The Apple has a Sense of Humor
 

Anna grinned briefly at her friend as she tugged her into yet another museum in Italy. "Come on. This one has a traveling exhibition, something about Renaissance pieces. You know it'll be fun."

The fun part wasn't the problem. The problem was that Anna was still in the "OMG WE'RE IN ITALY" mentality. At least she hadn't broken any laws or etiquette rules yet.

Little did they know, but the traveling exhibit in this museum wasn't just Renaissance things. They'd taken something and lumped it in with the Renaissance group, although it was much, much older. Not that anyone knew that. And the Templars wanted that thing, very much so. So much so that they were in the process of buying the whole exhibit so they could get that one piece.

But Anna didn't know, nor did she care. She just wanted to keep bouncing around Italy.

Iris let herself be dragged into the museum.

"Anna, really," she said, "we don't actually have to see everything in one day." That's what it had felt like, so far. Anna was excited, she knew, and really, she was too. It was Italy, for god's sake, a vacation didn't get any better than that. But they had three weeks there, so they still had time to see everything.

"I know, I know. I can't help it! Give me another few days and I'll crash and sleep for twelve hours." Anna grinned and started off towards the exhibit. Some of the things she recognized, and others were totally new to her. So she was a very happy historian in a museum.

Four Templars moved past the girls, going straight towards the Apple. Negotiations were taking too long; time to grab the thing and go.

Iris rolled her eyes, but it was half-hearted at best. The museum was practically heaven to her, and she was itching to figure out how the preservation department did their jobs here. She could be a very happy archivist in this museum. She jumped and glared a bit when she was pushed to the side by a group of men.

Anna looked over at the men when they shoved a few more people out of the way and she huffed. "Really, how rude," she grumbled. "Freakin' people."

One of them moved right over to the exhibit with the Apple and picked it up. It glowed for a moment, and all four of them fixed their attention on it. One of them made a move to grab it, and the one holding it shoved him away, but a third tried to tackle him. The Apple went flying out of their hands and rolled over to stop right in front of Iris.

Iris blinked at the sudden brawl, and almost tripped over the artifact when it rolled to her feet. Gingerly, she picked it up before she could step on it, although she was wary of doing so. Museums were a bit neurotic about people who didn't work there touching things.

The Apple glowed briefly against her skin before there was a flash of light and the two girls vanished. At the same time 800 years previous, Altair vanished from his room atop the tower in Masyaf, and the Apple glowed in Ezio's gloved palm.

Anna groaned quietly as she sat up, having landed flat on her back in the middle of a large room. She blinked when she found one guy standing at an end of the room, his eyes narrowed and blades extended from both hands. Another guy was getting to his feet, his eyes just as wary as the other guy's, although he didn't have any blades coming out of his forearms.

"What the hell?" She hadn't actually meant to say that alloud, and she flushed when the one in all white shot her a quick look, clearly assessing her.

Altair looked at the girl who'd spoken for a moment before he went back to his silent assessment of the other man. He was about 90% sure this man was an Assassin, although he'd never seen him before. And he had strange weapons, but for the blades. Those blades he knew; they were exactly like his own.

Still trying to figure out what exactly had just happened, Altair waited for the other man to speak first so they could figure everything out. Like where the hell he was and why wasn't he in Masyaf anymore. And where the Apple was, since he discovered a few moments later that it was no longer in his possession.

When the thing started to glow in Iris's hand, it took on a texture less like metal and more the consistency of human flesh. It startled her enough that she tried to let go of it, but she and Anna vanished before she could. She yelped when she suddenly tumbled down onto a wood floor, different than the marble one that had been in the museum. The artifact she'd been holding was gone.

Ezio watched warily as the three newcomers got to their feet. One was an Assassin, he knew that much. The white peaked cowl was proof enough of that, and the man moved too carefully and precisely to be anything else. The two girls, however, he had no idea. They were dressed strangely, nigh on indecently, but they seemed harmless enough. He knew better than to let his guard down, though. He glanced quickly at the desk in the room, where the Apple was sitting innocently, and then back at the others in the room.

