A/N: I'm now having a friend proofread and edit my chapters from here on out so that I can make sure that they're that much better. It takes longer, but as you can see, with this being one of the longest chapters in the fic so far, it's well worth it. As well we now have the first POV change for most of a whole chapter. And the ending has the introduction of something/someone I have been waiting to introduce for a long time. For those who have played the new Batman: Arkham Knight game, you'll have a good idea of what to expect out of this, now.

Chapter 18: It's Not Easy Being Green

Jason POV

Attacking fellow brothers, giving away the element of surprise, stealing an RPG, and using it on the target's house. Asgeir had been very busy. I opened the door into the observation room to the interrogation. Matthew stood behind Zar, who was seated in a chair by the window. I heard voices from the speaker.

"We can make this easy for you, Asgeir. It's your choice. You just need to explain your actions and tell us what you're hiding from us. Matthew says that everything you've done since you got here suggests you know something."

Asgeir was tied up in a chair by the wrists, hanging his head off to the side slightly forwards.

"I'll tell you everything. Under the condition I speak to Matthew and only him."

I heard a snort beside me as I stood behind Zar.

"That's not going to happen, bastard. You talk to me, and I talk to him."

"You will get what you want from me, but not in the way you're trying, rookie." Asgeir sneered. "Meet my demands, and I'll have my explanation for you."

"Are we even sure that this really is Asgeir, chief?" Zar said nervously. "He doesn't seem like himself."

Then, Asgeir looked directly at us through the window, and grinned. "'Ey Matthew!" He said, in a strange accent. "Before yah come inside to get the answers yah want in this noggin of mine, do me a favour, go upstairs, and fetch me a feckin' Guinness!"

Neither me nor Zar understood what Asgeir was talking about, wondering if he really did want a beer, or he was using some kind of code word to Matthew.

"What does that mean?" Zar asked. "Was that a Scottish accent he did?"

I shook my head. "Matthew?"

I glanced at the old Assassin beside me, waiting for an answer. He only stared at Asgeir with an anxious sort of puzzled expression. He kept looking at Asgeir strangely, then shook his head at himself.

"I think it's time that he and I had a real talk. When I go in there, shut off the microphones. This is between the two of us."

"What's this all about, Mentor?" I questioned, a little angrily. "There's something that you're not telling us."

"Yes, there is. It's something that needs to be kept between myself and Asgeir for the time being, because I've kept it a secret from him for so long for a reason. He couldn't find out."

"Find out what? Is this the reason why he blew up the farmhouse?" Zar asked.

"No, but it's why he's probably lost his faith in the Order. It's something I should have told him long ago. Please just understand that I'm doing what's best for him. Turn off the microphones."

I hit the switch at the table, and the speakers gave their last cry of feedback as they went out. Matthew breathed slowly, then walked in.

Zar and I sat beside each other as we watched what was going on in the interrogation room. Matthew dismissed the Assassin interrogating Asgeir and untied him. Asgeir rubbed his wrists and glared at Matthew, almost in a way as if his demands had not been met yet.

"I wish Troy and Rabbit were here. They'd be able to find out what they're saying in here."

Troy and Rabbit. The only pair of real brothers in our branch. Asgeir said that they were frozen by Ingrid along with Anna and Kristoff. No one could replace those warriors and what they did for the kingdom.

Matthew said a short statement to Asgeir, and he solemnly nodded in return. Then he angrily spat at his Mentor's feet and yelled out curse after curse at him. We could barely hear what he said due to the soundproofing of the room, but many of the words were every curse that Zar and I knew. There were a few terms that I didn't understand, but they sounded easily enough like offensive terms towards, well anybody.

"This isn't the Asgeir that we knew." Zar said as our brother thrashed and screamed at our Mentor, who only stood there and took it as calmly as I had ever seen out of anyone. "You think it was the Shattered Sight that made him blow up the house? It's afflicted him for so long."

"There's no doubt in my mind." I replied. "Asgeir and I read as much as we could on it, in hopes that we could cure him of it, since the worst pieces of the mirror were lodged into his eyes as well as his mind. But all we found is that killing Ingrid would be the only way he could cure what ailed him. All it really did to Asgeir was make him even more furious and determined to find Ingrid."

"But then why didn't he try and kill Ingrid already? She's working at that ice cream store on Main Street."

I shook my head. "I can't answer that. I don't know. I don't even know why he'd have lost his faith in us. Asgeir and I grew up with our hoods together. Whatever he learned in the last thirty years has clearly done something to him."

Asgeir continued yelling, but he was going so fast and emotionally, I couldn't read his lips even if I tried. When he had finished, Matthew tapped on the glass with his fist. He pointed to the table on our side, instructing us to turn the mics back on. Zar did so.

"Bring us four beers down here, boys. And come on in. Asgeir needs to tell us something."

Zar and I went up to the bar to get more beers from the taps. Zar helped himself to a Guiness, and took another for Asgeir. (I assumed he took that statement he said in that weird accent seriously.) I preferred a Kilkenny to that. We went back down into the Bunker and sat down in chairs that Matthew had brought in. We sat in a four-sided circle, the three of us looking at Asgeir.

"Well, Asgeir? What do you have to say for yourself?"

He sighed, shaking his head. He took a long swig of his beer, then dropped the glass to the ground beside his foot. It cracked, but did not shatter.

"Guys, they took my hood."

Why wouldn't that surprise me? It made as much sense to me as anything. It explained everything. But I couldn't believe it, and Zar put it perfectly in his own word.

"Bullshit."

"It's true, Zar. Just had a nice little chat with Bill Miles over the prepay. Turns out our own faithful American Mentor had made some decisions that he never even tried telling me about if he had any ways of contacting me."

"It was the Curse." Asgeir explained. "It started simple for the first few years I spent in this world, hoping I could find this town before Emma would be old enough. But most of the Assassins in this world didn't believe my stories about another world than this one. And the ones that did believed that my services were better spent jumping realms for them instead of finding this place, fighting war after war. One lasted over year and I saw things I wish I hadn't."

Asgeir continued. "Not long after I returned to this world from that war, I started showing signs of instability. The psychiatrists that Bill insisted I be put under therapy with said that I was under a severe case of PTSD from all this fighting. Maybe I was, but the Spell of Shattered Sight didn't help in the slightest. No one could find what was truly wrong with me, but not long after, Bill saw me do something that was the last straw for him."

He glanced at me, then Zar. "Have either of you heard of The Gates?"

Zar shook his head slightly. "Isn't that supposed to be some kind of mythical prison that the Assassins created in the Canadian wilderness? One that kills everyone that enters it?"

