Date:         Wed, 7 Sep 1994 08:51:38 EDT                                      
Reply-To:     Highlander TV show stories <HLFIC-L@PSUVM.PSU.EDU>                
Sender:       Highlander TV show stories <HLFIC-L@PSUVM.PSU.EDU>                
From:         "N.L. Cleveland" <NancySSCH@AOL.COM>                              
Subject:      Aloha Chpater 2 (conclusion)                                      
                                                                                
<It was impossible.> But the grim certainty, the absolute confidence in the     
Director's voice. <He knows. He knows. It's true.> Jonathan couldn't process    
the information. Couldn't incorporate it into the world he knew, the world he   
had lived in for the past 14 years. Nothing made sense. Or the sense it made    
was horrible, horrifying. He thrust the wild, half formed imaginings away,      
unable to speak, to think, to plan. He stared at the Director, saw him          
smiling back, saw his finger move, on the trigger.  <He won. The last battle.   
The final war.>                                                                 
                                                                                
The second wave struck. The sound flattened them. Like a tidal wave. Bearing    
down. Closer. It filled the universe.The walls twisted. Disintegrated. Turned   
to powder, collapsed. The ceiling came down on top of them, in pieces.          
Jonathan fell, pounded to the floor by chucks of concrete, metal, wood,         
huddled into himself, his last glimpse of the Director, crushed under a         
support beam, grim determination still on his face. He couldn't breathe.        
Couldn't see. Felt weights piling on weights, above him. Crushing him.          
Couldn't live, anymore. He clung to his final thought, his brain's final        
image, his final goal...the Black Dragons...Aki. Then there was no more.        
                                                                                
* * * * *                                                                       
                                                                                
The police had barricaded off the street. They could get no closer. Not in      
the car, at any rate. Duncan sat, concentrating. Felt nothing. Not a flicker.   
Not a hint of Raven's aura, of his buzz. <Perhaps we're too far away.> He       
looked at Richie. The youth was staring at the thick black smoke, at the        
flames, barely visible in the distance, licking orange and yellow, flickering   
in and out of the swirling pall of smoke.                                       
                                                                                
"I'm going to try and get closer. See if I can sense him, furthur in." He put   
his hand on the door, prepared to get out.                                      
                                                                                
"Mac, no. They'll stop you in a second." Richie turned to him, concern on his   
face. "He's not worth it. Look at what he's done, already. Do you really give   
a damn about him, anymore?"                                                     
                                                                                
<Do I give a damn? Yes....if only because I'm responsible for this man          
becoming an Immortal. I'm responsible for all the things he's done, since       
then. All these deaths. All this destruction.> He felt the heavy burden         
settle on his shouders. Accepted it. Accepted the responsibility. The guilt.    
                                                                                
"I have to know if he's still alive, Richie. If he's coming back." Duncan       
opened the door. "Wait for me. If you have to leave, meet me at the bike." He   
stood, slipped out, slammed the door behind him and walked away, ignoring       
Richie's protest, his last shouted objections. Walked along the street,         
parallelling the barricade, looking for a quiet yard, some shubbery, that he    
could use for cover, to slip away, to slip through the police line. To go       
back to the place he feared the most, right now. To the people who had hurt     
him so badly. <It must be done.>                                                
                                                                                
New immortals usually went a little crazy. Tried to test the limits of their    
new powers. Experimented. Took risks. Settled old scores, sometimes. But        
that's what the others, the older, more expereinced ones were there for. To     
teach, to guide, to moderate, to help. To prevent just the kind of bloody       
vendetta that an Immortal with a grudge could launch, and could succeed at,     
where a mortal would have died, long ago.                                       
                                                                                
<It is our role to watch from the shadows, not to try to interfere directly     
in mortal lives, in mortal history. Not until the end, when the One emerges,    
to rule.>                                                                       
                                                                                
He'd had so little time, with Raven. So little chance to instruct, to feel      
out the complex emotional patterns that surged in the man's heart, and to       
understand how to counter, how to buffer his rage, his pain, his desire for     
revenge. <But I could have done more. Should have known. Should have            
anticipated....> He couldn't flog himslef endlessly with his own guilt, his     
own passive complicity. He knew the issues were more diffuse, not a simple      
case of black and white, good and evil....there was wrong on both sides. The    
man had suffered. Had *valid* cause to seek retribution. Seek revenge.          
                                                                                
