I've already said that I'm terrible at updating and everything. I am of the sorry. It doesn't help that my girlfriend is currently back and we're basically remodelling the whole apartment. So yeah. My bad. Chapter 19 of Weapons Pointed at the Enemy is coming REAL soon. Like, 2-3 hours after this is published soon. So. Yeah.

Thanks Alsodef for hunting my ass on finishing this chapter and thanks all of you guys who have reviewed / followed / favorited the story. It's an experiment, but me and Alsodef are -VERY- confident you guys will like this story. So just keep holding on.

Just a quick message. I / We appreciate any and all feedback you give us, so please don't hesitate to do so. Also, poke Vera at any and all opportunities to tell him to "Update plz", he'll like that. (Note from Vera: Goddamn you.)

Hope you enjoy this chapter, I know I enjoyed writing it. :D

-Alsodef

The target had been some no-name. A merchant who helped the Templars with their weaponry. It had been no surprise that he was paid a lot to exclusively supply them. But, it also made him part of them, or at the very least he had hoped so.

Carefully Blake walked closer and closer to the panicked merchant, making sure not to make any sound.

"Please! Someone help! They're following me!" the merchant screamed desperately. But there was no way in or out the alley, the traps, already in place, made sure of that. There were a lot of dead bodies around the merchant already, even though she had only just loaded into the memory. It was odd, but probably the work of her friends at the order, who was at one of its power peaks at the time of this memory. It was several years before the terrible purge by the Templars, where they had killed a large amount of assassins. Speaking of Templars, some were still standing...

She stepped over the corpses of the last two guards defending him, flicking her weapon once to wind it back in its sheath, and looked the merchant in his eyes.

There would be no witnesses in this alleyway, so there was only one last thing to do. Carefully Blake moved her ring finger, unlocking the mechanism of the hidden blade and sliding the blade forward. A few quick steps and it was over, the blade lodged deeply in his neck as a gurgle left his lips.

Carefully Blake laid him down, the surroundings slowly fading to the familiar neutral animus environment, leaving her and the merchant alone.

"I never meant for people to get hurt." he labored through pained breaths.

Blake held her tongue, merely looking at the merchant as he stared at her, fear apparent in his eyes.

Slowly she watched life fading away from his body, as she let go of him gently, making him just another body amongst the dead in the alley. When she looked up and the surroundings returned, she saw three other assassins stand close to her, their traditional garbed highlighted with three distinct colors. The small woman with the large scythe was highlighted with red, the woman with the rapier was highlighted with an icy light blue and the last, taller woman with yellow bracelets was highlighted with yellow highlights. Suddenly Blake realized, that this was not her memory alone.

Left foot, left arm, right foot, right arm. Three out of four, Ruby. Three out of four. This wasn't her first mission, nor was it her first mission that involved tracking. But Ruby found herself often needing to repeat the motions in her head. She knew that Summer, whose live she was living right now, was an elite by now, but that didn't mean that all that climbing came naturally to her. Anyway, she had been desynchronised quite enough times while climbing in the past, but she thought herself at least decent by now.

Grasping the edge of the roof, she pulled up with half a flip, looking it over in a search for enemy guards. There were no guards on her current roof, but she spotted two on the next roof, idly chatting among themselves. She huffed, even Ruby knew that was a foolish thing to do. Not that she minded at this moment though. Enhancing her speed, she ran towards the edge, and took the jump.

For a few moments, she felt the magical feeling of flying through open air, seeing the streets below her, and feeling the air rush straight into her face. It only took two seconds, yet one of the guards noticed her just before she landed. Before he could shout a warning however, Ruby's hands clasped around the staff on her back, and slashed towards both of her opponents. During the slash, the nasty part of her weapon showed itself, turning the staff into a deadly scythe. The raised blade that the closest guard tried to block her with proved useless, as the weight and speed of the scythe forced it down, carving a red stripe over and through his chest. The other guard was fumbling with his weapon, shooting Ruby distraught looks while attempting to get himself and his steel out of the clutch. Another swing of the scythe ended his struggles, and with nothing louder than a whimper, he fell on the ground, clutching his chest. In a fast move, Ruby grabbed the collar of the guard she killed first, preventing it from falling down the roof.

