JOE'S TRUTH (part 9 - conclusion)
Joe's Truth
by mackiedockie and adabsolutely
Warnings: Slash & Puns R Us
Beta by methos_fan
Thanks also to elistaire for insightful comments over on insane journal where we did the test runs.
This is the conclusion. I thought there would be 10 parts, but the postings this second week worked better with three segments in each part. Mackiedockie and I were still changing it after midnight last night:-) Thanks for all the lovely feedback.
27.
Sitting on the cold concrete, Joe settled his back against a concrete pylon and surveyed the carnage. The smell of blood made his skin crawl. But the gun he settled on Liane remained rock steady.
"You shot them," Liane said in a stunned, quiet voice.
"Yeah. And I will again if I have to." He studied her face. "Your first dead bodies? Up close and personal?"
Liane nodded, swallowing.
"Kids.” Joe shook his head. These days they didn't cross train Watchers like they used to. Mortuary work, body pickups, that was all outsourced now. "You still want to kill me?"
Liane shook her head, slowly, almost grudgingly.
"Okay, now we're getting somewhere. Here's the deal. I fix it so you can be Cassandra's Watcher again. Her only Watcher. 24/7. "
"And what do you want from me?" Liane asked suspiciously.
Joe rubbed his aching head. "I want you to leave me and mine the hell alone." Of course, there was no way it could be that easy. "And I want you to stop using the Voice."
"Or you'll kill me."
Joe remained silent. The gun didn't waver.
Of course, the standoff couldn't last. Long, stalking steps and a swirl of steel announced MacLeod's arrival. MacLeod edged into the battleground, marking each weapon and checking each body. Methos started to stir, in such a controlled manner Joe half suspected he'd been playing possum for a while. And when Cassandra hitched upright with a short scorching oath and plucked at the hole in her blouse, they had a quorum. A very quiet quorum, reigned over by the Watcher.
MacLeod finally turned on Joe. "What the hell were you thinking, Joe? He can't protect himself when he's dead!"
Stung, Joe let the gun dangle, finally. "Gee, and it's nice to see you, too, Mac. I thought I'd have to waste a few more rounds on these two before you got here. Or I could have just let them hash it out and we could have picked up the body parts afterward."
Methos rolled to his feet to stand at MacLeod's shoulder, sword at half mast. He eyed Cassandra warily, but her concentration was now fixed on Joe, her eyes flickering with puzzled interest. Methos too, finally turned his attention to Joe.
"Oh-oh," Joe muttered, bracing himself against the pylon as Methos suddenly strode over to the mortal, grabbed him by his coat lapels, and pulled him abruptly to his feet.
Pinning Joe against the pylon, Methos leaned deeply into Joe's space. "What the hell were you thinking when you were masquerading as me?"
Joe shrugged. "It seemed a good idea at the time. I gotta work on the Etruscan accent, though," he said lightly. "Back off a little, willya? You're bleeding on my coat."
Then MacLeod was there, crowding in for a piece of lapel. "You did what?"
"He pretended to be Methos, scourge of the savannahs," Methos said in a withering tone. "He set himself up. Deliberately."
"If you'd been where you usually are, you'd never have known." The bar. Tibet. Bora Bora. Wherever.
"You pretended to be him?" MacLeod shook his head in disbelief. "Because it worked so well for the last Methos pretender?"
Joe was starting to get annoyed. Too damn many people were pushing him around, lately. "It was Watcher business, MacLeod. I lie to them all the damn time for you. For both of you. Just another day at the office. Now, will you back off?" With his back braced against the pylon, Joe was able to return a respectable shove to MacLeod's chest that moved him all of a half a step.
Methos held his ground inside Joe's defenses, close enough that Joe could feel his healed heart hammering, before whirling away, steel flashing under the garage lights. He stared coldly at Cassandra, who had recovered her sword, and silently dared her to renew the challenge. Joe nearly ended up falling over again as Methos dropped his hold.
Straightening his collar, Joe rolled his eyes and slapped his gun flat against MacLeod's chest. "Here, Mac, take this before I shoot him again. And where the hell are your earplugs?" Chastened, MacLeod eased back and fished into his pocket for the plugs.
Joe used MacLeod's distraction to get right back into Methos' face, ignoring both blade and blazing anger. "You. It's your turn to Watch, buddy." Joe reached up and took out his own earplugs and stuffed them into the Immortal's shirt pocket. "Master strategist, my ass." Joe turned his back on his Immortals and strode straight to Cassandra, unarmed and unprotected from the Voice.
Methos moved to stop him, but MacLeod stopped him with an iron grip on the upper arm. "Cassandra won't hurt him."
"You trust too much, MacLeod. And Liane has hurt him. And will again."
"If Cassandra can't control her own student for a ten minute conversation, then she can't be trusted with her beyond this building," MacLeod said with finality.
Methos' sudden grin didn't have a tinge of humor. "Agreed." He slowly allowed his sword to dip, but he did not sheathe it. "On your head be it."
Joe stalked up to Cassandra and forcefully planted his cane. "Go ahead. Ask your questions. MacLeod didn't call you over the ocean for a Bronze Age class reunion."
"Perhaps." Cassandra eyed him slowly, apparently unimpressed. "You've already been caught in a lie, Watcher. Your words hold no currency."
