The Animus relies on the idea of Lamarckism, which was a theory proposed by Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744–1829) which stated that an individual's specific experiences, and memories could be passed down to its offspring. If the theory were true, then any one individual would retain at the genetic level the memories of every ancestor in their bloodline.

Basically the Animus is a massive VR engine with the notable ability to construct "levels" out of genetic memory. The person is reliving the memories of their ancestors. They are in full control of how they are reliving them however, meaning they don't have to stick to the script and can do almost anything they want. They are effectively having a lucid dream, so to speak.

Of course, we can debate about whether the animus works like this, or not. But I'd rather just get on with writing.

Our characters work for Abstergo Entertainment due to their interesting encestory. They are put on the same project; a specific time era. Their main objective is to explore their memories and see whether it's usable for a pre-packaged genetic memory for the general public to play.

Our characters meet at the briefing with a few other people who are also picked due to their interesting encestory, and take a liking to each other. It's just friendship.

They meet again in the Animus, though aren't immediately aware of it, where they work together in that time era. They are able to interact with each other there - even though that's not very accurate but it's for the sake of the RP. Within the Animus, sometime along the way, they turn out to be lovers. And when they tell each other about their 'character's in the Animus' they start to link each other's experiences and realise what had been going on. What happens next is up to us.

- - -

So the RP will be divided in Animus and Real Life experiences.

We can come up with a timeline and a pairing.

We'll both play 2 characters: Real Life and Ancestor.