"Not a myth. It's very real, Zar. And I almost killed an innocent right there. Neil. I'm the reason he got out of Neverland in the first place. I threatened Pan to give him to me after I escaped the Curse, hoping that killing the boy would be my way of getting my revenge on Rumplestiltskin."

"You'd threaten an innocent soul? A child no less?" Matthew snapped. "Have you lost all your humanity?"

"I won't deny that, Matthew." He said. "Yes. Ingrid has taken my soul, my mortality, my family. And now my humanity. It's why I took such actions towards hurting Zelena by blowing up her house. Neil was a second chance for me to be the brother I never was to Anna and Elsa, and now he's dead because of that bitch."

I understood. I never knew my family. They sold me into the salt mines when I was a baby, and Asgeir's father Daniel saved me from that life, offering me a second chance. If I ever had any family that truly cared for me as Elsa and Anna cared for Asgeir, I'd do anything for them. I took a swig as he continued.

"Either way, Miles decided he would take drastic actions after I snapped. He stripped me of my hood, dumped me in The Gates, and then cuffed a GPS tracker onto my leg. He said that somewhere in my mind, there was some kind of solution to fixing what afflicted me. He was done trying to help me, and banished me there until I would finally shake off whatever was wrong with me. If I tried leaving the boundaries past Merritt or Kamloops, or take off the tracker, any chance I had of getting my hood back would die."

"That's why you're here." Zar realized. "You're going to kill both Zelena and Ingrid."

"Bill approached me over a week ago. He said that I'll be given back my hood if I kill both Zelena and Ingrid. He now believes my stories about the other worlds, and is worried that the threats that both of those witches pose could prove to be a risk to the entire world. Who's to say that after they're done with us, they aren't going to stop with Storybrooke and move to what's out there in this world. I'm here to stop them the only way I know how. But I can't do that in here."

"You may never get the chance to begin with." Our Mentor replied.

I turned to him in my seat. "What do you mean, Mentor?" I asked. "Asgeir's broken every tenant of the Creed since the First Curse began, but he's still gotta be the same brother we know. Please."

Matthew grimaced, clearly not pleased with the situation as much as I was. "Just because he has the name of the one we fought alongside doesn't mean he's immune to our laws. Normally I'd take his hood completely for his crimes, but the circumstances have also changed completely." He replied. "I see that the better option would be to take this to the table. Bring in all the Veteran Assassins and higher that we can, and within a week we'll vote on either keeping Asgeir with us, or stripping him of his hood entirely. Until then, Asgeir is not to leave The Bunker or Comac's. If he does, he's your responsibility, Jason."

Babysitting my oldest brother. What had the world come to? We both stood up.

"Better keep an eye on me, Jase." He smirked. "Bill often said I was a slippery bastard towards Templars and Assassins alike. It'd take a lot of luck to catch me if I escaped."

While Matthew and Zar went out to track down the few high ranking Assassins that Zelena hadn't turned into monkeys, Asgeir and I sat up in the bar. It was quiet, with the only sounds being the clack of billiards every minute or so with two novices playing their game, and the speakers playing an old Irish folk song by the name of "Molly Malone".

Asgeir sat across from me at the table we had in the corner of the pub. He spent most of his time watching the foam on the sides of his half-drank pint, not taking a sip. Occasionally he would look up at some of the sights around the bar. To any one person that walked in, they would look around the pub and see a regular Irish pub. To an Assassin, it was a monument towards our enemies.

I often had suggested to Matthew that we tear down most of the portraits or decorations that showed even a little pro-Templar propaganda, but he didn't agree to it.

"If we tear down everything we see, we're only closing our eyes to the truth." He had said. "This is how the Templars win: they close people's eyes and ears, and shove bullshit down their throats to make it look like they are what's best for this world. Everything that we see in this room is a reminder of how our enemy fights, and that our fight is never over."

Asgeir was now looking at a glass display case just above me.

"Is that really it?" He asked.

I turned in my seat and looked up at the case. Aside from a card explaining the importance of the contents inside, and a picture of Shay Cormac wielding it, the case held the weapon that every well informed Assassin should know: Cormac's Air Rifle. It lay on it's side on top of a folded black sail with the Templar Cross on it, which was apparently one of the sails that flew on Shay's brig, the Morrigan.

"Apparently it is, brother." I replied. "Almost everything in here is a tribute to Shay Cormac since he was supposedly the founder of this place. That was the tale, but now we know it's all a lie since this town has only existed for the last three decades. This place was something Regina had made to remind us of our failures. How we had made the mistake of trusting Shay into our fold, and he turned his back and slaughtered us. If it wasn't for Connor, we would have never bounced back against the bastards."

Asgeir took a long drink and finished his beer. "Have they talked yet about Neil's funeral?" He asked.

"I only know what I hear since not many of us speak to the townspeople. But yes, they are arranging to have Neil buried later this week. And Matthew and I agree that right or wrong on your actions doesn't matter. Neil was a brother to us even if he never took the hood and blade and became a true brother. It's your choice if you want to go to the funeral."

Asgeir only glimpsed at me solemnly, before looking back at the glass rifle case.

Matthew and I were asked by one of the scouts to report at the wreckage of the farmhouse while Zar and a few other guards were watching Asgeir, who would be kept at Cormac's until we had called the meeting of the council. When I was speaking on the phone with him on the drive over, he said that all Asgeir really did was sit there in his seat and not do anything aside from the occasion itch.

"It's amazing, brother." He said in bewilderment. "I'm looking at him right now and I would believe that he's dead if he wasn't moving every once in a while. It's kind of spooky."

"Keep an eye on him, Zar. You've got authorization to tranq him if he so much as looks at someone funny."

"Understood."

Matthew and I stopped about halfway up the driveway to the smouldering monstrosity on the hill. Already there were three vans with the teams working in and out of them as they swept up the debris, and three pickup trucks, where one served as a makeshift fire truck with hoses rigged in the canopy, and the other two being used as transport to carry away the debris. I also spotted the familiar yellow bug parked a bit closer to the wreckage.

When Matthew and I got out, an older Assassin by the name of Geoff came over. He was serving as the leader of the fire and cleanup crews for now, as evident by his hoodie.

A part of our operations here in Strybrooke had some of us serve timed schedules on the cleanup and fire crews we had. Every one of us did it at some point. This meant that if something that we had done had gotten too out of hand, the people on the cleanup crews at the time would help sweep away the mess and have it all finished by the time the good Sheriff would come along. Geoff was wearing the long red hooded coat to indicate he was part of the cleanup crews at the time.

"How bad is it?" Matthew asked as Geoff walked with us.

