I, ASSASSIN

Chapter Twenty-Two

"Paintball..." Bella Donna gave a vague laugh as she stood with her arms folded, watching as her father began unloading items from the back of the Jeep. "You're...actually serious."

"Yes," said Marius.

Remy gazed at the gun he'd been handed, it was a beige thing, ugly and light and rather large for what it was. He was confused about this new training exercise. What could he possibly learn from Paintball? What was the point of it all?

"The rules are simple," said Marius, he tossed an item of clothing in Remy's direction, "You'll go in to the woods, and you've got to get through to the other side."

Bella Donna gazed to the woodlands they were parked a little away from, Remy followed her eyes there; it was a thick woodland...more what Remy would call forest than woodlands. How large was that span of woods? How long would it take to get through.

"Can't be that easy," Remy dropped his eyes to the beige coloured jumpsuit his mentor had tossed towards him. He was supposed to wear this monstrosity? It was like the boiler suit Michael Myers had worn, except it smelled like paint thinner.

"You're right, it isn't," Marius tossed Bella Donna her jumpsuit, "there's ten Assassins in there right now waitin' for you. Object is simple, get through without bein' shot or seen."

Bella Donna began pulling her jumpsuit over her clothes, a grumble of disapproval at the smell escaping her lips.

"Now," said Marius, "Now..." he leaned against the Jeep, "I want your phones, anythin' like MP3 players, iPads, iPods, and your watches and guns if you got it."

Remy took his phone from his pocket and tossed it towards the older man.

"But why?" Bella Donna groaned, disapproving of having to hand over her phone.

"GPS. Compasses, location services, any kind of apps that let you detect other nearby users," Marius smirked, "you think I was born yesterday."

"By the lines on your face I'd say you were born a hundred years ago," Bella Donna muttered.

Ooh, she's really testin' him, Remy thought, almost impressed.

"Belle!"

"Got more lines on that face than an elephant's ballsa-"

Marius grabbed a hold of her wrist and yanked her away from the area of the car; Remy stood dressing in the Jumpsuit as he watched them walk out far enough to be out of earshot. He saw Marius pointing his finger at her, giving her a final warning. Bella Donna stomped one foot furiously, she threw her hands out, her voice raised but the only words Remy managed to catch from the distance were "Then do it!"

Idle threats, Remy thought. Yes, Remy imagined this was the cycle of their relationship; he'd make threats that if her behaviour didn't improve, she'd be taken care of the Assassin way, and she'd dare him. Nothing would ever happen, it would go on forever that way. Marius Boudreaux was a cold man but he loved his daughter, and she would get away with murder forever...in more than one sense.

The two returned a moment later, Bella Donna looking flustered, her father's face red.

"Now, if we've had enough outbursts for one day, perhaps we can continue with the training," he said.

Bella Donna came to stand by Remy, her gun hanging from one hand, her jumpsuit was far too big for her and seemed to drown her, made her look like a shapeless beige blob.

"This training session is about three key things," Marius paced a little. "Evasion, Elimination, and Navigation. Remember these three things. Evade your would-be killers, Eliminate any witnesses, and Navigate your way through without bein' shot."

"So," Remy examined his gun casually as he spoke, "the Assassins in there are lookin' for us...we gotta get through unseen. Anyone sees us, we gotta eliminate them immediate?"

"Yes."

"And then they're out of the game?" Bella Donna asked.

"This ain't no damn game, Belle," Marius snapped, "this is serious training."

"Fine," Bella Donna rolled her eyes, "so then they're out of the training."

"Yes," Marius answered.

"What kind of enemies can we expect to find?"

"All kinds," said Marius. "You won't be able to predict anythin'."

"You say navigate through without getting shot," Remy tested his aim on the same tree Bella Donna had shot, splattering it with a round of green paint, "are there any allowances for if we do get shot?"

"Yeah," Bella Donna spoke up, "I mean...if we get shot in the arm...or in the leg...does it still count?"

"No. Untouched, that's the rule."

"What if paint splatters on us from their guns?" Bella Donna queried.

"It better not," said Marius. "You're going to want to get out of that woodland before nightfall."

"Before nightfall?" Bella Donna blinked, "we're going to be in there that long? It's only eleven am now!"

"You may be in there that long. That is a large area, there ain't no paths to follow, you'll have to use your smarts to find your way through."

"Are there any kind of penalties for making it back out the wrong end?" Remy queried.

