Revelations
The first hints of Spring were in the air as Connor set up the saw table out on the lawn, by a large stack of wood planks resting on the ground where they'd been offloaded the day before. It was still a little chilly here in the mountains but Connor wanted to get the dock in as soon as the spring rains were finished and the ground firmed up enough for construction work.
He finished setting up the saw table and supports, then poured himself a coffee as Trent's car made an appearance, tearing up the drive to stop at the front of the house. "About time you got here!" The immortal called out good-naturedly as the younger man stepped out of the car. "Melissa keep you up all night did she?"
"Half it, and the morning," Trent replied with a wide grin and wink at the older man. He tugged his jacket on, the colder mountain air cutting through his shirt quickly once he was out of the warm cabin of the car. "Timber all arrive OK?" he asked, eying the large stack of it on the ground near where Connor was setting up. "Is that just the decking, or the pylons too?" Connor had described the structure to him and Trent had managed to pick up most of what the man was talking about but had figured he'd be learning a whole heap more once they started so didn't get into the nitty-gritty when they were chatting.
"Just the decking," Connor confirmed, pouring a second cup from the thermos and handing it to Trent as the younger man reached him. "The pylons will be delivered next week and I'll have the pros pound those into place, no sense doing that ourselves."
"How was the drive up?"
"Yeah, that parts definitely something for the guys with the big machines that do that!" Trent agreed, taking the coffee and nodding his thanks before taking a mouthful. "Good, bit of traffic down the bottom of the mountain, usual tourists and stuff, but thinned out the further up the mountains." He looked around appreciatively and inhaled deeply, the cold mountain air filling his lungs before he exhaled loudly. "Nothing like the fresh mountain air to wake you up though!" he laughed before taking another mouthful.
"So... what's the job today, boss?" he asked, fully aware of how little he still knew about tools the likes of which Connor had said they'd be using. He'd gotten better, more familiar with hand tools, but the power saws and things Connor had been setting up were still completely foreign to him.
"The job today will be marking, cutting, and stacking planks." Connor pointed to a set of two by fours on the ground. "We'll stack them over there and cover it with a tarp until we're ready to use them."
He took a sip of his coffee and then continued. "I've set the saw up out here since the weather's nice for this time of year. What I'll want you to do is help me out with handling the boards, I'll do most of the cutting."
"Sounds easy enough!" Trent replied enthusiastically, taking another sip of the hot coffee. "Reckon those things could make a mess of you real quick if you turned your back on them or lost your grip. Happy to be down the back end of it all, away from the fast spinning sharp bits for the time being. Don't want to have to explain to Cassandra why I'm needing some sort of new, special keyboard any time soon... or at all come to think of it!" he joked.
"You wouldn't have to explain anything. It'd be me who'd have to watch his head if you were hurt on my watch." Connor pointed out with dark humor. Cassandra was like a mother bear protecting her cub when it came to Trent, and he didn't even want to think about what the older immortal's reaction would be if Trent were hurt or, god forbid, killed and he was responsible.
Trent laughed, looking at the older man and nodding. "Yeah, guess you're right. She'd probably be a bit pissed at you if she suddenly had to try and deal with the computers herself," he chuckled. "She doesn't seem to like them very much, but likes what they can do," he mused, wondering not for the first time what it was about them that Cassandra didn't like. With her money and background Trent had thought she'd be much more familiar with them, but it was like she just didn't want to use them, or something, but needed what they could do. "Not sure what it is, just... you know... weird sometimes."
Connor shrugged and smiled in response to Trent's unasked question. "Cassandra is...Cassandra. Don't try and figure out what makes her tick, it's impossible. Finish your coffee and we'll get started."
Before long they had a stack of boards marked up for cutting and Connor fired up the saw. "Stick with me and I'll have you expert in all kinds of tools besides screwdrivers and circuit boards."
"Yeah, so I've learned," Trent replied. A small grunt followed as he helped Connor pick up one of the large pieces of timber that was going to yield three planks for the deck of the jetty. The gloves he was wearing were a little large and he gripped the plank tightly to hold it in place on the saw horses as Connor edged it forward till the marks were in the right place for the saw to do its work. As the first plank was liberated the timber shifted and Trent held it in place as Connor took the cut piece and laid it onto the crossbars they'd put in place already for the purpose of stacking the final pieces on. This continued until the three planks lay side by side, identical in length and the remnant was put in another pile next to the original one. "One down, a truckload more to go!" Trent said as they went to fetch another piece.
Connor laughed as they placed the next plank on the sawhorses. "We'll be done before you know it and down at the bar knocking back beers in celebration of a hard day's work, just wait and see."
Trent nodded, his bottom lip caught between his teeth as he balanced the large piece of heavy timber on the saw horse, pushing his hands into the gloves to help him keep a better grip. They kept working, stopping after about an hour to have another cup of coffee, then getting back into it again. Trent could feel his muscles were going to be aching the next day, his arms and back already starting to feel the strain of the intensely physical work which he wasn't used to. He realized he hadn't done much in the way of working out, and commented on it to Connor as they retrieved another plank and carried it over to the saw. "Didn't realize how much I miss the beach, or the convenience of it," he added. "Whenever I was feeling like I needed a run I'd just go down there and off I went. It's a bit different, actually living in a city. I mean, there's running tracks and bike tracks and the like, but mostly they're down round the lake and not exactly ... on the front door step." He gave a dry laugh before adding, "yeah, yeah, I know, just excuses, but yeah, am beginning to realize that having the beach literally on your front doorstep was a real plus!"
"There's no substitute for the beach itself," Connor mused as they set the plank down and manhandled it into position, "but it's no excuse for letting yourself go Trent. You never know when it can come in handy for more than impressing the ladies." Of course, that was literally true in Connor's case. It had been some time since he'd been forced to take a head, but immortals had to be in a constant state of readiness unless they lived on holy ground and never ventured from it.
"Still, I can't deny that beachfront living has its perks," he smirked at the younger man and then started to push the board into the saw.
"Yeah, because the scenery on the beach? Real special, especially in summer!" Trent replied with a knowing grin and wink. "And dogs, man, they're the best thing to run with! Used to take the neighbor's lab with me sometimes and I tell you, not once did that girl manage to pull some lovely lady's attention!" As he pushed the log forward for Connor to position for the next cut as Connor laughed then donned his safety goggles and earplugs again, a knot on the underneath of the piece caught on the saw horse and tilted it, the angle of the ground making the log slip toward the side where Connor was standing. Trent tried to hold it from where he was, the gloves conspiring to give him the least grip as they slipped on his hands. He yelled over the sound of the saw Connor had just started up again, the log perilously close to the man's leg.
Connor turned, twisting to see what the noise was and looked at Trent, not seeing the angle of the horse until too late, the timber tipping it past the point of no return and landing fair square in the middle of his shin, knocking him to the ground. His leg was already twisted and the break was clearly visible to Trent as he watched Connor go down.
"Fuck!" Trent took a tighter hold of the plank, the gloves no longer matter much and tired muscles forgetting their weariness as the adrenaline shot through his body and he lifted the plank up, levering it from on Connor's leg and tossing it away from the two of them. The heavy timber hit the soft dirt with a thud but Trent didn't really register it other than to know it was now out of the way. He scrambled up to where Connor was laying on the ground, his leg outstretched and his foot at a particularly unhealthy angle.
"Connor! Stay still, I'll call an ambulance!" His hands were already scrambling for his jacket pocket before he realized he'd taken it off when they had stopped for the coffee.
"Trent, don't." Connor ordered after a moment. The immortal was still white faced from the pain, but had recovered enough of his wits after the initial shock and flash of pain to stop the younger man from calling the first responders. He forced himself to sit up and look at the leg, the break clearly visible and foot twisted in an unnatural angle. It was bad, but he'd had worse in his nearly five centuries in the world. It could be fixed.
"Help me set the bone."
"What?? Wait, no!" Trent said, eyes wide with shock as he stared at Connor's leg then looked at the man. "Stay still, keep it still, and I'll call Cassandra, she'll get them up here real quick!" he said, knowing she had ways of making things happen that he didn't always understand, but had been impressed by. "We need to immobilize it... get it elevated," he continued, scrambling toward his jacket and returning to where Connor was lying. He finally found his phone and dropped it as he bunched his jacket up to put behind Connor's head.
"Trent, drop the damn phone and help me set the bone." Connor told him, his face tight with pain and a little anger with the younger man's panic. "Everything will be fine and I'll explain, but for now help me set the bone. We'll call Cassandra afterward if you want."
