RATED NC17 FOR ADULT THEMES & VIOLENCE. As always, The Highlander characters are the property of Rysher: Panzer/Davis. The character and circumstances of the birth of Sean MacLeod is being used with permission but should not be construed as making this story in any way a sequel to THE CHAOS CHRONICLES located at the HIGHLANDER QUILL CLUB This material may not be copied or distributed without my permission-I don't want R:P/D hunting me down--I have enough problems. Do not link, publish or post this material without permission.

It was a silent and nervous group that made it back to Xan's, pulling the Van into the garage and using the entrance into the shelter rather than going through the main structure. Methos kept his silence the entire trip and gave no indication that he was likely to speak soon until Sean had helped him into the main room of their temporary haven.  Abbas' still dead body was dumped into a small storeroom, Connor securing him wrists and ankles with twisted knots.

"Now what?" he asked glancing up at Kir.

"Just watch him...Let me check on Methos."

"Kir," Connor rose and laid a hand on her arm. "I love my kinsman, but this has gone too far."

Kir covered his big hand with hers. "I know. Gone to far to stop it now, Connor," she said and left him.

Methos had rejected anything to drink or eat from his brother. The nosebleed had stopped and he seemed more alert, Sean hovering and Methos seemingly reluctant to let the younger man out of his sight for more than a few moments.

He had not changed his shirt yet, blood still staining the gray cloth. Amanda sat quietly in the corner, eyes huge as she watched Methos, not sure she recognized him any longer.

"Keep your sensibilities out of this," Methos rasped as Kir emerged, her face expressionless.

"Your plan?" she asked curtly.

"Get Mac's location out of Abbas by any means available," Methos said.

"You mean torture."

"I mean any means available," Methos reiterated and got to his feet, moving stiffly toward his pack and pulled out a set of small daggers the length of his forearm, moving around the room, he checked drawers and shelves pulling down a half-dozen items but nothing significant.

Without checking with any of them or saying anything, he entered the storeroom, kneeling beside the trussed body, checking to make sure Abbas was not only tied well, but secured to one of the iron conduits running up the wall of the underground chamber. Satisfied, he pulled the knife from Abbas' chest that had kept the other man dead during their trip and waited. Connor stood to one side watching him, Kir at the doorway blocking the view from Amanda and Sean.

It took long moments before the damaged heart started beating again. Methos waited until Abbas began to come around, until the eyes opened and saw him. There was no smile on the oldest Immortal's face, not even one meant to frighten or intimidate, no expression whatsoever as he picked up the first of the two daggers and gripped Abbas' left leg at the calf, pressing it to the floor and leaning his weight against the other leg to part them. Without a word he drove the dagger through the man's knee with enough force to drive it through the other side. Abbas' initial sight of his old slave's face had sent him into slack-jawed panic.  But Methos' bone-shattering stab brought forth a high-pitched scream as the ancient thief writhed and cursed and tried to kick out.

Avoiding the kicks, Methos waited again until the screams dropped to sobs of agony and the wounds healed around the knife.  He picked up the second dagger and reached out for Abbas' right leg.

"Where is he?" he asked.

Abbas spat at him, cursed him in languages that Kir did not understand and she wondered at her own stillness. Connor had jerked at the first wounding but he stood now, fists clenched tightly at his side, watching. Vaguely, Kir was aware that Sean was behind her, his horror matching her own, shocked into immobility.

"Where?" Methos intoned again and got nothing except more curses. The second dagger went in and the screaming began again. Methos rose to his feet and stepped back, waiting for the wounds to heal and glancing up at the pipes over head. He picked up a rope and looked at Connor. "Overhead, two loops, " he said quietly and after a moment Connor took the cords and moved, tossing the ropes overhead.

"Adam, don't--" Sean began on a whisper but Methos would not even look at him.  Connor finished his preparations and looked at the older immortal.

"Hung by his knees?" he asked in a flat, chilled voice.

A nod was his only answer.  Then Methos looked at Kir with flat, dead eyes. "Close the door. I don't care which side of it you are on. Sean stays out." He said nothing more only watched as Connor drove the knife once more into Abbas' heart then began untying his careful knots.

Kir turned to Sean then pushed gently on his chest. "Stay with Amanda," she said and then closed the door in his face.

She would have given almost anything to join him on the other side but she stayed, arms across her chest as she leaned against the door. Abbas' cries had degenerated into moans and curses but they started again as he was hauled up by his damaged knees, the blades cutting into his skin, tearing tendons and then lodging against bone as he was lifted.  Even with his hands still bound he tried to strike out at Connor as Methos stayed well back, but his movements only swung him more violently, bringing fresher agonies and he stopped, still cursing, breath grating harshly in an already ravaged throat.

