Author's website: http://www.litgal.vague-disclaimer.org
Yeah, still not mine. If they were, they'd have been doing this on the screen.
Thanks Velvet_Virago for the beta and encouragement. and thanks everyone who commented on LJ and helped me revise and edit.
Post "The Sentinel by Blair Sandburg"

Chapter titles are from the prompts provided by Fanfic100 challenge on LJ

001 - BEGINNINGS

A wind rattled the window pane of the loft, and Blair felt like he had Sentinel hearing as the sound echoed against the bare walls, bare because Blair had already packed up his tribal masks and woven rugs. He'd labeled those with the address of the anthropology department at Rainer since he didn't feel like he could hold on to that part of him that had been an anthropologist up to that day when he'd renounced his life's work.

Nope, it was time to detach with love. Blair glanced up at the loft at the thought of the word, but Jim remained silent as he had since opening the door and standing frozen like a statue in his own doorway reviewing the disaster in his living room. Blair had sorted his belongings into piles that lazily sprawled around the room.

When Blair looked up with his heart beating wildly, he admitted to himself that he had wanted Jim to scream or curse and slam him into the wall and demand answers. He knew how to handle that. He wanted to shock Jim into that. Instead Jim walked over to the fridge, grabbed a beer and disappeared upstairs. Blair stood with a t-shirt still half folded and dangling from his hand, and his last hope had died.

After finishing with the packing and the labeling, Blair sat down and waited for the movers. He knew the guys from the station would help, but he hadn't even told them he was quitting. The look of resigned acceptance in Simon's face had precluded the idea of trying to face the others. Nope, he would just disappear from their lives the same way he'd shown up: no explanation and no excuses.

Less than an hour later, Blair watched as the movers carried out the last box. The books would be stored, the clothes were shoved in the back of his Cavalier, the keys.... Blair looked down at the keys in his hand. They weren't his anymore. Blair slowly pulled the key ring apart.

Jim's loft key dropped into the basket. Jim's extra truck key. The spare key for Jim's locker at work. The key to the basement storage room. The key to Jim's desk down at the precinct. As each key fell, it made a small clinking noise as it hit the others. He had no idea when he'd started carrying so many pieces of Jim's life, but Jim wouldn't share the one key Blair needed, and it wasn't healthy for either of them to keep lying their way through life. Blair took one last anguished look up at the bedroom, but the silence remained like this huge wall refusing him entrance into the inner sanctum of Jimdom.

Right. The end. It'd been a good run, but it was time for him to move on.

Blair turned the lock on the knob of the door and closed it. As he walked out to the street, Blair realized two things. First, his soul would never really recover from the Jim-sized injury that had left him in bleeding shreds. Second, Naomi was right, every end was a beginning. Now he just had to find some place where he could begin again.

002-MIDDLE

Middle, halfway, equidistant. Blair rolled those words around in his head except that they implied that he was not only leaving something but also going to something. You couldn't have a halfway without two ends. While his heart ached at what he was leaving behind, Blair still had no idea where he was going to. Naomi would be proud; he had detached. Blair's mind played with the words as the road and rocked him into numbness.

Middle, heart, midriff. The center of Blair's pain, and never before had he understood the phrase heartbreak, but he sure did now because, man, his body ached from trying to contain his brittle agony and anger and fear and loss.

Middle class, middle ground, middle of the road. Blair had always walked the edges, but he would have given up the nipple ring and the hair and the attitude if he could have recovered the relationship he once had with Jim. Instead he got to keep the nipple ring and hair and attitude and walk away before they destroyed each other, and god he hated being the responsible one who took action before they ended up in some emotional disaster from which neither could recover.

Middle finger, which he would love to show Jim right now. Smack dab in the middle again, and Blair figured that his emotions were in such turmoil that saying applied fairly well, too.

The middle of nowhere. Oh, the sign had been terribly wrong. He wasn't in the middle of nowhere--he was in the middle of everything. He just didn't know how he was supposed to navigate without Jim. In the absence of Jim's strength and stability, Blair didn't try to navigate, he just let the road lead him south, away from the source of both his dreams and his grief.

003-END

Blair listened to the radio complain about the unseasonable heat in May, and Blair was grateful to know that 107 wasn't normal for May, not that it made him any cooler right now. Dripping sweat, the mechanic stood and upended a gallon jug of water before disappearing back under the hood of a minivan. Blair looked around for some place where he could cheaply sit in air-conditioning. The Denny's on the corner won his business by advertising their 2.99 meals.

The cold air hit Blair like the blast from an open freezer, and he shivered for a second before slipping into the dim interior which smelled of burnt grease and stale smoke. Even though a sign asked that he wait to be seated, Blair slipped past the hostess' podium and found a quiet booth in the back. Really he just wanted the cold air, so if he could go unnoticed, he was just as happy to save the money.

Blair slumped in the booth, his feet finding the seat on the far side and his head leaning against the warm glass of the tinted window. He was just so fucking tired. Tired of running, tired of pretending he wasn't dying inside, tired of wondering what Jim was doing. Just because he was doing the right thing didn't mean it didn't still hurt.

Blair had reached the land of half doze when an angry voice woke him up with a shouted demand for the cash. Blair had slithered to the floor under the table before his conscious mind could even catch up. Of course that same instinctive part of him also grabbed for his cell phone to call Jim. He got all the way to the four and the one before he angrily jabbed at the 'end' button and dialed again using 911.

In the lowest voice he thought the operator could hear, Blair gave the location, described the man, guessed at the two different types of gun the suspect might be using since Blair didn't feel like standing up to get a better look at the weapon. He provided the numbers of hostages, including himself. He described the hostages since he didn't have their names as he waited for the police to arrive. Unfortunately, the suspect started for the door before Blair heard any sirens.

Crawling below the level of the windows, Blair scrambled to a glowing emergency exit sign hanging over a glass door. Watching as the suspect ran down the side of the building, Blair timed his move.

As the suspect came close, Blair slammed the door open. The restaurant alarm system went off with a shrill blast, and the suspect went down with a bloody nose and a lot of swearing. Blair dived for the gun with a curse of his own. Oh yeah, he thought to himself as he leveled the weapon at the would-be thief.

The officers at the scene had cuffed Blair since he was the one holding the gun when they showed up, but they cuffed the scruffy dude with the blood dripping down from his nose too, so that was okay. Blair looked at the reflective surface of the window and realized that he looked a lot like scruffy guy minus the nosebleed. His face was dark with stubble, his hair slightly shiny with grease, and his clothing rumpled and somewhat smelly.

"So, you called in the 911?" a detective asked. Blair leaned back against the white car and watched as the mechanic left his little Cavalier with its hood up in order to lean against the building and watch the show. And it really was quite a show. In Cascade you had to blow up a building to get this many cops in one place.

"Yeah, man. Not really much else I could do at that point."

"But you took it into your hands to attack the suspect with a door," the detective sounded aggravated and Blair shifted his shoulders to try and reduce the strain from the handcuffs.

"Any port in a storm," he offered with a shrug. "Took on an armed bank robbery suspect with a handful of baseballs once." Blair remembered that night at the loft. Jim had gone ballistic in his Jim-way which included a lecture given in dark tones barely louder than a whisper and a jaw muscle that that twitched madly. Of course by that Friday Jim had gotten past the fear and had slapped him on the back while telling the story to the guys who had come over for poker. Blair had seen admiration in Jim's eyes, acceptance even. This time he wouldn't get the lecture or the slap on the back.

"You an officer?" the man asked.

"Was," Blair admitted. "Worked Major Crimes up in Cascade." Blair could see the doubt rise in the tall man's eyes.

"Oh man, don't even look at me like that. The hair and the earrings meant I could go places other cops couldn't even get in the door. I have a minor in psychology and a Master's degree in anthropology, so cut the snap judgment crap," Blair snarled. He'd been doing more of that lately than he used to.

"You always have this much attitude?" the tall man asked as he crossed his arms over his chest. Blair felt his anger slide away leaving him just tired, tired and lost.

"Not usually. I used to be the good cop half of the partnership," Blair said quietly. Used to be... that still hurt.

"Why'd you leave Cascade?" The detective's voice made Blair really pay attention for the first time. These were not the questions he had expected.

"I didn't like the cold," Blair answered guardedly.

"No other reason? Nothing on your record?"

"Oh man. No no, no. You are not putting this down as some overzealous ex-cop going postal. Man, I had the cleanest record in the department, well aside from a small illegal wire tap," Blair added the last part as an afterthought since he didn't know whether his transgressions as an observer had found their way into his official file. Then again, any investigation of his background would reveal something far more damning than a wiretap.

"You looking for work?" the man asked after staring for so long that Blair was starting to get paranoid.

"You always handcuff people before making an offer?" Blair shot back. He didn't want to deal with this right now. He was still processing the end of everything, he wasn't ready for a beginning.

"After I lost three officers to IA, I may have to handcuff people to get them to listen. We're not the most popular department right now." As the man spoke, he used a hand on Blair's arm to turn him so that Blair leaned stomach first into the car as the officer removed the cuffs. "I'm Captain Roth, by the way."

Blair turned back around rubbing his wrist lightly before returning the offered handshake. The man's dark eyes squinted in the bright sun and his blond hair had more grey than blond, which matched the deep wrinkles that outlined his eyes. The hand that gripped Blair's own was calloused, and the man wore his shirtsleeves pushed up to show dark sunspots on his forearms. Blair searched the man for some sign that this was some cosmic joke and he just wasn't getting the punchline.

"Blair Sandburg," he finally offered. "I worked with Captain Banks up in Cascade. Call around before you make the offer. I'll be in town a few days." Blair glanced around and then amended his own statement. "Oh man, if that mechanic doesn't start working, I may be in town several days," Blair nodded across the sea of flashing lights to where the mechanic still leaned against the white brick building as he watched the action.

"I need you to come down to the station to sign a statement and fill out some paperwork so we can contact you," Roth said with guarded expression of his own.

"Yeah, man, I know the drill," Blair muttered as he opened the car door and got into the front seat where Roth had gestured. As Blair watched his own car disappear in the review mirror, he wondered whether this was a beginning or whether a quick background check would lead to one more end. Blair leaned his head against the warm glass as he decided that he was just too tired to care any more.

004-INSIDES

An enormous black woman watched him, her arms crossed over her chest as she leaned against another squat metal desk. A man with a pinched face and thin smile stood near the coffeemaker. A Hispanic woman with a distracted expression and a pencil behind her ear ignored him in favor of a mountain of paperwork. A large man who badly needed a shave walked into the room through a door on the far end, and he didn't even try to hide his displeasure. In fact the sight of Blair brought an instant scowl to his face.

Blair idly wondered whether the desk that was now his had belonged to one of the three officers found guilty of taking bribes or if those desks had been sent away in some attempt to cleanse the unit of the collective guilt of having dirty cops in their midst.

"So you'll take cases with either Jeff or Bets to start with, they've got the most experience." Roth nodded first at the thin-lipped man and then at the black woman who looked like an extra from the set of Xena. Well, she was a little too thick for a show that featured T&A as much as feminism, but she was still formidable with wide shoulders and enough height to look Simon straight in the eye. Jeff's lips just managed to get a little thinner.

"We take the calls as they come in unless I assign a case personally. No favors, no swapping cases, no exceptions," Roth insisted with a steely expression that made Blair doubt his wisdom in taking the job. Of course, he had steadily doubted his wisdom for the last week, so that wasn't difficult.

"Got it," Blair confirmed as he dropped his beloved backpack on his desk. So far it just had a couple of clipboards and a few notepads, but Blair knew that soon enough he would have case notes and files and reports and phone numbers of snitches and packets of food for when he had no time to eat between cases. In fact he hoped the backpacked filled with his life quickly because he couldn't keep living in his old one. Never again would he have anthropology term papers jammed inside the worn backpack next to a lunchable and a white noise generator. He needed something else to fill that space now.

Blair stood waiting for Roth to say something, but the man continued to stand and stare at the other members of the unit. For the first time, Blair wondered if Roth himself was on the inside of this closed society or if, like him, Roth was on the outside of the unit formed by the other detectives. Simon had always been one of the guys, but Blair supposed that he shouldn't assume that was true everywhere. The division between supervisors and workers was well documented.

Blair forced his thoughts away from those studies.

"So, anything on the agenda for now?" Blair asked to break the silence that had fallen.

"You and Jeff have a suspicious fire investigation on 6th and Indian School. Make sure you file a transportation request before you go," Roth ordered and then the man strode across the room and disappeared into an office that had the blinds drawn. Blair looked over toward Jeff whose thin-lipped smile had disappeared.

"Jeff Clarkson," he introduced himself as he walked between the desks with his hand held out. Blair extended his own hand.

"Blair Sandburg."

"So, heard you were part of some hotshot team up north," the black woman, Bets, added from her position still leaning on her desk. At that, Maria looked up.

"Oh man, I was sort of the tag-along end of that team. I partnered with Jim Ellison who was covert ops, Army-hero, cop of the year sort."

"Was?" Jeff's voice took on an edge that made Blair very aware of the fact that this closed society had been attacked and suffered losses. They were circled inside their defenses, and he wasn't one of them.

"No, no. Nothing like that. He still is off being this god-cop. I just needed to move on, you know," Blair shrugged in his best show of non-threatening resignation.

"I get that," Jeff nodded as he seemed to make some sort of decision. "Come on, we've got a case to investigate."

Jeff was still laughing as they got off the elevator three hours later.

"Man, I don't think it was that funny," Blair complained darkly as he glared at the man.

"Hell yes it is," Jeff insisted as he pushed open the doors to the bull pen. "Bets, check this out," Jeff called the minute he got in the room. Russo, the large, unshaven man had now shaved, and his square jaw made Blair flash on another face from another squad room before he blinked and noticed the suspicious brown eyes watching him.

"What's up?" Bets asked without looking up from the notes spread across her desk.

"Drunk guy who sleeps in the alley behind our burned out storefront... He thought Sandburg was his long lost girlfriend." Bets slowly looked up from her papers, her eyes focusing first on Jeff and then turning slowly to Blair. Blair crossed his own arms and glared back defiantly. Unfortunately, he knew full well how this was going to end. After a three second pause, Bets took a deep breath and started laughing, heavy deep laughter that carried to the far corners of the room. Jeff and Russo both joined her as Blair stood in the middle of the room both the center of and excluded from the joke.

"It gets better," Jeff finally gasped out. "The guy got a hold of Sandburg's curls and wouldn't let go. Kept calling him Veronica and trying to pet him." Blair transferred his glare from Bets to Jeff.

"It wasn't that funny, man."

"Oh the hell it wasn't," Jeff shot back. "It was fucking hilarious. Sandburg was all 'unhand me you beast'," Jeff mocked in a high tone.

"Hey, I do not have a girly voice, and that could have been called assaulting a police officer. Not cool. Very not cool," Blair interrupted before Jeff could take the joke any farther. Well, not that interrupting would stop the story from doing the rounds of the rumor mill. Blair understood how hazing worked, but he still didn't have to like it, even if it was an inevitable stage of being accepted into any closed society.

"You run the guy in?" Bets asked, her voice still edging toward barely contained laughter.

"Oh, this is the nice part. Sandburg got the guy to talk. Turns out the 'accidental' fire came the same night the owners moved thirty thousand dollars worth of assets into a separate storage facility. Sandburg's boyfriend took us right to it. We may not have a case yet, but I think we have enough for some warrants and a heart-to-heart talk with the Chanders."

"A homer first time at bat," Bets said, and Blair couldn't help feel a little spark of pride as the clear alpha-dog of the bull pen gave him her stamp of approval.

"Yeah, well I'm going for a shower. I feel like I have crap all over me after that."

"God knows you smell," Jeff added with a slap on Blair's back, and the friendly touch both assuaged and highlighted an ache in Blair's heart. Blair pulled himself back together before he made a scene in front of his new co-workers.

"Ha ha, man. I have a spare set of clothes in my car, so I'll be back in twenty." Blair headed back for the elevator after dropping his backpack on his empty desk. He didn't notice Bets behind him until he got on the elevator.

"Good work there," Bets offered as the elevator doors closed on them.

"Thanks," Blair stood staring at the numbers as he wondered why she had followed him.

"Haven't seen Jeff laugh since IA took his partner out in handcuffs." Bets' words were spoken unemotionally, but Blair had been around cops long enough to hear the warning. Part of Blair found it fascinating the way that this group was reacting with Jeff beginning an initiation that would end in Blair being part of the group if Blair could handle the teasing, and Bets warning him away. Of course, maybe Bets wasn't warning him off as much as warning him about the stresses in the group. Maybe it was even Bets' way of accepting Jeff's decision to let him in: her way of telling him to tread carefully now that he was moving toward becoming an insider.

"Must have been hard. My partner got accused once--didn't stick. Of course it wasn't true in his case." Blair offered back. Reciprocity. She offered some, he offered some. He tried not to think about how his heart still ached whenever he remembered Jim. Their friendship had survived the IA investigation, but it hadn't been strong enough to survive what came after.

"Oh, Nate was dirty. He hid it well, but Jeff spent a lot of time blaming himself after it all came out." Blair had no answer for that, so he watched the elevator doors open on the first floor employee lobby.

"Gotta go get some clean clothes," Blair offered as an apology as he stepped out and ended the conversation.

"Yeah, well lockers are at a premium around here, so don't expect to get your own, Frizzy," Bets said lightly, clearly indicating that their little heart to heart had ended. Blair stood and watched as the elevator doors closed on her and he was left alone in the small room that led out to the employee parking.

Symbolic language, he realized. Bets had warned him that he hadn't earned his way far enough inside to have a locker, he didn't have the status yet, but she had also opened the door with the assigning of a nickname. Blair reached up and pulled at his curls which actually had become rather frizzy and dry since coming to the valley, but he hadn't yet found a conditioner that could do battle with the desert air. Frizzy. Well, at least it was less effeminate than `Sandy'.

Blair pushed open the glass doors and stepped out into the bake oven with heat flowing off the concrete. He hurried to get his clothes from his car and get back inside to the air conditioning.

005-OUTSIDES

"Good morning to you too, man," Blair answered as he dropped his backpack next to his desk. He fell into his chair and tried to ignore the spot where the blue tape that patched the blue vinyl was starting to curl up. This chair definitely needed to belong to someone with less arm hair to lose.

"You know, if you are in a department where you only have one partner, this might work, but damn it, I needed the results of the ballistics test from the Kipfer case, and I don't know where the hell it is in that disaster zone." Jeff waved his had toward Blair's desk.

"Chill, man. It's right here," Blair plucked a file from the middle of a mountain of paper that leaned to the north.

"Frizzy." Jeff made Blair's nickname sound like a curse, and Russo snickered a little on the far side of the room.

"Man, I know. I'll get the files in order." Blair considered the mountain of lab reports and interview notes that made perfect sense to him but really weren't in any order that anyone else could use. In Cascade he had just used Jim's system for everything, but without Jim's disapproving eyebrow to condemn random papers left on the desk, Blair had fairly well fallen back into old habits.

"Sandburg, you're on desk duty until that desk stops looking like a disaster zone," Roth ordered as he passed the pair of them on his way to the office. Jeff's back instantly went a little straighter his lips thinned into that sharp expression of disapproval that was so unique to Jeff. Blair mumbled some answer as he considered the pile with a critical eye. Funny. He was the newest one in the department, but Roth was the outsider.

When the captain had hired Blair, he hadn't mentioned that Roth had been brought in to clean up the unit, which put him clearly on the outside of the society formed by the detectives who worked for him. Unlike Simon, he didn't get invites for drinks after work, he didn't throw barbeques at his house, and the others didn't look to him for advice or suggestions. Okay, to be fair Blair wasn't getting a lot of social invitations either, but no one looked at him with that guarded suspicion they used on Roth.

Blair plucked a file from the top of the pile as he watched Roth in his office. The man had started leaving the blinds to his office open, but now the detectives worked with one eye always to the captain who had replaced their "real" captain. Of course, from what Blair could gather, their "real" captain had been a genial and jovial man who'd let the detectives have full rein and hadn't noticed three of his detectives selling their services. Blair opened a drawer and used the edge to prop the files up as he started filing reports and notes into their respective case files.

"Guys don't approve of your vertical filing system, huh?" Maria asked with humor in her voice. Blair shrugged.

"Guess not. Something about have to be able to actually find paperwork when they need it," Blair said in a self-deprecating tone.

"Yeah, there is that. You want me to go down and requisition some office supplies for ya?" Maria offered. Blair gave her one of his best smiles even though the woman really didn't require the levels of bullshit required to win over women like Bets or even Sam back in Cascade.

"Would you?" he asked as he used one hand to keep the pile from falling now that he was disturbing the layers.

"No problemo. You don't even have to waste that smile on me," Maria said with a wink, and Blair just gave her a wider smile. She laughed as she headed out the door. Once she was gone, he realized that he hadn't told her what he wanted, but hopefully she would show up with something useful.

Blair had been working his desk for nearly two hours before he had corralled his paperwork into bins. He refused to go so far as to alphabetize the things, but at least with their tabs all lined up and facing out, a person could quickly skim the dozen files to find the right one. Lab reports had been filed, and in the process of checking the files, Blair discovered that he really had missed logging in quite a few reports. Each incoming report had to be listed in the front summary, and he didn't need some scummy lawyer getting someone off because of his poorly done paperwork.

Blair paused as he wondered when the police had become 'us' and defense lawyer had become 'scummy.' God, Naomi would have a fit and promptly burn enough sage in his house to set off the smoke alarms. Blair was still considering that mental shift when two men appeared at the door to the bull pen. Most of the detectives dressed in an office casual that would have thrilled Jim; however, these two had the cheap suits that dominated cop shows. Glancing around, Blair realized he was alone in the bull pen; even Roth was missing. He must have gone out the other door. Before the two suits even started heading his way, Blair had a suspicion or two. After all, he had ducked calls from Internal Affairs for three days now.

"We know this unit has sheltered dirty cops before, and with your own record, you surely don't want any more suspicion cast on your reputation," Grumpy Suit said as he leaned against the wall of the interrogation room. Blair knew the man was Detective Verder from IA, but he preferred to think of the man with the wide face and wider middle as Grumpy Suit.

"Oh man, do not even try that crap on me," Blair snapped as he leaned back in the uncomfortable chair.

"It's your duty to make sure that good cops don't get tainted by these creeps who sell their badges," Unctuous Suit insisted from his chair across from Blair.

"Man, you two have quite the routine, but if I see something I question, I'll go to Roth. So don't even try and play this cloak and dagger shit." Blair pushed back his chair and headed for the door. Grumpy Suit stepped in his way.

"You're either part of the problem or part of the solution, Sandburg." Blair stood looking up into the man's wide face.

"Buddy, that is what we call a false dilemma, which is a fallacy of distraction, sometimes called a black-or-white fallacy. Of course you've also thrown some ad baculum in there too, so you're just sprouting fallacies. So verbally you're not making your point as well as some of my freshman students used to. In fact, I'd fail you on logic and persuasiveness. And if you think standing in my way is physically is going to intimidate me, you obviously have no idea who I've worked with for the last four years because you can't glare half as well as a cranky ex-Ranger who's discovered ostrich meat in the chili."

Blair didn't wait for a reaction, he circled around Mr. Grumpy Suit and stormed out of the interrogation room. Rather than swallow his anger, Blair went in search of Roth.

Blair sat logging in the lab reports that had shown up for the day and wondering if Roth had any idea how poorly insulated his office was. Everyone in the bull pen could hear the yelling.

"... and if you want to talk to one of my detectives, you come to me. If I find you trying to go behind my back again, I will file a formal complaint with your captain." Roth yanked his office door opened and glared as the two IA detectives left silently. Russo and Maria sat at their desks pretending to ignore the scene, and so did Blair, but Jeff and Bets watched with undisguised glee.

As the door to the bull pen closed with the two intruders on the outside, Roth stood at the open door to his office, obviously still angry.

"Way to go, Cap," Bets offered, and Jeff smiled in a rather predatory way as he considered the closed doors through which the two IA detectives had disappeared.

"Vultures," Jeff proclaimed. For a second all movement in the room stopped as alliances swung and barriers moved.

Then Roth went back into his office, and everyone went back to work. Clearly the closed society had shifted because Roth and Blair were now inside, and the IA guys were clearly outside. Strangely enough, Blair could feel the pull in his own psyche, the desire to close ranks against the outside force that threatened the unit.

Thinking back, Blair wondered if he'd been inside or outside in Cascade. He knew the Major Crimes guys had taken him in, but to the rest of the department, and to the officers at the academy, he had always remained outside: the stranger, the invader, the one who threatened the group with his ruined reputation.

Blair wondered if he would have ever felt like he had a place inside the society if he'd stayed up there. Well, it was a hypothetical question now. Blair sighed as he realized a broken little part of him would always wish that he could have found a way in, but he hadn't and it was too late now.

006-HOURS

In the center of the room he would spread a Chinese rug Naomi had given him when he had first enrolled in Rainer. At the time, he'd been a little embarrassed and he really wouldn't have meditated in front of his roommate. Of course, his roommate had been either drunk or absent most of the semester, but Blair still hadn't pulled the old, faded rug out from under the bed.

Now Blair fingered the soft fringe and let his fingertips rub over the faded brick red pattern. Somewhere along the line Blair's meditation music had gone from jungle drums and the cellar music of the inner city to the sounds of a rainforest during a thunderstorm. He set the CD player on repeat and adjusted the volume before he felt like he could relax into the music.

Settling into the center of the rug, Blair crossed his legs in a lotus position. For the hundredth time, Blair tried to focus on finding some sort of emotional exit sign that would let him escape the cycle of depression and pain that he found himself in every day. He would go to the grocery store and reach for the allergy-sensitive soap or he would see Jeff question a suspect and compare the detective's technique to Jim. He was in another fucking city, and he still couldn't keep Jim from taking the starring role in his life.

Blair centered himself around his breathing, exhaling the negative energy and trying to find some sort of peace with himself.

As Blair released the tension from his body, he let his mind float in his search for answers. The image that rose was one of water flowing by on either side as the current had pushed at him. He remembered that day. Long trails of clouds marked the grey-blue sky and Jim had laughed at him when his foot slipped on a rock. He had windmilled his arms in an attempt to regain his balance, and in the process, his fishing rod had flown out of his hand only to land ten feet down river. He'd lost his balance anyway and landed in the water with an impressive spray as he drenched himself. Jim had waded out to him and held out a hand while still laughing.

He remembered Jim building the fire up as Blair tried to dry his hair without catching fire, and Jim had fetched his fishing rod. If Simon had watched his slip and fall, Blair would have been mortified, but because it was Jim, the laughter was alright. It was safe. Jim had draped another blanket over his shoulders as the sun started falling in the sky, and Blair hadn't even cared that dinner had been canned beans since they had both failed to catch anything more appetizing.

Sighing, Blair opened his eyes to his plain apartment and the candles which had burned low. Not only had he failed to find any answers, but a glance at the clock told him that he had once again lost himself in memories for hours.

007-DAYS

"It's okay," Bets muttered unconvincingly as she looked to Blair with mute horror at having to handle the rape victim. No amount of sensitivity training could teach her how to handle crying. Bets could do shootings, strung-out suspects, vicious white-supremacists, but not a crying victim. In fact, that was her hand searching her pocket for a cell phone, no doubt to call victim's services. Blair sat next to the two women on the hospital bench. The victim had insisted that she was fine to leave, but she hadn't made it past the hallway where the crush of bodies had sent her cringing into the wall. Then the woman who had flinched from every touch had clung to Bets.

"Can I hold your hand?" Blair asked as he knelt down in front of the woman. The small blonde woman's shoulders shivered, but she didn't give an answer. Blair ran the back of his index finger over the hand that pulled at Bets' blood red blouse.

"He was an asshole. Someone should find him and beat the shit out of the bastard." Blair said the words to relate to the victim, but he found he meant them too. "Oh man, better yet, throw his ass in prison. These guys are such cowards that he'll probably piss his bunk the first night he's locked in there. Oh, I know, let's make sure he's in Sheriff Joe's jail during the trial eating those infamous baloney sandwiches. Can you imagine eating baloney for two of your three meals every day?"

Blair watched as the woman's hand uncurled so that he could put his hand in her palm. He didn't close his fingers but allowed her to slowly close her hand around his. Her head tilted so that instead of burying her face in Bets' shoulder, half her face with one wary eye turned toward Blair.

"It still wouldn't be enough, would it?" Blair asked.

"No." Even though the woman was curled into Bets like a child seeking her mother and even though Blair could feel her hand tremble as she held his hand, her voice came out clear and angry.

"We could skin him alive, and it still wouldn't be enough, would it?" Blair said softly, shifting as his knees protested his position.

"No," she repeated in the same tone.

"But the thing is, I want him to pay. I know it won't be enough, but he needs to pay. Oh man, I really need your help to nail this asshole." Blair watched as the victim started sitting up.

"He was tall," the woman started as she let go of Bets and focused on Blair kneeling in front of her. Closing her eyes, she started talking while Bets' held a tape recorder that Blair hadn't even seen her pull out.

Blair glanced over to see a look of awed admiration on Bets' face before the tough detective remembered to close her mouth and stop looking so shocked.

Oh yeah, definitelyone of those days, Blair thought as he put the final lines on the request for a search warrant. The longer they waited, the greater the chance that the suspect would destroy the evidence, so sleep would wait. Blair glanced over at Bets and his tired mind wandered into areas that Blair normally roped off as out of bounds.

The victim's pain had left Bets, the clear dominate force in the unit, speechless and helpless. Maybe all alpha cops had some soft spot, some emotional kryptonite. For Jim it had been failure. Blair had watched the man deal with lack of sleep and angry suspects and scared witnesses and greedy informants equally well. Oh, he'd seen Jim lose his temper just as often as he'd seen the man's lips twitch with contained laughter. Jim's humor was quiet, but when he cut loose, Blair had loved his dry, sarcastic and sometime dark humor.

But when Jim felt like he had failed, Jim would stand and take the family's angry words like whip lashes. Angry Jim would speak in harsh whispers with a jaw muscle twitching and teeth grinding. Failure Jim would stand silent with a blank face while Blair could practically feel the anguish rolling off the man. The first time Blair had seen it, they had found a kidnapped girl with her lips blue and her head turned at an impossible angle. Blair only found out about the similarities to the case where Jim lost his first partner later, but Blair had watched while Jim not only endured but seemed to seek out the father's fury. The father had even gone so far as to punch Jim, and Jim had taken it silently, refusing to press charges when Brown had grabbed the man from behind.

Blair remembered going home that night. Jim had refused to eat, instead going right up to bed with his face set in this stony expression that frightened Blair far more than Jim's anger. Blair had made dinner alone, waiting for some sort of emotional breakdown. Instead he sat at the table alone with his plate. Blair remembered the curls of fear he'd felt. Never before had he been around someone who didn't express themselves. Hell, Naomi and her friends tended to express absolutely everything whether or not it was actually appropriate at the time.

Blair had fixed a second plate, and putting silverware on each plate, he'd climbed the stairs quietly with his offering in hand. Looking back, the quiet was a little pointless since he knew Jim would have heard every move. He'd reached the top and found Jim, still dressed, laying on the bed on his back and staring at the ceiling. Blair recalled saying something really stupid, and Jim turned to look at him in disbelief before he'd sat up on the bed. Blair had handed over Jim's plate and had then sat cross-legged on the floor to eat his own meal. Jim's expression of disbelief had increased, but he had started eating.

"You got that done yet?"

Blair literally jumped at the sound of Bets' voice interrupting his memory. Blair looked at his computer screen.

"Yeah, I'll just text it over to the DA and print a copy for the file." Blair started punching at computer keys far harder than was absolutely necessary.

"Hopefully we can get this wrapped up within the hour," Bets said with a sigh. Blair wasn't so sure, especially since it seemed like it was just one of those days. Of course, he thought as he printed the document and glanced at the time on the computer, it had just passed midnight so technically today was a new day.

008-WEEKS

009-MONTHS

He had loved this time of year in Cascade. The first summer session would end July 4th, and he always had a three week break from taking classes or teaching. He smiled remembering the second year he had lived with Jim.

Sprawled out over the couch in the loft, Blair stared at the high ceiling in utter exhaustion.

"Hey, Chief, pack a bag. I've got a week off and we're heading for the cabin," Jim had announced as he came through the door, and Blair groaned.

"Oh man, I'm too tired to move."

"Tough, Sandburg. Move your ass because we're leaving at first light, and I know you aren't going to pack in the morning. I'm going to be lucky if I can get you to the truck at all without carrying you that early in the morning."

"Man, I am not moving for the next week, so if you want me in the truck, you're going to have to carry me," Blair told the ceiling. It was too much work to actually look at Jim.

"Okay with me; I figure you're small enough." Blair tilted his head up and found Jim standing right in front of him with his arms crossed and a devilish look on his face.

"Oh no you don't. No, no, no, no." Blair words didn't stop Jim from pouncing. Blair tried to make it up and over the back of the couch, but Jim had his left leg in a solid hold, pulling him back.

"No feet on the furniture," Jim growled as he grabbed Blair's arm. Blair brought his other arm around to grab at Jim's head.

"Not fair, you're too bald to get any hair!" Blair complained as he pulled Jim's head to one side with a firm hold on Jim's ear. One quick move that Blair didn't have a hope of either copying or escaping, and Blair found himself face down on the couch as Jim sat on the small of his back.

"So Sandburg, you're planning on staying on the couch all week, huh? You're a little lumpy," Jim had laughed even as Blair bucked. Okay, it was actually more like Blair trying to buck because Jim was a solid man and Blair couldn't get leverage with Jim still holding one of Blair's legs hostage.

"Ass," Blair snapped although his words were muffled by the couch cushions.

"You say something?" Jim asked, and Blair realized Jim had his arm only when he started pushing it up Blair's back.

"Uncle!" Blair shouted, and the weight disappeared from his back.

"Wuss," Jim accused him with a smile.

"Yeah, well some of us missed these little brotherly ceremonies," Blair said as he righted himself on the couch. Immediately he had looked over to Jim afraid that he had stepped over some invisible line in Jim's guarded psyche, but Jim had looked back at him fondly.

"Still seems like I won fair and square, so we will be leaving at oh-five-thirty, and you will be in the truck," Jim said triumphantly before disappearing upstairs with an overly cheerful whistle.

Blair had complained at 5:20 when Jim physically pulled him upright and pushed a cup of coffee into his hands. He had complained at 5:21 when Jim took his packed bags down to the truck. He had complained at 5:30 when Jim threw a pair of jeans and a t-shirt at him, and again at 5:31 when Jim pulled him to his feet and pushed him into the bathroom. He was still complaining when he got in the truck at 5:50 and when Jim went through a drive through to grab breakfast before they left the city. The entire time, Jim remained annoyingly cheerful.

Blair didn't fully wake up and stop complaining until three or four hours later when Jim pulled off on a dirt road that wound its way around the mountains. Blair rolled the window down and breathed in air not filled with smog or pollution or the scent of hot city.

"Man, this is beautiful. God I love this time of year."

"Yeah, wait until you see the cabin," Jim had answered with a smile.

Blair blinked at the image of himself in the mirror, unwilling to recall the week of laughter and teasing and practical jokes involving baking powder. For the next two years he'd spent all June looking forward to that week they would take off, and now what did he have?

Blair finished in the bathroom and went out into the living room where a Salvation Army sofa draped with his meditation rug sat facing a small television. Yeah, this time June wasn't a month of anticipation; it was just one more month to survive. Blair grabbed his keys and headed to work.

010-YEARS

"Chill, man. I'll get it." Blair knelt on the hot sidewalk and concentrated on making the small pieces of interlocking metal actually interlock again.

"Not before I turn grey, you won't," Russo muttered impatiently. "We're going to hit all the university traffic if you don't get the lead out."

"There see, good as new," Blair declared triumphantly as he held up the backpack with the newly restored zipper.

"Yeah, until the next time. Frizzy, you're getting a paycheck that I know you don't spend on clothes, so do us all a favor and get a new damn bag... something that doesn't look like it belongs to a high school student." Blair got in the car without comment since arguing with Russo didn't generally end well. The man was cranky and aggressive. Usually Russo's attitude didn't bother him since the man generally didn't go after Blair, preferring instead to verbally attack Bets. This time his words made Blair irrationally defensive.

Blair fingered the worn strap of his backpack and considered all the years he'd had with the thing. It was the last thing Naomi had bought him before he went off to college, and he remembered picking it out while she had looked on proudly. This bag had carried his books that first semester when he had used his outgoing nature and his humor to hide his terror at being alone. The stain on the bottom came from the expedition where the Kombai people had nearly turned him into a giant bleeding pin cushion. The zipper had broken for the first time when he'd had a whole set of papers to grade and he'd tried to stuff two extra sweatshirts in on top of them so he wouldn't freeze on stakeout.

Blair's eyes stung, and he focused for a second on the traffic as Russo aggressively maneuvered around a truck to try and get into the carpool lane. He hadn't even noticed that they had reached the freeway, but now that his thoughts had gone to Jim, he couldn't seem to get that face from his memory.

He remembered Jim turning to him in resigned dismay when he'd had to drive back to stakeouts after Blair had left the backpack sitting in some corner, and sometimes that had actually worked out for the best. He couldn't even count the number of times it had flown through the air, bouncing to a stop on the bed as Jim cleaned the living room while complaining about Blair's inability to keep his stuff in his area. Several times Jim had even shoved the bag into his stomach, and at first Blair had been annoyed, but then he'd realized that he was the only one Jim trusted to see that anger and pain. Everyone had seen Jim's humor and Jim's stoic faade, but only Blair got those other parts.

Except that was past. Blair touched the fraying seam on the bag, and he realized that he hadn't ever detached from Jim. He still held on to that memory as though it could fill the hole left by Jim's physical absence. The bag was just one more symbol of that: a reminder of years spent as a student, a teacher, a guide.

It was time to let go. As Russo finally pulled into the coveted carpool lane and started accelerating past the other cars, Blair decided that it was time to truly detach. After work he would go and get a bag that wasn't soaked in his past. He would get something that didn't remind him of the years he'd spend chasing some impossible dream, and maybe even a bag that didn't look like it belonged to a high school student.

011. RED

Blair considered wiping his hands on his pants, but then he's just have red over more of him. Funny how the red came from trying to help and not the actual act of violence.

"Hon, you okay?" Bets asked in a concerned voice.

"Oh man. Oh man, I shot him," Blair whispered.

"Babe, I would rather have you shoot him that him shoot us."

"I just wanted to ask a couple of questions." Blair was vaguely aware of his voice taking on a petulant, whining tone, but he couldn't seem to control that any more than he could control the shaking in his hands. He just thanked god Bets had taken his gun away as soon as the backup arrived.

"Sometimes it works that way." Blair felt Bets' arm around his shoulders, and he leaned into her, taking comfort from her soothing voice and pretending she was someone else.

012. ORANGE.

Blair shook his head in frustration as he refocused himself on sorting dark pants and white shirts and multicolored shirts and tan pants and dingy socks and underwear and blue shirt.

Blair stopped and looked at the shirt in his hands. Dull orange splatters on the cuffs.

Sliding down the wall until he was on his knees, Blair's resolve that had held him together through the report and the psychologist's office and Captain Roth's lecture all failed him. While Blair hoped that taking a deep breath would somehow cleanse him, instead it released the tears that he had tried rationalizing away.

Yes, the man had been evil. Yes, without Blair another child would have died. Yes, the shooting was justified.

It didn't matter. Blair sat on the floor and sobbed over orange dots on a blue shirt.

013. YELLOW.

"Hey, you take calls with Bets, so I know you're not a coward."

"Watch it, white boy, or you'll find out just how intimidating I can be."

Blair was fairly sure the first voice was Jeff, and he knew the second voice was Bets. Hmmm. The well-dressed teasing cop and the tough lady cop. What did that remind him of? Blair had a passing thought about life and clichs, and then it was gone in the fuzzy-grey world of blessed intoxication.

"Frizzy, you are the bravest son of a bitch I know," Bets said, and a warm hand settled on his shoulder. Blair let his head sink slowly to the bar.

"Less than ten suspects a year are killed, and I killed one," Blair informed the surface of the bar. Faded white ring stains winked back at him.

"And if you hadn't shot either you or I would have been laying dead on that street, so don't talk like you did something wrong," a demanding woman insisted, and Blair wondered where the Australian accent had gone. He missed it.

"Yellow, yellow, yellow," Blair chanted as he tried to bring the beer bottle to his mouth. He found himself putting a knuckle in his mouth because the bottle had mysteriously vanished. "Scared to go back to work," he muttered around his knuckles, and then the world started waving in and out of focus. Blair solved his problems by simply passing out.

014. GREEN.

Living in the valley he had grown used to brown rock front yards and pale green leaves on light ash colored trees and grey boulders. Now all he could see was light green moss clinging to the sides of the rocks and deep green needles clothing the pine trees and verdant green weeds crowding the ditch. The green of life, Blair realized, and suddenly he didn't feel like he belonged here.

"Grab the table cloth," Bets ordered, and Blair reached back for the garish yellow piece of plastic.

"It's beautiful up here," Blair commented as he spread the cloth over the lone picnic table at the small roadside stop.

"Babe, that's what I love about this state. Even in the blistering heat of summer you can come up here and forget that we live in a damn oven." Bets started loading the table with covered dishes, far more than two people could possibly eat. "So, can't say I'm good with this sensitive crap, so I'm going to come right out and speak my piece. You did a good thing last week, and now you're pissin' me off by acting like you've somehow sinned against the universe."

"Oh man, I know I had to, but my heart hasn't quite caught up with the program." Blair sat down heavily on the gouged wood bench attached to the table.

"When the perp pulled that gun, you went by the book. If you hadn't pulled the trigger, what would have happened?"

"Bets, I know. Man, I totally get that it was a justified shooting."

"Then why are you playing martyr?"

"I'm not."

"Bullshit."

"Bets," Blair warned with his tone that he did not want to have this discussion, especially not if he was expected to eat afterwards.

"No. I'm not dropping this until you get over it. Since I don't know how to do the careful and caring shit, this is my version of supportive. So either pull your head out of your ass or you're going to see this side of me a whole lot, Babe."

"God help me," Blair moaned as he let his eyes follow the line of the mountains around them. The peaks he could see now were the home of the Hopi Kachina spirits who lived on the mountain six months a year and with the tribe the other six. Blair wondered if he could manage to wrangle an invite to a Kachina dance when it came around next time.

"Do not go wandering away when I'm giving you advice," Bets snapped.

"I thought you were yelling at me," Blair dryly commented as he turned his eyes to Bets who had her hands firmly planted on her hips in challenge.

"Same thing," she said with a complaisant shrug. "You've got to get your head in the job," she said in a nearly compassionate tone as she took a seat opposite of him and pulled the cover off a bowl of ribs before pulling one out.

"And if I can't?" Blair asked. Bets stopped and considered him with the rib sticking up in the air.

"Then you can't do this job." Bets words made Blair stop and blink in surprise. "And don't you dare give up because I am tired of taking calls with Russo. I'm going to end up shooting the man if I have to ride with him."

"I don't know if I can live with this. I killed a man."

"I really hate sounding like our local headshrinker, but you gotta talk about it."

"I've talked about it until I can't talk any more," Blair pointed out defensively as he pulled the bowl of ribs over to his side of the table.

"Babe, you have talked about statistics and cultural beliefs about killing and the fucking history of firearms, but you have not talked about anything that really counts. So stop trying to bullshit an old bullshitter like me."

"You're not old."

"And again with the creative topic change." Bets tore a piece of meat off her rib, and Blair pushed himself up and away from the table.

"I'm not hungry," he said dropping the rib he had just snagged on the top of the covered bowl before walking away from table. He hadn't understood why Bets had wanted to come so far for a simple picnic, but after enduring the three hour drive, he got it. He was essentially trapped here with Bets while she poked at his soft emotional underbelly. The woman was a predator.

Blair walked away from her and into the trees. So much green. Putting a hand on the rough bark of a tall pine tree, Blair breathed in the smell of life, the smell of green, and he wished that he still felt like he belonged to this world of living things. But since wishes weren't horses, he was going to have to walk.

015. BLUE.

The stream slid over rocks with frothy white-blue crests and dark blue eddies and blue-green spots where algae clung to rocks. Even though Blair desperately wanted privacy, he could hear Bets hot on his trail, her heavy footsteps making the bark chips snap under her weight.

"Maybe it's time to head back," Blair said as soon as she came close enough to hear him, but he never moved his eyes from the stream.

"Not even," Bets snapped.

"You know, this might be described as kidnapping."

"My ma always said a person should try everything once, so I guess this is your day for gettin' kidnapped."

Bets' words made Blair snort so loud that he made his own nose sting. "Oh man, you're like years too late to be my first on that count," Blair laughed darkly. "Years, man. Like about a dozen kidnappings too late to be my first."

Blair sat down on the damp ground and he could feel the moisture from the grass soak into his jeans.

"A dozen? You've lived an interesting life Frizzy." Bets sat down next to him, and Blair bit his tongue before he said too much.

"Yeah."

"Kidnapped, huh. Must be an interesting story."

"Not really. Kombai tree people thought I was an evil spirit but then they figured I was a geek and took me back to meet the family. An insane man thought he could kill me and steal my identity. A gun-runner grabbed me after I fell for his daughter. Then there's the paramilitary nutjob who grabbed me twice and the survivalists who tried to blow me up and the dirty cops," Blair glanced over and Bets was looking at him like he had lost his mind. "And I think I'm just stopping there."

