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Highlander fic: The Lesser Evil (2/2)
Just barely too big for one LJ post, darn it all.
Back to Part 1
She waited on the bench outside the bookstore for another fifteen minutes while she sipped her coffee and continued to check her watch and occasionally her phone for the benefit of anyone who might be watching her. After about ten minutes or so, Amy left the café and went off up the street. To her credit, she didn't even glance in Amanda's direction. Amanda wished Amy had waited longer, though; an extra hour or so probably didn't make that much difference to the Watchers' ability to mount a rescue, but might make a huge difference in terms of making Laird suspicious that Amanda had passed a message. I should have run more fake errands first. Given them more red herrings to keep them busy. But I couldn't wait. And neither could Amy, she knew. Amanda had just told her that her father was in danger. Of course Amy would be rushing off as soon as she could find a convenient excuse to leave.
Laird, I hope you realize what you've bit off for yourself.
And Amanda desperately hoped that she herself hadn't just set something in motion that would run them all down like a freight train off its rails. Contingency plans, Laird had said. How extensive were those plans? How many people were in danger besides Joe? Damn it, MacLeod. I wish I knew how to reach you. As it is, I don't even dare try.
She threw her frustration into visible anger, rising from the bench and striding away towards the Métro station. I need something else to do now. Something plausible, something a person might do in my situation -- if she's planning something other than a shootout at a church, that is. I need to look like I'm preparing to go after Laird the First. After some thought, she took the Métro to a different part of the city and went into a wig shop, examining different wigs while her mind turned busily.
To call Methos or not to call him. If Laird Jr. didn't know about him -- and depending on how thoroughly she was being watched -- then she might lead danger right to his door. On the other hand, if danger was already at his door, then he deserved to be warned about it. On the other other hand, Methos could take care of himself better than anyone she knew. Except for that time he almost got himself beheaded over the Methuselah Stone and we had to save him. He's clever and canny, not invincible.
She purchased a long blond wig and had it wrapped up. There were too many people in the store to risk making a phone call. Outside on the street, she walked as swiftly as she could, trying to outdistance possible pursuers, and pulled out her phone.
With any luck, he's already off in some suitably remote location, like Duncan, and I don't have to worry --
"Amanda," Methos drawled, and her heart sank. "You never call unless MacLeod's in trouble. Or you're in trouble. And yet, for some reason, I keep picking up the phone."
I wish you hadn't. "Actually, it's Joe," she said quietly, and sketched the basics of the situation, as she'd done for Joe earlier. She kept one eye on the pedestrian traffic. There were other people going her way, but none close enough to overhear. She hoped.
"When you get in trouble, you don't do it by halves," Methos said when she was done.
"I'm the best at everything, darling. I don't suppose you have any convenient travel plans in the immediate future. If not, you might want to make some."
"I always have travel plans when someone is gunning for me."
"I hope you mean that," Amanda said, and thought, What's wrong with me? I'd rather have him flee town and get himself out of harm's way than stay and help me? I'm turning into MacLeod.
"You sound like MacLeod."
Amanda snorted a small laugh.
"Despite the annoying inconvenience, I have to admire Laird's Machiavellian style," Methos went on in a musing tone. "Did I ever tell you I once met Machiavelli, by the way? Nice chap, actually. He would not have approved of the modern use of his name. How'd you attract this psycho's attention, anyway?" His voice went razor-sharp on the question.
"Don't blame me for it. I have no idea. Quite possibly he was an accidental witness to a duel, or saw me get shot, or any of the hundreds of things that mortals see every day and explain away because it doesn't fit with their worldview. Except Laird the Second grew up with Laird the First, so he's probably seen a whole lot of things that don't fit with most people's worldview."
"And at some point he realized that Daddy Dearest wasn't getting older," Methos said.
"I doubt if Laird Senior told him, or he'd have a better idea of how the whole Immortal thing worked, and he doesn't seem to. But he's definitely figured out the salient points -- that Daddy's Immortal, that I am too, and that it takes one of us to kill one of us."
"I wouldn't try if I were you," Methos said. "He's not a particularly stylish duelist, but he's lived a long time, and you don't get that old if you're a slouch with a sword."
Amanda startled herself with a sharp bark of laughter. "You know Laird? The original Laird, I mean. Why does that fail to surprise me."
"We've met a few times," Methos said. "Laird wasn't his name then, of course. He's a nasty one, and bear in mind who you're talking to. It takes one to know one."
Amanda cut through a park, putting more distance between herself and the nearest passersby. "The longer I spend on the phone, the more suspicious Laird is going to be that I'm cooking up something. But I have to know. What's so awful about him? From all I could see, he seems to be feeding the hungry and housing the homeless, and doing little else."
"And the thought didn't occur to you that anyone that altruistic must have some really ugly skeletons in his closet?"
"Of course I thought it," Amanda said. "Who do you take me for ... Duncan? But whatever he's done in the past, he seems to have gone straight in this lifetime."
Methos gave a dark laugh. "I doubt it. Maybe he has changed. Maybe he's like Darius, who knows. But the Philip I knew ... no. He was the sort of user and abuser who likes to fester in dark places. The sort of person who keeps a peasant girl in his cellar for fifteen years so that he can rape her every day." From the edge of darkness in his voice, Amanda didn't think it was a hypothetical example.
"God," she whispered. All those children's charities ... For a moment the battered street child inside her rose up, screaming, a lonely thin cry -- drowning in the things she'd pressed down, all the things she tried so hard not to think about -- "No wonder his son hates him -- whether he was abused himself or not, the things he must have seen ..."
