Maria slumped into the chair beside "Rashid Abdul's" bed and let the longest, most heartfelt sigh of relief she had ever emitted in her life flow from her lungs. Malik had been awake for the end of it but was still so groggy he kept referring to Maria as Adha and asking after Kadar and Altair. Nima had gone back to admissions to help with the already arriving wounded.
The sounds from the old town had mostly quieted now, the occasional sporadic cracks of gunfire were the only audible clue anything was wrong until you looked out of the window that was. Clouds of smoke and dust covered the buildings and the main part of the city behind it was entirely blocked from her view.
She and Nima had run around like headless chickens for the past hour, trying to find a body in the morgue close enough to Malik's age to switch their identities. Unsurprisingly that hadn't been too difficult but it still made her feel guilty as hell, this man had a family somewhere who perhaps didn't know he was dead and they were making it even harder for them to find him. Nima assured her she would make the switch back again as soon as it was safe to do so.
She leaned over the bed and saw Malik's eyes half open, "Can you hear me?"
His head practically slumped in her direction, "I can hear you Adha."
He was heavily sedated and on God only knew what pain killers so Maria let the mistake slip, "Nima will come back soon to bring you up to date and if anyone comes and asks you anything please try not to answer. You are Rashid Abdul and you were hurt in a factory accident. It's so important that you don't get this wrong."
His skin was on the wrong side of grey but he still seemed to have "lights on" somewhere in there, "Nima will fill me in but for now I can't answer to the name Malik, I understand." He took her hand and pulled her closer to his face. "You're not Adha, she wouldn't speak English. I remember now you're Maria you helped us get away from Dimashq."
"That's right but after all you've been through you can call me Shirley for all I care." He looked worse now than he did when he had been in the car, "Sleep now you need to rest and I need to get back to my life."
He had slept through the worst of the conflict and thankfully it seemed the last few remaining noises had all but died down, she had an idea if he knew what was going on he would die trying to get there to help. His eyes slipped shut again and Maria placed a tiny kiss on his hand before going to the door.
"Adha wait, where is everyone?"
She stopped to face him and he corrected himself again, his strong mind wasn't taking too long to clear the fog. "The last time I was badly hurt Adha had nursed me and my memory is playing tricks on me."
"They are down in the old town they will come to you as soon as they can Malik. Who is Adha; maybe I can contact her for you?"
His eyes dropped closed again, "Altair's wife."
She closed the door softly behind her but it was almost a full minute before she let it go and walked to the lift. During that minute she had managed to gain control of her cart wheeling stomach and her pounding heartbeat was practically normal.
'That bastard must have loved how easy I was!"
Her cheeks were flame red as she stood in the car park trying to work out her next move. Ahmed's car was in the old town probably under layers of dust if not masonry, she needed to find another way to reach Damascus. She had seen enough of the protests in that city to know people for the most part tried to get on with life so if she could skirt around the old town it was very likely she would be able to find a taxi driver who would be willing to take her.
She ran across the roads and made her way over the dusty ground that lay between the hospital and the town. The damage had all come from the left so she decided to make her way right and try to find the fastest way possible out of there.
"What the fuck are you doing Maria? Go find him and at least make him help you get out of this nightmare."
But she kept to her chosen path preferring to trust her own instincts. She could hear sirens and shouting but it was all streets away and she began to feel confidant she was making the right move. According to Kadar it was only their faction being attacked so probably the newer part of the city would be fine. She saw men dart out from behind a wall about fifty feet ahead of her but they had their faces covered so she had no way of telling who they were.
Suddenly this felt like the worst idea ever and she began talking herself into going back to the hospital and waiting for "someone" to show up. That someone would likely be Altair and it would be a cold day in hell before she gave that prick the satisfaction of being able to ease his cheating conscience by helping her. She took the next side street off to the right knowing sooner or later this would lead her to "normality".
She heard male voices behind her and looked for a doorway to duck into until they passed but she heard their feet pounding on the pavement behind her and knew they were coming to her. 'Please let it be Kadar or Felix please don't be that fucker Altair.' It never occurred to her there were far worse men than him to meet on the streets of Masyaf that day.
A hand pulled on her cardigan stopping her dead and spinning her round. "I knew it was her. This is the little bitch that helped them get away!"
