Date:         Thu, 1 Dec 1994 15:44:37 -0600
Reply-To:     Joshua A Reyer <reye0011@maroon.tc.umn.edu>
Sender:       Highlander TV show stories <HLFIC-L@PSUVM.PSU.EDU>
From:         Joshua A Reyer <reye0011@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU>
Subject:      Beginnings and Endings (Part One)

                          Beginnings and Endings
                           By Joshua A. Reyer

  This is my first fanfic, so I hope I don't too much of a fool of
myself.  This is a story about Daniel Crosby, my own character, an
Immortal born in the year 1580.  I'm essentially using the movie universe
as a base, but without all those sundry details like Connor winning the
prize in 1985 or anything like that.  Sorry, no characters from the
movies or the series.  Please e-mail comments, I'd appreciate it.
**************************************************************************

Dover, England.  1607 A.D.

   Mary Crosbye reached out to touch the still form of her brother,
but she drew back at last moment.  He seemed all...broken, wrong.  His
head was twisted the wrong way, and his knee was bent over backwards.
She felt herself getting sick.
   She heard steps behind her and but she ignored them.  She could
feel the tears filling in her eyes, burning them, and suddenly, it was as
if a dam broke, and they streamed down her face.
   An old peasant man ran up to the body and kneeled down.  He began to
run his hands over Daniel's body, and at first Mary thought he was
defiling it, looking for money.  Then she realized he was patting the
arms, the legs.  He was examining him.
   "Wot 'appened, marm?" he asked.  The old man's voice was still
strong and authoritative.  She guessed he was a village doctor.
   "He fell..." she whispered, and she looked up at the famed cliffs.  "I
tried to grab him, but he fell...."


   Arrangements were made to transport the body back to London.  Mum had
a plot reserved for the whole family in a cementary, and Mary supposed
the responsibility of caring for the body until the funeral would fall to
her.  Andrige certainly wouldn't to it.  Especially as now he was the
head of the household.
   "Oh, Danny, you never did make many friends," she lamented to herself.

   Daniel kept phasing in and out of consciousness.  He was incredibly
sleepy, but there was pain in his leg, his back, and in his neck.  All he
could see when he opened his eyes was blackness anyway.  To him, it all
seemed a dream.


   Rebecca Crosbye took one look at the sight of the young man carrying
her son and the tears went streaming down her cheekbones.  She kept from
weeping out loud, though.  She walked up to the young man carrying
Daniel.  He stopped by the gate of the house.  Rebecca slowly removed the
large blanket covering Daniel.
   He looked so peaceful, almost has if he was sleeping.  Rebecca at
first thought she saw his chest move up and down in the steady rhythms of
sleep, but when she blinked the breaths were no more.
   "Please," she asked the young man carrying Daniel, "take him up to his
room and lay him on his bed.  Andrige will show you were it is.
   As if on cue, Andrige peeled himself off the post by the porch and
went inside.  Rebecca went over to Mary.  She was over by the cart that
had brought her and Daniel's bo---her and Daniel home, talking to an old man.
   "I'm so sorry, mum," Mary said, choking.  "We were walking on the
cliffs, he went to look at the view, and the he slipped.  I tried to grab
him, but I wasn't fast enough and he fell, inches from my hand."  Mary
looked at her right hand, as if she was damning it for its lack of speed.
   "It's all right, dearest," Rebecca said, taking her oldest child in
her arms.  The both began weeping.

   Andrige stared sullenly at the body, buried under a mound of
blankets.
  "Well, you really had to do it, didn't you?" he spat.  Andrige rose and
began to pace.  He hated this room like he hated his brother and for the
same reasons.  Both were stuffy and claustrophobic.  As he paced,
thoughts that he had wanted to verbalize for years come to the surface.
Only with Daniel dead did Andrige have the courage to utter them to his face.
   "By God, did you ever realize just how everybody but mum and sister
hated you?"  Andrige checked for reaction, and of course, got none.
   "You were never nice to the commons.  Always told them to stick up
their arse for the damn you gave them.  You squandered most of Father's
fortune, you bastard, and you haven't done a thing to make up for it.
You never let me have my freedom, like the old man did you.  No, I was
your plaything.  Your hobby.  You played with me so you wouldn't get bored.
   "And do you know what?"  Andrige shouted at his brother, "DO YOU KNOW
WHAT??!!  I hated you too.  I despise everything you ever did, you
pompous, overstuffed son of a--"
   At that moment, Daniel rose out of bed.  Andrige screamed.
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