Tomb of the Khan

by Matthew J. Kirby

  “Like an eagle’s nest?” Javier asked. “Isn’t the eagle kinda you guys’ thing? You know, like Eagle Vision?”

  “I’m sure the Templars were very aware of that when they named it,” Griffin said.

  They reached the highway and turned north, skirting the foothills for a little while before turning east again, heading up through the hills toward the mountains beyond. As they climbed, the trees grew taller and thicker, and the sky darkened with clouds. Before long, rain slapped the windshield, and evening fell.

  When they reached an elevation where Javier’s ears popped, Griffin pulled the car over to the side of the road. “We’re going to have to make our way by foot from here to try and bypass Abstergo security.”

  Javier looked out his window. Water ran downhill along the edges of the asphalt mountain road. “I hope these hoods are waterproof.”

  “They are,” Griffin said. “But apparently they’re not whiner-proof.”

  “Good one,” Owen said, his voice flat.

  “Listen up.” Griffin cleared his throat. “From here on out, you pay attention to me, and you do exactly what I tell you to do. We’re a few miles away, but before long there’ll be cameras and electronic sentries. We can’t be seen by any of it.”

  “How do we do that?” Owen asked.

  “Eagle Vision,” Griffin said. “It seems you both have it. Try using it to find the surveillance and avoid it.”

  “Got it,” Javier said, even though it made him nervous. His proficiency with Eagle Vision wasn’t nearly as natural or advanced as Owen’s.

  “This facility is made up of five buildings. Your friends are housed in one of them. Let’s go get ’em.”

  The three of them opened the car doors and stepped out into the rain. Griffin was right, Javier’s coat and cowl kept him mostly dry, except for the drops that landed on his nose and cheeks.

  “We have to move fast,” Griffin said. “You’ve already seen the Assassin-hunting technology Abstergo uses, tracking our ‘ghost signature.’ We have to outrun that tech.”

  The air was more chilly up here, and more pure, uncontaminated by the exhaust and fumes of the city. Javier took a deep breath and felt cleaned out.

  “Are you both ready?” Griffin asked.

  “Ready,” Owen said.

  “Ready,” Javier said.

  “Let’s move,” Griffin said.

  He raced off into the woods, and Owen and Javier followed behind him. The ground here was fairly even, with little undergrowth where the pine needles and leaves had formed a permanent shroud over the soil. The trees rose high and spread wide, their branches shielding them from some of the rain. Here and there, they climbed or leapt over large gray rocks, and crossed a few streams bloated with the downpour.

  As they moved, Javier summoned his Eagle Vision. The ability wasn’t something he could force directly, which he had learned early on. If anything, it was a relaxing of his intention, like playing soccer. In a penalty kick, Javier had to ignore the pressure and just let his body do what it knew how to do. It was the same way with Eagle Vision. His mind took in the sights, smells, sounds, and feel of his environment, gathering information Javier wasn’t even consciously aware of.

  When they reached the first infrared camera, Javier knew it was there. He thought maybe he could sense its range and its aim over the ground, and estimated where he needed to move to avoid it. All three of them did.

  They glided through the trees, more quiet than the rain, and when Griffin pointed out a series of trip wires along the ground, Javier went up, climbing the trunk of a tree to the branches above, which proved easier than scaling the face of a building. From there they swung and leapt from branch to branch, and descended again when another camera came in range.

  Before long, they had covered a couple of miles, and the storm had set the sun early. Griffin paused them at the base of a steep slope.

  “You’re both doing well,” he said. “The Aerie is at the summit of this mountain.”

  Javier looked up, and couldn’t see the top.

  “Security will be more frequent, and not so easily avoided,” Griffin continued. “From here, we take it slow. Stay sharp. In addition to unmanned surveillance, we might run into armed guards.”

