The team gathers in Nate's apartment after a long job. Eliot has busied himself in the kitchen, and certainly no one else on the team will try and stop him. Hardison sets the table with Parker. Nate and Sophie pour drinks, Sophie glaring slightly at what Nate pours for himself. Hardison sits first.
"What do you think about that stuff the mark was talking about? That Undying Man stuff?" he asks as Sophie and Nate come to sit at the table.
"Oh, it's an old story. Been hearing it for ages," Nate says. "Supposedly there's this guy who can't die who likes to cause trouble for people. Mostly bad people, if you believe the stories. They call him the Undying Man because he can't be killed."
"The Undying Man sounds like a fairy tale," Parker observes, sitting at the table. "Like, once upon a time, there was a man who couldn't die, and they called him the Undying Man."
"That's not a very creative fairy-tale," Sophie says.
"It doesn't go like that," Eliot says. They turn to look at him as he brings over a pan full of seared fish and he stops mid stride. "What?"
"Are you saying there's actually a fairy tale about the Undying Man?" Nate asks. Eliot shrugs.
"Of course there is. You think a guy can hang around for more than a thousand years and not become a legend?" he says as he puts some of the fish on Parker's plate.
"Do you know it?" Parker says. Eliot nods, moving on to Hardison's plate. "Tell us!"
"Yeah, man, tell us the Legend of the Undying Man." Hardison wiggles his fingers in the air for dramatic effect. Eliot looks at Nate and Sophie.
"I want to hear it! I love a good story," Sophie says as Eliot puts the fish on her plate.
"Who doesn't?" Nate adds. Eliot finishes plating the fish and brings the pan back to the island in the kitchen.
"Fine. I'll tell you the legend," he says as he comes back. "You just gotta promise me one thing: none of you will ever make fun of the God in it."
"Why, what happens if we make fun of the God?" Hardison asks. Eliot sits down.
"You'll die horribly within 24 hours. Seriously, don't do it," he says.
"I won't. You won't, Parker, right?"
"I don't believe in Gods," Parker says.
"You don't have to believe in the God, you just can't make fun of the God," Eliot answers.
"Okay, then I won't. Tell me the fairy tale." Parker takes some of the fish on her fork and puts it in her mouth as if eating his food would get Eliot to talk faster. Eliot glances around the table before beginning.
"It starts when he's just a baby," he says. "He was born in the 800s in Scandinavia. It would later become Norway, but not for a very long time. The Undying Man was born to a blacksmith and his wife. They'd had other kids, but all of them had died shortly after being born. It seemed like this son was going to die too, and his father refused to look at him. His mother prayed to every god she could think of to save the child. She prayed and prayed until she passed out from exhaustion. While she was sleeping, she heard an unearthly voice." Eliot coughs and lowers his voice. They expect it to be funny, but it's actually disturbing.
"Your child shall not die."
"What was it?" Sophie asks.
"It was the God," Eliot says.
"One of the Norse Gods?" Nate says.
"No, it was the God," Eliot says again. "It's just the God."
"But that doesn't make sense. The Vikings had a vast pantheon of Gods-"
"Nate, shut up and let Eliot tell the story!" Parker says. Nate raises his hands in surrender.
"Thanks, Parker. Anyway, the next morning, the mother wakes up and the baby's kicking and yelling like a normal, happy baby," Eliot says. "His mother thanks the Gods and brings him to his father, who says it's a sign that their son will grow to be a great man."
"The baby grows up into a young man. He's not interested in blacksmithing like his dad, he wants to be an explorer. His father doesn't mind, since one of the son's friends is interested in blacksmithing, so the son goes and joins up on a Viking ship."
"And bashed in some heads," Hardison says with a nod. Eliot narrows his eyes.
"No. He was on an exploration vessel," he says. "The Vikings didn't just bash in heads. They were also tradesmen, and they travelled as far as Tunisia to trade. He was one of those Vikings."
"Did he go to Tunisia?" Sophie says.
"Not at that point. He did land in Spain and Portugal a few times, but they started to notice something weird about him," Eliot says. "While they were at sea, some of the men got sick. Everyone who got sick died. Every single one of them."
