Elijah is feeling better than usual when he takes everyone else from Ezio's hideout to their next destination. He's slept well, in a place that feels safe, surrounded by people that are definitely on his side. He hadn't even dreamed during the night, and he's ready to face whatever this new time period has to throw it them.

Or at least… that's the plan.

This time, for whatever reason, something goes wrong. Not with the apple, but with Elijah. In his head, and at the worst possible time. Or maybe that's a bad way to put it because they're outside of time when it happens, almost but not quite to their next destination. Maybe it's the dreams he's been having, finally reaching into the waking world, corrupting him the way the Sage in Egypt had warned him it would.

Maybe, this is inevitable.

It comes at him like a flood, the knowing (of knowing someone else, knowing him inside and out), washing over him and washing him away. He screams at the pain of it, as a thousand red hot daggers seem to pierce through his mind. He lets go of everything, loses focus, loses, loses, loses…

"Elijah!"

He's a million floating points of light in a void of nothingness—he can't let go of the apple but it's power is streaming through him, overwriting him, and the next thing he's aware of is falling, for what seems like a very long time, into darkness.

And then there is light, and he hits the ground with a thud that shakes him all the way to his bones. For a long, confused minute he just sits where he is, concentrating on breathing, trying to pull himself back together.

He's in a forest somewhere. There are trees all around him, and overhead, somewhere, a bird of pretty circling. It's a bright day, beautiful, with a sky so blue he could drown in it, and the shock of being here after the nothingness of before is so great that it's all he can do for the moment to simply exist.

An indeterminate amount of time later, he hears footsteps, and a man (a boy, really, although his face is so serious that the label doesn't seem to fit) appears in his field of vision. "Are you alright?" he asks.

A good question, and one he's not sure how to answer. He's not going into detail now though, not with a stranger. "Yes," he says, and when the man offers him a hand, he takes it.

"Are you hurt?"

"No," he says, which seems true enough, despite the odds. There's no broken bones, just a few bruises and sore spots. "Just a little… lost."

The man seems to consider him for a long moment before nodding. "I live on a homestead," he says. "About a mile in that direction." He doesn't point, but jerks his head slightly to one side. "There is an inn. You're welcome to stay for the night, if you need a place to rest."

It's more kindness than he would have expected from someone he's never seen before, but he does need a place to rest, and get his bearings, so he nods. "Thank you."

"I was heading back myself," the man says. "I'll take you there." He starts walking, without pausing to make sure he's being followed. "My name is Connor, by the way."

"Connor," he echoes. "Nice to meet you."

"And your name?"

"Aita."

-/-

When Elijah has his… his fit, or whatever it is, the rest of them are blown back and away from him, falling back into normal time, but separated. It's all Layla can do to grab Elina's wrist (and even then, it's only because Elina happens to be closest) and hang on tight as they fall. She doesn't see what happens to Elijah, or to Amunet or Khemu, for that matter, and then a second later they're slamming into the ground in the middle of what looks like a revolutionary war reenactment (only not a reenactment, because nope, nope, that would make way too much sense, this is time travel so it's the actual revolutionary war, probably).

Elina squeaks like an injured bird as they hit cobblestone, bouncing and rolling several feet away, but Layla is heavier and skids along the street, stopping just short of a gutter.

She lies there for a moment, face down, and questions her life choices.

The people around them are speaking English—mostly—which sounds definitely old fashioned but still understandable. Which is kind of a shame, because Layla isn't in the mood to hear the grumpy old man a few feet away declare her a demon, or the little girl down the street shriek that she's just jumped off a roof and can she fly like a bird, Mamma, can she?

Elina gets up while Layla is still contemplating rolling into the gutter and just staying there indefinitely, although Layla isn't aware of it until she feels hands on her shoulder, shaking her carefully.

"Are you okay?" Elina asks. "Are you… anything broken?"

