What never will be

[1stmacleod]

Staying just off the Nexus makes it easier to visit, and Connor is tentatively getting familiar with the place. He's been told by a couple of people that he needs to get a PINpoint, and he's learned to reliably find the free bar. He's met a girl who wants to get some sword training from him, which is something to do, and he hasn't felt the buzz of another immortal since his first time here, and that was Ramirez.

He is almost, just barely, settling in.

Then he answers a casual question, and the woman who asked it starts to tell him about the other Connor MacLeod. The one who still has a good friend and true brother in Duncan. The one who still has Alex. And John. And Rachel. An ageless, immortal Rachel.

Connor staggers back to Kairos' house, with a box of chocolates he's supposed to give to his own Duncan along with the apology he's dreading to make. Over the past five years he's mostly pulled his mind back together. He no longer hallucinates, he has enough presence of mind to walk around in public without attracting stares. He remembers to shave at least every couple of days and shower whenever he gets a chance, and he can carry on normal conversations. He's walking a fragile edge, though.
Now his mind is swirling with the stories he's been told of a big happy family with another Connor MacLeod at the boisterous center of it all, somewhere out there not so far away. It's the most wonderful thing he could possibly dream of to know his family is happy and healthy somewhere, and the most agonizingly painful thing ever to know that it's not his family, and it never will be.
He comes into the house and pets the dogs, and puts the box of chocolates on the dresser in the guest room, and sits on the floor beside the bed with his head in his hands and shakes all over for the next few hours.

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[kairos-aether.livejournal.com]

At five-ten sharp, there's a whirlwind of activity as Kairos comes home. There's a tinge of cold in the air, and that always pumps her up. She throws her rainbow-hued scarf on the hook in the hallway, dumps her work portfolio in her studio, and peels off her shoes - finally.

In the hallway, barefoot and exhilarated, she stops. Listens.
Then she frowns. She's used to Connor being so quiet, but this quiet felt.. odd. She's not preternaturally empathic but she finds herself going to his room, twisting open the door, and looking inside. A little worried to what she'd find, to be honest.

"Connor?..?" she calls quietly, not wanting to startle him.