Chapter 1
It was only suppose to be a normal get-together; they were going to binge eat on junk food while playing on Samantha’s new Xbox One. It had been a long, hard week so it was only fair that they be allowed to stay up all night, laughing and playing since there wasn’t anyone who could stop them. Then, something happened. All they did was pop in the newly released Assassin’s Creed Syndicate that Samantha had been dying to get her hands on when they found themselves waking up in a dark alley way.
The first one to wake up was Samantha, the host of their little party, and she was immediately in a panic when she managed to finally grasp where they were. Her friends were still out cold on the hard stone ground and there was a few puddles scattered around them. It was when she took notice of the puddles that Samantha realized that her shirt and a bit of her jeans were soaking and that she was freezing.
“Psst, Zenin?” Samantha whispered softly, she had seen enough horror and crime movies to know what happened when one is in a dark place and is loud. “Zenin? Dammit Blondie, wake your ass up!”
“Hm?” the fake blonde groaned, her head ached and her eyelids felt as though there were weights on them. She groggily turned her head toward her friend, croaking, “The fuck, Sam?”
“Shut up and keep quiet!” Samantha hissed darkly, now that one girl was up it was time to get the other two up and at ’em. “Jackie? Jackie, Christina wake up.”
Zenin almost decided to go back to sleep, as she was extremely tired for some reason, but then she realized that she wasn’t snuggled on Samantha’s bed anymore (nor was she on the semi-comfortable floor of the taller girl’s bedroom either). Awake and alert, Zenin started patting the ground and well as her person, with what intention? Not even she was sure.
“Samantha, my darling friend.” Zenin tugged at Samantha’s plaid button up that she wore over her dark green tank top. “What the fuck, how the fuck, and where the fuck are we?”
“How would I know Zenin, just help me get these two up.” Samantha tried shaking the two girls and smacking their arms, they were so hard to wake up! Damn them for being such heavy sleepers!
“Here, allow me.” Zenin pushed the brunette to the side and leaned toward the sleeping duo’s ears. “WAKE THE FUCK UP BITCHES!!”
“Zenin!” Samantha squeaked, she could hear where there was now distant footsteps moving about. There was some distant chatter as well, Zenin must have startled whoever was nearby. She could only hope that whoever that maybe was at least friendly. “Zenin, I was trying to be quiet for a reason!”
“Huh?” Zenin was confused, had she not just helped out?
The two girls, Jackie and Christina, abruptly awoke with Christina squealing a bit out of fear. They were both freaked out and frantically trying to figure out what was wrong. There were now more footsteps in the distance and Samantha was tried to figure out where would be their best bet of escaping.
“They’re awake now.” Zenin stated, not understanding just yet why Samantha was furious with her.
“Wait, that was you?!” Jackie asked in outrage, bopping Zenin’s forehead. “What the hell were you thinking!?”
Zenin glared at the Hispanic girl and whacked her shoulder, “Well, do you wanna sleep on the concrete?”
“Guys!” Samantha tried to get their attention, the footsteps were coming closer and she didn’t want to know who was on the way. She stood up and tried her best to get them to realize that they needed to make a run for it. “Guys please, we gotta go.”
“You don’t need to scream in our ears!” Christine whined, still holding her ear. “You could have made us deaf.”
“Well, pardon me.” Zenin crossed her arms and huffed, “Go on back to sleeping like the homeless, I ain’t gonna stop ya.”
Samantha finally had enough of her friends and screamed loudly, “Guys! SHUT THE FUCK UP!!”
The arguing trio stopped and stared up at Samantha, shocked that she was now yelling at them. They were almost going to start a fight with her but, then they were found by the patrolling men of the area.
“There they are!” they heard one shout to his comrades, “Let’s get ’em!”
“Oh, that’s what you’ve been going on about.” Zenin gasped, “Shit, time to go!”
The three girls picked themselves up and, together, they all ran down the alleyway, there was no dead end although it did seem like there was a dock up ahead. They weren’t too sure where they could go but, considering how a group of men who were all wearing the same uniform were chasing them, anywhere away from here would be nice.
When they reached the dock, they found that there was a carriage and a bridge to their right. While none of them knew how to drive a carriage, it was the best shot they had of getting out of there.
