Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Late August. Winston’s seasonal wave of appointments are rolling in, and a new guest somehow squeezes a time slot in for a private conversation with the king of the Continental business. Charon had a hand in the miracle, apparently, as well as Napoleon, so while Winston of course possesses the power to reject an appointment and never see a repeat of such an incident again, a rare light turn of Winston’s schedule and a flicker of his own curiosity sees the awkwardly dull name of “Devon Mills” remain penned in in Winston’s notebook.

On the hour of the appointment, Charon finds Winston in one of their more extravagant lounges with a glass of wine sitting in arm’s reach and a misleadingly slow acknowledgement of the new guest. The image that Charon leads in belongs outside of the Continental, with worn jeans, a plain hoodie, and empty pockets. A pale scar on the lips accentuates the contrasting curiosity and open gaze of the young man —— a boy, really, compared to Winston’s age —— who observes Winston’s easy confidence and the lounge’s extravagance as both one unit, before he absent-mindedly…nods in greeting. If Winston had reservations of the stranger’s familiarity with their world, he carries none now upon the stranger’s passive reaction to the Continental’s notoriously intimidating architecture with Winston at the centre. Winston almost surrenders to the temptation to nod back, feeling less as if he is sitting in the company of a naïve tourist, although he appreciates the respectful fear subtly lining the boy’s posture.

They exchange amusingly curt pleasantries as Devon Mills introduces himself, before Winston wordlessly gestures to the plush couch opposite of his across a coffee table, and the boy hesitantly accepts the offer with his gaze discreetly remaining on Winston or Charon. Or potential exits. The almost unnoticeable instinct is Devon’s only betrayal of an unconventional background; Winston could have otherwise picked him out of any unsuspecting crowd. The boy’s forgettable air proves…unusual. Winston has trouble remembering that Devon is there when a turn of Winston’s head places the boy in his peripheral, which should trouble him. Even Charon’s exiting of the room attracts Winston’s gaze easier than the boy sitting across from him.

“I understand that Napoleon recommended you to the Continental,” Winston observes. “What reason brings you here, to our New York camp?”

Devon hesitates. “I…need a job.”

“Oh?”

“A long-term one,” he elaborates.

The Continental has already run a background check on Winston’s guest, and the boy does not exist. Not “Devon Mills,” in the likelihood of a pseudonym, but the boy sitting before Winston, who has never been sighted by CCTV or pinned down by a birth certificate or even caught on telephone voice recordings, ever. Winston’s sources all quote no evidence of tampering, so either they are disloyal —— which none can afford to be —— or the living, breathing creature before Winston might as well be a ghost. Winston wonders if Devon traveled far before crossing paths with Napoleon in Chicago, and if so, how the boy has avoided cameras or suspicion for so long and without error. The only records closest to proof of Devon’s existence is a brief string of unsolved, unrelated motor vehicle thefts that lead absolutely and frustratingly nowhere except back to the motor oil beneath Devon’s fingernails. The boy possesses no placeable accent, either, but from the way his vowels are already starting to curve, he's going to pick up Winston’s in no time. A chameleon’s habit?

“Napoleon and Charon informed me as much.” Winston leans back in his couch. “They say you have a preference that delineates you from past applications.”

Devon has half the mind not to grieve Winston with circular chatter. “I don't want to kill anyone,” he states bluntly, fingers twitching down to touch calluses in his palms, and his voice softens. “But I need money.”

“I see.” Devon looks like he should be finishing college, but age plays little relevance in the underground world. “You are light with your hands?”

Devon looks at Winston like he told a terrific joke. “…Yes,” the boy hesitantly replies. Hm. He's downplaying his skill. That, or Devon has a big head, but Winston can work with either.

“Can you juggle?” Winston asks, just to mess with him.

~

He can juggle.

On Devon’s first try, too, but the boy is a quick learner and has honed reflexes. Winston was only joking when he decided that juggling is integral to bartending, but now Devon is attracting a crowd at the bar, and Winston finds no pressing need to stop the boy. Devon can send a shaker spinning in the air while drizzling syrup over the ice of another drink before catching the shaker almost without looking —— like a man snatching a gun in mid-air —— and fluidly proceeding to empty the shaker’s contents into a glass and slide it before a customer. His mind is also sharp; he only stumbles a little when he recalls ingredients and preparations from the dozens of drink recipes that Winston had pushed in front of him before opening the bar, and Devon’s ease remains the same when memorising patron’s orders for when they will appear a second time. Devon almost appears born for bartending. If he is aware of the similarities between his performance at the bar and that of a hitman in the field, Devon shows none of it.

“What profession had you worked previously?” Winston walks Devon through a tour of the hotel, listing Doctor’s Office, Laundromat, Kitchen with a swiftness that should require repetition that Devon never asks for. “As your new employer, I have to ask.”

“Ranching,” Devon replies.

Winston has to pause to decide if the answer is a work of irony, like much of their jargon. “And your previous employer?”

Devon has his own moment of hesitation.

