Incarnations of Immortality
By The Bear!
Disclaimer: See Prologue
Terminal 3
Methos was waiting. “Bloody
plane is 2 bloody hours late.” he thought sourly.
“5,000 years of progress and we still can’t schedule traffic any
better than we could with Bloody donkeys and carts.”
An announcement came across the public address system, “Flight 1013 From
Seattle Washington Now Arriving At Gate B10.”
“About Bloody Time!!” Methos said while jumping up off of his stool at
the bar. He threw down a $50 and
took off for the gate.
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Gate B10
Duncan MacLeod was pissed off. He
had been woken up at
He felt the quickening as soon as he stepped off the plane.
“Hullo Mac!” he heard from off to his left.
He turned to find a grinning Methos standing there looking entirely too
happy to see him.
“Alright, Why the hell am I here, Methos?”
Mac said without preamble.
“What… No ‘Hello’; No
‘Long time, no see’; Not even a
‘How’s it going’ for your old pal?”
Methos teased.
“How about a ‘what-the-hell’s-going-on?’”
Mac said sourly.
Methos picked up the carryon bag that Mac had dropped and hooked his free
arm in Mac’s, pulling him close and whispering, “In the car.
I have the feeling I’m being watched.” and then walked toward the
terminal, dragging Mac along.
Mac quickly surveyed the 150 or so people in sight and kept pace with
Methos.
As they entered the parking structure, Mac thought he had the tail
spotted. He was very good, blending
in with the crowd, never looking directly at them, or evenly matching their pace
of movement. However, he wasn’t
with anyone, wasn’t carrying a bag, and Mac didn’t recognize him from the
flight, so why would he be in the group of people heading toward baggage claim?
If he didn’t stop and pick up a bag at the claim, Mac would be sure-
since he himself only had carry-on bags and wouldn’t be stopping.
As they came around a bend Mac broke off and gestured for Methos to keep
going while he hid behind a concrete support and waited for their tail to show.
Carter knew it was a trap before he even entered.
However, there was no way around, and if he doubled back, he might lose
the target. Either he was already
made or they were just being cautious. All
he could do was move through it and either balls it out or fight through and
wait on the other side for them to come out.
He could hear the heartbeat of the mortal behind the pillar, and of his
target up ahead. He never broke
stride as he passed the first, but the silly mortal whipped out a sword and held
it to his neck. “Nice blade” he
thought. If he had to kill the guy,
at least he would get a nice souvenir out of it.
“What’s your problem, man?” he said out loud, trying to balls it
out.
“Nice try, but you forgot your bags.” MacLeod rasped out.
“Fight it out, I guess” Carter thought as he saw the target coming
back with another sword drawn.
Methos came into sight of MacLeod holding a small young man at bay with
his sword against the kid’s neck. He
was going to say “Aren’t you a little short to be a thug?” when the kid
moved. It was almost too fast for
the eye to see. The kid leaned back
at an impossible angle away from Mac’s sword then batted it up with one hand
while striking a back-fist against Mac's chest, caving it in with a sickening
crunch. Before he could even blink,
he felt something strike his chest with a force like being shot with a rifle.
He flew several meters down the ramp they were on and landed on his back.
He was pretty sure he had at least several broken ribs.
As Carter flew away he chastised himself for not pulling his punches more.
He was pretty sure the target survived, but the other one was almost
certainly dead. If not, he would be
soon, as Carter felt the ribs give way when he struck, penetrating the lungs and
heart. Miklos was not going to be
pleased. He wasn’t even going to
think of how the general would react.
To say that he was surprised when he observed both of them walking into
the parking lot not two minutes later was an understatement.
Neither moved as though they were injured at all.
He waited until they were in the car and then pulled out his phone and
placed a call before leaping into the air after them.
MacLeod waited until they were in the car before he said a word.
Methos turned toward him and started to speak, but Mac cut him off.