"You're either one hell of a liar or the biggest trouble magnet I've ever met."

"Try both," Blair said with a sigh. "Died once." Blair bit his tongue harder as he realized that he had said the one thing he didn't mean to say.

"Did ya now?" Bets leaned back into the slope of the stream bank, and Blair followed her example. Just like in the valley, the sky was a uniform crisp, clear blue.

"Yeah," Blair whispered as he stared up into the air.

"What that feel like?" Bets words sounded casual, but Blair didn't miss the sharp steel under the honeyed tones. He didn't doubt that Bets would keep him up here until she was satisfied that he had, as she put it, pulled his head out of his ass. Blair considered just how long they could be up here because he felt like his head had taken up permanent residence there.

"Cold," he finally answered. Bets didn't answer and Blair could feel the silence winding around him like a hungry snake. "Fucking terrifying," Blair added. The warm air moved over his face, and he kept staring up into the bright blue sky that didn't match his mood at all. He remembered the cold of the fountain where Alex had shoved his head under the water until his lungs had burned with the need for oxygen and his mouth had finally opened. He remembered the blue dreamscape where the jaguar had found him.

"I felt helpless," Blair spoke into that silence and drove away the snaking memories that tried to trap him.

"I bet you did. Did you feel like that when you killed Fielder?"

Blair opened his mouth to protest, but then he realized the truth. "Yeah," he whispered. "No fucking control. Just watching my life change, and I can't do anything about it," Blair whispered the truth to the sky above, driving the fears into the open.

"Funny thing about that. Killing makes a bad man feel powerful, but it makes a good man feel helpless."

"I didn't fucking want to do it. That asshole. He could have just dropped the fucking gun." Blair surged to his feet and ripped a small branch off a nearby tree. "He looked right at me. What? Is it so obvious that I'm not cop material that he thought I'd stand there and let him shoot me?"

"Oh, Babe, he knew you'd shoot. He picked his death because he couldn't face what prison held for a child molester and killer."

"And he fucking used me for his suicide."

"Sucks, don't it?" Bets asked quietly, and Blair clung to the branch he'd just ripped from the tree as if he could use it to beat the memories away.

"Man, more than I can say. I know that I didn't have any other choice, but I can't get guilt and the anger out."

"Don't try. Figure they'll be a part of you for a long time, but you just stop puttin' on yourself. Know that the guilt is Fielder's and you have a right to be angry."

"Bets, I think I just need some time. Maybe a chance to get my thoughts together."

"Wish you had somebody you could let help ya." Bets' words brought an image of ice-blue eyes and a smiling face to Blair's mind.

"I just need to work this out myself," Blair said softly.

"Okay, Babe. You want some ribs and coleslaw, and I'll be up at the table." As Bets started back up the trail, Blair kept his eyes focused on the turbulent blues of the stream as the water just kept rushing past. For some reason he couldn't stop thinking about the old adage about never being able to step in the same river twice. Closing his eyes, he let himself sink down into lotus position as he searched his mind for some sort of resolution.

016. PURPLE.

Dropping into his desk chair, Blair slowly lowered the file. He was so caught up in the report that the sight of a purple and red monstrosity on his desk startled him badly enough that he dropped the file and all the papers across the cheap gray carpeting of the bullpen. Behind him, a half dozen voices roared with laughter. Blair swiveled his chair around to glare at his various co-workers. Maria and Jeff leaned against the wall by the coffee machine, Bets was at her desk literally slapping her thigh and Carl snorted rather unsubtly from behind a file of his own while Russo just nodded happily.

"What the?" Blair looked again at the stuffed toy. A long curved red horn sat in the middle of the forehead right above a rather evil looking eye. The short purple fur covered the body while long curved red nails came out of each paw. In short, it was the creepiest looking toy Blair had ever seen.

"Man, if someone plans to give this to a kid, you'd better be able to afford the therapy bill."

"Nah, that's all yours," Jeff offered from across the room.

"Um, thanks?" Blair looked at the hideous thing again.

"You know, Babe, the song... the guy too tough for the one-eyed, one-horned purple people eater to eat." Bets commented and then made it clear the conversation was over by turning her back and slipping on headphones as she typed up a week's worth of reports. As the rest of the room wandered back to work, Blair sat looking at the small purple toy that suddenly seemed a lot less grotesque.

Blair reached out and touched the purple fur on one stuffed arm before putting the creature on the top of his in basket. He idly wondered if it was too morbid to name the thing Alex.

017. BROWN.

"Man, if you guys had any idea how often me being bait has backfired," Blair hissed into the phone. Ironically, the phone wasn't connected, but the wire he wore on his collar would carry the words back to the rest of his team. The rest of his team who were inside the nursing building while he was wandering the dim shadows between various buildings with a phone to his ear and a bag slung over his shoulder like the oblivious student he was supposed to be.

A brown-haired man approached him from the north as he came out from between two buildings, and Blair tried to not look like he was tensing up. Considering he'd seen the pictures of the vicious assaults, it wasn't easy: broken bones, internal injures, head trauma. The man passed with a small nod. Blair started to breath again.

Blair was within sight of the Student Union when something hard and crushing hit him in the kidney from behind. Blair fell to his knees with a gasp, and before he could recover his breath, he found himself dragged into the shadow of the old library.

A second blow landed, but Blair had rolled and squirmed so that the metal bar caught him in the hip instead of the more vulnerable back. Blair scrambled for his weapon, pulling it out with one hand as he grappled with the attacker with his other.

"Phoenix police, put your hands up and step back," Blair demanded as he lined up his gun with the suspect. For one moment, the shadow form that Blair could see froze, caught between attacking and fleeing and surrendering, and Blair felt a bubble of warm panic rise in his chest. Then the shadow raised its hands and began to retreat.

Blair pushed his way up to his knees while holding the gun steady, and a whole chorus of running footsteps heralded the arrival of backup.

Shouted voices ordered the man to his knees, and Blair slipped the safety into place before sliding his weapon into the holster under his multicolored vest. As his colleagues cuffed and Mirandized the suspect, Blair stood in the shadow, leaning against the stone building, and slowly smiling. Oh yeah. He'd done it. For the first time since the shooting, he'd pulled his gun.

The bubble of panic shrank rather than disappearing completely, but as Russo pulled the suspect to his feet, Blair looked at the attacker's wide face and brown eyes and brown hair and realized that he had just saved some random student from months of pain. He'd helped to stop the monster. The adrenaline rush Blair had felt so many times in the past came back, and he smiled wider as Russo roughly pulled toward the parking lot where they had left the unmarked police vehicles.

"You okay?" Russo asked in passing.

"Oh man, I'm more than okay. I'm so jazzed. I'm riding adrenaline," Blair said as he slapped Russo on the arm. Russo just rolled his eyes as he gave the suspect's arm another jerk to get him moving faster.

018. BLACK.

Moving forward toward the shadowy form of the jaguar, Blair also realized that he had four feet, which should have been another indication of dream. Well, he could do lucid dreaming. Man, he had read enough about lucid dreaming and altered states of consciousness to teach a whole catalogue of classes on them, if he had still been a teacher. Blair concentrated and forced his body to take on more human features although he couldn't seem to lose the hair.

As Blair stepped forward into the night, he nearly tripped over the body of a large deer. Blair was briefly tempted to complain about the improbability of the elk-like creature being in Peru, but then he was a timber wolf in Peru, so logic really didn't have much to do with it. The deer had its stomach torn out, and Blair felt his own stomach churn at the sight of slick intestines and organs slowly sliding from the warm interior of the animal.

"Chief, I didn't want this for you."

Blair spun around, and Jim stood there in his jungle fatigues with a tired expression on his face.

"I shouldn't have suggested it," Jim said sadly as he looked at the dead animal.

"Great man. I can't get you to talk in real life, so my subconscious just creates a new you," Blair snorted his disgust with a half-laugh and half-sob sound.

"Chief," Jim said as he took a step closer, but then he stopped. "Chief, are you okay?"

"I'm fine, Jim. Man, even in my subconscious you're still playing babysitter, but I can handle this." That must have been the wrong answer because Jim gave him one last look before shifting back into the black jaguar and disappearing into the jungle.

"Jim!" Blair called out, and a jaguar scream answered him. The sound ripped through Blair, and he took off running after Jim, suddenly terrified that something had gone horribly wrong. He tried to call out again, but his face had changed and when he opened his mouth, his tongue hung down as he ran.

Leaping over a fallen tree, he spotted the jaguar, black fur stained with red. Blair hurried forward, desperate to reach the cat's side. As he closed the final distance, the cat reached out a paw and slashed him across the face so that he could feel sharp points ripping through the flesh of his cheek.

Gasping in pain and reaching up to touch his cheek, Blair sat straight up in bed. The black of night surrounded him, and he could feel the unblemished skin of his face where the jaguar claws had torn him. Blair sat there trying to calm his heart beat and wrestle his own fears into submission. Reaching to his bedside phone, he picked the handset up and the numbers glowed softly before Blair put the phone back down and the room went black again.

Yeah, like he could just call Jim up in the middle of the night because he had a nightmare. Blair settled back down onto the mattress, but he spent the rest of the night staring into the darkness until the first glow of dawn crept into the space between the blinds and the wall.

Maybe he should go for a run, he thought as he lay there trying not to think of a black jaguar bleeding in a blue jungle.

019. WHITE

"Sweetie, I can understand why you accepted the position in Cascade, but this..." Naomi's voice trailed off in definite disapproval and confusion.

"Mom, I like the work. I like figuring out how the clues fit together, and I like helping people."

"I hear you," Naomi answered, and Blair was struck with a desire to strangle the phone, a desire which quickly faded into a tired sigh.

"Mom, I'm making a life here."

"And I'm so proud of you for picking up and moving on, and honey, I am so sorry that I made this trouble for you."

"I know, Mom. I don't blame you."

"I just wanted you to find your happiness, and I thought it would help."

"I know, Mom."

"But sweetie, as your mother this thing now worries me."

"Mom," Blair tried using a sharp tone to warn her off dangerous territory, but as usual Naomi ignored the warning.

"I mean, in Cascade you had Jim and I understand how you two became linked. Your spirits touched each other, and I understood that you needed to follow Jim even to the point of joining the force. I know that. But sweetie, you..." Blair could hear his mother's voice catch on the edge of tears.

"Mom, it happened. It was miserable, but I survived."

"You killed a man." Naomi's words sent a white hot spear of regret through Blair's soul, but he took a deep breath as he switched over to counting threads on the spider web growing in the corner, the delicate strands almost invisible against the wall.

"I know, Mom. I didn't have a choice, and as much as I wish something different had happened, I won't wish that it never happened. If I hadn't started questioning the construction workers, more children would have died."

"Oh honey, I hear you. And I am proud that you are living your beliefs. I just worry about you."

"I can take care of myself Mom."

"I know that. I've always had confidence in your judgment. You were the most mature ten year old I've ever seen, but you never showed any interest in police work before Jim."

"And now that I know how good it feels to help people, to make a difference, I don't want to go back to writing papers that maybe a hundred people will ever read."

"There are other ways to make a difference, honey. You could join an advocacy group or investigate corporate misconduct or become a spokesperson for an aboriginal tribe."

"I could be more like you," Blair snapped, and immediately he regretted it as the silence on the other end of the phone revealed his mother's distress far more than any words.

"I hear your frustration and confusion, sweetie. I just don't want you to try to be Jim now that you don't have him in your life."

"I'm not Mom. I have my own life here."

"As a detective?"

"Yes."

"Carrying a gun?"

"Yes."

"Playing a white knight?"

"Oh boy, I am not trying to play anything, Mom. I just wanted to make a new life away from the diss and the whole disaster. The rest just happened."

"We make our own destinies," Naomi pointed out quietly.

"Then this is the destiny that I've made for myself."

"I hear you, but I still worry. I'm your mom, sweetie, and I worry about you."

"And I love you for worrying, but I'm okay."

"What if it happens again?"

"I hope it doesn't, but I'll just have to deal with that when the day comes."

"Honey, you are throwing your life away."

"No, I'm not."

"You could do so much better..."

"Better than what? Better than a cop? Better like three million dollars better? Maybe I don't want to do any better." The ugly words slipped out of Blair like knives, and he could feel a white-hot anger rise like a monster from the deep. The silence from the other end condemned him far more effectively than any words. He took deep cleansing breaths as he tried to center himself. It hadn't been Naomi's fault, it really hadn't, but he still felt the anger curled inside.

"You deserve to vent. I made your life very difficult, and that wasn't my intention. I just want you to find your own path and not walk in someone's else's shadow... anyone else's shadow."

"Mom, I'm not in shadow here. I'm doing okay."

"And is that a white lie to make your mother feel better?"

"I'm as okay as I can be," Blair said truthfully.

"Have you heard from him?" Neither Naomi nor Blair had to define 'him.'

"No. I've talked to Simon and Megan a couple of times, but..." Blair struggled to describe it. "It just isn't the same."

"Oh sweetie, you just have to detach with love," Naomi said in a suddenly soft tone.

"Yeah, I did the detaching part, now I just have to learn to live with it," Blair answered. "But I'm doing okay, Mom. Promise."

"My little white knight," Naomi said fondly, and Blair had to smile at the tone, a tone she had always used when he had brought home some injured animal he wanted to save. The tone she used when the injured animal had died in Blair's arms.

"Always," he promised her.

020. COLORLESS

Thick, weedy grass covered the cemetery's property and sent creepers onto the concrete paths where the grass searched for ground where it could send down roots. Jeff had explained that this grass that crept into every available space and took root in rock and clay and dirt grey with lack of nutrients only thrived in the bake oven summers. Come winter with its mild weather the grass would lose its color and disappear only to come back from the root when the sun started blasting the valley again next year.

Wiping his hand over his neck, he considered losing a layer of clothing, but he didn't want to take off the multicolored vest that he wore over the short-sleeved green shirt. He didn't want the gun visible. Not here. Not now.

Blair looked at the limp paper in his hand and turned it as he tried to figure out the landmarks well enough to find his destination. He flashed on an image of Jim glaring at him from under a Jags hat as Blair admitted to getting them lost again. Jim would sigh dramatically even while having laughter in his eyes.

The sight of the Gethsemane marker pulled him out of his memory. If he was reading the map right, his goal should be in this section of the cemetery. He stepped off the path and walked between the sunken markers lined up in rows.

Death wasn't neat or clean or orderly, and the crisp order of the gravestones suddenly seemed like the world's biggest hypocrisy. Hell, death was even less orderly than life, and yet here it was cleaned up and trimmed and put in order so that the living could come and see the neat version of death instead of the messy reality.

At the far edge of the garden, the gravestones disappeared so that the land looked like a lawn interrupted only by small round markers with letters and numbers. Blair knelt down and pushed the creepers back off a marker in order to read it: 48B. Standing almost took more energy than he had in the thick, humid air, but Blair pushed on to the next marker. 49B. Blair took the map and figured out north so that he could estimate grave sized widths. 49B-lot 3. Moving to the piece of land that matched the highlighted square on the map, Blair sat on the ground.

"Hey man," he said to the ground or the putty colored sky or the soul that may or may not be able to hear him. "Thought I'd come out and just talk. Figured I had a few things to say to you." Blair stopped as he tried to collect the thoughts that kept scattering to the corners of his mind.

"I talked to your mother. Apologized really. She... um... no offense man, but she's a bit of a loon. I mean, she makes Naomi look like Betty Homemaker. I think she was stoned. Actually, I hope she was stoned because if she's like that when she's sober, that's really sad. Anyway, I told her how sorry I was, and she said she missed you. Well, it was between bouts of cursing me out, but she's just angry that she lost you." Blair took a deep breath.

"Your sister told me about the neighbor. She told me how you never wanted anyone to touch you after that." Blair blinked as the world suddenly lost its sharp edges as tears filled his eyes. "She knows you never meant to do something so evil, but sometimes we get evil put in our souls and we don't know how to get it out. The poison just keeps spreading." Blair tried to reconcile the feelings that flowed through him, but he couldn't find any middle ground between his anger at the evil this man had created and the compassion for the boy that man had once been.

"Man, you hurt a lot of people, but I know how you covered them up, dressed them again and put them somewhere safe so they would be found. I know you didn't want them to be lost or in pain. But man, you were the adult. You needed to get the poison out, and you just tried to fit in by poisoning everything around you. Not cool, man."

A distant rumble of thunder suggested that the promised rain might actually fall, but then it had felt like rain for hours and the clouds remained a colorless dull blanket over the valley.

"Oh man. I wish you would have asked for help earlier because I would rather have helped you find a therapist than helped you commit suicide. It wasn't fucking fair. I didn't deserve that any more than those children deserved what you did to them... any more than you deserved what happened to you. I'm just sorry for the whole mess." Blair closed his eyes as the wind started to blow.

"You know, usually when I solve a case I get all jazzed, but there just isn't anything to get jazzed about here. There's no good side. But man, I wanted to say that I forgive you. I know that you weren't strong enough to survive the poison that got into your soul, but I am. I'm okay, and I hope wherever you are, you're okay too. Well, maybe a little extra karma or a lifetime or two as a bug. You hurt kids, man, and maybe a few cycles of getting stepped on will teach you to be a little more careful of others, but after you've gotten the poison out of your soul, I hope you have a chance for something better. I hope my bullet wasn't the end for you. I hope you have a chance to make a different choice.

Blair opened his eyes, and the dust made his eyes sting and water as his hair whipped around his face. Blair turned and looked at the wall of dust descending on him. He'd read about haboobs, the wall of dust that would swallow the east valley whole and bury it under a dust storm. They only happened two places in the world, and Blair watched in wonder as the wall seemed to creep forward even though his mind told him that the leading edge of the dust storm could actually travel quite fast.

Blair continued to watch as the sky dimmed and his skin felt the prickles and then the wall engulfed him. Color disappeared in the thick dust and the wind pulled at the edges of his clothing. Blair had been in much worse storms, but the sudden shift as the dust enveloped him left him in awe. He could practically feel the storms power ripping past him.

Making a final silent prayer that Fielder's soul had found peace that it never found in life, Blair moved through the colorless dust storm back toward his car which had become a shadow in the sea of sand. He had work to do.

021. FRIENDS.

"A friend of his who he often had lunch with, Peter Collins," the secretary answered. Part of Blair was glad for a case that didn't involve a hysterical victim or some strange Babylonian script being left at vandalism sites as part of a bizarre frat prank. Another part of him wasn't sure he was ready to face this crime scene. Oh, it wasn't the idea of a body that bothered him as much as the room itself. The victim had been removed, but the office felt like a moment from Blair's past.

Blair stepped into the room and tried to get a feel for the professor who had been shot point blank in the chest some time after everyone else had gone home for the night. Blair walked around the room admiring the Sudanese masks and the Eritrean rug, the Afrikaner shipping manifest and the Libyan flute, the Mayan figurine and the Peruvian hat. Sanchez had a wide range of interests, but the pictures of his expeditions made Blair wonder what his life would have been if he had stayed in this world.

"He's..." a broken voice started, and Blair spun around, his heart beating madly as the stranger appeared out of nowhere. What the hell were the uniformed cops doing out there because they sure weren't keeping people back. The skinny, middle aged man had a long face, and a casual suit that hung from his frame. "He's dead," the man whispered.

"Mr. Collins?" Blair asked, finally making a connection. The man nodded. "Mr. Collins, maybe we should talk somewhere else," Blair suggested softly. The man ignored him and walked to spot right in front of the large desk, his eyes focused on where, at one time, Sanchez's chair had sat. Sanchez was gone, the crime scene unit had taken the chair out to collect detailed samples. Despite this, Blair suspected that Collins could still see what he had found this morning.

"Mr. Collins?" Blair said a little louder, and a shiver went through the man's frame as he reached out and braced himself with one hand on Sanchez's desk. So much for preserving the scene. Oh well, the man had found Sanchez, so his fingerprints were probably on the desk already.

"Mr. Collins?" Blair called louder and this time the man's head tilted toward him and his fingers slowly traveled the smooth wood of Sanchez's desk. "Maybe we should talk in your office." Taking the man by the arm, Blair guided him out of the crime scene.

Blair spent an unproductive hour with the primary witness who seemed utterly unable to process the image of death he'd seen. Blair remembered seeing that first body floating in a bathtub, a yellow scarf wrapped around her neck, and he couldn't blame Collins for being shaken. Sanchez had not been a pretty sight with six bullets through his chest. Definitely overkill. Definitely someone with a personal ax to grind. In the end, he got little more than Collins had offered on the 911 call, but he dutifully typed up the extra details in his laptop before heading back to Sanchez's office.

Finding the office disturbingly familiar, Blair wandered the perimeter trying to get to know Sanchez, maybe understand why someone would feel so much anger towards a middle-aged archeologist. The longer Blair was a detective, the more he understood that driving need to find the truth and give justice to the people left behind.

Blair fingered a South American carving of a protector god, and he realized that as much as he loved anthropology and archeology, he love helping people more. He certainly never intended to have this life, but all those years of putting clues together had made him into a damn good cop. Maybe he still couldn't compete with Bets or certain other people when it came to intimidating confessions out of people or tackling a suspect, but he had other strengths. A voice broke into his thoughts as his partner of the day came into the small office.

"So, didn't you used to be into all this stuff?" Jeff asked in a tone that carried curiosity but not the hostility the Cascade cops had always used when discussing his past.

"Yeah, used to," Blair admitted as he ran his fingers through his shortened hair.

"Must be weird, being back then."

"It's like visiting an old friend I don't get to see very often any more," Blair admitted fondly. And maybe it was the act of saying the words, but for the first time, Blair realized that anthropology was no longer a cherished lover and confidante but rather a simple friend, missed but not vital to his survival. Blair smiled as he walked out of the office

022. ENEMIES.

"What do you mean?" Blair asked as he shifted his leather messenger bag on his arm.

"Please, the vic was a professor with a clean financial record--no drugs, no gambling, no suspicious spending. How many enemies could he have?"

"Man, you have no clue," Blair said fondly, shaking his head.

"Okay, enlighten me, oh enlightened one." Blair gave Jeff a strange look, and Jeff just shrugged his shoulders. "Yeah, not really quick on the quips today, late night," Jeff admitted.

"Okay, I will then. The first category would be students. Oh man, you have not seen anything until you see a college quarterback benched by a grade or some guy who can't get his company to reimburse his tuition because he only got a C instead of a B. Not pretty. So we might want to look at students he failed last semester or students he is failing this semester.

"Then there are the other professors. You may think professors are these kind-hearted teddy bears, but oh no. The competition over grant money and tenure can get vicious. Asking around with the staff will probability give us the names of any of the other professors he was in a pissing contest with.

"Then again, there are the activists who accuse archeologists of raping the cultural heritage of a country for profit, and man, I totally understand their point of view, but not all archeologists are like that, and some of these activists are just," Blair whistled sharply and waved his hand palm down at shoulder level to indicate the level of nutsy some of the activists reached.

"And then you have to remember that professors are still people with love lives and quarrels, and I figure that's enough to keep us busy for a day or two," Blair stopped as Jeff looked at him thoughtfully.

"Frizz, I'm glad you decided to join the force. It's safer," he quipped before slapping Blair on the arm and heading toward the exit.

"Hardee-har-har, man. Hardee har-har."

023. LOVERS.

"Okay, that is more information that I needed to know," Jeff complained as he guided their car around an old sedan with an ancient driver.

"What? Homophobic?" Blair knew that Arizona was pretty damn conservative and homophobia was at epidemic levels, but Jeff had never struck him as one to care.

"Don't go there. What people do in their own homes is their own business as long as I don't have to think about it too much." Jeff paused for a second. "Or see it. I really don't want to see it." Jeff smiled and his sharp features took on a very fox-like appearance. "Then again I don't want to see Bets having at it either, although I wouldn't mind a look at Maria in the act." Blair aimed a backhanded slap at Jeff's arm, and the man gave him a sharp, "Hey!" for his efforts.

"Okay, if it's not homophobia, why does the idea of Sanchez and Collins offend you?" Blair asked curiously.

"Come on, they're geek boys. I don't like the thought of either of them getting busy with anyone."

"Oh man, you are pathetic. So... how do you expect scientists to reproduce?"

"I don't. I mean, hey, if they absolutely have to, they can do some geeky science thing, but anyone that pale and that skinny and that... geeky has no right to be getting busy. It makes for a bad mental image."

"Some geeky thing?" Blair crossed his arms in challenge. After all, he had his own geeky past to defend.

"Yeah, like artificial insemination or something."

"Maybe immaculate conception?" Blair asked as he tried not to laugh. Jeff turned away from the traffic long enough to shoot Blair a death-glare.

"I'm going to say yes even though I'm trying not to think of how that applies to Sanchez and Collins, 'cause the thought of either of them pregnant is worse than thinking of them getting it on."

"Well I suppose there is the old story of Horus's birth from the Papyrus of Ani. The spirit of Ra and the spirit of Osiris met and 'poof' Horus just showed up. So, you want geeks to do that sort of thing?"

"It'd be nice if they could. Much better mental image."

"Of course then there's the South American tale of the woman who got pregnant when the skull of a fallen hero spit on her."

"And I'm thinking that she was telling her father a little white lie with that one."

"Hey, it's an epic tale of good and evil. Reproduction is often a central theme in ancient times when the ability to reproduce determined who had heirs and allies."

"Really? I just thought it was sex."

"Oh man, not in ancient hero stories. Then again, sometimes it's about not having the sex. When Set was trying to steal the rulership of Earth from Osiris, he cut his brother up into pieces and made sure that Osiris' genitals would never be found."

"Okay, if he's cut up into pieces, what the hell difference does a missing cock make?"

"Osiris' wife put him back together, but she couldn't find his genitals."

"Okay, that's just disturbing. Actually that's a worse image than Sanchez getting it on, pre or post murder." Blair shivered in horror at that particular thought, but he still had some revenge to get.

"Not as disturbing as the next part. She madehim cock out of clay and so she could get pregnant." Blair watched as Jeff's head snapped over to him. Blair had to work to suppress the smile as he considered how to work the next bit into the conversation.

"You're shitting me. These people obviously did not understand biology very well." Navigating into the carpool lane, Jeff headed back for the station.

"Yeah, well it was all about reproduction. After Set attacked Horus to try and get Earth, Horus grabbed Set's genitals in his hand and crushed them."

"Oh god... you did not have to tell me that!" Jeff complained as he squirmed in his seat.

"Yep, Set threw some shit at Horus, and Horus reached out and grabbed Set's cock and balls and started squeezing." Blair pulled out the last word with a long eee sound accompanied by him holding out his hand and slowly closing it in demonstration.

"Okay, stop."

"There's this really interesting wall art in a pyramid in..."

"Stop!"

"And then Ra stabbed himself in the genitals," Blair couldn't contain his smile now as Jeff's lips pursed together in disgust.

"Okay, enough," Jeff nearly shouted. "Some things just don't need to be said."

"Yeah, well man,next time you start picking on the geeks, just remember that I have years of anthropology and cultural studies behind me. I've got mutilated genitals stories from a dozen different countries."

"Damn you geeks are vicious little shits."

"Yep," Blair agreed with a smile.

024. FAMILY.

"Yeah, what's up?"

"What type of aftershave do you use?"

"Why? Am I offending your nose?" Jeff asked as he stuck his head in the spacious bathroom previously owned by the dead Sanchez.

"Look," Blair gestured toward the tipped garbage can when a bottle of Armani aftershave lay partially buried by the crumpled tissues and an empty package of condoms.

"And?" Jeff asked with an exaggerated tone. Blair reached across the man and pulled open the medicine cabinet where a half full bottle of Parisian's Pure Indulgence aftershave sat on the third shelf. Jeff raised one eyebrow in a comical expression.

"Und ver-ry interesting," he said in a fake accent that was half Schultz from Hogan's Heroes and half bad New York gangster. Blair rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, well I don't think Sanchez lived here alone," Blair said as he put the silver trash container on the counter.

"Good catch, Frizz. Let's bag the Armani crap and send it for prints," Jeff said as he wandered out of the bathroom.

Blair headed for the kitchen. Opening the cupboards, he found chips and salsa sitting next to granola bars. Oh yeah, Sanchez hadn't lived here alone. Blair collected several boxes on the table for the criminologists to dust. Wandering up to the bedroom, Blair opened the closet. Unsurprisingly, the clothes stood spread out on the bar evenly. Too evenly. Blair was willing to bet that someone had recently removed clothing from half of this closet and had then spread out Sanchez's clothes to make it look like he lived alone.

Walking over to the bed, Blair completely broke protocol by sitting on the bed. He was willing to bet that Collins and Sanchez had been family, but in the face of a police investigation, Collins had fled. Now the only question was whether it was a murderer's guilt or fear of homophobia that had driven Collins from the home he had obviously shared with his lover.

025. STRANGERS.

Family filled the rows closest to the coffin with professors taking the middle rows, and crying students gathered near the back. Collins was in back with the students, and Blair could see three female students huddled around him protectively. Sanchez's three brothers sat near the front, the youngest flinching at every audible sob.

Blair listened as one family member after another rose to go to the microphone and talk about the murdered professor. His father spoke of a child who had loved books and worked to pay his own way through college. His older brother talked about the time Sanchez spent volunteering in his community in the eighties. As Blair listened to each family member rise and speak, he realized that Sanchez was a stranger to those people who remembered the child Sanchez had once been, but who didn't seem to know the man now.

No one mentioned the Mexican dig site from the photograph Sanchez had enlarged and hung on his living room wall. None of the speakers brought up the three awards Sanchez had earned for various articles he'd published. People really didn't talk about the gay-support group that Sanchez sponsored every Wednesday, working with students identified as at risk by the student services department. And not one soul mentioned Collins who sat in the back row trembling with grief.

Blair watched the crowd as the pall bearers carried the coffin out of the chapel and out into the graveyard. Sanchez's mother wept until her husband, a solid looking man with a grey mustache had to support her. Blair had the uneasy feeling that the real Sanchez had been a stranger to these people.

Blair rubbed his hand over his now much shorter hair as he watched the family pass. The youngest brother, a quiet man in his thirties carrying the back of the coffin glared at Collins as he passed the back rows of the church. Interesting. Collins drew himself up to his full proud five foot five and glared right back. Very interesting.

The procession out to the gravesite was slow and hot and miserable with the morning sun already pounding the ground and reflecting off every available hard surface: the sidewalk, the concrete benches, even the statues.

Blair tried to keep back, well aware that as the police officer investigating the crime he wasn't part of this collective grief, but he also regretted both the death of a man he was quickly coming to respect and the chasm that seemed to exist between the man he knew through his investigation and the man the family seemed to know. He couldn't help find it sad when people who loved each other were reduced to being mere strangers.

026. TEAMMATES.

A door popped open at random, and Blair used a precious half second to determine whether it was hostile or friendly before putting a bullet in the cardboard target.

Roth had been working with him, coming out to the range just to help Blair after hours when all the cadets were at home, tucked in their beds. Blair snorted. Yeah, right. The cadets were probably our drinking and getting arrested themselves, Blair thought as he lined up on another target that came out of a door.

Blair watched as the picture of the child with a water gun disappeared unharmed. He and Roth had worked the range until Blair trusted himself with the gun, and even felt confident. Of course it helped that Roth insisted that he'd rather have a detective with a slower score and no accidental hits than the detective with the best score in the department.

Well, Blair was nowhere near the best in the department if Russo's curses were anything to go by. Nope, at this rate, the two-five was going to easily win the bet, but Blair refused to hurry his pace as hereached the building and cleared the first room. A cardboard face appeared in the empty window frame, and Blair trained his gun on it for a brief second before the click behind him reminded him he hadn't cleared the closet yet.

Blair slammed his back to the wall near the window and lined his weapon up with the closet. A cardboard picture of a kind older gentleman appeared, shotgun in hand. Blair pulled the trigger with the same regret he always felt.

Blair understood. To help people and stop the bad guys, a person simply had to have the power to stop those who wouldn't be stopped any other way.

Pushed away from the wall, Blair identified the cardboard face of a child before moving to the second room. Three more faces, two hostile, one hostage. Blair put neat holes in two pieces of cardboard while moving around the third. One more door.

Blair came out the back door, the sun from the afternoon sky nearly blinding him as he stepped onto the gravel and rock surface of the house's "backyard." One shed and three fences to clear.

Blair suspected that the unit had well and truly lost the bet by now, and he anticipated a long afternoon of washing cars and getting verbally tortured, but he focused on the range, taking out two more paper villains and sparing three inanimate victims.

As Blair lined up and took out the last target, a horn blew and the range sergeant yelled his score through the bullhorn. Blair flinched. Oh yeah, they had totally lost the challenge. Well, no help for it... he was going to spend the afternoon washing cars over at the two-five with the rest of the unit. After that, getting back to investigating his cases would be a joy.

Blair holstered his weapon and started walking across the weedy and patchy grass to where the rest of the unit waited.

"You're washing the tires, Frizz," Russo growled unhappily.

"Whatever, man," Blair said. Russo snorted and started walking back to the parking lot. Funny, Blair had expected a lot more shit than that.

027. PARENTS.

"Captain?" Blair asked as he walked into the office and closed the door behind him. From the sound of the bellow, he wanted at least a little privacy for this ass-chewing.

"I have a complaint here from the Sanchez family that you have, and I quote, `harassed and insulted the family on multiple occasions.' Would you care to explain this?"

"Captain, I just know Tom Sanchez killed his brother," Blair started. Roth interrupted.

"So you harass the family? Sandburg, you know better than that!"

"I'm not harassing them."

"Then why do I have this letter from the parents?"

"Because the parents don't want to admit their son was gay!" Blair didn't realize he was shouting back until the last word. He also hadn't realized that he'd leaned forward into the desk. Now he stood and took a step back in the silence that followed. "I'm just trying to get them to talk about who knew about their son's personal life. They won't talk."

"The parents aren't going to start talking by you badgering them."

"Oh, man, I know. I totally know. I just can't think of any other way to get them to start seeing the truth. The parents are providing the alibi for their son Tom, and if they would only see the truth..."

"Sometimes parents don't see the truth, sometimes they can't." Roth's voice grew suddenly more tired and softer. "Frizz, sometimes you can't solve a case, and beating your head against this wall won't help. You don't need official complaints in your file."

"And what do I tell Mr. Collins? What do I tell Sanchez's lover and real family?"

"You tell him that you're sorry, but you can't keep beating a horse that's dead, buried, and rotting away in the earth."

"They don't bury horses," Blair pointed out petulantly.

"Yeah, well they do bury careers. Let this one go, Frizz," Roth ordered. Blair fingered the edge of the vest he was wearing, the small silver beads cool in his hand.

"I--"

"Frizz, you're one of my best detectives, but you can't close every case and you can't beat yourself up for not being perfect. Let it go."

Blair stood and looked at his captain's concerned expression, and he realized that he didn't really have a choice. As long as the Sanchez's were protecting the one brother, the other would never have justice. The most he could do was have faith that the universe would balanced it all out in the end.

"Right, no more calling the Sanchez's," Blair agreed. Of course, that didn't mean he'd stop chasing other leads, but for now, he realized that he couldn't fix the world single-handedly. Blair wandered back to his desk and looked at the growing pile of files in his active box. Oh, he definitely couldn't fix the world. But at least he hadn't done as Bets suggested and relegated these people to the dead files. If he couldn't solve the crime, the least he could do would be to remember. Well, that and care.

028. CHILDREN.

Of course there was such a crowd around the school building that Blair had more than enough suspects to choose from. He decided then that he hated summer school. Arizona was too damn hot and the kids too damn cranky for summer school. Ignoring his own aggravation, Blair went over to the group with a smile on his face.

"Did you know that in Chinese mythology, the pig is one of the most revered animals, the symbol of honor and loyalty. Being born in the year of the pig is considered good luck, and many people try to marry people born under that zodiac sign because people born under the influence of the pig are so caring. Of course I was actually born under the sign of the monkey, but I can still appreciate the pig.

"In fact there are many cultures that consider pigs to be symbols of prosperity, man. Just like there are lots of cultures that consider your piercing there to be symbols of prosperity and status. Did you know there are 4,000 year old clay statues from Iran that show women of status having multiple ear piercings, and the ancient people of Mexico and China used to stretch their ears with large ear spools that would make the piercings stretch until you could get a small hand through the lobe?

"Oh man, they were really into the body modification, but I've never gone past a nipple ring, and I had to get myself good and drunk before I even managed that." Blair looked at the shocked faces gazing at him from under dyed black hair and dark Goth makeup.

"So, anyone know what kind of losers spend their weekend trying to get into school instead of trying to get out of school like all the normal kids?" Blair asked sweetly.

029. BIRTH.

"Hey, Jim," Blair said to the dream cat. It instantly transformed into Jim as though the name had the power to force Jim back into his true form. Blair still kept his distance since he had been swept by those jaguar claws often enough that he didn't want to take the chance of waking up with his heart pounding and his fingers checking for blood.

"Blair," Jim said, and the pain and wariness in Jim's eyes was enough to make Blair take a step backwards. The emotional guards were all up, and Blair wondered why he conjured angry Jim into his dreams when he really just wanted to lose himself in some happy memory. Better yet, some happy fantasy of things that never ever would have happened in real life.

"Still pissed, huh?" Blair asked, deciding to go along with his subconscious which constantly insisted that he deal with this version of Jim.

"You walked out," Jim accused him.

"You walked out first. Oh man, I need to wake up. I am so not prepared to having this argument with my own psyche." Jim stood silent, watching him, and Blair felt a shiver travel his backbone as Jim transformed into the cat again. Right, avoid the claws. Obviously that wasn't an issue because the cat turned tail and then the jungle returned, trees blocking his view of the Jim cat.

"Oh man, do you ever wish we could just start over? I am so fucking tired of missing you," Blair whispered to the blue air. "I just want a fresh start, a way to erase all this crap and have my best friend back again. I..." Blair's voice cracked. "I wish there were some sort of rebirth or cleansing ceremony that would cancel out the past." Only silence answered Blair, and he woke suddenly. Looking at the clock, Blair decided to give up on sleep and go take a morning run. Maybe watching the sun rise would clear the feeling of anticipation that hung in the air.

030. DEATH.

"Yeah, yeah. I'm going to be cop of the year," Blair answered as he guided her toward the squad room. She might be a witness, but her fake psychic routine and her faker accent were both starting to bother him. Of course all the others had abandoned him to the old woman long ago. Cowards.

"Let's talk about the man you saw on the street," Blair tried as he sat her down next to his desk and brought out his tape recorder. He quickly spoke his name, the date and the location of the interview into the machine before setting it on the desk where it would catch Madame Zelanski's every word.

"The man is the five of cups... no moving on to the six... too much time in the four of cups." Madame Zelanski waved her hand dismissively as though she had finished. "But you... I would have you draw a card for yourself." Blair struggled to remember his mother's tarot period. He'd been young enough that he had sat at her feet as she learned their meanings and explained how the cards allowed the universe to speak to the individual.

"Five of cups," Blair said, ignoring the woman's comments about him. "You mean pain or loss? What did he look like to make you say that?"

"Ah, the young cub knows the cards. Do you hear the universe whisper its secrets?" she instantly asked in a low, reverent voice.

"Not lately," Blair said as he struggled to not lose patience, it wouldn't help anyone if he threw her in a cell for obstructing justice. "I just need some facts from this physical reality," he tried this time.

"There is no physical reality. The man with blood on his hands thought there was, but the four of cups tricked him," she said as she leaned forward conspiratorially. However, her accent was starting to slip. It kinda ruined the whole mystical routine, Blair thought.

"The four of cups, is that one pleasure?" Blair asked.

"Pleasure in excess or pleasure about to be lost," she agreed.

"Okay, let's try it this way. Pretend that I'm someone who doesn't believe in the tarot at all and tell me what you saw with your eyes that a non-believer could see," Blair tried. The woman looked at him with her head cocked to one side and a thoughtful expression.

"I'll make a deal with you," she wheedled.

"What sort of deal?" Blair needed her statement, but the tape recorder had caught the offer and now Blair wanted all the cards on the table, so to speak. If she wanted money, he had to turn that over to Roth.

"Pull a card," she demanded triumphantly as she held out a deck.

"Oh man, that's it?" The woman nodded once. "Deal. You tell me what mere mortal eyes would have seen and I will pull a card."

"His eyes were large and black, his steps unsteady from the drugs he had taken," Madam Zelanski started. Blair shifted the tape recorder close to her and flipped open a notepad so that he could take a few notes of his own. It helped him think.

In the end, the woman had seen even more than anyone had expected. Blair smiled as he looked down at the tape recorder with the wealth of details about the killer and the victim. Say what you want about the old woman, she had sharp eyes. And now those eyes were focused right on him as one fat finger tapped the top of a deck of tarot cards she had reverently placed on his desk. Blair glanced up at Bets and Maria who had shown up near the end of the interview.

Well he had made a deal. He picked up about a third of the deck and took a card. Pushing the rest of the deck to one side, he flipped his card face up on the corner of his desk.

"Ah!" Madam Zelanski exclaimed enthusiastically. "Death! Oh how exciting. I knew I could smell fate clinging to you like the scent of a rose lingering on the petals." Blair temporarily lost his train of thought as he heard Bets' snort of laughter.

"Yes, well let's get your statement typed up and then you can sign it," Blair said with a glare toward his friend.

"Doesn't it bother you?" Maria asked hours later long after Madam Zelanski with her fake accent and long skirts had been sent back home with a uniformed patrol.

"What?"

"That," Maria gestured toward the card that still lay on his desk, a skeletal hand holding a scythe and a skull grinning out from a hood. "It's like she cursed you or something."

"Oh man, no way. The death card is just about change. It means a person is about to move on to a new level or find a new level of consciousness. I mean, we all fear death, but really what we fear is the unknown. That just means I'm about to walk into the unknown," Blair explained. "Well, it would if I believed in that stuff," he amended himself when he caught Bets' amused expression.

"So, it's nothing bad?" Maria asked.

"Um, change can be good or bad," Blair explained. "I just figure I've seen enough major life changes that I know how to roll with the punches." Maria nodded and moved back to her desk while Blair considered just how terrifyingly true that statement actually was. Three months of getting settled, and if one counterfeit gypsy could be believed, life was about to change again. He couldn't decide if it was anxiety or just plain weariness that he felt at the thought.

031. SUNRISE.

The haloed mountain glowed in the dusky air of pre-dawn, and Blair took a deep breath of the freshest air of the day. For the hundredth time he wondered why he hadn't settled farther away from the city with it pollution and crime, but he had grown used to both during his time in Cascade.

As the harsh rays of the sun finally slid up and over the mountain, Blair resumed his jog, anxious to get back down off the mountain before the brutal heat started rippling the air. He had started his ritual run as a way to escape the dreams and the guilt, and now he found he couldn't concentrate on his work without it.

Running until his legs trembled and his lungs ached was the best way to forget the screams of the panther that chased him in his dreams. Running. He'd gotten good at that. He thought he'd given up that skill when he'd met his holy grail, but time had shown that nothing learned is ever unlearned. He should have remembered that from his psychology classes.

Blair made a detour to avoid the spot where he'd seen a rattlesnake the day before. The thing was probably long gone now, but no use taking any chances. His foot slipped on some loose rock for a second, but he recovered his balance and continued his trot down the path.

Blair walked into the station with his gym bag of dirty clothes flung over his arm since he didn't have a locker yet.

"Sandburg," a voice bellowed.

"Cap?" Blair asked as he came in the office and took a seat across from the huge metal desk overflowing with files.

"Got a detective from Cascade comin' down. Seems like one of their serial killers might be heading our way, and since that's your old precinct..." Roth let his words trail off, but Blair knew his captain still wondered why Blair had left. When Roth called Simon for a recommendation, Simon had only good words, but a cop normally doesn't just leave the men he's learned to trust at his back just for a change of weather.

"Who's coming?" Blair asked with false indifference.

"More like who's here," Roth corrected with a nod out toward the bullpen. With his heart in his mouth, Blair turned to see Jim standing in the middle of the sea of desks. "Banks said you two used to be partners."

"Yeah," Blair confirmed as he stood up and headed for the door. The question now was whether Jim was here or whether it was the Jim-shaped clone that had taken Jim's place after the news conference.

"Jim," Blair offered as he closed the distance between them.

"Blair," Jim offered back, and Blair stopped dead in tracks. Okay, that would be Jim-shaped clone. To Jim he was Chief or Romeo or Darwin or Genius or just 'Sandburg.' Only the clone called him 'Blair' in that perfectly reasonable tone that suggested that he had no emotions.

"So, you brought the file?" Roth asked, and Jim gave a nod as he passed Blair without even a touch on the arm or handshake. Blair closed his eyes for a moment before he followed Jim into his captain's office.

An hour later, Blair's in-box had grown by one file, and he sat at his desk with Jim uncomfortably perched on the seat normally reserved for witnesses or guests. Jim didn't fit either category. However after looking at the case file, Blair understood why Simon had sent Jim. This guy needed to be caught or no one was going to be safe.

"I didn't expect," Jim waved a hand toward the desk and files.

"What? For me to get on with my life?" Blair snapped. He knew he was only making things worse, but it's not like it was going to make any difference now. Three months of silence had made Jim's position pretty damn clear, and from his conversations with Simon, Blair knew that Jim was handling the senses just fine. Funny, he'd had some fantasy where Jim needed him as guide, but he had processed through that and realized he didn't want Jim or the Jim-clone tethered to him by the senses.