"Even for taking an RPG to this house, I've never seen such destruction on one house. Clearly Asgeir was aiming to obliterate this house, and aside from a few bits we were able to salvage, he's destroyed everything. Nothing here that we can use to find Zelena, or at least stop her plans. If the Witch was hiding anything important in this house, it's all been incinerated by his attack."

"Nah." I replied. "Asgeir told me about this Zelena witch before. She's smarter than she looks. She's more than likely established a contingency plan for this. We just need to find her."

"What were you able to salvage?" asked Matthew.

Geoff led us over to a blue tarp with all the evidence laid out for us. Sheriff Swan and her father stood off to the side, clearly waiting to talk with us.

Geoff went through each piece of evidence as best he could. "We found a few spellbooks, but they're all useless considering how the spells inside are all the basics. And most of the pages in them are burned, anyways. A charred bicycle right here, what remains of a wood stove, and a few pieces of spun gold from the Dark One."

Matthew shook his head, distressed. "This may have been evidence to prove Zelena was the Witch we were looking for, but it doesn't give us anything on what she's planning. It's useless!"

I glanced up from the evidence to Matthew, then to Geoff.

"That's Matthew's way of saying 'good job', Geoff. Keep the teams on standby for anything new that might pop up, and set up a perimeter around here. Now that the area is secure from Zelena, we can at least put up more defenses around here."

"You got it."

Matthew and I started for Swan and Charming before Geoff called over to me again.

"Hey, Jason! When you get the chance there's something else we need to discuss."

I looked back and waved before Swan and Charming approached us.

"What the hell happened here?" She demanded.

"Easy, fair one." Matthew replied. "We've got it under control."

"Under control? Someone used a military grade rocket launcher to blow an entire house to the ground. And I'm willing to bet that it was Asgeir, wasn't it?"

"He said take it easy, Swan." I said. "Yes, it was Asgeir, but he did not have the authorization to use those weapons in the first place. He disobeyed direct order from us and we've got him at our headquarters."

"May we speak to him?" Charming asked, more politely than his daughter. "We just have some questions that we think he can answer to help us track down Zelena."

"Afraid not." I replied. "Asgeir broke our rules, and until we call everyone together to decide his fate, he's not going anywhere outside Cormac's."

"Then maybe you can answer our questions." Swan replied, coolly.

"There's not much we can say, Savior." Matthew said. "But we'll give you what we can."

"Alright." Swan began. "Let's start easy: why didn't you give us the info you had on Zelena? We could have stopped her from killing Neil, and maybe we might have known her plans, even."

"Look, even if we did," I said. "We would have lost the element of surprise. You've seen how we work to some degree, Sheriff. And we have seen how you work. You like to go out all heroic and mighty for the whole world to see. But everything we've done since the First Curse broke, you never even knew was happening. We were going to indirectly convince Zelena as best we could that we had no idea that she was the Witch, and then take her out when we got the chance. That was our plan from the start, and you would have only gotten in our way."

"Don't forget that what you do is considered illegal gang activity, buddy. When we get Zelena it'll be up to the ones who deliver the right justice to decide how to take care of her. Not criminal scumbags like you. Clean this place up and don't let me see you carrying open firearms out on the streets again."

Swan started for her bug while Charming held back for a moment.

"Sorry about that. She's on the edge right now."

"She's got every right, Nolan." I replied. "We lost a brother, but she lost a love."

When the last truck was loading up the final chunks of debris, Geoff called me over to discuss what was on his mind.

"Is it true what I heard about Asgeir? You guys have him locked up in The Bunker?"

Geoff and his recon teams worked out of a cul de sac close by to where The Outpost weapons cache was stationed. He rarely ever went to Comac's or The Bunker unless he was needed. They kept most of their operations in the massive forests around the whole town.

I nodded. "He's awaiting his judgement on whether or not he gets to keep his hood. Turns out William Miles had already taken it from him seven years ago, and that was the last the Assassins had heard from Asgeir since. He's come back from exile because Miles had given him the offer that if he helps us kill Zelena, and then Ingrid, he could get his hood back. Now I'm worried that Matthew won't agree with that offer considering that he's pretty much spat in our own faces by blowing up the house. And he's keeping secrets from us for no apparent reason that I can understand."

"So you're thinking that I'm going to be called up for the vote? To help decide if Asgeir keeps his hood?"

"It's a majority vote that's to be decided by every Assassin above the Veteran rank that we can gather by the end of this week. You're an Officer Assassin, so of course Matthew is going to approach you. And I want you to vote against stripping him of his hood. I don't know much on what's going on, but I know Asgeir doesn't deserve it no matter what he's done, and I want you to vote alongside me."

"Of course you do." He groaned. "Do you know if Matthew's voting in favour of removing Asgeir from the Brotherhood?"

"I have no idea." I replied. "I've never seen either of them in this state of mind. Matthew seems to know whatever secrets Asgeir uncovered, and it's making him paranoid. But what isn't clear is whether he's going to play favourites for essentially his adopted son, or if he will make the decision without any bias."

Geoff listened, then started rubbing his chin, deep in his thoughts. He had his answer for me soon enough.

"Whatever vote you make tonight, Jason." Geoff said. "I will stand alongside with you."

Matthew went off to track down the other high ranked Assassins while I went back to The Bunker to get the latest from Zar. He said a recent development in George's activity put three more labs on the map. It only made me laugh how Sheriff Swan could look the other way when not-so-hidden meth labs started popping up in Storybrooke, but gun-running was where the line was crossed.

When we first came to Storybrooke, every Assassin stationed here threw ethics and codes out the window. Unknowingly we all broke at least one tenet of the Creed as we were viewed as violent criminals carrying out the highest levels of illegal activities possible in this kind of town. Before the Curse was broken all I cared for was getting the next shipment and the dirty money that came with it. It's a guilt I still carry today. So when we heard that George had slunk off into the shadows and had been building his empire from the ground up in the form of a small drug operation with high Templar contacts on the outside, Zar and I knew that this was our chance to right our wrongs. Guns and drugs don't belong on the streets, but unlike George, we would never use our product the way that he intended to. Slowly poison the town until it's too late.

Zar and I started our own smaller task while Matthew took charge of the bulk of the Assassins alongside the other Masters and Keaton. Project Boden, we called our operations of taking down George and his hidden efforts to take down everyone that opposed him. Zar gave it the name when we were trying to come up with it, naming it after a classic tactic in chess where two bishops double team to take down the king.

