One of Hearts, for morgynleri_fic
Title: One of Hearts
Author: calime33
Written for: Morgyn Leri
Characters/Pairings: Katherine/Nick Sutherland
Rating: G
Wordcount: 962
Author's Notes: In her request, Morgyn Leri mentioned Katherine, the immortal from the episode Two of Hearts. I had no memory of ever having watched that episode before, so I did. It never ceases to amaze me how many un- and underexplored characters and possibilities there are in the Highlander universe, and, well, this is the result. A bit of a character study, a bit of an episode tag... And heartfelt thanks go out to my wonderful beta who will be revealed later - thank you, and everything still wrong is my fault:)
Summary: This is who you are. This is who I am. This is what we do, and do best.
Her earliest memories were of the bright sun on the mountainside and the blue of the sea merging with the far-off sky down below. The world was bright and wide above, narrowing into familiar safety of a village huddled in a ravine high up on the mountainside. Their village was the highest, perched on the border of the human world below and the roofless high domain of the mountain and the sky above, where the kri-kri, the wild goats lived.
Down by the sea, the pantheon of Great Gods ruled from the Sanctuary and drew visitors from far and wide to the little island with the promises of its mysteries. Up here, though others were also given their due, it was the Great Mother, the mistress of the mountains, who was revered the most. The kri-kri were considered to be the more immediate manifestation of her power. In a barren land where not much of note would grow, the goats were the villagers' main livelihood - hunted for meat and skins both for their own use and for barter, and revered for their intelligence, agility and essentialness for survival.
My little kid, her mother used to call her, the little foundling from the mountainside, a child of the Great Mother and a kri-kri. This was the earliest name she knew herself by - the Kid-girl. When she grew, she would spend days climbing the great mountain, as agile and surefooted as the goats, learning to track and hunt them together with her brothers.
Hunting seemed to be in her blood, together with the yearning for the wide open sky. Like the kri-kri, she would not be contained, confined to the narrow borders of a woman caring for her hearth and man and children - and the village would've looked askance at her, child of the Great Mother or not, if not for the old healing-woman whom everyone respectfully addressed as the Grandmother. A kindred soul now trapped in an aging, though still surprisingly tough shell, she decreed she needed an apprentice and only the Kid-girl would do.
I'm not a healer, I'm a hunter, she'd told the old woman defiantly.
The Grandmother had only snorted. You will learn, was the only thing she'd said - and she had found herself drawn into the fascinating realm of knowledge she'd never before dreamed existed. The healer taught not only herb-lore and bonesetting and all and sundry cures to common ailments, but also how to trade and bargain, to collect gossip and glean the truth from it, to mend hearts and souls together with bodies, whenever possible - though her pupil often was better at reading goat tracks than people.
And so she'd made herself into a healer, and only rarely let loose her hunter half, even after her mortal life came crashing down around her with the hot bursts of ash and stones from the awakened fire in the heart of the mountain.
Carefully yet firmly she'd negotiated the path of immortality and the Game, like a mountain goat walks the cliff paths - always looking forward, never making a superfluous movement. She'd kept her head down, followed the quiet paths of a healer - and when she'd hunted, out of necessity, like she hunted Bartholomew - because someone had to take out the beast preying on people -, it was without joy, just with a singleminded practicality.
***
Nick had changed all that. Nick, full of glee and unstoppable optimism. Nick, who had accepted all she was, worshipped her like a goddess, loved her as a woman, and admired her as a competent partner. Nick, who had reignited the joy of the hunt in her. Nick, who had always been willing to die for her, yet had never denied her her fair share of danger. Together with him she'd been more alive than ever, the two of them an unstoppable pair high on mischief and hunting and ideals. They'd been like two modern-day Robin Hoods, dashing from one successful rescue misson to another, never planning for profit, yet somehow coming out with unexpected gains , more often than not.
I love you - this was easy to say. Don't ever die stuck in her throat - she was never one to seek the impossible, only the improbable. Watch your cholesterol, she'd joke instead. And Nick, being Nick, had understood her unspoken fears, yet refused to be bound by them.
After Bartholomew, curled up in their bed, she'd tried to broach the subject. I don't want anything to happen to you - yet how could she keep him safe? And even if she could, what would it do to them? Nick had just looked at her and stretched out a finger to gently smooth the worry-lines between her eybrows. This is who you are. This is who I am. This is what we do, and do best. He'd grinned then, a happy, boyish grin. I'll promise to watch my cholesterol, if you'll watch your head. I need it attached, so that one day you can name the first spaceship you own after me.
***
There was no grave nor marker for Nick Sutherland, formerly of Chicago, dead at 49 from a brain aneurysm, his ashes scattered to the four winds. But on May 1st, 2079, the world media was in a tizzy, reporting the launch of the first unmanned interstellar spacecraft utilizing the modified Alcubierre drive - a most improbable feat by the Fengari Foundation, an organisation with no known affiliations to any of the world governments, yet somehow managing to meld the world's top science minds and most successful financiers into a seamless project with mindboggling results. The spacecraft, sent speeding towards Alpha Centauri B, was named simply Nick.
