Author's Notes: My apologies for the pause. My updates will probably be fairly irregular since I'm juggling 3 novellas. And while I did say last time that I'll keep writing even if I don't get any reviews doesn't mean I don't love hearing from you guys!

Q Me? Chapter 11: Cat's Claws

I started to pour myself a shot, glanced at Methos nursing his beer, and put the bottle back. Damn but I wanted a drink. It wasn't until I had to keep stopping myself that I realized just HOW MUCH I had been downing. I should be hospitalized with the DT's right now instead I, physically anyway mentally was a whole other ball game, didn't even want a drink. I had to confess whatever it was Ari-El had given me it was good shit and I felt better than I had in, well, decades. I didn't like owning the SOB my life. It had been Mac who had finally gotten in my face about the pills Ari had left and the truth was I wanted to live. It still felt like I was selling out every time I took one though and I hoped somewhere Richie understood. I poured myself some club soda instead, grabbed Methos a fresh beer, and headed for 'The Table'.

Every time I glanced at that….thing my blood pressure went up another notch because it was still in the middle of MY bar and I couldn't move it. He'd rooted it to the floor of the bar, hell, for all I knew he'd rooted it to the core of the Earth either way it wasn't budging. It was a statement. One way or the other he was in our lives. 'The Table' was, admittedly, a work of art and the entire staff loved it. But they didn't know what it represented. 'The Table' and the man himself were a lot alike but then that had probably been his point.

I could never quite figure Methos. I had been hoping that he would consider this one of his when the going gets tough go to Bora Bora (or Katmandu or whatever other hole he crawls down) moments but instead he'd planted himself immovably at 'The Table'. He and Mac had essentially carved my bar into two separate little kingdoms but at least he was paying his tab these days. I wasn't frankly sure what I thought of Methos which wasn't exactly a new experience.

"I was under the impression you weren't speaking to me" Methos said looking vaguely surprised.

"Cord" I didn't bother elaborating, Methos knew.

"Cord saved your life by carrying you through the jungle. You knew him for less than a year. He risked nothing for you and you never betrayed him, Joe. It doesn't even come close."

I set the bottle down harder than I intended. I just meant that I understood what a bitch it could be to be beholden to a guy who turned out to be a bastard. And I knew more than I ever wanted to about being stuck in the middle.

I sighed. I was a Watcher and a bartender. I knew how to listen.

"No it doesn't."

Methos studied me with those eyes of his. How had I ever believed this man was Adam Pierson, grad student extraordinaire?

"What do you want?" he asked softly.

"Mac and Ari are…meeting in three days. I thought you should know."

"Warning the condemned man? Thanks for the thought, Joe but there's no where I could go where Ari couldn't find me in an instant."

"That certain Ari will win?" I hadn't meant it to have an edge but it did.

"Why doesn't he ever listen to me?"

I wasn't sure if that was a rhetorical question or not but I answered anyway "You're the one who insisted you were 'just a guy'."

Methos shrugged a little "You didn't see the way he looked at me that first day. Like I was some damn god that was going to give him all the answers. I don't have ALL the answers Joe but the fact that I've lived more than 10 years for every one of his should count for something."

"You're talking about him not avenging Richie. He loved that boy like a son" I'd loved that boy like a son.

"And I didn't love Byron! He was my Student too. So was Silas. Sean was my dear friend. And they're not the only friends and Students I've lost to Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod's overblown sense of vengeance. You don't see me going after his head."

"Byron killed Mike."

"No, Mike killed Mike. Duncan killed Richie. And don't even pretend that either kid was a lily white innocent."

"Like the man who used to be DEATH has any right to point fingers."

A new voice spoke "You might want to watch the volume." We both glanced up at the woman standing over us in shock. Catherine, Ari-El's granddaughter my brain supplied. Drinking red wind the bar tending part of my mind chipped in and tried to figure out which vintage from the color. "Please, don't stop on my account. This has been fascinating." She settled in the same chair her grandmother? Grandfather? Grand it? Had occupied the night it had carved the table. God she was a looker. Not as 'perfect' as her mother or Ari-El, with way more of a figure but slightly too stocky legs. She was a red head though and I'd always had a thing for red heads. And that voice. Ari-El's might be an opera lover's dream but Catherine's was meant for the blues. Down boy!

"This is a private conversation" I growled at her.

She grinned back. She had a nice smile and one slightly crooked tooth. I liked her better for it. Lord knows I wanted to nock all of Ari's teeth that way.

