Chapter Twenty

Methos stopped at the foot of the stairs and tilted his face back into the rain. "So, Mac," he said after a moment. "How would you like to go to Greece?"

Duncan stared at Methos through the downpour. "Greece?"

"Sure." The ancient Immortal stuffed his hands in his pockets, shrugging. "It's nice this time of year. Besides, it's a convienent hopping-off place on the way to Atlantis. Sure. Why not?"

"What do you want to go to Atlantis for? Weren't you the one telling me it was better left drowned?"

"That was before Ghean was alive," Methos said steadily. Joe stepped between the two men.

"Some of us," he said, "come down with colds if we stand around in the rain all night. Could we hail a cab and discuss this back in the hotel room?"

Methos frowned up at Ghean's apartment. "Nice of her to call one for us, yes. All right, Joe." The slender Immortal walked down the street, towards the main thoroughfare. Duncan hurried to catch up, then paused a moment, waiting on Joe's slower gait.

"What bloody difference does it make if Ghean's alive or not? I'd think you'd be glad to see her."

Methos clicked his tongue. "There you go again, Highlander. Thinking." Shoulders hunched against the rain, he stopped on the street corner, rocking back on his heels as he waited for a cab to appear. "Atlantean was an obscure tongue, Duncan."

"I'm sure you have a point," Joe said.

"Patience, Joe. Don't I always get to the point?"

Joe and Duncan exchanged glances. "No," Duncan said.

"Actually," Joe added, "you seem to take great pleasure in being cryptic and avoiding the point entirely."

"It's part of my charm," Methos explained. "But my point is, until Ghean turned up alive, I was the only one who could translate any Atlantean texts."

The rain bounced off the pavement, tiny circles like ballerina's skirts rippling out from puddles. For a few moments, the steady patter was the only sound, and then Duncan asked, "And this is important how?"

"Well," Methos said reasonably, "no one knows I can read it." His grin was disguised by the darkness.

Joe ran a hand backwards through wet hair. "Methos," he said dangerously.

Headlights flashed in the distance, and Methos squinted down the road. "I think it's a cab," he announced. "The real point, Joe, is that Atlantis -- it is a cab." He stepped down off the curb to hail the oncoming vehicle.

"Lousy night for it," the cabbie said cheerfully as they climbed in. "What're you doing out in the rain?"

"Getting wet," Methos offered, and remained stubbornly silent for the entire trip to the hotel. Once there, Duncan paid, as Methos protested, wide-eyed, "What? You think I have money?"

"I can't afford to keep you, Methos," Duncan said as they entered the hotel. "You're going to have to go mooch off someone else soon."

"Just as soon as I get myself killed," Methos promised. Duncan groaned.

"You're not still on about that, are you?"

"If you don't get to the point about Atlantis soon," Joe threatened, "I'll shoot you myself, and I won't doctor the records."

Methos turned an alarmed look on Joe. "You wouldn't."

"Try me."

Methos held up his hands in defeat as Duncan opened the room door. "The point is . . . okay, who gets his own bed?" he demanded, staring in dismay at the two double beds. "I forgot about that when we dropped off the luggage." He glared impotently at the room.

Longer than it was wide, the decor was identical to virtually every other hotel in America. Neutral brown carpet hid both dirt and wear from foot traffic well, and the walls were painted a non-descript rust. Heavy grey and brown curtains cut the sound of rain at the far end of the room, and a small round table with an overbright lamp was settled between two chairs just in front of the window. Paintings of wildflowers, stiff colors looking like paint-by-number canvases, hung over each of the beds, reflecting in the mirror that hung by the television. The luggage was piled neatly on the counter beneath the mirror.

"Joe does," Duncan said firmly, lifting a finger to point at Methos. "After all, we're having a night out with Dad. He deserves to not have to sleep with squirming youngsters."

Methos squinted. "I'm older than you. Hasn't anyone ever told you to respect your elders?"

"'Out of frustration, I shot Adam,'" Joe dictated dreamily. "'It might have been a little much, but I'd known for years that he was actually Methos, the oldest Immortal, and I was really tired of him not getting to the point. The record has now been set straight.' They'll probably run me out for not telling the truth in the first place, but hell. Nobody ever actually asked me."

"The Book," Methos finally burst out, impatiently, at Joe. "That book was two thirds full of information I couldn't even begin to comprehend forty-five hundred years ago. Information that science is just now catching up to, Joe. Cloning, gene therapy, God alone knows what else. It was so completely unfathomable to me that I didn't even know where to start. Today, they'll know where to start, and I shudder to think what could be done with it."