"He was one of the last ones sick, and he was the last one alive. It was one of those sicknesses where you feel like you're freezing, but you're actually burning up with a fever and you dehydrate from it. Anyway, he starts to slip away and he knows that he's going to die, when this face appears in front of him. The face is horrifying and beautiful at the same time, the same way a tsunami is right before it destroys everything around you. And its voice is like glass breaking on a marble floor. It says to him:"
"You shall not die." Eliot's voice is that same disturbing lowness as before. Then he shrugs and continues in a normal voice.
"Then he starts to feel better. The next day, he's up and walking around the ship again, and everyone on it thinks he's been blessed by the Gods." Eliot lifts his hands with a smile. "They get back to the town and the sailors start telling everyone how he survived this terrible illness, how he's been gifted by the gods. He just tells them he got lucky. He doesn't tell them about the face he saw."
"Why not?" Hardison says.
"Even then, seeing faces like that made you sound crazy," Eliot says.
"But what was it?" Nate asks.
"I'm not sure. It might be the God, but it's weird that They'd show Their face like that," Eliot says.
"They?" Sophie repeats.
"Yeah. They." Eliot sounds almost offended.
"Keep going," Parker urges.
"So, things go back to normal after that. He meets a girl in his town and they start, you know, courting. Then the town gets attacked," Eliot says.
"That's a quick change of plot," Nate remarks.
"NATE!"
"Sorry, keep going."
"The town gets attacked. Our guy takes up arms like everyone else, trying to defend the town, and he gets an axe to the gut," Eliot says, miming a blow to his stomach. "This don't kill you right off, so he's lying there for a while his father and his mother and his girl are fighting around him-"
"Wait, his mother and his girl?" Hardison says.
"Women Vikings fought too. Better than he did at the time, he was kinda a pansy-ass thing then. But he's lying there, dying, and everyone can see him now. He's not alone like he was on the ship. Then the face appears over him again and tells him:"
"You shall not die."
"And he doesn't. His gut heals up and he joins the fight again," Eliot says. "This time everyone sees him come back, and everyone's like, 'what the hell?' So he gets called in front of goði, the chief, and he's on trial."
"For what?" Sophie says. Eliot shrugs.
"The Vikings don't have charges like we do. They were mostly pissed that he upset the Nornar, their version of the Fates, by not dying when he was supposed to. Vikings were incredibly superstitious, and they thought upsetting the Nornar was going to reflect badly on the whole town. So they drag him up to the front and the goði starts questioning him. Is he a witch, did he carve protection runes, did he make sacrifices to the Gods, what did he do to bring this on? And our guy didn't do anything, so he's just standing there confused as all get out. Then they bring his parents up there and ask if they were witches, did they carve protection runes, did they call upon the Gods? Which is when his mother tells the goði about the night he was born and the voice she heard."
"What does the goði do?" Parker asks in a hushed voice.
"The goði decided that the Nornar must have heard his mother's prayers and blessed our guy to live a long prosperous life," Eliot says. "Our guy is free to go. He asks his mother about the voice she heard and she tells him that it sounded like a thousand swan songs shrieking over the valley. He knows it's the same voice he heard, but he doesn't tell anyone about it."
"Not much interesting happens for a long time after that. He courts his girl, he goes on a few more trading expeditions, he nearly dies a few more times, he marries his girl. Then his girl gets pregnant and he starts getting worried about this whole not-dying thing. Somebody points out that he doesn't look any older than he did a couple years ago when he first started going on expeditions. So our guy starts praying to the Gods at the temple for answers. Nothing happens. One night, on his way back from a temple, he falls asleep under a large tree. He didn't plan on it, he was walking past and wham-" Eliot smacks his palm on the table. "-he falls asleep while still walking."
"Was it the God?" Nate says. Eliot nods.
"Our guy is in total darkness. He can't see a thing. That voice he knows rushes in and fills the space like a wind tunnel." Eliot coughs.
"Speak, child of man."
"Are you the one who blessed me with life?"
"What makes you think it was a blessing?" Eliot's eyes grow wild at this. Nate and Sophie exchange a look.
"Well, because I'm not dead."
