Precursor Temple, 1760

The ground ceased shaking. All the broken fragments of rock and ice lay still. The earthquake had ended.

But the battle had not finished yet.

Liam felt a seething pain in his right leg. When he came to, he winced at the slightest movement he made. It must be sprained if not broken, but at least he wasn't dead yet.

He coughed, feeling blood come up out of his mouth. At that moment, Liam figured that if he wasn't dead yet that he soon would be. Either from the injuries he sustained in the fall, or from the Templar laying right next to him.

Liam chuckled, coming to terms with the finality of it. He knew that this was coming. He was an Assassin, after all; this was the life he had chosen. Still, he wishes that things were different, that he could've given his life in service to the cause. But it seemed now he was destined to share the same fate as the rest of his Brotherhood and wiped away from the world without a trace.

"That was... lucky," Liam weakly laughs, partly due to his injuries, but mostly due to the fact that he lost all respect for the traitor he was lying next to. He thought he knew Shay, the boy that he had grown up alongside of in the slums of New York just trying to survive; the boy who he looked after like his own brother and tried to keep him out of trouble; the boy who had detested authority as he himself did and wanted nothing more than to live free.

He was wrong about him. Shay gave up on him. On the Brotherhood. On all the good things he once stood for. Had the Templars twisted his mind, or was he always like this and Liam was too blinded by love for his brother that he couldn't see it?

He had no answers. Only the pain of betrayal.

Still, a small piece of him hoped that the good man that was Shay Patrick Cormac was still inside that Templar attack dog. He was half expecting his words to trigger a response in the form of that annoying catchphrase of his, but Shay hadn't said a word. Liam only heard grunting noises from beside him.

"I believe this is the part where you say, 'I make my own luck,' or whatever it is you do nowadays," Liam bitterly quipped, hoping to make Shay feel the sheer weight of his guilt.

Liam looked over to his side, and saw Shay lying on his back, hand clutched over his chest, breath shuddered. He saw a large amount of blood seeping through his fingers and onto his blackened coat.

"You're..." Shay gasped between bated breath, "still a right horse's arse… Liam."

At this moment, Liam realized that Shay's injuries were far more grievous than his own. The Templar was dying.

"Aye, I just might be," Liam answered, "but at least I'm not a Judas like you."

"What do you know of it?" Shay angrily growled at Liam through clenched teeth, "If you had seen what I'd seen... if only... Achilles had listened... none of this would have happened."

"But it did..." Liam began, propping himself up with one arm, "because you chose to make it so."

"To set things right," Shay continued, "All those innocents slaughtered... Lisbon, gone... you'd have done what I did."

If Shay wasn't already dying, Liam would've broken his jaw.

"Tell me, Shay..." Liam started to ask, "why did you join?"

"I just told you why, you idiot," Shay retorted.

"No, not the Templars," Liam interrupted, "The Assassins. Why did you join us all those years ago?"

Shay grunted in pain, and then said, "You brought me in, remember? Told me that... Achilles was a man of wisdom. That he'd never lead us astray."

Shay tried to laugh, but the pain in his chest was too great. He clutched harder at his wound, and Liam could see the Templar ring he was wearing.

"Look what's happened because of him," Shay spat, and Liam was beginning to lose his patience.

"Him?" Liam nearly shouted, "Do you honestly believe that Achilles wanted Lisbon to be destroyed? Or Mackandal with Haiti?"

"We were being careless," Shay tried his best to retort, "We should never have tampered with the blasted Manuscript and Box."

"The Templars..." Liam began, placing his hands out to try and steady himself, "were doing the same thing. Johnson, Wardrop, Smith, Washington... they wanted to use the artifacts to find the Pieces of Eden, same as us."

Liam started to crawl his way closer.

"None of us knew what could've happened, Assassin or Templar," Liam argued, "It was just your bad luck that you were the one to be sent to Lisbon."

Liam took a deep breath, facing towards the snowy ground.

"I understand now," he began again, "that the Manuscript leads to sites like these. That these temples are support beams for the world's plates."

He then looked up back at the dying Shay, with a venomous glare in his eyes.

"But you had no right to accuse us of wanting to see cities burn!" Liam raising his voice, "No right to declare our entire Brotherhood as something chaotic and evil to the point where you joined our sworn enemies for millennia out of spite for us! No right to betray our Creed and kill your own brothers!"

"The Assassins are not my brothers!" Shay started to shout at Liam through the pain, trying to prop himself up to face him.