Trent had picked his phone up again and was pressing the quick dial to call Cassandra as Connor spoke. He could hear the phone call being made, the sounds easily identifiable. "Sure, OK, but I'll just tell Cassandra," he said, the woman's voice audible on the phone still sitting in Trent's hand between them. He lifted it to his ear.
"Hi, Cassandra, it's me," he said rather pointlessly as she would have been able to tell from the ring tone itself, Trent having set it to 'Top Gun' for his number as a joke. "Uh, things aren't going real good right now," he said in response to her question, her voice already sounding somewhat concerned. "Connor's had an accident, his leg's badly broken, and he needs an ambulance. Can you call one? He wants me to help him set it so if you could do that..." His voice trailed off as Cassandra spoke, Trent's face clearly exhibiting the surprise that he felt as she told him in a tone that afforded no protest to do exactly what Connor told him and she would be there as soon as she could. He stared at Connor and then the phone in his hand as she ended the call abruptly.
Despite the pain, Connor had to laugh at the expression on Trent's face. The kid was completely out of his realm of understanding, people weren't acting like he would expect rational people to and it didn't make any sense to him. "It'll be all right Trent," he assured the younger man, "I'll explain everything, afterward."
Trent nodded numbly, looking from Connor's face down toward the man's leg and back again. "So... what do I have to do?" he asked, swallowing hard before shoving his phone back in his pocket.
"Hold my leg still and I'll push the bone back into place," Connor told him, trying to portray a calmness he didn't truly feel. "Put your hands here," he gestured, "and I'll do the rest." He'd had plenty of experience over the years setting broken bones on both mortal and immortal alike, this was no different. The only complication was that Trent didn't have a clue what was going on. "If I pass out afterward, just leave me be, I'll only be out a few minutes at most."
Once Trent did what he was told, Connor grunted as he shifted to get to the broken bone. The immortal grit his teeth against the pain as he reached down to grasp his foot, then yelped as he pulled the limb back to the correct angle, then pushed down to set the bone in place. His vision went gray, and he passed out.
The sound was one Trent would never forget, the ends of the bone grinding against one another as Connor pulled his leg back straight. Trent's stomach churned, his skin feeling clammy, more a result of the shock than anything else, but the young man not knowing as he'd never seen anything like this before. He swallowed, hard, a few times, staring down as he waited. With no little trepidation he shifted down till he was at Connor's foot, the man still and unconscious. Concerned about an open wound he gingerly lifted the hem of the pants leg, already a little surprised at the small amount of blood. It was nothing though compared to what he did see. A flickering blue light, like some sort of electrical spark, flashed in the darkness against Connor's shin. Trent dropped the cuff as if the spark had shocked him, falling back on his butt and hands and staring at Connor again. His jaw snapped shut as he sorted himself out, a stream of questions all stacking up. He had no idea how long he sat there, but the slow rise and fall of Connor's chest gave him some small measure of comfort, or at least stopped him from calling the paramedics himself.
Connor wasn't sure how long he was out, but when he regained consciousness the pain was gone save from a lingering soreness and a mild headache. The immortal mumbled to himself in his native Gaelic and sat up, glancing over at a gray faced Trent. "You look like you could use a drink, laddie," Connor told the younger man with a chuckle, and rubbed his face. "Hell, I could use a drink. Come on inside and I'll tell you whatever you want to know."
He pushed himself up and got onto his feet, testing the healed leg gingerly. Satisfied it was healed enough to walk on, he started toward the house and the booze inside.
Trent's eyes nearly fell out of his head when Connor stood up, his jaw falling down and mouth left agape again. "Connor... your... " Words failed him and he scrambled to his feet as the older man walked away toward the house.
Inside the door Trent stopped, Connor already pulling a bottle out of the cabinet and turning to him. "Connor... what the hell is going on??" he finally spewed out, his own mind beginning to question what his eyes had seen earlier, and what he was watching now.
"What do you think is going on, Trent?" Connor asked as he poured the young man a glass of scotch and sliding it over to him, then pouring himself a glass as well, setting the bottle on the table between them and sitting down.
"You've seen a lot of clues, lad, all you have to do is add them up."
"Clues?" Trent replied after taking a large mouthful of the scotch and only wincing slightly as it made its way down his throat. The heat of the liquor seemed to kickstart his questions. "Clues about what? I mean... your leg was broken, Connor. I saw it, it was ... broken!, And the sound, as you straightened it, that was something I don't want to hear again in a hurry. But Connor... what was that... that... blue electricity stuff? What are you???"
"Heh, that's an interesting question laddie," Connor smirked, and knocked back the contents of his glass before setting it down and looking straight at the younger man with a serious expression. "I am Connor MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod. I was born in 1518 in Glenfinnan, near the shores of Loch Shiel, and I am immortal."
The words settled into Trent's mind but they weren't exactly making a whole lot of sense. "1518? Immortal?" he repeated, staring at Connor. There was no mistaking the stunned expression on his face. "As in... can't die kinda thing, right?"
"More or less," Connor decided not to go into the details on how immortals could be killed. "Let's just say there's no way I can die a natural death of old age or disease and leave it at that for now. I've been alive four hundred ninety one years and seen the best and worst of what humanity has to offer in that time."
Something clicked in Trent's mind and he looked at Connor, eyes narrowing. "And Cassandra knows this, right? I mean, she told me to just do as you said, and she was coming up. So she knew you'd be able to... heal yourself, or whatever it is you did!"
"Cassandra knows, yes." Connor poured himself another scotch and took a sip. Cassandra's secret was hers to tell, it wasn't his place. "As for healing...I'll heal from just about any injury, or 'die' and revive soon after. It isn't pleasant, but it is what it is."
"Die?! And revive!" Trent's voice almost squeaked, but he coughed and cleared his throat when he realised it. "Man, you're telling me you actually die if like... you're shot, or stabbed, or whatever... but ... you heal?" he said, his mind working through it all and coming up with the answer himself but needing confirmation. It wasn't something you learned about someone every day. Or ever, really. "How? How did you get to be like this? I mean... 1518? It obviously isn't some scientific experiment, or whatever..."
"I don't know, no one does." Connor told him simply, "I was mortally wounded in battle with the Frasiers by an immortal named the Kurgan in 1536, but my kinsmen got me away before he could finish the job. When I miraculously healed in a day from a wound that should have killed me, I was run out of my village and forced to go into exile." His eyes were haunted as he related the tale, in many ways that event would follow him until the day he died.
"I've been something of a world traveler ever since."
"Wait. Another one? How did you know he was one too? I mean... are immortals common in Scotland or something?" He was joking, in an attempt to keep on top of the things he was being told.
"Not particularly, but I do have a kinsman roughly seventy-five years younger than myself." Connor smirked, though the smile didn't reach his eyes. "The Kurgan was a sadistic bastard, looking to kill off younger immortals before they had a chance to be trained to defend themselves. He was very powerful, but we settled scores in 1985. I'm still breathing, he's not."
"OK, this powerful thing, I... " He paused as he remembered the flickering blue that traveled across the skin of Connor's leg. He told Connor what he'd seen while Connor had been unconscious. "What was that? I mean... you weren't plugged into anything, so... it came from in you?"
"That's right, we call it 'the quickening'. Don't ask me how it works, I don't know. It just does."
Trent nodded slowly, repeating the word. "Quickening," he murmured. He fell silent as he processed what Connor had told him, pulling it all together and taking another mouthful of his drink. "And Cassandra knows all about this," he murmured, something nudging at his mind but there still being too much for him to take any notice of yet another thing. "So that makes you... wow, really old!" He grinned as he looked at Connor. "That must feel weird."
"Not exactly." Connor shrugged and finished his drink. "Makes me cynical sometimes, or long for the 'good old days' when it wasn't so easy to track people around the world at the click of a button, but most of the time it's no different from anyone else."
"I guess I am old, but only in comparison with mortals. My first teacher was over two thousand years old, the Kurgan was nearly three thousand when I killed him."
That made Trent's eyes widen again but it was what Connor had said first that had his mind ticking over. The comments about finding information out at the click of a button, and his eyes narrowed as he looked at Connor.
"Yeah, it is. And that's what I do... for Cassandra... hey... !" It was clear his mind was now whirring at high speed. "This thing I've been doing for her, finding out stuff, and things that happen... is that anything to do with you? And what you are?" he asked, small pieces starting to look like they might fit together.
"It is, but I'll let Cassandra fill in the details as it's her project," he looked at the younger man and decided he could go a little further. "I'm sorry you had to find out this way Trent, I wanted to tell you earlier but Cassandra insisted that I wait and I respected her wishes."
