Date: Mon, 10 Oct 1994 16:19:32 +0100 Reply-To: Highlander TV show stories Sender: Highlander TV show stories From: MB Overton Subject: "End of the Road" Part 6 Penultimate episode... HIGHLANDER "End of the Road" Part 6 Maire pouted. "Now now. Aren't you going to say it's a perfect plan?" "What do you think?" Richie retorted, testing the bonds on the back of the chair. They were nylon ropes, the sort used by mountain climbers for their strength, and he suspected his wrists would give way before the ropes did. He kept trying anyway. "Oh, come on, don't be a bad loser," Maire said. A disinterested part of Richie's mind noted that she seemed to speak with the same half-childish style as Flint. "You must admit it's clever. A good idea." "Does the word diabolical mean anything to you?" Maire laughed. "Devious, perhaps, and not entirely within the rules, I do admit that. But it's still neat. Macleod is driven to mad fury by these incidents, all of which are designed to implicate Flint. He attacks Flint, and Flint defeats him, as he will. Flint is better than Macleod, he'll take his head. Then the mercenaries attack Flint, stun him, bring him back here, and I take his head. Macleod and Flint's Quickenings all in one go." "Go to hell," Richie said. "Perhaps. But that's the interesting thing about the Game, we never quite know, do we? An uncertain end, so to speak." Maire rose. "Well, darling, it's been fun talking to you, but I have other things to do. According to the information this little gadget's been giving me, Macleod's just attacked Flint after he found Tessa." She hefted the earpiece in her hand, and smiled down at Richie's confusion and worry. "You didn't know that bit of course. One or two of my men went in while Flint was out and had a bit of fun with dear Tessa. Beat her about a little." Her expression turned cold for a brief moment. "No rape, of course. Nobody should suffer that." Then the smile appeared again. "But they did cut her up a bit." "Bitch," Richie said in cold fury. Maire smiled and slapped him calmly around the face. His cheek began to sting and then, with just as little passion as when she'd struck him, Maire leaned down and kissed him on the lips, holding his head so he couldn't move away. She released him after a moment, smiled again, and then the sound of her footsteps dwindled in volume as she disappeared into the darkness of the warehouse. Richie began to struggle at his bonds with renewed anger, and also with desperation as well. Things, so far as he could see, were going from bad to worse. ... "You always were stubborn, Duncan," Flint said in exasperation, flicking away a particularly savage lunge with the lower blade of the doublesword and retreating another step. "Why won't you listen?" "The only words I'll listen to are your surrender," Duncan snapped, attacking once again. This time he dodged Flint's standard parry and got within inches of the older immortal's heart, missing only because Flint had anticipated the move and used the upper blade to knock the katana aside once again. The mad anger within Duncan's heart did not abate, and he pressed home his attack. Flint's defence was half-hearted, almost desultory, and the fact that he had the body of an eighteen-year-old whilst Duncan seemed in his mid-thirties was beginning to tell against him. "Grief, Macleod, it's a setup!" Flint declared. "Can't you see that?" "It's a setup alright," Duncan agreed, leaving the accusation hanging in the air as he slashed at Flint's legs. Flint retreated backwards as quickly as possible, but the katana caught at the edges of the jeans he was wearing and tore a ragged hole in one leg. The success spurred Duncan onwards, and he moved forward still closer. "Don't make me kill you, Duncan," Flint warned, meeting Duncan's attacks with parries from the doublesword. "I don't want to, but I will." "I thought you wanted to die," Duncan snarled, lunging. Flint sidestepped and ran past Duncan into the middle of the shop, turning to face him. Now there was anger on Flint's face as well, anger of a different kind. "I will not die branded a criminal! Especially falsely branded a criminal!" "It's you or it's me," Duncan snapped, emerging from the shadows of the shop and attacking again. "You think I could ever forgive you for what you've done to Tess!" "I didn't, for crying out loud!" "You did!" Duncan's retort was harsh and unforgiving. "Mac..." The weak voice echoed in the sudden silence and Duncan hesitated, his eyes automatically flicking sideways to where Tessa was just beginning to sit up. There was a blur of motion at the corner of his eye and suddenly the katana was whirling away into the darkness, Flint's doublesword pricking at the edge of his throat. "Flint, what..." Tessa started "Run, Tessa!" Duncan commanded hoarsely. Despair tinged his voice. Just once, just for once, he had hoped and prayed he could beat Flint, but the other's skill and long experience had proved true once again. There was nothing he could do. In the final test, he had failed. Failed himself, failed to avenge what Tessa had suffered... "Tell him, Tessa," Flint snapped. "Tell him what happened." "What's happening?" Tessa clutched at Duncan's black coat, hunched around her shoulders, close to tears. "What's going on?" "Get away from him, Tessa," Duncan insisted. "Shut up," Flint said coldly, a fury in his eyes. "Tessa, tell him who it was attacked you." "But - " "Tell him!" She hesitated. "It was...dark. Two men....dark green. Khaki. They had machine guns. I...couldn't see their faces." "You see?" Flint looked down at Duncan and now the fury was gone, replaced by that weariness Duncan had seen so often, but only seemed to recognise for the first time. "To stoop that low, Duncan, would me make unworthy even to exist. I told you the very first time we met, right after I'd spared your life at Talbot's mansion, that I obey my own code of existence. I obey it absolutely. I would never - NEVER - do anything like the things which have happened to you today. Never." He took the doublesword away from Duncan's throat and folded it up, tucking it away. "Duncan, you're very clever. Work it out. How many immortal