"I WAS!" Liam bellowed, "YOU WERE MY BROTHER! MY BEST FRIEND! WE GAVE YOU EVERYTHING YOU HAD! AND NOT ONLY DID YOU TURN YOUR BACK ON YOUR ONLY FAMILY, YOU WOULD DESTROY THE FREEDOM OF MANKIND AND GIVE CONTROL TO THOSE TEMPLAR BASTARDS!"

The Assassin locked eyes with the Templar, the both of them fuming. There was a lengthy pause as the initial rage dissipated, but the anger remained.

"The Templars know order, Liam," Shay finally broke the silence, "I've seen the truth for myself. Had the Assassins succeeded, the colonies would've been thrown into chaos, and more lives would be lost."

"Le Chasseur..." Liam began, "Kesegowaase… Chevalier... Adewale... Hope..."

He raised his arm up to wipe tears that had formed around his eyes.

"... those are the lives lost. And you took them," Liam bitterly spat.

"I had to..." Shay continued, his voice sounding weaker by the moment.

"No, you chose to," Liam continued, "That's one thing you Templars will never understand. You fight and preach to instill peace through coercion and force, but ultimately free will drives all judgment you form."

"Then I chose... to keep the world safe..." Shay muttered, his head lowering back onto the ground, "I pray that the Assassins have good enough sense now... to keep it that way... to be responsible, even when... everything is permitted..."

Shay's shuddered breathing stopped, and his black hair lay against the icy cold ground.

"We intend to, old friend," Liam said solemnly, lifting a hand up to close Shay's eyelids.

Liam leaned back and sat down in the snow, next to the body of his fallen friend. He had no tears to spare for the traitor, for he had already done so after Chevalier had shot him off the cliffside four years ago.

After a few moments in silence, Liam leaned over and observed the ring on Shay's hand, noting the red cross upon it. He slid the ring off of his finger, and held it in his palm.

"I hope that the Father of Understanding will guide you into a better world," Liam said with no emotion, and he pocketed the ring. He then removed Shay's hidden blades from his wrists; they were the tools of an Assassin, and Shay was no longer one. It only seemed respectful to him in death, to make note that he had indeed died a Templar.

Liam stood up, realizing that if Achilles were still alive, he would have to find him. Putting his hood up, Liam attempted to stand up, but found it near impossible to do so. The pain in his leg was so strong he was sure he had broken it in the fall.

"Damn," Liam cursed, and wondered how he would be able to get back to the ship if it hadn't been sunk already.

Looking down at Shay's body, he saw that he still had that rifle he took from Lawrence Washington all those years ago. He figured he could use that as a walking stick until he could get his leg treated.

Carefully grabbing it, Liam used it to hobble forward through the snow, away from Shay's corpse and towards his near future.

Eventually, Liam came out of the icy caverns and into a clearing, and in the distance he saw Achilles engaged in a fierce swordfight with Haytham Kenway. Blow after blow was exchanged with ferocity, but the Templar Grand Master appeared to have the advantage.

"Achilles!" Liam called out, limping forward as fast as his injured leg would allow him. He lost his sword and pistols in the fall, so he didn't know how he was going to stop Haytham in time.

Haytham had repelled another one of Achilles' strikes, and he used his strength to push back the Assassin Mentor and caused him to fall into the snow. Haytham raised his blade, poised for the kill.

"HEY!" Liam shouted out, and Haytham directed his attention at him instead of Achilles. With little other choice, Liam gripped the rifle by the barrel and attempted to club Haytham with it, but he merely parried the attack with his sword and promptly kicked the Assassin in the chest. He then fell onto the ground and the pain in his leg was excruciating to the point where he couldn't stand.

"You Assassins are a persistent lot, aren't you!?" Haytham taunted as he tried to kill Liam. Before he could, Achilles had gotten up off the ground and was charging at Haytham with a battle cry. The Templar quickly spun around, blocked the attack, capitalized on Achilles' rush to save Liam and disarmed him, and then extended his hidden blade through the bottom of his mouth.

"NOOOOOOOOOO!" Liam screamed, watching as Haytham killed his mentor, the one man he looked up to above all others, the one who trained him and gave him a purpose in this life.

And the Templar cast his body aside like he were nothing.

By the time Haytham turned around to deal with Liam, the latter was holding Shay's rifle and pointing it right at him.

"You cold-hearted bastard," Liam snarled, pulling back the rifle's hammer. Haytham didn't flinch.

Liam pulled the trigger, but no shot came out. The only thing that came out was a resounding "click."