She peered down on the square. Their target was speaking with another merchant, unaware of the imminent danger. Focussing deeply, she enhanced her eyes in the way many assassins were capable of. It allowed her to gather and process information much faster, and notice more. From what she could see with her enchanted sight, she spotted eight guards belonging to the bodyguard of the merchant, and three guards who just patrolled over the market square.

Intel they had gathered over the past three days told them that he would be meeting with the Templars. Ruby, or rather Summer, was doing a final scouting run to search for traps, and find out which of the meeting places their target would pick. Seeing as he was here now, this made the templar base near the harbor the most logical spot. Ruby smiled, she knew enough. Now it would be up to Weiss and Yang.

Weiss waited patiently near a group of monks, making sure she blended in as much as possible with her hood up. The intel had been solid and she had hoped Ruby, or rather her ancestor Summer, could confirm it. If she wouldn't get any signal, it would be solid and the plan would continue.

Weiss had planned ahead and made sure the glyphs her ancestor, Winter, used were placed already. They weren't visible, all it would take is for the target to make the right turn and her to activate them.

After a few more moments, Weiss found her patience to run thin. The target should've been here already. Gently she tapped her fingers on the hilt of the weapon of her ancestor, a beautiful rapier she had become quite versed in using after many months of fencing training both in and outside the animus.

She looked down the street from the town square, where target would be coming from. Finally the guards turned the corner, causing Weiss to sigh in relief. Shortly after that the target came into view. Weiss kept her head level, knowing her task would soon be complete, provided their route was the one they anticipated.

Finally, the entourage of the merchant made their way into the alley. Weiss quickly stood up and slid into the shadows behind them. After the merchant had made it's way to the middle of the single-way alley, Weiss triggered the traps, causing large ice-spikes to block the exits. Keeping to the shadows, it was now time for Yang to start her beatdown.

Yang smirked. Below her, the guards and their target realised that they were in trouble. She jumped down, not wasting any more time, and got to work. As usual, the parts that required more finesse were left to Ruby and Weiss, or Summer and Winter, as her ancestor called them in these memories. Her right blade embedded itself in the neck of one of the poor guards, piercing multiple large blood vessels, by the looks of it. Yang continued her spin, dodged a thrust of her next target, and pushed both her hidden blades through his chest. Most of the guards were now aware of where the danger was coming from, and went to encircle her. Yang smirked again, this was proving to be much more fun than the standard memories she had gone through thus far.

"Yaah! Yaah! Huff! Yaah!" Three punches, interrupted by one block. One dead Templar, one with a broken arm and a dropped blade. Half a second later, he joined his former comrade on the ground. It appeared to be the last guard that was still standing, but where was the merchant? In all the ruckus, he had apparently fled further down the alley, now standing near one of the walls of ice, two Templars still accompanying him, both with blades drawn. The rest of the alley was littered with bodies. Seeing that there was nothing else moving near her, she strode towards the merchant, bearing both her hidden blades.

*Warning, Leaving Memory, Desynchronisation Imminent.*

"What the…" Yang spoke aloud. Was this a glitch? Why couldn't she enter the next part of the alley? Had she failed?"

Next to her, Ruby, or Summer, jumped down from one of the roofs. "You seeing this Rubes?"

"Hmhmm, I have the same. Any idea as to what is going on here Weiss?" Summer spoke, just as much at loss at the situation as Yang.

"Girls, look!" Weiss spoke up, pointing down the alleyway. What they saw was hard to describe. There was a black mess of numbers, and rifts of some sort. It was hard to make sense of, but both the guards dropped dead, and the merchant followed several moments later, grasping at his neck. Suddenly, the barrier dropped, and all three of the girls found themselves in the white Animus Environment. The merchant spoke to the black cloud, and died. Around them, the memory faded, and Yang opened her eyes to the familiar sight of electronic screens and data just inches away from her face. Next to her, the new research assistant pushed a button, sliding the screen to the left.

