Sorry for the empty posts folks, but my webmail's acting up!  :P

   THIS is the first chapter in a continuing story (my wife requested it,
so you have no worries about it 'dying on the vine' :)

   Best wishes, all

   empath

   empath Nulli Bureaucrati Carborundum!  "Anyone plain can be lovely,
anyone loved can be lost, Maybe I lost my direction, what if our love is
the cost?" "Falling for the First Time", Barenaked Ladies, _Maroon_

   -----------------------------------------------------------

   <1st attachment, "forever1.txt" begin>

   Highlander: A Love for Forever By Empath Copyright, 2001

   ------

   Admonition: This story contains explicit depiction of sexual activity in
it and shouldn't be made accessible to minors.

   Author's Note: This story follows the common theme I've been having
lately of lovers separated with the twist of accepting the premise of the
"Highlander" television show.  As such, it should probably be considered
'fanfic', but I like to think I have explained all the twists and turns
adequately for the uninitiated (and much better than the show EVER did:) to
allow them to get into the meat of the story.

   ============

   I sighed as I watched yet more snowflakes drift out of the sky. 
'Perfect; its snowing again,' I thought.  'If this keeps up, all the work I
just put into clearing the driveway will be undone by the time I get back,
and I still have to shower before going to work!'

   My shoulders sagged as I contemplated the depths of my despair.  'And
without the car in the driveway, the WHOLE thing will fill up with snow!' I
gritted my teeth and resumed clearing enough of a gap to drive out.

   I settled back into the rhythm of dig and toss, dig and toss, as I made
my way across the barrier of plowed snow, dwelling on the futility of my
efforts.  This chain of Lake Storms had started in November, burying
Buffalo and indeed all of the Great Lakes' eastern shores.  I thankfully
hadn't been present for that first storm which had paralyzed Buffalo, but
thanks to the State Department losing my identity, the Canadian government
returned me to my hometown in time to catch at least half the winter.

   Not that I hadn't avoided this cold, heavy winter.  Most of New England
was receiving Jack Frost's attentions, and even Atlantic Canada was being
pummeled by abnormal amounts of snow.  I spent a fair amount of my time in
Bathurst shoveling the walk and driveway.  It was only February, but they'd
already gotten more snow than they'd ever gotten in something like a
hundred years of keeping records; last count when I phoned Nicole last was
ten feet for the season to date and even more falling as we spoke.  It had
become a continuing story on the national news up in Canada - though I
couldn't get word one of ANYTHING north of the border, even on the Weather
Channel.  I simultaneously cursed my nation's insularity and my ill fortune
that my beloved had to cope with that much snow without me around to help.

   My reverie was broken as the chunk of soft snow I was lifting cracked in
half; one piece fell off the shovel to land on the hood of my car, the
other slid down the handle to plaster me straight in the puss.  I dropped
the shovel, wiping at my face and blurting out "FLACONS DE MAIS!" as I
staggered back, snow-blinded in a manner other than the term intended.

   Internally, I chuckled as I realized my bilingualism - and all of
Nicole's exasperated French lessons - had taken hold, even if I had just
yelled out something that translated to "Corn Flakes".  I recalled first
seeing it on the back of the cereal box, and announced to my darling that
it sounded like a great phrase to curse, 'Ah!  Flacon de mais, cochon!'
while giving some asshole driver the finger for cutting me off.  Nicky
laughed, but warned me not to use it in Quebec, where it wouldn't have the
effect I wanted.

   Finally clearing my face, I sighed at the pleasant memory and started to
step back to my shovel and the task ahead of me.  Then I heard the car horn
- very, very close to me.

   * * * *

   I awoke to an agonizing jolt of pain lancing through my neck and back.
It felt like something scaldingly hot was being poured into my spine at the
top and spreading throughout my body.  As immeasurable time passed, the
'hot lead' cooled as it spread, and I merely felt painful aches in the
small of my back and neck.  Before long, even those feelings faded from the
forefront of my awareness, allowing me to take in my surroundings.

   I was lying down, strapped to some sort of bed or gurney.  The room I
was in was dark and quiet.  I couldn't tell the size of the room due to a
lack of sounds to echo or not.  Then a memory tapping away at my
metaphorical shoulder grabbed me by the attention and made itself known.

   The accident!  I remembered the front of the car striking my hip and
tipping me over.  As I fell, my head hit the hood.  My last memory of the
incident was a really sharp wrenching in my neck that caused me to pass
out.

   And now, this room.  I couldn't see any detail of the ceiling above me,
and couldn't turn my head much for the restraints.

   Restraints?  I was strapped down - plenty of thick bindings over my body
- ankles, knees, hips & hands, chest and shoulders.  And even my head was
stuck in between two foam...blocks...wait - I'd been here before!  I was on
a spinal board!

   I had helped a friend in college for his lifeguard certification exam.
They had to pass a practical exam - one part was taking a spinal injury
victim out of the pool.

