Date: Sun, 12 Nov 1995 12:40:15 -0700 Reply-To: WOLFEM@CGS.EDU Sender: Highlander TV show stories From: Michelle Wolfe Subject: my so-called immortality 3b/13? From: WOLFEM 12-NOV-1995 12:36:27.36 To: WOLFEM CC: WOLFEM Subj: my so-called immortality 3b/13? My so-called immortality Part III-continued: Shadows in the rain... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Jittery and restless, he roamed the side-streets, going nowhere in particular, striding just a few paces short of a run. Alien thoughts and feelings flashing on the surface of his consciousness, his muscles charged with an irritating energy, feeling at moments as if he were about to crawl right out of his skin. Walking and walking, as his body and soul wrestled with the essence of another. Strength, mind and will all transmuted into a powerful, foreign, and repulsive stream of energy. And it fought viciously-- even after it had been assimilated-- to remain intact, to keep from being dissolved and incorporated into the new self which had absorbed it. The light drizzle graduated to a steady deluge. The downpour plastered his wet and sandy hair to his scalp; a persistent stream of rain began to run almost continually off his steep forehead and down his nose like a gutterspout. He didn't notice. He'd gone blocks and blocks when he found himself facing an imposing marble wall at the end of a cul- de-sac. He leaned against the wall and closed his eyes, the wet stone hard, cool and soothing against his tense flesh. Not having the best morning, are you Connor? he asked himself wryly. (...The fire crackles in the stone hearth. In the bedroom Heather sleeps, her firm curves artfully avoiding the worst lumps in the mattress. Leaving them for him, of course... ...The old man still sits at the table, staring into the hearth, smoking pensively. Ramirez never seemed to sleep, as if he'd done all the dreaming he needed, centuries ago... ...He bends over the fire for a moment, stirring the embers. Then he sits across from the old man, waiting... ..."Days pass into weeks, the centuries merge into millennia," Ramirez begins, his voice low and resonant. A raised eyebrow and an ironic smile suddenly grabs Connor's attention. "Not that you'd know anything about that, would you, clansman?" the old man shakes his head, the fire-light casting flashes of gold on his white hair. "No-- None of it's real for you yet. It never is-- not for the first few decades. At first there seems to be no difference between you and the mortals. You both fall in love, grieve for your dead, and try to stay alive. But with time--" ..."--with time the differences will become clear. Mortals act without ever living with their actions-- a blink and their time is over. Their memories are short and faint and if a deed still rankles and resists forgetting then they spit it out to a priest, and the guilt passes through them like dirty water, never to be felt again... ..."But we aren't so lucky. No, you'll carry your deeds with you all your life, MacLeod. Every detail of the moment as sharp and clear as day. The memories branded in your brain... ..."...and the guilt carved into your heart..." ...The calm smile on the old man's face, the even tone of his voice, confused Connor. What were all these impassioned speeches, these pretty words, supposed to mean to him? ..."...Yes, carrying your mistakes for centuries. The weight on your shoulders, the sharp edges of regret like thorns digging into your flesh. They'll cling to you, and you'll feel them with every step you take. For hundreds of years you'll carry them--" the old man stops and draws deeply on his pipe, exhaling the smoke in fetid curls that seemed aimed for Connor's offended face... ..."Unless, my young friend, you have the good fortune to learn from them...") ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ He committed a map of Paris to his memory every two or three years. He knew where he was, even he had paid little attention to getting there. Shelter was not far away. A warm, dry apartment. Expensively furnished, an exquisite view. A kettle on the burner and scotch waiting to be poured. Dry clothes: clean, pressed and hanging in the closet. Heat, light and comfort just a few blocks away. He stayed right where he was, standing in the rain, bare-headed and drenched, staring into the empty street through a dark gray curtain of falling water, stretching from the pavement to the sky. Trying not to think of anything. Feeling the strange nuances of someone else's power and knowledge merging with his own, slipping into cracks and spaces of his body and mind, displacing buried memories, shoving forgotten feelings of his own out into the open. Or feelings he just wished he could forget.. ("...they'll cling to you, and you'll feel them, every step you take...every detail of the moment as sharp and clear as day...") He'd never known the little girl's name. 'The Doll', Kempe had called her. He had done the right thing, he still believed. There was no life he or anyone else could have offered her. Trapped in a child's body, at best living as someone's burden, buried in the bitter memories of her violation, of her irreparable mutilation. She had been one of his many lessons in learning that you could do the right thing-- and still regret it. That little girl's face, so small and desperate and vulnerable. So much...so much like another face 300 years later, pleading for protection...A face still waiting anxiously for him, somewhere in Manhattan, the lines of late middle-age only a thin veil over the face of the little girl she had been when he'd first seen her. Rachel. And what sort of life have you had, thanks to my heroic act of rescue? Tied to a man who can no longer be your father and who will not be your lover...who should have sent you away years ago, pushed you out into world, where you might have fallen in love, married, had children...but instead he holds onto you at arm's length, binding you by his secrets, by his cold intimacy...he couldn't bring you closer, but he couldn't let you go, paralyzed by his own... ...loneliness. ("...For hundreds of years you'll carry them... Unless, my young friend, you have the good fortune to learn from them...") And here he was in Paris, trying to remedy another mistake, another aborted act of love, another rescue gone wrong. About to do the right thing-- and probably regret it. He closed his eyes and began walking away, afraid of of other memories that might be waiting in the rain... ___________________________ Yeah, I know I stole the kid bit from Anne Rice, Dostoyevsky, _Forever Knight_, *and* the notorious "Kenny" episode. Forgive me. Or chew me out at . (And please let me know if the Ramirez stuff was way too cheesy -- I was really of two minds about it...) =========================================================================