"He's probably right that the world would be a better place without Philip in it," Methos said. "And coming from me, that's really saying something. But don't get to feeling too sorry for the little bastard. It doesn't give him any right to go screwing up your life. Or, most importantly, mine."
******
There was no way to prepare for a confrontation at the church without making it too obvious that she was preparing. So instead she prepared for a confrontation with another Immortal. She used the files Laird Jr. had provided her to guess at Laird Sr.'s current location -- he'd been living in a beach house in Aruba for the last half-year, so he was probably still there. She booked tickets for a flight tomorrow afternoon. She packed. She checked her email and phone messages obsessively. Nothing at all from the Watchers, not that she was expecting anything. By now Amy would know who she was, and heaven only knew how many Watchers were aware that Amanda could be added to the pool of Immortals who knew about them. If they all survived the next day, there would be unpleasant fallout ahead. Well, can't make an omelet without breaking eggs, she thought.
And while she worked, she tried to think of ways to turn the tables on Laird Jr., to close the trap around him as he was closing it around her. It was better than thinking about Joe, and what Laird might be doing to him, or what he might have planned for the rest of her friends.
He's very well-connected, but I doubt if he has any actual friends -- a man like that? I doubt it. His people are loyal to him because he pays them, I'm sure. Could I use that?
She couldn't see any way to subvert Laird's employees' loyalty overnight, though.
Okay, so -- cut him off from them somehow. A real friend would do whatever it takes, overcome any obstacle, to get back in touch with him and help him. This wasn't something she'd always known. Other people had taught her that: Rebecca, MacLeod, Fitzcairn, Joe. Methos too, though he'd never believe it. But an employee? I doubt it. They're not going to risk themselves for him any more than they have to. So how do I separate Laird from his people?
She called Weasel. It was the middle of the afternoon in his time zone, so he was probably asleep. At any rate, the call went to his voicemail. "I have a job for you that you might find interesting. I'll pay well." With Laird's money; there was a certain poetic justice in that. "I don't know if you can do it; it's very hard --"
"You know how to get a guy's attention," Weasel said, cutting into the voicemail system.
Amanda smiled into the phone. "It's what I'm best at. Tell me, do you think you can take down the communications network in Paris for a little while?"
There was a brief pause. "Did you just say Paris? You don't mean Paris, Illinois by any chance."
"Paris, France."
The pause was longer this time. "Okay, I'll need a couple of weeks --"
Amanda checked her watch. "You have fourteen hours. Oh, and if you can do the power grid too, that'd be perfect."
******
Morning brought nothing but more waiting. She wished she knew if the Watchers were preparing a rescue or at least a coverup and cleanup operation. She was tempted to travel across town and try to make contact with Amy again, but didn't want to arouse Laird's suspicions -- assuming he wasn't already suspicious. She thought about calling Methos and then forced herself not to. Either he'd gone on the run or he was planning his own operation without her input, and either way, she doubted if talking to him would help calm her nerves. Weasel called three times, mostly to complain about the impossibility of what she was asking him to do.
"Look, if you can't handle it, I can keep my money. I could use some new handbags. And shoes, lots of shoes."
"Devil woman," Weasel muttered, hanging up on her.
About eight-thirty, one of the phones rang. It was the second burn phone that Laird had given her. Amanda picked it up with deep misgivings. "Yes."
Laird sounded like he always did: confident, fresh and cheerful. "Our meeting this morning? I believe we'd better move it up a bit."
Her heart sank like a stone. Unpredictability. Damn him. Damn him.
"Nine o'clock," Laird said. "He'll be there. Hope you don't have anything else planned." He hung up.
There was barely time to get herself to the church, let alone to get anyone else there. She pounded off a quick email to Weasel on MacLeod's computer -- URGENT!!!!! CHANGE OF PLANS! MEETING AT 9:00!! -- and just hoped that he was as good as he claimed he was. She didn't have a number for Amy. The only person she could call in Paris was Methos, and he didn't answer his phone this time. She wasn't sure whether to be hopeful or not that he'd made good on his threat to skip town at the first sign of trouble.
"He's moved up the meeting," she told his answering machine, phone held in the crook of her shoulder as she threw things into her bag. "Nine o'clock. I don't know if the Watchers will be there. I will be."
If I can get there in time. She abandoned her stylish heels for a pair of flats, purchased years ago and chucked into a closet with the rest of the spare clothes that she kept at MacLeod's place. All the while she kept thinking of things she should have done and hadn't. I should've bought a gun. I should've called Cory -- if there's anyone who knows sneaky underhanded ways of screwing someone over, it's Cory. I should've bought a dozen guns. I should've marched into Watcher HQ and demanded to see their director. I should've --
But all she could do now was run.
She arrived at the church with her watch reading 8:59. Racing up to the doors, she didn't see any sign of anyone except a startled-looking elderly woman kneeling in a flowerbed. No one loitering around. No cars. Philip Laird, if you've done anything to Joe, you won't be able to run far enough or fast enough --
She burst into the church, thinking Stupid, so stupid. If she'd just planned better, she could have been waiting at the church already. She'd been afraid to get there too early -- afraid Laird would guess she was planning something and call the whole thing off. Or kill Joe. And now here she was, unprepared and unready, stumbling into a possible ambush --
There were two men at the far end of the nave. Both of them rose, one a bit stiffly, and Amanda's knees went weak when she recognized Joe. The other man wasn't Laird; he had no neck, lumberjack-style shoulders and one hand stuck in a pocket with a suspicious bulge. Hired muscle.
