Incarnations of Immortality
By The Bear!
Disclaimer: See Prologue
The Corbeau
MacLeod
entered the club and stopped for a moment. He
was struck by déjà vu. He knew he
had never been to this place before, but something about it seemed very
familiar. He just looked around for
several minutes before moving toward the bar.
It didn’t look like anyplace he could remember, but it still…
“What can I get for you?” the bartender asked, jarring him out of his
thoughts.
“Springbank, neat; if you have it.”
Mac answered, expecting a look of confusion, followed by ‘What?’
“12 or 18 year old?” the bartender asked without missing a beat.
“18, of course.” MacLeod answered, keeping the surprise (mostly) off
of his face.
As the bartender handed him his snifter and a small stopper bottle of
water MacLeod smiled. “I could get
to like this place,” he said to himself and turned to watch the dancers on the
floor- his eyes roving around to see if he could spot the girl he had met
earlier.
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Janette watched the crowd from her table in the shadows of the back of the
club. It afforded her a measure of
privacy while allowing her to keep abreast of the comings and goings into her
club. Surprisingly the crowd was
mostly human tonight. There were
only half a dozen vampires in the place; none of them over a century old.
The
Her brief stint as a mortal hadn’t seemed to lessen her powers as a
vampire, she was certainly no fledgling, but she wasn’t comfortable with the
thought of exploring her new relationship with her former sibling and now
master. “It is ridiculous to have
a master who is younger than I am!” she thought.
Not that Nicolas would ever act like her master, she knew.
He brought her back out of his own selfish desire to ‘save’ her.
Ironic that he would want to save her from the very fate he himself had
longed for, and had been trying to attain for nearly two centuries.
She had been relieved that Nicolas had not tried to contact her.
Even now, wasn’t sure she was ready to see him.
It hadn’t even been two years yet.
Such a short span of time in her long life, yet it felt much longer.
She had not taken another lover since her beloved Robert had been killed.
Nor had she taken another life since she avenged his.
The events of her leaving and then re-entering immortality had changed
her in many ways. She did not suffer
the self-hatred that her now master had felt for so long; neither did she revel
in the vampire as she did prior to Robert.
Robert McDonagh. She still
missed him, but the pain was finally subsiding.
Despite her love for Robert she was glad that she was once again
immortal. It really was her forte.
“I don’t do ‘mortal’ very well,” she thought.
Even if she could have Robert back, she would want him to be immortal
like herself, never to face old age or death.
Having watched him die, she knew she could never face truly falling in
love again with a mortal, unless she intended to bring him across to be with her
forever.
Unfortunately, few mortals had the depth of character that it takes to
live forever. She had seen many a
vampire that didn’t survive their first century.
They couldn’t handle the change- seeing loved ones age and die, moving
on every few decades to avoid detection; they weren’t able to sever their
mortal ties.
No, immortality was not for the weak willed.
The catch, of course, was that such personal strength took a long time to
develop. Consequently, few mortals
ever attained it, and those who did were usually old and gray by the time they
did. It was harder to attain it
after the crossover. Vampires tended
to remain as they were at conversion; emotionally as well as physically.
She realized that these thoughts were stemming from her encounter earlier
at Hénri’s. That man she had
briefly met, “Duncan MacLeod,” she whispered to herself.
He was very beautiful. And,
while she had seen definite attraction in his eyes when he looked upon her, his
eyes had remained on hers, not raking up and down her body as so many of those
pawing, grasping boys who fancied themselves to be men were apt to do.
She had the feeling that when he looked at her, he was wholly focused on
*her*, not her body. She felt a
slight tingle at the thought. She
had barely met him, but she knew instantly that he would be an attentive lover.
He had a look of sensuality about him that caused her millennia’s old
body react like a virgin bride going to her wedding bed.
“It was well that I left,” she told herself.
“Such a man would be distracting. I
would be unable to stop myself in time, I think,” she tried to convince
herself. Unfortunately, her argument
seemed less than compelling, as she spent another evening sitting in the back of
her club, alone.
She sat back in her chair with a soft sigh and began to once again scan
the crowd. Looking for something to
divert her from such melancholy rumination.
Her eyes roamed over the dancers and then swept along the bar when she
saw him. “Oh no,” was all she
said.
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Nick and Scully decided to see LaCroix after the encounter at the Dirty
Mick. Scully was both pleased and
angry about the experience. Pleased
that she could handle herself without loosing control, but she still felt
residual anger at that pig. The
thought that kept floating into the periphery of her mind was, “I should have
killed him.” Rationalizations kept
popping up in her head, ‘What if he rapes someone else and I could have
stopped him?’ ‘He is an animal;
I would have been doing society a service!’
She knew that it would have been wrong to kill him.
Vigilantism was not the answer to crime, she knew.
“This is normal, Dana,” Nick told her.
“The vampire wants to kill. If
you give in to rationalization, you will find yourself on a path to
self-destruction. I spent a century
hunting only the ‘guilty.’ I
rationalized it in my mind as being different than hunting innocents.”
Nick looked haunted for a moment. “It
isn’t. Murder is Murder.
Who am I to judge guilt or innocence?”
Scully laid her hand on the arm of her master, “I know, Nick.
I won’t give in to the darkness. I’ve
always felt this way when I dealt with evil.
I never gave in to it, and I’m not planning to start now.”
They landed outside the alley entrance and went in.
The music was like a wall of noise they had to fight through to get to
the offices at the front. They found
LaCroix waiting for them in his office.
