All Fall Down

by LithiumDoll

Well, no, life wasn't really much like an empty bottle of beer ... [complete]

5. Part 5

MacLeod had planted himself in the chair by the phone after his shower and was watching the object as if it was liable to attempt an escape. Some of the man's usual dignity had been stripped by the borrowed clothes he now wore, which were the only ones that fit him - a Mickey Mouse t-shirt and green drawstring pants a decade old that were more frayed edge and hole than anything else now. It should have made him ridiculous; it barely managed to make him eye-catching. Methos scowled. It just wasn't fair; vengeance was being denied practically everywhere.

Greta had claimed his bed, huddled so far under the covers only tufts of blond hair peeked out the top. She hadn't said a word after deciding to play Devil's Advocate, just watched them both reproachfully until she'd turned her back and burrowed under the blankets. Hopefully she was asleep by now. Having been given some detail of her adventures, he didn't envy her the nightmares that would come. On the other hand, why should she be the only one without them?

He lingered in the kitchen and told himself it was only because he liked the smell of coffee brewing. He did like the smell of coffee brewing. And the clock gently ticking over the refrigerator was soothing, as was the muted colour of the walls. Even the peeling linoleum had a strange kind of charm, if it was looked at in the right light. The right light possibly being no light but, even so, now he thought about it, it was perfectly obvious he had chosen the best room in the apartment to hide in. Wait in. Damn. It was enough MacLeod's heroic inclinations were starting to rub off on him; the honesty was just too much.

The phone in the next room barely had time for half a ring before it was picked up; he went to lean in the doorway hoping MacLeod wasn't about to scare a student. One of them had developed the habit of calling at unsociable hours when she'd learned helpful Mr Pierson kept them as well. Sweet girl but roughly as suited to a history degree as a lemming.

MacLeod kept his voice low but it was still possible hear one half of a very short conversation with the person they'd been waiting to hear from. "Yeah, thanks Joe. Okay, we'll be here."

He remained slouched against the frame as MacLeod dropped the phone back in its cradle and watched as the man stood and turned to pass on the information. "Joe's found Richie; hauled him out a couple of bridges down. They'll be here in half an hour."

"Want to wake up Greta?"

The lump in the bed stirred and spoke, muffled but audible. "She's awake. She's wondering if it's light yet."

"It's a new day, good morning." Adam spoke cheerfully and watched the girl's head emerge tentatively from its protective covering of the eiderdown. She blinked in the complete lack of morning brightness. "It's still dark."

"It's four a.m., it's technically morning."

She scowled and sat up straighter, keeping the covers around her. "Is Richie okay?"

A cup of coffee was handed to her by a Highlander who was clearly feeling more benevolent than himself. "He's intact. We'll know more when he gets here."

Adam kept his tone light as he interjected - no wish to start an argument but bickering was strangely relaxing. "Hopefully he won't feel the urge to hit me for saving his life as well."

There was a brief hesitation as MacLeod tried to gauge his mood and he made no effort to help him come to a conclusion, keeping his expression as bland as possible. Finally there was a glimmer of amusement and the battle was joined. "I apologised for that."

"So?"

"So it's not polite to bring it up again."

"So?"

"Good point."

"And well made, I thought."

Round one was his and he put a point on the scoreboard as round two began with an opening salvo from the opposition. Greta was already beginning to look from one to the other of them like a spectator at a tennis match.

"Where did you get this t-shirt?" MacLeod's fingers plucked at the red and blue monstrosity with the grinning mouse on the front.

"Disneyland. You don't like it? I would have thought the wholesomeness would appeal."

"You went to Disneyland?"

He'd never been to Disneyland; a misguided but well meaning student from the University had bought the t-shirt back for him. But now he was seriously considering it if only so he could regale MacLeod with more details and see if he could make his eyebrows retreat any further into his hairline. "Any reason I shouldn't have? It's only a few miles away."

"Don't talk; I'm trying to realign my world view again."

"Sounds painful."

"Did you wear mouse ears?"

"No, there were no ears of any animal of any kind." He answered with complete honesty and a wide smile.

"Thank God."

Another point on the board in his column. He hummed the Small World tune until he saw MacLeod's fingers twitch towards the katana, then retreated back into the kitchen. Vengeance was where you found it.

When the buzz of a new Immortal came he cast his eye around for his sword and, seeing it precisely where he had left it, stayed where he was. If it was Richie and Joe he wouldn't want to get in the way of a family reunion. If it wasn't, he wouldn't want to get in the way of MacLeod decapitating anyone unfortunate enough to have decided tonight was a fantastic time to make a Challenge.

The door opened a few moments later and he could smell the particularly pungent odour of the Seine seconds after it closed. Definitely Richie and Joe. The words of the resulting conversation were unintelligible, but the tones were relieved and grumbling. Joe's more gravely voice underscored now and then with Greta's lighter one murmuring quietly at the end.

Adam poured the coffee, added healthy amounts of whisky and sugar to all the cups, and then bore them out of the kitchen on his only tray. It was practically nutritious enough to be breakfast.

Richie pointed at him immediately, outrage written in every still-dripping line. "He pushed me in the river!"

"He could have just left you for them to pick up, it's not his fault you were hit."

If anyone was going to speak up for the defence, he would have expected it to be Greta again, but instead MacLeod had risen to the occasion. From another it would have been sheer hypocrisy, but somehow the Scot managed to make it something cleaner. It remained a constant mystery how he did it.

Richie calmed down under the firm gaze and gave a nod. "Yeah, I guess. I just can't believe I was sleeping with the fishes twice in one night."

"I think you need more concrete than that to be sleeping with the fishes. Ask Benny some time." MacLeod ruffled his student's hair, then remembered where he had just spent the last two hours and looked at his hand as if wondering whether to boil it clean.

This time when Richie looked over, the degree of glee at MacLeod's plight matching Adam's own was clear. His apology more informal than his teacher's had been but still sincere. "Sorry, man."

It was on the tip of his tongue to make a comment calculated to leave the child smarting, just as it had been to make one to MacLeod earlier in the kitchen. The closer he let them get, the more he let them get comfortable, the worse it was going to be in the end. "Coffee?"

