AC2 Novelization Part 17
Part Seventeen: Tracing History
Blank ceiling.
No gondola. No smelly waters. No thief siblings.
No arid desert. No Maria. No... Sef.
Loft.
2012.
Desmond Miles. He was Desmond Miles.
He sighed in relief, his dream still haunting him and glad that he still knew whom he was. That was freaky beyond measure, and he quickly got out of the Animus after Rebecca was done fiddling with his arm. He stretched slightly, and looked at the shadows the high windows cast, where the blocks of light fell.
"Did we get out early?" he asked slowly, looking over to Rebecca.
"Yeah," the rocker said, adjusting her headphones and tapping away at the Animus computer. "Not much was happening - well, not until the end there - and we figured you were at a good place to stop."
Desmond shook his head. "It doesn't feel early. How many years did I just live through?"
"About four."
Whoa.
"Anyway," Lucy said, getting up from her station. "I think we should have an early lunch and then have you looking for glyphs. Shaun and Rebecca have found some in Forli, and several in San Gimignano."
"Okay," Desmond said slowly, remembering the city of towers and the home of that hot countess Caterina. "Wanna run with me first?"
"At least he's consistent," Shaun muttered from where he faced the wall. Desmond ignored him; the man obviously still sour from Desmond's sleeping in.
Still, Desmond, Lucy, and even Rebecca (thought this was likely to spite a certain Brit) all ran around the warehouse and the different obstacle courses Lucy had set up yesterday. After that was a good stretch, Shaun complaining viciously that he had been left to cook, and they all sat around the plasma, munching on "fish and chips," Rebecca commenting several times that they should be eating Italian fare, not some lame British default. Desmond stayed well away from a certain historian as the two began their epic battle, instead eying Lucy several times to see if she were okay. It seemed she was past her "little breakdown," but it was obvious her mind was far, far away. He stayed next to her, hoping it would be enough.
Then, it was back in the Animus, Desmond spawning in Monteriggioni and its dismal effigies. With an intimacy that was similar to being in Masyaf, Desmond walked down the stairs, past the practicing Ulderico and his mercenaries, and down the main street. He studied Santino's shop, past Adler's bank, looked at Vincenzo's art shop (Ezio hadn't seen it yet, and the idea of knowing something his ancestor didn't made him perversely happy), and sparing a glance at Alfeo's apothecary.
At the stables he grabbed a horse and rode down the dirt path to the edge of the map, the Animus switching to the white loading screen before the hills of Tuscany and San Gimignano rose before him.
"I can see why he loves this country," Desmond said, riding out.
"Tuscany is beautiful," Rebecca said. "I've seen lots of pictures. Their food is great too - except for saltless bread."
"Oh, so we're not in Tuscany right now?"
"No."
"Okay. Where to?"
"First stop: Monte Oliveto Maggiore."
"That's the Benedictine abbey Stephano Bagnone died," Desmond muttered to himself, remembering Ezio and his growing Eagle Vision. He nudged his horse, eating up territory as he rode over the rolling green hills. It was a shorter trip that it was for Ezio, but in this at least, Desmond was beginning to understand the limits of the Animus. The abbey was a big complex, and it took a while for Desmond to find the glyph on the roof before he scanned it. Martyrs, the glyph said, and Desmond saw an old black and white photo of some guy called Nicholas II, Czar of Russia. "Okay, he muttered, why is this guy important?" He scanned the picture with his special sight, and saw that the staff the man was holding looked different.
ID: Piece of Eden 34. The staff that Sixteen had talked about earlier. "So... the staff is in Russia?"
"Abstergo thinks it was destroyed," Lucy said, "And that Assassins did it. I'm not sure how or why. Vidic flagged a few of Sixteen's memories, but I never saw them all."
Next up was a painting of some chick in armor, and given the last glyph he saw and the staff he focused in on the sword. Lo and behold, the girl, Joan of Arc from France, had Piece of Eden 25.
"They burned Joan alive," Sixteen's voice said, still dithered and scratchy. "They condemned her as a witch even as they took it. Rasputin, he took it to Tunguska. Without the staff, the Czar was powerless. He could no longer control his subjects... Revolution! Revolution!"
Desmond blinked. "I'm lost again. Oh mighty historian?"
"Look at that, the baby assassin's learned to ask a question properly, well done, well done. Okay, so Joan of Arc would have been a contemporary of Ezio's grandfather. Peasant girl who claimed she was following the will of God and broke all kinds of tradition by leading the French army to many victories in their Hundred Year War with England. I think it's safe to assume it wasn't God, but the Piece of Eden she was following, though how she got it is anyone's guess at this point. She was eventually captured and sold to England, and at the tender age of nineteen burned at the steak - declared a martyr by a Pope in 1456.
"Nicholas, meanwhile, is a bit more interesting. I won't bore you with details, baby assassin that you are, but he was the last Czar of Russia. History books say that because of World War I and Russia's losses and general mismanagement, along with several things he did that would bore the baby to tears, the people began a revolution. Sixteen's implications, however, suggest that Rasputin - a mystic close to the Romanov family - stole the staff and thereby ruined any control over the people that Nicholas had. Tunguska... I'll have to get back to you on that. Post industrial revolution is considered current events to me, I'm not as familiar with it."
But, with Shaun's explanation the glyph had ended, the construct returned and Desmond was back on his horse. "Next?"
"The ruins."
"Gotcha. Have fun looking up Tunguska or whatever." He rode west, passing the gates to San Gimignano and to the old Roman ruins. He could see afterimages of Ezio, limping over the structure to spy on the Pazzi and the Templars, and an earlier version of him exploring the ruins to scope the place out. He firmly reminded himself that he was Desmond Miles, and that he had work to do.
The glyph was in one of the half-covered passageway, the massive stylized butterfly symbolizing chaos theory, and he scanned it. "Keep on Seeking, and You Will Find," the title red, and Desmond saw another collection of pictures he had to select from. The hint read: "First plucked from a tree guarded by a snake, its powers perform miracles. Then, worn across the ages, torn asunder, hidden under a sea of RED, reconstruct the timeline."