Altair glanced around quickly. This was definitely not Masyaf. The architechture was different, and it wasn't something he recognized. And since he'd been quite a few places, that was a little worrisome to him.

"Where are we?" He turned his attention to the other Assassin again, for the moment at least, having dismissed the two females as unimportant and harmless.

Anna got to her feet slowly, glancing around. Okay, this was weird... But at least someone had asked the question. She brushed herself off and offered Iris a hand up.

Iris got to her feet as well, staying close to Anna. Things were just getting weirder and weirder, and she was wary of drawing the attention of the one holding the weapons.

"Venice, Assassino" Ezio replied carefully. The other Assassin's accent was exotic, not one he was used to hearing. "In Italy."

Well, at least they were still in Italy, Iris thought. That was good, right?

"Italy." Altair had to take several moments to digest that. Italy?! He'd never been to Italy! He only knew two or three people who had!

So how did he end up here?

He glanced over at the desk behind Ezio and froze when he saw the Apple. "How did you come to get that?" he asked very carefully.

Anna looked back and forth between the two. At least one of them seemed to have some sort of idea what was going on, although they both looked a little out of sorts, as it were.

"It was liberated from the Templars," Ezio replied, still careful of his words and watching the other Assassin's every move. He'd dismissed the girls in the room as harmless; if they were spies or generic assassins of any kind, they would have tried to act already. They were still just acting like scared mice. "How is it you know of it?" That was the real question. Nobody outside of his circle of immediate contacts was supposed to know about the Apple.

"The last I saw, it was in my office." Altair's eyes narrowed as his mind raced through the possibilities. He hadn't simply been knocked out; he would have known if someone had gotten close enough to him to do so, and said person would have had to have gotten through a few dozen Assassins first. Besides, simply being knocked out wouldn't have given someone enough time to get the Apple to Italy and give it to this man, if he was telling the truth. And there was no way the Templars had gotten their hands on it; not while he was still in charge.

Anna looked over at the Apple and blinked before she poked Iris. "Hey, that's the thing you picked up when those idiots at the museum dropped it." She kept her voice to a whisper, but the way the Arab's eyes cut to her she was sure he'd heard, at least. Whoops.

"It looks a bit different, though," Iris murmured back. She shut her mouth when both mens' eyes snapped to them.

"You two have seen this before?" Ezio asked, looking between the girls. Neither of them were bad-looking, although now wasn't time to really be thinking about such things. But he definitely filed the thought away for later on. The situation was just getting stranger and stranger; the Arab couldn't have had the Apple before Ezio, the thing had been on Cypress for God knew how long before the Templars moved it.

"Yeah," Anna answered carefully. She was still a little wary of weird men with pointy weapons attached to their forearms. "In a museum."

"Explain." Altair fixed his gaze on Anna, and she started fidgeting. Okay, he creeped her right the hell out.

"We were in a museum just looking around. We're here on vacation. But a group of guys went over to that," she pointed at the Apple, "and grabbed it, and they all started bickering. One of them dropped it and it rolled over to us and Iris picked it up."

Altair frowned, now very thoroughly puzzled. There was no way the Apple could be in three places at once; he knew that his was genuine, since he'd used it. And he was fairly sure there weren't three Apples. That was just too much.

So what, then?

Ezio frowned as well. As far as he knew, there were no major museums in Venice; the most important ones were in Rome. And he would have known if there were other Apples in Italy, he would have heard about it before now. None of it made any sense.

"What museum?" he asked finally, turning the information over in his mind.

"The Italian national museum," Iris finally piped up. "We thought it would be fun to see it while we were in Venice."

"There is no such place here," Ezio replied.