That wasn't what he'd meant to say at all. He winced and handed around the mugs, trying to ignore the look amused look Joe was giving him. The man may not have had Greta's talents, but he had a disconcerting way of seeing what was going on anyway. Must have been all that Watcher training.

Obviously he just needed some sleep and he'd be himself again. Well, perhaps not himself; someone like himself but without the tendency to raze villages to the ground.

Joe raised the thin manila file he had been carrying and looked around, speaking into the momentary silence. "Okay, boys and girl, we have the intel on one Henri Montoya."

Adam waved sleep a mental goodbye and pointedly sprawled over his bed with his coffee in hand, taking solace in selfishness as the others were left to arrange themselves less comfortably around the room. At least he took solace in it until Joe unceremoniously moved his legs and took a seat on the edge of the mattress. Muttering, he drew himself up and settled into a smaller corner, only to find Greta and Richie promptly took advantage and descended on the other side.

The coffee jumped in the mug from their rush and splashed on his hand; he plotted the ways he could kill everyone in the room with the minimum of effort and still have time for eight hours sleep before fleeing the country. Joe coughed and went on.

"Montoya, Henri. Dual nationality - Spanish father and a French mother - he spent time in both countries growing up. Born in sixty-five, joined the army when he turned eighteen and died last year – training accident."

MacLeod spoke quietly from his seat in the chair he'd occupied most of the night. "He was talking fast for a corpse."

"Yeah, well, that's the public records." Joe gave an unimpressed huff that made it clear what he thought of that as he shuffled the sheets to the back of the small pile of print-outs. "I ran a search through some of the other databases we have access to and he pops up again. He got seconded to another unit. We don't have much on these guys, they don't seem to be attached to a government but they're not mercs either – they've got black bag funding from a number of very official places."

"How official are we talking?" MacLeod's voice was sober, seeing the threat that had probably escaped Richie and Greta, maybe even Joe to a certain extent. Nothing made you more aware of the government than the news it might be aware of you.

"NSA, MI-6, Mossad … name an agency of a world power and they're in there."

"Wait, you lost me. Black bag?" Richie looked from Joe to MacLeod and received a succinct answer.

"Money that's attributed to one thing on paper but winds up being used for something else."

"Oh. Yeah. So these guys are government funded but not run?"

Joe shrugged and flicked through the papers again. "We don't know that, just that a whole lotta people are going to a whole lotta trouble not to be responsible for them."

"They got a name or they just 'Those Guys'? 'Cause I can see how that would look funny on the books."

"They got a name - Xerxesi. That mean anything to you?" Joe was looking at MacLeod, giving Adam the time to school his expression against the sen-surround of memory that hit him.

Sap on green leaves, dead pine needles under his feet and his sword at the neck of the Traveller as his rightful quarry crashes away through the undergrowth in escape. "Who are you?"

"Just a Traveller."

Serene eyes; too kind, too understanding, too weakening. The point of his sword dropping against his will, suddenly too heavy to lift a moment longer. "An Immortal."

"I cannot be both?"

Logic he can't dispute and he asks the oldest question he knows. "What do you want from me?"

"I want nothing."

The answer is the oldest lie. A hand on his arm he wants to shake away but can't remember how. "Everyone wants something."

"Then I want you to drink this and regain your strength. We have far to walk."

How can they walk in this snow? Where has the snow gone? Snow under the skeletons of trees. "What is your name?"

"Xerxes, for now."

The taste of the name wrong for the accent, the lilt given it softening the meaning. "You are not Persian."

"No."

A small wooden bowl in his hands, a clear green shimmer within it, silver on the surface. A sip before he remembers to ask, "What am I drinking?"

"A mould culture."

The strength of the memory of the taste almost had him spitting out the coffee in his mouth, but he managed to swallow at the last moment and catch the end of MacLeod's response to Joe. "… don't know. Does it mean anything to you?"

Now MacLeod was staring at him and this was it. He could tell them, he probably should tell them. He violently didn't want to. He shook his head. "No."

"You don't look like it means nothing to you." He hoped Joe had long line of progeny that he could make regret their ancestor's acute observations.

Now Greta was looking at him and he closed his eyes for a moment before opening them.

Dispassion was found; he wrapped cruelty around it and smiled. "If you insist then, yes, it means something to me. It's a name Darius used for a time. If you're looking for the original meaning, it's 'Prince'. It's a little pretentious for a holy man but I suppose it's better than 'King', which is what Darius means ..."

"So what does your name mean, 'know-it-all'?" An off the cuff question from Richie and he smiled vaguely at the boy until he saw him pale, then shrugged with affected nonchalance. "Maybe I'm the utterance of my name. I am senseless and I am wise, after all."i

There were blank expressions on all sides until Joe turned slightly to fix him with a slightly sour look. "You're something, all right. It's too late to start quoting Gnostic texts."

He gave a mocking clap as the reference was caught, then settled back and awaited the flood of questions he could see looming on the horizon of the Highlander's steady attention.

He wasn't kept waiting.

"Do you think it's linked?"

"I haven't seen any Chronicles that would suggest it. Who could say?"

"You could, Adam. Do these people have any connection to Darius?"

"Well, not anymore unless they've managed to find a talented medium."

"Don't." The glint was lost in a flash of sorrow he sternly reminded himself he didn't feel the slightest bit of guilt for provoking.

Given the advantage for the moment, he sharpened the edge of his tone to remind everyone in the room that anything he was going to say was definitely not going to implicate him as the world's oldest Immortal in front of Richie. "They might. I am but a simple Researcher, MacLeod. I don't know."

Liar.

So?

A good point … and well made.

Oh, good, his inner thoughts were arguing with each other. He could have lived without the voice of the conscience he'd been attempting to eradicate for years having a slight Scottish burr.

It was impossible for an Immortal to sneak up, but even so he almost missed the signal that glazed over MacLeod's eyes, too caught up in his own mind, but it cut through as they always did in the end. He uncurled himself from his bed and reached for his sword, a step behind joining the Highlander and Richie at the door.

When it came, the knocking was less than polite but recognition of the voice made him lower his sword. He promptly considered raising it again when he heard the tone.

