I’m frustrated and losing my patience ... and it feels like it’s raining in my head, he thought. Duncan MacLeod knew all of this was evident on his face as well as in his stride down the darkened street. He didn’t dodge the occasional puddles or rivulets of water in his path; he sloshed straight through them. His companion, who was nearly the same height, matched pace silently. The occasional whisper of Duncan’s long coat as it tangled about his calves could be heard, but otherwise, there was silence. Blessed, eventual, almost desperately necessary, silence.

I’ve been arguing for hours, thought Duncan. Connor is so intractable and pig-headed—I don’t understand, *he* won’t explain, and when I *ask him to explain,* he goes straight to defense and peppers me with questions to deflect the original one! He took a right turn at Fourth and New Holland, not even waiting for the crossing light before stepping into the deserted street. We used to speak so easy, now it’s like I’m some enemy he must back down.

“Where are we going, Duncan?”

“Nowhere,” retorted the younger Scot, stating the obvious. “I’m just walking. You can find your way back to the dojo any time you’re done walking.”

“You’re pissed and pounding the pavement over this?" demanded Connor. He halted in the circle of a streetlight, but Duncan kept walking, forcing him to walk faster to catch up again. “I came before it happened. I thought I should at least talk to you first and this is the reaction? Well, next time I’ll just keep my hole shut!”

“Telling me something like this just adds the burden of knowing when I see him next.” Duncan growled the hot words out of the side of his mouth without even turning.

“So I shouldn’t have come? I should just confront and whack him without even talking to you?” Connor’s voice switched to full sarcastic mode. “Just mention it to you like some postscript in a letter? ‘By the way, Duncan, I killed your old friend Sterrett—hope he didn’t owe you money’?” Connor stopped in the glow of the next streetlight and this time, he didn’t pursue the immortal in the lead.

Duncan halted ten feet away, fists clenching and unclenching … then retraced his steps. The other man’s face was in shadow, but he could tell that Connor was very agitated. He’s gritting his teeth the same way I’m digging my nails into my palms. “Tell me why, dammit? Tell me why you are so intent on confronting him?”

“You wouldn’t understand,” retorted Connor.

Deep breath. Pause. Let his heart beat. The more you clash with him, the more he fights back. Duncan turned and looked out over the front lawn of the college. Someone had left their bike parked near the front steps and the shadow was twelve feet long in the lights illuminating the marble columns. The pools of rainwater were black—black like blood on the ground. “Try. Try to help me understand. How can you even know I won’t understand when you won’t even tell me?” he admonished.

“Because I DO know you,” snarled Connor. “You’re cleaner than I am—you stay out of shit that I get trapped up in. By the time I get it figured out, it’s messy and unclear and I just have to hack my way through it. It’s not pretty, it’s not elegant, and it’s not simple.” Connor’s harsh voice halted, then resumed somewhat softer, acquiescent to explanation; aware of how he sounded against Duncan’s soft request. “It’s old, Duncan. Something from way back … before you were born. You won’t understand.”

Duncan took another deep breath, willing his unsettled feelings to remain calm. “When you were young?”

“Still in the clan.” Connor wasn’t looking at him. He stared at the shadow of the bicycle on the walkway. “I wasn’t immortal, and even after I became immortal, I didn’t get it until I met him again, later. He was immortal! I couldn’t believe what my memory was telling me and I denied what I knew for years. But,” he paused for one deep breath, drawn slowly as if it hurt, “Every time I see him, I have to confront it inside my heart again. I’ve tried to let it go, I’ve tried to forget, I’ve tried to believe he didn’t really intend it—but it’s eating me from the inside out.”

Duncan drew a shuddering breath. I know about dark things that haunt you until you have to deal with them, regardless of the cost. He didn’t have time to say anything, because Connor’s voice lurched on.

“It’s something leftover from an older, more savage era—an era that I was born to. An age where there were consequences for certain actions that wouldn’t have consequences today. I have to know if he understood that, back then. And if he thinks no one from that old barbaric lifetime would still be around to render judgment and justice.” He turned his head and looked into Duncan’s face, accusingly, daring him to deny his own judgments and executions. “Tell me, if it was your good buddy Methos telling you that someone you cared about had to die because of an old, old wrong that finally had to be set right—would you be taking him to task as much as you are me?”