"Death," said Marius.

Remy swallowed hard, he tried not to let his anxiety show. "What if we ain't out of there by nightfall."

"Then you better find a way to survive. The Assassins got lights on their guns...you don't."

"Do we work as a team?" Bella Donna asked, sounding bored, her gun dangling from her hand.

"No," said Marius. "Assassins work alone, you know that. You go in separately. I've marked the paths for you to take," he gestured to ribbons high up in the trees, Remy had not noticed them. "Remy, you'll follow the green ribbons...Belle, you'll follow the pink. Once you're in deep enough, there won't be any ribbons, and you'll be on your own. Don't try to back track, I'll be having the ribbons removed. Once you're in, you're in, until you get to the other side."

"Any supplies?" Remy asked.

"Water...a bottle each, that's it, that's all you got until you get out of there."

"Can we go already?" Bella Donna asked with a frustrated sigh, she was already bored, Remy could see she was.

"One more thing," said Marius, "the one who gets through to the other side first...they win."

"What do we win?"

"A day off," said Marius smugly, "from trainin', from supervision. But just one day."

Remy felt a strange surge of hopefulness. He needed a day like that. A day to just escape and not be followed.

"A day to do anything we want?" Bella Donna asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes."

"Is that an actual promise? We'd have your word?" Bella Donna asked carefully.

"You have my word," said Marius.

Remy took a deep breath, "fine. I'm ready. I think I know all I need to."

The woods were far denser than Remy had initially thought; shrubs, branches, and ditches were in every which way, and it didn't matter which direction he took, they all seemed to lead to getting tangled scratched and snagged.

It was impossible to try and be quiet with so much shrubbery and dry twigs and leaves on the ground. Every single movement caused something to crack, snap or crunch. Remy now understood why it could take as long as until nightfall to make it through this woodland; to get through without being heard was going to be an exercise of slow, careful, precise movement.

Remy wondered if Bella Donna was getting through her section of woodland without hitch. Just 'cause she's smaller, more agile, faster and a better shot than me don't mean she's gonna get through this better, he reminded himself. He hated thinking that way, he had to stop and remind himself not to underestimate her. Bella Donna wasn't a stupid girl; she may seem bored and disinterested in what was set out for her, but she was keen, and she listened well, and her behaviour might all be a distraction to pull her father's attention from her real goal, which was to be the surprising, impressive and deadly daughter he hoped she would grow up to be.

After a couple of hours in the woods with no incident, the weather began to change and it began to get quite windy. Remy used this to his advantage, the rush of wind pushed the shrubs and trees around, making a lot of noise. It made it easy for him to make short dashes from brush to brush.

It seemed as if almost four hours had passed before he met with his first Assassin. The guy was a black shadow, clad in dull black leather from head to foot, even his face was masked in it. He melted into shadows behind trees as he moved and Remy had caught sight of him from afar only by chance as he'd been moving from bush to bush.

He ain't seen me, Remy realised. He hid there for a minute, trying to ignore that one of the branches was digging into his cheek. I'm gonna be real obvious the minute I move, this jumpsuit is too damn bright...

Remy looked around him for a moment, as he crawled behind the next bush a little his hand slipped in the mud and he fell flat on his face into it, it was thick, gooey, dark brown, smelling earthy and damp. He stared at it for a moment upon his hand until it struck him that this wasn't exactly an unfortunate discovery.

Quickly, he took handfuls of the stuff and began rubbing it across the thick denim-like fabric of the jumpsuit. He used some of the water from his bottle to soften it, make it easier to spread across his bare face, he coated his hair in it, not caring about how long it would take later to scrub it out. He rolled across the woodland floor, letting pieces of dirt and moss and dead leaves stick to the mud, giving him natural camouflage. He rubbed the dirt across the gun, making it as dark as possible as easy to hide as he could.

It was going to have to do, it was all he had.

He moved silently behind trees, through the bushes, belly crawling as low as he could, avoiding being sighted by the first Assassin. Breathless from the effort, he took a moment to rest, settling against a tree, he sipped from his bottle of water and gazed around.

Something caught his eye; it had been subtle at first...he had seen movement. He had thought perhaps it might have been some kind of moth, a bug of some description taking to flight. He stared at the large tree ahead of him, trying to figure out what it was that he had see.

And then he realised the tree had eyes.