"That's better," Methos said casually when the man's struggles ended and he came forward a bit to crouch in front of their captive. "You know you are going to die, Barabbas.  Sooner or later I'm going to take your head. But if you tell us where to find MacLeod, I will kill you sooner, from the neck first instead of cutting you into small pieces starting at your ankles and working my way up."   He glanced up at the bound, upended body.  "Or in this particular case, working my way down."  But there was no humor there, only a subtle nuance to his voice, soft and coaxing.  Even knowing it, even understanding how it was done, Kir almost found herself trying to answer his questions.

"I don't know where he is!!" Abbas screamed at him "Sun moved him!!"

"And Sun reported to you, General Abbas...not the type to strike out on his own...where is he, Barabbas?  You know, I even thought about crucifying you -- seems appropriate given that you missed your last chance," Methos said and reached out to wipe away the blood that dribbled onto Abbas' mottled, sweating face from the wounds in his legs. He examined the crimson-stained finger then sucked the blood off slowly.  A small, cold smile touched his lips as he leaned close to whisper.  "They are right -- the blood of the betrayer is the sweetest."

Kir watched as he silently rose, going to his small cache of supplies.  The back of his shirt was damp with sweat and he reached out a hand to steady himself against the wall as he crouched down to pull out a spool of wire and another knife.   But the voice and hand were rock-steady as he pulled the knife out, showing it to Abbas before sliding the point under the collar of Abbas' shirt and ripping slowly upward, inch by inch. Abbas screamed again, not shy about giving into his pain as the knife scored the skin from neck to belly.

Amanda found Sean huddled in the hallway outside the grim room.  They could hear the evidence of Methos' work, though, and Sean's hands were over his ears, his face a gray mask.  She sank down onto the floor, pulling his stiff, unyielding body into her arms.  At her touch he began to rock just slightly back and forth, back and forth.

"Shhh," she whispered, running her hand across his clammy brow.  "It will be okay, Sean."

"No," he answered.  "It won't ever be okay.  He's . . . doing this . . . he's . . . because of me.  Because I killed.  Because I wanted to kill."  Slow tears began to trace a path through the stubble on Sean's cheeks.  "I've never wanted to kill before, Amanda.  Never.  This is what Da meant.  This is why he tried so hard, why he wanted . . . oh, God, and now I've destroyed Adam and killed my own father.  And Connor . . . I've never known him like this.  Never known anyone could . . ." He ran out of words as they tumbled one over the other in confusion and despair.

"Oh, baby, don't do this to yourself," Amanda whispered.  "My God, you've been hit all at once with the full force of the Gathering surrounded by more Immortal power than most young ones ever have to contend with, and trying to keep Methos together and Duncan gone missing . . . you can't blame yourself, Sean."  She put her hands on both sides of his face, wiping his tears with her thumbs.  "You've been a tower of strength, Sean MacLeod.  You can't blame yourself for forces beyond your control.  You'll start sounding just like Duncan and that's the last thing in the world anybody would want!"  She tried to sound light hearted, but at the dark look on his face, the evocation of his father, of what had been done to him, was the wrong thing to say.

He drew a deep shuddering breath.  "I just keep seeing that video over and over in my head, every time I close my eyes.  Every detail, down to the paint peeling off those horrible gray walls."  He shook his head, lowering his forehead to his knees as though he were fighting off a wave of nausea.  " Why would anyone do something like that to him?  It's just not . . ."

"Fair?" Amanda finished for him.  "Mac would be the first one to tell you that life is not fair.  He would also be the first one to tell you that none of this is your fault."

Sean's laugh was more like a harsh bark.  "That's right.  He'd say it was all his fault!  And now Adam and Connor are doing to Abbas exactly the kinds of horrible things that were done to Da.  He would hate this, Amanda!  He would never let this happen!"

"I wouldn't be so sure, Sean.  If they were holding you or Adam, I think the noble, ever virtuous Highlander would do anything, and I do mean anything, to get you back.  You've just never seen him like that.  I have, and I can tell you it's as scary as anything you've seen from Connor or Methos or even Bar Abbas."

Sean was quiet for a long time.  "Do we all eventually get like that then?  Cold and hard and old and desperate?  No conscience?"

Amanda pried the younger man's arms from around his knees and pulled him to her arms.  "I hope not, Sean.  Duncan wanted it to be different for you.  Of all of us, he was the best, the one who resisted the hardest, until you came along.  Now you've had the merest taste of what the rest of us have always known.  But you're your father's son, Sean MacLeod.  If I know you, it will only make you stronger, more determined to be compassionate.  Just as Mac, when we find him, will refuse to let whatever happened to him in that little windowless room break him or change who he fundamentally is."

A long moment passed, then Sean asked, in an odd voice.  "A windowless room?  But there was a window.  Where Abbas and Sun were watching."

Amanda looked into Sean's golden questioning eyes.  "But . . ." then she saw something there, a flare of possibility, of hope.