“Short notice, customs, sword, no explanation,” he was ticking each
point off of the fingers of his right hand as if counting from 1 to 5, but on 5
he made a fist and shook it at Methos. “And
dead from a bloody crushed chest- not the most pleasant way to go, by the
way.”
Methos took a quick breath as if to say something when Mac jumped in
again, “And what the hell was that? I’ve
been hit by cars with less damage!” Mac
complained.
Methos just started the car and began driving off.
He waited for MacLeod to stop ranting before even trying to get a word
in. Finally Mac wound down and
Methos said, “I don’t know what it was MacLeod.
I was in a club looking for Froag last night when I saw this guy.”
MacLeod jumped once more, “You mean the guy that just kicked out butts?
And why are you looking for Phineas Froag?”
“Maybe if you would let me finish a sentence, I could explain?”
Methos said, exasperated.
“Well by all means, please do go on,” MacLeod said sarcastically.
“Thank you,” Methos said just as sarcastically.
“I saw a guy in the club that I recognized from a long time ago.
But, there was no quickening. I’m
sure it was the same guy, and he recognized me as well, even put my drinks on
the house tab.” Methos shot a
quick glance at Mac to gauge his reaction, before continuing.
“Any way, ever since I left the club, I felt like I was being followed.
I never could find the guy, no matter how many times I doubled back or
walked in circles. That’s why I
called you this morning.”
“So the thing that attacked us wasn’t the guy from the club?
Are you sure you were close enough to feel the quickening?”
Mac asked.
“No and Yes, respectively.” Methos
replied.
“How do you know the guy from the club?”
Mac asked.
“He had me crucified in
“Why?”
“He was a Roman General. He
wiped out a tribe I had been living with for a decade or so.”
Methos said.
“So why single you out for special treatment?”
“I had been leading raids against his troops for a couple of weeks
before they got to our village. I
never did figure out how they found us- we always escaped away from the
direction of the village when we retreated from our raids. I
left tails and we were never followed even in the wrong direction, let alone all
the way to the village.” Methos
shook his head slowly. “Any way, I
was thinking of going back tonight…”
“And you wanted me as backup?” Mac
asked, incredulously.
“Yeah, fat lot of good you did so far.”
Methos teased.
“I didn’t see you get any good strikes in, and *you* had time- he
attacked me first!” Mac
complained.
“So, you want to go with me?” Methos
asked.
“Well, I haven’t been killed in at least…” Mac looked at his
watch, “10 minutes or so. Why
not?”
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Vachon landed on the roof of the loft and looked in the skylight.
He saw Trace, Nick, Natalie, and a Vampire and a mortal that he didn’t
know. He was about to jump off the
roof and come in the conventional way- since he didn’t know if Tracy knew
about Nick being a vamp, and he didn’t know about the other mortal at all-
when Nick looked up and gestured for him to enter.
“He must have told
Natalie, Tracy and Mulder all started slightly when they heard the
skylight open and saw Vachon jump down. Mulder
was like a kid in a candy store, seeing all of the X-Files fodder around and for
once being able to share it with Scully. “She
can’t ‘scientific explanation’ it all away this time!” he thought,
somewhat uncharitably. He loved her
more than life itself, “but damn! I
get tired of being the only one to see it every time!”
he thought, remembering all of the supernatural and/or alien phenomena he
had witnessed while Scully was unconscious, missing, or just plain looking the
wrong way.
“Hey Trace,” Vachon said.
“Ouch! What was that for?”
he asked the madwomen who had just assaulted him.
“That’s for not telling me about Nick!”
Natalie and Nick laughed at the ‘little boy caught red-handed’ look.
Scully had finally calmed down enough to start breathing again when she
caught Nick’s ‘whipped’ comment through the link and started laughing.
“Better not let Natalie hear you say that,” she thought to him.
Again, if Nick could have blushed, he would have.
As it was, Natalie seemed to pick up on the exchange and elbowed Nick in
the ribs, just in case.
Mulder chuckled at Scully’s sheepish look and answered for her, “She
only recently, Ahh… joined your ranks.”
By that time Vachon had detected Knight’s scent on her.