"Adam Pierson, you let me in this instant! I know you're in there!"

MacLeod jerked open the door to reveal the fuming figure of Amanda standing on the threshold with one hand on her hip and the other raised to knock again. Her eyes widened and she propelled herself forward, sending MacLeod back with an armful of ex 'I'm really reformed this time' thief.

"I went to the barge and the place was swarming with police and this horrible bald little Inspector was saying you probably hadn't made it out after it exploded!"

MacLeod attempted to talk through the smattering of kisses being delivered over his face. "LeBrun?"

"I didn't ask his name!" She released the man at last. "You scared the hell out of me, MacLeod. I'm wondering whether to hit you or kiss you."

"Do I get a vote? What are you doing here?"

"I'll give you a moment to rephrase that before I make my decision."

"Amanda, light of my life, it's a joy beyond all measure to see you again and my heart is composing poetry on every strand of your very, very blond hair as we speak. What are you doing here?"

She kicked him in the ankle, and then drew him down for another quick kiss - the chaos butterfly in action. "I came to see you, of course. I had a few days free and … Joe! Richie!"

Another kick sent MacLeod hopping out the way and she hugged the other men in turn, holding out her hand to Greta who reacted just like others meeting Amanda for the first time tended to, with stunned bemusement.

Adam muttered under his breath and closed the door, the apartment was entirely too small for this sort of thing. "Did someone order a Gathering and forget to tell me?"

Amanda paced back to his side with a sweet smile that gave him immediate cause to worry but only linked her arm with his. "Don't be grouchy."

"I can be grouchy if I want to." He attempted to extricate himself but she hung on tightly. There didn't seem to be a crowbar within reach so he let her stay there after a brief and futile struggle.

"You can, but then I won't give you your present."

"If it's a kick I'll decline, thank you."

"It's a book. Well, more of a parchment. I tripped over it in Istanbul."

MacLeod spoke up sharply. "You mean you stole it in Istanbul. What were you doing in Istanbul?"

They both ignored the man and, despite himself, Adam knew he was looking interested. Fluency in the universal language of bribery didn't make him immune to it. "I'll play nicely with the other children."

He gave her a quick kiss on the cheek, a fleeting brush. There were precious few he felt affection for and fewer still he was inclined to show it to, but Amanda had won it fairly with a night in the train yards and he was man enough to admit defeat.

"Is anyone planning to tell me what you're all doing here, and why Duncan's barge is at the bottom of the Seine?"

Richie returned to the bed and dropped back with a groan. "We should make a slide show so we don't have to keep answering that."

"Here, read my notes." Joe held the manila folder towards her with a fast grin that Methos couldn't help but notice had more than a hint of wicked in it.

MacLeod reacted as Joe had obviously been anticipating after watching the file change hands. "You're taking notes?"

"See the tattoo here? Watcher." Joe helpfully raised his sleeve and gave a visual reminder of the blue mark on his inner wrist.

"Are you planning on adding this to my Chronicle?"

"No reason not to, is there? Besides, there are two other Watchers out there taking notes as well, if mine don't tally there'll be hell to pay."

Amanda spoke from her perusal of the information, looking up as she licked the end of her finger and turned a page. "Martin isn't, I left him in Athens."

"Neither's Mike, we lost him in London." Greta added a nod of confirmation to Richie's words and suddenly it was Joe's turn to be aghast.

"You've been ditching your Watchers!?"

With a negligent wave of her hand, Martin's errant Immortal dismissed the concept that perhaps she shouldn't have left him stranded in an airport. "Oh, please, they enjoy it. It makes things more exciting."

"I seriously doubt Marty's thrilled, Amanda, he's getting too old for those kinds of shocks."

"I always leave a little clue."

Joe rounded on Richie as Amanda failed to be moved. "And Mike is keeping his eye on you as a personal favour to me, he has better things to do than figure out where you've gone."

He was met with an overly innocent expression, the very model of a lack of repentance. "He kinda doesn't, it's his job isn't it?"

"It's not your job to make it harder for him. I'm gonna give them a heads up."

Richie grinned as he watched Joe make a beeline for the phone. "Are we being told off by the organisation secretly keeping tabs on us for not making it easy on them?"

"Yes."

"Okay, just so we're clear."

"Joe?" Amanda's voice was mildly questioning, Joe growled in response as he punched in the number of HQ. "What?"

"Does this say Michael Doyle?"

Dawn broke half-heartedly at best. Only the increased visibility of the continuous drizzle suggested that, somewhere behind the thick grey clouds, the sun was trying to do a day's work.

Adam's bed had been firmly annexed by Greta and Richie, MacLeod had taken the sofa and Amanda lay over the man like a second blanket. Joe had made do with the easy chair and spare blanket. He himself had spent the last three hours stood by the window; sleep held darkness he didn't want to explore and it hadn't been altruism that had led to him volunteering to watch over them until daylight.

Despite Amanda having actually heard of Doyle, courtesy of Rebecca, she hadn't been able to shed any more light on what he was doing in Paris or where he had been - the full extent of her knowledge was his name and to avoid him at all costs and, for once, she'd taken the teaching to heart. Disappointment had crept into his relief; it would have been nice not to be the buck's proverbial last stop.

With nothing more to keep them awake, a few hours respite had been taken and he had been left with thoughts that he couldn't quite put a logical narrative to. It seemed pointless to keep searching for answers in events that hadn't held them a half a millennium ago and were certainly not going to have them now.

He reached for his coat and held it in his arms as he picked his way quietly towards the door. Pierson had no reason to practise stealth but Methos found old skills still sharp and knew he made no noise to alert anyone as he opened the door to leave.

The whisper was just loud enough to carry to him without waking any of the other sleepers. "Where are you going?"

He'd made no noise, but he had forgotten the Highlander was a notoriously early riser. A half truth came to mind and he used it without hesitation as he glanced back, hand still on the door. "The bakery. We need food and I'm not stocked to feed the five-thousand."

A bare nod and MacLeod carefully began the process of extricating himself from under Amanda. "I'll come with you."

"I'm reasonably confident I can make it to the boulangerie and back without being beheaded." Briefly he considered just leaving but MacLeod would only follow him and it was far too early, not to mention pointless, to start yet another battle of wills.