Sean grabbed for her hand, squeezing it until she almost pulled away in pain.  "You saw the later videos, didn't you?  You saw where he is!"

"No!" Amanda shook her head.  "All I saw was . . . a room, a brief look as they took him in and chained him to a wall, then the Quickening blew out the power and the computer practically exploded.  The whole recording melted inside.  You know that.  If I could have saved it I would have!"

Sean's hands moved to her shoulders as he levered himself up to his knees.  "But you saw!  You saw something!  Maybe more than you think."

She read his thoughts in his eyes.  "Sean, if you're thinking what I think you're thinking then Methos is in no shape to go inside my head and I don't want him there!"

"But Amanda, if Abbas doesn't know, then you may be our only chance!  Sun's knowledge is so confused and warped by emotions and motivations in my head that finding it, understanding it, is almost impossible under the best circumstances.  But maybe there's something you can remember, something you saw that will help.  Please, Amanda."  His golden eyes shone with hope and desperation.  "Please, just try!"

The Immortal woman looked at this beautiful child, so much like Duncan, so much like Methos.  How could she refuse him anything?  But she remembered Methos reaching inside her head, violating her in a way she never wanted to be touched again, and slowly pulled away.  "Sean, I . . ."

"Kir and I will help, Amanda.  We'll be there.  We won't let him hurt you, even unintentionally.  Oh, Amanda, this could be our only hope, and we're out of time!"

Her skin crawled with a cold, sick feeling as she slowly nodded her head.  "Okay," she breathed.  "Okay."

"Take his boots off," Methos instructed Connor, with absolutely no indication that he thought Connor might not obey.  The Scot moved to comply without comment. Methos, in the meantime made a horizontal cut along Abbas belly. "You know -- even had you not tortured Mac...I would still have lots of reasons to make you suffer.  And I've had thousands of years to think about it." Methos murmured, seemingly fascinated by the welling blood, his voice still lightly persuasive.  He picked up the spool of wire, unrolling a length and slipping it under the edge of the wound, the fine filament biting into the skin. He pulled steadily downward with a slight sawing motion, moving slowly as the wire cut into the soft connecting tissue and the pink flesh began peeling away from the body.  It hung and Methos reapplied the knife, easing the recalcitrant skin back while Abbas howled, panted and wept and groaned.

"I would love to flay you completely but I don't have that kind of time," Methos whispered close into his victim's ear, "so tell me, where is MacLeod?"

"I don't know!" Abbas screamed. "I was looking for him, too.  Oh, God, Miklos, just end it, please!"

"God?" Methos chuckled.  It wasn't a pretty sound.  "A little late for that, don't you think?"  He pulled Abbas' hands down till they nearly touched the floor then applied one booted foot to the bound wrists, settling his weight on them. Abbas' screams almost drowned out the sound of all those small bones breaking.  Once again, the man swore in the name of long-forgotten deities that he didn't know.  He didn't know.  He didn't know.

"I almost believe you. You never were very good with resisting pain," Methos commented. And began again, slowly, methodically, with the wire and the knife until Abbas was screaming again, and was then reduced to gibbering in blind panic as Methos took his knife and cut away the waistband of his trousers, exposing his groin and buttocks. "You left me to the mercy of the priests...or their lack of mercy," the oldest Immortal said.  The voice had become distant and hard, and for a moment Kir feared the Oldest Immortal no longer remembered what the point of this gruesome task was.

But he was an ever-constant source of surprise.  "Where is MacLeod?" Methos insisted again when his captive's murmurs finally diminished to wordless gasps and hiccups, and got gibberish as an answer. A small slice at the base of Abbas' flaccid cock and the wire came up again. Connor looked away, jaw set and eyes closed but he made no move to stop the horror as Abbas erupted again into screams and nonsense and Kir had to close her eyes as well.

"Now," Methos said in a whisper and it took Kir a moment to realize he was talking to her. His face was gray, the eyes dulled, fresh blood spattering his face and clothes and hands.

She had to think about each step as she forced herself to move forward...trying to clear her mind, to push back the fresh scent of blood, of excrement and urine -- Abbas having soiled himself at some point and she had not noticed. Abbas was still whimpering incoherent gibberish as she crouched in front of him.

"Where is Duncan MacLeod?" she asked, the subtle Voice breaking through the pain and panic in Abbas' mind...streaming eyes fixed on her. "I . . . don't. . .  know..." he gasped out. She asked again, with more force and got the same answer. Again and again until Abbas' voice faltered once again into incoherence.

"Enough," Methos whispered at last. "He doesn't know..." His voice broke and he slid against the wall, eyes staring sightlessly ahead. "He doesn't--" He looked up at Connor.  "His head is still mine," he said flatly and pushed himself upward. "Just kill him for now," he instructed and made it to his feet again and to the door.