The gun rose, it had been invisibly camouflaged, painted to look like the bark of the tree, as was the Assassin who had been standing flush against it. Remy ducked, he heard the splatter of the paint as it hit the tree at his back, he turned briefly and saw the red there; a round of red splatters followed him as he rolled out of the way, the Assassin had shifted, Remy lost sight of him.

Fuck, where is he?! Remy panicked, he held his gun, hand shaking, not sure why it was.

Another shot fired, missing him narrowly, he saw a slight movement, he turned and fired but missed. The target was an expert of camouflage, he knew every place to hide. Remy ducked into a bush and began moving through a huge cluster of them as the wind began to pick up, the leaves on the ground rustling violently.

Need to figure out a way to make that bastard visible, Remy realised. Ain't gonna catch him otherwise...

Remy quickly and quietly reached for the spare cartridge Marius had provided for the gun, as the wind picked up, he slammed the head of it against a nearby rock, the pressure giving a loud hiss an the small pellets began falling out. Remy pocketed the pellets.

Ain't getting the upper hand on me, he frowned as he held onto one of the pellets and began to charge it with his kinetic powers.

He ducked out of the trees and gave a loud yell to grab the attention of his attacker. A splatter of red hit a rock, the aim showed the direction of the shooter. Remy tossed one of the pellets to the ground hard as he could, the excessive kinetic build up in the thing caused it to explode into a fine mist of green and Remy saw the Assassin as he moved only slightly, leaving an outline of himself against the tree. Remy fired once at the splattered green figure and a single pellet exploded upon his chest.

"You're out," Remy smirked.

The Assassin bowed his head down and stood with his hands together at his lap, then backed up slowly into the shrubs behind him and quickly disappeared.

Remy heard a rustle at his back and he swung out behind him, his elbow catching something; he turned and saw he'd elbowed the face of the next Assassin.

Fuck, they're playin' in pairs now, he realised.

The Assassin kicked Remy's ankles out from beneath him, and he went down like a ton of bricks onto his front; he scrambled to get onto his side, seeing the aim of the paintball gun directly towards his face. Remy swept his arm up and knocked it aside hard just in time, the red paint escaping his face just narrowly. He thrust his own gun up and tried to shoot but the enemy knocked it out of his grip with his own. There was a struggle, the Assassin trying desperately to turn his gun on Remy as he fought to keep it turned away. Finally, Remy managed to push a leg up, kick the enemy gun away.

His own gun wasn't close enough, he twisted onto his side with the Assassin holding him down, somehow he managed to grab onto the strap and pull it towards him and he shot at an awkward angle catching the second Assassin in the groin; the Assassin let out a howl and fell over grabbing his – now green – family jewels.

"Sorry 'bout that...hope you weren't in the middle of tryin' for kids or nothin'," Remy said apologetically; although he hadn't liked the way the Assassin had hurt him on the struggle (his neck being stepped on by a rather heavy boot at one point) he felt that no man deserved to be shot in the genitals by a powerful paintball gun (unless of course they were the kind of men who hurt children, in which case, it should be a real gun, Remy decided).

Two down, one I passed already; there could be another seven lurkin' unless Belle took 'em out, I better be on my guard.

Remy took the time to break there for a few moments to catch his breath while the Assassin took off and disappeared into the trees. Remy supposed those two Assassins would go off to brief Marius about the altercation. After he'd had enough time to rest, he continued on, being more cautious. The evening was coming in; Remy had been able to tell from the direction of the sun; it had started out on his left and a little behind him, but now it had moved to the right, getting lower, the light beginning to filter more behind the trees than from above the canopy.

As he was checking for the sun direction, a flock of small birds caught his attention darting out of a tree quite suddenly. It shouldn't have been too unusual a sight in the woods, but Remy thought it quite unusual.

Somethin' spooked them, he realised. Some kind of predator?

Yes, it turned out there was a predator up there, only it was an Assassin dressed in expert camouflage that mimicked the shapes of small branches upon a strangely reflective uniform that seemed to almost absorb the light and mimic it, making it blend. The Assassin had spied him at the same moment, and dropped down from the sky right ontop of Remy, bashing him in the head with the paintball gun after the landing.

As light as the gun was in comparison to a real rifle, the impact still damn well hurt, and Remy felt dazed for a moment. So we're playin' dirty then? Remy thought angrily, his head felt tight right where the weapon had caught him. Two can play at that. His hand found a rock where he had landed and he swung it towards his assailant, catching him in the side of the head.

