The Council was meeting for what they knew could very well be the last time.
"The Assassins have breached the facility, Laylah has been freed, and they're nearly to our location." The Council leader said.
"Can't forget the fact that the government didn't like us taking the drones." Someone else said.
"So what do we do?" Another member from sitting in the main body of the room asked.
"We abandon this base, and we locate the second power source. We'll continue our plans from there, it's a minor setback but it's better than starting over from the beginning."
A voice from the back spoke up, "Wait… What if we set a trap for them...?"
"Right, of course. Sorry, not thinking straight at the moment. Everything is a bit weird right now, my mind is kind of on other things..." Desmond said, pressing a button on his phone.
As the group charged into the room, Desmond was immediately shot in the shoulder.
"Son of a bitch!" He said, wincing as he fell to the floor. Aiden and Rebecca dropped down and dragged him back out of the room. Laylah had frozen in the doorway, looking at what was in the room with both awe and terror.
"Laylah, get do-" Rebecca began to shout at her, but stopped when she saw what was in the room.
"Oh shit…" She whispered, as Aiden turned to look, too. Desmond sat up, recoiling from the pain, to get a good look into the room.
The room contained various instruments and measuring devices, computers, test tubes filled with various glowing substances. The instruments and devices had labels such as 'power conduit' or 'genetic power converter'. The computers were all spewing out numbers and test results. The test tubes were all labeled in another language, unknown to all but one of the four who were looking inside the room.
The room itself was shaped like a silo, with an observation deck higher up in the room, with stairs leading down to the main floor.
However, they barely noticed any of this, because in the center of the room was a very large, very dangerous looking missile with a biohazard symbol on the side of it.
Laylah motioned for them to follow her as she walked into the room. There were a few guards standing in front of the missile, pointing their guns at them.
"Don't come any closer!" "We will shoot!" They shouted.
"No, you won't." Laylah said as she snapped her fingers and they fell to the floor.
"Kind of a deux ex machina, isn't it…?" Rebecca whispered to Aiden.
"Yeah…" Aiden replied, but noting how Laylah seemed visibly weakened from knocking the guards out.
Desmond groaned as he stood up, and Aiden made sure to keep pressure on his shoulder. The bullet had only skimmed it, but it definitely had ripped through a bit of muscle.
"Oh, how nice of you to join us. Now we can talk one-on-one. The guards weren't that great, anyway." A condescending voice said and echoed throughout the room.
"Laylah, Mr. Miles. Ms. Crane. I'm not overly familiar with the other one, although I'm sure I'll get to know you in due time." The voice said, with a sinister edge to it.
"Wait a minute, I know that voice…" Desmond said, trying to recall where he had heard it. Laylah glanced at Desmond in curiosity, wondering where he could have met the bastard.
"Flauros… Show yourself! Your guards cannot help you now, we have the advantage!"
"Oh, I think you'll find that I'm still the one with the advantage, my dear."
"Hold on, I know where I know him from! But I don't know him is Flavnos, or whatever you called him, I know him as-"
"Warren Vidic." Rebecca said, recognizing the voice.
Aiden quickly realized that he was the only one who didn't know the man behind the voice. "Uh, who?"
"Bad dude, kidnapped Desmond, forced him to relive his ancestor's memories, then later kidnapped his dad before Desmond killed him." Rebecca said, as Desmond activated his eagle vision to try to find Vidic.
"What do you mean you have the advantage? I may not have full power here, but I'm certainly not lacking." Laylah said as Desmond scouted the room for Vidic.
"Yes, but I also have power. What exactly do you think I did with all energy I've extracted from you over the past few months? Also, you may have noticed the nuclear missile in the center of the room."
"Oh, shit."
"Oh, shit, indeed, Laylah! For the uninformed; I've used it to power up a deactivated Apple, which happened to be generously donated by someone very close to Mr. Pearce down there!"
"Hold on, what? I was only brought into this a few days ago! I don't exactly have a lot of friends, and my family is-" Aiden hesitated before speaking again. "My family is far away from here, so it couldn't be them. Who the hell are you talking about?" Aiden asked, more confused than ever. He watched as Rebecca glanced around, then began to pace around some machines, looking for anything that would be of use. After finding nothing, Desmond finally looked up, and saw a golden glow coming from inside the observation deck higher up.
"He's up there!" Desmond shouted, pointing at the room.