"Shite!" Liam tossed the rifle aside in fury, while Haytham gave a half-smirk to the injured Assassin.

"That is an air rifle, O'Brien," Haytham responded with dry sarcasm, "You won't find bullets inside one of those."

Haytham then drew his pistol from his holster, and remarked, "This one, however, does fire bullets. Perhaps it would do you a great deal of good to better understand how fast one can travel through the human skull."

He directed the gun at Liam, and remarked, "Master Cormac is dead, isn't he?"

Liam did not respond. He let his silence speak for him.

"I see," Haytham remarked solemnly, "A pity. I saw such potential in him."

"I didn't kill him," Liam spoke truthfully.

"Do I look like I give a damn what you have and haven't done!?" Haytham said through gritted teeth, continuing to point the gun at Liam, "Tell me where the Precursor Box is! Now!"

"How should I know?" Liam answered, "Chevalier took it. Shipped it off I know not where."

"And I know not where I should begin eviscerating your pathetic body," Haytham remarked.

"I don't," Liam answered, and he pulled out the Manuscript from the inside of his coat. Haytham raised an eyebrow.

"I know now what these sites are capable of should this fall into the wrong hands," Liam began, "Shay was wrong about many things, but one thing he wasn't wrong about was wanting to see this Manuscript destroyed. Without it, the Box is useless."

"And so do you offer this willingly expecting me to spare your wretched life?" Haytham's head tilted.

"No..." Liam said, tossing the Manuscript towards Haytham's feet, "If you intend to kill me, get on with it then."

Haytham slowly thumbed back the hammer, and pointed it at Liam in silence for a moment.

"I want to. Oh, believe me I want nothing more than to see your Order perish," Haytham began, finger resting on the trigger, "but now you understand what these sites are, and how they are never to be disturbed by Templar or Assassin."

Liam raised a confused eyebrow.

"I spare you so that you can return to whatever is left of your wretched Brotherhood and tell them to abandon the search for the temples indefinitely," Haytham coldly commanded, "It is what Shay would have wanted."

"I suppose you're right," Liam remarked.

Haytham smirked, and then he quickly moved the direction of his pistol from Liam's head to his right leg, and pulled the trigger.

"AAAGH!" Liam cried out in pain, clutching his leg in pain where Haytham had just shot him. If his leg was already broken, he had no idea what lasting damage this could cause him.

"You - sadistic - bastard!" Liam screamed at the Templar, but Haytham was hardly miffed as he holstered his empty weapon.

"Never forget what has happened here today," Haytham ordered, and Liam, blood seeping from his leg, bitterly replied, "I won't, I swear to God!"

"And should you try to raise up the Brotherhood here in the colonies, we will not hesitate to destroy you all once again," Haytham concluded and turned to walk away. After taking a few steps forward, he paused and craned his neck to look at Liam, seething in pain and rage.

"Oh," Haytham exclaimed, "congratulations on the promotion... Mentor."

With that, Haytham resumed walking back towards the Morrigan. Liam watched as the Grand Master boarded the ship, and then it took off again to parts unknown.

After the ship disappeared from sight, Liam looked over towards the body of Achilles. He had saved Liam at the cost of his own life.

"Achilles..." Liam called out, eventually finding the strength to drag himself across the snow closer to his body. The blood from his leg dripped onto the ground, leaving a visible streak of crimson against the soft white snow. He made his way over to Achilles' side, and clutched one of the Mentor's hands in his own.

Liam supposed the only consolation is that now he'd be able to see Abigail and Connor again.

"I'm sorry," Liam began, "For everything... it's my fault for bringing Shay into the Brotherhood. He destroyed us, flaunted our Creed and killed our brothers and sisters."

He raised a hand to close Achilles' eyes.

"You wanted me to be Mentor after you... now I suppose I am," Liam spoke, "But not like this... not like this."

Liam did have tears to spare for this man. Achilles had taught him everything he knew, gave him every skill he had, and set him on the path to safeguarding mankind's freewill.

But it seemed as if the Templars won. Shay's death was of little consequence now; they had destroyed the Brotherhood and taken control of the colonies. And now there seemed no hope of the Assassins rising up again.

As Liam wept for Achilles, it occurred to him that he was the very last of the Colonial Assassins. The last man who knew the training, the teachings, and the tenants of the Creed.

One day, perhaps, Liam would find the strength to build the Brotherhood back up. To rise up against the Templar menace and do to them what they had done.

Liam prayed that day would come soon.