It was crowded in the room-marketplace-palace-too crowded for him to breathe. "Go away! Go, get lost!" He remembered, he remembered how to figure out who he was. Count the fingers. Ten. Close the eyes. Feel the face. Clean-shaven. Feel the hair. Short. This was a good thing. He was Desmond, and he was going to open his eyes and ask for some excedrin and maybe some junk food.

A man deserved donuts on his way to saving the world, after all.

He opened his eyes.

Two men stared down at him, faces almost identical but for the color, clad in similar jackets and hats.

He squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them again. Nope, still there. The younger man looked suspicious, the older one pitying. Okay, this was definitely a bad day for his brain. He re-counted his fingers extra slowly. Still ten. Five looked a bit overcooked, though. Face, still smooth. Hair, still short. Wait, what if-nope, everything looked normal under his shirt. But the two men were still there, now both looking slightly confused. Which was nothing compared to how Desmond felt.

"What's your name, lad?" asked the older man, gently. Okay, this was really Bizarro Land. The only good thing was that the younger man seemed to agree with that assessment.

Desmond wasn't sure how to reply, or even if he really was Desmond. "Umm..."

"I think that you are some other bastard son of my father's that he has helped stow away on my ship for evil purposes, but he thinks it more likely that you are a man named Altaïr from many years ago, somehow appearing out of nowhere."

Desmond rubbed his eyes, confused. How did one respond to that? "Your father's right, it is more likely."

"I told you so, son."

"How is that possible?!"

"I'm not actually Altaïr, today anyway. But I..." How could you explain the Bleeding Effect? How could you explain the Animus? DNA? How could he explain it all to his ancestors, starting with the fact that they were his ancestors?

"So some days you are Altaïr and some days you are not." Connor's voice was flat, agreeing with the madman to keep him quiet.

"Connor! Be nicer to him, he's been tortured. You wouldn't believe it if you'd seen it."

"And how have you seen it, Father? Were you the one torturing him?"

"No, I... it was in a dream. Many dreams. Dreams I've had longer than you've been alive."

"Then it cannot have been this man, can it? He has few scars for having been tortured for more than two decades."

Haytham frowned, puzzled. "He has always looked this age."

Desmond spoke up, hoarsely. "I'm from the future."

"Of course you are. That is why you are not Altaïr today, because he is from the past and you are from the future. Perhaps tomorrow you will be Ezio Auditore!"

Desmond shrugged. "Maybe. He's pretty badass too."

Connor glared at Haytham. "Is this what you are trying to do to me? Drive me so mad that I end up like him?" With that he turned and stomped out, muttering something in his native tongue.

Desmond asked Haytham, "What does he have against New Jersey? I mean, there's no turnpike yet, Newark doesn't have a sketchy airport, Rutgers doesn't yet have a reputation for bullying, and Snooki is like negative two hundred years old still."

Haytham's voice was strained. "I am not going to ask you what any of that meant, but how did you understand him?"

Desmond gulped. "Um, listen, I'm really tired, what with all the time traveling and you almost shanking me and me setting my hand on fire. And it's a really, really long story and it'll probably piss you off a lot." He determinedly closed his eyes.

"Were you being tortured in that chair?"

"You could call it that. Haytham, I'm really tired-"

"The people torturing you, putting you in that, that machine. Were they Templars? Or assassins?"

"Both, actually."

"Ah." A pause. "How typical." The words were barely audible, so loaded with loathing that Desmond felt sick-the pain in every careful inflection overwhelmed him so. "Well, sleep well, lad. You're safe now." And just like that, Haytham's voice was gentle again.

Desmond kept his eyes shut-he had no hope of figuring out how to get out of this situation, this whole century, if he had to invent his story on the fly, trying to keep out of whatever dungeons they threw crazy people in during the American Revolution. Obviously the greatest threat to him right now was Connor, who didn't want to give him the benefit of any doubt-

Was Haytham fucking Kenway actually tucking him in?

And despite his best efforts to stay awake and plan, he fell asleep immediately