"Ah, I see you've spotted where I am. But it's not like you can get to me." As he said it, the stairs retracted into the wall.
"Hold on, guys. This'll just take a minute." Aiden said, pulling out his phone as Rebecca grabbed a tablet she found.
Aiden looked around the room for an access point into the DedSec network, although it wasn't difficult, considering there were about a million machines in the room. He picked one at random, bypassed the firewall, and was in. He scanned the stairs, then flipped them back out before deactivating the observation deck's control over them, so they couldn't be put back into the wall while they were climbing up them.
"Alright, we are good to go."
"Sweet, let's do this." Desmond said, charging up the stairs, followed by Laylah, Rebecca, then Aiden.
When he got to the top, Desmond looked around, but there was no sign of Vidic, he was gone. When Rebecca and Laylah got to the top, they were just as surprised as Desmond.
"Damn it! Where did he go?"
"Hey, I'm as surprised as you are, man." Rebecca said, scrolling through the tablet.
Although as surprising as this was, it wasn't as surprising as when Aiden got to the top and saw what the others had overlooked.
"Jordi?!"
Tied up and shoved in a corner was Jordi, Aiden's occasional partner in crime and one of the best fixers in the country.
"Mmmf! Mmh mmhm mm mmhs! MM MMHS!"
"Uh, yeah, hold on a second." Aiden said, taking the gag out of Jordi's mouth. At the same time, Desmond activated his eagle vision and began looking around the room.
"Alright, now what were you trying to say?" Aiden asked Jordi.
"He's inside the walls! There's a hidden door!"
At about the same time, Desmond saw the hidden door with his eagle vision, and pulled it open, revealing a dimly lit room with Vidic waiting inside. Desmond grabbed him by his collar and pulled him out, slamming him against the wall.
"How the HELL are you alive? I KILLED YOU!" Desmond activated his hidden blade, putting it at Vidic's throat.
All Vidic did what laugh.
"Desmond, let him go. I need him alive." Laylah said in a calming voice. Desmond sighed, then let go of Vidic as Laylah walked over.
"So Jordi? What are you doing here?" Aiden asked him, curious to know just what the fixer was doing with DedSec.
"Oh god, Aiden, I thought it was a normal contract like any other one! But, fuck is this bad!"
"Tell us something we don't know…" Aiden said as he helped Jordi up.
"They had me get some weird artifact, called it the Apple, from Abstergo. Next thing I know, they've got a big bomb and are doing all sorts of awful things!" Jordi said as he looked around, still on edge.
"Okay, calm down. We've got this under control now." Aiden said as he tried to calm Jordi down.
"AHHHH! What are you doing?! Help!" Vidic shouted as Laylah held him by his ankle over the edge of the platform.
"Laylah! I thought you said you needed him alive!" Desmond shouted at her, running over.
"I do. But I need information, and if I drop him, the fall will not kill him."
"Hey now, I'm not so sure about that!" Vidic shouted up at them.
"Would you like to see just how far you can fall before breaking your neck, Flauros?"
"No, no! I'll tell you what you want, just put me down!"
"You know, a few days ago I wanted to save DedSec from the corruption of the Apple. But now, eh. Do what you want, I'd kind of like to see him dropped. And why do you keep referring to him as Flauros? I'm like ninety-five percent sure his name is Vidic." Desmond said, chuckling at the sight of Vidic dangling over the edge.
"It is his name from the Old Times, and it irritates him to be called by it these days." Laylah said as she pulled him onto the platform.
"Old Times? When was that, like the golden age of the First Civ?" Rebecca asked Laylah.
"No, somewhat before that. It is not important now, though. Now, you are going to tell me what I want to know." She said, turning to a pained Vidic lying on the ground as the palm of her hand lit up.
"Fine, I'll tell you anything! Whatever you want to know!"
"First, where is rest of your council hiding?"
"They're in the heart of the facility, it's just beyond this room! You can access it by pressing that green button on the console! The door is opposite to the way you came in. There's a password, though, and not even I know that… " He said, pointing to a green button which Aiden walked over to and began trying to access with his phone.
"Second, and I think you know what this one is. Where did you get the Apple?"
"Well, DedSec's resources were very helpful in stealing data from Abstergo, and they didn't even know what was missing until it was too late. Jordi is the best fixer in this city, if not the country."
"Wait, hold on. You work, or at least you did, work for Abstergo. Why are you stealing from them?"
