Will you be there when the sun shines no more?

White. It's everywhere. Wherever you look, and wherever you go, it's waiting for you. But sometimes. . .there's also red, tainting the white. Captivating you, making you glance at it more and more often. Seconds later, it might be gone. Nothing is permanent. Because nothing is true. And everything's permitted.

~.~

I wouldn't call myself impulsive. For that matter, I'd actually say I'm quite patient. Since I worked at a bar, I'm used to different kinds of behaviour. And although I never hated my job, it got really tiring whenever an idiot decided to play it cool in front of his so-called friends, and start a fight for no reason. Each and every time, I convinced myself not to beat the shit out of whoever thought that was a good idea, even though all I wanted was a quiet night without some bastard ruining the peace I couldn't hope to get at home because of my ever-loving neighbours. So yeah, I'm patient. But even I have my limits. Abstergo crossed those limits within seconds.

"I won't."

His eyes were focused on mine, not blinking once. It seemed like hours before he closed them. He sighed in frustration and faced the wall, arms behind his back as usual.

Then he walked toward the bed I lie on, slowing the nearer he got.

"Don't be so foolish," he said, staring down with amused—but still cold—grey eyes. "You surely didn't think you had a choice?" He spat the word, as if entertaining that possibility was insulting.

Before I could answer, he raised his left brow. "Live or die—that's the only thing you may decide on. The outcome will be the same." I glared as he went to the door, pushed the button to open it, and walked slowly through the frame.

I carefully sat up.

"I await you in fifteen minutes, Mr. Miles. And for your sake, I hope you won't disappoint me." I heard the usual swishing as the door closed.

My neck was sore, and my head felt like shit. That damn doctor thought it couldn't hurt to keep me in one or two hours longer yesterday. Not that I minded. I was absolutely happy here in my nice little room, trapped by crazy scientists that wanted to make the world gold and shiny, in a machine invented to let you know what hell's really like.
Subject 16 would've agreed with me, if not for the incident where he went berserk and started drawing symbols on the beautiful white walls, before dying—probably from blood loss. All thanks to some pen he found wherever; I didn't know, because the room included a bed, a wardrobe, and a desk with nothing on it. Guess I could call myself lucky. I didn't need to fear that one day a pen would be lying there waiting to seduce me.

Note to self: When your head feels like it's going to explode, stop thinking.

In that moment I felt nothing but pain, caused by enduring what turned out to be four more hours in the Animus. Replaying memories that weren't even mine.

I had about eleven minutes before the procedure started over.

And I'd slept on my blanket. Again. No wonder my neck stiffened up if I always fell asleep the minute I touched the bed.

I pushed my legs off the bed and stood, trying to take it easy. I didn't dare stretch. My left foot felt a bit numb, but I ignored it and made my way to the bathroom; a good shower could work wonders.

After I stepped out of the shower, I heard a knock on my door. "Desmond?" a voice whispered softly from the other side. "Are you in there?"

Inwardly, I had to laugh—I mean, where else could I be?

I opened the door, still dressed in a towel.

"Hey, Desmond, could you—?" Lucy cut off when she saw me, and looked away, cheeks turning red.

"I'll be there in a second," I assured her. "Tell the doc I just wanted to look nice for our next date, or something."

Lucy smiled at that. She slowly looked up at my face, before giving a slight nod.

Then she turned and left.

I sighed. She was the only sane person here, and therefore the only one who could keep me sane. That was one thing I really wanted to hold onto. But with the Bleeding Effect getting worse, it was nearly impossible.

I didn't tell anyone because Vidic wouldn't care; he'd probably speed things up before I ended up like my dear friend, Subject 16. Lucy is another matter. She'd try to convince Vidic to shorten my time in the Animus, and that might be the trigger for him to dismiss her—leaving me alone with these psychos.

Instead, I pretended not to see those piercing golden eyes when I looked in the mirror. Or the shadow of a person walking through the room, deep in thought. I could no longer deny that it was getting harder to distinguish my memories from his. Sometimes, I even had a feeling that someone was watching me—but every time I turned around, no one was there. I was slowly but surely going crazy, and the fear of completely forgetting myself grew stronger and stronger. It made no difference to me whether it was inevitable or not. The only thing that mattered to me was to stop this fucked up plan to get me out of this living hell. It didn't need to make sense to anyone. It just had to make sense to myself.

