DISCLAIMER: All characters belong to Panzer/Davis, Rysher, and whoever else has a legal claim to them.  Absolutely no money made - my bank manager hates me - and this is just for fun.

THOUGHTS ON A WINTER'S DAY
BY MAGGIE

The last dregs of beer swirled around the bottom of the bottle and reflected the soft light from the pearl bulbs which lit the bookshop cellar as Methos swung it in small, unnoticed circles. Leaning over his latest journal he considered the events of the day so far and wondered idly how best to record them. These days he would normally have typed in the entries and then put the plastic pockets of printout into a folder. But for some reason, since Alexa's death, he had gone back to writing longhand directly to paper.

Methos had learned to love humanity in five thousand years. It had been a long lesson in the learning, but he considered that it had been worth it, and he was damned if he was going to let MacLeod ruin his hopes for the future of every mortal on the planet, by losing his head for the sake of a code of honour that had been dreamed up by a couple of sentimental minstrels in the Middle Ages. That thought brought forward another, which gave him a starting point for his latest journal entry and putting pen to paper, he began to write.

'MacLeod's at it again, getting involved in someone else's dangerous, not to mention sticky, mess when he should be keeping his head down and running for cover. The worst of it is that this chivalry stuff is catching.

He saves my head by coming up with a scheme to deceive Kalas. Then he does his best to save me from Amanda's tigerish claws, and keep the Methuselah Stone for Alexa.

Unfair that -- losing the damn thing at the last moment. We could have dredged the river for the pieces but it would never have been in time to save her. There was so much more that I needed to show her, so much more that she should have known ...

'Don't dwell, Methos, don't dwell'. Those were the last words I ever heard from Darius, nearly a Century ago. I wish I had taken the trouble to look him up before the Hunters took his head.

Well; not much point in dwelling on that either, I suppose.

Anyway; he goes and does all that for me, so now I owe him a glimpse -- only a glimpse, mind you -- at a few Watcher files. There goes Golden Rule number one. He's so ... hell, I don't think they've developed a word pithy enough for Duncan MacLeod yet. He's so persuasive. And persistent. And I thought that was me.'

Later that day, he had no trouble continuing to put his thoughts about MacLeod and his quest to restore Warren Cochrane's memory.

'Oh, yes, there is a word for Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod; yes, there damn well is. Two, actually. Boy Scout! Rotten big penknife and quick with it. Not reluctant to make a point with it as well, if I'll forgive the pun; still, I suppose I can talk. He's going to lose my head for me one of these days ... he's good at that ...

I almost wish he'd taken my head when I'd asked him to -- at least it would have saved me all this aggravation. Of course, I don't suppose he realises that he has only delayed the inevitable. I've absolutely no intention of my Quickening going to someone as evil as Kalas ... or Felicia Martins (now there's another one who walked away from our beloved hero -- God, I'm bitching today, aren't I? That's what being around MacLeod does to you; I'm sure I never used to have such a sarcastic repartee).

At least I managed to deal with Kristin; if she'd been left to her own devices much longer, I don't suppose there would have been an awful lot of us left. Well, not males, anyway. I'm sorry, Darius, but I actually enjoyed taking her head; and it did make my point rather nicely.

Oh, Brother Darius, I wish you were still around to take my confession; I'm not sure if I'm a cat or a rat at the moment, and I don't think I like either choice. I feel muddied and cold today; apart from all this rather chilly snow, I can sense something just around the next corner that could throw everything I've worked for to the four winds. Or just everything, full stop.

You were so good to talk to; you listened with your eyes as well as your ears and I miss that.

Anyway, back to rule-breaking. I suppose I'd better hang onto these files on Warren Cochrane awhile longer; I dare say he of the elegant ponytail will be by shortly for another update. He's not going to get his sticky paws on them this time though; I must be going soft, just handing them over with all that wet snow around.

"I need some information," he says. "It's important to me." Soft touch, that's what he is. So who is the bigger fool, Methos? The four hundred-year-old fool Knight Errant or the five thousand-year-old fool who, against all better judgement -- and at the risk of losing not only his cover but his head (again!) -- gets his information for him?

I don't like feeling like this; I wasn't really planning on getting crabby in my old age. Alexa wouldn't have been very pleased with me either.