And Layla reminds herself that she's supposed to be the adult here, and forces herself to stand up. "I'm fine," she assures Elina, and checks the girl out for injuries, just in case. Her face is a little beat up, she's bleeding slightly, but it doesn't look like anything too serious. "We should get off the street," she mutters, looking around at the slowly growing crowd that seems to have decided they're the day's entertainment.

"Yea," Elina says, sounding relieved. "Please."

So Layla puts her arm over Elina and guides her off the street, into the closest alleyway, and…

And right into the man that's standing there, waiting for them. Layla backs up a step, eyeing him warily. She recognizes from the symbols on his clothes that he's a Templar, but that doesn't bother her much. She works for Templars, and Elina's father is a Templar—not the worst thing in the world.

"I'm going to go out on a limb here," the man says. "And guess that you're time travelers?"

Layla narrows her eyes at him, but her suspicion only makes him laugh.

"My name's Shay," he says. "Shay Cormac. I'm familiar with the idea."

"Oh," Elina says, and her voice instantly takes on the tone of bored teenagers everywhere. "Dad talks about you all the time. And you helped with Juno."

"Yes," Shay says, and Layla relaxes. If he'd helped stop Juno, he'll understand why they need to stop Aita too.

"Can you help us get off the street then?" she asks. "We sort of… crash landed."

He raises his eyebrows, but a certain twitchiness around his mouth betrayed his amusement. "That must have been… quite a sight," he says.

"We lost everyone else too," Elina said, and Shay looked down at her, smile fading.

"There were more people with you?" he asks.

"Elijah, Khemu, and Amunet," she says. "We were all coming through time together, and then…" Her face creases with worry. "Elijah had a sort of fit, and we all got separated."

"Come back with me," Shay says. "And I'll start putting feelers out to see if we can find them."

Layla lets out a breath. Well, that could have gone a lot worse, to be honest.

-/-

Khemu slams into something wooden (a railing, maybe?). It hits him right in the stomach and he gives a horrible, pained grunt before sliding backwards and falling another several feet before hitting—

Water.

Khemu gasps (which hurts) and fights to focus on where he is and what he's doing before he drowns. His head is a mess of worry where is he and why is he drowning and where are his friends and what happened to Elijah but he flails and kicks off his gym shoes and just barely manages to keep his head up above water.

"Man overboard!" Somebody shouts, and there's a distant sound of running feet and commotion from the—well, from the ship he'd hit on the way down. Khemu, bobbing up and down in the water, sort of flails a bit to look around and try and figure out where he is.

And the answer, he's alarmed to see, is the middle of the ocean. There's no sight of land around anywhere, and the only ship Khemu can see is the one he'd hit. Luckily, they seem willing to fish him out.

Once he's been hauled up, Khemu's willing to admit that he sort of spaces out a little. When he peels off his sopping wet T-shirt (it sticks out, and half the men on the ship are bare chested anyway) he sees a truly brutal looking bruise starting to form across most of his stomach.

"Ow," he mumbles at one point, and someone laughs—a man with hands that feel like they're approximately the size of Khemu's head wraps clean-ish bandages around him, and then at some point he's being helped across the ship's deck to a set of stairs leading down to the… hull? Is that the right ship term? Khemu's vaguely wondering about that when he happens to glance up, and sees the flag flying proud and high from the mast. He doesn't need to know much about ships to recognize a pirate's flag when he sees it.

Which kind of blows his mind a little bit.

He's not exactly locked up, but it's pretty obvious that he's being strongly encouraged to stay below deck until someone figures out what to do with him. Khemu sits on a worn out stool, trying not to wobble too much even though none of the three legs are the same height. He ends up focusing on that so much that he almost misses the new man (pirate, oh God he's a pirate) heading down toward him. He's surprisingly quiet, considering who he is and where they are, and his smile sort of reminds Khemu of Ezio's—genuinely cheerful but with an undercurrent of danger. Only Khemu knows Ezio isn't going to hurt them, and he doesn't even know who this guy is.