Anna frowned. This wasn't making any sense at all. "No museum here." She looked over at Iris, puzzled, then looked back at Ezio. "What is that thing, anyway? Besides a slightly freaky glowy ball of light."

"It is the Apple." Altair answered, his eyes narrowing further. He knew that not just anyone could use the Apple; it took a strong mind to withstand its power, and he wasn't entirely sure how that worked with those two. He hadn't heard of any other Apples, either.

Still trying to figure things out, he took a few steps towards the Apple, keeping half his attention on Ezio, just in case. Perhaps it would have some answers.

Ezio immediately stepped between Altair and the Apple. He didn't trust anyone with it, barely even himself. He watched Altair carefully, although he kept part of his attention on the girls as well. Clearly, they were able to activate the Apple, and that made him wary.

Iris was just as confused as Anna. No museum? That wasn't possible, they'd been there.

"What do you mean?" she asked. The question could easily be interpreted as meaning the Apple or the museum. She would take either answer, at this point.

"The nearest museum of any sort is in Rome," Ezio replied, still watching them all. "And it is filled with religious relics and artifacts."

Altair didn't try to get past Ezio. Not yet, at least. "How long have you had it?" he asked, glancing between Ezio and the Apple. Perhaps he didn't know how to use it? He certainly seemed more skittish of it. Protective was natural, as it was a very powerful artifact, but skittish? Not so much.

Anna looked over at Iris. "Nearest museum is in Rome." She shook her head. "What, are we in the Middle Ages or something?"

"You may not be all that far off the mark," Iris murmured to Anna. She glanced around the room, really taking it in. No power outlets, no wiring... The desk had a pair of oil lamps on it, although the light for the moment was natural light spilling in from the far window and only one of the oil lamps was lit.

"Not long," Ezio replied. "However, I understand it was locked up for quite a while before it came into my possession."

Altair frowned. It was certainly not locked up in his time. It grated just a little to have to ask this boy for help (since he was younger than Altair, and didn't look quite as experienced), but he had to.

"May I? I have some experience with it."

Anna grimaced. "Seriously? No electricity? What the crap." She looked around, moving over to a window while keeping an eye on the two men to make sure neither of them objected. She looked outside and stopped dead, staring. Horses? Really? No cars, no telephone poles, no subway, none of the touristy gondolas, nothing.

"You might want to see this, Ri."

"Experience?" Ezio repeated. That didn't seem possible. The Apple had been locked away, and then been in either Templar or his hands since. It didn't seem possible that this unknown Assassin would have come into contact with it.

Iris moved over to the window and stared.

"It's like a giant 'what's wrong with this picture' page," she said. "This isn't right. None of it looks right." There was no pavement on the roads or sidewalks, and none of the buildings looked even remotely close to what she was used to seeing. Even the people she saw looked strange, dressed in antique styles from head to toe.

"I will explain as soon as I get answers from the Apple." Altair didn't back down. He had more experience with the Piece of Eden than the younger Assassin, and he was used to dealing with potentially unruly people. He'd become the leader of the Brotherhood in his time for a reason, after all.

"No kidding." Anna stared out the window, swallowing hard before she forced herself to start analyzing things. "The dress looks wrong for the Middle Ages, though. And he said Italy, not an independent city-state. So we're after the Middle Ages, then."

"The next major time period after the Middle Ages was the Renaissance," Iris commented. She looked at the people again. "That looks about right, don't you think?" She was trying very hard not to actually think about what she was saying, or else she would probably go a little hysterical.

"You will please excuse me if I seem to be a little wary," Ezio said. He didn't move quite yet. "The Apple has a history of corruption, after all."

"I think so. The clothes look about right, and there are more people out about instead of working. So Renaissance sounds about right." Anna was very carefully not actually thinking about what she was saying. Or the implications of it.

She needed a drink.

Altair inclined his head. "So it does." Internally, though, he was frustrated. He had no idea what was going on, and he knew he could get some kind of answer, or at least a hint, from the Apple. If he could just get to it.