Title: Kimmie Author: akire Email: akire@mailcity.com Status: complete/unbetaed Category: Crossover: Highlander/Voyager (AU), plus misc. others Spoilers: umm, got a basic grasp of the Highlander universe? Fine. Oh yeah, we're a Clan Denial fanfic. This Voyager is an AU one, but there may still be spoilers for various bits and pieces across the seven seasons. Disclaimers: D/P and Paramount really DO own them. If you don't recognize it, its probably mine. If it's silly or crazy, definitely is mine. But if anyone sends the lawyers after me, I'm sending out the boys with swords ;) Oh yeah, and imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. If you recognize a specific fanfic creation, it belongs to its author (when this series is finished, I may tally them up) Rating: PG, prob. Hey, I'm not offended by much, if it should be rated higher, tell me! Content Warning: purists beware. Language may offend some readers. m/m relationship in the periphery. Summary: The trio plan for the day when three become four. Dedication: For GWAPEs, for allowing me multiple obsessions ;) That's long enough. On with the show! ~~##~~ The three minute walk from her quarters to the mess hall gave them sufficient time to agree on the corrections they would need to make to their cover. Adam and Richie Pierson-Ryan (Reia teased them on being too attached to their cover names) knew Rachel Wills ('BORing!' was Methos' reply) when all three were teenagers in the Euro school system. Though they went to different schools in the network, they had mutual friend who introduced them. It was a story that should stand up to most casual investigation. The shift change crowd had eased slightly whilst the three had been talking, but it was still busy enough to cover their covert observations of their target. "His name is Harry Kim." "Kim? Descended from a Hiroshi?" Reia smirked over her steaming mug of tea. "Only a girl-child was born about half a dozen generations back. She married a Kim. Good lad. I should know, I introduced them." "Glad to see you don't have any 'no interference' rules." Reia smiled at her younger friend. "The best Watcher's were the ones that got their hands dirty. Stop staring, you'll unnerve him." Methos began peeling his fruit with long, delicate fingers. "Does he know you?" "Only in passing, as Rachel. I was friends with his mother, but 'Rene Tyler' had an unfortunate accident when he was about five." "What is it with you and 'R' names?" "What is it with you and 'Adam'?" "Children!" Richie snapped sharply. "Be-have!" "Yes, dad," Reia replied. But any more was cut off by the approach from behind Richie of Chakotay in a Commander's uniform." "Adam, Richie, Lieutenant," he nodded in greeting. "Getting to know each other?" Reia looked to the boys with an appropriately coy smile. "Actually, Commander, we're renewing an acquaintance. We knew each other as children in the Eurosystem." Methos got that gleam in his eye. "Yes, I had a dreadful secret crush on Rachel here for years." Richie played along, gently punching his lover's arm and mock pouting. Reia decided to leave before the boys ganged up on her. "Well, I'd love to stay chatting about our hormonal teenage love lives, but I've got to get back to shift. Let me know your schedule, and we'll have dinner and catch up on old times." She nodded to the Commander and left with a familiar sway in her step. Methos and Richie both saw the Commander watch her leave before dragging himself back to the present. "Okay, you two, we've got more briefings to attend." He gestured as if to shoo them along, them moved deeper into the throng to gather up the other pockets of the Maquis that were scattered around the room. Sighing, Methos offered the last segment of fruit to his lover before the pair made their way to the exit. "More bloody lectures. Wonderful." ~~##~~ It was nearly a week before the chaos died down enough for Richie and Adam to make good on that dinner date with Rachel. Pooling their replicator rations meant they could lay on a respectable feast in the privacy of their quarters. Despite abandoning the Liberty with little more than the swords on their backs, Adam and Richie had managed to turn their bare quarters into something more homely. Reia walked around the small room twice before settling down on the small but comfortable couch. "Going for that student chic again, Richie?" Richie brought over a glass for her as he answered. "Nope, can't be a student's digs. There's not a stereo on a cinderblock shelf in sight." Methos joined them with a large platter, which he set on the table. "And no moldy pizza boxes in the corner, either." "And the neighbours haven't complained about the noise." Richie blushed. "Well, at least some things haven't changed," Reia observed calmly. "That smells wonderful, what is it?" Over dinner, conversation was kept light and cheerful as they caught up on mutual friends and the other vagaries of modern life. Only when the last of the dishes had been recycled did Reia raise the topic of her future student. "If the rest of our time out here is anything like our first week, Harry's going to be an Immie before we know it. I'd like to have a few plans in place, just in case." "Pity the Boy Scouts have been disbanded for nearly 400 years. They know how to be prepared." Richie whapped his lover with a cushion. "Janeway and her lot don't know about our sword wielding hobbies. I for one would like to keep it that way." Methos nodded. "She strikes me as just the kind of woman who would use an Immortal as a resource to be exploited, without giving a fuck about the person underneath." Reia nodded. "Yeah, I got that feeling too. So no public dying if we can avoid it?" "But that only buys us maybe a decade, best case scenario," Richie pointed out. "You and me, Rei, we can pass for 28, tops. After that, I think people are going to start asking questions. Methos doesn't have much after that." He wrapped his arms around his lover's legs and leaned back against them as he stretched his legs out on the floor where he sat. "So, no dying, no getting visibly hurt and then healing, and we've got ten years to come up with a reason as to why we're not getting any older. How long until we get home again?" "Seventy years, give or take. Of course, by then we'll be more than just another entry in the personnel section to them, hopefully." Methos shrugged. "What about the kid?" "Well, a plus is he's in Janeway's inner circle. I've already noticed she cares for those directly under her nose. Its us grunts hiding in the wings she tends to forget about." "So we make ourselves indispensable, get on this kids good side and wait." Reia raised her glass in toast. "We have a plan. The plan is good." Methos chinked his glass against his companions'. "I wouldn't go that far." Richie joined the toast. "We have a plan. That's more than what we usually have." "Salud!" ~~##~~