"So what am I looking for?" Desmond asked.
"Snakes," Rebecca suggested.
"Red," Shaun added.
"Cloth," Lucy offered.
"So helpful..." Desmond followed all of their instructions, red cloaks and snakes both, and saw a new image: S.P.Q.R. in a small wreath of leaves. "Even less helpful," he called out.
"Senatus Populusque Romanus: Roman government in ancient times," Shaun said, but even as he started explaining Desmond saw a new tidbit of information: a portrait of the Crucifixion with the increasingly common text: "They took it."
ID: Piece of Eden 66 - Shroud
"Missed the connection on this one," Desmond said.
"Oh... Oh! Wow," Rebecca was saying. "In the Bible, they say that Jesus was risen from the dead, and wasn't there a Shroud of something-or-other that people thought was his death-wrap or something? Doesn't that mean the Templars stole that as well?"
"No," Desmond said, frowning as the ruins respawned in front of him. "Uncle Mario... he has a story about something he called a shroud. He told Ezio about it once... I think it was one of the memories we fast-forwarded through."
"I'll flag it and look it up," Lucy said. "Next location is Santa Maria Assunta."
And so Desmond rode up to the city gates and dismounted, familiar with the city because of the months Ezio spent waiting for Jacopo de' Pazzi to show up. He frowned as he wandered up the steps and over roofs. It was so long ago that he - Ezio - had been here. The disconnect was enormous as he looked up at the towers. "How many years have I covered as Ezio?" he asked, coming to the large square in front of the church.
"About eight years."
"Shit that's a long time. And in only... what? Four days?" The summer he spent with Altair hadn't been nearly as long, and he realized that Ezio had gone from being younger than him to almost his age. How much longer was he going to stay with the guy? As an ancestor, he had to have kids eventually, and didn't people get pregnant young in this day and age? He shook his head, climbing to the roof and finding nothing before backtracking to the ground and finding the glyph, a pair of pagodas, in a narrow hallway.
"He wanted to stop the cycle," Sixteen's voice filtered through, "to tell the secret. Shit. I've got to keep thinking through the headaches..." The Inventor spread across Desmond's vision, and then came the document.
From Nikola Tesla:
The economic transition of power without wires is of all-surpassing importance to man.
By its means he will gain complete mastery of the air, the sea and the desert. It will enable him to dispense with the necessity of mining, pumping, transporting and burning fuel, and so do away with innumerable causes of sinful waste. It will make the living glorious sun his obedient, toiling slave.
It will bring peace and harmony to Earth.
And beneath it was the signature of Nikola Tesla. After it Desmond watched the world light up per this guy Tesla's idea, and as it lit up he saw a photograph of an oddly shaped building: Nikola Tesla's Wardenclyffe under construction, c. 1902. Nothing happened afterward, and Desmond sighed. "And here I thought this glyph just might be easy," he muttered, scanning the picture. Many quotes from the guy this glyph seemed to be centered about the photo:
"Fights between individuals, as well as governments and nations, invariably result from misunderstandings in the broadest interpretation of this term."
"Money does not represent such value as men have placed upon it. All money has been invested into experiments with which I have made new discoveries enabling mankind to have a little easier life."
"Misunderstandings are always caused by the inability of appreciating one another's point of view. The best way to dispel ignorance of the doings of others is by a systematic spread of general knowledge. With this object in view, it is most important to aide exchange of thought and intercourse."
"This guy sounds almost like an Assassin," Desmond said, eying the last quote. "Was he?"
"Don't know," Lucy said.
The picture morphed into a freaky photograph labeled Nikola Tesla c.1900. A man sat calmly in the middle of a room while some kind of science fiction machine was exploding electricity all around him, roots and branches and infinite strings of light arcing this way and that, like some kind of amusement park attraction.
"He found it in Croatia. They would find it in his lab," Sixteen said. And hidden in the picture, Desmond saw another string of words:
He used it to develop a bottomless source of energy.
And in the man Tesla's lap, was a Piece of Eden, Apple number Four.
"Wait, so does this mean this Tesla guy used the Apple to help create electricity or something?" Rebecca asked.
"More current events I don't know about. I'll add that to my list," Shaun said.
"And if we're lucky, you might actually know something before the next glyph," Desmond muttered.
"I heard that."
"Dick."
San Gimignano spawned around Desmond, in the abbey, and he exited to the main square. Lucy directed him to Torri dei Salvucci. It took him a minute to remember it was the twin towers of the city, both practically on top of each other. Pushing through a throng of lifeless constructs, he hoisted himself up the face of a building and walked between the two towers, wondering which one it was on until he realized it was immediately in front of him. "Sweet," he muttered, switching to his Eagle Vision looking to the eye-in-a-triangle that topped the pyramid on US currency.
Titans of Industry came up and was quickly replaced by a letter.
From the Laboratory Thomas Edison:
Dear Mr. Morgan,
A serious matter has come to my attention. Nikola Tesla plans to use PE4 to create an information network across the entire world. And if that weren't bad enough, he intends to allow access to it for free! Imagine the masses spreading knowledge amongst themselves instantaneously. That would make everything we intend to do much more difficult.
You must cut off all funds for his experiments at once! In case you get cold feet, I'll have you know he wants to make electricity free as well, thereby putting us out of business.
I've already begun slandering Tesla in the press. Just reallocate his funding, and I'll take care of PE4 myself.
Sincerely yours,
Thomas Edison
"Morgan? Like J.P. Morgan?" Desmond asked. One of those corporate bastards that had tanked the economy and then took gobs of money from the government as a bailout?
"Its founder, I bet," Lucy replied. "It wouldn't surprise me if he or any other corporate mogul was a Templar, given Abstergo."
"Peachy," Desmond retorted. "And Thomas Edison? If Tesla found electricity and sounded like an Assassin, but we credit our power to Edison and he references here about Piece of Eden Four, I'm guessing he's a Templar. Or associated."