"Waited? Why?" Trent asked, puzzled a little, but starting to recover from the initial shock. "And why'd you want to tell me anyway? I mean, except for today and that timber, I'd still not know, and really, what difference does it make?" Even before he finished saying it things started to click. "Well, yeah, can guess it has been tough sometimes, to kinda not let things slip," he added with a grin.
"You have no idea!" Connor replied feelingly. "I wanted to tell you because you've become a good friend and you're part of the 'family' as far as Cassandra is concerned." It wasn't entirely the truth, but he couldn't exactly tell Trent that without telling the lad that he was a pre-immortal, and that would send Cassandra through the roof.
He checked his watch. Assuming Cassandra had left as soon as Trent called her, the older immortal should be arriving any minute.
"Thanks," Trent replied, appreciating the acceptance, and feeling a strange little feeling of 'belonging'. "She's been good to me, and my sister, since we met and I hope I can live up to what she expects," he continued, aware that he seemed to have been doing so to date, but wanting to make sure he kept that up.
It wasn't too much after that there was the familiar sound of tires crunching on the drive and Trent looked across at Connor. "Guess we know who that is, hey?" he said, downing the rest of the scotch in his glass. "Should I make myself scarce for a few minutes?" he asked, standing up. "Need to make a visit to the bathroom anyway...."
"If you want," Connor didn't care one way or the other, but in reality he probably would need to speak to Cassandra privately for a few minutes and was pleased the younger man recognized that. The buzz of her quickening proceeded Cassandra into the house and he greeted her with a raised scotch glass when she stormed in.
"Cassandra. I'm sure the sun is over the yardarm someplace, care for a drink?" He figured the best way to lighten the mood was to joke about it.
Cassandra stared at Connor and looked around for Trent. Hearing the panic in the young man's voice had triggered her centuries old instinct to protect, and Milo had driven them up the mountain with only a safe arrival in mind, disregarding all potential traffic violations at his mistress's unnecessary instruction to do so.
She crossed the room to Connor, his presence clearly identifiable to her even before she'd entered the cabin. "How are you?" she asked, "and where's Trent?"
"Using the bathroom, and I'm fine." He lifted the fabric of his pants leg to reveal the dried blood that was the only sign of the injury. "He helped me set the break and I passed out. Once I came to I figured we could both use a drink. Good kid, he didn't panic too much, considering. He's full of questions, that one."
She studied Connor's leg quickly then glanced across toward the hall that led to the bathroom. Her voice was low but intense. "So... what does he know?" she asked after letting out a sigh that spoke of pent up concern and a little frustration. While she didn't even begin to think that Connor had done this on purpose, it had removed things from her control and she didn't like that sort of thing. But she was also dealing with it, having had the journey up the mountain to to come to terms with it. "He has an inquiring mind, so it's not really a surprise," she sighed, sitting down where Trent had been and pouring herself a drink.
"He knows about me: how old I am, where I'm from, a bit about quickenings and that there are others out there." Connor's tone was careful. He knew Cassandra wasn't happy about it, but there was nothing that could be helped about it now. "He guessed the general idea of the project he's working on for you, but I told him that he'd have to ask you the rest of it."
The younger immortal dropped his voice to a low murmur. "He doesn't know you are immortal as well."
She nodded, the scotch slowly trickling down her throat. "Thanks," she murmured in response, leaning back in the chair and rubbing her forehead for a moment. "Well, I guess if he had to find out this was the best way, and breaks the ground, so to speak," she admitted, looking from Connor down into the glass and the slowly swirling clear amber liquid in the bottom of it. "How did he handle it? I mean, when you told him, did he believe you?" She knew it was not likely for him to argue it, he'd never been argumentative, rather just being very inquisitive when something grabbed his attention. And this would be enough to grab anyone's attention.
"He did," Connor confirmed. "Took it remarkably well, all things considered. I don't know if I would have as easily if someone had told me and I'd been mortal. Probably would have considered him a devil. These are more enlightened times I guess, for all that's been lost with all this newfangled technology maybe that much has been gained."
"Yes, these days the abnormal are almost normal and the rest of us? Well we're just there too," she mused, glancing across to the hallway again and wondering just exactly what was going on in Trent's mind with this revelation. "I guess it's a blessing in disguise," she continued, the glass in her fingers absently being slowly twirled as she thought.
"A blessing?" Connor grimaced as the memory of the break and the pain associated with it still quite fresh in his mind. "I suppose so. The question is how much more do you want to tell him. You've wanted him protected from the knowledge all this time and you've had your reasons, but the time is coming when he'll have to know everything. Maybe it would be better to tell him now."
Cass's eyes flew up to meet Connor's, then darted across to the door and back again. "Everything?" she returned, voice low. "You mean everything about us, the both of us? Or everything entirely?" she asked, eyes never leaving his.
"About the both of us," Connor nodded and knocked back the rest of his scotch, putting the empty glass down on the table. "If he puts two and two together and guesses about himself, we shouldn't deny it. I'd recommend telling him about what he is, but if you still want to hold off on that I'll respect your wishes."
Her jaw tightened as she held Connor's eyes for a long moment, then lowered them to the glass in her fingers. Lips that had thinned as she thought parted as she lifted the glass and drank down the amber liquid.
"It will depend on how he takes the news about us," she said, only to hear a door open and turn to see Trent's bulk fill the doorway.
"What news?" the young man asked, looking from one to the other and back to Cass. "What, you two getting married or something?" he asked, grinning and giving Connor a wink, but wondering as he had done the whole time in the bathroom about the two of them in a different way.
Cass managed not to snort, or splutter, the absurdity of the question lending a lighter tone to the atmosphere that had thickened in the cabin in Trent's absence. "Us? Married?" she laughed and shook her head. "Why ruin a perfectly good friendship, hmm?" she continued, looking across at Connor as she spoke. "One that's lasted so long," she added, giving him a look that told him she was willing to go this next step but would see what happened with that.
She patted the table where an empty chair was standing beneath it. "Come, sit down, there are some things you need to hear and it might be easier if you're seated first," she told him, Trent eying her, then Connor as he crossed the room to join the two others.
"I take it you know about Connor, and ... his ... leg," he said, his voice trailing off a little as he realized from the look on her face that she not only knew about that but probably a lot more.
"Yes Trent, I know about Connor, his leg, and probably every other part of him a lot better than you might imagine," she said, a small twinkle in her eye showing as she glanced at Connor than looked back at Trent. "As I've known him for... oh... four centuries?" she said simply, looking at Connor for confirmation.
"A bit under four, but whats a few decades between friends?" Connor smiled back, trying not to laugh at Trent's reaction to their words. The lad was doing a fine imitation of a fish, sitting there with his mouth opening and closing as he looked between the two immortals, no sound coming out.
"She's well preserved for an old lady of more than three thousand, don't you think? I told you I'm by no means the oldest among the immortals." He watched Trent closely, wanting to make sure he could catch the lad if he fainted or some other odd reaction to the news. Everyone tended to react in a different way, and it had been decades since he'd last told anyone his secrets.
Trent indeed sat there open-mouthed, his eyes traveling from one to the other. The simple revelation was enough to make him blink a number of times, words lost in the enormity of it all.
"Three thousand is probably being kind," Cassandra suggested, seeing Trent was struggling a little. She reached over and patted his arm for a moment, wishing there was someway this could be done that wouldn't send the young man into a spin, but knowing it was impossible.
"My first memories are of a time now called the Bronze Age, and I was raised by a wonderful, caring man, Hijad, who was the tribe's healer," she continued. She knew Trent's mind gobbled up information, similar to what his programs were designed to do, so she kept a steady stream of it going, helping draw the picture, albeit brief, of her life. She left out the part about the Four Horsemen, figuring 'horror stories' weren't going to help much right now. That could come later, once the lad had had time to become comfortable with the concept.
"When I met Connor I had already lived, and died, for three thousand years," she continued, telling of how she had met the dashing young sea captain at the ball that night.
"When I sensed him it had been a number of years since I'd come across one of us, and to find that it was a kinsman of the young Duncan Macleod... well, that was fate," she said with a warm smile.
Trent had sat back in his chair, arms folded across his body as he listened, slowly letting them fall till his hands rested in his lap, his palms sometimes being rubbed up and down his thighs being the only outward sign of his state of mind.
"And this other one, Duncan, he's your... well, sort of brother," Trent said, looking at Connor. He was trying to relate with words that he was beginning to understand weren't really suitable, but there wasn't any others he could think of right then. "I mean... kinsman. He's still alive?" he asked.