“The Continental enjoys neutrality because of its respect and power, my boy,” Winston comments between Staff Stairs and Guest Elevator. “The only interest of our staff’s backgrounds are their previous allegiances.” Unless Devon hails from governmental origins, in which case the Continental’s rule-enforcing side will introduce itself unkindly. Winston hopes not, else he will have to find another bartender just as good. Unknowingly to the boy, Devon has raised the bar of Continental service.

Devon walks in silence between Security Office and Common Restrooms. He nods at one of the guards whom they have passed before and yet whose face Devon already remembers —— and this almost successfully distracts Winston —— before Devon’s answer rises to Winston’s ears when the hotel king isn't ready. The words come quick and soft like a kiss of death.

“My father.”

~

~

Desmond is sixteen years old when he runs away from home. His mother shouts his name and his father runs after him with more vigour than simple worry, but the moment Desmond shakes off his dad and his family friends for even a second, Desmond pulls up his hood and never looks back.

Correction:

Desmond is not even a novice when he outruns master assassins and assassins-in-training with the tools and vehicles of a fortress at their disposal to hunt him down and capture him. William Miles, the expected successor of the current Mentor, dogs after Desmond’s tail like the important investment that Desmond is, but even with the direct heir of the Auditore and Kenway lines and prestige leading the chase after Desmond, the teenage initiate melts into the sparse Dakotan population of the small town nearest to the Farm, and vanishes. For all of William’s criticisms of Desmond during their combat lessons, Desmond’s proficiency for stealth impresses even the Mentor when the old man hears of it from his good friend Bill. Desmond’s admirable skill would fill William with pride —— a foreign sensation regarding his son —— if it didn't make searching for Desmond so frustrating. Desmond’s mother is understandably upset. William doesn't find a way to cool her down until five months later, when they resolve that if the Brotherhood’s best can't find Desmond, the Templars can't.

No one can.

At least, not if they are looking for him.

~

In his second town, Desmond catches a ride with two men in a truck for thirty miles before he realises their intentions with him. He strikes the neck of the driver, then grabs the steering wheel and swiftly turns hard to the left which knocks the other man’s head against the glass and dazes him. Desmond draws the driver’s gun, because this is the west, and pistol-whips quick and accurate in the tight space before slumping between two unconscious kidnappers and wiping the gun in his hand of fingerprints with his shirt. He wipes down and abandons the truck and its passengers on the side of the dirt road. Desmond cannot help a feeling of betrayal when he recognises that the bad men were not Templars but just normal folk, and wonders with more finality this time if all the adults in his life had been lying to him. He doesn't dial 911 into one of the kidnappers’ phones because the Farm will trace the incident to him, and acknowledges that he also has skewed priorities.

Two girls in a small, round car pull up to Desmond next, and after walking five miles in growing heat, their air conditioning tempts Desmond to their window. Bubbly and kind, the girls ask if he wants a ride to the next town they're headed, and Desmond agrees so long as he sits behind the driver’s seat. He relaxes after ten miles of non-stop chatter that persists despite his slow, brief responses, and he senses that he is missing something apparently implicit between the two girls. The “college students” luckily find his “awkwardness” “charming” anyway. They are pleasant people and not Assassins, and Desmond has a cheeseburger for the first time at their next road stop. He decides that he likes the girls and his cheeseburger.

When Desmond asks for a drink in their first city and gives his age when asked, the bartender kicks him out and makes comments on the two girls who had dropped him off at the entrance. Desmond steals his bike and takes a joyride through narrow streets and tight corners, and decides he also likes bikes.

Camera coverage is almost laughably easy to dodge even in urban areas as Desmond returns with a skinned knee and a wide grin, and his two friends click their tongues with twinkling eyes before sneaking him out of the city with cops none the wiser. As they whoop in the cool night air of a small car with its windows rolled down, the girls ask Desmond if he wants to see through their road trip to Chicago, and he accepts. Desmond develops a not-habit of nicking cars and bikes of rich jerks in the cities they stop in with the precise randomness that he knows will slide under the Assassins’ radar, and the girls sometimes know of his adventures and sometimes don't as Desmond learns to drive without hurting himself or crashing. In his down time while the girls go on dates, Desmond also finds lounges that don't question his age but rather his “allegiance,” and tossing nicknames and vague stories around and sometimes simply making use of those pointless stealth lessons from the Farm allow Desmond to slip into a nice and unbothered corner; much easier than the lounges that require a laminated photo ID. Impulsively, Desmond will nick a truck or bike for one or two nice old men in the establishment, and the men in turn slip a golden coin in Desmond’s pocket with a wrinkly smile and the promise of never sharing how the vehicle had ended up in their hands. The prospect of an improved reputation for the men makes it so that Desmond doesn't have to try hard to persuade them.

The girls and Desmond travel through two more states before finally arriving in Chicago, whose lights, noise, and crowds almost send Desmond in a drunken stupor as he attempts to absorb every facet of the colourful, rough, yet charming city with his suddenly small mind, and he contemplates the logistics of seeing all of it without being caught by the usual Assassin methods of tracking. The fact that Chicago is a drop in a bucket compared to the rest of the world Desmond has yet to explore both excites and humbles him. The shadow of the Brotherhood on his freedom in contrast feeds a sense of hesitance and paranoia. He has been obeying the urge to live looking over his shoulder; an instinct difficult to resist. He wonders if he can ever truly “live.”

