Hey guys - another update. I'm planning to finish this story in the next couple of months. I am also pleased to announce that I will be starting a new Assassin's Creed SYOC once I finish this one. I have been planning it for about... 9 months now? Just coming up with different protagonists, historical figures to include, locations, what equipment they would use etc. Anyway, as you can guess, it's set in London during the Industrial Revolution, but also twenty years after when Assassin's Creed: Syndicate is set, so hopefully I'll have a lot more lee-way when it comes to the story, as I do care very much about the story being canon.

Also, as I've told some of you, each protagonist in my Assassin's Creed stories is an ancestor of one of my characters, Edmund Marlowe (in Assassin's Creed: The Knight's Templar). To clearly outline lots of Edmund's ancestors, I've created a family tree online, consisting of ancestors from the French Revolution, Industrial Revolution, American Revolution and (in time) World War II.

Chapter Three: Le Réveillon Émeutes

27th April 1789

I walked along the rooftop, pulling on my gloves as I examined the ground below. Crowds of people stood in a large congregation, all of them shouting and screaming at the large wooden factory. I couldn't make out any of the words they were saying, but the hostility radiated off them like heat from a fire.

"Another protest? Already?" I looked to Darius.

"Are you surprised? These men earn less than fifteen sous a week," He glanced around to me. "But then again, you never went hungry in your life did you?"

Darius had grown up in the district of Le Bievre - one of decadence and poverty. Since he was a child, he had been accustomed to traversing across Paris, learning which side of the road to walk on, and which merchants wouldn't chase after you if you stole a loaf of bread. He was a fairly withdrawn boy - and I say boy as he could not have been much older than myself.

"No, I didn't. Shall I apologize for that as well?" I asked pointedly. Darius shot a look of distaste at me before pulling up his black beaked hood, which only revealed showed his shadow of stubble along his jaw. I followed suit, pulling up my green hood.

I followed Darius as we ran across the rooftops, vaulting over the cracked chimney pots to get a better vantage point. Eventually, we came to a the roof of a patisserie, where we could examine the courtyard, and the protests that were occurring.

"What are we doing here?" I asked.

"Jean-Baptiste Réveillon," Darius said in a growl, turning around to face me. "Made a statement last Sunday, stating that wages should be cut and the price of bread should be lowered-"

"Wages should be cut?" I asked, outraged by this. "They can barely survive as it is!"

"Oh, I know Monsieur." Darius said with a mocking smile.

"So, what's the mission?"

"You're not an Assassin yet Fillian," Darius reminded me. "You've got no need to know this information. And if you were to be caught," Darius began to circle his glare from the crowds towards me. "Well, who knows what you'd tell under duress."

"You're right, I'm sure they'd be more focused on one man than the screaming crowds outside the factory." I stated, looking down onto said crowds. Darius smirked.

"I suppose that's true," he then turned back to the protest and knelt down, surveying the scene. "Three other demonstrations today were resolved peacefully. We're here to make sure the same thing happens for this one. After the protest, we'll interrogate Réveillon."

"That's it? We're babysitting?"

"Until we're told better, oui." Darius responded, his voice growing stern.

"I thought the Assassins wanted us to think for ourselves? Why are we to follow in blind obedience if that is the case?"

"Why indeed Monsieur?"

I watched as the children marched, their skin hanging off their bones. They had doubtlessly just lost brothers and sisters if not their parents too during the harsh winter that they had barely just survived. And it would all have been for naught, because of men like Réveillon cutting the wages that the poor so heavily depended upon. I looked over to Darius.

"Maybe at ground level, we could have more effect in helping this protest resolve peacefully?"

Darius thought for a moment, and I could see the cogs in his brain coiling and twisting.

"A sound idea." He nodded, and we began to descend from the balconies and cables until we both landed on the dirt.

We moved through the crowds, being careful to make sure no civilian was brandishing a weapon of any kind. I felt sick doing this - as corrupt and immoral as the man who was cutting their wages and letting them die to keep more gold for himself.

I saw a small boy fall to the floor - and no wonder. If I had legs as skeletal as his, I would've fallen to the ground too. I made my way over to him as a soldier knelt down to help him. The soldier had a look of pity on his face - one I saw rarely saw in times like these. The commanding officer then came by, jerking the arm of the officer and puling him back from the boy with a stern look of scolding. He then turned to the boy, who's arm was stretching outwards in a final plea of desperation. One human was asking for help from another, and yet somehow, it was possible for this man to turn his back on the boy.

In a flash, the captain of Réveillon's guard spun around, and the back of his palm connected with the side of the boy's face.

I froze. I no longer felt the warmth of the sun on my chin, I no longer heard the chants of the crowds around me, and I no longer saw the countless others around me - I could only see the officer in front of me and the beaten child.