“Good evening Nicolas,” LaCroix said.
“Granddaughter, tell me how your education is progressing.”
Scully spared a glance at Nick as they both sat down.
“I think it has gone very well. Nick
is a good teacher,” she said, wondering where he was going with this.
LaCroix raised and eyebrow at that, but refrained from comment.
“She has a very good grasp of the basics, Father.
She can control her bloodlust, even in the heat of attack.
She is far more advanced than her age would dictate,” Nick said, proud
of his childé. “Feel her, Father. She
doesn’t even feel like a fledgling.”
LaCroix leaned back in his chair with his fingers steepled in front of his
mouth and reached out with his senses. He
was surprised at what he felt. She
didn’t feel at all like a fledgling. He
had known vampires in their second century with less presence.
“This is unprecedented in my experience.
How is this possible?” he asked, concerned.
“We don’t know with any certainty, but I think that her consumption of
immortal blood has caused rapid advancement.
She shares a link with Mulder that is more complete even than our link
together,” Nick said. At the
deepening of concern that he felt from his master he quickly added, “I have
been able to block it during our training however.”
“Describe this link,” LaCroix instructed Scully.
“It is as though we were still in a bloodkiss.
When Nick isn’t blocking, I can see with Mulder’s eyes- I sense what
he senses. We are like one being in
two places.” Scully answered.
Nick leaned forward slightly in his chair, excited by the possibilities,
“She even caught the quickening earlier this evening.
I came down the stairs and she was wrapped in a blue electric glow and it
was like she was on fire, mentally and physically.”
He shook his head at the memory. “Mulder
has undergone some changes as well. Did
you see the body? Did he tell you
what happened?”
“No. I had Miklos take care
of it. I was taping my show for this
evening. Why?” LaCroix asked,
leaning forward and carefully considering his son.
Nick deferred to Scully, even though she was obviously less than
comfortable with this discussion. She
hemmed and hawed for a moment when LaCroix asked her a question.
“You were in this link with him at the time?”
“Yes,” she answered.
LaCroix stood up and held his hand out to her.
“Show me,” he commanded.
Scully silently looked at Nick, unsure of what to do.
She was hesitant about sharing this intimacy with a man she hardly knew.
Nick was surprised that LaCroix would want to share with one so young who
wasn’t his own. “It’s alright,
Dana. Go ahead.” He told her.
With some hesitancy she took LaCroix’s hand and stood up.
He drew her to him and bent down to her neck.
He gently sank his fangs into a vein and silently encouraged her to do
the same.
Scully felt the mild erotic rush from being bitten, and then complied with
his unspoken command. As she bit she
was assaulted with two millennia of memories.
It was far too much to process at once and she was swept up into the
maelstrom, helpless to do more than hang on for the ride.
After a moment that seemed like an hour, it was over.
Scully dropped back down into her chair, bewildered by the experience.
LaCroix merely stood there considering this newest member of his
immediate family.
“Fascinating. Utterly
unprecedented.” He said at last. “I
am sure that nothing like this has ever happened before in our history,” he
said while returning to his own seat. “I
shall want to see both of you periodically to see where this progresses.
Nicolas, have you given consideration as to what this might mean to you
and Natalie?”
“I think we will find out very soon how this might impact us,” Nick
replied.
“Yes? You plan to go ahead
with Natalie’s conversion then?” LaCroix asked.
“Tomorrow night,” Nick said. “At
the latest,” he added, thinking that he might not be able to wait that long.
“Why don’t you invite the others to join us here, Nicolas?” LaCroix
asked. “I should like for you and
I to spend a moment with Agent Mulder and perhaps determine what effect this has
had on him.”
“Of course, father,” Nick said, getting up and walking away from the
desk to use his cell phone.
Scully looked at LaCroix for a moment.
She was worried about this thing that was happening to her and Mulder,
but she didn’t know what to say or ask. Finally
she said, “Thank you, Lucien.”
“For what, my dear?” he asked.
“For taking care of Mulder’s mess earlier this evening.
I don’t know what we would have done if we had to deal with a homicide
investigation on top of everything else going on right now.” She replied.
“As you move through the centuries you will find that I always take care
of my family, Dana.” LaCroix responded. “Always.”
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
It was almost
Scully could feel Mulder as
they got closer. She knew it the
moment that he and Natalie entered the club.
She couldn’t really touch him through the link; Nick was still blocking
it, but his presence was leaking through as their physical proximity closed.
She got an enormous grin on her face and said “Mulder’s here!” in a
breathlessly excited voice.
LaCroix frowned slightly at his
son, “You said that you were blocking them.”
“I am!” Nick said,
surprised that she could get through his block.
“A can’t sense him like
that,” she said. “It’s not
like before… I… I’m just aware that he’s here!” she said, standing up
and turning toward the door just as it opened.
Mulder followed Natalie into
LaCroix’s office and was immediately assaulted by a short redheaded monster
that immediately began kissing him with abandon.
He was startled by his own reaction- not the kissing part, or the raging
hard-on part; those he understood just fine- but the part where he was feeling
like he had lost her and just now found her after being apart for ages.
That part he didn’t understand at all.
“God I missed you!” he said.
Scully was feeling a bit
confused herself, “Me too!” she said, but her brow was furrowed and it came
out almost like a question. “Mulder,
it’s been less than a day since we saw each-other.
Why do I miss you so much?” she asked.
Mulder just smiled.
