failscendant

• that he was born and raised an Assassin
• that he left at 16 and ended up working in a bar
• that he was kidnapped by a Templar organisation called Abstergo that basically runs the world
• that he's 'read about' their lives (as a way of explaining the Animus without explaining it)
• Pieces of Eden
• Those Who Came Before
• the war between Those Who Came Before and humanity
• the current situation regarding the coronal mass ejection
• the Grand Temple and Juno
• that he has lived their lives via the Animus
• he has explained Lucy and what she did
• he dropped the 'Haytham was raised an Assassin' bomb
• that the King Washington thing never happened
• UPDATE - assassin family log explaining how they all fit together
• UPDATE - canon updated to making his final decision

ᴛʀᴀɴsᴄʀɪᴘᴛs:

ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ ᴀɴᴅ ᴄᴏɴɴᴏʀ; ғɪʀsᴛ ᴄᴏɴᴠᴇʀsᴀᴛɪᴏɴ

❝So...Desmond Miles, born and raised an assassin in a place that was pretty much off the grid, kind of like Masyaf, just assassins only. My dad was the one who trained me and he kept telling me about the dangers of Abstergo - that's the front for the templars and I didn't think they were everywhere but guess what? They are. I left. I didn't believe my parents and what they were talking about, training me for this war? I thought they were paranoid, y'know, conspiracy nuts. The training was good, can't fault them there because it took nine years for Abstergo to pick me up and then they wanted information out of me. About the assassins. About things that were left behind. Artifacts. Is there anything you can tell me about anything like that you've come across? They called them Pieces of Eden.❞

❝Most of them are called apples, just like the garden of Eden, there are...anything someone thought was magic? It was one of them. Someone said once to a mentor with one that they held fire in their hands. I've seen what they can do. I've never seen one like that before - the one I've seen is gold, about so big I think it affects us differently to others, it's something about being an assassin. Some of them can make copies of people, living or dead. Hold people against their will. Protecting you probably makes more sense than some of what I've se- heard about.❞

❝Some are missing, there's a map of them that Ezio had in his possession but not all of the places they were are around anymore. Some got destroyed. We've got one right now, kept safe. The Templars want them to control the minds of everyone on the planet; we'd have peace but no free will. They've been trying, in my time, to get them so they can enslave everyone's mind.❞

❝This...I don't fully understand the science behind it, when I left I worked as a bartender and this sort of thing is off the charts. Here we go. A long time ago, we're talking BC here, before you and me and Ezio and Altair, there were people around called the First Civilization or Precursors or Those Who Came Before and they were the ones who made the Pieces of Eden. They made humanity in their image and called Earth their home. We even have a thing in our brain - not all of us, but it's not something anyone knows much about - that makes us obey the Pieces of Eden. But the ones without, I think we're hybrids, children of them and humans, the ones who couldn't be controlled. The first humans didn't know what they were so they called them Gods - it's why they're called things like Juno and Minerva, it's why with the Pieces of Eden, any miracle or something like that? It really happened, it's just not how it was recorded. The first humans were their workforce but eventually they were no longer slaves and war broke out.

So when this war broke out there was this first disaster that I think gets called the Toba catastrophe. Before, people in my time thought it was the eruption of a supervolcano that caused it but it was caused by a thing called a coronal mass ejection - it's a massive burst of solar wind and when it hit, it flipped the magnetic field of the Earth and the radiation from the sun burned everything. The fires went on for weeks. There were earthquakes, the planet was...god it was ravaged and less than ten thousand humans and some of Those Who Came Before emerged. They worked together. But because of how few of them survived compared to us, even with their longer lifespans they weren't the ones to go on, just their influence. We were built to survive though so that's what we did.

Until now. Right now there's a second one coming. Hurricane season lasts all year in some places and that's without whatever Abstergo has been up to.❞

❝We found that site, it's where I was before Manhattan, it's this Grand Temple. It requires an Apple to open it and thankfully, Haytham didn't have one. But we do, now, it took a lot but we've got in and we're in there. I was in Manhattan to get a power source but I got abducted by the dragon and now.

