Title: "A Kiss Can Be a Fatal Thing Pt. 3"
Author: Rebecca Bradstreet
Rated: PG-13
Archive: No
Summary: Death, magic, and time travel, and Methos' day is just starting.
Warning: Cursing, gunfire, and flaming hit men.
Disclaimer/Notes: I'm using a Phileas that's part SAJV part my image of him from my youth. In Pt. 1 Becca was me. I've made Becca one Rebecca Elizabeth "Becca" Drake. She's me -- a healthier me with some magic. I also own Jason "Jazz" Tyne. I don't own any part of The Secret Adventures of Jules Verne. I don't own Methos, or any other part of Highlander: The Series. The words inside the <<>> are the last words from Part 2. I use // as thoughts, :: as telepathy, and ** as emphasis. It's not beta'd so all mistakes are my own.
"A Kiss Can Be a Fatal Thing Pt. 3"
by Rebecca Bradstreet (c) 2001Albion 2001,
<<"They fit fine thank you. To the time machine? You mean we're leaving in the Phoenix?" Phileas asked looking very doubtful.>>
"Yes, the Phoenix. It's what you came in. If you're ever going to get home again we can't leave it here. We can't leave it here to be captured by...well...by whatever is after us." Becca reached out to him with one hand while she lay the other over Jason's arms around her waist.
"Fogg, it'll be safest if we stick together, and take the time machine," Jazz told Phileas, his tone shifting from light to serious.
"There was a coat in the closet. Just allow me a moment to dawn it." Fogg kissed Becca's hand before going to collect the coat.
::I *am* right about why we're taking the time machine, right?:: Becca thought to Jason.
::Of course, Becca. The man and the machine must be returned to 1861.:: Jazz squeezed her, and kissed the top of her head.
::1861? I thought he was from 1872?:: She thought puzzled.
::That's just the year Jules Verne set Around the World in 80 Days. Phileas Fogg and the Phoenix have come to us from 1861.:: Jason told her gently.
"I'm ready now, Becca, Tyne. The Phoenix isn't more than a couple of hundred yards from here," Phileas said, wishing he had a hat to put on his head.
"Time to go," Becca said, sounding relieved. She unwrapped Jazz's arms from around her waist, and pushed past him heading down the stairs. Jason stood waving Phileas down the stairs in front of him. Fogg stood for a moment at the top of the stairs studying Tyne, then he went on down the stairs. Jazz came down the stairs last to find Becca and Phileas waiting for him at the door.
"The snow is still coming down out there. I thought we should all go together," Becca told Jason nervously.
"Good idea," Jazz nodded, opening the door for the others.
"The Phoenix is this way," Phileas told them once they were all out in the snow. Jason and Becca nodded, following Fogg through the snow towards the time machine. When they reached the time machine Becca said, "We're all getting into *that*?"
"There is plenty of room in it, but not much warmth. Let's get into it, and get it started," Phileas told them, climbing up into the thing -- showing the others how to get in. Becca shrugged and followed him. Jason stood for a moment peering back through the snow at the house, then he too shrugged and climbed in.
"This is the key?" Becca asked, reaching out to a stone that glowed when she touched it.
"I think," Phileas said, sounding less than certain.
"That's the key," Jazz said evenly. He laid a hand over Becca's keeping hers on the key.
"Think about getting Fogg home and it will take us there, love," Jason told Becca softly.
"Yeah...sure...think and it is done," she whispered back in her best announcer voice.
"That isn't..." Phileas started, stopping as the Phoenix began to move. He knew it was leaving Becca's, and Tyne's proper time. He could see out the window the energy bubble forming that would pop when they exited their time for the swirling blue black darkness of between time.
"I...I'm not sure. Phileas, where...when is home to you?" He was about to answer her question when the bubble popped, and they plunged into the darkness.
Paris 2006,
"This isn't 18 something London," Becca grumped to Jazz.
"It' certainly isn't 18 something," Jason agreed cheerfully.
"It isn't London either," Phileas said, listening to the people around them speak French.
"At a guess I'd say it's Paris. As for the time...I'm not sure when *we* met," Fogg looked to Becca for the answer to that question.
"It was February 9, 2001 when you knocked on my door, Phileas. This looks close to my time, but it could be earlier or later. It certainly feels more like Spring or even Summer here," she said, glad she'd left her coat in the Phoenix.
"Springtime in Paris, I think people write songs about that," Jazz grinned, putting his arms around Becca's, and Fogg's shoulders.
