Andy, Sol, Ann, and Nerida boarded a plane early the next morning. The ride was short and uneventful. Havana, Cuba was only a short flight away, and a century in the past. Soon enough the group was in a cab and on their way to the assassin's den in Havana. They checked in with the den leader, and then got ready to head out.
"Alright," Andy said. "Sol, Ann, you guys are with me. Nerida, you wait here as backup."
With that, the group split up. Andy, Ann, and Sol got back in the cab and asked the driver to take them to the Abstergo building. They asked the driver to drop them a couple blocks away. It was time to get to work.
"Walter Jönsson is a low key Swedish Templar who has been feeding the Templars large sums of illegal money from Caribbean banks. If we get this man we can grind their finances to a halt and stop their advance. He's currently in an Abstergo industries building here in Havana. The building is eleven stories tall and heavily guarded." Andy explained.
"I'll check the server room for information while you two get rid of him," Ann said.
"Jönsson should be on the eighth floor and the server rooms are in the basement," Andy continued.
"Alright, I'll enter from the back and meet you there," Sol nodded.
"Hide your face as much as you can. You can bet there's cameras everywhere. I'll meet you at the escalator."
Ann snuck in first with a high school tour group as they excited from their bus and followed a tour guide into the building. She pretended to text on her cell as she secretly hacked into the emergency stairwell's alarm system. The group walked past the stairwell door just as her profiler app gave her the green light. Ann slipped silently from the group and entered the stairwell quickly. She went down to the server room.
The room was cold and dry. The twenty servers in the room humming softly. She moved to the nearest one, opened the case, and plugged in her laptop.
Sol and Andy entered the building from different locations. Andy casually strolled up to the information desk and began talking with the pretty woman who was working there. Sol slipped into the building behind one of the janitors. She casually made her towards the escalator.
"I'm in," Sol whispered, her earpiece sending the message straight to Andy.
Andy excused himself, slowly strolling over to the escalator. Sol was waiting for him when he arrived. He greeted her like an old friend. Together, they mounted the escalator.
"Are you ready to go?" Sol asked without turning back to face him.
"Ann stand by. We don't know what where up against and may need backup." Andy whispered into his earpiece.
"I'm still getting some shit," Ann responded. "I found some not suitable for work shit. Gross, Templars are gross; but I'll stand by."
The duo climbed off the escalator. They glanced around the crowded second floor. Everywhere they, looked there where guards.
"We need to get to the eighth floor, but by the looks of it, it's in the restricted section of the building," Andy muttered to Sol. "Once we get up there, we'll have to fight our way down."
"We need to find the area of least resistance," Sol muttered in return.
Sol paused for a moment and pretended to read a text on her phone, as she scanned the room. She noticed the single guard in front of a private stairwell off to the side. There seemed to be no other security in that area.
"There," Sol gently pointed out the guard in question. "We can quietly take out that guard there and get up without raising alarm."
Andy turned slightly and caught sight of the guard.
"Okay," he replied. "I'll distract him and you get in the stairwell. I'll ditch him later and join you.
"Got it."
Andy walked over to the guard.
"Excuse me Sir, can you please help me find my way to the Abstergo directory?"
"Sure, Sir, I'll show you quickly."
"Thank you, Sir."
Andy clicked his tongue to signal Sol. She snuck quickly behind the guard and opened the door. She slipped inside, trying her best not to let the door make any noise. CLICK! Shoot. The guard turned back to the door quickly.
"What was that?"
"OH!" Andy cut in. "I'm sure it's nothing."
"No, I need to check this out, excuse me, Sir."
Sol overheard the guard and quickly scrambled up the stairs. The guard entered cautiously. He looked around.
"Who's there?" He asked, scanning the room.
Then he spotted her.
"HEY!"
Andy ran up behind the guard and stabbed him with his hidden blade. He tried to cover his mouth to keep him from screaming, but the guard's scream was out in the air before he could. He turned sharply to Sol.
"MOVE!"
Sol sprinted up the next flight, moving quickly to the eighth floor. Andy followed on her heals, checking on Ann as they ran.