“Let me ask you something,” returned Duncan. “If it was my good buddy Methos telling me that you had to die to settle an old, old wrong, what do you think I would be saying?”

Silence.

“This is why immortals are not suppose to be ‘friends’ with one another.”

An answer that wasn’t an answer at all. Duncan gritted his teeth and stepped closer to his old mentor. “I would be interfering, Connor. I would have him cornered in the bar explaining his reasons the same way I’m grinding on you right now for Sterrett. That’s what friends DO in this fucking game. It’s about the only thing we CAN do—persuade one another not to fight. Not if it can be avoided.” He looked hard into his kinsman’s eyes. “People change Connor. The whole world changes and we have to ride those changes and not get stuck in the past.”

“Who always has the right of judgment, Duncan?” asked Connor, driving straight to the point.

Duncan sighed and looked away, watched the tree branches wriggle with the wind. On another night, they would seem beautiful. Tonight, they writhed as if tormented. “The person wronged, or the family of the wronged, has the supreme right to exact justice.”

“I’m not planning to whip out steel the next time I see him,” Connor said, “but we will have to talk; try to reach an understanding.”

“Will you try?" Duncan gestured at the surroundings, as if the world was his witness. “You haven’t really tried with ME tonight, have you? You’ve just fought and argued, thrown my mistakes and my decisions to kill back at me.”

“It’s not EASY to come and tell you this!” barked the other man. “You’ve known James for three hundred years!”

“He’s my friend.” Duncan’s rage and pain was in his voice. “And you’re here to tell me you’re going to kill him.”

“I might have to.”

“You don’t have my permission, Connor.”

“I know.” Connor sighed, sounding resigned and tired. “I didn’t come here to ask for it. I have tried to avoid this confrontation with him ever since I knew you two were friends. I just can’t carry the burden any longer, Dhonnchaidh …” He met his gaze openly, unguarded. "I figured if I was going to deal with this that I'd better have the balls to come and talk to you first. You're Clan. You deserve this, no matter how it hurts us."

Silence for a few moments. Duncan breathed in the damp night air, wishing it would soothe old injuries and prevent future ones—future deaths. The sprinkle of light rain grew more serious, but did nothing to cool his mind or heart. I need to see James before this goes down. How am I going to hide that this is a possibly a final meeting with him? And is this my goodbye visit to my kinsman-brother? His soul was a tempest and there wasn’t a sound. He struggled to keep his voice even, to keep the agony out of it and focus on Connor’s face. “Try to reconcile with him over this; try to find the road to peace.”

“I’ll give him a chance to justify himself, to try to explain, but,” Connor’s voice hardened, “if he’s not able to defend his actions, it will likely end with swords.” A beat. "And he's very good with the sword."

Connor knows what I'm thinking, too. Duncan turned away, gloomy and disheartened, afraid. It’s bad enough to have to kill my friends myself. Now my *friends* are killing my friends and I can’t stop that either. His spirits sank even deeper when a current of immortality snatched his thoughts awry. Connor jerked beside him. They were both so edgy on the darkened street that the dragon swords were in their hands before they'd moved apart or turned to search for the other immortal.

“Ahhh, there you are,” laughed a basso voice. “I’ve been looking for you, MacLeod.” A figure dressed in dark clothing cleared the nearby shadows and stood backlit by streetlights. He didn’t have a sword revealed, but his hands “floated” near the edges of the long coat like a gunfighter waiting for the draw.

This isn’t good, thought Duncan. I’m angry and unsettled and a fight would feel better than this terrible conversation and its final conclusion.

“Which one did you want?” rasped Connor.

“Which … one?” said the approaching immortal. He paused twelve feet away and looked at them.

“I’m Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod, and this is Connor MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod,” announced Duncan. He watched their opponent appraising the two of them and it deepened his irritation. Sizing us up for which looks to be the easy kill. I’ve talked too much about death tonight.

“Twins? That’s rare.”