"That is not a blessing! You are not blessed! The voice tells him. You will never die! You will live as long as there is life in the Universe, and perhaps beyond that. You will watch your children, your grandchildren, and your grandchildren's grandchildren wither and die before your eyes! You are a cursed man!"
"Why have I been cursed? Who are you to curse me?"
"I am They Who Are, They Who Have Always Been, They Who Always Shall Be. I am the Creator of Time, Space, and Life, and I will not be questioned by my Creations!" Eliot's eyes go back to normal and he coughs again. He continues casually.
"Then our guy wakes up. He knows what just happened was an audience with the God, and that's as much of an answer as he's going to get on the subject," he says. "So he heads home to his wife and he tells her what's happened. She tells him she's sticking with him as long as she can."
"But he's going to have to watch her die," Nate says.
"He's going to have to watch everyone die. That's the thing about not dying," Eliot says. "Everyone else dies, and all he can do is move on."
"So what happens next?" Parker asks.
"That's the end of the Legend. He has to face the future," Eliot says.
"But what happens to him next? He's obviously still doing stuff, he's not dead at the end," Parker says.
"It's not part of the Legend."
"Come on, Eliot! Tell me what happens to him!" Parker insists.
"Yeah, that's no way to end a story," Nate says.
"Fine," Eliot grumbles. "Fine. Time goes on. Our guy and his wife have a daughter. They name her Dagny, which means 'new day.'"
"What's our guy's name?" Hardison asks. Eliot pauses, looking pained.
"Elof."
"Elof? That sounds like a dog noise!" Sophie says.
"It means eternity's heir," Eliot says.
"Wait, so his mother named him something that means forever before she knew he would live forever? Does she ever even find out he'll live forever?" Nate says.
"No, he doesn't- look, if you don't like the legend, you can make up your own," Eliot says, getting irritated again.
"What's his wife's name?" Parker asks quickly.
"Idunn," Eliot tells her, his voice softer. "Idunn means to love again."
"Oh, that's romantic," Sophie says. A smile grows on her face and she glances at Nate, who blushes and looks at his plate.
"Yeah, Idunn tells him to take it literally after she passes on," Eliot says. "Anyway, Dagny grows up, going on trading trips with Elof and helping Idunn protect the village. There's no sign that Dagny's like her dad, but they worry anyway. Elof dies in front of Dagny and has to explain what's going on when she's…fourteen? Fifteen? She's almost an adult. So Elof tells Dagny what's happened. The first thing she asks is if she's the same. And he can't tell her. He doesn't know which would be worse- if she is or if she isn't."
"Soon enough Dagny's old enough to get married. She has her eye on one of the local boys. By this time, everybody in the village knows about Elof and nobody questions the fact that Dagny's father looks like he's her brother. The engagement is made, and by the time the marriage is held, Dagny looks older than Elof. They take that as a sign that Dagny is not like her father in that way. Elof is both relieved and devastated by the realization."
"Why is he relieved?" Parker asks. "He's going to be alone."
"Dagny's not going to have to watch everyone she knows die," Nate says before Eliot answers. "She'll be spared his fate. No father wants that for his child." He doesn't have to explain the devastation- they all have seen what losing a child does to someone.
"We don't need to get into all that," Eliot says. "What happens next is that the family moves around, moving from village to village as the generations marry into new families. For whatever reason, every generation ends up being only one kid, so Elof can just follow the family tree as it travels. They all know that he's their ancestor, even though he still looks like he's twenty, and he's treated with the same respect as a grandfather. That changes when they leave Scandinavia."
"Why do they leave Scandinavia?" Sophie asks.
"Trade," Eliot says. "There's money to be made in Southern Europe. The latest man of the family learned to blow glass and that was easier to do in warmer places. They ended up in Poland, which was Prussia then."
"Lucky for them," Nate says.
"What do you mean?" Hardison says.
"Poland was the least affected by the Black Plague, which would be starting in a couple hundred years," Nate says.
"Why do you know that?" Hardison replies. Nate shrugs.