She pulled herself together and tried to get her breathing under control -- she was no longer in tip-top cat-burglar shape. Then she sauntered down the aisle and hoped she wasn't as sweaty and mussed as she felt. "Dawson," she said, and her stupid, betraying voice cracked a bit. He looked tired and stressed, but intact, except for a bruise purpling his cheekbone. "Uh, did they ..." She raised a hand to her face.
Joe cracked a grin, and shot a glance at his jailer, who glowered sullenly at the two of them. "You should see the other guy."
The grin faded, and Joe took a bundle of cash from his pocket and handed it to her. "You know me, I'm not a guy who chases the almighty dollar, but there's something a little heady about seeing this much in one place, you know?"
"I know," Amanda said absently, thumbing through it. She became aware of something, a change in the atmosphere around her. A sound? No, an absence of sound. All around them, the ever-present electric hum of the modern world -- the collective sound of refrigerators, lights, air-conditioning units, computers -- had ceased. Even in the big stone church, there must be appliances and electric items, because the silence was sudden and deafening to her.
Weasel had done it. He'd also promised her the cell network would go down along with the power. She hadn't asked if it was part and parcel of the power outage, or something he had to do separately -- now she wished she had, because that would let her know if she was guaranteed a few precious moments of safety, or if she was about to sign a whole bunch of death warrants.
"All there?" Joe asked.
"All here," she said, and met his eyes. No way to let him know what she was about to do. She'd just have to hope that his mind was still as nimble as it had always been.
Moving in one quick, fluid motion, she drew her sword. Joe was already in motion at her first twitch, throwing himself down. Amanda swung over his head, as the thug started to draw his gun from his pocket, and beheaded him.
She hadn't actually meant to. After all these years, it was reflex. She wasn't used to fighting to wound with the sword. She always fought to kill. One had to.
There was a moment's silence. The headless body convulsed on the floor. Amanda was torn between relief, and a deep unbearable revulsion at defiling holy ground. For so long it had been so deeply ingrained in her that one did not fight here. She knew that the killing of a mortal on holy ground did not carry such a terrible price, but still -- for all that it had been self-defense, she felt as if a great wrong had been committed here.
"Get his gun," Joe said.
She did, and passed it to him without a word. He was a better shot and they both knew it. She wiped the worst of the gore off her sword on the dead man's jacket, and gave Joe a hand up.
"Plan?" Joe asked hopefully.
"Try not to die?"
"Sounds like the way our plans usually go."
"There was a plan," Amanda said. "A pretty good one, if I do say so myself. Then Laird moved the meeting up, and it went all to hell. Is he here?"
"Behind the church, along with about a half-dozen guys." Joe jerked a thumb towards the nearest side door. "I expect that in a minute they're going to come bursting in here and --"
He broke off at the sharp popping of gunfire outside. "Okay," he muttered. "Hope that's on our side. You expecting more company?"
"I didn't dare hope," Amanda admitted.
The side door burst open and someone stumbled in. It took Amanda a second or two to recognize Laird. He was clutching his side and his composure was completely gone, his neat hair mussed and his immaculate suit in disarray. He snapped off a couple of shots and then ducked out of Amanda's sight in the shadows, but she could hear him clearly, his voice echoing off the church's ancient stone walls. "You don't know what he's done," Laird screamed. "You don't know what he is! He's a monster, he doesn't deserve to live, and he can't die. I've tried!"
"You feel qualified to be judge, jury and executioner, then? How noble of you." The dry voice was Methos's.
Amanda looked at Joe, who made two quick hand movements -- towards the door and back up the aisle. Amanda nodded and slipped off, up the aisle, to outflank Laird, while Joe took the shorter distance to the side door to back up Methos.
"You can't tell me he doesn't deserve to die for the things he's done!" Laird shouted hoarsely.
"We all have ugly things in our pasts," Joe called.
"We've all known monsters," Methos said more quietly, though Amanda could still hear him through the church's clear acoustics, even though she was almost all the way to the opposite end of the aisle. "Some of us have been monsters. You aren't defined by your past unless you let it define you."
"And you, buddy," Joe said, "have let it turn you into something that's every bit as bad as he is."
Laird made a noise of pure rage. "You don't understand!"
Amanda finally moved around to an angle where she could see him. He was startlingly close to her, not more than a few steps away. In one hand he clutched a snub-nosed pistol; the other, streaked with blood, held a cell phone, into which he was frantically punching numbers.
She became aware that the faint background hum of electricity, of Paris on the move, was back. And that meant the phones were probably back too.
Whoever he's calling, it's bad news for us. We can't let him.
Amanda lunged forward and swung her sword. This time she aimed for his hand. The sharp blade bit it off at the wrist.
Laird shrieked, more in shock than pain. A bright fountain of arterial blood cascaded across the wall, the floor. He spun around, opening fire. Amanda tried to dodge, but she felt the impact of the bullets -- one in her chest, one in her throat. The hammer fell on an empty chamber, and he screamed again -- the sound was barely human -- and wrenched the sword from her nerveless hand.
"I saw you!" he shouted. "All those years ago, I saw you -- saw a car hit you, saw you come back! I was just a child, but I saw that! And years later, I saw you again -- unharmed, untouched, unchanging!" He swung the sword at her, a wild, raging stroke. Amanda, unable to speak and all too aware of darkness closing about her, flung up her arm in instinctive self-defense, felt the sword hang up on bone. "What does it take to kill you!" Laird screamed, and then darkness closed around her and she felt the floor come up and hit her in the face. Death claimed her before she could know if Laird found his answer or not.
