"No more tears" - Duncan MacLeod, Avatar

This page recounts the present day storyline of "Highlander", for Season 6. The title chosen for each season is taken from an episode from the Season and is of my choosing, reflecting my feeling about the entire season. For the sixth and final Season, with MacLeod overcoming his grief for Richie's death at his own hands, the confrontation with the demonic presence of Ahriman and the end of the series in "To Be, Not To Be", the theme has to be "Armageddon". Episode titles are shown in italics.

Season Six - 1997

Regular Cast

A year passes after the death of Richie Ryan before Duncan MacLeod is ready to face the evil that has come in the form of James Horton. Isolated in a monastery for that time, he returns to Paris to seek Joe Dawson's help, but must face the anger that Joe feels, left alone to bury Richie. Joe eventually agrees to help, but is still not certain that the demon exists and is worried when Duncan won't take back his sword. He tells Duncan that Jason Landry had an assistant, Sophie Baines. But Duncan and Sophie met within hours of his return to Paris, when he rescued her from the river. Ahriman has a simple temptation for the "Avatar" - if Duncan surrenders to him, he will bring back anyone from the dead, just like Sophie - even Tessa. When Duncan refuses, the demon tells Sophie she must kill Duncan to maintain her resurrected life, but she recognises Duncan as the Champion and kills herself to protect him. Duncan and Joe find an ancient symbol common to all cultures and start to explore it as a possible key to defeating Ahriman.

Searching for the symbol, Duncan goes to Robert Beaufort, the archivist of Darius' order, who is grieving for his brother, who committed suicide. Robert is the next target for Ahriman, who finally appears to Joe Dawson as James Horton, determined to separate Duncan from all those who care for him. Despite tempting Joe with by offering to give him legs, Joe refuses to abandon Duncan and the stage is set for "Armageddon". Joe gives Duncan a Tibetan Singing Bowl that the Watchers found, which has the mysterious symbol on it, and Duncan uses it to embark on a vision quest. He confronts Ahriman as a dwarf and as Kronos before Joe brings him back to reality. He realises that Ahriman is trying to get Robert to commit suicide and confronts the demon in Darius' church. With Robert safe, Duncan faces Ahriman in his dream world and refuses to fight him, instead accepting his evil as a part of himself, a part most of us are afraid to face. With no power over Duncan, the demon is defeated and banished. Joe decides to leave Paris, but persuades Duncan to take back his sword before he goes.

With the battle for humanity won, Duncan returns to a more normal existence and renews his friendship with George Thomas, a banker. George has retired and his grandson runs the bank now, but the past catches up with George in "Sins Of The Father", when a car bomb kills him. Feeling the presence of an Immortal seconds before George was killed, Duncan at first suspects Alex Raven, but when he finds out that she is trying to recover money stolen from Polish Jews by George's bank, suspicion falls on George's grandson, Grant, who first tries to kill Alex, then Duncan, then both of them. In the end, it is Grant who dies and the two Immortals combine to recover the missing millions.

If Duncan found a new friend in Alex, it was an old friend who tested him deeper. Willie Kingsley is an inveterate scoundrel, but when one of his scams turns sour and his mortal wife Molly is killed, Willie is unwilling to let the law sort it out, especially when the law grants "Diplomatic Immunity" to another friend of Duncan's, the American Ambassador, Edward Banner. Despite Duncan's warning that he shouldn't jump to conclusions, the vengeful Willie murders the Ambassador before Duncan can tell him that it was Edward's son who killed Molly. When Willie goes after the son, Duncan warns him that if he doesn't let it go, Duncan will kill him.

A chance meeting on a street corner reunites Duncan with another old friend, Kyra. But his pleasure at seeing her evaporates when he realises that she doesn't know him or who or what she is. Hunted by the police for murder and by General Milos Vladic for her head, "Patient Number 7" is in serious trouble. Duncan convinces her of her immortality, but Kyra is forced to relearn who she is on her own. When her memory returns, so does the pain of losing her mortal lover at Vladic's hands, a pain that can only be partly expunged when the General comes up short against the vengeful Kyra.

A night at the Opera turns out to be the overture to a day at the races, when Duncan's new girlfriend Margo is kidnapped from the barge by gunmen. The only clue is a toy left on the Quai, which leads Duncan to the "Black Tower" of Keram Industries. There, he confront his first student, Devon Marek, who refuses to face Duncan, but sets a group of bounty hunters to chase him through the building. As Duncan races against time to find Margo, the hunters close in, only to be eliminated one by one. When Duncan confronts Marek, Margo shoots him, a fifth bounty hunter, but Duncan turns the tables on Marek with the aid of a terrified computer programmer. Marek kills Margo and Duncan teaches him what he could not years before - that the Rules of the Game apply to all Immortals. And there can be only one. The next episode in the series was a tale of murder, infidelity and financial misfortune, "Unusual Suspects", but as it is set wholly in the past, it is covered on the Timeline page.