"Maybe. We need to be sure that's when/where we are. Come on lets see if we can find a newsstand," Becca sighed, shrugged off Jason's hold, and headed down the street. The Phoenix had landed inside a warehouse in a less populated part of the city. They'd shed as much of their winter clothes in the Phoenix as they felt they could do politely then struck out from the Phoenix in search of clues as to when and where they'd landed. Phileas wasn't sure if he felt more comfortable, or more lost in the city. The cars and buses as Becca and Jazz told him they were called weren't familiar, but the crush of people and the buzz of their talk even if it was in French were.
"We will get you home, Fogg. I promise you that," Jason whispered to him. Phileas couldn't help the feeling that Jazz had read his mind.
"What the?" Becca announced, coming to a dead stop at the entrance of a dark alley.
"Get on with it damn you!" A voice shouted from the alley's depths.
"Methos?" Becca whispered, plunging forward into the alley. Jazz and Phileas raced to catch up with her.
There was gunfire, and a shouted "You murdering bastards!"
Phileas watched as Jason's form flickered, and what was racing ahead of him ceased to be human and became a black panther.
"Dear God," Phileas whispered when he could see everything in front of him plain. The panther was slipping past two burning...bodies to sniff at a third body lying where he'd been shot. Becca was standing stock still staring at the burning bodies. Fogg moved forward to touch Becca's arm. He didn't know if she'd ever seen anything like it, but he couldn't bare how still she was standing.
"Becca?" Phileas said softly, reaching out to her.
"Lost my temper badly this time," she muttered before passing out into his arms. Fogg sank to the ground holding her. He shifted her in his arms so he could get a better look at her. Becca's nose was bleeding, and Phileas didn't have a handkerchief on him.
"Damn! Tyne? Jason?! She's bleeding, Becca's bleeding," he called over his shoulder not wanting to take his eyes off of her, or meet the eyes of the panther.
"It's all right. It'll stop. She...she's made it bleed before. I wish I knew why she came here, and who this guy is," Jazz said, once more in his human form, and dragging the man who had been shot past the charred remains of the gunmen who had shot him.
"Made it before?" Phileas said confused. Becca's nose stopped bleeding. Jason sat down across from her and Fogg studying the man she'd come after.
"It can't be!" Jazz said as recognition dawned on him. There were many versions of Fogg in the universe, but there weren't many versions of Methos. Some would say the existence of more than one Methos was too many. It wasn't true. Each Methos was precious. This one had been in trouble -- he *had* to have been for Becca to have used the attack she had. //Phileas and Methos will want to know how Becca roasted those hit men. I wonder if either of them will be able to believe how she did it.//
"Can't be what? Jason, talk to me," Phileas had been worrying about getting home, now he was worried about Becca, and Jazz, and the man Tyne was studying.
"Fogg, Phileas, when Becca was first talking to you she told you how you were just a fictional character to her, right? Well this...this man is more of a fictional character than a real one *even* to me," Jason never lifted his face from Methos' as he gave the explanation. Becca, and Methos gasped back to consciousness at the same moment. The return of life to Methos might have surprised Phileas, but his concentration was all on Becca, holding her, watching her grey eyes open.
"Phileas, you know you're upside down," she smiled up at him as she tried to sit up, and get her bearings. Methos looked up into Jason's blue eyes, and wondered what the Hell was going on. A couple of Fenrir's Hounds had run him down. He hadn't been expecting to wake up, not long enough to do more than loose his head anyway. The blue eye's looking down at him, not to mention the voices at his feet, weren't Fenrir's.
"Who are you people?" He decided to be direct.
"Methos, you're all right? When they shot you...I'm afraid I didn't exactly take the time to ask them what the Hell they thought they were doing. Don't tell us if Kronos is going to come looking for you. I don't really want to know if we've landed in a timeline were the Horsemen are fighting Horton for control of the world," Becca told him, finally sitting up enough to look at Methos. She hadn't proved steady enough on her own, Phileas was helping her sit up, and look at Methos.
"Horton? Kronos? MacLeod killed them before Fenrir destroyed him," Methos voice was heavy with sorrow.
"So Duncan, Horton, and Kronos all existed in this timeline, but they're dead now. What do you think Jazz? After 1998?" Becca found her head was getting light sitting up so she leaned back into Phileas' arms.