******
She woke with the usual painful jolt of air drawn into lungs recently stilled. For a moment she lay, breathing quietly, letting the sensation return to her limbs. Her chest and right arm ached dully. Someone appeared to be stroking her hair, but that might be a phantom effect of the feeling coming back all over her body.
"Amanda?" Joe's voice said. She blinked and focused on his face. There was hard wood under her hips, but her head was pillowed on something soft. Flopping a hand around, she gathered intel by feel -- she was lying across a row of hard wooden chairs, but she had her head in Joe's lap.
"Joe, Joe," Amanda murmured. "People will talk."
"I don't mind. Let them flatter an old man." He brushed his hand down her cheek. "Welcome back."
Amanda pulled herself upright, brushing off his offer of help. She looked down at a dark stain on the floor, and her sword lying next to it, then raised her head as someone else came in from outside: Amy, dressed all in dark clothes like a commando.
"The bodies are in the trunk," she began, then saw Amanda and faltered. "Oh. Hi. I guessed that you were, uh -- you know. But I wasn't sure. Thank you for warning me."
"Thank you for coming." Amanda rubbed her hand across her face. She was always a little spacy after dying. "How did you know the time of the meeting had been changed?"
"I didn't," Amy said. "I've been here since six this morning, staking out the place."
"Teacher's pet," Methos scoffed, appearing out of nowhere. "I've been here since seven."
"You're both over-achievers," Amanda said, closing her eyes as a headache swelled in her temples. It was easy to beat herself up, tell herself that she should've thought of doing the same thing. But it was hard to think when one was under incredible amounts of stress and trying to coordinate a rescue on two continents. "Is Laird dead?"
"Yes," was Joe's succinct answer, in a tone that gave away nothing. He rested a hand on her elbow.
"The Watcher cleanup crew will be here soon to finish mopping up," Amy said. "I, uh, think maybe some of us shouldn't still be here when they arrive?"
"My cue to leave," Methos said cheerfully. "Well, reunions are always nice. Let's do it somewhere a little less noisy next time. Assuming you can manage to go five minutes without getting kidnapped." This last to Joe.
"If you're gonna be a dick about it, next time you're not invited to the rescue."
"Fine with me. I like sleeping in." Methos reached out to squeeze Joe's shoulder with one hand, the other settling lightly on Amanda's arm. For an instant his guarded face was soft. And then he was gone, ghostlike into the shadows of the church.
******
It wasn't until the following evening that Amanda wandered into Le Blues Bar. When she'd finally made it back to the barge, she'd locked the door, flung both of Laird's cell phones out the window, and slept for fifteen hours. Then she took herself on a nice long shopping spree, with Laird's money. It wasn't going to be doing him any good, after all, and there was quite a bit left over after sending Weasel his well-earned cut. She was a firm believer in robbing from the rich and giving to the needy -- namely herself. Joe and Amy were both too ridiculously moral to touch it, and Methos ... well, all right, she probably did owe Methos a very nice dinner out on the town, at the very least. He was back to being his usual, difficult-to-get-hold-of self, however.
When she did finally drop by Le Blues Bar, she found the CLOSED sign hanging out. The door was unlocked, however, so she let herself in and wandered through the dark, quiet bar until she found Joe in a back room. He was sitting at a table, oiling the parts to a disassembled rifle. Amanda was not an expert on guns, but she did have a passing familiarity with them, and if she didn't know better she'd say that it looked like a high-powered, quite expensive sniper rifle.
"How's it goin'?" Joe asked. "Sorry I can't offer you a drink. Bar's all closed down."
"I noticed," Amanda said, leaning a hip on the table. "Going somewhere?"
"Figured I'd go out of town for a bit," Joe said. "Mac's not due back for awhile. Not like I really have anything better to do than go on vacation."
"Vacation? Where?"
"I've heard Aruba's nice this time of year," Joe said, quietly setting pieces of the rifle into their case.
Oh. Oh. "Do you want some company?"
"Nah," Joe said, snapping the case shut. "You guys have ... things you can't do."
So do you, Amanda thought. So do you. But she'd spent her life believing that rules were situational, that no moral absolute was too absolute to bend if the conditions were right. "Well, be careful," was all she said. "Travel can be hazardous. Keep your eyes open."
Joe huffed a soft laugh. "You too."
He reached to take her hand; she pulled him into a tight hug and kissed his cheek. Life is too short, she thought, for them and even for us. Too short not to let the people you love know that you love them. It had taken her a lot of mortal lifetimes to learn that lesson.
Maybe she would go find Methos after all, even if he didn't want to be found, and offer him that all-expenses-paid dinner. Or maybe something else, a quiet night of staying in and drinking, just companionship and a friend if he wanted one.
Life was, indeed, too short.
Back to Part 1
She waited on the bench outside the bookstore for another fifteen minutes while she sipped her coffee and continued to check her watch and occasionally her phone for the benefit of anyone who might be watching her. After about ten minutes or so, Amy left the café and went off up the street. To her credit, she didn't even glance in Amanda's direction. Amanda wished Amy had waited longer, though; an extra hour or so probably didn't make that much difference to the Watchers' ability to mount a rescue, but might make a huge difference in terms of making Laird suspicious that Amanda had passed a message. I should have run more fake errands first. Given them more red herrings to keep them busy. But I couldn't wait. And neither could Amy, she knew. Amanda had just told her that her father was in danger. Of course Amy would be rushing off as soon as she could find a convenient excuse to leave.
