Chapter Eight:

Work Sets One Free

Auschwitz, German Empire, 1944

The pain on Katherine's inner-forearm lingered like a bad tune, though much more resolutely. In black a number was forever etched into her skin as if she was a piece of parchment. But she was glad for the pain, if only to remind her that she wasn't being sent to death.

It had been like a dream—a nightmare, rather—once the Master Assassins passed Mary's motion to allow an investigation into Auschwitz. They almost immediately had her on the train, where she was crammed within like a sardine in a can. If it hadn't been for Mary's five-minute-long farewell Katherine would have thought the Master Assassins were all too eager to enter Auschwitz.

The camp was large, totalling well over one-hundred-fifty-thousand people living, and even more dead. By some stroke of luck Katherine was not to be put to work moving the bodies, and while she didn't know what she would be doing she was relieved it wasn't that. She thought, at the very least, she would be made to work on weapons for the Axis war effort.

Her rapport with the registration officer had been brief and filled with disgust. Mary had told her exactly what part she would play: she'd once been a German loyalist, but used that front to smuggle Jews out of Poland. Mary had smirked when she added Katherine's reason for changing sides.

"Apparently," Mary had said, "ye've got a fancy for Jewish men."

Katherine had rolled her eyes at that, and she did so in the camp with the mere memory of it.

If Mary's reports are right, Richard Cole and the Assassin-hunters may have been sighted near the administration office... Katherine shuffled along the line of new inmates while keeping her eyes peeled. Eventually she sighted administration and observed it. It was built of brick, and based on her own limited knowledge of architecture it was done fairly poorly with the intent to be built as quickly as possible. Corners were cut. Should be easy to feel the cold. Then Katherine spotted a cellar adjacent to the building to go underground. I'll bet that's used as a secondary entrance...

As long as I'm here and nowhere near the commandant's house, I should be fine. Katherine bowed her head submissively and followed the detainee entourage while her eyes continuously scanned the area. She tried to memorize the amount of guards, the weapons, physicality, who was lazy, who was alert, prisoners that looked like they would squeal to guards, the lack of the elderly and children around... Misery encompassed the camp like a black haze. Katherine felt overwhelmed by it but didn't let it deter her mission. While she wished she could help, the best Katherine could do for those people was help fight the Templars influencing the German people, though she was discouraged when she saw a few passing officers with smug grins on their faces without the clouded look most Germans carried thanks to the Apple.

The power of a Piece of Eden... Katherine's eyes locked onto those Germans, and an angry look came over her. It can enthral even those who don't know it. How fickle the desire for power is.

Katherine's observations quickly led her to believe that the weapons would soon far exceed the amount of Axis soldiers following the Third Reich. Why would they make so—?

"Over here." A German guard pointed the line towards a worker's camp with a line of long buildings clearly made to be their hovels. Katherine followed the line and held back a gag. It stunk like rot and bile, and was partially due to the dead being carried out of the place. Some had blunt force trauma wounds while still others seemed to have passed from starvation, abuse, and even typhoid.

A body was lifted from a thin cot over a plank bed, and Katherine was instructed it was now hers. Night had already fallen, so she was to fall asleep with the rest of the prisoners, new and old. Katherine stared at the bed for a while and tried to purge the image of the body from her mind, all the while she lowered herself into the cot and tried to make herself comfortable for the night. But she couldn't forget the woman's face—her eyes that found relief in her own passing.

The next morning Katherine was rudely awakened by a loud horn. Veterans of the camp were already making their way towards the door, and the American followed without question. She kept her eyes firmly ahead of her so she wouldn't be treated with suspicion. The Germans led her and the people around her to a dirty and rancid-smelling shop, where she was sat down, given brief instruction of what to do, and began working.

I need to find allies, she concluded. I need distractions, and I need to figure out where everyone is answering to. The obvious answer is the administration building, but it could be a front...

Hours into the day and Katherine had already surmised what her plan was, in the case she found where the Assassin-hunters were coming from. There was a young man seated not far from her who appeared to be the rebellious type, enough to be made an example of a few times a week while not being killed quite yet. She felt he would be eager to help, if only for a chance to get even with the Germans. And there was a girl not far from him that looked better than the rest of the prisoners—she was being cared for, so long as she continued to rat out the schemes and secrets of the prisoners. That was why she seemed to be all but ignored by the German guards pacing and patrolling the grounds.

A German officer—a Templar by the subtle red cufflink on his sleeve—entered the building and scanned the area. Katherine focused on the gun being constructed while he approached some other prisoner, and while she strained to hear what was being said she couldn't discern it from the sounds of the guns. Then the officer began to walk down her aisle. Katherine kept a calm demeanour, and then the door to the workplace opened a second time.

She glanced out the corner of her eye and froze. Entering the building and striding towards the Templar was a figure dressed in a heavy overcoat with a red cross on their shoulder. A hood obscured their face from view and a mask hid what remained. Katherine saw a rapier strapped to their hip, two pistols on their belt, and a knife sheathed on their boot. No one dared look at the person who entered—at the Assassin-hunter.

Katherine's hairs prickled upward when the hunter came to a stop just behind Katherine. The Templar had also halted.

"Were you successful?"

The Assassin-hunter didn't answer. Katherine sorely wished she could just spin around and watch the conversation like a moving picture in the theatre. Was it the one from London? Was it the one who put her brothers to death?

She heard the officer chuckle. "Fine. Well, you know the drill. Hop to it."

The Assassin-hunter took a threatening step forward, but the German tutted his tongue.

