Starting Fires

Emperor Sexto sat there with an astonished look on his face, desperately trying to keep his mouth from dropping agape. Eon smirked and Titan crossed his arms, both proud of their student. How did they anticipate that test of accuracy?

"Give the child a bracer," the Emperor said at last, slumping in his chair.

"I thought you'd say that," Titan chuckled, "but there is some intense training we need to get out of the way before he has the right to call himself one of us. Let's away before you manage to smash everything in this room."

"Let's away," I muttered, following my instructors. "Haven't heard that in a good 500 years."

"I only sound pretentious," Titan scoffed. "Really, all I am is just heavily judgmental. Training is going to be so much fun!"

***

Training wasn't all that hard, actually. With the exception of Titan yelling at me whenever I made the smallest mistake, there were no obstacles. All I needed to do was use my Tac-G to give me information about my surroundings, then picture my objective, and I would complete it almost to perfection. Moreover, I could feel the information storing itself into my brain. Within hours, I became stronger, faster, more agile, and proficient in all sorts of weaponry. Oh, yes, and thanks to Titan, I knew some British curses. Temperamental little wanker, he is.

"Run it again," came that Cockney voice of his.

I set down the heavy weights and collapsed dramatically to the ground, emitting an over-the-top sigh.

"Haven't I run it enough?" I asked, wiping the simulated sweat off of my forehead.

"No," the Commander growled. "Enough of this bollocks, get a pair of 25 kilogram weights and run it again. Faster this time. And no excuses. You beat your best times every time you train, even with heavier weights. This is better for you. So move your arse, or I will strangle you with Eon's bare hands!"

Eon took a step away from Titan and raised his arms in innocence.

***

Running, weight lifting, target practice, wall-climbing, tactical ground navigation, practice fights, acrobatics, torture resistance, hiding techniques. Hell, I even got in a little flight practice, learning the skills to fly an F-16 Flying Falcon, an AH-1 SuperCobra, and an AV-8B Harrier II. It was all an exhilarating experience, being in the air, being the one with full control over my surroundings. It felt like I had been in here for weeks, but it had only been about a day, due to the mind... er, it was like a dream in that... you know how time passes in the brain... Virtual Reality. 'Nuff said.

When I finally exited the program and returned to my body, it felt like I had just woke up from the most restful sleep of my life (because who sleeps for 27 hours?), however I was ravenously hungry. Eon convinced Titan to give us a lunch brake, probably because the VR trainer didn't have a program for improving hunger resistance.

I walked back to the barracks and my dormitory where I was met by the rest of my roommates who were fixing their own meal in the kitchen.

"Hey, Mage," Brody called out. "We're fixing lunch. What do you want?"

"What do you have?" I asked, walking into the surprisingly spacious kitchen.

"I could make you just about anything," Haven replied, stepping forward, clad in one of those ridiculously clichéd "Kiss the Cook" aprons and a chef's hat.

"And she cooks, too?" I chuckled, thinking about what I wanted. "What's your specialty?"

"I'm proficient with toast," she replied, "I'm told my cereal is pretty good, and I know my way around sandwiches, but I can make a pretty mean foie gras."

"Let's just stick to pizza for now," I said, having already made up my mind.

"A whole pizza, small one, or just a slice?" she asked, taking out a notepad.

"A whole one," I replied, my stomach growling as an addendum. "Er, make that two."

I could describe to you how hungry I was, but that's not all that exciting, I could write an epic simile about how delicious the pizza was and how it tasted like an angel from Little Italy in Heaven came down and gave me manna topped with tomato sauce, cheese, and pepperoni, et cetera, but I think that my feelings can be relayed in a smartassed paragraph about what I could say and an anticlimactic three-word maxim:

Best Pizza Ever.

Once I was finished with the pizza, I washed them down with a Coke before heading out. I stepped into the hall and looked around for my teachers. There was no one in sight, so I walked in the direction of the elevator that would take me to wherever we went yesterday. When I turned a corner, a hand slammed down on my shoulder from behind. I jumped, screaming bloody murder, turning to face Titan and Eon who were laughing their asses off.

"You should have seen the look on your face!" the Commander exclaimed, slapping his knee.