"How's the hacking going?"
"Good," she replied. "So, I'm going to take this as my cue to leave; unless you need backup. Just letting you guys know."
Without waiting for an explanation, she fled "heroically." Sol reached the eighth floor a moment later and pressed herself against the wall next to the door. Andy reached the floor and stopped next to her.
"I'm going to check for guards," she whispered to him.
"Okay, I'll cover you."
Sol opened the door to find the floor mysteriously empty. It looked deserted with not a living soul in sight. She glanced around, her suspicion growing.
"Something's not right," she muttered. "There's no security in sight. I have a bad feeling about this. The Eighth floor is too quiet."
Sigma team radio: "Trap in place, Sir. Moving in."
Sol turned to Andy, eyes fide with worry. The sense of unease was steadily growing in her gut. Andy too began feeling uneasy.
"Should we go?" Sol asked.
Andy opens his mouth to respond, but stopped as he noticed something rolling slowly towards them, something small, and green.
"GRENADE, GET DOWN!"
Andy and Sol ducked quickly. The grenade exploded sending shrapnel everywhere. When the smoke cleared, there was Sigma team. They opened fire on the assassins.
"CRAP, it's Sigma team!" Andy shouted.
"What's Sigma team?!"
"Templars!"
"Let's get out of here!"
Andy leapt to his feet and opened fire on the Templars. He moved quickly to the first window closest to the stairs, and broke the glass with a swift kick. He glanced down. There! A pile of garbage bags caught his attention. He turned to Sol.
"Do you know what a leap of faith is?"
"I'm guessing you jump and hope for the best?"
"Just follow my lead."
Andy took a couple steps back and, like an eagle about to take flight, spread out his arms. He dashed forward and threw himself threw the broken window. He seemed to hang in the air for a moment, as if he truly had wings that would take him soaring away from danger, then, with a flip, he fell out of sight. Sol rushed to the window just in time to see him land safely on the pile of garbage bags. She stepped back, took a deep breath, and leapt. The adrenaline coursed through her as she spotted the ground far below her and realized she was hanging in midair. She closed her eyes as she twisted, the wind beginning to scream in her ears as she started her descent. Then, out of wonder or fear, she opened them again and saw the bright blue sky getting farther and farther away. It was beautiful, yet terrifying. Finally, her back hit the garbage bags and the rush dulled. That's when she noticed the pain.
She looked over at her wrist. It had landed just outside the protective pile of bags. It didn't look that bad, a little red and starting to swell up, but the pain told a different story.
"Well that's broken," she mumbled.
"Sol, are you okay?" Andy asked as he watched her examine her wrist.
"Yeah, the adrenaline is keeping the worst of the pain away," she nodded examining her wrist closer.
"Well, we're going to have to run."
"Guys," came Nerida's static filled voice threw the earpieces. "Is everything okay?"
"NO! Sigma team set a trap for us, and we were forced to abort the mission. We had to do a leap of fate to get out of there. Now we're on the run and Sol has a broken wrist so she can't parkour out of here." Andy explained.
"Where are you?" Nerida asked. "I'll come get you guys."
"The Abstergo building in downtown Havana. It's near the center."
"Alright, I'll be there with bandages."
"Okay, Sol and I are hiding out nearby."
Nerida grabbed a first aid kit and a map. She scaled the wall of the nearest building. Hopping from house to house, she quickly made it past all the traffic and was soon in the downtown area. Taking the high road turned out to be the fastest way through the city. She shimmied down the drain pipe of the building next to the Abstergo building. She scanned the nearby alleyways for any signs of her friends. She was beginning to worry she had come too late, and then she spotted them.
"Yo!" She greeted them.
She waved a little to catch Andy's attention. Andy and Sol slipped silently from there hiding place to join her.
"Nerida, glad to see you," Andy sighed.
"Yup," Nerida tossed him the bandages. "Here."
Andy quickly inspected Sol's wrist and bound it tightly. He could tell the bone was just fractured, not completely broken, and would take two months to heal. That meant that Sol was currently incapacitated and probably couldn't fight. He could already see the first of the enemy pouring out of the Abstergo building.