“I don’t know Scully. But,
I feel exactly the same way,” he answered.
Meanwhile, Nick and Natalie had
kissed their hello’s for several seconds.
LaCroix looked at this group as
though they were mad, “Enough!” he said loudly.
They all snapped their heads toward him, looking like children with their
hands caught in the cookie jar. “I
will thank you to save your sexual exuberance for a place other than my
office!” he mock growled.
The couples each broke apart
slightly, “Sorry,” they each mumbled, not looking at all contrite.
LaCroix singled out Mulder and
Nick with his withering glare, “I can see that I will not be able to keep your
attention for very long this evening.” He
stood up from his chair and very slightly adjusted the drape of his jet-black
Armani suit coat, “I would like to try and determine what is happening to you
Agent Mulder. You and Nick shall
accompany me.” He regarded Scully
and Natalie, “The two of you may wait in the club.
We shouldn’t be long.” He
silenced their protests before they even began with one raised eyebrow.
After waiting half a beat, he strode purposefully out the door and up the
stairs to his apartments, not even looking back to see if everyone was following
his instructions.
Mulder gently squeezed
Scully’s hand and whispered to her, “I miss you already.”
He kissed her hand and walked after the master vampire.
Natalie forestalled any protest
from Nick by saying, “The sooner you get this started, the sooner we can go
home.” Then she kissed him softly
and turned to collect Scully. “Come
on, Dana. Let’s get a drink.”
She gently dragged Scully by the hand into the club.
========== X-FILES ==========
FOREVER KNIGHT ==========
HIGHLANDER ==========
“Nicolas, you are still blocking their connection?” LaCroix asked as
they reached his rooms above the club.
“Yes,” he replied.
Turning to Mulder, LaCroix asked, “Can you sense your partner at all?”
Mulder was still somewhat struck by the sense of longing he felt.
He reached out through their link and said, “Barely.
It feels the same as it has since Nick started blocking us.”
He suddenly realized something, “You know, we haven’t actually been
in the same room together since this… since we…”
“Since the link was established,” Nick finished for him.
He turned to LaCroix and said, “That’s true, Father.
Natalie and Mulder left the loft before Dana woke up this afternoon, and
they haven’t been in physical contact until just now- and I was blocking them
then.”
“Maybe that’s why I feel like this,” Mulder whispered.
“Feel like what?” LaCroix asked.
“I miss her terribly,” he replied.
“I feel like we have been separated for months…” it hit him just
then that he had felt exactly like this once before.
“Actually, it feels exactly like when she was abducted, and I
couldn’t find her, and I didn’t know what was happening to her, and I
didn’t know if I would ever see her again.”
Suddenly Mulder started smiling, but at the same time, his eyes welled up
and tears began running down his face.
“What’s wrong Mulder?” Nick asked.
Mulder looked a Nick with confusion evident on his face, “What do you
mean?”
Nick glanced at LaCroix as if to confirm that he was seeing what he
thought he was seeing. He said,
“Uh, Mulder- you’re crying.”
Mulder reached up to touch his face and was surprised to find wetness
there.
LaCroix broke in, “It is obvious that they are influencing one another
even with your block, Nicolas.” He
turned to Mulder Let us see if we can determine anything from your blood.”
He held out his hand, clearly expecting Mulder to acquiesce.
Mulder decided that anything he could do to get this over with more
quickly, and get back to Scully, would be worth it.
He wordlessly held out his wrist.
LaCroix took Mulder’s hand and brought it to his mouth.
He hesitated a moment, realizing that this would be his first experience
with immortal blood. Experiencing
something entirely new after two millennia of life was not to be taken lightly.
Nevertheless, this was about family.
“I always protect my family,” he thought.
Mulder gasped a little at the sensation and then was assaulted by the
overwhelming experience of sharing with such a powerful vampire.
It was vast, dark, and frightening. This
was one vampire who never felt any regret for his violent past.
“Regret is a waste of time, Mulder,” LaCroix said as he pulled back
from the link. “The past is
unchangeable and not worth concern. As
for the present, I must say that I have never tasted anything like that
before.” He watched with
fascination as the bite sparked with blue energy and healed before his eyes.
“Is he changing?” Nick asked.
“There is very little of the vampire in his blood, but it is there,”
LaCroix answered his son. Turning to
Mulder, who was rubbing lightly at the area where LaCroix had bit his wrist,
LaCroix continued, “Not enough, however, to explain what Dana showed me about
your encounter with the other immortal today.”
“What do you think it was then?” Mulder asked.
He was mildly curious about this, though it ranked very low on the
concerns he had right now. Primarily,
he wanted to go find Scully and bury himself in her, mentally, emotionally, and
physically.
“I imagine your link with Dana operates on more than just a mental
level- spilling over into the physical, as with this afternoon’s quickening,
and the emotional, considering your tears a few moments ago.” LaCroix
answered. “It should be
interesting to see where the two of you go with this.
You have shared blood only once so far, I take it?”
“Yeah. Wow it’s only been
about 20 hours ago,” Mulder said, surprised as he looked at his watch.
“Hey, Nick- do you think you could… you know…”
Nick smiled knowingly. “Could I stop blocking you and Dana?
Is that what you’re asking?” he said teasingly.
“Yeah.” Mulder said sheepishly.
Both LaCroix and Nick watched with interest as Mulder’s eyes unfocused
and his face grew serene. He closed
his eyes for a moment and then reopened them, focusing on Nick.