Zar and the few novices we had working on the Project were waiting for me at the Bunker when I returned. We worked our own project out of a smaller room off to the side of the main operations room. The map on the table showed Storybrooke in it's entirety. One trek throughout the whole town would tell you that it's much larger than one would think. And George had taken advantage of the town's size to hide his drug manufacturing business much better than we thought. After the First Curse broke his followers ran thin, and so he turned to more unethical and illegal ways to provide himself with more followers to take us down. He had lost so many followers after he murdered an innocent to turn the town against Ruby, and so now he needed money to hire the guns he wanted to come back, stronger than ever. The drugs were to finance the whole thing, and while I could give two shits about some of the people here who thought of us as criminal pond scum for the last thirty years, neither I nor Zar could let the drugs poison Storybrooke.

"What's our latest development?" I asked.

Zar pointed to three new markers on the map. Each of them older suburban homes, and all of them hadn't been renewed in their insurance in years. This was the recurring pattern in every lab that George's followers were using, so it made it easier with every sweep to find the labs. However the circumstances of this whole town facing off against Pan and Zelena over the past few months made the Sheriff have to leave all the dirty work to us, and she didn't even notice that some people weren't paying their mortgages or insurance since the First Curse had been broken.

"Our scanners caught traces of George's methylamine gas coming out of these houses. He's been busy while we're looking for Zelena."

"Eh, he thinks that he's won because no one has bothered him for over a year. We'll get him soon. How's the hardware look on the houses?"

Zar pulled up pictures onto the screens on the wall. I saw about five thugs armed with pocket knives and baseball bats. Amateurs.

"These are thermal scans of one of the houses. They barely have the hardware to protect against rats, so I'm betting that we can take it right now."

I sat down on the table's edge looking at the screens. "It seems like a fair strategy, but of course there's the chance that one of them could end up alerting George too soon. We need to make sure we have the element of surprise on our side as well as coordination. We stick to the plan, and once we're sure we've located every lab in Storybrooke, we hit them all at once. George won't even have time to scratch his arse before one of us puts a blade through his neck."

"And is that still going to be Asgeir?"

I looked over at the novice who had asked that question. For a second he retained his expression of overreaching his position, before realizing whom he was talking to, and regressing back to his computer.

"Torren has a point, Jason." Zar said. "It was Matthew that asked Asgeir to be the one to take out George when given the chance. Is he still in play?"

"I don't know. Matthew and I are still notifying the Veterans about the upcoming vote at the end of the week."

"Do you think he's going to be exiled back to The Gates?"

"Again Zar, I don't know."

Zar often confided in Asgeir for reassurance. He almost viewed him as an older brother, since he was a few years younger than him and I. I could only see dread in Zar's expression.

I grabbed Zar by the arm. "Asgeir is not going to lose his hood, Zar. I can't let that happen. He's my brother same as yours. You've always looked up to him. You'd do whatever it took to help him. Help him the way I mean to: we convince whom we can that taking Asgeir's hood away is wrong. We're better than those stuck up Mentors who thought themselves above people like Arno. The arseholes who simply took their brothers' hoods away for their own personal gain. I've seen Asgeir fight for the Creed. I've seen him kill Templars, chain their rings to his neck and then say the words to them as they died. He's still that same person. Maybe not entirely, but you and I have to believe that he's still there."

"Asgeir keeps his hood." Agreed Zar. "Make no mistake."

They had the funeral three days from then. Nice graveyard just on the outskirts of the town. So many people showed up to say goodbye to Neil. I don't think I ever talked to him or ever knew him aside from that moment I had seen him in the hospital only hours before he died. But he was a friend of Asgeir's, and a brother to me. Distant and unofficial, but I knew he was a good man simply because he had known Asgeir. I stood outside the crowd of people around the grave as I watched on.

Asgeir followed a custom that some of us Assassins do at funerals. If the fallen brother is buried, an eagle's feather is dropped into the grave as any brothers who mourn him drop their part of the dirt into the grave. Connor started it with Achilles, and we have done it ever since. Asgeir dropped the feather on the dirt mound on the shovel, before dropping that into the grave.

They had the wake at Granny's diner afterwards. It was nicer than I ever thought it was. Cormac's had an interior that was made to look out like most pubs in Ireland, but Granny's had a more modern upbringing. Asgeir introduced me to two of his friends at the wake.

"Red, and Cindy." He said to them. "This is my brother at arms, Jason."

They both clearly didn't think high of me judging by the looks they gave me as I sat down.

"Yeah." Cindy said, snidely. "We know him better as Aaron Milburn here. Lead enforcer on the gun running shipments here in Storybrooke. Wasn't really the nicest person in town here."

I shifted in my seat. "Weren't we all people we were not when this Curse hit? Asgeir and I fought alongside each other as closely as anyone ever could."

"Jason was a big player in our war against Regina. He just spent a lot more time in the shadows than I did. We're all on the same side, now."

They seemed to lighten up a little, now that they had Asgeir's reassurance.

"That's good to hear." Red replied. "Hey, did you hear about that farmhouse the Witch was in? Apparently one of the Assassins blew it up."

Asgeir gave the slightest twitch in his seat. He took a long drink of his ale while I gave the story we had agreed on.

"Actually I heard that the pilot light on the stove in there had gone out. Gas flooded the whole building. Even the slightest spark could have sent the whole thing up in flames. At least that's what we've been hearing as Assassins."

"Even so, it's nice to have some sort of retribution for what the Witch has done to us so far." Cindy replied. "Blown up by gas explosion, or whatever, it's a start for what she's done. Neil was a good man."

"A great man." Asgeir said. He held up his pint. "In the Assassins we have a saying for fallen brothers. Requiescat in Pace."

"Requiescat in Pace." The girls and I echoed with our toast.

The door suddenly flew open. The sneering ginger came in with the Dagger in her hands.

"My condolences!" She taunted. "So sorry I missed the funeral, but I could never pass up a wake!"

I couldn't stop Asgeir as he stood up and started for Zelena, but he was beat by Swan. She started for Zelena, but Snow grabbed her arm.

"Emma, no." She whispered. "Too many people will get hurt."

Zelena snickered. "Listen to your mother." She commanded. "Anyone who tries to interfere with my plan is going to have to deal with the Dark One!" She held up the Dagger to demonstrate.

Asgeir cracked his knuckles. "Not all of us are afraid of him, Cabbage Face."

Zelena only laughed. "As if destroying my house wasn't enough for you. I've got no time for you, Assassin." She took a few steps towards Snow.

David stood in between them. "Don't come any closer!" He warned.

Zelena smirked that smile that made me want to punch her in the face. "Oh, don't worry. I'm not here for your baby. Not today, anyway."