   Trent and his classmates had taken me from a prone floating position - I
had been asked to do this because I could hold my breath a good, long time.
The prospective lifeguards rotated me smoothly onto my back, gotten the
buoyant spinal board under me, fastened an assortment of straps around me,
and simply hoisted the board and me onto the pool deck.  After the
examiners checked all my restraints, and asked me whether I had been jarred
at all during the procedure (I hadn't) everyone was given a passing grade.
Then they propped me against the wall and left me.

   Seriously.  The bastards mopped up the pool deck, cleaned the other
equipment they'd used in the exam, then went into their respective change
rooms and turned out the lights, leaving me leaning against the wall.  I
discovered that a spine board was very effective in keeping me put.  No
part of my body could move very much; I was comfortably but definitely held
in place.  I spent a nervous time waiting in silence, as my pride prevented
me from calling out.  After they'd gotten cleaned up and changed, Trent
came in through the pool office and let me loose.

   And here I was strapped in a spine board again.  Which made me nervous -
when I got hit by that car, did something serious get broken?  I didn't
feel any pain now, but I wouldn't if my spinal column was severed, would I?

   Well, I couldn't do anything myself like this - maybe I should get
someone else to help?  "Hello?  Is anyone there?  Where am I?  What's going
on?" I could hear an echo, so the room must've been fairly large and empty.
The darkness and emptiness didn't reassure me, and my calls got a little
more frantic.  "HEY!  VAS HABEN SIE?  Q'EST-CE QUE PASSE?" I struggled to
think of any other languages I knew - not enough Spanish, and the only
Japanese I knew I pick up from James Clavell.  Might as well repeat myself:
"What's going on?  Q'est-ce que passe?  Vas haben sie?  C'MON!  SOMEBODY!
QUELQU'UN?"

   Then I heard a door open - and all hell broke loose.  There was a loud
buzzing noise, like I had just sat on a beehive.  I could almost see a
flickering in the corners of my vision.  And I felt someone enter the room
- even beyond the shadow on the ceiling, even beyond the footsteps, I felt
a person come near out of the 'white noise'.  All these confusing
sensations were pushed from my concern when this stranger flicked the
lights on.

   "DAMN!  Take it easy with that, willya?" More steps closing to me.  I
felt my 'bed' shift slightly as the person touched it, and then the person
moved my gurney out of the focus of the nearest overhead light.

   "There.  That should be better for you.  Sorry - you didn't care what
you were facing when I brought you in here." The voice was a woman's, soft
and seemingly gentle.  But there was a hint of hardness - like cotton
batting wrapped around a steel bar.

   "Who are you?  Where am I?  WHAT'S GOING ON?" I opened my eyes and
wasn't blinded a second time.  I could only see a ceiling done up in
cracked-institutional-green.

   "I'll answer all your questions and give you more information than
you'll want, but I need you to calm down, first." The voice was moving
away, off to one side.

   "Why?  I don't know ANYTHING - is this some kind of kidnapping?  If it
is, you're an idiot - I'm a nobody.  Just a low-class night-watchman-"

   "-Named Mitchell Franklin Davis.  Adopted son of Frank and Irene;
supposedly born May 14, 1971.  Adopted at the age of two, and no one knows
anything about your birth parents.  Average to good grades in high school,
but you quickly flunked out of NYU because you fell in love and ignored
your studies.  Knocked around-"

   "What?  How do you know all this?  *I* didn't even know I was adopted -
and I told no one about my crush on Wendy!  What'd I do to deserve this?"

   The voice stopped receding and I was assaulted by a screeching - she was
dragging a chair over.  "I've been watching you closer than any government
agency that could be interested in messing with you, Mitch.  I've taken a
personal interest in you since you appeared, my boy." The chair stopped
somewhere behind my head.

   "Why - are you some kind of psycho?" Not a wise thing to ask, I'll grant
you, but I was a little worked up at the time.  "What, do you think I'm the
next Messiah or something?"

   She chuckled.  "Close, but not that big.  Mitch - you asked where you
were and why you're where you are.  I've put you in a disused room in the
closed wing of County General, near the morgue.  It was the first quiet
place I could find after taking you out of the locker."

   "Hospital?  This is one fucking nice bedside manner!  Waitaminute -
morgue?  What are you talking about?"

   "The man that ran you down called EMS for you - the ambulance that
responded strapped you down and rushed you to the hospital, but spinal
damage stopped your heart long before they arrived.  The ER doctor didn't
even bother taking you off the spinal board, just ordered you sent to the
morgue for pickup by loved ones.

   "Mitch?  You're dead."

   "Yeah, funny - you're a friend of Trent's aren't you - C'MON Trent! 
Fool me once shame on you but fool me twice shame on me!  You've had your
fun, now let me out!  Trent?"

   "I assure you I'm not personally acquainted with your friend Trent
O'Grady, and this isn't one of his pranks.  You died in that ambulance."

   "Yeah, right - and you're the Grim Reaper come to usher my soul off to
the afterlife?  I always thought he talked like a dried-up old man!"

   "Death doesn't have quite the same meaning for people like you and me,
Mitch.  The car accident would've killed a normal person, and you did die,
briefly.  But your body recovered."