"You probably could." With an amiable grin MacLeod finally managed to disengage himself from Amanda's grip; she rolled over with a sigh and settled again immediately.

He tried another gambit. "You can't go out wearing those clothes; you'll scare small children and the elderly."

With a wince he realised he'd set MacLeod up with the perfect straight-line, but the man just shrugged and smiled slightly. "I'll wear my coat."

"I want some peace and quiet."

"I won't talk."

"I …"

"Yes, I know - intense dislike, right?" MacLeod picked up his shoes and coat and ushered him out the door, shutting it with a barely audible click behind them, continuing in a whisper as they donned their coats and, in one case, shoes. "Where were you really going?"

Peevishly he stuck to his story, seeing no compelling reason to make life easy on the man. "The bakery, it's too early for devious machinations."

"Uh huh." With the buttons of the long-coat done up and his hair pulled back, MacLeod looked more or less presentable even though the frayed edges of the violently green pants were still visible – not to mention the vivid red collar of the t-shirt. It was enough to restore some of his good humour as they made their way down the stairs and he let it show in his tone as he grumbled.

"I don't get up in the morning and wonder what fantastically convoluted plot to try today. Even when I have plans they never last longer than an hour before something happens to blow them out of the water. Improvisation. Adaptability. That's how you stay alive."

MacLeod was silent on the last flight and he stopped on the last step and turned to face him, trying to make him understand again and knowing he was doomed to failure. "You're mistaking experience for thought - I'm not the ultimate mastermind any more than I'm the ultimate wise man. I'm not the ultimate anything."

The man's stare went on for some time, honestly searching for something and it nearly gave him hope before the almost apologetic half smile appeared. "I don't believe you, Methos. Things turn out the way you want them to too many times. I'll buy you don't have a plan, but you still manipulate everyone around you. You're the ultimate survivor and I guess that's what ultimate survivors do."

Anger flared for a moment that this Scottish thug, this child, refused to see anything outside the blinkers of his own limited experience and still presumed to have an opinion. It was even worse that the assessment wasn't entirely wrong, it just wasn't right in the right places. He shoved the emotion aside quickly before it could become obvious, turning his back to resume the walk to the door. "I'm starting to wonder about that, you're not healthy to know. As a doctor I may have to advise myself to stop associating with you."

"You haven't been a doctor in a hundred years; they've come up with a lot of new cures since then."

"I'm fairly sure they haven't invented one for beheading yet."

The cold morning was a slap in the face as they left the warmth of the building and started down the road; he hunched his shoulders against it and pulled his coat tighter. The fact MacLeod didn't seem to be affected at all did nothing for his mood. Scots!

"Where were you really going?"

"I thought you said you'd be quiet."

"I lied."

"The bakery. Look, there it is." He pointed to the little shop on the corner, one of the few with the lights on and open for business.

"Adam …" A hand on his arm made him glance over to the other man.

With a slightly overdone sigh, he tugged his arm away. "I was going to look at the bridge, see if there was anything there."

MacLeod released him at once and fell into step beside him again. "Richie didn't say which one it was." The slight question in the statement was neutral and, despite a burning desire to remain irritated, he did appreciate the effort that the annoying one was taking to keep civil.

Of course, it meant he had to make a concession too. And MacLeod had the nerve to call him manipulative. Unsure whether to remain irritated or go with the irony he finally gave in a mix of both. "I know. Go on, ask, I know you want to."

The question came quickly, as if MacLeod were trying to beat a time limit. "Who are the Xerxesi?"

"Who they are now, I honestly have no idea. The name was used as a sort of collective noun for a group Darius taught. It's centuries old and it was never exactly official, more of a nickname. I doubt it's even a footnote in a Chronicle somewhere"

"Darius didn't train anyone to kill." MacLeod was so very certain and he wanted to resent that faith, but he couldn't.

"Probably not, but people have free will. One of his students could have taken on the cause and changed it to suit them. Or it could just be coincidence, they do happen."

"But it still doesn't answer why they'd be after us."

"Next time you could ask one of them before half killing him, he might be more amenable to a chat."

There was a grunt he suspected was something like an agreement, then MacLeod switched topic. "Darius was the one who stopped you killing Doyle. Why?"

"Michael always claimed the person who took his head would become like him, a walking plague. We didn't understand he would have had to have infected himself deliberately, it was like he controlled it all. Maybe Darius thought I'd make a more dangerous carrier than Michael, he'd have had no way of knowing it wouldn't transfer either."

"Or he knew it would. We've known how contagion works for a long time, but Michael's still around. Is it possible the Xerxesi are protecting him for some reason?"

And there is was again, the apparently simple and straight-forward MacLeod making leaps of logic and intuition that it was almost offensive for him to be able to make.

He mumbled something non-committal, pushed open the door to the bakery and was immediately enveloped in the smell and heat of bread fresh from ovens. If he closed his eyes and ignored everything save that smell, he could be five thousand years past in a heartbeat.

The bell jangling on the door as it closed behind his unwanted escort rudely interrupted his nostalgia and he opened his eyes to grin broadly to Madame LaSeille.

She was a small, thin woman who steadfastly fought the cliché that, as a baker, she should be spherical. Her staff all called her Maman - whether they were her children or not - and he had never seen her without a smile or a friendly welcome, even to the tourists who plagued her existence.

Now she looked tired, there were dark smudges under her eyes. Of the usual four bakers behind the counter, there were only two and he supposed that was the reason for her appearance. Her voice was as brisk and welcoming as ever.

"You're early, mon enfant. The bread is barely out of the oven. Have you even slept? You've been reading all night, haven't you? You need sleep and proper food, you should hire my sister's niece to cook for you. She's a good girl, she'd keep you fed. Too thin!" She tutted and he tried to ignore the second baker's giggle and the suspicious silence behind him. If he was going to lose all dignity today, it was probably just as well to get it over with early.

He spoke with the shreds he had left and promised himself if MacLeod ever spoke of this again; he could take his head with a clear conscience. "I'm here for the good of Paris. I have company from out of town, I'd rather feed them than let them loose in an unsuspecting city to hunt for their own breakfasts."