  Javier and Owen both nodded, and then Griffin started up the hill. Javier found the wet ground slippery, and at times it was hard to keep his footing, forcing him to use his hands, climbing on all fours. Not far up the slope, they ran into their first obstacle, a series of cameras covering the forest in a coordinated sweep.

  They took cover behind some trees and Griffin armed something on his gauntlet, tapping one of the touch screens. “Be ready to hustle,” he whispered. Then he aimed his gauntlet at one of the cameras, and a thin razor of light pulsed from it.

  “Now!” he hissed.

  The three of them bolted, and Javier could see the gap. One of the cameras had stalled, and he dove through the narrow opening. Owen followed him, and then Griffin. Once they were safely beyond that point, Javier noticed the camera had resumed its patrol.

  “What was that?” Owen asked.

  “Laser interference,” Griffin said. “These cameras are smart, programmed to track movement. I just sent it a signal that threw it off, glitching the software for a few seconds.”

  Griffin pushed ahead, and Javier whispered to Owen, “I gotta get me one of those gauntlets.”

  They climbed another dozen yards, evading more cameras and sensors. Javier noticed a few gun sentries mounted to the trees, ready to spring to life. The rain continued unabated, a steady drizzle, and as the hour grew later, Javier started to see wisps of his own breath.

  “Our heat differential could be a problem,” Griffin said. “These jackets hide a lot of our signature, but if it gets too cold out here, we’ll stand out from the ambient temp.”

  “So what do we do?” Javier asked.

  Griffin shook his head. “Try to keep yourself as calm as you can, to keep your blood pressure and temperature down. If we trip security this far out, we’ll have a much harder time getting to your friends.”

  The slope soon declined by a few degrees, allowing for an easier climb, but the trees had also thinned, offering less shadows and places to hide from the more frequent cameras. Their progress became more a series of dashes, leaps, and rolls from location to location, slow and deliberate.

  Eventually, they reached a fence twenty feet high, and not a chain-link fence like the one that had surrounded the police warehouse. The ground had been cleared of bushes and trees for at least thirty feet on both sides of it, and it appeared to be made of thick bars in a tightly packed grid. No cutting through them or blowing them up with a grenade. Besides, the whole thing was probably electrified and pressure-sensitive.

  Griffin stared at it, chewing on the corner of his mouth, and raised his gauntlet. “Let me see if I can get some readings off that thing.”

  Javier and Owen waited.

  Beyond the fence, away through the trees, Javier glimpsed a building that seemed made of glass. The whole thing glowed with internal light, the hallways and offices clearly visible. If they could get close enough, that might make it easier to find their friends.

  “I can’t get much,” Griffin said. “But my guess is, if we try to climb that thing, they’ll know. If we cut it, they’ll know. If we disable it, they’ll know. We have to get over it without touching it. Unless we want to just announce ourselves right here.”

  “That building isn’t too far,” Javier said.

  “Yes, but this complex is big,” Griffin said. “That’s one of five.”

  “Can you jump that?” Owen asked.

  Griffin squinted at the fence. “No. I’m going to have to run a zip line over it between the trees, but I’m pretty sure that will get us detected, too.”

  “Doesn’t sound like we have a choice,” Javier said.

  Griffin looked up at the trees, glancing through the fence toward the far side, and finally seemed to settle on
something. He climbed up one of the nearest trunks into the branches, until he was higher than the top of the fence, and then he shot something into the trees across the gap, a thin line Javier could barely see in the darkness.

  Griffin gave them a whistle, and Javier and Owen climbed up to join him. Javier looked down at the fence from above, and at the cable that disappeared into the trees fifty feet away. His Eagle Vision revealed several cameras, and once he was out on the line, there wouldn’t be any way to move and avoid them.

  “You have to get across fast.” Griffin clipped a kind of pulley grip onto the line. “Take hold of this, and pull yourself across with your other hand. If you trip security, just keep going.” He nodded toward Owen. “You’re up.”

  Owen took a deep breath and grabbed on to the clip.

  “See you on the other side,” Javier said.