Coloring, Joe acknowledged the accusation with a tight nod. "Liane was obsessed. She was so sure of her assumptions that she was willing to commit more than one murder to get back in your good graces. Hardly anything I told her was a lie. I only made her question her assumptions."
"I assume you are lying about that, too," Cassandra challenged coldly. "You holding a gun, Methos holding a sword...the situation reeks of entrapment."
"That's because Liane learned her obsessions from you. You taught her to hate someone she'd never even met," Joe shot back. Then he deliberately lowered his voice. "And as a result, an Immortal named Kneissl is dead. He didn't have to die. He never harmed you."
Cassandra flicked her gaze to Liane. "Kneissl? That harmless hebephrenic?"
"Not so harmless when Liane wound him up like a three dollar watch and sent him to his death," Joe stared at Liane, daring her to contradict him.
"He was a womanizing playboy. Useless. It was worth his death to take Methos' head," Liane returned, still certain of Cassandra's hatred, if not her own.
Neither mortal expected the whispered note of grief that escaped Cassandra's throat. "Fool. Are your Chronicles so threadbare, Watchers? Kneissl helped me smuggle thousands of Romany and other refugees through the forests of occupied Austria to safety in Switzerland. Some of them are your sisters, Liane. You used your Gift to harm him?"
"Liane used her gift to murder him," Joe corrected coldly. Still, he averted his eyes as Liane subsided in shock. He didn't have the right to cast stones.
"But what about Methos? Together we could take them all! They can't fight off our Voices combined!"
Cassandra looked at Liane, then at Methos. She was clearly furious. And cornered. And very, very tempted.
Alarmed, Methos shifted his sword and dug for Joe's earplugs. MacLeod edged a step forward, but this time Methos held him back. "Use the gun if you have to. Joe's too close for sword work."
Joe caught the comment, and agreed. He was way too close for sword work. The problem was bullet work wasn't likely to improve Cassandra's mood. Or wardrobe. He solved the problem by moving forward two steps, close enough to Cassandra's steel to appreciate the fine folds in the blade. In looming over the witch, he cut off her view of Methos. He also blocked MacLeod's field of fire. "We didn't come here to trap you. But only you can keep this from getting out of hand. The way I see it, you have two viable options. You take responsibility for your student, and you walk away. Or you give her up to us. And you walk away."
Cassandra scowled in disbelief. "And we come back to your penchant for untruth."
Joe gripped his cane, gathering something from deep inside. "Go on. You've got the mojo. Use your Voice and make me tell it straight."
Methos reached out to MacLeod. "Give me the gun. Joe doesn't know what he's doing."
MacLeod stirred restlessly. "She won't hurt him. She didn't hurt me."
"Cassandra lusts after you, Highlander," Methos snapped. "She doesn't even like Joe. Not one little bit."
"She knows he's my friend."
"Like me?"
MacLeod hesitated. "Joe's under my protection."
"Funny," Methos said acidly, "From here it looks like the other way around."
Cassandra edged around Joe's side and peered suspiciously at Methos, still keeping his taller frame between her and the other Immortals and her sword very much at ready. "Very well."
Joe bowed his head and stood his ground against three thousand years of bound up rage, as Cassandra unleashed the Voice. The conversation was not loud. It was not long. The power of her magic curled around the Watcher like a vise, bearing down on his will and mind and heart. When the eldritch tones fell silent, Joe staggered under the weight of his answers.
Cassandra relaxed the grip on her sword slowly as Joe nodded one last quiet assent, praying it was enough. Just enough.
But there was one last question. "Tell me, Watcher. Why do you abandon your own mortal destiny to follow MacLeod's standard? You could be a scholar. A bard. A husband and a father. Why devote your life to scribbling and spying? MacLeod's story isn't yours. It will never belong to you."
Joe's voice caught, his face twisting as he battled the geas laid upon him. In dismay, MacLeod moved to intervene, only to be stopped this time by Methos' iron grip. "You can't save him from his own demons, MacLeod. I tried to warn you."
Shaking with the effort, Joe slowly lifted his cane, changing the grip.
"You can't fight the truth..." Cassandra warned.
The cane dropped from nerveless fingers, clattering away. But Joe's eyes cleared, and his face calmed. "You know what, Cassandra? It's none of your god damn business."
At that, Cassandra laughed, a strange and ringing sound in the echoing garage. She reached out and brushed his forehead, a new respect in her eye. "My apology, Bard. I will take Liane back. And I will teach her a different path."
Pale and aching, Joe didn't move as Cassandra shepherded Liane into the van and slammed the doors, leaving all her Watcher impedimenta behind. Her eyes were sharp and watchful as they eased the vehicle past the Immortals on guard. Methos still gripped his sword in a bone white hand.
MacLeod shook his head and took out his earplugs. Noticing Joe hadn't moved he strode to his elbow, only then realizing the Watcher was swaying on his stumps to a song only he could hear.
"Are you all right, Joe?" he asked softly.
"The truth hurts, man. The truth hurts."
28.
MacLeod took Dawson’s arm and lifted it over his shoulder. “Come on, Joe, let’s get out of here.”
“My cane.”
Methos searched around for it, retrieved it from the concrete floor of the parking structure and passed it to Dawson. Cane firmly in hand Joe tried to relinquish the Highlander’s support but MacLeod held fast. “Let me help until you’ve shaken her Voice.”
“It’s OK, Mac. I’m back.” This time Joe freed himself and stepped aside, directly into Methos’ path.
“Well. You’re still here.”
