Simon was standing in front of the exit to the cavern

Simon was standing in front of the exit to the cavern. He was a good thirty feet away and completely exposed. Max's first instinct was to step forward, shout at him, warn him to get under a tree or head for the rock piles near the entrance, anything to make it harder for an aerial to spot him.

Mac anticipating her movement put a firm restraining hand on her forearm.

"Wait." Cassandra said.

Max stared at the older woman for a moment. The war had drained her. Literally in fact. She had learned of Cassandra's bizarre pact with Jack. Half disgusted and half admiring Max had been surprised by the other woman's willingness to sacrifice, and then ashamed of that surprise.

"What is he doing?" Max asked Methos.

"He's saving us."

"No, Methos-"

"It's his choice Max. He said… Well, he said a lot of things most of it was insane or at least unintelligible. He wants this Max, just, let it be." He said exasperated. Max clenched her jaw and wrapped her tired hands into fists but remained quiet.

"Max, don't trouble them. I don't particularly like what I've chosen to become. I thought it would be easier than before but… well, I was wrong. Your people need to be ready to run, perhaps further into the tunnels or across the open ground, I'm not sure what will happen but it will likely be destructive." He stared at her with his hostile impossible eyes and an image of a blasted landscape and cracked planetary crust filled Max's memory.

"Mac, Cass do as he says." She whispered, mouth suddenly dry, throat catching. She coughed slightly and reached for her canteen. She was very, very white.

The two older immortals were immediately obedient. Which scared Max as well. She tried to think, tried to remember when these people, who in at least two cases were thousands of years older than her began to listen to her and jump to follow her orders. She felt like a small child for a moment but hid the feeling well.

Max gave the others forty-five minutes to reach safety. Simon stared at her. She was not going to leave. She had let him do it alone once not again.

"Simon… will it kill you?"

"Possibly, maybe, probably."

"But-" She protested tears in her eyes.

"You're crying for me." It was not a question but she nodded anyway.

"Don't cry for me Max. I'm a monster. More angel than anything now. Only I haven't got a God to keep me on a chain and give me rules. I could be the dawnstar reborn in this hell hole. Did I ever tell you that they're gone? The others? I don't feel them anymore. I finally got what I wanted Max, an existence free from my father and uncles, and its driving me mad. Whatever humanity I had was frozen out of me in the belly of that mountain. If I don't do this Max, everything I ever dreamed of being, everything I wanted will be perverted and twisted. So don't cry."

"What if they're tears of joy?" She asked stubbornly as another crocodile tear traced her grimy cheek.

"You shouldn't lie to an angel." He said simply.

He stretched his arms out and leaned his head back. His fingers flexed and straightened he stretched as though on an invisible rack. The tension and unnatural silence of his movements weighed on her like a lead blanket. Slowly inexorably the pressure grew. Just as she thought she would die, her flesh rent, her veins gushing from the pressure - it stopped. He raised his impossibly limbs in to the sky and shouted one single word.

The word filled the air choking and strangling her for what felt like eternity, it filled her mouth and throat like a wildfire. She dropped to her knees. Her vision swam and grew red. The man in front of her pulsed with hideous nauseating light and the word swam and filled the world, drove into her marrow and echoed in her soul. All feeling, all knowledge all sensory information was driven away only the word remained searing her soul and gnawing at what little sanity she retained.

Then it was silent. She was on her back, the weight of the word, or Simon's power, had driven her to the ground, spread her limbs and then thrust her entire body several inches into the high mountain hard pan. She lay gasping in agony for several minutes before healing enough to move.

Slowly she rolled onto her side, coughing weakly and managed to get to her knees. She sat there on her knees. Her hands hung limp at her sides. Her chest heaved and her vision swam. Her ears ached and burned.

He was gone.

There was no sign, no scorch mark, no imprint, no impact crater, not even a lone feather.

Unbidden a tear crawled out of her redden eyes and dropped unheeded to the dusty ground.

She sat for nearly an hour, dazed incapable of real thoughts. Finally it occurred to her that she made a most delicious target sitting in a heap in the midst of a newly minted clearing right in the heart of the Earthling's hard earned territory. She struggled to her feet, and swaying like a drunk managed to get to the entrance to the cavern.

After another hour or so Methos arrived.

"I wouldn't let the others come." He said helping her to stay standing. She didn't care, was too worn to really understand his words. She simply nodded and allowed him to half carry her.

"What happened?" Methos asked.

"He said forget." She said and coughed as they re-entered the subterranean fortress.

"Forget?" Methos asked. She nodded. Methos put her to bed and called a gathering or the remaining officers.

"We need intel." He said. There were less than fifty leaders left. Some had fled with the vamps, some had been killed others had simply vanished. Fled, deserted, or worse who could tell?

"Like what?" A ragged captain demanded. The boy was still mortal but he had the look of a veteran.

"Like what the hell just happened? Why is it that we don't have eighty Jackal squads and fifty Air assault shuttles breathing down our necks right now?"

"We're too damn scary sir!" A junior lieutenant shouted from the rear of the group. Methos suppressed a smile. It was nice to know someone thought so.

"No Simon did something, we need to know what, how far its effect is, whether its permanent and how we can use it."

"Recommendations?" The same Lt. asked.

"Recon patrols. I know its shit duty but that was before now, I have a hunch we won't take a single casualty, but even if we do it's a necessary risk. That weird crazy son-of-a-bitch likely got its ass scrapped doing whatever the hell it did to buy us some time to end this shit. Least we can do is use what it gave us." Methos let the lower ranking officers deal with the logistics and details.

He made sure Mac and Cassandra stood down and headed for their bunks. He put one of the hold out vampires in nominal charge and went to get some sack time himself. He wandered around for a bit first.

Since they had bivouacked to the Cavern he had changed his sleeping place daily. He really didn't have a set place. Half the time he slept as close to the nerve center as possible but not now.

Eventually he found himself outside Max's storage room. He opened the door and peered in. She was sound asleep. He kicked his boots off and stretched out next to her. They were both fully clothed. As the tired ancient drifted to sleep Max stirred in her sleep and shifted, using his lean belly as a lumpy pillow she sighed and drifted off again. Methos rested his arm across her back, his hand tangled in her unkempt hair and slept as well.