"And our baby Assassin can form logic. Well done!"
Desmond decided not to dignify that with a response.
"Sounds like these kind of people don't care for the internet much," Rebecca said. "Maybe it could have been made at the turn of the century, maybe not, but its here now."
"And there are countries that try and limit access to the internet, like China," Lucy added.
A map appeared in front of Desmond covered in lights that slowly went dark. And as the lights went out, sentences appeared. Headlines.
Edison, creator of DC electricity, accuses Tesla's AC current of electrocution!
J.P. Morgan revokes funding Tesla's Wardenclyffe project!
Edison creates "electric chair" to prove danger of AC current!
Edison proves danger of AC current by electrocuting an elephant on camera!
And then an old film started rolling, scratched and dirty and poorly lit in places, as an elephant was led forward, and then, after a film cut, was peaceably standing there before it went completely rigid. Desmond couldn't help but shudder.
Subject Sixteen spoke with great anger, "He wanted everyone to know the secret. To set us all free. They used it to drive him insane."
A photo of Edison holding light appeared and Desmond easily recognized it as a Piece of Eden. From there, a flurry of pictures appeared, including an aged newspaper clipping. Another lock cipher appeared, and Desmond studied the pictures to line up the lock and input the code. With the code, another file unlocked. The header was old school, and another titan of industry was named.
Henry Ford
Dearborn Mich
Dear Mr. Edison,
I wanted to thank you for letting me make use of PE4 all these years. Among several things, I was able to convince the workers I was raising their pay to $5 a day when, in fact, I gave them a pay cut. But, I had to let PE4 go. Per instructions, I've shipped it to Europe.
H. has it, so I assume the war will begin as soon as he can take over. We'll let him have his fun (Lord knows, that kind of purge will be good for Europe) and then end it with a bang, as planned. Out of all the chaos of war a new order will emerge! I've enclosed a picture from Florida of you, me and Firestone. We should attempt to spend more time on the golf course this summer.
Yours,
Henry Ford
"H? Who the hell is H?"
"If I were to guess, given current events, I'd say Adolf Hitler," Shaun replied.
"Ford had connections with Hitler?"
"Or his associates did."
"And this purge, they mean the Holocaust? Jesus fucking Christ."
There were times Desmond really didn't care to hear these secrets. Desmond knew that some of the things Altair had seen were horrid in the true sense of the word. Terrible. Ghastly. What Garnier did or what Majd Addin did ranking tops on the list. What Altair saw and fought against was that evil that didn't have a word to truly describe it. People used words like horrible, terrible, ghastly, to describe things that were simply an inconvenience, and the over usage made the words somehow less applicable to what their definitions were truly meant for. The Holocaust was an act of evil, genocide, that defied definition. And the Templars had planned it! This wasn't just one madman named Hitler who went off the bend on power and bigotry to murder millions of Jews, Romani, Catholics, leftists, or anyone else who dared disagree; this was organized, planned, and ready easily decades before it even occurred.
There were no words.
Desmond sucked in a breath. "Next glyph?" he asked, his voice cracking.
"That's it for San Gimignano," Lucy replied quietly. "There are two more in Forli."
Desmond nodded and climbed back down, glad to exit the city, get on a horse, and just ride. He backtracked to Florence, using a distance-eating canter and stayed at the steady pace as he traveled through the mountains, admiring the Animus's ability to craft such beautiful scenery. He paused once in a while on his horse, looking down the valley to the small village at the base, and tried not to think of the horror of the Holocaust and what it meant that the Templars had been involved and planned to end it with a nuclear bomb.
He arrived in Forli and it looked as dismal as the winter when Ezio had passed through. The skies were cloudy, everything was damp and dirty, and the floods were settled against the city walls. Desmond noted that the water had no motion, only token splashes if he or the horse walked through it, making no ripples that spread.
"So where in Forli?"
"San Merculiale Abbey," Rebecca answered.
Desmond nodded and entered the city. The abbey was easy to find as it was across from the equivalent of City Hall and the glyph itself was also easy to find as it was in the courtyard of the abbey, Hebrew letters glowing in the dull city. Desmond switched to Eagle Vision and heard Subject Sixteen getting more and more frustrated with his confusion.
"It happened in 1908. Or was it 2008? 1708? I can't remember!"
The Calvary came on screen, followed by a letter to Nikola Tesla by an unknown party.
Nikola,
We know what they have done to your lab, to your career. It may be too late to set things right, but you can help prevent something far worse. They have taken an object from the Czar, and are conducting experiments in Tunguska to figure out how to use it. Before they do we must take it from them, or the world will be in danger. We do not ask you to risk your life, just that, when the time comes, you use your electricity to destroy the object.
Regardless of your decision, know that we admire your work greatly and will bear you no ill will.
We respect your freedom above all else.
"Guess he wasn't an Assassin," Desmond murmured. "Yet."
"That's the Piece of Eden Rasputin must have taken from the Czar," Shaun said. "Tunguska? More to the research list."
A map of Europe appeared with a bunch of places listed all out of order, like Alaska or Madagascar, which definitely weren't European. Desmond touched Tunguska. A picture of Tesla appeared and a staff, and Desmond dragged the staff to Tesla. An explosion filled his vision, one that looked like a nuclear mushroom cloud.
"Damn," he muttered. "So Tesla destroyed a Piece of Eden and it created an explosion like that?"
"There's a lot that's unknown about those Pieces of Eden," Shaun replied. "Well, the Templars clearly know more, but we don't know what."
"This is post-Industrial Revolution, right?"
"This will make a hell of a morning meeting tomorrow. Sixteen's got information aplenty, but doesn't explain a damn thing."
"Right," Desmond said. "So where to next?"
"The Venetian outpost," Lucy answered. "The lighthouse in particular."
"Gotcha."
Desmond left through the northern gate and found a horse to ride off to the outpost where Ezio had needed a pass to board the ship for Venice.