He spun around toward him saying, “You brought across an FBI Agent?!
What were you thinking?”
Inexplicably,
Vachon told her what LaCroix had told him.
Vachon thought “Well that answers one question.”
He noticed that she was looking back and forth between Knight, Natalie
and himself, trying to figure out why they were all smiling at her.
“LaCroix is the oldest vampire in
“Because you’re my partner, Tracy.
He knows that I care about you.” Nick
told her the rest, “He’s my Father Tracy.”
“Your Father?”
“Father, Maker, Master- how ever you choose to describe it.”
Nick said.
Nick looked at Mulder and said, “Why don’t you four go see our
‘suspect?’ I’ve got the
address of the place where he is apparently staying from LaCroix.
Nat can drive while you explain the situation to Vachon, and then Tracy
and Vachon can talk on the way?”
“Yeah. I’d like to figure
out what these guys are.” Mulder
said. “Plus,” he thought to
himself, “The sooner he trains Scully, the sooner we can be together again.”
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
“Irony,” was the one word Carter thought of to describe this
situation. He was watching the
target for Miklos, for when the General was ready to find him; however, it
seemed that the target was ready to find the General first.
Carter pulled out his phone.
MacLeod and Methos stood in line at the Raven for about 20 minutes when
someone opened the door and the Bouncer stuck his head into the club for a
moment. When he came back, he
immediately opened the rope line and let everyone in front of them in until they
themselves got in. Mac noticed that
they were the last ones allowed in before the bouncer closed the line again.
Methos and Mac shared a look. “Quite
a coincidence,” they both thought as they went to find a table.
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
LaCroix was intrigued. First
Miklos informed him of the incident at the airport, and now this man and his
companion had come straight to him. He
made sure they got in immediately, but winced when he noticed that his
incompetent bouncer had been so obvious about it.
LaCroix reviewed the facts, such as he had, “They are both like the one
Nicolas and Agent Mulder encountered the other night.
They can be killed but they don’t stay dead.
Unless you take their head, perhaps?”
he thought, remembering Nicolas’ description of the first encounter on
Saturday night. “There are at
least three of them in the city. At
least one of them is as old as I am, perhaps older.”
LaCroix watched them on the CCTV system for a bit, considering his next
course of action. He was in no
particular hurry. They would not be
allowed to leave until he was ready for them to do so.
“If that time should come,” he murmured.
He thought it might be amusing to allow Nick to approach them in his
capacity as a member of ‘
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Nick had decided that quick instruction was needed for a variety of
reasons. He knew Dana wanted
strongly to be with Mulder again- soon. He
himself wanted to bring Natalie across and he didn’t want to wait any longer
than necessary.
Fortunately there was a way to facilitate the training.
Unfortunately it involved a level of intimacy that was rather
uncomfortable to consider. He would
have to be as intimate with Dana as he was with Natalie.
Not physically, but in every other way.
He thought Natalie would understand once she came across, but might have
a more difficult time from a purely mortal perspective.
That Dana might resist such intimacy was also a consideration.
He would have to convince her.
Scully watched Nick as he considered her.
She didn’t care for the new relationship that she had with this man.
He was her master. She had
the impression that he didn’t really think of her as a slave, but she could
feel the power he wielded over her and, by any other name, she felt like a slave
just the same. She tried not to
resent him; he had saved her life, after all.
It wasn’t his choice that made her what she was, it was hers.
She could have gone on, not crossed back over.
She thought of Mulder, and realized that whatever she would have to do,
it would be worth it.
Nick felt his new fledgling’s turmoil and resolve.
He decided that it was foolish to wait, and that it was equally foolish
to try and reason and cajole her into what had to be done.
He would play the part of master to the hilt, demanding what was
necessary, and then releasing her once it was complete.
They would always share a bond, but one not nearly as strong as the link
between him and his own master. He
would train her and then let her go her own way as she chose.
Scully was becoming uncomfortable as Nick continued to stare at her
intently. He had closed off their
link and she couldn’t feel what he was thinking.
