him!'
'He's all I have! And if he doesn't do as I say, he's in a lot of trouble himself. He's trustworthy for now.'
Shaun looked decidedly sceptical.
'Don't give me that look.'
'You know you can't trust him.'
'Just leave it now, Hastings. Get back to work. He'll contact you soon.'
'How soon is soon?'
The lunch bell went, and it made them both jump.
'Go, just go!' She hissed as footsteps sounded outside. Shaun took his cue and hurried out just as the workers poured in, and the receptionist was left to weave her way through clumps of people, making no secret of her feelings about it.
'Mind you don't step on me, yer' daft bugger!'
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