“Apparently. What were you thinking, Joe? Telling her you’re Methos!”
“He was protecting you.” MacLeod said.
“I don’t need a keeper, Joe. Five thousand years!”
Joe asked, “And what were you thinking when you came dashing up here to meet Cassandra, or were you just high on varnish fumes?”
“He was protecting you,” MacLeod repeated.
“Shut up!” Joe hollered.
“MacLeod!”
MacLeod laughed at them. “Testy, testy, guys. Come on, let’s get out of here before they change their minds and come back.”
“I thought you said Cassandra wouldn’t do that!” Methos shouted again but with diminishing energy.
“I said she wouldn’t go after Joe, not you. I think another night at Joe’s secret hideout is in order. We need to know for sure they’ve left the country. Unless you’re planning to take off now?”
Methos glared at MacLeod’s knowing grin. He thinks I’m going to stay, I should leave now!
MacLeod yanked him up close by the lapels just as he’d done in the bar the night before and kissed him roughly.
Joe longed to whop them with his cane, but he wasn’t steady enough to take a swing at them. So instead he charged toward the elevator. “Thanks for the show, guys!” He called over his shoulder.
MacLeod broke the kiss abruptly. “Wait up, Joe!” He dashed after their disgruntled friend.
Methos stood disoriented in their wake. “Wam bam, thank you…” he muttered.
He stared at MacLeod standing inside the elevator holding the door open for him.
“Hurry up!” MacLeod shouted.
A variety of responses zinged through his thoughts.
“Stop thinking.” MacLeod commanded.
Methos tugged at a fringe of hair on his forehead. “Yes, sire.”
A smirk and raised brow was all this display earned him. So he ambled over to the elevator, still thinking. He sighed and shook his head. Payback could wait.
The elevator ride to the ground floor was outwardly silent, if inwardly tumultuous. The weary men trudged across the street to Joe’s bar and locked the doors. Then they clambered into the T-bird and MacLeod drove a bit out of the way to buy take-out barbeque, before they headed over to Joe’s condo. The ride was accomplished without a great deal of conversation, but not in silence as each man seemed prone to grumbling and muttering.
The testiness eased up as they gathered around the kitchen table. Joe placed out more of the left over Christmas paper plates. MacLeod served the spicy pork ribs from the take- out sack and Methos opened three bottles of beer. Quiet reigned as they ate.
Once the ribs were naught but bones, MacLeod launched what he believed was a safe topic. “You know, Joe, I bet that under the tiles the rest of your bar floor is that beautiful hardwood too. We could -.” He stopped when Methos started laughing.
“What’s so funny?”
Methos shook his head. “Nothing, nothing. You should find another old house to remodel, MacLeod. Let Joe have his bar back.”
“You’d help me?”
“Only if there were power tools involved.”
“Hmm.”
“Just say yes, Mac,” Joe prompted.
“Yes.”
“But no nose painting.” Methos said.
“What?” Joe’s curiosity was aroused.
“Never mind!” MacLeod insisted.
“MacLeod has impulse control issues.”
“That’s true,” Joe agreed.
“Hey!”
“He can’t help it. He’s just a hot headed lad.”
They shared a laugh and another beer. Dawson was sore from hitting the ground twice in as many days, so he called it a night early. He had another long day of repair work looming ahead tomorrow.
“Keep it down will you, guys?”
“Yes, Joe,” his Immortals replied. He shook his head and laughed. He could practically smell the lust. Must be the fighting.
After Joe had left the room, MacLeod gave Methos a leering smile just before he yanked him out of his chair and urged him up the stairs. Once behind the closed bedroom door he said, “Maybe we don’t have that quiet as mice thing down yet.”
“Perhaps I should gag you?” Methos suggested.
“Me!”
“Sssh!”
“MacLeod laughed. “Yeah, I guess it could be me.”
“You do have enthusiasm, Highlander. Perhaps we can find - ah!”
MacLeod had shoved Methos onto the bed. “Sssh!”
Methos grinned up at MacLeod from his sprawl across Amy’s pale pink bedspread. And sprawled some more. “What am I ever going to do with you, Highlander? Shoving me around like you own me! Do you know what happened to the last fellow suffering from that delusion?”
MacLeod stood at the foot of the bed watching Methos lure him. He heard words, but knew their information value was near zero. Methos the word slinger. So in kind he spoke, “I’ve been thinking about your leather chastity strap story all day long.” Duncan slowly removed his own shirt with Methos’ undivided attention.
“Did I ever mention that you shouldn’t believe every story I tell?” Methos voice had become raspy.
“I figured that out on my own shortly after meeting you. Still I think the idea has nice possibilities.” He bent over and untied his shoes, turning slightly so that Methos would have a nice view of his backside during the process. “I have a box of leather scraps I’ve collected over the years.” He stood and kicked off his shoes. Next he unbuttoned his jeans and slowly opened the zipper. “I bet I could fashion a serviceable strap for you.” He slid out of his jeans with more wriggling than required and was pleased to note his companion’s breathing rate quicken. “Would you like that?” Since he was lowering his briefs at that moment he was not surprised by the lack of response.
Now nude he crawled up the bed in between Methos’ long limbs and inquired, “Why do you still have your clothes on?” Then he assisted his recumbent friend out of his jeans and shirt.
“You’re such a helpful sort.” Methos observed.
“I try.”