Joe sat on the edge of one of the beds, staring at Methos in genuine disbelief. "The Book? Methos, Atlantis sank nearly five thousand years ago. What makes you think it still exists?"

"Ghean exists," Methos said darkly, flinging his greatcoat over the back of a chair. "I would have said that was impossible. Right at this very moment, I'm highly reluctant to discount anything at all as impossible."

Duncan came out of the bathroom with an armful of towels, tossing them to the other two and keeping one for himself, rubbing his hair dry as he spoke. "Why are you so angry that she's alive, old man?"

Methos caught his towel, wiping his face dry. "I don't like surprises, Mac. Surprises can be dangerous."

The Highlander pulled his towel over his shoulders, hanging on to both ends of it in front of his chest. "Is that it?"

Methos closed his eyes. "Why don't you spit it out, Mac?"

"He's touchy, for someone who dances around the point all the time," Duncan observed to Joe, then looked back at Methos. "She was trapped for four and a half millennia, Methos. You sure it's not guilt that's making you angry?"

Methos opened his eyes, regarding Duncan. "Yes." As Duncan lifted his eyebrows dubiously, Methos scowled. "They were fighting on holy ground, MacLeod. I had no idea what was going to happen, but I was dead certain no one at ground zero was going to survive. I was sure she was dead as soon as Karem cut her down."

"She was Immortal," Joe said quietly. "But you left her body."

"Do you think," Methos demanded, "that I haven't thought of that a hundred times in the last few hours? A thousand times in the last forty-five hundred years? Do you think I haven't what-iffed the situation to death?" He threw the towel down over his coat with a snap. "The goddamned world looked like it was ending, Joe, and I made a judgement call. Karem and Aroz were fighting between me and her body, and she'd been damned near cut in half. I didn't think I had time to pick up the pices and run. The world is a very simple place, Joe. If it comes down to me or the other guy, I'm always going to choose me. Always. You're thousands of years too late to make me feel guilty for choosing my life over hers."

"And yet you saved Minyah." Duncan's voice was soft, the words almost a question. Methos sighed, anger draining away.

"She was mobile. She was in front of me. I had to get her out of the way so I could move, and no, I am not pretending that my own best interests were what motivated me. I am not a heartless monster, Mac, and I was not a heartles monster then." A smile drifted across Methos' face, without humour, without touching his eyes. "That came immediately after." He dropped into a chair, on top of his coat and the towel, silent a few seconds.

"I would have saved Ghean, if I'd thought I could, and still gotten out of there alive. Now, knowing what happened to her, knowing she survived all those centuries in that prison," Methos shrugged. "I would do the exact same thing."

"Is it really that easy for you, Methos?" Duncan asked, voice tinged with a sort of faint, horrified admiration.

"After five thousand years? Yes. It really is. Death before dishonor, come home with your shield or on it: those are concepts that don't belong in my world, Duncan. I can live with dishonor. I can't live without my head."

Duncan quirked a curious smile. "Does dishonor mean anything to you at all?"

Methos shook his head. "No. Someone else might percieve my actions as dishonorable, but someone else would be dead. My own judgement is the only one I'll accept. I'm the only one who has to live with what I am and what I've done." He raked a hand through his hair, sending water droplets to the floor. "There are a few people whose opinion is important enough that I'll alter or reconsider my first impulse for them, but ultimately, I'm the only one who gets to judge me."

Duncan's smile turned half amused. "You've risked your head for me and Joe both."

"So you're two of the ones whose opinions matter. Can we stop this line of conversation before anyone gets embarrassed by the gushing sentimentality?"

Duncan chuckled. "It might be worth pursuing, someday. The oldest man's perspective on what makes a worthy human being."

Methos snorted. "You should have tried that back in Atlantis, Duncan. I was a lot more introspective in those days."

"I wasn't there," Duncan pointed out.

"I guess you missed your chance, then."

"Not to change the subject," Joe said mildly, "but how do you know what's in the Book is stuff that shouldn't be messed with today? You said yourself it was over your head, when you read it. It might prove incredibly useful for today's scientists."

"Sure," Methos said, "and the Horsemen might have advanced civilization by a thousand years by uniting everyone in fear against them. But it didn't happen. Whatever's in that Book, Joe, we're just now beginning to understand it. I'm not at all enthusiastic about handing over the secrets of eternal life to the masses, not anymore now than I was then."

"But you went after the Methuselah stone for Alexa," Duncan said. Methos gave him a sharp look.