Something like that. Truth is written by the people in power and the Templars always have a way of inserting themselves in organisations, pretending they believe when they're just using it to get ahead. They took part in the Crusades for that reason, same again when they were involved in the papacy. We have to keep records. It's the only way we'll keep track of the truth and not whatever lies the Templars put out.❞

❝You don't? It's not above ground, or, y'know the door is. The rest is under, it's this remnant thing and Juno's haunting it. Or there's a projection-- we're not completely sure but something that looks like Juno is there and she just sort of appears and stares and sometimes she'll talk if I've gone exploring.

Now the company they run is everywhere. I didn't believe my mom when she told me as a kid but once I got out into the world after leaving the farm, that's when I realised. There's nowhere to go that they can't find you unless you still keep yourself as cut off as you can. No records, just one and they get you. They don't want freedom, they want their utopia where they decide everything for everyone else and if there are people who can't be controlled by Pieces of Eden who pose a threat then we can both guess what happy fate awaits them. The US was a good place to exploit - they had a Precursor site, couldn't use it but in my time, the US is a huge global power. What better place to start trying to set up the system you want than a 'new' country? Lots of angles to exploit that I'm sure I'll learn more about whenever I get back.❞

ᴍᴇᴍᴏʀʏ ᴛʀᴀɴsᴄʀɪᴘᴛ
ᴄʟᴀʏ: Just walk right past me.
ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ: Sixteen?
ᴄʟᴀʏ: They didn't tell you my name?
ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ: God dammit I'm still in the Animus?
ᴄʟᴀʏ: Quite a shock you suffered out there.
ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ: Rebecca! Get me outta here!
ᴄʟᴀʏ: They can't help you Desmond. You're a broken man, your mind it's...broken.
ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ: Broken? I feel fine.
ᴄʟᴀʏ: So did I. [laughs] Look at me now! Let's talk buddy. Walk with me.
ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ: What is this place?
ᴄʟᴀʏ: It's nice, isn't it? We're in the guts of the Animus. The original test program, no memories here just basic physics, weather simulations. Hello world! You're lucky someone up there had the sense to plug you in here. Saved your life.
ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ: Saved it from what?
ᴄʟᴀʏ: Right now you should be sitting in a hospital ward drooling and chewing on your tongue. For now the Animus is keeping you intact. Keeping all your ancestors from collapsing into one big mess but if you can't find a synch nexus all those personalities will smash together and that won't be pretty.
ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ: A synch nexus?
ᴄʟᴀʏ: I'm getting there, hold on. There. That thing is your way out.
ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ: You're screwing with me.
ᴄʟᴀʏ: Here's the problem: your brain is hash, too many ghosts in your head, too many voices so how do you fix that? You claw your way back in the stored data and you find unfinished memories and you crack them open. Finish what you started until your ancestor has nothing left to show you. And that is a synch nexus and when you find it, the Animus can separate Desmond from Ezio and Altair and send you home, back to your body.
ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ: How do you know all this?
ᴄʟᴀʏ: Because it happened to me but my body, it's worm food now. So I'm stuck here. A word of warning - when you step through there, everything changes. Nothing feels normal. But you are still in control and it's up to you to find your way out.
ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ: Right.
ᴄʟᴀʏ: If you hurry you might make it back in time for Lucy's funeral.
ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ: What? [desmond experiencing the flashback to brotherhood, shouts in pain, collapses]
ᴄʟᴀʏ: Oh, I thought you knew.
ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ: Lucy. Oh god. I'm so sorry. It wasn't me. Wasn't me. It was that voice. Juno. She took hold of me. She made me- [flashback ends] What am I doing? What have I done?

ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ ᴀɴᴅ ᴄᴏɴɴᴏʀ; ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ ᴍᴇᴍᴏʀʏ
❝I need to tell you everything, it's the only way this makes sense. I didn't lie when I said I studied you but it wasn't with books. I was kidnapped by the Templars to put me in a thing called an Animus to relive the lives of my ancestors - you, Altair, Ezio. They needed me to find Pieces of Eden. Then Lucy sprung me so I relived more and we used it to train me except...there's a big side effect. The Bleeding Effect. I mean it helps, I can learn skills in hours using it but it makes you go crazy. I-- I had to-- We found Ezio's, in Rome, and I heard things, Juno-- she made me...