And it did in some strange way. I wasn't fighting back when they ordered me to go in the Animus but I also didn't do all those things willingly. If possible I tried to let myself go so that I went too deep in the system of the Animus and they had to get me out of that thing. Some other time I blocked their sight so that Vidic couldn't see what happened in that memory. I don't know how exactly it happened or how the hell I actually did it but Vidic was mad. As in really, really mad. Mind the pun. And if that wasn't enough in the last few days my dear brain just sometimes stopped synchronizing with the Animus. Except for yesterday where Vidic therefore decided that we were far too behind schedule and therefore I had this slightly longer session that caused me to throw up afterwards and granted me this lovely headache this morning. I went back into the bathroom to grab some new clothing even though they all looked the same. Sometimes I kinda confused them and I had to change four times because of my very own stupidity. But today was my lucky day and I actually put on the right clothes. When I finished changing I didn't dare to look into the mirror so I just grabbed the dirty clothes, threw them into the basket and left the bathroom.

Not seconds after I entered the Animus Project laboratory, as they introduced it to me,Vidic was already glaring at me.

"This is called being late, Mr. Miles. Not a behaviour you should accustom yourself to", was all he had to say before he got back to doing whatever he was doing before. Not that I'd actually care about what he was doing or not for it was surely something I did not or I did not want to understand. I halted as I looked over to Lucy who stood at her usual spot, typing something without even noticing my arrival.

"And what are you waiting for, Mr. Miles? If there's one thing we haven't got it's time so if you wouldn't mind?" For a second I considered answering his question and denying his wish of obedience but I hold myself back and made my way to the Animus. Vidic only muttered a quiet 'finally' before directing me to lie down, then going to his usual place, as well. The whole process was nothing new to me so I obediently lay down and closed my eyes.

I felt my whole body shivering as I felt the all to familiar tingle. As I opened my eyes again all I saw was white what could only mean they were preparing to load the newest memory. I relaxed taking all the white in. It already felt like home to me for everything around me was white. My room, the bathroom, the laboratory and everything here within the Animus.

And his clothes.

Wherever I looked there was only this white, consuming me and all around it.

"Can you hear me Desmond?" That must have been Lucy. Now that I was realizing where I was I was getting confused. "Lucy?" I heard her breathing a sigh of relief as I said her name.

"What is going on here? Why am I still here?" I couldn't understand what was going on but I sure as hell had no fun staying here all day while my head was still fuming.

But there was no answer. Instead I heard some quiet voices, mumbling something I could not understand. "Lucy?", I asked again hoping this time she would answer. But she didn't and with every passing minute I was getting more and more impatient. What was going on? This had never happened before not even at that time were I wasn't able to synchronize with...that was it! The feeling of being on the brink of a synchronisation never came which could only mean that there was something wrong with the Animus. Even when the synchronisation didn't work there has always been this feeling as if one would stand on a skyscraper, standing there right on the edge and finally getting pushed by something from behind. But I couldn't feel anything at all.

"Lucy? Damn Lucy what the hell is going on?" I was getting frustrated not knowing what was happening and I didn't like this familiar feeling of being trapped. And it surely didn't help at all that I had claustrophobia. Even though there were no real borders I felt like being trapped in the Animus, trapped in the white like it actually does instead of granting me the feeling of being at home. Although recently it started to feel the same to me. Being trapped was part of my life, part of me that I inwardly must have already accepted a long time ago even though I still convinced myself otherwise. I knew it was drawing me down, deeper in my conscience without me being able to resist. If someone wasn't going to help me soon it would drag me down further and further until 'Desmond' would left to be nothing more than an empty shell. I just knew it.

"Desmond? Are you're still there?" There was a voice talking to me, asking me if I was still present. Well of course I was, wasn't I? I was still able to think, still able to hear and everything felt numb. It was like I was sinking deeper and deeper, like being on the brink of falling asleep. But...was I? The more I thought about it the less sense it made to me. Why would I fall asleep? I wasn't tired and with time this numbness was a real burden. Which brought me to the thought, why the hell was I even here? And more importantly... where exactly was 'here'?

Within a second I was back in the white area whilst I slowly gained back my consciousness. More like I ripped it out of the grip of the darkness that had just nearly consumed me.

"Lucy?", my voice was hoarse like I hadn't used it for ages,"what the fuck is happening to me?" That was all I could muster because everything was swirling around me and I suddenly felt so god damn dizzy.

"I don't know! He seems to be angry that it won't work but left a minute ago because he doesn't know what is wrong:" Her voice was getting quieter and higher with every spoken word until the last word was nothing but a whisper. I could hear the panic in her voice and that was something I didn't quite fancy. Lucy was the calm type that rationally thought about what to do when getting in a stressful situation. But now she was afraid of whatever was happening and that didn't help me to calm down at all.

"Right now we think the best thing to do is to get you out of the Animus even though that means wasting more of our limited time as he thoroughly explained. You know I think right now he is even..."

Oh god no! Now she even started to ramble, with that being that one thing I couldn't cope with. So although she kept on talking I wasn't listening. This wasn't just my thing, calming people, trying to ease the situation. Those things were usually her part or someone else's but not mine. And for sure not if I was actually the one being trapped in the machine that was going to collapse any minute.