Laird, I hope you realize what you've bit off for yourself.
And Amanda desperately hoped that she herself hadn't just set something in motion that would run them all down like a freight train off its rails. Contingency plans, Laird had said. How extensive were those plans? How many people were in danger besides Joe? Damn it, MacLeod. I wish I knew how to reach you. As it is, I don't even dare try.
She threw her frustration into visible anger, rising from the bench and striding away towards the Métro station. I need something else to do now. Something plausible, something a person might do in my situation -- if she's planning something other than a shootout at a church, that is. I need to look like I'm preparing to go after Laird the First. After some thought, she took the Métro to a different part of the city and went into a wig shop, examining different wigs while her mind turned busily.
To call Methos or not to call him. If Laird Jr. didn't know about him -- and depending on how thoroughly she was being watched -- then she might lead danger right to his door. On the other hand, if danger was already at his door, then he deserved to be warned about it. On the other other hand, Methos could take care of himself better than anyone she knew. Except for that time he almost got himself beheaded over the Methuselah Stone and we had to save him. He's clever and canny, not invincible.
She purchased a long blond wig and had it wrapped up. There were too many people in the store to risk making a phone call. Outside on the street, she walked as swiftly as she could, trying to outdistance possible pursuers, and pulled out her phone.
With any luck, he's already off in some suitably remote location, like Duncan, and I don't have to worry --
"Amanda," Methos drawled, and her heart sank. "You never call unless MacLeod's in trouble. Or you're in trouble. And yet, for some reason, I keep picking up the phone."
I wish you hadn't. "Actually, it's Joe," she said quietly, and sketched the basics of the situation, as she'd done for Joe earlier. She kept one eye on the pedestrian traffic. There were other people going her way, but none close enough to overhear. She hoped.
"When you get in trouble, you don't do it by halves," Methos said when she was done.
"I'm the best at everything, darling. I don't suppose you have any convenient travel plans in the immediate future. If not, you might want to make some."
"I always have travel plans when someone is gunning for me."
"I hope you mean that," Amanda said, and thought, What's wrong with me? I'd rather have him flee town and get himself out of harm's way than stay and help me? I'm turning into MacLeod.
"You sound like MacLeod."
Amanda snorted a small laugh.
"Despite the annoying inconvenience, I have to admire Laird's Machiavellian style," Methos went on in a musing tone. "Did I ever tell you I once met Machiavelli, by the way? Nice chap, actually. He would not have approved of the modern use of his name. How'd you attract this psycho's attention, anyway?" His voice went razor-sharp on the question.
"Don't blame me for it. I have no idea. Quite possibly he was an accidental witness to a duel, or saw me get shot, or any of the hundreds of things that mortals see every day and explain away because it doesn't fit with their worldview. Except Laird the Second grew up with Laird the First, so he's probably seen a whole lot of things that don't fit with most people's worldview."
"And at some point he realized that Daddy Dearest wasn't getting older," Methos said.
"I doubt if Laird Senior told him, or he'd have a better idea of how the whole Immortal thing worked, and he doesn't seem to. But he's definitely figured out the salient points -- that Daddy's Immortal, that I am too, and that it takes one of us to kill one of us."
"I wouldn't try if I were you," Methos said. "He's not a particularly stylish duelist, but he's lived a long time, and you don't get that old if you're a slouch with a sword."
Amanda startled herself with a sharp bark of laughter. "You know Laird? The original Laird, I mean. Why does that fail to surprise me."
"We've met a few times," Methos said. "Laird wasn't his name then, of course. He's a nasty one, and bear in mind who you're talking to. It takes one to know one."
Amanda cut through a park, putting more distance between herself and the nearest passersby. "The longer I spend on the phone, the more suspicious Laird is going to be that I'm cooking up something. But I have to know. What's so awful about him? From all I could see, he seems to be feeding the hungry and housing the homeless, and doing little else."
"And the thought didn't occur to you that anyone that altruistic must have some really ugly skeletons in his closet?"
"Of course I thought it," Amanda said. "Who do you take me for ... Duncan? But whatever he's done in the past, he seems to have gone straight in this lifetime."
Methos gave a dark laugh. "I doubt it. Maybe he has changed. Maybe he's like Darius, who knows. But the Philip I knew ... no. He was the sort of user and abuser who likes to fester in dark places. The sort of person who keeps a peasant girl in his cellar for fifteen years so that he can rape her every day." From the edge of darkness in his voice, Amanda didn't think it was a hypothetical example.
"God," she whispered. All those children's charities ... For a moment the battered street child inside her rose up, screaming, a lonely thin cry -- drowning in the things she'd pressed down, all the things she tried so hard not to think about -- "No wonder his son hates him -- whether he was abused himself or not, the things he must have seen ..."
"He's probably right that the world would be a better place without Philip in it," Methos said. "And coming from me, that's really saying something. But don't get to feeling too sorry for the little bastard. It doesn't give him any right to go screwing up your life. Or, most importantly, mine."