"Asshole!" I yelled, stepping back from them. "How long were you two following me?"

"Ever since you exited your room of course," Eon replied, trying his best to wipe the broad smile of amusement off of his face. "It's called stealth, subtlety. Not something we have in our VR trainers. That's something an Assassin learns over time."

"The hard way," Titan added, leading us to the elevator.

I took note that they were wearing ceremonial white hooded robes with a red sash around the waist. A vision of the strange figure in my dream flashed; he wore the same robe, only black, with that red sash. Holy shit. It was a bad time to mention the whole thing, so I kept my mouth shut as we took the two elevators, the first of which was moving faster now, and were deposited on the roof of a great obsidian tower, standing about 700 meters tall. Titan and Eon stepped out of the elevator, giving me a moment to join them.

"Here, put these on," Eon said, opening a courier bag on his back and tossing a bundle of cloth my way.

I opened the package to find one of those white robes, a brown leather belt, a red sash, a leather spaulder that went on my right shoulder and was secured around chest with three leather bands that met at the vertices of a triangular belt buckle that rested the upper right corner of my chest, a white tunic, a pair of leather trousers, a pair of leather boots, a pair of leather gloves, both cut off after the first knuckle on the hand, and two leather vambraces, one slightly larger than the other one.

"Nice getup," I said, looking at all of the stuff laid out before me.

"Most of it's ceremonial," Eon reassured me. "But I think the robes are badass."

"Kind of 1000 years out of style, don't you think?" I muttered, changing into the trousers and tunic.

"Ceremonial," Titan repeated. "It's tradition. We also used to cut off initiates' left ring fingers, but it was either the robes or that, and we decided that shag carpeting and finger removal were an unnecessarily expensive mix."

I grumbled a few curses at him while shoving on the boots and the robe which flowed down to my mid-shins in the front and to my ankles in the back, with a split int the middle that allowed me to move my legs freely. All in all, it was surprisingly comfortable. The sash went underneath the belt and the larger vambrace went on my left wrist while the smaller was placed on my right. I secured the buckles that kept the bracers strapped to my wrist and pulled up the hood.

"How do I look?" I asked, really quite curious.

"That look suits you," Eon complimented, patting me gently on the shoulder. "There's a place for your Tac-G on the left vambrace if you wanna put it in."

The monitor of the Tactical Gauntlet broke out of the metal bracelet and fit perfectly into the leather bracer.

"Sync your weapons systems," Titan ordered.

The Tac-G had a weapons library that I opened, listing all of the different armaments that Titan had assigned to me. There was a "Synchronize" button at the bottom of the screen that I pushed, prompting a loading screen, after which the same screen appeared, albeit with a new addition: a wrist-blade.

"Al-Nasr gave us that weapon," Eon explained. "When he confronted the Hashshashin at Alamut, he fought off the guards with a similar device. No one saw the blade until just before it was lodged into their throat." I cringed. "It's discreet. Just give someone a hug and bam! Just make sure no one's looking or you could piss off a lot of people."

"Stop freaking the poor kid out," Titan scoffed. "We're going to make him jump off a building, he doesn't need a case of the nerves."

Before I could question that statement, the rest of what I assumed to be the Assassins on the team came up and out of the elevator. Haven and Lucky were there along with a couple of other Umbramancers and a Solarmancer I didn't know. They all lined up on either side of me, with Titan standing at the edge of the roof at the end of the lines. I gulped and stepped forward as each pair of the cloaked figures bowed their heads as I passed.

"There was once a time where this was a larger ceremony where I would read to you our values and preach our ironies," Titan called out. "That time has passed and now, the closest we can get is giving you our garb and saying to you, that you are an Assassin. And, er, don't fuck up."

He then directed me to stand on the edge of the roof. I looked down at the smooth obsidian side of the tower, the ground so far away.

"So you said you wanted me to jump off of this thing?" I asked in disbelief.

"It's an initiation thing," Titan replied, shrugging. "I did it. Everyone else here did it. The Tactical Gauntlet... well, I never understood all of the mechanics of it, but it'll slow your fall. Have faith."