Shaking her head, Yang climbed off the Animus. Next to her, Ruby and Weiss were going through the exact same. The director was nowhere to be seen, so Yang addressed the new girl first. "Hey, Belle was it? Do you have any idea as to what happened just now? It looked super weird…"

The girl seated on a desk in the same room as their Animus machines were located shook her head, and answered with a short shake of her head, furiously typing on her computer, probably already looking for the cause of the problem. Yang didn't know all that much about computer technology, and she doubted if she could be of any help. Still, she walked over to the desk, and looked at what Belle was doing.

Crap! Crap! Crap! Blake thought to herself as her fingers quickly hammered on the keys of the animus console. How are these memories still active with 'that' part in it?!

"Can I.. uh.. Do anything to help?" Yang stated again.

Yes, but if I told you, you'd be killed! Blake mentally yelled at Yang.

"No. I think it's best if you three wait for the official escort back to your rooms. Which, I suspect, will be shortly." Blake said, maintaining her calm voice and posture even though there was chaos and panic in her mind.

The blonde peered at Blake for a moment, causing Blake's heart to skip a beat as she looked right back at her. Does she know? Remember Blake, don't react. Keep calm.

"You have the strangest eyes. Sorry. I just, never seen someone with eyes like yours." Yang said, laughing a little and smiling.

Inside, Blake sighed a breath of relief. "Well, thank you for the compliment, I guess." Blake said dryly.

Much to her relief, the doors opened and three security officers walked in. "Alright ladies, you know the deal. Let's get you back to the common-room. You'll have to stay there until we've got this fixed." the main guard said, smiling as he spoke.

"Oh come on!" Ruby whined as she walked after Weiss and Yang to the hallway outside the Animus Centre.

Blake sighed a real breath of relief now as she accessed the memory banks of abstergo and pulled the memory block to her computer. Examining it, the corruption of the file itself was clear. But the boundaries they had set up in advance of her undercover mission turned out to be not fully functional. Already Blake saw the memories inside the DNA of Ruby, Weiss and Yang begin to repair the memory, leaving a glitched version of the full memory instead of a cut-off version.

Blake felt a lump in her throat at the realization. Either they needed to continue to corrupt the memory blocks or Blake needed to speed up the plan.

This plan was supposed to take months. Looking at this, it might be weeks.. Damnit. Blake thought to herself.

A harsh cough broke Blake from her thought, seeing the director stand next to her. "Do you have a report on what's happened?"

"Yes. It appears that some of the memories in the bank are corrupted. But it seems that exposure of the subjects with the memories has managed to uncorrupt them due to implementation of the original ancestors' memories. I'm sure that if we continue as planned, we'll find what we're looking for." Blake said.

"Good. Keep up with the work then. I want to have the system ready tomorrow again." the director stated again and the hiss of the door meant that Blake was alone again.

I need to find a solution for this, and fast. Blake thought.

Two years earlier…

"Qrow, we have a situation…" Blake started the moment she ended the synchronisation and the Animus process. "I saw others, Bella was involved with a squad, and I saw other assassins in the bright white of the Animus. You know, when Bella was talking to the merchant."

Qrow looked up from his book, left eyebrow raised, and gave her a curious expression. "An assassin squad? That's odd. I never read any records of Belladonna being in a squad like that. What did they look like? Any specific features you could spot?"

Blake nodded once as she walked over to the computer next to the Animus. "Yes, although it was short, and they were standing behind Bella. There were three of them, and they wore clothes in the same style as Bella. You know, Assassin Style, easily recognisable and all that."

Qrow smirked at her words, knowing how much this irritated Blake. To think that a hidden guild that was fighting an underground and undercover war against a larger enemy would wear clothes that basically beamed their affiliation into the wide world. He signalled Blake to go on, to which his protege turned the computer screen around.

"Here, red, white and yellow. Faces hidden below the cloak, as is Bella's. You have any idea who these people are Qrow?"

"No, I do not. I guess we'll have to put our researches to work again, and dive into the books ourselves as well. Anyway, we're done with the Animus for today. Let's grab a swift lunch, and then you can head over to the library, while I go and deliver the report of this to the Mentor."

Locking her account once again, and after double checking it, Blake followed her mentor towards the exit of the underground lab, her mind occupied by this recent development.