Organization: Penn State University Date: Thu, 28 Apr 1994 18:45:13 EDT From: "Lawrence E. Nagy" Message-Id: <94118.184513LEN101@psuvm.psu.edu> Newsgroups: alt.ql.creative Subject: Highleaper 4 Highleaper part 4 Sam drifted in and out of sleep. Strange images kept swirling through his mind. Scenes of ancient places and far off lands. Through out it all, images of swords and blood. Sam even thought he heard someone calling his name. Sam awoke with a start, fearing for his life. He could hear a familiar chirping in the darkness. "Al," Sam whispered "is that you?" "Who do you think it is," Al replied in his normal loud and projecting voice. "the bogeyman?" Sam turned on a reading lamp by his bed. "It's about time you woke up." Al said "We have to figure this leap out, now." Sam pulled on his jeans and headed out of the room. "Come on." he said softly "The kid's asleep in the next room." Sam climbed a ladder to the roof, meeting Al who was already checking out the view of the surrounding neighborhood. "What do you have?" Sam said dropping the trap door shut. "Your name is Duncan Macleod." Al said right off "Ian McShane is an alias." "It's an alias? How'd Ziggy find Macleod?" Sam wasn't really surprised by the alias with the way these two were living. "Ziggy didn't find it." Al replied "Macleod told us." "What?" Sam said surprised "I thought you said he died?" "We thought he had." Al waived his cigar around and paced away from Sam a few steps. "The going theory is that the leap somehow effected him. We've never had anybody leap in mortally wounded before, leaping may have a healing effect." Al looked at his friend in his new persona. His long black hair blew in the breeze as he looked out over the surrounding decay. "That's not possible and you know it." Sam finally said after considering the theory. "It's the only thing we've come up with so far." "Well keep working on it. What else do you have for me?" Al hesitated again. "Something else your not going to like." "And that is?" "You, or should I say Macleod and his friend down there are going to be found in a corn field five days from now, dead." Al mumbled the last word. Sam went totally pale and looked visibly shaken. "Macleod was dying when I leaped in. If he's killed five days from now I've already changed history and its not him that gets killed." "Now listen to me Sam." Al said "You don't know that, you may leap before then. Besides, if Macleod survived after leaping perhaps he would have survived if you hadn't leaped in thus saving his head for the corn field." "Whoa," Sam jumped in "hold it right there. What did you mean by 'saving his head'?" Al hesitated and walked away from his friend a few steps. "Both Macleod and Ryan are not only killed in that corn field, but they're beheaded." Al said this with an absolutely sick look on his face. "Now wait a minute, Al." Sam said excitedly "I haven't had a chance to tell you the whole story of when I leaped in." Sam then finally related the details of what happened when he leaped in. "So you, er or Macleod had just beheaded this Lance fellow when you leaped in." Al had the standard puzzled look on his face. "Yea, see if you can dig up anything on this guy. He would have been found in a dock side warehouse. Oh, he also rode a classic Harley Davidson." "Anything else?" Al asked before leaving. "See what you can find out about something called The Quickening. Richie mentioned a couple of times that he couldn't feel it in me. What is it he can't feel." "The Quickening, hu?" Al said with a bit of a grin. "I'll see what I can do." "MAC!!" Sam was awakened by someone screaming his host's name. He could hear the sound of metal clashing and other sounds of scuffling. Wearing only the boxer shorts he slept in, Sam threw open his bedroom door just in time to see Richie get stabbed. A thin man, slightly taller then Richie stood with his back toward Sam. In front of him Richie stood like a rag doll with the man's sword protruding from his back. Blood poured from the young man's mouth and wounds as the life quickly drained from his body. Without thinking, Sam grabbed the Katana laying inside his door. He turned back just in time to see Richie drop from the man's sword to the floor. Richie landed on his knees doubled over clutching his abdomen his eyes wide watching the pool of blood growing around him. The man stepped to one side and with a slight flourish brought his sword above his head. Sam noticed from this new angle as he ran toward them that the man seemed to actually have a look of regret on his face. The intruder was totally oblivious to Sam until he let out a primal scream just before throwing himself at him. The two men went sliding across the slick wooden floor with swords flying in opposite directions. Sam jumped to his feet and took his standard fighting stance. "Who are you?!" Sam yelled "What are you doing here?!" Sam didn't know what to do, tend to the boy, or face this guy and protect himself. The man ignored Sam's near hysteria "Ah, Duncan Macleod, I didn't know you were here." The man looked at Sam strangely then at the still gasping form of Richie on the floor. "Your not one of us, were is the real Macleod?" Sam didn't reply he just started edging toward his sword to match the man's casual stroll toward his. When he leaned down to pick up his, Sam jumped to the Katana bringing it up to an on-guard stance. The man laughed "Don't worry, the game isn't for you." he put his sword under his trench coat and turned toward the door. "Now you tell Macleod that I'll be back for him, and maybe even the boy." Sam was dumb founded by the man's casualness after probably killing Richie. All he could utter "Why..who.." The man held the door open and looked back at Sam "Just tell him the Hunter came to vis.." the shutting door clip off the last word. Sam immediately dropped to Richie's side trying to tend to the wound. "Hold on kid, you'll be okay. Richie's blood covered hand reached up and grasped at Sam leaving red smears across his bare chest. Sam grabbed his hand and held it as Richie took his last breadth. A wave of panic swept over Sam and he tried to get away from the still form in front of him. Unable to get proper footing in the blood, Sam did a crawling scramble away from the body toward the phone. Just as he reached the phone heard his name being called.. "My God, Sam what happened!" Sam looked up to see Al near by still in his neon green coat. "Jesus, Sam are you okay?" "I'm okay" Sam gasped "but I think the boy is dead, I have to call the police!" "No don't!" "What?" "I found out about these people, you can't call the police." "I've got to call someone, there may still be hope for Richie." Al squatted down and looked directly in Sam's eyes. "You can't call the police. These people are part of some cult they've been running all over the place chopping each other's heads off. If you call the police, they'll try to connect you or Duncan to every bizarre murder this city has had in the past two years." "What do I do?" Sam asked, the room seemed to be spinning around him. "Go get cleaned up. I'll try to think of something." Al said. He then looked back at the gore and disappeared out his door of light. Sam stumbled to one of the bathrooms grabbing some clothes out of a laundry basket on the way. When he finished his shower he came back out to the main room hoping Al would be there with some ideas. Nobody was there, all he saw was the mess of blood in the middle of the room and two trails of foot prints leading from it. One was his leading to the bath room, the other lead to the kitchen. From this distance Sam could see the kitchen sink was smeared with blood as if someone had washed up there. Sam walked slowly out of the bathroom avoiding his own bloody foot prints. What was going on? Where was the boy's body? There's no way he could have survived that wound but it didn't look like anybody else had been here. Sam called hesitantly "Richie?" Sam headed for the katana laying on a chair by his room. The 'Hunter' may have come back. The door to the boy's room opened and Richie stumbled out. He wore a only pair gym shorts, was smeared with brown dried blood and looked extremely pale. In the middle of his chest was the scabbed over wound and he held his hand over his abdomen in pain. "It's about time you got out of the shower." the boy gasped as he shuffled by Sam. "You can start cleaning this place up and when I'm done with my shower, you can tell me who you are and where Duncan is." With that, Richie went into the bathroom and closed the door. to be continued.....