//------------------------------// // Chapter 8: High Noon Somewhere in the World // Story: A Long Way to Fall // by Cinders of War //------------------------------// Frigid Night had met Mirror Match at the entrance to the Trottingham bureau, arriving after her. They had both removed their coats and dressed plainly, just in case they would attract too much attention as they shopped. Frigid gave plenty of excuses why he was slower than she, but Mirror Match just smiled and laughed, not believing a word of it. They had headed out towards the shopping district of Trottingham, looking for stuff to spend their money on. “Clothes?” Frigid asked as they walked. “You don’t really need more clothes, do you? I mean, you wear your Assassin garb most of the time, right?” “I do like to accessorize myself when I can,” Mirror told him. “Alright,” Frigid said. “It’s your money, I guess. Can’t tell you what not to spend it on.” “What about you? What are you looking for?” “I don’t know yet. Maybe furniture.” Mirror Match stopped in her tracks. “Wait, furniture? Now who’s the weird one?” Frigid Night shrugged. “You never know when you want to feel more comfortable in your room.” “Okay,” Mirror said, rolling her eyes, continuing on. "As you said, it's your money." “Shall we grab some food before we go on?” Frigid asked. “I wouldn’t mind some lunch.” “Sure,” she agreed. “I could use a burger.” They continued down the street, heading for the burger place. Frigid could already smell the grilled beef as they neared the place. They were about to walk in when something caught Frigid’s eye. “Hold on,” he told Mirror Match. He turned back to look, concentrating his vision until he could see the aura of the passing people. Most of the people glowed blue, but one stood out in the crowds, glowing red. “There,” he told her, pointing at an orange skinned man wearing a black suit, walking away from their position. “I remember him. High Noon or something. He was the driver I fought with when we took down Hemlock.” “Well, he’s not after us, is he?” Mirror Match asked. “Let’s just get on with lunch.” “We should do it,” Frigid said, trying to convince her. “Who knows who he’s looking for? And besides, we’re not wearing our hoods. He’s not going to know who we are.” Not waiting for an answer, Frigid began tailing the Templar agent. He walked into a crowd of three people, talking about how cool their cars were. Frigid didn’t want to listen to them, but he had to stay in the crowd to get closer to High Noon, so he endured it. Mirror Match joined him in the crowd, keeping an eye on High Noon as he made his way down the street. “So, boss. What’s the plan? We just tail him all the way?” “What I was thinking, is to nab him when we get close enough.” “How do we do that with so many people around?” “I’ll think of something,” Frigid assured. He dug around in his pockets, finding a pen, and a few crumpled papers. “We could use these. Now… how do you draw the Templar emblem?” Frigid scribbled a few drawings down on the paper. Mirror Match shook her head for each one. Frigid tried again, drawing something that looked like a triangle, but split up into three segments. “Not that one too,” she told him. He shrugged and handed her the paper. She took it and traced out the correct one. “This one.” “Oh yeah!” Frigid said out, hitting himself in the head for forgetting. “How could I have forgotten that? I see it all the time.” “So what’s the plan, chief?” she asked, watching Frigid Night scribble instructions on the paper. “We just hand this to him?” “Well… yeah.” “Oh.” She handed Frigid Night the paper as he snuck closer to High Noon, finally leaving the crowd of car fans. He casually walked past High Noon, stuffing the piece of paper in the Templar’s hand and walking straight past him. Frigid watched him with his peripheral vision, seeing the cowboy open the paper and look around in every direction before walking down the nearby alley, following the instructions on the piece of paper. “He bought it,” Frigid told Mirror Match as she caught up to him. She gave him a high five. “Now we just need to ambush him where no one else can see him.” Frigid went in first with Mirror following closely behind. They didn’t bring their gear with them this time, so they had to be a little more careful, just in case High Noon had a weapon on him. “Let’s get this done,” Frigid whispered to Mirror, ready for action. Mahogany Wood turned around in his chair, steepling his fingers together as he braced himself for the news. “So with all the latest testing, we have come nowhere closer to figuring out the source of the artifact’s energy,” his scientist, Test Tube, briefed. “And what of the energy the artifact takes from a user?” Mahogany asked, irritated