And he’s obviously stupid on top of it. “Not twins. Twins look identical or similar. We’re kinsmen.”

“Oh, those ‘Scot’ types … they’re all the same. Nice for talking about ‘brotherhood’ and all of that rot, but when it comes down to killing, they’d sell their ‘kinsman’ for their own neck.”

“Quit talking and pick your man,” growled Duncan.

“Oh, I don’t think so. I’m not going to fight either of you with the other one standing right there—what do you think I am? Stupid? You’d take my quickening while I was still down from the first one!”

“That’s not how I fight,” retorted Duncan, insulted. “It’s not honorable.”

“And you’re a man of honor, right?” sneered the other man. He darted a look at Connor. “I notice your ‘friend’ is suspiciously quiet on the matter.”

Duncan turned his head and looked at Connor. For a fleeting instant, he saw the fire of an older, more savage era staring out of the elder man’s eyes. It took a barbaric and inhospitable land to birth strong men. *This* man. Myself. I never thought about the fact that Connor was born and bred less civilized than I— His mind conjured the image of Kristin. He saw the terrain, her sword, and her pitiful defenses. Then he saw Methos emerge from the shadows, heard again, "A man who was born long before the age of chivalry." His mind flicked ahead to the same man with Kronos; deadly, conniving, plans within plans, the one who went with the winners. There's a dangerous old civilization living in Adam as well... Different rules of conduct for different men—jaguars and jagged depths, hiding beneath the casual exterior.

“You’re right, there,” slowly admitted Duncan. “I’m telling you that I wouldn’t kill you right after you killed him—but Connor? I can't speak for Connor ... his was a fierce generation." A sly smile crept across his face. "You’ll have to take your chances with him. Good luck.” With that, he tucked his katana up behind his arm at rest, waiting for the decision to be made.

Connor said nothing. He watched from beneath his brows, a thunderclap unspoken.

The silence grew. The stranger stammered something about the rainy night, the timing, that there were two of them. Within a minute, he faded back into the darkness and the two Scots were again alone under dark skies with the trees writhing above them.

Connor waited.

Duncan waited.

The world seemingly waited.

"Do what you need to do to find peace, kinsman," finally said Duncan. "Settle the matter. I want you both as friends, not one as friend and the other struggling to be a peacekeeper." He gripped Connor's elbow, just above the joint. "I wish this wasn’t happening. I wish I could fix this; wish there was a way…” he halted. Words can’t change this. We’re *immortal* and this is what we do…. "Call me when it's over. And if you have to fight, be sure to tell him that whomever wins must call me when it's over. I will want to know." There. I've said it. It's out in the open.

"I'll come and see you, or he will. You deserve that from us." Connor gripped the arm that held his and looked just as fiercely into his face, then let him go.

“You staying?” asked Duncan, willing the subject to change completely.

“No.” The rain was plastering Connor’s hair down, making him gaunt and older than his years—as if he too felt the rain on the inside. “I won’t stay this time. You’re unhappy with me and it would be a lie to stay.” Then he walked away, slogging uncaring through puddles and the rush of endless street debris in the gutter.

Duncan watched him go until the tan coat became smudgy gray—until the gray began to blur around the edges—until the shape became a shadow only by streetlights—until there was no shadow at all. Then he stood staring down the vacant street after him, a silent farewell that he could not wish away and the water trickled like tears upon his face and streamed down the lines of his coat. "It’s always raining in my head," he whispered to the night, but there was no answer. Just rain and more rain.

~finis~

&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

MacNair
March 27, 2003

Note from the author: It was impossible to get into ConnorMuse’s head for this piece to find out exactly what this immortal friend of Duncan’s had done. He would not tell me out right, would give me impressions and then change them, and generally was uncomfortable about talking about them. The best picture I can give is that it had something to do with a Clan skirmish, Clan allies, an act of cowardice, and the death of a clansman as a result of that act of cowardice.

As to the fate of James Sterrett—Connor killed him. I don’t “see” the actual confrontation or swordfight, but I can see Connor at Duncan’s door to tell him what happened. It’s raining that day as well. Somehow fitting.

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