Suddenly he seemed to come to a decision.
Nick focused on Dana and spoke, “This is going to be uncomfortably
intimate for both of us, but it is the quickest way to cover the basics and
significantly reduce the time we will need to accomplish your training,” Nick
sighed. He then continued with a
tone that bore no argument, “I expect that you will obey me, Dana.
You will feel the impulse to resist once the link is initiated.
That is normal. I will beat
down your resistance and completely possess you.
It won’t last long, but it will feel as though it does.
The more you’re able to relax and allow it to happen, the easier and
quicker it will be.”
Before she could even comment, Nick struck.
He had her in his arms and his teeth buried in her throat in less than an
eye blink. She felt compelled to
bite him as well, so she did. Intimate
didn’t begin to describe it. Her
instinctive resistance to this… Violation seemed to come the closest… was
quashed immediately and she felt herself being erased and replaced with him.
S/He was being taught by LaCroix. S/He
experienced every agonizing moment- being repeatedly thrown off of a cliff until
S/He grasped the concept of flight. Being
abandoned in a maze and forced to focus on the link with her/his master and find
him where he was hidden.
Then the killing came through. S/He
was hunting. Hunting humans,
reveling in the blood and death. S/He
was a killing machine, draining and destroying wherever she went.
S/He gloried in the power of the vampire.
Suddenly the guilt began. S/He
began to feel the crushing remorse that came from realizing that S/He was a
monster, and damned for all eternity. Finally
S/He found forgiveness and the chance for redemption.
Scully slowly came to an awareness of herself as a separate entity.
She felt the bloodtears dried on her face, and the rawness and
hypersensitivity of her flesh. She
also felt gnawing hunger as though she hadn’t eaten in days.
As soon as he felt that she wouldn’t collapse, he flew to the fridge and
grabbed several bottles. He tore the
cork out of one and handed it to her, while biting the cork out of another for
himself. After they each finished
several bottles he reached through their link and compelled her to follow him.
He took off into the air and through the skylight into the night.
Scully didn’t even stop to think but took off after him into the sky.
She had been chasing him for several minutes before she realized what she
was doing. “Wow!” she thought.
The night was nearly as bright as it would be during daylight.
Everything was crystal clear, and the colors were intense!
She was slightly lost in the intensity of the experience when she heard
“Find me” and realized that she no longer saw Nick anywhere near her.
She remembered finding LaCroix this way, “I mean, I remember Nick
finding LaCroix…” Either way, she knew what to do.
It seemed like only moments later that she came upon Nick hiding in a
mausoleum in a graveyard on the outskirts of the city.
“Cliché, I know,” he said. Then
he was gone again.
This time she couldn’t hear him calling her.
This too, she remembered. She
extended her senses, envisioning a cloud around herself that defined her
awareness. She pictured that cloud
growing larger in all directions. She
could hear the heartbeats of the small mammals in the cemetery all around her.
She could feel the movement of the trees as the breeze blew through the
leaves. She felt the still coldness
of the reptiles below the surface, hibernating through the winter months.
Finally as she expanded her awareness to the limits of her ability she
felt him. He was about 65 meters
away from her in a tree. She laughed
as she focused her attention toward him. He
was hanging by his toes from a branch in a tall oak.
“More Cliché, Master?” she thought toward him as hard as she could.
She could hear him laughing with her ears, though he managed to keep the
link shut to her.
He whispered to her from across the distance, “to the loft.” and then
disappeared again.
She laughed again, reveling in the freedom of flight, now that she
wasn’t focused on following or finding. “I
can’t wait to bring Mulder for a ride!” she thought.
She flew back to the loft, filled with excitement and wonder,
“Yesterday Vampires were a myth. Something
Mulder believed in, but didn’t really exist,” she thought ruefully.
“Poor Mulder. I owe him an
apology.” She smiled again as she
thought of how she would show her repentance, and seek his forgiveness.