Connor took a deep, relieved breath as he ran Abbas through with his sword.  The sudden silence left Kir and Connor with their own inner voices roaring in their ears as they stared at each other, both of them thinking Abbas had gotten off far more lightly in his tortures than had the oldest Immortal.

It was over. Abbas could tell them nothing and Methos had no doubt whatsoever that the Eastern Dawn general knew nothing more than he had said. The only other viable possibility to find Mac in time was Sean and that thought as well as all hope skittered away from him even as he passed his brother and Amanda in the outer chamber. He now had no thoughts at all save to clean himself of the stench of blood and fear. If he was going to take of Barabbas' head and at last give over to the madness clawing at his soul, he was at least going to do it clean.

He could almost hear Duncan laughing at such a fancy. Distant and echoey in his mind, the sound of that sweet laughter, the glimpse of a smile or the stubborn set of the strong jaw. Such a waste. A waste and a loss, he amended as he gathered fresh clothes, then stripped out of the sweat and blood sodden clothing he had on and reached into the shower to turn on the water. The first touch of the water almost burned his skin even though the gauge on the shower showed it not to be that hot. <<I am just cold, he decided but made no attempt to pick up soap or cloth, just let the water run over him, beat on him, the pressure leaving his skin cleaned but bruised.

He was seeking a coward's way out and knew it. His escape into madness would let the Gathering come without the Community to mediate it -- he wondered what Kir would think to know he gave any thought to the Community at all. Restore her faith in human nature no doubt. He decided to keep the thought to himself. No use in setting her up for disappointment. He had no care for the Gathering anymore or the prize. That had been Darius' crusade and Duncan's life work and sacrifice.  Now both were gone.  The best of them all.  Gone.  Chances were, given the remaining Immortals, Connor would take it, praying all the time that he would never have to face Sean over crossed swords. Unless Sean took up his father's place in the Community but Methos doubted it were possible anymore -- he had managed to shatter Sean as well as his father -- and himself. <<Three with one blow... The old fairy-tale came to mind about the tailor who gained the reputation as a giant killer or a beast killer or some such when in reality he had managed only to kill three flies on his table.

That would have made Duncan laugh too.

He felt more lucid than he had in weeks -- lucid as long as he didn't try to match speech to thought. God only knew what language would spill out of his mouth at this point. God. Duncan's God...when had he made that transition? Long about the time he lost track of where the Highlander began and he ended, he supposed.

Lucid. Well the terminally ill sometime had brief lucid periods just before death -- hadn't that been the way with....his mind blanked. He could see her face...honey gold hair and a sweet, round face with enormous eyes...not long after he had met Duncan...Alexa. He was definitely ill and hopefully terminal. It fit. It worked.

<<I'm sorry. The apology went winging it's way along the nearly non-existent link left between he and MacLeod. He knew he'd be forgiven. Duncan always forgave him.

He turned the water off. He had just enough in him to take Abbas' head. He would have preferred to make it slow and infinitely painful but there wasn't time for that. He could only hope Kir would be strong enough to take his head when he was done.

Sean's head snapped up from his knees as the door slammed open at last and Methos slipped by like a wraith, his shirt soaked with sweat and streaked with blood not his own.  He stiffly climbed to his feet, helping Amanda up as well, finding Kir standing in the doorway leading into the gruesome room.

The look on her face told a story too heartbreaking to put into words.  "I'm so sorry, Sean," Kir whispered.  Her face was ashen, her expression hard.  All the sorrow, the grief and pain had been stripped away in the need to survive the assault on her senses, her values, her own identity that had been tested to its limits and beyond in the confines of that small torture chamber.

Connor moved in behind her, carefully closing the door.  All expression had been wiped clean there as well and the eldest Highlander, always an intimidating presence, seemed hardly human.

"Kir . . ." Sean began, but she put her up hand to stop him as though the very sound of his voice caused her pain.

"It's over, Sean.  I think you should get as far from here as you possibly can as quickly as you can.  You can't help him.  You can't save him.  He doesn't want to be saved, and I will do what I have to do.  The best thing -- the only thing -- you can do for him is to survive this, to go on."

"No!" Sean broke in desperately.  "There's another way, Kir.  Another possibility.  Amanda."

Kir glanced over at the other Immortal woman.  "You don't understand, Sean.  As good as Amanda is at ferreting out information, there's no more time.  Methos can't continue.  He's going to take Abbas' head and then I'll have to take his.  Then, . . " her voice caught and she couldn't go on for a moment.  "Then they'll both be gone."  Tears finally found their release, but they were hardly noticed as she reached out a slim hand to touch the face of the youngest Immortal, destined to lose both of the people he loved most in the world.

"Stop it, Kir," Sean ordered.  His voice took on a command, a presence that was an echo of his father's and his brother's.  "Amanda saw something.  Something on the video before it was destroyed.  I know it's not much, but I, for one, am not ready to give up yet."

"Saw what?" Connor demanded, exhaustion and strain making his voice hoarse and grating.