  Owen nodded. “Right.”

  “Push off the tree,” Griffin said.

  Owen faced forward, bracing one foot against the trunk, coiling up. “Okay,” he said. “Here goes—”

  A siren blared, loud enough it jolted Javier and he almost slipped from his perch on the tree branch. Bright lights switched on up and down the fence, and distant shouts could be heard.

  “Was that us?” Javier asked.

  “I don’t think so,” Griffin said. “Cameras can’t detect the cable, and Owen hadn’t moved yet. Something else tripped their security. The Aerie will be in lockdown, and that’s going to make things harder for us inside.”

  “So what do we do?” Owen asked.

  “Get across. Hurry.”

  Owen nodded, got back in position, and heaved himself out into the open. The clip in his hand buzzed over the line, and Owen used his other hand to pull himself across. He covered the distance quickly, disappearing into the trees, and then Griffin attached a new clip.

  “Now you,” he said.

  Javier gripped the clip and followed after Owen. The motion was harder than it looked, and the entire time, Javier felt exposed and vulnerable. Someone watching could have easily shot him right out of the air. He pulled and slid and pulled and slid his way across, until he reached the safety of the trees on the far side.

  “Under different circumstances,” Owen said, “that would have been fun.”

  The sirens went quiet then, but the lights remained on.

  “I wonder what that means,” Javier said.

  Shouts rose up through the trees, and then a unit of Abstergo agents marched out of the forest into the open space before the fence, not too far from Javier and Owen. They wore the same black paramilitary uniforms, with Assassin-hunting helmets and weapons. There were eight of them, and before long, one of them pointed up at the cable, and they all looked in Griffin’s direction.

  “We have to get out of here,” Javier said.

  Owen had already pulled out an EMP grenade and chucked it at the agents. But when it landed, it had no effect.

  “Griffin will have to find another way across,” Javier said. “If we stay here, we’ll get caught.”

  Owen nodded, and Javier moved as quickly and quietly as he could from their position to the next tree over, and then the next, free-running until they seemed to be safely away, and then they dropped to the ground.

  The glass building stood a shorter distance off, and now Javier glimpsed two more structures some distance away, connected to one another by enclosed walkways.

  They’d made it to the Aerie, but for now, they were on their own.

  Grace lay on top of her bed, seething. She wasn’t tired, at least, not in a sleepy way. She was tired of David. Not too long ago, she’d felt responsible for him, but more important, she hadn’t really minded that. David was her little brother, and she was happy to look out for him.

  But then Monroe had pulled them into this secret war, and after that, her sole purpose had been to get her brother and herself out of it safely. When they’d begun the simulation in New York City, her main concern had been for David, just like it was back home. But then the dynamics of the simulation had confused everything.

  David had been in the memories of Abraham, while Grace had been in the memories of Abraham’s daughter, Eliza. The role reversal had kind of messed with Grace’s head, because David was suddenly the one looking out for her. The experience had done something to him, too, because ever since then, he hadn’t listened to her like he used to. He was off doing his own thing.

  Like going into restricted areas at night and getting them all in trouble.

  She didn’t know what to make of his story about that. Mostly, she figured his imagination had gotten the better of him. He was pretty immature about the Animus. It was all still a game to him, and a part of her didn’t want to be the one responsible for him anymore. It was just so draining. Her experience in Masireh’s memories had only made her wish she had a brother she could rely on.

  It was still raining outside. Grace lay there listening to it, wondering where she would go next. Which ancestor’s memories would she inhabit? Maybe this time, she would be the one to find the Piece of Eden. Not Sean and his Viking.

  Her thoughts roamed, and before long, she did start to fall asleep, lulled by the sounds of the storm. And then the lock in her door clicked, automatically, startling her awake.

  She looked over at it and sighed. She didn’t like the idea of being locked in. She didn’t think anyone would. But that was the way it was now, thanks to David.