"Not for much longer if you don't rein in the shouting" she returned.

She turned her attention to Methos and I silently cursed myself for being disappointed. She was Ahriman's GRANDCHILD and I was way too old to go sweet on a pretty face.

"Somehow I expected you to be taller."

"Sorry to disappoint you." He sounded terribly tired.

She shook her head and the bar lights made her hair…I cut that thought off. So she's cute – get over it old man. She's in the enemy camp and she's a bit too young for you even if she's really too old.

"I'm curious not disappointed. You're the one person about whom Mother never dared to rant. And about whom Grandmother would not speak. I've always wondered why."

"I have no idea."

"Somehow I doubt that."

"Why don't you just ask the source?"

Cat arched a brow at my tone but didn't appear to take offense. When she turned toward me I noticed the glittering gem in the hollow of her throat for the first time. Was that a teeny, tiny Methuselah Stone?

"Because when Grandmother goes silent on a subject the Inquisitors of the Cardassian Central Command couldn't get her to talk."

Methos finished his beer "In three days it won't matter because I'll be dead."

Cat blinked clearly caught by surprise "I very much doubt that."

"No, I will be dead, at Ab-El's hand" Methos sounded like a five year old who just discovered Santa was secretly a serial killer, crushed and incredulous.

"Actually" I allowed "Ari-El challenged Mac. You're home free."

A moment of silence and then in perfect unity "What?" They couldn't have done it better if they had practiced. Maybe they had. After all to quote Mac 'what do any of us really know about Methos?'

"Ari-El challenged Mac" I repeated while they both blinked at me like I was speaking an unintelligible language.

"No" Methos said tapping the side of his own head "I've been INSIDE his head, Joe and I know just how much he loathes killing. He'll do it if you back him into a corner but it isn't his first choice."

"It's not Mac's either" I said starting to rise.

"I didn't say that" he shot back but that's what he'd implied and we both knew it.

"It's been four thousand years. People change."

Methos stubbornly shook his head "Not about this. Not Ari, not ever."

I turned to Cat "What do you think?"

"I agree with Adam. My grandmother dislikes killing but more than that she's terrified of ending up like Tarzon. She has no intention of killing your friend. And if she wanted him dead all she had to do was stop restraining mother."

I had known that Ari-El wouldn't be fighting to kill. The fact that he clearly wanted Mac alive was chilling because it meant that he wanted to use him for his own nefarious purposes but the thought that Ari-El might be afraid to make a kill put a whole new spin on it. If Ari-El couldn't kill Mac then Mac had one hell of an ace in the hole. Except the hologram had looked VERY willing to kill and why would he be afraid?

"Who was Tazron?"

It isn't often you see the Immortal trademark flashback look on a non-Immortal.

"I've always loved traveling and when I was in my early twenties I managed to convince my parents to let me go with Grandmother. We spent several years off world on Trill and I became close friends with a Neitic Trill named Tarzon."

I tend a bar and I'm a professional voyeur – they were a hell of a lot more than just friends.

"He was witty, charming, and full of life. More than anything though he wanted to be joined."

She paused and played with her glass making the red wine swirl just a bit. "The Trill home world has a second sentient species know as the Symbionts. The Trill have a vestigial pouch. Ideally when a Symbiont is placed in the pouch and 'joins' the Host they become a new being, a blending of both personalities, neither dominating the other. Because the Symbionts can live for centuries or even millennia they are transferred from Host to Host, thus each new Host benefits from the lifetime experiences of the previous Hosts while the Symbiont gets to escape its watery, subterranean world and travel. But there are over a thousand Trills for every Symbiont so the competition is fierce. 90 of Trill are Yeitics and the Symbionts had always gone to Yeitics. Tarzon was wild to be the first Neitic Host. I went to Grandmother certain that she would smooth it over with the Symbiosis Committee. She tried to explain to us what would happen but we were young and we wouldn't listen. I've never felt so betrayed in my life as when she used her influence to try block any Neitic Trill from ever being joined. We prevailed in the end though. Tarzon was so excited to be honored with the Odan Symbiont." I could see her eyes welling up but no tears actually trickled down her cheeks. "Grandmother had tried to convince both us and the Symbiosis Committee that subtle differences in the neurology of Neitics would cause an irreversible loss of the Host's mind leaving the body an empty vessel for the Symbiont." She just blinked unseeing at her wine glass "She was right of course she always is and I lost him to Odan." She raised her eyes to mine and I was suddenly someone else…

I stared out over the purple waves without really seeing them. He'd loved this place, loved the sea. Odan certainly didn't, he said he'd spent enough of his life swimming. Odan, not Tarzon-Odan because Tarzon was gone.