She hadn’t even noticed that the link was open again until she felt Nick
chuckle and say to her, “You’re not quite ready for that yet, Dana.”
She didn’t miss the ability to blush, she thought, chagrined.
“It’s nothing to be embarrassed about Dana,” Nick said to her as she
re-entered the loft. “You just
need to know a couple of things about sex between mortals and vampires.”
She couldn’t meet his gaze as he continued.
She felt exactly like she had at age 10 when her mother gave her ‘the
birds and the bees’ talk.
“Except this is more like the bats and the bees, I guess,” Nick
answered her train of thought. The
important thing to remember is that carelessness on your part could lead to his
death, Dana. That’s why it is
important to wait a bit until your control is even better.”
“I thought you said I had good control now,” she complained.
“You do, Dana. You remember how wonderful it felt when you drank from
him last night?” he asked.
Scully nodded.
“It is even more intense when you drink from here,” he said, gesturing
toward his throat. “It is closer
to the heart and mind, and the imagery, the link, will be deeper, as you
discovered with our bloodkiss not an hour ago.”
Scully looked at her watch as though her head was being pulled on a string
down toward it. “Has it only been
an hour?” she asked, incredulously.
“The kiss only lasted a few minutes,” Nick smiled.
“I told you it would seem longer.” He
continued, “The point is, you could easily get lost, and Mulder cannot sustain
a significant blood loss, like one of us can.”
“Can’t I do it without biting?” Scully asked.
“Technically, yes. However,
you cannot personally… well… finish, I guess, without biting.
Even if you just try to ‘be there for him’ you will have an almost
irresistible urge to bite.” Nick
shook his head ruefully, “Dana, I am 800 years old.
Even I need to make sure I am well full before Nat and I, well, you
know.”
“What if Mulder wants to, you know… come across,” Scully asked
softly.
“I would strongly recommend that if the two of you make that choice, you
wait a while- like a year or more- or you get someone else to do it.”
He continued on over her protest, “Dana, you will have the basics down
pretty quickly, but you’re not ready for a childé of you own, you won’t be
for a while. You could effect the
physical change, any of us could, but it requires a great deal of strength to
control a fledgling. That kind of
strength takes some time to develop.”
Scully
looked crestfallen.
“Dana, even in a year, you would need my help to adequately train a
fledgling, especially a strong-willed creature like your partner,” he returned
Scully’s smile at that comment. “Frankly,
I plan on having my hands full with my wife.
If you really want to go that route, I would help you find a suitable
master to bring him across. In any
case it is hardly a decision that needs to be made tonight.”
At that moment the phone rang.
“Nick Knight,” he answered.
“Nicolas, our friend is back, and he has secured reinforcements.”
LaCroix said and then went on to describe the incident at the airport and
them showing up at the raven again.
Nick told him he would send Tracy, Vachon, Mulder and Natalie.
LaCroix, of course, understood why Nick would not be attending.
He inquired as to how the training was going.
“We did it the hard way,” Nick said.
“You always were impatient, Nicolas,” LaCroix said in an indulgent,
though slightly disapproving tone. “Bring
my granddaughter to me tonight after closing,” he commanded and then hung up
the phone.
Scully, of course, heard the entire discussion.
“Is there a problem?” she asked, somewhat worried.
LaCroix intimidated the hell out of her.
“No. This method is somewhat
frowned upon because weaker individuals can be entirely overwhelmed and crack
under the pressure. Such creatures
are usually destroyed.” Nick
answered the look on her face, “I had no concerns of that sort whatsoever with
you Dana. You’re anything but
weak.”
Scully shut her open mouth with an audible- even to non-vampires- snap.
Nick said, “I’m going to call Nat and tell her what’s up.”
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Natalie closed her cell phone with a snap.
“He said that this guy and another guy like him are at the Raven right
now.”
“What do you mean ‘like him’?” Mulder asked.
“Nick said the one they had following him had to fight them when he was
detected. He killed our target’s
partner and seriously damaged our target. Then
not two minutes later they walked away like nothing happened.”