"I didn't expect you to be a detective," Jim shot back, and Blair was caught off-guard by an honest answer. Jim usually steered the conversation away from the truth when it came to any subject related to the aftermath.

"I'm good with clues, I like helping people, and I get the whole adrenaline rush," Blair shrugged. "I wouldn't want to walk a beat, but this," Blair waved toward the bullpen as he tried to decide how to end that sentence. "It's where I can do the most good," Blair finally finished.

"You cut your hair." Jim said in a strange non-sequitur, and Blair blinked twice before he could find an answer for that.

"Oh man, if you lived in 115 degree heat, you'd understand why." For some reason, Blair suddenly felt self conscious about his short curls and he ran his fingers through them. "So, let's go hit a few places," Blair suggested as he picked up the brown messenger bag that had taken the place of his ubiquitous backpack. "We should probably start down on Van Buren, hit a few of the less upscale bars."

"The dives," Jim clarified.

"Oh yeah, there are places down there the rats won't be seen dead in," Blair said with a half-laugh before the smile died on his face. God, it was just so damn easy to fall back into the same old pattern, but in the old pattern, Jim's hand would have been on his back or his shoulder, and this Jim just stood carefully outside Blair' personal space. Right, time for work.

032. SUNSET.

All the way home, Blair's thoughts revolved around what they had once shared, the companionship and trust and gentle touches. He'd watched the sun slipping out of the sky and felt more alone than he had when he'd been alone. As he watched the brilliant oranges and reds streak across the cloudless sky, he supposed it was like a person who never saw a desert sunset not knowing what they were missing. But he'd had four years of learning to love that sunset, and now he had to give it up.

He knew now what it meant to have and lose a best friend. He'd never had another person inside his life the way Jim had been, and when Jim emotionally stepped back out of his life, he hadn't known what to do. He'd tried meditating, talking, screaming, falling silent. Nothing made any difference to the Jim-shaped person living in the loft. That's when he'd quit Major Crimes. Living with the Jim-sized reminder of a Jim he'd lost was more than he had the strength to endure.

033. TOO MUCH.

Now he attacked the mountain with all the frustrated desires the dreams always inspired. The dreams were a reminder that he and Jim had once been close spiritually and emotionally. Blair had even at one point hoped that the relationship might go a little farther; Burton had certainly included certain crude innuendo about the Sentinel and his companion. But instead of time pulling them together, they had pulled apart at the seams until Blair felt himself starting to fray at the edges. And now Jim had appeared to start pulling at the loose threads of his soul, to remind him that he had utterly failed as Jim's Guide and Shaman.

Blair drove his legs faster until the loose rock rattled off the trail in his wake. How dare Jim show up now when he was starting to get his life back together. He was making a difference in people's lives, supporting them through difficult times and helping them find closure even when he couldn't catch a suspect. Blair panted hard for air as he turned the final bend to the spot where he would watch the sunrise. As he cleared the boulder, he stopped short.

"Jim," he nearly whispered into the dark air. With only wisps of light dancing around the mountain, he couldn't see the features clearly, but Jim's large frame and square shoulders were unmistakable. He turned around, and Blair still couldn't see his face.

"Blair," he said softly, and Blair flinched at one more piece of evidence this wasn't his Jim.

"Oh hey, what are you doing up here?" Blair closed the final few yards walking, suddenly unsure about his footing.

"Captain Roth said I might catch you up here."

"Oh. Right." Blair didn't have anything else to say, so he leaned back against his rock and waited for sunrise as he tried to catch his breath. Many mornings he shared the mountain with hikers and dog walkers and joggers, but with Jim standing there looking at him, for the first time, Blair felt like his sacred space had been violated. He started considering other spots where he could have his morning meditation.

"I didn't think you'd stay on the force," Jim finally offered after an eternity of silence as the sun framed the mountain in pink.

"I'm good at the work," Blair pointed out as he cocked his head and really looked at Jim. This was twice that Jim had brought up his job, and Blair could feel something moving right under the surface. He thought he knew, but he had made so many mistakes in trying to understand Jim that he wasn't willing to go into that minefield again.

Jim turned and watched the sunrise without any further comment.

"So, is that why you came all the way up here?" Blair asked cautiously. Jim remained silent and motionless in the growing light. In the past, Blair would have pushed, but he had lost that right the day Jim came home to find Blair busily packing everything he owned. Jim hadn't even commented. He had opened the refrigerator, grabbed a beer, and headed up to his bedroom. Blair had finished packing with his eyes stinging, but in the end, he had chosen to leave Jim.

"Megan told me I'm an asshole," Jim finally offered, and Blair couldn't contain a snort of laughter. He could even imagine the tone of voice the Aussie would have used.

"She did, huh?" Blair answered even though he had more than once fantasized about turning to stone and refusing to talk to Jim the way Jim had once frozen him out. However, when push came to shove, he couldn't fake emotional constipation as well as Jim could live it.

"She told me that I was so busy trying to make sure you had choices that I didn't give you the choice to stay." Jim had turned so that the sun light illuminated half his face, and Blair was struck again by the man's stunning beauty. Jim stopped but he looked as if he was searching for words so for once Blair just shut up and waited.

"She said I was a drongo, and I'm guessing from the context that isn't good," Jim finished.

"Oh man, you really got the Megan Special."

"Yeah."

"You agree with any of it?"

"Some." Jim's honesty shocked Blair. As long as he'd known the man, Jim avoided any sort of emotional admission of blame; Blair had learned to accept an oil change on the Corvair as an apology from Jim.

"We both screwed up," Blair admitted as he squinted and turned to face the trail. The bright disk of the sun cleared the edge of the mountain so that the rays of light now created long shadows that fell across the mountains. Blair eyed the trail as he considered just walking away. He knew if he did, Jim would turn back into Jim-clone and he wouldn't ever have to deal with this again. "I made mistakes," Blair said instead.

"Chief, can't we go back to being friends." Jim's voice sounded strange, husky, and Blair turned to see an expression of pain that was completely unfamiliar on Jim's face. It came close to the expression when Danny Choi had died in Jim's arms.

"Oh man, don't do this now. You'll open up and drag me back in and then you'll shut me out the minute I get close to any of those Ellison sore spots."

"Chief..."

"I can't Jim." Blair struggled to control the panic attack that he could feel rising; this was just all too much. "I can't walk this damn tightrope where we're okay as long as no one says anything important."

"I love you." Jim blurted the words out in a rush, making them sound like one, long jumbled word. For his part, Blair stood with his mouth open struggling to even decipher that series of vowels and consonants. After several minutes, Jim turned his back and started walking back down the trail."

"No, no, no, no, no. You do not get to say something like that and walk away," Blair practically screamed as he started after his one-time partner.

"You obviously don't feel the same way, Blair. Let's just work the case and get out of each other's lives."

"Don't tell me what I do or don't feel, James Ellison. I loved you for so damn long that I couldn't see straight. I put up with your house rules and your bad moods and your fucking silence for so long that I started questioning my own sanity. But then you'd touch me or I'd wake up in the hospital with you watching over me or you'd change the fucking oil in the car, and I'd tell myself that you loved me and that made it okay."

"I did love you, do love you," Jim interrupted, "too damn much to let you do this," he whispered to the desert air, but Jim didn't turn around and the trail was narrow enough at this point that Blair couldn't stand at his side. Instead Blair reached out and put a hand on Jim's broad back.

"Why did you have to give up your whole fucking life for me?" Jim whirled at the touch, and the despair had disappeared under anger, no more like cold, deadly fury. Blair involuntarily took a step back.

"Fear-based reactions," he whispered, and Jim's belligerence vanished like a popped balloon.

"Fuck you," Jim declared tiredly before starting down the trail again.

"Oh the great Sentinel of the city running away from anything that scares him. Great, man. Just great. But you brought this up and I'm not dropping it. First, I didn't give up my whole fucking life. I gave up a career in anthropology."

"Which was your whole life."

"Man, I am not so boring that my whole life fits into one slot. I loved the expeditions and the excitement, but I get that now. Instead of putting together clues on a two-thousand year old puzzle that only a handful of people will read about in some academic journal, I'm putting clues together in a way that makes a difference in people's lives. And you know full well that I loved the excitement of police work. Even when I had guys shooting at me, I felt jazzed--alive."

"Damn it." Jim slapped his hand against a rock and stopped on the trail so suddenly that Blair actually did bump into him. "I shouldn't have pulled you into this life. You should be safe on some expedition."

"Right, would that be safe as in the Kombai tree people trying to stick spears in me or safe as in getting caught in a civil war in Eritrea?"

"Blair," Jim's frustrated tone didn't stop Blair for a second.

"But you're so busy thinking that you have all the power over me, that you can make me do things I don't want to do, that I would let you trap me in a life I didn't want. News flash James Joseph Ellison: I speak up when I'm not happy. If I didn't want to be a cop I would have said so right in the middle of the station. I don't keep everything bottled up until I hate myself. I'm not fucking you." Blair stopped. Oh god, he had never intended to let that much out, but now the words hung heavily in the air. Jim's back trembled as though an electrical current had run through it, but other than that he stood motionless, blocking the trail and staring off into the distance. Blair thought he might have even zoned.

"Jim, just fol..." Blair stopped as Jim started down the mountain without a word in response. Great. It was just like old times. Blair silently followed with the healing wound in his soul bleeding profusely.

Blair typed notes into his laptop, holding the computer firmly as Jim took a left turn far more aggressively than he had to. It was amazing how well Jim spoke with actions. Right now the white knuckles on the steering wheel and the aggressive driving screamed "angry" or maybe "betrayed." Jim had obviously come to make peace, and Blair had refused to go along with the Ellison sweep it under the carpet method of dealing with emotions.

As the truck merged with the traffic on I-17, Blair started typing again. He could have told Jim that people referred to this highway as the I-17 Parking Lot, but he hadn't been asked, and Jim was navigating from a map. Blair silently hoped he choked on the thing. Pulling out a cell phone, Blair started making calls on his latest rape case: the trace evidence lab, the hospital where she had been admitted, the girl's parents, and even a couple of witnesses who had been at the party.

With the car limited to 30 miles an hour, he had time to gather enough to convince him that he had four or five favorite suspects. He typed names into the computer and used his wireless connection to pull up records. Three were clean, college boys at the university. One had a petty theft arrest. The last had been convicted of aggravated assault. Blair pulled up that record, and read about how the suspect had nearly beaten a man to death with a stool. Blair put that man on the bottom of his mental list. If someone with that much trouble controlling his aggression had attacked the girl, she'd be in the morgue, not the hospital. Blair's money was on one of the three college boys: studs attracted by ASU "party school" reputation. That would match the injuries to the girl which seemed more accidental than intentionally abuse.

"Working a case?" Jim asked, the first time since the mountain the man had said more than two words at a time.

"Yeah. Rape case," Blair answered as he scrolled through the public records he could access on the boys. He would visit them later.

"Hate those cases." Jim said, and Blair was struck by the fact that Jim was trying to make small talk and that Jim really didn't know how to talk to Blair any more, hence the short, choppy sentences offered in clipped tones.

"Yeah, man. There was a felon at the party, but my money is on the three college boys who were circling her all night."

"Not the felon?"

"Definitely. The felon would have seriously messed her up if his record means anything, but her injuries where sustained from her clothes being ripped from her and a fall where the guy landed on top of her. That sort of stupidity screams drunk college guy."

"No description?"

"Oh man, I wish. He caught her outside after the party, and the streetlight was broken. She didn't see anything except the ground."

"Tough case to make." Blair resisted cheering Jim on as the man went from two and three word sentences to a whole four words.

"Yeah," he agreed quietly instead.

"Want me to take a look?" Jim's voice was uncertain, as though he was breaking some great taboo to even make the suggestion, and Blair ran through a number of possible reasons, none of which actually made any sense to him.

"I'd love it. I know I don't have the experience you have," he answered, careful not to seem too enthusiastic while still letting his gratitude show. Oh yeah, he was falling back into old patterns right on schedule.

"No problem, Chief." Jim navigated onto the main roads as he headed for the sleaze strip they had worked yesterday. If their murderer followed pattern, he would spend several days working himself up in some cheap strip bar before making a kill. "Do you really like..." Jim waved a hand toward the laptop as though he had run out of words.

"The rapes, no," Blair said dryly as he rolled his eyes at Jim's inability to talk. "Helping catch the rapists, hell yes. Making people believe that someone cares, oh hell yes. I'm good at my job even if I'm not the best."

"You have good instincts, you'll become the best," Jim said confidently, and Blair could only blink in surprise as Jim pulled into a parking space next to the Red Cock bar where a neon Rooster blinked merrily. Blair wondered how drunk someone had to be before that joke seemed funny. His thoughts were completely derailed as he came around the car with his messenger bag slung over one shoulder, and Jim's hand found the indentation on the small of his back and rested there comfortably as if the past year with its betrayals and misunderstandings hadn't happened.

034. NOT ENOUGH.

Today had seen the return of the real Jim who touched Blair until several of the beat cops were whispering rumors that would probably haunt Blair long after Jim went home. It felt so damn right, but it wasn't enough. Blair wasn't sure how he was going to go back to living a life of 'not enough' after tasting just a little of their friendship for one last time. However, Blair now remembered that the real Jim could be just as much of a closed mouthed bastard as the Jim-clone, just for different reasons. So Blair sat at his desk and typed up the report about finding the suspect in the Red Cock bar.

Usually Blair got a spike of adrenaline every time he caught a suspect, but as he typed words into his computer, he just felt tired. The case was over. Jim still wasn't talking to him. And somehow knowing Jim was back to the friend who hovered over him and rolled his eyes and always found some reason to touch him didn't make him feel any better. Leaving the Jim-clone had nearly killed him, but knowing that the real Jim was about to leave him made things even worse. He wondered if a person could die from a wounded soul because his was quickly bleeding out, and Blair was ready to declare a soul-death by exsanguination.

"Hey, Chief. Got the report done?" Jim asked cheerfully, and Blair felt an overwhelming urge to hit the man with his computer. Problem was Ellison had such a thick skull, he'd probably just break his laptop.

"Almost. Have to attach a 94-10 since I had a non-Phoenix ride along on the bust." Blair's fingers paused as he considered that Jim had become the ride along. Life was funny.

"Want me to look over that rape case?" Jim asked, either not noticing or not commenting on Blair's phrase.

"Sure," Blair pulled a file out of his in-box and slid it over to Jim who opened it and started scanning every note, every picture, and every piece of trace evidence. "Oh here, add these," Blair said as he pulled pink copies of lab reports out of his incoming mail stack. Quickly sorting through the papers, Blair found the ones relating to the rape and handed them over. Without a comment, Jim added them to the bottom of the file and kept reading. Blair pulled out an erasable pen and wrote on a section of his desk, "Sum. add rpt. Yelson."

"You're writing on your desk, Chief."

"It's erasable. I just won't erase it until I add the new lab reports to the summary sheet for the Yelson rape file there. Can't screw up the paperwork." Blair watched as something shifted in Jim. The man slumped a little farther into the desk, his shoulders lost some tension, and Blair really wished he had some sort of user's manual that would give him a hint as to why his writing on his desk made Jim relax.

"Sandburg, Ellison" Roth boomed from his office door, and Blair pushed his computer back. 94-10's would have to take a backseat to bellowing captains. Blair only realized that the universe had reversed itself when he took lead on the way to the captain's office, Jim following behind. But then this was Blair's captain and Blair's precinct, not Jim's.

"Well Banks was certainly right about you two. Two days to catch a serial killer who's been on the loose for six months. Good job,"

"Thank you, sir," Blair smiled his appreciation for the compliment as he sank into one of the chairs in front of Roth's desk. Instead of taking the other chair, Jim went and leaned against the window. Blair narrowed his eyes at the sudden signs of tension in his Sentinel's body.

"Can't say that I wouldn't like a little more of that magic. Your paperwork came through Ellison, and I can't offer you anything now, but in two months Riller is retiring. I'll have a spot for you then. We don't have enough space in the locker room though, and Sandburg gets the next available locker, so you'll have to do without.

Blair opened his mouth several times as the significance of the words slowly sank into him. Each time, he closed his mouth without uttering any one of a hundred phrases that ran through his mind like "what the fuck?" or "have you lost your mind?" Opening his mouth again, Blair finally managed a quiet, "Could you give us a second?" Roth looked at him for several seconds before silently deciding something and nodding his head.

"Need to go yell at Tyler in records anyway," he shrugged as he stood and left the office. Blair noticed that on his way out, Roth gave the one set of open blinds a twist so that Jim and Blair would have privacy.

035. SIXTH SENSE.

"Oh man, you take the cake. Had you even considered talking to me first?"

"Talking's not my thing, and quite frankly, it's not yours either. I've never know someone who could speak so much without actually talking." Blair stopped dead as he tried to process that comment. He opened his mouth to protest but found he couldn't in good conscience.

"Yeah, I know," Blair finally said as he slumped in the chair and tried to sort through the wide range of emotions that were dodging through his brain like flashes. Talking might not be their thing, but they needed to start if they wanted to change anything. Blair took a deep breath. "Okay, I'm thrilled that you want us to work together and I'm furious that you couldn't bring yourself to talk to me and I'm fucking scared that we're just going to end up doing this whole insane push-pull thing all over again, and I just don't have the strength to keep picking myself back up after you push me away."

"I know, Chief." The familiar words and warm tone pulled at Blair's soul until a part of him didn't even care what the future held. A part of him just wanted Jim back even if it only lasted a while. Another part of him knew he couldn't let go a second time if things went bad again.

"Tell me what's changed. I can't do this again if we're going to walk the same damn path," Blair whispered.

"I kept thinking that you were unhappy, even if you didn't say it. I kept thinking that your life would be better without me," Jim said, and a part of Blair had always understood that even as he couldn't break through the barriers Jim put up to keep him away. It's why he hadn't left earlier.

"And now?" Blair asked quietly.

"I'm taking you at your word. You like police work and I didn't fuck up your life," Jim said with a shrug and then he turned to look out at the busy street. "If you don't want me here, that's okay too. I still have my job in Cascade."

A new thought suddenly crossed Blair's mind. "Cascade is your territory, man. You can't leave your tribe."

"Chief, you were always wrong on that. When I was in Peru, Incacha's tribe was my tribe. The minute you became my guide, Cascade was my home because it was your home. A guide or shaman has a territory, a Sentinel has a guide," Jim said quietly and then he turned back so that Blair could see the open vulnerability in those eyes. "All a Sentinel has is a Guide."

"Jim," Blair said softly as he felt his eyes itching with the need to cry.

"Blair, I can't..." Jim stopped, but Blair heard the words anyway. He realized that he this sixth sense that meant he could always hear what Jim left unsaid, but sometimes he just didn't listen.

"Butch and Sundance together again, huh?" Blair asked as he stood up and walked toward Jim. Large arms opened, and Blair stepped into the embrace. Jim's head rested on the top of his head, and Jim's arms trembled as they held him tightly enough that Blair took shallow breaths.

"As long as you don't try to convince me to go over a cliff," Jim whispered without loosening his hold. "Because if you do, I'll probably go along," he added in a rough voice. Blair closed his eyes and leaned into Jim's chest as tears of relief slipped past his defenses. Instead of answering with words, Blair just slipped his own arms around the small of Jim's back and held on as he realized the disaster was finally over. The storm had passed, and he was safely with his Sentinel again.

"I love you, too, man," he whispered. The arms holding him just tightened as Jim offered the only answer he knew how to give. It was more than enough.

036. SMELL.

"Oh man, sorry about that," Blair said as he hurried to open the patio doors despite the heat. He had the sliding glass door to his sun-baked patio half opened before it occurred to him that it was his apartment, sage smoke and all.

"No problem. You don't need to leave that open," Jim quickly added, and Blair realized the Jim was just as uncomfortable as he was. Suddenly Blair wondered whether this was such a good idea. He wasn't the same person and Jim was leaving his home and Blare could think of a thousand reasons why this was such a bad idea.

Blair stood with a hand still on the glad door handle, the warm summer air slowly drifting in through the screen door. He had no idea what to say next, and for someone who always had words, this was a new experience.

037. SOUND.

The sound came again, and Blair narrowed his eyes as he tried to identify it. The third time, Blair figured out that the sound was his cheap cupboard doors bouncing closed as Jim searched the cabinets. Finally the sound of metal scraping against metal as Jim extricated a pot or a fry pan. He was fixing breakfast.

Blair had missed Jim horribly for the month they had spent apart, Jim closing the loft and finishing up his cases in Major Crimes. When Jim appeared at his door asking if he could crash on the couch, it had felt familiar and right. Now though, Blair realized that for all the similarities, it wasn't the same. Now Jim was searching an unfamiliar kitchen for one of Blair's Salvation Army pots, and Blair knew that Jim was probably raising an eyebrow at the peeling Teflon.

Well, time to see if their friendship could survive Salvation Army dishes. Blair swung his legs out of bed and wandered into the kitchen as the first rays of the sun started casting a glow against the curtains hanging in front of the sliding glass door.

"You're up early, Chief," Jim said, an egg in one hand and Blair least beat up pan in his other. "I hope I didn't wake you up."

"Nah, I usually get up and take a morning run," Blair answered, rubbing his hands through his curls.

"Yeah, I guess you do now. Never saw you as the sort for a morning run."

"People change," Blair answered, suddenly feeling the distance between them like a physical force. He crossed his arms and tried to come up with something lighthearted and familiar to say.

"Oh man, Roth got a hold of your file and he's like bouncing off walls over getting you for his department." Blair's words just made Jim look at him strangely, and Blair bit his lip.

"He seems like a good man," Jim answered slowly, and again the sound of silence overpowered their ability to talk. Jim put the pan on the stove and cracked the egg. At least now the spitting of the egg white on the hot surface interrupted the quiet.

"You want some breakfast?" Jim asked.

"Sure," Blair answered, and Jim cracked more eggs, not even asked how Blair liked his eggs. Then again, Jim already knew he liked them easy over. As the eggs cooked, Blair slipped by Jim in the tiny kitchen to put bread in the toaster.

"Where are the plates?" Jim asked.

"Above the dishwasher," Blair answered as he buttered the first set of toast and Jim handed him one plate. Jim lifted two eggs from the pan and slid them onto a plate before setting it down next to Blair. Blair added the toast and watched the toaster for the second set.

"You want jam?"

"Yeah, that'd be good. Got strawberry?"

"Yep." The last set of toast popped up as Jim handed him the second plate. Blair took both plates and headed for the table as Jim opened the refrigerator.

"Bottom shelf in the door," Blair offered and Jim snagged the jar. Jim had already found the silverware drawer, and now he grabbed forks and knives as he followed Blair to the table. Dropping the mismatched silverware on the mismatched plates, the metal against the ceramic made a familiar dull ringing sound. Blair grabbed a fork and smiled as he took his first bite of Jim-cooked eggs in nearly six months. At least some of the sounds were exactly the same even if the silverware and dishes were new.

038. TOUCH.

Blair walked over and leaned against the edge of the counter as he looked at the second inventory list Jim had placed on the desk. Oh yeah, interesting was the word.

Blair felt the heat of Jim's hand resting on the middle of his back as Jim looked over his shoulder.

"Looks like someone had two sets of books," Jim said with that smile he got anytime he cracked a case.

"Which means someone has a whole lot of not-so-nice business partners," Blair said. Blair smiled back at Jim, but then Jim's face shut down, the righteous glee disappearing under an emotionless mask and the hand on his back yanked away. Blair turned around to try and understand why Jim had...

Right, the two crime scene guys stared at them across the room with shocked looks. Blair rolled his eyes at the idea that two guys couldn't touch without it being somehow sexual.

"You okay, man?" Blair asked as Jim walked to the other side of the desk with the cold efficiency of a robot.

"Yeah. Never meant to make the rumor mill here start up," Jim whispered so softly that Blair had to bite his tongue to avoid pointing out that he didn't have Sentinel hearing. Blair stopped at that thought and considered Jim's straight back and tight expression. How much had Jim heard with that Sentinel hearing of his?

"It bother you?" Blair asked.

"Me?" Jim looked up in surprise. "I don't care," he answered honestly. "I just thought you--" Jim stopped.

"Like I give a damn about their assumptions," Blair snorted as he rested one hand on Jim's broad back and the other on the desk as he looked at the second ledger.

039. TASTE

"Oh man, you are going to get seriously messed up talking about big bad Army rangers like that," Blair pointed out.

"Chief, I somehow doubt Miss Gentle would mind a little rough housing," Jim said with a hint of amusement.

"You volunteering to find out?" Miss Gentle moved forward, her wide body slinking and shimmying as she walked.

"Oh I'm vetoing anyone finding out anything other than what can go into a report," Blair said as he stepped between the two men. Chocolate Babe and Honey Girl started laughing as they leaned against the bar in their evening dresses and fake boobs.

"Our little Frizz is all possessive. I always knew he had some nice queer genes in that solid little body," Honey Girl said playfully.

"Hey, I'm here for an investigation," Blair protested, and he could feel the heat in his face as the teasing continued. When Jim's large hand rested on his shoulder, the gesture, which Jim no-doubt intended as comfort, became almost painful in its intensity. Blair swallowed around the lump that had grown in his throat. "We need information on someone who might have been stalking down here," Blair said as he concentrated on the gay bashing case they'd been assigned and not the heat from the hand that rest familiarly and comfortably on his shoulder.

"And we do always appreciate it when you're the one to... handle... our problems," Miss Gentle winked at the word handle, and Blair crossed his arms and tried to glare. It obviously failed because the transvestite laughed.

"Some guy's been making rounds, beating up transvestites pretty seriously," Jim announced in a dark and threatening tone that sent a shiver through Blair. This was the Sentinel guarding his territory.

"Oh Honey, there are always some crack heads who think our sex lives are their business. Trust me, my sex life will never be any business of theirs. Now you... you're another story all together," Miss Gentle took a final step so that she was inches from Blair, but her height meant that she was eye to eye with Jim while Blair had to look up as the two locked gazes. Okay, this wasn't awkward at all.

"Sorry, I'm already taken," Jim said seriously as he stood at Blair's back. Blair had to admire the man's ability to lie well because Miss Gentle stared for a few more seconds before shrugging and backing off.

"Can't blame a girl for trying," she sniffed. "But I have to say I admire your taste in men."

Blair blushed even harder as Miss Gentle's look made it clear who she thought Jim meant. Blair opened his mouth to protest, but Jim's hand on his shoulder tightened, and Blair got the message.

"Can we just talk about the case please?" Blair pleaded without correcting the mistake.

"For you, anything." Miss Gentle said as she waved them over toward the bar where her two friends were finishing up counting the day's receipts.

040. SIGHT.

"Something interesting out there?" Jim asked as he came up behind Blair on the small patio.

"Oh man, those mountains. They're beautiful," Blair said as he watched the late sun set the distant slopes on fire with red and orange.

Jim didn't answer, he just leaned on the railing, a beer bottle in one hand, as he looked at the distant mountains beside Blair.

"How far can you see?" Blair asked curiously.

"Haven't tried." Jim said before falling silent, but the look of concentration on Jim's face told Blair that the Sentinel was trying now. Blair laid his hand on Jim's arm and waited.

"Can see cars driving the road up the lower slope, but I can't see make or model, just a hint of color on a moving form and the dotted green plants against the rock," Jim finally answered. Blair gazed at the distant, featureless feature with his mouth literally hanging open.

"You can see that? Oh man, that must be twenty miles away. That's--" Blair couldn't even come up with a word that matched his shock and excitement.

"Yeah, can always see farther when you're here," Jim said as he turned to go back in. The autumn air didn't have the brutal heat of summer, but Jim still preferred the air conditioning to the ninety degree weather.

"Really?" Blair asked. He followed Jim, but the expression on Jim's face made it clear that Jim didn't intend to discuss this any more.

"Long day today, you want to camp out in the guest room?" Jim asked as he tossed his beer bottle in the garbage under the sink.

"Sure," Blair said gratefully. He really didn't want to drive back to his apartment when every muscle in his body ached from chasing that damn gay-basher over the back fences of Fillmore Street.

"Sheets are in the closet," Jim said as he nodded toward the hall that led to the main bathroom.

"Thanks, man." Blair got up to get the sheets when he caught Jim's eye. The Sentinel's eyes were large and dark, the pupils dilated the way they did when Jim was trying to see something distant, only Jim was looking right at him with a strange expression. "You okay, man?" Blair asked.

"Fine," Jim answered as he came over to the couch, their shoulders brushing as Jim went to the couch and dropped down at the same time he hit the remote for the television. Blair watched Jim watch television for a good minute before he turned to go make the bed in the guest room. Some days he just didn't understand his Sentinel.

041. SHAPES.

"I don't think so," Jim answered in that dry voice that only Blair recognized as his amused tone.

"Come on, he was my regular partner before he was yours. Besides, I have this weird assed case, where my main eyewitness is an absolute loon who thinks aliens have been experimenting on his intestines." Jeff's voice now took on a petulant whine.

"Not going to happen." Jim's words made Blair smile. Rafe or Brown or Megan knew that Blair was Jim's primary partner and would never challenge that, but when he and Jim had come back from a routine call, Jeff had made the made the mistake of asking Blair to go along on his call without even acknowledging Jim.

Jim had gone silent and stone-faced, and Blair knew that Jim expected him to leave with Jeff, especially since the whole case was weird-assed. For one second, Blair considered turning around and leaving Jim with the paperwork while he chased this new case, but something in Jim's face stopped him. Hell, he knew the something that stopped him; it was the way the jaw muscle flexed and popped.

For weeks, Jim had remained painfully neutral on every topic, and now Jim was showing a clear desire, and the desire was to have Blair stay with him. Blair was man enough to admit that he was more than a little complimented. So Blair had deferred to his partner, and Jim had quickly fallen back into the old patterns. Blair was his partner and no one was taking Blair out of the station except him. Blair suspected that he should have been offended, but it was actually nice to see the old possessive Jim back in control.

"What? You think I can't take you?" Jeff asked in a tone that was only half playful, and even Blair gave the man a strange look at that one.

"I know you can't take me," Jim commented in this time he actually gave a small laugh.

"Guys, come on, don't be like this," Blair complained as Jeff's face took on the sharp defensive expression that the man so often wore around Captain Roth. Jeff opened his mouth to continue the exchange, but then Jim physically stepped back and Jeff closed his mouth, and Blair thought the moment had passed. Blair thought wrong.

"Jeff may not be able to take you, but I'm willing to lay odds that I can," Russo chimed in, from his side of the room. Blair watched as Russo pushed his chair back and stood, straightening his jacket over his wide shoulders in a rather amusing dominance display.

Jim looked over at the second detective, and Blair could tell from the relaxed slope of Jim's shoulders and the amused grin that Jim didn't feel intimidated at all. Unfortunately, Jim's amusement only seemed to annoy Russo even more.

"Unless you have a whole lot of friends around the corner that I don't know about, I know I can take you," Jim commented as he crossed his arms over his chest.

"Big talk from the new guy," Russo said darkly as he crossed his arms over his own chest and glared. What Russo didn't take into consideration was that Jim's glare was twice as lethal.

"You know, my gym has a boxing ring, we could settle this very quickly." Russo pushed his lower lip out with his tongue in an expression that Blair had learned meant that the man was about two seconds from shoving a cuffed suspect face-first into the nearest wall. The man had been challenging Jim for so long that Blair should have known it had to come to a head at some point. For weeks, Jim had stepped aside for Russo as Russo physically shoved past him at the station. Jim had ignored muttered insults that the sentinel could clearly hear. For weeks, Jim had been building up his own frustration, and now that the actual challenge had been issued, Jim's face lost all playfulness.

Blair opened his mouth to suggest just how foolish that would be, but then again, he didn't think Russo would listen to him in the first place. Instead he just kept his mouth shut and watched the most blatant display of posturing he'd seen since he was sent out to study the behavior of adolescent chimpanzees in the wild. He was caught somewhere between fascination and amusement and horror that this was about to get out of hand. Of course he wasn't going to compare them to chimps out loud. He didn't think they would actually kill him, but he'd been wrong before.

So instead he moved to the side of the bullpen where he could watch Jim and Russo glare at each other viciously while Jeff stood with his hands on his hips in frustration at being ignored by the two larger men. Of course, it could be worse. Jim certainly had more immediate ways to prove his physical superiority, and no one would be actually hurt by a small boxing match. Hopefully.... Maybe. Blair looked from one to the other as he tried to judge just why Jeff's pestering had made the two men react so strongly.

"I suppose I can use the exercise," Jim countered quietly. Quiet Jim was dangerous Jim, but only Blair knew that.

"Oh man, you two did not just make a date to be beat the shit out of each other, did you?" Blair interrupted since this little contest over who was in better shape was starting to get out of hand.

"Oh for God's sake just flip a coin or something." Bets complained loudly from the other side of the room where she sat at her desk with narrowed eyes frowning at the whole room. "I swear to god I am so sick of dealing with men and their egos that there are days I just want to spit. If you both wanna work with Frizz, then flip a coin or something, but from where I sit, I don't really give a shit which one of you is in better shape." Bets glared until Russo and Jim both lowered their arms and dropped the aggressive body language. "I think the whole point of this job is to work together against the criminals, not to beat each other up every other day try to prove who has the bigger cock."

Bets immediately went back to her paperwork, and Blair could see the shock on Jim's face as he opened his mouth to shoot a comment right back to her. But then Russo turned his back and wandered to his desk, and Jeff gave up on the idea of getting Blair's help with his recalcitrant witness and snorted his frustration before leaving.

Blair wasn't sure whether it was that the other men had backed down so quickly to Bets or whether it was that Jim simply respected the fact that he was on her territory, but Jim closed his mouth without saying a word. Jim turned and went back to his desk, a large hand lingering on Blair's arm for a moment at he passed.

Blair really needed to get together with Bets and figure out how she managed to get the toughest man he'd ever met to back down without a fight. With scary superpowers like that, it didn't even matter who was in better shape.

042. TRIANGLE

Jim's jaw muscle twitched again at the FBI agents as he thumped the map in the middle of the table with his thumb.

"Any suspect has multiple escape routes," Jim said in a tight, controlled and barely human growl.

"This is the best vantage to watch the drop-off point without risking being seen. We'll have agents at every escape route," the older of the two agents insisted, and from the way his lips tightened to a thin line, Blair guessed that the man wasn't far behind Jim in sheer frustration. The second agent leaned back in her chair and just glared at Jim.

"They're too far away."

"If we get any closer we're going to scare the kidnappers away," the second agent responded quickly.

"I'll be a lot happier with being that far away if we actually put money in the drop," Jim now stood up and crossed his arms. "If we lose the kidnappers, they're going to be left with a bag full of newspapers and one hell of a bad attitude. I understand not requisitioning real funds for this, but since we don't have funds we need to make sure that there's no chance of the kidnappers walking away from this drop." Jim struggled to make his point through his anger, Blair could see that in every muscle of Jim's body. He gave Jim credit for making it this far without cursing someone out.

"The girl is probably dead now," the agent pointed out and Jim's jaw muscle twitched again. Blair could imagine just how much self-control Jim using to keep from hitting the man. Now Bets had a different approach. She was just looking at the agent like he was some sort of bug that had crawled in the room and gone belly up and died with its legs kicking in the air. The agent didn't seem particularly impressed with either of them.

Look, you people are part of a community-based program; I appreciate the fact that this kind of unit works when you're dealing with college pranks and local crime. However, this is a major crime and your people have more experience in dealing with vandalism and drunk college students passing out in the road than any real crime."

The agent directed his words towards Roth, who sat at the end of the table frowning. Blair was just happy that no one considered him alpha dog enough to actually attack because it was getting a little tense.

Even Blair was having trouble telling who backed who. The alliances were shifting fast with Bets occasionally siding with Jim against the FBI agent, leaving Roth spluttering. Other times, Bets seemed to side more with Roth, especially when the agent started attacking the unit. And right now Bets was clearly siding with Roth, physically sliding her chair closer to the Captain as she scowled at the two agents. Jim opened his mouth to continue his attack, and Bets sent her death glare over to him.

Jim sat back and clenched his teeth while Blair just tried focusing on the ugly pattern of green and black dots on the carpeting. Blair had thought it was uncomfortable back in Cascade when it was the feds against the department, but this department versus department versus feds was even more fun. Hell he could get a whole slew of dissertations out of the social behavior he was observing in this room.

Roth was the next one to break the silence. "This program has worked for a long time, and we deal with homicides, rapes and narcotics as well as those drunken college boys and vandalism. So don't go talking about my people when you haven't seen our stats. We have some of the best statistics in the unit."

"I assume you mean after you had three of your officers removed for accepting bribes and illegal activities." The older agent's sarcastic and snide tone made his opinion of the units entirely clear. Now it was time for Roth to clench his job tightly enough that the jaw muscle popped. Blair figured that in this one room alone, there was at least $5,000 worth of dental repairs to be had. Once again Jim leapt into the battle.

"None of this is getting us anywhere with this. I'm telling you right now I've seen dozens of drops, and that Parks Service building is not a good vantage point," Jim interrupted the pissing contest. Or rather he shifted the pissing contest back to the original source of the piss, which was the kidnapping case they were all trying to work together.

"And I'm telling you we're not getting any closer than that," the older agents insisted darkly. Blair shot a curious glance over to Jim, and Blair recognized that expression all too well. The great Sentinel of Phoenix was not going to let this drop. Jim pushed his chair back as he stood.

"If you're not interested in my expertise than I really don't know what I'm doing here," Jim snapped as he started towards the door, and Blair quickly stood to follow despite the incredulous looks of both Roth and Bets. Jim was the only one not surprised as he held the door open for Blair before slamming it soundly. Of course, why should Jim be surprised? Only Jim knew that Blair was his guide. Blair realized that no matter how much he loved being a cop in this department, being a cop didn't define who he was. It didn't define him any more than being an anthropologist had defined him. The fact is his first job would always be Jim's guide.

"Chief, if they keep their agents that far away, there is not going to be time to respond when something blows up in their face."

"Oh man, I assume we're assuming that something is going to blow up in their face?"

"Doesn't it always?"

"There is that," Blair admitted

"Well I'm not about to let a young woman die because that man has his head so far up his ass he can't listen to good advice," Jim snapped as they got in the elevator. Blair couldn't argue with that logic.

"So what are we going to do?"

"This isn't a "we" thing, Junior. If something goes wrong, we don't have Simon to cover our asses. If something goes wrong, this could ruin our careers. So before you just say 'yes,' you need to think about what you've built here." Jim pressed the button and then turned toward Blair with a serious expression. Blair looked up at his partner's face and opened his mouth immediately to protest the idea that he would let Jim do this alone.

"I'm serious, Chief. Think this through."

"Man, there are days that you really are as thick as a brick wall," Blair protested as he crossed his arms over his chest. "What I've built here doesn't mean anything compared to my job as your guide. So if you're going to do something to get your ass fired, I'm going to be right there next to you."

"Chief, are you sure about this?" Jim asked seriously.

"Oh yeah, absolutely."

"Glad to have you on board then." Jim flashed a quick smile and slapped Blair on the arm. "So Roth and Bets can work the kidnapping angle and give support to the fibbies, the feds can handle the money drop, and we'll be the one to break the case open," Jim announced confidently just before the elevator doors opened.

"Just like old times," Blair quipped as he followed Jim down the hall to the squad room.

043. SQUARE

"Yeah Darwin?" Jim answered without moving; he had his eyes focused firmly on the chipped blue trash can in which an agent in plainclothes had just placed a stack of newspapers inside a briefcase inside a black trash bag.

"Isn't that Kendra's father?" Blair asked as he nodded toward a man pacing just this side of the park's restroom. Blair watched as the thin nervous man snatched off his glasses and rubbed his hand across his face before shoving his glasses back on impatiently.

"Fuck," Jim swore.

"Yeah." The kidnappers had insisted that the father not be near -- a request neither Jim nor the FBI could figure out. Now the man paced nervously, looking one pocket protector short of complete geekdom. Blair had trouble seeing this nerd as the father of the fuchsia-haired and pierced kidnap victim.

"Shit. The fibbies don't seem to have spotted him," Jim swore again, and Blair didn't remember Jim swearing so much back in Cascade.

"Have our guys spotted them?" Blair asked.

"Nope, no one." Jim's voice revealed his frustration. Blair really couldn't blame Jim since he felt the same. Since they were stationed on top of the tall stone building that stood next to the duck pond, they couldn't exactly radio their guys. Of course stationed might be the wrong word considering they had snuck up here before the FBI set up a perimeter. Radioing would involve Roth finding out that two of his detectives had refused a direct order and were camped yards away from the pickup site. Blair was all for avoiding that unless, like Jim had predicted, the drop went bad. Then Jim and Blair could spring into action and their insubordination would be cheerfully forgotten.

Even though Blair had gone behind Simon's back more times than he cared to remember, going behind Roth's back made him feel slightly nauseous -- especially when he remembered all those nights Roth had spent with him down at the firing range. Blair opened his mouth to say something, but he closed it again. Jim was right about the FBI mishandling the case, and it was a little late to argue now anyway.

Various FBI agents wandered the park in the brown uniforms of park maintenance workers or the Phoenix Suns T-shirts of locals out for a day of feeding the ducks.

Bets and Jeff and Russo were at the park's north entrance coordinating the police cruisers that were hiding in the local parking lots ready to catch anyone who got past the FBI.

Jim and Blair lay unobserved on the top of the building ready to jump in if needed. They were close enough to simply grab anyone getting near the trash can, triggering a lockdown of the entire park.

And now Kendra's father darted away from the bathroom building toward the trash can. Oh yeah, Blair feared there were too many cooks in the kitchen for this to end well. Before Kendra's father reached the trash can, the agent who had dismissed Jim's suggestions came trotting across the park lawn.

Just as the agent was pulling the father away, Blair heard the whine of distant dirt bikes growing louder. Blair slipped his hand onto Jim's back to anchor his Sentinel as the high-pitched sound increased dramatically. Over a dozen dirt bikes came around a pile of huge boulders that separated the main park from the trail that led up the mountain.

The agent started running back toward the FBI base in the distant park service building, towing a clearly protesting father with him. The dirt bikes left the trail and now darted across the green grass of the park straight at the trash can.

Blair could feel his adrenaline flow. God, there were too many of them, and no one had equipment to chase them up the mountain. And the helicopter would never be able to track so many people. Blair watched in horror as nearly 20 bikes flowed around the trash can in a huge melee and the roar of revving engines. It took Blair a second to realize that the helmeted figures were using the trash can as a marker. The riders circled the can and then raced back towards the mountain trail.

One rider turned too sharply and slid to the ground, his bike careening into the paths of two other bikes, and those riders went down too. Blair pushed himself up on his elbows, but Jim's hand on his arm kept them still.

"Wait for it," Jim said softly, his eyes still focused on the can. Two of the three fallen bikers had gotten back up and rejoined the race.

Suddenly Jim surged forward. "Stay here. Call for backup, green bike." Jim yelled as he slipped over the side of the roof and dropped to the dumpster below with a metallic thud.

Blair scrambled to pull his radio from his belt as he followed. "Ransom taken. Green bike. Black helmet. Westbound toward the mountain," Blair yelled into the device, ignoring the confused and angry voices that came back to them from the other end.

Once on the ground Blair ran toward the fleeing bikers, thanking God that the pack had to pass him on their way back to the mountain. Bikes parted and dodged as Jim charged toward the green bike, but the rider reversed direction to avoid him. Blair was only vaguely aware of yelling voices and agents with drawn guns hurrying toward them.

Rather than try to target the green bike, Blair went for a domino effect as he grabbed the jacket of a random rider, pulling him down to the grassy ground. The motley bike with its front fender painted red and black with the rest in primer gray spun out of control and took out a second bike. Blair repeated the maneuver with a black bike, and now a half dozen riders went down as the field became an obstacle course. The man on the green bike tried to dodge north. The detour allowed Jim to reach out and neatly pick the figure right off the bike.

"What the fuck is your problem, dude?" an angry voice demanded. Blair turned around just in time to see the punch aimed at his face. Blair was saved from further pummeling as armed agents started yelling for everyone to get to the ground. Since Blair was already lying on the ground, he just pulled his badge as the agents came up.

"Oh fuck. Dude, I hit a cop," the one guy complained as he went to his stomach with his hands above his head. "That's like entrapment or something. You fucking hit me first," the kid complained as the agent started handcuffing him. Blair couldn't actually argue with that logic. He had hit first, but the suspect from the green bike was face down in the grass so the black eye didn't really matter.

044. CIRCLE

"... interference in a federal investigation. I have half a mind to file federal charges," the lead FBI agent hissed softly enough that the cameras on the other side of the police line couldn't pick up the argument. But Blair had no doubt that the man meant what he said.

"Now wait one minute!" Roth interrupted. "Their actions were unforgivable, and they will both face disciplinary action, but they will receive credit for arresting Kendra Rence for trying to extort money from her own father."

"There is no way..." the agent began.

"Ellison grabbed her, he and his partner get the arrest." Roth crossed his arms over his chest and Blair watched as the dominance displays began again. This time Jim clearly took himself out of the running as he leaned against a tree managing to look frustrated and sheepish at the same time. Jeff looked from one face to another and Bets was actually reading something she'd previously written in her small notepad. That left Roth and the agent staring at one another in a silent battle that would've made a gorilla proud.