"You shouldn't worry; we have repelled Barbarian hoards before. Did you bring one with you?" Her eyes glittered her amusement as she appraised MacLeod.

"He's carrying everything."

Finally, from behind him, MacLeod spoke. His voice was quiet and slightly forced, very much as if he were striving not to laugh out loud. "I am?"

"You are. And you're paying." As dire revenge went it didn't really make much of an impact. It was just going to be one of those days.

In the end, both left the warm little boulangerie burdened down with bags - MacLeod having reminded him how much Richie was capable of eating. As least they acted as a kind of windbreaker, and the heat of the fresh bread seeped through his coat enough to make the walk back almost pleasant. Then MacLeod began to speak with the thoughtful tone he was beginning to dislike almost as much as the judge and jury version.

"Were you the one who gave Darius the Fifth Chronicle?"

"Nope." It was something he was inordinately happy about. That Chronicle had gotten the Immortal killed and it had been absolutely nothing to do with him. The sensation of complete innocence was unusual enough to bring a bright smile to his face, earning him a slightly bemused glance.

"I wonder how he found out about it."

"Darius moved in mysterious ways." This time he did regret the flash of hurt that appeared, MacLeod had done nothing to deserve it this time.

"Why do you keep mocking him? He was a good and honourable man." The absolute certainty in the words drove out the prick of conscience, he responded as flippantly as he could. Hero worship was one thing, but Darius had been no deity to have such blind faith in. It was petty and cruel and it felt wonderful.

"So are they all, all honourable men."

"Stop it."

"You don't like Shakespeare?"

"I don't like having to repeat myself. Why?"

Adam shrugged and then moved quickly to avoid dropping half his bags. "I mock everyone, Highlander. He may have been a living saint to you but he wasn't when I first met him. Oh, he was showing the signs but he was younger, barely over a thousand."

But MacLeod wasn't going to play. An indrawn breath and then another and the man answered with level amusement. "That's still old."

"Yes, well, when you're a thousand years old, say that to me with a straight face and I'll buy a round of drinks."

"You think either of us will be around in five years, let alone five-hundred?"

"No, why do you think I offered to buy the drinks?"

"You don't respect who he became because you know who he was?"

The relaxed tone had lulled him into a false sense of security and he answered too quickly. "That's not it."

"Oh, I think it is - I'm just trying to work out why. You of all people …" He was expecting smugness he could retaliate against but it wasn't there, just the same light questioning. Oh, MacLeod was getting dangerously good at this.

"I, of all people, can't."

"You shouldn't be respected?"

"I am who I am, Highlander, and that's enough."

"Who are you?"

"A man who wants some coffee and a shower and I don't care who's in my way."

"I can respect that." MacLeod grinned and stepped aside to allow him to unlock the front door.

"Now who's mocking who?"

They climbed the stairs back up to the apartment to find Amanda frowning in the doorway, wearing a worn blue bathrobe Methos vaguely recognised as his own and tapping her foot in agitation. All that was missing was the hair-curlers and they'd have a 50's sit-com ready to go.

"Next time you go in the middle of a crisis, leave a note. Joe's been frantic."

Joe's voice called cheerfully from somewhere at the back of the apartment. "No I haven't."

"Richie was concerned."

A slightly more groggy voice was just audible from the direction of the bed. "Richie was asleep. Richie goin' back t'sleep."

"Greta was mildly anxious."

Greta passed behind her, wrapped in a towel. "I was in the shower."

Finally she gave up and raised her fist. "Don't leave me without a note again!"

Adam slipped by her with a grin. "Is that a mothering instinct rearing its ugly head or are you normally this neurotic in the mornings?"

She took one of the bags, frown deepening. "Don't start, I know where you sleep."

"Or don't sleep, more to the point." He rooted through his drawers and found some clothes that hadn't been sacrificed to his guests, gathering them fast before swinging around to face the woman again. "You're between me and a shower, I suggest you move."

With a now fully fledged scowl she moved and he escaped into the bathroom, shutting the door behind him slightly louder than necessary. Peace descended at last and, as an added blessing, there was still hot water left.

When he emerged he felt like a new man and vaguely considered becoming one with the emergency ID he had stashed at the back of his sock drawer. He could probably make it to the airport before anyone noticed. But the scent of freshly brewed coffee was too strong to resist and he padded barefoot into the kitchen to find everyone else gathered there in various stages of wakefulness.

They looked up as one, conversation ceasing. He fought the urge to see whether his hair was sticking up and just took the cup Joe handed to him with a nod of thanks. "Do we have a plan yet or shall I go away again?"

MacLeod spoke around half a croissant from where he'd managed to claim counter leaning space at the back. "We have a plan."

He snagged a small roll and looked around for the preserve, replying as he risked life and limb by removing it from Richie's side. "And should I be pleased or terrified?"

"Richie and I are going to the place Darius left … whatever it was he left … it can't be coincidence Greta got the vision and then this happens. Amanda and Joe are going to canvas the streets; maybe they can find where the Xerxesi are operating from."

"I dread to think what I'm doing." There was only one place left, of course. That didn't mean he was going without a fight.

Joe confirmed his deduction, looking entirely too unsympathetic about it. "You're going swimming."

"Did I draw a short straw in absentia? I want a recount."

"You were going to the bridge anyway; we need to know what they threw off."

The Highlander's smile was more sympathetic but it still wasn't enough and he shook his head.

"I said I was going to look, not revisit the joys of hypothermia. Richie can go; it's practically his second home now."

"Richie doesn't know what he's looking for."

"I do?"

"You'd have a better idea. Please, Adam."

He opened his mouth and shut it again, he couldn't really argue with the logic anymore and politeness had more or less been served. He tore off some of his roll and rolled his eyes. "If I get arrested you're breaking me out or you die trying."

Greta spoke up quietly after the murmur of assent had passed. "You never said what I was doing."

He watched MacLeod's slightly amused expression turn serious once more as the man looked to her, command coming easily and mostly unquestioned. He supposed you either had it, or you didn't.

"You're staying here with the door locked and bolted. We'll be relaying information to each other through you, checking in every hour. If someone doesn't call, we all drop everything and look for them. If anyone tries to break in here, you go down the fire-escape and head to Le Blues, that's the fallback point for all of us."

