Title: "The End, The Beginning"
Author: Rebecca Bradstreet
Rated: G
Archive: Sure
Summary: Ceri welcomes Kronos home.
Warning: Magic.
Disclaimer/Notes: This is a Highlander: The Series fanfic, but it doesn't feature the Highlander concept of immortality.  In this AU all the characters that were Immortals in canon are...other kinds of supernaturals.  I don't own Kronos, Duncan, or any other HL: TS characters.  I don't own "Never Enough".  It's by Papa Roach, and Chuck gave it to me.  I do own Ceri Arawn.  I use  // as thoughts, and ** as emphasis.  Being a Lyric Wheel story, this is unbeta'd all mistakes are my own.
 

"The End, The Beginning"
by Rebecca Bradstreet (c) 2002

Albion, Maine
December 31, 2000

Albion -- a son of the sea -- some records claimed he'd been a son of Neptune, and ruled England until he was slain by Hercules.  Whatever his story it had become a name used for England, and it was the name of the town she stood in waiting for Time.  The Seelie Sith Duncan MacLeod of the clan MacLeod had banished Kronos as best he could.  Some would say it was too bad that the Old Man couldn't be banished for good, but they didn't understand the nature of the universe.  Time was needed just as much as love or death.  Ceri Arawn was a Tylwyth Teg.  She understood the nature of the universe, and she did her best to see it had time, love, and death enough for always.

An owl called out somewhere down the slop from where Ceri stood on Drake's Hill, and she wondered what quirk of the universe had chosen little Albion Maine to be the place Kronos would return to from...from his banishment.  The date didn't strike her as particularly strange though it did amuse her that it fit to the modern calendar.  Kronos always said he preferred the old ways best.  Ceri wondered what he would look like when he returned this time.  Would his eyes be blue, or green, or perhaps hollow windows to the night sky?  Would his hair be black, or silver, or maybe blood red?  And what about his scar?  That Cold Iron scar he couldn't seem to shake.

Ceri pulled her cloak tight about her shoulders, and stamped her feet in the snow.  Albion was very much a cold wintry place in December.  There was a farm house on Drake's Hill, but it's occupants sleeping snuggled in their beds would never know what passed on the hill outside their windows.  They wouldn't see the glory she would see.  Ceri's pale blond hair covered her ears, and stung her lips driven by the biting wind.  She wouldn't have been anywhere else for New Year's Eve 2000.  Ceri had spent much of the...time...since Kronos banishment learning where and when he'd return.  She was ready, and waiting to welcome him home.

When the moment came, she felt it before she saw or heard anything.  Ceri felt the door open -- felt power pour over the threshold.  Only when that rush had built to one she could hear as well as feel could she see anything.  At first all she could see was the faintly glowing outline of the door -- of the portal.  Power danced about the outline as much as it poured out of it, and for the longest time all that seemed to be coming through the door was power.  Then, she could see his outline in the door.  Ceri was tempted to march right up to the door and try to pull him through it, but she knew she had to wait, //All things in their own time, not the least of them Time himself.//

His outline filled in slowly, or maybe it filled out.  At any rate she began to be able to make out his hair, his eyes, and the scar, //I guess you'll never shake *that* scar Old Man.//

He stood in the doorway -- on the line between being *in* the world, and being *out* of it.  Kronos was dressed all in black from his high boots to his long mantle.  His eyes were a pale silvery blue.  His hair hung in dark curls down to the collar of his cloak.  As he stepped from the doorway into the world he swept his hood back and gave her a wide smile.

"Is everything okay?"  Kronos asked her as if he really cared about *everything*.

"Now everything's okay," Ceri assured him as she dared to reach out a hand to steady him in the deep snow.

He took her support, and grinned, "It is isn't it?"

"It is," she promised him.
 

"Never Enough"
By Papa Roach
The lyrics I used in the story I've highlighted with *'s.

Life's been sucked out of me
This routine's killing me
I did it to myself
I cannot said this would not be
Somebody put me out of my misery
Expression, stimulation, I lose and serve myself
I did it to myself again
Somebody put me in my place

Never enough, Never enough
Do I deserve what I got?

*Now everything's okay*
There's nothing wrong with me
This seems unnatural
To me I'd say in every way
Somebody kick me in the face
Now something's wrong with me
I'm bleeding profusely
And this seems natural
To me I fuck up everyday
Somebody put me in my place

Never enough, Never enough
Do I deserve what I got?
Never enough, Never enough
Do I deserve what I got?
What I got, what I got
What I got, what I got

I feel as if I'm running
Back to where I started
That's what's wrong with me
And I say nothing
*Is everything okay?*
There's something wrong with me
Pushing and pulling through means each and all the heart is yours
I feel as if I'm running
I feel as if I'm running
I feel as if I'm running
RUN!
Life will knock me down!

Never enough, Never enough
Do I deserve what I got?
Never enough, Never enough
Life will knock me down

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