Disclaimers in part 1 The Vegas Chalet Motel was well out of the tourist areas, but as was true with the rest of the town, Joe observed, its owners had seen no contradiction in incorporating something as outrageous as a Swiss chalet motif into a seedy motel in the American Southwest desert. Joe paused before knocking on Methos's door. His brain had finally wearied of working on the paradox of Methos's sexuality, but a sudden apprehension of facing the man, knowing what he had learned, stopped Joe for a moment. Once again, he was disappointed with himself. He knew many gay men and a few lesbians. He *knew* it didn't mean anything, dammit. It's just that you think you know someone ... He knocked. He heard Methos speak to someone, then his approaching footsteps. The door opened. Methos stood there, wearing a sweatshirt and jeans, looking young and harmless, and holding in one forearm, close to his side, a squirming cat. *A cat?!* Joe stared. It was a jellicle cat, the kind they sing about in "Cats". White face and legs, but a pied coat of black and orange covered the cat's head, back, and long, fluffy tail. Calico. Methos had a cat. Methos had a cat. "Come in, Joe. Quick," was Methos's greeting. Clearly the struggling cat was determined to escape. Joe seldom moved quickly, but he did his best, still staring at the cat. Inside the room, he started to grin. Methos got the door closed as the cat wriggled free and climbed his sweatshirt to his shoulder, meowing with irritation. Methos tipped his head to the side to better balance the compact, angry weight on his shoulder. Joe was grinning broadly by the time the cat leaped, in an impressive display of athleticism, the five feet to the bed. "You have a cat," Joe accused, delighted. "Yeah," Methos breathed, running a hand over the tuft of his hair which the cat had ruffled. "This is Scully. Scully, meet Joe. I've told you about him." The cat meowed. Joe couldn't hold in the laughter which bubbled up from somewhere inside him. "You have a cat!" he repeated. Joe couldn't afford to actually fall into a chair, so he lowered himself into one quickly, before his laughter made him lose his balance. "You have a cat," he gasped a third time. He got no response, this time, and, recognizing a note of hysteria in his own laughter, Joe struggled to gulp it down. He wiped his tears to find two pairs of green-gold eyes regarding him curiously. "Uh, it's a nice cat. She?" Methos nodded. "She's a nice cat." He snickered again. "Please tell me you took her with you to visit John Kirin." Methos's eyes widened. "How ...?" He stopped. "Who is his Watcher, anyway?" Joe laughed some more. "Never mind. Why on earth did you take your cat?" The cat in question meowed again, the sound almost a question. She jumped from the bed and sniffed cautiously at Joe's prosthetic left leg. Methos opened a small ice chest and removed two bottles of beer, popping their tops off in a practiced motion against a night stand. Not the mini-bar type of hotel, Joe observed, accepting the beer. "She's a good judge of character. I wanted to see if she'd be afraid of Kirin." Methos sat on the bed, which sank so far under his weight that Joe guessed the box springs were shot. Joe looked down at the cat. She had chewed Joe's shoelaces free, and lay on her side, champing one of them with enthusiasm. Methos's answer seemed nonsensical to Joe. He looked back at the other man, but Methos didn't look like he was joking. "She wasn't," Methos continued. She's not afraid of you, either." Joe looked down again, to where the cat was attacking his other pair of shoelaces. "Well, that's good, I guess. She doesn't look like she's afraid of much." "Some things," Methos replied, quietly. He looked at Joe intently, but didn't elaborate. *Like what things?* Joe thought of asking, but it seemed a ridiculous direction in which to take the conversation. They had other things to talk about. "So did you decide Kirin can live? Even Mac let him go instead of taking his head for his past crimes." "I don't give two figs for his past crimes, Joe," Methos replied with surprising vehemence. "I can't let him do *this*. It could lure Duncan into a vulnerable position. Aren't the Watchers concerned about him blowing immortality wide open?" "Not particularly. He's not the first to make himself a god by coming back from the dead." *Maybe you were the first.* "For all I know, Jesus Christ Himself was an immortal." Joe couldn't believe he had said that. He couldn't believe he had said that to Methos, the man who could actually confirm or deny it. The man who, even now, was opening his mouth to say ... "DON"T YOU SAY A WORD!" Methos froze. Joe had flung up his hand as he yelled. Even the cat quit chewing and leaped upright. "Joe," Methos ventured. "NOT A WORD!" Joe was practically shaking. He didn't want to know this. He and Mac had danced around this possibility, deciding that faith was better than knowing. At least, that's what Joe had decided. God, he was really beginning to feel in over his head. How did they get to this? *You brought it up,* he chided himself. Methos spread his hands, his beer in one of them, his gaze on Joe. The cat took the gesture as an invitation and jumped into Methos's arms. "All right, all right," Methos said, earnestly, trying to ignore the cat who was butting her head against his chest. "I'm not saying anything." Joe glared at the immortal, looking for an expression of mockery or amusement, but Methos was looking down at the busy cat in his lap. Joe found that he was breathing hard. He forced himself to relax. They were both silent, pulling back from that brink. The cat, having had her fill of petting for the moment, jumped back to the floor to try teething on the tip of Joe's cane. "Is there a code word for Christ? Or for God? In