"I expect them to be disciplined," the agent demanded tersely.

"Oh they will be," Roth promised, and Blair realized that his Captain meant to keep that promise. "You two head back to the station and get your paperwork done," Roth ordered. Blair didn't even bother to apologize. He took one look at Roth's barely contained anger and decided to wait until they were in private where Roth could rip them a new one without an FBI audience.

"Yes, sir," Jim answered for both of them and Roth's body stiffened even more as his lips pressed into a tight line. Blair followed Jim back to his truck.

"Oh man, Roth is seriously hacked off," Blair commented once they were the privacy of the truck.

"He'll get over it, Junior. We made the arrest," Jim pointed out. Blair couldn't dispute that despite the fact that it didn't ease his guilt in the least. Jim started the truck and pulled out onto the traffic on 19th Ave.

"You're going to have quite the shiner there," Jim commented, and Blair reached up to explore the edges of his injury with his fingers. Jim was right -- he was going to have one hell of a black eye.

"I thought I told you stay on the roof?" Jim complained mildly.

Blair looked over his partner. Oh yeah, they'd come full circle now. What bothered Blair was the thought that when you walked in a circle, you never got anywhere.

045. MOON

Blair started walking, climbing over broken logs as he moved toward the familiar temple. The eroded carvings and stone blocks were as familiar to him as his own face in the mirror, but as he continued down the path, the familiar landscape and angles distorted. As he grew more and more and comfortable, Blair hurried towards his goal. The faster he walked, the more the jungle loomed unnaturally large over him.

Blair closed the last several feet and reached out to touch the cool stone which always felt so good in the uncomfortable jungle heat. That's when his hand slipped into the groove formed by the first carving, Blair realized his dream self had shrunk until his whole hand disappeared into one carved curve. This temple steps loomed over him, so tall that Blair couldn't reach the top of the first one even if he stood on tiptoe and pressed his body to the cold stone. Blair started to panic at the impossible task of climbing the gigantic structure. And yet, but he knew he had to.

Unwilling to give up, Blair turned around to look for a ladder or an elevator, a thought which seemed strangely logical in the dream state. Instead Blair found himself fascinated with the giant yellow moon that hung in the sky. It was so close Blair could see the various features of the beautiful orb: -- Cantor crater and Oceanus Procellarum.

Blair reached out toward that hanging globe, only slightly surprised to his fingers managed to touch the sandy surface. He used his fingers to rearrange mountains and carve new valleys in the stark landscape. Blair was still playing with the moon when the alarm woke him.

Blair sighed and hit snooze before rolling over and going back to sleep. He didn't have the energy to go for a run this morning. He needed to save his energy for the meeting with Roth.

046. STAR

"Cap--"

"No, don't say it. I swear if you say one word I will boot you off the force so fast your head will spin. I expect this shit from Russo or Ellison or even from Jeff in some lesser form, but you?!? What were you thinking?" Roth took a deep breath. "What were you not thinking?" Roth slammed his hand down on his desk, and Blair jumped. His eyes went to the door where the closed blinds kept him from seeing Jim although he had no doubt the Sentinel could hear every word of the current ass chewing.

"I know the others are aggressive sons of bitches who take their jobs too seriously and see every case as a challenge to their manhood or their honor or some other shit like that, but I trusted you to have more common sense than that," Blair looked back to his captain in order to see the open fury his inattentiveness had triggered. Blair rearranged his face with the same contrite mask he had used to survive so many rounds with Rainier administration. Roth sighed.

"Jim is a damn good officer, but he sees the rules as applying to other people and I trusted you to either keep him from walking too close to the edge or to at least letting me know when he was getting out of line," Roth said, and the disappointment bothered Blair more than the yelling or the hissing or the anger.

"Captain I really--"

"Really fucked up? Because unless that's what's about to come out of your mouth, you have missed the point."

"I know we should have--"

"You should have done a lot of things, but get that 'we' out of your sentence. You should be telling me that 'I should have' and the fact that you aren't tells me that you're still fucking up. Damn it Blair, you are one of the up and rising stars in the department." Roth's words made Blair duck his head. This man had taken a risk by hiring him, stuck by him through the investigation into the shooting, gone to the range to help Blair get over his new fear of firing his weapon. This man came closer to being a father than any other man in Blair's life ever had. Roth sighed again heavily. "You work well with people, you have a sharp mind, hell, you can talk an Eskimo out of his coat..."

"Inuit," Blair interrupted

"Isn't it what?" Roth's voice which a moment ago had been heavy with disappointment now just sounded confused.

"Eskimo isn't the name of the people, that's what white people call them. They're the Inuit people," Blair shrugged.

"Have I mentioned that you are able to talk your way out of trouble with frightening regularity?" Roth said dryly, and Blair decided that his captain definitely didn't fit into the category of most people. Roth continued after a brief moment of silent glare. "You are a damn good cop with damn good instincts, and yet your ex-partner walks in and you're suddenly Mr. Follow Along. Either you get yourself together or one of you is out of my department. Am I making myself clear?"

"Yes, sir."

"For God's sake, Sandburg, why didn't you say something?"

Blair had to really stop and think about that. "I thought Jim knew best."

"Damn it, Jim did think best when he was talking about the coverage at the drop. I can't fault the man's strategy, but Jim's judgment went right out the window when you two went rogue. You would have been better off turning that charm on the FBI idiot and getting him to listen to Jim. Or maybe you should have turned that charm on your partner to get him to work inside the system. Damn it, Blair. This is not going to look good on your record."

"I know sir."

"It's going to look worse on Ellison's since he has any number of violations of this nature."

Blair flinched at the idea that Jim could lose his job. In Cascade, that never felt like a real possibility, but here it did.

"So if you want to help your partner, stop assuming the man is always right."

"I just..."

"Blair, you better get your head on straight. Jim is damn good at what he does, but you're just as good at what you do. Funny enough, in that meeting with the FBI, I didn't see you do anything. You and your partner out there need to figure out why that happened."

Blair opened his mouth to protest, but really there wasn't anything he could say to that. Roth made a dismissive gesture toward the door while he sat down heavily. Blair left silently.

047. HEART

"Sandburg," Jim answered as he picked up his beer bottle from the end table before dropping onto the couch.

"It go that bad?"

"Simon yells louder," Jim shrugged as he focused on watching the Suns lose a basketball game.

"It go that bad?" Blair repeated, refusing to be thrown off the track this time. Jim's head fell back against the sofa so that the sentinel was staring up at the ceiling.

"I shouldn't have come. You had made a new life, and within a month or so you go from being the up and coming star to the maverick cop who can't be trusted."

"Oh man, it's not that bad," Blair paused as he silently reviewed his own ass-chewing. "Is it?" Blair sat on the arm of the couch farthest from Jim.

"I would say yes. Roth had me sign off on an agreement of do and don't that if I don't do something on the do list or do do something on the don't list, I'm out of there."

"Shit."

"Yeah. He get that serious with you?" Jim rolled his head to the side, and now Blair could see the ache in Jim's heart shining out his eyes.

"Nah. He just yelled. It felt like being home; I haven't been yelled at like that for a while."

"And you wouldn't have been again if I hadn't come," Jim added.

"No, no, no. I made the decision to go along with your idiocy."

"Idiocy?"

"Yeah, well it was pretty idiotic, but I agreed so I'm just as big of an idiot as you are."

"At least you'll be an idiot with a secure job," Jim said, but Blair could hear the unfamiliar uncertainty in Jim's voice. He wondered if Jim was uncertain about his own future or worried for Blair's. Blair slid down so that he was sitting cross-legged on the couch, one of his legs pressed again Jim's outside thigh. If he needed proof that Jim was upset, the lack of complaints about shoes on the furniture was proof enough.

"Really? He's that mad?" Blair asked softly.

"Oh yeah, Chief. I'm just glad you didn't catch the worst of it."

"Yeah. He just ripped me a new one." Blair paused as he considered how to bring up the next part. Jim had been right when he'd said that neither of them really liked talking about things like feelings, at least not when it really counted. "Roth suggested that we needed to have a heart to heart," Blair finally announced.

"Another time, huh Chief? I'm really wiped out here."

"Oh man there's nothing more I would like to do than just let this drop. I'm just not sure we can afford to."

"I didn't say drop it, I just set another time, Chief." Jim's voice took on the brittle hardness that warned Blair that he wasn't kidding. This time, Blair refused to take that warning.

"Problem is if we don't talk about this now, it just gets easier and easier did not talk about it all."

"What you want? You want me to put on a hair shirt and beg forgiveness?" Jim snapped as he sat up and jerked away so that their legs no longer touched.

"Man I never said anything close to that."

"But what the hell do you want to talk about? I screwed up. I get it. Now drop it." Jim spit his words angrily, and Blair felt his own temper rising up to overshadow his good intentions. He took a deep breath to avoid snapping something he didn't really mean, or even worse, snapping something he did mean.

"I've would if that would fix anything!"

"Dammit, I shouldn't have moved down here at all." Jim pushed himself up and started pacing the room.

"And that's the kind of thinking that got us in trouble in the first place! Dammit it's like were in this rut and we're not getting out of it."

"So I'll get us out of it," Jim shouted as he started walking toward the bedroom. Blair suddenly had a flash of what Jim meant.

"By leaving?" Blair demanded as he stood up to follow Jim.

"You did it."

"Yeah, and it didn't turn out particularly well either."

"I don't know, it seems to have worked out pretty well for you," Jim countered as he opened his closet door and started pulling shirt off hangers one at a time, folding them and then stacking them on the bed.

"It didn't work out at all. I spent every damn day missing you. Every time something happened I wanted to pick up the phone. I kept having those god damn blue dreams," Blair took a deep breath before he humiliated himself by crying, not that he hadn't done that in front of Jim before. "Nothing worked out," Blair practically whispered in his desperation.

"You've made a home here, a home I don't fit into."

"Shit. We just have to talk through this. We can't just go back to the old patterns where you tell me to stay in the truck while you go break every rule."

"We're guys were not supposed to be able to talk through things," Jim pointed out, but at least he had stopped folding shirts. Instead he stood in the middle of the room with his arms hanging at his side as if he couldn't figure out what to do. Blair understood the feeling.

"Yeah well Naomi raised me better than that. I'm not supposed to get caught up in the testosterone shit," Blair answered tiredly.

"Newsflash, Chief, you're a guy. You have testosterone issues."

"Yeah I'm figuring that out."

The two of them stood in silence in Jim's bedroom. Blair knew this feeling -- this desperate empty feeling like things were sliding away and he couldn't do anything about it. "God, I can't... " Blair lost his words again. "I can't do it again. I can't lose you like this," he finally admitted in a harsh and ragged voice.

"Chief, you aren't losing me. I'll never stop being your friend." Blair had closed his eyes, so the strong arms wrapping around his shoulders and pulling him to Jim's chest were a surprise. He allowed himself to lean into the warmth as he tried to catch his breath. "We're both tired and wrung out. Look, we have a few days off to think about things. Let's take a little break and try this again."

"I'm starting to think we're helpless at the heart-felt talks," Blair said with a small laugh. He wished he could just stay right here, held in Jim's arms. Even without talking, this felt right.

"Yeah. I noticed." Jim answered, and Blair felt a weight rest against the top of his head. He realized it was Jim's cheek, and that made him struggle even harder against the tears. He wouldn't lose this, not again.

"So we don't talk," Blair said with sudden inspiration.

"I thought that's what got us in trouble in the first place," Jim said, pulling back just far enough to look Blair in the eye with suspicion without actually letting go.

"So we write it all out. We take the three day suspension to figure it all out and write it down," Blair suggested. He waited for Jim to protest having to write out feelings, but to Blair's surprise, Jim nodded slowly.

"I can do that, Chief." Jim's arms tightened for a brief moment, and then Jim let him go. Blair could have cried in relief when Jim started taking the shirts from the bed and putting them back in his closet.

048. DIAMOND

I love you, man. Really! When I became a cop, I hoped I could join you in your world, but the longer I was in the academy, the more I doubted it myself. Yeah, a couple of the instructors were real assholes, but the bigger problem was that I didn't believe in myself enough to ignore their shit.

And then you got all distant. Looking back, I see that you only pulled away when I started to drive you away, but I couldn't see that back then. I never wanted to lose you, and I don't want to lose you now.

I love being a cop, but I'm afraid that when I'm around you, I go back to being the guide and observer, not that there's anything wrong with being the guide because I love that part of my life. I'll always be your guide, man. But I'm not an observer now. I can't go back to following your lead when it comes to police work and waiting in the truck while you go out and catch the bad guy. And yeah man, I know it's my fault too for falling back into the old patterns, but I can't seem to break free without some help. So I'm asking for help.

I figure if I smack you every time you treat me like the sidekick and you smack me every time I go and get insecure about not being half the cop you are, we can get through this. If not, one of us can transfer over the 29 because I don't want to lose you was a friend again -- it hurt too much last time.

Blair looked at his words and wondered if they would be enough. He felt so off-balance that he knew something had to change.

Blair took another gulp of the weak Denny's coffee and waved off the waitress who approached with a fresh pot in hand. He was nervous enough without adding more caffeine to his system.

By the time Jim appeared next to the gaily painted door announcing the $2.99 breakfast special, Blair was physically bouncing in his seat. His wide smile slowly faded as he considered Jim's grim expression. Jim walked past the hostess who tried to seat him without a word.

Blair fingered his letter while staring at the plain white envelope in Jim's hand. Jim put his envelope down in front of Blair and then stood there as if trying to decide whether or not he wanted to sit. Blair swallowed nervously before pushing his own envelope across the table and picking up Jim's. They stayed that way for several moments, Jim looking increasingly uncomfortable and Blair afraid to take his eyes off Jim as some deep instinct told him they were walking an invisible edge that neither one of them could risk falling over.

"Oh man, please," Blair whispered, and Jim jumped as if surprised. But at least it was movement, and Jim sat down across from Blair as he picked up Blair's envelope. Blair waited well Jim unfolded the lined paper before he pulled the neatly typed sheet from the envelope Jim had handed him.

I never meant to make your life more difficult. I called Simon and it looks like I can get my old job back.

Blair felt his heart speed up and his eyes flew to Jim's emotionless face. Jim didn't give him any more than a glance before concentrating on Blair's writing again.

I'm sorry.

Blair read the words again in a state of shocked disbelief that made the noises in the restaurant fade to a distant murmur.

"Jim, man?" Blair had so many questions and accusations and fears running through his head that he couldn't get out more than those two words.

"Chief, you don't want me to..." Jim's voice trailed off and confusion.

"Oh man, for an intelligent, college-educated man, you're a complete moron," Blair exclaimed.

"Maybe we're right for each other then because you have no reason to forgive me for screwing up your life over and over and over again."

"Hey, I'm perfectly capable of screwing up my own life, thanks! I've was doing it years before I ever met you. But this," Blair held up the letter, "sounds more like a divorce agreement that a heartfelt feeling"

"Give me a break chief. I don't do this sappy shit."

"Do you want to stay?" Blair blurted the words afraid of the answer and afraid he'd made too many assumptions. Jim stared at him with unblinking blue eyes that left Blair squirming uncomfortably.

"Yes," Jim finally answered.

"Then will be okay. After all, you know how the old saying goes... that which does not kill us makes us stronger."

"Chief, if that's true, as much pressure of we've been under in the past year, we've got to be pure diamond by now," Jim said with a familiar exasperated tone and a quick smile.

"Only if we were coal to start with."

"Well you're small enough for Santa to stuff you in a Christmas stocking," Jim pointed out in a tone that someone else might have mistaken for Jim being serious.

"Oh man, low blow! Besides I'm not the one who's all shiny on top like a diamond," Blair retorted. The joking was still a little stiff, but at least Blair could feel the rough edges of frustration and guilt start to smooth out. Blair laughed as a foot kicked his chair leg hard enough to scoot it back several feet.

"You know we're both going to keep screwing this up, don't you?" Jim suddenly asked in a more serious tone.

"Yep," Blair shrugged unconcerned. As long as they stayed together, he could handle the rest.

049. CLUB

"Oh man, I appreciate the vote of confidence, especially now. But a couple of uniforms could do this," Blair pointed out. He loved the trannies who ran the Queen Land, but his lack of height seemed to make every gay weight lifter in the bar assume he was a bottom boy looking for a big daddy. Even the joy of finally being back on a case with Jim didn't make up for an evening of getting groped.

"Oh please," Miss Rose gentle sniffed dismissively. "The asshole who keeps writing these letters would be a lot happier if he would just suck a little cock." Blair choked a bit and just avoided running into a chair in shock at Rose's words. Jim's hands on his shoulders saved him at the last second, guiding him around the furniture.

"These threats sound serious this time, and we've had two clubs firebombed." Jim pointed out. Blair felt the heat of Jim's hand resting on his shoulder as Miss Rose stopped at the bar.

"Sugar, maybe you should listen this once," Chocolate Babe said from behind the counter, her deep voice unmistakably male despite the impressive breasts and immaculate makeup. One black hand nervously tapped long red fingernails on the bar.

"Babe, I said the cuties could stay here and watch, but I won't have homophobic pigs in uniform wandering my club. This is my world and my sanctuary."

Blair could hear the desperation in Miss Rose's voice, and it bothered him more than he could say. Miss Rose never let the hate get to her, but that was before these letters from the serial arsonist. The details he included made it clear that he had been inside the club. To keep Miss Rose and her club safe, Blair would risk a night of getting his ass groped.

"Well let's just get you two cuties into something that blends in a little more with the atmosphere," Miss Rose suggested.

"I can blend just fine on my own," Jim insisted. Blair had to suppress a smile at the thought of what kind of get-up Ms. Rose would consider "blending in." This job might have a few perks that made getting manhandled worth it.

"Oh, come on, Jim. Where's your sense of adventure? After all, the whole point of community-based policing is to fit in with the community." Blair could feel his lips twitching in suppressed laughter. From the droll expression on Jim's face, Jim could see it just as easily

"Oh honey, I'm glad to hear you say that. I have the most darling outfit for you." Blair turned horrified eyes toward Miss Rose as he considered just what she might make him wear.

"Miss Rose, I'm not wearing anything that makes my ass hang out. Some of the outfits I've seen in here... I'm not entirely sure they're legal."

"Oh sweetie, for a man with a nipple ring, you're being awfully judgmental." Blair opened his mouth in shock as he considered how Miss Rose knew about that nipple ring. Blair glanced down but his shirt hadn't formed any spontaneous holes. He looked back up to find Miss Rose smiling mischievously. "I promise you that you will not have any naughty body parts dangling -- at least not unless you have enough to drink that you choose to make them dangle yourself." Miss Rose winked at him, and Blair felt like the rabbit about to get eaten by a wolf on a National Geographic special.

"There will be no drinking." Jim's voice took on that tone that normally made people shake in fear, but Chocolate Babe started laughing, and Miss Rose joined in with her own deep laugh.

"I guess Frizzy isn't the only one with a jealous streak." Miss Rose said as she slapped Jim's arm hard enough that the sharp sound of it made Blair flinch. "You two make my heart feel good; I didn't think there were any one-man boys still out there."

"And they look so cute together," Chocolate Babe offered, "who would want to get between them anyway? "

"Now hold on one second," Blair started complaining.

"Give it up, Chief. They're going to believe what they're going to believe."

That earned Jim one very strange look from Miss Rose, but Blair didn't have a chance to ask what she might mean by it. Honey Girl walked in carrying an armful of clothing. Well, maybe armful was overstating it, since there really wasn't enough fabric there to make Blair happy.

"Oh no, just no! Whatever you three have cooked up, it's not going to work," Blair insisted as he smelled the set up. The glances that the three trannies shared over his head didn't make him feel one bit better, either.

"And what happened to that sense of adventure of yours, Chief?" Jim asked with barely contained laughter.

"You suck, man." Blair snapped, and Jim gave an answer, but it was too soft for Blair to hear. Meanwhile Honey Girl had spread out three or four outfits across the bar. None of them look like they would cover as many body parts as Blair preferred to have covered at all times.

"Come on, Miss Rose, I thought you liked me?" Blair tried for boyish charm, but Miss Rose just pinched his ass hard enough to make him jump toward the bar. Fortunately, Jim moved up behind him, one hand resting on Blair shoulder and glaring at Miss Rose with his best Blessed Protector face. Unfortunately, Miss Rose just winked at Blair anyway.

"Oh Babe, you have no idea how much I like you. However you have to get rid of the khaki pants if you don't want to end up looking like a cop. Those pretty little beaded vests of yours are not enough to make you fit in here. The kids in this place like to play dress-up, and if you really want to be able to look around without being spotted, you're going to have to dress-up with the rest of us."

"She has a point, Chief," Jim pointed out. Blair crossed his arms in considered whether this was one of those times that he needed to have the strength to veto Jim. However, his common sense was telling him that Jim was right this time and he needed to suck it up and embarrass the shit out of himself if he planned to catch the arsonist.

"I hate it when you guys are right."

050. SPADE

"He's taken. Go fish somewhere else," Jim snapped peevishly. Blair wasn't sure whether the peevishness came from the loud music and flashing lights of the club, or whether Jim was just tired of having to defend his partner's honor.

"Thanks, man," Blair sighed as the mountain moved away.

"No problem, Sweet cheeks," Jim said with an evil twinkle in his eyes.

"Don't you start, Jim Ellison."

"What? Your ass is pretty sweet in those leather pants. They really don't leave much to the imagination do they?" Jim looked down Blair's body, and Blair felt himself blush from the top of his head all the way down to the waistband of those leather pants. And since he wasn't wearing a shirt, but rather the thinnest, skimpiest leather vest that Blair had ever seen in his life, his blush was completely visible.

"You're one to talk. At least my vest covers something; that harness doesn't cover you as much as it does draw attention to you."

"Yeah, Chief, but I've got some good stuff to draw attention to." Jim laughed as he flexed his arm, making the muscles stand out, and Blair had to admit that Jim did have a seriously impressive body. He looked at the way one muscle disappeared into another on Jim's arm, the curves creating a form of art work. Oh shit, he couldn't figure out what the hell had been wrong with him lately. One thing he did know, cops did not think about other cops' bodies as if they were artwork. It was time to get his head back into looking for the arsonist.

"Geez, who would've thought you'd have an exhibitionistic streak, Ellison?"

"Hey, when you got it, flaunt it!" Jim dropped a familiar arm over Blair shoulder, and Blair appreciated the defense against the piranha that seemed to have been circling him all night. Jim bent down so far that his warm breath tickled Blair ear. "Have you seen anything yet?"

"About a dozen cases of lewd and indecent behavior in public," Blair shrugged. He had seen plenty of illegal activity, but none of that had anything to do with the arsonist.

"Same here. This doesn't fit the pattern. At every other club, once he mailed the letters, he firebombed that next night."

"Maybe he's getting smart, "Blair suggested. Jim shook his head.

"Maybe, but I doubt it. A spade is a spade, and this guy wants to firebomb the place tonight. If he doesn't show up, it means something or someone stopped him."

"Maybe his signature is evolving. It could be that he's going to take more time between the letters in the firebombing in order to enjoy the build up," Blair whispered into Jim's ear. Jim's arm around his shoulder tightened pulling Blair in even closer so that no one else would be able to hear their conversation.

"Profiling's outside my range. You have more experience in psychology than I do. Do you think that's what's happening here?"

"No." Blair sighed in frustration as he looked across the sea of dancing bodies. "If he was changing his pattern, something would've changed in the letter, but the letter was identical. I don't know what the hell is going on."

"Join the crowd, Chief. Something stopped him, though."

"If that's your way of being supportive, we can safely say that skill is out of your range too."

"Yeah, but I look pretty," Jim teased with a wink. Blair rolled his eyes, and tried to remind his body that Jim was just joking.

By the end of the night, Blair had counted a dozen violations of decency laws, observed two new sexual positions, and decided that he was never going to use a public bathroom in a bar ever again. However, they had not discovered any arsonist as they stood in a now empty bar. There were days that Blair really hated police work.

"So are you two cuties coming back tomorrow?" Miss Rose asked with a smile.

"I don't think the Captain is going to pay us to come to the club every night," Blair said with a grimace. He wasn't sure what was worse: the idea of leaving Miss Rose here exposed to the arsonist or the idea of the Captain sending them back in. He'd discovered that there was a worse torture than having large men randomly grab his ass. It was called Jim Ellison. Having a half-naked Jim draped around him for most of the night had been just about more that his self-control was capable of handling. Blair understood that Jim was a very physical man who tended to touch his guide all the time. However, Blair's cock was getting entirely too excited about it.

"Too bad--you two are a cute couple in those outfits," Miss Rose insisted, and Honey Girl smiled widely from behind the bar where she was counting the evening's profits.

"You do know that we're not actually a couple, right?" Blair sighed in frustration at his inability to get Miss Rose to understand that he and Jim were not an item. But then again, he couldn't exactly explain sentinels and guides and the ever-present need to touch that existed between them.

"Oh darling, I call a spade a spade when I see one," Miss Rose insisted as she gave them a wink and went to help Honey Girl count the evening's money.

"Come on, Chief. Let's get out of these clothes before someone from the precinct shows up." Blair followed Jim to the back where they had left their street clothes. As much as he felt ridiculous in his own leather outfit, he had to admit that a small part of him was sad to see Jim take off that leather and brass harness. Jim had been right about one thing; those who had it certainly should flaunt it.

051. WATER

"Frizz, you with me?" Bets asked.

"Oh yeah, sorry. Wandered away for a second," Blair admitted as he turned his attention back to the evidence he was supposed to be gathering.

"Anyone I know?" She asked mildly, but Blair could hear the edge in her voice, and he knew exactly who she meant.

"The people in those lakeside houses," Blair answered as he bent down and started going through the piles of trash again. The growing stack of blank and shredded driver's licenses, birth certificates, social security cards, and green cards made it clear that the coyotes used his rented house to both smuggle people and forge documents. The small but growing pile between Bets and Blair would put these guys away for a lot longer than the 68 illegal aliens found inside the house.

"People live here for all sorts of reasons. Some fit in, some move away, and others," Bets gestured toward the expensive houses and condos, "they just try to turn this place into something it isn't. Those people are always going to be unhappy no matter where they go." Bets shrugged as if she had no time to waste thinking about such people.

"Oh buddy boy, that's just kind of a sad thought." Blair brushed a stray curl out of his face, and thought back fondly on the days when he could have simply tied his hair up in a ponytail.

"Yeah, it is." Bets paused. "You know, the last couple of weeks, I've missed working with you," Bets said conversationally.

"Oh no. No. No. No. If you're going to do the guilt thing that Jeff did, don't." Blair rocked back on his heels and considered Bets with his best determined glare.

"What, you think a sistah doesn't have the right to send your sorry ass on a guilt trip?"

"I think," Blair shot back quickly, "that we didn't go out together that often. So it's not like I've been neglecting you too."

"Yeah, but with Mr. Boy-Scout hogging you, I get stuck with Russo a lot more than is good for my blood pressure," Bets pointed out with a rather unamused laugh. "Besides who you think listened to all Jeff's whining?"

"Man, if I take out a huge 'I'm sorry' billboard on the I-10, would you guys stop with the guilt already?" Blair begged plaintively. Some part of him had known that he had been too wrapped up with Jim, but he had no idea that the guys had gotten so cranky over it. He supposed he should consider it a compliment, but right now he just needed the guilt to stop.

"Nope," Bets said in an entirely too cheerful voice. Blair was on the verge of describing the woman as evil, but he just went back to sorting his half of the garbage pile.

"You guys suck!" Blair complained halfheartedly.

"And you expect us to believe you don't?" Bets demanded as she gave him a downright salacious look. Blair opened his mouth to ask what she meant by that, but a glance at the paper in his hand distracted him. All other thoughts left his mind as he smiled in triumph.

052. FIRE

"Sandburg, have you ever heard of knocking?" Roth demanded as he looked at Blair's phone, the image zoomed in on the names. For a moment Roth's face remained blank, and Blair opened his mouth to remind his Captain of the one case Blair had refused to ever relegate to the dead files. Then Roth started to smile.

"I'm glad to see that Sandburg fire back," Roth said as he nodded slowly. "Do we have a date?"

"Three days," Blair said as he bounced slightly on the balls of his feet. "Oh man, I can't believe this is the same group of coyotes."

"I can. Running illegals is big business, and these gangs are jealous of their territories," Roth answered. Blair sat down in one of the seats across from Roth's desk for a moment, but he couldn't stay down. Before Roth had even finished his sentence, Blair was up and leaning over his Captain's desk again. "Are you sure the runners are the ones who raped her last time?" Roth asked.

"Almost sure. Anytime I mentioned her brothers, she clammed up. I want them! I don't want to see Saundra Lopez in the hospital again," Blair said as he clenched his fists.

"The coyotes may just drop off the brothers and grab the money," Roth pointed out.

"No way man," Blair shook his head. "They figured out she's not going to talk no matter how rough they are. They'll want more."

"You willing to bet some free time on that?"

"Hell yes," Blair nearly shouted.

"Who do you want to partner with on stakeout?" Roth held up a hand, palm facing Blair. "And before you answer, keep in mind that it's your job to get them to agree to be paid if and only if you get a bust."

"Jim," Blair answered without hesitation. Roth had started filling out the paperwork, but his pen hesitated as Blair said the name.

"Can you two play by the book?" Roth asked, the pen motionless against the paper.

"Captain, I know I screwed up, but I will not risk my conviction on this case. Jim's the best there is at surveillance. His covert ops training makes him perfect." Blair felt only a small twinge at not adding that Jim's Sentinel abilities made him the best possible partner for this job.

"And you'll be lead detective?" Roth's sharp tone made it clear that only one answer would be acceptable.

"Yes sir."

"Then talk him," Roth answered, and the pen started moving again as Roth approved the stakeout of the Lopez home on the grounds that a gang of rapists were about to track down one young woman and demand payment for bringing her brothers up from Mexico.

053. EARTH

There was a slight shifting next to him and then the length of Jim's body pressed up against his left side. At first, Blair felt only the pressure, but then the warmth soaked through his jacket and Blair could relax his jaw without having his teeth chatter loud enough for the whole neighborhood to hear.

"I can't believe you're cold in Arizona, Chief," Jim teased softly.

"Man, deserts lose all their heat at night. It's scientific fact," Blair whispered back.

"Whatever you say, Chief. Any movement on your side?"

Blair used the binoculars to check the street to the north. Nothing. "Man, maybe this is just wishful thinking. Maybe the Lopez brothers got dropped off somewhere else and we're wasting our time here," Blair admitted as he looked at the deserted street.

"Maybe," Jim said cautiously, and Blair felt embarrassment warm his face as he considered that Jim had spent all evening pressed to the side of an artificial hill in a rundown playground waiting for bad guys who might never show. "I sat a lot of stakeouts that didn't amount to anything, but I think your instincts are right on this one. If they aren't," Jim shrugged and Blair could feel the movement as their bodies pressed together, "we'll just have to wait for another break."

Even though the streetlights had been broken long ago, Blair kept his eyes on the road and his face turned away so that he didn't make a fool out of himself. Sometimes having a partner with Sentinel sight was rather inconvenient because he didn't need to let Jim see just how much he'd needed those words. He wasn't a kid who needed praise, and yet Jim's words warmed him just as much as the warm body pressed to his side.

Unfortunately Blair's body started reacting to the warmth in rather embarrassing ways. Blair focused his mind on what the coyotes had done to Saundra Lopez -- the broken ribs and wrist, the bruised kidneys, the black eyes and damaged vagina. Oh yeah, that worked. Blair's body lost all interest in pursuing things it shouldn't be interested in.

"Heads up, Chief," Jim hissed and Blair watched an old white panel-van pull up in front of the Lopez House.

"Telling the press that the documents were burned worked like a charm," Jim whispered happily as three middle-aged men got out of the panel van and slammed the doors closed behind them.

"Call for backup or wait?" Blair asked. The men's voices were so low he couldn't hear them.

"Wait," Jim said. "They want to have a talk with Saundra Lopez, and I think we need to hear it."

"Oh, yeah. They are so busted," Blair said happily. Jim started to get up and had taken a step or two, but he stopped when Blair didn't follow.

"I'm calling for some units to stay on the perimeter ready to come in," Blair explained as he waved Jim on. By the time Blair had called in the back-up units, Jim had gotten in place below a back window that stood open to the cool night breezes. Blair kept low and ran for the side of an old Ford sitting 50 feet away from Jim's new location.

As Blair knelt on the curb with his weapon drawn, he could feel the need to rush in and save the young woman whose trauma he had witnessed first hand, but he also knew they needed enough evidence to put the men away for good. Blair watched, and suddenly Jim's back stiffened.

"Move in, move in," Blair called quietly but desperately into the radio before he shoved it back onto his belt. Jim stood and ripped the screen from the window as he identified himself as Phoenix PD in a thundering shout. Since Jim had his part under control, Blair angled his weapon to cover the front.

Sure enough, two of the suspects came barreling out the front door. "Phoenix, PD! Hands up!" Blair shouted, the adrenaline in his system making his voice rougher than usual. One, a thin man with heavy features froze in indecision.

"Don't do it. On the ground! On your stomach!" Blair yelled as he kept his weapon steady. The one dropped to his belly with his arms stretched out, but the second suspect made a run for the van.

"Freeze," Blair yelled, even though he knew the man wasn't likely to respond, and policy really didn't let him shoot a fleeing suspect, not even in the leg, not even if the man was a rapist. It actually kinda scared Blair that he would rather shoot the guy than let him get away. Luckily, he wasn't faced with that choice because two patrol cars came around the corner, blocking the van's escape.

The suspect rolled out of the van while it was still moving, but two uniformed officers gave chase as soon as the one officer had slammed their car into park in the van's path. Blair turned his attention back to his suspect, trusting the back up team to catch the third guy.

"Chief, you okay?" a familiar voice asked. Blair turned to see Jim with his hand on a cuffed suspect's arm and Saundra Lopez crying behind him. For a moment, Blair wondered why Jim had to ask, and then Blair realized that his heart was pounding madly.

"Oh hell, yeah. Two in the bag and one getting run to ground. Shit I love this job," Blair answered happily.

054. AIR

"Oh man, that was my oldest open case, and I'm flying here," Blair answered, thrilled both with the arrest and Jeff's tentative olive branch toward Jim.

"Credit goes to Blair on this one," Jim answered. The answer seemed to please Jeff because he relaxed a bit and gave Jim an expression that almost approached a smile. Almost.

"Well, as long as those bastards go way for a long, long, long damn time, I don't care who gets the credit." Blair's smile was wide enough for both men, and both men smiled back at him.

"Listen, Jeff. I'd like to clear the air here," Jim started.

"Well you know what the cartoon cat said, put your past behind you," Jeff shrugged as he started to turn away. "No harm no foul."

"Well, I may have been a little possessive of Blair," Jim said, and Jeff stopped and turned so that he half-faced Jim but kept his body angled away. For a long moment, Blair was afraid that the silence was becoming another one of the strange contests that Jeff and Russo and Jim would so often start. Instead Jim took a breath and talked.

"I lost one partner, and I almost lost Blair to a psycho. Makes me little twitchy about watching him walk out of here with someone else. Anyone else." Blair glanced over at Jim, and realized from his tight expression that he was telling the truth. It wasn't that Jim didn't trust him -- Jim was just afraid of never seeing him again every time he walked out. Oh great, that made Blair feel a whole lot better about walking out on the man in the first place.

"Blair told us the story about the drowning after we gave him Alex," Jeff said quietly. "I didn't know about your other partner. I'm sorry."

Blair shifted from one foot to another as he looked at the two men. Every cop understood the fear of losing a partner, but Blair hadn't expected Jim to share that pain and that fear. The awkward silence continued.

"Alex?" Jim finally asked in a bewildered tone of voice. Blair suddenly realized that he had never introduced Jim to his normal desk-mate.

"Oh man, that's right. You never met Alex. She got loaned out to one of the gals and forensics who was having a hard time," Blair said with a bounce. He couldn't wait to see the expression on Jim's face when he saw the stuffed purple monster. "Man, she's been gone a long time. I guess I should go get her back,"

"You want Alex back?" Jim asked in an even more confused voice, but at least the awkward silence had passed, and Jeff gave Blair a conspiratorial grin while Jim just continued to look wonderfully confused and mildly alarmed.

"Oh yeah man, I miss her purple hide."

"I don't know. That girl always gave me the creeps," Jeff complained with a shudder, and now and Jim looked even more confused.

"Purple?"

Jeff laughed as he walked off toward the squad room leaving Jim and Blair to go retrieve Alex.

"Oh yeah man. Totally purple. In fact, let's head to forensics now. I really miss my girl."

055. SPIRITS

Tonight the dream seemed to feature the Spirit animals. Blair rarely saw his own wolf in the streams; Jim's cat was a far more normal feature. However now the cat and the wolf slowly circled each other in a clearing. Blair walked through the trees and approached the two animals.

"Have you guys ever considered just coming right out in telling us what's important?" Blair demanded wryly. As he expected the animals didn't answer. In fact they continued their circling as if Blair wasn't even there. Blair sat down on the top of a fallen log and watched them.

If this was a mystical message from beyond, Blair was missing it. The only thing he noticed was that the two animals really had no business being in the same environment. Of course, the irony of his own spirit animal being a cold-loving wolf wasn't lost on him either.

Blair watched as the sleek, black cat darted to one side, and the wolf lowered its headed and whined. The cat darted back the other way, and now the wolf's whine took on a more pathetic edge. Blair rolled his eyes. He did not sound like that! Blair pulled his legs up under him and sat cross-legged on the log as he waited for the animals to do something interesting enough to be worth spending his evening with.

God, now he understood why these things annoyed Jim so much. Blair wondered if he was asking too much to just wish that either the mystical beyond or his own subconscious would spell things out a little clearer. These blue dreams inspired a sort of desperate need, but without a clear message, that feeling was really more frustration than any sort of useful motivation. Even though Blair had forgiven Jim for kicking him out of the loft, Blair never really understood it until he started having the damn dreams for himself.

The cat darted around to the side again, and the wolf was clearly growing more frustrated. Blair tried comparing this to their current situation, but it didn't make sense. For the first time, he and Jim were finally working together as partners and as equals. When Blair came up with a strange theory, Jim listened instead of rolling his eyes. And when Jim insisted that something was true, Blair turned his gift of persuasion on everyone else in the room. They weren't working together exclusively any more, but over half of Blair's cases had Jim as the second detective. So really, there was nothing for the wolf to get frustrated about in the cat's frantic jumping didn't seem to have anything to do with Jim.

Now the cat was acting like it had gotten into catnip, racing toward the wolf playfully and then bounding away. The wolf made little puppy sounds, but it didn't try and follow the cat's antics. What the hell were they doing? This certainly didn't look like anything National Geographic ever recorded.

The wolf finally seemed too tired to even react when the cat nipped at it. It sat down and whined unhappily. Then, seemingly out of energy, wolf flipped over to its side and showed its stomach. Blair stared in horror at what he saw. Well it didn't take Freud to figure that one out, especially when Blair's spirit animal was so well endowed.

Blair turned his attention to the cat, getting off the log and crouching down so that he could try and see between the animal's legs. The cat took another run at the wolf, and Blair got a nice full frame image of exactly what he was looking for. Great. So now he just needed to decide whether this was some message about his Sentinel from the beyond, or if this was some Freudian wishful thinking bubbling up through his dreams. As Blair watched the cat play, he wondered how the poor thing could even move with that hard on.

056. BREAKFAST

Blair sighed in frustration because it wasn't a question he could go around asking people. He had woken up with a determination to find out whether Jim was interested in him, but faced with a life-sized Jim cooking in his boxer shorts, Blair realized he couldn't tell the difference between normal and interested.

"Chief, you planning on setting the table or standing there with the plates in your hand all morning?" Jim's voice broke Blair out of his thoughts and he hurried to put the plates on the table just as Jim came walking over with the pan.

"What's up with you this morning?" Jim asked as he used the spatula to dump a pile of eggs onto each plate.

"The Bray case," Blair quickly obfuscated. That case was bothering him, but not nearly as much as the casual way that Jim's arm brushed his as Jim went back to put the pan in the kitchen sink.

"Is that the assault case?" Jim asked as he ran water in the pan and looked over his shoulder.

"Yeah," Blair answered as he pulled a bowl of cut cantaloupe pieces out of the refrigerator. The apartment kitchen was much smaller than the loft's kitchen, and Jim's hip bumped his as Jim passed him. With the refrigerator door open, there really wasn't much room to get by without the hip bump so Blair wasn't sure whether to count that as a hint or not.

"Who are you working with on the case?" Jim asked as he sat down to breakfast, and Blair followed, putting the bowl of fruit on the table as he sat down.

"Russo," he said. "I think the man was ready to beat the hell out of the two mechanics at the shop across the street," Blair admitted with a disgusted sigh. "I know those guys are covering for someone, but threatening to bury them under the jail if they don't talk is not the best approach."

"Oh, I don't know. I've used that approach several times myself," Jim pointed out. "With the right guys, you can leave them begging to tell you what they know."

"Yeah, but these two? Oh man, they look like rejects from Conan the Barbarian, and the more Russo growled, the more they got their backs up." Blair rolled his eyes at the other detective's antics.

"So go back without him," Jim said around a mouthful of eggs. Blair looked up in utter shock and disbelief. He had only earned Roth's trust back so that he and Jim were working cases together on a regular basis instead of being permanently separated at work.

"Or not," Jim quickly added with a shrug as he looked at Blair expression.

"You know, it's really weird to be the rule following one here," Blair complained. "I was always the one trying to slide around the rules."

"People change, Chief."

"Yeah, I guess," Blair said, suddenly disquieted by the realization that, in some ways, he was more a part of the cop culture in Phoenix than Jim was. Entirely too weird.

"So, how are you going to handle Russo's permanent case of testosterone poisoning?" Jim asked.

"I figure I'm just going to tell him he's a Neanderthal and tell him to just stay back." Blair didn't expect Jim to start laughing.

"What?" Blair demanded.

"I'm just remembering that first day when you called me a throwback," Jim admitted.

"Well, hopefully he won't slam me into a wall," Blair laughed. He watched as Jim reached down to scratch himself. Okay, was that a signal or just a stray itch?

"He better not," Jim said as he continued scratching.

Blair resisted the urge to roll his eyes again, but even though he had meant the Blessed Protector comment as a joke, Jim really did take the idea of protecting the guide to heart. Since he couldn't come up with an answer that didn't either condone Jim's over protective streak or sound bitchy, Blair just ate in silence.

Jim was putting breakfast away at a good pace, his eyes going from the newspaper laid out next to his plate over to Blair and then back down again. Blair tried to remember if Jeff and Russo did that... kept taking small glances at him. He didn't think so. That went into the hint column.

Jim finished his food and stood and stretched. As Jim's arms rose up, the boxer rode down low enough for Blair to see a few stray hairs trailing from Jim's belly button down to the waistband of his boxers. When Blair looked up and saw Jim looking at him with one eyebrow cocked, Blair realized he'd been staring. He opened his mouth to come up with some excuse, but Jim started talking first.

"You done with your plate, Chief?"

"Um, yeah," Blair managed to get out. He held up his plate and Jim snagged it on his way to the kitchen. Okay, if Jim was trying to hint, wouldn't catching Blair staring at his groin be a good time for a few hints? So, were the lack of hints there a hint?

"Since it's my morning for dishes, you have 10 minutes if you want to use the shower first. Otherwise, I'm getting in there whether you're finished or not," Jim called from the kitchen. Blair stood in the apartment's dining room looking at Jim's back at the sink. Okay, had Jim just said what Blair thought he just said?

Blair hurried for the bathroom as he considered the evidence. At this point, he was starting to form a hypothesis, but he couldn't afford to be wrong here. As Blair slipped his robe off and got under the spray of hot water, he smiled. He would do what all scientists did when faced with a hypothesis. It was time to do a little testing.

057. LUNCH

"So, this is new -- having lunch in the middle of a workday. What's up?" Blair asked as he picked up the menu.

"What? Do I have to have a reason to invite one of my detectives to lunch?"

"Oh man, am I going to be in trouble if I say yes?" Blair laughed as he started scanning the various menu items. He was having trouble finding anything that wouldn't trigger an instant heart attack. It was funny, he'd spent months in Mexico on various expeditions, and Mexicans ate quite healthy, but for some reason when Americans made Mexican food, they managed to make it about as healthy as Wonderburger.

"Nice, Sandburg. I try to invite you out for a little small talk, and this is what I get." Blair would have been a lot more upset had Roth not had an amused expression on his face. Countless hours on the firing range together meant that Blair could read Roth nearly as well as he could read Jim.

"Hey, as long as I'm not in trouble again, we can have all the small talk you want. I'm not, am I? In trouble I mean." Blair clarified as he looked up.

"Have you done something that you should be in trouble for?"

"No way man!" Blair insisted as he put his menu down.

"Good to hear. Something's come up, and I wanted to talk to you about it." Roth waited a half beat, just long enough to let Blair know this was serious.

"They're looking for somebody to head up a new unit out of the downtown precinct, and normally I would say you didn't have nearly enough experience. Normally, that is, but this might be a real opportunity for you. The brass wants to set up a special crime unit modeled after some unit they have in New York: A unit that would handle rape and sexual abuse cases exclusively." Roth stopped to take a drink of water and gesture at their tardy waitress. It didn't work.