“Thanks, Nick,” he said with such relief in his voice that one might
have thought he were a drug addict getting his ‘fix’.
Nick felt for his daughter through their link and found her emanating
blissful satisfaction as well. He
shook his head slightly and wondered what it was going to be like between
Natalie and himself. “Mulder sure
looks happy, though,” he thought.
LaCroix was amused at Mulder, and at the feelings he was getting from his
son- some concern, a little envy, and a lot of avid anticipation.
He turned to Mulder with a smirk and said, “All better now?”
Mulder did feel better; so much so that LaCroix’s cut didn’t embarrass
him in the slightest. “Yes, sir.
I feel *much* better now!” His
feeling of missing Scully was gone, erased as though it had never existed.
After commenting on one thing she had said, he retreated, letting the two
ladies have an enjoyable ‘get-to-know-you’ conversation.
“She and Natalie are chatting. I
think they’re going to be really good friends, Nick,” he said, smiling.
Nick smiled in response, “If all goes well, by this time tomorrow, they
will be sisters.”
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER KNIGHT ========== HIGHLANDER ==========
Scully was sitting in the booth, moping.
It was silly, but since she had seen him in LaCroix’s office, she
really missed Mulder. She noticed
herself repeatedly reaching through their link to reassure herself that he was
still there. Of course that didn’t
work, because Nick was blocking them. She
couldn’t restrain herself from whining to Nick through their link, “Hurry
up, Nick. I need him!”
But Nick was ignoring her.
Scully snapped herself out of her self pity long enough to notice that
Natalie was behaving just like she was. Morose.
“What’s she got to be down about?” Scully thought.
“What’s the matter, Natalie?” Scully asked, raising her brow at the
almost pensive look on Natalie’s face as she cast sidelong glances at Scully.
“I
don’t know, Dana. I… I don’t
know how to explain how I feel,” Natalie began.
“Everything is a whirlwind.” She
shook her head as if trying to clear it, “Did you know that less than 1 week
ago I was still trying to help Nick ‘cure’ his vampirism.
I despaired of his ever loving me… I couldn’t imagine how I was going
to go on without him if he left.” Natalie
hugged herself, bewildered at the tears she felt threaten to well up in her
eyes. Sometimes that seems like a
lifetime ago- time so distant that I can’t even remember it clearly.
But I still wake up in the middle of the day and feel alone.
Then I roll over and see Nick sleeping next to me and it feels like a
vise loosening from my heart. And, I
didn’t even know it was squeezing the life out of me until it was removed.”
Scully watched as the tears that were filling Natalie’s eyes finally
welled over and rolled down her cheeks. Really,
she had just met this woman a handful of days ago- how could she feel such
empathy for her? She knew the answer
was a combination of her blood link with Nick, and her own frighteningly similar
experience with Mulder.
Natalie had stopped talking and was just sitting there, staring off into
space, not even noticing the tears trailing down.
She started suddenly at the feel of Scully’s cool hand cupping her
cheek, her thumb gently wiping away the tears.
She looked into the eyes of this woman- this vampire, the childé of her
lover, closer to him than she herself in some ways.
She saw the blood tears welling in Scully’s eyes and realized, “She
knows exactly how I feel.”
Scully’s words echoed Natalie's thoughts.
“I understand,” was all she said, but the look on her face and the
tears in her eyes spoke volumes.
Scully was surprised when Natalie copied her own gesture.
She felt the warm palm and thumb wipe away tears she hadn’t even
realized were falling. “So much,
so quickly, after sitting in neutral for years,” she said as she pressed her
cheek into Natalie’s palm, luxuriating in the warmth of contact with a like
soul. “I haven’t felt like this
since Missy died,” she thought. Out
loud she said, “So much pain for so long that I had forgotten how it felt to
be without it. It’s like my heart
was numb and now the return of sensation is almost painful in its intensity.”
Natalie found her head nodding in unconscious agreement, “Like pins and
needles. But, I wouldn’t trade it
for anything,” she said with a genuine smile.
Scully’s eyes suddenly lost focus in that way that Natalie was beginning
to realize indicated her silent communication with Mulder.
Scully laughed and said, “Nick wants to know what we are doing.”
Natalie was taken aback slightly, “Why?”
“Mulder is crying and has a ‘ridiculous smile’ on his face, as
Grandpa puts it,” Scully replied.
Natalie laughed heartily at both the image of Mulder as described, and her
own imagination of the look on LaCroix’s face at the sight.
Then the thought of his reaction to hearing Scully call him ‘grandpa’
made her laugh even harder.
They both calmed down slowly, dropping their hands, but each realizing the
closeness they felt toward each other was another welcome change.
Natalie said, “I didn’t have a sister or girlfriend in my life
growing up, but I think it would have been like this.”
Scully was so happy that the memory of Melissa didn’t even sting like it
usually did. “I had a sister.
We were close, but not like this. I
feel like you’re a best friend I have known for years, but I don’t know that
much about you. Even though I have
shared Nick’s memories of you.”
Natalie looked slightly confused.
Scully grimaced, “I’m not saying this very well…
It’s like I know *you* very well, but I don’t know things about your
life.” She paused and tilted her
head slightly, “Does that make any sense?”
Natalie got it then. “Nick
and I didn’t really ever talk about either of our pasts.
Before the blood link I knew very little about his life before
Scully was shaking her head.
“What?” Natalie asked.
“That’s one area where Mulder and I are different.
I know almost everything about Mulder’s past.
