Second Chances
Written By LockBox22
o0o
It took more effort then it had a week ago. The shuffling steps he took with his cane tapping the ground beside him annoyed him. Was even walking to be an effort now? Tap, shuffle, tap, tap, shuffle, tap. He stopped; taking a deep breath.
The birds singing in the trees above reminded him of his youth and the days spent in the countryside before the war. His eyes slipped closed for a moment before he was overcome with vertigo and chose to sit on the bench placed suspiciously in the right place.
Damn; he was getting old.
The stone was cool beneath his legs and the light breeze was a welcome feeling on the warm July morning. His eyes closed once again as he breathed in the sweet summer's air. He knew that someone had joined him, but he choose to ignore whoever it was.
Whoever it was decided to walk even closer. He opened his eyes, resigned to the fact that a nurse had come to check on him. He froze, surprised; it wasn't a nurse.
"Hello, Erik." She greeted him.
He looked her over. She was dressed casually; jeans, loose white shirt. Her hands were stuffed into her pockets in that familiar gesture. The gentle summer breeze blowing her dark hair gently around her face. She was still beautiful; and hadn't aged a day. Suddenly all the emotions he had felt sixty years ago when she had left him came flooding back. He felt angry and dammit he was still hurt.
"What are you doing here?" He asked. "Come to see an old man off?" His tone reflected more then his current emotions. Curses, he was sounding like a bitter old man.
She felt it too; the mask she had been wearing dropped off her face as she came closer, almost touching him. "I know you have every right to be angry..."
"I wasn't angry." He interrupted. "I was furious. You left me." He scooted away from her so he could think more clearly. Her presence was like a warm blanket on a cool night. He had missed her, missed her scent. But she brought back memories that he would rather stay buried.
She sat down beside him and reached for his hand. "Erik..."
He pulled away. "And if that wasn't enough, you left my children, Sarah. Hannah... she was just starting to call you mother and you..." He broke off unable to finish. "You left us to die. That monster..." He was shaking. "That monster left me alive because he wanted me to suffer. And you know what hurts the most? It's the fact that he was right. I should have never taken you into my home. I should have never fallen in love with you."
She grabbed his hand. "It wasn't your fault. It's mine, ok? If you want to blame someone you need to blame me, not yourself."
"That's too easy." He told her, regaining some control. He pulled his hand away. Her touch still made him feel things... "I've had to live with for all these years and I'll die with it." He pushed himself off the bench and walked back towards the building, hoping to God that she didn't follow. He wasn't in any shape to outrun her.
"I wanted you to know that we found him."
He stopped. He'd hoped this day would come, even prayed for a few a times; but now that he was hearing it, the news did nothing to help soothe the ache his heart had been carrying all these years. He felt... nothing. That man would receive no judgement from any human court of law
"That is no concern of mine." He said without turning around. "Your world has nothing to do with me. Your kind has made that perfectly clear."
He continued his walk towards the building; tap, shuffle, tap, tap, shuffle. With every step that he took, the weight on his heart grew. It was guilt, that weight, and it was something that he had learned to live with over the long years. Through the long nights, it had been his only companion.
From the bench where she still sat, Sarah watched him go. She sensed another presence and looked up to the small incline on her left. He stood there, waiting for her. She had called him as soon as she had found where the Immortal was hiding.
She rose to her feet and walked through the grass and up the hill to join him. "I told you this was a bad idea." He said once she reached his side.
Sarah looked him over. The sandy-haired man had his hands stuffed deep within his trench coat pockets, an unreadable expression on his face. The Highlander. Conner McLeod. Strong, silent, and deadly. She looked away from him, back towards to the bench where she and Erik had sat moments earlier.
"You sound like an old man." She said, but without her usual teasing tone. "I had to tell him. You know what happened. I had to let him know that it wasn't his fault." She turned to look up at Conner. The wind blew her hair around her face. "It's important to me that he knows that."
After a moment, Conner nodded. His expression hadn't changed. She bit her lip in concern. She worried about him.
"We should go." He said. "We're losing daylight."
She let out her breath silently. It had been years since they had a bead on the Nazi who had killed Erik's son and daughter. She had been living with Erik, caring for him and his family in Germany when the war had started; when the Jews had started to disappear.
As German citizens, they had tried to help as many men and women get out of the country as possible. Erik's deceased wife had been Jewish and he had ties to community. Conner had been among those they smuggled out several years earlier. They had been fine until the Nazi had shown up. Immortal, he had sensed her and had used Erik and his children as a bargaining chip. She had agreed to leave to keep them safe.
The night she had left for France, the immortal aligned with the Nazi Party had killed Erik's two children. His time had come.
"Come on then." She said, trying to make her tone lighter then she felt.
The past weighed heavily on her mind day and night. It was one of the prices they paid for their immortality; they remembered. They remembered everything they had seen, everything that had been done over their long lives. Many of them choose to forget, but the ones who didn't forget; they carried the weight with them.
Conner McLeod was such an Immortal.
This time he didn't have the bear the weight of that past alone. This time they would both see this quest to it's end. They owed it to Erik, a German who had saved both their lives while risking his own.
Yes, it was time that justice was done; for all their sakes.