   I kept rolling my eyes at this crap.  "Wow.  I must be some kind of
medical miracle - I know; you're a spy for a pharmaceutical company. 
You've kidnapped me so they can examine me, find out what keeps me alive,
isolate it and make millions."

   Another chuckle.  "You think quickly, if not always plausibly, Mitch.  I
like that."

   "What do I care?  Cut this bullshit and LET - ME - GO."

   "Mitch.  Stop panicking and listen to me." She didn't seem any more
worked up from when she came in, I wish I could have said the same for
myself.  "WHY SHOULD I?  HEEEEELLLLP!  SOMEBODY!"

   "Mitch, we're underground and a fair distance from anyone else - don't
waste your energy."

   "LET ME GO!  HELLLLLP!"

   "Mitch?  How can I explain things to you if you won't shut up?"

   "FUCK YOU - whatcha gonna explain to me, how I'm now your loving slave
or some shit?  FUCK OFF!"

   I think I finally managed to get her going; I saw a hand bring a handgun
into my vision.  She placed it against my chest, right above my heart. 
"I'm sorry, Mitch, but this'll do two things: illustrate what I'm trying to
say to you, and shut you up for a short while."

   "Ohshit - nonono, please-"

   She fired.  I'd never been shot before, so it's hard to describe - kinda
like a cross between an injection and a really painful punch.  I tried to
gasp, couldn't, and blacked out.

   * * * *

   And then someone grabbed the bullet and yanked it out of me with just as
much pain.  That gasp finally came, and I jerked my back off the gurney. 
"Aaaaaaaaoooohhhh!"

   "Just over three minutes; rather fast for your first gunshot death - I
must've missed the heart."

   The pain was centered on my left chest for a moment then it washed
through my entire body, and was diluted as it spread.  Next thing I knew,
it was gone.

   "In a mood to listen, Mitch?"

   "What just happened?" I felt my chest, and realized I wasn't strapped
down.

   My companion sighed.  "I shot you, you died, and then you came back,
just like when your neck snapped."

   I jumped off the gurney and faced this woman.  She was sitting in that
chair about ten feet away from me, looking rather reserved for a psycho. 
She was leaning back, her hands steepled under her chin with that gun
sitting in her lap.

   "What do want from me?"

   "A number of things.  First I want to explain some things to you. 
Please calm down and listen.  Or do I have to kill you again?"

   This was beyond weird.  She talked about death like it was just a minor
infection, a cold or something.  "Why shouldn't I just run outta here?"

   "Because you'd never reach the door before I shot you again, and then
I'd have to strap you down again.  I assure you that lying on splinters is
very uncomfortable." She gestured to the gurney.

   I looked at it; the spine board was on top, straps in detached disarray.
Just left of centre at about chest height was a bullet driven into the
wood. Lots of little splinters were sticking up around the intrusion, and
the wood was stained red.  I looked at my chest, poked a finger through the
hole in my bloodstained uniform shirt and felt my unmarked skin.  Then,
with a looming sense of what I would find, I felt over my back.  Another
hole and some splinters were present.

   I was dumbfounded; this just wasn't possible!  It had to be some kind of
charade, but why?  And what about the pain - I didn't know any way of
faking that.  True, I'd never been shot before, but it certainly SEEMED
genuine.  I looked up at my captor and gave her a beseeching look, silently
pleading her for a way to make sense of this madness.

   "Is it starting to sink in?  Oh, sorry for that." She gave me a
sympathetic look and a moment later I got it: sink in - bullet wound.  I
laughed flatly.

   I looked at this woman closely for the first time - her expression was
the only odd thing about her.  She looked on me with *concern.* That
stopped me quicker than the threat of another bullet.  "What is all this -
what's going on?"

   "Your awakening, fellow immortal."

   * * * *

   We were in Regina's car - she'd managed to get a promise from me that I
wouldn't run, put up a fight, or do anything that might attract attention
until she'd had a chance to say her piece.  I agreed on the provision I
could walk away after without her shooting me again, or the like.  But what
had happened to me was eating away at what I thought of as the laws of
nature; it was very unsettling and even though her explanation was hard to
believe, it was the only one offered to me.

   We walked out of the hospital as if nothing was wrong; she'd advised me
to just say we were visiting a patient and gotten lost if anyone stopped
us. Before she pushed open the door, she offered her hand and introduced
herself as Regina Garant.

   No one did stop us - the first rule in trespassing is behaving as if you
belong there.  (Something I would remember the next time I was on duty) I
imagine my uniform helped, even though I knew a different security firm had
the contract for County General.

   We exited the building and I followed Regina to a plainlooking sedan. 
When we got in, I noticed she fastened her seatbelt.  "Why bother?"

   "Being immortal doesn't mean you don't feel pain - that gunshot hurt,
didn't it?  Want to try it again?  Besides, dying in front of witnesses
makes things very uncomfortable." She had a point; I put on my seatbelt as
well.

   Once we were on a main road, presumably to her place, Regina began her
lecture.  Immortals had lived amongst normal people for all of recorded
history.  No one knew where we came from; no one ever had any knowledge
about these people being born, and no immortal seemed to have any memories
of times before 'normal' people had found them.