He approached the lighthouse and rode around it, looking for where the glyph might be before spotting it and starting his climb. The glyph this time was a symbol mountain with a moon (or sun?) and Desmond reached for his Eagle Vision to see The Bunker appear. After that came another set of images and a wheel to try and match up.
"Well shit, this looks like a nightmare," Desmond commented. His eyes were drawn immediately to the number four on the pontoon and the on the building. And while lining them up was easy, figuring out the blank spots was not.
"Suggestions?" he asked.
"Try rotating through? If they're in order you should be able to guess what comes next," Rebecca suggested. But as Desmond cycled through, he realized it was a hopeless endeavor.
"Fake symbols, random order, very clever, Sixteen," Shaun said distractedly as he continued to study.
Desmond stared at them as well, trying to figure it out.
"To quote Archimedes, Eureka!" the historian and self-proclaimed whiz with decryption finally shouted. "Desmond, it seems the number match up to the number of angles in each symbol. Zero has a circle, no angles. One was originally lined up with the less than sign, which only had one angle. For two..."
"I get the idea," Desmond replied, already inputting the numbers. A letter appeared from Abstergo.
Abstergo Corporation
May 02, 1945
The war is over; we are in control, as planned. But, a slight concern has arisen. I received word from our agents in Berlin. H. was supposed to execute his double inside the bunker and meet C. at the rendezvous point with the Piece of Eden.
It's been three days and he still hasn't appeared. Something must have gone awry. Please send instructions.
"Okay," Desmond said. "So H is Hitler, who the hell is C?"
Shaun, however, had started swearing.
"Shaun?" Rebecca asked.
"Churchill!" Shaun growled. "Winston Churchill, that we all think of as a bloody hero, was a Templar agent? That man got us through the Blitz, kept hope alive, forecasted the threat of Germany long before anyone ever believed him! Really, is Sixteen sure of all this?"
Desmond shrugged. "If Churchill and Hitler both were in on it, want to bet that dear old FDR was as well? And Stalin? They were all the major leaders of the war, right?"
Shaun just started growling out impolite words and talking about the current events he'd have to look up for the morning meeting tomorrow.
Desmond was about to respond, but Subject's Sixteen's voice filtered out with repressed anger.
"They engineered the war, they engineered the peace, but they weren't going to get away with it. Find our mark."
A picture captioned, We watched the exit from above, he didn't see us coming, appeared with a picture of some sort of mansion with strange structures in the foreground.
"That's the bunker! That's where Hitler and his wife committed suicide!" Shaun gasped.
"And here I thought you didn't know 'current events'," Desmond muttered. He saw the Assassin symbol on the corner up by on of the rooflines, and it looked photoshopped in. Sixteen's work no doubt. He tapped the symbol and the picture changed to a demolished picture of what was likely the home, the Assassin's symbol clearly visible on one of the chunks of debris. Desmond tapped on it and another passcode was found, opening another tiny video clip.
Shaun grumbled more about how, thank you, he did have a standard public school education and no matter how one looked at it, the Blitz and World War II were a large part of what was covered.
"Yeah, yeah," Desmond replied. "Am I off to Venice next?"
"No," Lucy replied. "Shaun's to-do list is long enough for now. Besides, you do need practice with combat. You can free-run around the warehouse all you like, it's not practice with fighting."
Desmond shrugged. "Sure thing."
It had been Lucy's turn to cook dinner that night, not that Shaun paid much attention to it since he was buried in his research and whining about having to use the internet for information and its unreliability, given that all the materials he'd brought with him were for Renaissance Italy. Rebecca eventually was fed up with his nose being in the book, so to speak, pinched his nose and force-fed him some salad. An argument predictably followed and Desmond couldn't quite hold back the laugh. Lucy, next to him, was far more restrained in her laughter, but there was a distinctly bright smile on her face. Desmond took that as a good sign.
The next morning, however, Desmond didn't wake to smiles and laughter. Instead, he woke to an argument.
This wasn't the first time, of course. By giving up the extra bed in Shaun's room and taking the bed in the main living area, he was privy to anything and anyone who came wandering in. (Rebecca, night owl that she was would often wander in to tinker on the Animus or grab a snack, and Lucy always came in impossibly early to start work.)
The argument was between Shaun and Rebecca and sounded very much like an oft-repeated iteration. Apparently Shaun couldn't make coffee to save his life and refused to be shamed by it as none of them could make him a proper cup of tea.
"I'm always making my own tea, you lot should make your own coffee!"
"Shaun! I've shown you a million times how to set the coffee maker! It's just a few buttons and filling a machine! Nowhere near as complicated as your tea strainer and milk-sugar ratios!"
"Do you mind?" Desmond muttered, sitting up and rubbing his face.
At least he didn't have another freaky dream.
"Sorry, Desmond," Rebecca immediately apologized.
Shaun, naturally, didn't. He just scoffed and went back to his work.
Still, Desmond was up. It was time to shower at least. Shaun, stuck-up prick that he was, was already dressed for the day, while Rebecca was still in her nightshirt. Lucy came in yawning, dressed but still needing very much to brush her hair.
"What's the yelling for?" she asked, a hand running through her blond locks. "Did we lose another team?"
"Nope," Desmond replied, standing and stretching. "Just an argument over who the hell should be making the coffee."
Lucy blinked. "Maybe I should go back to bed," she mumbled.
"No need, fearless leader," Shaun replied. "Morning meeting should be in about fifteen minutes."
"Geez," Desmond grumbled. "That's barely time for a shower."
"Well maybe you should have gotten up earlier."
Desmond knew better than to get into an argument. He showered and dressed and was deliberately late as he cooked breakfast (pancakes and eggs) that ended up drawing everyone to the kitchen since it smelled good.
"A guy who can cook!" Rebecca exclaimed after practically swooning over the pancakes. "Where have you been all my life?"
"I'm no chef."
"Still better than me!"