"He's a kinsman, something of a cousin as we're both of the Clan MacLeod, and very much alive. 'Same Clan, different Vintage' is how one of us put it a few times, and you would definitely be able to tell by personality." He glanced at Cassandra and noted her knowing smile at the differences he alluded to.
"I know this must be something of a shock laddie, imagine how it was on our end when it happened to us!" Connor briefly outlined his first meeting with Ramirez and how the older immortal had taken the Scotsman and taught him what he needed to know to survive as an immortal.
Cassandra remained quiet about how she learnt of her own immortality. Instead she focused on Trent and his reactions, eying him thoughtfully as he asked Connor questions and received the answers. She was happy for the back and forth to continue, knowing it would be helpful, even critical, in the future for Trent to have complete trust in Connor. Too often she'd found that revealing the truth to a pre-immortal had been too much for them to even contemplate, let alone accept without a fight, and she didn't want that to happen with Trent.
Gauging when the right time was to tell him was going to be a completely different issue, especially with the friendship he and Connor had struck up. But it would still be a dicey thing. She knew only too well how even the best laid plans could turn to dust in a few seconds with the wrong word or action.
A comfortable silence fell when Trent's questions finally slowed, his mind now with so much to work through. She was about to speak when the young man suddenly spoke up again.
"Why didn't you tell me about this before?" he asked, eyes rising again to meet Cassandra's and holding hers steadily.
"There was never a time that seemed right, or even necessary," she told him, hoping he would see that it was true. "Believe me, there were times I did consider it, given the work I've been having you do, as it would have saved me a lot of 'padding' to disguise the real target of my research. But my experience has been that unless necessary most people react badly when they're told out of the blue, demanding evidence and still being distrustful even when it's presented. Today's accident, although painful for Connor, has served a greater purpose," she added, reaching over and giving Connor's arm a gentle squeeze.
"Believe me, if it had been up to Connor he would have told you earlier," she added, then realized too late that that was probably something Trent hadn't needed to know, that they had discussed when to tell him.
"What? Why? You mean you two've talked about telling me?" he asked, looking a little confused.
"One reason would be that it's easier to look for the information Cassandra wanted if you knew the truth," Connor told him honestly after a brief annoyed look at Cassandra for letting that peice of information slip. "You had to wonder why she was having you research according to the parameters you were, right?"
He took another long look at Cassandra and inwardly cursed that she'd let that peice of information slip. If she didn't want the boy told then they needed to be careful with how much information they gave him about their time since they'd met him. "Another was that I like you Trent, you've become a good friend and I don't like keeping secrets from friends I think can handle the truth. There are very few people in the last five centuries I've told that secret to, if I hadn't thought you could handle it I would have come up with some other explanation."
There was also the cold, unspoken, truth that if Connor had thought Trent to be a threat to his survival the young man would have been dead before he could dial the phone.
Inside Cass had felt her stomach drop when she realized that Trent would of course want to know why they had discussed what and when to tell him. She was eternally grateful to Connor for not having told him, knowing it was going against his own thoughts on the issue. She paused as she waited for Trent's reaction.
"You mean your leg?" Trent asked, looking at Connor. He huffed a small laugh. "Not sure whatever else you came up with would be much different to what you've told me," he replied, thinking back at what he'd seen. "Though I guess the whole healing thing? That could have been something that was a standalone kinda thing, sorta like you know, electrons etc all just realigning and repairing in any bits that are damaged, without the whole immortality gig," he conceded, realizing that what they had told him was about as unbelievable as anything else could be if he hadn't actually seen what had happened to Connor.
"And thanks," he added. "Thanks for telling me." He looked at Connor. "It really did hurt, didn't it?"
Cass breathed a silent sigh of relief and gave Connor a look of gratitude that the immortal had averted a potentially difficult situation, though it did of course leave her with having to explain at a later time just why they hadn't told him the whole story right there and then. But that was something she was willing to deal with when the time came. And it would come, she knew that, and it still worried her.
"It always hurts," she answered in Connor's place, deciding there was a small concession she could make that might help assuage Connor's anger at her not telling Trent the complete truth. "Just the same as it would hurt anyone," she added. "We might be immortal but we're still the same when it comes to pain and strength. And physical skills. If we let them fade, for example sword fighting, then we're in a dangerous situation if we come across another of our kind who is intent on taking our head, and therefore our Quickening." She gave Connor a quick, small smile.
"And you could learn how to fight, with Connor, and help him keep his skill up, and me too I guess," she said, realizing that it was necessary to be seen to be living up to the expectation they'd set up of an immortal needing to be a skilled swordsman. Her 'voice' wasn't something that would help Trent, unless she was there on the day he was confronted and that wasn't something she could count on. The day would come when he would be faced with a challenge and she knew Connor was right that he needed to be trained.
"So you can play 'Dungeons and Dragons' for real, instead of with a mouse and keyboard thing," she added, giving Trent a wide smile and purposefully avoiding the glare she knew would be coming from Connor.
And glare he did. There were few times in the nearly four centuries he'd known Cassandra that he wanted to throttle her to within an inch of her life, and this was one of them. Between slipping up and nearly forcing him to tell Trent about the lad's own pending immortality and then the 'Dungeons and Dragons' quip he had to stop and mentally count to ten.
Sometimes she knew just how to push his buttons.
"Aye, it'll be fun to train a new student in the art of the sword." Not to mention a challenge, since until the lad's first death he'd heal just as poorly from sword wounds as any other mortal. Still, Connor found himself forgiving Cassandra at least partially for the D&D crack.
"Unless we want to live our lives out on holy ground we need to stay prepared. I usually train every day, even if just a heavy workout and katas, but I try to spend time with the sword whenver I can. It's one reason I chose this place," Connor gestured to the walls of the rennovated and expanded farmhouse and by extension the rest of the property itself. "Out here I can do more or less whatever I want, the sounds of swordplay don't carry far and there's no one within sight of the property."
"Right!" Trent hadn't ever wondered why Connor had chosen this place in the mountains. The waterfront had been enough of an attraction and he understood how the man had wanted the privacy but now it made even more sense.
"So... you'll teach me?" he asked, looking at Connor. "I'd really like to learn," he added, the idea at first strange, but becoming more exciting than he'd expected.
"I'd be happy to, but don't expect me to take it easy on you because I'm your friend." Connor wanted to make sure the younger man understood what was expected of him. "If I train you you'll do as I say with a minimum of griping, and the first few months will be hard on you, but by fall you should start to get the hang of things." It helped that Trent was already in good shape, but that wasn't the same as being in sword fighting shape.
Trent nodded, slowly at first but with a little more enthusiasm. "Then I might be of more use, huh?" he suggested. "Just better make sure I don't lose any digits or anything in the process, or might make my boss a little unhappy," he added, giving Cass a grin. The female immortal gave him a wry smile, the idea of Trent losing any part of himself before his first death something she wasn't wanting to even contemplate. The saving grace was that Connor wouldn't risk anything like that, knowing the consequences would be something not worth considering.
"You'd just get in voice recognition software or whatever it is you were talking about the other night and be back on the job in no time!" she said lightly, hiding the real concern she felt beneath the well-practiced veneer. "And on that note... " She stood up, Trent doing so also as she did. "If I can trust you two on your own I will return home as I have dinner plans that I don't need to cancel now I know things are... all settled here."
Trent was tempted to ask if she was having dinner with Radek but resisted, deciding it probably wasn't his place to ask right there and then.
An eyebrow quirked in mild curiosity to the 'dinner plans' comment but Connor left the statement alone. Cassandra was a big girl, nearly ten times his age in fact, whatever she decided to do he was certain she could look after herself. "Have fun," he told the older immortal. "I promise he'll keep all his body parts intact. Not necessarily unbruised or un-sprained, but intact."
A contemplative look at the younger man and Connor stood up as well. "In fact, I think we've had enough excitement of the immortal variety today. Training begins tomorrow, tonight we go out. That is, if Melissa will let you off the leash for a night?"
"You sure?" Trent asked, first instincts being that Connor might need to take it easy given the injury, but realizing even as he said it he was probably making a fool of himself. "I mean.. yeah, sure. Melissa figured I'd be staying up here tonight anyway," he continued, trying to cover up his comment.
Cass smiled, giving him a pat on the shoulder. "It's OK, Trent, it'll take a while to get used to it, I know, so don't worry about it." She turned and leaned in to give Connor a kiss. "Thank you, for everything," she said to him, her look telling him a lot more than just the simple words. "Have a good time tonight and don't get him into any trouble I can't bail you both out of," she added with a knowing lift of her eyebrow.
"Don't worry, I promise to get him home to Melissa in one piece." Connor assured her, returning the kiss with interest. He might tweak them both, but he would never let either come to harm if he could help it.