"Probably. I don't suppose you'd tell us what year this is, and what city we're in?" Jason asked Methos as the Immortal sat up to get a better look at the two voices he hadn't put faces to. The woman was pale and bloodied not like she'd been shot more like someone had broken her nose. The man's head was bandaged, and he was wearing blood that Methos guessed was hers rather than his. Under the blood, and through their exhaustion they didn't seem people to take on Fenrir's Hounds muchless ones to reduce them to smoldering ruins.
"You haven't answered my question," Methos responded impassively.
"Our apologies, Methos. The...*being* sitting behind you is the ageless cat spirit Jason 'Jazz' Tyne. Jazz why don't come around where Methos can see you, and change form for us," Becca said, motioning Jason forward.
"I've already seen him do that," Fogg said in a small voice over Becca's head.
"Oh? Jazz." She narrowed her eyes at him.
"There was gunfire, you screamed, I shifted into panther form," Jason told her, looking not the least bit apologetic.
"Phileas, he was just acting to protect me. He wouldn't have hurt you. He is...himself in all his forms. Jazz, please change your shape," Becca asked with her eyes as well as her voice. Jason nodded, and flickered from human to panther. Tyne padded over to Becca, and Phileas presenting his ears to Fogg for scratching.
"I promise he won't bite," Becca said, moving one of Phileas' hands from her waist to Jason's head. Fogg scratched behind Tyne's ears briefly then put his hand back at Becca's waist.
"He's very soft," Phileas observed in a detached tone. Jazz rumbled agreement, and padded towards Methos.
"No thanks. I'll take Phileas' word for it," Methos said, waving the panther away. Jason returned to Becca's and Phileas' side, and to his human form.
"I'm the dragon souled archmage of the Drake family, Rebecca 'Becca' Drake. I'd do some simple magic for you, but I...ah...over stretched myself a bit when I…" Becca gestured to the smoking remains behind Jazz, Phileas, and herself.
"You did that?" Fogg's voice was utter shock.
"Yes, *I* did that. I don't know if *this* Methos is like the one I've watched on TV anymore than I know if *you're* like the Phileas Fogg I've read about in Jules Verne's Around the World in 80 Days, but I couldn't stand by and let a version of Methos be shot and beheaded when I could stop it. It might have been a mistake. He could be a villain as black as they come, at least one version of him is. But the Methos I know well -- that I *care* about isn't a villain, and he would be hurt by the loss of Duncan MacLeod," she wasn't sure she should acknowledged that she'd heard the pain in Methos voice when he spoke of Duncan, but she couldn't resist.
"Watched on TV?" Methos repeated, focusing on something other than talk about his feelings.
"I'll get to that. I haven't finished introducing you to everyone yet," Becca smiled.
"The gentleman keeping my head off the concrete is Phileas Fogg, Esquire. He traveled from 1861 London to 2001 Albion in a time machine called The Phoenix. We tried to take him home in it, and landed here where/when ever here is. Can you tell us when/where we are?" Becca begged.
"You're in 2006 Paris. Time machine?" Methos answered her question, and asked another of his own.
"I think The Phoenix is a time machine that can cross timelines. I mean I think we have three separate timelines represented in this alley. I hadn't heard that Phileas Fogg was a real person in Jazz and my timeline, and I *know* you aren't. I've met the actor who played Methos on the TV series Highlander. Peter Wingfield may have an identical twin on the planet somewhere, but his twin will be identical -- human not Immortal. Our world has immortals but no Immortals," Becca grinned sheepishly.
"Ageless cat spirits, and dragon souled archmages, but no Immortals?" Methos grinned back at her.
"I think the magic in worlds with Immortals is mostly invested in them. I mean if The Prize is unimaginable power..." She shrugged.
"So we definitely have two separate timelines here. Phileas when was Jules Verne born in your timeline?" Methos asked, deciding he liked the strange group that had saved him from Fenrir's Hounds.
"1837, what difference does it make?" Phileas wasn't sure he was following the conversation though he was trying.
"Three separate timelines!" Methos, Becca, and Jazz said at once. They laughed as Phileas scowled at them.
"Jules Verne was born in 1828 in *our* timeline," Drake, and Tyne chuckled gesturing to each other.
"1828 in *this* timeline as well," Methos nodded.
"We should get out of this alley. Those Hounds may be stopped, but Fenrir seems to have an unending supply of them." Methos stood, and held out his hands to Becca. She took his hands and let him pull her to her feet.
"I *really* wish the world would stop spinning when I move," Becca grumbled as she leaned into Methos.
"Your head will clear with a shower and some rest…if we can get some. Need a hand Phileas?" Jazz followed Methos' example, standing, and holding his hands out to Phileas.