The girls unwind after their long trip by lounging in front of a hotel TV —— Desmond’s first exposure to the device —— covering gangs and the American mafia, and Desmond soon realises from their reactions and from the news coverage that he has developed an awareness of both the public and apparently “underground” worlds without consciously separating the two first. The anti-ID bar lounges he has frequented exchange information and golden coins as currency because paper money is traceable, and the plaques discouraging firearms in the lounges are apparently not a work of irony.

The first property without the telling mark of a mafia family or two that Desmond comes across in Chicago stands thin and short between forgettable street shops, with only gold lining and the name CAFÉ NAPOLEON reading over the double doors to suggest comfort and class for the less public crowd. A hushed but relaxed atmosphere permeates the establishment that Desmond recognises as he steps in, and a golden coin finds him a window seat with a cup of coffee from the bar that eases his nerves with its earthy aroma. A dirty blonde gent in a subtly fine suit slides into the seat beside Desmond’s and raises his hand intently.

“I see you are new to my café,” the stranger greets with a polite smile. He doesn't know how close he was to a dislocated shoulder; while not as tall as puberty will see through, Desmond knows thanks to William’s insistence how to win a fight with a bigger man before the opponent knows it.

Desmond accepts the handshake with forced ease. This hostile paranoia he has maintained so far truly isn't his style.

“Devon,” Desmond offers, “pleasure.”

“Welcome to the Café, Devon.” Green eyes flick down to the scar on Desmond's mouth without the glint of recognition. Not an Assassin, or at least not from the Farm. Desmond relaxes minutely. “Is this your first time with us?”

The plurals confuse Desmond, but he adapts. “Only in the States.”

The stranger exhales with a friendly, “ah,” and the unguarded looseness of someone who owns the room, literally. The fine suit makes more sense. “We share the important similarities with our sister establishments, of course; a bar perpendicular to the front bay windows, mirrors to cancel out key blind spots, and sharper alcohol for sharper…ailments of the gut. Would you like to try the week’s special?”

“I'll pass,” Desmond decides. “Thank you.”

“Of course. Anytime you need anything, you call for me or one of my attendants.” A vague wave of the arm follows, but Desmond identifies two solemn men in dress suits well enough, and the bespoke stranger leaves. Desmond’s coffee cup empties over the course of a long hour and the curious observation of the café’s solid political neutrality. Men and women bearing familiar marks with rotten history from Desmond’s travels stroll in and sit within arm’s length of each other without throwing even a glance. Besides the weaponry strapped or hidden on them, the sight fills Desmond with a sense of domesticity. Compared to the micromanaging, obsessed Farm and to the fleeting pleasures of the road trip, the café bar carries the prospect of a more meaningful and content lifestyle.

Desmond memorises the insignia decorating the café and his golden coins, and decides he will return again.

~

~

Winston sits down to eat with the boy at the end of the day, if only to catch a read on him. The kitchen prepares winter cabbage wedges with blue cheese, and dry-aged, bone-in New York strips with shallot butter –– a simple but fine dinner –– and the staff throws a white tablecloth over cherry wood, because they know Winston’s tastes. Devon pauses at the blue cheese dressing. Much like the steak that he eats afterwards, he consumes the salad methodically but peculiarly, and Winston wonders without staring if the boy dislikes blue cheese and five-star steak.

“How have you found bartending so far, Devon?” Winston asks.

The boy appears very aware of their dinner setting. He knows that the attention is unusual. “Rewarding.” To his credit, Devon replies smoothly without an obvious edge of nervousness. “Time almost flies by when I make drinks that are purposefully flavoured. Bartending is…fun.”

Purposefully flavoured? “You have not had juice or soda before?”

“I…” he fumbles. “I’ve only ever had water when I’m alone. I don’t think soda or juicing is for me.” He misunderstands what Winston refers to; even children must consume orange juice when they are young in order to meet their wide vitamin needs. Winston believes it safe to conclude that Devon hails from an unconventional household. The boy’s odd reactions to the blue cheese and steak now fall under a new light. He even seems to struggle with the concept of “fun.”

Winston knows how Devon gets by, at least.

The boy’s smile.

Devon knows how to make others feel in on a secret as special as they are. If Devon didn’t want to work in the Continental, the boy wouldn’t have broken years of anonymity by stepping into Continental grounds. Whatever game he's playing proves difficult to grasp, at least in one day.

~

~

Napoleon pauses upon sight of a new face at the café bar, before waving his bartender aside and serving the new patron’s drink himself. The young man glances up from his dazed gaze at the coffee can cylinders and watches Napoleon approach and slide a glass of tea over.

“Hello,” the young man greets with familiarity.

Napoleon inwardly frowns in confusion. “I believe…” he improvises, “you have been here once before, sir.”

“Yesterday,” the man agrees. “I’m Devon.”