Courage and a baby? Those were odd things for a Witch to want unless she had some kind of strange spell she was casting. And that seemed to be the idea.

"Then why are you here?" Regina demanded.

Zelena turned towards the former Templar Queen. "Now that my cover's blown, I can finally pay a visit to my little sister."

"Who the hell are you talking about?" She replied lowly, clearly either pissed or confused. Her frown made it difficult to decide.

"Why you, of course, Regina." Zelena said, flatly.

No one in the room who wasn't wearing a white hoodie could believe this news. I heard a few expressions of "What?!" from a few people in the room. Ashley was one of them, while Red's mouth simply hung open.

Regina wasn't buying it, though. "I'm an only child." She claimed.

"Cora lied to you, Regina." The ginger snapped back. "I'm your sister. Half, if you want to get technical."

I wondered then if Asgeir's meeting with Elsa and Anna was this awkward. Though that seemed unlikely considering the fact that while Asgeir was an Assassin who killed had several people right in front of them before they had accepted him as their blood, he was neither insane, nor wished to kill either of them. At least not at the time was he insane.

"Why should I believe anything you say?" Regina said, challenging the statement set before her.

"Oh, well you shouldn't!" Zelena replied. "It's a lot to swallow, which is why I've brought a gift to help."

"I don't want a gift from you!" Regina said, chuckling.

"Oh, but you shall have it." The Witch replied, reminding me of that day when Regina made her threat of the Dark Curse so many years ago.

"You see, my gift to you," She continued. "is this sad, sad day. Use it to dig into our past, Regina. You need to learn the truth, and you must believe it. And then meet me on Main Street. Say, sundown."

What, like some kind of shootout? I swear, what had our enemies come to? Asgeir turned his sights from George to this?

"And then, what?" Regina asked.

"Then I'll destroy you."

"This isn't the Wild West." Regina sneered, as if reading my thoughts on how stupid this sounded.

"No, dear." Zelena shot back. "It's the Wicked West."

Asgeir's face said exactly what I was thinking, and nothing more. If he wouldn't kill her for that line alone, I'd drive a good shot right through her eye myself.

"And I want everyone to be there to see the Evil Queen lose!" Zelena called out to all the rest in the diner.

"I don't lose." Regina replied, smirking.

"Neither do I." She said. "One if us is about to make history." She leaned towards Regina. "See you tonight, sis."

She started for the door, chuckling. Before she got there, Asgeir suddenly stood right in front of her.

"Out of my way, Assassin." She snapped.

In response, Asgeir spat right at Zelena's feet. The whole diner gasped in surprise.

"Has he gone nuts?" Red whispered.

I only stood by as I saw Zelena suddenly stab Asgeir in the chest with the Dagger. He only looked down at the spot, and then back at her.

"Cheap shot. You feel better about it?"

Zelena pulled the Dagger out of his chest, a little surprised. "Whatever magic afflicts you, it's no match for me. The next time you dare try to oppose me, I'll ensure you go down. Permanently."

She stormed out slamming the door behind her.

"Care to explain just what the hell is going on?!"

"What is there really to explain?" Asgeir said. "She stabbed me, but I've taken a few wounds like that before."

"No." Red replied. "I've never seen anyone take a knife to the chest like you did. Shouldn't you at least be bleeding, or dying? You didn't even flinch!"

"Asgeir, look at them. If you're not going to tell them, I will."

Asgeir sighed, finished his beer, and then started. "Where Jason, myself, and the other Assassins in our branch come from, ice magic is a common sight there. It's not like magic practiced anywhere else, and it can be more dangerous than anything else if it's in the wrong hands. Someone from that world hit me with two curses at once, one of which involved freezing my heart. At first it seemed like nothing really changed, but when we faced off against your mother all those years ago, Red, I discovered that I could not physically die at all. Quinn had bit me, but my wounds weren't there when I checked. Somehow all this magic that has been thrown at me combined into an unstable affliction on me. I can't die. At all."

"I think I saw something like that." Ashley said. "That night when I saw you fight off against all those sellswords Tremaine had hired to protect herself, I saw several get you, but you didn't even strain yourself."

"You're right, Cindy." Asgeir replied. "But it's gotten worse over the years. I've encountered even more symptoms to my affliction that have only gotten worse. It's why I'm here. I heard that the apparent cure for what ails me lies in Storybrooke, and I need to get back with the Assassins to free myself from it."

"What exactly has happened to you over time?" Red asked. "Does this have something to do with why I found you on the floor of the Diner a few days ago?"

"Yes, Red." He replied. "Now what afflicts me includes severe cases of sleepwalking, nightmares, outbursts of crazed anger, and…hallucinations. Occasionally."

That might explain the reason why Asgeir fired the RPG at Zelena's house. He may have been under the influence of the Spell of Shattered Sight at the time. No one can resist such a curse forever like he's tried.

"So it's true, then?"

I looked up. Tinkerbell had just walked up and was looking down at Asgeir. He was smiling a little at her, reminding me of how they were friends long ago.

"Tink." He said. "Nice to see you, again."

"Yes, Asgeir. It is. But you didn't answer the question. Is it true that you were the one that caused the explosion at the farmhouse? Blue is furious considering that there could have been a way to track her had you not been so reckless."

"Oh, Blue can go stuff it." Asgeir replied, a little angrily. "She'd find fault with me if I were to save this town of every Templar and freakish blight that plagued this town. I would never take back what I did to Zelena considering what she did. Neil was my brother, Tink, Why are you even siding with Blue?"

"Neil was my friend as well. And this isn't what he would have wanted you to do on his behalf. If you really want to take down Zelena, you'll listen to what others think of you. Some of the people who have caught their glimpses of you are afraid of you, Asgeir."

"Good." He replied. "They should be."

I couldn't believe it. "Asgeir, it's not good." I replied. "We're not supposed to scare people. We're supposed to help innocents and strike fear only in those who deserve it. Can you really say that you deserve to keep your hood if I told Matthew what you just said? What would your father think?"

Asgeir glowered at me. "Don't you dare, Jason. You don't know anything about my father or what he would want out of me. You don't know anything about me, either. You know absolutely nothing that gives you the right to judge me and say that this is not what my father would want out of me. There are some things that he kept from me with no real good reason." Asgeir got up and started for the door.

"If you're going to find Zelena or the other bitch, you have another thing coming, brother!" I called over to him.

"Fine." He shot back. "Send a novice to baby-sit me. I'm still waiting for my turn to take a real shot at that green faced whore!"

He headed out the door just as I pointed over to one of the Assassins in the diner, and signalled for him to follow. Tink looked over at me.

"You're Jason?"