A particularly powerful breaker sent a lavender mist across my face to mingle with my tears. Perhaps I should mingle something else with the waters of Trill.

"I'd rather you didn't."

I whirled in shock, that Grandmother could sneak up on me was no surprise, she'd been doing that my entire life, but that she would do it HERE was inconceivable. Her loathing of any and all bodies of water larger than a bath was legendary.

"I wouldn't mind if you took a few steps this way either."

I glanced down at the swirling waters and the jagged rocks fifteen feet below and wondered if Grandmother would follow me if I jumped. It would be so easy to let the water take me. The drop wasn't far but the rip currents and the undertow would probably be deadly.

"Yes, I would. And take my word for it, drowning is never easy."

Warm hands wrapped around my shoulders. Warm was so utterly wrong. They should have been Tarzon's cool ones. She pulled me in against her breast and sang softly to me as I wept. Someday I needed to learn what the words meant but not today. Today it was enough to simply hear the song that had sung me to sleep since infancy.

The sun was much higher in the sky when I finally looked up "I'm sorry" I had said such hateful, hateful things. Would she forgive me? "I should have believed you" If I had Tarzon might still be Tarzon. I paused waiting for the 'I told you so'. God knows, Mother NEVER let an opportunity to say it pass her by but Grandmother just blotted away my tears, gently kissed my forehead, and passed me a handkerchief. "You aren't angry with me?"

"Oh, child, you'll punish yourself far worse than I ever could." She cupped my chin in one long-fingered hand as she took a half step back so that she could look me in the eye. "And don't claim all of the blame. Tarzon KNEW the risk, had been informed of the danger, and CHOSE his fate. He was determined to be joined no matter what. Grieve for him but remember that if he had loved you better he would not have taken this path."

I wasn't certain if that was comforting or not. Another breaker sent a purple shower over us and Grandmother shivered a little. I hadn't even noticed that we had both been soaked by the incoming tide.

"Is drowning why you hate the sea?" I could have simply thought the question, God knows Mother and Grandmother could fight for hours without either of them opening their mouths but when I was little Grandmother had insisted I actually speak and I'd kept the habit long after she'd stopped demanding.

"Drowning didn't help any but it's not why I dislike water. I DESPISE squid."

I racked my brains before I finally asked "What is a squid?"

That was enough to nearly make me lose Cat's train of thought. Ari-El was afraid of FISH BAIT! Damned if I could think of a way for Mac to use that bit of info. The mental image of Mac tossing a squid at Ari-El in the middle of a fight and him squealing and running off like a little girl was just… righteous. I also decided to order some calamari, TONS of it. Maybe the sheer mass of squid would drive him off.

Grandmother provided an image of some sort of disgustingly tentacled sea monster. I shuddered myself "Trill doesn't have squid, does it?"

"No" she replied in a tone that clearly said she had had enough of this particular topic.

I suddenly wanted to go sailing on Tarzon's Wind Puppet but I couldn't handle the boat by myself. I was hardly the best of sailors.

"I'll take you."

I blinked at her in amazement.

"I didn't ALWAYS hate sailing and I remain a passable seaman." I picked my way back envious of Grandmother's nimbleness. The woman was more than half mountain goat. The hair on the back of my neck rose as Menheyet gave me one of his unblinking stares. I wished (not for the first time) that Grandmother had brought the hounds instead of the cats. She thought of the hounds as nothing more than tools; the cats were her companions. The problem was the cats considered everyone else prey. Oh, they never actually killed anyone but all that stalking was NOT the benign play Grandmother pretended it was. Heaven help us all if anything ever happened to her because there wasn't a doubt in my mind that they would go on a killing spree. I shivered at the malevolent intelligence that glittered in those golden eyes. Thousands of years of frustration and all of Grandmother's knowledge filtered through feline brains. I love cats, I do, but not these and they had no affection for me either.

I blinked my eyes trying desperately to clear them, determined not to show weakness in front of Grandmother's overgrown, longhaired cheetahs. I sank down on one of the boulders strewn across the rocky headland. Grandmother laid a gentle hand on my shoulder.

"Isn't there anything you can do?" I'd asked (or wailed) the question at least a dozen times already.

She gathered me up in her arms and to my chagrin the cats curled around us.