His first student in the twenty-first century. As Connor turned back to Trent as Cassandra left, he knew for certain that at least this one wouldn't be boring.
He finished setting up the saw table and supports, then poured himself a coffee as Trent's car made an appearance, tearing up the drive to stop at the front of the house. "About time you got here!" The immortal called out good-naturedly as the younger man stepped out of the car. "Melissa keep you up all night did she?"
"Half it, and the morning," Trent replied with a wide grin and wink at the older man. He tugged his jacket on, the colder mountain air cutting through his shirt quickly once he was out of the warm cabin of the car. "Timber all arrive OK?" he asked, eying the large stack of it on the ground near where Connor was setting up. "Is that just the decking, or the pylons too?" Connor had described the structure to him and Trent had managed to pick up most of what the man was talking about but had figured he'd be learning a whole heap more once they started so didn't get into the nitty-gritty when they were chatting.
"Just the decking," Connor confirmed, pouring a second cup from the thermos and handing it to Trent as the younger man reached him. "The pylons will be delivered next week and I'll have the pros pound those into place, no sense doing that ourselves."
"How was the drive up?"
"Yeah, that parts definitely something for the guys with the big machines that do that!" Trent agreed, taking the coffee and nodding his thanks before taking a mouthful. "Good, bit of traffic down the bottom of the mountain, usual tourists and stuff, but thinned out the further up the mountains." He looked around appreciatively and inhaled deeply, the cold mountain air filling his lungs before he exhaled loudly. "Nothing like the fresh mountain air to wake you up though!" he laughed before taking another mouthful.
"So... what's the job today, boss?" he asked, fully aware of how little he still knew about tools the likes of which Connor had said they'd be using. He'd gotten better, more familiar with hand tools, but the power saws and things Connor had been setting up were still completely foreign to him.
"The job today will be marking, cutting, and stacking planks." Connor pointed to a set of two by fours on the ground. "We'll stack them over there and cover it with a tarp until we're ready to use them."
He took a sip of his coffee and then continued. "I've set the saw up out here since the weather's nice for this time of year. What I'll want you to do is help me out with handling the boards, I'll do most of the cutting."
"Sounds easy enough!" Trent replied enthusiastically, taking another sip of the hot coffee. "Reckon those things could make a mess of you real quick if you turned your back on them or lost your grip. Happy to be down the back end of it all, away from the fast spinning sharp bits for the time being. Don't want to have to explain to Cassandra why I'm needing some sort of new, special keyboard any time soon... or at all come to think of it!" he joked.
"You wouldn't have to explain anything. It'd be me who'd have to watch his head if you were hurt on my watch." Connor pointed out with dark humor. Cassandra was like a mother bear protecting her cub when it came to Trent, and he didn't even want to think about what the older immortal's reaction would be if Trent were hurt or, god forbid, killed and he was responsible.
Trent laughed, looking at the older man and nodding. "Yeah, guess you're right. She'd probably be a bit pissed at you if she suddenly had to try and deal with the computers herself," he chuckled. "She doesn't seem to like them very much, but likes what they can do," he mused, wondering not for the first time what it was about them that Cassandra didn't like. With her money and background Trent had thought she'd be much more familiar with them, but it was like she just didn't want to use them, or something, but needed what they could do. "Not sure what it is, just... you know... weird sometimes."
Connor shrugged and smiled in response to Trent's unasked question. "Cassandra is...Cassandra. Don't try and figure out what makes her tick, it's impossible. Finish your coffee and we'll get started."
Before long they had a stack of boards marked up for cutting and Connor fired up the saw. "Stick with me and I'll have you expert in all kinds of tools besides screwdrivers and circuit boards."
"Yeah, so I've learned," Trent replied. A small grunt followed as he helped Connor pick up one of the large pieces of timber that was going to yield three planks for the deck of the jetty. The gloves he was wearing were a little large and he gripped the plank tightly to hold it in place on the saw horses as Connor edged it forward till the marks were in the right place for the saw to do its work. As the first plank was liberated the timber shifted and Trent held it in place as Connor took the cut piece and laid it onto the crossbars they'd put in place already for the purpose of stacking the final pieces on. This continued until the three planks lay side by side, identical in length and the remnant was put in another pile next to the original one. "One down, a truckload more to go!" Trent said as they went to fetch another piece.
Connor laughed as they placed the next plank on the sawhorses. "We'll be done before you know it and down at the bar knocking back beers in celebration of a hard day's work, just wait and see."
Trent nodded, his bottom lip caught between his teeth as he balanced the large piece of heavy timber on the saw horse, pushing his hands into the gloves to help him keep a better grip. They kept working, stopping after about an hour to have another cup of coffee, then getting back into it again. Trent could feel his muscles were going to be aching the next day, his arms and back already starting to feel the strain of the intensely physical work which he wasn't used to. He realized he hadn't done much in the way of working out, and commented on it to Connor as they retrieved another plank and carried it over to the saw. "Didn't realize how much I miss the beach, or the convenience of it," he added. "Whenever I was feeling like I needed a run I'd just go down there and off I went. It's a bit different, actually living in a city. I mean, there's running tracks and bike tracks and the like, but mostly they're down round the lake and not exactly ... on the front door step." He gave a dry laugh before adding, "yeah, yeah, I know, just excuses, but yeah, am beginning to realize that having the beach literally on your front doorstep was a real plus!"
"There's no substitute for the beach itself," Connor mused as they set the plank down and manhandled it into position, "but it's no excuse for letting yourself go Trent. You never know when it can come in handy for more than impressing the ladies." Of course, that was literally true in Connor's case. It had been some time since he'd been forced to take a head, but immortals had to be in a constant state of readiness unless they lived on holy ground and never ventured from it.
"Still, I can't deny that beachfront living has its perks," he smirked at the younger man and then started to push the board into the saw.
"Yeah, because the scenery on the beach? Real special, especially in summer!" Trent replied with a knowing grin and wink. "And dogs, man, they're the best thing to run with! Used to take the neighbor's lab with me sometimes and I tell you, not once did that girl manage to pull some lovely lady's attention!" As he pushed the log forward for Connor to position for the next cut as Connor laughed then donned his safety goggles and earplugs again, a knot on the underneath of the piece caught on the saw horse and tilted it, the angle of the ground making the log slip toward the side where Connor was standing. Trent tried to hold it from where he was, the gloves conspiring to give him the least grip as they slipped on his hands. He yelled over the sound of the saw Connor had just started up again, the log perilously close to the man's leg.
Connor turned, twisting to see what the noise was and looked at Trent, not seeing the angle of the horse until too late, the timber tipping it past the point of no return and landing fair square in the middle of his shin, knocking him to the ground. His leg was already twisted and the break was clearly visible to Trent as he watched Connor go down.
"Fuck!" Trent took a tighter hold of the plank, the gloves no longer matter much and tired muscles forgetting their weariness as the adrenaline shot through his body and he lifted the plank up, levering it from on Connor's leg and tossing it away from the two of them. The heavy timber hit the soft dirt with a thud but Trent didn't really register it other than to know it was now out of the way. He scrambled up to where Connor was laying on the ground, his leg outstretched and his foot at a particularly unhealthy angle.
"Connor! Stay still, I'll call an ambulance!" His hands were already scrambling for his jacket pocket before he realized he'd taken it off when they had stopped for the coffee.
"Trent, don't." Connor ordered after a moment. The immortal was still white faced from the pain, but had recovered enough of his wits after the initial shock and flash of pain to stop the younger man from calling the first responders. He forced himself to sit up and look at the leg, the break clearly visible and foot twisted in an unnatural angle. It was bad, but he'd had worse in his nearly five centuries in the world. It could be fixed.
"Help me set the bone."
"What?? Wait, no!" Trent said, eyes wide with shock as he stared at Connor's leg then looked at the man. "Stay still, keep it still, and I'll call Cassandra, she'll get them up here real quick!" he said, knowing she had ways of making things happen that he didn't always understand, but had been impressed by. "We need to immobilize it... get it elevated," he continued, scrambling toward his jacket and returning to where Connor was lying. He finally found his phone and dropped it as he bunched his jacket up to put behind Connor's head.
"Trent, drop the damn phone and help me set the bone." Connor told him, his face tight with pain and a little anger with the younger man's panic. "Everything will be fine and I'll explain, but for now help me set the bone. We'll call Cassandra afterward if you want."
Trent had picked his phone up again and was pressing the quick dial to call Cassandra as Connor spoke. He could hear the phone call being made, the sounds easily identifiable. "Sure, OK, but I'll just tell Cassandra," he said, the woman's voice audible on the phone still sitting in Trent's hand between them. He lifted it to his ear.