   Raised by foster parents, or even just by the 'school of hard knocks'
immortals would mature and age normally.  Some had even died of old age,
never suspecting they were any different from their kin.  This was because
every immortal started off in a 'passive' or 'latent' form.

   Should a 'latent' immortal die in a violent manner - shot, stabbed,
drown, die from a fall, etc.  - they would appear to die.  And then the
'immortality' would kick in and the immortal would awaken, his injuries
having healed themselves at a vastly accelerated rate.

   And so this 'active' immortal would continue, never aging, never dying;
illness could take hold but not kill, minor injuries would quickly
disappear, and lethal injuries would merely incapacitate the victim until
his special recuperative powers took effect.

   The one exception was decapitation; whatever this mysterious power was
that immortals had, it was tied into the head remaining on the body.  If an
immortal was beheaded, their 'magic' was released in a 'quickening.'

   This odd term was both an object and an event - a phantasmal force that
sought out the nearest immortal - usually the killer of the beheaded - and
'inserted' itself into the new immortal.  Receiving a quickening was quite
a painful experience, Regina informed me, but quite worth the discomfort.

   After the quickening, the receiving immortal would gain the knowledge
the beheaded one had learned in his life - history, languages, sciences,
artistic and musical ability, all would be passed on to the living
immortal. For this reason, immortals tended to be rather cannibalistic,
preying on their own kind in an effort to gain more power.

   In this respect, immortals were just as prone to greed and avarice as
mortal people were.  Most just tried to live out several quiet lifetimes,
moving on when their lack of aging began to disturb their friends and
neighbors.  A rare few risked exposing themselves to public scrutiny by
doing good works - an attempt to 'repay' this boon they had been given. 
Regina said she fell somewhere in between.

   The lecture was paused when I recognized the part of town she was
heading through.  "My parents live near here."

   "Yes.  Just three blocks from my house.  I have been watching you since
you were five."

   "I still don't get that - why are you so interested in me?  Has twenty
years of stalking me been worth the effort?"

   "Mitch.  Do you know how rare you are?  Normal mortals outnumber our
kind by more than a million to one.  This is a wild guess, but I'd hazard
to say that there are probably only two or three thousand immortals in the
entire world.  That makes finding you more important than finding water in
the desert."

   She smiled.  "And also remember that I'm going to be around for a long,
long time.  Spending a couple of decades watching a latent to see if he
might turn out okay isn't that much of a waste; I've got plenty of time
left."

   My next question was postponed by our arrival; she had a simple
bungalow, similar to my family home, but not identical.  We entered the
house, and I put my coat and boots where instructed.

   My hostess directed me to the living room couch, and asked "Something to
drink?"

   "Coffee.  I suppose you know how I like it?" I added with a half-smirk,
half-frown.

   "Black with two sugars." She disappeared from view, allowing me to take
in the room.  It was a generic middleclass 'living' room that no one ever
entered except to dust: landscape and still-life prints by unknown artists,
a few porcelain pieces sitting in spots to fill space, reproduction
furniture and a dark burgundy paint on the walls.

   One feature that stood out was the lack of any family photos, even of
her.  This might as well have been a model home.  I said as much to Regina
when she returned.  "It is, my good man - when I spotted you this
subdivision was new, but almost completely bought up.  I had to settle for
the developer's demo unit.  I haven't really brought anything new into
these rooms except some fresh paint not long ago." She sat on the settee
opposite me.  "So, any questions about my briefing?"

   There had been several, but some had faded from my consciousness.  I
took a moment to remember them, failed, and settled with one that had stuck
in my mind.  "So *why* have you been watching me?  Waiting for me to mature
and then take my head?  Want my quickening to be a little more?"

   Regina looked annoyed.  "No; that's been the farthest thing in my mind.
I've been around long enough to grow out of that 'greedy' phase - I will
confess that there was a time when hunted my own kind - but lately I've
taken up the custom of taking apprentices."

   "And I'm the latest?"

   She nodded.  "Yes.  I find a latent immortal, watch him or her until
they 'awaken', and come in to teach the person of their new abilities, and
dangers."

   "But why?" I was missing something important; maybe she wasn't
explaining it properly.  "What does it do for you?"

   "Philanthropy, I guess.  Attempts to atone for my bad behavior earlier?
But mostly it's a maternal instinct."

   "You see us 'apprentices' as your children?"

   "Yes...the only children I will ever have."

   "Something happened to you...your-" I gestured toward my abdomen.  "But
wouldn't it heal?"

   "Mitch?  I'm sorry; I thought I explained that - no immortal can have
children."

   "What, no one?"

   A shake of her head confirmed that.  "Immortal men are sterile, and the
women barren.  We can never bring new life into the world."

   What Regina had said triggered a quick link of thoughts: I could never
give Nicole children - Nicole!  "Oh God.  Nicole - she's - she'll grow old
while I-" The thought of outliving her seemed like the end of the world.

   My tutor took an expression that I'd already come to hate - a knowing
smile.  "Mitch?  Relax - it's not that bad."

   My despair turned to rage.  "Not bad?  How could it be WORSE?  The one
woman I've found that I can share my life with, and now I can't even do
that?  Damn you, you patronizing bitch!"