Oh, Lord, I do miss having her around; those young/old shining eyes taking in everything, making me see it all so differently. The way it felt, just holding her, the touch of her small, cool fingers stroking gently across mine, or brushing down my face.

It didn't matter where we went or what we saw or did, everything was a wonder to Alexa. I can't forget the way she kept running her hands over the rough, painted walls of the house in Cairo, as if she couldn't get enough of the strong, primitive texture of them; and she would stay awake at night just to watch the tiny lizards scampering over the stone floors.

And Santorini; the island has so much rich history and, even now, somehow remains part of the age which shaped that history. We spent days just searching out and admiring the Minoan frescoes ... No, it was more than that. For her, it was as if we had stepped back into the past. So vivid was her imagination that her presence there amongst the memories of the time I spent there, so long ago, that I kept expecting to see people I had known there; I could feel them around me, almost hear their thoughts.

Watching the Sun go down -- even as it had gone down on the Minoan civilisation nearly three and a half thousand years ago when the volcanic eruption buried their excesses forever -- was a moment of pure magic. She was so happy, so much at peace with herself that for a moment or two, even though her eventual decline was constantly at the back of my mind, I found myself conversely hoping that we might have years to spend reawakening old shadows of an age gone by.

I suppose I should have realised. The day we spent together on the beach, and that evening, totally captivated by the incredible colours of that evening sky, was Alexa's Swan Song; as the Sun sank below the horizon it took the last of the magic with it. After that those final telling symptoms set in fast, and we had no time to think of anything other than doing what had to be done in preparation for the end. It hit her hard, but she took it well, not brooding over it, just trying to accept the changes that were happening too quickly.

Packing to leave was the hardest thing I've ever done; I've never come so close to despair in my life, that I can remember. During the seemingly interminable flight to Geneva, far too aware of how she was slipping away from me, the ambulance ride the other end, and checking her into the hospital, knowing that its endless, modern corridors, antiseptic smells and endless boredom -- offset only by increasing discomfort and pain -- would be the last place she would ever know ... all the time, in my mind, apart from constant concern over Alexa's condition, was the driving need to risk everything, should it become necessary, to save her.

For once all thoughts of self-preservation, except what was needed to secure her one chance for life, went out the window; the alternative so unthinkable that I ran from it, somehow making the effort needed to ignore its footsteps, all the time coming up faster behind me.

I haven't hated a mortal for a very long time, but I came so close with Dan Geiger; he had a full measure of mortal years ahead of him, no different from so many others, but he just couldn't count his blessings, could he? He had to have it all. He had no-one to blame but himself for his death. Had it come only to that, I might have pitied him, but he robbed Alexa of a life that would have been a hundred times more fulfilling than he could ever have known, and, try as I might, I cannot forgive him for that.

There is only one blessing to come out of all that, really, and that is that Amanda finally took another step away from similar selfishness, albeit that that step had to be wrung out of her. To say nothing of what I went through to get her to see the truth.

Bitterness and Change; and it's not done with yet. There's still that feeling that this is only the beginning of it ...

But I'm wandering again; where was I?

Oh, yes; breaking rules, fools and Warren Cochrane. Duncan MacLeod of The Clan MacLeod; all this irritability is undoubtedly the boy scout's fault ...

Oh, the hell with it, let's get back to putting the washing out. I didn't count on getting rid of the dust quite this way; poor old parchment. It doesn't rub shoulders well with river water, especially when it's the Seine. I suppose there must be fish in it somewhere, but what I had to mop up earlier certainly didn't smell too healthy.'

His final entry covering the incident concerning Warren Cochrane started out as the pithiest of the lot.

'Richie Ryan was right about one thing; Duncan MacLeod really is a pain in the backside. The trouble is that sheer cussedness of his is a big part of what also makes him the best of us.

MacLeod's little piece of Navaho lore had made me see the truth of Alexa's Immortality depending on me living to remember her, so now what do I do; rethink my whole plan? I was quite willing to have him take my head when the time comes; it wouldn't have been easy, but it came under the heading of necessity if every mortal on the planet isn't to end up in the workhouse under someone as evil as Ghenghis Khan or Hitler.

Now, I don't know whether I can. I don't know if I can reconcile myself to the thought that Alexa could just disappear for ever, as if she had never lived.

Damn you, MacLeod ... what am I going to do with you?'

~finis~

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