But this....he was closer to the burning building now, working his way across   
the shaded back yards, over fences, through shrubs, staying well away from      
the streets...he glanced up, saw the glass and steel walls crumpling,           
shattering, saw the building collapse in on itself, the tiny streams of water   
from the clustered fire engines around its base as ineffectual as a gnat        
pissing on a forest fire...this was excessive.  Even for an Immortal. This      
was wanton, callous slaughter. Murder. Premeditated. No one could do this       
much damage by mistake.                                                         
                                                                                
He paused, Stood. Concentrated. Still nothing. Not a flicker. No sign of        
Raven. No sign he was alive. Duncan considered. It could be hours before        
another Immortal could sense him. If he was somewhere buried, deep below.       
Days, if his body was badly enough damaged. Before his Quickening could         
reconstruct the damage, before he could regain consciousness. Or never, if      
indeed he had been consumed in the explosion, blown to pieces, his head         
severed from his body that way. Or if he had not even been in the building      
when it exploded....unlikely, but still a possibility.                          
                                                                                
Could he wait? Could he find a burrow to watch from, to wait and see what had   
happened? Or had some information survived, some person who knew who he was,    
what he looked like, where he had gone to ground...was there a massive          
manhunt starting even now for the late, lamented Mr. Cartwright? Did he have    
time to tarry, or did he need to leave the country, to get out while his face   
was still relatively unknown, to run far away, and let them forget, let his     
file gather dust, and be thrown away, in 20, 30 years....                       
                                                                                
He watched a helicopter, hovering over the burning ruins. News at 7. God, how   
he despised the press. Vultures, picking at the bones of the dead, the dying.   
                                                                                
                                                                                
There. He felt it now. An Immortal. The buzz. Not Raven. Not Richie. <Damn.>    
He had his sword, his spare katana, but where was the other? Why hadn't he      
sensed him before? <The helicopter? He's in the chopper?> The helicopter        
turned away from the building, turned and flew towards him, towards the quiet   
green yard he was standing in, the wind from the blades beating up dust,        
leaves, grass clippings, from around his feet. It hovered, menacingly,          
overhead. He glanced up. <A mistake.> A news camera was pointed out, pointed    
down at him. He covered his face with his arms and sprinted for shelter, for    
the scanty cover of the newly grown trees in the scrub filled back yard.        
                                                                               
The copter hovered for a few moments longer, then pulled away, Flew up, off,    
to the west. Back into the heart of the city. <I suppose they were feeding      
live footage to the network, too.> His decision was made for him. Someone was   
bound to recognize him, now. He doubted the entire staff of the Agency had      
been killed, had even been in the building, when Raven's attack came. <I'm      
assuming a lot. Assuming he did all this, Perhaps I'm assuming too much.>       
That was the easy way out, at least. Give the man the benefit of the doubt.     
And leave. He couldn't stay any longer. The police would have his picture       
soon, if they didn't have it all over the television screens already.           
                                                                                
He headed back for where he'd left Richie. Hurrying now,  not worrying about    
stealth, about not being seen. There was no time to lose. They had to leave.    
Immediately. He cursed the coincidence of another Immortal being in that        
helicopter. Cursed, and vowed he'd find out who it was, some day. Look them     
up. Make them pay. Probably the camera man. A wonderful cover, for an           
Immortal. Never seen, but seeing everything. Invisible, but everywhere.         
                                                                                
He wondered when the next flight to Japan left from Dulles. That was were       
Raven would go. If he ever went anywhere again. Duncan knew enough, from the    
brief contacts he'd had with the man's mind, from their short time together,    
to understand how significant a role the Black Dragons had played in his        
life. <If he's intent on settling old scores, he will go back to them, next.    
Go back to desrtoy the clan forever, this time. Destroy the men who created     
him, made him what he is, today. > He was getting into the man's thoughts.      
Understanding his motivations, understanding him. <I still can't condemn him,   
totally. Still can't hate him, for what he is, what he has done. But I cannot   
let him continue. Cannot.>                                                      
                                                                                
To be continued.....                                                            
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