   I'd hit Regina where it counted - I threw her helping hand back in her
face.  With a mixture of hurt, disappointment, and annoyance she replied
"There's no need to be ungrateful, my boy."

   "Ungrateful?!?  "You say I could have lived out a normal life, grown old
and died a natural death.  Why didn't you?!?  Now I have to stay like this
while she ages -"

   She stood quickly and crossed to me, holding by the shoulders.  "LISTEN.
Firstly, I wasn't driving the car that ran you down.  You would have become
immortal with or without my help, I just helped you avoid any difficult
questions from witnesses.

   "Secondly, you will have no fear of Nicole growing old and leaving you.
I told you I've been watching you for most of your life.  I followed you to
Bathurst, and was nearby when you met her.  She is like us."

   I can be rather thick - it took me a while to figure out what she meant.
When I did, I found it unlikely.  "She's immortal too?  I find that hard to
believe; very hard, indeed!"

   Regina shrugged.  "Believe it or not, two latent immortals found each
other and fell in love.  It's probably this very improbability that makes
you two so special."

   "But how can you be sure?"

   "You felt me arrive when you were yelling your head off in that spinal
board.  You felt my presence even beyond your normal senses, right?" With
difficulty, I nodded.  "It's the same for all immortals; we can sense one
another.  And any 'active' immortal can feel the presence of even a
'latent' one.  When you pulled up in front of her house, I felt another
'aura' in addition to yours.  At first I worried someone was coming for
your head, but before long I realized your beloved is just like you."

   Even drowning in the deep waters of despair like I was, I was leery at
grabbing this suddenly available life ring.  "Nicole?  Immortal?"

   "Yes." Her eyes searched my expression.  "I can see you still don't
believe me.  Just wait here." And Regina left the living room.  I heard the
front door open, and saw her walk down the pavement to her car in the
street.

   She turned onto the sidewalk and disappeared down the street.  What was
she doing - abandoning me?  Had I proved untrainable, too inconsiderate of
her charity?  What had I done?

   This concern was dispelled by another swarm of bees.  The noise was back
and just as distracting; I clapped my hands to my ears, but that did no
good.  When it faded, I found myself kneeling on the living room floor.  I
jerked my head up to see Regina standing in the doorway.

   "What you felt was my 'immortality' coming within the threshold of
yours. Every time one immortal comes close to another, they both feel what
you did.  You'll get used to it in time - just as well, since it's your
early-warning system against those who would take your head."

   I looked at her in a new light: if she could put up with this, this
cacophony every time she met a fellow immortal...  I noticed something
else. "It's gone now."

   Regina nodded.  "Yes, it only lasts when one immortal first comes
'within range' of another.  And I assure you, I felt it when I followed you
to Bathurst."

   "But maybe it's not Nicole?"

   "Mitch, it's her - there was that time when you met her out in the park?
I felt her approach before you could ever see her.  Once you two...ahem." I
blushed.  "I patrolled around - we three were the only people in the entire
park; Nicole's another immortal."

   I wasn't as comforted as Regina may have expected.  "That's nice, but
what do we do?  Kill her and make her properly immortal?  What if she wants
to live a normal life?"

   "You're right, of course.  This life may be long-lived, but it has
drawbacks.  You always have to be on the lookout for other immortals
wanting more power; you have to keep moving or risk having Frankenstein's
villagers show up on your doorstep one night.  And the lack of children is
another thing.

   "But remember - most of that will affect Nicole's life regardless of
whether she stays latent or not - active immortals can still seek her out,
and she'll never have children anyway."

   "But wouldn't ignorance be bliss?"

   "And what happens if she falls off a cliff walking along the shore up
there?  Thirty-foot drop that she gets up from?"

   I didn't have an answer for that.  I couldn't bear the thought of my
darling Nicole suffering through all the pain and confusion I had, without
even the help of some 'mentor,' but neither could I bear the thought of
following her around, never coming in contact with her, waiting for
disaster...

   "Mitch?  You have a decision to make: you can leave now, abandon your
old life and Nicole, cut all ties to family and friends, move away and
change your name.  There are many wonders out there to experience, and
you've been given a wonderful gift in enough life to see as many of those
wonders as you like."

   Abandon Nicole - all the wonders of the world didn't seem very appealing
without her to share them with.

   It was as if Regina read my mind.  "Secondly, you can go to Nicole,
'awaken' her and explain to her what we are and take her with you on your
journey.  Love truly is one of the world's greatest wonders."

   That was tempting, but could I do that to Nicole?  Hell - I'd have to
KILL her; I could never bring myself to do that!

   "I can see my offers aren't very appealing to you, Mitch." That damn
knowing smile was back.  "How about this: You go to Nicole and explain the
situation first?  Tell her what she is and what you are - give her both
sides of the coin: the benefits and drawbacks of immortality.  And then let
her decide what she wants to do?"

   When I heard that, my decision was moot - it wasn't mine to make at all.
As I confirmed to Regina what I felt, a thought occurred to me.  "That was
a test, wasn't it?  You wanted to see how I'd react and base my suitability
as your apprentice on that?"