All eyes turned to Amanda.  "I . . . I'm not sure.  Just a windowless room.  Guards bringing Duncan in and chaining him down before Sun . . ." she didn't go on, not wanting to get specific.

"But it wasn't the same room where he was tortured, Connor!" Sean insisted.  "There might be a clue there, a piece of information, something Amanda needs help remembering ...."

"Oh, Sean," Kir sighed, knowing that the boy would do anything in the name of denial, delay, false hope.  Anything to avoid what was now inevitable.  But he hadn't been in that room.  This could not go on or all of them would disintegrate into the worst their already flawed Race could be.  Hardly the appropriate legacy for Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod.  And all done in his name.  The thought made her ill.

"Sean, let him go.  Let them both go, please. Release them from this torture! We're not doing this anymore for Duncan or Methos, we're doing this for ourselves!"

"Kir?" Amanda's voice was soft but it carried, cutting through the thick emotional mist enveloping them all.  "I want to try.  Please.  If there's nothing, if this doesn't work, I promise I'll take Sean out of here if we have to knock him unconscious.  Get him as far away as possible while you and Connor do what has to be done.  But I'd never forgive myself if I thought I might have made a difference -- when it really counted -- and never even tried."

Kir shook her head, lowering her eyes, despair washing over her like a tidal wave, feeling like she was drowning, drowning.  "Amanda . . ."  But two strong hands gripped her upper arms and she opened her eyes to stare into wide dark pupils that matched her own.

"You owe me this, Kir."

The four Immortals were locked into a tableau in that dark hallway for a long, long moment before the Indian woman finally broke the contact as she slowly closed her eyes, a final, single tear escaping down her cheek before she silently nodded her assent.

They left Connor standing guard over Abbas' body and retreated to their quarters.  They could hear the shower running and for once Sean was grateful that his brother wasn't present.

He sat next to Amanda on the couch, waiting for Kir to take charge of the situation, ready to help in any way he could, but the Indian woman wandered aimlessly around the room, pacing distractedly.

"Kir?" he prompted.

"I . . . I don't think I can right now, Sean," she whispered.  "My mind...my thoughts.  There's no clarity, no concentration.  I'm afraid .... I'm afraid of what I'll do, that I'll do damage."  What she didn't say was that she was in a cold, blind panic, afraid she had lost her way.  She was a shaman of her People, but the Spirits that had guided her for centuries were silent, accusing, watching, judging.   And that sudden silence was deafening her to all else.

Sean took a deep breath, recognizing the subliminal signs of panic and breakdown that were infesting them all, spreading and worsening with each passing moment now that all hope seemed to have finally fled.  It was up to him.  His hope was all they had.

"Amanda," he said quietly, letting his mind wash clean of fear, of despair, of anger, of hate, leaving only that last small vestige of hope, and reached out with tender affection for this remarkable woman who warred with her own instincts and had risked everything out of loyalty and love.  "Listen to my voice. Let go of everything but the sound of my voice.  Take a deep breath and do it now.  Let the sound of my voice carry you back to that moment as you watched the last of the tape.  It shows some men, bringing Duncan into a room . . ." he let his voice trail off.  He had reached into a place in his own mind he rarely touched, using his innate gifts at a level he had never dared and would not have done so now except that everything in his life depended on this.  As he took Amanda deliberately into deeper places in her mind than she wanted to go, he found he was taking himself along that path as well, and was surprised to catch brief glimpses of another scene as he gazed deep into the black, dilated pupils of Amanda's dark, wide eyes.

"They're bringing him in on a gurney, unstrapping him and laying him on the floor.  Sun is there, watching.  They put shackles on his wrists and ankles.  Poor Duncan," she said softly, sadly.  "He doesn't seem to know or care.  He looks so thin, so . . . young."

"Describe the gurney, Amanda," Sean forced himself to push her.

Her eyes closed and she frowned slightly concentrating.  "Metal.  Probably steel.  It has one wheel that wobbles and makes a lot of noise."

"Are there any markings on it?" Sean prodded.  "Any writing anywhere?"

Amanda slowly shook her head.  "No," she whispered.

Sean was subliminally aware that Methos had entered the room and was standing behind him, watching.  It almost made him lose his concentration and he had to fight to stay calm, to keep his voice soothing.

"What about the men, the guards," Sean asked.  "Any name tags that you could see?  What did they look like?"

"One was black, slender.  Bald with a small mustache.  Wore a gold link bracelet.  The other was a white man, probably early thirties, thinning hair, paunchy.  No name tags."

"Is there anything else you can remember?" Sean prodded desperately, pushing.  He was running out of questions to ask.

"The men leave and only Kiem Sun is there," Amanda reported quietly.  "He pushes the hair out of Mac's face and says something the mikes can't pick up. Then he picks up the sheet they had used and leaves."