  She climbed off her bed to brush her teeth, the light in her small bathroom harsh and cold. Then she went to change into her pajamas, but before she’d undressed, an alarm went off.

  It was loud. Like a siren throughout the whole facility.

  An emergency?

  She looked at the door, expecting it to open as Isaiah had promised, but it didn’t. A moment passed, and then another, and still it hadn’t opened, and meanwhile, the alarm continued to blare. Grace felt panic rising up her back and down her arms. She went to her window and looked out, but all she saw were some distant lights that had switched on and off in the trees.

  Was it a fire? Was it an accident of some kind? Or maybe a drill?

  She tried her door, just to be sure, but it wouldn’t open. She paced her room, and then a few minutes later, the alarm simply ceased.

  Grace stopped and listened, hearing nothing more, while the lights outside stayed on.

  Whatever it was, it seemed as if it might have passed, and she thought that maybe it really had been some kind of drill. Next time, a warning from Isaiah or Victoria would be helpful.

  She left the bathroom light on and lay back down in bed, but didn’t change into her pajamas, just in case she had to get up again in the middle of the night for another alarm. It was some time before she managed to get anywhere close to falling asleep again.

  Another click from the door awoke her.

  She sat up.

  Something was wrong. She looked around, listening, trying to figure out what it was, and then she realized it was the bathroom. The light was off. In fact, all the lights in this part of the Aerie seemed to be off, even the ones outside.

  The door to her room creaked a bit, and she jumped out of bed.

  “Grace?”

  “David?” she said.

  Her door opened, and her brother stepped through.

  “What’s going on?” she asked him.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “My door just unlocked and popped open.”

  “Mine too,” Grace said. “The power’s out.”

  “We should check on Sean and Natalya.”

  She agreed, so they left her room and crept down the hallway, the corridor silent and dark, lit only by moonlight dripping in through glass still wet from the rain. But the storm had apparently moved on.

  As they turned a corner, they actually ran into Natalya, who let out a little yelp and jumped back before she seemed to realize it was them.

  “Are you okay?” David asked her.

  “Fine,” she said, touching
her chest. “You guys?”

  “We’re fine,” Grace said. “Did you hear that siren earlier?”

  “Yeah,” Natalya said.

  “Have you seen Sean?” David asked.

  “I assume he’s still in his room.”

  So the three of them walked a little ways on, and found the door to Sean’s room open a crack, as theirs had been.

  “Sean?” Natalya whispered into the opening.

  Nothing.

  “Sean,” David said, more loudly.

  Grace heard the sound of tossed bedding from inside, and then a groggy, “Huh? Hello?”

  “Sean,” David said again. “It’s us. The power’s out.”

  “Hang on,” Sean said.

  Then came the familiar rattle of Sean’s wheelchair, and a moment later, he opened the door. “What are you guys doing? You’re not supposed to be out of your rooms.”

  “Power’s out,” David said.

  “So?” he said.

  “Didn’t you hear that siren earlier?” Grace asked.

  “What siren?” Sean said.

  “Are you serious?” Grace said.

  Sean rubbed his eyes and yawned. “I seriously have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  Grace knew something was going on, even if Sean seemed completely oblivious to it, and even if she didn’t know how someone could have possibly slept through it. She looked down the hallway in both directions, wondering what they should do.

  “Should we stay here?” Natalya asked, apparently wondering the same thing.

  “What do you mean?” Sean said. “Of course we should stay here.”

  “I don’t know,” David said. “Something’s not right.”

  Sean spread his hands wide. “Like what? It’s just a power outage.”

  “But the siren,” David said.

  “What siren are you talking about?” Sean asked.

  “I’m going to look around a bit,” Natalya said, turning away from them.

  “Me too,” David said, joining her.

  Sean looked at Grace, his mouth halfway open, brow creased, and she knew what he was thinking. This was exactly what had gotten them into trouble once already, and he didn’t want to get kicked out of the Aerie. She didn’t, either.