Part 4: In which old friends clash and a dream ends.
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"But the price of getting what you want is getting what you once wanted."
Dream Country by Neil Gaiman "A Midsummer Night's Dream" p.19, panel 3
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Death and Destruction stood in the middle of the remains of a trading caravan. Everywhere they turned they were greeted with carnage.
"This is all your fault, you know," Destruction said to his eldest sister, his brown eyes surveying the wreckage. Death spun around to face him, appalled by his accusation.
"Mine?" she asked placing her hand on her chest for emphasis. "How could this possibly be my fault? I'm Death remember? No, baby brother," she pointed at him, "this has you written all over it."
Destruction laughed the full-bodied laugh of pure amusement. The sun gleamed off of his highly polished armor, causing the bronze bull heads on either shoulder to glow. His long red head fell past his shoulders and swayed as his body shook with laughter. "You are mistaken, sister mine. I had no part in this," he said waving his hand over the carnage. "A friend of yours is responsible for this."
Death took a step back in disbelief. "A friend of mine?"
He motioned his hand towards the band of raiders. "See for yourself." Her gaze followed to where he pointed. There amidst the marauders stood a thin, yet muscular man in white. His shoulder-length black hair was windswept but framed his war painted face.
"Methos!?" she gasped, shocked. She looked up at her brother. "What is he doing here?"
"He's been the mind behind the Horsemen for over a thousand years," Destruction explained.
"But, but, but…" Death stammered. "I saw him 300 years ago and he was living life of a scholar in Greece."
The large being beside her shrugged. "Perhaps he was taking a break. But for the better part of a thousand years he has lived the life of 'Death'. I do not have hold of him, my sister. No, his brothers Kronos and Silas are mine."
"What about the other one? Caspian?" Death asked, eyeing the thin Horseman. At that moment a face poked out from behind the Immortal and waved at them. "Delirium, of course," she said. Their youngest sister stepped away from the group of Immortals and walked over to where they stood, leaving a trail of pink and purple polka-dot frogs behind her.
"Hi tHErE," Delirium said. Her hair was a rainbow of colors that constantly changed lengths and colors as she talked. Her mismatched blue and green eyes were full of laughter and her clothing was an odd assortment of colors and cultures that some how looked right on her. "I'm HaVinG fUn. THE anGry man THinKs aLL KinDS of InTErESTinG ThouGHTs. RiGHT noW WE aRE TRyinG To THinK of a Way To KiLL an ImmoRTaL. ISn'T THaT funny? HoW Can you KILL SOmETHinG THaT CannoT diE? BUT WE Can diE, Can'T WE? And WE aRE EnDLESS. DESpaiR diEd and noW WE HavE a nEW SiSTER. I don'T LiKE iT WHEN THingGS Go aWaY." As the youngest of the Endless spoke, her words turned into multicolored fish that swam around her head. She quickly became captivated by the school swimming around her and began to play with them.
Death smiled at her sister before turning back to her brother. "All right. I can understand Caspian. And you say that Kronos and Silas are under your control. So into who's realm has Methos fallen?"
Destruction looked down at her from the corner of his eye. "Haven't you figured it out yet? He's still living the dream you asked our brother to make for him over a millennium ago."
"What?!" Death exclaimed in surprise.
Destruction turned his head and looked fully down at his sister, an amused smile playing across his lips. "You asked Dream to get him away from Despair. Well, he did. He made the dream that Methos needed to survive. Only Methos has embraced the dream to the point that the dream has become his life."
Death rose herself up to her full height, grim determination set on her face. "Well, it's going to stop here and now." With that she disappeared.
Delirium looked up at her older brother with a smile as Death vanished. "I WanT To Go HavE dinnER aT THE BoTTom of THE oCEan and EaT PaiSLEy fLavoRED icE cREam."
Her brother looked down at her and smiled. "That sounds like a wonderful idea, lass. Why don't we both go." The two vanished in a swirl of wind and colors, leaving the band of Immortals to their own devices.
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Methos strode across the camp of the Horsemen to inspect his horse before riding out on the morning's raid. Everywhere he looked he saw fear and terror written in the eyes of the slaves who tried not to look at him. It was just the way he liked it. He stopped suddenly, surprised by an emotion he had not seen expressed towards him in centuries- pity and, perhaps, disappointment. When he looked back, the eyes that caught his attention were gone.
He scanned the group of people before him, desperately searching for the owner of the mysterious blue eyes. He saw a slender woman dressed in black walking away from him. He strode purposefully towards her. When he was within range, he reached out and grabbed hold of her arm. "And just where do you think you are going, my pet?" he sneered at her. The woman turned and looked at him. The sight of her face caught him by surprise and he released his grip on her. "You!" he exclaimed. "Have you finally come for me?"