Leaning against the refrigerator, Amanda finished the last swipe of the file against her nails and spoke as she held the hand out before her to inspect it. "Are you planning to speak to the police about the barge? The poor things looked quite upset about it all."

There was an answering groan. "I'm going to have to or I'll have LeBrun following me over half the city."

Now he had to grin at the mental image that provoked and did so, widely, as he refilled his coffee cup and ate the last of his roll. "I can see how that would be awkward when you're attempting some amateur breaking and entering."

Amanda began on her left hand, the file rasping quietly as she spoke with feigned casualness. "Maybe I should go with you; it would be much quicker if there's any real security."

She was thwarted as MacLeod shook his head. "I know it's boring but you and Joe aren't known to the Xerxesi and you'll be more useful on the streets. You both have contacts we don't."

It made Adam's heart glad to see the disgruntled half-snarl half-pout and know Amanda was nearly as unhappy with her assignment as he was with his own.

Her file stabbed out to emphasise her words. "This isn't what I had in mind for a holiday. You owe me, MacLeod."

The target of the, admittedly sharp, implement help up his hands slightly. "I'll make it up to you, I promise."

"You better believe you will." She gracefully pushed herself away from her leaning point and fastidiously brushed a non-existent smudge from her nails, observing their shine before she turned to Joe with a raised brow.

He came forward, leaning on his cane for a moment until sure of his balance, then held out his arm. "May I have the honour of escorting you, Mademoiselle?"

She smiled coquettishly and turned with overdone flounce, looking over her shoulder smugly to MacLeod as they left arm in arm. "Watch and learn."

Pont Neuf was a bridge with exactly two virtues, in Adam's opinion. The first was the name – continuing to call the oldest bridge on the Seine 'New Bridge' was just about ironic enough to appeal. The second was the charmingly friendly house of a young woman where he'd spent many a happy evening but as that had been demolished some three-hundred years ago, he decided to strike it from the list.

Pont Neuf was a bridge with exactly one virtue, in Adam's opinion, and that was in severe jeopardy of being heavily outweighed by the fact he was about to jump off the damn thing.

Oh, certainly, he could breathe under the water but, looking down at the glorified open sewer below, he just wasn't sure he wanted to. Not to mention the cold, the sudden wildlife and who knew what else lurking under the murky grey top. He cast his eye to the bag of dry clothes and sword hidden away on the verge below, checked for a dearth of concerned citizens and vaulted over the rail to drop with the force he'd need to make it all the way to the bottom.

He hit the water cleanly, slicing down as the cold smashed into his brain and temporarily froze his thoughts. In defiance of five-thousands years of Immortality, his feet began to kick in a drive to take him to the surface, fighting against the weight of the old long-coat he'd worn to drag him down. After a few seconds he began to think enough to stop struggling but already he could feel the freezing temperature leeching his life away.

His eyes stopped stinging a couple of seconds after he forced them open but it was nearly impossible to see anything through the darkness. The torch in his hand gave some illumination but mostly only served to better define the silt blocking his vision.

Finally his feet touched bottom and he dragged himself towards where he hoped whatever it was that had been thrown would be.

Fingers scrabbled over rock and sand and other things he desperately tried not to identify until they found rough tarpaulin. The strength of the material said it hadn't been down there long and a quick search confirmed his suspicions of its dimensions. Unwillingly he explored further and, as he'd expected, he found chain tethers embedded into the rock. The men throwing the body off the bridge may have been disturbed but they'd come back later to finish the job.

Searching further he found the protruding hilt of a knife embedded in the body, exactly as he'd expected. Hundreds of years and they still hadn't come up with a better method. Observance of tradition had its place but this was sheer stupidity.

His vision began to blur with a blackness that had nothing to do with the silt. As quickly as he could with his actions impeded by the water and lack of feeling in his extremities, he stripped off the old coat and kicked upwards. Breaking the surface, the winter air felt almost pleasantly warm in comparison.

The verge looked impossibly far away and, even worse, it seemed to keep backing away from him. At a crawl he finally came within reaching distance and made a grab for it, his fingers closing twice on the brickwork before he was able to convince his muscles to grip well enough to haul him back onto land.

He knelt at the edge, coughing up the last of the water in his lungs, fairly sure he wasn't going to die but beginning to wish he would. Then he felt the encroaching presence of another Immortal and changed his mind. Life. Life was good.

His body obeyed him enough to stagger the few steps to his sword and he tried not to worry about the fact it took two hands to grip and even then it shook uncontrollably. On one knee he tried to pinpoint where an attacker could conceivably come from.

Not from the river, he was almost certain of that, the build of the buzz had been too slow. Not from the bridge, it was too far away. Not from the cars above either, they would have moved whoever it was well out of range.

Earth slid down the bank behind him and he turned fast, trying to bring himself to both feet and nearly succeeding in falling back into the water, his balance not nearly as sure as it should have been. A slightly muddied figure landed in a crouch ten feet away, short-sword already held before him.

The black hair was shorter and the sunglasses and biker-jacket were most definitely new affects, but his opponent was still instantly recognisable. The smile was thinner and harder than he last remembered but, after six-hundred years, he supposed it would be.

"Stefano."

"Just Stefan now, Mattios." The English was almost flawless enough to completely remove the original accent, but not quite. He sighed and bought his own sword up, trying to ignore the tremors in his hands still running down the blade.

He lapsed deliberately into the native Venetian of the other, keep him talking long enough and he'd be strong enough for the fight that was almost certainly coming. "Stefan, then. You're four-hundred years early."

"I hunt for Doyle, where are you hiding him?"

Well, that was interesting. He gave a rueful smile and was gratified to see it seemed to throw Stefan just a little off balance. "I'm not hiding him anywhere, there are other people doing a surprisingly bad job of that already. If you want him dead, I'd suggest just waiting."

"If I can't have him then I'll take you." Dark eyes glinted sharply like the light on his blade and he met them as calmly as he could. Just a little longer was all he needed.

"No, you won't. You'll die and your family will never be avenged, which seems a bit of a waste of six-hundred years training to kill me."