"That's right." I replied. "Asgeir told me about you. Made friends with him while he was still getting a name for himself as the White Reaper."

"He spoke often about you to me as well. Said he was the one brother he trusted the most. What's happened to him all this time?"

"What happens to too many of us: he was bent too hard. And we all know to things that won't bow when they get bent."

When Zar confirmed over the radio that Asgeir had returned to Cormac's, I called in several of the Assassin teams to help lock down the streets and make sure no interference would come. The teams came in to set up barricades at the ends of the streets we needed cover from. David, Swan, Tinkerbell and I started going through the positions we needed cover.

"If we position someone there, there, and there." David said, pointing. "We'll have the whole street covered."

"I'll talk to Blue, see if we can get reinforcements." Tink said as we walked over to the middle of the intersection.

"No." Swan replied. "You heard Zelena. She said no interference. She might order Gold to level half the block if we try something before she gets a crack at her sister." Even she was still finding it hard to believe.

"So they really are sisters?" Tink asked.

Snow had just walked up. "She found a letter in her vault confirming it." She said.

"Where is she? Regina?" David asked his wife.

"She disappeared. Something in that letter upset her."

"Should we try to find her?" Tink asked.

"No." Swan repeated. "Regina was pretty clear. She didn't want any help on this one."

"So you're going to let her walk into this fight alone?" David asked.

"No, she's going to get help whether she wants it or not."

Belle was confused. "B-but- but you just said we can't interfere."

"Because Zelena has Gold on her side." Swan replied. "We need to remove him from the equation. It's the only way Regina has a fighting chance. We just need to get his Dagger."

"Did you see that bitch?" I said. "She practically has that thing forged to her hand."

Suddenly Belle piped up. "Wait, wait." She said. "What if I were to get through to Rumple without the Dagger?" She offered.

Snow glimpsed at Swan. "It's worth a try. Regina can't do this alone."

Emma took a second, then nodded at Belle. "Fine. Do what you can. Aaron, is there something that you have in mind?" She asked me.

"We're gonna at least need a few teams of Assassins to make sure this whole thing gets contained. I can maybe set up some of my gear on one of the rooftops and have our teams set up barricades. If Zelena loses we might have a way of taking her down non-lethally."

"Which is why I was going to ask Blue for reinforcements." Tink replied.

"Look, Tink." I said. "Asgeir trusts you, so I do. But don't even think for a second that I'm going to trust Blue or any other fairy on this job. This is something only we can keep contained. Nothing can change that."

Tink glared at me. "You wanna start, Assassin? There's a good reason why Blue hates most of you."

"I don't care who keeps the fight from causing collateral damage." Swan suddenly snapped. "Someone just needs to get it done. Aaron, if you have a plan of taking down Zelena if Regina fails, then you have the go ahead to set it up. But no one else needs to get hurt. Can't have what's happened before with us while this Curse was happening. Too many people got shot or worse."

"Needn't worry, Sheriff. Never missed a shot in my life. The Assassins don't use nicknames like 'Aeroshot' lightly."

When I got back to The Bunker, Matthew was in his office with Keif, going over ammunition reports.

"Jason." He exclaimed as I walked in. "What's going on?"

"Zelena's made her threat on the town." I explained. "She's challenged Regina to a duel and demands the whole town be there to witness her defeat."

"Ah, this greedy broad thinks she can take on the Queenie Templar?" Keif groaned. "Not a chance. Cost me my leg when I went up against her during the war."

"In any case, brothers." I continued. "Asgeir would know more about Zelena's threat than anyone since he faced off against her a long time ago before we returned to Arendelle. But given the current situation, he shouldn't fight her."

"Agreed. I was just discussing his fate with Keif."

"We need a backup in case Regina fails, and I see no other option than doing what I should have done a while ago. Let me be the one to take her down."

Matthew glimpsed at Keif. The two of them were the oldest Assassins in the former Arendelle branch, and were the last living members from back when Daniel Swortssen was Mentor.

"You have everything you need to set it up?"

"My rifle is loaded up and I have a killer itch on my trigger finger."

"Do it."

My locker with all my gear was in another part of the Bunker, where most other Assassins stored their weapons. I opened up my locker and grabbed what I could carry over to the rooftop I had scoped out.

While I had no real issue with using my hidden blades to take out targets when I needed to, I have found often that a sniper rifle can do the job just as well. My own rifle I kept here in this world for a long time, and have used it mostly when I shadow other Assassins. Mostly I attach a custom silencer to the barrel and pick off the guards that less experienced Assassins don't see. As I started assembling the rifle, I grabbed the thermal scope considering how our weather equipment was estimating fog tonight. At the distance I was planning to set up, and where I assumed the battle would take place, I needed the tool that would give me the upper hand to ensure I kept my reputation. "The One Who Never Missed." They called Ryan the Rogue that name until he missed his shot trying to kill Elsa, and then they passed the name onto me when Asgeir killed him.

The last thing I grabbed after my backpack with the rest of my nest gear was my good luck charm: a Philadelphia Eagles baseball cap. Assassin snipers typically wear baseball caps backwards when they're set up, but I found when I got that hat from Keif during my first mission in this world, my shots became even better than they already were. If that was possible.

Matthew sent Asgeir to sit up in the nest with me once we were ready. He sat on the edge of the wall on the roof while I clicked open the tripod on my rifle and rested it on the edge of the building.

"Argon comm. check." I spoke into my radio.

"Reaper comm. check." Asgeir said as well.

"This is Kingshark." Zar replied over the radio. He would be overseeing the whole thing on a smaller drone we had flying above Main Street. "We have connections established with both Golf and Romeo Team Trucks. All teams check in."

"Golf team on standby."

"Romeo team on standby."

"Remember. Mission is to ensure the duel between Queenie and the Primary Target doesn't reach the civvies present. Mission is a go once Primary Target appears." We heard Zar say.

"Affirmative." I replied as I let go of my sniper. The back end of it dropped down and rested gently on the ground, the barrel pointed upwards.

"So this is the kinds of ops we do, now? What am I supposed to do?" Asgeir asked.

"Easy. You spot me and confirm any shots that I make. You're supposed to watch me and essentially just buddy up. You never heard of a spotter?"

"Sounds more like you're babysitting me. Not the other way 'round."

"Call it what you like." I replied. "Just don't do anything stupid considering I had Zar confiscate every weapon you had on you after confronting Zelena today."

"Argon, come in."

I grabbed my sniper and peered through the thermal scope. A small lake of orange on blue glowed on the street away from us. Our nest was set up on the bakeshop a block away from the clock tower. I saw two figures walking towards the area. The Assassin trucks and teams were set up at opposite ends of the street.

