The Promise
by Maisie (maisierita@comcast.net)
copyright 2001

Disclaimer: As much as it pains me to say it, I don't own even a little bit of Methos.  But it's fun to borrow him sometimes!. :)

Warnings: None.  At least, none that I can give without giving everything away.

Feedback:  Please!  Everything but flames gladly accepted at maisierita@comcast.net

Archive:  Sure, but ask first.

He felt no victory, nor sadness. Nor, oddly, any great sense of 
relief, though he suspected that would come later, when everything 
had settled, and the reality sank in. Instead, all he felt as the 
last few flickers of lightning faded away was a vague sense of 
disbelief that it had finally come to an end.

He needed suddenly to sit down and so he did, on cold concrete 
sprinkled lightly with blood. He gazed with only mild interest at the 
still and mutilated corpse of his challenger -- his last challenger, 
he mused lightly, in fact the last challenger -- where he lay as he 
had fallen. Graceless in death, the nameless Immortal yet held onto 
his sword, fingers clenched tight around the weapon that had carried 
him past all his kindred to this final battle.

He was no one Methos had known, nor had even heard of, though with 
the Watchers long since disbanded, he'd had no safe way to track and 
identify others of his race. He'd avoided close contact with other 
Immortals for so long it had ceased to become even a habit; it was 
near as automatic as breathing, and as necessary to his survival. So 
this last Immortal, as so many others, had been an adversary with no 
name nor history.

As a sword-fighter, this one had been better than average, even much 
better than average, but by no means one of the best. He'd simply 
been lucky enough to evade those better than he, strong and savage 
enough to take whatever advantage he was offered, and desperate and 
ruthless enough to create advantages when none were offered. In the 
end, Methos thought, absently fingering the rents and tears in his 
clothing, the other man had been almost good enough. Almost.

He heaved a sigh and pondered the decapitated head off to the side.  
The eyes were open, staring sightlessly upward, and Methos reached 
with steady fingers to shut them. It was, he reflected, the least he 
could do for the man who had come so close to winning the Game. But 
there was no Prize for coming in second, unless it was death itself, 
and if so it was no more nor less than that awarded to any other 
creature on the planet.

Any other creature but him, Methos corrected silently, since he'd won 
something else entirely. As a reward for millennia of death, 
brutality, and fear, the Prize itself was something of an anticlimax, 
and he was glad he'd not known it in advance. An image flashed 
briefly through his mind, Kronos stomping and raging in fury that the 
Prize was not world domination after all -- for which Methos was in 
truth profoundly grateful, having lost his taste for power long ago --
 and he snorted in amusement. He banished the restless spirit and 
rose easily to his feet, wounds healed, the final Quickening already 
settled.

He stashed his sword in his coat out of nothing more than habit. It 
would, he supposed, take a while before he felt comfortable enough to 
rid himself of it permanently. Not that there were any other 
Immortals left to fear -- he knew this, felt it clear through his 
bones, knew it as he knew, suddenly, so many things -- but it was 
hard to shed a weapon one had borne for over six millennia.  Hard to 
rid himself of it even as he realized that there were no Immortals 
left to slay, no new Immortals to be born, none left but he.

He strode out of the ruined warehouse without a backward glance, and 
strolled easily down the street, pace steady, drawing no more 
attention than he wished. The streets were crowded with off- 
worlders, exotic colonists visiting their ancestral home, and Methos 
allowed himself a moment's jealousy at their freedom to come and go 
as they pleased. He'd left the planet once, at the insistence of some 
wife or another, but had never made it past the moon. The dizziness 
had struck the moment they'd left orbit; by the time they'd docked at 
Luna Station he'd been terrifyingly weak and desperate in his 
insistence that they return to Earth.

The marriage hadn't lasted much longer, but the sacrifice of a 
mediocre relationship was a small price to pay for the knowledge 
gained. He'd never again tried to leave the planet, and didn't waste 
much time regretting it.

The stream of tourists parted for him as he strode deliberately 
through the crowd and onto the less popular side streets. It was only 
after the eighth block that he realized he'd no particular 
destination in mind. The last half century had been relentlessly 
brutal, filled with challenge after mindless challenge, and he'd held 
no job in decades, had no permanent home, no family nor friends.  He 
stopped abruptly in the street and looked around, suddenly uncertain 
that he could even put a name to the city he was in, or even the 
country.

Paris, he decided finally. He was fairly certain he was in Paris, one 
of the few cities that had managed to stay somewhat familiar 
throughout the ages. That was the Eiffel Tower there, wasn't it?  
Yes, he was reasonably confident that he was in Paris.