"There has to be something more, Amanda," Sean insisted.  This was their last hope, their only hope.

"I'm sorry, Sean," Amanda opened her eyes, and took his hands in her own.  "That's all.  Sun picked up the sheet and left, then the door closed and the light went out and that's all I could ....Wait."

Everyone in the room held their breath as Amanda closed her eyes again for a long silent moment.  "The sheet.  There were initials stenciled on the corner of the sheet.  "PMRF"."  Her eyes flew open.  "PMRF!"

Suddenly Methos was out the door, almost running down the hall, with the others right behind.  He slammed into the storeroom and in two strides had crossed to the hideous, dangling wreak still tied to the overhead pipes, and yanked the long dagger free that had kept Abbas dead.

Sean pushed into the room last, took one look at the flayed, deformed figure hanging like beef on a hook, turned and vomited into the corner, the smell of it only adding to the horror of the gruesome scene.  His heaves accompanied Abbas' gasps back to life, but Sean could not turn and look again.  Instead he leaned his hands up against the dank, cold wall, listening.

"Abbas!" Methos growled.  Then again.  "Abbas!"

A low gasping groan rolled out of the ravaged throat.

"Barabbas, what does P.M.R.F. mean?"

"Wha..."

"Tell me or what I've done before will seem like one of Xan's pleasure sessions, 'Bas!" Methos voice was a nearly incoherent scream.  "What does PMRF mean?!"

"P . . . M . . . R. . . F?" the hoarse voice repeated stupidly.  Then cold chills washed over every listener as that grating, tortured voice laughed.  "PMRF?  Oh, shit!  That prick!  That stupid, brilliant slanty-eyed bastard!"  The voice deteriorated into a series of gasping, coughing groans.  "Pennsylvania Mental Research Facility," he finally croaked.  "The asshole took him back to where it all started.  He knew that's the last place I would look!"  The hideous laughter started again, cut short with a choked scream when Methos jammed the dagger back into the broad, bloody, skinless chest.
 

They got as far as the bedroom when Methos collapsed, sinking to his knees in the deep carpet.  Sean knelt in front of his brother, pulling him forward until the dark head was resting in the curve of his neck.  He wasn't sure if Adam was weeping or just shuddering in shock and relief.  He was only marginally aware of the sudden hustle and bustle of movement around him, of Connor and Kir and Amanda talking in low tones.  His entire universe was contained in the circle of his arms, as though it was only his will, his strength, his faith that kept his brother from flying apart into a thousand small pieces.

Finally, the long elegant hands moved up to fold around his shoulders, and the pale face pulled away.  For the first time since they had brought him back from his dreamwalking effort to hold onto Duncan's spirit, there was a spot of color in each cheek.  The hand traveled up to hold the strong jaw that looked so much like Duncan's.

"Thank you, Sean."  The voice was barely audible.  Then he laughed a harsh, dry cough of a laugh.  "At least I think so.  I was ready . . ."

Sean's grip on his brother hardened.  "I know, brother.  But I wasn't.  It's not time yet.  Not for a long time to come."

Connor knelt down on one knee beside them.  "The van is being brought around the back.  Amanda is going to stay here with Abbas, who will call with a security clearance for us just before we are set to arrive."

"No!" Methos shot to his feet, although Sean had to steady him as he swayed and almost fell.  "Abbas is mine!"

"Abbas alive is the only way we will ever get into the facility, Methos," Amanda interjected.  She was sitting behind the small desk in the corner of the bedroom, having just hung up the phone.  She rose and walked towards them, her presence filling the room like a lioness on the hunt.  "And when I'm finally finished with him, Methos, he will stand accused of Kiem Sun's death and MacLeod's escape from the Eastern Dawn."  Even her voice was a low, predatory purr.  "The man is no friend of mine, either, Methos," she said quietly.  "I will make certain his status among the Eastern Dawn is permanently changed.  I have no idea what they will do to him, but I can assure you it will not be pleasant."

"Amanda," Methos growled, "I want his head.  I don't give a rat's ass about his status with the Eastern Dawn."

"We can't afford the distraction," Kir said from the door.  She had changed into clean fatigues.  "Specifically, you can't afford it, Methos.  We can't spare the manpower to guard him if we took him with us, and if you took his head, what kind of shape would you be in when we find Mac?"

Her words struck him like small blows.  He wanted Abbas.  His nearness during the torture had been a torment.  He craved that death, that Quickening even though he knew in the current circumstances it would nearly kill him.  To walk away, to let him go, to let him live when he was so close . . . it was almost too much to bear.  He felt Sean's arm circle his shoulders once again.  Another choice then.  With a ragged breath he turned, separating himself from his brother, stepping towards the dresser containing his things, reaching to pack.  "This isn't over," he whispered, as much to himself as to those standing behind him.  "It will never be over until I have made Barabbas pay the full and final price with my own bare hands."