"This from the man that killed them?" Confusion again, dulling a little of the other's rage. All he had to do was keep Stefan wondering what his game was for another minute.

"Yes, this from the man that killed them - you can't beat me, Stefan, and I won't willingly die for my sins."

The sword sagged a little in doubt at the conviction he'd put in his tone, then flew up again. "You're weak now."

"Not weak enough to lose, weak enough not to spare your head a second time." And now it was true. He didn't want to fight, but he could and he knew he'd win but not so easily he could be sure that a mistake wouldn't cost Stefano his life.

"God guides my blade." The words were strong and proud with conviction and they reminded him strangely of MacLeod, despite the fact he'd never heard the Scot call on a higher power.

He met Stefan's eyes again and this time he let the hoof beats run through his soul as he spoke softly. "Hades follows mine."

Only when the sword had lowered entirely did he let the Horseman go with a shrug and smile. "Michael Doyle is in Paris and I promise you, despite my objections, he is being dealt with. When it's done, if you still want to fight, you'll find me at Le Blues."

"I will find you." The boy snarled his frustration, six-hundred years of rage and pain in eternally fourteen year old eyes. His window of opportunity was past for the moment and he knew it. Without another word Stefan scrambled back up the bank with the fast, awkward sort of grace of his apparent age.

Only when the imprint of the littlest nemesis left his mind did Adam lower his sword and quickly begin to change into his dry clothes. A few minutes later and he was following the same path up, albeit at a slightly more sedate pace, trying to remember where the closest public phone box was so he could give a heavily edited report.

Greta picked up on the first ring but then she was psychic. That or she'd encamped by the phone, à la MacLeod.

"Adam, calling in safe, wet and very cold." He sneezed and made no effort to smother it; nothing quite like spreading the joy to brighten a day.

"Did you find anything?" She sounded perfunctory rather than curious, an odd sort of response but who knew what she'd already picked up.

"Yes, but I'm certainly not going to drag it back up. I'm going to be taking the long route home because I'd be very surprised if I haven't been seen."

"Okay, I'll let the others know when they call."

"No one else has reported in yet?"

"You're the first, there's still twenty minutes to go anyway."

"Do I get a prize?"

Her answers had come more and more slowly, enough to make him wonder if she wasn't occupied with something else as well, but now she came through loud and clear again. "Who was the boy you met?"

Loud, clear and annoyingly clairvoyant. "I said prize, not prying eyes."

"Sorry, I just wanted to know whether I'm meant to pass that on or not."

"I didn't mention it, that would indicate a 'not', don't you think?"

"You didn't mention it? Are you sure?"

"Very."

"Okay, nix on the boy."

A glance at the timer on the phone showed his money ticking down to the last seconds and he didn't much feel like feeding more coins to Paris' newest Psychic Line. "I'll be back soon."

Greta hung up as the line went dead and tried not to listen to the tick of the clock over the bookcase. She'd skimmed the titles, the ones in English anyway, but it hadn't seemed polite to start handling what were obviously old books without permission. Instead she flicked through a magazine Amanda had left her. Not Cosmo or Vogue as she'd expected, but a trade title for security professionals. It didn't mean anything to her but it was something to do while she waited for the calls to come in.

Her hand was half way to the phone before it began to trill and a flood of images battered against her mind as she drew it to her ear. Amanda and Joe driving, walking, talking and then drinking at a café. Jokes and laughter and two pairs of eyes that never, ever stopped cataloguing what they were seeing. Questions to a nun collecting money on a street corner, a black van they saw once too often for it to be coincidence.

"Hi, Greta. Joe."

I know. "Hi, did you find anything?"

"Well, there're a couple of people we've talked to but nothing definite yet."

I know. "Anything you want me to pass on to the others?"

"Naw, nothing's come up anyone needs to know about just yet."

Except the transit. "Okay, I'll just tell them you're following a van."

"How'd you know about the van?"

You told me. "Didn't you mention it?"

"Yeah, guess I musta. Anyone else called in yet?"

Methos. "Adam, just a couple of minutes ago. He's on his way back, he found something but he didn't have anything to share."

"Sounds like Adam. I'll get gone; Mac might be trying to get through. Call again in an hour."

No, you won't. "Joe! Wait."

"Yeah?"

"Come back to the apartment."

"Why, you getting lonely or something?"

His tone was gently concerned and she realised how ridiculous she sounded. "No, I just … don't follow the van, you won't call back." Lame. Lame, lame, lame.

"Okay, we're on our way back now. If something comes up, it's a black Ford Transit. Plates are foreign. S.C.V. four-thirty."

Amanda watched as Joe put the phone down, wondering what had caused the man's slightly troubled expression and their sudden change of plans. "We're going back? I thought we were following this up."

"Nope, Greta's calling that a no-go." He shrugged and leaned on his cane but he didn't seem in any great hurry to pack up and go home; still thinking about it. She could work with that.

"We're taking orders from a child now? A perfectly nice child, lovely in a Rain Man sort of way, wonderful for Richie, but …"

"She says we won't call back if we follow the van."

That gave her pause for all of half a second before she thought of the hundred and one ways that could be interpreted and proceeded to list a few with a confident tone and bright smile.

"Maybe she meant, you know, followed it all the way. We could follow it a little bit. Or, maybe, we don't call back because we've just lost track of time. A sudden grid failure on that block…"

Now she let a careful hint of pleading in, trying to appeal to his desire not to waste the time they'd spent that morning. "Joe, it's right there and no one crossed her palm with silver at breakfast. We can see where it goes and then we'll go home."

Seeing him wavering, she crossed her arms and tried to hit a pitch of determination that would match his. "I am not going to spend any more time walking around the streets looking like a lost tourist finding that thing again."

Finally she smiled and moved in for the killing blow, walking in the most sensuous manner she could muster. He surrendered before she got within a foot; there was just no fun to be had with some people.

"Okay, okay, we'll go to the door but we're sure as hell not knockin' to come in."

"You have a deal, Mr. Dawson."

"I mean it, Amanda."

"I know you do." She patted his cheek and swept past him to slide into the passenger seat of the car.

