"Okay -- let me get this straight," Scully began, the doubt dripping from her voice, "You are immortal," she pointed to MacLeod, "only not really *immortal* per se, you're just a really long-lived person who can die by beheading... and *you* Watch *him* cut off other Immortal's heads.
"Immortals kill each other because in the end there can be only one and when one of Immortal kills another there's a light show called a "Quickening" -- which sounds like the title of a movie that Mulder would watch -- and Immortals come from a planet called Ziest."
"Um... everything but the Ziest bit," Duncan said, wondering what kind of dementia could be responsible for the thought that Immortals came from a planet called Ziest. The only thing he could think of that would be even weirder than that would be that Immortals are really time travelers from the distant past.
Scully snorted, "I'd have an easier time believing in aliens than immortals." Then she realized what she'd just said. "I've been spending too much time with Mulder -- I think I need a vacation," Scully added to no one in particular.
"I think," Joe began, "that right now we *really* need to find a way out of here before Carlson comes back."
"Carlson -- is he a Watcher?" Scully asked.
"He *was*, when we get out of here I'm going to have him court-martialed and thrown out of the Organization."
"*When* we get out? Being optimistic for a change, Dawson? Is that good for someone who runs a blues bar?"
"Funny MacLeod, funny," Joe said. "C'mon Mac, four hundred years of experience must have had you confined in worse places than this."
"Yea, Turkish prisons are hell," MacLeod circled around the perimeter of the cell, inspecting the walls and door. "Sorry, Joe, but it looks like the only way out would be to jump the guards. This place is sealed up tight."
"Wonderful," Joe snorted.
"No, we want to turn *right* when we get to the intersection," Richie insisted, jabbing a finger at the unfolded map on the hood of the car.
"Look, Richie, *I'm* the one with the photographic memory -- *I* say that we turn left," Mulder countered.
"Mulder, I've lived here all my life -- I was literally raised on the streets, I think that I'd know my way around by now."
Chance sighed and meandered away from his parked car and the voices of the other's arguing. The parking lot was deserted except for them, and fading, dim lights cast yellow circles on the broken pavement. Chance walked over toward the deserted K-mart building, scuffling his shoes on the pavement and shoving his hands deeper into the pockets of his trenchcoat.
Lying on the ground was a soggy old copy of The Examiner. Chance's photograph of the lightening strike was emblazoned on the front page. Grinning slightly and remembering the hair raising events surrounding that photograph, Chance knelt down and picked up the old paper.
Underneath the wet paper, There was a stubby cylindrical piece of white plastic with a hole in one end laying in a pool of rain water. Dropping the paper, Chance picked up the object and turned it over in his hand.
There was a Watcher trefoil on the bottom.
"Hey, guys," he said, straightening up and walking back toward the arguing Immortal and FBI agent. "Does anyone know what this is?"
"It looks like a piece of rubber," Richie said, his irritation with Mulder carrying over to his reply.
Mulder, however, displayed more interest.
"It looks like the tip of a cane," he said, taking it from Chance and turning it over in the palm of his hand.
Richie's eyes widened, "Let me see that."
Richie snatched the rubber piece from Mulder and held it in the light from a dim lamp.
"This is from Joe's cane," he croaked.
"Oh, c'mon Richie," said Mulder, "You have no way of knowing that."
"I *know* it is, there's a Watcher symbol on the bottom..." Richie said with such passion that Mulder decided not to say anything. "Carlson has them... I *know* it."
"Look, guys," Chance said from over by the car, "Let's just see if we can't get to Joe's. Maybe we can find out more from there."
Richie clasped the rubber stopper tighter and nodded slowly. The trio climbed back into Chance's scrap heap car and slammed the doors.
Dana Scully was sitting in a corner of the cell, contemplating what she'd heard. Duncan and Joe were sitting across the cell from her talking about whatever Immortals and Watchers trapped in a cell together talk about. Immortals -- well, it's not like it was the strangest thing she'd ever encountered. At the very least it explained the murders, regardless of whether or not MacLeod really was Immortal. If he believed that he was, he might be deluded enough to actually go out and decapitate people.
That thought sickened Scully. MacLeod certainly didn't *look* like the kind of man who'd kill someone, but looks could be deceiving. On the positive side, MacLeod didn't think that Scully was one of his "Immortals", and it seemed as though he only killed other Immortals. So, for the moment, Scully was safe. She hoped.
But then, it wasn't like she hadn't been in more dangerous and bizarre situations before. Actually, compared to silicon-based life forms and alien bountyhunters, the idea of immortality and Immortals seemed downright ordinary. In fact, something nagged at Scully, almost like she'd heard of Immortals before -- in a movie somewhere.
She pulled herself out of that train of thought; it was slightly ridiculous. A movie about Immortals -- next she'd be thinking that there was a TV series about the X-Files.
"We could, you know," Joe's voice interrupted Scully's train of thought.
"Could what?" Scully asked.
"Jump the guards," At Scully's skeptical look he added, "No, I mean it. MacLeod's Immortal and --"
"I don't think so, Joe." Duncan interrupted, "These guys are professionals, and they probably know what I am. I doubt that we could get away with that."
"Yeh, damn, you're probably right, Mac. Well, it was an idea anyway."
"I hate it in here as much as you do, Joe. We'll figure a way out."
"Doesn't anyone want to know *why* we've been thrown in here together?" Scully asked, pulling herself to her feet.
Joe shrugged, "See how we react to each other?"
"I think you're been watching too many reruns of "Star Trek", Joe," MacLeod commented.
Joe cast Duncan a mock withering look, "Seriously, though, Mac. If these guys are a breakoff group of the Hunters, and from all appearances it seems that they are, shouldn't you be a bit more concerned about your head?"
"If all they wanted to do was kill me, they would have done it while I was still dead from the gunshot wound."
"Maybe so. But if I were you, Mac, I'd be just as worried about them *not* beheading you... they might have something worse planned."
Scully felt odd caught in between the exchange. Certainly both of these people seemed to believe that MacLeod was Immortal. Maybe it was some sort of mass delusion. But then of course, there were the bullet holes in MacLeod's shirt --
Scully's thought was cut sort. As Dawson finished speaking, the cell door clattered open and several armed and tattooed guards trooped into the cell. One of them grabbed Scully and pointed a gun to her head.
"I think it'd be best for you to cooperate, MacLeod," the man said.
Not wishing to see Scully injured, Duncan acquiesced and he and Joe were lead from the cell.