"Desmond, haven't you caught on yet? I'm not actually your friend."
"He's right. He has used many people as a host over the years, and this time is no different." Laylah said.
"Yeah, that's… Weird."
"Uh, hey guys, I unlocked the door. Should I press the button?" Aiden asked.
Everyone exchanged glances for a few seconds.
"Press it." Desmond said.
Aiden pressed the button.
A double door slid open on the main floor.
"I was kind of expecting it to be a bit more… Dramatic." Rebecca said, finally looking up from the tablet she had found.
Laylah had found a marker in the room, and had begun drawing what looked like a pentagram on the floor.
"Uh, whatcha doin' there, Laylah?" Desmond asked her.
"It's a way of keeping him here, so he cannot run if it turns out he was lying."
"Oh. So why does it look like a pentagram?"
"Coincidences happen." Laylah finished the design, and she placed Vidic into the center of it.
"Now, if it turns out that you are lying, I will come back and kill you. I may not be at full power, but I have more than enough to finish you off once and for all." With that, she turned and left, and the others followed her, now accompanied by Jordi.
After a fairly short walk, they were at the council room. Unsurprisingly, it was empty.
Desmond sighed, "Oh, damn it."
"I mean, were you really expecting them to just wait here for you?" Rebecca asked.
"No, but still. We were so close, and now they're gone." Desmond said, defeated.
"But they must have left somehow. We should still be able to catch up to them." Laylah said.
"Uh, guys? They may have left, but they left behind a bunch of their stuff." Rebecca said, picking up some designs that were scattered around floor.
"Hold on a minute…" Laylah said, looking at them. "I know what this is… Oh, this doesn't look good..."
"What do you mean?" Aiden asked, keeping an eye on Jordi.
"Are you familiar with gamma ray bursts?"
"Wait, gamma ray bursts? Nah man, screw this. I'm gonna leave, I can find my own way out of here. No thank you." Jordi said, walking out the door.
"Wait- Jordi!" Aiden shouted at him, but Jordi just waved goodbye without looking back.
"Guess he won't be of any help, after all… Anyway, I'm somewhat familiar, sort of. Aren't they basically giant death beams from outer space?" Desmond asked.
"Yes, caused from exploding supernovae. They aren't exactly a good thing." Rebecca said.
Everyone was looking around the room for a few minutes before Desmond decided to activate his Eagle Vision and see if he could find a trail to follow. But right as he did, there was an intense flash of light. He covered his eyes, and when he took them away, he discovered that him and his friends were suspended in the same types of beams that Laylah had been kept in.
"Oh, not this again." Laylah said, sighing.
With another but less intense flash of light, the DedSec Council members appeared in front of the group.
"Hello! Laylah, Desmond. Others. I'm glad that you could join us. I'm just disappointed it had to be under these conditions. Honestly though, I wasn't sure our trap would work." The man speaking had a short-trimmed beard, short yet somehow messy hair, and a Scottish accent. He also appeared to be the leader. He seemed familiar to Rebecca, but she couldn't figure out why...
"What are you trying to do with gamma rays? Whatever it is, I won't let you follow through with it!" Desmond shouted at them.
"Oh, I see we're getting right to the point. I'm sure you saw the missile in the previous room? And I'm sure you know we have an Apple?" Everyone nodded at the questions as they were asked.
"And you've found our information on gamma ray bursts too, it seems. So, put two and two together."
The group all looked and each other, realizing the plans DedSec had.
"Wait, are you going to actually follow through with what the Templars have been trying to do for centuries?" Desmond asked.
"Correct. You see, the Templars have failed time and time again because they never had the power to follow through with their plans and actually take over the world. Centuries earlier, Al Mualim knew exactly what needed to be done in order to take over the rest of the world, and made actual progress. He saw that the Apple contained enough energy in order to control the minds and hearts of people. But of course, the will of Altair was immeasurable and he was able to overcome it, and you know how that went. Over the centuries, the Apples began to lose their 'charge', so to speak, and that's why the Templars, and Abstergo, have never been able to really utilize them again on such a grand scale. With the charged Apple, we will be able to send out a burst, similar to a gamma ray, that covers the surface of the Earth, allowing everyone on it to be under the Apple's control."
