Chapter 5
They’ve given me a journal to keep but the entire book only consists of these next seven days. I don’t understand anything anymore. My entire beliefs have been shattered. Is this a hallucination or something? This can’t be happening. I refuse to believe that it’s happening.
I don’t know where my head is at right now. After what he told me? It can’t be true.
When I entered the mansion, I was in awe. A little child like me seeing something like this for the first time? I was amazed my jaw didn’t drop onto the floor. The floor was covered in tiles with elaborate drawings on them. The ceiling was extremely high, higher than the outside appearance suggested, and was covered in a painting. I remember squinting so that I could see it but I just couldn’t.
In the middle of this hall, there were three men, dressed the same as Drake (the man who drove me here). They didn’t move. Drake went ahead to join them and left me standing alone. For a split second the insane idea of escaping occurred to me. I didn’t know these people; they could be lying to me about my brother. I should run. I should run now.
As though he had heard my thoughts, the man who stood closest to me, the one who stood apart from the others, stepped forward and took his hat off. His face was one that I hadn’t seen for the good part of a decade and yet instantly recognised it. It was him.
And yet it wasn’t him.
My brother was standing there in front of me and yet I didn’t want him to be there. I didn’t want everything to be true. Because if this was true, then our father did have a heart attack. Our mother was dying. Selena was hurt. Mustafa was a traitor. It was all true.
Apparently the feelings that were inside me showed on my face and he came and comforted me with a single arm around my shoulder. I pushed him away. And then grabbed him back again. Like a child would do to its mother.
Motioning for the rest of them to go, he walked me to my room. The journey there took at least half an hour. I think we went underground but I’m not sure. The light had suddenly turned off for a few minutes and I was scared which shocked me. I had never been so scared of the dark in my life and yet here I was, terrified of a few minutes of darkness, feelings of claustrophobia enveloping me, threatening to take me down with them.
Along the way, my brother went ahead to tell me his story. It started with an awkward question on my part. As none of my family had ever spoken about him, I had forgotten his name. He said it was Hassan and joked about my memory being something that belonged to an old man or something. I laughed with him, but there was something odd about him. The way he secluded himself from me. He didn’t look at my face while talking to me and his face didn’t move with emotion. It was set in stone for all I knew.
This wasn’t the brother I knew. He was less and more.
He told me about how, one day, he had found papers from ages ago, official looking papers. So he had taken them to his friend to ascertain what they were. His friend told him that they were adoption papers. Apparently our parents had wanted to give us away.
But this was not the worst bit.
After he had found this out, he had found a photo. A photo of his mother, father, me and him and another. Another child. My age. He was sitting with me on my father’s lap.
Our brother.
They had given him away.
Given him away to some complete strangers.
After he had found this, he couldn’t take it. The lies. The betrayal. He had thrown the papers onto my father’s lap, gone to his room and packed. The next day he had left.
He had gone to his friend in London who had issued him with a ticket to Spain. He told him that he could live there. It was here that he sent the letter to our father.
A small town to the west of Madrid. They spoke English and welcomed him with open arms. He worked there as a security guard/policeman and earned a good salary. He got on with the people there and they got on with him. They never asked questions about where he had come from and for this, he was glad. There was no intrusion on their part.
One night, he was working late and he saw an old man walking by with a couple of hundred Euros with him. He seemed new to the town and Hassan had felt that he had some sort of responsibility over him. He wanted to protect him.
The old man walked past him without giving him a second glance and went down an alley. A few moments later the noises of a fight erupted.
Hassan had run towards the elderly man and saw that he had been overcome by three young men. They were also new to the town. One of them had the Euros in his hand and seemed to be speaking some foreign language to him. The other two had him pinned against the wall.
Hassan had dived into the fight without a moment’s hesitation and had successfully beaten them all up. the elderly man took the Euros from him and grabbed him by the arm. Telling him to follow him, he took him behind the town and then stopped before the hills.
He told him that he had been watching Hassan for a few months now. He was from England as well. He had come to Spain looking for an heir.
Hassan remembered being very confused at this point and so the elderly man told him.