"You have one hell of a reputation in that area," Roth finally continued. "Better than any other cop I know. The question is, whether you want me to throw your name in the hat." As Roth's words sunk in, Blair stared at the man in utter shock. From the minute he had taken the badge from Jim in Simon back in Cascade, he knew he could do the job. Somehow though, he didn't actually expect to be this good at it. And in truth, he had no idea what to say, which is pretty much what he then said.

"Wow, Cap! I mean, I really don't know what to say. I totally appreciate you even considering me, but I don't know if I'm ready for something like that."

"Son, you're as ready as you're going to be. The only question is whether you want it. Some people, like Russo, want the promotions but they'd never be able to handle the administrative work. Others, like Jim and Bets, would be great, but they don't want to move up. They're detectives, and they don't want to be anything else. You're a little harder to figure out though. I know you can do the job, I just don't know whether you want to. So, when Daniels from downtown asked for names, I told them I have to talk to you."

"Captain, this means a lot to me after some of the crap I've had flung at me in this last year or so. But I don't know whether other people are ready for a cop with more experience in anthropology than police work."

"They're ready, Sandburg. Why do you think Daniels called me in the first place? Trust me, I don't have another detective who can deal with sexual assault cases the way you can. Every other detective in my department hides in the bathroom when it comes to rape cases. And I can't blame them since those cases are the ones little tear you apart as a cop. But you take every damn one. You do the job right, and the brass knows that."

"Oh man, I really have to think about this," Blair admitted. He had endured so much change in the recent past that he wasn't sure he was ready for more. But then again, he'd always thrived on challenge, and it was a challenge.

"You need to talk to your roommate?" Blair shot Roth a sharp look. His Captain hadn't said anything when Blair had changed his address to Jim's apartment, but the tone of voice Roth used just now made it clear that some bug had crawled up Roth's butt. Blair just wasn't sure which possible bug had committed the crime..

"Jim would support me whatever decision I made. As long as he gets to run down criminals, he's not actually all that picky where he works." When Roth's expression changed to one of shock, Blair had to parse his own statement. When he looked at it from Roth's point of view, he could see how strange it seemed.

Blair realized that he implied that not only would Jim accept his decision but that Jim would go along with him. Blair frowned a bit at the realization that he and Jim might be letting the pendulum swing a little too far back the other way. He didn't have the right to make decisions for Jim anymore than Jim had a right to make decisions for him. Blair had never been very good at relationships, so he didn't have that many healthy or long-term relationships to compare to, but he wondered if everyone had this much trouble keeping a healthy balance.

"Well, give it some thought. Daniels needs to know within two weeks who's willing to take the job so that he can do the background research and present the mayor with some recommendations."

"Captain..." Blair started, but Roth interrupted him.

"Save it, Sandburg," Roth said. "Don't ruin my appetite with any of your great emotional revelations."

"Oh man, you totally need to get in touch with your emotional side."

"Some of us don't want to be that in touch, Sandburg."

"You're going to die of emotional constipation, you know."

"Most men do, Sandburg." Roth answered as he picked up his menu, his smile only half concealed. Blair glanced and saw the waitress headed their way, and he picked his own menu up as he went back to the task of trying to find himself the meal that was least likely cause permanent heart damage.

058. DINNER

He started by actually cleaning up the living room, shoving his various piles of case notes and National Geographic magazines and half finished crossword puzzles back into his room. Jim was getting better about biting his tongue, but Blair knew that he still got annoyed on occasion, and Blair needed to make sure than any reactions tonight were from the movie and not from Blair's work scattered across the room.

Blair tucked his messenger bag with the three video options between the couch and the side table since he really didn't want the titles showing. The goal was to find out if Jim was interested, not announce his own interest. Okay, on to step two. Blair went to the dining room where he had dropped plastic bags full of supplies from the grocery store.

By the time Jim came in the door, Blair had a nachos grande sauce warming on the stovetop, bowls of chips on the dining room table, and both chairs on the side of the table that would let them watch the television.

"Hey, Chief, what smells so good?" Jim called as he stuck his head in the door. Blair looked up with red swollen eyes from cutting onions.

"Nachos," Blair said with a smile as he struggled not to wipe his eyes. Since he was cutting jalapeo peppers, touching his face with his hands right now would be a very bad idea.

"Smells great," Jim said as he leaned over Blair to look at the pan of cheeses and refried beans and tomatoes and onions and peppers and ground beef and spices.

"Hope so," Blair said as he sniffed. "Making it really clears the sinuses."

"Yeah, I can see that. Go wash up and I'll finish the jalapeos," Jim offered. For one second, Blair thought about the fact that he wanted Jim to be in a good mood and a Sentinel who got jalapeo on his skin would be a cranky Sentinel, but then Jim took the knife from his hand and pushed Blair to one side with his shoulder. Blair really did want to wash the pepper from his hands and blow his nose, so he abandoned Jim to finish up while he went for the bathroom.

When Blair reappeared four hand washings later, Jim had set the table and the nacho sauce sat between their two plates.

"Something good on TV tonight?" Jim asked curiously, probably because of how Blair had moved the chairs.

"Karen down in records recommended this movie that came out a few years ago," Blair answered as he walked over to his bag and flipped the top open. His hand hovered over the three choices before he settled on "Wedding Banquet" and popped it in the VCR.

He and Jim sat and dipped chips into the same bowl as they watched the young, male Wai-tun collect his rent from his tenants before going home to his young, male lover Simon. Or actually Blair watched Jim as Jim watched the movie. Was that a grimace? If so, was Jim feeling sorry for Wai-tun whose parents didn't know their son was gay? Was Jim disgusted by the fact Wai-tun and Simon were getting a little handsy? Was that smile because the movie was damn funny or had Jim figured it out and was he laughing at Blair's little experiment?

Jim continued to tear into the nachos as he watched Wai-tun's parents show up from Taiwan. Blair was almost sure that Jim rolled his eyes at Wai-tun and Simon moving Wai-tun's stuff to the basement so they could pretend to be just friends. Blair was feeling pretty good about the whole experiment until he noticed Jim starting to squirm a bit in his seat. Jim's eyes wandered away from the screen as Wai-tun had a sham marriage to try and please his parents.

When Jim got up to take his dishes to the kitchen in the middle of Simon and Wai-tun trying to find a little private one-on-one time, Blair was truly confused. He just wished that Jim would be a little more consistent as a test subject.

"Do you want to turn the movie off?" Blair asked and then he tried not to hold his breath. He didn't need for Jim to get suspicious, especially if Jim wasn't dropping hints and Blair had just imagined the whole thing.

"No, it's fine," Jim insisted as he came back out. "Go ahead and watch; I'm just going to do a little paperwork."

"If you don't want..."

"Sandburg, watch your movie. I just can't get into something with subtitles."

"It isn't all in subtitles," Blair pointed out. Jim just gave him one indecipherable glance as he settled in on the couch and proceeded to do his paperwork while ignoring the movie. Blair cursed silently as he realized that was what he got for not controlling all the variables. Blair considered switching over to Jeffery since it didn't have subtitles, but two gay movies in one night might be a little suspicious, and Blair really did want to find out what happened to Simon and Wai-tun. Blair sighed and moved to the opposite end of the couch so he could watch the rest of the movie.

059. FOOD

A table on the far side of the break room held the various dishes that different detectives had brought for their mini-Thanksgiving celebration. Looking at the buffet, Blair realized that he could tell a lot about the people from the food that they brought.

Russo had brought nachos, but not the type that Blair had fixed for Jim. No, his red plastic bowl was filled with a concoction that Blair suspected was made up of equal parts refried beans and Velveta cheese. Maria was clearly the homemaker of their crew. Blair didn't go out with her often, but when he did he had gotten hints that she had survived a rough life, and now she was determined that her children have better than she did. Being a cop was hard, being a cop and a single mother and a damn good single mother -- that was a lot harder. And even though Maria's time was at a premium, she had taken the time to make homemade tamales wrapped in corn husks.

Jeff, who always tried his best, had brought a cake. However, from the perfectly even frosting, Blair suspected that it had come straight from Fry's grocery store. Betts had brought fried chicken, a recipe she said came straight from her grandmother. She had also made various and colorful threats against the first person who made a comment about a black woman bringing fried chicken while glaring at Russo. Captain Roth had brought a green bean salad that had probably been made by his wife. Blair wondered if he was stretching the metaphor by pointing out that Roth had brought food good for the unit.

Last but not least, Blair's eyes fell on the dish at the end. He wondered what it revealed to others that he and Jim had brought chicken stir-fry.

060. DRINK

"So, you know that offer you made earlier," Blair said as he leaned against the wall next to his captain. Roth turned and looked at him.

"Yeah?" Roth asked.

"I think I'm going to say 'no'," Blair said as he watched Russo playfully punch Jim's arm. Jim gave Russo a suspicious look that led to Russo punching Jim's arm again.

"Is this your decision or his?" Russo asked.

"I didn't even tell him the offer was on the table," Blair honestly answered. "I just don't think I want to trade in my life right now," Blair admitted.

"Well, you can lead a horse to water..." Roth let his voice trail off. "Daniels wants you, ya know. The chance to move up this fast just won't happen again."

"And that's okay. Man, it's never been about the money or the position," Blair pointed out as he watched as Jeff jumped in on the conversation between Russo and Jim. Jim rolled his eyes in exaggerated dismay, and Jeff shook a finger toward Russo.

"If you're sure...."

"Oh yeah, I'm sure," Blair answered as he reached around Roth to snag a bottled water. "I'm already where I want to be. I don't really want to be led to any new water."

061. WINTER

"Funny, I always assumed winter came from the rotation of the Earth," Jim said dryly.

"Ha, ha, man," Blair answered. "Seriously, it was a whole moral about people being punished for not appreciating what they have."

"Considering we live in Arizona, I appreciate winter very much," Jim pointed out as he unlocked the truck door and took the bowl from Blair. He reached in and used an old sweatshirt to brace it on the seat so that it hopefully wouldn't tip over.

"Yeah, there are a lot of things in my life that I appreciate," Blair said.

"Yeah, Junior. Me too." Jim turned around and let his hand fall on Blair shoulder. Blair stood there in the dim light of the streetlamp feeling the warm pressure of Jim's hand and he smiled up at his partner. Jim smiled back and then stepped past Blair, his hand sliding down Blair's arm and disappearing as Jim walked around the truck. Blair got in the truck and buckled up as Jim climbed in the driver's side. Oh yeah, no matter where their relationship did or didn't go, Blair appreciated it.

062. SPRING

"Um, thanks?" Blair said uncertainly.

"No problemo. None of their damn business if you're a fag." Blair's coffee cup shattered as it fell from his trembling fingers. Blair stood in the bullpen with ceramic dust scattered across his shoes as he opened and closed his mouth soundlessly.

"Hey, Frizz, you alright?" Russo asked, and Blair struggled to collect his thoughts.

"I'm what?" Blair managed to squeak. Okay, he had been thinking of switching teams lately, but he certainly hadn't made that announcement to anyone, and when he did decide to talk, he wasn't planning on Russo being his first stop.

"Shit, don't go all PC on me, Frizz. Fag, gay, homo, whatever. Look, the important part is that I don't care what you and Ellison stick where, and I'll go to bat for you with IA." Russo's words only managed to confuse the issue even farther as Blair tried to figure out if he'd been dropped into some alternate universe. He took the two steps to his chair and dropped down heavily. "Frizz? You okay?" Russo stepped up to his desk and looked down nervously.

"Oh man, I am like entirely not okay. What the hell are you talking about?" Blair finally demanded.

"The IA investigation. They called me in for a statement about you and Ellison last night. Asked if I've every seen anything improper. I told them to go be improper with their own dicks." Russo said the last part with great satisfaction. Ever since IA had tried to link Russo to his dirty ex-partner, the man had taken every chance to strike back. Blair could just imagine the expression on Russo's face as he had said that.

"This is not the way to spring this on me," Blair complained as he tried to organize his thoughts. "And Jim and I are not lovers," Blair said, carefully avoiding the fact that he wouldn't mind if they became lovers.

"What? You guys aren't... you know?" Russo demanded suspiciously, and his arms came up to cross over his chest.

"No," Blair insisted.

"You guys touch a lot."

"Touching is not sex, and we do not have sex."

"You look at him like he's last candy bar in the world," Russo pointed out.

"I do not!" Blair snapped, and he could only hope it was the truth.

"He looks at you like you're the last damn cold beer on Earth," Russo added.

"We're not lovers. We've never been lovers. IA is not going to find anything if they're trying to make a case against us." Blair looked up and Russo still looked skeptical.

"If you're not lovers, why are you white as a ghost, Frizz?"

"Because I just walked in here and you sprang this on me like some sort of ambush." Blair leaned back in his chair and tried to calm his breathing. Okay, IA couldn't find something that didn't exist, Blair reminded himself. He glanced toward Russo and caught a hurt expression on the other man's face that disappeared the moment Blair looked over.

"Geez, Sandburg. Just offering my support," Russo frowned.

"Man, I appreciate that. You just caught me off guard," Blair offered. Russo started walking away without another word. "Hey Russo," Blair called, "if IA tries to make something up, you can hold them while I beat the crap out of them." Blair watched as Russo turned, a wide smile on his face.

"That's a deal," Russo agreed before returning to his desk. Blair looked at the shattered cup scattered across the floor and he got up to search out a broom. He really hated it when life managed to spring these little surprises on him.

063. SUMMER

"So, let me just make sure I get this," Blair started. He could hear Jim grinding his teeth, and he didn't think that he had long before Jim got up and stormed out of the room. "Internal Affairs suggests that the fact we're roommates makes us automatically gay." Summer opened her mouth to protest, but Blair held up his hand to hold her off since he didn't want to discuss the many affidavits that testified to their 'inappropriate' touching at work.

"And if we say we're gay, the Gay Alliance is willing to pay the legal costs involved in fighting this." Summer nodded, her sun-streaked hair bouncing a bit as it hung down to her shoulders.

"But if we claim that we're not gay, the Gay Alliance won't cover us and the union recommends that we accept the reprimand and any other consequences IA wants to throw our way?" Blair finished. He was definitely getting a headache.

"The union is constrained by the fact that policy forbids fraternization of officers in the same unit. The Gay Alliance is willing to argue that the policy discriminates against gays. It's the perfect case. The cases you two work together have a higher close rate than any other officer or partnership in the entire department. We could force the department to admit that you are effective," Summer brought he small fist down on the file that lay in the middle of the table, and Blair glanced over at Jim who still had a faintly ill expression on his face.

"Chief, this is getting out of hand," Jim said softly.

"Exactly," Summer jumped in. "It's absolutely unforgivable for them to target you just because of your sexual orientation. Your partnership in your personal life doesn't preclude an effective professional partnership."

"We're not lovers," Blair snapped, and Jim's flinch was so small that Blair was sure that he was the only one who would have noticed it.

"But if you continue to take that position, the Gay Alliance certainly can't be connected with people who deny that homosexuality is a natural expression of love and nothing to be ashamed of."

"Hold on one second, lady," Jim finally jumped in. "He never said anything against homosexuality. He just said that we aren't actually homosexual." Blair had to admit that Jim was doing a good job of keeping the growling to a minimum. Summer seemed to have a different opinion as she scooted her chair back a fraction of an inch.

"You have to admit that the evidence--"

"Is crap. Two men can be close friends without sharing a bed," Jim insisted, and at that Blair looked sharply over at his Sentinel. Blair found it ironic that everyone else was so sure they understood Blair and Jim's relationship when Blair was finding it more and more difficult to figure out.

"Well, I think I've made our position clear," Summer said as she stared back at Jim. She would have seemed much more fierce without the pink shoes.

"So, we either lie and get help or tell the truth and get hung out to dry," Blair summed it up.

"If that's how you chose to interpret it," Summer shrugged.

"I'm out of here," Jim said as he stood suddenly enough to send his chair sliding backwards. Jim walked out, and Blair rested his forehead on his hand as he considered just how messed up things were becoming.

"Look, I know how hard this is. It's not easy to be yourself in this type of environment," Summer waved her hand at the conference room. "And I think it sucks that they've targeted you. I get the feeling this was personal, maybe because you two are so good and that offends their homophobic assumptions or maybe because of some internal cop thing. I want the chance to take them down." Summer's words made Blair look up. She had an earnest expression that made Blair suddenly see the warrior inside the small feminine body.

"We really aren't gay," Blair said apologetically. Summer stood up and held out a card.

"Give me a call if that changes," she offered before she left. Blair sat in the empty conference room as he tried to figure out how to get out of this mess.

064. FALL

"Thought you might be up here," a voice said, and Blair didn't even bother turning. He knew the voice as well as he knew his own. Better maybe.

"Oh man, I needed to get away from all the bad vibes down there," Blair said as he gestured toward Phoenix.

"How do you want to handle this?" Jim asked as he leaned against the same rock.

"I am so out of answers," Blair admitted.

"Don't have any here myself, Chief. Do you want..." Jim stopped, and Blair suspected he knew what options Jim would suggest. After all, the man's first instinct always seemed to be to throw himself on the grenade when it came to anything approaching emotions.

"If you say you'll leave I'm going to kick your ass all the way back down the mountain," Blair threatened. Jim just gave a soft chuckle.

"You and what army?" Jim asked.

"Russo'll help," Blair shot back.

"He probably would," Jim said in a far more serious tone. "But I was actually going to suggest taking the Gay Alliance up on their offer. If no one stops IA, we could get fired or assigned to departments on the opposite sides of town on opposite shifts. Of course, if that's what you want...."

"Man, you are so busy trying not to push me into something that you haven't said one word about what you want. Do you want to have Summer on the case?"

"She looks like an escapee from 'Legally Blonde'," Jim complained, and Blair smiled.

"The Great Sentinel of the City avoiding the issue again," he pointed out as he crossed his arms.

"Chief, I'm so out of my league here I don't know what I want."

"What did you want before the IA started pissing all over our lives?" Blair asked. His plan of slow and steady research into Jim's sexuality suddenly tossed out the window.

"I never want to push you away again," Jim said, which was really the same as not saying anything, but then again, Blair had no room to criticize in this case. He may have his whole "plan" for figure out whether Jim was interested in him, but he hadn't exactly confessed his feelings openly. More like he had hidden behind his scientific method.

"You couldn't ever push me away," Blair said as he tried to figure out a way to get his tongue to say the real words he was struggling to say.

"Good." Jim threw an arm over Blair's shoulder, and Blair realized that he was going to have to talk if he ever wanted Jim to.

"I don't want to be the great gay spokesmen of the police force," Blair admitted.

"Miss Rose would be thrilled, but there are people who wouldn't talk to us. We wouldn't be as effective," Jim mused.

"Man, you suck at the whole feelings thing," Blair said as he leaned his body into Jim's. He was just so damn tired that he wanted to lie down and sleep.

"I'm trying, Chief." Jim's arm tightened around Blair's shoulder and Blair let himself be pulled in to Jim's side.

"I'm afraid that everything I built here is circling the drain," Blair suddenly announced, "just like in Cascade."

"Chief..."

"No, I need to say this. I'm having visions of myself having press conferences as the great gay role model when I'm not even sure I'm gay."

"You're not sure?" Jim's body stiffened, and Blair bit his own tongue.

"I have an idea," Blair said quietly, not sure that he really wanted to deal with this on top of everything else.

"What idea might that be?"

"I think I might be falling for someone," Blair admitted, stepping carefully out onto a precipice that if he guessed wrong could send him flailing into the void.

"Funny, I fell a long time ago," Jim answered. Jim's arm tightened, and Blair leaned his head on Jim's shoulder. He would have thought that the sudden admission that their embrace was more than friendly support would make the universe move, make him feel weird or change the way Jim's arm fell across his shoulder, but it felt just like it had three minutes earlier.

"This really doesn't change anything, does it?" Blair asked.

"It means we can take Summers up on her offer without being liars," Jim answered. Blair watched the light fading from the sky. This spot had a much better view of sunrise than sunset, so he didn't get to see the sun as it dipped behind the mountains leaving shadows behind. He only watched as lights blinked on in the fading dusk. They really needed to start moving if they wanted to get off the mountain before dark.

"We'd be freaks... both of us," Blair answered, and he could feel Jim's body jerk under him.

"Yeah, Darwin, we would."

"But if we leave, I feel like we're running away from a fight."

"So, do you want to stay? We can fight these IA guys until they're sorry they ever heard our names," Jim promised with a fierce scowl.

"And if we lose?" Blair asked. He knew the politics in Phoenix well enough to know that that was a pretty safe bet.

"Then we'll probably both be looking for new jobs."

"Oh man, even if we win, we're screwed, aren't we? I mean, those mechanics that Russo was getting in a pissing match with, they never would have described that assault suspect if they'd seen me on the evening news as the great gay hope."

"Probably not, Chief. I doubt we'd be able to work in the field." Jim sighed heavily. "Shit, I doubt we'd be able work at all. Cops have an unwritten 'Don't Ask Don't Tell' policy, and showing up on the evening news... well it wouldn't make life easy. No matter how a judge decided the case, we probably wouldn't be able to effectively work together. If we split up and went to different departments where people didn't have to see us together, people might be willing to forget, but that sort of defeats the purpose of fighting this in the first place." Jim scrubbed his face with this hand, and Blair reached out to touch his arm. "We could just take our lumps and let them separate us," Jim offered, and in the tone of voice Jim used, Blair suddenly recognized Jim's fear, either of losing his guide or losing his job. Both were possible here.

"Neither one of us wants that. And I like working with you; it worries me that when you really need to go deep into your senses you still need a guide."

"I always need a guide, Chief," Jim answered. "I made it through those months in Cascade without you, but it wasn't easy." Blair bit his tongue to avoid asking Jim to start cataloguing symptoms. Old habits weren't going to help here.

"It's not going to work here, is it?" Blair asked.

"We could try and make it work." Jim's words made Blair think of those people who turned the desert into a lake so that they could try and make things into something they weren't.

"No," he whispered. "We can't. So maybe we need to find some place where we fit in without having to try." The two of them stood in silence as more lights blinked on below and the shadows slowly blended together into night.

"I can call Simon," Jim said quietly. Blair felt an ache when he thought about Simon and Brown and Rafe. He remembered Taggart's support when he first started and Rhonda's willingness to bend the rules to help him and even Megan's relentless teasing and nicknames. The problem was that he knew now that he would miss Bets' brutal honesty and Russo's rude comments and over-protectiveness and Jeff's sharp wit. And Roth. The older he got, the more he didn't understand Naomi's ability to detach from people who she loved.

"Will they... oh man, I don't want to go through all this back home," Blair said. "I mean, with us being more."

"They won't care, Chief," Jim promised.

"How can you be sure?" Blair demanded with the threads of panic starting to weave through his brain.

"They thought we fell for each other a long time ago," Jim confessed.

"They... really? And you think they'd want us back?" Blair asked. Of course everyone would want Jim back, but Blair had walked out. He hadn't even said goodbye, and now he was crawling back and asking that they give him back the job he had walked out on. He couldn't help but feel a little unsure.

"Oh yeah, Chief. They want us back. Let's just get down off this mountain before it gets any later, huh?" Jim started toward the trail, and Blair realized he couldn't see much in the dark. Slipping his hand around Jim's waist, he let his Sentinel start to guide him toward the trail back down to the cars.

"So back to where it started?" Blair asked.

"If you want." Jim's voice had taken on a cautious edge to it.

"Man, I can't believe I'm saying this, but I do miss the rain," Blair confessed. "Rain and decent coffee. These people think Starbucks is the epitome of coffee making," Blair complained. "And clouds," he added. "I am so sick of getting blinded by this desert sun every time I walk outside."

"The low humidity. I get nose bleeds at least once a week."

"Oh man, the pollution. Every time I walk the mountain, I see that brown cloud hanging over the valley and think about the fact that we're breathing that every day."

"And the hicks."

"Oh hell yeah, like people who take guns into Denny's after a Sunday hike in the desert," Blair agreed.

"The worst has to be the damn sports," Jim groaned unhappily.

"They do really suck, don't they?" Blair asked.

"Yeah, Chief, they really do."

"Sounds like a good reason to move," Blair said as they walked down the dark mountain trail. With anyone else, walking the trail in the dark would be an invitation for a broken leg, but Blair walked at Jim's side through the darkness and trusted that they'd be just fine.

065. PASSING

We may never pass this way again

Blair sang to the mountains as he followed Jim's truck up the steep incline. He remembered coming down this same road more than six months ago feeling totally alone, but now the world had changed. He'd fled Cascade thinking that he had lost something that he could never replace.

Now as he followed the old blue truck that Jim refused to trade in, Blair realized that all the downs he'd gone through really had still been leading him up. Even now as he considered the pain of Jeff's sullen farewell and Bets' threat to come up and kick both their asses if they didn't call and Russo's promise to stop calling gays "fags" and Roth's quiet acceptance and Maria's tears, even now Blair knew he was still going up. He was going home. Looking up at the red mountains with their streaks of grey and dots of green trees, Blair had a feeling that he had finally listened to the universe whisper.

"Thank you," he whispered back.

066. RAIN

"Bobby moved out about a month ago, and Simon closed the place up for me," Jim said, as he hung his keys over a hook and then added his jacket over it. Somehow Blair found himself missing the basket that had once caught their keys, even though the last time he had seen it, he had been dropping his keys to Jim's life into it one at a time as he pulled them off the key ring. But now the very fact that the basket with the mail scattered around it was gone, heck the whole table was gone, it just didn't feel right.

"It's a little empty," Blair commented. The baskets and giant pots that lived on top of the kitchen cupboards, the jar of spatulas and skewers that stood next to the stove, the collection of magazines that normally lived on the coffee table, the bills that Jim would jam between the phone of the wall, the red and black blanket that was normally folded over the back of one chair: it was all gone. Only the major furniture was left, draped in sheets as though dressed up for Halloween.

"Yeah, Chief, but we can fill it up again." Jim dropped their suitcases inside the door and went over to the couch where a white sheet was draped over it. He started pulling the fabric from the couch, and even Blair could smell the dust rising in the air. He couldn't even imagine how much the smell had to be annoying Jim, but the Sentinel just kept going from one piece of the furniture to another ripping off the sheets. Before long, the television and chair, and the couch and the kitchen table had all reappeared.

"Right, I'll get the broom and dustpan." Blair headed for the kitchen automatically before it dawned on him that there probably wasn't a broom in there anymore. Yeah, Jim had been with him in Phoenix, but he still couldn't imagine someone else walking around their home, moving the things that Blair remembered. Blair stopped without warning, and Jim bumped into him from behind.

"I'm going to buy you brake lights, Chief," Jim complained.

"Hardy har har, man." Blair covered his moment of confusion with a complaint of his own, but Jim stopped with one hand on Blair's shoulder. When Blair turned to look at him, he saw from the expression that Jim understood. Jim had a slightly panicked, confused expression that matched what Blair felt. Blair opened his mouth to say something, anything that would fill this awkward silence.

"Simon left cleaning supplies right where they used to be, so don't think you're getting out of your half of the chores," Jim said quickly.

"Oh man, we've been driving for 6 hours today, and your first thought when you get home is to clean. There is something seriously wrong with you."

"I just like a clean place, Chief." Jim walked past him and opened the cupboard under the sink. The allergy-sensitive cleaners in their white labels stood lined up neatly.

By the time the loft had reached Sentinel-approved cleanliness levels, the sun had faded and Blair lay sprawled across the couch in exhaustion. He eyed the stairs that led up to the loft and wondered whether he would even make it to the top. Of course, Jim was currently putting the only clean sheets in the loft on his bed. Jim's bed. Blair glanced at the stairs again and then at the small room under the stairs. The futon had a plain brown cover and a couple of couch pillows sitting on it, but it was clear the room wasn't a bedroom anymore. But then again, Blair wasn't exactly comfortable inviting himself upstairs.

White curtains that Bobby must have added lazily flopped in the breeze that drifted into the windows, and Blair turned his head toward the fresh air. The air in Phoenix had smelled of dust... nothing else, just dust. Now Blair could smell the salt of the ocean and the tangy scent of fresh cut grass. Of course he could also smell car exhaust, but no place was perfect.

"You about ready for bed, Chief?"

"Man, I think I might already be asleep." Blair emphasized his words by closing his eyes and letting his head flop back against the couch. Jim chuckled.

"I thought I was supposed to be the old man here. Aren't you supposed to be the young pup with all the energy?"

"Don't you dare start, Jim Ellison," Blair threatened as he opened one eye. "You don't exactly qualify for Social Security." Blair let his eye fall closed again. Part of him wanted to talk about this strangeness, this sudden feeling that the home he had longed for over the last several months somehow wasn't his home... the feeling like everything was a half a centimeter off, and he didn't fit. Part of him wanted to meditate and talk and discuss until this feeling of wrongness passed. Another part of him was just too damn tired to care. And if he was going to be absolutely honest, a big part of him was quickly getting in touch with a huge reservoir of fear and panic.

"No, Chief, I guess I don't." The silence of the room grew heavy, and if he'd been with anyone else, Blair would have faked sleep. Unfortunately, he was with a Sentinel who wasn't likely to be fooled. Jim had been leaning against the railing, but now Blair heard him walk over to the chair, and Blair assumed that the man sat down. However, Blair was too tired to look.

"You okay, Chief?"

Blair silently cursed Sentinel senses that would allow Jim to know how Blair's heart was pounding and how shallow his breathing had become.

"Just trying to get used to being back here."

"Yeah," Jim answered quietly. Blair squirmed a bit as the awkwardness from the continuing silence and the feeling that he just didn't belong grew, clinging to him like the rising humidity from the breeze blowing in the open window. In the distance he could hear thunder. Not the loud distinct cracks of a desert thunderstorm, but the low rolling rumbling sound of a storm blowing in from over the ocean.

Blair turned his head and looked at the lights out of the loft windows. Blair knew that the loft hadn't changed, or least it hadn't changed much, and the view definitely hadn't changed at all. Logically, he knew that he was the one who had changed, but that didn't stop him from feeling irrationally disappointed that he couldn't be a new person and still seamlessly slide back into his old life.

"Are you sorry?" Jim asked in the silence. Blair didn't ask for clarification; he knew it his partner meant.

"Never, man!" The rolling thunder came closer and Blair could see flashes illuminating the undersides of the gray clouds that hovered over the city. "Beautiful," Blair commented.

"What?"

"This storm," Blair clarified as he nodded toward the open windows. Jim turned and looked just as another flash of lightning traveled across the sky, its branches reaching out from that central streak of brilliant light.

"Guess so."

Blair pushed himself up so that he was leaning forward with his elbows braced on his knees as he watched the storm roll in. The air that drifted in through the open windows had the weight that announced a coming rain. Blair wasn't sure when it had happened, but sometime during his stay in Phoenix, he'd grown to miss the way the air felt before a storm. It was heavy against his skin and as the rain approached the temperature dropped. Blair shivered even though he was wearing two flannel shirts.

"Want me to close the window?" Jim asked. Blair looked over in surprise.

"No way, man. I can't believe I'm saying this, and I will deny it if you ever tell anyone, but I missed being cold." Blair stood up and walked over to the windows. Leaning against the rough and cool brick, he let the wind ruffle his hair. The first few drops of rain struck like ice against his face and hands.

"Now I know you aren't Sandburg," Jim snorted. Before Blair even realized that Jim had gotten up, the man's arms closed around his waist and Jim's cheek rested against the side of Blair's head.

"Some days I don't feel like I am," Blair admitted. "Some days... some days I just don't know who I am."

Jim didn't answer, and Blair really didn't expect him to. It was enough that Jim was there holding him, and Blair thought that Jim probably did understand since the man had reinvented himself several times.

The wind picked up again, and Blair stepped back from the window as the rain began in earnest, pushing himself into Jim's chest. Jim moved with him so that now they stood leaning against each other several feet back from the window as the rain fell on the floor and tapped on the windows and beat on the roof.

"Okay, I'm now officially over missing the cold," Blair complained as a full body shiver ran through him.

Jim let go and walked around Blair to close the windows as the storm intensified.

"I have to say though, it does make the loft smell a lot better," Blair said as he realized that the smell of dust and disuse and orange cleaner had been replaced with the fresh scent of rain and ocean.

"You mean you wouldn't trade it in for the smell of night-blooming flowers and desert?" Jim stepped close, the two of them standing face-to-face well inside each other's personal space.

"Hell no! Cascade is home, even when I'm running away from it." They both smiled at that.

"No more running, huh Chief? I'm getting too old for it." Blair opened his mouth to once again tell Jim to drop the old man routine, but Jim reached up and ran a single finger from the outside of Blair's eye over his cheek and down to his chin, just below his lower lip. Blair suddenly lost all ability to form coherent thought.

Oh yeah, he was home.

067. SNOW.

Blair brought his hand up and braced it on Jim's forearm, as much to keep from falling over as anything else. Standing with his hand wrapped around Jim's arm, Blair looked into Jim's blue eyes and realized that he had no idea what he was doing. Every other time he'd felt like this, his partner had curves. Not that Jim didn't have curves, because he did, but not in the same places.

"Oh man, do you have any idea what to do?" Blair quietly asked. Yeah, he might be attracted to powerful people, but never before had a powerful man left him breathless and hungry and completely unsure about what to do next.

"I might have one or two ideas," Jim said, and Blair watched with a strange feeling of floating as Jim bent down. Jim's lips pressed against his own softly, moving slowly as Jim's hand slid around Blair's shoulder. The tenderness surprised Blair; the motion was so gentle that it tickled. Blair opened his mouth a little as he moaned, and Jim's lips pressed more firmly against his. Blair groaned louder as his cock hardened. Oh yeah, the angle might be different, but he knew this.

Blair opened his mouth farther and sucked Jim's lower lip into his mouth as he ran dull teeth over it. Jim waited until Blair released his lower lip, and then Blair felt his mouth invaded as the kiss grew more aggressive. Blair has always been careful with his dates, which was a little ironic since they were generally aggressive women who rarely showed the same concern for him, but now Blair let himself go. He tilted his head a little to the side to get a better angle and attacked Jim's mouth hungrily. Breathing heavily through his nose, he pressed forward and ground his erection into Jim's hip. The feeling of Jim's own bulge caused only a second of hesitation and then Blair pushed his weight into Jim. Strong hands pulled him even tighter as Jim made a strangled sound into Blair's mouth. Jim pulled back, and Blair gasped for breath as he tried to not come in his pants.

"That work?" Jim asked with a chuckle, and Blair realized that the Sentinel could probably smell the pheromones pouring off Blair. Right, Sentinel stuff later, sex now, Blair decided.

"Oh hell, yeah," Blair agreed.

"Upstairs," Jim said.

"Yeah," Blair agreed and then the two of them stood motionless in the living room looking at one another.

"Upstairs," Blair repeated as he stepped back. Jim's arms opened, and the awkwardness returned. "Um... I'll just go upstairs," he said as he took a step backwards. Jim just watched with those dark eyes, so Blair turned and started climbing the stairs.

"So..." Blair said as he reached the top and looked around.

"We don't have to do anything tonight," Jim promised as he reached the top of the stairs.

"Fuck, yes we do," Blair insisted as he considered the idea of going all night with an erection that was already straining his pants and aching with need.

"Which is also fine with me," Jim agreed as he closed the distance between them, and then Blair was lost in another kiss that made him forget all his nervousness. He liked Jim kisses, he decided as he felt Jim's large body press into his. When Blair's knees hit the edge of the bed, Blair fell backwards without even trying to catch himself, and Jim fell on top.

"Never dared do that to Carolyn," Jim whispered before moving on to nibbling on Blair's ear.

"Fuck yeah," Blair encouraged his lover while he pulled at the bottom of Jim's shirt. He had gotten the fabric bunched up under Jim's armpits before Jim stopped and yanked his shirt off and then returning to the task of tasting and nipping and kissing the skin from Blair's ear down to the collar bone. Blair fumbled with the buttons on his own shirt. When the last button gave, Jim slipped his hands between their bodies and put them palm down on Blair's chest so that Blair could feel the heat of them. Blair watched as Jim pushed himself up to his knees, his legs straddling Blair's body.

As Jim gazed down with wide, dark eyes, Blair wondered what his Sentinel could see with his pupils dilated so much. He decided he didn't care any more when Jim's weight pressed down on his cock. Jim gave a small smile that made it clear that it wasn't an accident.

"Fuck. Oh man. Move or this is going to be over," Blair hissed, and Jim shifted his weight onto Blair's thighs as Blair pressed his eyes closed and struggled to stop his orgasm. Warm hands returned to his chest, running through his chest hair and over his nipples before pressing up toward his shoulders, pushing the shirt out of their way as they went. Blair cooperated by half sitting up and shimmying out of the thing.

"Oh, Chief," Jim whispered, and then Blair found himself under Jim's weight again. For one moment, he was so distracted by the flurry of kisses across his neck that he didn't notice the hands deftly working his jeans. When Jim tugged at the waist, Blair pushed his hips up as the jeans disappeared. But pushing up had brought his cock up against Jim's stomach, and Blair could feel the heat from Jim's body soak into him.

The urge was too great to deny, and Blair began thrusting up into that heat. When Jim sat up to unfasten his own pants, Blair groaned with loss and need and an overwhelming desire for that heat.

"Patience, Sandburg," Jim said smugly.

"Fuck patience," Blair shot back, and he would have had more to say except that Jim was pushing down his own pants. Blair had never been cock-shy in the various locker room of his youth, but he'd never before had access to any cock but his own. He reached out and took Jim's cock in his own hand feeling it twitch as he squeezed a little. For purely scientific reasons, he closed his other hand around his own cock, feeling the similarities in their girth and their hardness and their twitching. However, Jim's cock was longer and more pale, which left the vein far more visible. The head was rounder and Blair ran his thumb over the end. Their two cocks leaked just the same, and Jim groaned loudly as he threw his head back, his mouth falling open even though Jim didn't make any more noise.

Blair let go of his prize, especially since he wasn't entirely sure what he wanted to do with it. Almost immediately, Jim dropped back down, his weight pinning Blair, and the pressure on Blair's cock demanded that he move. He thrust up into Jim's body, and almost felt guilty about using Jim like the table leg Jim used to tease him about. Well, he would have felt guilty except that Jim was thrusting down into him just as enthusiastically. Blair grabbed Jim's shoulders and pulled Jim's full weight down onto him as he angled his hips and lunged upward.

Blair bit his lip as the need started building to a critical mass. When Jim's whole body shuddered and jerked, Blair opened his eyes to find Jim's face twisted into an expression of ecstasy. A feeling of warmth spread on Blair's stomach and his cock now slid smoothly between as Blair thrust up even more vigorously two or three more times before he felt himself stiffen as his balls drew up. On last thrust and Blair fell over the edge into orgasm as he gave several more thrusts up into his now-lover's body.

Blair lay gasping for air, Jim now half on him and half on the bed.

"Not how I imagined the first time," Jim said, and Blair felt a softness run across his stomach. He looked down to see Jim slowly wiping the mess they had both formed with a white towel.

"How did you imagine it?" Blair asked curiously. It wasn't his most elegant experience, but he wasn't going to complain about any evening where he got off. He really wasn't going to complain when the evening ended in Jim's bed. Blair smiled as he realized that the fact it was Jim made it the perfect evening even though he had sort of bumbled his way through it. Next time he would just have to make it better. He smiled even wider at the thought of a next time.

"I wanted to taste every inch of you. I wanted to know what every centimeter of your body feels like and tastes like and smells like," Jim whispered, and the towel was replaced with Jim's hand rubbing circles on Blair's stomach.

"Oh shit, man. Just give me some time to recover and I am totally there with that," Blair agreed. The mind was willing, but the body needed some time to recoup.

"We have all the time in the world, Chief," Jim said, and then he moved his hand up to Blair's face where his thumb traced the edge of Blair's upper lip. Blair reached over to Jim who lay next to him and traced the edge of one of the muscles in Jim's arm. He didn't have any idea which muscle it was, but he had been admiring those arms for years. He thought he'd admired them in a 'god I wish I had those' type way, but looking back he had to question his own feelings over the past several years.

"Look," Jim suddenly said in a far more conversational tone. "It's snowing." Blair craned his neck to look at the dark windows, and he could only vaguely see lighter and darker shadows passing over the glass. However, he didn't doubt that Jim could see every single snowflake that touched the window.

"Never would have seen that in the desert," Blair said.

"Nope," Jim agreed before lying all the way down on his side, looking at Blair. Blair shifted so that he could see the window, and that put Jim at his back. Blair smiled as he felt Jim move forward to fit himself against Blair's back.

"If we don't get up and put on some sort of night clothes, we're going to freeze," Blair pointed out.

"I'll keep you warm," Jim muttered. Blair smiled at the tone; Jim was already half asleep. And that was another benefit to his newly discovered gayness: Rolling over and going to sleep was definitely okay. Blair used his foot to grab the blue sheet and brown comforter folded down to the foot of the bed. Dragging it up to where he could reach it, Blair pulled the covers over both of them as sleep sucked him under.

068. LIGHTENING

Even in sleep, Jim had a strong, chiseled face. Beard stubble shaded his cheeks and his eyes twitched, proof of some dream. Blair let his eyes wander down to Jim's chest, which was a tribute to the wonders of weightlifting even when a man ate as much junk food as Jim Ellison did.

Funny, last night Blair hadn't know how to touch Jim, but now his mind supplied any number of possibilities. He smiled as he thought about having a chance to try them all. A little nagging voice whispered that Blair had never been good at keeping relationships going, but he viciously shoved that thought to the back of his mind as he considered the sleeping body next to him. Blair wanted to touch those curves and angles. He wanted to kiss the inside of Jim's thigh and see if it would tickle the man or drive him wild with lust. However, he wasn't ready to wake him. So instead he slipped out of bed as quietly as possible.

Blair had no idea where his robe had ended up in his packing, so he didn't bother digging through the various suitcases and boxes in order to find it. Instead he snagged his boxer shorts from last night off the floor and went to his still unpacked suitcase and pulled a t-shirt from a side pocket. Then he padded downstairs. The living room was quiet and still seemed strangely empty without all the bits and pieces of the life that he and Jim had shared there.

"Chief?" Blair's heart almost pounded through his chest as he spun around to find a Jim standing at the top of the stairs.

"Oh man, you almost gave me a heart attack," Blair complained.

"You okay?"

"Yeah, I guess I'm just trying to figure out what to do next."

"It's a little early for big life-changing decisions, so are you talking about what to do next in terms of breakfast or what to do next in terms of life?" Jim's tone of voice made Blair stop and really think about what his partner meant. He could hear the defensiveness, and he'd known Jim long enough to know that that hid fear.

"Breakfast would be a good start," Blair quickly assured Jim. "Of course, then again, I wouldn't mind knowing what the hell I'm going to do about work."

"I told you Simon offered us both jobs," Jim said with a confused look as he started coming down the stairs rubbing his hair.

"Yeah, man, I know that. I guess I'm just getting those first-day jitters, you know? I used to get those before the first day of class, even if I was the one teaching and even if I had taught the class a dozen times. I just..." Blair stopped as he struggled for the words that would explain his problem without making Jim think that he regretted his decision.

"I know, Chief. Let's get dressed, and I'll take you out for breakfast.

"Is this going to be breakfast with actual food, or breakfast with grease disguised as food?" Blair asked, trying to lighten the mood.

"Would I feed you grease for breakfast?" Jim asked indignantly as he headed for the bathroom.

"Yes," Blair quickly answered to Jim's back as he started up the stairs. If they were going out for breakfast, he probably needed to get dressed.

The restaurant Jim picked did in fact have a few breakfast items that didn't feature grease as the first ingredient. Blair worked on his omelet and whole-grain bagel as he considered which of the questions currently rattling around in his brain Jim might be able to answer.

"So," Blair began as he tore off another piece of bagel and spread cream cheese on it. "How exactly was Simon able to get us both back into major crimes after we quit?"

"Technically, I never really quit." Jim quickly took an enormous bite of Belgian waffle which precluded any further conversation. Blair found himself sitting with bagel half way to his mouth in utter and complete shock.

"You never quit!?"

Jim shrugged even though his mouth was still full.

"Oh man, no no no. You do not get to say something like that and then shove food in your mouth." Blair put his bagel down and glared at his partner who gave him a wry smile even as he continued chewing. Determined to get some sort of explanation, Blair leaned back, crossed his arms, and waited. Jim had to swallow eventually.

"I tried to quit, but Simon wouldn't accept my resignation," Jim said once he finished swallowing.

"For four months?"

"I had a lot of leave saved up," Jim shrugged.

"You didn't think it would work with us." Blair realized he was right the minute Jim blushed, and he had no idea how he felt about Jim having an escape plan for all those months in Phoenix.

"I didn't know," Jim admitted. "When you left, I thought it was the right thing for you. I didn't want to be the one who dragged you back into this again if you finally managed to get yourself free."

"Into this?" Blair asked incredulously.

"You know what I mean, Chief."

"Being a cop. You didn't think I'd stick with it."

"I didn't know if you wanted to, Chief. I knew that if you put your heart into it, you'd do well. I just didn't know where your heart was."

"Okay, I guess that explains why your job is still open," Blair said slowly. "It doesn't really explain how Simon can just hire me back without any sort of explanation to the Commissioner."

"Oh, I figure the Commissioner is feeling rather generous toward you lately," Jim said uneasily.

"Oh man, what did you do?"

"Me? Nothing." Jim had that self-satisfied look that suggested that Jim had done a whole lot more than nothing.

