(No relation/no spoilers--to the Sanctuary in the movie. I'm referring to the club that Amanda ahem took over from Andre Korda (RIP) at the end of the ep "The French Connection". I personally liked "The Raven", so I definitely consider it a part of Genevieve's timeline. But in re: the movie--consider my stories as still before the movie. Who knows if I'll raise similar themes--since I've got all manner of new thoughts in my head, now.)
Cassandra stepped on the gas of the rental as she wound through the streets of Paris with a bleeding girl in the seat next to her. Genevieve shouldn't still be bleeding--she was Immortal--but she was, and she had gone pale, and seemed in shock.
"Genevieve!" she called, employing the Voice. "Say something."
"Don't do that," the girl responded, querelously. "I know when you're doing it, and when you aren't."
"Left. Rue de St. Michel. Two blocks, and a right. We're going to Sanctuary...it's cool. I know the proprietor."
"You're..."
"I can't engage in, like, detailed coversation, right now--but I'm glad to see you know where the gas pedal is. You drive alright."
"Thanks?" Cassandra said, more of a question than an honest response to her comment. She glanced overm, briefly, and watched as the young woman's features composed themselves into a blank mask of equanimity--she seemed to see nothing, hear nothing, feel nothing, at that moment, and even if she tried, she could sense nothing from the woman, not fear--not even pain. It was as if the girl had gone into the trance of a shaman.
She didn't know where the girl would have learned that. No more than she knew where she had picked up her manner of fighting--perhaps she had come up with her methods through nothing more than experimentation. She knew Duncan had tried to show her something, and was rewarded with disappointment. She wondered if Methos had shown her how to fight, but doubted it--she fought in a way women, eventually, must learn.
She would do anything. Anything.
The opponent had been a woman, and Genevieve tried to talk her out of the fight with the usual ruse--she was Anath-Sin--a ridiculous lie, but curiously effective amongst these creatures. And when it hadn't worked, Genevieve simply engaged, face--perhaps face as blank as it was, now. And she was losing, right up until she dropped her sword.
No, that hadn't been it. She threw it away. She threw it, and beckoned.
"This is how an old woman dies!" she had screamed. "I am yesterday, today, and tomorrow."
Cassandra wondered where those words had come from--they were familiar, as if taken from some old book. She was not old, at all--but a child--and yet, she stepped aside as the woman lunged,just at the moment she should have been run through. She grabbed the woman by the hair, wrapping it in her hand, and yanked her. The woman tried to lift the sword to such a point as she would touch it to Genevieve, but the girl put her hand on the very blade, and held it to the woman's shoulder. Genevieve was physically stronger--that much was clear.
"How old are you?" she had asked, with something in her voice--it was a lump in her throat--Cassandra knew why she was asking. And when the woman answered--"Why? I'm...I've lived...seventy-eight..." she understood. All of the Gauntlet was older than she. And yet they wanted her--*vintage* Quickening. She took the woman with her own sword, and simplydropped whn the Quickening hit, exhausted.
But then the shots rang out--one hitting her. Cassandra rushed forward, not even thinking, only knowing that she wanted to protect the younger woman while she was incapacitated. Whoever the assailant was, he ran once he knew they were two--the team of Genevieve and Cassandra--so far--was an effective one for that.
"One more person, off the social security rolls."
"I doubt she was an American."
"Really?"
"You were speaking Italian."
"Oh." She then laughed. "Italian in France? It felt like home."
"Howdid you end up with a French name then?" Cassandra asked, as she helped Genevieve to her feet--and saw she wasn't healing. She still bled.
"My mom thought it was pretty. My dad didn't care. And...I'm messed up?"
And then the girl had become the pale wrech she saw now. The wreck who now was trying to peer out the window so hard that her face was pressed against it. "I think we're close."
Cassandra stopped ruminating over the fight she'd seen. "What am I looking for?"
"Sanctuary--there isn't really a sign--this neighborhood--not so much for signs--but it's...I'll try and stay conscious...we're...like, a block away. Shooo...that guy didn't see you, did he? Eh....
"The Sanctuary. Was this a church?"
"Maybe. I think. One of the former proprietors had a sense of humor. The current proprietor--is Immortal. Amanda--she's a friend of Duncan's, too. Help me out of the car, would ya?"
"Sanctuary--a bar on Holy Ground, run by..."
"Yeha...got the joke. It's only funny to us."
Cassandra smiled. "I like it."
Posted on Sep 7, 2000, 8:58 PM from IP address 172.135.222.67