Much of the last seven years of our lives has been spent trying to find
answers about Mulder’s past, especially his sister.
In the process I think I have learned most of Mulder’s life… the
events anyway.” Scully pondered
for a moment, digging in to her link with her lover.
“Actually, I think I didn’t know him at all.
Not really- I knew the events, but only as biographical details.
Before the link, I didn’t really know how those events really impacted
him. Not the full extent anyway.”
Natalie asked, “How do you mean?”
“You would never know it to meet him or talk to him.
Or even to work with him; but he is a very tortured soul.
It wasn’t until I had witnessed some of his recurring nightmares that I
even got a glimpse of how the horrible events in his life have affected him.” Scully’s
eyes lost focus again. “I can’t
understand how he didn’t snap,” she said softly, as if to herself.
“I think I would have had to be institutionalized if I had gone through
that as a child.”
[Now you know why it was so easy for me to profile all of those psychotic
serial killers and mass murders] Mulder thought to her.
[I was one step from joining them. If
it hadn’t been for you, I probably would have.]
[Oh, Mulder.] She thought back to him with a smile.
[Don’t be so melodramatic.]
She and Natalie fell into comfortable conversation, getting to know one
another’s past experiences as they already knew their present personalities.
========== X-FILES ========== FOREVER
KNIGHT ==========
HIGHLANDER ==========
Methos caught up to Ken Baker
as he was waiting for a red-eye flight back to the states.
He introduced himself and began asking questions, giving Baker the
impression that he was on official Chapterhouse business, investigating the
possibility of a new player in the game. After
Baker made some statements that contradicted key areas of his report, Methos
began to press him for the truth.
Feeling the relentless pressure
of questioning by this Pearson fellow, finally Ken was at his wit’s end, “I
couldn’t report what I saw! I had
to be seeing things, it isn’t possible!”
Methos recognized that Baker
was about to lose it, so the toned it down, “Its ok, Ken.
Just tell me what it looked like to you.”
“No!
Its crazy, you’ll think I’m mad!” Baker moaned, face buried in his
hands.
Methos put his hand on Ken’s
shoulder and reassured him, “Ken. You
spend your days chasing immortals around the globe, watching them chop off each
other’s heads in order to take their quickening.
Why would I think you’re mad?”
Baker chuckled slightly at
that. “Alright.
I’ll tell you, but remember- you made me tell you.
I still think I must have been hallucinating.”
He furtively checked the surrounding area for anyone who might be
listening, then leaned in close to Methos and began speaking.
“I was following Willy when
he suddenly veered into this parking lot. I
knew from experience that this usually meant that he had felt a quickening.
I pulled over across the street from the diner and started watching.
A man and a woman exited the diner and I could see the man begin to look
around himself- he was the immortal and he was trying to figure out where the
quickening was coming from. He
spotted Willy who was walking very rapidly toward them.
He sent the woman away just as Willy drew his sword.”
Baker shook his head again, “I waited for him to draw his sword, but he
just stood there. I got a sick
feeling in my stomach- I mean, its not that I really like seeing anyone get
their head cut off, but at least there is usually a fair fight first.
Both individuals enter into combat knowingly and the best fighter
wins.” His voice took on a hollow,
haunted quality, “I was about to watch Willy walk up to an unarmed man and
chop his head off. I knew he was a
real bastard, but I never thought… I
guess I didn’t know what to think.”
Baker paused for several
moments, obviously reliving his feelings at that moment in time.
Methos encouraged him to continue, “But that isn’t what happened, is
it?”
“No.
No, it isn’t. You could see
that Willy expected an easy one because he just walked up to this guy and cocked
his sword back behind his head like he was going to hit a home run or
something,” Baker said.
“It’s like pulling bloody
teeth!” Methos thought as Baker stopped again.
“And then?” he said aloud.
“I’m sure this guy didn’t
have a sword. His hands were empty,
at his sides. I don’t know how he
did it, but there’s Willy standing there in front of him, about to chop his
freakin’ head off, and then…” He stopped and looked Methos right in the
eye, “I didn’t see him move, man! I
freakin’ blinked and when my eyes opened, this guy is standing behind Willy
like he had walked past him. Willy
is still standing there with his sword still cocked back, but his head is torn
off.”
“Torn off?
What do you mean?” Methos asked.
“I mean its not cut off,
because it is still hanging down his back by a little piece of skin, but his
neck is all torn up, like the guy just tore his head off with his bare hands.
God, I puked my guts out when I saw his head hanging there like that.”
Baker leaned back and slouched down in his chair.
“Anyway, there was the quickening and then the woman pulls up in a
green Cadillac- old one, early ‘60s maybe- and the guy grabs the body and the
head- which must have come loose in the quickening- and throws it in the trunk
of the car. Then he jumps in the
passenger seat and they take off. End
of story.”
Methos just sat there,
absorbing this news.
“Now can you see why I
couldn’t report this?” Baker whined.
Methos decided that he would
have to get the rest of the story from Mulder himself.
“Yes, you did the right thing, Ken.
I suggest you keep this to yourself- it is pretty unbelievable.” He
said to Baker. “Good luck,” he
said as he stood up and walked away.
Baker decided that he would put
in for a transfer to research when he got the states.
“I’ll just pretend this whole thing never happened,” he decided.