"Hi, Cassandra, it's me," he said rather pointlessly as she would have been able to tell from the ring tone itself, Trent having set it to 'Top Gun' for his number as a joke. "Uh, things aren't going real good right now," he said in response to her question, her voice already sounding somewhat concerned. "Connor's had an accident, his leg's badly broken, and he needs an ambulance. Can you call one? He wants me to help him set it so if you could do that..." His voice trailed off as Cassandra spoke, Trent's face clearly exhibiting the surprise that he felt as she told him in a tone that afforded no protest to do exactly what Connor told him and she would be there as soon as she could. He stared at Connor and then the phone in his hand as she ended the call abruptly.
Despite the pain, Connor had to laugh at the expression on Trent's face. The kid was completely out of his realm of understanding, people weren't acting like he would expect rational people to and it didn't make any sense to him. "It'll be all right Trent," he assured the younger man, "I'll explain everything, afterward."
Trent nodded numbly, looking from Connor's face down toward the man's leg and back again. "So... what do I have to do?" he asked, swallowing hard before shoving his phone back in his pocket.
"Hold my leg still and I'll push the bone back into place," Connor told him, trying to portray a calmness he didn't truly feel. "Put your hands here," he gestured, "and I'll do the rest." He'd had plenty of experience over the years setting broken bones on both mortal and immortal alike, this was no different. The only complication was that Trent didn't have a clue what was going on. "If I pass out afterward, just leave me be, I'll only be out a few minutes at most."
Once Trent did what he was told, Connor grunted as he shifted to get to the broken bone. The immortal grit his teeth against the pain as he reached down to grasp his foot, then yelped as he pulled the limb back to the correct angle, then pushed down to set the bone in place. His vision went gray, and he passed out.
The sound was one Trent would never forget, the ends of the bone grinding against one another as Connor pulled his leg back straight. Trent's stomach churned, his skin feeling clammy, more a result of the shock than anything else, but the young man not knowing as he'd never seen anything like this before. He swallowed, hard, a few times, staring down as he waited. With no little trepidation he shifted down till he was at Connor's foot, the man still and unconscious. Concerned about an open wound he gingerly lifted the hem of the pants leg, already a little surprised at the small amount of blood. It was nothing though compared to what he did see. A flickering blue light, like some sort of electrical spark, flashed in the darkness against Connor's shin. Trent dropped the cuff as if the spark had shocked him, falling back on his butt and hands and staring at Connor again. His jaw snapped shut as he sorted himself out, a stream of questions all stacking up. He had no idea how long he sat there, but the slow rise and fall of Connor's chest gave him some small measure of comfort, or at least stopped him from calling the paramedics himself.
Connor wasn't sure how long he was out, but when he regained consciousness the pain was gone save from a lingering soreness and a mild headache. The immortal mumbled to himself in his native Gaelic and sat up, glancing over at a gray faced Trent. "You look like you could use a drink, laddie," Connor told the younger man with a chuckle, and rubbed his face. "Hell, I could use a drink. Come on inside and I'll tell you whatever you want to know."
He pushed himself up and got onto his feet, testing the healed leg gingerly. Satisfied it was healed enough to walk on, he started toward the house and the booze inside.
Trent's eyes nearly fell out of his head when Connor stood up, his jaw falling down and mouth left agape again. "Connor... your... " Words failed him and he scrambled to his feet as the older man walked away toward the house.
Inside the door Trent stopped, Connor already pulling a bottle out of the cabinet and turning to him. "Connor... what the hell is going on??" he finally spewed out, his own mind beginning to question what his eyes had seen earlier, and what he was watching now.
"What do you think is going on, Trent?" Connor asked as he poured the young man a glass of scotch and sliding it over to him, then pouring himself a glass as well, setting the bottle on the table between them and sitting down.
"You've seen a lot of clues, lad, all you have to do is add them up."
"Clues?" Trent replied after taking a large mouthful of the scotch and only wincing slightly as it made its way down his throat. The heat of the liquor seemed to kickstart his questions. "Clues about what? I mean... your leg was broken, Connor. I saw it, it was ... broken!, And the sound, as you straightened it, that was something I don't want to hear again in a hurry. But Connor... what was that... that... blue electricity stuff? What are you???"
"Heh, that's an interesting question laddie," Connor smirked, and knocked back the contents of his glass before setting it down and looking straight at the younger man with a serious expression. "I am Connor MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod. I was born in 1518 in Glenfinnan, near the shores of Loch Shiel, and I am immortal."
The words settled into Trent's mind but they weren't exactly making a whole lot of sense. "1518? Immortal?" he repeated, staring at Connor. There was no mistaking the stunned expression on his face. "As in... can't die kinda thing, right?"
"More or less," Connor decided not to go into the details on how immortals could be killed. "Let's just say there's no way I can die a natural death of old age or disease and leave it at that for now. I've been alive four hundred ninety one years and seen the best and worst of what humanity has to offer in that time."
Something clicked in Trent's mind and he looked at Connor, eyes narrowing. "And Cassandra knows this, right? I mean, she told me to just do as you said, and she was coming up. So she knew you'd be able to... heal yourself, or whatever it is you did!"
"Cassandra knows, yes." Connor poured himself another scotch and took a sip. Cassandra's secret was hers to tell, it wasn't his place. "As for healing...I'll heal from just about any injury, or 'die' and revive soon after. It isn't pleasant, but it is what it is."
"Die?! And revive!" Trent's voice almost squeaked, but he coughed and cleared his throat when he realised it. "Man, you're telling me you actually die if like... you're shot, or stabbed, or whatever... but ... you heal?" he said, his mind working through it all and coming up with the answer himself but needing confirmation. It wasn't something you learned about someone every day. Or ever, really. "How? How did you get to be like this? I mean... 1518? It obviously isn't some scientific experiment, or whatever..."
"I don't know, no one does." Connor told him simply, "I was mortally wounded in battle with the Frasiers by an immortal named the Kurgan in 1536, but my kinsmen got me away before he could finish the job. When I miraculously healed in a day from a wound that should have killed me, I was run out of my village and forced to go into exile." His eyes were haunted as he related the tale, in many ways that event would follow him until the day he died.
"I've been something of a world traveler ever since."
"Wait. Another one? How did you know he was one too? I mean... are immortals common in Scotland or something?" He was joking, in an attempt to keep on top of the things he was being told.
"Not particularly, but I do have a kinsman roughly seventy-five years younger than myself." Connor smirked, though the smile didn't reach his eyes. "The Kurgan was a sadistic bastard, looking to kill off younger immortals before they had a chance to be trained to defend themselves. He was very powerful, but we settled scores in 1985. I'm still breathing, he's not."
"OK, this powerful thing, I... " He paused as he remembered the flickering blue that traveled across the skin of Connor's leg. He told Connor what he'd seen while Connor had been unconscious. "What was that? I mean... you weren't plugged into anything, so... it came from in you?"
"That's right, we call it 'the quickening'. Don't ask me how it works, I don't know. It just does."
Trent nodded slowly, repeating the word. "Quickening," he murmured. He fell silent as he processed what Connor had told him, pulling it all together and taking another mouthful of his drink. "And Cassandra knows all about this," he murmured, something nudging at his mind but there still being too much for him to take any notice of yet another thing. "So that makes you... wow, really old!" He grinned as he looked at Connor. "That must feel weird."
"Not exactly." Connor shrugged and finished his drink. "Makes me cynical sometimes, or long for the 'good old days' when it wasn't so easy to track people around the world at the click of a button, but most of the time it's no different from anyone else."
"I guess I am old, but only in comparison with mortals. My first teacher was over two thousand years old, the Kurgan was nearly three thousand when I killed him."
That made Trent's eyes widen again but it was what Connor had said first that had his mind ticking over. The comments about finding information out at the click of a button, and his eyes narrowed as he looked at Connor.
"Yeah, it is. And that's what I do... for Cassandra... hey... !" It was clear his mind was now whirring at high speed. "This thing I've been doing for her, finding out stuff, and things that happen... is that anything to do with you? And what you are?" he asked, small pieces starting to look like they might fit together.
"It is, but I'll let Cassandra fill in the details as it's her project," he looked at the younger man and decided he could go a little further. "I'm sorry you had to find out this way Trent, I wanted to tell you earlier but Cassandra insisted that I wait and I respected her wishes."
"Waited? Why?" Trent asked, puzzled a little, but starting to recover from the initial shock. "And why'd you want to tell me anyway? I mean, except for today and that timber, I'd still not know, and really, what difference does it make?" Even before he finished saying it things started to click. "Well, yeah, can guess it has been tough sometimes, to kinda not let things slip," he added with a grin.