It was the man from the car park but she couldn't think of his name. 'Shit! What had Altair called him?'
Another man with thick curly hair and a full beard inspected her, "Are you sure?"
"Abbas I'm telling you this is her, the bitch was there at the hospital and when I spoke to her Altair looked like he wanted to gut me."
He eyed her up and down, "The Master is being careless with his toys I see. You could be useful to us should it prove too difficult to get out of this place."
About ten minutes before Maria had toyed with the idea of wrapping her cardigan around her face to help block out the smoke and dust but had decided against it. Syria was far more liberal than most Arab countries but she knew it would offend some people if they saw her in the street with a small strappy top on. Now with this man Abbas staring at her she had occasion to be glad she had kept her body covered.
She licked her lips, "I'm not his toy or his friend, I'm a journalist; he promised a story but as soon as we got here it was clear he had lied and now all I want to do is get out of here."
There were three other men behind the two speaking all of them smirking at each other no doubt amused by this western woman's stupidity. "Farim take her, we will keep her around maybe she will want to hear a few of our stories."
She saw a blonde head pop up from behind a car further down the street but it was gone so fast she questioned her eyes. Then Farim was grabbing her arm and twisting it up her back, "We'll have plenty of time to finish our conversation now." His laugh sounded wet and slimy.
"I doubt we would have much to talk about but you never know you might surprise me and prove to be slightly less boring than watching paint dry." She offered him a wide smile which she kept on her face even when she felt his fingernails dig into the flesh of her arm.
"You would do well to remember Altair is not here to protect you this time."
"I hate to shatter your ego Farim but you are not even close to being the worst thing that's happened to me today, so why not cut the crap and get moving?" She heard Abbas laugh but it wasn't any more friendly than Farim's had been. She was in shit loads of trouble here and knew it well but bluff and bravado felt a hell of a lot better to her than crying and begging to be let go. She knew enough about terrorists to know she would never be able to alter their plans and she would be damned if they would have the satisfaction of seeing her bleed.
It occurred to her she had instantly thought of them as terrorists yet it was a word she hadn't applied to Malik or Altair. Strange considering she knew Farim was a member of whatever little tin pot army the almighty bastard better known as Altair was part of. A few streets from the Souk al Saghir and what Maria considered would be the place she might have first looked for help she was pulled off to the left into a small street which bordered the old and new parts of the city.
It was one of those streets were the sun never made it much lower than the rooftops but that's not why Maria shivered. They were taking her in the direction the shelling had come from. If she was handed over to government forces her chances of ever making it out of Syria alive were slim to none. She had aided the men who had tried to kill their beloved leader and Maria knew the penalty for that would be nothing short of horrific.
She heard a loud bang from behind and Farim lunged forward. Maria spun to see what had happened but there was nothing to see. She looked back to Farim who was now on his knees in the dusty street facing what looked to be fresh blood. Her captives rushed to take cover in doorways but Maria stood rooted to the spot.
'He's just been shot in the head.' She should have been panicking but she felt curiosity more than fear and looking to a rooftop above she saw the outline of a man she knew even from this distance was Altair.
"Move it." Abbas would have torn her arm from its socket had she not moved to keep up with him. He pulled her into a building entrance on the same side of the street Altair was on but two more of his men who had run to the other side were taken down within seconds. Two shots fired, another two men lying dead in the street.
"Abbas that's Altair out there you are in the same faction as him. Identify yourself as a friend for fucks sake!"
"Do you think he doesn't know who we are? We serve the same order but he and men like him have ruined it. Assassin's used to be feared, revered even and now people don't know we exist. We have been spread throughout the world on a fool's errand, fighting an enemy we should be supporting. For almost a thousand years my ancestors watched men like him expand our group and count infidels within our ranks and I say enough!"
He grabbed her by the throat and shoved her against the window.
'He's insane... he is out of his fucking mind and I'm going to die right here.' Her mind raced frantically trying to think of some way to reason with him but the truth was she was frozen with fear. She had never even been mugged and now this madman with a gun had her pinned to the glass and he seemed to want to hold her responsible for all his grievances.
She swallowed but her throat felt rough and glassy, "I'm sorry I don't know anything about assassins or what they stand for I'm only here to report the news."