"Go for Argon."

"We got eyes on Primary Target. Please advise."

The two figures must have been Zelena and Rumpelstiltskin. I couldn't confirm that it was them with this kind of scope, so Asgeir looked through his binoculars to try and confirm through the fog.

"I can't see much right now, but I can confirm that it's them." He said. "Repeat, we have eyes on the Primary Target. 100 yards out."

I gave the elevation adjustment on the scope a few turns before setting the crosshair right on Zelena's head. She started approaching the crowd of people. A smaller man stood in front of her, but as soon as she told him off he backed away. The crowd stood around Zelena, but no one dared approach.

"Argon, this is Golf Team. Queenie is not here." He paused. "Primary Target's just issued her threat. We have five mikes before she unleashes the Dark One on the town."

"That's it." Asgeir said, standing up. "I can't sit back while she could take down this whole town. I should be down there trying to take her out."

"Negative." I snapped. "Kingshark please advise."

"Eye in the sky cannot confirm Queenie is in vicinity. Primary Target isn't bluffing. It's your call."

I took the magazine with the non-lethal rounds out of the rifle and replaced them with the lethal shots. I didn't say to Asgeir that I was considering taking the head shot at Zelena if she made good on her threat, considering what kind of actions he had been making since he had arrived in town. I was even wondering in that moment why I had asked those other Assassins to vote with me and save his chances of keeping his hood.

Five minutes passed. Just as Zelena looked at the clock on the tower, Swan approached her and appeared to offer to duel her in Regina's stead. Zelena only sneered at Emma, then waved the Dagger. Rumpelstiltskin used his magic to push Emma into two other civilians present.

"If you want to take the shot Argon, now's the time."

I wanted to, but that was what was stopping me. I didn't become an Assassin to kill people because I wanted to, and I swore to myself that I wouldn't let vengeance or anger cloud my judgment. Asgeir was too far gone, but I knew it wasn't too late for me. If I were to take the shot, it would be because I had to, not want to.

"Come on, Jason. Time's up." Asgeir said.

That fact was only reinforced by how Zelena was stalking around the crowd, holding up the Dagger, snarling and snapping like a rabid dog. Suddenly, I picked up another figure in the scope approaching the crowd. There was no doubting who it was, even with how ironically blind the scope made me.

"It's Regina." Zar said. "Queenie is here. Hold your fire. Let's let them at each other."

"Romeo Team here." I heard over the radio. "We're switching on the mics. You might want to hear this."

We heard more voices coming through the radio as we heard the sharp squeak of feedback coming from a new mic coming online.

"So you've finally accepted me into the family?" We heard Zelena. I kept my scope trained directly onto her head just in case.

"I've accepted that we shared a mother, yes." Regina admitted. "But I still have one question: What the hell did I ever do to you?"

"Isn't it obvious?" I heard Zelena and Asgeir say almost in unison. "You were born." She snarled on her own.

Regina suddenly slapped Zelena right across the face in response.

She grinned. "I've been waiting to do that all day."

"Rumpelstiltskin can't save you this time." Zelena shot back. "He should have chosen me!"

"Who?'

"Rumpelstiltskin!"

"What?" I thought to myself. "Is this seriously what this is about?"

"That's what this is about?" Regina said in slight surprise, echoing what I was thinking. "You're jealous of me?"

I rolled my eyes. "This is bullshit." I said. "Whatever happened to the first grade Templars we used to kill? Now we're trying to kill a witch quite literally green with envy!"

"Can't always get what you want." Asgeir admitted. "But at least we can agree on that. The villains we have now have really gone downhill."

Suddenly Regina reached up and pulled down the streetlamp with her magic. She tossed it at Zelena, who parried it away.

"You still don't realize what you had!" She sneered. "You never did! You got everything I ever wanted and you didn't even deserve it! But I'm gonna take it all from you!"

She forced Regina onto a nearby car, angrily. At this time I was now considering pulling the trigger, now thinking it was more like putting a suffering animal out of it's misery than killing a Witch. I'd seen so many Templars chasing butterflies, but this was taking it to one really stupid and pointless effort.

Regina got up from the car and started towards Zelena. She summoned a fireball in her hands, but Zelena threw her hand out and suppressed it. Then she held her up by the throat, suspended in the air.

"You can't beat me, little sis." She snickered. "Everything Rumpelstiltskin taught you, he taught me, too! But I was the better student."

Better student, my arse. Someone has a swollen ego. Zelena hurled Regina up towards the clock in the tower, smashing her through the glass. She then vanished in a poof of green smoke.

"GolfTeam here. We have no eyes on the Primary Target."

"10-4 with Romeo."

"Yeah, we got the same." Asgeir said. "Kingshark, please advise."

"I'm getting orders from Matthew. If you think that what you have is powerful enough to take down the Dark One, take the shot, Argon."

I started aiming towards Rumpelstiltskin, but suddenly he vanished, too. The crowd started scattering in fear.

"Both targets have escaped." I said.

"There's no point in staying out there any longer." Zar said. "Return to base."

"Returning to base." We heard on both Romeo and Golf's sides.

"10-4." Zar replied. "All teams return to base for debriefing. Let's pack it up, friends."

Asgeir started packing up all the gear in the water cooler we had carried it in, then jumped off the roof and slid down the drainpipe to the truck we had in the alley below. After disassembling my rifle, I followed and we headed back for Cormac's.

After our debriefing with Matthew, he pulled both me and Zar aside.

"The Veterans are here as we speak getting ready to cast their votes on Asgeir's expulsion." He said. "If you still haven't made your decision on you vote, now's the time. But I'd really consider carefully whatever vote you'd cast." He looked hard at me as he said this. Then he walked out.

"So are we still making that vote?" Zar said to me.

I nodded. "Asgeir has done a lot of things wrong already, but he's still on of us. I hope he is, at least. What kind of Assassin doesn't lose their way at one point in their life or another? And then there's Ingrid. We have a huge storm coming and he's the only one of us who truly knows what kind of threat we're up against."

"What about Matthew?" Zar asked. "Didn't he say he knew Ingrid?"

"Yeah, he said that a few times. But Asgeir was there when he saw Ingrid try and kill everyone who she either suspected opposed her, or openly did so. And don't even get me started on our numbers. Even with the amount of novices we have to spare, we're shorter than ever on masters. We need as many as we can get."

Zar and I took our seats around the table. While he sat to my right, I sat at Matthew's right. The only seat that wasn't filled around the table was Asgeir's. He just stood at the end of the table opposite to Matthew.