“I think you’re succeeding.” It took immortal control not to tremble when Duncan touched him.
“So it seems.” MacLeod spread himself across his lean partner and sighed. He kissed the long neck then blew warm air over the skin he had dampened causing a lovely shiver. Methos swallowed, and because MacLeod thought he saw discomfort asked, “Am I too heavy?”
“No. But perhaps you could move a little more rapidly?”
“Aye. I could do that.” And he did. He moved faster, exploring the fine body with many kisses, but not so fast that they would finish without a proper worship of each other. Anointing with lotion was followed by joining. MacLeod, slowly caressing through that moment of vulnerability, cherishing the deep growl from Methos as his aim proved very true.
When no more could be taken and the little death occurred words they would never repeat in the light of day were spoken. And so it seemed, for a period of time they would walk their path together, thanks to the complicated truth of a very good friend.
29.
Joe made it to his bedroom in a relatively straight line, considering the mileage he'd added up over the last two days. He figured he must have pulled it off cleanly (with a little help from MacLeod's impulse control issues) because the five thousand year old quack didn't follow him and start prodding. Not that Methos' utter disgust at Joe's attempted masquerade had anything to do with it. Methos could get murderously annoyed over the short term, but he didn't hold grudges. Which was a good thing for Joe and very good thing for MacLeod.
Cold beer and a warm bed didn't hurt, if the laughter that trickled down from the bedroom upstairs was any indication.
Ruefully fingering the lump on the back of his head, Joe took stock. He wasn't really any more banged up than usual - he'd come out of a couple of St. Patrick’s Days in worse shape. Having his Immortals safe and celebrating under his own roof was worth far more than a couple of stings and dings.
That was the real secret he concealed from Cassandra and Highlander alike. Joe didn't aspire to be a member of the Clan MacLeod. Mortality aside, his lifetime role as a spy for the Watchers forever barred him from the clan handclasp. But in the privacy of his mind, for a few brief years, MacLeod and Methos and Amanda and even poor, dead Richie were all inducted into his own unspoken clan. In a few years, a dozen or more if he was lucky, his secret would safely die with him. Still, his clan would carry on, because there would always be a tavern or inn somewhere in the world with a bit of music, a tall beer, and a warm companion. And all Cassandra's cold magic couldn't change that.
Joe rubbed his burning eyes, banishing his maudlin thoughts. Only long Marine-instilled habits kept him from shedding his clothes and props all over the floor and falling into bed. Instead he fell into the chair, unstrapped and stacked the gear, and rubbed some feeling back into his thighs. After checking to see the coast was clear, he pushed into the bathroom to quietly wash up and dress down in some cutoffs and an impossibly faded sweatshirt that once said Chicago State.
He tossed the sawdust trashed bandage and cleaned the burn with a lot more whispered bad words than his boyhood priest normally countenanced in a month of confessions. He contemplated chasing a couple of pain pills with a shot of Scotch, but he had too much respect for the single malt to waste it on sleep.
A thump, followed by a series of bumps from the ceiling overhead made him laugh. Neither of his Immortals were going to notice him sneaking around to practice medicine without a license. "If they break the bed, they're going to pony up for a new one," he growled, and then laughed again for talking to himself like a peevish old maid. He just hoped like hell neither of them had managed to scare up a can of caviar.
Knowing he was too tired to sleep anyway, Joe compromised two of his vices, taking half a pill and a half a shot of the good scotch. Rolling into the main room, he plugged his guitar into the preamp, put on the headphones and started picking at a tune. Joe worried at the notes long into the night, chasing rills and riffs through lonely shadows, seeking the song he knew lay just beyond. Long after midnight, he finally laid the guitar away and stretched his fingers. Methos' voice floating out of the darkened stairwell seemed like a mere extension of his dark dreams.
"That's an old song, Joe. Very old." Methos blinked, his eyes catching the harbor lights.
"Cassandra's parting gift. I didn't think you heard."
"I heard her laugh, Joe."
Joe shrugged. "Wiccan humor. You had to be there."
"I was there, you dolt." Methos came into the room, and knelt at Joe's side. Working completely in the dark, he touched Joe's skin above and below the burn, feeling for the unnatural heat of infection. He explored the lump on Joe's crown, the aching stumps, and the calloused palms. Finally he touched Joe's forehead. A feather touch. Like Cassandra.
Joe twitched away, coming fully awake. "I'm okay. Just another day at the office."
"That's what I was afraid of," Methos stood, his face unreadable in the shadows. He silently made room as Joe pushed himself out of the room, pacing the chair down the hallway. He fetched water, and loomed over his victim until the glass was finished.
While Methos was refilling the glass, Joe cast himself into bed, pulling up the quilt over the chill of the sheets.
On Methos' return, Joe glared at him balefully, then belatedly slammed his eyes shut. "You're naked."
"You only just noticed? Then I am worried about you." Methos reached out to smooth the bedcovers.
"Tuck me in, and I'll shoot you," Joe threatened, though his heart wasn't in it.
Methos frowned. "Again? That's a very bad habit, Joe."
"Must be the company I keep." He was already drifting, his lids too heavy to reopen.
"Are you cold?"
"Go keep Mac warm..." Joe muttered, turning on his side and curling into himself.
"Okay, Joe. This time," Methos promised, pulling up the quilt and tucking it in over an exposed shoulder.
