It's a little earlier than usual when Altair makes it home. Between Edward's comments in the animus (which, for the moment at least, most people seem ready to discuss as some kind of glitch) and the… light explosion from the basement (the official line on that is electrical malfunction, but no one's buying it), almost everyone is sent home early. "Just until everything gets sorted out," Melanie explains as she sends her team home for the day. "It should all be fine by Monday."

So Altair gets home at 3:30 in the afternoon to find Ezio sitting at the kitchen table, looking tired and worried. He glances up when Altair comes in, and greets him in Italian, rather than English.

"You lost the apple, then?" Altair asks, sitting down across from him.

"Desmond has it," Ezio says.

"Oh." Since everything that happened today was part of a plan to reunite Desmond's body with his mind in the apple, this doesn't explain Ezio's almost defeated stance. "What went wrong?"

Ezio shakes his head. "A whole group of guards found us," he explains. "So Connor and Haytham took them on while Desmond and I were out from the apple."

Something in Ezio's tone tells Altair that this is the part of the plan that didn't work out. "They're dead?" he asks. It's not likely that two men of their skill level would be taken down by the half trained underlings employed by Abstergo Entertainment, but on the other hand… they only have to get lucky once to get rid of the Kenways forever.

Ezio's answer surprises him. "I don't know," he says. "But they're gone."

"Gone," Altair repeats. "What does that mean?"

"Desmond…" Ezio hesitates. "He did something with the apple, sent all of them… somewhere. It was like nothing I've ever seen before. I mean- you've had your apple for a while now, you know how difficult it is to get it to do anything. And we all remember what happened when he tried to use the apple to stop Connor and Haytham from killing one another."

"Hard to forget," Altair says.

"But today it was different," Ezio says. "When I gave the apple back to him, it knocked us both out, but he got up first. I think he was scared- it was like the last time I saw him. I really don't think he remembers anything. He didn't know what was going on, and he just reached out, and…" Ezio shrugs. "They were gone."

Altair stands, his chair sliding back behind him. It's the only noise in the otherwise silent room. "I need to talk to him," he says.

"He was asleep when I left him," Ezio says, nodding at one of the bedrooms. "But that was a while ago, he might be up by now."

When Altair opens the door, he finds that Desmond is, in fact, awake. There's a full length mirror hanging on the back of the closet door, ancient and warped, but still usable. It was there when they moved in, but until now, it hasn't seen much use. Desmond's sitting cross legged on the floor in front of it, chin in his hands, staring intently at his reflection. He doesn't look up when Altair comes in, doesn't move at all for several minutes.

At last, Altair gets tired of waiting. "How are you feeling?" he asks.

"Strange," Desmond says, and lapses back into silence.

"Do you mind if we talk?" Altair asks.

"Uh-" Desmond shrugs and turns so he's looking at Altair instead of his own reflection. "Sure." He hesitates, eyes darting away from Altair's face and then back again. "What's wrong?"

There are so many answers to that, Altair doesn't even know where to start. Instead, he asks, "How much do you remember? From before?"

He can't come right out and say 'from before you died', and Desmond misunderstands. "From before today? Nothing. Just the dark." There's something about his face and his tone when he says dark that Altair doesn't quite like, but before he can ask, Desmond continues. "I'm sorry," he says. "I know I'm supposed to, but I don't. I don't know what's going on, I don't know who's on my side and who wants me dead. I don't even know who I am. I wouldn't know my own name if Ezio hadn't told me, I don't-"

"Hey," Altair interrupts, and Desmond stops, eyes on the floor. "Let's start from the beginning, alright? My name's Altair."

"Altair," Desmond repeats. He says the name slowly, almost like he's trying it out, maybe trying to remember if he's heard it before.

"Yes."

"Did we know each other?" Desmond asks.

"Very well," Altair says softly.

"Oh. Then can you-" he takes a deep breath. "Can you tell me?"

"Tell you what?" He's already pretty sure he can guess the answer, but he wants to hear it, just to be sure. The old Desmond, he knew him almost as well as he knows himself, thanks to all the time they spent in one another's minds. But this new Desmond is a mystery.

"Everything," Desmond says. "Everything I don't remember."

"It's a long story," Altair warns. "And not a very nice one."

"I don't care," Desmond says, and for the first time, there's something like determination in his face. He takes his eyes off the floor, and looks Altair straight in the eyes. "I need to know."

-/-

So this chapter ended up being a little more rushed than I wanted, but whatever.

Also, PSA in case anyone actually cares about when I update- my spring break starts tomorrow and I'm pretty bad about writing when I'm not at school. So just don't be super surprised if updates are infrequent or nonexistent for the next week or so.