"You have no idea!" Connor replied feelingly. "I wanted to tell you because you've become a good friend and you're part of the 'family' as far as Cassandra is concerned." It wasn't entirely the truth, but he couldn't exactly tell Trent that without telling the lad that he was a pre-immortal, and that would send Cassandra through the roof.
He checked his watch. Assuming Cassandra had left as soon as Trent called her, the older immortal should be arriving any minute.
"Thanks," Trent replied, appreciating the acceptance, and feeling a strange little feeling of 'belonging'. "She's been good to me, and my sister, since we met and I hope I can live up to what she expects," he continued, aware that he seemed to have been doing so to date, but wanting to make sure he kept that up.
It wasn't too much after that there was the familiar sound of tires crunching on the drive and Trent looked across at Connor. "Guess we know who that is, hey?" he said, downing the rest of the scotch in his glass. "Should I make myself scarce for a few minutes?" he asked, standing up. "Need to make a visit to the bathroom anyway...."
"If you want," Connor didn't care one way or the other, but in reality he probably would need to speak to Cassandra privately for a few minutes and was pleased the younger man recognized that. The buzz of her quickening proceeded Cassandra into the house and he greeted her with a raised scotch glass when she stormed in.
"Cassandra. I'm sure the sun is over the yardarm someplace, care for a drink?" He figured the best way to lighten the mood was to joke about it.
Cassandra stared at Connor and looked around for Trent. Hearing the panic in the young man's voice had triggered her centuries old instinct to protect, and Milo had driven them up the mountain with only a safe arrival in mind, disregarding all potential traffic violations at his mistress's unnecessary instruction to do so.
She crossed the room to Connor, his presence clearly identifiable to her even before she'd entered the cabin. "How are you?" she asked, "and where's Trent?"
"Using the bathroom, and I'm fine." He lifted the fabric of his pants leg to reveal the dried blood that was the only sign of the injury. "He helped me set the break and I passed out. Once I came to I figured we could both use a drink. Good kid, he didn't panic too much, considering. He's full of questions, that one."
She studied Connor's leg quickly then glanced across toward the hall that led to the bathroom. Her voice was low but intense. "So... what does he know?" she asked after letting out a sigh that spoke of pent up concern and a little frustration. While she didn't even begin to think that Connor had done this on purpose, it had removed things from her control and she didn't like that sort of thing. But she was also dealing with it, having had the journey up the mountain to to come to terms with it. "He has an inquiring mind, so it's not really a surprise," she sighed, sitting down where Trent had been and pouring herself a drink.
"He knows about me: how old I am, where I'm from, a bit about quickenings and that there are others out there." Connor's tone was careful. He knew Cassandra wasn't happy about it, but there was nothing that could be helped about it now. "He guessed the general idea of the project he's working on for you, but I told him that he'd have to ask you the rest of it."
The younger immortal dropped his voice to a low murmur. "He doesn't know you are immortal as well."
She nodded, the scotch slowly trickling down her throat. "Thanks," she murmured in response, leaning back in the chair and rubbing her forehead for a moment. "Well, I guess if he had to find out this was the best way, and breaks the ground, so to speak," she admitted, looking from Connor down into the glass and the slowly swirling clear amber liquid in the bottom of it. "How did he handle it? I mean, when you told him, did he believe you?" She knew it was not likely for him to argue it, he'd never been argumentative, rather just being very inquisitive when something grabbed his attention. And this would be enough to grab anyone's attention.
"He did," Connor confirmed. "Took it remarkably well, all things considered. I don't know if I would have as easily if someone had told me and I'd been mortal. Probably would have considered him a devil. These are more enlightened times I guess, for all that's been lost with all this newfangled technology maybe that much has been gained."
"Yes, these days the abnormal are almost normal and the rest of us? Well we're just there too," she mused, glancing across to the hallway again and wondering just exactly what was going on in Trent's mind with this revelation. "I guess it's a blessing in disguise," she continued, the glass in her fingers absently being slowly twirled as she thought.
"A blessing?" Connor grimaced as the memory of the break and the pain associated with it still quite fresh in his mind. "I suppose so. The question is how much more do you want to tell him. You've wanted him protected from the knowledge all this time and you've had your reasons, but the time is coming when he'll have to know everything. Maybe it would be better to tell him now."
Cass's eyes flew up to meet Connor's, then darted across to the door and back again. "Everything?" she returned, voice low. "You mean everything about us, the both of us? Or everything entirely?" she asked, eyes never leaving his.
"About the both of us," Connor nodded and knocked back the rest of his scotch, putting the empty glass down on the table. "If he puts two and two together and guesses about himself, we shouldn't deny it. I'd recommend telling him about what he is, but if you still want to hold off on that I'll respect your wishes."
Her jaw tightened as she held Connor's eyes for a long moment, then lowered them to the glass in her fingers. Lips that had thinned as she thought parted as she lifted the glass and drank down the amber liquid.
"It will depend on how he takes the news about us," she said, only to hear a door open and turn to see Trent's bulk fill the doorway.
"What news?" the young man asked, looking from one to the other and back to Cass. "What, you two getting married or something?" he asked, grinning and giving Connor a wink, but wondering as he had done the whole time in the bathroom about the two of them in a different way.
Cass managed not to snort, or splutter, the absurdity of the question lending a lighter tone to the atmosphere that had thickened in the cabin in Trent's absence. "Us? Married?" she laughed and shook her head. "Why ruin a perfectly good friendship, hmm?" she continued, looking across at Connor as she spoke. "One that's lasted so long," she added, giving him a look that told him she was willing to go this next step but would see what happened with that.
She patted the table where an empty chair was standing beneath it. "Come, sit down, there are some things you need to hear and it might be easier if you're seated first," she told him, Trent eying her, then Connor as he crossed the room to join the two others.
"I take it you know about Connor, and ... his ... leg," he said, his voice trailing off a little as he realized from the look on her face that she not only knew about that but probably a lot more.
"Yes Trent, I know about Connor, his leg, and probably every other part of him a lot better than you might imagine," she said, a small twinkle in her eye showing as she glanced at Connor than looked back at Trent. "As I've known him for... oh... four centuries?" she said simply, looking at Connor for confirmation.
"A bit under four, but whats a few decades between friends?" Connor smiled back, trying not to laugh at Trent's reaction to their words. The lad was doing a fine imitation of a fish, sitting there with his mouth opening and closing as he looked between the two immortals, no sound coming out.
"She's well preserved for an old lady of more than three thousand, don't you think? I told you I'm by no means the oldest among the immortals." He watched Trent closely, wanting to make sure he could catch the lad if he fainted or some other odd reaction to the news. Everyone tended to react in a different way, and it had been decades since he'd last told anyone his secrets.
Trent indeed sat there open-mouthed, his eyes traveling from one to the other. The simple revelation was enough to make him blink a number of times, words lost in the enormity of it all.
"Three thousand is probably being kind," Cassandra suggested, seeing Trent was struggling a little. She reached over and patted his arm for a moment, wishing there was someway this could be done that wouldn't send the young man into a spin, but knowing it was impossible.
"My first memories are of a time now called the Bronze Age, and I was raised by a wonderful, caring man, Hijad, who was the tribe's healer," she continued. She knew Trent's mind gobbled up information, similar to what his programs were designed to do, so she kept a steady stream of it going, helping draw the picture, albeit brief, of her life. She left out the part about the Four Horsemen, figuring 'horror stories' weren't going to help much right now. That could come later, once the lad had had time to become comfortable with the concept.
"When I met Connor I had already lived, and died, for three thousand years," she continued, telling of how she had met the dashing young sea captain at the ball that night.
"When I sensed him it had been a number of years since I'd come across one of us, and to find that it was a kinsman of the young Duncan Macleod... well, that was fate," she said with a warm smile.
Trent had sat back in his chair, arms folded across his body as he listened, slowly letting them fall till his hands rested in his lap, his palms sometimes being rubbed up and down his thighs being the only outward sign of his state of mind.
"And this other one, Duncan, he's your... well, sort of brother," Trent said, looking at Connor. He was trying to relate with words that he was beginning to understand weren't really suitable, but there wasn't any others he could think of right then. "I mean... kinsman. He's still alive?" he asked.
"He's a kinsman, something of a cousin as we're both of the Clan MacLeod, and very much alive. 'Same Clan, different Vintage' is how one of us put it a few times, and you would definitely be able to tell by personality." He glanced at Cassandra and noted her knowing smile at the differences he alluded to.