But Joe didn't hear the solemn words. He had already slipped away from the waking world into a darker land where a song curled like wood smoke through his dreams.
by mackiedockie and adabsolutely
Warnings: Slash & Puns R Us
Beta by methos_fan
Thanks also to elistaire for insightful comments over on insane journal where we did the test runs.
This is the conclusion. I thought there would be 10 parts, but the postings this second week worked better with three segments in each part. Mackiedockie and I were still changing it after midnight last night:-) Thanks for all the lovely feedback.
27.
Sitting on the cold concrete, Joe settled his back against a concrete pylon and surveyed the carnage. The smell of blood made his skin crawl. But the gun he settled on Liane remained rock steady.
"You shot them," Liane said in a stunned, quiet voice.
"Yeah. And I will again if I have to." He studied her face. "Your first dead bodies? Up close and personal?"
Liane nodded, swallowing.
"Kids.” Joe shook his head. These days they didn't cross train Watchers like they used to. Mortuary work, body pickups, that was all outsourced now. "You still want to kill me?"
Liane shook her head, slowly, almost grudgingly.
"Okay, now we're getting somewhere. Here's the deal. I fix it so you can be Cassandra's Watcher again. Her only Watcher. 24/7. "
"And what do you want from me?" Liane asked suspiciously.
Joe rubbed his aching head. "I want you to leave me and mine the hell alone." Of course, there was no way it could be that easy. "And I want you to stop using the Voice."
"Or you'll kill me."
Joe remained silent. The gun didn't waver.
Of course, the standoff couldn't last. Long, stalking steps and a swirl of steel announced MacLeod's arrival. MacLeod edged into the battleground, marking each weapon and checking each body. Methos started to stir, in such a controlled manner Joe half suspected he'd been playing possum for a while. And when Cassandra hitched upright with a short scorching oath and plucked at the hole in her blouse, they had a quorum. A very quiet quorum, reigned over by the Watcher.
MacLeod finally turned on Joe. "What the hell were you thinking, Joe? He can't protect himself when he's dead!"
Stung, Joe let the gun dangle, finally. "Gee, and it's nice to see you, too, Mac. I thought I'd have to waste a few more rounds on these two before you got here. Or I could have just let them hash it out and we could have picked up the body parts afterward."
Methos rolled to his feet to stand at MacLeod's shoulder, sword at half mast. He eyed Cassandra warily, but her concentration was now fixed on Joe, her eyes flickering with puzzled interest. Methos too, finally turned his attention to Joe.
"Oh-oh," Joe muttered, bracing himself against the pylon as Methos suddenly strode over to the mortal, grabbed him by his coat lapels, and pulled him abruptly to his feet.
Pinning Joe against the pylon, Methos leaned deeply into Joe's space. "What the hell were you thinking when you were masquerading as me?"
Joe shrugged. "It seemed a good idea at the time. I gotta work on the Etruscan accent, though," he said lightly. "Back off a little, willya? You're bleeding on my coat."
Then MacLeod was there, crowding in for a piece of lapel. "You did what?"
"He pretended to be Methos, scourge of the savannahs," Methos said in a withering tone. "He set himself up. Deliberately."
"If you'd been where you usually are, you'd never have known." The bar. Tibet. Bora Bora. Wherever.
"You pretended to be him?" MacLeod shook his head in disbelief. "Because it worked so well for the last Methos pretender?"
Joe was starting to get annoyed. Too damn many people were pushing him around, lately. "It was Watcher business, MacLeod. I lie to them all the damn time for you. For both of you. Just another day at the office. Now, will you back off?" With his back braced against the pylon, Joe was able to return a respectable shove to MacLeod's chest that moved him all of a half a step.
Methos held his ground inside Joe's defenses, close enough that Joe could feel his healed heart hammering, before whirling away, steel flashing under the garage lights. He stared coldly at Cassandra, who had recovered her sword, and silently dared her to renew the challenge. Joe nearly ended up falling over again as Methos dropped his hold.
Straightening his collar, Joe rolled his eyes and slapped his gun flat against MacLeod's chest. "Here, Mac, take this before I shoot him again. And where the hell are your earplugs?" Chastened, MacLeod eased back and fished into his pocket for the plugs.
Joe used MacLeod's distraction to get right back into Methos' face, ignoring both blade and blazing anger. "You. It's your turn to Watch, buddy." Joe reached up and took out his own earplugs and stuffed them into the Immortal's shirt pocket. "Master strategist, my ass." Joe turned his back on his Immortals and strode straight to Cassandra, unarmed and unprotected from the Voice.
Methos moved to stop him, but MacLeod stopped him with an iron grip on the upper arm. "Cassandra won't hurt him."
"You trust too much, MacLeod. And Liane has hurt him. And will again."
"If Cassandra can't control her own student for a ten minute conversation, then she can't be trusted with her beyond this building," MacLeod said with finality.
Methos' sudden grin didn't have a tinge of humor. "Agreed." He slowly allowed his sword to dip, but he did not sheathe it. "On your head be it."
Joe stalked up to Cassandra and forcefully planted his cane. "Go ahead. Ask your questions. MacLeod didn't call you over the ocean for a Bronze Age class reunion."
"Perhaps." Cassandra eyed him slowly, apparently unimpressed. "You've already been caught in a lie, Watcher. Your words hold no currency."
Coloring, Joe acknowledged the accusation with a tight nod. "Liane was obsessed. She was so sure of her assumptions that she was willing to commit more than one murder to get back in your good graces. Hardly anything I told her was a lie. I only made her question her assumptions."