There was no way to prepare for a confrontation at the church without making it too obvious that she was preparing. So instead she prepared for a confrontation with another Immortal. She used the files Laird Jr. had provided her to guess at Laird Sr.'s current location -- he'd been living in a beach house in Aruba for the last half-year, so he was probably still there. She booked tickets for a flight tomorrow afternoon. She packed. She checked her email and phone messages obsessively. Nothing at all from the Watchers, not that she was expecting anything. By now Amy would know who she was, and heaven only knew how many Watchers were aware that Amanda could be added to the pool of Immortals who knew about them. If they all survived the next day, there would be unpleasant fallout ahead. Well, can't make an omelet without breaking eggs, she thought.
And while she worked, she tried to think of ways to turn the tables on Laird Jr., to close the trap around him as he was closing it around her. It was better than thinking about Joe, and what Laird might be doing to him, or what he might have planned for the rest of her friends.
He's very well-connected, but I doubt if he has any actual friends -- a man like that? I doubt it. His people are loyal to him because he pays them, I'm sure. Could I use that?
She couldn't see any way to subvert Laird's employees' loyalty overnight, though.
Okay, so -- cut him off from them somehow. A real friend would do whatever it takes, overcome any obstacle, to get back in touch with him and help him. This wasn't something she'd always known. Other people had taught her that: Rebecca, MacLeod, Fitzcairn, Joe. Methos too, though he'd never believe it. But an employee? I doubt it. They're not going to risk themselves for him any more than they have to. So how do I separate Laird from his people?
She called Weasel. It was the middle of the afternoon in his time zone, so he was probably asleep. At any rate, the call went to his voicemail. "I have a job for you that you might find interesting. I'll pay well." With Laird's money; there was a certain poetic justice in that. "I don't know if you can do it; it's very hard --"
"You know how to get a guy's attention," Weasel said, cutting into the voicemail system.
Amanda smiled into the phone. "It's what I'm best at. Tell me, do you think you can take down the communications network in Paris for a little while?"
There was a brief pause. "Did you just say Paris? You don't mean Paris, Illinois by any chance."
"Paris, France."
The pause was longer this time. "Okay, I'll need a couple of weeks --"
Amanda checked her watch. "You have fourteen hours. Oh, and if you can do the power grid too, that'd be perfect."
Morning brought nothing but more waiting. She wished she knew if the Watchers were preparing a rescue or at least a coverup and cleanup operation. She was tempted to travel across town and try to make contact with Amy again, but didn't want to arouse Laird's suspicions -- assuming he wasn't already suspicious. She thought about calling Methos and then forced herself not to. Either he'd gone on the run or he was planning his own operation without her input, and either way, she doubted if talking to him would help calm her nerves. Weasel called three times, mostly to complain about the impossibility of what she was asking him to do.
"Look, if you can't handle it, I can keep my money. I could use some new handbags. And shoes, lots of shoes."
"Devil woman," Weasel muttered, hanging up on her.
About eight-thirty, one of the phones rang. It was the second burn phone that Laird had given her. Amanda picked it up with deep misgivings. "Yes."
Laird sounded like he always did: confident, fresh and cheerful. "Our meeting this morning? I believe we'd better move it up a bit."
Her heart sank like a stone. Unpredictability. Damn him. Damn him.
"Nine o'clock," Laird said. "He'll be there. Hope you don't have anything else planned." He hung up.
There was barely time to get herself to the church, let alone to get anyone else there. She pounded off a quick email to Weasel on MacLeod's computer -- URGENT!!!!! CHANGE OF PLANS! MEETING AT 9:00!! -- and just hoped that he was as good as he claimed he was. She didn't have a number for Amy. The only person she could call in Paris was Methos, and he didn't answer his phone this time. She wasn't sure whether to be hopeful or not that he'd made good on his threat to skip town at the first sign of trouble.
"He's moved up the meeting," she told his answering machine, phone held in the crook of her shoulder as she threw things into her bag. "Nine o'clock. I don't know if the Watchers will be there. I will be."
If I can get there in time. She abandoned her stylish heels for a pair of flats, purchased years ago and chucked into a closet with the rest of the spare clothes that she kept at MacLeod's place. All the while she kept thinking of things she should have done and hadn't. I should've bought a gun. I should've called Cory -- if there's anyone who knows sneaky underhanded ways of screwing someone over, it's Cory. I should've bought a dozen guns. I should've marched into Watcher HQ and demanded to see their director. I should've --
But all she could do now was run.
She arrived at the church with her watch reading 8:59. Racing up to the doors, she didn't see any sign of anyone except a startled-looking elderly woman kneeling in a flowerbed. No one loitering around. No cars. Philip Laird, if you've done anything to Joe, you won't be able to run far enough or fast enough --
She burst into the church, thinking Stupid, so stupid. If she'd just planned better, she could have been waiting at the church already. She'd been afraid to get there too early -- afraid Laird would guess she was planning something and call the whole thing off. Or kill Joe. And now here she was, unprepared and unready, stumbling into a possible ambush --
There were two men at the far end of the nave. Both of them rose, one a bit stiffly, and Amanda's knees went weak when she recognized Joe. The other man wasn't Laird; he had no neck, lumberjack-style shoulders and one hand stuck in a pocket with a suspicious bulge. Hired muscle.
She pulled herself together and tried to get her breathing under control -- she was no longer in tip-top cat-burglar shape. Then she sauntered down the aisle and hoped she wasn't as sweaty and mussed as she felt. "Dawson," she said, and her stupid, betraying voice cracked a bit. He looked tired and stressed, but intact, except for a bruise purpling his cheekbone. "Uh, did they ..." She raised a hand to her face.
Joe cracked a grin, and shot a glance at his jailer, who glowered sullenly at the two of them. "You should see the other guy."