“Looks like something outta Sherlock Holmes.” Zenin commented before they heard a gunshot, “Tell me they didn’t just shoot at us!”
Christina glanced at Samantha, gagging slightly at the sight of blood oozing out of her arm. “Sam, your arm!”
Samantha held onto her arm, the pain hadn’t fully registered in her head thanks to the adrenaline. Luckily though, the bullet wasn’t in her arm rather it had left a fair size gash on the upper half, more toward her shoulder. “Go! We are so not welcomed here!”
They raced to the carriage, bullets flew past them and, thankfully, didn’t hit anyone else. Still, there was no time to spare a thanks to any holy being out there that may be watching over them. They weren’t safe until they got as far away from this place as they could.
“Oh god! We’re gonna die!” They heard Christina cry, “They’re gonna kill us!”
“Don’t you dare give up Christina!” Jackie growled to her foster sister, “We’re going to make it out of this alive and in one piece!”
“But we don’t know how to drive this thing!” she retorted as the stopped in front of the carriage. Christina was in quite a state of fear and panic, she had every right to be. It could have, preferably, happened later although.
They all had seen westerns and european based films and, if those films were to be believed, it should be easy enough. Samantha, having the more trustworthy ability of being a visual learner, was about to tell them that she’ll take the reigns, however a male voice stopped her. “Worry not ladies, I’ll help you.”
“Huh?” they turned and found a handsome man hoisting himself onto the bench where the driver was suppose to sit. “Who-?”
“Get in, unless you want to deal with them”
“Fair enough!” Samantha and Zenin grabbed Jackie and Christina’s hands and pulled them into the lavished carriage while the man urged the horses to move with haste.
“They’re getting away!” they heard someone yell, it was someone with a more scraggly voice and he sound blistering furious. “Get off your arse and go after them!”
“The fun never stops.” they heard the man who saved them say, he was certainly odd as were those other guys.
“Well.” Zenin said in between deep breaths, “This is a fabulous adventure, wonderful way to wake up. Truly.”
“Shut up Zenin, this is your fault to begin with.” Samantha growled, she was in absolutely no mood to deal with sarcasm. Her arm hurt like hell, her lungs just received one hell of a work out, and the tiredness from waking up made her incredibly irritable.
“How was I supposed to-”
Samantha didn’t let Zenin finish her question as she punched Zenin’s arm, making it go dead for a minute. “I told you, I was trying to be quiet. You know what, how about we be logical? Huh? Okay, you wake up in a dark alley way, outside, in puddles, and you’re trying to wake your friends up because, potentially, we could be in some shit. What the fuck is the best possible way of going about this?”
Zenin looked out the window, just because Samantha had a point did not mean she had admit it. Besides, anyone would have made that mistake.
“Zenin,” Samantha narrowed her eyes at her friend, “how do people die in horror movies?”
Zenin definitely felt offended by that question, and leave it to Jackie and Christina to make it worse.
“Wow, and here we all thought that Christina would be the death of us in a horror movie.” Jackie spoke without really thinking of what she was saying and without meaning to say it aloud. Being that the statement was true, that didn’t mean that Zenin appreciated it being spoken or even crossing someone’s mind.
Samantha sighed, combing her fingers through her tangled hair, “Okay, I’m sorry for snapping but, c’mon now. The hell, Zenin?”
“Whatever, the damage is done.”
“The damage was preventable.” Samantha shot back, “Either way, we’re lucky this guy showed up.” Samantha point toward the front of the carriage where the man was.
“Yeah, but where’d he come from?” Christina asked, she was hugging her breasts as they, due to their...impressive size, were throbbing slightly from her running. The girls were also quite amazed that Christina managed to keep up in those high heeled boots of hers. Actually, it never registered in their minds that they magically had their shoes back on. “He came out of nowhere.”
“Who cares.” Zenin shrugged, stretching arms over her head. “He’s here, for however long he plans on staying.”
As they went off about the stranger, Samantha inspected her arm; the gash had blood crusting around it and it wasn’t entirely big. Still, she needed to get it looked at soon. For now, she had a damaged shirt that had some blood on it anyways. So, even though she loved her plaid shirt, she tore off the damage sleeve and wrapped it around her wound.
