For one disorienting second after he opens his eyes, Altair's not sure if he's actually logged out of the animus, because the first thing he sees is a face that shouldn't be there. It should be in the Caribbean during the early eighteenth century, not twenty first century America.
The man smiles in a self-satisfied manner when he sees Altair staring. "That's right," he says. "You and I have never met face to face. Not in this century, anyway."
The face is identical to Roberts', but the voice is John's. Even more importantly, he's holding a gun in one hand, and it doesn't take a lot of imagination to figure out what he's planning to use the gun for. "So you're John," he says. Better to keep the man talking until he figures out what's going on here. It's not so much that Altair thinks he couldn't take John in a fight, but if he kills the man now, he'll never know what he wants.
"Yea," John says. "And you-" he leans forward, keeping the pistol trained squarely on Altair. "Are a mystery. Also, annoying."
"Well, so are you," Altair says. "How about this- you tell me your story, I'll tell you mine."
"Or I could just shoot you now," John says. "Believe me, I would really like to."
"You could have killed me while I was still in the animus," Altair says. "Instead you waited for me to wake up."
John glares at him. Altair looks back, careful to keep his own expression neutral. Finally the man nods and lets the gun drop, just slightly. "Alright, he says. I tell you, then you tell me, then I shoot you."
Or not, Altair thinks but does not say.
"You've been paying attention in the animus, right?" he asks. "You seem, you know. Intelligent. Sort of. More than most of the losers that work here. You're probably not one of those guys that skips past all the talking bits to get to the next part with swords and cannons. You remember the sage Kenway met?"
"Yes."
"That was me- well, sort of."
"There's been more than one sage," Altair says slowly. He's starting to put things together. "There have been a lot. Every once in a while some poor kid gets born with the wrong genes and they- you- start to remember things."
"I was right. You are smart."
"But what are you remembering?" Altair asks. "Previous lives?"
"One in particular," John says, and smiles a crooked smile. "Those precursors the assassins and templars are so obsessed with? I remember them. I was there. I was one of them."
And what strikes Altair at that moment is an overwhelming feeling of pity. How many people throughout history have been born with these memories? With the knowledge of another people, with the burning need to-
"I was going to bring her back," John says. "And you ruined that. She wouldn't take your body, and I want to know why."
"I don't know," he says.
"You're lying," John says. "Lying! You said you'd tell me who you are!"
"I will." He's not sure if it's even going to mean anything to John, but then- he doesn't expect him to live much longer, either. A man like this is dangerous. "I-"
And that's when he sees the flash of golden light, and the next thing he knows, John is dead on the ground with his throat ripped out, and there's an enormous wolf standing over him. It all happens in a split second, so quickly that Altair is left blinking like a moron and wishing he had a weapon-
"Would you stop doing that," a voice says. It sounds mostly exasperated, and Altair turns to see Haytham behind him.
"Haytham," he says. "What are you doing here? Where's Connor?"
The man sighs and points back at the wolf- only when Altair blinks it's not a wolf sitting there but Connor, looking tense and ill. "It's a long story."
"Ezio mentioned something about… animals," Altair says. "He didn't mention…" he looks at Connor, at the strange light in his eyes, and does not say 'insanity'.
"Yes." Haytham also looks at Connor, and also does not say 'insanity'. "Things have started to get complicated. We need to get out of here."
Altair nods, and because he's closest to the door, he turns to lead the way out. On the way, he steps over the mangled mess of a body that had been John less than a minute before. He glances down, and instantly regrets it. He's seen a lot of dead bodies in his life. Some of them even looked worse than John does now, but most of those people weren't killed by humans. Wild animals could do this to a person. Sometimes a plague will leave nasty looking corpses behind. Altair once saw a man who had been crushed to death in a rockslide.
But this is different. It's hard to believe a human would be capable of completely wrecking somebody like this. In his brief glance downward, Altair sees blood oozing from a rough looking wound on his throat. Tooth marks. Jagged claw marks across his face. And-
And he's still moving. Altair stops, and Haytham makes an annoyed noise as he almost walks into him. "What's the matter?" he asks.
"John's still alive," Altair says. He looks from Haytham to Connor, and adds, in a very quiet voice, "Do you understand?"
Connor looks back at him, but so does the wolf, along with whatever else might be living in his head. It's not comfortable looking into the man's eyes, but Altair forces himself not to blink. At this point, he's actually used to having conversations with people that are half out of their mind, or half in somebody else's mind, or just totally amnesiac. Most of the time he's just making it up as he goes along, trying to keep them all together, trying to keep everyone relatively sane. So he knows what he's looking at on Connor's face, and he can see the part of him that does understand fighting against the animal parts, the parts that don't.
He's not sure which side of Connor is going to win until Connor gives him a short nod, and bends over John. The man's still bleeding out, and he could be for quite a while. His eyes stare up at the three of them, and his mouth works soundlessly as he struggles to say something. It's obvious he's in a lot of pain, and that's not what they do.
John's hand moves weakly, grasping Connor's wrist. Then the assassin slides his hidden blade out of it's sheathe with a soft click, and slides the blade into John's body. A moment later, the hand on Connor's arm goes limp and falls to the ground.
"Alright." Altair clasps Connor briefly on the shoulder. It looks like there might just be enough of the man left to save. "Let's get going."
-/-
...I'm starting to wonder if everyone in this fic is going to be certifiable by the time I'm done with this.