Story [Highlander] Child of the Universe * DDC 2013 * new post on 21/May

Title: Child of the Universe - The diary of a 235 year-old teenager
Author: Hazel
Characters: Claire Giovannelli (OC), Max du Champs (OC), Darius, Duncan MacLoud, Methos, Joe Dawson, etc.


Intro to Highlander:
The Highlander franchise is about immortal humans. They are skilled warriors (most of them) that roam the Earth since the beginning of civilization and can only be killed by cutting off their heads. Details will be explained as this diary continues. If you have any questions, feel free to ask.

Here you can find a little look into Claire's childhood.


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Vienna, 4th of January of 2013


I have never kept a diary before, but Joe gave me this one for Christmas and assured me that it would help my state of mind. I don't see how writing will help, but I promised I'd give it a try and I always keep my promises.

How does one start a diary, anyway? Do we just write down what we did during the day? Do we jot down our innermost thoughts and wishes? Do we scribble whatever nonsense goes through our minds? Do we draw on the blank pages? None of these feel right to me.

Maybe I'll just start at the beginning and introduce myself - my birth name is Claire Giovannelli and my original records state that I was born on the tenth day of December in the year 1777 by the base of Mount Etna in Italy. That's right, I'm 235 years-old, but I don't look a day passed 18. This is because I am an immortal, but I'll explain that later. For now, I'll continue with my introduction.

I don't know if I was really born on that date and in that place because I have no idea who my real parents are (this is common among immortals and I'll try to explain that later too), I just know what my adoptive parents told me. That I was found as a newborn in a niche under a tree by the side of Mount Etna early on that day. I guess I was lucky to have been found by such wonderful people who raised me as their own and offered me the best eighteen years of my life. We had so much fun!

I had an uncommon childhood for many reasons, albeit none of them related to my posterior immortality. You see, diary, I was found by circus people. My mother was the sister of the owner of the Circus Giovannelli and a brilliant performer in her own right. She was a trapeze artist. I miss her so much.

Another reason my childhood was uncommon was my looks. You see, I have albinism. My hair is almost completely white, my skin is even paler and my eyes are light, almost transparent shade of blue. This is why was lucky to be found by circus people. Because, otherwise, my life would have been that much harder. Ordinary folks don't look too kindly on different people.

But my family loved me dearly. My mother was not married, even though she already had a child of her own, my brother Samuel, but I did not lack a father figure. My uncle Giovannelli more than filled in the gap. I also had two cousins - Giuseppe and Giovanna. We bickered all the time, but we were very close. Then there were the rest of the circus performers, who even though were not actual relatives, were still members of the family - the clowns, the tamers, the knife throwers, the acrobats...

God, I miss them all so much... it hurts now.

Maybe this diary thing isn't such a good idea after all.

I like Claire and her back-story. It must be hard living so long and losing so many friends, family over the years who of course are not as long-lived. It also gives chances to form new ties, but I would imagine you would have to move around a lot because after a while, when your friends all look 50-ish and you still look 25, And if you had kids - wow that adds a whole new wrinkle!

Tag please, if it works LOL

You are exactly right on the moving a lot front. On the children front - immortals are sterile, they can't have children, although many adopt. Claire will be relating all this to the diary in the future.

235 years as an albino. That is a lot of money spent on sunscreen. Can you tag me? I look forward to reading more.

You bet it is! Fortunately for her, although immortals get sunburns, they don't get skin cancer because they heal too fast.
When i wrote the 1st viggie years ago, my mom had just gotten a new puppy who happened to be an albino. He was (and still is) so cute that inspired my muse, so i wrote Claire this way, now she his stuck with it.

I'm very happy to hear that you like it, and no she wasn't in series or the movies. Claire is my creation.

I hope this diary will be cathartic for her too, she has some lingering issues to work out as you'll find out in due time. Thank you so much for sticking with this.

Silly question here... if immortals are sterile, how is one born? I watched the first Highlander movie, and saw the series for awhile and enjoyed it, but can't remember why i stopped watching. I can't remember any details about it.

I like this so far. I imagine it can be rather lonely, being an immortal.

Not silly. That is probably the biggest mystery in this fandom. In the 2nd movie they say that Immortals are aliens from the planet Zeist (?) that have been exiled to Earth - the thing is NO ONE bought that and no one likes the second movie, it's stupid. So most fans prefer for it to remain a mystery than to accept the alien thing. With that in mind - no one know where immortals came from or how they came to be. Claire will be going into some theories in future entries,

Thank you all for your support. Like in my other diary, I'll be sending PMs for the updates instead of tags because it will remind me to pm the sock and if anyone wants out, they just have to click on leave conversation.