"Now, now," said the Templar, "you really don't think you can do anything here? It seems as though someone is in need of re-education."

The step was retracted, though not without hesitation. Katherine could almost feel the German smile.

"Good." He paused. "Now go. He's waiting. And you don't want to make him wait."

Almost like a machine, the Assassin-hunter turned and made their way out the door, and the Templar moved on.

But Katherine was confused. Now she had to act quickly. Get rid of the rat, ally with the punk, follow an enemy into the bowels of their operation... Katherine paused, then smiled a bit to herself. It'll be easy to find a trail. I just need to see another Assassin-hunter and see if I can't tag them somehow with Eagle Vision.

_/-\_

Several weeks passed very quickly in the camp. While Katherine managed to keep her head down and avoid attention, she'd also managed to set the snitch up to fail with false information passed to her by note (thankfully the girl hadn't recognized her afterward), as well as recruit the young man, David, to help create a distraction. He had some connections within the camp that would help as well.

But that was all finished within the first week-and-a-half. Five whole weeks had passed since Katherine had arrived, and she was subject to watching her bunk-mates change almost every few days because of the spread of disease or the body giving out under such harsh circumstances.

But, five weeks into Katherine's imprisonment, opportunity arose. She was working when another Assassin-hunter entered the building. It was stiff, unlike the other one she'd seen but very similar to the one in London, and had only briefly entered to search for the German officer from before. It gave Katherine a chance to utilize her Sight and tag the hunter, then it left behind a trail as it continued its search.

Late in the night when the prisoners were sleeping, Katherine rose and woke David, who quietly rustled his allies from sleep. Two guards stood outside the door to the long hovel. Beyond that were numerous patrols, a few searchlights, and possibly some Assassin-hunters watching for any uprisings.

Thankfully though, one of Mary's agents had already made himself known to Katherine: he was one of the troops standing guard at their door. Katherine gave him a signal, and swiftly he knocked out the second guard. They dragged his body within the hovel, dressed one of David's allies in his uniform, and then hurried out into the night. Katherine's eyes, alight with the use of her Sight, stung from overuse. She hadn't used it in anything but short bursts, and not for several weeks, so this was draining her. But they needed to find the Assassin-hunters. Andrew Lee's information wouldn't be in vain. Besides, Katherine had promised to find a way to get David out of the camp should they succeed.

Katherine followed the trail right to the administration building, and further, to the outdoor cellar. That was when she regained her natural sight and had David begin to cause a ruckus elsewhere in the camp. While he began creating her opportunities, Katherine delved deep into the cellar. It appeared ordinary, but further investigation revealed a secret trapdoor into darkness below. Steeling herself, Katherine grabbed the ladder and slowly made her way down.

Her feet touched the floor a few minutes later, but it was clearly a hundred-foot-drop had there been no ladder. The height was why she couldn't see any artificial light up above, but now that she was in the tunnels she could see dim electric lights leading the way deeper into the tunnel. Steeling herself, Katherine followed and tried to take every opportunity she could to stick to shadow.

Sounds echoed through the concrete tunnels. Katherine recognized moans, screams... People were in pain down below. Why separate them from those above?

The tunnel forked. Katherine breathed deeply and drew upon her Sight again. She could see a dim shining trail and chose to follow it. Wherever that Assassin-hunter was going, she wanted to know. Goosebumps rose on her arms, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood upright. Beyond the screams of the dying, something was terribly amiss below. Katherine could only hope to discover it and leave with everything intact.

What Katherine emerged into, however, was everything she hadn't expected.

Torture. Pure, relentless torture. Nazi officers dismembered and disembowelled those unfortunate enough to be below. Katherine covered her mouth with a hand as she witnessed those horrid events. But she saw the trail, and managing to tear her eyes from the hell she had no chance of rescuing those people from she followed it. Her stomach was knotted as tightly as a ship's rigging. Why? Why did that need to happen? Who condoned that?!

Katherine unexpectedly received her answer when two large hands locked her arms to her sides. She was pulled to a broad chest and struggled, but whomever had her was not one to be deceived by her frame or her gender. She was offered no room.

"Hello again, miss," cooed Richard Cole with a lofty grin on his face. "I remember you, Assassin, though I wasn't privy to your name at the time of our first meeting. I was distracted by your loud-mouthed Scottish friend."

Katherine froze. She felt heavy, like lead. When had he gotten behind her?! She hadn't heard any footsteps but her own!

"But you're like me. You have the Sight. So I'm glad I waited in Auschwitz. I knew Lee would lead you idiots here eventually." She felt him shrug. "A pity he died. Though I'm glad he helped me to see my new toy works."

"New... toy...?" Katherine repeated, almost unsure.

Cole roughly pulled her hands behind her back and slapped some cuffs on her wrists. Katherine noted how he watched and waited for any signs of resistance, and how he seemed to know exactly how Katherine was readying to escape.

"Since you're so eager to see the place, I'll give you a tour." He gave her a harsh shove forward, but his hand never left the chain between her handcuffs. "It'll be your last, as it is, so you'll be my new VIP." He led her down the corridor until they reached an iron door. Cole knocked, it opened, and he ushered her within.

The sight made Katherine's heart stop and sink into her stomach; men and women dangled from chains against the wall, some naked, some not, but all were either drooling or had their bodies convulsing. Some had taken to smashing their heads against the concrete. The guards didn't seem concerned of that in the least... because they had train cars full of people coming in every day.

"Welcome to the re-education room," said Cole. "This will be your new home."