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A Little Rusty by Jess S
Methos' P.O.V.
Methos didn't let himself pause and choke on the sip of beer he'd started taking as the buzz of an approaching Quickening registered, but he did put the half-drunk beverage down as soon as he'd swallowed. Then he glanced in the direction the warning had come from with a frown.
The side door. Not the front. Rendering that way of egress closed despite it being the closest exit to his usual seat.
Wonderful. He could only hope that didn't mean this was another Immortal that actually scouted out areas in advance the way he did. The disciplined and wisely wary were rare, but if he was proof of anything it was that they could be by far the most dangerous.
"What's wrong?" Joe asked, even though he'd gotten more than good enough over the years to recognize what the ancient's subtle reaction meant. He knew Methos didn't react to the Buzz the way most young Immortals did. Knew that the ancient didn't particularly care whose Quickening his own was warning him about, because reevaluating his exit options was more important than who they might be.
But then the familiar, practiced signal came; the Buzz suddenly surging and just as suddenly dimming again, back down to the duller feel of only a few centuries instead of millennia, despite said Immortal's continued approach.
And Methos relaxed. "Nothing," he lied as he picked his beer up again.
Not because his student—the woman he'd considered family for nearly all of her existence—was any sort of threat to him. Because she'd never choose to be. But because her coming to find him at this bar rather than waiting for him at his apartment meant there was something wrong. Something that couldn't wait even that long.
The door opened then. He knew only because Joe's eyes darted that way, not because the faint squeak could be heard over the blues music that lent the bar most of its atmosphere.
"Friend of yours?" Joe asked uncertainly, the subtle crinkling of his brow betraying his worry at not recognizing the woman that was walking in and therefore not knowing if she wasn't a threat to the world's oldest Immortal. Or, indeed, if she was even the Immortal that the ancient had sensed.
"Yes," Methos answered without turning to look, not needing to.
Even if another Immortal had mastered the manipulation of their Quickening enough to do that—and it'd taken Felicitas centuries to come even close—he doubted there was anyone other than her old enough to have a Quickening that was both quite as powerful as hers was, and still have the undercurrent of calm that was wholly her.
The ancient queen probably had the most powerful Light Quickening the world would ever know. Her sweet, sincere personality when she was still new was enough to help Death find some small measure of peace himself in her presence alone, just like many mortal warriors had then and in the ages since. And with thousands of years for her power to build naturally—even with as few beheadings as she could manage thrown in. It was veritable force of nature. A true weapon, really, despite her rarely choosing to use it.
She let her heels click on the floor, her specific stride undisguised, till she stopped right next to him. The chair beside him clacked rather than scratching against the floor because she tilted and jerked it back to where she wanted it; just enough for her to climb onto it. "I'll have what he's having."
After the unnecessary confirmation of his oldest friend's voice, Methos finally looked at her as the bar's owner obliged.
She'd disguised herself, of course. She had that much common sense, so at least he wouldn't be working up a lecture on that.
The wig she was wearing was pure black, a lot darker than her natural shade, so mascara and eyeliner were also darkening her brows enough to make it realistic. And the long dark waves were shrouding her face just as much as the makeup.
Smoky make-up made it hard to tell if her eyes were blue; they could just as easily be green, gray or hazel.
The beauty mark on her lower cheek, positioned just right to augment her radiant smile if she chose to employ it, was as fake as the tattoo on the French-manicured hand she was accepting her drink with.
As was the faint scar line that was drawn across her throat... at least it'd better be. If it wasn't, it'd happened since the last time they'd met face-to-face a few months back, because it wasn't something he was capable of missing at a glance. Not there. And not when she was too old for a thin cut to leave a clear mark; for it to be real she would've needed to come much too close to losing her own head, or at the very least her vocal cords.
The heels made her height hard to distinguish on sight, though that was only part of the reason she abused her feet with them. She'd always been willing to bow to the strange aspect of society that 'beauty was pain,' telling him more than once that it was a part of blending in that a man wouldn't understand even when she wasn't set on seducing some monarch or other such leader.
A masterful disguise job that would throw the Watchers off almost as well as whatever device she had on her disabling their cameras and bugs would.