This entry includes the January challenge - cold.


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Vienna, 18th of January of 2013


Today my mood matches the weather – it’s cold and gray and it’s raining. I don’t have to work today so here I am. Over the last couple of weeks thought a lot about my childhood and early years, so much more than I have in decades. I think it was this diary that did it so I guess I'll give it another try. There is still so much to remember...

Like I said before, I grew up in the circus and that made all the difference.

Our circus wasn't big, it wasn't anywhere near the size and importance of the Great Royal Circus that would turn up later, but we performed well and were known for our originality. My mother started out as a tightrope dancer, but then decided to try something new - she hung a rope swing from a high structure and would perform acrobatics on it. It was a rudimentary form of what would later become the trapeze and, of course, my mother would never be credited for it, but that was okay, she did it for the fun. We also had a fantastic animal show featuring dogs riding horses, and my brother and I would often participate by doing acrobatics on the horses' backs. To this day I can't seem to just sit still while riding. Over the years we featured many acts - performers that would stay with us for a season or two and then move on, so we tried our best to learn from them and enrich our spectacle.

Naturally, we traveled a lot. We toured Europe every year, performing in various places and even got invited to appear in some of the ruling courts. We performed for Emperor Leopold II in the Hofburg when I was twelve and for Catherine the Great when I was fifteen. When I was nine, we performed in Versailles, for Louie XVI and Marie Antoinette. It was wonderful. Marie Antoinette gave me a pink ribbon for my hair and told me I was very pretty. She liked exotic creatures such as me. I think she wanted to keep me but, of course, my mother wouldn't hear of it.

Sometimes we performed in the festival. It was at one such festival, in Vienna in 1785, that we met Mozart. He was there conducting a small orchestra that played some of his serenades and I fell in love... with music. I was seven years-old at the time and to me that music sounded like the angels singing. After that, I troubled everyone I ever met to teach me whatever instrument or song they might know. I didn't know if the life of a musician would be compatible with that of a circus performer, but I knew that if, when the time came, my family would support me in my choice.

As I was saying, we traveled continuously. But no matter where we were before or would go after, we always spent Christmas in Paris and we always visited Darius in his chapel.

Darius... Darius is probably the most important figure in my long life. Ever since I can remember we visited him on Christmas and he taught us things. He talked to us and wanted to know all about our adventures. Even though he disguised it well, I could always tell he had a special interest in me. Every time we left him, he would make a point to tell me that if I ever needed help, any help at all, I should come to him.

I would learn the reason for his interest later.

That sounds like an interesting life. If I was going to live forever I guess I would occupy myself with learning new skills and talents. The good thing about moving around is you are not with anybody too long. As an immortal you don't get attached to someone and then have to watch them grow old and die. If you are always on the move you can avoid that problem.

Interesting update.

Oh, how cool is that - performing for famed historical figures Looking forward to reading more about Darius.

And yet immortals still get attached ans watch their loved ones die of old age. More on that later on.


@Jade_eyes - You'll learn more about Darius in the next few entries.

I think the 1st movie takes place in the 80s while the tv series takes place in the early 90s, but they are not that compatible. They are kind of AUs to each other. The movie is supposed to be the end of the line, with one man left standing, but in the series (and the later movies) there are still a bunch of immortals around.
So i guess you can do whatever you want. Just know that the 1st episode of the series includes the main movie character (the last man standing) .

Next entry will be about how Claire became an immortal and after that I'll introduce Darius. I'm sort of improvising this diary and I'm very optimistic. I might even start posting once a week for a while.

Thank you all for your support. Like in my other diary, I'll be sending PMs for the updates instead of tags because it will remind me to pm the sock and if anyone wants out, they just have to click on leave conversation.


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Marseille, 25th of January of 2013


I don't like Marseille, but since I chose to make my living as a musician (I am a cellist, this time around), I must go where the orchestra goes and this week we appear in Marseille.

The reason I don't like Marseille is not because of the city itself. It is a beautiful city with beautiful beaches and delicious cuisine. It's just that it was here, a few miles away from where I am right now, that I lost everything.