"No one ever said I was consistent, Highlander. If I could pick and choose everyone who got Immortality, without ever risking my head, yes, I'd do it. But I can't, and what I said then still stands: people with Immortality at their fingertips are eventually going to notice us. Whether it's because we survived a mortal blow while not wearing one of their precious artifacts, or if it's because somebody realizes we're not filling ourselves with the cocktail of drugs that keeps everyone supple and youthful, eventually the top's going to be blown off the whole Game. I want no part in furthering that. It'll happen sooner or later. It doesn't need my help, or the Book of Aquarius' help."

"What if it had a cure for cancer somewhere in there?" Joe asked. Methos turned the dark look on him.

"Alexa's dead," he said flatly. "Nothing changes that, Joe. Everyone dies. It just comes sooner for some people than others."

"But if you could have saved her -- "

"If! God damn it, Joe. Yes. If I'd had the Book, if it had a miracle cure for cancer, yes, I'd have used it. I'd have given it to the world, just so some doctor somewhere could make it work. But I didn't have it, and now she's dead, and all I can do for her is remember her. I can't change the past and I can only try to control the future. If that Book has survived, I don't want anyone but me to have it."

"Maybe Ghean doesn't want it," Joe suggested.

"I don't know what Ghean wants, and that makes me nervous. She knows where it is now, and I'd just as soon I was the first one who got to it."

"How?" Duncan demanded. "Do you have a submarine stored somewhere?"

Methos pressed his lips together. "Unfortunately, no. I suspect there's going to have to be a rather large donation to the Atlantis research fund by a historian who would like to join the team on their dives."

Duncan eyed Methos suspiciously. "And just who is providing this rather large donation?"

"Aren't you the skeptical one?" Methos chuckled softly. "It'd be a lot more in keeping with Adam Pierson if you provided it. I can transfer the money into your account."

Duncan glowered at Methos through his eyebrows. "Are you saying you actually have money?"

"I'm five thousand years old, MacLeod. I have more money than God. Adam Pierson, though, is permenantly short on cash. I wouldn't borrow really significant amounts of money from you, but one must keep up pretenses."

"Uh-huh. And just what do I get for fronting this money for you?"

Methos tilted his head. "A chance to see the ruins of Atlantis, of course." He turned to Joe. "You going to join us?"

The grey-haired Watcher shook his head. "Nope. I'm keepin' my feet on dry ground. You can tell me all about it if your submarine doesn't implode."

"We'll tell you all about it anyway," Duncan said. "Wouldn't that be a nicely dramatic way to die, Methos? Sudden compression? You could burst to the surface in agonized awe, trembling with relief to be alive."

"You're making fun of me," Methos accused.

"Would I do that?" Duncan grinned. "Then I could go back and tell Joe about how you handled your first death, and how proud I was of you, and how I planned to walk you through those first uncertain days while you became accustomed to being more than mortal."

Methos hid his face in one hand. Duncan's grin grew wider as he warmed to his topic. "We could invite Joe, the old friend of the mortal Adam Pierson, to your first sword lesson. He could write up a lengthy tribute to my astonishing skills and your child-like awkwardness. He could comment on my neverending patience, and your clumsy attempts to emulate me. 'If only Adam will turn out like Duncan,' he'll write. 'The world would be a better place to have two such men.' And I, modestly, will share my meager knowledge, and send you out into the cruel world to fend for yourself against men and women a hundred times your youthful years -- "

"Enough!" Methos roared, dropping his head onto the table with laughter. "I don't think I've ever heard you accolade yourself so outrageously, MacLeod. With any luck, I never will again. Shut up, man, and go to sleep!"

Joe grinned suddenly. "I think I'll put a passage in it about how I've always thought of Adam as a son, and about how it gladdens an old man's heart to know that this youth who's been so close to me will endure through the centuries. How's that sound, Mac?"

"Oh, very good." Duncan nodded solemnly. "Very touching. We'll have to add something about how his boyish charm is tainted by the sudden cynicism of death, and how we hope a few years will give him the acceptance he needs for that roguish sense of humour to re-emerge."

"Maybe a comment about how he often seemed alone, and how we're afraid this new difference in him will set him further apart from his fellow man -- " Joe broke off with a burst of laughter.

Methos staggered from the chair to the second bed, hands pressed firmly over his ears. "I am not hearing this," he claimed loudly. He dove onto the bed, pulling a pillow firmly about his head. "I can't hear you." He remained there, ensconced in the pillow, until the chortling Highlander turned the lights out for the night.