free cryptic?" Methos inquired. Well, it was a safer topic, anyway. What was with the man and free cryptic? "No. Why would we need one?" "What about uh, ultimate good? Or ultimate evil?" "No." Joe frowned. "What are you trying to get at?" "Just getting an education. Surely there's something about something being really bad?" "Well you know a sick nephew means danger from an immortal. General danger is natural phenomena, like blizzards or plague. The worse the danger, the worse natural disaster you pick. If you want to say everything's okay, you say the blizzard's over, or the sun is shining, or something like that." "And a sick niece means danger to an immortal." "No, that's just the improv we talked about." "Right. What about danger to the whole world?" "Oh, come on! Don't be ridiculous! What are you still doing in town? Aren't you worried about Connor?" Methos regarded the beer in his hands. "How did you find me, Joe?" "Well ... Connor paid me a visit. He knew where you were." Methos nodded, paling slightly, Joe thought. "That's one reason I'm still here. If I run, the hunt will be on." Joe looked at the oldest immortal, taking in some other details for the first time. Methos's eyes were shadowed. The room, which he had to have been living in for almost the two weeks Joe had been in his own room, was bare of any personal items. A closed suitcase by the bed, and the cooler with beer was the only evidence that anyone was living there. Most telling of all, Joe didn't see a single book. Methos was ready for a hasty exit. It must really suck to have to live like that, Joe thought. "Do you really think he'll hunt you?" "He followed you. He'll follow me. He hasn't got many leads." "What are you planning to do about Kirin?" Methos rose from the bed, looking like he would have liked to pace, as Connor had, around the room. There was nowhere to go, however. He leaned against the wall. "There's only one sure way of stopping an immortal if you don't like what they're doing." He sounded unhappy. "So you're trying to get Connor to fight him," Joe accused. "What do you care? I told you not to try to play the Game, Joe." "That *is* what you're doing!" Joe had hoped for a denial. "If they fight, one or the other of your problems gets solved." Joe would have liked to leap to his feet with anger, but more than the awkwardness of his prosthetics prevented him. The cat now had all his shoelaces thoroughly tangled. He leaned down to begin retying them. Methos took a pull from his beer bottle before answering. His eyes glinted with something. "God, I'm good," he said, smiling, as if it were a joke. "You're a conniving son-of-a-bitch! You still haven't told me why you want Kirin stopped. So, what if it makes Duncan show up? I, for one, would like to know where he is! If Connor gets killed ..." "Don't you think Kirin would be easy pickings for MacLeod?" Methos looked innocent. "You know full and damn well that Kirin's been practicing, and he's damn good!" "Oh." Methos nodded sagely, his expression bland. The cat, unfortunately, took Joe's angry attempts at retying his shoes as a fun game. His attempts to bat her away only renewed her determination to use his shoelaces as dental floss. He would have appreciated some assistance from her owner. "Why does she do that?" he demanded, irritably. Methos's smile as he regarded the two of them turned fond. "Near as I can tell, Joe, everything in the cosmos was created to be a cat toy." He took another drink. "Well, I am more of a dog person," Joe complained, picking up the cat and looking for a place to stow her. Methos reached across and accepted her, one-handed, reseating himself on the low-slung bed. "I can't believe they let you keep a cat here," Joe continued, still redirecting his anger, as he tied his shoes. Methos laughed, without much mirth. "If you offer them enough money, they'll let you do anything, here. Literally. Including bribing your cat out of customs quarantine. Isn't that right, Scully?" The cat, though apparently content to be stroked in Methos's lap, watched Joe's every move with avaricious attention, her tail flicking. His shoes tied, finally, Joe stood, his cane in one hand and the empty beer bottle in the other. Methos stood, too, dropping the cat on the bed behind him. He held out his hand for the bottle, and Joe took a perverse pleasure in pitching it past the immortal to thud gratifyingly in the can. "Joe," Methos said as Joe started for the door, the darn cat darting at his feet. "What?" "What did you want?" Joe halted, his hand on the doorknob. Oh yeah. He sighed deeply. He didn't feel like pumping Methos for information, now, but, dammit, that is what he came for. Turning in place was never an easy maneuver for him, and he knew the immortal would recognize the sacrifice to the importance of his question which it was, so he did it. The cat thought that was great fun. His shoelaces once again in grave jeopardy, Joe looked wearily at Methos, who smiled and scooped up his cat. "Scully," he remonstrated gently. Then he regarded Joe expectantly. "Did Mac ever mention the guy who was his first head to you? A hermit?" Methos frowned as he scratched the cat's ears. "Why?" "He mentioned him to Connor. And apparently Kirin said something just like the hermit did. Something about evil being the color of blood. I thought there might be some clue there." Methos's face lost the frown, along with what little color the man had. He gripped the squirming cat tightly. She protested. "Yeah, he told me about him. He said he was completely 'round the twist. Totally bats. There's nothing there, Joe. Tell that to Connor. And tell him Kirin has to be stopped." Damn. Joe left, knowing Methos would never give him a scrap more than he wanted to. But he was certain the man knew *something*.