========== X-FILES ==========
FOREVER KNIGHT ==========
HIGHLANDER ==========
Mac sat at the bar for an hour,
nursing a couple of drinks. He
thought he had spotted her at a table near the back of the club, but he had
decided to wait a bit and see if she would make any move, either toward or away
from him, before he approached her. Frankly,
he had no idea why he felt like this. Certainly,
she was lovely- young, charming, and aristocratic.
He was intrigued that such a young girl would have an interest, and the
money to exercise that interest, in fine antique jewelry.
He was also intrigued that she owned this club; which- if a bit on the
dark, gothic design- was quite elegant, without being stuffy.
“She barely seems old enough to drink, let alone operate such an
establishment,” he thought.
Mac looked around the club for
a while longer, still struck by that nagging sense of déjà vu that he had felt
upon entering. He couldn’t put his
finger on it. He hadn’t been to
this club before, it didn’t appear to be a chain, or copy of anyplace he could
remember- yet it felt eerily familiar. The
entire evening seemed to be a mystery- the girl he couldn’t remove from his
thoughts, and the club. “I should
just forget about this and leave,” he decided.
He stood up to walk out, but found that his steps were taking him across
the dance floor, directly towards her table.
========== X-FILES ==========
FOREVER KNIGHT ==========
HIGHLANDER ==========
Janette knew that he had seen
her. His gaze returned to her table
again and again. For one brief
moment their gazes had locked, and she thought her heart might have actually
beat twice in succession. She
wondered why he made no move towards her, at the same time dreading that he
might do that very thing. She knew
that she could leave, and he would undoubtedly get the message, “Maybe he is
waiting to see if I will,” she thought. She
rationalized that it was *her* club, and she would not allow some pathetic
mortal, no matter how beguiling he might be, to drive her from it.
It had nothing at all to do with her wanting him to come over to her
table and join her. Absolutely
nothing at all.
When he stood up, her heart
fluttered again. She berated herself
for acting like a child. If he did
decide to walk over and join her, she would be calm.
She would be cool. She would
be… Janette; 1000 year-old vampire seductress.
“Oh, my,” she said as he
began to cross the dance floor. He
walked a perfectly straight line towards her.
Dancers seemed to move out of his way inadvertently, as though the sheer
presence of him was enough to part the sea of humanity before him.
They closed behind him without missing a step, as though it had been
carefully choreographed.
========== X-FILES ==========
FOREVER KNIGHT ==========
HIGHLANDER ==========
MacLeod wasn’t entirely sure
what he was doing. He really had
meant to leave. Now was not the time
for emotional entanglements. He had
more important things to consider- Mulder, possibly Natalie as well.
Even if he did not take them as his students, his own sense of honor
would preclude him from simply abandoning them to their fate.
He had never abandoned a new immortal when he found them.
He would always arrange for their training if he were unable or unwilling
to do it himself. That not all of
them availed themselves of his largess was not his fault.
He could no more force them to learn than he could turn back time itself.
All of these thoughts ran
through his mind at once, encouraging him to turn away and leave now.
His steps did not falter, however. He
didn’t even notice the dancers parting before him; his attention was on her.
Janette dúCharme. She alone
held captive his attention at this moment. He
tried to think of what he was going to say when he got to her table, but he
found it hard to concentrate. Normally
he had no trouble at all charming a lady- he had, after all, four centuries of
practice. Tonight he felt a
nervousness he didn’t remember having ever felt before.
He stood in front of her, silent for a moment, overcome by something
about her- though he couldn’t tell what.
Janette was fascinated by this
man. She stared at him as he stood
before her, silent and still. Finally
she heard him say, “I was going to leave.”
She felt an altogether unreasonable sense of loss hearing that.
“But, you did not,” she replied, unable to think of anything other
than the obvious.
Mac didn’t know where that
came from. “I was going to
leave?” he thought. “That
probably wasn’t the smoothest line.” Her
response, however, did nothing to discourage him.
“I couldn’t,” he replied. Again
honestly, if not elegantly put.
Now she was even more intrigued
- he seemed as affected by her, as she was by him.
“Why?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” he
replied. “I got up to walk out the
door, but I ended up here.”
“Do you want to leave?” she
asked.
He shook his head slowly, never
breaking eye contact.
Janette smiled warmly, truly
pleased that she had this effect on him. He
certainly was having a strong effect on her!
She decided to ignore her earlier advice to herself, “Then let us throw
caution to the wind. Sit down, Mr.
MacLeod,” she invited.
“Please, call me Duncan,
Mademoiselle dúCharme,” he replied as he accepted her offer.
“Certainly,
“Janette.
Of course…” MacLeod paused again for a moment and considered the
lovely girl before him. “I don’t
want to give you the wrong impression, Janette.
I don’t generally follow after young ladies whom I bump into
accidentally,” he began.
“Non?
This is not a habit of yours then?” she teased.
“Should I consider myself special?” she said with a genuine smile.
She could hear his heart racing, and his blood had a spicy, peppery smell
to it, like a young American northwest pinot noir.
More than the smell of his blood, however, his very presence was arousing
her, not just the vampire but the woman as well.
Though MacLeod recognized the
teasing tone and it would have been easy to fall into a light, flirtatious
banter, he was unable to do so. In
all seriousness he said, “I must say, Janette, that there is something very
extraordinary about you. I find
myself captivated. I don’t want to
sound trite; we hardly know one another in the least.
However, I would very much like to rectify that.”