It took me a minute to compose myself, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. I had never liked jumping off of things, so paranoid of what the landing would be like. The lines flashed through my vision again, but I was able to ignore the insane burning sensation in my head to see the robed figure from my dream crouched on the edge of the roof beside me. He launched himself into the air and rocketed downwards, rolling in midair so that his back was to the ground. Then he faded out of sight.

Much to my dismay, I felt myself yanked down with him. Resisting the sudden force of the involuntary tug, I jumped up, just as my vision had, plummeting to the ground and rolling through the air so that I was looking up. Come to think of it, I wasn't falling all that fast. My robe had billowed out around me, but it was much to small to break my fall. My thoughts were interrupted when I landed violently into a cart full of loose hay.

***

"Never again!" I exclaimed to Titan once I was safe and sound in my dormitory again.

"Well, what are the odds that you're going to happen upon a pile of marshmallows where we're going?" Titan scoffed. "I mean, at least you're not going to die should you fall off a building. Isn't that a plus?"

He was answered by a slammed door.

"Bollocks," he muttered, wandering off.

Inside, Eon, Haven, and Lucky, along with our other roomies, including Eddie, were gathered in the living room, all wanting to get the details of my initiation from me, personally.

"I really don't want to talk about it," I growled.

Everybody sighed and complained that I should lighten up while Eddie played a polka tune through his speakers.

"Well, my day was quite nice," Harrison stated. "I was inducted into the Thieves' Guild. I spent a lot of time in that trainer thing, but... I'm not a very good thief."

It seemed that each Elemental Guild was connected to a different archetype, Geomancers were Scholars, Aeromancers were Thieves, Aquamancers were Artisans, Pyromancers were Warriors, and the last three formed the Assassin Order.

For a while, we talked on about what each Guild was like, and you can imagine that a lot of it was straightforward. The scholars think, the thieves steal, et cetera. The news played on the TV in the meantime, running some mundane stories about local issues about shutting down most of the city, but a breaking news sign caught our attention as the anchorman relayed some shocking information.

"This just in," the man on the TV said, the fear in his voice showing. "The German terrorist cell, Die Kraft, Die Treibt has driven the German Government out of the country. Several members of Parliament were killed in the raid on Berlin, but reports indicate that the President and the Prime Minister are safe. Unfortunately... the terrorists have taken over control of the country. Germany has seceded from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and is preparing to declare war on France. The remaining NATO forces are withdrawing half the troops from the Middle East and sending Reserve troops over to England for when this all goes down. Russia is also ready for an offence from China, who has shown aggression for its former communist sister."

"Since when did Russia ever like China?" Eon scoffed.

"You ever watch Winnie the Pooh?" Eddie asked.

The Assassin shot the android a cold stare before looking back at the TV.

"Latin America is also feeling the tension. Studies indicate larger amounts of drugs being shipped to the US to pay for a larger amount of arms being manufactured. The civil wars in Africa are also increasing in intensity. It is likely that we will be facing the Third World War. When it goes nuclear is the only question that remains."

***

I lay in bed that night, staring at the ceiling and wondering how the world must be up there. Things got so fucked up so fast. And it was all my fault. Slowly but surely, I drifted off to sleep. As the image of the ceiling faded from my vision, the black-robed figure became clearer.

"You are human," the demonic voice hissed. "Therefore you are weak. You feel fear. Therefore, you let yourself become weakened. Fear, regret, joy. These hold you back. Your conscience is destroying you. Your soul is corrupting you." The lines in my vision intensified, the pain returning tenfold. When it ended, I felt like something was missing. "I have removed your soul and your conscience. You may no longer feel fear or regret. Happiness is something with which we shall deal later, along with your... blind faith. But for now, this will do. I am your soul and your conscience. Shit trade, yes, but I didn't get landed with the best, either."

The figure walked up to me and brought me back to my feet.

I looked him in his black eyes and asked, "Who the hell are you?"

"The Sentinel," he answered simply before walking through me.

This felt... good. I reflected on the people I had killed so far. Why didn't I care? My thoughts wandered on people I would kill in the future. Why wasn't I afraid? It had worked. The Sentinel had got through to me. So then was this good or bad?