"Man, you are a seriously bad liar." Jim's smirk grew a little wider as he shrugged. "Come on, you can't just leave it at that. Spill!" Blair ordered.

"I know they gave you shit, Chief."

"Yeah? So? I mean, I told you they hassled me some, but the real problem was that I wasn't so sure I could do the job."

"Well, I just had a discussion with Simon and the Commissioner and a couple of the instructors from the Academy about professional ethics."

Blair's eyes went wide as he started to put pieces together in his mind. He could only hope that he was putting them together wrong because this wasn't a pretty picture.

"You didn't," Blair said with a growing heaviness as he watched Jim's expression.

Jim shrugged noncommittally and Blair was starting to hate that Ellison-shrug. "I wasn't going to let them get away with it."

"Oh man, I'm never going to live this down." Blair groaned as he considered just how screwed he was.

"Nothing to live down, Chief. I might have mentioned that you felt a little harassed by some of their sexist and small-minded comments. I also might have mentioned that you left town to avoid suing the department that you felt so much loyalty toward. I made it very clear that if you pushed things, you could make sure that everyone in the state knew that the Cascade police was full of bigots. I pointed out that one word in the wrong ear and certain instructors would be working from a street corner as they directed traffic. Then I pointed out that you chose not to do that." Blair sat looking at his partner in shock. Suddenly had a mental image of Jim in full out Blessed Protector mode with his jaw twitching and his blue eyes pinning the Commissioner to his seat. Blair felt the giggle starting to form in his chest, and he couldn't help it. He started laughing.

"Chief?"

"Oh man, you did it, didn't you? Shit, I can't believe you bluffed like that."

"It wasn't a bluff, Sandburg," Jim said fiercely. "A couple times I came early to pick you up thinking I might get to see you working on the obstacle course, and I heard what they said. It was everything I could do not come across that field and break their fucking necks. Some of those cops out there became trainers because they couldn't handle it on the streets, and they still thought they had a right to judge you. They saw you with your long hair and your earrings and your strange attitudes, and they never even took into consideration that you have more guts than all of them put together."

Blair sat at the table in utter shock. Yeah, on the surface Jim looked angry -- Jim looked downright enraged, but under that anger Blair heard more.

"Oh man..." Blair looked at Jim and had no words to answer him. Jim shrugged and the fury seemed to drain from his face.

"I couldn't let them get away with that. In Phoenix, they weren't willing to bend rules that were on the books, but they didn't try and drive you away because of who you were."

"That wasn't what drove me away," Blair said softly. "I couldn't find myself here," he tried to explain.

"I know that now, and maybe it would have happened anyway... maybe we would have needed time away from each other no matter what happened."

"I know what I want now," Blair said confidently.

"Me too," Jim said quietly before he turned his full attention back to his waffles. As Jim devoured his breakfast with singular devotion, Blair knew the time for sharing had passed. But he couldn't help feeling that some great weight had been taken off his shoulders and suddenly he had the feeling that everything was going to be all right.

069. THUNDER.

Scaramouche,scaramouche

Will you do the fandango

Thunderbolt and lightning

Very, very frightening me

Galileo, Galileo

Galileo Galileo

Galileo, Figaro

Magnifico

The speakers at the front of the club screamed, and Blair put his hand on Jim's back where the muscles had tightened into thick cords that slowly loosened as Blair traced a small circle on Jim's skin. Blair continued until Jim's back had relaxed--a sign that the Sentinel had found the setting on the dials that made the club bearable. The overhead lights flared with the words creating a strobe light effect that made Blair flinch, but Jim gave a small hand gesture, and Blair pulled back.

Blair had missed the non-stop rollercoaster action of Major Crimes, and now not only had he gotten back on the roller coaster, but Simon had loaned them out to a joint FBI investigation of a serial killer or killers in the area. Blair started walking the perimeter of the room, letting his body sway in the time with the music as he bobbed his head. Even now that he was getting older, he could still blend in just because he knew how to let his body go. Jim on the other hand was looking a little painfully stiff as he made his way over to a spot near the bathrooms.

Of course, what the two agents in the room didn't know was that Jim could hear everything in the room. He and Blair had practiced this exercise. Jim would let his eyes sweep the room, and his hearing would follow, allowing him to concentrate on a conversation in the far corner while still blocking out the blaring music. However, Blair was still a little worried about the strobe light effect affecting Jim's vision.

Meanwhile, Blair danced his way through the crowd looking for the most vulnerable targets. He didn't have far to look; he soon found himself weaving to the beat next to a small gaggle of pierced and colorful and mostly nude young women. Their eyes focused on the distant lights flashing in the ceiling, and Blair recognized that blissed-out expression of ecstasy.

As the song changed, Blair let himself jerk to the new beat, his eyes half closed. He wondered if any of these kids even listened to the lyrics which screamed about making mistakes, facing mistakes even when you wanted to run. Blair understood that need to both run and to face up to his mistakes, but he didn't think these kids were hearing anything other than the beat. And the very fact that some asshole was using this weakness to turn these kids into prey... that infuriated Blair. If the FBI was right, somewhere in this crowd, one or more rapists stalked these girls whose only sin was being lost and confused and young and in possession of a fake ID. But none of those offenses deserved the punishment that Blair had seen in the FBI photos of the dead bodies.

As Blair let his body fall into the rhythm, he tried not to see these girls' faces superimposed over those broken and dirty bodies. Instead he tried to imagine them growing up and growing into something healthier, better. And if he could make that happen by catching these assholes and putting them in jail for the rest of their lives, he would do what he needed to do to make that happen.

Blair glanced over towards Jim, but his partner was still scanning the crowd, which meant he hadn't heard anything yet. Even while keeping an eye on this group, Blair started threading through the thundering crowd. The FBI agent had seemed cynical when Blair had claimed to be able to profile possible victims from the floor, but Jim had backed his claims.

Of course, the fact that the two lead agents had asked whether he and Jim were planning on going renegade on this investigation was a big hint that the agents had called around and gotten his Phoenix record, and that probably helped Blair's case too. No matter what had convinced them, he now moved from one group to another, looking for girls who fit the profile and any man or men who might be watching them. Men who might be a little too sober or too observant to fit in at a rave.

For three nights he and Jim had done this, and for three days the only report to Simon the next morning had been that they had wandered through the crowd unable to identify anyone suspicious. But Blair still clung to the hope that tonight would be it. The timing was right, and Blair needed to get these guys.

When he had first seen the FBI file, Blair had felt his stomach curl in revolt: both at how many girls disappeared and in how vicious the attacks had been. The attacker or attackers had worked their way west to Cascade, and these were sadists who left no evidence behind. Well, unless you counted the bodies with their red tracks and curled burns. But nothing had led back to any suspects.

Blair spotted a blonde near the back door. She had a streak of blue going through her hair and blue eye makeup that made her look vaguely clown-like, but her expression was one of utter despair. She was on a trip, and from the expression on her face, it wasn't a good one either. Blair watched as she put a hand on the wall to brace herself, her fingers splayed across the white surface. Blair had seen enough bad trips to know one when he saw one, but what interested him a lot more was the man who watched her from the shadow of a pillar.

The man was unremarkable in his normalcy. No birth marks, no unusual characteristics, nothing remarkable at all. He swayed as though dancing, but his body moved to some internal rhythm that had nothing to do with the music, so he moved out of sync and awkwardly. Someone else might have mistaken that motion for being stoned; however, as he moved, his gaze remained locked on the blonde. Blair's alarm bells went off. While this might just be some perverted businessman trying to pick up an underage date, Blair didn't think so. In fact, he was so certain he signaled his partner.

Blair let himself be swept back into a clump of dancers as the thundering music kept him from using his radio. Well, technically he could use it, but he didn't think anyone on the other end could hear him. Blair orbited around the girl and her watcher, determined not to let her turn into one more body that would be dumped on the street in a week.

Blair smiled as a cute red-head flashed him a grin full of metal from a tongue ring and a lip ring before she curled her arms around him. With the girl clinging to him, Blair felt safer staying in one place and watching. He took a quick peek over her shoulder and saw Jim working his way through the crowd, but Jim wasn't close enough and the man with the girl was entirely too close to the back exit.

Blair worked his way slowly toward the wall so that he would have a clear shot at the door if worse came to worse. Of course he was hoping for better, for Jim to have signaled the feds, for backup to be outside the back door, but he had learned to prepare for the worst.

Jim had almost reached him when the man made his move. Blair watched as Mr. Normal moved in and slipped a sympathetic arm around the blonde's shoulder. At first the girl flinched back, but then the man must've whispered something into her ear because she leaned into him. The hand that had been braced against the wall now curled against his shoulder, her bright red fingernails contrasting against the man's black T-shirt.

Blair danced closer, unwilling to let this creep get far enough away to have even the slightest chance of escape. Looking back he saw Jim now shoving through bodies recklessly.

Blair screamed something at his dance partner that he suspected she couldn't hear over the thundering music, but his gentle push certainly told her what she needed to know. She made a rude gesture in his direction before turning away and curling herself around an orange-haired black boy.

Blair abandoned his attempts to be subtle in favor of making a straight line toward the suspect and the girl, but the man didn't even notice. He had already pulled open an exit door that was supposedly alarmed and was busy herding the girl out the door. Blair ran the last few steps and the cold night air hit him in the face at the same time as he pulled his weapon.

Standing at the door to the club, Blair took aim and yelled his warning. "Cascade PD! Stop right there!"

Blair briefly wondered why he even bothered yelling because no one ever stopped. This man was no exception. The arm that had soothingly embraced the girl shoved her away so that she hit a blue dumpster and rebounded onto the concrete ground in the alley. His other hand pulled a gun from waistband and brought it up.

Blair ducked just as the blast from the gunfire rang in his ears. For one blind moment, Blair thought he'd been shot. Then he brought his fingers up to his face and realized that a bullet had shattered the wood frame of the door leaving a trail of splinters down his cheek. Blair wasn't about to let that stop him, so just as Jim reached the door, Blair darted across the alley and used a dumpster on the far side for cover. Jim had his own weapon out and pointed down the alley instantly.

As it turned out, neither of them needed to do a thing. Agents and uniformed cops swarmed the alley from the far end, and faced with such overwhelming numbers, the man held up his hands.

Blair nodded as another officer gave him a 'thumbs up' gesture. This had been a large operation and the arrest meant that a dozen teams that had been canvassing a dozen raves had congregated on the site.

"Not bad, Sandburg," offered one of the same FBI officers who had earlier demanded to know whether Blair and Jim planned on going rogue.

"Thanks," Blair grinned back and then winced. He could afford to give up grudges tonight. One bad guy in custody, and Blair could tell from the snippets he'd overheard that the man was singing like a bird. Blair felt the normal adrenaline rush of the arrest, and part of him wanted to go run the mountain. Instead he struggled to sit still on the cold metal.

"Definitely not bad, Chief. If he'd gotten out that back door unseen..." Jim leaned against the open back door of the ambulance, and Blair flinched as the medic pulled another splinter.

"Ow!" Blair complained.

"This would be a lot easier if you'd go to the hospital," the medic complained, but Blair just glared up.

"No way, man. No hospitals."

"We're going to need your statements," Agent Berger interrupted, ignoring both the medic's soft Spanish curses and Blair's outburst.

"Oh shit, please tell me I have time to change," Blair begged as he gestured toward his shirt with splatters of blood and a ripped collar where Jim had been a little too enthusiastic about checking out the injury. Then he yelped again as the medic pulled a deep splinter out of his cheek near his hairline.

"I think we can wait a few minutes for the walking wounded to change," Berger agreed with a crooked smile. "Ellison, we'll need yours right away."

"No problem," Jim answered, but Blair noticed that his lover's eyes never left him. He thought back and realized Jim had always done that when he got hurt. He would talk to Simon while still watching Blair. Blair wondered if it was a Sentinel thing or if Jim had been falling way back then. Jim interrupted his thoughts with a far more mundane question. "Chief, do you want me to drive you home or do you want to bum a ride off a black-and-white?"

Blair tried to relax his face and wait for another splinter to be pulled before answering. At least this time he managed to limit himself to a hiss. "I think I can bum a ride, unless Dr. Frankenstein here leaves me permanently disfigured,"

"Very funny, tough guy," the medic rolled his eyes and then got revenge with another splinter. "I think that's the last of them," he announced as he ran a gloved finger over the sore skin.

"Yeah," Blair agreed. "Feels like."

"Right, so if you'll sign here that you're an idiot who doesn't want to go to the hospital where they have topical anesthetics and antibiotics, I'll go find someone who's actually injured." Blair signed the paper that the grouchy medic thrust into his hands.

"Hospitals are dangerous, man. You have no idea how many diseases those places have," Blair defended himself as he handed the paper back with his signature.

"You cops are all the same. You'll face some psycho with a shotgun but you run away from one little germ." The medic rolled his eyes again, and Blair glared as Jim hid a laugh behind a fake cough.

Blair hopped off the end of the ambulance and Jim followed him over to the main FBI van. As they walked, Jim's hand found the small of Blair's back, and Blair let himself bounce a little at getting one more scumbag off the street, and getting credit on the arrest didn't hurt either. Blair hadn't said anything, but he and Jim had traded glances as Simon had failed to assign Blair as primary on any cases.

Jim had been wonderful about remembering the lessons of Phoenix and giving Blair room to use his own talents, but that didn't stop Simon's actions from stinging. But now, Blair smiled as he reached the van and then regretted it when his sore cheek started to tingle and throb. Well, Simon couldn't ignore the fact that Blair had identified the suspect, and Blair had gotten primary credit for the arrest. Blair even planned on being there when the FBI agents questioned the other suspects.

"What do we have, people?" a deep voice bellowed, and Blair thought of the old saying about speaking of the devil. He immediately regretted it, especially since the Simon had gotten Blair his first badge and convinced Roth to hire him in Phoenix. In fact, it was Simon who had sent to Jim to Phoenix in search of the serial killer in the hopes that the two men could recover their friendship. Blair knew he had a lot to thank Simon for, but somehow that still didn't make up for the fact that Simon couldn't seem to give him the one thing Blair truly wanted: respect.

"We have a viable suspect, a confession, and two teams going to pick up co-conspirators," Agent Finnegan, Berger's partner, said with obvious glee. "You have a damn fine team here, and if I thought it would do any good, I'd try to get them federal badges."

"Don't even think it," Simon threatened as he took the cigar from his mouth and pointed it in Finnegan's general direction. "But you're right about them being a good team. One of my best." Simon smiled widely and stuck the cigar right back in his mouth, even if it wasn't lit. Blair felt the warmth of the praise even if he didn't dare smile back. Instead he ducked his head a little in embarrassment.

"Your man identified and flushed him. Sandburg's quite the cop," Finnegan hadn't quite gotten the end of his sentence out when Simon's shocked voice cut him off.

"Sandburg?!" Simon demanded incredulously as he snatched the cigar from his mouth again.

Blair's head snapped up at the tone of voice, and his eyes caught Simon's gaze.

"I mean, of course they're both excellent officers," Simon stumbled, but Blair felt the warmth of the compliment darken into a blush as the three FBI officers turned to look in confusion at Simon's disbelief. Blair could feel Jim tighten up next to him, a subtle shifting of weight that told Blair that Jim wanted to attack something, and would be very much in need of a backrub later.

Blair waited for the explosion, but Jim remained quiet, and Simon quickly turned the conversation to other matters. However, Blair didn't miss the glances the agents would give him. As soon as he could, Blair pled exhaustion and went in search of a ride home. He wasn't surprised when Jim followed, the statement and Blair's offer to catch a ride with a black-and-white forgotten.

Blair slammed the passenger side door shut on the truck a whole lot harder than necessary, but Jim didn't comment until after he started the engine.

"Do you want..."

"I don't want anything other than a change of clothes, a quick statement, and a good night's sleep. I need a chance to think about just what I want to say," Blair snapped back. He instantly felt guilty about taking his anger out on Jim, but Jim just nodded slowly as he navigated the streets of Cascade.

070. STORM.

As they walked, Jim's hand touched the small of his back where Jim often let his hand linger, since long before they'd become lovers, but now Blair walked faster. He knew that hand would sooth him, just like Jim intended it to, but he needed to stay good and angry. Behind him, Blair heard Jim's footsteps pause for a moment, and then Jim followed several steps behind.

When Blair pushed open the double doors to the bullpen, he stood for a moment unsure about what exactly he was supposed to do. Part of him said to push everything from his desk into his bag and just get the fuck out, but he'd tried that once and it hadn't gone well. If he were to be perfectly honest, all the things that had gone well hadn't made up for the lack of Jim in his life.

He needed to find a new pattern, and he needed to tattoo that pattern into Simon's hide. Blair's stomach tightened into knots at the thought of confronting Simon. He would rather face five armed suspects than Simon. If there was any way in the universe of avoiding this, Blair would take it. Unfortunately, the only way to avoid the confrontation was to swallow his pride and allow Simon to keep treating him like the tag-along observer trotting after Jim. Blair clenched his jaw and took deep breaths as he strode forward toward Simon's office.

When his hand closed around the doorknob, Blair glanced back, and Jim was sitting on the edge of his desk watching. Part of Blair wanted Jim to deal with this while Blair stood back, but that wasn't exactly a good solution for either of them. Instead Blair knocked sharply on the door and waited for Simon's answering bellow.

The moment Blair opened the door, he knew that Simon didn't want to deal with their problems. That was evident in the way that Simon instantly frowned as Blair came in the office.

"Sandburg, I don't have time for this today." Blair could feel the urge to back down crawling up his backbone like ice water, but he steeled himself and dropped into one of the chairs across from Simon.

"Oh no, man. No, we are not dropping this."

"Sandburg, get out," Simon said as he turned back to his computer screen.

"Not a chance. We need to talk about what happened last night."

"Dammit, Sandburg, I don't have time. I'm not telling you this again."

"Simon, you make time for every other detective on this floor, and if you won't make time for me, then I guess that says what my status is here, doesn't it?" Blair snapped even though the confrontation made his morning bagel churn uncomfortably in his stomach. Blair just hoped he got through this before he had to throw up because running to the bathroom in the middle of this conversation wouldn't exactly improve his standing.

"Don't you dare tell me what your status is or isn't in my department." Simon stood up and leaned over his desk, but Blair refused to back down.

"You humiliated me out there. You really expect I'm just going to let that slide?" Blair demanded incredulously.

"Look, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to say it. But I don't have time for this right now," Simon said as he dropped back down into his seat.

"You didn't mean to say it? Great! So that supposed to make everything okay?" Blair could feel his anger override his meditative breathing as he considered Simon's unmoving attitude. "You may not have meant to say it, but you were fucking surprised that I had done a good job. What does that say about me as a detective? What does that say about your expectations of me?" Blair demanded, his voice rising and his bagel turning to lead in his stomach.

"Sandburg, I said you were a good cop. Look, I slipped, and I didn't mean to. So, take it however you want to, but I'm busy."

"You don't think I can't do the job." Blair's voice dropped to a near whisper in his rage and hurt.

"I never said that," Simon quickly snapped back.

"You don't have to, Simon. If you thought I could do the job, you wouldn't have been fucking surprised when I got it done. If you thought I could do the job, I would have cases of my own out there instead of tagging after other detectives."

"Is that with this is about? You're upset about how I assign cases?" Simon growled dangerously, but Blair had long since passed the point where he could be intimidated. Simon's distrust of him was far more painful than Simon's anger.

"I'm upset about how you don't assign cases, Simon. Come on, man, look at the board! I don't have a single case. I never have."

"You and Ellison have plenty of cases. If you want more, just let me know and I'm capable of burying you under cases."

"No, Simon. Jim has cases; I tag along after Jim."

"What is your problem, Sandburg?" Simon demanded in an exasperated tone of voice.

"Damn it. You don't even see it, do you? Brown and Rafe work together most of the time, but each one gets his own cases. But not me! No, I'm just the tag-along who follows after Jim. I don't count as a real detective up there on that board."

"You can stop the histrionics now, Sandburg." Simon's voice dropped into a low rumble that warned Blair that the man was no longer amused, not that he'd been all that amused at the beginning.

"Oh man, if I wanted to be hysterical, I would've done that in front of the FBI agents when you humiliated me by implying that me doing a good job is somehow surprising. If I wanted histrionics, I'd go to the commissioner and point out the fact that I'm a detective in my own right and yet I don't have any cases.

"I'm not an observer anymore, Simon. I'm a fucking cop, and I can do my own job without having to tag along behind someone else. They offered me my own corner office down in Phoenix, and they don't do that because somebody's good at following along. For three months I worked down there without Jim at all! And for two of the months when Jim worked there, we had very few cases together. But you? You just still see me as the observer. If I can't be a detective in this department, then find me a department with a captain that will let me do my fucking job."

Blair had pushed himself up to his feet before he even stopped talking. And without waiting for any sort of response or reaction, he slammed out of the office. Jim quickly stood, and Blair had no illusions about privacy when there was a Sentinel in the building, but he also didn't want to talk about it right now.

So instead of stopping at his partner's desk or at his own desk, he grabbed his leather messenger bag and slammed back out the bullpen doors. Blair stormed down six flights of stairs before his stomach forced him to find a bathroom where he could empty out his morning meal. Waves of guilt and fear and tidal waves of anger and fucking tsunamis of uncertainty crashed into him.

Blair couldn't stay at the precinct, and so he pushed his way outside to his own car, thanking God that he had insisted on driving himself to work today. He wasn't fit company for anyone, not even Jim. Maybe especially not Jim.

Blair was sitting on a bench that overlooked the commercial docks with the huge barges being towed through the sluggish waves. The water in postcards always looked blue, but from here Blair could only see grays and black and a few shades of dark green.

"I thought I might find you here," Jim said as he came and sat on the bench.

"You did, huh? How's that?" Blair asked. This wasn't exactly a normal hang-out for him. In Phoenix he had always retreated to the mountain, but in Cascade, Rainier had once been his safe retreat.

"I put an APB out on your plates," Jim admitted with a shrug. Blair couldn't help but smile a little. It was such a damn Jim-thing to do.

"I'm fine," Blair promised.

"That's good because Simon's not," Jim answered. "Simon is chewing through his entire cigar stash at a pretty good clip."

"Good," Blair said uncharitably. He didn't have the emotional energy left for charity.

"He really hadn't realized that he'd been shutting you out."

"Did he realize that before or after you told him he'd been shutting me out?" Blair asked, well aware that his tirade had expressed his anger, but it hadn't changed the stubborn expression on Simon's face.

"I might have told him that if he treated you like that again I'd kick his ass," Jim admitted.

"My Blessed Protector," Blair sighed, but he had to admit that it was nice knowing that someone would always take his side. He had known it wasn't going to be easy coming back, but now that he was here, he realized that Phoenix had never been home. He had never tried to make anything permanent there. He had never hung decorations or put down roots. He missed Roth and Bets and the others more than he had expected, and he had expected to miss them a lot, but he didn't miss Phoenix. Looking out over the grey water and bluish-grey sky, Blair realized that it was because Cascade would always be home to him in some intangible way. He just hated the fact that Major Crimes might not be home for him.

"I'm not the only one, Chief. When I left Simon's office, Taggart was waiting outside, and he had a look of thunder on his face," Jim added.

"Really? Over me?" Blair looked over, and Jim nodded with an expression of pity, but somehow Blair didn't think the pity was for him.

"Oh yeah," Jim said in a tone that made it clear he expected Simon to walk away from that conversation missing a limb. "And then Brown was explaining what happened last night to Megan, and both of them looked fairly pissed. I might have mentioned that you had asked for a transfer if Simon couldn't respect your judgment and trust your abilities as a cop." Blair flinched as he imagined what Megan would have to say to Simon.

"Oh man, that wasn't very nice," Blair said as he looked at Jim. Jim looked over at him with a small smile, and then the expression faded under something more unreadable.

"What are you thinking?" Blair asked since he couldn't quite identify Jim's emotion.

"I'm thinking how many of us owe you, including Taggart, including Simon, including me. But before you left..." Jim paused, and Blair could feel his partner struggling for the right words. "I don't know." Even though Jim had fallen silent, Blair could feel the apology and the guilt. Rather than say something that would embarrass both of them, Blair slipped his hand under Jim's arm and let his fingers trace the sensitive skin of the inside of Jim's forearm.

"I won't lose you again, Chief. Not over this job I won't." Jim's voice was rough and gravelly even though his face remained stoically unemotional. Blair looked out over the water where Jim had focused his own eyes.

"Oh man, you won't," Blair promised. "Ever." Jim's hand came down and rested on the top of Blair's thigh, and they sat and watched the boats navigate around each other in the crowded harbor.

071. BROKEN

"I smell blood."

"You could smell blood from a paper cut a block away. You smelling blood doesn't actually count as blood," Blair insisted, as his legs were gently but firmly forced farther apart as Jim searched for a source of the scent. Struggling to not squirm, Blair gasped as warm fingers skimmed the sensitive skin behind his balls and over his pucker. The movements left Blair both ticklish and horny, which was an uncomfortable combination considering it looked like he might not get any tonight.

"Ha!" Jim said triumphantly, holding out a finger so that Blair could turn his head and see the small streak of pink running across the pad.

"Okay, if you let that stop you, I am going to fucking kill you," Blair threatened.

"You're the one who said stop," Jim pointed out, and Blair noticed that Jim's cock had softened far more than Blair's had.

"I meant stop as in slow down and give me time to adjust," Blair fumed

"You winced."

"It hurt."

"And that's why I stopped."

"And it doesn't hurt any more," Blair said with clenched teeth. As far as sexual encounters were concerned, this wasn't one of his better ones.

"Let's try it the other way," Jim offered again with all the enthusiasm of a sacrificial victim.

"No. I don't trust you," Blair shot back, and he blamed the poor phrasing on the fact that his blood was all trapped in his cock, despite Jim's fear that adding a second finger had caused massive internal bleeding.

"You... what?"

"I don't trust you to stay 'stop'," Blair tried to explain as he looked at Jim's devastated expression." You'd dial down the pain, and then I really might hurt you."

"As opposed to me hurting you?" Jim demanded, and Blair sighed as he realized he had triggered the defensive, alpha-dog Jim. The arms crossed over the chest and the narrowed eyes were a dead giveaway. Blair wasn't sure he wanted to face alpha-Jim buck naked and face down on the bed. Not exactly a strong negotiating position, Blair mused.

"You didn't hurt me," Blair pointed out. "I, however, am on the verge of hurting you." He unconsciously writhed his hips against the bed.

"But you bled," Jim said, in his "but Chief, I'm only being reasonable" tone. So, that was his defense against trying to slowly kill Blair with sexual frustration?

"We both knew it might happen the first time or two, it doesn't mean you've hurt me." Blair glanced over his shoulder, and Jim still had a determined expression on his face. "Oh man, I do not like that look," Blair complained.

Jim rubbed his hand over his face as though he could wipe away the expression. "Chief, I'm just not okay with hurting you."

"If I have to tell you that you didn't hurt me one more time, I'm going to go get a frying pan out of the kitchen and hit you upside the head," Blair growled as he half rolled onto one elbow. With Jim kneeling between his legs, those large hands cradling his hips, Blair really couldn't move any farther. "Now get your fingers back in there," Blair demanded, and he suddenly had an image of some covert ops team conducting illegal surveillance on them and getting that on tape. However, Jim obediently picked up the lube from the towel spread out on the edge of the bed and did as ordered.

Blair used meditative breathing to try and relax as muscles strained around the large, slippery intrusion. He tried to not mentally compare the size of those two fingers to the size of Jim's cock because the man had been blessed in the genitals department. He was smaller than porn stars, but bigger than any men Blair had ever showered with after P.E. class. The same spot inside that had caused problems before started stinging again, and Blair groaned in frustration because Jim had just reached in far enough to press into the prostate, a gland Blair was just now beginning to fully appreciate.

"Is that a good or a bad groan?" Jim demanded as he immediately froze.

"That's a good groan, with a warning that `this is as far as we're getting tonight' groan," Blair admitted as the one spot started really hurting. Jim carefully pulled out, and then Blair felt Jim move up and lay over him so that Jim's cock was nestled between Blair's cheeks.

"Fucking tease," Blair pouted, with a small hump into the bed below him.

"I'll just have to take care of you the old fashioned way," Jim said softly, and Blair felt lips brush the back of his neck. The feeling of Jim kissing him, tasting him with small licks across his shoulder, made Blair's whole body shiver in need. Blair pulled his hands out from under the pillow where he had tucked them and reached behind to stroke one of Jim's muscular thighs. Blair could feel Jim's cock harden at even that small touch, and he hitched up so he could close his thighs tight around it.

Jim moaned appreciatively and gave a few small thrusts into the tight space, but the kisses and licks continued across Blair's neck and now teeth worried the earrings of one ear. Blair squirmed happily and tried to roll enough so that he could get a hand under him to grab his own cock.

Jim sat up, his legs now straddling Blair's thighs, and Blair looked over his shoulder at Jim's large eyes, the pupils dilated so far that they looked almost black. Blair opened his mouth to ask what Jim needed, but Jim's fingers trailed over his lips, silencing him. Blair lay back and waited. For the longest time, Jim just stared.

Then, Jim's hands pulled at Blair's waist, and Blair cooperated with the grip that flipped him on the bed. Jim again lowered his weight, and this time the two cocks were trapped side by side. Blair groaned.

"Oh man, fuck, yeah," he encouraged as Jim started up a slow rocking motion that was more teasing than actual satisfaction." Fuck, more," Blair hissed as he clutched at Jim's shoulders and tried to thrust up. Jim's weight was too much though, and Blair was stuck having to accept Jim's slow pace.

"Fuck, faster. Come on. Have some mercy," Blair begged. He could hear Jim panting in need just as much as he was, but Jim kept the motions steady. Blair started to make another death threat, but then Jim shifted his weight so that Blair's cock pressed into his stomach even harder, and Blair couldn't think about anything other than coming, not even killing his partner.

Blair squirmed and struggled to get a hand in between them until Jim finally caught one of Blair's hands in each of his and pinned them to the mattress. Their fingers twined together as Blair threw back his head and gasped for air. Moaning, Jim sped up and Blair felt his own balls draw up as he started coming between their two bodies. The warm liquid spread across his stomach and chest as Jim's now-frantic humping spread it about. Blair was still floating on the bubble of his own orgasm when he felt Jim start to shudder as he came.

Once Jim finished, he released Blair's hands and slumped down onto Blair's body. Blair could feel their come sliding down his waist, and hopefully the large towel Jim had laid out would catch it because Blair couldn't come up with the energy to care enough to check.

"So, how was that?" Jim asked with a chuckle.

"I think you broke me," Blair said with a happy sigh.

072. FIXED

"The Raceway case?" he asked, his eyes going to the print-out summary as Simon wrote down Blair's name in his paperwork.

"You got a problem with that?" Simon demanded darkly, and obviously the man wasn't yet over the part where Blair had yelled something about fucking off or fucking respecting him or something with fuck in it. Blair didn't exactly remember what he had said, but Simon clearly did.

"No problem, Simon," Blair quickly answered. Simon went about assigning the two other cases that had landed in Major Crimes overnight, and Blair glanced around at his coworkers. Since he had made a point of demanding his own cases without Jim, he couldn't exactly ask Jim to be second on the case. Simon ended the meeting, and the detectives wandered away.

"Think you might need some help with that, mate?" Megan asked, and Blair smiled widely at the one member of Major Crimes who actually knew something about horses.

"Please?" Blair said in his most winsome voice. Megan laughed.

"Yeah, yeah. You can turn the charm off there, Sandy," she said as she reached for the file. Blair surrendered it without a fight.

As Megan negotiated traffic, Blair flipped through the through the case notes from Vice."It looks like someone is fixing the races," he said.

"Which wouldn't be a major crime if the mayor's major campaign contributor didn't own half the place," Megan agreed.

"Yeah, can't get away from politics no matter where you go," Blair said.

"Could be organized crime."

"Yeah, except they're usually more organized. This is just sloppy. I'm surprised Vice didn't catch these morons," Blair pointed out. The file showed that on certain days, all but one or two horses would suddenly run entire seconds under their normal times, a method of fixing races that was both obvious and stupid.

"Everyone's stretched a little thin with the flu. You've only got this one case to work on as primary. Most officers are running more than a dozen right now."

"Yeah, there's that," Blair said unhappily, as he considered what had led up to him being assigned his first case.

"Are you two okay now? 'Cause I don't mind telling you that if you take off again, I just may chase you down and haul you back to Cascade by the scruff of your neck."

"I missed you too," Blair said as he rolled his eyes. "But I think Simon and I are okay. I hope so anyway." Blair finished a little more unsure than he had intended.

"I heard about what he said, Sandy. You know that's not how he really feels, right?"

"Oh man, I am not up to having this discussion right now."

"Yeah, just keep in mind that the poor schmuck they hired after Jim left spent several months listening to Simon complain about how he needed to be more aggressive like Jim and how he needed to be quicker to spot things like you. Poor bastard jumped at the chance to transfer to Vice."

"Megan, if you're trying to convince me of something..."

"Just saying, mate, keep an open mind." She kept her eyes on the road.

"You mean don't go cursing Simon out again?"

"That would be a start," Megan said as she pulled into the driveway in front of the racetrack.

"Yeah, well I don't think it's going to be an issue because if Simon can't learn to see me as a cop, I'll just transfer to another unit. Assuming another unit would have me." Megan pulled smoothly into a parking spot near the main building and turned off the car before turning to look at Blair.

"Sandy, half the captains in the precinct would be happy to have you, and the ones that wouldn't aren't worth a tinker's damn. But as much as Simon blows hard, he does respect you. I think it's more that he doesn't expect other people to respect you." Blair had been putting the file back into his bag as Megan spoke, and he found himself frozen as the picture in his mind suddenly rearranged into a new pattern.

"When did you turn into the smart one?" he finally asked.

"Always was, mate." Megan gave him a wink before opening her car door and getting out. Blair shook his head as he considered the possibility that Megan might be right and he might be wrong. In the end, only time would tell. Either Simon respected him and they'd be able to work together or Simon didn't, and he'd transfer.

Blair shook his head for a moment as he realized that Megan was halfway to the front door, and he was still in the car. He finished shoving the file into his bag and hurried to follow her into the building.

A man wearing an off-the-rack business suit and polished shoes showed them to the stables where the horses that were going to race later in the day or later in the week were housed.

"So who has access to the horses?" Blair asked as he looked at the padlocked stalls and the tightly woven wire mesh that kept fingers and treats away from these animals whose diets were carefully monitored by veterinarians and trainers, all of whom had thousands of dollars at stake.

"Every time a trainer or owner checks in a new horse, we give them one key to the lock you see on that there stall door. The other key is kept in a safe in the main room just in case of fire or emergency. But the safe is locked, and no one's opened it in at least three weeks."

"Who has access to the combination?" Blair asked.

"I do, the night manager does, the track owner, the on-staff veterinarian, the head of security, and the head of maintenance."

"Mate, that's a lot of people who know the combination do that safe," Megan pointed out.

"I trust my people," the man instantly snapped. Megan made an unpleasant expression and then shrugged as she physically backed off a step.

"So in an average day, how many times are these stalls open?" Blair quickly asked as much to distract the man as to get the information.

"Usually, the horses are out for some morning exercise, the staff will clean out the stall while the horses are on the track, and the trainers will bring them back and feed 'em. Any horses that are racing that day will be out about two hours before their race. The ones that are racing will stay in the stalls until evening, and the trainers'll take those horses out again at night."

Blair exchanged glances with Megan and wondered if it could be just that easy. He knew from the paperwork that none of the trainers or owners was benefiting from having their horses run far slower than usual, so his newest theory he seemed at least possible. From the small grin on Megan's face, Blair thought she might have come up with the same idea.

073. LIGHT

"Just check your side," Megan said through clenched teeth, and Blair could tell that he was about two seconds away from getting something thrown at his head.

"Stubborn," Blair muttered to himself as he went back to feeling with his hands behind the hay bales. Only the stable hands worked in his room, so Blair was hoping that they would be arrogant enough or stupid enough to leave some sort of evidence around. After all, they were stupid enough to be so obvious in their schemes as to attract the attention of Vice. And they were stupid enough to target a racetrack that had as one of its co-owners one of the most politically influential men in Cascade. So overall, Blair was guessing they were pretty stupid.

"I have seen the light!" Megan suddenly exclaimed as she held up a black object. Blair turned around and spotted the Bible in her hand.

"Religious epiphany?" Blair asked innocently.

"Not quite," Megan said, flipping open the front cover. Inside was a hollowed-out space, crammed full of little brown balls.

"I'm betting that that stuff isn't good for horses," Blair said with a wide smile of his own. He'd learned the hard way that many cases required weeks or months of hard work. He'd grown to accept the fact that many cases would never be solved at all. So, to have his first case back on his home turf practically wrapped up in a little over an hour would have to leave even Simon pleased.

Blair smiled. One way or another, Simon was going to see the light.

074. DARK

"Forget it, Sandburg. The lights stay off."

"Come on, man. This isn't fair." Blair heard Jim chuckle as the mattress dipped to one side.

"Bully," Blair complained. The small movements of the mattress stopped and Blair could practically feel Jim freeze in place.

"Maybe we could turn on a light downstairs," Jim said, and Blair could feel the uncertainty.

"Oh man, ignore me. I'll whine about doing it with the lights on later. With light, without light, whatever," Blair insisted as he realized just how uncomfortable Jim must be. The mattress tilted again as Jim got up, and Blair lunged up, fumbling to grab Jim in the dark. With the new moon in the sky and the streetlight next to Prospect Place out, the bedroom was pitch black with only the pinpoints of stars contained in the square windows to give Blair a sense of direction.

"I'll switch on the light over the sink," Jim said, pulling against Blair's grip.

"No way. Forget I said anything."

"Sandburg." Jim turned his name into something that was half warning and half curse. Blair would have been frustrated, but he understood Jim's misgivings. The more Jim tried to not take control of everything, the more frustrated he got with Blair changing his mind... which was a problem since Blair seemed to change his mind all the time. Blair knew they were off balance and needed to work this out in time, but right now he just needed his lover beside him.

"Stay," he whispered as his hand held on to Jim's forearm. Blair felt the pressure as Jim continued pulling away for a minute before he relented and got back on the bed.

"I'm not trying to bully you," Jim said quietly.

"I didn't mean you to take it seriously. I say something stupid, you growl at me, we get on with life," Blair reminded his lover. The mattress rolled a bit as Jim stretched out next to him, and now Blair released that arm and allowed his fingers to travel over Jim's stomach and right down to the prize.

"Remember?" Blair asked as he ran a slow finger up the side of Jim's cock. He felt with satisfaction the way the flesh started hardening instantly under his touch.

"Yeah," Jim said roughly, and Blair felt a warm hand rub his upper arm before sliding down to his thigh. Blair opened his knees in invitation, and that large unseen hand slipped between his legs to fondled his cock and balls until Blair had to grab Jim's shoulder and gasp for breath to keep from thrusting into that grip. He suspected Jim wanted him to finish. Jim couldn't get over the idea that he was using or hurting Blair, even as he admitted that he really did want to have sex.

Well this time, Blair didn't plan on making it easy for his Sentinel. He had jerked off that morning after Jim left for work, so he planned on holding out until he had Jim inside of him. The feeling of Jim's fingers moving inside him, pressing to the point of near pain and then hitting his prostate... it left Blair craving more, and Jim wasn't going to get out of giving him more.

Jim stroked Blair's perineum with a knuckle, and Blair's body jerked uncontrollably as he swore loudly.

"Fuck, yes." Blair rolled partially away from Jim and bent down to taste his cock. Jim's hand tightened on Blair's shoulder as he sucked the crown into his mouth, using his tongue to trace the slit and explore the underside of the ridge. Jim hissed sharply, but didn't make any other sound as Blair leaned up, savoring the taste of precum in his mouth.

"Planning on doing anything about that?" Blair asked as he placed a chaste kiss on Jim's lips and pressed his thigh into his still-damp erection.

"Chief," Jim said in a small strangled voice.

"Want you in me," Blair whispered back, half plea, half promise. Blair closed his eyes against the velvety darkness as a big hand cupped the side of his face, the thumb stroking the outside corner of his mouth. The hand disappeared for a second, and Blair could feel the mattress shift and hear the sound of wood dragging on wood as Jim opened the bedside table.

When a hand returned to tease his cock, Blair bent his top leg to give Jim more room to work. A small popping noise warned him before a cool lubed finger massaged his perineum and circled his hole. Blair took deep meditative breaths, leaning his head back against the pillow as he relaxed his muscles. Blair was concentrating on how that touch made him squirm, so the warm lips against his came as a surprise.

Blair gasped and slid both arms around Jim's broad shoulders . Opening to the kiss, Blair invaded Jim's mouth just as he felt the first finger push into him. He bore down to help loosen the ring of muscle, and hummed a little as he felt Jim's finger slid easily inside. Without breaking the kiss, Blair hooked an ankle behind Jim's thigh, pulling him closer.

Jim took control of the kiss now, sending his tongue to explore and taste as his finger probed into Blair's body. Moaning happily, Blair started squirming his encouragement, rocking his hips in tiny ovals. When Jim's mouth withdrew, Blair made a string of soft curses as he threw his head back and tried to grind down onto Jim's finger. Frustratingly, that finger was stroking just a little too lightly to set off the sparks of pleasure that Blair felt so tantalizingly close.

"You ready?" Jim asked as he curled his finger, and the slight extra pressure made Blair shiver. He could hear the smile in Jim's voice, even he couldn't see it in the total darkness of the loft.

"Fuck, yeah," he gasped. The finger disappeared, and were replaced with something larger. Blair bore down again to help the two fingers slide inside smoothly, the sting of penetration now becoming familiar. Blair leaned forward blindly until his lips touched some part of Jim's face. He could feel the tiny spears of stubble against his lips as he planted small trailing kisses down the side of Jim's cheek until he reached his lips, through happy trial and error.

Jim's mouth opened almost immediately, and Blair threw himself back into that kiss even as the fingers inside him stretched him. He couldn't seem to make Jim understand how much he loved this. His body felt like the way it did when he had a good run, that same stretching sensation... that same sensation of things feeling right and healthy.

Blair almost purred with joy as Jim scissored his fingers, carefully opening him. This was as far as they had ever gone, and Blair used his ankle to pull Jim's body close, although in reality he just dragged his own body closer to Jim since he was a good deal lighter. Either way, Jim got the message because Blair now felt himself stretching to accommodate a third finger.

Blair broke off the kiss as he let his head flop down onto the pillow. "Yeah, oh shit yeah," he muttered happily as he squirmed and Jim's fingers reached in far enough to make the pressure on his cock suddenly double. "Fuck," Blair managed a strangled cry as his body trembled with need. He wanted to thrust so bad he could barely stop himself, but there was no way he would risk having Jim find blood and stop again. Blair felt overwhelming need to just slam and push and fuck and be fucked. Just then Jim's fingers stopped.

Jim's fingers pulled out for a moment, but then Jim pressed one finger back in slowly enough to leave Blair groaning and tightening his muscles in a vain attempt to regain the feeling of fullness.

"Roll over," Jim said hoarsely, and Blair felt a large hand guide him up onto his elbows and knees in the dark room. Blair let his back dip as he tucked his forearms under his pillow, reaching to grab the railing. Jim's finger pulled out and then two fingers pressed back in, slick and cool with lube.

"More," Blair demanded as he realized the change in position left him more room, which mean it took more to reach that feeling of stretching and pulling that he loved. Blair had thought Jim would add a third finger, but suddenly the pressure at his ass was larger, duller. Blair had a flash of panic that there was no way Jim would fit without a funnel since the pressure just felt like something pushing against his skin, not pushing to get inside.

Blair remembered to bear down to open the first ring of muscle, and the sensation of pressure increased without actually pushing into him, and then something changed in the angle, and Blair felt the head pop inside in one swift motion. The sudden size of Jim's cock made Blair gasp as the muscles were abruptly stretched to the point of pain.

"Blair?!" Jim called in obvious concern, and then that pressure started pulling back so that Blair felt a sharp sting.

"No, just wait," Blair answered, and the body behind him froze." Oh man, yeah, that's good. God. I love it, I just need... I need a second. Just let me wait," Blair knew that half his words weren't making sense, but he could feel his muscles stretch into new shapes as he relaxed his body. Jim's hands were motionless on Blair's hips as he waited for his signal.

Jim must have recognized the signs of relaxation because now Blair could feel his lover rocking back and forth so slightly that he could barely feel it as Jim's cock slowly worked into his body. Blair pushed back, impaling himself a fraction of an inch at a time. Jim froze as Blair repeated the maneuver, slowly taking his lover deeper into his body. Blair groaned as the pressure moved toward the underside of his cock, pressing against the prostate gland and making his body ache with need.

Blair rocked forward on his knees to feel the slick pull of Jim's cock. Gasping, Jim tightened his hands on Blair's hips as he thrust in harder than before, wringing a shout of surprised pleasure from Blair.

"Fuck, yes." Blair's encouragement must have worked because Jim pulled back and slammed in again, and now Blair started squirming for real. Jim thrust a third time, and at last Blair felt a hard stomach tapping his backside. He drew a shaky breath- this was it. His lover was finally seated deep in his body. Above him in the darkness, Jim's answering groan sent a shiver through Blair. For a man who obviously didn't talk during sex, that one moan said everything. Blair curled his fists around the railing to hold himself steady, but he couldn't keep his back from arching and curving in an imitation of a thrust.