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end
Author: calime33
Written for: Morgyn Leri
Characters/Pairings: Katherine/Nick Sutherland
Rating: G
Wordcount: 962
Author's Notes: In her request, Morgyn Leri mentioned Katherine, the immortal from the episode Two of Hearts. I had no memory of ever having watched that episode before, so I did. It never ceases to amaze me how many un- and underexplored characters and possibilities there are in the Highlander universe, and, well, this is the result. A bit of a character study, a bit of an episode tag... And heartfelt thanks go out to my wonderful beta who will be revealed later - thank you, and everything still wrong is my fault:)
Summary: This is who you are. This is who I am. This is what we do, and do best.
Her earliest memories were of the bright sun on the mountainside and the blue of the sea merging with the far-off sky down below. The world was bright and wide above, narrowing into familiar safety of a village huddled in a ravine high up on the mountainside. Their village was the highest, perched on the border of the human world below and the roofless high domain of the mountain and the sky above, where the kri-kri, the wild goats lived.
Down by the sea, the pantheon of Great Gods ruled from the Sanctuary and drew visitors from far and wide to the little island with the promises of its mysteries. Up here, though others were also given their due, it was the Great Mother, the mistress of the mountains, who was revered the most. The kri-kri were considered to be the more immediate manifestation of her power. In a barren land where not much of note would grow, the goats were the villagers' main livelihood - hunted for meat and skins both for their own use and for barter, and revered for their intelligence, agility and essentialness for survival.
My little kid, her mother used to call her, the little foundling from the mountainside, a child of the Great Mother and a kri-kri. This was the earliest name she knew herself by - the Kid-girl. When she grew, she would spend days climbing the great mountain, as agile and surefooted as the goats, learning to track and hunt them together with her brothers.
Hunting seemed to be in her blood, together with the yearning for the wide open sky. Like the kri-kri, she would not be contained, confined to the narrow borders of a woman caring for her hearth and man and children - and the village would've looked askance at her, child of the Great Mother or not, if not for the old healing-woman whom everyone respectfully addressed as the Grandmother. A kindred soul now trapped in an aging, though still surprisingly tough shell, she decreed she needed an apprentice and only the Kid-girl would do.
I'm not a healer, I'm a hunter, she'd told the old woman defiantly.
The Grandmother had only snorted. You will learn, was the only thing she'd said - and she had found herself drawn into the fascinating realm of knowledge she'd never before dreamed existed. The healer taught not only herb-lore and bonesetting and all and sundry cures to common ailments, but also how to trade and bargain, to collect gossip and glean the truth from it, to mend hearts and souls together with bodies, whenever possible - though her pupil often was better at reading goat tracks than people.
And so she'd made herself into a healer, and only rarely let loose her hunter half, even after her mortal life came crashing down around her with the hot bursts of ash and stones from the awakened fire in the heart of the mountain.
Carefully yet firmly she'd negotiated the path of immortality and the Game, like a mountain goat walks the cliff paths - always looking forward, never making a superfluous movement. She'd kept her head down, followed the quiet paths of a healer - and when she'd hunted, out of necessity, like she hunted Bartholomew - because someone had to take out the beast preying on people -, it was without joy, just with a singleminded practicality.
***
Nick had changed all that. Nick, full of glee and unstoppable optimism. Nick, who had accepted all she was, worshipped her like a goddess, loved her as a woman, and admired her as a competent partner. Nick, who had reignited the joy of the hunt in her. Nick, who had always been willing to die for her, yet had never denied her her fair share of danger. Together with him she'd been more alive than ever, the two of them an unstoppable pair high on mischief and hunting and ideals. They'd been like two modern-day Robin Hoods, dashing from one successful rescue misson to another, never planning for profit, yet somehow coming out with unexpected gains , more often than not.
I love you - this was easy to say. Don't ever die stuck in her throat - she was never one to seek the impossible, only the improbable. Watch your cholesterol, she'd joke instead. And Nick, being Nick, had understood her unspoken fears, yet refused to be bound by them.
After Bartholomew, curled up in their bed, she'd tried to broach the subject. I don't want anything to happen to you - yet how could she keep him safe? And even if she could, what would it do to them? Nick had just looked at her and stretched out a finger to gently smooth the worry-lines between her eybrows. This is who you are. This is who I am. This is what we do, and do best. He'd grinned then, a happy, boyish grin. I'll promise to watch my cholesterol, if you'll watch your head. I need it attached, so that one day you can name the first spaceship you own after me.
***
There was no grave nor marker for Nick Sutherland, formerly of Chicago, dead at 49 from a brain aneurysm, his ashes scattered to the four winds. But on May 1st, 2079, the world media was in a tizzy, reporting the launch of the first unmanned interstellar spacecraft utilizing the modified Alcubierre drive - a most improbable feat by the Fengari Foundation, an organisation with no known affiliations to any of the world governments, yet somehow managing to meld the world's top science minds and most successful financiers into a seamless project with mindboggling results. The spacecraft, sent speeding towards Alpha Centauri B, was named simply Nick.
----------------
end