"I wish I could" it was her turn to shiver "I'm far too close to sharing his fate not to sympathize."

I felt a cold chill form in my belly "What?" I asked as I swiped at my puffy eyes.

"I am as much a joined being as any Trill. Instead of a pretentious slug in my gut I have the most arrogant fugitive in the history of the Universe slithering in my soul. And he'd like nothing better than to do to me what Odan did to Tarzon."

Grandmother was the bedrock of my world and the thought that what had happened to Tarzon could take her too... I knotted my fists in her vest.

She worked them free and held them in her own "I've been fighting this battle for a very long time and I have no intention of loosing myself."

"You wouldn't warn me if it wasn't a possibility" I protested not at all reassured.

"My 'symbiont' has never been strong enough to destroy me and if I'm careful it never will be."

I was confused for a split second and then it hit me – Quickenings.

"It's putting the pieces of itself back together again, sliver by sliver" she whispered "And when that happens. Well, that's neither here nor there. Let's go sailing."

She finished her drink. "I became a little obsessed with the joined Trill. Did you know that after the joining of a Yeitic Trill you can actually see three different brainwave patterns?"

I figured that had to be a rhetorical question since Trill was undoubtedly a gazillion miles from here.

"One for the Host, one for the Symbiont, both overshadowed if you don't know what to look for by the new, blended personality."

And we care because? I thought but didn't actually say.

"My Grandmother exhibits a nearly identical phenomenon but the other Quickened don't."

That one froze me in my seat – was Ari-El sporting the equivalent of a Dark Quickening? Was that why he was searching for a Champion? Was that the human side looking for someone who could actually control it? Except that I remembered that ravenous look in Ari-El's blue eyes that day when the hologram had fought Mac, it had been the look of a starving man with a loft of oven fresh bread set in front of him. As I considered my interactions with him, it did fit, that ability of his to be a completely arrogant bastard in one breath and then be a decent gentleman in the next – two separate beings time-sharing the same body with (probably) utterly different plans for Mac, one of whom would, very, very much like to kill him. Damn. Double damn and a whole lot of other expletives. Methos' eyes went to the door and I rose as quickly as physically possible. I didn't want Mac to catch me 'fraternizing with the enemy'. I felt more than a twinge of guilt since it was a shitty thing to do to Methos everything else notwithstanding. I shot a glance at him but he was back to studying the bubbles in his beer which I was beginning to think was his number one hobby.

I was about halfway back to the bar when Mac walked in and stopped dead while staring over my shoulder. I glanced back not exactly surprised to see Cat behind me.

"Did Ari-El send you?" he asked eyes hard. I had an irrational desire to defend a woman I'd barely met from arguably my best friend.

She shook her head "But she did give me permission to annoy you." She smiled again revealing the crooked tooth "Not that I needed it." She stepped around me and held a hand out to Mac, "Catherine Kerrigan."

For an instant he looked as if he expected it to bite him but then he reached out and shook it "Duncan MacLeod."

"So I hear. Can I buy a round?"

Mac had made a point of only drinking with me when we were friends so I was more than a little curious about his answer.

"No thanks. I only drink with my friends. I made an exception with your Grandmother and ended up drugged. No offense but I have no intention of repeating the mistake."

Mac might have said no offence but his tone and body language were clearly trying to push Cat who just gave him an Ari-El patented amused glance except somehow it didn't seem quite so infuriating on her.

"I intended to purchase the drinks from Mr. Dawson" she pointed out reasonably "who is, I believe, your friend, and can presumably be trusted not to drug you."

"Club soda" Mac shot back without looking at me.

"The same" she echoed except she actually smiled at me and said please too. I resolutely ignored the warm little flutter that caused.

"It's Joe and coming right up." I headed for the bar as quickly as possible while hoping I wouldn't miss too much. I also wondered where Amanda was.

They had slipped into the back corner table –good, the natural acoustics of the room made it and The Table the two places where you nearly needed to shout to be overheard. Speaking of which Methos was no longer at The Table. Hmmm. Odd.

Neither looked up at me as I settled in and put their club sodas in front of them.

"So you're telling me he's a split personality?" Mac didn't really sound as if he much cared.

"Not split – blended" whatever else she was Cat was a mighty patient woman but then she had undoubtedly been spending her entire life running interference between Evangeline and Ari-El and they were both pretty damn high maintenance. Poor kid. Except the kid was well over a hundred years old and didn't look a day over thirty-five.

"But both original personalities are still present, aware, and capable of exerting influence."