A slick hand reached around and grabbed Blair's cock as the sex degenerated into uncoordinated thrusting and moaning and cursing and straining until Blair felt his orgasm tear through him, shredding reality and leaving nothing but the feeling of warm metal under his hands and a huge cock buried inside his body and his own cock emptying out into a hot fist. Blair collapsed bonelessly on the bed before he even thought to wonder whether Jim had finished or not.

Obviously he had, because Blair could feel the cock inside him changing shape. They had discussed condoms and partner history and decided to make a monogamous commitment, Now Blair was grateful that he trusted his partner enough for them to make that decision together- he knew full well that for a condom to be effective, you had to pull out before the erection was totally soft. But this languid, slow withdrawal, with his lover's weight pressed into his back as Jim panting his own breathless lust in his ear- the delicious sensation of that hard cock softening, shrinking to its normal size as it slipped gently from him... this was right.

Blair opened his fists slowly, working the fingers to get the blood circulating after closing his fists around the railing so hard.

"Love you," Jim whispered, and Blair felt fingers running through his hair, tenderly pushing some of the growing strands back out of his face. It was just at that awkward stage of neither long nor short, but Blair hated to give up and cut it when Jim spent so much time gently carding his hair, fingertips running over cheeks and forehead and neck as the Sentinel sought to make order out of Blair's unruly curls.

"Love you, too," Blair smiled into the darkness.

075. SHADE

"Carl?" Ellison asked in a shocked voice. "What the hell are you doing here?" The words sounded angry, but the tone was amused and happy.

"Just passing through, and I thought I'd see if you were still stuck in the same mud puddle," the man came in now, and Blair looked up. The man was Hispanic with a wide pox-marked face and a deep scar that ran the length of his left arm leaving a furrow of puckered skin.

"Oh, didn't know you had company," the man said as he caught sight of Blair on the couch.

"He doesn't count; he's just my partner," Jim said as he moved toward the kitchen, and Blair flicked his middle finger toward the men. The guest laughed easily.

"Blair Sandburg," he offered as he moved the computer to the coffee table before standing and offering his hand.

"Carl Perti," the man offered his name.

"Nice to meet you." Blair went back to the sofa and closed the screen on his computer.

"Obviously you don't know Perti well," Jim said as he held out a beer toward Perti before bringing Blair one. "He is one of the shadiest, most underhanded, unreliable bastards I met in my covert ops days."

"Yeah, but I'm good at what I do," Perti said with a wink.

"And why do I have the feeling that I don't want to know what that is," Blair said with a smile as he brought the beer up to his mouth.

"Smart man," Perti said. Jim gestured toward a chair and Perti sat down and leaned forward with his elbows braced on his spread knees. "So, you and Jim work for the locals, huh? God, Jim, I remember a day when you used to make fun of the locals and now you've gone and joined the dark side."

"Perti, I think what we used to do was the dark side," Jim retorted dryly.

"So, are you busily saving society from the evil influences of crime and urban decay?" Perti asked with half a smirk.

"Since someone let you into town, obviously not well enough."

"You hurt me Ellie-boy."

"Ellie-boy?" Blair asked with amusement as he looked over at Jim who had a look of dismay on his face.

"You are evil," Jim growled at Perti.

"So, am I interrupting some important, top-secret meeting on some criminal mastermind who keeps tagging walls in South-town?"

"Oh no, I'm just looking over a paper for a friend. Nothing work related," Blair hurried to reassure the man. Then he glanced over at Jim trying to decide how Jim wanted to handle this. With the door to the office open, it was clearly not a bedroom and with the open floor plan in the loft, there was no way to hide the fact that the two men only had one bedroom.

"Blair lives here, if you can't already tell that from the mess," Jim said as he looked around the room.

"Oh Ellie-boy, you haven't changed a bit. You were the only man I ever knew who looked forward to inspections. So you're staying here?" Perti's voice took on a sudden cautiousness as he turned to Blair.

Blair froze, he wasn't sure how to answer that without either denying his relationship with Jim or outting him to someone that Jim might not want to be outted around.

"For the last four or five years," Jim said quietly, his voice suddenly tightly controlled. "Like I said, Blair's my partner." Jim took a long drink from his beer while keeping his eyes on Perti. Blair held his breath as he waited for the reaction.

"Well, Ellie-boy, I guess you've gone to the dark side in more ways than one."

"Careful, Perti. I've kicked your ass before, and I can do it again," Jim answered. Blair started searching for plausible reasons to run for the hills.

"Hey, whatever floats your boat," Perti held up his hands in a placating gesture. "I just thought you might be up for some pool and beers. If you've gone and gotten yourself a... partner, no skin off my nose."

Jim was silent for a long time, and Blair could practically touch discomfort in the room.

"So, you haven't taken up knitting or anything, have you?" Perti threw out in the silence. Blair snorted his laughter, not sure whether he was laughing at the image of Jim Ellison knitting or just because the situation was so damn uncomfortable.

"Not likely. I can still kick your ass in a game of pool," Jim glowered back at the man, crossing his arms with the beer bottle still hanging from one hand.

"Now that sounds like a challenge."

"It's a promise."

"Bring it on!" Perti said with a smile that reminded Blair of Russo.

Blair had just finished reading Rebecca's dissertation on the cultural norms of young girls in gangs when the door slammed open. Jim came in with a slightly glazed expression that suggested he had consumed about a half dozen beers to many.

"Oh man, why didn't you call? Tell me you didn't drive," Blair said as he pushed the computer to one side and hurried to close the door behind Jim.

"Don't nag, Sandburg," Jim said as he tossed his keys at the wicker basket they had bought for next to the front door. He managed to hit the basket hard enough to make it and all the mail in it slide off the small table and onto the floor.

"I am so not picking that up," Blair said as he went into the kitchen to get Jim a large glass of water.

"You know what, Sandburg?" Jim asked, and Blair found strong arms wrapped around his waist as Jim leaned his weight against Blair's back.

"What?"

"I'm gay," Jim whispered in Blair's ear. The scent of beer and whiskey made Blair wrinkle his nose.

"Okay," he answered slowly. "And does that work for you?" Blair braced his hands on the edge of the sink. He wasn't sure if he wanted to hear the answer. The saying en vino veritas floated to the top of his mind.

"I don't want to buy any Judy Garland movies." Jim put his chin on Blair's shoulder even though he had to slump down to manage it. It also meant that Jim's hands slipped farther south.

"Okay," Blair answered with even more caution.

"And I don't want to put in track lighting or buy leather pants." Jim slurred his words until Blair wasn't even sure that he had heard correctly.

"That's fine. I have to say you look good in leather, though," Blair said as he thought back to Miss Rose's wardrobe choices during that stakeout.

"Mmmm. Is it okay if the only part of gay that I feel like doing is the whole fucking and loving a man part?" Now Jim's words slurred so badly that Blair was afraid he might hit the floor. Blair squirmed around until he faced Jim and put his own hands around Jim's waist.

"Oh man, that's just fine with me. Let's just get you upstairs before you pass out because I'm not carrying your ass up all those stairs." Jim responded by slowly sliding to the ground, dragging Blair down with him.

"Or we could just sleep here," Blair said as he found himself sitting on the floor with Jim lying in his lap. Jim just reached up and patted Blair on the nose clumsily before Blair could intercept that drunken gesture. "Man, you are one pathetic drunk."

Two weeks later, Blair picked up the mail only to find an oversized white envelope with embossed flowers decorating the front. It was addressed to both of them, so he slit the envelope open in the elevator, the rest of the mail shoved under his arm. He pulled a wedding card out, a fancy one with roses in shades of pink and embossed baby's breath flowers decorating the front. Blair opened it.

"Congrats Ellie-boy. He sounds like quite the catch," a rough hand had scrawled on the opposite side from a hallmark comment in scrolling cursive. Blair smiled. Sometimes people surprised you.

076. WHO?

Blair pulled out his most charming smile and his badge. "Blair Sandburg, Major Crimes. My captain is the one who called you in." The man physically took the badge of out Blair's hand before reaching over to Taggart and taking his badge as well. Taggart glanced over to Blair with an amused expression. Blair coughed to cover an urge to smile. He and Taggart probably had the most in common of any of the guys, and they had spent more than one lunch hour talking about how ridiculous some people got about defending their 'turf.'

"I'll need to call these in and get confirmation," the man said as he stared at the badges as though looking for an 'Acme Co.' logo on the bottom. Blair just nodded without comment as the man turned his back and left them standing outside the crime tape. Trying to push in now would just make the man get his back up.

"So, want to go get coffee?" Taggart asked. Blair looked at the large man in confusion, but Taggart nodded across the street. A coffee shop with a huge glass pane in front had a perfect view of the crime scene. And in that window stood the indistinct form of a woman. "You could use a little of that Sandburg charm," Taggart suggested.

"Oh yeah. Definitely feeling a need for coffee," Blair said with a smile. There was more than one way to skin a cat or get around a cranky FBI agent.

077. WHAT?

"What do you mean, what's up? We're just having coffee and thought you might like to join us," Blair said. After a morning of working with Agents Stuck-Up and Passive-Aggressive, Blair and Taggart had allowed themselves to be pushed out of the way again.

"I'll even spot you to the first cup," Taggart offered, and Blair thanked god he had gotten paired with the laid back man for this case. Brown or Megan or Jim would have told the agents off long before.

"So, we're just drinking coffee?" Jim asked, clearly confused.

"Oh yeah. Man, we do not spend enough time just chilling out and listening," Blair said with a nod toward one of the junior suits sitting at a far table eating lunch.

"Ah," Jim said with a small smile as Taggart got up to get a coffee.

"Hey, you want a sandwich with that coffee?" Taggart asked.

"Yeah, lunch would be good," Blair answered for Jim who had his head cocked to the side with an expression of intense concentration on his face.

078. WHERE

Jim tilted his head to the side for a second before pointing to the far corner of the lot. A dark van waited in the shadow caused by broken streetlight.

"Oh man, if they're going for subtle, I think they missed the mark."

"The FBI isn't known for subtle," Taggart pointed out. "So how are we going to do this?"

"Do what?" Jim asked. "I'm just doing my shopping."

Blair snorted. "Those agents catch you out there, and you're going to have a hard time convincing them that you normally shop 20 miles away from the loft."

"Then it's a good thing they don't know me, huh, Chief?" Jim said as he opened the door to Taggart's car and got out. "I'll let you know the minute I hear anything interesting."

"So," Taggart asked as Jim pulled the baseball cap down over his eyes and then sauntered into the grocery store looking like a single man on the prowl for a date. "Are we just going to wait?"

"Not a chance, my friend," Blair smiled. "Let Jim try and figure out what the FBI is doing while you and I look for the suspect.

"Simon's going to hang you out by your ears if we end up at cross purposes with the FBI," Taggart pointed out, and Blair smiled at him.

"Hey, they're the ones who told us to get lost. If I happen to show up where they are..." Blair shrugged to show his complete innocence in the matter. From the skeptical expression on Taggart's face, he wasn't impressed.

"That look may work on Jim, but you're going to need something better than puppy dog eyes if you piss Simon off," Taggart said, but then he opened his car door and pushed himself up and out without another word. Blair followed him out into the night.

079. WHEN

The heavier of the two FBI agents answered. "We had reason to believe that the suspect was a member of law enforcement. After all, you were concerned enough about the lack of forensics evidence to call us, so you had to recognize that this was not a local issue." Blair cringed as Simon's back went stiff. If it weren't for the bright lights and cameras, he suspected Simon would have verbal skinned these two by now. Instead he answered in a tight, low voice.

"What I recognized was that this was a serious offender, and that these rapes were violent enough and often enough that the suspect had probably moved into the area from somewhere else. What I recognized was that you have a wider database and could help coordinate information from other departments. What I recognized was that my officers would benefit from having another pair of eyes on the case. What I refused to recognize is that you had any right to walk in here and shut my detectives out. What you did was out of line, and your boss can expect to hear from me."

"Look Captain, the job got done." The second senior agent, the man who had originally taken Blair's badge, stepped forward now.

"And when you say that, you damn well better say who managed to get that job done. Sandburg spotted the potential victim, Taggart was in the car that cut the suspect off, and Ellison and Sandburg together ran the suspect down. I don't hear where the FBI has anything to do with any of that."

"So your official..."

"When we file our official reports, they are going to reflect the truth," Simon insisted as he shoved a cigar in his mouth angrily. One of the agents opened his mouth to continue the arguments, but Simon turned his back and stormed away.

080. WHY

"Hey, Simon," he said as he walked into the office and put the file down.

"That the serial rapist case?" Simon asked, and Blair instantly went on the defensive. He didn't know what it was about the tone of voice, but he recognized something not good was coming.

"Yeah," Blair said slowly.

"Next time you think you're getting the runaround, you don't go off on your own."

"Simon..."

"Don't give me one of your longwinded 'buts', Sandburg. Why the hell do you think you have a Captain? You solve the crimes, I make sure you have what you need and that no one's giving you shit. So next time, you tell me before you go off half cocked and running your own operation," Blair opened his mouth to protest, but the similarities to what Roth had said to him so many months ago stopped him cold.

"You're right, oh man, totally right," Blair finally said as he realized no captain, not Roth or Simon or even Taggart when Taggart had been a captain would have been okay with what he did. "Next time I'll let you know. I just forget to ask for help sometimes," Blair admitted with a shake of his head and a shrug.

"Shit. I understand that, Sandburg. And you need to know that you don't have anything to prove here." Simon looked up from the report, and Blair caught the earnest expression on Simon's face, an expression Blair had seen when he watched Simon talk to Daryl.

"If you need help, like any other detective in this department, you ask me first," Simon ordered quietly. With that, Simon swung his chair around and focused on his computer screen which Blair took as a clear dismissal.

Funny, he'd never before felt so good about getting his ass chewed out.

081. HOW?

"I want... you know," Jim said in a low, ragged whisper. Blair gazed down at his partner whose strong features were lit only by the moon and the light from the streetlight trickling in from the windows. It lent the room a grayish-blue tone that almost mimicked the color of the dreams Blair no longer had.

"No, I don't know," Blair corrected him as he bent down and started laying a trail of kisses across Jim's chest until he reached a small nipple. He sucked hard to bring the flesh to a point and then licked at it gently, enjoying the sensation of Jim's powerful body writhing beneath his mouth.

Jim's large hands closed around his back and pulled their two bodies together, and Blair had to fight the urge to start humping his partner. While they both enjoyed frottage, he wanted to make tonight something a little more special. After all, they had worked far too many hours on the Atwood case. They deserved a treat.

"Yeah, more of that," Jim said encouragingly when Blair sat up.

"More of what? This?" Blair asked as he turned his attention to the other nipple. Bingo- Jim jerked up so hard that Blair was almost bucked right off.

"Yeah," Jim begged as his hands restlessly explored Blair's waist and back.

Blair obligingly leaned into the embrace, resting his chest against Jim's. He lowered his head so that he could feel Jim's breath ghosting against his own lips. "Tell me what you want," Blair whispered. Jim started thrusting up mutely, and Blair immediately transferred his weight up to his hands and knees, denying his partner a chance to end it quickly.

"Nuh-uh," he said with a smile that he knew his Sentinel could see in the dark.

"Come on, Chief; have some mercy here," Jim complained, but in a light tone of voice that suggested that he wasn't really all that upset.

"I will, just as soon as you tell me what kind of mercy you're looking for," Blair said as he slowly and carefully lowered his weight back down. This time Jim lay still although Blair could feel the hard cock twitching under him.

"Just, you know..." Jim said helplessly.

"Oh man, I am not a mind reader and I totally don't know. What do you want?"

"You, Chief. I want you." Maybe it was the words or the desperation in those words or the way Jim now shifted uncomfortably, but a light bulb went off in Blair's mind.

"How do you want me? Because I'm right here," Blair answered, needing to be sure.

"I want you." Was that a blush? It was so hard to tell in the dim light.

"As in?" Blair prompted.

"Whatever, just do something," Jim's tone of voice geared up from needy to confrontational even as he lay unmoving. Blair smiled as he leaned his forehead against Jim's neck; clearly, he was going to have to help his Sentinel along a little.

Blair planted a line of tiny licks along that neck until he reached an ear, and then he whispered, "Do you want to feel me inside you, pressing into your body, touching you from the inside as you come?"

He briefly worried that the dirty talk would be too much for his normally stoic partner-- would he be embarrassed, or would he laugh? Neither. Jim's arms tightened convulsively round him until Blair gasped, and Jim released a little pressure.

"Yeah," Jim pleaded with just the one word.

"So tell me," Blair insisted softly.

"I want you inside," Jim sighed, eyes closed tightly.

"Just tell me what you want, man. I want to make you happy." Blair shimmied his hips against Jim's, and Jim caught his breath.

"God, you already do, Chief."

"So tell me how to make you happier," Blair suggested as he pushed himself up to his knees and straddled Jim's thighs. "Tell me how to make you deliriously happy." Please, man. Say the words. Just tell me, Blair begged in his own mind. He needed to know.

Blair looked down at his lover, and even in the low light, he could see Jim struggling with the concept of using actual words. The hard cock pearled with precome shining at the slit demanded action, but Blair needed more. So often Jim would remain silent when it came to what he wanted or what he needed. By nature Jim took care of everyone else and not himself.

"Tell me and I'll take care of this," Blair breathed as he rubbed his thumb in a soft circle around the swollen crown. Jim jerked up off the bed with a gasp. "Tell me," Blair begged.

"Touch me," Jim finally asked, and Blair wrapped his hand at once around the shaft of Jim's cock.

"What now?" Blair asked, and Jim's eyes drifted open.

"I think you know this part," Jim remarked as he gave a small thrust with his hips.

"Man, I have so many different ideas about what to do... I just want to know what you need. What do you want?"

"Rub it," Jim asked, and that was definitely a blush staining his cheeks as he finally said the words.

"Gladly." Blair began a slow, warm stroking up and down the shaft. Since he didn't have lube on his hand, he kept his grip light and teasing, watching as Jim helplessly fisted the sheets.

"Harder," Jim demanded breathily, and Blair closed his hand and fisted the cock tightly.

"Whoa." Jim's voice had a strained edge to it, and Blair instantly stopped. "Lube." Jim already had the bedside drawer open and was fumbling inside for the towel and lube. That answered one question--Jim definitely seemed to lack any interest in having a little pain with his pleasure. Reaching for the proffered lube, Blair flipped the cap and dripped slick into his hands, rubbing them together to warm the gel.

"What now?" Despite Blair's question, Jim remained silent. Blair just waited with the lube warming in his hands and his own erection throbbing. Finally Jim spoke.

"Chief, do what you want."

"I am," Blair pointed out. "I want to know what you're thinking and wanting, so I'm asking." Jim muttered something so soft that the only word Blair could hear was 'annoying.'

"Touch me," he finally asked, and this time he opened his eyes to look up at Blair.

"Where?"

"Oh for... touch my cock." At Jim's words, Blair closed his slick and warm hand around that throbbing cock, feeling the flesh harden even more under his fingers.

"Stroke it," Jim ordered, very softly.

Blair set up a slow pattern up and down the length of the shaft. He smiled... Jim was finally getting it.

"The head, touch the head," Jim gasped, and on the next upstroke, Blair closed his thumb and forefinger into a ring around the ridge of the glans as he used his left palm to rub teasing circles over the slit. Jim arched his back, mouth open in a soundless gasp as his strong legs stiffened under Blair.

"Stop. Shit. I'm not ready to come," Jim panted. Blair knew the feeling--the sight and sound of Jim squirming and begging had brought Blair almost to the edge of orgasm without any touching at all. So he sat up and took deep cleansing breaths to regain his own control while Jim's chest heaved below him.

"Can you... get up a minute?" Jim finally managed to ask between gasps. Blair wiggled backwards on his knees until he came to the edge of the bed and climbed off. Jim rolled over and got up onto his knees. Blair tried to not show his shock since he knew Jim could see him as clearly as if all the lights were on, but then the sight of Jim vulnerable and waiting made the shock disappear under pure lust. Blair struggled to control his own rising fantasies in favor of listening to his partner.

"Where do I start?" Blair asked as he stood beside the bed.

"Just," Jim's voice stopped for a moment, "fuck me." Blair opened his mouth to point out that maybe that would be missing a few steps, but Jim started talking before Blair could say anything. "Put a finger in me, Chief, find that spot that always makes you swear when I touch yours..."

Well, he wasn't going to have to ask twice. Blair hopped back onto the bed behind Jim and grabbed the lube. As soon as he generously slicked one finger, he started rubbing the puckered entrance in front of him.

"Oh yeah," Jim shivered. "I like that, and the skin below it," he suggested. Blair widened the massage so that he was teasing the hole and the perineum with first a firm and then a feather-light touch. He put his free hand on Jim's ass and felt the firm muscles trembling under his touch.

"Inside." Jim's voice was hoarse with desire. Panting, Blair slipped a finger inside Jim's body. The passage was tighter than he'd expected and he could feel the pressure around the base of his finger as he reached in for the little nub of the prostate. He knew he found it when Jim pushed back onto his hand, his ass tightening into cords of muscle.

"Yeah, do that again," Jim demanded more firmly now, and Blair crooked his finger over the swelling again.

"Shit. Chief, a second finger." Blair pulled out slowly and then pushed back in as he tried to loosen up the muscles enough to do that, but the ring remained frighteningly tight.

"Jim, where is your dial for touch?" Blair asked suspiciously. Silence answered him. "Jim?"

"At about a 7," Jim finally admitted.

"You're dialing up too high, your body won't loosen up with that much tactile input. Dial it down," Blair said as he ran a soothing hand over Jim's back. He could feel Jim take deep breaths, and he waited as the muscle around his finger finally relaxed.

Blair started the stroking again, and now the muscle began to soften until his finger moved without resistance. Blair hurried to get more lube before adding a second finger. He pushed in slowly and steadily as Jim's breath caught in hitched little groans. The second finger slipped in easier than he had expected, and Blair placed a kiss on one of Jim's exposed cheeks as he began to stroke and spread Jim's passage.

"More," Jim gasped, and Blair smiled. Oh yeah, he knew that song. He spread his fingers until they ached from the unusual movement and then Blair pulled them out.

"No, don't stop," Jim said as he started to push himself up.

"Just a second," Blair soothed as he added more lube, and then pressed into Jim's loosened hole with three fingers tightly compressed into a triangle. Blair knew the pleasure of being on the bottom, feeling that burn and stretch and then the glorious pressure as his partner stroked his prostate. He hadn't known how sexy it was to be the one giving such pleasure. Even now he felt his erection harden at the sight of his strong lover, so exposed and vulnerable and trusting. Jim arched his back and spread his thighs even wider, and it was the most erotic thing Blair had ever seen. He was reducing the most controlled man he had ever known to pure lust and need.

"Fuck, Sandburg, move," Jim half demanded and half begged, and Blair pressed his fingers in farther. Resistance squeezed his fingers almost painfully , and Blair pulled out a little before pressing firmly in again. Then again, slowly seating his fingers even more deeply into Jim's body.

"Just--" Jim's words broke off into a hiss as Blair pressed into the prostate. "Just fuck me," Jim finally finished.

Blair pulled his fingers out and grabbed the lube. His fingers shook as he struggled to open it and get himself lubed up. The first touch of his own slick fingers across the head of his cock nearly did him in. He knelt on the bed fighting to control his own body.

"Chief, just fuck me, damn it," Jim swore below him, and the sound of that beloved voice begging made Blair gasp as he struggled not to come on the spot.

"Oh man, I'm trying. I just need a minute," Blair hissed.

"Think Russo," Jim suggested with a chuckle, and Blair's orgasm retreated at once.

"Oh man, that's not an image I want to have during sex. Why would you say that?" Blair asked incredulously.

"What the hell do you think I'm doing down here? If you don't hurry up and fuck me, I'm not going to make it through the main event, Chief," Jim said with a strangled laugh.

"yeah, well, I could have lived without ever having that image," Blair muttered as he took his slightly more manageable cock in hand and lined up with Jim's opened hole. He pressed forward, and sucked in a surprised breath at the unexpected pain as his sensitive cock tried pushing into that maddeningly small opening.

"It's okay, Chief. Just push past that first bit, and it's more than worth it," Jim offered from below. Blair sucked in a deep breath and took the advice. The unfamiliar and painful pressure gripping the head of his cock instantly turned into a delicious squeezing sensation as Blair slid home into Jim's body.

Jim panted a harsh "fuck" and arched his back. Blair took that as a good sign and pressed in a little farther. The muscles around his cock rippled, and that gorgeous clench made Blair grab for Jim's hips to steady himself as he cursed in pleasure.

Blair rocked forward, burying himself in that smooth tightness that felt nothing like a woman. Jim started moving below him, and Blair decided to abandon the whole 'make Jim talk' plan since it was now pretty obvious what his lover wanted. Blair braced himself on Jim's back as he pulled back and then slid in. The familiar motion and the unfamiliar tightness sent hot shivers of lust up his backbone as he thrust in again. Gasping, he reached around to grab Jim's cock.

"Yeah... like that... fuck me, please fuck me..." Jim now started to thrust in earnest, and Blair nearly lost himself as the feeling of Jim impaling himself and the rippling muscles gripping his cock built to an almost unendurable pleasure.

Jim half-sobbed and stiffened, and Blair felt the cock in his hand thicken as the balls drew up in release. A clasping heat rippled around Blair's cock, unlike anything he'd ever experienced. Wailing, he lunged forward, slamming deep into Jim's spasming body just once more before he fell away the void of orgasm, pleasure rocketing along every nerve. Nothing existed except the two of them, joined at the very core.

Blair wandered his way back to the real world slowly, first becoming aware of his cock slowly slipping out of that glorious tightness. Then the gentle rising and falling motion, like the ocean, rocking him where he lay on Jim's broad back. Finally, he connected that motion to Jim's labored breathing as the Sentinel sprawled under his weight. Blair struggled just to roll over to one side so Jim could breathe easier.

Blair had no more than touched the mattress when strong arms pulled him into an embrace.

"How was that?" Blair murmured as sleep started fuzzing the edges of his newly formed reality.

"Perfect," Jim whispered back.

082. IF

"What?" Jim looked over at Blair, ignoring the game. Then again, the Jags were up by 50 points, so it wasn't exactly an exciting game.

"You know, the old 'what if' game," Blair shrugged.

"No, I don't know, Sandburg. You mean what would have happened if we'd met after I'd been shoved in a nuthouse for seeing things no one else could see?" Jim asked with a half-raised eyebrow.

"Oh man, that is not what I mean. I mean more like what would have happened if we had met when you first went into the military--you as a cadet in uniform," Blair let his eyes travel his partner's body at the thought.

"Considering you would have been about six at the time, I can safely say 'no'," Jim answered, amused.

"No way. I would have been at least..." Blair stopped, and the tiny grin on Jim's face made it clear that he understood exactly why. "Okay, so maybe that wasn't a good example. Let's not think about that any more."

"Please," Jim confirmed.

"Haven't you ever wanted to play at being someone else?" Blair tried again. Jim's lips quirked in that way they did when he was trying not to laugh. Crossing his arms, Blair glared.

"Okay, okay, Junior, chill out. Right, so role play you mean."

Blair bit back a surprised comment that strait-laced Jim had 'fessed up to understanding so quickly. "Man, haven't you at least thought of other scenarios?"

"You mean like I could be one of those annoying FBI agents who don't know their asses from a hole in the ground?"

"And I could be a hippy on the run for twenty years." Blair stopped and thought about what they had just said. "Oh man, we suck at this game."

"What do you mean? I can work with that," Jim insisted.

"You're playing a law enforcement officer and I'm playing a hippy," Blair sighed. "That's not thinking outside the box; that's more like circling the box. The point is to be something you'd never normally be."

"Okay, considering you've been a student, a teacher, an anthropologist, a truck driver, a shaman, a welder, a drug runner," Jim's lip twitched at that one and Blair glared again, "and impersonated a doctor, that doesn't leave you much room to work, Chief."

"Very funny, man. The trick is to pick something that's the opposite of who you are so that you can do what you'd usually never get to do." He brightened. "Oh. I've got it! I could be a suit. I've never even been close to being a yuppie, so I can be the spoiled, rich businessman who inherited his company from his father and has never had to actually work. Someone who thinks he can buy everything and everyone." Blair smiled in triumph, but Jim looked at him dubiously.

"Okay," Jim finally answered slowly, standing up from the couch and switching off the television before pacing between the TV and the stairs. "Fine," he announced after several laps. "I'm the jaded male prostitute who pulls down the big bucks." Blair had stood when Jim did, and now he leaned back against the arm of the couch, jaw literally dropped in shock. Blair could see the triumph in Jim's eyes at having chosen a role that shocked even Blair.

"Um... right."

"Okay." Jim looked a trifle smug.

"So, um, how much for a night," Blair finally asked.

"I can't do this. I really can't," Jim said as he started smiling. "I'm sorry, but this is just too funny," Jim leaned back against the stair railing and laughed softly.

"Oh man, you suck!"

"Only if you pay me, Chief," Jim shot back.

"Whatever." Blair turned and went to the bathroom. He'd learned long ago that when all else failed, a trip to the can was often the best way to save face.

Blair took extra time, so when he opened the door, the last thing he expected was to find Jim leaning against the wall insolently with a dark expression.

"So you think you can buy me?" Jim asked, his voice silky and tough at the same time. Blair stood open-mouthed as Jim's eyes traveled his body curiously as though never having seen it before. For one moment, Blair's brain stuttered--probably because all his blood was heading for points south. Then Blair leaned back against the door frame.

"Oh, I know I can," he answered confidently. "I can afford a thousand whores like you," Blair said, and Jim's lip twitched before he could cover with a cough.

"You seem awfully sure of yourself," Jim said once he'd taken a deep breath. Blair could practically feel Jim's struggle to control his laughter like a tangible wave rolling just beneath that cool exterior.

"You seem rather buyable," Blair responded quickly. "But I'm not sure you have that special something that's worth buying." Blair shrugged and started walking down the hallway. He caught the surprised expression on Jim's face just before he turned his back.

"Oh no," Blair felt a hand grab his arm and push his back into the wall. "You aren't walking away that easy," Jim said, and the edge of danger in that voice made Blair even harder, and he had no illusion that Jim didn't know that too.

Now Jim pressed Blair into the wall with his body and lowered his head to whisper in Blair's ear. "I can make every fantasy you ever had come true. Tell me what you dream of, and I'll make you come so hard you'll forget your own name," Jim promised, and Blair couldn't stop a shiver from making his legs tremble.

"You're awfully sure of yourself," Blair said as he swallowed heavily.

"I'm awfully good," Jim answered as he backed off, cool blue eyes never leaving Blair's.

"How much for a striptease?" Blair blurted. Jim cocked his head for a moment, obviously taken by surprise, and Blair feared he had pushed too hard, but Jim just slowly smiled.

"Fifty bucks," he said.

"Oh man, you have an inflated sense of your own worth. I'll give you twenty," Blair countered. Once again, that surprised look crossed Jim's face, but then he nodded before crossing to the stereo.

Blair dove for the couch, sure his trembling knees weren't going to hold him up much longer. As soft jazz music filled the loft, Jim quickly pulled down the window blinds, moving with a subtle roll of his hips that made Blair breathe harder. Privacy assured, Jim turned to throw a melting glance at Blair as he started undulating to the music, his shoulders dipping in time with the saxophone's melody.

Slowly, Jim brought his hand up and undid the bottom button on his shirt with one hand while he pulled it out from the waist of his pants with the other. He moved lazily and languidly, a knowing smile touching his lips as he locked eyes with his customer. Blair found himself desperate to see the skin that Jim revealed only in the most tempting glimpses, a lift of the hem here, a button flicked open there...

Blair tightened his hand around the arm of the couch as Jim slowly ran a hand up his stomach, disappearing under his shirt. Blair longed touch that skin, but now that he'd set the rules, he didn't want to end the game. So he sat, cock straining against his jeans, watching avidly as one button after another gave way under Jim's nimble fingers.

Now Jim closed his eyes and started writhing to the music as his blue shirt slid off one shoulder. Rather than let it fall away, Jim brought his arms up over his head, bending his elbows and twisting his hips. Blair lost all coherent thought at the sight of Jim's broad chest first hidden and then revealed by the silky blue fabric, as Jim threw him teasing glances.

As the song came to an end, Jim brought his hands down and shrugged so that his shirt fell to the ground behind him. Jim had ended the song half turned away, so now Blair had a front row view of the flexing muscles in those perfect arms, framed by back muscles tightening in rhythm. Blair wondered how he could have ever missed the sexual appeal of that broad back and perfectly defined body.

A new song started, the piano taking center stage, and now Jim's movements were more sinuous as he toyed with his own nipples, sliding his fingers down well-defined abs before casually flicking open his pants button. Jim danced closer, smiling an invitation as he rocked his hips wantonly. Blair gasped and very nearly came in his pants. Damn, who knew Mr. Strong and Silent had such a wicked streak in him?

He had seen Jim use that body as a battering ram and as a weapon, as a shield and as a crime lab. He had never before seen Jim use his body like this. Jim rolled his hips again as he pushed the zipper of his pants so agonizingly slowly that Blair heard every click of the fastener opening. Jim licked his lips as both hands disappeared into the front of his pants, and now he closed his eyes and tossed his head back. Blair resisted the urge to grab his own pants, transfixed by the sight before him.

Jim's thumbs hooked over his waistband and he shimmied his hips, pushing down slowly until his cock finally appeared, and Blair gasped for air. He'd seen Jim naked any number of times, but this--the sight of that hard cock slowly appearing as Jim slithered out of his pants and boxers at the same time--this made Blair nearly mad with lust. Blair looked away for a moment to get his control back, and when he opened his eyes Jim was in front of him, naked and hard and looking incredibly smug as he still swayed in time with the music.

"So, still think you can afford me?" Jim challenged, all arrogance.

"I can buy and sell you a dozen times," Blair said, but the words came out far breathier and higher than he intended. Jim gave him a predatory smile and bent over with his hands braced on the back of the couch on either side of Blair's head.

"So, Bigshot, what are you looking to buy?"

Blair swallowed again even though he couldn't come up with enough moisture to spit. "What are you selling?"

"Oh, if you want my mouth, it's a hundred. If you want my ass, it's two hundred." Jim bent his arms so that his mouth was right next to Blair's ear, naked thighs straddling his lap. "If you want me to take that ass of yours, I'll do that for free, but I expect a two hundred dollar tip afterwards." Jim straightened up some so that he was an inch from Blair's face staring him straight in the eye. "And if you want something less vanilla, all prices are negotiable."

Blair could feel his cock ache with need as his brain struggled to get enough blood up to his top head to actually get his mind to work. He hadn't ever dared imagine that Jim might be willing to get this creative. He didn't want to blow it by not being able to come up with any ideas, but all he could do was stare at the magnificent body arched over him.

"What are the menu options?" Blair finally managed to squeak out. Oh yeah, he was doing a great job being the large and in charge type. Jim cocked his head and sucked in his cheek a little, and Blair could tell he was biting it to keep from laughing. Blair cleared his throat and struggled to not be totally distracted by that beautiful naked body, so close he could feel the heat drifting off it.

"For an extra hundred, I can tie you up. For two hundred, you can tie me up," Jim leaned forward again and whispered conspiratorially. "And if you want me to call you 'Daddy', you can call a cab." Blair was so desperately close to coming that he had to take several deep breaths.

"So that will be two hundred and two hundred," Blair choked out. "Oh yeah, man. I can handle four hundred. I can totally handle four hundred. No problem at all," Blair babbled as he firmly told himself to not babble.

"Four hundred and twenty," Jim corrected him haughtily. "I don't dance for free."

"Yeah, four-twenty," Blair repeated, but then he would have agreed to anything by that point. And he'd babble while doing it.

"Plus tip," Jim reminded him, closing his legs to press tight on the outside of Blair's thighs.

"Only if you make it worth my while," Blair insisted as he struggled to get back into his role.

"Oh, I'm worth your while," Jim promised smoothly.

"So get upstairs, and I'll be there in a few minutes," Blair squeaked. There was no way he could walk upstairs until he had gotten control of himself. Jim straightened and looked down at Blair, pupils so wide that his eyes appeared to be almost black. Then he turned and scooped his pants and shirt off the floor in one graceful motion, striding across the floor as he headed for the loft as ordered.

Blair flopped his head against the back of the couch and tried to slow his breathing, focusing on sucking air in through his nose, whooshing it out through his mouth. Calm... calm... When he thought he could move without humiliating himself, Blair hoisted himself up from the couch and followed Jim upstairs. He had his shirt off before he even reached the bedroom, but the sight from the top of the stairs stopped him in his tracks, flannel shirt hanging limply from one hand.

Jim sprawled decadently on his side, his legs bent and open to frame the hard cock resting on his thigh, one arm propped up on his bent knee. From the wrist of that hand dangled a length of rope, one end knotted around the wrist and the other end hanging free. The hand braced on the bed trailed a second length of rope and Blair suddenly lost all coherent thought at the sight.

"So, you're the customer," Jim shrugged nonchalantly. "How do you want me?"

Blair realized that Jim was much better at this game, and never had he been so happy to lose at anything. His brain felt like it was shorting out from too much erotic input. He couldn't have told Jim his name. Instead he stood and simply stared at that body laid out like a lewd banquet, his brain shrieking so many suggestions at once that Blair couldn't even sort through the images.

"On your back," Blair finally ordered, and Jim shifted languidly, flexing his muscles in clear display as he lay back on the bed and stretched his hands over his head. Blair walked over and took one trailing end of rope in his hand. Gazing down at his lover, he saw the trust and humor in Jim's eyes as he pulled a trapped hand up off the bed. Blair took a second to trail a finger across the exposed palm before he let the hand fall back to the bed. He knotted the rope to the railing. He walked around the bed and tied off the second rope, and now Jim was truly his. Opening a drawer, he retrieved a bottle and towel.

Blair ran an appreciative finger across Jim's arm and shoulder and then down to a tight nipple. Jim shivered but stayed silent, his eyes warm on Blair's. As quickly as he could, Blair stripped out of what was left of his clothes and climbed on the bed. Jim obligingly spread his thighs to make room. Kneeling between those spread legs, Blair slicked his hand, and closed his fist around his own erection as hips thrust with a mind of their own. In an instant he was coming, like fireworks behind his eyes, gasoline flung on a fire.

"Well that seems like a waste of $420," Jim remarked, brow raised. Blair just gasped for air as he braced himself with one hand on Jim's exposed thigh.

"Oh, you can't possibly think I'm done with you yet," Blair panted as he struggled to put the world back in order, which included remembering his part in this kinky little play. "That was just taking the edge off." He reached for the towel and gently cleaned his come from Jim's stomach and chest.

"Told you I was worth it," Jim boasted, and Blair rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, yeah. As much as I'm paying, I plan to get my money's worth," Blair said as he opened the lube again. With his non-sticky hand, Blair reached up and grabbed a pillow.

"Up," he ordered, and Jim obediently raised his ass so that Blair could slip the pillow underneath. When Jim settled back against it, his ass was angled perfectly, and Blair smiled wolfishly at the sight. So often Jim's hands would be all over him, distracting him, tormenting him, making him crazy with desire. Now the tables were turned, and Blair had a free pass to explore Jim at his leisure. He started by running a slicked finger over the perineum and up to the balls, reaching to cup and roll them lightly until Jim bit back a moan.

From there, he let his fingers carefully explore every part of Jim's cock, from the bold vein down the underside to the edge of the plum-shaped head- the arrow-shaped indentation underneath, and the little slit like a tiny pair of lips at the very crown. He gently mapped the ridged, bumpy surface of the shaft and the baby-soft, sensitive skin hidden under the curls where the cock joined his body. For all his iron control earlier, Jim couldn't help thrusting up slightly now, and Blair smiled as Jim's pinioned hands curled into fists.

Bending over, Blair took the head in his mouth, lapping up both the musky salt of Jim and the faint medicinal taste of the lube. He danced his tongue along the slit, and now Jim swore, breathless and low and needy.

"God, Blair, more," he begged, and Blair obliged with slightly more suction, quite forgetting to mention that he'd never "told" his name to the high-priced rentboy.

Jim writhed beneath the tormenting mouth and thrust roughly. Blair sat up at once, pulling away from the wet cock and letting Jim push into nothing but air.

"Fuck!" Jim swore.

"Or not," Blair answered blithely. "After all, I'm the one paying here, so it's kinda my choice."

Blair dropped onto the bed, curling against Jim's side with his head propped on one arm while his free hand trailed over a hard stomach and chest. "I could leave you here aching," Blair threatened softly, running a thumbnail over a pebbled nipple.

"Chief," Jim hoarsely whispered.

"My money," Blair repeated as he leaned down to kiss Jim. Jim returned the kiss enthusiastically. Blair shifted to better press himself to that talented mouth, hand cupping the back of Jim's head. Then he felt the thrusting from below and the sudden warmth as Jim came with a happy groan. Blair let himself sag onto Jim, nuzzling kisses along his jawline.

"Well, so much for the long buildup," Blair said wryly.

"Don't worry, Chief. I still owe you $200 in services," Jim laughed softly. "After all, if I didn't know how to keep my customers happy, they wouldn't come back, would they?"

083. AND

"And, but, or, yet, so?" Rafe asked in an exaggerated tone of voice.

"Oh, man, you watch entirely too much Stargate," Blair laughed. He hadn't pegged Rafe as a sci-fi fan, but then again, Blair had learned that people were often more than they appeared to be.

"What? I'm not," Rafe protested. "Now Law and Order... that's a seriously good show."

"Don't give me that; you're quoting Stargate."

"I did not," Rafe insisted, and now Blair could see Rafe start to blush.

"And, but, or, yet, so?" Blair repeated. "That's classic O'Neill."

"It's just a saying, Hairboy," Rafe said, picking up on Henry's favorite nickname. Blair wondered why all his nicknames seemed to focus on his hair. He also had a flashing thought that the assignment of communal nicknames could be an interesting topic for a paper. He let that thought go.

"The only person I've ever heard say it is Colonel O'Neill. Just saying," Blair quickly added when Rafe opened his mouth to protest again. "Now this is different," Blair said as he gestured toward the painting. "If these guys are such pro's, why would they leave a job half done?"

"Good question," Rafe answered as he walked around the armchair in the lavish study so that he could look at the painting from the side as the techs fingerprinted everything around. Blair didn't expect them to find anything, especially since Jim hadn't found a single clue despite the three crime scenes he'd visited. Simon had finally pulled Jim off to deal with a homicide leaving Rafe and Blair to handle the rash of art thefts from private homes.

"I suppose they could have been interrupted," Blair thought out loud as he circled to the opposite side.

"And what interrupted them?" Rafe asked.

"Something or someone that didn't trip the alarm or call the police."

"And that someone or something is now... where?"

"Somewhere else, and yeah, this theory is not really working," Blair said without bitterness. As a scientist, he knew the value of challenging a hypothesis.

"Not really," Rafe agreed.

"Could they have had an accomplice who pulled them out for some reason, maybe buzzed their phone?"

"And why do that?" Blair took his turn at asking the questions.

"Because... okay, you got me there. I have no idea."

"Okay, let's take a step back," Blair said as he walked out to the garden room where a neat hole had been cut in the glass door. "I come in looking for art work. I've obviously cased the place..."

"And you watch way too many bad detective shows if you think in terms of 'casing a place,'" Rafe interrupted.

"Whatever, man. I'm looking for art, and I go straight for the study because I know that Roberts has an original Dorothea Tanning in there." Blair stopped and Rafe picked up the story.

"And you're obviously an idiot because you start taking the painting and then abandon a $30,000 piece of art for no reason." Rafe had no more than said the words when he looked over at Blair with an expression of revelation. Blair smiled as he had the same thought.

"We need to take this painting back to the lab," Blair said.

"Indeed," Rafe said with a deadpan voice.

084. HE

"No kidding. I can't believe all that stuff was forged."

"What people won't do to keep up a front, huh?" Rafe said as he straightened up.

"You mean, like hiding a little Stargate obsession?"

"Or hiding a relationship," Rafe shot back, and then the man instantly stepped back as he flushed slightly. "I'm sorry. That's really not my business," he quickly added.

"Whoa. I have never hid my relationship, and if I don't go waving it in people's faces, I think I have my reasons."

"I know. It was a stupid thing to say," Rafe quickly agreed.

"Then why did you bring it up?" Blair demanded. He wasn't about to let this slide. If there was a problem, he would rather have it out right up front.

"No problem," Rafe insisted in a tone of voice that begged Blair to drop the matter.

"Oh man, cough it up."

"Blair, let's not go there."

"Oh, let's."

"Fine. I just think it's pretty crappy that you were hiding behind all those women."

"Wha... all what women?"

"Oh come on, you had a parade of love interests that you used to trot out. I mean, poor Sam."

"Poor Sam?" Blair nearly squeaked. He could think of many words to describe Sam, who he still considered a friend, but poor wasn't one of them. Brilliant, beautiful, arrogant and terrifying maybe, but not poor.

"You used her."

"I dated her!"

"When you were interested in him!"

"Whoa, what the hell are you talking about?"

"You and Ellison."

"Ellison and I weren't an 'us' until we came back from Phoenix. I never used Sam or any of those other women to put up some front."

"You mean... you two weren't...?" Rafe's voice trailed off in confusion.

"Man, I am as wysiwyg as they come. What you see is what you get."