"Uh," Khemu says. "Hey."

So that's… okay, that's one way to start a conversation with a pirate. Not… the best way, probably… probably one of the worst ways, really.

"You fell out of the sky," the pirate says, which kind of makes Khemu feel better because it's almost as awkward as what he'd said.

"Yea," he says and then, on a whim, because he's stranded in the middle of nowhere in a time that—that he doesn't even know, like what century is this? Because of that, he says, "I was travelling through time, and then something bad happened, and we all got separated."

The man looks genuinely, almost insultingly amused by that. He laughs, showing slightly yellow teeth, and Khemu crosses his arms. "It's true," he insists. "I know it sounds crazy, but how else do you explain how I got here? There's nothing around for miles."

"Well—" He tilts his head sideways, and Khemu has the idea that for the first time, he's being taken seriously. "You raise a good point there."

"Seriously," Khemu says. "Ask me anything. I have no idea where or when I am. Like… I pretty much know I'm on a boat in the middle of the ocean, and that's it."

"Ship."

"What?"

"It's called a ship," the man says. "And if you're going to stay here, you might as well start by learning all the right words."

"I'm staying?" Khemu asks.

"There's nowhere else to go, unless you feel like taking a long swim. And we can always use an extra pair of hands. Besides." Again there's that flash of serious consideration in his eyes. "Maybe I'm a bit curious. Maybe I want to be the only pirate captain in the Caribbean with a time traveler on his ship."

He holds out a hand, and Khemu eyes it for a second before letting himself be pulled up and to his feet.

"I'm Edward Kenway," the man says. "And this ship is my Jackdaw."

Edward Kenway. Khemu knows that name—this is one of the people Elijah and the Sage from Egypt had said they needed to gather together to stop Aita. So… maybe there is a reason he's here, because what are the odds that he would just… show up right in front of exactly the person he needs to see?

"Khemu," he says.

"Khemu from the future," Edward says cheerfully. "I'll make sure someone shows you the ropes." His eyes flick down to Khemu's bandaged torso. "And then get some rest," he adds. "It's no good for any of us if you stay hurt."

"Okay," Khemu says. "I…" He just doesn't know what else to say. "Okay," he says again, and leaves it at that.

-/-

Amunet is still relatively new to time travel. Everyone else seems to have some understanding of how it works, but she still feels like she's running to catch up. And now, worryingly, she's alone in a place she does not know.

Well, almost alone. She has Senu, and some part of Aya (Amunet—all these years later and she still can't completely shed her past) is grateful to have the eagle with her. She understands Senu better than any of the people around her.

There's no Khemu or Layla or Elijah—there's no one around that she can talk to.

It's going to be a real struggle to figure out where she's ended up, and how to get back. "Alright, Senu," Amunet says. They're on the edges of the city where she'd fallen to Earth, skirting around the people that looked at her like she was a threat. "What do we do now?"

She's not expecting an answer, but Senu gives her one. The bird chirps in a way that almost forces Amunet's mind into the past. To their home in Siwa, when Khemu was a baby and Bayek was just starting to bring this odd little bird home with him.

She follows as Senu flaps her wings and takes off, gliding leisurely away, sort of perpendicular to the city itself. Amunet has no idea where they're going, but Senu clearly does. Her path doesn't waver at all, not until she comes to… well, not the kind of person Amunet would have expected. He's a stony faced rock wall of a man, whose face looks like it might never have seen a smile. But he seems to at least recognize Senu, and Amunet sees a flash of surprise on his face before he notices her as well, and he schools his expression into something haughty and somehow difficult to read.

He says something, in what might possibly be English. Amunet hasn't heard enough of it yet to be able to recognize the sound of it, but she half thinks she recognizes the cadence. And it doesn't matter anyway. English or not, she doesn't speak it. "I can't understand you," she tells him flatly, knowing that he won't under stand her Egyptian either. It doesn't matter, because he seems to get the general idea that they're not going to be able to understand each other.

