========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Mar 1996 12:20:34 -0500 Reply-To: LC Krakowka Sender: Highlander TV show stories From: LC Krakowka Subject: Long Lost 4/5 Sarah awoke about an hour later, lying in a strange bed, incredibly sore from her wounds. She opened her eyes to find Adam leaning over her. "Deja vu," she said weakly. He smiled, "You're at my place." Sarah sat up and looked down at herself. Her wounds had heeled, but she was still covered in crusted blood. "Mind if I use your shower?" "Be my guest," he smiled again, motioning to the bathroom door. A few minutes later, she came into the living room, wearing a pair of his jeans and an old tank top and drying her hair with a towel. He was sitting on the couch with a bowl of steaming pasta and two beers nearby. "Hungry?" She laughed. "You know that quickenings leave me starved." Sarah threw the towel on the back of a chair and ran her hands through her hair, then crossed the room and sat down next to him. He handed her a fork and the bowl and chuckled as she dug in. "I'm sorry I had to clock you one," she said between bites. "I'm sorry I deserved it," He looked at her, sitting there in his jeans, which bagged at her waist and were cuffed at the bottom. The tank top was more revealing than he felt comfortable with really, being used to seeing her in medieval attire, but he liked it. She was relaxed now, a little sore from her wounds, but the warrior that had fought and killed her mortal enemy not two hours before, the one that ruthlessly knocked him unconscious so he wouldn't interfere, had receded into the depths of her personality and she was his Sarie again. "What?" She eyed him skeptically. "What's that look for?" "I'm just glad to have you back," he smiled. Sarah smiled back and took another swig from her beer. "You and me Old Man, we go way back." She continued to shovel in the pasta. "I'm sorry...for all that happened between us," he trailed off and looked down at her bare feet. "Hey," she got up and moved to sit on the coffee table in front of him, ducking her head to meet his gaze. "What's going on with you, Petey? Duncan told me you've been out of the Game for centuries now...why did you show up with a sword tonight? Don't you know what could have happened if someone like Martin got your quickening?" Adam nodded. "You're my best friend Sarie...I thought I lost you back in Germany all those years ago...I couldn't let it happen again." "Well, it didn't...and it won't. And you didn't let anything happen back then...I left because I thought you were dead." He looked up at her suddenly. "Dead?" She nodded. "After I killed Albrecht Zauer I went back to find you, but couldn't...there was a quickening nearby...I waited at the inn for two days, but you never came back..." Adam chuckled. "I followed you to Zauer and got there in time to see the quickening...I thought he had killed you. I went off looking for him," he paused. "But then I come home with Duncan one night, six hundred years later, and there you are..." "And there you were," she grinned. "But then you had to go pull this macho crap again..." He rubbed the back of his head gingerly and grinned back at her. "Not a mistake I will make again, I'm sure." "What's with that anyway? We did so well for so long...then you got all fatherly on me." Adam started to answer, but the CD player changed discs and the classical music that had been playing was replaced with Big Band. Sarah pulled him to his feet. "God, Petey, if you had known me in the forties! I could Lindy like no one else." She dragged him to a clear spot on the floor. "You want me to dance with you?" "C'mon!" She twirled under his arms and danced around him until he finally capitulated and joined her. When the song ended she threw her arms around him, laughing. He laughed with her, it was wonderful to have her back in his life. "Sentimental Journey" started and they began to sway to the music. Sarah looked up at him and smiled. "You must have been very dashing in the forties...in your double breasted suit and fedora...I bet you had women falling all over you." "I tried to avoid it," he smirked. "But they just kept hounding me." Sarah laughed and rested her chin on his shoulder. "You always did have a way with women." "But they all keep dying on me," he said, attempting to joke, but failing. "I wish I had gotten the chance to know Alexa better," Sarah said. "I'm sorry you lost her." He sighed. "That's the price we pay when we get involved with mortals. The good-byes always come." They fell silent, but continued to dance. He lowered his arms to her waist and she draped hers around his neck. When the song ended, they looked at each other for an awkward moment, before returning to the couch and their beers. "Petey, do you think we would still be friends if we hadn't lost each other for so long?" He shrugged. "I don't know. Probably. You and I were a good team." "If I had known you could dance like that we might have been more than just a team." "What's that supposed to mean?" "Men don't realize how nice it is for women when you have a dance partner that is right for you...a good fit...who knows how to lead, but does it subtly," she sighed and set down the empty bottle. Adam cocked an eyebrow at her, unused to hearing such romantic sentiment from his old friend. She grinned and tweaked his chin, "Who have such a devilishly cute face." "You think I'm cute?" He feigned a