"I assume you are lying about that, too," Cassandra challenged coldly. "You holding a gun, Methos holding a sword...the situation reeks of entrapment."
"That's because Liane learned her obsessions from you. You taught her to hate someone she'd never even met," Joe shot back. Then he deliberately lowered his voice. "And as a result, an Immortal named Kneissl is dead. He didn't have to die. He never harmed you."
Cassandra flicked her gaze to Liane. "Kneissl? That harmless hebephrenic?"
"Not so harmless when Liane wound him up like a three dollar watch and sent him to his death," Joe stared at Liane, daring her to contradict him.
"He was a womanizing playboy. Useless. It was worth his death to take Methos' head," Liane returned, still certain of Cassandra's hatred, if not her own.
Neither mortal expected the whispered note of grief that escaped Cassandra's throat. "Fool. Are your Chronicles so threadbare, Watchers? Kneissl helped me smuggle thousands of Romany and other refugees through the forests of occupied Austria to safety in Switzerland. Some of them are your sisters, Liane. You used your Gift to harm him?"
"Liane used her gift to murder him," Joe corrected coldly. Still, he averted his eyes as Liane subsided in shock. He didn't have the right to cast stones.
"But what about Methos? Together we could take them all! They can't fight off our Voices combined!"
Cassandra looked at Liane, then at Methos. She was clearly furious. And cornered. And very, very tempted.
Alarmed, Methos shifted his sword and dug for Joe's earplugs. MacLeod edged a step forward, but this time Methos held him back. "Use the gun if you have to. Joe's too close for sword work."
Joe caught the comment, and agreed. He was way too close for sword work. The problem was bullet work wasn't likely to improve Cassandra's mood. Or wardrobe. He solved the problem by moving forward two steps, close enough to Cassandra's steel to appreciate the fine folds in the blade. In looming over the witch, he cut off her view of Methos. He also blocked MacLeod's field of fire. "We didn't come here to trap you. But only you can keep this from getting out of hand. The way I see it, you have two viable options. You take responsibility for your student, and you walk away. Or you give her up to us. And you walk away."
Cassandra scowled in disbelief. "And we come back to your penchant for untruth."
Joe gripped his cane, gathering something from deep inside. "Go on. You've got the mojo. Use your Voice and make me tell it straight."
Methos reached out to MacLeod. "Give me the gun. Joe doesn't know what he's doing."
MacLeod stirred restlessly. "She won't hurt him. She didn't hurt me."
"Cassandra lusts after you, Highlander," Methos snapped. "She doesn't even like Joe. Not one little bit."
"She knows he's my friend."
"Like me?"
MacLeod hesitated. "Joe's under my protection."
"Funny," Methos said acidly, "From here it looks like the other way around."
Cassandra edged around Joe's side and peered suspiciously at Methos, still keeping his taller frame between her and the other Immortals and her sword very much at ready. "Very well."
Joe bowed his head and stood his ground against three thousand years of bound up rage, as Cassandra unleashed the Voice. The conversation was not loud. It was not long. The power of her magic curled around the Watcher like a vise, bearing down on his will and mind and heart. When the eldritch tones fell silent, Joe staggered under the weight of his answers.
Cassandra relaxed the grip on her sword slowly as Joe nodded one last quiet assent, praying it was enough. Just enough.
But there was one last question. "Tell me, Watcher. Why do you abandon your own mortal destiny to follow MacLeod's standard? You could be a scholar. A bard. A husband and a father. Why devote your life to scribbling and spying? MacLeod's story isn't yours. It will never belong to you."
Joe's voice caught, his face twisting as he battled the geas laid upon him. In dismay, MacLeod moved to intervene, only to be stopped this time by Methos' iron grip. "You can't save him from his own demons, MacLeod. I tried to warn you."
Shaking with the effort, Joe slowly lifted his cane, changing the grip.
"You can't fight the truth..." Cassandra warned.
The cane dropped from nerveless fingers, clattering away. But Joe's eyes cleared, and his face calmed. "You know what, Cassandra? It's none of your god damn business."
At that, Cassandra laughed, a strange and ringing sound in the echoing garage. She reached out and brushed his forehead, a new respect in her eye. "My apology, Bard. I will take Liane back. And I will teach her a different path."
Pale and aching, Joe didn't move as Cassandra shepherded Liane into the van and slammed the doors, leaving all her Watcher impedimenta behind. Her eyes were sharp and watchful as they eased the vehicle past the Immortals on guard. Methos still gripped his sword in a bone white hand.
MacLeod shook his head and took out his earplugs. Noticing Joe hadn't moved he strode to his elbow, only then realizing the Watcher was swaying on his stumps to a song only he could hear.
"Are you all right, Joe?" he asked softly.
"The truth hurts, man. The truth hurts."
28.
MacLeod took Dawson’s arm and lifted it over his shoulder. “Come on, Joe, let’s get out of here.”
“My cane.”
Methos searched around for it, retrieved it from the concrete floor of the parking structure and passed it to Dawson. Cane firmly in hand Joe tried to relinquish the Highlander’s support but MacLeod held fast. “Let me help until you’ve shaken her Voice.”
“It’s OK, Mac. I’m back.” This time Joe freed himself and stepped aside, directly into Methos’ path.
“Well. You’re still here.”