"Welcome to Seacover." Methos finally said, letting none of the questions his raised eyebrow implied leak into the laid back greeting. Though not quite able to keep the warmth of honest welcome absent even with Joe still standing opposite them.
"I'm not staying long," Felicity answered, nodding a polite dismissal to the bartender because she knew who, and what, he was. "Thank you, Mister Dawson."
For a non-Watcher—or one who wasn't friends with her brother—she probably would've played the pretense of meaningless chitchat about this and that until his attention was finally called elsewhere by either another bar patron or simply the fact that even a Watcher can only pretend they're not really listening to you for so long.
They both watched the bar's owner pretend he wasn't disappointed at the dismissal as he headed for the Researcher at the other end of the bar with a line of sight on the them and a tablet in hand. Though the fast way he his eyes were scanning the screen, thumbs flicking around as rapidly as a gamer's did on a console, told them he was already perusing the portable database by her characteristics.
Not that that would help them at all with every one of those characteristics—save for her skin color and slender, fit form—being fake. But if that didn't have them frowning soon, they'd still be scowling when they realized the tablet's camera wouldn't work right now.
Methos' favorite student was nothing if not thorough.
Felicity sighed, "I need your help."
"With?" he asked, hiding his amusement at all the trouble she was causing the mortal men with a sip of his beer.
"Training."
Methos cocked his head to the side as he set his beer back down. "You completed your training over twenty-seven centuries ago."
"Yes," she agreed with a barely-there grimace. "But they've come up with all these new toys since then."
"Like what?" He asked curiously.
"Electric stun batons." She wrinkled her nose a little. "I'm not used to dodging batons, but with electricity they hurt."
Methos was frowning long before she finished, but at the end it was closer to a scowl. "What happened?"
The disguised beauty took a sip of her own beer before admitting, "I may be a bit rusty."
"No," Methos immediately shook his head. "That's never your problem." He drained his own drink, setting the empty glass down on the counter to give Joe an excuse to wander over rather than trying to spy from afar.
Mostly because Felicity's disguise told him she remembered that his favorite hangout in Seacouver was a bar belonging to the head of the Watchers in North America, which meant none of their surveillance equipment would currently be working either. Might as well give him a couple bread crumbs. And it was a good test for just how 'rusty' she really wasn't.
"Your problem," he went on as Joe came over to take his time providing a refill. "Is that you don't like to hurt people."
"You always say that like it's a bad thing," Felicity sighed softly, voice soft but resolute as she added, "It's not going to change." Her eyes were studying the counter; both to avoid his gaze and hide the real eye-color from the Watcher. Her disguise only shrouded her eyes with shadows and heavy make-up, rather than changing it with the color contacts that she'd never been able to wear for long. "Never has, never will."
"I know," Methos snagged his new drink to take a gulp, ignoring the Watcher who was cleaning the bar next to him. "So what happened?"
"I froze," the answer was flatly matter-of-fact and almost uninformative.
"And?"
"Found out a knock-out voltage from a tazer to the heart'll stun me long enough for someone to grab me."
There was more to it than that, obviously, but Felicity wasn't going to go into specifics with a stranger listening in, even if said stranger was someone she knew was her teacher's friend. Though that distinction wasn't one he'd granted many mortals, far less than she had, Joe Dawson hadn't done anything to earn her trust yet.
"I told you about the hunters—"
"So I might take mortal threats more seriously," Felicity finished, shrugging as she took another sip from her beer. "Didn't work, I guess."
"And you won't leave your current life behind."
It wasn't a question.
If the answer was that simple, she would've done it already. She would've sent him a courtesy note via text or email that—once he found his way through whatever codes her sometimes frighteningly brilliant brain decided to spell it out through—would tell him where she happened to be moving to.
But she wouldn't move if she found her current identity too worthwhile, or if she'd taken a new lover she couldn't convince to come with her. Or both. Sometimes it was a little more complicated than that, occasionally an adopted child or a civilization's wellbeing were involved. But somehow the first two were always the key raison d'être.
Even before her last relationship had ended in betrayal, agony and nightmares, Methos had always had a hard time with that facet of his dearest student's nature. But it wasn't something he could change anymore than he could abandon his sister to the end it could bring her if there was any way he could prevent it.