In the spring of 1796 the French Revolution was setting France and its neighbors on fire. The roads were becoming ever more dangerous and demand for performances of a traveling circus had dimmed considerably. This was when my uncle decided we should try our luck elsewhere and that was why we made out way to Marseille. He hoped to arrange for transportation to Constantinople, a place he had longed to visit for many years. Because many of our performers did not want to venture in such an unfamiliar journey, by the time we reached the south of France our numbers were less than a dozen. Perhaps that was why the band of deserters decided to attack us.

It was almost nightfall when we reached the outskirts of the port city, so my uncle decided to make camp in a small valley by a stream where the horses could drink fresh water and we could bathe. He decided he would go into the city in the morning and seek out a captain to take us on our journey.

During the night we heard our dogs barking and realized there were strangers in our camp. The men went out of the tents to see what was going on and were immediately greeted by the sounds of gunfire. I distinctly remember my brother yelling for us to run and I know he did not finish his warning.

I can't say how long the brawl lasted. I know that my mother tried to lead us, the women, to the horses, but we were intercepted by some of the attackers. Next thing I know a huge pain ripped through my chest and I fell to the ground. The last thing I remember was hearing my cousin Giovanna screaming from behind some bushes and our old dog Luka growling like a beast.

When I came to the sun was coming up.

At first I though I was just waking up from a nightmare, but when I got up I saw the desolation of what had been my camp. Everything was broken and the bodies - my family - lay where they had fallen. They were all dead, even the dogs. The horses were nowhere to be found – undoubtedly they were taken by our aggressors.

Before I realized it, tears were running down my face. When I raised my hand to clear my eyes, I found it covered in dry blood – my blood. That’s when I remembered that I had been shot. My once white dress was now red and there were three holes in the fabric that covered my chest. The strangest thing was (and I remember this feeling so surreal) that there were no wounds under the holes, not even a scar. But at the time, it did not occur to me to question my lack of wounds or why I was alive. All I knew was that my family was dead and they could not be left out there. My thoughts were torn between doing right by my family and the fear that our attackers would return. I ended up discarding the second possibility (after all what could they possibly do that they hadn’t already done) and concentrate on honoring my family.

I gathered all our destroyed belongings and the bodies and piled them up. Then I lit them into a funeral pyre the way I had heard the ancients used to do in the stories my uncle told us. Somehow this type of funeral seemed more appropriate to the people they were, free and extraordinary, than a burial.

As the fire burned, I prayed. I stood there for hours, praying for them. During that time, it crossed my mind to jump in and join them, but something always held me back. Maybe some part of me already knew that it wouldn't have worked.

Looking back, it’s a wonder how no one else showed up, lured by the smoke. I guess people were busy.

After the pyre burned out, I was left alone. I never felt so lost in my life. I walked aimlessly for the rest of the day, not caring about the looks people gave me. I must have been a sight – a white creature, covered in dirt and with a bloody white dress. This was how I walked away from Marseille.

I can’t really remember the next few days, but I know that at some point I came across a group of nuns. They took pity on me and took me to their nunnery. They offered me food and shelter, and asked me no questions. I think that they thought I had been raped, but my lack of physical injuries confused them. They started asking questions to which I had no answers to give and their questions echoed in my head. When? Why? How?

One night, as I relieved the attack in my dreams, I heard Darius' voice telling me to go to him. I left the nunnery under the cloak of darkness that same night, leaving only a note behind - 'I leave in search of answers. Thank you for your care.'

As I walked purposely into the dead of night, I wondered if I hadn't, in fact, died that night. Even if my body was still breathing, it felt like the carefree happy circus girl I had been no longer existed.

It would take me decades to find her again.

Awesome & poignant Now I can see how she can lose and have to move on, bereft, not able to explain Wow. You capture the hectic frenzy around that time period excellently.

Nice update. Being an immortal is definitely not the wonderful thing one would imagine. There may not be physical scars, but what about emotional?

Thanks! I also wanted to convey that even after all this time it's hard for Claire to talk about it. That's one of the reasons i didn't go into much detail, that ans the Boards' rules.

There is a lot to be said about being immortal. It is no pick-nick.

You should watch both. I should warn you that first few episodes of the series (especially the 1st) isn't that good in terms of performance. They get much better as the season continues and the actors get more comfortable with the characters.

Thanks Mira! As Claire will explain in future entries, immortality is triggered by a violent death, and given the turmoil of the war and all I figured this would be a likely way for it to happen.



The next few entries will be about the 'technical aspects' of immortality. As Claire remembers learning them, she recounts and analyses them in her diary.