Natalie answered.
“You’ve never heard of these people before, Vachon?”
“No. But think about it,
they don’t really stand out, you know? The
General only recognized the guy we are looking for because he had seen him
before. A long time ago.
Otherwise he would have never known.” Vachon answered.
“I couldn’t tell anything out of the ordinary when Nick and I fought
that guy on the roof, either.” Mulder
paused and then gave a dry chuckle, “At least not until he got up after Nick
shot him several times. That was a
little unusual.” He said wryly.
“Yeah, I guess that would have been strange.
Kind of like finding a guy walking around holding his right hand in his
left hand,”
Natalie and Vachon laughed, Mulder looked confused.
Vachon explained, “I was on a plane that crashed.
I lost my right hand and was looking for it when
“*Not* Funny Vachon!”
Mulder laughed as he imagined the scene.
Natalie was about to answer yes, when Mulder interrupted her.
“How far are we from the apartment where this guy is staying?”
Natalie said, “About 2 blocks. Why?”
“Well,” Mulder began, “If we know this guy is at the Raven, it seems
like this might be an excellent opportunity to check out his place, you know-
see if any useful information might turn up.”
“We can’t do that, Mulder! It
would ruin any case we might…”
“It’s not like we can take this case to court, Trace.
Even if this guy is involved in the death you’re investigating.
This can’t go to trial any more than a vampire kill could,” Vachon
interrupted- rather liking Mulder’s suggestion.
“I don’t like it,”
“Look, it would be rather suspicious for all of us to go.
Why don’t I go and you guys can talk about LaCroix’s ultimatum while
I check it out.” Mulder said.
“I’m not sure that’s such a good idea,” Natalie said.
“If this guy is at the club, there’s no danger, right?”
Mulder began, “What’s to worry about?
I’ll go in, see if there is anything worth further investigation, and
then go out.”
Natalie looked at the others. No
one had a better idea to bring up, so she just shrugged and looked for a parking
spot.
She was forced to park around the corner and halfway down the next street.
Mulder Jumped out of the car and said, “Back in a few,” and then drew
his coat tightly about him and briskly walked off.
Natalie watched him in the rear view until he rounded the corner.
She turned in her seat and looked at the two in the back.
“So... What are you going to do
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Jimson had been watching the door to the run-down
looking brownstone for almost 2 hours.
Pretty soon it would be Sonny’s turn and he could get a nap.
“God, I’m tired” he thought. “I
wish this freak would show up so we can get this over with!”
He felt his eyelids beginning to droop.
As he forced them back open for what must have been the hundredth time,
he saw a man in a black trench coat entering the door he had been staring at.
Frantically, he looked at his watch, “How long was I…
Damn! almost 10 minutes!”
he whispered. He looked over
at Sonny, who was in the back of the van sawing logs.
“Sonny! Sonny!
Wake up!” Jimson shouted
softly.
“What?!” Sonny said blinking the sleep out of his eyes.
“Is it my turn already? Man!
I was having this incredible dream…”
“Shut up, Sonny. He’s
here!”
“What? Who’s here?”
Sonny was still a little groggy.
“The freak we’ve been waiting for, you idiot!
Let’s just grab him and get him to Perone.
I want to see him chop this guy’s head off.”
“How do you know it’s the guy?”
Sonny asked.
Jimson looked at Sonny like a monkey trying to solve a math problem.
“Well, let’s see, He has short hair, a long black trench coat, and…
Oh yeah! He’s the only guy who
walked into the apartment we have been watching for the last twelve hours!
I think that’s what clued me in!”
“Ok, ok! Sheesh!
You don’t have to bite my head off.”
Sonny whined.
“How did you ever make it into the Watchers?”
Jimson asked, incredulous.
“Hey, Fu…” Sonny began.
“Shut Up!” Jimson
interrupted, looking back over at the door.
“He’s coming back out.”
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
“Well… that was a waste of time,” Mulder thought.
The place was entirely empty except for a mattress and blankets on the
floor, and next to it a single wooden chair.