Methos' code of honor was very different from the Highlander's—both of them—but he did actually have one. Buried deep down at times, yes, but some morals were (at times unfortunately) there.
"No," she confirmed unnecessarily. "I can't."
"And your current lover's no help?"
"We're not..." Felicity pursed her lips, reigning her tongue in, then took another sip of the world's most popular poison, before answering. "We're not there yet. He doesn't know."
Methos knew he should've expected that. He'd gone through more than a few lifetimes without telling any of his temporary lovers that fact after all. There was no reason to tell a woman he wasn't going to marry, after all. But he still couldn't keep the critical cynicism out of his voice as he answered, "That worked so well for you last time."
"That's not..." she trailed off again, but shook her head quickly. "That doesn't have anything to do with this."
"It's the first time you've been interested in someone enough to not deny it since that," he had to point out.
Maybe he shouldn't be referring to it. Bringing that utter disaster up now that she was finally starting to really move on. He hadn't been the one on the stake, after all... but he had had to briefly watch her burn. Again.
And he'd been the one to free her body from it. Again.
At least that first time, when she'd followed in her mother's footsteps to leave her first life behind, the poison she'd swallowed beforehand had dulled her senses to the initial heat and killed her before the real burns began searing her flesh. The time after that he hadn't arrived in time to watch, but that didn't make the sight of her more recent pyre any easier to bear.
There had been no mercy then. Even the crowd that'd wanted to save her but couldn't, hadn't been any help. Methos was sure Felicitas felt guilty for those that'd died in that mob scene, personally he'd been more bothered by the hindrance they'd been at the time. Her brave efforts to hide her pain had seared just as deeply as her screams when she couldn't hold them back a moment longer. And making his way through the frenzy and chaos hadn't made reaching her burning body any easier than the soldiers there to make sure the execution was carried out.
Of course, such things shouldn't be mentioned, or even really thought about in front of observant Watchers. Particularly Joe Dawson, who could read some of the reactions Methos couldn't entirely suppress. Who was studying those reactions because he didn't know the disguised beauty well enough to read her minimal reactions and couldn't read very much between the lines of their deliberately vague dialogue.
"It's more complicated than that," Felicity insisted finally, though her voice was more tired than persuasive.
"It always it," Methos reminded her, watching as she took an unladylike—and therefore very unusual—gulp of her own beer.
"Are you going to help or not?"
Methos contemplated his drink for several seconds, enjoying the simplicity of it now just as much as he had when he first sampled its early ancestor millennia ago. Then he drained the whole stein in several long gulps, placing the empty glass back on the bar before he answered, "I guess we have work to do." He nodded to the Watcher as he set the empty glass on the bar again. "Thanks, Joe."
"Aren't you gonna introduce us?" the Watcher surprised him only a little by actually asking.
Though it was unnecessary confirmation that what the Watcher on the computer at the end of the bar had told Joe before he'd wandered over was that the female Immortal's image still wasn't anywhere in their database.
"I'm Alyssa," the lady lied with a forced smile that told her teacher just how hard it'd been to make herself come here.
Joe accepted her handshake over the bar, but didn't let her hand go after the requisite up and down. "That's not your name, is it?"
Her smile was more real, more that vibrant room-lighting look that'd brought warlords and kings alike to their knees, as she admitted. "No more than his is Adam," she admitted, tugging just a little to free her hand from the old man's gentle grasp. "But it's nice to finally meet you, Mister Dawson."
"I'll say the same when it's true, Miss," was the Watcher's reply, delivered evenly even as he blinked in the face of that beautiful smile.
"Well," Methos nodded towards the side door that didn't have cameras watching it from the outside, because she'd probably come in that way earlier deliberately. If whatever disabling devices she had only worked within a certain range she wouldn't make the mistake of using an entrance with two cameras on the opposite side of the street pointed towards this front door. Which was only one of the reasons Methos, and his student, would prefer that more inconspicuous entrance. "Places to go. Good night, Joe."
Of course it was child's play to lose the two Field Watchers that were waiting to follow them outside.
NEXT: Deadly Dances.
Because every step matters, every time...