Date: Mon, 1 May 1995 20:08:30 -600 Reply-To: Otis the Omnipotent Aardvark Sender: Highlander TV show stories From: Otis the Omnipotent Aardvark Subject: "Gothic" ("In The End..." Pt.2) Ch.8 X-cc: Jonathan Haupt , Haydee Viardo , Lorene Buttram , Brandy Lumpkins , Pat Stubblefield , Elizabeth Donald ****************************************************************************** " I N T H E E N D . . . " ****************************************************************************** A Highlander/Batman Tale of the Future Jason R. Tippitt, 1994-95 http://www.utm.edu/~jtippitt/j.html Warning: Violence and Profanities Comments, suggestions, questions, back-chapter requests to JTippitt@Utm.Edu (I wear asbestos boxers, so don't bother flaming me.) Book 2: "Gothic" Chapter 8 ******* Kenny tried to stay as far away from the woman Immortal, Shiva, as possible. He could feel that she was quite powerful, and he feared that. She might be here for his head, after all...so he figured he could at least make himself hard to find. Still, she was fascinating to Kenny. She was about five-nine, very thin, yet muscular...much like a ballerina. Only she danced to the beat of wardrums. Shiva. Her name was stolen from Hindu myth...maybe she'd even influenced the myths. And so he and Carrie watched her talking with Bruce. There were many secret passages in the tunnels beneath Gotham. Some had been there before the Batman had moved his army underground, Carrie said, but many had been created in the past few months. "I'm not sure that any one person knows where they all lead," she'd commented when asked about the tunnels. "What brings you back to Gotham?" Bruce asked as he turned to face Shiva, carrying two snifters of brandy. Torches flickered, the light taking five, ten years off the man's face. In his black attire, he almost melted into the shadows. She took her glass from him, nodding her head and smiling lightly. "Business, Bruce. Times are dire. You are needed." "I hear someone's running around New York in a Batman suit...Jason Todd, I gather. Why don't you get him?" "I thought he was dead..." Carrie whispered, in the hiding place behind the wall. "Another Immortal, I guess..." Kenny whispered in reply. "We need the *real* Batman. You're familiar with some of what we're facing." She stood and began to pace the room. "You know about Immortals..." "God, yes." "Kenny is one. I am another. Jason is a third. There are others trying to contact him before he can be...misguided." "You're an Immortal?" "I was born 6,000 years ago in what you now call India. In my time I have taken the Quickenings of over 300 other Immortals. The last one was the Sensai--he told me I must do it, that we could survive the coming storm better as one than as two. What do you think?" Kenny shuddered. Carrie slowly lay her hand on his shoulder. "It's going to be okay..." "I think you know what you're talking about." Bruce took a sip of brandy and sat back in his armchair, eyes closed. "Why do you Immortals keep coming to me?" Shiva's face went blank. "You *do* seem to attract us like a magnet, don't you?" She turned her back to him. "I'm not sure. You are a brilliant man...a superb fighter, even if I was never able to give you the killing edge..." Bruce lay his glass to one side and moved to stand behind Shiva. "It seems odd that whoever sent you here sent *you* to retrieve me...it seems we'd be natural enemies, wouldn't we?" Shiva shrugged. "I asked to be the one." "Why?" "I wanted to know that you were still alive. If it was true...it might mean you were one of us..." "And then you would kill me, is that it?" Shiva spun. "No!" The glass fell to the floor. "If you were one of us...I could never fight you to the death, Bruce. I would probably have offered my head to you." "You're a superior fighter, Shiva--" "But you are pure, Bruce." She hung her head. "If you were an Immortal, I would offer you my head. There is no one left suitable to rule...no Immortal I know of. 'The best lack all conviction--" "'While the worst are full of passionate intensity,'" Bruce finished. "I remember Yeats. I introduced his work to you." "Not really...I met him while he was in the United States once." "What are they talking about?" Carrie whispered. Kenny shrugged. "Dunno. Think he was a poet or something." He shivered and stepped a little closer to her. "Man, it's cold in here." "Still...there must have been another reason you asked to be the one. And I think I know what it is," Bruce said. "I remember the time we met after you helped me get back on my feet...after I'd reclaimed the name from Jean-Paul. You told me you loved me, while we were being held by Ra's al Ghul..." "It was a foolish thing to say," Shiva snapped. "I thought he was going to take my head. He'd already taken my dignity." Bruce picked up his glass and took a sip. "So, he's one of you, too? But Talia--I mean, she's his daughter--but you can't have children--" "Your little Ms. Might-Have-Been is adopted, Bruce. I thought you were supposed to be a detective. He's the reason I'm here. He's making a big play to win the Game...and there are some other Immortals trying to take the fight to him. But they're risking world war in the process, since he's in Tibet...the Chinese are getting very nervous. We need to stop this other team...but I want Ra's to pay, too. If he wins the game, humanity will have been better off killing itself with nuclear bombs." Carrie shuddered. Kenny put his arm around her awkwardly. "That's not going to happen," she murmured. "She's exaggerating..." "I've seen what a nuke did...riots here in Gotham when the blackout hit...people died in the hospitals..." She was starting to cry. "I don't want to die." Kenny hugged her tightly. "It's going to be okay..." He hoped it wasn't a lie. Bruce took Shiva's hand in his. "So who are you Immortals working for, if you're so intent on saving the world? Yourselves?" "Actually...I believe you're acquainted with Senator Grayson." It was Bruce's turn to drop his glass. "Carrie, look at me," Kenny said, placing a hand under the girl's chin. "It's going to be okay. I promise...you're going to live a long, happy life." "Kenny, how can you say that?" "I'm an Immortal. I know all about long lives, trust me." With that, he leaned forward and kissed her. His fingers were crossed; this always worked in movies, after all. She tensed for a moment, then relaxed. Maybe movies weren't so far from fact, after all. ******* To be continued... =========================================================================