“You okay?” Jackie asked, having watched Samantha work. “Does it hurt?”
“Duh.” Samantha sighed, she took the sleeve cuff and held it in her mouth as she tied it around the wound. “I’m not looking forward to putting peroxide on it.”
Jackie nodded and turned her attention to the window, the carriage wasn’t going as fast as it was anymore and it started to seem like it was slowing down. “I wonder where we are? This isn’t Salinas...”
They all silently agreed on that, this wasn’t their little town and it was painfully obvious that they probably weren’t in California anymore either. So, where could they be?
“What were we doing before we passed out?” Jackie asked curiously, “My memory’s kinda blurred.”
“Well, we were playing on my Xbox One.” Samantha thought back, the last game she remembered them playing was Minecraft when Zenin asked for a more action kind of game. They had debated for a bit since there was a few games that Samantha had that were action packed, although-since her Xbox One was new- she had more games for the 360 and only certain games were apparently compatible with the One. No one wanted to switch consoles so they settled on playing....
“...Assassin’s Creed Syndicate...” they said in perfect unison, they remembered that only Samantha knew how to play and Zenin acted as her second pair of eyes in case she got stuck (not to mention that it was a single player game).
“No.” Zenin said, “It is impossible.”
Just then, the carriage finally halted and they heard a sharp whistle. There was footsteps again (Christina freaked out and threw herself into Jackie’s arms) and the door opened to reveal the man smiling at them.
“Come out ladies, I’ll escort you inside.”
“Uh, okay.” Samantha was the first to pathetically crawl out of the carriage, Jackie and Christina were the last.
“Alright, Rooks.” the man called to some men who were poorly dressed and wearing a yellow sash around their waists and green coats. “I want this carriage gone, do with it what you will.”
“Alright boss.” they responded back, taking the vehicle away to its doom.
The girls watched it disappear with curiosity, they wanted to know what those men were going to do to get rid of the carriage. However, there were more important things to worry about.
“Come along, you need to eat.” the man said with his voice low, he sounded slightly seductive which was not fair to the girls. They were all nineteen year old girls (except for Zenin, she was still eighteen) and a man with a seductive voice was completely and entirely unfair. “And I will personally look at that wound for you, Miss.”
“Ah!” Samantha hadn’t thought that he noticed her gash, “When did you-?”
“I saw most of your little show, especially when you got shot.” he smiled, “Judging from the cleanliness of the blood spill, it’s not an actual bullet wound. Still, it needs cleaning.”
“O-Okay..” Samantha blushed as he gently took her hand and led her into the bar place they stopped at. She could hear Zenin mumbling something about wanting the guy to hold her hand which earned her a few quiet giggles. She wanted to dump a bucket of worms on Zenin for finding humor in this.
“Forgive me, I don’t know your names.” the man suddenly said, he has an expression that was rather cute and that read: oh yeah, that.
“Oh! Sorry, I’m Samantha.” Samantha smiled and leaned her head toward her friends, “The blonde is Zenin, with a Z, the dark skinned one is Jacqueline, and the….voluptuous one is Christina.”
The man stifled a chuckle at Samantha’s use of words toward Christina’s chest, “Pleasure to make your acquaintance, my name is Jacob Frye.” he leaned forward and laid a soft kiss on top of Samantha’s hand. The gesture wasn’t missed by her friends.
“Oh my god, we have ourselves a gentleman!” Zenin teasingly exaggerated, fanning herself as though she was about to faint. “Send some of the that lovely British formality our way too!”
Samantha lowered her head, she kept telling herself that Zenin was in some delusional state and that it would be wrong of her to bash a shovel into the blonde’s face. “Um...Jacob? Could you feed them so they can go to bed soon?”
“Ah!” Jacob left Samantha’s side and opened a door, presumably that led to a kitchen or something, “Evie? Henry? Are you here?”
“Jacob?” they heard a female voice respond back with confusion, “Why do you sound like you’ve a bit of fun? And what was with that carriage I heard you come here with?”
“I brought company, dear sister.” he responded back, pulling himself away from the door to let two new figures come out of the room. There was a woman with a similar, although softer, face to Jacob’s and dark skinned man that the girls quickly identified to be of Indian descent. “They’re young girls I found while at the factory, one of them is hurt.”