"Lucy, please. Calm down!" I tried to help her getting back the control of the situation. If not for me than at least for her sake. Because I was a dead loss if I actually had to be the one staying calm, even though it worked so well as bartender. Guess being only surrounded by drunkards who equalled brainless idiots must have been an entirely new situation. Although that was actually the only time when I didn't freak out because of nearing problem. Not that I've showed that on the outside. But when Lucy lost the control she panicked and made all things even worse, therefore not helping the situation at all. For a second there was nothing and I already thought my attempt was useless but then I heard a quiet: "You're right." And that seemed to be the key word as I heard her starting to type something again.

I left her alone for a while and sat down, listening to the typing noise in the background because waiting was the only thing I could do. And it was the only thing I did. What seemed like eternity could have been days, hours, minutes or even seconds for I didn't know how long I waited for Lucy to finally speak to me again, hopefully having a solution. But there was nothing. Only the soft taping on the keyboard that stopped once in while. But I was happy it hadn't vanished which meant I was still connected to the real world. And that was more than I could hope for in this situation.

But then at some point, although I can't exactly say when, I heard some other noise. It sounded like voices but I couldn't identify them, although one clearly had a heavy Italian accent. I stood up and went towards the direction of the voice. It was nice listening to it and was also a welcomed distraction of the ruling silence in here. As I stepped closer suddenly the direction of the voice changed and I quickly turned around and rushed towards the new source of different voices. One of them I recognized. It was Malik and it seemed like he was talking to someone but I didn't know who. I tried to recognize what they were saying but it was sheer impossible and after some time the voices seemed to slowly fade away as I concentrated on their exact words. This strongly reminded me of the bleeding effect, even though usually it was his voice and his shade that I was seeing.

Suddenly the Italian accented voice came back to my right and I turned to it, intending to follow but shortly after, the silence was back again. I tried listening closely but there was nothing but the soft tapping, just like before. It felt highly oppressive because I could no longer sat down and relax, using the situation the best I could., but was rather anxious of being alone again, a feeling that was completely new to me. And then the tapping stopped and everything was silent. After a while I couldn't bear it any more and needed to ask if she was still there with me and thank god for she answered.

"Yes, everything's alright now. I stabilized the Animus so you should be able to come out any minute. It seems like the Animus overheated again which caused an important wire to stop functioning. I guess it was either burned or some materials started to melt which brought about the malfunction." I sighed with relief as I heard the good news.

"Okay I'm going to get you out of there now. Just say something if there's something..." she paused at that. Not something I wanted to hear after I've just been told that I'm not going to die because of some overheated Animus. And I sure as hell just wanted to get out this thing before it decided to just not work like it should whilst I was still in here.

"Okay, ten seconds left", was all I heard before I realized that the white around me slowly started to fade, leaving the familiar black and before I knew it, I was back. But within the last second I could have sworn that I had felt a hand on my shoulder, just lying there but easing the unbearable pain nonetheless.

I knew I felt dizzy before I even got to open my eyes. I guess this was what I deserved for leaving the farm instead of staying there like a good boy. They've always said you get no less than what you deserve or something like that. And it seemed to be fucking true.

"Desmond? Is everything alright? Can you open your eyes?" For starters, let me tell you a thing or two. Being bombarded by questions the second you come back to the living is not something you want to experience for yourself. Although it was nice to know that I was back, alive and probably still sane enough to think rationally I'd really appreciate some quiet moments before I had to face reality.

But luck didn't seem to be on my side today so I just tried to move some body parts, shaking the numb feeling off and was suddenly very aware of my condition.

My eyelids felt heavy which made the whole process of opening my eyes a bit harder but after a while I slowly started blinking. The light was so bright that I had to raise my hand in front of my face to shield it before I actually got the chance to see something.

Right there above me was Lucy's face as she looked down at me, probably still worrying that I wasn't feeling well. But now that I thought about it I've never felt better. And I meant it. My headache was gone, my body didn't ache at all and I didn't feel like throwing up. Feeling so good made me sit up as I still stared at the ceiling.

"Desmond?", she hesitantly asked me again. I turned my head towards her face and starred at her.

The panic was still slightly visible on her face, but her features were clearly showing her concern for my well-being. Being taken care of could actually feel real nice. Although her worries seemed to disappear as I looked at her.

"Welcome back", was all she said as she smiled down at me, although I didn't expect her to push me from the Animus right on the floor. But she did and therefore being absolutely unprepared I shortly after made friends with the ground. And god damn it that fucking hurt like shit, and that just after I was enjoying my painless state after being revived. But she had taken me by surprise, so she also had the upper hand and fled the moment I was too shocked about the fact that I was actually lying on the floor because Lucy Stillman had pushed me down without any warning or something.