"Alright." He began. "As you all know we had a little disruption in our fight against Zelena. Asgeir has come before us with the charges that he stole weapons from The Outpost, and he also admitted that he's broken every tenet of the Creed since the First Curse struck. I ended up talking with Bill Miles over the phone a few days ago. He said that he banished Asgeir to The Gates over seven years ago, and the reason he was released is because killing both Zelena and Ingrid will give him a somewhat full pardon. However the actions I've seen Asgeir commit suggest instability, and symptoms that make him unfit for duty. Which is why I called this vote. But before we start, I want you Asgeir." He pointed at him. "How do you plead with these charges you face?"

"Guilty, Mentor." He replied.

"Alright." Matthew replied. "Since you have admitted guilt of your crimes, by our laws you are given one vote towards keeping your hood."

"Gentlemen." He continued. "You all know the procedure. We go around the table and each of us will cast the vote. Majority vote wins. Vote 'yes' if you wish Asgeir to keep his hood and title, and 'no' if you do not."

As he spoke, I looked around the table. There weren't that many Masters in our wing of the Order, so a lot of the Veterans that stood around the table were from the branches in the Enchanted Forest. I counted a good nineteen around the table.

"I will start by saying 'nay'. Proxy vote for Keaton to say 'nay' since he's not present."

The vote passed to me. I clenched my teeth a little. Matthew had just publicly announced his distrust of Asgeir, and used the proxy vote against him. Quivering angrily, I growled out a "Yay."

Zar nodded to Asgeir. "Yay."

"Yay."

"Nay."

"Nay."

"Yay."

"Nay."

"Nay."

"Nay."

Seven to five. These people had forgotten what kind of person Asgeir used to be. The kind I had hoped he still was.

"Yay."

"Nay."

"Yay."

"Yay."

"Yay."

"Nay."

Tied up. Geoff sat across from me to Matthew's left with the empty seat in between them I glared hard at him. He looked at Matthew, who was also glaring at him. He shook his head at Matthew.

"Yay."

I only heard a breathe of relief at the far side of the table as each Assassin either cheered or kept silent.

"Motion denied." Matthew said curtly, banging the gavel. "Looks like we're stuck with you for a while, son."

Asgeir narrowed his eyes over at Matthew as he walked out of the room. The other Assassins started filing out. I got up and started out with Zar, but I heard something.

"Talk to you for a minute?"

I glanced back at Matthew, then talked back to Zar.

"I'll catch up. First round's on me."

"Alright! C'mon, Asgeir! Jason's buying." He ran out with his brother.

I sat down at my seat, taking off my Eagles hat.

"What were you doing?" He asked.

I shook my head. "No idea what you mean."

"You told off as many Assassins as you could and convinced them to vote for Asgeir to stay with us."

I slammed my hand on the table. "I took the hood when I was twelve, Matthew." I snapped. "Asgeir and I were the closest of friends and we were taught all we know by you. Don't you remember any of that?"

"I'll never forget it. Asgeir was the son I never had."

"And yet you voted against him right then and here."

"Because I had asked the others to follow your plan."

"What?"

"I knew that you'd convince as many of us as you could to throw the vote. I taught you everything you know. I told off a couple other Assassins. Oh sure, there needed to be some people who would vote against Asgeir's actions. You think being Mentor or even a Master doesn't mean you get second-guessed by any clever little shite with a tongue? This is more than just about whether Asgeir deserved to keep his hood or not. This was me testing him to see if he's truly ready to one day take my place as Mentor of this branch. Being Mentor means you always have your choices getting second guessed by every little shite with a mouth. But it's only when he starts second guessing himself that it means the end for us all. If I see Asgeir stand by every one of his decisions from here on out, I'll know he's ready."

I always pictured Asgeir taking that mantle as his father once held it, but this was not how I thought it would happen.

"So you still want Asgeir to keep his hood?"

"This was partly about what he and I discussed in the interrogation room a few days ago. That secret that he discovered long ago was one that his father and I had known a long time and kept from him for several reasons. Yet despite his discovery, I still see a true Assassin in him. But he may have to try and prove himself yet again."

I got up from my chair. "Yeah." I said. "I get it. You want to see if some of us are even worthy of the hood that we wear. But here's the thing you don't seem to remember, Matt: Once you understand what the Creed stands for, there's no going back for you. Asgeir still has it, even without that stupid test you tried on him. Now he doesn't trust you anymore because of you testing him. And you know what?"

Matthew was about to ask what when I socked him right in the nose. He fell back as his chair fell over. I started for the door.

"Now I don't, either."

Asgeir POV

Jason, Zar and I spent the night away drinking glass after glass of whatever we felt like as the night went on. At around the fifth pint, the bell above the door rang and someone stepped in.

"We're closed, Your Majesty." Kevan the barkeep said.

"That's alright." She replied. "I'm just here to see Asgeir."

I looked up. While I was still pretty dizzy from drink, I could see it was Regina who stood in front of me.

"Reginaa!" I slurred a little. "Sorry. I'd stand up but I don't fink I'm in the right fame of mind."

She smiled a little. "Yes, it looks like you've a had a bit too much. I just wanted to drop something off I thought you might want."

She pulled off the red glove on her right hand, then something silver off her finger. She placed it on the table.

"Not worth it, anymore. Best of luck on the next one." She turned and walked out the door.

"What is it?" I said, holding up the little metal object. It felt circular in my hand with a hole in it, but the name for said object escaped me at the moment. I closely looked at the object, and just as I made out the small Red Cross on it, another headache hit me. I winced as the visions came flooding into my head.

"Admit it! I nearly had you!"

"A pity. The boy has so much potential. But so little discipline!"

"YOU MADE ME SLAUGHTER INNOCENTS!"

"So Cabbage Farmer. Are you still convinced the Templars are right?"

"Then perhaps we should start a Revolution of our own!"

"I make my own luck, Liam!"

"Hey! Asgeir! You alright?"

I snapped my eyes open. Jason looked over at me, looking worried.

"Are you alright? You're not looking so hot, brother."

I felt a hand on my arm as someone took the seat next to me. Someone that Jason nor Zar could see, nor hear.

"He's alright, lad. He's just had a bit too much to drink." He said to Jason.

A black coat with a red vest, his air rifle strapped to his back, and a smug expression on his face. He had haunted me for the last several months, and I knew that there was still no ridding him until I killed Ingrid.

"I'm fine, Jason." I said. "In fact, I'm more than fine. I'm the luckiest bastard under this roof."

"Hah!" The ghost said to me. "You had to have your hood saved by your Assassin brothers, and you call it luck. Me? I make my own luck, Asgeir!"