You saw it. And Clay, Sixteen, he was me. Or the subject before. He killed himself, left clues. Helped me get my mind back together again so I could wake up. Finish things.❞

❝Yeah...I don't know how close but it's genetic memories so it's you guys. And Haytham. I saw his life from just before he went the states up to him and your mom at the Precursor site.  I don't know how about it's weird? You know, strolling up saying hey I'm proof you'll have a family one day and I've lived out intimate moments of your life and know way too much about you thanks to a machine that's meant to help train me so I can save the world and sorry your genes made it down to such a goddamn disappointment?  And Clay, Sixteen, he was me.❞

❝You know at first I didn't even know he was a Templar? I kind of blacked out in the temple then I woke up in the Animus, saw him kill a guy at the theatre, kill a guy on a ship, meet Charles Lee  and assemble his merry band of assholes. It wasn't  until they inducted Charles Lee that we found out he was a Templar. We're looking for the same thing. When I woke up from my coma, going to the temple and opening it - or part of it at least, we still need power sources - was our goal.

I didn't know how to tell you.  I'm sorry. I just...I'm sorry, I fucked up, it's what I do.❞

❝We got to where Ezio had hidden his Apple, it's what we were looking for, we got down into this vault and I could hear Juno but no one else could.

I walked over to it, there was gold light, Lucy wanted to know if I asked it the right thing, Shaun was talking about the symbols in the light, symbols for freedom and then when I touched I-- I couldn't move. Her voice, my DNA. The final journey but she said the cross darkens the horizon, she...she meant Lucy. Balance. Open the path. I had the Apple in one hand.


I killed her. I killed her because she left the Assassins. She was working with the Templars. I didn't know. I heard more when I was in a coma but...now you know.❞

❝I was trying to get her away! I wanted to tell you both but I didn't know if I could trust either of you then, I didn't know if either of you even liked me enough to listen to me tell you the whole story of what the fuck is going on in my time! I wanted to sit down, all three of us and Lucy when she was better and figure out where we stood. She'd just been brought here and she was still hurt, I didn't know if she was going to die again, I didn't want a scene!

Hey, when Abstergo kidnapped me she was the only one who gave a damn about the fact that I was going insane and that they could have killed me! Vidic threatened to induce a coma, go through my memories to find what he needed to then leave me to die! She was alone, it was just her and no contact with everyone else. You wanna know something? Your old man? He was born to the Assassins.  Your grandfather was one of us, then the Grand Master of the Templars in London got a hold on him and look how the fuck that turned out. I saw what Haytham did already, I saw what he's doing.  I'm willing to bet there's so much more of him, Charles Lee and the gang to watch whenever I get back. Lucy? Lucy didn't get to do anything. She was working on the Animus. Abstergo had more people before they had me. I killed her. I'm pretty damn sure she's not going to be able to do anything because if she goes back then guess what, she's dead, she's buried and one of our friends went to her funeral. I don't know who I'm meant to trust anymore. The world is ending, we've known for hundreds of years and it's still us against the Templars when we might not even have a world to fight over if I can't find a way to fix it!❞

❝It's not going to matter what I say, you're mad for a reason so anything I say'll only make it worse because that's what I do.  I needed her better so I could talk to her but all I know is that she was alone with Abstergo. She was alone, surrounded by people who were there for her when she needed someone. She watched a man go insane through a machine she helped to fix, write messages on the walls in his own blood then kill himself. She saw the cost of this fucking war - this war is going to kill the whole world because we're fighting over peace and that's fucking dumb in the first place and how to get it while the world is about to get fucked over. Abstergo offered her something when she was cut off from everyone watching all this death and destruction. People get seduced all the time by less.❞

ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ ᴀɴᴅ ᴀʟᴛᴀɪʀ; ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ ᴍᴇᴍᴏʀʏ
❝Because it sounds less insane? Because I'm going to go 'oh hey Altair remember that time you had to stab your mentor and lead the Brotherhood because you really kicked ass doing it?'  Maybe I wanted to try to be a normal member of the brotherhood instead of the guy who went crazy reliving the lives of people from hundreds of years ago so he could learn their skills in a short period so he could apparently help to save the goddamn world.

