Chapter 3: Solo Flight

Fanfiction by TerinAngel and FlameStar66

Chapter by FlameStar66

Disclaimer:

Neither TerinAngel nor FlameStar66 own Assassin's Creed. This fanfiction has been made strictly for entertainment purposes, not for profit.

Authors Notes:

Hey, I'm back, as promised! Thank you for all who are reading, reviewing, and favoriting this, we do appreciate it!

So, this one's hint: Desmond follows Ezio, and is caught by Frederico... for a small period of time.

R&R! Thankies!

The following day, after a scathing reminder from Paola to not cause any trouble, Desmond was back on the rooftops of Florence. "Now, what to do...?" Desmond asked himself as he crouched on the edge of a roof. He could barely hear a call for guards out in the distance, and Desmond smacked himself on the forehead. "I knew it," he groaned, shoulders slumping in defeat.

Ezio had to be caught by Christina's father after tumbling with her. Maria must be having a conniption fit.

Desmond was on the move towards the Palazzo before the cry even ended. Ezio's next move would be to go back home, and Desmond wanted to get there first. He, for once, just ran across the roofs without attracting attention, and managed it rather quickly. The tiles were barely clacking now as his feet were lightly tapping against them, using mostly his stronger leg muscles to push him along the roofs. He guessed that if anyone noticed him, they would see mostly a man-shaped blur of white and light blue. Desmond drew his eyebrows together as he neared the Palazzo, remembering what was going to happen that night.

Now came the important question: If his appearance hasn't changed anything in this time period, then could he push his luck and change what was going to happen? And even then, would he even be able to?

A flash of the hanging appeared in front of Desmond's eyes, and he clearly heard Ezio's heartbroken cry: "Padre!"

He gulped once he reached the buildings surrounding the Palazzo. The memory scared him, and Desmond made up his mind, making the hardest decision of his life:

He would do ANYTHING to stop that from happening.

Desmond was pulled away from his dark thoughts as he heard an angry female voice yell, "Giovanni Auditore! Your son!" He had reached Palazzo de Auditore sooner than expected.

Desmond came to a total stop as Giovanni asked, "Which one who would get in trouble? I have two."

"Ezio! Do you realize what he did last night?"

"My love," Desmond settled down, a small smile forming on his lips, "I realize that he should not be getting into fights with the Pazzi, but... I must say that I am quite proud of him."

Silence reigned for a second, and then Maria Auditore blew up again:

"Oh, so he got in a fight with the Pazzi last night also?!"

"Ah, what exactly were you talking about, my love?"

"His late night visit to Christina's?" Desmond held back a snort; oh, so this was why Giovanni confronted Ezio?

"Ah. I will discuss this with him -"

"You will discuss both of them with him, Giovanni Auditore. And I do not want to hear anything along the lines of a complement come from your lips."

Giovanni paused before saying, "Yes, my love."

Desmond had to bite his lip to keep himself from laughing. He had figured that Maria had a small influence on how the Auditore's were raised, but he did not think that she was in charge of the way it runs; Giovanni had sounded afraid of her! And he was a Master Assassin, who should not really be scared easily!

...Maria had him wrapped around her pinky finger.

Speaking of the Maestro, he just walked into the courtyard, and into the entrance of the Palazzo. Desmond knew what was going to happen next, and shifted slightly to a more comfortable position so he would not lose blood flow to his legs. That would be fairly important.

He had finally just figured that, since he was not in Ezio's mind, he most certainly was not in his memories, either. So, for now, Desmond would just shadow Ezio while he does his errands.

His ancestor had just arrived outside of the Palazzo, and Desmond held back a grin at the tentative voice Ezio used when he greeted Giovanni. Unfortunately, Desmond was slightly out of hearing distance to listen in much. He slowly moved closer to the entrance so he could hear more clearly. In doing so, he spotted Maria standing in the corner.

Giovanni had just started speaking again, and what Desmond heard caused that grin to come back out. "It... It..." Giovanni sighed and continued, "It reminds me of how I was at your age." Desmond tuned out the small conversation between the two male Auditore to glance over at Maria. He could see from the distance he was at the tenseness in her jaw, and Maria's eyes were squeezed tightly shut.

Giovanni was doomed. Simple as that.