He wandered aimlessly for a few hours, till the mid-afternoon sun 
became uncomfortably warm, and he rested in the shade of an ancient 
oak tree laughably younger than he. The park was peaceful, manicured, 
decorated tastefully with all the flowers of spring, and it came to 
him in a flash where he was. He grinned ruefully to himself and rose 
to his feet again, muscles protesting slightly, and wandered, 
purposefully this time, to a small square area behind the fence. The 
gate was rusted shut and gave way with just the smallest squeal of 
protest.

"Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod," he said quietly to the 
overgrown plot. "I wonder what you'd have made of this." He brushed 
some dirt off the badly crumbled headstone and gazed at it in 
silence, half expecting an answer, but MacLeod, dead and avenged for 
more than five centuries, had no voice to speak from beyond the grave.

Methos kicked a few stones off the plot, shamed that he'd let the 
grave deteriorate so badly, but really, how many graves could he be 
expected to tend? And anyway, who had appointed him the man to do 
it? "It was your own fault," he accused the grass. "You never did 
learn to walk away." He kicked spitefully at the ground.  "Bloody 
stubborn Scot." 

He poked at the ground, digging out a few weeds with his heel.  There 
had been no weeds last time he'd visited.  Of course, he'd been 
living in Paris at the time, and so he'd come every week, or nearly 
so, until his wife had gently objected.  "Here again, are you?" a 
ghostly voice lilted tenderly in his mind, quiet laughter tinkling 
like bells. "You can pay someone to tend it, Ben. Come home, love. 
It's time for dinner."

And so he'd gone home with Giselle, back to their comfortable 
apartment overlooking the Seine, and he'd not been back in the 300 
years since. He'd not even thought of Duncan in years, had given up 
toasting him on his birthday after they'd changed the calendar again, 
and wasn't even sure now he could clearly remember what Duncan had 
looked like.

"You promised," a voice chided gently. "You promised, Methos," and 
the faint Scottish burr was tantalizingly familiar. 

"Promised what?" Methos asked, staring intently at the grave.

"You promised," the voice repeated reproachfully. "I can't believe 
you don't remember."

And quite suddenly, Methos did remember, and he chuckled softly and 
dropped to his knees, running his fingers through the soft 
dirt.  "You can't remember that, you silly oaf. You were already 
dead."

He'd been quite drunk that night, drinking himself blind in his hotel 
room with the door barricaded and his sword across his knees. The 
computer screen had fallen off the wall after he'd thrown his boot at 
it for the second time, and it lay on the floor sparking angrily. 
He'd pay for that come check-out time, but Duncan deserved it. *Had* 
deserved it, he amended drunkenly, and poured himself another shot of 
whiskey. Stupid, ignorant, stubborn, misbegotten, stubborn, half-
witted -- had he mentioned stubborn? -- stubborn Scottish bastard. 
Over an artifact, for god's sake, a cold lifeless hunk of long-
forgotten history; he'd gotten himself challenged and killed over a 
god-damned artifact.

Methos kicked the smoking screen farther away from him and reached 
for his glass. He was not quite drunk enough, judging from the way 
his body adamantly remained conscious, but he suspected that one more 
drink would do the trick. He toasted Duncan with that last shot, 
whiskey sloshing over the edge of the glass and splashing on the 
floor -- something else he'd pay for, come check-out time -- and 
finally, blessedly, felt darkness taking hold. If he'd made a promise 
then, an impossible promise, really, it was nothing more than the 
alcohol talking.

"I was drunk, MacLeod," he said to the ground. "Very, very drunk.  I 
wouldn't know how to go about it anyway."

But of course he did know how to go about it, he realized with a 
jolt. He hadn't then, hadn't known or even suspected it was possible, 
but now . . . now he'd won the Prize and he knew exactly how to go 
about it, and it wouldn't even be that difficult.  "Good God," he 
muttered, and stared into space for a minute debating with himself, 
but then again what good was a promise if you didn't keep it when you 
could? Anyway, he was here, after all, and Duncan was here, or what 
was left of him, and the essence of him was here too, because Methos 
had the essence of all of them now, and it was as easy as thinking of 
it to reach inside and take out what he needed.

His head throbbed and his vision grew blurry for an instant so he 
blinked his eyes to clear them, and when he opened them again there 
was Duncan sitting on the ground next to him, staring at him in 
confusion.

"Methos?" he said, irritation clear in his voice, and Methos couldn't 
control the laughter that washed over him in great sweeping waves.

"Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod," he said, rising to his feet and 
extending a hand, feeling relief as he took in Duncan's strong 
familiar features -- yes, that's exactly what he looked like; he 
hadn't forgotten after all -- and pulled the bewildered man to his 
feet. "Let's get a beer."

THE END 

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