“Hurt?” the woman looked at Jacob accusingly, “Might I suspect that you are at fault for that?”
Jacob scoffed, he didn’t look the slightest bit bothered that the woman was accusing him of being responsible for Samantha’s wound. He wasn’t responsible but, still, he took it rather leisurely. “Now sister, have just the smallest bit of faith in me. I assure you that I actually am not the reason she got shot at.”
“Sister?” Zenin tilted her head at the two, she wasn’t paying attention to most of what the duo were saying. She was more interested in surveying their surroundings. “You two are siblings?”
“Twins, to be accurate.” the Indian man sighed, he seemed to have been with the brother and sister duo for some time already. “Forgive us, we haven’t introduced ourselves.”
The woman stepped forward, giving a nod as she spoke. “I am Evie Frye, Jacob’s older sister.”
“I am Henry Green.” they both gave a slight bow.
“Uh..Hi.” the girls nervously waved, they had yet to start playing Syndicate but, Samantha had told them the names of the twins and she knew what time era the game took place in. The actual plot of the game, past the whole killing Templars and whatnot, they had not the slightest damn clue.
“Here, let me look at that wound.” Jacob came to Samantha’s side again and gently pulled her into the room where Evie and Henry came from. “Evie, could you help the other three get something to eat and show them to the spare room?”
“Four girls in one room?” Evie questioned, “That doesn’t-”
“It is all we can offer for now, Miss Frye.” Henry sighed sadly, “I’ll get the food, why not get them to the room?”
“Alright, follow me girls.” Evie still didn’t think that it would be best for the girls to crowd into one room but, she wouldn’t argue. They could give the girls more space tomorrow on the train. Good thing they did add a new Caboose to the train.
“Good.” Jacob continue to take Samantha away, they eventually made their way to a table where a medical kit was already out. “Ah, they were waiting for me.”
“Huh?” Samantha eyed him, if it still rang true, then Jacob was suppose to be the more reckless of the assassins.
“Alright, let me see your arm.”
Samantha didn’t say anything while Jacob tended to the wound, only making hisses and whines when he applied the medicine. She was also blushing like crazy and she kept telling herself that it had nothing to do with the fact that she was alone in a room with an attractive man. Zenin probably would beg to differ, as would Jackie and Christina too actually.
“There, all done.” Jacob said, putting away what needed to be returned to the box and gathering what should be thrown away. “Handled that better than I thought.”
“Thanks.” Samantha spoke softly, a bad habit of hers that would automatically happen when she was around the company of strangers by herself. Technically, Jacob was now no longer a stranger however, she wasn’t going to openly admit that she was shy toward the opposite sex (it’s only obvious though and her friends all pretty much knew it).
“Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to ask you a question.” Jacob took the chair he had been sitting a moment ago and turned around so that the back of it faced Samantha.
“Hm?” Samantha looked up at him, following him as he took his seat. “What?”
“Four little girls hanging around a large factory, which is guarded rather heavily, and you managed to get there entirely undetected?” he eyed her with a mischievous glint in his eyes, “How could that be? Even my sister, who’s far stealthier than I, cannot do that without scaling buildings.”
“Uh..” Samantha felt her cheeks heat up again, “Um...I-I don’t know.”
“Don’t know? How can you not know?” he smiled, Samantha was quick to realize that he knew how attractive he was and that he was trying to use his devilish good looks against her. That realization caused her shyness to dissipate and turn into borderline offense.
“Because we don’t know, we just woke up there and then they caused a scene.” she huffed, her pale tinted cheeks puffed up slightly.
Jacob couldn’t help but laugh, she looked like a tiny dog that thought it was vicious. “Try to be serious with me, you look ridiculous.”
Samantha growled slightly, “Oh shut up, and I am being serious!”
“Right.” he smiled, losing most of his seductiveness as he could see that it wasn’t going to work on her. “If you just woke up there, how do you suppose you got there to begin with?”
Samantha shrugged, “I don’t know...”
“Don’t know much.” he leaned forward, he flicked her nose which was enough to earn a small growl out of her. “Where are you from? Your accent is awfully foreign to me.”