He told him how, a couple of hundred years ago, a man, Yousef, had come to Japan to be taught the intricacies of sword-making and sword-fighting. He had been taught how to kill people without leaving a trace of evidence, how to sneak up on people without them knowing and killing them with a single blow to the head.
This master had chosen him because he saw that the world was on the brink of chaos. He needed someone to balance it out. This master was an unknown person, not even divulging his name to Yousef.
However the master had taught two people. Yousef and Jaymie.
Yousef was more arrogant then Jaymie and more aggressive. He saw that his skills could be used to give him power over other people. Jaymie was more quieter than him. She knew that her skills were the same as Yousefs but she didn’t boast about them as much as he did.
After several hard years of training with the master, they were both sent off to assassinate someone. The master had chosen two people, unknown to the public, mere tramps that lived on the road.
Whoever got to their victim first would succeed in knowing the ultimate secret of the Japanese arts. The art of concealing ones emotions and using them against their victims. The power of utilising anger and love and depression was a great one. And could only be trusted to those who earned it.
Jaymie got to her victim first and sliced his throat open. Going back to the master’s place, she saw Yousef running out of there. Feeling disappointed, she asked him whether or not he had received the training. He didn’t respond but just continued on his way.
She walked in to find the master dying, his throat had been slit and he told her that Yousef had killed him for the teachings. The master had refused to give it to him because he hadn’t won. So, in his fury, Yousef had slit his throat and ran.
With his final minutes on this earth, the master whispered into her ear and then succumbed to the final sleep.
Giving her the power of emotion was his final job on this earth.
She tried to kill Yousef over the years but couldn’t find him. She married and had kids of her own, teaching them the same that she was taught.
She had two children, a boy and a girl. By the age of eleven, they knew the secrets that she and only one other person in the world now knew about. And that was when he came for her. Killing her, her husband and her son, he left the girl and went, not knowing that Jaymie had entrusted her with the power of emotion, the secret that he would never have.
This girl then wanted revenge. She went after him like her mother and soon killed him. But not before he had done the same and taught one other of his secrets.
And so the war had begun. A war of two groups, each trying to kill the other for something that had happened such a long time ago.
After the girl died, her next-in-line to lead them was a boy named Rick. He was English and didn’t believe in this feud. There were people dying out there because of other humans and he thought that they were just adding to the millions of people already dead.
So he split her group in two. Half of them continued the fight against the other group. The other went ahead to keep the promise that Jaymie had made to her master so long ago.
To save the world from the brink of chaos.
And so they had. For generations, they had killed so many people that had wanted to bring a war on this earth. They had stopped World War 3 so many times. They had stopped so many others.
But they had died out now.
The elderly man was the only one left. He needed an heir to carry on this legacy. And so he had chosen Hassan.
Learning the arts from him, Hassan recruited two others, Drake and Leo. He recruited the final member when the elderly man died; Francesco.
They carried out several attacks over the years and killed many people.
And now they wanted me to join. Because Hassan felt as though he had left me there alone, he wanted me to come and join him. He thought that because they were brothers, I contained the same skills that he did and they could be transferred. He had plans. Plans for setting up a world-wide assassination plot.
I nodded to his story, listening intently and agreeing in the right places. I made him believe that I wanted to go with him in this, become one of them for the ‘Greater Good’ as he put it.
But I don’t.
I want revenge.
Revenge on everyone.
Sparing no-one.
Chapter 6
Today was interesting.
I had my first lesson with Drake today.
He taught me that they used swords because they left less evidence then bullets. He taught me how to use one and how to sharpen one. How to conceal one.
That’s why they wore the cloaks. So that they could conceal everything from plain view.
Francesco taught me more about the calmer side, how to stop my emotions from getting in the way. At first I thought that he was going to teach me how to make my emotions make me more powerful but no. that would come at the end if I was worthy enough. All he was going to teach me was how to calm myself.
It reminded me of when mom used to do yoga.
Leo made me do rigorous exercise. After two hours with him, my limbs felt as though they would drop off at anytime and I couldn’t actually do anything he wanted me to.