"I don't plan on making friends with Ari-El. I plan on killing him."

"My Grandmother, in spite of any and all protests to the contrary, is being hunted by something and damn worried about dying but not at your hand. My Mother wanted you dead. My Grandmother disagreed. No surprise there but I think you don't have any idea what my Mother's death and the possibility of my Grandmother's means for you and Methos or what either of your places are in all this."

"And I'm supposed to believe whatever you tell me?"

"What you do and don't believe is purely up to you but one way or another you are going to have to deal with Ari-El. Ari wants to help you and El wants your Quickening. Wouldn't it make more sense to ally with Ari?"

Mac rose to leave in disgust but Cat caught his sleeve "I'm trying to help all of you."

I could see him wanting to swat her hand away but he was too much of gentleman. His jaw worked for several seconds before he sat back down.

"Ari-El told Nick Wolfe that gave up his humanity. What do you think?"

"I think El is an arrogant bastard. I think Ari is the best person of any race I've ever met. And yes, I think that Ari-El – the BLENDED personality isn't very human anymore but he isn't a monster either."

God but you just wanted to believe her except for Richie.

She rocked back and blinked at both of us "Who was that?"

"Who was who?"

She licked her lips "While I'm not a telepath like my Mother and Grandmother I get…flashes occasionally." This time she glared at us "Who was that?"

"Richie" Mac said "his name was Richie. He was my Student. Your best person you've ever met tricked me into killing him."

Something had hardened in her eyes and suddenly she was a little scary, for the first time I believed bone deep that she was Ahriman's granddaughter. "Do either of you happen to have a picture of him?"

I quickly dug out my wallet and pulled a battered one of him on his bike out.

She glanced down and when she looked back up her eyes were blazing and the stone in the hollow of her throat was glittering "Would one of you gentlemen be so kind as to show me his grave?"

Mac nodded solemnly and we trooped out.

The place was exactly as I remembered it and even after all the years. I had to swallow hard against tears for the boy who should have lived forever but had died twice over before twenty-five. Cat had peppered us with questions about him on the ride over, how we had met him, what his life had been like, without once telling us why.

"Where are you?" she hissed.

"Presently?" Ari-El's voice came from behind us "Dealing with the Calamaran." He was leaning nonchalantly against on of the cemeteries more stately trees.

Cat stalked over rage written in every motion. "Why? Robbie loves you, Richie would have too. Why didn't you give me my son?"

My God, Richie had been Cat's son? She'd said loves not loved – Richie's twin was still alive.

"Because this was more useful."

"Useful?" she shrieked "He was my son. He was your great-grandson it should never have been about useful."

"Then what should it have been about?" he retorted – icy indifference to her raging fury.

She blinked at him a moment either too stunned or too furious to speak. She'd believed in him. In spite of her mother and he was smashing her faith to bits. Bastard.

"Yes, I could have given him to you and let you raise him with Robbie and they would both be dead now. What purpose would that serve? Young Richie was never going to see thirty, no matter what. Why give you a child only to lose him? Particularly when he was going to get his mortal brother killed as well? So, yes, I chose to use him. I preferred an easily avoidable death that might have had a purpose over a completely senseless one that would have devastated you."

She trembled "It was never your choice to make" she whispered before whirling and bolting. Mac gave Ari-El one hard glance and started after her. I turned to go back to my car figuring they would turn up there eventually when Ari-El's voice stopped me.

"Be good to her."

"What?"

"You would never have trusted her if she had kept faith with me." Something flickered in those eyes. Doing this had cost him something too. Good. Whatever scraps of humanity he had left had cared for Cat. And her anger and rejection had hurt. I felt a grim grin curling my lips at that thought. "And you will make a fine couple. I don't plan on dieing Joseph Dawson but if it happens I intend to be certain that my house is in order and Cat will find greater comfort with you then than with a corpse. This than the alternatives for all of us."

"Real sweet of you to decide for everyone" I spat at him as I shoved past.

"Merely practical" he returned "Oh, and when you decide that you'd like to wrap your legs around a beautiful woman my offer still stands. All you have to do is ask."

"When they start ice skating in hell." I shot over my shoulder.

His laughter followed me, not a wicked laugh but a bright bit of sound that didn't fit the man I'd met at all "I love ice skating."

I turned around but he was already gone. Was Cat my next temptation? He knew I wouldn't sell my soul for a lousy pair of legs – would I do it for love? Stupid question. I didn't love her and I never would.

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