Senu looks back and forth between the two of them, and chirps in what almost seems like a bossy tone. "What's so special about him?" Amunet asks, raising a skeptical eyebrow.

In response, Senu stares her down. Amunet blinks first.

-/-

Shay has a sort of hideout, sort of house, sort of headquarters where he ends up taking Elina and Layla. They're there, getting to grips with the century they've suddenly fallen (headfirst) into, when Shay comes back inside from a brief trip out. To see what people are saying about their abrupt arrival, he'd said.

He doesn't come back alone.

"This is Haytham Kenway," Shay says, gesturing to the man that Elina doesn't recognize. "He's the Grandmaster here."

"Amunet," Layla says, sounding startled and relieved. "You—" And then she's off, launching into Egyptian. Elina huffs a sigh as she watches the two adult women fall into deep conversation. She's not really sure she wants to talk to the two Templars, especially considering that they're like her dad's heroes. Lame. But they might have information that she needs to know, so against her first instinct, she turns to Shay. Both of them are… sort of intimidating, if she's being honest, but Shay seems more open. He doesn't keep frowning at her like Haytham does.

"There were two more of us," she tells Shay. "Elijah and Khemu—they're my best friends, and they're still missing."

Shay nods at her. "I understand," he says softly. "And we'll find them."

The way he says it, he kind of reminds her of her dad. Firm, but with just a hint of softness. Elina feels her eyes welling up with tears, and Shay surprises her by reaching out to squeeze her shoulder. "We'll find them," he says again, but with everyone spread out across who knows how much time, Elina isn't sure she believes him.

-/-

Berg knows he's playing with fire, but he's always thrived on that. He doesn't know what that means about him, that he's always sought out danger, but it's served him well. So far. Of course, up until now, he's always been able to fight back. Now, frozen from the waist down, he can't.

It doesn't stop him from charging as fast as he can into danger, of course. Only this time, it's with his mouth.

"Sages," he says, raising his eyebrows skeptically (like everybody knows that, like Aita should too). "You really have no idea what they are."

Aita looks at him like he just can't understand why he would be taunting him at this point. Berg can't explain that to himself. "No," Aita says. "I don't."

"Men and women—well, mostly men, but there have been women too, occasionally—born with your face. They're always… odd."

"Odd?"

"They know things they shouldn't. They stay on the edges of society and never fit in."

"But why?" Aita asks, sounding genuinely confounded.

"I guess you'd have to ask Juno," he says. "It's all her fault,"

And then he watches as Aita turns an interesting shade of pink.

"Juno," he says. "Juno. Why?"

Berg considers his options, and then decides on his answer solely because he wants to see Aita's reaction. "According to her," he says. "She loved you too much to let you die."

Aita turns a bright shade of pink, and looks—pleased? Definitely pleased. "She said that," he says. "About me?"

Berg considers him, and then says, "So you haven't married her yet."

"I've barely met her," Aita says, in a rush, and Berg barely stops himself from smiling. He would rather have something other than words to fight with, but it seems like he's off balance and distracted. "I… married?"

Berg gives him a level look. "I'm not sure it's the best idea," he says. "She isn't… she wasn't exactly the definition of sanity."

"So she's here too?" Aita says.

"I might be able to tell you," Berg says. "If you unfreeze me." He gestures to his legs.

Aita frowns, clearly unhappy with the answer, but apparently he's curious enough to give in. "Fine," he says. "But don't… try anything." He raises his apple pointedly, and Berg feels his feet sort of melt back into feeling. Excellent. So that means he can fight, if it comes to it. And he might have to, in a minute, because he's pretty sure his best chance here is to make Aita as unstable as possible. "We killed her," he says, and he's expecting anger, he's expecting rage—

But instead, Aita seems to crumble.

Berg hadn't expected tears.

-/-

Well... Elijah surprised me a little in this chapter xD