But Rebecca's energy and cheer had infused everyone again, and some were still licking their fingers as they sat down for Shaun's presentation.
"Tunguska, a river in southern Siberia, and at the turn of the last century, an extremely isolated region with almost no people for miles around. Even now there's very little population in the area, but back in 1908, something odd happened," Shaun gestured to the plasma and old black and white photographs of flattened trees appeared. "On June 30, at approximately 7:14 a.m., local time, there was a midair explosion of catastrophic proportions. Approximately two thousand square kilometers of forestry was completely flattened. Natives and Russian settlers reported seeing a column of bluish light about as bright as the sun that moved across the sky. About ten minutes later came the shockwave and sound, which should give you some idea of the distances we're looking at for the nearest eyewitnesses.
"Looking closer, the atmospheric pressure given off was strong enough to be recorded back home in merry old England. The next few days saw night skies in both Europe and Asia 'aglow', though no one explains what that means. But here's the interesting thing: no one knows what caused the explosion."
The pictures on screen showed several unrelated things. Asteroids, comets, black holes, nuclear bombs, cartoonish aliens, Desmond couldn't see what purpose all the images were there for.
"Common accepted theory is that it was a meteorite or comet of some kind impacting earth, though what it impacted five to ten kilometers off the surface of the planet is unanswered, or how it exploded that high up in the first place. Other theories with holes about the size of Heathrow have causes ranging from aliens, nuclear bombs, and black holes. But that's not the most interesting theory I found."
The pictures all faded to the background and another picture came forward, one more familiar.
"Hey, that's from one of the glyphs!" Rebecca said.
"Wardenclyffe," Lucy nodded. "Tesla's dream of wireless energy."
Shaun smiled. "One interesting theory was that an experiment by dear old Nikola Tesla was experimenting in Wardenclyffe during one of Admiral Robert Peary's North Pole expedition. Not much is said on the subject, but then we get to the documents left by Subject Sixteen.
"The Assassins found out a Piece of Eden was being taken to Tunguska for experimentation and went to take care of it."
"And the note to Tesla asking for help," Desmond said, sitting back as this new information settled over him. Assassins didn't keep records of their accomplishments, too risky for anyone to find and there was no guarantee of destruction before enemies got their hands on them.
"Precisely," Shaun nodded. "Tesla may have been able to stick it to Templar Tommy Edison after all, though he couldn't exactly gloat about it. Looking at this another way, Tunguska isn't the only explosion without a known cause. Though at the estimated ten to fifteen megatons of yield, it is by far the biggest. Makes one wonder, doesn't it, yeah?"
They sat together in silence for a moment, the reality of another aspect of the Templar's ambitions settling around them.
Desmond was the one to break it, standing and stretching. "Well, let's get back to work."
Failing in saving the Doge was bad enough, but Ezio's public escape from the Palazzo Ducale in the early morning rush was worse. Everyone knew his face and his cloak and his hood, and for a solid week he couldn't even look out a window of Antonio's Palazzo della Seta without sparking interest of the city guards. It was decided very quickly to get him out of Venice all together.
After a quick and heated debate with Antonio, Ezio chose to escape to Milan instead of Monteriggioni. The decision hurt him deeply, he hadn't been home in years, but the Templars would no doubt be out for his blood and expect him to run home, and so he chose the one city he hoped no one would think of: the home of Leonardo.
"Ezio!" the painter said in open shock when he saw his friend. "My God! You're alive!" Word traveled fast it seemed, and Ezio, exhausted from travel, sagged. Leonardo was quick to dismiss his apprentices and workers, shooing them out of his studio and opening a bottle of wine to soothe the young assassin's nerves. "Is it true?" he asked, curiosity overtaking propriety. "They say you killed the Doge."
The Florentine shook his head; leaning back and putting his boots up, weary. "I was trying to save him, Leonardo," he said slowly, reliving his failure, the look on the Doge's face, the arrogance of Grimaldi. "But the truth matters little. I failed. And now I'm the most wanted man in Venezia."
"And so you come here and wait for life to settle down," Leonardo said, sitting on the edge of his seat, attentive. "Perhaps that is for the best. How long will you stay?"
"... I don't know," Ezio said, rubbing his face. "Leonardo, forgive me, but I've haven't slept in three days; I fear I'm poor conversation right now."
"Of course, of course; come, I'll show you to my room. I'll get a fire going and you can sleep there tonight."
"Leonardo I can't-"
"Sh-sh-sh! I won't hear a word to the contrary. Sleep, my friend, we'll talk more in the morning."
Sleep was fitful at best; Ezio dreamed of his family, the gallows, watching them swing from the rope, burying them, and of Giovanni expressing disappointment that he couldn't save Venice as he had saved Florence. The next morning left him almost as tired as when he arrived, but he put on a good face for his friend.
"Grazie, my friend," he said over breakfast. "I have something for you." He pulled out the loot he and Antonio had found from Emilio's palazzo, handing it over.
"Ohhh!" the blond painter said, recognizing the decorative boarders. "More of the Codex!" he snatched at the papers greedily, musing over them with the intense focus Ezio associated with his friend, and Ezio made the excuses when the assistants began to arrive, saying Leonardo was engrossed in a new puzzle. More then a few laughed, saying this was nothing new, and got back to work. It wasn't until dinner that Leonardo emerged from his own mind, a feeling of intense satisfaction that only solving a puzzle of such complexity could bring him.
"It's a new design, my friend," he said, his face bright and flush with excitement. "A mechanism for your wrist, but not a blade... In fact, it seems to be a kind of firearm, but as small as a hummingbird!"
Ezio blinked, unable to picture such a device. A cannon, as small as a hummingbird? "Is it possible?" he asked, incredulous. The weight alone would be astronomical!
"I have no idea," Leonardo said brightly. "Let's build it and find out!"
For all of October, Leonardo was in constant contact with several smiths in Milan, explaining his needs and assigning each smith with a different piece of the mechanism. Ezio in comparison worked his way through the rest of the Codex pages, reading Altair's philosophies and pondering their meanings.