“You do not sound at all
trite,
Normally MacLeod would have
dismissed such a statement as empty bravado; however, he could feel from this
little slip of a girl a sense of strength and power that belied her frail
appearance. “I must be going
mad,” he thought; he became more enchanted by this woman every moment he spent
in her presence. He could not think
of any woman in his past that had so fascinated him.
Janette was amazed.
“I hope I can wait long enough to see if he is worth bringing
across,” she thought; one last vestige of reason holding tenuously under the
onslaught of her desire. Certainly
this man must be a sorcerer to mesmerize her so quickly and so thoroughly.
MacLeod wanted to take her away
from this place, he felt suddenly uncomfortable in the club- he felt as though
they were being watched. “Would
you come for a walk with me?” he asked. “It
is quite noisy in here,” he added, trying to come up with a reasonable excuse
to leave the club. He didn’t think
‘I’m jealous at the thought of anyone else even looking at you right now’
would cut it.
She thought that was an
extremely apt suggestion. She felt
an absurd compulsion to separate him from anyone’s presence, outside of her
own. Rather than responding
verbally, she merely stood up and took his arm, waiting for him to lead her out.
Rather than going through the crowded dance floor she then suggested,
“let us go out the back, yes?” indicating the direction with a nod of her
head.
As MacLeod led her to the rear
exit, he marveled at how right this felt, having this woman on his arm.
He was intellectually aware that this entire situation was completely
ridiculous- both of them were behaving precipitously at best, they really knew
nothing about each other. He should
have been concerned at her willingness to go along with such lunacy.
There was no good reason for her to respond as she was unless she had an
ulterior motive. Yet he could not
bring himself to believe that this was the case.
“What is happening to me?”
he wondered as they walked out into the night.
========== X-FILES ==========
FOREVER KNIGHT ==========
HIGHLANDER ==========
Nick and Nat rode the elevator
up to the loft in silence. They were
holding each other in their arms, kissing. Soft,
languorous kissing, telling each other without words of their love and adoration
for each other. Mulder and Dana had
decided to go flying for a bit. Nick
had sternly warned Dana about being in before dawn, and Mulder had quipped
‘I’ll be sure to have your daughter home at a reasonable hour, Mr.
Knight’, annoying Nick, but causing Natalie to laugh.
Dana had reassured him that she would be sure to be back in plenty of
time.
Nick cupped Natalie’s face in
his cool hands and broke the kiss, “Your eyes are red, Nat.
Why were you crying?” he asked gently, stroking his thumbs across her
cheekbones.
Natalie was slightly
embarrassed, but it didn’t even occur to her to lie.
“It’s hard to explain, Nick.” She
took a deep breath as she paused to consider how to put into words the way she
was feeling. The elevator stopped
and she waited until Nick had opened the door. She
took him by the hand and led him over to the couch.
She sat him down and then cuddled up in his lap, resting her head on his
chest.
“I’m so happy right now
Nick. Sometimes I wake up and think
its all been just a dream. I wake up
in the middle of the day and I almost cry because I was so happy and it turns
out it was just another in a long series of Nick and Natalie fantasy dreams.
Then I realize where I am, and I roll over and see you sleeping next to
me,” she stopped and pulled away from him slightly to look him in the eyes.
“It’s like my heart was being squeezed in an enormous fist, and I
never realized how much pain I was in until it let go.
I get so overwhelmed with relief and love that it almost hurts.”
She answered the unspoken confusion in Nick’s eyes, “Do you remember
when you were mortal and you fell asleep on your arm, and when you woke up it
felt like little pins and needles were jabbing your flesh as the arm as feeling
returned?” At his nod of
comprehension she continued, “It’s not pins and needles, but it is a pain
that is accompanying the return of feeling to my heart.”
She reached out and ran her
hands over his face. “A week ago I
thought I had lost you forever. I
was despondent. I cried myself to
sleep almost every night. I felt
like a teenage girl with a crush on the most popular boy in school.
Oh God Nick, I was such an idiot.”
“No Natalie, you weren’t an
idiot. If I had been more open…” Nick began.
“Shh, Nick.
This isn’t about recriminations. Both
of us were blind.” She laid her
head back on his shoulder, pressing her forehead against his neck, “You barely
spoke 3 words to any woman who was near you, and you were totally oblivious to
the advances of some of the more aggressive ones.
Yes you spent tons of time with me. You
sought me out for no other reason than to talk to me, you invited me over to
watch movies and let me fall asleep in your arms all the time.
In retrospect, I was an idiot not to notice how much you wanted me.”
Nick smiled, “I even choked
down those terrible concoctions you made for me.”
Natalie slapped him on the
chest, “Hey! I was trying to help
you! They weren’t supposed to
taste great,” she complained.
“One of these days, after you
come across, you’re going to have to try one of those, just so you can get the
full effect.
Natalie sobered at that.
“After I come across… Nick, what if I…”
It was Nick’s turn to
interrupt, “Shh, Whatever happens, you and I will be together forever.
Even if you don’t cross, we won’t be denied the important part- you
and I can be linked together. I know
you want to fly,” he had seen that in their sharing together, “and I want
that too, but its more important that neither of us will grow old and leave the
other behind.”
“What if someone wants my
head?” she asked plaintively.
“There’s no reason you have
to fight if you don’t want to, Nat. You
can run away, or I can help protect you until you’re strong enough to defend
yourself. Plus, it’s not like
you’re going to go out looking for a fight.”
Nick stroked his fingers up, across her cheek and into her hair,
“Whatever comes- you and I will face it together.”
They snuggled together for
several minutes before Natalie's caresses became less soothing, and more
arousing.