“Apparently. What were you thinking, Joe? Telling her you’re Methos!”
“He was protecting you.” MacLeod said.
“I don’t need a keeper, Joe. Five thousand years!”
Joe asked, “And what were you thinking when you came dashing up here to meet Cassandra, or were you just high on varnish fumes?”
“He was protecting you,” MacLeod repeated.
“Shut up!” Joe hollered.
“MacLeod!”
MacLeod laughed at them. “Testy, testy, guys. Come on, let’s get out of here before they change their minds and come back.”
“I thought you said Cassandra wouldn’t do that!” Methos shouted again but with diminishing energy.
“I said she wouldn’t go after Joe, not you. I think another night at Joe’s secret hideout is in order. We need to know for sure they’ve left the country. Unless you’re planning to take off now?”
Methos glared at MacLeod’s knowing grin. He thinks I’m going to stay, I should leave now!
MacLeod yanked him up close by the lapels just as he’d done in the bar the night before and kissed him roughly.
Joe longed to whop them with his cane, but he wasn’t steady enough to take a swing at them. So instead he charged toward the elevator. “Thanks for the show, guys!” He called over his shoulder.
MacLeod broke the kiss abruptly. “Wait up, Joe!” He dashed after their disgruntled friend.
Methos stood disoriented in their wake. “Wam bam, thank you…” he muttered.
He stared at MacLeod standing inside the elevator holding the door open for him.
“Hurry up!” MacLeod shouted.
A variety of responses zinged through his thoughts.
“Stop thinking.” MacLeod commanded.
Methos tugged at a fringe of hair on his forehead. “Yes, sire.”
A smirk and raised brow was all this display earned him. So he ambled over to the elevator, still thinking. He sighed and shook his head. Payback could wait.
The elevator ride to the ground floor was outwardly silent, if inwardly tumultuous. The weary men trudged across the street to Joe’s bar and locked the doors. Then they clambered into the T-bird and MacLeod drove a bit out of the way to buy take-out barbeque, before they headed over to Joe’s condo. The ride was accomplished without a great deal of conversation, but not in silence as each man seemed prone to grumbling and muttering.
The testiness eased up as they gathered around the kitchen table. Joe placed out more of the left over Christmas paper plates. MacLeod served the spicy pork ribs from the take- out sack and Methos opened three bottles of beer. Quiet reigned as they ate.
Once the ribs were naught but bones, MacLeod launched what he believed was a safe topic. “You know, Joe, I bet that under the tiles the rest of your bar floor is that beautiful hardwood too. We could -.” He stopped when Methos started laughing.
“What’s so funny?”
Methos shook his head. “Nothing, nothing. You should find another old house to remodel, MacLeod. Let Joe have his bar back.”
“You’d help me?”
“Only if there were power tools involved.”
“Hmm.”
“Just say yes, Mac,” Joe prompted.
“Yes.”
“But no nose painting.” Methos said.
“What?” Joe’s curiosity was aroused.
“Never mind!” MacLeod insisted.
“MacLeod has impulse control issues.”
“That’s true,” Joe agreed.
“Hey!”
“He can’t help it. He’s just a hot headed lad.”
They shared a laugh and another beer. Dawson was sore from hitting the ground twice in as many days, so he called it a night early. He had another long day of repair work looming ahead tomorrow.
“Keep it down will you, guys?”
“Yes, Joe,” his Immortals replied. He shook his head and laughed. He could practically smell the lust. Must be the fighting.
After Joe had left the room, MacLeod gave Methos a leering smile just before he yanked him out of his chair and urged him up the stairs. Once behind the closed bedroom door he said, “Maybe we don’t have that quiet as mice thing down yet.”
“Perhaps I should gag you?” Methos suggested.
“Me!”
“Sssh!”
“MacLeod laughed. “Yeah, I guess it could be me.”
“You do have enthusiasm, Highlander. Perhaps we can find - ah!”
MacLeod had shoved Methos onto the bed. “Sssh!”
Methos grinned up at MacLeod from his sprawl across Amy’s pale pink bedspread. And sprawled some more. “What am I ever going to do with you, Highlander? Shoving me around like you own me! Do you know what happened to the last fellow suffering from that delusion?”
MacLeod stood at the foot of the bed watching Methos lure him. He heard words, but knew their information value was near zero. Methos the word slinger. So in kind he spoke, “I’ve been thinking about your leather chastity strap story all day long.” Duncan slowly removed his own shirt with Methos’ undivided attention.
“Did I ever mention that you shouldn’t believe every story I tell?” Methos voice had become raspy.
“I figured that out on my own shortly after meeting you. Still I think the idea has nice possibilities.” He bent over and untied his shoes, turning slightly so that Methos would have a nice view of his backside during the process. “I have a box of leather scraps I’ve collected over the years.” He stood and kicked off his shoes. Next he unbuttoned his jeans and slowly opened the zipper. “I bet I could fashion a serviceable strap for you.” He slid out of his jeans with more wriggling than required and was pleased to note his companion’s breathing rate quicken. “Would you like that?” Since he was lowering his briefs at that moment he was not surprised by the lack of response.
Now nude he crawled up the bed in between Methos’ long limbs and inquired, “Why do you still have your clothes on?” Then he assisted his recumbent friend out of his jeans and shirt.
“You’re such a helpful sort.” Methos observed.
“I try.”
“I think you’re succeeding.” It took immortal control not to tremble when Duncan touched him.