Desmond sat on his haunches, waiting for Ezio to leave on the letter delivery to Lorenzo de'Medici. He was just going to have to shadow his ancestor for a while until he came up with an idea of how to stop... THAT... from happening. He heard the door open, and Desmond slid out of sight as, a few seconds later, Ezio joined him on the roofs. The little devil seemed focused on his job, however, and did not notice Desmond watching him before following. Golden eyes glanced into the courtyard below and noticed that Maria was walking determinedly into the Palazzo proper. A smirk graced his scarred lips again, and he reached back to bring his hood up over his head.

'Yeah,' Desmond thought as he refocused on shadowing Ezio, 'definitely doomed.'

The trip itself was rather uneventful, Ezio sticking to the roofs predominately before dropping down to lure the Pazzi thugs away from de'Medici's. Desmond concealed himself behind a lower roof's chimney, waiting for Ezio to reach the "checkpoint" outside of the Medici building. After receiving the news that Lorenzo had left early, Ezio returned again to the roofs. This time, however, five of the Pazzi followed him up to Ezio's home ground. Desmond gritted his teeth as Ezio froze. Of course, the Pazzi would find Ezio up here.

The bantering between the Pazzi and Ezio was short; Ezio stated several times that he did not have time to mess around with them. However, the Pazzi thugs ignored his comments and just started swinging. Ezio managed to slip away, but Desmond felt the need to stop their pursuit of his Florentine ancestor. He pressed against the chimney, taking a deep breath before slipping out of his hiding spot.

The closest Pazzi thug's nose soon became well acquainted with Desmond's fist; the next, his crotch met Desmond's knee. The American turned to face the last three Pazzi to see them scrambling off the roof. Desmond smirked before following Ezio back to the Palazzo. The Florentine seemed slightly confused that he was "not being followed," because he kept glancing behind him. However, eventually, especially once they had reached the Palazzo, Ezio just shrugged and seemed to just think that they had given up on the chase after a while.

Oh, how he was wrong.

Desmond stayed on the roofs as Ezio left them, traveling to his home on the streets for a little bit. Frederico was standing in the courtyard next to the door to the Palazzo proper, and Desmond thought he had been doing a good job of staying out of sight. In fact, he only glanced away from Frederico for one second, just long enough to conceal himself better, and the next second the elder Auditore seemed to disappear. A sigh of relief escaped Desmond, and he foolishly sat up on the roofs.

"Escusa, but I do believe that I have seen you before. May I ask what your purpose is, on my family's roof?"

Desmond felt his shoulders stiffen slightly. 'Shit,' he thought, taking a deep breath to steady himself. He slowly turned his head around, lucky that his hood was still up from earlier. Yep, it was Frederico behind him. He was screwed.

"Ah, mi dispiace, but I do not think we have met. I was… just stopping to rest for a few seconds." Desmond stood and slowly backed off. "As you can see, I'm done, so… I will just take my leave." Desmond whirled around and started running.

"Cazzo!" he heard Frederico curse quietly before the tapping of feet following him started. Desmond's mind fell into survival mode, and he was soon focused on trying to lose Frederico, while not killing himself.

It took a while, but eventually, after jumping from roof to roof and finally winding up on another Palazzo's roof, the telltale footsteps stopped following him. Desmond glanced behind him, just to check if it was just his imagination.

He was in the clear. Desmond sighed, and then promptly ran into a solid, distinctly male body.

"You are not from around here, otherwise you would have known there was a shortcut a few roofs down," Frederico stated calmly, as if he was not just basically run over by Desmond. The American backed up, his eyes wide and staring right at Frederico. "Now then, why don't we try that again, shall we? And no more running," Frederico demanded, giving Desmond a hard glare that reminded him of Giovanni. Desmond gulped, having not thought that he would run into the man before him so soon.

"Ah, yeah. That does sound like a good idea; but…" Desmond glanced down, noticing a Leap of Faith point to his right. "…I don't exactly feel like sticking around. So, see you!" Desmond bolted to his right, jumping off the roof and allowing himself to land into the haystack below. He caught a curse fall from Frederico's lips as he fell, and he could tell that a question was asked of his location.

Desmond brought up his Eagle Vision and scanned for a crowd of people to approach the haystack he was in. A small group was, luckily, walking straight towards his location, and Desmond jumped out of the haystack as they passed. He received an odd look from one of the males in the group, and Desmond gave him a shy smile and chuckle. "Aah," the unknown male said knowingly, and Desmond was soon off of his mind completely. He stuck with the crowds surrounding him, and was soon rounding a corner around the group of buildings Frederico had chased him to.

'Hope he does not spot me again,' Desmond thought as he slowly walked away. 'Now, for a weapon…'