Guilt and wonder stir in Napoleon’s stomach at the revelation. To think a sharp man such as Napoleon would forget a face in the span of a day, especially as his highest-paying job depends on his intellect and wits. The faint mark bleached lighter than the rest of the young man’s face tickles the back of Napoleon’s head until he recognises this Devon with a scarred lip. When the young man had chosen a window seat as opposed to the locations with unexposed backs, Napoleon had approached the guest with the concern that a non-combatant had entered his establishment and was carrying golden coins he had no idea could make him a target. The scarred lip and passive ease with which the man had regarded Napoleon and the café throughout their conversation, however, had settled Napoleon’s nerves.

He isn't sure if Devon’s invisibility is intentional. The man can kill someone in Napoleon’s café unseen if he wants to, and the reality both concerns and excites him.

“Devon.” Napoleon works to remember the name and face. “Back here so quickly? The Continental sits only five blocks over.” The hotel has its own bar, of course.

“The Continental,” Devon absentmindedly repeats, turning a coin over in his hand.

No patron currently in the café requires attention, not that Napoleon cares at the moment, anyway, so he leans forward on the counter, helpless to his own curiosity. “…Do you know who I am, Devon?”

The young man returns Napoleon’s particular tone from earlier, as if all-knowing or simply improvising. “Napoleon,” he states. The coin turns and turns. “Does the Continental know you ask so many questions?”

“Only when I tell Winston,” Napoleon confesses without guilt. Carrying a long conversation with Napoleon has its dangers that curb even the confidence of reputable hitmen within Napoleon’s earshot, and yet Devon displays no hesitation, if he even possesses an awareness of Napoleon’s true Business. Napoleon wonders how much of Devon’s background and free will he can steal before their amicable air expires. The stranger might be useful.

“Is it business or pleasure that brings you to Chicago?” Napoleon refills Devon’s glass.

“Pleasure.”

Ho ho, a hitman. And here Napoleon’s first impression was a consultant.

“Have you a destination after this city?”

“Have you a motive in asking?”

My word, this man is sharp.

“Forgive me,” Napoleon says, backing off, and means it. “You aren't John Wick, are you?”

“You have my forgiveness.” Devon rises, and Napoleon inwardly curses while he outwardly maintains a cooperative smile. Whether or not the man is the debated myth, Napoleon despises the idea of anyone leaving his café with criticism for the Continental subsidiary and its local master, Napoleon himself.

“If no place calls you,” Napoleon attempts with controlled sweetness, “New York City is the place to go. You can walk in and out with nothing, but if you leave with something, you are one lucky son of a gun.”

The door swings open and closed with a chime. Napoleon cannot remember hearing Devon’s footsteps.

~

~

The lounge, like any other Continental property, hosts an agreeable air of relaxation and recovery for a target market usually trained into paranoia. The first idiot that Winston witnesses in a long time to disrespect the rules draws a knife on his target and nearly upsets the calm atmosphere of the lounge. The rule-breaker slides into his target’s blind spot and moves to slit her neck. Winston almost blinks. He's thankful he doesn't.

As if primed to spot someone sneaking, Devon’s head twitches up, and in the next heartbeat, he already has a hand on an exposed neck and the other following the path of a knife falling for the counter; Devon catches it with a brief twang of metal contact with wood. No one lifts their heads at the short-lived scuffle; if Devon wants to, he can lie the rule-breaker on a bar stool and over the bar counter, and leave the lounge none the wiser. The boy commits more than the act, instead, by following up with presenting the criminal’s knife to Winston akin to an offering.

When Winston checks, the rule-breaker still breathes, unconscious. He appreciates that Devon walked the distance from behind the bar to the half-circle bench that Winston so favours, but the bartender’s departure from his expected location had attracted eyes that now eventually find the motionless hitman slumped at the bar, and already some patrons wonder if a Continental employee has just committed Business in a supposedly neutral place of recreation. Winston fights a frown as he waves the offensive knife away, and, confused but obedient, Devon slips it between his belt and slacks without danger of cutting anything before following Winston to the bar.

“Are you quite unharmed, Ariadne?” Winston asks.

The petite brunette’s round, doe-like eyes slide between her attacker and her bartender. An informant, Ariadne exercises her intellect and wits more than her physical form, which simultaneously cuts her out as an unwise yet easy target. Clearing her throat, Ariadne nods.

“Thank you, Mr. Winston.”

As an employee of the Continental, Devon is invisible next to the king of the global kingdom. If he takes the dismissal personally, his straight face reveals none of it. Winston signals the new guard whom Devon has greeted earlier before, Julio, over to transport the rule-breaker to a plastic tarp-covered courtyard for official excommunication from the Continental, and Winston’s obvious command of the lounge wordlessly informs those watching that Business had been conducted not by an employee of the Continental, but by a patron. The concerned guests of the room finally return to their drinks as if nothing had happened. Winston catches Devon’s shoulder before the boy can return to the bar.

“Why don’t you finish early today, my boy?” Winston has a meeting in five, and Charon has plans to buy groceries. If Winston wants to continue observing the Continental’s bartender in any environment, he’s willing to allow a less-skilled but old friend manage the bar in Devon’s place while the sun is still out. “After this err against the Continental, you deserve a break. Not to worry, you’ll still be paid.”