"Nate's right. Poland was pretty safe during the Plague years," Eliot says. "There were a couple reasons, mostly that the Polish didn't kill the cats like most of Western Europe did. They also had a large, mostly unbothered Jewish population who had a lot better sanitary practices than most of Europe at the time. One of Elof's great granddaughters, the daughter of the glass-blower, converts to Judaism and marries into a Jewish family."
"Uh-oh," Sophie says. Eliot nods.
"Yeah. Thing is, there's no place in the Jewish theology for something like Elof. He has to keep his distance to make sure they don't freak out and burn him at stake. The great-granddaughter tells her husband's family that he's a cousin, and that's what her son is told. She doesn't tell her son the real story before she dies."
"Why doesn't Elof tell him?" Parker asks.
"Why would he believe a guy he doesn't see all that much?" Eliot says. "Elof just goes with it. Nobody lives long enough to figure out that he's not aging, so things go smoothly. Once the worst of the plague is over, Elof goes travelling around Europe."
"He sees the Renaissance spread around Europe. Elof sees the printing press become a commonplace thing, and he learns to read in whatever language he can get someone to teach him. He learns a lot at this time, including that there is an overwhelming majority of Europeans who don't like Jews. This one day, he's hanging out with some painters- and you know, painters are real dicks- and in that period, European painters did a lot of Biblical stuff. Elof asks the painters why Jesus looks so European, since you know, the guy was Jewish. Even Elof knows that, and he hasn't finished reading the Bible yet. The painters all look at him like he's asked to sleep with their boyfriends."
"I imagine it doesn't get better," Sophie says.
"It varies, person to person," Eliot says. "He stays close when things get hairy, but he has to keep moving. Elof actually ends up in Italy a lot- or the nation states that make up Italy. It's a center of trade and art, so he's not usually bored. He meets more people there than he's ever met in one place before."
"Which is saying something for such an old dude," Hardison laughs.
"Yeah," Eliot agrees with a smile. "After a while though, he gets pulled into wars. Mostly he does it to keep whatever young man in his family out of whatever war's going on. The Great Northern War of 1721, the War of Polish Succession in 1733, the Polish Russian War of 1792, the War of the First Coalition."
"That's a lot of fighting," Nate observes.
"Elof's getting better at it. He doesn't get killed nearly as much, which is good since he doesn't want to get discovered and burned at stake," Eliot says. "He's managed to avoid it so far, but he isn't big on finding out what it's actually like."
"Eventually the Polish government gets its bearings back and realizes that he's the same guy signing up for every war and showing up every couple decades with the same face. They offer him a job as a spy. In exchange, his family will be protected from the anti-Semite risings that happen every so often. With that assurance, Elof takes up their offer. Within fifty years, he becomes the worst-kept secret in all of Europe."
"Everybody knows he's a spy?" Parker asks.
"Some idiot starts telling people that the Polish government has an unkillable spy. Naturally, every other country tries to find him and kill him," Eliot says. "This isn't a good time for Elof."
"I'll bet it's not," Nate says.
"How long does it take for them to give up?" Sophie says.
"About eighty years. World War One distracts everybody from everything else they had going," Eliot answers. "That's not usually how it works. Before then, a war was something you could run while you had your other political shit going on, but this is the biggest war Elof had ever seen. He doesn't disagree when they call it the Great War. He does think 'the war to end all wars' is a load of crap, though. Elof's seen too much of humanity go by to think that the fighting will stop just yet."
"What does he think is going to happen?" Nate says.
"Wars only end because somebody can't fight anymore. The loser always builds themselves back up again and declares war back, so the League of Nations tries to make sure that doesn't happen," Eliot says. "They destroy the Weimar Republic- Germany's old name- with economic restrictions and war debts. Elof thinks there's gonna be a mighty revenge for that one."
"What does he do?" Hardison asks. Eliot shrugs.
"Not much he can do but watch. The Weimar Republic collapses under war debt as expected. Elof's seen enough to know that somebody's gonna go pick up the pieces to strike back after the dust settles, and the National Socialist party takes up the task. He knows things are only going to get worse, so he goes to the Polish government and tells them to get ready. They send Elof to the guys in MI6 to learn about the British military and help the Poles with theirs," Eliot says. "MI6 is thrilled to have him, of course, and they start sending him on missions. It takes Elof a little while to figure out that MI6 is using him and not teaching him what he wants to know, but he doesn't find out Poland's been invaded until a year after it's happened. By then his family's been shipped off to a concentration camp."