“Nick?”
“Yes, Love?”
“I don’t want to wait for
tomorrow,” she whispered.
Nick’s senses were suddenly
on overload as the vampire came out in full force.
He yearned to drink her down to death, stimulating the rebirth of another
daughter, this one to be both daughter and eternal mate.
“Me neither!” he grunted out around his fully descended fangs.
“Come on!” he said, getting up and leading her to the stairs.
Natalie’s heart was hammering
in her chest. Hope and anticipation
and fear and dread were warring inside her.
She didn’t think she could wait another moment to do this.
She wanted so badly to join Nick in his world, but even if she
couldn’t, she knew they could be closer when she shed her mortality one way or
the other.
Nick stopped them at the foot
of the stairs, “Natalie, I wanted to make this special, for you to have a last
meal with all of your favorites, for you to take one last walk in the sun…”
he began.
Natalie interrupted, “I want
my next meal to come from you Nick. I
want my next walk to be a flight through the night sky with you.”
Nick just smiled at his
beloved, more in love with her at that moment than he could have ever conceived
of in his long life. He grabbed her
and flew them up the stairs and into the bedroom.
========== X-FILES ==========
FOREVER KNIGHT ==========
HIGHLANDER ==========
Scully luxuriated in the
strength her new incarnation afforded her. She
flew herself and her lover to the one place she had secretly wanted to go since
landing in Toronto almost a week ago; the CN Tower.
Standing atop tall structures
always brought out the childlike joyfulness in her.
When she was young, being able to look down from a great height allowed
her to fantasize that she could fly. Now
that she really could, the elation of standing on the edge was sharpened, rather
than diminished. She leapt off of
the edge a couple of times and flew back in, just for the sheer delight of it.
Mulder reveled in his lover’s
joy. “God, this feels so
amazing!” he said.
Scully threw herself into his
arms, giggling like a little girl. “What
does?” she asked, feeling his echo of her delight, but not catching his exact
thoughts.
“This,” Mulder replied.
“You, laughing in utter delight, the feel of flying and the feel of
being carried in flight. Me,
wrapping my arms around you and holding you tight.
All of it- it feels so… so…”
“Right.
It feels right. It feels like
home, like belonging,” she finished for him.
She felt his joy surge even more as she spoke.
“Yes.
That’s exactly how it feels. I
love you *so* much!” Mulder said.
Scully could feel the
outpouring of love washing over her and flowing back from her into him.
“Me too,” was all she got out before their lips met.
Their kiss was all
encompassing, as their focus narrowed to the sensation of lips and tongue to the
exclusion of everything else. Slowly
their awareness expanded to include the whole of their bodies and they touched,
stroked and undressed each other. Seemingly
of their own volition, their bodies joined together as their mouths had.
They breathed each other’s breath as they moved within and around one
another. As they neared their
climax, Scully sliced into her throat with one sharp fingernail and moved
Mulder’s head to her neck to drink. She
then bit into him and they simultaneously came.
As with the last time the orgasm was amplified in a feedback loop until
both passed out from the pure ecstasy.
Mulder died again after the
sensation overload rendered them both unconscious.
Even though Scully didn’t drain him entirely, it was enough to cause
his heart to stop. Nevertheless, he
recovered first, gasping back to life in what he was coming to determine was the
‘normal’ manner. He found
himself propped up against the wall of the enclosure, a naked, boneless vampire
sleeping in his arms. Her
head was lolled back, and he could see the tips of her fangs through her
slightly parted lips. He suddenly
noticed the smell of her blood, still drizzling slowly out of the wound on her
throat. “Scully, you smell like…
strawberries?” Mulder rasped. He
was suddenly compelled to lick the blood from her throat.
“Oh my God!” he whispered. The
taste was unlike anything he had ever had before.
Both of the previous times he had tasted her blood, last night and just a
few minuets ago, it had tasted like blood- slightly bitter and metallic. Now, it
was sweet and rich, with hints of acidic tartness- like biting into a fresh,
just ripened strawberry. And, it was
definitely Scully. It tasted like
her, as though- somehow- there was ‘essence of Scully’ mixed in with the
berries. He would forever be able to
identify that taste as ‘Scully’s Blood.’
He bent down for another taste,
and suddenly he felt a tearing sensation in his gums.
“Ouch!” he said, loudly enough to wake Scully from her stupor.
Scully came to, just in time to
see Mulder staring at her with green eyes and fangs.
To say she was startled was understating things rather a bit.
“Mulder? Are you ok?”
“You tashte like
shtrawberriesh, Shcully.” Mulder lisped through his new fangs in a husky,
sex-roughened voice.
The combination of the desire
evident in Mulder’s voice, his comment about the flavor of her blood, and the
eyes and fangs was too much for Scully to
The sensation of being bitten,
previously erotic but painful, was suddenly a discovery of a whole new erogenous
zone. He felt a hard slap, as his
erection grew rock hard with a single heartbeat.
He drove himself into Scully at the same time he buried his new teeth
into her neck at the shoulder. “Oh,
dear God!” he thought. The flavor
of Scully’s cool blood in his mouth was almost overpowering.
[You taste so good, Scully!] he thought to her.
[Now you know why I can’t
keep my fangs off of you, Mulder.] she replied.
[You taste like cardamom- fragrant and overpowering and wonderful!]
Suddenly the taste changed and she tasted strawberries.
Mulder also noticed the flavor shift to the carda