   She looked genuinely surprised, then thoughtful for a moment.  "No.  Not
consciously at least.  I've already seen enough of you growing up to know
you're a decent person and worthy of my tutelage, meager as it is.

   "But you do have a point.  If you'd decided to rush off to Bathurst with
a gun to make Nicole join you, I wouldn't have offered to help you - I
don't know whether I'd try to stop you or just bail on the whole situation,
but you'd never get any help from me."

   "Help?  You never said anything about helping me with Nicole."

   "Mitch, you're now my apprentice, my prodigy - do you think I'd let you
try to handle something like this on your own?  Not likely - and definitely
not before you get at least a modicum of training."

   "Training?"

   "With a sword, my boy - the favorite means for an immortal to take
another's head."

   "But we've come a long way with..."

   Regina took out her gun, and handed it to me.  "Here - separate my head
from my shoulders - completely mind you; no leaving it hanging by a sinew
or something." I understood her point - lead pellets were good for killing
people in the conventional sense, but beheading someone with even a shotgun
would be a tricky proposition.

   Then she pulled at the cuffs of her suit jacket, and suddenly had two
small swords in her hands.  "These, however, will chop through a neck just
fine." She handed one to me, and I examined it.

   "They're not as long as most swords that immortals carry, but I make up
for the lack of reach with a second blade.  I've seen some use axes - the
weight behind the cutting edge makes the killing blow easier, but since
most of the weapon is handle, it's harder to hit your opponent with a
weakening blow.

   "Back in the Eighties - with all those ninja movies going on - the
Japanese swords became rather popular: the light but large katana with a
hilt that can allow use one-handed or two, the wakazashi - the samurai's
other weapon - much like these and intended more as a parrying blade.  I
even met one who came at me with a no-dachi - the heavy cavalry sword of
the mounted samurai, but then he *was* charging me from horseback.

   "Other popular weapons are the sabers, but I find them a little light in
the blade for a serious severing chop." I looked at the short sword in my
hand; it was much thicker than most swords I'd seen - more like a pointed,
doubleedged machete.  "It reminds me of a butcher's knife."

   "It would - you have to remember that decapitation is your final goal,
regardless how much injury you put your opponent through.  He'll get up and
come after you even if you've cut his heart out.  Even if you don't want to
kill another immortal, you may have to in order to survive."

   I thought on that, and Regina led me to a door that led to the basement.
Once we were down there, I was confronted with an armory.

   "It looks like the NYU fencing club!"

   "Yes, I run a private club out of here - just a half dozen people, to
keep in practice.  And I'm glad you took up this sport in college."

   My face flushed.  "Well, I only joined because-"

   "Because Wendy fenced, I know.  It's unfortunate that you were so
infatuated with her; a college education before you 'awoke' might have
helped.  Still, no use crying over spilt milk - maybe it was good
preparation for you." She walked over to a large wardrobe.

   "Huh?"

   She opened the closet door to reveal an assortment of fencing vests and
masks.  She grabbed what must have been her gear, and gestured for me to
pick out mine.  "You'll find that many things in modern society are denied
you, Mitch.  You'll never be able to take a pension - without a lot of
makeup, at least.  Government jobs, the military - any field where they'll
check your background.  And even if you get a raft of degrees, no one will
take a young buck like you on as a professor." She threw me a pair of
sweatpants and sneakers, and began to disrobe.

   I felt a little uncomfortable watching Regina undress, and not just out
of modesty.  She was rather attractive, but how old was she: a hundred
years?  Five?  Older than Christianity?  It seemed impolite to ask, so I
shelved that curiosity for the time when the conversation touched on the
topic.

   I concentrated on taking slacks and uniform shirt off, not quite
ignoring the swell of her breasts under her bra and the line of her legs as
they slid into a pair of knee-high heavy stockings.  I quickly pulled up
the sweatpants - hoping the loose material would hide my involuntary
response.

   Resuming the conversation to distract myself, I said "Pity - I'd have
thought our kind would have made excellent historians." I found that the
sneakers fit perfectly, and wasn't really surprised.

   "We usually are, but no one believes us when we say we saw it
first-hand." Regina was ready, right down to the gauntlets to protect her
hands.  She had a standard saber in one hand and a mask under her arm.

   "Mind you, there are benefits to balance this out too; no need for
health insurance or pension payments, and we can really clean up on
long-term investments; put a thousand dollars away in a savings account and
let it sit for a century or so."

   By this point I'd gotten my gear together, and Regina put her mask down
for a second and fumbled behind the wardrobe.  She had what looked like a
pair of padded dog collars, and threw one to me.  "A little addition for
our style of swordplay.  Put it on under your mask with the clasp in front
- the mask's bib will protect that part of your neck."

   I complied; feeling a little restricted by the collar.  "So what do we
start with?" I asked, catching the saber Regina passed me.

   "Just standard Olympic saber.  For the first hour."

   * * * *

   It was quite a workout.  I hadn't touched a foil, epee or saber since
I'd flunked out of college two years previously, and my reflexes weren't
what they had been.  But my training in fencing was complete - that one
benefit came from my obsession with Wendy.  Before the hour was up, I was
scoring points on my tutor, even if my body felt like a holding place for
welts and bruises.