"No, I have not come for you. Not yet anyway," Death said offhandedly as she glared at him.
"Then, what are you doing here?" he demanded.
"Realizing I made the biggest mistake of my entire existence," she snapped.
Methos took a step back from her in surprise. She stood before him in clothing that was the exact replica of those he wore, only in the deepest black rather than purest white, and her eyes, which were lined in black with what looked like the Eye of Horus decorating her right one, held cold contempt. She stood with her hands on her hips, radiating anger.
"You're expecting me to believe that you make mistakes?" He snorted in disbelief. "You're one of the Endless, you can't make mistakes."
"That's what I once thought. But looking at you right now has made me see that I can."
"I don't understand," he said, fighting to keep the anger he felt rising in check. She was not giving him a straight answer and it was beginning to annoy him.
"What's happened to you?" Death asked softly, a sadness that Methos could only describe as pity flashing briefly in her eyes.
"What do you mean?" he asked placing both palms on his chest. "I'm perfectly fine," he spread his hands out in front of him, "wonderful in fact. Things couldn't be better. The world trembles when it hears our names. Villages flee when they hear that my brothers and I are coming. What could possibly be wrong with that?" he laughed.
Death reached out and grabbed a hold of the collar of Methos' tunic. He yelped in surprise at her strength as she pulled him down so that she could look him in the eye. "Who are you and what have you done to my friend?" she demanded.
He struggled to break free of her grasp to no avail. "Let go of me, woman. Do you have any idea who I am?"
Death let go and shoved him away, causing him to trip and fall over backwards. He looked up at her in surprise as he sat in the sand with her towering over him. "I used to think I knew you. You were my friend, Methos," voice sounded like she was almost begging him to understand her. "You were a kind and compassionate man who fought only when necessity demanded and then only for survival. But now… now… you have become a monster." She spat the last word and stood there shaking in rage.
"A monster am I?" he asked rising back to his feet. "I am no more a monster than you." His anger broke loose and he leaned in to meet her eye to eye. "Like you, I deliver a release from life, except for those that are destined to serve me. If you don't like what you see then you need to take a good look at your own soul. I am nothing more than the earth bound reflection of you."
Death stared at him for a moment, astounded that he dared to make such a comparison. Something inside of her suddenly snapped and she gave into her anger. "You are not me," she hissed. "Not in the slightest. How DARE you presume that you have the same purpose as the Endless, let alone think that you are even the palest shadow of me?" Her voice rose as she continued. She pointed at her chest, "I do not indiscriminately take life. I merely guide the dead to the afterlife. I do not take life and kill just to feel a sword in my hands or to have the smell of fresh spilled blood fill my nose. You," she said poking him in the chest, "are nothing more than an animal. No you are worse than an animal. An animal kills for food or to defend its home or
family. You kill just to kill."
He shoved her hand away and laughed. "Oh you are so wrong, my dear. I have risen above animal. Even above man. I have become," he threw his head back and his arms out wide, "a GOD!"
"A god?" Death asked, laughing in disbelief. He lowered his hands and looked at her with a glare cold enough to freeze water. "You don't actually see yourself as a god, do you? I have known men and gods and demons in my long existence. And you are no god." She crossed her arms in front of her and glared back at him. "You are not even fit to lick the boots of a god. No, if I had to equate you to one of the three at this very moment, you have fallen to the rank of demon. And even that might be considered an insult to the demons."
Methos felt his anger rise even more and his face become flushed with rage. He balled his hands into fists to keep himself from reaching out and trying to strangle her. "Just where to you come off showing up here full of insults and dictating on how I should run my life? You randomly appear in my life every couple hundred years, share a drink or two with me, and then disappear on your happy little way," he motioned with his hand with dismissive circles. "Or you come and take those I love and care about away from me before I've had any chance to have them. You seem to believe that it is your right to run my life and tell me how to live it. Well I have news for you," he poked his the index finger of his right hand into the middle of her chest. "I am the master of my own destiny. I do not cater to the whims and wishes of beings that use the living as puppets for their own amusement, to be forgotten when longer interesting. This is my life, Death, and I want you to stay the hell out of it and leave me alone." He poked her so hard that he forced her to stumble backwards and land in the sand at his feet. With an air of superiority he turned on his heel and stormed off towards his brothers in arms.
Death mustered what dignity she had left as she rose to her feet, brushing the sand from her clothing. She stood on the dune and glared at Methos' back as he walked away from her. Her anger had risen to point where she shook with rage.
Rather than risk herself and do something she would later regret, Death growled in exasperation and disappeared into her realm.
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Some time later, Death returned to the dunes above the camp of the Horsemen. She watched four riders returning, a large group of slaves in tow.