“Talk about traveling light.” Mulder mumbled as he pulled his coat
tightly around him and walked out into the night.
He pulled out his cell phone to call Natalie and let her know he was on
his way back. “Just don’t want
her to worry” he thought.
As the phone rang he heard the sound of a car starting down the street
behind him. He started to turn
around when she answered. “Hey
Natalie, the place was empty. Yeah,
there was a mattress and a chair and that’s it.
I’m heading back your…” Mulder
never finished the sentence because the car he had heard starting drove right
into him on the sidewalk. Blissfully,
he was rendered unconscious. Had he
remained conscious he would have felt the pain of his broken legs, torn back
muscles, and cracked skull.
“What the hell did you do that for?”
Sonny yelled at Jimson. “He’s
no good to us dead!”
“You really are an idiot, Sonny. He’s
*immortal* remember? This just gives
us time to get him secured. Now, get
him cuffed and put him in the trunk!”
Sonny scrambled to obey.
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Natalie had been listening to Tracy and Vachon discussing the pros and
cons of him bringing her across when the phone rang.
She shook her head at the two, as they were dancing around the subject of
their feelings for each other. “Are
we really all so clueless?” she
thought, remembering the tension between herself and Nick, as well as between
Mulder and Dana. She listened to
Mulder tell her there was nothing there and start to say he was coming back when
suddenly she heard the screech of tires through the phone.
“Mulder? Mulder, are you
still there?” She could still hear
sounds through the phone, but Mulder wasn’t answering.
Vachon heard everything through the phone as well.
He said, “I’ll go check it out,” and just like that he was gone.
Natalie smiled in response.
Suddenly she heard Vachon’s voice through the phone.
“Natalie- I think somebody hit your friend with a car- his blood is on
the ground and his phone was about 15 feet away from the blood, lying in a
flowerbed. I saw a car spinning off
around the corner- I’m going to follow it.
You go to the Raven. I’ll
call when I find him.”
Damn. When it rains it pours.
Natalie started the car and pulled away from the curb.
“What happened? Where are we
going?”
“Let me call Nick and you can both hear it at the same time.”
Natalie replied, hitting the speed dial and pointing the car towards the
Raven.
When Nick answered she explained what happened, and where they were going,
and that she would call back as soon as she heard from Vachon.
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
“Stop right there, Dana.” Nick
said as soon as he hung up the phone. “We
will wait right here until we hear anything.
You’re not ready to go out there right now, especially in your current
state of control.”
This was her master speaking with all of the power and authority he could
project. Scully sat down abruptly on
the couch. She had heard the entire
thing and the words ‘hit Mulder with a car’ had her ready to go out and
destroy whoever had the temerity to harm her lover.
Once Nick made her stop, she began to think rationally again.
“Where was I going to go?” She
wondered. I don’t even know where
they are.
“You and I are going to practice, and you’re going to focus on the
task at hand. We cannot do anything
until we know where they have taken him.”
Nick said sternly. “Now,
Find Me!” With that, he
disappeared out through the skylight again.
Scully sighed, as she felt that he had closed the link again.
She flew up and out, once again trying to expand her senses.
Scully was hovering about 200 feet in the air, trying to focus her
newfound senses outward, trying to find her master.
“Funny how ‘master’, odious as it is, seems easier than
‘father’,” she thought. Nick
called his master ‘father’, and she heard LaCroix refer to her as his
granddaughter, but she still found the concept difficult to wrap her mind
around. Ahab was her father- no one
could ever replace him.
Not to mention she was having difficulty focusing on anything right now.
She was terribly worried about Mulder.
“Why is this happening to us? How
many times can I lose him, when I just found him after 7 years of denial?”
Just then she noticed a shadow flit across the sky in the distance,
landing on a building about 1500 meters away.
“She couldn’t reach that far with her vampire senses, but her eyes
still worked just fine. “Who else
could it be?” she thought as she took off toward him.
“Talk about dumb luck” Vachon thought.