Devon, true to his instincts, hesitates, but eventually nods. Winston parts from him at the ground floor in sight of the front desk, and when Devon returns from a changing room in a hoodie and with his uniform in a backpack, the boy runs into Charon on their way out the lobby.

“Groceries?” Charon asks, as if nothing in the Continental is coordinated.

The rule-breaker’s knife is an unseen weight in Devon’s backpack, but he, Winston, and Charon are employees of the Continental, and Devon trusts all four of them. He shakes off his trained paranoia for a small smile.

They find themselves in the self-care aisle of a small grocery with a store clerk upsetting Devon’s hyper-aware nerves. The boy glances at Charon with the direction of his peripheral gaze on their distant company, before returning his eyes to a multitude of flashy labels.

“Why does she keep tailing you?”

Charon acknowledges Devon’s honest tone. “She thinks I will steal something.”

The boy gives him a look. “Because you look rich?” he notes flatly.

“Because of the colour of my skin,” Charon replies. He observes the planes of Devon’s face as the boy subtlety frowns. He is honestly struggling with Charon’s answer. Devon can pass for a Spaniard or an Arab, but then again Devon can pass for anyone. “You have not witnessed this before?”

Devon absentmindedly tracks the female clerk’s vague reflections on shaving cream canisters like he can judge her distance from them to an inch. “Where I grew up, everyone was treated the same.”

Charon adds a pack to his basket. “Some would call that paradise.”

Devon smothers a different response. “Paradise should also have freedom, though.”

The boy has a clean shave as always and the subtle whiff of scentless soap, and his white hoodie bears the slightly softened seams of hand-washed and line-dried care. “Have you stolen something before?” Charon asks innocently. Between them, the question hardly poses offence.

“Not out of need,” Devon replies with the hint of a wicked smile on his lips, and Charon thinks of the still unsolved vehicle thefts strewn across three states. “Also when I don't want to.”

“Cannot help the pull?”

Devon ducks his head and mutters to himself. Charon thinks he hears, “Couldn't escape training.”

At the same time on the roof of the Continental, Winston drops his gaze into his glass of wine and sighs. Napoleon reports that the FBI have a mole in the Continental, and Winston does not miss the fact that this news rolls in a few days after Devon’s hiring. Therein explains Winston’s regretful exhale: that regardless, he will not hesitate to rid of the mole the same way he rids of rotten produce —— by burning them. He isn’t unfamiliar with young blood on his hands, but such is the way of Business. It's time he conducts a proper background check of his employees.

It will be a shame if Napoleon’s boy proves to be the traitor. Winston rather likes Devon.

Chapter Text

In a room with autumn sun filtering through stained glass windows, an out-of-state delegate outlines all the reasons why the Continental would benefit from trade with his boss – brother-in-law to a second cousin, but they’re still tight, you know? – while Winston patiently lounges in an armchair with a pen and notepad in hand and pretends he cannot speak a lick of Spanish. As a professional, Winston grasps most other romance languages almost as well as he does his second language French, but none of them are good enough for him to negotiate firearms with, and he still has the FBI mole problem to crack.

He’s also just petty.

Winston rolls a nonexistent cigar between his fingers before he remembers himself and exhales. Turning, he catches Devon in his eye and impulsively beckons the boy over.

“Devon.”

The boy jogs over like a teenager. “Sir?”

“Find out what this man actually came here for.”

To his credit, Devon only blinks at Winston before he bends down to address the delegate, and unaccented Spanish spills from his mouth. The delegate’s intense attitude improves with earnest surprise, and a Westwood chest pocket turns Devon’s way as a question kicks a vowel into the air and lands back down in an area of propriety with muted humour. Their tones shift like water up a shore of pleasantry and down to business, with scattered nods from Devon, as his conversational Spanish is apparently limited to firearms and not common pleasantries – how curious – before the boy straightens up and addresses Winston.

“Mr. De Salle wishes to run the family business himself. He requests that the Continental collects his boss’s debt to De Salle’s family.”

“Very good, Devon.” Winston pats Devon’s back and pretends he misses Devon’s instinctual stiffening –– less in surprise and more in self-defense, as if ready to flip someone. Winston signals Charon over to handle De Salle’s request and update the ledger. Devon waits until Charon and the guest are out of sight.

“Why did you call me, sir?”

Winston reflects and resists the temptation to shrug. You didn't exist until nine months ago. Your bar tricks imply an intimate sense of gravity and a dedication to honed reflexes. You have an eye for exits, which for some reason include windows level with ballroom-high chandeliers. Before the Continental, you stole a sportscar and dumped it when you grew bored. The police still think the vehicle’s AI just glitched.

“I wished to test a theory,” Winston dismisses. “I sense that you are a man of many talents.”

~

~

Emmanuel Barraza is a black ops type of soldier born in the gritty streets of desert war zones which never truly leave him even when he touches down on American soil for indefinite leave. Bullets are afraid of him, aging refuses to show on him, and he can reconstruct a fight scene and tell how the bodies fell based on blood splatters and splintered wood. He is loyal to the Brotherhood beyond common sense, but he refuses to take a life. The people at the Farm affectionately call him “Manny,” or “vegan.”