"Brother!" she cried looking up at the sky. "I do not stand in my gallery, nor do I hold your sigil, but if you consider yourself a being of any intelligence or brains, you will attend to me. NOW! Dream show yourself!"
"You called?" a voice asked as a swirl of smoke appeared before her. The smoke began to take form and her brother materialized.
"You had better believe I called, brother. I want you to stop it and stop it now."
Dream looked down at his eldest sister, confusion written on his highly chiseled face. "Stop what?"
"The dream you created for Methos over a thousand years ago. It has to end." She placed her hands on her hips for emphasis.
"The dream I created?" Dream repeated blankly. He shook his head. "I don't understand."
"A thousand years ago I asked you to create a dream to help Methos escape from Despair. What did he ask for?" Death demanded, tapping her foot with impatience.
The younger of the two Endless stared off into space for a moment, ignoring the rage that was emanating from his sister while he recalled events. "Oh yes. He asked for vengeance. Said he dreamed of exacting revenge on those who killed his family. Of introducing them to your realm." He looked down at her. "I did as you asked. I granted his dream. Why are you so angry?"
Death reached up and grabbed hold of her brother's ear. "Let me show you, brother dear." She led him to center of the camp. "Watch," she ordered. For a few moments, all Dream could see what the collection of tents that made up the camp. Then Methos rode in. He came to a halt in front of one of the tents, dismounted and removed a large, rolled up carpet from the back of his horse. Dropping it with an audible thud, he unrolled it, spilling the contents, a brown haired woman, on the ground.
"Surprise, you're not dead," he hissed. "Your kind is hard to kill." He leaned down and offered her his hand to help her to her feet. Dream and Death watched as the woman drew a bronze knife from Methos' belt and lunged at him with it. He grabbed her wrist and drew her against him. "You'll have to try harder than that," he drolled as if bored by her actions. He disarmed her with little effort and shoved her away.
The two Endless continued to watch the scene play out before them. Death shook with barely controlled rage, while Dream stood there emotionlessly as the woman demanded that she be taken to her people and Methos indicated that they were among the pile of skulls on the edge of the camp. He then indicated that along with the people of her tribe, she had also been killed.
"She's an Immortal as well?" Dream asked.
Death nodded. "Only she doesn't know that and it appears that Methos is not about to share that little bit of knowledge.
"You live because I wish it," they heard Methos tell the woman. "And you stay alive as long as you please me." He reached out with his left hand and rubbed the woman's neck. In an act of defiance, she shoved it away from her. Methos countered with a strong slap of this right hand that knocked her to the ground. "That did not please me." He then knelt down and ran his hand up her leg and under her dress. The woman looked away, revulsion and disgust marring her pretty face. He looked her in the eyes to make sure she was listening to him. "I am Methos. You live to serve me, never forget that." Before he could go any further in
proving his dominance over the woman, an argument broke out amongst his brothers. Methos left the woman lying in the sand and went to deal with the problem.
Death turned to her brother. "Do you see?" she asked gesturing towards Methos. "See what that dream has done to him. That, that… thing is not my friend. The dream you created for him has turned him into a nightmare. End the dream." Her voice began to crack, "Give me back my friend."
Dream looked down at his sister and saw tears threatening to fall from her endlessly blue eyes. Never in his entire existence had he seen her in such an emotional state. He then turned his gaze towards the Immortal who meant so much to her. She was right, Methos was not the same man he had met a thousand years ago. He had indeed become the stuff of nightmares.
"To uncreate a dream a complex as his is not something I can do over night. It took a thousand years for it to become what it is today. While I do not think it will take as long to undo it, it will take some time," he confessed.
"He's Immortal and we are Endless. Time is something we both have abundance of," she pointed out.
"Very well," he said nodding and then looking back at her. "I have never had experience with a dream that has lasted as long as your friend's. I will do what I can to correct the damage it has caused. As I said, it will take time. I must return to the Dreaming and start working on a solution." With that, he disappeared in a puff of smoke.
Death watched Methos for a few more minutes before returning to her own realm.
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Destiny walked through his garden, treading the labyrinthine paths that cris-crossed the lawns. As he reached a crossroads, he felt the book in his arms begin to stir. He held it out in his palms as a wind took hold of the book. Pages turned with purpose and he made no effort to stop them. When the book stopped on a specific page, Destiny looked down to read the passage:
As the months following his confrontation with Death progressed, Methos found himself losing interest in the life of the Horsemen. For reasons he could not explain, he was no longer consumed by the drive for power and domination. His bloodlust faded and he began to long for a quieter existence.
And when Methos slept, he dreamed a dream of peace.
Destiny nodded to himself. All things happen in their time, he thought to himself as he closed the book and continued on his walk.
TO BE CONTINUED…