Story [Issue 78] The Controlled Assassin

[thethiefofvictory 339]

“Assassin, you are here to kill the King, not to rob Sector Royalty of every single coin, every single thing worth anything! I repeat, do not go out of your way to steal. DO NOT risk the mission for money. We have more than enough as it is.”

“Right.”

“Also, Command’s finally sent a layout of the Palace. It’s bad news - you can’t enter through the front doors.”

“Last time I checked there was no secret route in or out of the Palace. The King’s tunnels collapsed last week.”

“Yes. Which means you will have to climb the building.”

“Tell me one thing: why don’t we just teleport into his office and finish him off? Why can’t we frame someone?”

“You’re not cleared to receive answers, assassin. Wait - James left his room. And I’ve received a note from Command, saying he’s going to Health and Cure. He's definitely not going for a cure, but to interrogate the doctor. Leave Royalty, now. Find and kill the doctor. Understood?”

“Understood, sir.”

The assassin’s fingers made their way into his ears and detached a small device. He looked into it, and vanished.

The guards at the doors of the convention were not alarmed when a man appeared out of nowhere in front of them. Rather, they paid no attention, as if it was not odd to see someone teleporting.

The guards opened the doors. The assassin walked through, and then ran down a narrow corridor illuminated with bright coloured lights. He found them to be disconcerting.

It was not long before he came to a large room filled with people. He was not sure what was happening, or why these people were gathered here. He was not cleared to know that. What he did know was the art - as Deadcliff’s ruthless murderers called it - of assassination.

He gazed at the people gathered in the room, trying to identify his target.

One man looked like a nobleman who had a voice in government, and who, the assassin guessed, was indifferent to all but his own desires. Another, a frail old man, was followed by his son and two daughters. He smiled when he watched his children volunteer to serve the guests water.

Another worked at Research as security, and received her orders directly from the captain of the Peacewatch. Her uniform said so, though not her words.

Yet another was a nobleman who, unlike the other one, looked rather generous. Maybe a bit too much, he thought, based on the amount of people near him. The King would let him live even if he was guilty of treason.

A man appeared out of nowhere, and then disappeared again. He heard his annoyance at teleporting to the wrong place. But before he vanished, he noticed a ring on his right index finger. A ring upon which was inscribed the word “Peace".

He heard a scream. He turned and tried to search for the source but noticed that nobody else heard it.

He felt a compulsion to move towards the stairs. He climbed, and from there gazed upon the people. At once he noticed a man in the uniform of a doctor. His target.

The supposedly selfish nobleman he saw earlier vomited blood. He looked at his hands and the thing his left hand held, and hid them in his pockets. He felt a device, and removed it from his pockets. He looked at it, muttered, “Strategy dead. Page, assassinated. Conspiracy potentially compromised", and vanished.

He reappeared in a room within a cave in Deadcliff. He could see the Pacific flowing through the cold mountains, and the many tourists nearby. None of them could see the assassin.

There were two monitors in the room. One showed the mountains, and this he saw. The other was connected to a supercomputer so large it took a mountain to store it, and capable of computing human thought. It was one of very few in all of Peace.

This screen showed the assassin, and a man behind him. The ring the latter wore revealed a seal, and beneath it a dagger. He saw a word inscribed.

 

This story is part of a series. Complete details in this post. Thanks for reading!

Edited August 4, 2018 by thethiefofvictory

[thethiefofvictory 339]

Good header! I won't say more because this is my own story :ph34r:

[Total_SkiIl 1,983]

I really didn't get what is going on in this specific fiction.

[thethiefofvictory 339]

I really didn't get what is going on in this specific fiction.

Predictable. My stories are more confusing than most around here it seems. If you desire, I may explain.

[Total_SkiIl 1,983]

No offence, but AWS, and newspaper too seems to be going around like this => *throw some high quality vocabulary here and there* *make grammar perfecto* *give snappy title* *call it a story* *sit on a mountain of le blue shiny crystals*.

Edited August 3, 2018 by Total_SkiIl

[thethiefofvictory 339]

No offence, but AWS, and newspaper too seems to be going around like this => *throw some high quality vocabulary here and there* *make grammar perfecto* *give snappy title* *call it a story* *sit on a mountain of le blue shiny crystals*.

 

I think, with my stories, it's less of a problem with substanceless words and more with deliberately undisclosed information.