"Oh, no," Parker murmurs. Eliot acts like he didn't hear. He stares at a space over Parker's head, eyes distant.
"Elof keeps working with MI6. The only way to find and rescue his family is to win the war. So he goes where he's told, does what he's told. V-E Day is the day after he's sent to Japan to escort the MI6 agents stationed there out," Eliot says. "He hears about an American secret weapon, and he stays to satisfy his own curiosity about it."
"That's a terrible idea," Hardison says.
"They think he figured that out," Eliot replies in a dry voice.
"They think?"
"He didn't report back after Hiroshima," Eliot says. "The bomb fell and MI6 didn't hear from him again. Poland didn't either, once they got their shit back together. There hasn't been a confirmed sighting since 1945."
"But he can't be dead. He's the Undying Man!" Sophie says. "I mean, there's plenty of talk about him, even now. He can't have been killed for good!"
"Yeah, that God of his said he would never die. Do people really believe that an atomic bomb was outside the realm of the God's control?" Nate adds.
"Some people do. Other people think he might have had his mind reset, or that he was so radioactive he developed cancer and that killed him," Eliot says. "But there's another theory. One that I think makes more sense."
"Which is?" Sophie prompts.
"He walked away from Hiroshima and went back to Poland, only to find the extent of the things the Nazis did to their Jewish prisoners. Elof was so horrified, the theory says, that he swore he'd never ally himself with a nation or a people again. Then he disappeared to make it so," Eliot says. He picks up his beer and takes a sip while the other four digest that theory. Then Eliot puts the bottle down. "Of course, that's not the only reason people still tell the Legend of the Undying Man."
"Why do they still tell it?" Parker asks.
"There's another part of the legend I didn't tell you yet. See, Elof was around a really long time. He accumulated a lot of stuff, including tapestries, carvings, paintings, and statues of his family members. There's also rumors saying that once he learned to write, Elof started writing everything down," Eliot says. "He needed a place to keep all this stuff, so they say he got himself a cave or a vault to lock it up in. The place would probably have everything he got over the years. Things like money, treasure, art from ages past. Finding his stash would make you a very rich person."
"So people are still looking for it," Nate says.
"Yeah. Nobody's ever come close to finding it, though," Eliot says.
"How do you know?" Hardison says.
"The books," Eliot replies. "If somebody found the stash, the first thing they'd do is get the books authenticated so they could sell 'em. Then they'd start advertising, and I'd hear about it."
"You don't think they'd keep the books to themselves?" Hardison says. Eliot shakes his head.
"Too many people would pay too much money for those books."
"Have you ever gone looking for the stash?" Parker says.
"I had better things to do than chase a story." Eliot picks up his beer again. "That's all there is to the Legend of the Undying Man, a story. No point in looking any further." Finality permeates his voice and his face. The others don't press the matter.
"Explains why our mark was so easy to lure into a treasure hunt," Nate remarks.
"Seriously. If you believe in one legend, you'll believe in them all," Sophie says. "Did you know, there's this legend about a star that fell to Earth…"
The conversation leaves the Undying Man far behind as the team gets into their favorite legends. No one is surprised that Nate is a big Arthurian nerd, or that Hardison knows a ridiculous amount about werewolves, zombies, and vampires. An actual, intense argument arises over vampires and what they can and can't do. It seems as though the Undying Man has been cast aside long before they leave the table.
"Eliot?" Parker puts a hand on Eliot's forearm after they bring their dishes to the sink. Nate and Sophie are still by the table with Hardison, insisting that vampires are affected by crosses, and none of them can hear Parker's soft voice.
"Yeah?" Eliot answers.
"Thanks for telling us the Legend," Parker says. Eliot shrugs.
"It wasn't a big deal." He turns to the sink and begins doing the dishes. Parker's hand lingers on his arm a moment longer before turning to shout that vampires don't sparkle and that's the only thing that matters.