When Desmond is fifteen, Manny is the weapons instructor in the Farm and later the reason that Desmond knows limited Spanish. Mrs. Miles allows it, indulging in Desmond returning to his “roots.” William argues that if Desmond is going to cut out time from his training to pick up a foreign language, he might as well learn it while dismantling a gun. Desmond hears about the War on Terror, of Templars tricking countries into fighting each other, and of collateral damage younger than him strapped with bombs and locked in a truck and screaming in Manny’s dreams when the soldier sleeps for too long. Desmond mantles and dismantles a model that killed twelve children, then learns to do it blindfolded and sleep-deprived before Manny refuses to teach Desmond any more firearms or Spanish.

Maybe all adults are crazy, Desmond, at age fifteen, thinks. They hurt each other, berate grudges while nursing the worst of them, grow tired of conflict, then instead of settling down, encourage more conflict. All the while, they expect children to be better than them.

“Strength, speed, agility. No excuses!” William flips Desmond over onto the ground. “You have to be ready when they come, because they're always ready!”

The Templars resemble a monster under the bed, but for adults and for justifying their hostility. Desmond cannot focus in another sparring lesson with William, and the Assassin barks the question why Desmond isn't improving. Desmond mutters a word in Spanish under his breath and surprises his father. Manny leaves the Farm the next day for a ship that will wander the seas for the next ten years, where he cannot teach Desmond any more Spanish. The only reason Desmond doesn't continue learning of guns is because William doesn’t approve of his hand-to-hand yet. A year later, Desmond shows off his stealth by leaving the Brotherhood, and keeps on leaving for the next nine years.

A boy can disappear from the Brotherhood, but the Brotherhood cannot disappear from the boy.

Miles out in sea, Manny wonders after the boy he had briefly trained once, and never hears of the teen who leaves the Assassins.

~

The Farm’s failure to find one of its own for five months straight boosts the matter up to the attention of the Brotherhood in all its global glory. They have not had a traitor since the turn of the last century, but the Mentor’s lack of concern on the Desmond Miles case encourages the rest of the Assassins to not treat the betrayal with the characteristic weight of their more archaic traditions. Many debate Desmond’s rank, then existence, because what sort of Assassin can dodge the eyes of the entire Brotherhood for months on end with little experience or training? The ambitious of the American bases attempt to locate and catch Desmond Miles, but everyone eventually — part grudgingly — comes to the same conclusion as William in the end.

After the fifth month of nothing, a cell briefly recuperating in Detroit stumbles into a motor vehicle theft that nearly delays their return date by a day because Gallagher has the most disobedient van still in existence, and Monty has its engine’s temper. Monty chases after the reason why the cell no longer has even a trashy van to get them from Michigan to Ontario for three blocks straight, until the thief abandons the van in mid-turn around an empty street corner and hits the ground running without a single stumble or drop of sweat at the daring act. Monty is half-impressed, because the thief had done well taking the streets with the Devil’s van while Monty, an Assassin, took the rooftops; but now Monty just wasted an hour on a van that is now totalled, and the thief is bloody laughing.

Monty makes chase.

He's later glad and mostly ticked off that he did, but still a little glad. Only a little.

Because the white-hooded thief running the city streets like the wind itself and still laughing from the thrill of nicking a car throws a glance with startling accuracy at Monty’s way, and Monty swears he’s––

Flipping through cold cases again that include the recent traitor of this and that prestigious family, why on earth would he even leave––

Or back in Rome turning the marble halls of the Headquarters with the Brotherhood’s entire history running down either side in paintings and busts, and there at the central pedestal between Ancient Egypt and medieval Jerusalem solemnly stares one of the few surviving stone carvings dedicated to a young Altaïr Ibn-la-Ahad.

Monty struggles to wrap his mind around the concept of the Brotherhood’s philosophical role model currently laughing back at Monty from a traitor’s face, and he trips.

He also quickly recovers, fortunately, now one story lower than the rooftops he was navigating, but in doing so nearly kisses the heels of the van thief — of Desmond Miles — as they share a startled look at Monty’s sudden proximity. The heavens might as well have dropped a promotion and revelation in his lap. Monty reaches out, confused and excited but mostly running on adrenaline, but Desmond upshifts just in time for Monty’s fingers to graze white cotton. Their distance never shortens even as the runaway Assassin leads Monty through what feels like every sharp corner of the city in an admirable effort to shake off his tail; their street chase lasts until the difference between Desmond getting caught or running free is an unsteady iron bar hanging by a crane.

Desmond takes it without hesitation.

Out of his depth, Monty stumbles to a halt and impulsively throws a knife that hits a steel rope an inch to Desmond’s left and clatters to the pavement. Monty curses — the iron bar hangs not even a yard above ground — but the impossible marriage of speed and balance required to confidently navigate the parkourist’s nightmare now has Monty sweating over a novice’s height while only the memory of Desmond’s clothing rustling with movement remains by the time the knife stops clattering. Miles is as gone as a ghost.