“Eh?” Samantha had to stop and think about what she should say, she didn’t want to say anything that would give her away. To do so, she had to remember basic American history. America existed by this time, the date of Independence Day was July 4, 1776(supposedly at least, there were rumors that their independance hadn’t been won just yet. Those were little details though) and this took place in the mid or late 1800s. 1868 if her memory was correct which meant that she could say she was American. What about calling herself Californian? The pacific state was made a part of the states in the mid 1800s so she should be okay. Although, she was pretty sure that no one in America spoke like they did yet. “Um..we’re from America.”
Jacob tilted his head, curiosity filled him as he asked, “Really, I’ve never actually spoke to an American but, I remember when I’d see some while they were visiting. They sound nothing like you.”
“W-We’re different from them!” she insisted, at this point she was caught between confessing that they weren’t from this timeline (saying that they weren’t from this world is a bit too much at the moment) and insisting that he was wrong. “We’re, um, not really from this...world.” That wasn’t suppose to come out.
“Excuse me?” Jacob stared at her in surprise, “What are you talking about?”
“Uh....!” She was screaming at herself internally, how stupid was she?! “Well, fuck it! I said it already.”
“A..different world?” he looked at with utter disbelief, she was crazy! She had to be! Yet, while he processed her words, they oddly made sense. After all, who spoke or acted like these girls? In this day and age, girls were submissive and mostly damsels in distress. The last part was partially true to them, as he was the one who saved them earlier, however he had the slight inkling that the girls could handle themselves if they knew how.
“Well, in a sense this similar to my world.” Samantha admitted, she was certain to keep the part about them being in a game to herself. “I guess you could think of it as being a parallel world, if that makes sense?”
“Parallels? Interesting, and what proof do you have to convince me?”
“I don’t know, other than none of us talk in a fashion that you’ve ever heard nor do we seem acquainted with anything that obviously seems typical to you guys.” she, despite how uncomfortable it made her, looked directly into his eyes. She truly hoped that he would see that she wasn’t lying because lord knows how awful asylums are in this day and age.
“True.” he admitted, “Alright, let’s say that I believe you. Do you have any way to get back to your world?”
Samantha hadn’t thought about that, if was a dream then she should have woken up after she got shot. “No we don’t, to me it seems like we had a one time passport here.”
“I see.” he stood up from his chair, holding his hand out to her, “Then you girls can stay with us. It’d be wrong to force four little girls to live on the streets.”
“Thanks.” Samantha muttered back as she took his hand, letting him be the gentleman he thought he was. “And we’re not little.”
“One of you isn’t.” he snickered, he then took a good look at he and slyly grinned. “Well, you’re also quite sight.”
Samantha let out a shriek and slapped Jacob across the face, “YOU PERVERT!” She truly did not expect him to make comments about their breast sizes. Maybe she shouldn’t be surprise, this wasn’t an era where women had rights of any sort. Still, he didn’t need to do that.
Jacob was rather surprised that she swung at him, the slap admittedly hurt and he was curious to know what it would be like if she was taught to fight. He tenderly touched the burning skin, it still stung thanks to how crisp and cold her hands were. There would probably be a handprint left on his cheek, nothing unusual since he was a flirt. Many nights he had come back with one cheek red or redder than the other. Not to say that he wasn’t successful, he used the markings as a way to get innocent girls’ sympathy.
“Jacob, what did you do now?” they heard Evie sigh, she was leaning against the wall with a face was tired and in need of a good night’s sleep.
“Ah, Evie.” Jacob grinned, an evil plan formulating in his head. He slung his arm around Samantha’s shoulders and gave them both a cheeky grin. “Just getting acquainted with our new recruit.”
“Huh?” the two women stared at him in absolute confusion. What did he mean ‘new recruit’?
“That’s right, I want Samantha to join the Rooks or train her to be an assassin. I’ll think over in the morning.” He strode past them and tipped his hat at Samantha, “Nine O’clock sharp, Evie will show you to your room.”
“Uh...” Samantha only stood there, her train of thought running a million thoughts a second. “Gah... um... ’kay?” At this point, that was all she could say.
Evie was no better, she stared after her younger twin with her mouth held agape. She didn’t know what madness had gotten into her brother’s head but, she was certain he was just being a fool now!