that they still don’t have an answer. “Is there no way to use the artifact without… the fatal side effects?” Test Tube shook his head. “We still have to figure that part out, but Quantum thinks that we, as normal people, can’t harness the true power of these artifacts.” “What are you saying?” bellowed Talon. “Normal people?” Test Tube put his hands together to calm himself. “These artifacts came from somewhere. Quantum thinks that only people from that ‘somewhere’ can use the artifacts to their full power.” “Nonsense!” Talon said, standing up from his chair and walking to a window. He turned his head to Mahogany. “Does that not sound ridiculous? I mean, it’s almost as ridiculous as me trying to smuggle weapons out of my base, even though I’m one of the highest ranking officers there. More ridiculous, in fact.” “Ridiculous as that may sound…” Mahogany said. “We have nothing else to go on.” Cough Drops, another at the meeting, nodded in agreement with the Chairman. “It’s worth a look.” “I do have to agree with Talon,” Quickdraw, another Templar, added. “Chairman, what if there are no other… ‘higher lifeforms’ out there? It is a possibility that these artifacts were not meant to be controlled so well.” “No,” Mahogany said, finalizing the conversation. “If we believe that, we might as well give up. Someone out there created this artifact. Whether it is one of us or a celestial being, this artifact can be controlled, and we are going to find out how. Anymore arguments?” None of the others said anything else, shaking their heads in agreement. They might have more to say, but questioning the Grand Master wasn’t something they should do so openly. “Good,” Mahogany smiled. The room remained silent, only to be broken by the shrill of a phone ringing. Mahogany put his hand into his pocket and pulled out his phone. “Yes?” said the Chairman after putting the phone to his ear. He listened for a while, his face turning into something of rage and shock. “HE WHAT??” The Chairman had shouted a bit too loud, attracting the attention of the rest of the Templars in the room. He returned to his calm demeanor as he listened to the rest of the report. “Find him. They couldn’t have taken him far.” The Chairman hung up, staring at the rest of the Templars until they finally looked away. He stood up to leave the room, Crescent Wing following swiftly behind him. “This meeting is over.” Frigid Night and Mirror Match arrived in the infirmary, looking for Dust Fencer. “There he is,” Mirror pointed, recognizing his fancy yellow hair. “Dust Fencer!” Frigid called. The seasoned Assassin looked up to see him walking towards him. “Heard you got a few scrapes on you. You’re okay, right?” “Of course, Frigid,” Dust smiled, giving Frigid a pat on the shoulder. “Just a little flesh wound. Dr. Patch is gonna… patch me up just fine.” “Good to see you can still make jokes,” Frigid laughed. “But who did all this? I heard two Assassins and two civilians were killed?” Dust Fencer nodded, wearing a serious expression. “I’m afraid so. Killers. The Templars hired really bad people to take us down.” “What?” Frigid asked, aghast at the lengths the Templars have taken to make sure they wipe out the Assassins. “Well, Mirror Match and I captured a Templar agent. His name is High Noon. I tangled with him a while ago during the Hemlock mission.” “Ah, I recall you telling me something like that. Perhaps we can get some answers out of him.” “I hope so,” Mirror Match nodded. “That was the idea when we took him, but then we heard you guys were back from your mission, so here we are.” “Well, I will be here a while, so why don’t you supervise the questioning, Frigid? Maybe you can learn something.” “I’ll get on that,” the young Assassin confirmed. He nodded to Mirror Match and set off. “I’ll see you two later.” High Noon woke up in a dimly lit room. He tried to move his hands, but they wouldn’t budge. After regaining his surroundings, he realized they were tied behind him to the back of the chair he sat on. “Where...?” he asked, trying to remember what happened. Then he remembered. Someone had given him a cryptic paper with the Templar cross, telling him to meet them in the alley. After entering, he remembered the two Assassins showing up behind him. He had recognized the male Assassin as the one who wounded him in Manehattan a year ago. He fought back, but they managed to subdue him and knock him out. High Noon could feel the blood trickling down his head from the lead pipe the Assassin had used. He pulled his hands, trying to break the cable ties that held him down, but even with all his strength, he couldn’t snap them. A door in front of him opened, revealing two silhouetted forms walking in to join him. After they closed the