Monty’s failure only proves that having Desmond within sight doesn't ensure that Desmond has forgotten how to identify, steal from, or run from Assassins, intentionally or not. In the mission debriefing—–

After Gallagher has had to interpret Monty’s staticky curses between pathetic, gasping pants to the rest of the cell during the course of the chase, and come to the conclusion that yes, our Monty found Desmond Miles and actually lost him, couldn't even return with the precious van—

Monty explains how Desmond’s behaviour before and after Monty tripped off a rooftop has lead Monty to conclude that Desmond didn't know that he was stealing from Assassins until, well, Desmond’s pursuer fell from a story and walked away with only damaged dignity.

It's not like everyone outside a Farm or outside of Rome bears the ring finger mark, which might explain Desmond’s surprise, but Gallagher argues that it wasn't like their cell had been actively employing stealth techniques or controlled casualness that Desmond apparently has a sixth sense for, either. Past mission failure reports describe how Desmond can vanish at the drop of a hat once the runaway catches even a whiff of Assassin in the same city as him, which is why catching sight of Desmond — as opposed to fingerprints that grow rarer as Desmond learns how to wipe down thoroughly — stirs up some influential Assassins, and an agent from the Farm flies to Detroit to personally debrief Monty and his cell.

“You don't pull knives on an initiate!” she criticises, and ouch, does that hurt.

“Miles is an initiate?” Monty says in disbelief. “The ‘bring back Desmond Miles’ mission level implied differently, and actually chasing him felt harder. Have you ever tried catching a bird in air or a fish in water?”

Gallagher, ever the pacifist, reminds, “The mission level is high because no one has caught him yet.”

“Then make up your mind and lower the mission level, or stop treating Miles worse than a novice,” Monty directs at the Farm agent. “I'd say give this mission the respect that Miles deserves, and make it Assassin-class.”

“Even when he's sixteen?” Evelyn from Monty’s cell hesitantly raises, and Gallagher informs them all,

“He grew up in the Farm, and we all know the notorious quality of the Assassins who return from there. Even Rome sends its own to the Farm for evaluation and training.”

Monty forgets to breathe. The rest of his cell looks no better.

“Then…”

“He’s from the Farm,” Gallagher confirms. “The one for the entire world.”

Sanchez scratches his head helplessly. “And Miles is an initiate?”

The Assassin from the Farm crosses her arms. “His rank is irrelevant if you stand by your mission assessment, Montgomery,” she adds, because only an old woman with a semi-automatic slung over her back can get away with proper names. “Desmond Miles’s case is officially promoted to Assassin-class. Get the word out.”

The Brotherhood stirs with the update, but compared to the preceding news of a traitor, less waves roll. “Desmond Miles” moves from a golden source of gossip to the cold mission that’s assigned to Assassins who need a lesson in humility regarding stealth and tracking, and “Montgomery” cares for none of it except for the moment when the agent from the Farm keeps Monty after the debriefing and asks him how Desmond Miles looked like he was doing.

“William has accepted that he's more useful to the Brotherhood by running the American Branch,” the aging woman says, “than continuing to search for Desmond, see, and because he knows it's a waste of the time given to him by the Brotherhood, he won't ask permission to join the search. Like accepting a promotion, William will only be lured into doing anything if efficiency allows it.”

“Sure, I get it,” Monty nods, except how many Williams or Wills or Bills or I-go-by-Gregs are there from the Farm, and how many American-based Assassins are dying to know something of Desmond Miles? Maybe someone higher up in the ranks plans to make the mistake of treating Miles as nothing more than an opportunity at reputation or promotion, and give Monty one more reason to laugh and feel better about his unintentional almost-victory.

Monty weaves a humiliatingly honest impression of laughter and impishness, and the Farm Assassin leaves satisfied. He doesn't know which William she speaks of until years later, when his bosses’ boss William Miles becomes everyone’s boss, the de facto Mentor, and his relationship with Desmond as the runaway’s drill sergeant, tutor, and father back from the Farm becomes more apparent. Monty will then regret throwing a knife at William Miles’s son, but that's a scared-piss breakdown for another time.

~

~

Desmond is having a scared-piss breakdown.

Winston sends him on one errand – one – that brings Desmond outside of Continental grounds, and Desmond – who has been raised by an anti-Big Brother cult in sparsely-populated hills where no one else can hear two-dozen people fire machine guns or splinter tree branches in a parkour race – sincerely believes he now understands the meaning of “violence,” and “crazy.” A wildly-pitched, puncturing force like the united air displacement of a handclap and a metal pole flying at supersonic speed tears a hole through a loose centimetre of Desmond’s hoodie sleeve, and Desmond belatedly realises it was a bullet that with – insane – accuracy barely shaved the skin of his elbow. The collapse of a tall, burly man in a suit behind Desmond registers only another delayed second later, because dozens of men on high protein diets are hitting furniture and floors around Desmond and have been doing so for a total of two seconds, while the slower deaths experience broken bones or blindness before meeting their ends.

Desmond swears he has stepped into a scene of Judgement. He’s wrong, of course, because given a gun, five magazines, and a nice suit, Judgement would take ten seconds.

John Wick needs only five.

“You’re not Winston,” John remarks as he shatters a thug’s finger bones, then kneecap. From fifty feet away. With a dead man’s hand gun.

