Michelle jumped as the black cat streaked out of the shadows before her. Trying to turn her shriek into a chuckle gave her the time to settle her nerves. Smoothing almost steady hands through her long dark hair, she resumed her careful steps toward the warehouse. As she moved, she recalled the previous day’s conversation with her friend and former teacher.

Flashback

“Amanda, I am no longer the spoiled child Duncan rescued.” Michelle stopped the angry little foot stomp just in time, it would have ruined the effect of her words. “I must investigate this invitation, and I have to do it alone.”

“Sweetie, it’s not that I don’t trust you …”

“No, it’s just that Duncan doesn’t trust me.” Cutting off any objections with a wave of her hand, Michelle began to pace. “You,” the wave turning into a condemning point, “are more concerned with not offending Duncan.”

“Michelle, honey, you have to understand.” Amanda oozed sincerity, usually the first indication that the one thousand year old immortal thief was anything but sincere. “You’re my student, the best one I’ve had, I don’t want to lose you either, you know.”

Turning her head slowly, Michelle fixed Amanda in her gaze. “Yes, I’m your student, and you know I can do this. This isn’t about us, Amanda, it’s about Duncan.”

“Okay, fine, you’re right, it’s about MacLeod.” As always, Amanda conceded with a stunning lack of good grace, but with some humour. “You trigger his Mother Hen tendencies so much he clucks at me. He’s known you since you were a child, he almost lost you to Axel, and he is terrified that something will happen to you. Happy?”

Michelle hid a quick smile as she looked at the flustered immortal. “Very. Thank you.” This provoked exactly the reaction she expected, and watching Amanda throw her hands in the air, only to land them on her hips to the accompaniment of a tapping toe in three hundred dollar shoes made Michelle giggle. Soon, both women were laughing.

“So, you’re going?”

“I have to.”

“I don’t like it. I know, know,” an elegant hand waved off the automatic protest, “you’re a big girl now, with a couple of heads under your belt, but I’m still worried and not just for MacLeod’s sake. Promise me you’ll be careful?”

“I will, Amanda, I promise.”

“And promise you’ll call MacLeod if you need help?”

“I’m going to Seacouver,” Michelle almost sighed, “do you actually think I could avoid Duncan completely?”

The women exchanged a look, one that spoke of trust and love, then Michelle grabbed her coat and headed for the airport.

End Flashback

Standing at the edge of a pool of light, Michelle pulled the invitation that had started this whole thing out of the pocket of her long coat.

Michelle,

The witching hour is upon us, the time when spirits walk the earth to gain vengeance and right wrongs done to them. Meet me at the Bellevue Yachts warehouse in Seacouver, 10 pm, Halloween Night. We can discuss my vengeance.

Axel

“I know you’re dead, Axel. I watched you die.” Michelle’s muttering carried no farther than arm’s length, Amanda had taught her well. “So, let’s go see who’s behind this.” Checking the time, Michelle moved around the back of the warehouse.

********************

Slipping through the broken window, Michelle checked her watch again; fifteen minutes before the ten o’clock deadline. Silently cursing the late flight, the mix up with the rental car, and all around bad karma, Michelle crept around a stack of boxes. Using a penlight to illuminate the floor directly in front of her, she edged toward a lighter area on the wall, hoping it was a door.

Easing around the door frame, Michelle saw a huge central area, lit by moonlight through the six skylights set in the ceiling. The full moon was bright enough to cast shadows of the skeletal spars of the unfinished yachts dotting the floor. Shuffling her feet, and remaining close to the wall with its concealing shadows, Michelle began to survey the room.

“So far, so good,” she whispered to herself as she glided slowly across the floor. Just then, the familiar immortal tingle swept across her nerve endings. “Oops, spoke too soon.” As quickly as it appeared, however, it disappeared again.

Michelle continued to move around the outside of the room, feeling the immortal presence at least four more times before it moved out of range again. “This is getting old, you know!” she called out as she quickly reversed direction. The only response was a creaking spar and a muffled chuckle.

“So, this your idea of a ‘trick’ for ‘trick or treat’?” Michelle was thirty feet from her last position before she spoke again. Thus, it was a shock to feel a blade flick out against her Achilles’ tendon. Spinning on her good leg, she saw nothing.

Cursing the pain, Michelle hobbled behind a partially finished keel. “Who are you anyway? I know you’re not Axel. He’s dead, he couldn’t have written that note.”

“Oh, Axel wrote it.” Michelle was trying to puzzle out the almost familiar accent when she heard the rush of wind and felt the sharp pain of the throwing blade striking her shoulder. Putting some pressure on her almost healed ankle, she pulled the leaf bladed knife out, shifting it to her left hand as she placed her right hand on the hilt of her rapier.

“Whatever. We gonna fight?” Michelle stepped carefully over deck planking, backing herself toward the only nearby open space. She heard the click clearly as she stepped into the moonlight under the skylight.

As the deck planking shifted, concealed razor wire snapped up behind Michelle, slicing neatly through both hamstrings. Blood gushing from those wounds, Michelle dropped, screaming, to her knees. At that point, a sharpened spar swung out, piercing the young woman’s abdomen and carrying her body to the warehouse floor. Her hands opened, releasing her weapons as she was splayed out in the moonlight, life’s blood looking black instead of red.

“No,” said a very calm voice from the shadows, “we are not going to fight. You, my dear, are going to die.”

“Why?” Michelle choked out.

“Because you betrayed me,” answered a voice that sounded too much like Axel.

“Because I’m hungry,” answered a wet voice with an Eastern European accent.

“Because I want you to,” answered the cultured, almost familiar voice.

“But, who are you?” Even almost dead, Michelle thought she felt flickering immortal signatures. Not one on one, not fair.

“Life isn’t fair, little girl,” snarled the last voice, making Michelle realize she had spoken her last thoughts aloud. “You may call me Kronos. My hungry friend is Caspian. And you already know Axel.”

“Axel is dead.” Michelle didn’t want to admit it, but she knew she was very close to death herself. “And he wouldn’t torture me like this.”

“Oh, this?” the voice asked mockingly. “This is for Caspian, he likes to play with his food.” Michelle could almost hear three distinct laughs as she shivered, watching a hand snake out of the shadows.

“Tasssty,” hissed the wet voice, and Michelle could visualize her blood passing those lips and smearing all over the questing tongue.

“And now, it is time for you to die. Perhaps you should have called MacLeod after all.” Michelle recognized the elusive voice just as the immortal stepped into the moonlight and severed her head.

********************

The man threw his long dark trench coat on the Quickening lit fire. There would be no evidence linking him to this death. He grinned as the edge of the coat fluttered over the already burning face of Michelle’s hapless Watcher. The fewer of that lot, the better.

Striding confidently out of the warehouse, he moved quickly to his car, adjusting the small plastic pumpkin he had pinned to his sweater in a nod to a Halloween costume. They were expecting him at Joe’s soon, for the party, and he mustn’t disappoint.

Looking in the rearview mirror, he made sure he had his Duncan MacLeod face on, then started the car. As he drove, he let Luther start composing the note to Amanda.