door, he could see that one of them was the Assassin who wounded him. “You again!” High Noon shouted, remembering that the Assassin was one of the reasons why Mahogany hated him so much. He struggled against his ties, but still couldn’t break them. “What more do you want to do to me?” High Noon turned to the other man. He wore a stained white apron and had a thick gray beard. “Hi there, Templar,” he started. “I hear your name is High Noon. They call me The Auger. I’m here to get some questions out of you today. If you answer everything I need, we will let you go.” “That’s what they all say,” High Noon said, planning on being defiant. “Well, sorry, but you’ll be getting nothing from me.” “Perhaps we should use him as leverage,” the other Assassin suggested. “Trade him to the Templars for something else.” High Noon started laughing, getting the eyes from the two assassins. “Trade me? They probably don’t even care if you kill me. After what you did to me, Assassin… killing Hemlock, they don’t trust me anymore.” The Auger stepped forward and punched him in the face. “Then you’ll just have to answer our questions.” “What is your position in the Templars?” the younger Assassin asked. High Noon remained silent, earning two more punches from The Auger. “Answer his question!” “Why should I?” High Noon asked. “Well, there’s a reason I’m called The Auger, boy,” the man said, putting on two plastic gloves. He walked over to the table, looking through his tools. “I have plenty ways to get someone to talk.” High Noon swallowed a huge amount of saliva. Some tools on the table looked questionable, but dangerous altogether. “I’m… I’m just a bodyguard,” he finally said. “Bodyguard, huh?” The Auger said, walking back to him. “Bodyguard for whom?” “Oak Wood and then Hemlock…” he told them. “But they’re both dead.” “Yes, I know them,” the young Assassin said. “I’m the one who took them both down.” High Noon’s eyes widened with anger. At first, he’d thought it was only Hemlock this Assassin had killed, but now, he knew he was the one who killed Oak Wood as well. “You! You’re the one causing all this pain for me! Because of you, the Templars don’t trust me anymore!” He struggled in the chair, but The Auger just gave him another good punch. “Stop complaining! We just need you to answer the questions.” “How many killers did you hire?” the white cloaked assassin asked. “Only three…” High Noon replied. “I know… they’re not… good people, but it wasn’t my idea.” “Whose idea was it?” The Auger asked demandingly, pushing High Noon back in the chair. High Noon thought about all of this for a while. If he were to tell them, Mahogany Wood would definitely take him down. If he didn’t tell them, the Assassins would probably take him down. Right now, it looked like it was one or the other. “Huh…” High Noon sighed. “Mahogany Wood.” The younger Assassin nodded. “Mahogany Wood. Chairman of the Board of Education. Of course.” He turned to The Auger. “I would suggest we turn him in in exchange for calling the killers off, but he says they won’t care if we kill him.” “They don’t,” High Noon stressed again. He turned his raging eyes to the Assassin. “Because of you. It’s all your fault that I’m in this situation anyway.” The Assassin wanted to throw a punch at him, but The Auger stopped him. “No, Frigid Night. Don’t waste that punch. We’ve got just about everything we need out of him. Nothing else we can do.” “One more thing,” Frigid suggested. He looked at High Noon. “What is this artifact the Templars have?” High Noon thought about that piece of power. He knew the artifact was something of great power, but he had never seen it personally. “Truthfully… I don’t know.” “Really?” The Auger asked slowly, preparing to throw a few more punches at the Templar if he didn’t cooperate. High Noon continued. “I’ve never seen it in person, but I do know it… drains a lot out of the person who uses it. We’ve had a few cases of… death in the last few years.” “This artifact…” Frigid asked the senior Assassin. “What do you suppose it is?” “I don’t know…” The Auger replied, shrugging his shoulders. “But if the data is correct, it is a very powerful weapon, but it seems the Templars have yet to figure out how to use it effectively.” “That’s good,” Frigid Night agreed. He pointed at High Noon. “What do we do with him? We can’t just let him walk out.” High Noon lowered his head. He knew they wouldn’t let him go. He’d already seen their place, and he gave them too much information. “I have an idea,” the Auger said, walking over to his torture tools. High Noon started panicking as The Auger searched through his tools for the right one. It was then that he felt a piece of metal strike him in the back of the head, and everything went black.