He grunted and threw her against the wall to her right, "My father believed in our order, he gave his life for it and how did they remember him? Altair spread malicious lies and rumours which to this day are still remembered. I hear them mocking me behind my back "Abbas the son of a coward" but I never let it show. I waited for the right time to strike to come, it was many years but that time is here and I will not be denied my chance to avenge him and clear his name."
"You can start now, I'm listening..."
"It's over Abbas come outside there is no reason for her to be harmed she is an innocent."
Altair was calling to them from the street but she couldn't see where he was. "We are all here Abbas your brothers. Waiting to hear how you can explain this act of betrayal. You have nowhere to go, end this now."
Maria wondered what had happened to the other man who had been with Abbas; she hadn't heard any more gunfire.
He sneered, "Altair ever reasonable and always willing to use the tenants of our creed to win an argument when it wasn't so long ago you broke them all in one day."
The next time he spoke he sounded closer and Maria knew the shit would be hitting the fan very soon. "It's me you want to talk to Abbas. Let her come out and I'll come in."
Abbas pulled Maria in front of him and took a few steps towards the door before he stopped and began whispering in a desperate tone into a walkie-talkie. Shoving Maria forward again he gloated, "He thinks he can beat me but I will win this day."
Realisation dawned in a heartbeat and Maria suddenly knew what he had said and who to. She broke free from Abbas and ran to the doorway screaming. "Altair run he has told them were we are!" She got one foot on the pavement before she felt a horrible burning pain in her back. Altair ran towards her but she was still trying to scream for him to run the other way. "He told them were you are get out of here now."
She saw Altair raise his gun as another bolt of pain seared into her left shoulder throwing her forward face first onto the ground. There was a sound above her and as she turned her head to Altair she saw other men run out after him, Kadar and Felix were among them. 'You need to go you are going to die.' But she couldn't speak she saw smoke from Altair's gun it seemed to rise above him in one slow puff and at the exact same moment the building behind them exploded covering them with bricks and glass.
Then the whole world seemed to be swallowed in a cloud of smoke.
She wasn't sure how much time had elapsed before she next opened her eyes but much later she would reason it couldn't have been too long because there were no soldiers in the street yet.
She lifted her head easily enough but the rest of her body screamed defiantly at her for the attempt she made to move it. She gritted her teeth and forced herself to her knees to survey the damage everything was the colour of dust and there was nothing to be seen but rubble and the smoke signalling the many small fires around the ground.
Then her eye caught something pinkish poking out from a below a pile of stones, panic almost claimed her when she realised she was probably looking at Felix; his wild formerly blonde hair had been stained by blood. Altair had been in front of him and Kadar behind but she could see neither man. She tried to crawl towards him but a voice stopped her.
"They are all dead. This is how it had to be, I did this to protect my brotherhood."
She faced him still on her knees and spoke in a low croaky voice, through a throat choked with dust. "Abbas you killed them all why would you do that?"
He took a few steps to her and she saw he had blood on his shirt from a chest wound; Altair's bullet must have hit the mark. "I protected them. From here we will rebuild and be what we were meant to be and no one will ever know of the part I played."
He stopped at her feet and pulled his handgun from its holster, "I am sorry you got messed up in this but in the end you have only yourself to blame."
She scrambled backwards in the dust trying to gain a footing to get up but her hands got stuck behind her leg and she fell onto her back. Then she felt something in her back pocket, something Altair had been teasing her about earlier...
"It's a throwing knife Maria, the reason it has no grip is to keep it light all its power comes from how you throw it."
She drew it slowly from her pocket as Abbas raised his gun and pointed it at her head. He never considered this woman would have a weapon let alone know how to wield it and while the last part was true she was determined to at least try.
She adjusted it in her hand so she held the blade in her fingers gradually freeing it from beneath her body. Abbas whispered something like "I'll pray for you." No more time for stealth it's was now or never. She swiftly pulled it from under her body feeling it slice across her hip as she did but not being aware of any real pain. His eyes went wide when he saw the knife then wider still after she released it.
His neck seemed to explode almost before the knife had left her hand but exhausted, bleeding and on the point of unconsciousness she dropped her head to the ground grateful for the air that managed to get past her spongy throat into her lungs. She could hear the sound of vehicles approaching and had just enough time to hope they were here to help before darkness engulfed her.
This was sort of depressing :(