"See how you like it, asshole," Remy muttered. The Assassin was momentarily stunned, and Remy crawled out, he tried to see where his gun had fallen, he couldn't see it.

Fuck, where is it?

A round of red blasts went off near his feet as he swung himself out of the direction of the assailant. To daze the guy, he grabbed a large handful of the paintball pellets from his pocket and charged them quickly, dove out of the way as he tossed the entire handful of them into the ground. The sound went off almost like fireworks, and green paint splattered everywhere, Remy landed in a ditch, his hand finding the paintball gun that had fallen out of his hands upon the attack.

He lifted it just in time as the Assassin – completely coated in green paint looking almost comical like a special effects extra in a movie – came to the edge of the ditch to shoot.

The guy got the first shot off but it back fired and simply sputtered out of the gun; even with the mask over the guys face, Remy saw the momentary confusion and that was when he took his shot and hit the guy square between the eyes with a small burst of paintballs.

The guy held his face and yelled something out that Remy didn't quite make out as the mask had muffled whatever it was.

Remy was impressed with what the Assassins had to work with in the way of camouflage. He gave a laugh, "You guys take paintball serious, don't you?"

There was a sudden high pitched sound and a small section of the tree Remy had been facing exploded into splinters. Remy turned and gasped looking around, "what the...?"

Three more of those strange sounds, he recognised them immediately, the sounds of a gun and a silencer. Someone was shooting for real.

Remy ducked into a bush, he'd lost sight of the green-covered Assassin he'd just taken out. Marius is right, this ain't a fucking game, it's turned serious now! Shit!

More bullets, leaves and twigs from the ground exploding into the air as Remy darted and bolted from tree to tree trying to find some cover. This weren't part of the plan, this was never specified! What the fuck?! How do I take this guy out?!

He glanced around the side of a tree, a thin branch was shot straight off of it and he gasped, turning around it. It was going to be nightfall soon and he was in the middle of the woods with a killer who had a silenced pistol.

Remy tried to figure out the trajectory; it seemed to be coming from the trees. He had no way of getting up there, not without becoming a sitting duck. There was one large tree, one with branches thick enough that would hold a person high enough and in the cover of the leaves enough that Remy realised had to be where the Assassin was. He slipped into a bush out of sight and waited for the wind to pick up and rustle the leaves before he began moving, peering out awkwardly trying to get a better view. He still couldn't see the Assassin.

Need to take him down, or I'm gonna die out here, Remy realised. Remy felt around in the bush, hand getting scraped by thorns; a rock...yes, a rock was ideal.

Drawing his breath, he began charging the thing, it growing hotter and hotter in his hand, starting to vibrate in his fist as the energy began to build up. He needed to get out of the bush to make the throw, he needed to swing just right to get the right kind of accuracy.

He waited for the right moment and got out, he heard the bullet whizzing past, he felt something catch his ear and hot white pain caused him to cry out. Instinctively he threw the rock towards the trunk of the tree and the explosion shook the entire area. Remy ducked out of the way as splinters flew in every direction, the tree creaked and bent over and over it went like a tree that had just been axed down; it took several smaller trees with it.

Remy saw the black figure trying to catch himself on the way down, grabbing onto branches and trying to swing himself out of danger before the tree came down. But one branch snapped unpredictably and the guy hit the ground with a hard thud, just before tree crashed upon him.

Remy's chest felt tight with panic, it seemed as if it had all happened in slow motion. The sound didn't cease once the branches all settled, birds were squawking in terror, the sounds echoing until distant upon their escape to safety. After a moment, as he came to his senses, he realised that the Assassin was trapped beneath the trunk of the heavy tree; Remy dashed to the tree, seeing the Assassin laying there, facing downwards, arms stretched out, one hand still hanging onto the branch that had snapped off, the other holding onto his suppressed gun; Remy recognised it from Marius's extensive lesson about weaponry...a Glock.

"No no no no!" Remy cried out, "No!" he tried to move the tree but it wouldn't budge, the thing must have weighed several thousand pounds. Remy shook the Assassin, "I'm gonna get you out, I'm gonna—hey come on!" he tried to wake him up, "come on!"

The guy was not moving, crushed beneath the tree Remy realised to his absolute horror that he was dead.

Remy's stomach did a flip. It had finally happened. He had killed a man.