They all seemed to be more physically able than anyone else I had met, more flexible, more graceful.
The entire day seemed to pass this way.
Until evening.
We sat around a huge dinner table in another one of the mansions rooms and ate in silence. Nobody talked. It was so awkward. At times I felt like I should say something but then decided against it. Maybe this was how they were.
Towards the ending of the dinner, a security guard came in and placed a laptop in front of Hassan. Opening it, he read something and then twitched his upper lip in amusement.
‘It seems that they have lost quite a number in the fight in the Sahara.’
And that’s all that was said at dinner.
Going to my room, I couldn’t help but wonder who they were. He was probably talking about the other groups of assassins that he had told me about.
But why was that amusing? God these people are so cryptic.
Chapter 7
Same as yesterday.
Unbelievably tired from Leo’s class.
Dinner went the same.
So tired…
Chapter 8
Same.
Chapter 9
I woke up today realising that I had left my whole life behind. It was a shocking thought.
I had left everything behind for what? To become a killer? Someone who could be hired to kill everyone and anyone?
What kind of life was that?
And this was when I panicked.
I had to get out of here. There was no point of me staying anymore in this madness. I would convince Hassan to come back with me and we would rebuild our lives. I would take over Dads business with him and we would all live happily ever after.
Wait.
No.
That would never happen.
He wasn’t Hassan anymore, but someone else. He was a changed man. What made me think he was going to come back with me.
And that quickly, the feelings of hope were extinguished.
And were replaced by anger.
I wanted questions and I would get them.
Telling Drake that I wasn’t going to attend his lesson but, instead, go to Hassan didn’t get the result that I had thought. Instead of asking why or shouting, he merely nodded his head and said ‘OK.’ and walked away. As though he had been expecting this of me.
Maybe it was obvious that I wanted answers to my questions. I don’t know.
Making my way to Hassan’s room, I thought of what I would ask him. Maybe what he intended to do with me? Why I was here? How those texts had come? Who sent them? How had they known? Everything, I would ask him everything.
And so I did. He gave me clear concise answers that were meant to put my mind at ease. But they didn’t. It seemed as though he was just simply reading of a list, all the emotion he was giving.
After three hours of talking, I went to Leo’s lesson and again, came back so tired I wanted nothing to sleep.
Which I’m going to do now.
Chapter 10
I wonder what’s going to happen tomorrow.
Chapter 11
This is the final day of my ‘induction’. Safe to say, after today I will no longer be Antonio ‘Bug’ Khan anymore. The next four years of my life are going to be in pursuit of perfecting my skills and gaining the emotion control thing they all go on about.
I can’t wait.
There’s going to be a huge ceremony thing with us five.
Wow.
-
Well that was awesome. Not.
All they did was tell me that the induction was over and that I had to choose a new name for myself.
I didn’t even know what to pick. Drake said to pick a name that I thought was good, that suited me but I couldn’t think of a name other then ‘Evil’ that suited me. I mean, I can’t be named Evil for the rest of my life. That’s just beyond stupid. And not to mention childish.
In some cases, I thought of myself as a rebel. Going beyond what others thought of me.
And that was it.
I had an epiphany right there in that underground hall.
Why should I pick a normal name like Drake or Leo?
Even Hassan was a bit normal.
Under the circumstances I thought that I might as well make up my own name. It seemed that I would have to anyway. No other name suited me as well as the names that the others had chosen.
I stood there for a minute, thinking about my decision. Wondering whether it was right or now? Should I choose this as my name or not?
And I told them.
I wanted my name to be Revil.
They all stared at me for a few minutes and then Drake patted me on the back. ‘Cool name. Now you just have to finish your training to fully receive it.’
Looking at him in confusion, I asked ‘Why not now?’
‘Because you haven’t completed your training.’ Hassan spoke, his voice echoing off the walls. ‘To receive your new name, you have to complete your training.’
And with that it was over, we left the hall and went to sleep.
New name.
New life.
Old revenge.
Gender:
Points: 517
Reviews: 34