How many weapons has this man grown familiar with, to be able to confidently fire a gun with only its weight and grip as a clue towards its model?

Desmond has ingrained instincts specifically designed for a fight, but John is shooting down all the aggrovators before their presence can even register, like John’s presence is actual death. “Winston sent me,” Desmond shouts above gunfire that quickly vanishes. “I’m Devon.”

The fifth second passes before the end of Desmond’s first syllable, meaning John no longer has another living soul in the vicinity to pour his full attention into for the rest of Desmond’s words except Desmond, who is armed with only a knife and more than a decade of Assassin training. Theoretically, regardless of the weapon stock or setting, an Assassin is able to kill anyone. Desmond is hyper-aware of this, as he is not an Assassin or even a novice, and Winston’s “friend” is not a one so much as a thing. Luckily, John seems to agree that Desmond isn’t a threat, and doesn’t fill the teenager with holes during Desmond’s last six syllables before making sense of Desmond’s unprofessional attire and young face.

“You're new.”

“To Business? Yes.”

“Hm.” John wipes his gun, but the sound in his throat isn't dismissive or judgemental, just acknowledging. “Next time you find a client conducting aggressive negotiations, wait in the car as Winston would. Fights can spill over into neighbouring buildings and streets quicker than you can react. Where's your car?”

“I ran.”

John stares at Desmond and then glances at his watch; reasonable, since Desmond had used the rooftops to reach him as the crow flies and not as the cars drive. A GPS route would have brought Desmond to John’s location unprofessionally late. It helps that Desmond is almost a bird in air — so fast and effortless that one might question if he was born on land and not in the sky — when given the opportunity to use parkour. He has outrun people older and more athletic than him before.

“Winston said you needed––” Desmond says something in the ironic language of Business, and steers attention away from his preferred method of travelling, “––but you ordered in pretty late. Winston can’t be sure what you actually need.”

“I did request for it very soon,” John admits.

“Winston doesn’t care and always welcomes a request from a friend,” Desmond corrects. It’s Winston who’s speaking, but the man’s lessons dissolve under Desmond’s helpless curiosity. “He just named a ‘John,’ though. Are you John?”

The man nods. “John Wick.” He needs the request in a “special” way –– gestures to the dead bodies and drops terms that will help Desmond with Business, because John is thoughtful outside of a gunfight –– but Desmond’s mind is still the blue screen of a computer.

The Boogeyman? The name that even mob bosses drop when they’re scared, as if he’s as powerful as a religious figure or an Italian man’s mama?

Eventually they hit the part where John needs a covert route from his current location to his next place of work, and this evokes more silence than answers, because Winston’s idea of training is on the “speak in riddles and sip brandy” end opposite to where William’s “colour-coded spreadsheet or nothing” sits. To Desmond’s credit, he gives the silence the company of his thoughtful gaze tracing a feasible route that at least leads out of the locked down building they stand in.

Oh yes, the building’s doors are all locked and barred. It was a pain for John to reach his targets hiding behind bolted doors once they registered his presence, and it’s a pain now that he wants to leave the building. Fortunately, Desmond had propped a window open as he came in, just in case Winston’s valued customer appeared capable of shadowing a boy up a wall, and Desmond is pleased to see that John should have no problem.

No problem.

It’s not like Desmond, from his angle while running across roofs in a hurry, decided that entering through the front door was more effort than it was worth.

Police sirens distantly wail, signalling that someone reported a noise complaint.

John searches for possible grips from where they stand to the window that Desmond’s eyeing, and only finds mounted lamps locked in spaces too tight to fit a person and too distant from each other to be climbable. Then John opens his mind up and acknowledges that the open wall before them displays a minimalist rendition of crashing waves like layered paper cut outs, offering sloping ledges the width of John’s fingertips. It’s a luxurious building. If John didn't keep his nails well-manicured like any good hitman, John’s palms would have perspired a bit. As it is, John turns his head to Desmond with a neutral look anyone in Business knows well, often employing the dry expressionlessness themselves. When John raises his eyebrows, Desmond cracks.

“To be fair,” Desmond says, “if I’m supposed to wait in a car, you should be finding exits yourself.”

“You…came in that way.”

It’s a statement. Somehow, it still impacts Desmond like a bullet.

“How did you get in?”

“The front door.”

Desmond would laugh, but he’s raised on we work in the shadows and never compromise the Brotherhood. The Assassins exercise secrecy, paranoia, and refined skill. They are founded in theatricality and myth, and a few in history have assassinated kings, lead armies, and founded countries. All security is proven inexplicably penetrable by them because for centuries, the Assassins have taken lives, left, and never been caught.

John Wick is not an Assassin.

In the bright of day, where men fall dead around him from bullets and not mythical curses, where John can clearly be seen injured as a man and injuring back, mysticism still follows him.

Knowing how John kills doesn’t stop his targets from dying.

So. Front door.

Desmond scrubs his face. “When Winston said––”

“He meant a clean route,” John confirms the interpretation. “Completely.”

“To move someone between places without detection would take – magic,” Desmond suggests, then surrenders. “Unfortunately for me, I’m very good at disappearing. Follow my lead, Boogeyman.”