enemies do you have already without needing to make another one out of me?" Flint looked in Tessa's direction. "And besides. She needs you a lot more than anything else now." Duncan stared for a moment, then scrambled to his feet. "Flint," he said slowly, "I apologise." Then he ran towards Tessa and she allowed herself to fall into his arms, and then everything was suddenly much brighter again. ... "Sun's a bit brighter now." Maire shielded her eyes and peered upwards. "Not by much." She allowed her gaze to fall again and she looked at her mentor, dressed in the loose comfortable clothing so at odds with normal masculinity of the nineteenth century but so much more practical for the endless warrior training sessions he insisted on putting her through. She wondered, not for the first time, if being a woman was what prompted Duncan to make her do so much. "Och, it's enough." Duncan took the swords from the backpack leaning against a tree and tossed one to her. "Come on. You're good wi' yon longswords and the big stuff, but I'm nae sure about fencing. Ye havena got quick enough reactions." "That's it, Duncan, work her into the ground," a new voice said. "I was wonderin' when ye'd speak to us." Duncan didn't seem surprised, and Maire realised that this third immortal who had now arrived was the source of the strange fuzzy sensations swimming through her brain. It was taking her a while to get used to all the full ramifications of being immortal. At least she'd never need to worry about getting the pox if she spent the night in someone's bed. "I just thought I'd watch a little, get used to what you were up to." A young man about eighteen sauntered into the clearing and nodded politely to Maire. "Hello." "Hello," she responded, looking uncertainly towards Duncan. "Maire - Flint. Flint - Maire." "Pleased to meet you," Flint grinned to Maire. She nodded vaguely, her head filled with the sensation of extreme age and experience. This Flint was obviously a lot older than his appearance suggested, possibly older even than Duncan himself, who claimed to her that he was almost two hundred years old already. "Flint was wi' us on the night ye died," Duncan said to her. "He left before ye actually did so." "That was five years ago," Flint protested. "Don't hold it against me just because I left you with six virgins. You were the one who bet I couldn't find more than four, anyway." Duncan grinned shamefacedly. "Och, it was a fair guess." "When you've finished," Maire interrupted. "Are we fighting or not?" Flint smiled. "How fierce you are." ... "It's Maire, isn't it?" Flint looked down from where he was sitting halfway up a ladder. "You guessed, did you? It took me a while, but I didn't think you'd get it." "I was closer to her than you were, for a time." Duncan rubbed a hand over his face tiredly. Tessa was sleeping uneasily in bed, tossing and turning with nightmares. She had accepted his assurances that he and Flint would find the men who had attacked her and take care of them. "Until she turned against you." Flint sighed. "I should have known something like that wouldn't have gone away. Maire was never the type to give up." A ghost of a grin appeared on his face. "You should remember that." Duncan shrugged. "Yes. She never gives up and she always wants something more than what she's got. Like you." "Mmmm. Somewhat ironic, really." ... The tavern was dark and silent, all except for the half-drunken snoring of Duncan and several other companions. The door of the tavern opened with only the slightest creak and a slim lithe figure stepped inside, closing the door gently behind her. Moonlight flashed on Maire's sword as she slid it gently out of the scabbard, looking around her until she saw Flint sleeping quietly on a bench. Step by slow silent step, Maire moved across the tavern, careful to cast no shadow on Flint, until she was within attack range. She raised the sword to strike. "Dinna do that." Maire hesitated, then stopped. "You'd kill me without giving me a chance to defend myself?" Duncan smiled. "Why should I show ye any more courtesy that ye were about to show Flint?" Flint rolled off the bench and rose to his feet. "Do you two have to talk this late at night? Couldn't it wait until morning?" He paused as he saw Duncan's sword levelled at Maire, and her sword poised in his direction. For a moment, he actually looked angry. "Ah. I see. We have a rulebreaker in our midst." "Why d'ye do it, Maire?" Duncan demanded. "We're friends, all three. We've been together for two years. Why?" Maire looked at Flint. "Because of him. Five thousand eight hundred years of experience and skill. Almost six thousand years of pure unadulterated power wrapped up inside a little boy's frame." Her voice was tinged with scorn as she looked at Flint. "What could he ever do in that body?" "So you take my head," Flint said, "and my Quickening, and then you have the power to do what you want?" Maire didn't answer, which in itself was a reply. Flint stepped quickly forward and pulled the sword out of her hand. She started and was about to respond when Duncan's sword touched her in the small of her back. She froze, not daring to move. "Go," Duncan ordered her. "Dinna come back or one of us will take your head. We never want tae see ye again." ... "I can see two solutions," Flint said. "The first is to let her leave and give up Richie - " "No," Duncan said simply. "Or the second is for both of us to try and get Richie away and take Maire's head once and for all." "Yes." "Leaving Tess alone." Duncan scowled. "Point taken. One of us ought to stay in case someone else comes back." Flint raised a finger. "Just a minute. I've been thinking. Those men came for Tess the moment I'd gone out for that pizza. That means - " " - they're watching the shop." Duncan rolled his eyes. "You'd think after four hundred years I'd have worked something like that out by now, wouldn't you?" Flint clapped him on the back. "Never mind, youngster. We're none of us perfect. Especially you." Duncan gave him a grim smile. "Come on. Let's find those men." ...end of part six... =========================================================================