"We must get back to the Assassins den," Andy panicked. "Sigma team is on our asses again, and you know they hate you."
"Well of course," Nerida shrugged. "Luckily my glaive is with me!"
"Targets confirmed, shoot to kill," came the voice of the lead Templar in the distance.
Nerida smirked, her glaive slipping naturally into her hands. She adored a good challenge. Most of all, she loved killing Templars.
"I'm all fired up!" She grinned.
"Haha, same here," Andy smiled as he pulled his cutlasses from his belt.
"Yeah, they're dead." She nodded.
"Well, let's go," Andy sighed, glancing around.
"Your call," Nerida replied calmly.
Sol could tell by the way the both looked towards the top of the buildings and then back at her that they were weighing there options. The only save escape route was hopping from rooftop to rooftop, but she knew she couldn't climb with her wrist this way. The other option was to fight the Templars and hope they could eliminate enough of them to escape.
"I can use my rapier, Hamlet, with my good arm," Sol reassured them. "I can handle myself."
Andy's expression softened. He could tell she was telling them to escape while they still could, that it was okay to leave her behind, but Andy knew that he could never do that. He scanned the buildings again. There has to be another way, there's always another way.
"Attack from the air, they never see it coming," he realized.
Andy quickly scaled the wall of the nearest building. He hopped onto the roof and crouched down, ready to spring on the unsuspecting Templars. Nerida looked over at Sol, but instead of the worried look she had thought she would see, she saw a fire burning in her eyes. It made her smile to see it. Sol turned to her and smiled.
"I'll hide in the ally since I can't climb," she ducked behind a stack of boxes.
Nerida nodded and climbed the building, landing nimbly next to Andy. He could tell by the excitement in Nerida's face that something interesting was about to happen. He had a feeling he already knew what it was.
"Sol, you're going to fight with just one hand?" Andy asked over the earpiece.
"Yeah," she replied. "I'll be fine."
"Alright," he smiled. "Watch yourself, Okay? Follow my lead."
Stigma team members began slowly creeping into the alley. Nerida readied her glaive. Andy tightened his grip on his cutlasses. Sol made a makeshift sling of her jacket for her arm and pulled out Hamlet. Then the Templars got right under where Andy was. He leapt from the rooftop and landed on top of the leading Templar, plunging his swords straight threw his head. Then he pulled out his M9s and opened fire on the rest. He ran out of bullets and pulled his swords out of the dead Templar.
"Some help would be nice!" he called out.
"I got this!" Nerida called down.
She jumped down and landed next to Andy, glaive ready. Sol dashed out of her hiding spot, rapier in hand, and stopped by Andy's other side. Andy moved first, slicing two Sigma team members as they tried to reload their guns. Nerida stabbed and slashed two others, wielding her glaive like an extension of herself. Sol ran on the two closest to her, Hamlet a blur of motion in her hands. She slipped passed the two Templars. They turned to face her, confused as to what she had done. Then they suddenly collapsed, dead. Andy pulled out a set of poisoned throwing knives and used them on the rest of the now fleeing Stigma team. The radio on one of the dead Templars flared to life with a loud beep.
"All units pull back and regroup," came the voice of the enemy.
"What now?" Nerida shrugged.
"We should go before they manage to regroup," Sol reminded her.
"Right!"
Andy quickly led them to a parked car and broke into it. He slipped under the dashboard of the Ford and quickly hotwired it. The car sputtered and then roared to live. He swung himself into the front seat.
"GET IN!" he hollered.
Nerida got into the passenger seat as Sol hopped in the back. Andy stepped on the gas. The car jerked forward. The car was old and unreliable, but it did the job, taking them far enough to escape Sigma team.
"Alright," Andy said. "We'll drive a few miles away from the den, and then go the rest of the way on foot. That way the Templars can't find it."
"Right! " Sol agreed.
They parked the car in an abandoned lot and trudged back to the den. They quickly said goodbye to the Havana team, and a few hours later, their plane landed in the Fort Lauderdale airport.