"Why do our instincts insist on violence? I have studied the interactions between different species. The innate desire to survive seems to demand the death of the other. Why can they not stand hand in hand? So many believe the world was created by the hand of a divine power - but I see only the designs of a madman, bent on celebrating destruction and desperation. Our origins seem chaotic. Unintended. Purpose and being instilled solely by the passage of time. Imposed first by nature - and later men...
"Man seeks dominion over all that he encounters. I suppose it is a natural tendency for us to aspire towards mastery of our surroundings. But this should not include other human beings. Every day more and more are pressed into service - by deception or by force. Others, though not so firmly imprisoned, are made to feel as if their lives are worthless. I have seen the ways in which men persecute women. Heard the cruel words hurled at those who come here from other lands. Watched as those who believe or act differently are made to suffer...
"We discuss such things often - watching as we do from the spires of Masyaf. What can be done to stop this? To encourage tolerance and equality? Some days we speak of education, believing that knowledge will free us from immorality. But as I walk the streets and see slaves sent off to auction - my heart grows cold. When I see the husband hurl abuses and stones at his wife, insisting she exists only to serve him - my fists clench. And when I see children torn from their parents so that another man might profit - sent off to suffer beneath the desert sun and die...
"...On these days, I do not think that dialogue will make a difference. On these days, I can think only of how the perpetrators need to die."
It... was consolation, to a point. Altair's words made Ezio think in ways he never expected to, listening to a man hundreds of years past balk at the cruelty that was still pervasive in the here and now, to wonder how to change it, as was an Assassin's desire. Did knowledge truly free people to learn the truth? If even Altair vacillated, it made Ezio wonder if he, too, could ever hope to reach the ideal that Assassins strove for. He thought of Claudia, difficult to marry off because of her temper - why was she supposed to get married in the first place? He thought of Paola, and how she came to know his father, what had happened to her; he thought of prostitutes in general and the things they were forced to endure because someone paid them. Was that not slavery of a kind as well? In proof, even knowing Paola, he had never thought of it like that...
Men in power, would they always treat others as if they were beneath them? Was the previous Doge any better than Marco Barbarigo? No, that wasn't a fair question, Marco was a Templar, and proven to be callous with human life.
Lorenzo de' Medici understood; his life was dedicated to making the people happy as he ruled over them, the patron of Florence. But he was but one man in a sea of men who abused their station: and that was just Italia. Was the world like this? What hope did Ezio have?
The thoughts were daunting, and sometimes Ezio sought to avoid them all together.
In December, he received a visitor in the form of his uncle, Mario.
"Nipote! You are still alive!"
"Zio! Must you choke me every time we greet?"
"You are my nipote, Nipote, how can I greet you otherwise? I fear I cannot stay long, but I wanted to see how you were doing." They caught up for three days, Ezio explaining his failures and expressing his regret, Mario informing him of the new Doge - as they had feared - but also saying that he was doing much work in Forli. Santino, irate upon learning Ezio had bought Venetian armor, had spent months pouring over his work, and as a gift Mario gave Ezio a new set of armor, called Missaglias; and that there was news in Monteriggioni from the villa.
"Is it Mother? Has she taken a turn?"
"No, Ezio, though Claudia always makes sure to give her the feathers. No, my boy, it's good news indeed: your sister is getting married!"
... Married?
... Married?
His precious, innocent, perfect little piccina was getting married?
Leonardo, in the room at the time, saw Ezio's rapidly changing expression and quickly gathered his notes and moved to a corner, out of the line of fire. "Who is it?" Ezio demanded, his voice low and dangerous. "She's not settling is she? She's not picking some cazzo at random because she's twenty-five and running out of marriageable years? She's not picking some figlio d'un cane like she settled for before?"
Mario, unaware of Claudia's circumstances in Florence, openly marveled. "Just whom do you think we're talking about?" he countered, incredulous. "Claudia doesn't 'settle' for anything but the best!"
"She almost did, once," Ezio said, remembering Duccio, and the disgrace he made even associating with Claudia. If she thought for one minute she should just get it over with...
"No, Nipote, this has been growing for quite some time, I'm told; though I'm hardly home enough to have noticed it. No, her lucky beau is Ulderico, your instructor and captain of Monteriggioni's guard."
... Ulderico?
Who swore bitterly and got drunk at every opportunity? To his Claudia?
"You tell Ulderico," Ezio said in a low, menacing voice, "that if he does anything, anything, to make her cry I'll kick his cazzo so hard it will enter his ribcage - and then I'll take my hidden blade and carve it out of him before boiling it in sheep's urine and horse shit and feeding it to pigs. And that's just his cazzo."
Mario burst out laughing, not helping Ezio's mood at all, and slapped his nephew's shoulders, pride beaming from his face. The young assassin was still brooding when his uncle left, muttering darkly and creatively. It wasn't until Leonardo asked what on earth happened in the past to create such a vindictive protective streak in his friend, and Ezio haltingly explained Claudia's broken engagement, and of his release of Cristina. Men needed to treat their women right, with honor and respect and fidelity, and how he'd been forced to let Cristina go to another man because of the life that had been dropped on him. He would be damned if he let anyone disappoint his sister as he had been forced to disappoint his love.
Leonardo was quiet for a long time, before asking Ezio to sketch Cristina, and slowly Ezio was able to work his way out of his mood.
At the end of January, the blacksmiths were done - and happy to be done from the sounds of it - and Leonardo assembled the piece. Ezio didn't understand remotely what the thing was, only that it added several pounds to his arm that he would have to account for. There was a thin, narrow barrel, ribbed inside for some reason, and Leonardo pointed out where small lead balls could be loaded, along with a mixture of powder used in smoke bombs, and Ezio was soon spirited away to a private courtyard with straw dummies to practice. Monteriggioni it was not, and he felt supremely self-conscious as he fumbled with the device, Leonardo at his shoulder helping him, holding his arm and explaining each step, before there was an enormous BANG that startled them both.