 

Okay, time to explain. Protagonist is an assassin tasked with killing a king. Title says the assassin is controlled - literally, his actions are controlled, as the story later reveals - by a conspiracy with access to powerful supercomputers. Anyways, king decides to leave the palace and meet a doctor. Not for a "cure" (this is important, mind you. King has an ailment), but to personally interrogate him. Conspiracy orders assassin to kill the doctor instead, so he visits a "convention". He does not understand what is going on around him because he's controlled, so in normal terms said "convention" is basically a hospital. Probably.

 

Now, king discovers a conspiracy base and teleports there, although first accidentally teleporting to the hospital where the assassin is, hence disclosing his identity (the peace ring and dagger is only available to royalty, as other stories reveal). King teleports to conspiracy base, kills the person on the computer (hence the screams nobody else hears - the teleporter doubles as a telephone), overtakes assassin's mind and forces him to kill another conspiracist instead before making him teleport to conspiracy base so king can kill him too.

 

Fun fact: the man whom the King would forgive even if he was a traitor is the nobleman at the graveyard in Her Wish

Edited August 3, 2018 by thethiefofvictory

[Total_SkiIl 1,983]

I think, with my stories, it's less of a problem with substanceless words and more with deliberately undisclosed information.

 

Okay, time to explain. Protagonist is an assassin tasked with killing a king. Title says the assassin is controlled - literally, his actions are controlled, as the story later reveals - by a conspiracy with access to powerful supercomputers. Anyways, king decides to leave the palace and meet a doctor. Not for a "cure" (this is important, mind you. King has an ailment), but to personally interrogate him. Conspiracy orders assassin to kill the doctor instead, so he visits a "convention". He does not understand what is going on around him because he's controlled, so in normal terms said "convention" is basically a hospital. Probably.

 

Now, king discovers a conspiracy base and teleports there, although first accidentally teleporting to the hospital where the assassin is, hence disclosing his identity (the peace ring and dagger is only available to royalty, as other stories reveal). King teleports to conspiracy base, kills the person on the computer (hence the screams nobody else hears - the teleporter doubles as a telephone), overtakes assassin's mind and forces him to kill another conspiracist instead before making him teleport to conspiracy base so king can kill him too.

Still, disconnected.

 

I would rather like a cliffhanger, or a properly done suspense thriller (where the info which connects pieces of plots aren't secret).

Edited August 3, 2018 by Total_SkiIl

[thethiefofvictory 339]

Still, disconnected.

 

I would rather like a cliffhanger, or a properly done suspense thriller (where the info which connects pieces of plots aren't secret).

PM, please.

[Jeggernut 2]

That was so exiting  :blink:  :blink: .

[ChandlerBing 138]

Reminds me of Death Note.  :ph34r:

[thethiefofvictory 339]

Reminds me of Death Note.  :ph34r:

Hexed mentioned The 100 in Issue 77 and now this. What will Issue 79 (:ph34r:) remind people of, I wonder?

 

Anyways, thanks for reading!

[ChandlerBing 138]

Hexed mentioned The 100 in Issue 77 and now this. What will Issue 79 ( :ph34r:) remind people of, I wonder?

 

Anyways, thanks for reading!

I always loved your work, Pen. 

[PeregrinTook 25]

For me, it was hard to follow, because all you used was "he" to identify characters. Also, I'd like more details (clothes, etc.) about the people in the room, and other things. Useless details make everything! Just ask Lemony Snicket :P. If I had a better brain capacity, I would have understood it. But, here's from the me-that-doesn't-exist: "Great job!"

(PS: This is pretty random and probably not the best place to post it, but here's a list of some of my all-time favorite books.

The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis

The Penderwicks by Jeanne Birdsall

The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart

And some other great authors: Lucy Maude Montgomery, Frances Hodgeson Burnett, Roald Dahl, Lemony Snicket [Daniel Handler], Patricia Pollaco, and thousands of others, but my hand is getting tired. If you'd like, please let me know if you've read any books by these authors, and what your opinion of them was :)!)

[thethiefofvictory 339]

For me, it was hard to follow, because all you used was "he" to identify characters. Also, I'd like more details (clothes, etc.) about the people in the room, and other things. Useless details make everything! Just ask Lemony Snicket :P.

I actually agree, although the lack of details is partly thematic - the assassin is not allowed to know much of the world he lives in, so he doesn't understand anything nor can explain in detail. As for the first point, I noticed that after you pointed it out. While it can be said that the assassin is the only one thinking, I agree that it's still a bit hard to follow. I'll fix this next time. :D