The grin faded, and Joe took a bundle of cash from his pocket and handed it to her. "You know me, I'm not a guy who chases the almighty dollar, but there's something a little heady about seeing this much in one place, you know?"
"I know," Amanda said absently, thumbing through it. She became aware of something, a change in the atmosphere around her. A sound? No, an absence of sound. All around them, the ever-present electric hum of the modern world -- the collective sound of refrigerators, lights, air-conditioning units, computers -- had ceased. Even in the big stone church, there must be appliances and electric items, because the silence was sudden and deafening to her.
Weasel had done it. He'd also promised her the cell network would go down along with the power. She hadn't asked if it was part and parcel of the power outage, or something he had to do separately -- now she wished she had, because that would let her know if she was guaranteed a few precious moments of safety, or if she was about to sign a whole bunch of death warrants.
"All there?" Joe asked.
"All here," she said, and met his eyes. No way to let him know what she was about to do. She'd just have to hope that his mind was still as nimble as it had always been.
Moving in one quick, fluid motion, she drew her sword. Joe was already in motion at her first twitch, throwing himself down. Amanda swung over his head, as the thug started to draw his gun from his pocket, and beheaded him.
She hadn't actually meant to. After all these years, it was reflex. She wasn't used to fighting to wound with the sword. She always fought to kill. One had to.
There was a moment's silence. The headless body convulsed on the floor. Amanda was torn between relief, and a deep unbearable revulsion at defiling holy ground. For so long it had been so deeply ingrained in her that one did not fight here. She knew that the killing of a mortal on holy ground did not carry such a terrible price, but still -- for all that it had been self-defense, she felt as if a great wrong had been committed here.
"Get his gun," Joe said.
She did, and passed it to him without a word. He was a better shot and they both knew it. She wiped the worst of the gore off her sword on the dead man's jacket, and gave Joe a hand up.
"Plan?" Joe asked hopefully.
"Try not to die?"
"Sounds like the way our plans usually go."
"There was a plan," Amanda said. "A pretty good one, if I do say so myself. Then Laird moved the meeting up, and it went all to hell. Is he here?"
"Behind the church, along with about a half-dozen guys." Joe jerked a thumb towards the nearest side door. "I expect that in a minute they're going to come bursting in here and --"
He broke off at the sharp popping of gunfire outside. "Okay," he muttered. "Hope that's on our side. You expecting more company?"
"I didn't dare hope," Amanda admitted.
The side door burst open and someone stumbled in. It took Amanda a second or two to recognize Laird. He was clutching his side and his composure was completely gone, his neat hair mussed and his immaculate suit in disarray. He snapped off a couple of shots and then ducked out of Amanda's sight in the shadows, but she could hear him clearly, his voice echoing off the church's ancient stone walls. "You don't know what he's done," Laird screamed. "You don't know what he is! He's a monster, he doesn't deserve to live, and he can't die. I've tried!"
"You feel qualified to be judge, jury and executioner, then? How noble of you." The dry voice was Methos's.
Amanda looked at Joe, who made two quick hand movements -- towards the door and back up the aisle. Amanda nodded and slipped off, up the aisle, to outflank Laird, while Joe took the shorter distance to the side door to back up Methos.
"You can't tell me he doesn't deserve to die for the things he's done!" Laird shouted hoarsely.
"We all have ugly things in our pasts," Joe called.
"We've all known monsters," Methos said more quietly, though Amanda could still hear him through the church's clear acoustics, even though she was almost all the way to the opposite end of the aisle. "Some of us have been monsters. You aren't defined by your past unless you let it define you."
"And you, buddy," Joe said, "have let it turn you into something that's every bit as bad as he is."
Laird made a noise of pure rage. "You don't understand!"
Amanda finally moved around to an angle where she could see him. He was startlingly close to her, not more than a few steps away. In one hand he clutched a snub-nosed pistol; the other, streaked with blood, held a cell phone, into which he was frantically punching numbers.
She became aware that the faint background hum of electricity, of Paris on the move, was back. And that meant the phones were probably back too.
Whoever he's calling, it's bad news for us. We can't let him.
Amanda lunged forward and swung her sword. This time she aimed for his hand. The sharp blade bit it off at the wrist.
Laird shrieked, more in shock than pain. A bright fountain of arterial blood cascaded across the wall, the floor. He spun around, opening fire. Amanda tried to dodge, but she felt the impact of the bullets -- one in her chest, one in her throat. The hammer fell on an empty chamber, and he screamed again -- the sound was barely human -- and wrenched the sword from her nerveless hand.
"I saw you!" he shouted. "All those years ago, I saw you -- saw a car hit you, saw you come back! I was just a child, but I saw that! And years later, I saw you again -- unharmed, untouched, unchanging!" He swung the sword at her, a wild, raging stroke. Amanda, unable to speak and all too aware of darkness closing about her, flung up her arm in instinctive self-defense, felt the sword hang up on bone. "What does it take to kill you!" Laird screamed, and then darkness closed around her and she felt the floor come up and hit her in the face. Death claimed her before she could know if Laird found his answer or not.
She woke with the usual painful jolt of air drawn into lungs recently stilled. For a moment she lay, breathing quietly, letting the sensation return to her limbs. Her chest and right arm ached dully. Someone appeared to be stroking her hair, but that might be a phantom effect of the feeling coming back all over her body.