"I know this must be something of a shock laddie, imagine how it was on our end when it happened to us!" Connor briefly outlined his first meeting with Ramirez and how the older immortal had taken the Scotsman and taught him what he needed to know to survive as an immortal.
Cassandra remained quiet about how she learnt of her own immortality. Instead she focused on Trent and his reactions, eying him thoughtfully as he asked Connor questions and received the answers. She was happy for the back and forth to continue, knowing it would be helpful, even critical, in the future for Trent to have complete trust in Connor. Too often she'd found that revealing the truth to a pre-immortal had been too much for them to even contemplate, let alone accept without a fight, and she didn't want that to happen with Trent.
Gauging when the right time was to tell him was going to be a completely different issue, especially with the friendship he and Connor had struck up. But it would still be a dicey thing. She knew only too well how even the best laid plans could turn to dust in a few seconds with the wrong word or action.
A comfortable silence fell when Trent's questions finally slowed, his mind now with so much to work through. She was about to speak when the young man suddenly spoke up again.
"Why didn't you tell me about this before?" he asked, eyes rising again to meet Cassandra's and holding hers steadily.
"There was never a time that seemed right, or even necessary," she told him, hoping he would see that it was true. "Believe me, there were times I did consider it, given the work I've been having you do, as it would have saved me a lot of 'padding' to disguise the real target of my research. But my experience has been that unless necessary most people react badly when they're told out of the blue, demanding evidence and still being distrustful even when it's presented. Today's accident, although painful for Connor, has served a greater purpose," she added, reaching over and giving Connor's arm a gentle squeeze.
"Believe me, if it had been up to Connor he would have told you earlier," she added, then realized too late that that was probably something Trent hadn't needed to know, that they had discussed when to tell him.
"What? Why? You mean you two've talked about telling me?" he asked, looking a little confused.
"One reason would be that it's easier to look for the information Cassandra wanted if you knew the truth," Connor told him honestly after a brief annoyed look at Cassandra for letting that peice of information slip. "You had to wonder why she was having you research according to the parameters you were, right?"
He took another long look at Cassandra and inwardly cursed that she'd let that peice of information slip. If she didn't want the boy told then they needed to be careful with how much information they gave him about their time since they'd met him. "Another was that I like you Trent, you've become a good friend and I don't like keeping secrets from friends I think can handle the truth. There are very few people in the last five centuries I've told that secret to, if I hadn't thought you could handle it I would have come up with some other explanation."
There was also the cold, unspoken, truth that if Connor had thought Trent to be a threat to his survival the young man would have been dead before he could dial the phone.
Inside Cass had felt her stomach drop when she realized that Trent would of course want to know why they had discussed what and when to tell him. She was eternally grateful to Connor for not having told him, knowing it was going against his own thoughts on the issue. She paused as she waited for Trent's reaction.
"You mean your leg?" Trent asked, looking at Connor. He huffed a small laugh. "Not sure whatever else you came up with would be much different to what you've told me," he replied, thinking back at what he'd seen. "Though I guess the whole healing thing? That could have been something that was a standalone kinda thing, sorta like you know, electrons etc all just realigning and repairing in any bits that are damaged, without the whole immortality gig," he conceded, realizing that what they had told him was about as unbelievable as anything else could be if he hadn't actually seen what had happened to Connor.
"And thanks," he added. "Thanks for telling me." He looked at Connor. "It really did hurt, didn't it?"
Cass breathed a silent sigh of relief and gave Connor a look of gratitude that the immortal had averted a potentially difficult situation, though it did of course leave her with having to explain at a later time just why they hadn't told him the whole story right there and then. But that was something she was willing to deal with when the time came. And it would come, she knew that, and it still worried her.
"It always hurts," she answered in Connor's place, deciding there was a small concession she could make that might help assuage Connor's anger at her not telling Trent the complete truth. "Just the same as it would hurt anyone," she added. "We might be immortal but we're still the same when it comes to pain and strength. And physical skills. If we let them fade, for example sword fighting, then we're in a dangerous situation if we come across another of our kind who is intent on taking our head, and therefore our Quickening." She gave Connor a quick, small smile.
"And you could learn how to fight, with Connor, and help him keep his skill up, and me too I guess," she said, realizing that it was necessary to be seen to be living up to the expectation they'd set up of an immortal needing to be a skilled swordsman. Her 'voice' wasn't something that would help Trent, unless she was there on the day he was confronted and that wasn't something she could count on. The day would come when he would be faced with a challenge and she knew Connor was right that he needed to be trained.
"So you can play 'Dungeons and Dragons' for real, instead of with a mouse and keyboard thing," she added, giving Trent a wide smile and purposefully avoiding the glare she knew would be coming from Connor.
And glare he did. There were few times in the nearly four centuries he'd known Cassandra that he wanted to throttle her to within an inch of her life, and this was one of them. Between slipping up and nearly forcing him to tell Trent about the lad's own pending immortality and then the 'Dungeons and Dragons' quip he had to stop and mentally count to ten.
Sometimes she knew just how to push his buttons.
"Aye, it'll be fun to train a new student in the art of the sword." Not to mention a challenge, since until the lad's first death he'd heal just as poorly from sword wounds as any other mortal. Still, Connor found himself forgiving Cassandra at least partially for the D&D crack.
"Unless we want to live our lives out on holy ground we need to stay prepared. I usually train every day, even if just a heavy workout and katas, but I try to spend time with the sword whenver I can. It's one reason I chose this place," Connor gestured to the walls of the rennovated and expanded farmhouse and by extension the rest of the property itself. "Out here I can do more or less whatever I want, the sounds of swordplay don't carry far and there's no one within sight of the property."
"Right!" Trent hadn't ever wondered why Connor had chosen this place in the mountains. The waterfront had been enough of an attraction and he understood how the man had wanted the privacy but now it made even more sense.
"So... you'll teach me?" he asked, looking at Connor. "I'd really like to learn," he added, the idea at first strange, but becoming more exciting than he'd expected.
"I'd be happy to, but don't expect me to take it easy on you because I'm your friend." Connor wanted to make sure the younger man understood what was expected of him. "If I train you you'll do as I say with a minimum of griping, and the first few months will be hard on you, but by fall you should start to get the hang of things." It helped that Trent was already in good shape, but that wasn't the same as being in sword fighting shape.
Trent nodded, slowly at first but with a little more enthusiasm. "Then I might be of more use, huh?" he suggested. "Just better make sure I don't lose any digits or anything in the process, or might make my boss a little unhappy," he added, giving Cass a grin. The female immortal gave him a wry smile, the idea of Trent losing any part of himself before his first death something she wasn't wanting to even contemplate. The saving grace was that Connor wouldn't risk anything like that, knowing the consequences would be something not worth considering.
"You'd just get in voice recognition software or whatever it is you were talking about the other night and be back on the job in no time!" she said lightly, hiding the real concern she felt beneath the well-practiced veneer. "And on that note... " She stood up, Trent doing so also as she did. "If I can trust you two on your own I will return home as I have dinner plans that I don't need to cancel now I know things are... all settled here."
Trent was tempted to ask if she was having dinner with Radek but resisted, deciding it probably wasn't his place to ask right there and then.
An eyebrow quirked in mild curiosity to the 'dinner plans' comment but Connor left the statement alone. Cassandra was a big girl, nearly ten times his age in fact, whatever she decided to do he was certain she could look after herself. "Have fun," he told the older immortal. "I promise he'll keep all his body parts intact. Not necessarily unbruised or un-sprained, but intact."
A contemplative look at the younger man and Connor stood up as well. "In fact, I think we've had enough excitement of the immortal variety today. Training begins tomorrow, tonight we go out. That is, if Melissa will let you off the leash for a night?"
"You sure?" Trent asked, first instincts being that Connor might need to take it easy given the injury, but realizing even as he said it he was probably making a fool of himself. "I mean.. yeah, sure. Melissa figured I'd be staying up here tonight anyway," he continued, trying to cover up his comment.
Cass smiled, giving him a pat on the shoulder. "It's OK, Trent, it'll take a while to get used to it, I know, so don't worry about it." She turned and leaned in to give Connor a kiss. "Thank you, for everything," she said to him, her look telling him a lot more than just the simple words. "Have a good time tonight and don't get him into any trouble I can't bail you both out of," she added with a knowing lift of her eyebrow.
"Don't worry, I promise to get him home to Melissa in one piece." Connor assured her, returning the kiss with interest. He might tweak them both, but he would never let either come to harm if he could help it.
His first student in the twenty-first century. As Connor turned back to Trent as Cassandra left, he knew for certain that at least this one wouldn't be boring.