He was following the car when it pulled in to a warehouse garage, not
even a mile from Nick’s loft. He
settled on the roof across the alley from where the car pulled in.
He could sense about a dozen heartbeats, including one that seemed
thready, unhealthy. “Probably
Mulder,” he thought. “I feel
sorry for those guys if Knight’s childé gets a hold of them.”
Actually he didn’t feel sorry for them at all.
He pulled out Mulder’s cell phone to call Natalie.
As Scully got closer, she realized that it was Vachon, not Nick.
He was talking on a cell phone, though she was just a little too far away
to hear what he was saying. Her
undead heart beat twice in succession, “Mulder must be in there!” she
thought, looking at the warehouse Vachon was focused on.
Nick’s admonishment fled her mind as she thought of Mulder injured and
hurt in there.
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Perone was not impressed when Jimson and Sonny showed up claiming to have
captured the immortal and opened the trunk to reveal their prize.
Mulder lay groaning in the trunk. He
was barely conscious, and wracked with pain.
He was also still bleeding steadily from the wound on the back of his
head.
Jimson and Sonny pulled him from the trunk and sat him on a chair in front
of Perone and the others. “What
makes you think that this is the one I sent you to find?”
Perone asked disdainfully.
Jimson realized something was wrong when their quarry was still out of it.
Sonny forged ahead “We caught him coming out of the apartment you sent
us to. We hit him with the car and
brought him straight here!” he said excitedly.
“If this is an immortal, why is he still *bleeding?*” Perone asked in
clipped tones. “Get rid of it him,
you idiots!”
Scully landed in front of a dirty window and peered in just in time to see
a group of men standing around Mulder, who was propped up in a chair.
Her heart broke to see him, he looked beat to hell, and she could smell
and see his blood covering his face and clothes.
Natalie
was on the phone with Vachon when she heard him say “Uh oh!”
“What is it, Vachon?” she
asked.
“Knight’s daughter just landed in front of the warehouse.” Vachon
answered.
“Where’s Nick?” Natalie asked.
“I don’t know.”
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Nick was becoming concerned. He
had felt his daughter when she thought she had him located, but she had flown
the wrong direction. He popped up
into the air and began looking for her.
His cell phone rang and he stopped to answer it.
“Nick where the hell are you!?” Natalie
practically screamed at him.
“What’s wrong Nat?”
Natalie began speaking rapidly, “Vachon followed them to a warehouse
about a mile down the road from you, and he just told me Dana is there now!”
“Damn! She must have seen
Vachon, and thought it was me. I’m
on my way now.” he said and then closed the phone and took off toward the loft
and past it.
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Nat called Vachon right back. She
told him Nick was on the way, so he popped up into the air to look and saw him
in the distance. Just then he heard
gunfire and then an inhuman scream that sent chills down his spine.
It was loud enough that Natalie even heard it over the phone.
“What was that?!” she demanded.
“I think they just killed your friend,” he said, stunned.
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Nick felt a wave of despair/anguish/anger/hatred through his link with his
daughter at the same time he heard the gunshot and her scream.
“Oh, no!” he cried.
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Scully stood frozen as she watched one of the men pull a pistol and fire
in one smooth motion. It was as if
time came to a near-standstill. She
saw the bullet impact Mulder’s chest directly over his heart.
She saw the weak spray of blood as his heart gave one last contraction
and stopped. She waited for a second
beat, and when it didn’t come she felt her world end.
Suddenly her vision was red, and her throat was raw and bleeding from the
scream that tore out of her as if of its own volition.
Her body reacted without any direction from her mind, which was focused on
Mulder. The words, “He’s dead,
they killed him” reverberated in her mind as her body flung itself through the
glass in front of her and began to rend and destroy.
When Nick and Vachon arrived only moments later, it was already over. The only intact bodies in the room were the corpse of Mulder, who was hand and foot cuffed in a chair; and the body Dana was just finishing draining. The others were in various pieces, strewn all over the room. Blood was sprayed all over the room and Dana was completely soak