Would you have believed me if I'd told you the truth from the start?❞


❝I read your codex. Ezio reassembled it and used it to find a vault You wanna know something that happened to me? I forgot who I was. I was seeing things. Hearing things. I dreamt I was you outside of the Animus. I was screaming in my sleep - you can check that with Lucy if you really want - I was losing my damn mind and I only just put it back together before I got here.  What was I meant to do? I'm not you. I'm not Ezio. I'm not Connor. I'm just Desmond.❞

❝Trust me, after the Bleeding Effect, I need to just be me.

Except that's what needs to happen. I need memories and skills from you, Ezio and Connor and what you all experienced to be able to stop what's going to happen or to find a solution.  You know what my old man had to say when he saw me properly - not the first thing but pretty close - he bitched me out for working in a shitty bar wasting my life and he punched me in the face.❞

❝I can't. I have to get back. There's a deadline and the people I'm with, dad, Rebecca, Shaun...it's just us. We have to figure it out and save the world, there's no one else, I have to be the me they need me to be.  I'm an Assassin, that's who I am. It's who and what I was always meant to be. That's all there is to it.❞

ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ ᴀɴᴅ ᴄᴏɴɴᴏʀ; ᴄᴏɴɴᴏʀ ᴍᴇᴍᴏʀʏ
❝I don't know what sort of acid trip dream that is but uh no...that sure as hell didn't happen.

There something you wanna tell me about shit I'm going to have to deal with at some point?❞

❝Well that sure as hell didn't happen. I thought the whole point was getting away from the British crown - the US got independence and Washington was the first president and there's never been an American king. I've only seen up to you being welcomed into the brotherhood.  Do you know Washington?❞

❝I guess I'll see that whenever I get back to everyone else. Do I want the advance screening on what he did?  Well last time anyone in charge went crazy it was the Borgia family - I mean Rodrigo Borgia wasn't a shining beacon of popeliness anyway - and a Piece of Eden was involved. I mean, besides the Shard, you didn't come into contact with anything else like that?


❝Remember the thing you saw when you were a kid, before you went looking for Achilles? What if it's like that? A what-if scenario?❞

❝Yeah, there's this thing I heard someone talk about once, a multiverse theory. It's this idea that basically everything that can exist, exists somewhere - infinite possibilities almost sounds like something Juno and the others could do or be aware of or I guess project? I don't know, physics isn't my thing.  Maybe that's part of it too? I mean she turned you into an eagle in the thing I saw.❞

❝It's the Animus. I see what you see, hear what you hear, muscle memory learns what you learn and when I come out, I can do what you do.

Maybe it's to make sure you keep fighting? They spoke to me via Ezio via a Piece of Eden once so if and when a Piece of Eden is involved, don't expect the rules to actually apply or even exist anymore.❞

ʟᴜᴄʏ ᴀɴᴅ ᴀʟᴛᴀɪʀ; ᴅᴇsᴍᴏɴᴅ's ʀᴜɴᴇ
❝I'll stay by his side as long as he wants. I mean no ill intent against him... not anymore.❞

❝That's part of it. There is much I never wanted for him.

Originally, I was planted. I was forced to cut ties with the Assassins when I was seventeen, to better penetrate Abstergo Industries - that's the front for the modern day Templars. The next I heard from the Assassins directly was not for another seven years. Not until four months past, actually.

In the end, I deferred.

I don't know what to think of them anymore. But back then, I was alone, isolated, tossed aside by the Brotherhood. Abstergo needed me to work on the Animus, to be of use. I thought they understood humanity. I thought they cared about it.

But that was before Sixteen - Clay. He was in Desmond's memories. It wasn't long after when I became a liability.❞

❝No.

I wanted it to be over for a long time before coming here. That hasn't changed.❞