The four Immortals stood in front of the huge building that hadn't come into clear view until after Abbas' clearance had gotten them through the main gate.  Sean and Kir and Connor all looked dismayed at the sheer size of the gray edifice, but Methos' face was expressionless. One more obstacle to overcome.

They moved up the long concrete walk and into the echoing marble foyer where a massive receptionist desk was occupied by two white-coated women. Kir moved in front of the group, fearful that the tactics the others might use would only generate hostility and resistance.

"Excuse me."

The woman looked up over her half-glasses. "May I help you?"

"Where is the director's office, please?"

"The director?" she repeated coldly.

"Yes. The hospital director."

"Do you have an appointment?"

Methos leaned over the desk in front of Kir. "The Director's Office. Now," he whispered, his eyes digging holes in the woman's head.

She looked at him for a long moment as the color drained out of her face. She lifted a trembling hand and pointed down the long hall to her left. "Elevator. Third Floor," she said so softly they could hardly hear.

"You didn't need to do that!" Kir snapped in a horse whisper. "The woman was just doing her job. I would have gotten the information without coercing her."

Methos didn't answer and one look at his face told Kir she needn't have bothered to discuss it. He wasn't interested.

"Can you sense him?" Sean asked his brother, his face white with strain. "I can't feel anything."

"I will once we get closer," Methos said. "And we're close." He knew there was still doubt. Until they actually found him, there would always be doubt. But they all wanted desperately to believe. There were even times when those tendrils of doubt chilled his own soul, but he refused to let them in.

A brief, pointed conversation with the facility's director left the man nearly unconscious, but extracted little helpful information. The place held over 2,000 patient-inmates. There was no way to know what name he had been registered under, or even whether he was registered at all. Sean's quick search of the institution's database from the director's terminal revealed no name similarities and over two-thirds of the inmates were male Caucasians, over half of them between the ages of 30 and 50.

Sean's hands were shaking over the datapad and Kir put her hands on his shoulders as he almost sobbed in frustration. "If necessary," she said gently, "we'll search room by room until we find him." And they did. Dragging the reluctant director along with them and walking slowly down grim hallways lined with large wards or tiny closet-like rooms, Sean and Kir and Connor followed Methos like he was some kind of human bloodhound. Floor by floor, hall by hall, room by room. Twelve stories high, two blocks long. After almost four hours they had found nothing. Not a trace, not a murmur of presence had been felt.

Methos stumbled as they neared the end of the last hallway on the top floor and Sean caught his arm. He jerked it away angrily, but then leaned up against the wall, his face a pasty white, sweat soaking through his clothes with the effort of his concentration.

"He's here," he whispered. "He's got to be here."

With a sudden explosion of anger and energy, he lunged at the director, shoving him up against the wall and circling the man's fat neck with long, thin fingers. "Where is he!" Methos screamed. He jerked the man off the wall and slammed him back again. "Tell me where he is!"

"Stop it, Methos!" Kir yelled, yanking on one of his arms as Sean pulled on the other side, but Methos swirled on them both, backing them off with a wave of desperate anger that bespoke of death should they interfere. Whose was the only question.

The director had only squeaked an incoherent garble, bringing up his hands in tight fists against his chest, cringing as a sudden stain dampened his trousers.

Methos advanced on the trembling man again and Kir watched the Oldest Immortal take a deep breath and close his eyes briefly. "Where Else Do You House Any Patients?" he asked. The tone was quiet, but each word sounded like a small bomb.

The three other Immortals backed off.

"Nowhere. That's all there is!" the man squeaked. "You've been through all the wards."

"There's someplace else," Methos said with absolute conviction. "Someplace maybe you don't control. Someplace maybe they told you never to talk about." He moved in, hovering over the cowering figure, his voice lowering to a horse whisper, but no less compelling for the lessened volume. "Maybe someplace they don't even know you know about. Tell Me. Tell Me Everything."

The man slowly slid down the wall, sobbing uncontrollably, his hands over his ears. "I don't know if that's where he is," he blubbered. "I just heard rumors."

Methos knelt in front of him, gathering the man's tie in his hand and pulling him forward. "What Rumors?"

"One of the heads of research sometimes inspects the facility. I overheard him make a joke to one of his men about a vegetable garden."

"What Are You Talking About!" Methos' rage was beginning to fray his control.

"In the annex in back. Restricted area for Research Division only. Labeled "VG". Sometimes the term is used for a ward for comatose patients. Never been there. Please!" he sobbed. "Please stop!"

Methos dropped the man to the floor, where he curled into a tight hysterically weeping ball. Long legs carried the Oldest Immortal toward the elevators with the three other Immortals right behind.

The annex was a concrete block building behind the hospital. Featureless, windowless. One entrance with an electronic lock. Connor made a quick trip to the car, leaving the others to wait in tense silence for his return. The A-30 he brought back bit into the lock and blasted a hole in the metal door, finally ripping it off its hinges. Three guards appeared, but they fled down the hall at the sight of the swords they had drawn. Defending against Cherokee Nation guerillas was one thing, but an entire pack of angry Immortals was something else entirely.