   "Right, now let's get a little more practical," Regina announced and
changed her stance immediately; going from standing side-on to me to a
slightly hunched frontal position.  Her off hand came up and grabbed my
blade.  I lurched away from her attack, pulling my saber free.  My next
slash was blocked with her left arm, and I felt her blade slap itself
against my ribs.  "Foul!" I cried at the obvious infraction to Olympic
rules.

   "What foul?  Mitch, this is PRACTICAL fencing - the goal of which is to
behead your opponent.  There's not going to be any judges or audience when
another immortal comes around - we don't like to be watched." She suddenly
charged me with an overhand slash.  When I parried high, she
shoulderchecked me to the floor, and thrust her point against my chest. 
"And someone after your head isn't going to stop and let you get up, unless
he feels like toying with you for a while."

   I woke up to the realities of my situation, and watched her turn her
back on me and walk away.  I jumped up and made a low cut toward her thigh.
She managed to parry it as she spun, and pressed me with a quick flurry of
attacks.  As I parried them with both sword and off-arm, she punched me in
the facemask.

   I stumbled for a second, and got a poke in the groin for my troubles. 
As I curled up against the pain, I watched the legs in front of me stop. 
"I'm sorry - I forgot I didn't have a cup for you." I lashed out, reaching
behind her knees and pulling her off her feet.  Before even I realized what
I was doing, my blade was holding her down at the throat.

   "That's more like it!  Really, I'm sorry for hitting you there, but I
forgot."

   "And you let your guard down - gave me an opening." I pulled off my mask
and wiped a sleeve over my sweaty brow.  I didn't release my opponent.  I
watched her chest rise and fall with the effort of the last hour.  Maybe
she'd start to tire soon...

   When I pulled my saber clear and gave her my hand, she pulled me down on
top of her.  I felt a tap against the back of my 'neck guard', to which I
simply tried to bite the wire mesh of Regina's mask.  I heard her laugh. 
"Okay, okay - truce!  We both need to rest; this'll do for you first
practice session." We each stood with other's help.

   After we put our masks, vests, gauntlets and swords away, Regina ushered
me upstairs to a main-floor bathroom.  "You can shower in here - I'll get
you a sweatshirt and fresh pants.  There's plenty of towels, for
hygiene...or modesty," she added, turning and walking for the upstairs.  I
watched the muscles in her back work under her bra straps.

   And wondered...what exactly was I being trained for?

   * * * *

   The shower was both a delight and a torture.  My tired muscles soaked up
the heat, but the vast map of welts that covered my chest and arms
complained from the pressure of the water stream.  Once I'd taken what
benefit I could from the shower, I dried off and wrapped a large towel
around my waist - those clean clothes hadn't materialized.

   Looking outside the bathroom, I found the house silent.  'Guess I'll
have to go find her,' I told myself.  The stairs surmounted, I began
tapping on doors, calling out "Regina?  Where're those sweats?"

   I found her in a bedroom, still in her sweaty things.  She was sitting
on the bed, her head slumped forward into her hands, and she was sobbing
openly.  A footlocker was before her, the open lid showing an assortment of
male clothing, topped with a framed picture of a man.

   I quickly sat next to her, putting an arm around her shoulders.  She
leaned on me, crying just a little less.  "Who was he?"

   "Robert - my husband."

   "Was he?"

   "Yes, I found him much like I found you, though not as deliberately." I
held her close and let her rock slightly as she began to talk.

   "I was living in Belgium at the turn of the century, and when the Great
War began, I just hid in a quiet cabin and planned to sit it out like I'd
done with other European wars.

   "He was a officer in the British Army.  His regiment was sent to the
Front in 1916, and he died for the first time not far from where I was
living.  I had gone to look at the battlefield when we felt one another. 
He had a huge rent in his jacket and shirt - been felled with shrapnel,
apparently.  He was wandering around in a daze, trying to figure out why
his men were all dead, yet he survived.  I took him in and explained what
he was, and all that.  We hid in that cabin to ride out the war and fell in
love.

   "After peace was declared, we changed our names to Robert and Regina,
got married back in England and moved to America.  We spent the Twenties
having fun, and the Thirties saving up - an immortal doesn't put all his
investments into one thing, like the stock market.  We moved back to
England when things got really bad in the U.S.

   "When war broke out again, Robert enlisted in the Army.  I stayed
behind, doing what I could to help the war effort.  He was posted to the
Asian Theater and I got letters from India, Burma, and finally Hong
Kong...just before it fell.

   "But I never got my Robert back - something changed in him.  He'd been
taken prisoner when the Japanese captured Hong Kong and something in their
treatment must have broken him.  He came back to me in '46, and he just
wasn't the same.  He was quiet, meek, even shy.  His love for me was still
there, but his open affection was gone."

   Regina's tears increased, and I could tell she was coming up to
something big.  "And one day he came after me - he tried to take my head. I
pleaded with him, begged him to stop - he never was as good at a sword as I
was, I taught him everything he knew.  But he wouldn't let up - it was as
if he wanted me to kill him." She stopped to let out a few heavy sobs,
shaking in my arms.