With a light groan, Joe crossed over to the driver's side. At least with customised controls he wouldn't have to be the passenger with an Immortal driving. They always figured speed limits and slowing at turns were things that happened to other people.

The van drew away and, a careful two or three cars behind, he followed it through the twisting streets and towering old buildings of the Latin Quarter.

Richie looked up from his perch on the alley wall as he felt the brush of an Immortal pass at some speed. When it didn't reappear, he checked his watch then whistled down quietly.

A moment later his teacher's head appeared out of the open sewer hole with a light smattering of dust covering his hair and shoulders. "Time?"

He slid down from the wall and rummaged in the bag at his feet, finding the bottle of water and handing it over. "Uh huh, want I should go do it?"

MacLeod took the bottle with a smile of thanks and opened it, drinking down half before he replied. "Yeah, I want to keep working at this."

"We actually got anything to report now?" Their report was going to be the worst, he just knew it. Adam had probably found whatever had been thrown off the bridge and had a spare moment to solve world hunger, Joe and Amanda would have done the Hardy Boys thing and be having weird French scones with the Police Commissioner, and he and Mac were looking at a hole in the ground. A really bad smelling hole in the ground. With rats.

"We're still alive."

Oh yeah, it was a red letter day. "You still haven't found the way in there yet?"

"I've found it; I'm trying to work out how to open it. This could take a while."

While Mac looked unconcerned, Richie was ready to try killing himself with a spoon just to relieve the boredom. Maybe if he helped it would go faster. "Want me to come look?"

"Not unless you took a course in structural engineering lately." The tone was dry but he knew the man well enough to see the humour that nearly always lurked below the surface.

He crouched down with a grin, always willing to argue his case when he was given a half a chance. "And you have? That time with Anne in the subway totally doesn't count."

"Well, not lately then. But I have worked in a mine."

"And this is like a mine how?"

"A pick in the wrong place and you get your own tomb."

Well okay then, death by spoon it was. "You're right, there's not enough room for two. I'll just go report we're still breathing and ask if Adam's got any industrial digging equipment lying around. Just, you know, in case."

MacLeod grinned as he watched Richie retreat down the street, then lowered himself back down in the darkness again. The sewer wasn't one of his favourite places in the world but it did offer the easiest access to the catacombs running beneath the city and it was somewhere in that warren, he was sure, Darius had managed to sneak people out.

Mortar, newer than the rest but still centuries old, cemented in a thick block of stone under the apartment block. His disquiet grew. It wasn't just that Darius had left him something; it was that he must have done it before they'd even met. He knew the Priest had precognitive dreams, but that was stretching belief.

Carefully he began to scrape away once more. Soon he'd have to abandon the project, it was the work of more than a day and he had an appointment to see LeBrun in the afternoon. His mind turned to that problem as he resumed chipping with the light pick.

By now the forensics would have detected traces of an explosive so claiming a gas leak was definitely out of the question. A case of mistaken identity might wash. He wouldn't be believed, of course, but the important thing was that it couldn't be disproved. Then there were the bodies under the bridge. The morning paper had reported the explosion, but not any casualties. If the Xerxesi had taken care of the cleaning, that would be a bonus.

Another chunk of mortar fell away and he turned his gaze up to the ceiling of the vaulted roof. A large crack ran along it, dust drifting down. In another ten years the weight of the buildings and traffic above it would have collapsed the entire passage; his work was accelerating the process. Still, he was reasonably confident nothing would fall for the moment.

Then again, what he hadn't mentioned to Richie was, while he had been a miner, he hadn't been a particularly good one.

Another clump of mortar so hard it was almost rock itself came away and revealed a small gap between the stone and the wall. He worked at the chink for a few minutes longer and then climbed back out of the manhole. A pair of knees blocked his vision and he looked up sharply into the gentle smile of Inspector LeBrun.

"M'sieur MacLeod."

"Inspector."

The man stood and backed away far enough to let him finish climbing out. The trick wasn't to look innocent, both knew he wasn't, the trick was to look like there was nothing LeBrun could do about it. So he returned the smile cheerfully as he dusted off his hands.

LeBrun looked unimpressed. "I was waiting at the station but when the call came in of a man matching your description illegally tampering with civic works, I thought this would be easier. So, which charge would you like to answer first, MacLeod?"

"Want to give me the list?" He took another long drink from his water bottle and felt the slight buzz of an Immortal waiting at range. At least Richie had the sense not to come closer.

"Insurance fraud."

"You're digging."

"As are you, which we'll come to shortly. Your barge was worth a great deal of money."

"Yes, it was. And if I was going to perpetrate insurance fraud, there are better ways to go about it."

"Where were you when it exploded?"

A mildly interested tone and nothing of his personal opinion in his expression, purely the professional. LeBrun was good at his job and he'd never underestimated the man. They'd had a tentative understanding briefly, but he doubted it would hold much weight now.

"With a friend."

"The name of your friend?"

"Adam Pierson."

"Pierson … he was the man who identified the killer of another friend of yours, was he not?"

"An acquaintance. You have a good memory, Inspector."

The thin smile came again with no mirror in his impassive gaze. "I take a great interest in your file."

"I'd wait for the movie, myself."

"And you and M'sieur Pierson left the barge when?"

"Adam wasn't at the barge at all; we met up at a bar and left about ten."

"I see. Witnesses reported gunfire shortly before and after the explosion."

"Did they?"

"They did."

They looked at each other for a long moment and he had a sudden disconcerting feeling that he may not be able to talk his way out of this one as cleanly as he'd hoped. "Any leads on who did it yet?"

"Just one, M'sieur." LeBrun continued to look at him unblinkingly and then shrugged. "But we are investigating other avenues as well. You will be required to make a full statement, which you can do after I arrest you for this."

"You're arresting me for opening a sewer grate?"

"No, I'm arresting you for climbing down there, unless you have an authorised work permit?"

"I must've left it in my other pants. Give me a break, LeBrun. This is a fining offence at most."

An eyebrow rose and for the first time there was a real emotion behind it, distinct pleasure. "It's my discretion and my discretion tells me you're a dangerous man to leave to his own devices. Will I need the cuffs?"

i From "The Thunder, Perfect Mind"