"Uh, wow." Desmond said, looking quite surprised at the new information. "Yeah, actually, that does clear it all up. The only problem of course, is that you're still down a drone." The leader's eyes widened as he realized what that meant, and the drone which Desmond had stolen from DedSec only a few hours ago blew a massive hole in the ceiling. Desmond sighed a sigh of relief at his planning ahead; on the ride over with Rebecca he had seen a 'protect' button in the drone's controls, and figured it would come in handy.
The drone's grand entrance had damaged various things in the room, one of them being whatever was keeping the group suspended in midair, which promptly shut off.
"You're too late! The missile is already set to launch with the Apple onboard! There's nothing you can do!" The leader shouted, running out of the room and pulling out a length of rebar from his side, all while the drone obliterated several panicked council members. Laylah and Aiden had unintentionally been knocked unconscious by the drone, while Rebecca and Desmond had narrowly missed being hit by pieces of concrete from the ceiling.
"Rebecca! Come on, we need to stop it from launching!" Desmond shouted, following the trail of blood the leader had left while running for the missile silo. Rebecca grabbed her now cracked tablet and followed him, pulling up the DedSec network.
In the silo, the countdown on the missile had just under 4 minutes until launch. Desmond began looking for a way to manually stop it if Rebecca was unable to.
He picked up a chair and smashed a few consoles.
Nothing.
Another few consoles? Nothing.
Dammit! What could he do?
Meanwhile, Rebecca was in the system, but she could see nothing about the missile. She tried to scan for a new network, thinking the missile was on it's own network, but nothing came up.
"Desmond, I'm not sure I can hack it, I don't think the missile is on any network!"
"Shit, this is bad…" Desmond said, starting to panic, as smoke began to pour out the bottom of the missile. The countdown was at just under 2 minutes, and the roof of the silo
"Wait, the Apple! It should be somewhere inside the missile, right? If you can find it and take it out, the missile will just be a dud!"
Hearing her suggestion, Desmond ran up to and climbed on the missile. He began using his hidden blade to pry plates off, looking for the Apple.
"One minute remaining." A voice coming from the countdown said.
Desmond was frantically looking all throughout the missile, but he couldn't find the Apple.
"Fifteen seconds remaining."
"Desmond, you need to get down!" Rebecca shouted at him. But as she said it, Desmond had made it to the top of the missile, and had pried off the tip of the missile, uncovering the Apple.
"Launching." The countdown said. Desmond grabbed the Apple and jumped off, rolling as he landed.
He took a step back and watched as the missile shot up the silo and out into the sky, leaving a fading trail of smoke as it did. Laylah and Aiden ran in just in time to see it leave the silo.
Desmond breathed a sigh of relief and sat down in a chair, exhausted and relieved at the same time.
"What'd we miss?" Aiden asked, grinning, because he saw the Apple in Desmond's hand and knew that it hadn't gone up with the rocket.
"Oh, shut up." Desmond said, grinning back at Aiden. The whole group broke into infectious laughter, knowing that DedSec had been finally been stopped.
Laylah realized, however, that there was still one last loose end to tie up. She looked up to the catwalk, where her old friend was being held.
"Excuse me, I'll be right back." She said to the rest of the group, climbing the stairs to the top.
"So, I see the missile launched. I don't suppose the Apple is still onboard, is it?" the pathetic man inside the circle asked.
"No, Vidic. Desmond removed the Apple before it launched. The world is safe, for now." Laylah said in a surprisingly indifferent tone.
"So, we were told you're the merciful one, and since you stopped our plans, I don't suppose you could let me go…?" he asked with a small chuckle.
"You know about the other? How?" a surprised Laylah asked.
"Oh. Uh, the Apple." Vidic said, realizing his slip-up too late. Laylah looked over the edge of the observation deck and realized that the leader of the DedSec council had left a trail of blood leading out the door.
"Oh, great…" She said, sighing and walking down the stairs.
"Desmond! In our celebrations, we seem to have overlooked the fact that the leader has made his escape."
"Huh? What?" Desmond said, looking around the room, realizing that Laylah was right. "Oh
shit!" He shouted, shoving the Apple in his bag and getting ready to chase after him, when Aiden grabbed his arm.
"Desmond, he's out of the facility by now for sure, there's no way you'll catch him. It's been a long week, for all of us. Go home, get some rest. Get a bagel. It's over."
Desmond looked into Aiden's eyes and knew he was right. He sighed and looked around at his friends and smiled.