Leaving a fencing club, Duncan feels the presence of an Immortal and spots a sniper on a rooftop. Investigating, he finds a woman aiming a crossbow at the man that Duncan has just been sparring with and who he's due to meet for lunch. The woman, Katya, shoots Duncan and leaves, warning him to stay out of her way. Later, at the man's house, he senses the woman again and confronts her. The man is the husband of the child she adopted thirty years ago, but he killed his wife when he found her in bed with his most trusted aide. Duncan sets out to show her how her hate is destroying her, but it is the husband's love for his own daughter that makes Katya realise that it is not "Justice" she wants, but vengeance on the cuckolded husband for the loss of her own child, and she walks away.

Immortal Regan Cole arrives in Paris for her first vacation in over 200 years, but finds that her work has followed her. Regan, a bounty hunter, watches as Celine, a fashion photographer, is assaulted and killed in front of her. Helping the photographer's friend and model Brian to try and understand what happened, they discover that the last photograph Celine took was truly a "Deadly Exposure", as she had inadvertently captured terrorist-for-hire Kendal on film. They hide out on Duncan's barge, but Brian is lured back to his apartment and killed by Kendal's men. Regan puts two and two together and confronts Kendal as he tries to explode a bomb at a Ministerial summit, but is seemingly killed in the blast and forced to disappear.

Over seven hundred years ago, Bartholemew had a village burned to the ground for refusing to pay the taxes needed to fund the Crusades and his own wealth. Ever since, he has used wars and charities to line his own pockets, always tracked by Katherine, the sole survivor of the massacre and an Immortal. As Bartholemew prepares to shed more crocodile tears to increase his wealth, Katherine and her mortal lover Nick arrive in Paris. She wants Bartholemew's head and he wants to make the money reach the starving children for whom it was intended. Before Bartholemew can escape once again, the unlikely pair both achieve their "Two Of Hearts" desire.

With MacLeod in London with Claudia Jardine, Joe Dawson could have been forgiven for thinking that things would be quiet. But past "Indiscretions" come back to haunt him, as he supervises newly graduated Watcher Amy Thomas with a very fatherly eye. He knows that she is his daughter, a secret kept by Joe and her mother. Methos reappears in Paris, unwilling to talk about where he's been and eager to avoid an indiscretion from his own past, in the form of Immortal Morgan Walker. When Walker captures Amy, who is his Watcher, Joe and Methos are thrown together to resolve their personal unfinished business. Father and daughter start to explore their future together as the Immortals settle their differences the old-fashioned way. And Methos shows Walker that just because he doesn't like to fight doesn't mean that he can't, as the Horseman of old makes short work of his challenger.

A flying visit from Amanda ends in her being kidnapped from the Quai by Immortal Liam O'Rourke, who wants to settle his old score with MacLeod. O'Rourke also siezes Joe and offers Duncan their lives in exchange for the Highlander laying down his sword. Duncan is willing to surrender his life for his friends, but Methos is not so ready to see him killed. In the ensuing gunfight, MacLeod is shot and dies. He wakes to find Hugh Fitzcairn with him. Fitz tells him that he's come to give MacLeod a gift and shows him the world that was "To Be" without Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod. He shows him Amanda, who has graduated from theft to murder, and Duncan watches as she kills her husband, but is then killed herself by the Watchers. Fitz takes him to a broken Joe Dawson, who was unable to prevent James Horton from perverting the Watchers and declaring war on the Immortals. In the midst of the murders, a familiar figure walks untroubled by the world she never knew - Tessa is alive.

Duncan goes to Tessa's gallerie, where the attraction between them is as immediate as it ever was. Tessa's husband invites her "old friend" to dinner, but when he leaves, the emptiness in Tessa's life overwhelms her and she and Duncan share one night of passion. Distraught, Duncan asks Fitz why he let him see her like this and Fitz tells him that it is her fate in a world without the Highlander. As it was his fate to die 280 years ago when Duncan wasn't there to rescue him from the headsman's axe. Their conversation is interrupted by a sullen Methos. Fitz shows him the nightmare of this world - The Horsemen ride, Kronos having rescued Methos from Horton's killers. They recruited a young Immortal called Richie Ryan, but when he couldn't bring himself to kill Joe Dawson, Methos took his head. Now, Methos and Kronos are about to kill Joe unless he betrays Horton to them. Faced with the world that was "Not To Be" because he lived, Duncan revives in his own reality and faces O'Rourke, rather than give up his life. With O'Rourke dead, MacLeod reflects on his life with his friends and all that has brought them together.