"Amanda?" Joe's voice said. She blinked and focused on his face. There was hard wood under her hips, but her head was pillowed on something soft. Flopping a hand around, she gathered intel by feel -- she was lying across a row of hard wooden chairs, but she had her head in Joe's lap.
"Joe, Joe," Amanda murmured. "People will talk."
"I don't mind. Let them flatter an old man." He brushed his hand down her cheek. "Welcome back."
Amanda pulled herself upright, brushing off his offer of help. She looked down at a dark stain on the floor, and her sword lying next to it, then raised her head as someone else came in from outside: Amy, dressed all in dark clothes like a commando.
"The bodies are in the trunk," she began, then saw Amanda and faltered. "Oh. Hi. I guessed that you were, uh -- you know. But I wasn't sure. Thank you for warning me."
"Thank you for coming." Amanda rubbed her hand across her face. She was always a little spacy after dying. "How did you know the time of the meeting had been changed?"
"I didn't," Amy said. "I've been here since six this morning, staking out the place."
"Teacher's pet," Methos scoffed, appearing out of nowhere. "I've been here since seven."
"You're both over-achievers," Amanda said, closing her eyes as a headache swelled in her temples. It was easy to beat herself up, tell herself that she should've thought of doing the same thing. But it was hard to think when one was under incredible amounts of stress and trying to coordinate a rescue on two continents. "Is Laird dead?"
"Yes," was Joe's succinct answer, in a tone that gave away nothing. He rested a hand on her elbow.
"The Watcher cleanup crew will be here soon to finish mopping up," Amy said. "I, uh, think maybe some of us shouldn't still be here when they arrive?"
"My cue to leave," Methos said cheerfully. "Well, reunions are always nice. Let's do it somewhere a little less noisy next time. Assuming you can manage to go five minutes without getting kidnapped." This last to Joe.
"If you're gonna be a dick about it, next time you're not invited to the rescue."
"Fine with me. I like sleeping in." Methos reached out to squeeze Joe's shoulder with one hand, the other settling lightly on Amanda's arm. For an instant his guarded face was soft. And then he was gone, ghostlike into the shadows of the church.
It wasn't until the following evening that Amanda wandered into Le Blues Bar. When she'd finally made it back to the barge, she'd locked the door, flung both of Laird's cell phones out the window, and slept for fifteen hours. Then she took herself on a nice long shopping spree, with Laird's money. It wasn't going to be doing him any good, after all, and there was quite a bit left over after sending Weasel his well-earned cut. She was a firm believer in robbing from the rich and giving to the needy -- namely herself. Joe and Amy were both too ridiculously moral to touch it, and Methos ... well, all right, she probably did owe Methos a very nice dinner out on the town, at the very least. He was back to being his usual, difficult-to-get-hold-of self, however.
When she did finally drop by Le Blues Bar, she found the CLOSED sign hanging out. The door was unlocked, however, so she let herself in and wandered through the dark, quiet bar until she found Joe in a back room. He was sitting at a table, oiling the parts to a disassembled rifle. Amanda was not an expert on guns, but she did have a passing familiarity with them, and if she didn't know better she'd say that it looked like a high-powered, quite expensive sniper rifle.
"How's it goin'?" Joe asked. "Sorry I can't offer you a drink. Bar's all closed down."
"I noticed," Amanda said, leaning a hip on the table. "Going somewhere?"
"Figured I'd go out of town for a bit," Joe said. "Mac's not due back for awhile. Not like I really have anything better to do than go on vacation."
"Vacation? Where?"
"I've heard Aruba's nice this time of year," Joe said, quietly setting pieces of the rifle into their case.
Oh. Oh. "Do you want some company?"
"Nah," Joe said, snapping the case shut. "You guys have ... things you can't do."
So do you, Amanda thought. So do you. But she'd spent her life believing that rules were situational, that no moral absolute was too absolute to bend if the conditions were right. "Well, be careful," was all she said. "Travel can be hazardous. Keep your eyes open."
Joe huffed a soft laugh. "You too."
He reached to take her hand; she pulled him into a tight hug and kissed his cheek. Life is too short, she thought, for them and even for us. Too short not to let the people you love know that you love them. It had taken her a lot of mortal lifetimes to learn that lesson.
Maybe she would go find Methos after all, even if he didn't want to be found, and offer him that all-expenses-paid dinner. Or maybe something else, a quiet night of staying in and drinking, just companionship and a friend if he wanted one.
Life was, indeed, too short.
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Parts I loved: Joe, understanding immediately what Amanda had in mind and responding to it instinctively, Amy and Methos coming through for Amanda (keeners!), the companionship and love throughout.
Thank you!
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ALSO:
"I didn't," Amy said. "I've been here since six this morning, staking out the place."
"Teacher's pet," Methos scoffed, appearing out of nowhere. "I've been here since seven."
brb, dying of laughter.
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Amy and Methos are a fun team! I need to write them more (though I hadn't realized how similar Amy and Amanda's names are until I started writing scenes with both of them, and kept mistyping one for the other ...)
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"My cue to leave," Methos said cheerfully. "Well, reunions are always nice. Let's do it somewhere a little less noisy next time. Assuming you can manage to go five minutes without getting kidnapped." This last to Joe.
"If you're gonna be a dick about it, next time you're not invited to the rescue."
"Fine with me. I like sleeping in." Methos reached out to squeeze Joe's shoulder with one hand, the other settling lightly on Amanda's arm. For an instant his guarded face was soft. And then he was gone, ghostlike into the shadows of the church.
LOVED this bit! ♥
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