His hand had been burned from the explosion, but they both realized this was minor compared to what might have happened if his hand had been in the way of the barrel - the straw dummy had a hole ripped through it, straw and sand leaking.
It took a week to learn the right combination of powder, how to aim, and how to fire with relative ease. The noise was incredible, but the damage done to the dummies was impressive - particularly to Leonardo who explained to a very lost Ezio what that kind of damage would translate to in the human body. In the end, all he really understood was that it was a lot, and Ezio decided he loved his new toy.
"You've done me good, brother!"
"Of course," Leonardo said with confidence, rubbing his longer beard. Walking back into Leonardo's studio, his face turned serious, saying, "I've heard about this terrible new Doge they've installed... Marco Barbarigo?"
Ezio nodded slightly. "That was their plan from the beginning."
"When will you return to Venezia?"
Taking a deep breath, Ezio sighed and turned to his friend. "Soon, Leonardo. I cannot allow Marco to do the damage he and his allies are planning."
The painter frowned for a long moment, his bright eyes studying Ezio, before shrugging his shoulders. "As you wish, just give me time to get packed."
"... Packed?"
"I'll come with you. If I tell people you are my assistant, smuggling you back into the city should be relatively easy. Besides, Lent is approaching, and that means Carnevale. This is the time when everybody goes without a face!"
"Va bene," Ezio said, eyes lighting up at the prospect. "That's a great idea!"
"Of course," Leonardo said, confident once again.
In proof, the thieves of Venice loved Carnevale, masks made thieving much, much easier, and the guild at the docks was often empty as they roved the streets, picking pockets of planning heists or using the party to plant their stolen wealth on the poorest people they could find. It was Antonio's favorite time of the year, and he often said his yearly sacrifice for Lent was not meat or fasting, but rather giving up his mask at the end of it all and making himself wait until next year.
Ezio shared this story with Leonardo on the journey back to Venice, and Leonardo laughed, saying he had heard it before.
"I've seen him quite a bit lately at a, um, mutual friend's, in the Dorsoduro district. Ask for Sister Teodora."
The Florentine blinked. "...Sister?" He hadn't realized Antonio was quite that religious. Nor Leonardo, for that matter.
Imagine his surprise then, when Leonardo flushed and coughed. "Well, um... In a way. Yes, sister..."
When they landed in Venice, Leonardo bought a pair of masks for Carnevale, several people already wearing them on and off, trying them out in preparation for the upcoming day of parties. Arriving at Emilio Barbarigo's old palazzo, Rosa greeted Ezio quite fondly, causing Leonardo to cough and strike up a quick conversation with Ugo. After the biting and petting and fondling finished, though, the siblings said - with matching grins - that Antonio was off to see his "sister."
Leonardo coughed again, and Ezio was beginning to wonder just what he was walking in to.
He and the painter parted ways, however, Leonardo off to see his old studio and catch up with some friends, and Ezio made his way south. Wanting to look less like a mercenary and more like a noble, he wore a teal doublet and no weapons save his hidden blades and his dagger tucked into his boot. No armor, either, and he felt strangely naked without his equipment. Still, he dusted off his nobleman gate and crossed the many canals south.
The city was alive with activity, streamers, flags, and lanterns were being strung up in preparation for Shrove Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday and the start of Lent. Several people were dressed up as jesters and harlequins, showmen practiced their fire breathing or acrobatics, tables were lines up for feasts and stages popped up everywhere, along with colorful tents and stalls and other things only ever seen once a year. Asking around, Ezio found - of all things - a whorehouse was attached to the name Sister Teodora, and only then did Ezio begin to understand Leonardo's nerves.
After all, without Paola to satiate him anymore, the painter had to find his love somewhere. Ezio wondered if the man would ever be comfortable talking about his sex life to him. Leonardo must have some excellent stories of conquest under his belt. He resolved to cure the painter of that some day.
Inside, the twenty-six year old eyed the courtesans, all with crucifixes around their necks - and interesting addition as it lead the eye down to the low cut corsets. Alluring for both the male and female whores but especially the females. Ezio was now accustomed to seeing people fornicating in the front lobby, and didn't mind the grunting and groaning and clenching he heard in the various rooms as one courtesan led him up to a particular room. Inside was the distinct, sharp tenor of Antonio, and Ezio debated coming back later, but the prostitute guiding him smiled and said it would be fine.
Antonio sat in a chair, utterly naked, and was sipping a glass of wine while long, slender fingers played with his manhood. Attached to those fingers was a delicate hand, and attached to the hand was a woman in a habit with a cross and her breasts completely exposed. Watching strangers was one thing, watching Antonio was another, and Ezio politely cleared his throat, removing his mask.
"Ezio!" Antonio said, the purse of his lips at the interruption melting away. He stood, unabashed and walked up to greet the man. "Ezio Auditore!" Ezio stepped back, not quite interested in embracing a naked man in even the most innocuous of ways, and it was only when he did so that Antonio seemed to realize his lack of attire. Nonplussed, the thief walked over to a bed and began grabbing his clothes, still extolling platitudes. "Teodora, meet the most... ahem... talented man in all of Venezia!" Pulling up pants, he quickly added, "Not as talented as me in certain... aspects, mind you, but he's a good man to have around."
Ezio turned, still a little embarrassed at seeing Antonio, to the woman, who was now more covered. "Madonna," he greeted, before seeing the crucifix and the habit, and the deliciously low neckline that hinted at the mere glimpse he saw moments ago. "Ah! 'Sister' Teodora..." He glanced over to the thief, still getting dressed. "I never imagined you as a religious type."
Antonio openly laughed at what appeared to be a time-worn joke.
"It depends how you understand religion, my son," Teodora said. She had a beauty mark on her cheek, and a perfectly defined collarbone, and deep, soul-dark eyes. "It's not just men's souls that call for soothing."