“So it seems.” MacLeod spread himself across his lean partner and sighed. He kissed the long neck then blew warm air over the skin he had dampened causing a lovely shiver. Methos swallowed, and because MacLeod thought he saw discomfort asked, “Am I too heavy?”
“No. But perhaps you could move a little more rapidly?”
“Aye. I could do that.” And he did. He moved faster, exploring the fine body with many kisses, but not so fast that they would finish without a proper worship of each other. Anointing with lotion was followed by joining. MacLeod, slowly caressing through that moment of vulnerability, cherishing the deep growl from Methos as his aim proved very true.
When no more could be taken and the little death occurred words they would never repeat in the light of day were spoken. And so it seemed, for a period of time they would walk their path together, thanks to the complicated truth of a very good friend.
29.
Joe made it to his bedroom in a relatively straight line, considering the mileage he'd added up over the last two days. He figured he must have pulled it off cleanly (with a little help from MacLeod's impulse control issues) because the five thousand year old quack didn't follow him and start prodding. Not that Methos' utter disgust at Joe's attempted masquerade had anything to do with it. Methos could get murderously annoyed over the short term, but he didn't hold grudges. Which was a good thing for Joe and very good thing for MacLeod.
Cold beer and a warm bed didn't hurt, if the laughter that trickled down from the bedroom upstairs was any indication.
Ruefully fingering the lump on the back of his head, Joe took stock. He wasn't really any more banged up than usual - he'd come out of a couple of St. Patrick’s Days in worse shape. Having his Immortals safe and celebrating under his own roof was worth far more than a couple of stings and dings.
That was the real secret he concealed from Cassandra and Highlander alike. Joe didn't aspire to be a member of the Clan MacLeod. Mortality aside, his lifetime role as a spy for the Watchers forever barred him from the clan handclasp. But in the privacy of his mind, for a few brief years, MacLeod and Methos and Amanda and even poor, dead Richie were all inducted into his own unspoken clan. In a few years, a dozen or more if he was lucky, his secret would safely die with him. Still, his clan would carry on, because there would always be a tavern or inn somewhere in the world with a bit of music, a tall beer, and a warm companion. And all Cassandra's cold magic couldn't change that.
Joe rubbed his burning eyes, banishing his maudlin thoughts. Only long Marine-instilled habits kept him from shedding his clothes and props all over the floor and falling into bed. Instead he fell into the chair, unstrapped and stacked the gear, and rubbed some feeling back into his thighs. After checking to see the coast was clear, he pushed into the bathroom to quietly wash up and dress down in some cutoffs and an impossibly faded sweatshirt that once said Chicago State.
He tossed the sawdust trashed bandage and cleaned the burn with a lot more whispered bad words than his boyhood priest normally countenanced in a month of confessions. He contemplated chasing a couple of pain pills with a shot of Scotch, but he had too much respect for the single malt to waste it on sleep.
A thump, followed by a series of bumps from the ceiling overhead made him laugh. Neither of his Immortals were going to notice him sneaking around to practice medicine without a license. "If they break the bed, they're going to pony up for a new one," he growled, and then laughed again for talking to himself like a peevish old maid. He just hoped like hell neither of them had managed to scare up a can of caviar.
Knowing he was too tired to sleep anyway, Joe compromised two of his vices, taking half a pill and a half a shot of the good scotch. Rolling into the main room, he plugged his guitar into the preamp, put on the headphones and started picking at a tune. Joe worried at the notes long into the night, chasing rills and riffs through lonely shadows, seeking the song he knew lay just beyond. Long after midnight, he finally laid the guitar away and stretched his fingers. Methos' voice floating out of the darkened stairwell seemed like a mere extension of his dark dreams.
"That's an old song, Joe. Very old." Methos blinked, his eyes catching the harbor lights.
"Cassandra's parting gift. I didn't think you heard."
"I heard her laugh, Joe."
Joe shrugged. "Wiccan humor. You had to be there."
"I was there, you dolt." Methos came into the room, and knelt at Joe's side. Working completely in the dark, he touched Joe's skin above and below the burn, feeling for the unnatural heat of infection. He explored the lump on Joe's crown, the aching stumps, and the calloused palms. Finally he touched Joe's forehead. A feather touch. Like Cassandra.
Joe twitched away, coming fully awake. "I'm okay. Just another day at the office."
"That's what I was afraid of," Methos stood, his face unreadable in the shadows. He silently made room as Joe pushed himself out of the room, pacing the chair down the hallway. He fetched water, and loomed over his victim until the glass was finished.
While Methos was refilling the glass, Joe cast himself into bed, pulling up the quilt over the chill of the sheets.
On Methos' return, Joe glared at him balefully, then belatedly slammed his eyes shut. "You're naked."
"You only just noticed? Then I am worried about you." Methos reached out to smooth the bedcovers.
"Tuck me in, and I'll shoot you," Joe threatened, though his heart wasn't in it.
Methos frowned. "Again? That's a very bad habit, Joe."
"Must be the company I keep." He was already drifting, his lids too heavy to reopen.
"Are you cold?"
"Go keep Mac warm..." Joe muttered, turning on his side and curling into himself.
"Okay, Joe. This time," Methos promised, pulling up the quilt and tucking it in over an exposed shoulder.
But Joe didn't hear the solemn words. He had already slipped away from the waking world into a darker land where a song curled like wood smoke through his dreams.