After my shock I stood up and made my way over to my room because that was too much for me. Being kidnapped and then trapped by some crazy scientists which made you use a machine that tortures your body for weeks and than finally when you can relax because there is a malfunction within the system there's another one that traps you inside of it, nearly causing you to end up brain-dead. And then the only friend you've got there pushes you down so that at the only time where you hadn't felt any kind of pain your whole body aches because of the impact. Nicely done, really.

So whilst I was limping to my bed I planned how to avoid the next session without having to leave it. As I hopelessly did so I could already feel my headache coming back. I groaned. This was so not happening. God, what the hell have I done to deserve this.

When I woke up the following morning the first thing I noticed was my headache or rather my non-existent headache. Carefully I stood up and made my way to the bathroom, not wanting to provoke it to come back. Moments like these were rare and I did my best to enjoy them to the fullest.

I didn't feel like showering so I just skipped it, although I did change my clothes after I had worn them the whole night. Not that I could actually decide whether it was day or night having no windows at all. Good though that I had asked Lucy for an alarm clock so I wouldn't completely loose my sense of time, when I was trapped inside of here. Now with new clothes on I walked out of the bathroom to the room door, pushed the red button and went through it as it opened.

Lucy was already at her usual spot as I went over to the Animus.

"Where's the doc?", I asked her because I couldn't see him and it was highly unlikely for him to be late. "He said he has some important things to do, so we're all alone today", was all she said as she directed me to lie down. "Although I think it has something to do with the incident yesterday."

Oh yes, that lovely episode. Not that I had a problem with him not being here, it was just so unexpected of him because usually he insisted on being present.

As I closed my eyes I felt myself being drawn deeper into my consciousness before a second after I was back in the white area. But this time everything felt normal, nothing more nothing less.

"Desmond, are you feeling well?" Because this time I actually did, I nodded, forgetting that she was probably not able to see it. "So it seems.", I said after I actually realized that small problem before I began to walk for a bit. As I walked I looked around for anything suspicious but there was nothing and so I started to relax, waiting for the feeling before a replay to arrive. But nothing came so I slowly felt the panic rising within me and I stopped abruptly.

"Lucy, please tell me there's nothing wrong this time." For a moment she didn't answer but then she sighed and started to talk.

"Actually there is nothing wrong with the Animus but...", at that she stopped talking. Just the thing I loved the most so I asked her again.

"Well I know this sounds weird but...", please not again. "Yes?", I tried to encourage her.

"It seems to be a problem coming from you this time." My mouth literally dropped open and I was too shocked to answer.

"No, no, no, no no! I didn't mean like your some lost cause or something", well thanks,"but more like ...you know? Well what I mean is that..." Even though Lucy was usually someone who would get straight to the point, this was confusing me to no end. But then she breathed out, so loudly even I could hear it and started anew.

"What I really mean is that there seems to be another presence with you in there. The Animus keeps on telling me that you can't replay his memories because of that presence. In other word, someone or something must be right there with you, keeping you from entering the memories. But that's just impossible. There can't be another one with you in there." Her voice reflected her frustration as she talked and I could practically hear her typing furiously on her monitor. Someone's here?

I carefully looked around but there was nothing but white. In the background I still heard her sighing as she talked again.

"Don't ask how, but somehow the presence is allowing us to go on." What? That was fast.

"What do you mean with it's allowing us ?" Whatever or whoever it was, I didn't care. I just wanted to get out of here. But as I opened my mouth to ask her to get me out, I suddenly felt that pull again. The memory was being loaded and the white started to fade again, slowly being replaced by the appearance of Masyaf.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Because I sure as hell wasn't. But I guess it was too late because I already felt myself being drawn away as everything around me steadily turned black. And that could only mean that I would soon be in Masyaf. I guess in a few seconds everything was going to go back to normal.

"Desmond? Can you see someone? The presence should be directly in front of you."

Or not. But as I stared in front of me there was nothing. And it didn't feel like there was someone, as well.

"Now it's behind", she said. Carefully I turned around, shortly before being completely absorbed into the memory. At first I didn't see anything but then suddenly there he was, standing directly in front of me. Oh god, this can't be. I took a step back but his piercing golden eyes followed my every movement.

"Desmond? What is wrong? Your blood pressure increased enormously", I heard Lucy ask me. But I didn't care.

"This is not possible", I whispered. But even as I closed my eyes, repeating that sentence over and over and then opening my eyes again, he was still standing there, staring down at me.

I couldn't do anything, my body felt numb and it wouldn't listen to what I wanted. So the only thing I did was gazing over to him as I slowly faded into nothing, going to his place within his memories.

And then everything turned black.

"Altaïr"