"Indeed!" Antonio said brightly, now fully dressed if more than slightly rumpled. "Come! Join us, Ezio! Have a drink! Meet the ladies!"
The Rosa della Virtu did not have a back courtyard the way Paola's did in Florence, but they more than made up for it with a dining hall in the kitchen, closed to customers. It was a long table, flanked with benches, with silverware and food already set up. "My girls are very busy during Carnevale," Teodora said, "And so we make sure they can eat when they can. Now, let us say Grace." She led them in prayer - Ezio's first prayer in years - and they broke bread and wine, simple fair. "But," Teodora explained, "It is more than appropriate given it was the Lord's last supper, and that we are to give up much in anticipation of that last supper."
Teodora was off-putting, to say the least. Ezio turned to the thief.
"Antonio, I trust you know why I'm here."
"I imagine to rid Venezia of Marco Barbarigo?" the thief answered before sipping his wine. He gave the young assassin an incredulous look. "But really, Ezio, we did this once already! And this new Templar Doge is a bigger culo than the last. He's instituted all of Emilio Barbarigo's plans; the merchants are all under one banner and have to pay a huge tax just to sell merchandise here in Venezia, this added to the rent for space, import and export taxes, usage fees if they do not own a stall, and all of it at astronomical rates. The rich, they can afford it, and buy off the servicemen to get out of paying it, but the poor? They're lucky if they turn a profit after everything is said and done! Never mind that he can't leave the palazzo, and we all saw what happened last time you snuck in."
"Yes, except..." Teodora said slowly, "for tomorrow night. Marco wouldn't dare miss Carnevale."
Both men openly blinked. "How do you know this?"
In lieu of answering, Teodora expanded on her point. "In fact, he's throwing the biggest party of them all, but getting in won't be so simple. You'll need a golden mask for entry."
"Is that all?" Antonio asked, already grinning at his most beloved accessory of February. "I can forge one in only a few hours.
"Except keep in mind," Teodora interrupted, "each mask is numbered."
Antonio was crestfallen.
"Fortunately for you, I have an idea. Let's see if we can't win you a mask."
But, before she could outline her plan, there was a high-pitched shriek upstairs and a flurry of activity, footsteps banging over their heads. Teodora was up even before the quick Antonio and Ezio, darting to the lobby just in time to see a thief of some kind run full tilt out the bordello.
"One of yours?"
"No."
"Murderer! Butcher! He sliced Lucia and stole her money!"
That was all Ezio needed to hear, and he was off like an arrow, bolting out the door and following the disrupted flow of the crowds. The chase was pathetically short, without his armor Ezio was perhaps twice as fast, and the thief realized this quickly, barreling into a cluster of courtesans dancing for coin and gripping one by the throat, pulling out a dagger and holding it to her throat.
"Don't come any closer," he threatened, "or I will carve up another one! Don't make me kill again!"
The girls backed up in terror, the one in the thief's grip already crying, and Ezio held his ground, trying to figure out how he could forestall the upcoming slaughter.
"Get away from me!" he shouted. "It wasn't my fault! She laughed at me! She made me do it, stupid bitch."
No throwing knives, no way to disappear without the madman seeing it, no way to get close... But then inspiration struck, and Ezio lifted his hidden blade, taking careful aim. Not the chest, too much risk of hurting the girl, not the arms, he didn't trust himself to make a shot like that yet, the head...?
"You think holding your hand up is going to stop me? They all need to die! Every one of them! The make me do it! They deserve it!"
Ezio fired, and everyone startled at the explosion, uncertain what had happened or where it came from. Many people began to run, but the mad thief fell, his face a mess of blood and brain matter. The courtesan, also covered with flecks of blood, screamed and ran back to her girls, taking her away quickly. Unparalleled damage, Leonardo had said. Ezio looked at the body, at the mess. He had certainly been right.
"Requiescat in pace," he said softly, before disappearing into the crowd.
Back at the brothel, Teodora and all the girls were circled around the dead girl, Lucia, and prayed through their tears, slowly taking a linen and placing it over her face, clasping her hands over her chest.
"Did you get him?" Antonio asked softly.
"Yes."
"Why is it wherever you go, trouble follows?" the aristocratic thief demurred, before stepping up to Teodora and placing a hand on her bare shoulder.
The nun/prostitute turned watery eyes to Ezio before her face closed off. "You have our gratitude, Ezio; but for now, I have work to do."
"I understand, Madonna," Ezio said, and he and Antonio left the brothel, slowly winding their way to Palazzo della Seta and its gothic architecture.
Author's Notes: Desmond! He snuck up on us. Meh, that's just explaining more glyphs. The information dolled out is actually quite interesting, we had never even HEARD of Tunguska before AC2, and didn't even know what it meant until researching the glyphs for writing this fic. One thing the writers do a great job of, is weaving together this pseudo history and connecting it all together. And wasn't there a comic about a Russian assassin? Great times. Also note, we've put a cap on what Shaun does and doesn't know about history. Funnily enough, there's just so much of the stuff out there that it's impossible to know all of it. We sort of assume Shaun's specialized in something - possibly the Renaissance, though that would be too convenient - and has to research the rest. He didn't get all those ancient looking tomes in his workstation from a local Barnes and Nobles, after all.
Ezio the Dim resurfaces. He tries hard, but he just can't conceive of the fact that Leo's not quite like him. Also note his reaction to learning Claudia's finally getting married. It'll only gets better later. Trust us. We're also starting to shift his perceptions about women. Well; not quite shift them so much as make him actually think ABOUT women. Altair brings up a long list of good points, and Ezio needs to start to understand just how privileged he is just because of his gender so that he can recruit female assassins in brotherhood. It's gotta start somewhere, right? This will (hopefully) only be perpetuated by Teodora. Oh, and perhaps someone else he meets next chapter. Wonder who it could be...
And in AC3 new: ZOMG the jail sequence! The Homestead wedding! Squee; we're having so much fun!
Next chapter: Carnevale. Need we say more?