haughty tone. "You're very cute, Old Man," she smiled. "You have beer running down your chin, but you're cute." Adam wiped his chin on his sleeve and smiled. "And you, my Sarie, are beautiful." She barked out a laugh. "Hardly!" "No, really...you are. I like you with your hair short..." She eyed him skeptically for a moment, then gasped and clutched her hair. "That's it!" "What?" He edged away from her, suddenly nervous. "That's why you got so macho...somewhere along the line you figured out that I was a woman!" She leapt to her feet and paced away a few steps, then spun back at him; anger flashing in her eyes. "Now you think you have to protect me!" "Sarie...I..." "Forget it. You can't protect me. Don't you see...if it came down to just us, we would have to fight," she paced away again, and repeated her turn at the corner of the couch. "My god, that's it. I'm no damsel in distress, Methos!" Adam got up and caught her by the shoulders. "No. You don't understand...I always knew you could take care of yourself...but I found myself wanting to take care of you anyway. I thought you were DEAD Sarie...it nearly killed me. I couldn't let it happen again." Her eyes narrowed and she backed away from him, but he took her shoulders again. "Sarie, I..." The sense of another immortal in close proximity distracted Adam enough for her to duck away. Moments later, Richie let himself into the apartment. "Hey! Mac sent me over to see how Sarah was doing...he said it was a rough quickening," he said, by way of greeting. "She's..." Adam turned back to look for her, but she was no longer in the room, "she's...gone," he flopped back onto the couch in defeat. "Did I interrupt something?" Richie asked. Adam nodded, "You could say that." Seconds later, Sarah came from the back of the apartment carrying her sword and jacket and making a bee line for the door. "Wait! You can't go out alone, you're still weak..." Adam jumped back up. She stopped and looked at him for a second. "I don't need you to protect me," She brushed past Richie and out the door. "Sarie, wait!" Adam ran after her, but she was already down the steps and gone. "Why don't you go after her?" He shook his head. "She doesn't want to talk to me right now." "I'll keep an eye on her," Richie clapped him on the shoulder. "Thanks..." *** "You know, I think you really hurt Adam's feeling the other night," Richie said between clangs as their swords clashed in a sparring match. "You'll loose your head if you try to have a conversation with another immortal in the middle of a fight," Sarah responded, using her elbow to sock him one in the chin. "Ow!" He backed off and touched his bleeding lip lightly. "Was that really necessary?" "Look, the deal is, I teach you how to fight; you don't give me advice about my friendships. Now pick up your sword," she kicked it over to him. "What were you guys fighting about anyway?" Sarah heaved a sigh. "You know, you should be a Watcher instead of an immortal, for all your concern about other people's business." "Go easy on him Sarah," Duncan said from the doorway. "He's just concerned about friends." She tossed her sword to the ground in frustration, then flopped down beside it. "Pete feels like he has to protect me. You all do. It's like some male ego thing...never mind that I have been taking heads for almost a thousand years...I'm a woman, so I need to be protected. And Pete...all those years I thought we were partners...he wasn't looking at me as anything but a ward." "We're all looking out for one another," Duncan sat down next to her. "And what Adam feels for you is more than a need to protect you." Sarah flashed him a quizzical look, then began to pick at the tape on her wrists absentmindedly. "He told me that the reason he left the Game was because he lost his passion," Duncan crooked a finger under her chin and raised it up so she was looking him in the eye. "He would have gotten back into it for you the other night...doesn't that tell you something?" She stared at him blankly. "It tells me he was pulling the big brother act again." Duncan sighed. "Maybe he's just glad to have you back in his life and doesn't want to lose you again." "There is a difference between that and wanting to fight someone's battles for them," she said. "Duncan, you know how we live. We all have our own wars to fight." "Maybe he wants to help you fight yours," Richie offered. "Or maybe he's in love with you." Duncan glared at Richie, but Sarah threw back her head and laughed. "In love with me, that's a good one." "Look, you two have been lost to each other for centuries," Duncan shot a silencing look at Richie. "Maybe you just need some time to sort things out between you." She nodded. "You're right. I'm going to take a walk and clear my head," she scrambled to her feet. "I'll see you guys tomorrow." Duncan smacked Richie on the back of the head once Sarah was out the door. "Ow, what was that for?" "For telling her about Adam, bonehead." "It's the truth..." "It's none of your business." "You almost told her." "No, I made a suggestion that she could interpret as she wanted to, you stuck your nose in where it didn't belong." [end part 4] copyright, 1996-Lisa Krakowka -- LC Krakowka /215 CCC/255-5378/ hck1@cornell.edu CIT Learning Technologies Center/Lab Webmistress http://krakowka.cit.cornell.edu/hpage/lisa.html Duct tape is like the force. It has a light side, a dark side, and it binds the universe together.