"Although it may be over for now, the leader will come back eventually. There are other Apples out there, but this is a massive setback for him." Laylah said, now rejoined the group
"But he doesn't have a way to charge the Apples, so he can't use it like this time, at least not on a worldwide scale, right?" Rebecca asked Laylah.
"Well... No, that isn't entirely correct."
"What do you mean?"
Laylah hesitated. "I'm not here alone, there is another on Earth." she said.
"Another?" Desmond asked.
"Yes… I will explain on the way, but we really should get going. I'm sure the authorities will be investigating the missile that launched from here." Laylah said, leading the rest of the group out to the exit.
"Desmond, I must ask, why did you seek the Apple?" Laylah asked when they got outside the facility. They didn't have to take the weird house back out, they had to take the house back out, which was a strange experience for all of them. Desmond let out a sigh in response to Laylah's question.
"Well, I originally wanted to use it to find my father. But now that we know the Templars are back in full swing, and that they're playing dirty, using civilians to get what they want. I mean, yeah, I knew they were dicks before, but they basically corrupted an entire organization and let them do what they want just to stop me." Desmond said.
"I kinda thought that too, but I'm not sure it was the Templars corrupting them so much as it was the Apple itself." Rebecca said.
"Rebecca is correct, they were originally given the Apple by Templars as an experiment, and seeing as how they had no experience with it, it completely took over their minds. In a way, the Apple was the one running the experiment."
"Wait, hold on, so what's to stop it from controlling us?" Aiden asked, suddenly worried.
"Desmond and Rebecca have their Assassin training, and although you have not been directly trained to counter the mind-control effects of Apples, I can tell that you have intense focusing abilities. In other words, I would not worry about being influenced by it."
"Good to know." Aiden said.
"Now, as I said before. If DedSec is to be completely stopped, their leader must be stopped. Fortunately, I have a general idea where he may be headed…"
"Where? How could you know where he's headed?" Desmond asked Laylah.
"Like I said before, Desmond; I am not alone. There is another member of my species, one who is much more powerful than me, and one who can easily power a thousand Apples. I believe that it is the leader of DedSec's intent to capture him, as he did with me, and use him to power another Apple, possibly several."
"Oh. Wow. Okay, um. So what do we do about that? Like, where is your… Friend?" Rebecca asked her.
"I am slightly unsure of his exact location. When we came here, our original purpose was to study Humanity, and he began his research at the most prominent university of the time; Oxford."
"Oxford… So, we're going to England, then?" Rebecca asked.
"Wait, you guys are just going to drop everything and go to England? Don't you have responsibilities as Assassins?" Aiden asked.
Desmond and Rebecca looked at each other.
"Well… Yeah. But this is the best lead we've got on stopping the Templars in a good thousand years or so, so I'd say it's kind of worth dropping everything and following it through." Desmond said.
"A thousand years… Seems a bit drawn out, if you ask me." Aiden responded with. To his surprise, Laylah seemed to smile at that, ever so slightly.
"I just hope this can break the stalemate." Desmond said, checking to make sure the Apple was still in his bag.
"Oh, hey, you should join us! I'm sure your skills could be seriously useful to us." Rebecca said, not wanting to have to say goodbye to Aiden.
"Oh, damn, I'm not sure. I kind of have friends and family here…" Aiden started to say, trailing off, realizing that there wasn't a whole lot left for him in Chicago. "Actually, now that I think about it, I really don't. You know what? I'd love to join you. I need to take a vacation, anyway. I'm not really feeling too welcome in Chicago anymore, after these past few months."
"I am glad to hear that, Aiden. We will need all the help we can get for this, after all!" Laylah said, smiling at Aiden.
"Alright, then it's settled! So, should we get going, then?" Rebecca asked the group.
"I think we should! C'mon, the car should be over this way." Desmond said, leading the group away from the facility, and the ruins of DedSec.
Cassandra and Matt watched the group walk away via the live feed from the drone hovering a few miles above them.
"England." Matt said, biting his lip as he looked away from the screen.
"They're heading to England. Richard!" Cassandra shouted, calling for her secretary.
"Yes, ma'am?" Richard asked, appearing at her side.
"Get the company jet ready."
"Ma'am?"
"We're going to England."
"Hey Des?" Rebecca asked Desmond as they were on their way to O'Hare Airport.
"What's up, Rebecca?" Desmond asked in return.
"After this is all over, we're going to find your dad." Rebecca said.
Desmond kept his eyes on the road.
"I promise." She said.
"I sure hope so."