The group paused in the entrance when Methos stopped and closed his eyes. Kir gently took his elbow when he swayed with exhaustion. Then the hazel eyes opened and he walked slowly forward, stopping as long hallways opened up to either side. Methos turned right and opened the double doors leading in that direction.

"Oh, Christ almighty," Sean whispered. It was a huge ward. Probably a hundred men and women were strapped on row after row of bare mattresses, hooked to IV lines, their bodies white and limp. There was an almost overwhelming smell of urine and feces, of disinfectant, of decay.

Kir moved forward, looking at the names on the datapads mounted at the end of each bed. She swallowed and moved on to the next, and then the next. Then she stopped, putting her hands over her face. Sean went to her, taking her hands away, wiping away the tears streaming down her cheeks.

"I know these people," Her voice caught in her throat. "These are our people. What have they done to them?"

"Captured. Tortured. Kept as hostages against a day when the Nation might get the upper hand," Methos said darkly. Then he turned and left, not sparing any thought or energy for the poor lost souls trapped in their own failing bodies.

He slammed out of the room, heading in the other direction. The other hallway was a long, dark tunnel punctuated by doors every fifteen feet. The doors were locked, but had little windows in the center, and a slot to pass through food or other items. They went from door to door, looking in. Inside was a small, bare room with a drain in the middle and one glaring overhead light. Scarred concrete walls. No window. No toilet. No water. Nothing.

About a third of the rooms were empty, but others were occupied with some waifish figure on a bed dressed in a hospital gown, blank eyes staring at the ceiling. Sometimes there were IV's attached, sometimes not. It was hard to tell even what sex they were unless there was a beard.  All the bodies thin and wasted.

Connor had decided this was among the most awful places he had ever been when Methos suddenly surged forward, turning a corner, breaking into a run as the others trotted behind. Another hallway, no different from the first, but all these rooms were empty, except the last.

Methos looked in the tiny window, but could see nothing in the blackness beyond, tested the lock, and stepped back.

"Open it," he said without intonation.

Connor stepped in front and blasted one shot at close range right at the door lock. The door slammed open with a noise that left their ears ringing.

Methos stepped in, then stopped as the others crowded in behind him and Sean knelt to the floor. Unlike the other rooms, there was no light, and the dim reflection from the hallway barely revealed its occupant -- a naked man permanently chained to the wall. The room was freezing cold and the body was cool to the touch. Were it not that the unseeing pupils contracted slightly at the light, Kir would have thought him dead. Perhaps most shocking was that until she touched him she wasn't even sure it was MacLeod. But as her hand brushed against that cold flesh, there was the tiniest thrum of presence, familiar but so distant, like an echo of a half-remembered tune.

Sean sat on the floor, gathering the bone and tissue into his arms, silent tears pouring down his face, rocking gently back and forth, the motion more to comfort himself than the still, unresponsive figure he held.

"Find a blanket," Kir instructed gruffly to anyone who was listening. It seemed they were all fighting for rational thought because it was a moment before she felt Connor slip out the door. She moved to the other side of this wraith that had been Duncan MacLeod, looking up at Methos. His face was unreadable in the dark. "We have no keys for the shackles," she said.

"Break his hands," Methos voice came tonelessly out of the dark. "He won't feel it."

After a moment's hesitation, Kir reached to take the arm, but Sean stopped her. "Hasn't he endured enough?"

But Kir gently removed Sean's hand, stilled her breath and folded the hand over on itself. She almost lost control as her fingers brushed against the familiar calluses she could still feel on the bloodless palm. Chills washed over her skin at the sound of bones breaking and skin tearing when she forced the shackle over the knuckles, and she couldn't stop the sob that escaped her as she deliberately mutilated her lover. Through it all Methos stood silent and still. Then Connor was there and, to everyone's relief, lay a blanket over his kinsman, who looked nothing so much as like a neglected child, all of the strength, the defenses of mind and body built and sustained over six centuries, all gone, leaving a helpless shell behind.

The eerie similarity between this moment and when Duncan had finally released Methos from his prison was not lost on any of them, but where Methos had ever been hard-angled and thin, Duncan MacLeod had not. The slight figure Sean held bore not the slightest resemblance to the strong, beautiful Highland warrior they had always known. Worse, whatever spirit had inhabited the body was gone, and Sean could barely clamp down the despairing voice whispering in his head telling him that even though the body had been retrieved, his father was yet irrevocably lost.

Sean gathered his father in his arms and stood easily, the weight almost unnoticeable. The look that passed between the brothers was layered thickly with anger, relief, despair, horror, shock, grief and, on Methos' face at least, iron determination.

TO PART ELEVEN