   "Had to...couldn't stop...I took my husband's head.  And in the
quickening, I knew.  I learned what it was like being a prisoner of war. 
And I almost forgave him.  But he could have rigged something to kill
himself.  Or even ASKED me to help him.  But to make me..." Further words
were lost in great wracking sobs.  I let her cry herself out, and moved a
foot to close the lid of the footlocker.

   When her tears subsided, so did her energy.  I laid her out on the bed,
and moved to take off her sneakers.  When I pulled the duvet from under her
to tuck her in, she pulled me to her.

   The kiss was desperate and feverish, and when she broke it her eyes were
still closed, and she gasped "No, don't leave me, Robert."

   Oh God.  She was delirious - thinking I was her long-dead husband.  She
hugged herself to me, kissing my chest.  "Don't go away.  Please, Robert."

   With a tear in my eye, I held her and kissed her forehead.  "Never,
darling.  I'd never leave you." I pushed lightly against her, and we lay
back on the bed, kissing all the while.

   As I began to undress Regina, she ordered me "No foreplay, just take me
- I'm ready for you, my love." Removing her hot, damp underwear confirmed
this.  I'm ashamed to admit that I needed no preparation; I slipped off the
towel around my waist, and moved between her splayed legs.

   Entry was divine, though part of me called out in apology to Nicole.  I
could understand if she never wanted to have anything to do with me if she
learned of this, and my heart ached when I realized I would have to keep
this secret from her, possibly forever.

   Then Regina pulled herself up and sucked on my neck.  Thoughts of my
beloved faded from mind, and I paid attention to consoling the woman
beneath me.

   We kissed and I fondled her breasts, teasing her passion higher.  Her
hips worked against mine as I plunged into her again and again.  I felt her
legs wrap around my back and pull me to her.

   I shifted to one side, freeing a hand to slip between us and stroke her
cleft as my phallus split it.  Once my fingers were moistened with her
juices, I worked gently at the engorged nub at the peak of her furrow.  She
cried out at the sensations and soon I felt her fingers clench at my
shoulders, her legs clench at my waist, and her womb clench at my impaling
rod.  I gritted my teeth, found myself looking Regina in the eye, and heard
her tell me "Let go, Mitch.  I'm sorry for making you do this, so just let
yourself go." I did.

   * * * *

   We hugged even after we calmed down.  I don't know for sure who was
comforting whom.  After a time, I heard her say "Thank you, Mitch - I know
you didn't really want to-"

   "It was therapeutic, not romantic." I eased down to be face-to-face with
Regina.

   She smiled.  It was a sad smile, but one that promised better times for
the soul behind it.  "Yes, and I thank you; Nicole is a very lucky woman."

   "As was Robert - I'm sorry he couldn't open up to you."

   She didn't so much as blink, so maybe I had helped her.  "Yes, well -
c'est la vie et c'est la guerre.  Que sera, sera." I felt her shrug in my
arms.  I hugged her close again.

   As we rested, Regina brought up a non sequitur: "Mitch, do you know that
it's been more than fifty years since I've fucked?" For some reason I will
never be able to adequately explain, I began to laugh.  "What is it?"

   Between gasps, I told her "And I thought I was in bad shape from not
getting any in three months." That set Regina giggling, and she managed to
tell me "Welcome to the big leagues of sexual abstinence, buddy!" before
laughter took over her voice.

   When we had calmed down, Regina got up and opened the footlocker again.
My concerns for her state of mind were dismissed when she took Robert's
picture and placed it facedown on the nightstand.  She grabbed some clean
sweats for me, and as I dressed she stripped down the bed.

   She showed me to another bedroom and gave me a kiss before leaving for
hers.  "Thank you, Mitch - it was very kind of you to help me fight off my
demons like that."

   I kissed her back, chastely on the cheek.  "Thank YOU, Regina - it was
very thoughtful and selfless of you to rescue me from a potentially
embarrassing situation and get me up to speed what the new 'facts of life'
are.  What's on the agenda for tomorrow?"

   She walked down the hall to her bedroom and looked back over her naked
shoulder.  "Tomorrow we have to get you a new identity - especially if you
want to see Nicole.  I'll get some things from your apartment, and meet
with some people-"

   "Forgers."

   "Some people.  Once I get them working, we'll practice more."

   "Surely there's more to being immortal than swordplay!"

   "Yes, but most never get the chance to learn it if they can't keep their
head."

   ============

   Author's postscript: Right; I was worried how I'd manage to work in a
little sex in the first chapter, but my muse came through with a nice
little 'tear-jerker' sub-plot, didn't she?  So what do you think?  The TV
show is finished, but it runs often enough in syndication, so you can
always catch reruns.  A lot of episodes were as deep and somber as this, so
if you like serious stuff based on a fantastic premise?  <shrug>

   Anyway, you'll get more of this just as soon as I can get it written;
Dancer will be definitely interested in this, so I'm not going to abandon
it...

   <1st attachment end>