I began to push aside the men and women around me, making my way over to the man. Was this on the orders of Réveillon too? I didn't care if men and women noticed me or not - the poor of France had been disregarded for too long!

I tensed my arm, flicking my wrist and allowing a small blade to eject from my bracer. I broke into a run towards the man, launching myself up into the air and slicing my blade through the jugular of his throat. Blood spurted from his throat, and began to flood across the dirt of the courtyard. I turned around to his officers who stood there - about a dozen of them, all now training their muskets on me.

"Pour le peuple de France!"

I turned around to see hundreds of men raising their arms before charging towards the soldiers. I allowed myself to drowned by the crowd, looking out to see Darius tugging my arm backwards and pulling me towards the factory.

"Nicely done crétin!" He yelled sarcastically as we disappeared from the chaos below and began to scale the building.

Darius was better at climbing than me, and so he entered through the window first. I slipped inside a couple of seconds afterwards, drawing my sword.

A tall, well-built man was cowering in the corner of the room, utterly terrified at the sight of Darius wielding a long pike, with a strong, sharp axe-face at the end of it.

"Jean-Baptiste Réveillon," Darius introduced the man to me. "Monsieur Réveillon, Monsieur De Sauveterre."

"Is it wise telling him our names?"

"We're the least of his problems." Darius replied. "What's this we've been hearing about cutting wages monsieur?"

"Cutting wages...what?"

"You clearly stated that you intend to cut the wages of your workers." I interjected. "Do men like you find it incomprehendable that the people of France cannot survive on the pitance you pay them?"

"I... I said no such thing!" Réveillon said in a trembling voice.

"You liar-" I took a step forwards.

"I said it was high- too high!" Réveillon recoiled in fear. "The bread - it needed to be lower otherwise people wouldn't be able to eat!"

I grabbed the man by the scruff of his shirt and drew him up to my face, staring him in the eye. I had been brought up beside honest men; Men who lived and died by their honour, who had never lied or cheated once in the time I had known them. I had known the women of Rouen who had helped raise me that had never once shown any form of jealousy or envy for my elevated status. And as I looked in Réveillon's eyes, I saw these people staring back at me.

"Please... don't kill me..." Réveillon whimpered.

The door smashed open off it's hinges, and all three of us know looked towards the hordes of the factory workers fixing their eyes on us, with shavehooks, filling knives and stake-ended paintbrushes.

"Merde!" Darius hissed, before tackling the petrified Réveillon out of the window. I darted over to the window, just in time to see Darius dragging Réveillon out of a pile of hay that had been lying there. It was easily a forty foot drop, and the haystack looked miniscule from where I was standing, but the rabble looked a bit too big.

With a deep breath and a silent prayer to God, I leapt out of the window after Darius and Réveillon, somersaulting and twisting through the air helplessly, until I was caught by the hay, a mere two or three feat above the ground. I lay for a moment, breathing sighs after sighs of relief, before Darius grabbed me by the arm, pulling me away.

Réveillon, Darius and I made our escape through the crowds of soldiers that continued to run towards the factory, until we were a good three miles away from the factory on rooftops. I stopped, turning around to look back at the factory, and was greeted only be a sight of smoke and fire from where the factory used to be. Screams echoed across this city and resonated through my ears and across my conscience.

Réveillon had never intended to lower the wages, only the cost of food. Our information had undoubtedly been manipulated, and I had acted upon it, and this was what I had wrought - death and destruction. Absolute and utter chaos.

"Still think you can call yourself an Assassin yet crétin?" Darius muttered to me as he stood by my side.

"I thought they were going to die-"

"This is why we act on the orders of our Mentors. When some sanctimonous sot decides to act upon his own impulses, he puts everyone at risk." He shook his head, the anger seething off his voice, which was drenched in distaste. "You think you know better because you grew up in a fancy house with a Mentor as your dad compared to us peasants?" He walked over to me, his nose an inch from my ear as he enunciated each word that stabbed at me like a knife.

"Our creed - our first tenet: Stay your blade from the flesh of an innocent." He pointed over to the fire in the distance. "Your doing. Every death in today is on *your* shoulders." He jabbed a finger into my chest.

Hope you guys enjoyed - I re-wrote this chapter a couple of times, and I'm still not wholly happy with it, but I figured that I can always re-post it if I need to. Anyway, I'm afraid no-one guessed this chapter would happen. I am, however, going to make a habit of teasing the next chapter to you all. So, here is your next clue (though it's a bit obvious):

Lorde.

Also, please leave a review about:

Fillian

Darius

The Chapter

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Detailed reviews are very helpful and do act as an incentive for me to write quicker - I have the week off, but I also have a lot of exams coming up, so I'll try to write and upload another chapter. Until then, stay tuned.

R.