Rafe snorted. "If you think that's true, then you were putting on a front for yourself because everyone except you and Ellison already knew you two loved each other." Rafe answered. Blair opened his mouth to respond, but then he closed it again. He had already come to a similar conclusion himself. Blair shrugged as he took the lab report and added it to the art theft file.

"Whatever," Blair answered. After all, he couldn't change the past now.

085. SHE

"What's the matter, Sandy?" Megan asked as she came across the bullpen.

"Who took Alex?" Blair growled. No one messed with his purple girl.

"Someone snagged your favorite sheila?" Megan said with eye wide in shock. A little too wide.

"Yes, someone took Alex, and someone better 'fess up," Blair said as he focused his glare on Megan.

"Geez, Hairboy, it's only a stuffed toy," Brown pointed out as he leaned against a file cabinet to watch the morning's entertainment. Blair turned to include Brown in his glare, but the other detective just laughed.

"No, she's only my stuffed toy, and if someone doesn't return her to me, retaliatory strikes are entirely possible."

"She'll be apples, Sandy. Just chill," Megan laughed.

"And just what makes you so sure that she's okay?" Blair demanded. Megan held her hands up in surrender as she backed away from him.

"Woman's intuition?" she asked unconvincingly. Blair would have followed up, but Simon came in with an expression that suggested he had more important concerns that a missing toy. Alex would have to wait.

086. CHOICES

Sliding Brown's desk drawer open, Blair searched for something worthwhile to steal. There was Brown's stash of top of the line and possibly illegally imported cigars or Brown's black book of girl's phone numbers which was actually green. Choices, choices. Blair's hand hovered before he snatched both the cigar case and the little book.

Blair pushed the drawer closed with his hip as he slid the items into his jacket. One quick trip to his car, and he could hide the loot. Now he had some bargaining power. Blair made the trip down and up in record time without everyone else trying to get on the elevators at the same time, but by the time he got back, another Polaroid sat on his desk.

A uniformed man Blair didn't recognized held Alex in his arm as he leaned on a sign that read "Mount Gilead Police Department." Blair groaned, and he would have gotten on the map and looked up Mount Gilead, but he knew from past experience that he would eventually find another conspirator who would laugh and say he had already mailed Alex to the next address on the list.

"Hey, Hairboy," Brown said as he came in the door. Blair narrowed his eyes defiantly stared at the man who Blair just knew was in on Alex's little road trip. Brown and Megan were definitely in on the scheme, and possibly Rafe.

"If she so much as has a dirty patch of fur," Blair threatened as he held up the newest picture before opening his drawer and dropping it in with his growing pile of Polaroids.

"Hey, why are you telling me? I keep tellin' ya, Sandburg, I'm not the mastermind here!"

"Right," Blair said as he slammed the drawer. "Well whoever the mastermind is, you'd better get in touch with him or her if you want your own stuff back," Blair said with a smug smile. Blair watched in satisfaction as Brown hurried to his desk only to find the lock jimmied and his stuff gone.

"That's... that's just not right," Brown eventually fumed. "Those were my best cigars!"

Blair leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms feeling more than a little satisfied with himself. Now Brown had a few choices to make, and hopefully he'd choose the one where he'd call the next name on the list, whoever came after the Mount Gilead Police Department.

087. LIFE

"And I need Alex back," Blair pointed out. He would have felt a lot more sympathy if he hadn't just gotten yet another Polaroid, this time from all the way over in Nova Scotia. The picture showed a man in a beige uniform leaning on a blue sign that read "Yarmouth Town Detachment-RCMP" in both English and French.

"I don't know who's next on the list. Have some mercy here, have you seen Karla? I can't afford to go pissin' her off."

Blair just sat back with a vicious smile as he watched Brown panic.

"Man, Hairboy, you used to be a lot nicer."

"You never stole my stuffed toys before. This one time when I was five and someone stole my woobie, I made an entire commune abandon the state," Blair shot back. He could admit to having a seed of pity for Brown, but there was no way Megan would crack and give the name of Alex's current location, so Brown was his best chance.

"How about if I give you a lead, would that be enough to get my stuff back?" Brown asked. Blair tilted his head in confusion.

"What kind of lead do you think would be worth me giving up my only leverage?" Blair demanded.

"I could flip on the ringleader; that'd be worth something."

"Oh please. Like I don't know it's Megan," Blair rolled his eyes.

"It's not. Look, just promise me you'll give me back my stuff before you do something that gets your ass thrown in jail for the rest of your life."

"This better be good," Blair threatened as he reached in his pocket for his car keys.

"It is. Just give me the book, and I'll give you a lead you can work with." In the end, Blair's curiosity won out and he led Brown down to his car where he'd hidden the cigars and the book under the emergency blanket Jim had bought him. He held the items out, but didn't let go as he waited for the grand revelation. Brown sighed heavily.

"He's going to kill me, but better him than Karla. Ellison has the list of addresses," Brown said, and Blair had to rewind that bit of speech and run it through his brain a second time before he believed his ears.

"Ellison?" Blair said incredulously.

"Ellison. Now look, Hairboy, it was supposed to be a joke," Brown explained as he took his valuables from Blair's suddenly numb hands.

"Oh, I'll show him a joke, alright," Blair said as he pulled the keys from the trunk and slammed it down as hard as he could. "I'll joke him right into a coma." Brown was still talking, but Blair didn't listen as he got in the car and headed for the loft.

Blair pushed the door open hard enough that it bounced off the wall.

"Chief? You okay?" Jim came out of the kitchen with a spoon still in his hand and a slightly panicked expression on his face.

"Alex." Blair announced the single word, and Jim's eyes widened just a bit.

"What about her? Did someone mail her back?" Jim asked, but Blair could read the lie in Jim as easily as Jim could read the lies in a suspect's beating heart.

"Where is she?" Blair demanded as he stepped into the loft and slammed the door behind him.

"How should I know?" Jim shrugged.

"Oh man, just tell me where my stuffed toy is and no one has to get hurt," Blair threatened as he walked toward Jim with one hand raised and one finger pointed at his partner.

"Blair? Come on now, you know I wouldn't do anything to Alex," Jim tried placating him, but Blair continued until he was inches from Jim and physically poking Jim in the chest with one finger.

"Where the hell is my fucking Alex?" Blair demanded.

"She's just out enjoying life, having a bit of a road trip," Jim said. "Whoever sent her just wants to have a little fun."

Blair wasn't fooled by Jim's words or by the way the side of Jim's lip twitched as he tried not to smile.

"I want my fucking stuffed monster back," Blair growled. Jim obviously couldn't take it anymore and that lip twitched its way up into a smile as Jim's body started to tremble with repressed laughter. Blair poked his finger into Jim's chest again for emphasis, and it was like pressing a whoopee cushion: The air came out of Jim in one long hiss and then Jim started laughing uncontrollably.

"Weirdo," Blair complained.

"Yeah, but I'm your weirdo," Jim said as he closed his arms around Blair. Blair tried to back off, but Jim's arms held him tight even while Jim laughed, his breath stirring Blair's curls.

"I still want my Alex back," Blair insisted even as he let his own arms come around Jim's waist.

"We'll call Frank up in Canada and tell him to skip ahead to the last address. I guess the joke's run its course," Jim agreed.

"You have a warped sense of humor, Jim Ellison" Blair said into Jim's chest.

"Yep," Jim agreed happily.

088. SCHOOL

"Chief?" Jim's voice sounded worried, and Blair wondered how Jim could know within one second of getting home that Blair's life had managed to somehow turn itself upside down once again. Blair didn't answer.

"Chief, you okay?" Jim's voice was louder now, and Blair turned to face him. Blair opened his mouth to explain the impossible thing that had just suddenly become possible, but the words refused to form in his mouth.

"Blair, you're really worrying me now." Jim's hands closed over Blair's shoulders, and Blair began to slowly smile.

"Oh, man," Blair managed after a second.

"Come on now, Chief. I need a little more to work with than that. Is that an 'oh man, someone is out to kill me' or an 'oh man, I just won the lottery'?"

"Man," Blair whispered.

"I'm looking for more words here, Chief, not fewer." Blair felt strong hands guide him toward the couch, and he followed along without protest.

"You're not going to believe it. Oh man, no fucking way are you going to believe it."

"Chief, if you don't tell me what's going on, I can't believe it. What's more, you're frustrating me enough to consider beating a few facts out of you." Blair just smiled wider at Jim's threat.

"They want to hire me," Blair said in a shocked voice. If he hadn't been looking at Jim, and he never would have seen the moment of pure pain that crossed Jim's face, but the moment he saw that expression, Blair could have kicked himself. "Whoa there, no jumping to conclusions!" Blair blurted, but Jim held up a hand to keep Blair from saying any more.

"If someone's offering you some big chance, you need to take it. You turned down your own department once, and if you do it again you can't expect fate to keep giving you new chances."

"Man, you are the world's biggest goober. No one's offering a different job. That was the University of Phoenix on the phone. They want me to teach at their new online program. Me. Teaching again." Blair stopped as his brain once again stuttered to a halt--shock making him temporarily incapable of forming complete thoughts or sentences.

"Teaching?" Jim seemed just as shocked as Blair had been when he picked up the phone. In fact, Blair had thought it was a practical joke at first. However both the program and the offer had been legit.

"Yeah, isn't that cool? They want me to teach Criminal Culture and Working with Marginalized Populations. The whole program is online, so I could do all of my grading and paperwork right on my laptop."

"They don't," Jim stopped in the middle of the sentence, but Blair could hear the rest just as clearly as if Jim had said the words.

"Man, that's the perfect part. I talked to the chancellor for over an hour about the diss and the press conference and my lack of academic credentials. The man told me it was a good thing that I was a cop because I didn't understand how criminals worked. He said if I was actually a fraud, I would've taken the $3 million. Said that the very fact that I gave it back proved that I was just somebody who got caught in the middle of other people's ambitions. He wants to hire me, Jim." Blair realized that he was sitting on the couch only when he turned to face his partner. "They really want to hire me."

"Don't sound so surprised, Junior. You have some pretty unique credentials. How many trained anthropologists ever get a chance to see inside police culture and criminal culture as much as you have?" Something in Jim's words set off alarm bells in Blair's head.

"That's true," he said slowly. "A trained anthropologist inside police culture, huh?" Blair watched as just the edges of Jim's ears turned pink. "Oh man, if you want to avoid torture, start talking."

"What?" Jim demanded as he scooted a couple of inches farther away on the couch and crossed his arms over his chest. Blair didn't answer but simply glared.

"Okay, Simon might have mentioned to me that he and Roth had recommended you for the position," Jim admitted. "They wanted to know whether this would be something you wanted or whether this would be rubbing salt into an open wound. For some reason they seem to think that I understand you.

I told them that I had no fucking clue what made you tick, but that I was fairly sure that the idea of holding down two jobs and trying to live on caffeine and two hours' sleep a night would make you happy." Jim shrugged dismissively and then stood up as he headed to the small table next to the door. He dropped the keys from his hand into the basket.

"Jim, have I mentioned lately that I love you?"

"Not lately, no." The answer took Blair aback for a minute, but then he realized that even if they didn't say the words, it was still there.

"I do, you know."

"Yeah, yeah. Don't go mushy on me, Chief." And with those words Jim retreated to the bathroom.

089. WORK

"No problem, Chief. New case?" Jim came over and looked over Blair's shoulder.

"I wish. These psych papers are driving me nuts. The students don't know the difference between Jung and Adler, and you don't even want to know some of their theories on crime and poverty. If these guys don't get over their chauvinistic attitudes, they're going to do more harm than good no matter what part of law enforcement they go into."

"Well, I know you'll whip them into shape." Jim's strong fingers started rubbing along his neck, and Blair could feel the tension draining from his body.

"But it was my turn to cook," Blair said guiltily.

"It's worth it to see you back to the same bouncing, hyper, overcommitted goof I fell for," Jim assured him.

"Hey, I resemble that remark," Blair swatted at Jim's thigh.

"Yeah, well, I'll call for Chinese."

"Oh, hey, order me some sweet and sour chicken," Blair called as he went back to a paper on the psychology of gangs.

"No problem. After all, it's your night, so you're paying."

"Whatever," Blair said absent-mindedly as typed his response to the paper in a second e-mail window. He was so tired of his students using post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacies. Next semester he was definitely going to send out an e-mail on logical argumentation.

090. HOME

"What are you yelling about?" Blair asked as he ran his fingers through his curls and headed for the coffeepot.

"Just once, would it kill you to pick up your own damn stuff?" Jim snarled, and Blair stopped by the kitchen table. Jim was busily mopping up coffee with paper towels, at least he was mopping up the coffee that hadn't soaked into the papers and files stacked on the table.

"Oh man," Blair breathed softly as he looked at the mess.

"If you'd pick up after yourself, this wouldn't happen," Jim said as he threw the coffee soaked paper towel down on top of what used to be Blair's case file for the Sisson rape. Blair thanked god that he followed policy obsessively, meaning that all his personal files were photocopies with the originals safely stored at the station. Of course, that meant that he would have to photocopy and highlight and annotate another set of files. Blair winced.

"Oh boy," Blair said both at the sight in front of him and the idea of spending hours redoing all his lost work.

"Well, if you wouldn't leave your crap sitting around on every available surface, maybe this wouldn't happen." Jim stormed back into the kitchen and slammed the mug down on the counter hard enough that Blair flinched and half-expected the thing to shatter.

"It's not as if--"

"It shouldn't have happened at all," Jim said in a low, deep voice that practically trembled with frustration and anger. Blair also suspected Jim had a bit of guilt in there since that was the one emotion guaranteed to send Jim off into a tight-lipped rage. Blair bit his lip in indecision. Usually his relationships fell apart before they got into the daily aggravations stage, so he wasn't entirely sure about how to handle this.

"I'll get this cleaned up," Blair offered as he headed for the cupboard with the trash bags. He would have to take the files to work until they dried out and he could shred them, but he didn't think Jim would want to have the smell of drying coffee and wet ink in the loft.

"Leave it. I'll get it after my shower," Jim snarled.

"It's okay I'll just--"

"Leave it, Sandburg. You didn't get in 'til after three, and you're not the one who spilled the damn coffee." Jim hurried out of the kitchen, detouring around the far side of the table to avoid Blair.

Blair watched Jim disappear into the bathroom and slam the door. Nice. Well, Blair supposed they had to have fights over something. Blair decided that the best way to keep the peace was to take Jim at his word and go back to bed. Blair suspected he wasn't going to get much sleep.

Blair cursed out the walnut-colored laminate board as he turned it one way and then the other trying to figure out how to make the object in his hand look like the object in the drawing. Deciding it was futile, Blair put that board down and picked up a slightly longer plank and repeated the process. He was so engrossed that he didn't notice Jim until the man stood over him, blocking the light from the living room windows.

"Sandburg?" Jim asked in a wary tone of voice. Blair just wasn't sure whether the man was wary because of their morning fight or because of the disaster in his living room.

"Oh, hey. I can explain," Blair said quickly as he looked up into Jim's patented frustrated expression.

"This should be good."

"It's from Ikea," Blair explained with a wave toward the various boxes and faux wood planks and pieces of hardware strewn about the room like shrapnel from some home decorating war. "I thought it would be a little easier to put together than this," he admitted.

"Is this why you borrowed the truck at lunch?" Jim asked as he started stepping over pieces to look at the pictures on the fronts of the boxes.

"Um, yeah. It's called the home office organizer. It comes with file cabinets, work space, a mail organizer, vertical filing slots, the whole works," Blair said enthusiastically. He could just see the spare room with the small desk moved out and this whole unit in its place. Or at least he would be able to see it if he could get it put together.

"So is this because of this morning?" Jim asked as he moved a particularly long board in order to sit on the couch.

"Oh man, I totally didn't realize how I let my stuff collect all over the house," Blair said. When he'd gotten up the second time, he had looked around the loft and realized that Jim had been right about one thing: he had started leaving his stuff absolutely everywhere. In the past, Jim had started yelling when the clutter reached a certain point, and Blair had cleaned it. This time, Jim hadn't yelled and Blair hadn't cleaned.

"This is your home, you shouldn't have to listen to me yell about how you live in your own home," Jim sighed.

"This is your home too, and you shouldn't have to put up with my shit if it frustrates you," Blair quickly pointed out. "I'm just not good at noticing that I'm spreading, so here's the deal. When I leave my shit all over, you yell and I'll put it way in my brand new home office organizer."

"Just like old times?" Jim asked.

"Oh hell yeah. Your yelling is not exactly new."

"I--" Jim stopped after the one word, obviously trying to come to some decision. Blair waited as Jim struggled with some internal demon that Blair didn't even understand. "What piece are you looking for?" Jim finally asked.

"C-13."

Jim looked around the room, getting up so he could circle a bit before picking up a long skinny board from near the front door and handing it over.

"Finally!" Blair exclaimed as he compared the piece in his hand to the picture in the directions. "Now we need to attach this to B-1." Blair started looking at the pieces near the couch while Jim hung up his jacket before looking at the pieces laid out near the kitchen table.

Jim quickly spotted the missing piece, and handed it over.

"Thanks man." Blair smiled as he took the piece.

"What's the next piece on the list? I want the living room turned back into a living room before we go to bed."

"B-3."

"You start putting it together and I'll get these pieces in some sort of order. We'll get this up in no time," Jim promised.

"Good to have you home," Blair said, and Jim stopped for a moment, his hand reaching for a thin strip of laminate. Then Jim picked up the wood and Blair started using bolt T8 to attach C-13 to B-1.

091. BIRTHDAY

"If you start going on about windows and make-up gifts, I will not be held accountable for my actions."

"But your birthday was last week; that's not in anyone's window, man. I mean, we've had dinner six times and I haven't even mentioned it." Blair grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge and leaned against the wall as he watched Jim quickly sorting out the junk mail.

"Which is fine, Sandburg," he insisted without looking up.

"But I forgot your birthday."

"Chief, you've had so much going on lately that I'm surprised you remember your name on a daily basis." Jim finished his sort and headed for the kitchen. Blair thought he might be forgiven from the way Jim walked close enough that their bare arms brushed against each other.

"Pure exaggeration, man, pure exaggeration," Blair complained as Jim pulled out a beer for himself.

"Oh yeah?"

"Totally."

"How many online classes are you teaching?" Jim asked quickly, an expression on his face that suggested he expected to win this fight.

"Oh man, is that what this is about? I only have the two, which is fewer than when I rode along with you and took classes and taught."

"Uh, huh. And how many active files are you working right now?"

"I don't see what that has to do with anything. We all have big case loads," Blair said defensively and without actually answering the question.

"Stop obfuscating, Chief. How many?"

"Seventeen, okay," he snapped, "but most of those are dead in the water."

"And every week you still make the rounds on all seventeen cases, no filing them away into the inactive files."

"You never know when you might get a break," Blair insisted stubbornly. He wasn't going to budge on this point, not for Roth not for Simon and not even for Jim.

"I agree, Chief, but you can't kill yourself or you're going to do anyone any good. And right now, how many of your friends' dissertations are you 'looking over'?"

"Ah-HA! Only one. Got ya there."

"And if I added in master's thesis and other research papers, papers for publication, and honor's projects?" Jim asked with that victorious smile widening.

"Oh, man."

"Yeah, Chief. 'Oh man' would be one way to put it. 'Way too many' would be another."

"But that still doesn't excuse me forgetting your birthday."

"No, but it explains it. And I don't need a guilt gift and no talking about windows for forgiveness."

"But it's a cultural rule man, you miss a major event by this much and it's like WHOA!" Blair held out his hands wide to illustrate just how big of an issue he thought it.

"Then let's make up our own rules, including one that says the window of forgiveness never closes here."

"Hey, like a countercultural norm established in our little society of two," Blair said as he flopped down on the couch. He could definitely get used to not having to grovel or beg forgiveness or buy gifts he couldn't afford.

"Chief, you're strange."

"Yep, but you still love me... even when I forget your birthday." Blair said certainly. Jim's only answer was to sit on the couch and turn on the television. Someone else might have been insulted by the lack of an answer, but Blair focused on the way Jim sat just close enough for their knees to touch.

092. CHRISTMAS

Funny, she looked smaller than he remembered, but then again, she tended to dominate every memory with her larger than life personality, so he supposed that it was psychologically inevitable that he remember her as larger than she really was. Of course, she was still a physically imposing woman and taller than he was. But as she came in the loft and stood next to Simon and Jim, she no longer looked impossibly large.

"Bets, good to see you," Jim said as he stepped forward with his hand stretched out. Bets ignored the hand and pulled Jim into a hug.

"How are you two no-good trouble makers?" Bets demanded.

"Still causing trouble," Jim said agreeably.

"I'll second that," Simon said as he stood up from the couch and held out his hand. "Simon Banks. I've heard a lot about you, and I'm glad Blair had a friend down in Phoenix those first few months."

"He had a lot of friends. He's a damn good cop," Bets corrected him fiercely, and Blair wondered for a second whether guides had some sort of 'protect me' smell that made warriors get all defensive on his behalf. Then again, Alex... the blonde one, not the purple one... kind of disproved that theory.

"We're lucky we got both of them back," Simon agreed, and that seemed to make the aggression levels drop significantly.

"Yeah. Roth complains constantly about you stealing Ellison and Frizz. But from the sounds of it, he's happier being back here, so we'll just have to live with the loss, even if it does mean I keep getting suck on Russo-duty."

"Frizz?" Simon asked with an amused expression.

"Don't start," Blair warned as he went back to the couch and sat on the arm.

"Yeah, lay off Frizz," Jim teased as he emphasized the nickname. Blair tried to shoot his partner an evil glare, but Jim had turned his back and headed for the kitchen.

"Watch it, Ellie-boy," Blair counter-attacked. Simon's expression grew even more amused.

"Ellie-boy? Oh, wait 'til Russo hears that one," Bets said with a wide smile.

"He'd just better not say it in front of me," Jim warned as he returned with beers.

"Boys and their egos," Bets said as she laughed and rolled her eyes. "How do you put up with them, Frizz."

"Hey, I'm a boy too just in case you didn't notice. Just because I'm sleeping with a guy doesn't mean that my dick fell off," Blair complained. He was rewarded with Simon sending beer out his nose as he choked from shock. It wasn't easy to shock Simon, and Blair felt a moment of pride at the accomplishment.

"You're all guy, Frizz. I know a dozen girls who would like a chance to remind you about all the things Ellison can't do for you. However, you aren't one of these guys with so much ego that you go around trying to defend your manhood by pissing all over your territory and shaking your spear at the enemy." Bets picked a chair and sat down.

"It sounds like you're accusing us of being some sort of throwback to a primitive form of man," Jim said with a smile over to Blair at the private joke.

"Oh man, do not agree with that," Blair warned Bets. "I told him that the first time I met him, and he slammed me into a wall." Bets looked over at Jim in shock, and Jim could only shrug.

"And did you think slamming Frizz around would prove you were a civilized human being?" Bets demanded with a raised eyebrow.

"Wasn't really thinking at all," Jim admitted. "But it all worked out in the end."

Blair looked around the room as Jim and Simon settled into seats, and he was shocked at how easily the two parts of his life slipped together. Bets with her plain-speak and Simon with his casual acceptance of her rather overpowering personality and Jim on the couch in an alpha-male sprawl that practically screamed his comfort with having these people in his territory.

"So, what have you two been up to lately?" Bets asked before taking a deep drink of her beer. Blair and Jim exchanged glances, and Blair took a deep breath and started in on their latest case.

Several hours, several attempts to play one-upmanship on who had the biggest case load, and several stories featuring psychopaths later, the four of them sat around the table with the smell of Christmas dinner drifting past them. Blair studied his cards and tried to use his knowledge of the players to figure out which of them was bluffing.

Simon gently chewed a cigar that he wouldn't light in the loft. Jim had a closed expression that even Blair had trouble reading. Bets looked amused, but she had looked amused when both folding and raising any number of hands. Blair decided to make a run at the pot this time.

"I'm in."

"I hope you don't play poker often." Bets said as she leaned back and considered the others.

"I'm in, so let's see what you have," Simon insisted unhappily as he dropped his money in the pot. But then the man was down by twenty dollars, so he had a right to be grumpy.

"Like taking candy from babes," Bets said as she laid out her cards triumphantly. Blair groaned before tossing his own pair of queens face down on the table.

"Well I'm out. Unless I want to hock Jim's Christmas present, my mad money for the week is gone."

"That's my Frizz, the only man to admit that he's outgunned rather than keep firing blanks."

"You know, if I wanted to be verbally abused, I could go have Christmas with my ex-wife and Daryl."

Bets laughed. "Okay, I'll stop picking on the men-folk."

"And I'm going to go check on the bird. It should be time to take the tinfoil off," Blair said as he stood up. "Jim, you're on dressing duty."

"Hell, it's not like I'm doing any good here," Jim said disgustedly as he pushed his chair back.

"How in the hell are we supposed to play poker with two people?" Simon demanded. "I'm not stopping until I win my money back off this witch."

"Sweet-talker," Bets said cheerfully. "Tell you what, let's have a little game of 21."

"You're on," Simon grabbed the deck and started shuffling.

"Man, should I point out that Bets paid her way through college by gambling?" Blair asked as he opened the oven door.

"Traitor," Bets hissed.

"Oh, Chief. You're in for it now," Jim whispered as he grabbed the French bread and pulled a knife out of the knife block. Blair shrugged. What was Christmas without a little bloodshed. Besides, he could hear Simon shuffling the cards even as he complained about Bets being a con artist.

Jim was busy carting dishes to the table while Blair carved the turkey and transferred the cut pieces to a plate, the steam slowly rising from the white meat.

"You two are quite the cooks," Bets said as she reached over with her fingers and grabbed a bit of stuffing. Jim took a swipe at her with a serving spoon, but she pulled her hand back with her prize before popping it in her mouth.

"Candy from a baby," Bets taunted, and Blair didn't have to see Jim's face to know what expression he'd find on Jim's face.

"Blair, did you invite Brown today?" Jim suddenly asked out of nowhere.

"Yeah, but he said he had to work," Blair answered as he look up. Jim's head was tilted at a particular angle Blair always associated with Jim using his Sentinel senses.

"He does. He's taking calls for the department," Simon added.

"Well, he's storming up the stairs two at a time," Jim said.

"Shit." Blair slammed the knife down on the counter. "Is it too much to ask for one day off?" Blair demanded to know as he pulled Tupperware out of the cupboard.

"But, how..." Bets asked, clearly confused. Simon ignored her as he got up and opened the door as a breathless Brown came into sight. Jim picked up the bowls he had just put on the table and put them back on the counter.

"Been trying to call you," Brown said as he came through the door.

"Yeah, some of us planned a quiet day without family members calling and pissing someone off, so some of us disconnected the phones," Blair said as he transferred hunks of meat and dressing into the plastic containers.

"Well, we have a bomb threat. Bomb squad says the first device was real, and the bomber says he's planted three other bombs."

"Oh for crying out loud. Can't criminals take at least one day off?" Simon demanded as he pulled his coat off the rack.

"Not in Cascade. Bets, welcome to the world's most dangerous city," Jim offered before heading up the stairs. Knowing that Jim would grab both their weapons, Blair kept packing up Christmas dinner.

"So, you want to ride along?" Blair asked Bets who still had a slightly bewildered look on her face.

"Sandburg, this is police business."

"And she's a police officer. Considering you let an anthropologist with no police experience at all ride along...." Blair looked over at Simon as he put the rest of the mashed potatoes into a container.

"And here I thought you guys were exaggerating," Bets said with a shake of her head as she stood up and pulled her own coat off a hook.

"Oh man, when you live in Cascade, you don't have to exaggerate," Blair answered as he grabbed a canvas shopping bag out of a drawer and started loading the food.

"Chief," Jim appeared in the kitchen, wearing one shoulder holster and carrying a second one. Blair took the second holster and slipped into it as Jim finished packing and picked up the heavy bag.

"Are we ready, people?" Simon asked, and Jim headed for the door while Bets followed. Blair brought up the rear, grabbing his keys out of the basket and locking the door behind him. Merry Christmas, Cascade style.

093. THANKSGIVING

"Blair, I'm fine," Jim said as he continued to watch the game with one hand curled around Blair's waist.

"I know," Blair murmured against Jim's skin as he moved his hand down under the sheet. He found the curve of Jim's hipbone and traced the edge of the bone before letting his fingers slide down into the dip formed by the lower curve of that feature.

"So stop acting like I'm going to break. It's annoying, Sandburg." Despite Jim's words, Blair continued to explore every small shape and angle and texture on Jim's body. He touched everything except for the spot where gauze and white tape covered a hole that Blair didn't want to think about.

"I know you won't break," Blair said as he allowed his fingers to trail down to Jim's thigh where he could feel the coarse hairs under his fingertips.

"So what's this about?" Jim asked as he finally turned his head. Blair looked into the blue eyes of his lover, his injured lover, the lover he had nearly lost to a madman with a bomb and a gun and not enough brains to take his insanity somewhere other than Cascade.

"Just giving thanks, man," Blair said honestly. He leaned forward and pressed a gentle kiss to Jim's lips as he gave thanks to every deity whose name he could remember.

094. INDEPENDENCE

Jim was off working a multiple homicide case with the FBI while Blair was working a serial rapist case. Blair pushed the details of his case out of his mind as he stroked a little harder, the cars racing around the track becoming background noise to his own rising lust. Oh yeah. Blair squeezed a little harder and angled his hips to give himself a greater range of motion. Oh fucking yeah.

The keys in the lock didn't register on Blair's lust addled brain until the door swung open. Oh shit. Blair pulled his hand out of his sweats and tried to will the blood back out of his cock. No way was he letting Jim catch him wanking on the couch.

"Hey, you're home early," Blair said as casually as possible as he focused on the cars.

"Told Simon I was getting a headache." Jim dropped his keys in the basket and went to the refrigerator where Blair heard a beer pop open.

"Hey, bring me one," Blair called.

"Aren't you on duty later?" Jim asked, but the refrigerator door opened again as he fished a second beer out.

"Much later," Blair said looking at the clock.

"How's the case going?"

"It sucks. Oh man, these prostitutes are never going to open up."

"You'll get there, Chief."

"So are you doing okay with your senses?" Blair asked, as he took the beer from Jim's hand. His Sentinel really did look worn and tired.

"Yeah, I just get headaches when I use them too much. As soon as you're done with the rape taskforce, Simon promises you'll be on this homicide."

"No guarantees, man, but I can feel it in my bones... we're this close to a suspect."

"I know you'll get him." Jim dropped to the couch heavily, and Blair had a flare of guilt that he couldn't be on both task forces at once. For a second he wondered whether Jim had been this worn out and frayed at the edges the whole time Blair had been in Phoenix alone.

"So, what have you been up to today?" Jim asked. For a second, Blair feared he'd been busted, but Jim just relaxed into the couch and cracked his neck first one direction and then the other.

"Not much. I have trouble sleeping in the day," Blair admitted. He didn't say that he had trouble sleeping without Jim, but he thought Jim knew it.

"Yeah, know what you mean, Chief." Jim agreed as he rolled his head so that his cheek rested on the couch and he looked over with a predatory stare that Blair recognized a second too late. Just as Blair went to flee the couch, a large hand grabbed his arm and pulled him back. Jim's forearm wrapped around him trapping one of his arms to his side as Jim's other hand started tickling his side.

"No. Man. Stop it. Jim!" Blair hissed between fits of laughter as Jim hijacked his body. "Red!" Blair finally gasped out, and the tickling stopped only to have Jim flip him onto his back on the couch with Jim crouching over him. Times like this, Blair could practically see Jim's spirit animal in him.

"Jacking off on the couch, Darwin? I'm sure there's a house rule about that somewhere," Jim insisted with a dangerous grin. Blair wrapped his legs around Jim's lower body so that Jim was just as trapped on the couch as he was.

"Rules, schmules," he shrugged.

"Oh, Chief, I can't have you breaking the rules by jacking off on the couch, Jim insisted as he shifted his weight to one side and moved his hand between them. "What kind of partner would I be if I didn't save you from yourself?"

Jim's hand pulled down Blair's sweatpants so that Blair's erection popped free. Blair went to grab his own cock, but Jim intercepted his hand so that no one was touching it, and Blair groaned his displeasure.

"Can't have you breaking the rules, Chief." Jim said in a falsely concerned voice. However, Blair let his arm relax against the couch as he waited to figure out his lover's game. Jim let go and slipped his hand in to unbutton and unzip his own pants before pushing them down. Jim lowered his weight a bit so that Blair could smell the beer and sour onions on Jim's breath as Jim grabbed both their cocks in one hand.

Blair bucked up off the couch and grabbed Jim's shoulders as he felt his lover's warm and twitching cock lying next to his in that tight grip. The hand vanished for a moment and then returned.

"Oh fuck," Blair grunted as Jim started working his fist up and down. Blair realized the whole thing had been a set up when he felt the cool slick of lube slide over his cock. And with each stroke, Blair could feel the warmth of that hand and the heat of Jim's cock travel through him.

"Oh fuck. Fuck," Blair threw his head back as he struggled to buck up with Jim's weight pinning him to the couch. "Fuck!" he nearly screamed as he fell over the edge of his orgasm and his muscles stiffened as his orgasm began. Jim pumped harder for a second, then stopped as Blair's cock emptied over both their clothes and probably dribbled onto the couch. Blair lay boneless and sated as Jim continued the last few strokes to finish himself off so that they really had created an impressive mess between them.

Jim's trembling arm collapsed, and Blair grunted as his partner's weight fell on him, both of their heads resting on the same cushion. Blair tightened his legs around Jim.

"Oh man, I think that last part qualified as jerking off on the couch," Blair muttered.

"Then we're even," Jim answered sleepily.

"Sometimes," Blair murmured, "too much independence sucks, man."

"Sometimes, Chief," Jim answered. Blair glanced at the clock on the TV, checking for the red light that told him he'd switched on the alarm, before closing his eyes and going to sleep to the sounds of cars racing laps on television and Jim's steady breathing in his ear.

095. NEW YEARS

"What?" Brown asked since he was the only other one there yet.

"You just had to ask, didn't you?" Jim rolled his eyes and went to his desk.

"Happy New Year!" Blair translated while Brown looked over in confusion.

"You have a problem there, Hairboy. It's February."

"Exactly. Time to put away the brooms and open the windows and welcome in the new year."

"Okay, you have definitely been smokin' something," Brown said as he shook his head.

"No way, man. Today is the beginning of Chinese New Year. There's a parade down in Chinatown and millions of people are celebrating the beginning of new chances."

"This ain't China," Brown pointed out with a smile.

"Yeah, but you should take every opportunity to remember that the world is full of new chances and new starts," Blair pointed out as he sat at his desk and started sorting the various lab reports on his cases.

"Hairboy, you are weird," Brown finally announced.

"Welcome to the Sandburg zone," Jim offered from his own desk.

"Whatever. You two need to broaden your horizons," Blair shot back with a smile. He just knew that he was ready to open the windows and let the old year out. As he thought back on the growing pains of the last year, he hoped that he would never again have to go through so much, and he hoped that he never lost the things that he had gained. Megan came in the door with a nod to him, and Blair nodded back.

"Hey, Blair. Got a weird one for you," Taggart called as he came through the doors. "Has your name all over it."

"What's up?" Blair asked.

"Did you know there's a Romanian mob? Got a shooting down at 14th with a bunch of grandmothers as witnesses. Won't talk to anyone."

"Let me grab my bag," Blair said as he shoved all his reports back into his in-box. "Catch you later, Jim," Blair said as he walked past his partner's desk.

"Home for dinner?" Jim asked.

"Yeah, but it's your turn to cook."

"Whatever," Jim answered, throwing Blair's favorite word back at him. Blair gave his partner a small smile as he followed Taggart out the doors. New year, new chances, new life: Blair would celebrate those just as often as he got the opportunity.

096. WRITER'S CHOICE

"Yeah, more than I expected," Blair answered. The bar was crowded with police officers who were quickly getting drunk as they huddled in groups telling stories that made Blair blush until he finally retreated to the corner where he'd spotted Simon. It seemed like everyone knew the story of him falling for a drug dealer or taking out a bank robber with a baseball. There was only so much embarrassment that Blair could take.

"Don't sell yourself short, Sandburg. A lot of people want to make sure to get in a few last cheap shots before you head off for Florida."

"No way. I'll leave Florida to you old guys," Blair insisted.

"Watch it Sandburg," Simon warned as he lifted his cane and threatened Blair with the curved end.

"Aren't you two a little old to still be threatening each other?" Jim asked with a chuckle as he came up behind Blair.

"Not so old that I can't take care of the kid."

"Simon, I'm on the far side of fifty, no one calls me a kid any more."

"Still, I'm surprised you're retiring."

"Oh man, I have two books I'm working on and a half dozen seminars planned. But I have my twenty in, and I'm ready to move on."

"More like the new captain is ready to move us along," Jim corrected him. "And I notice the good captain is missing tonight."

"After you made him look like a fool on the Kilmer case, I'm not surprised," Blair said laughing at the thought.

"The captain is a fool. I don't have to make him look like anything."

"So you two are still making captains miserable." Simon shook his head sadly, but Blair recognized the fond expression.

"This guy deserves it, though," Jim said with a weary sigh as he sat down next to Blair. Blair looked at his lover sharply. All too often Jim tried to hide the way the years had started to make his joints ache.

"What? You think Simon didn't?" Blair teased. Simon had a look of exaggerated shock on his wrinkled face, but his retort was interrupted by someone ringing a bell at the bar.

"People, come on now, people," Ricky Williams yelled from the bar. Jim ducked his head, well aware that the rookie had a case of Ellison worship and was probably about to say something horribly embarrassing. Blair would have offered sympathy, but he was too busy planting an elbow in his partner's ribs.

"Quiet!" Bets yelled, and the bar grew suddenly silent. Then a wave of laughter swept through the place as Ricky had one of his famous blushes at being out-shouted by an elderly black woman with grey hair.

"Thanks," he muttered. "So, I figure it's time we have something to say about the two guests of honor," Ricky started.

"Yeah, before we're too drunk to remember," one voice from the crowd shouted out.

"Or they drop dead of old age," another answered, and Blair recognized the second voice as Rafe. He leaned forward so that he could glare at the captain of the organized crime division. Rafe just smiled back.

"So, does anyone want to start?" Ricky asked the crowd. A dozen voices shouted, but one shouted them all down.

"Quiet up," Bets yelled over the crowd. A lot of people in the room knew her from her visits, but Blair thought the others had probably figured out who she was from the various stories he and Jim both loved to tell. The voices slowly subsided. "I worked with Frizz, that's Sandburg to you lot, back in the Phoenix PD. When I first saw him, he was this long-haired skinny white boy who looked like something the cat dragged in." Several voices yelled comments about Blair not haven't changed a bit, and Blair flipped off a number of people in the room. When he turned back to face front, he caught Jim biting the inside of his cheek in an attempt not to laugh along with the others.

"Laugh it up--your turn is coming," Blair hissed. Jim's smirk just grew wider.

"I wondered if my captain had taken to picking up detectives down at the bargain basement, but then I started working with him. First week we went out together, that boy lectured me on everything from how many vitamins I needed to the ways the Native culture had influenced modern Phoenix." The room broke into a chorus of agreement at that point. Bets held up her hand to quiet them again.

"But Frizz never backed down off a fight. We were questioning everyone in this neighborhood about a girl who got attacked, and we went up the driveway to where this guy was fixing his car. We identified ourselves as police, and before I knew what happened, I have a big-ass gun pointed at me." The room fell quiet as Bets shared the common fear of every person in the room.

"I figure, great, I'm on a call with the second-hand detective over there and I don't even have a chance to pull my own weapon. Thought that was the end 'cause Lord knows I'm not one to talk my way out of something like that. Next thing I know, Frizz has his weapon out and orders the man to the ground. I can tell this guy ain't goin' for it, and Frizz is sounding more desperate, and I'm standing there like a useless clod with that gun pointed straight at me." Blair ran his hand over his graying curls as he remembered that day. It wasn't something he had wanted to remember today, but he had to admit it was part of who he was. Even though he'd never had to face that horror again, every time he pulled his weapon, he remembered that day.

"I see the guy's finger start to twitch, and I brace for it, and then this sound roars, and I start feeling myself up looking for the entry wound before I realize Frizz took the guy down." Blair felt a warm hand close over his arm, and he leaned toward Jim for support in the suddenly quiet room.

"That tore him up, shooting a man. He used to go to the grave, but Frizz did what he had to do. He never backed down when standing up was the right thing. More amazingly, he never got his back up when he didn't need to. If you lot are anything like the testosterone driven morons down in Phoenix... and from the stories Frizz tells, you are," Bets accused the room. The solemn mood broken, several people in the crowd yelled their disagreement. "Well, it's amazing that Frizz never stood up and picked a fight that he didn't need to. When he stood up and took a stand, you knew he was doin' it for the right reasons.

"So, I know you're leaving the force for the right reasons, and now that you aren't stuck up here with more cases than the Lord himself could handle, I better see your scrawny white ass visiting Phoenix a little more often." Bets raised her glass toward their table, and Blair raised his own in return before drinking. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Jim smiling at him.

"Oh," Bets suddenly added. "Jim's not bad either as far as testosterone driven morons go." Bets' words caught Blair so off guard that he snorted beer and sudden found himself choking, much to the amusement of the entire room. Jim snagged Blair's glass out of his hand to keep him from spilling it while raising his own glass to Bets in acknowledgement.

"And from an old pain in the ass like you, I take that as a compliment," Jim called over the crowd's voices. Bets laughed with the rest of the guests.

097. WRITER'S CHOICE

"I figure after spending a couple of years married to the great Ellison, I have a right to say a thing or two." Blair smiled as Jim started turning a gentle shade of pink. No one else might notice, but Blair knew that Jim was slowly dying of embarrassment. Considering how hard it was to embarrass Jim, those pink ears made it worth having his own past remembered

"To the man who managed to make male pattern baldness sexy," Carolyn began, and the room was suddenly filled with wolf whistles and shouts of approval. Looking at his partner, Blair had to admit the man aged well. Take out a little grey, add an inch or two of hair at the top, and take way a few laugh lines, and Jim was the same man he had fallen in love with. Jim's ears turned a darker shade of pink.

"You know, for years I tried to figure out why my marriage fell apart. I think I just may have figured it out," she said with a smile and a nod at Blair, which precipitated another round of wolf whistles, and this time Blair could feel the heat of his own blush.

"The first time I knew that Jim loved Blair was the day that I came over to yell at Ellison about doing some piece of paperwork wrong, and I stepped into the living room to find nests of papers and feathered masks all over the living room. I figured Jim wouldn't put up with that mess for just anyone. After all, mess is definitely against his house rules." A ripple of laughter traveled through their closest friends.

"And for those of you who wondered, he had those house rules when I lived there too.I once spend hours trying to sort the paperwork from four difference cases because Jim had been kind enough to 'clean up' after me."

"But really, Blair puts up with more than I would have ever put up: the house rules, the growling, the practical jokes, the horrible sense of humor, and enough bad luck for any ten people." That comment caused a number of hallelujahs from the crowd. "But considering Blair's luck, it's a good thing those two can't have kids because the combined bad luck genes would probably cause an Armageddon." Now the crowd shouted their agreement, and Carolyn had to wait for the noise to subside.

"Jimbo managed to be targeted by a serial bomber, poisoned by a designer drug, and shot at in a monastery." The noise had steadily increased as she gave her list, and Blair could hear people at the tables around him add their own Ellison stories. Carolyn held up her hand for the room to settle down again.

"But that's only fair since Blair managed to get trapped in an elevator with a bomb while trying to do some work for the university, got kidnapped by scientists raising deadly spiders, and was once kidnapped four times in one day." Blair ducked his head in embarrassment as the crowd roared. Put all together like that, it sounded... well, it sounded pretty damn bad.

"And the sad thing is, that's not even my favorite story," Carolyn said over the crowd. "I doubt these two ever told you about their vacation to Minnesota." Blair groaned, and he could practically feel Jim stiffen beside him. He turned and saw Jim shaking his head and mouthing the world 'no' to his ex-wife, but she just smiled back sweetly before taking a breath.

"It seems like Jim trusted Blair to read the map," and the roar of laughter and shouts made Blair blush even darker. Yeah, yeah, so he wasn't the best at navigation. "And Blair managed to get them onto some back logging road that no one had used in a hundred years, well no one except the counterfeiters who Jim stopped and asked directions from." The whole room erupted at that, Simon laughed so hard that he was gasping for breath until Blair worried about the man's heart.

"Oh yeah. Only them," Carolyn said cheerfully once the room finally settled. "Well, the bad guys got the drop on our fearless duo, but luckily these were small-town criminals who didn't want to kill two cops, so instead they made the boys strip naked and stole the truck." By this time Carolyn was having to shout over the cheering crowd. "Hey, quiet down... it gets better." Blair turned his back to Carolyn and put his head on the table so that he wouldn't have to face everyone after the next part. Simon's heavy hand patted his back once or twice.

"So there they are wandering buck naked and lost when they find a clothesline. By the time they get to town and go to the police station, the officer behind the desk arrests them both for indecent exposure since Blair was wearing a skirt and Jim there a red and white tablecloth." Blair flinched at the crowd roared uncontrollably. When he tilted his head up to look, Rafe and Brown were both laughing so hard that tears ran from the corner of their eyes. Blair looked at Jim who was slowly shaking his head in resignation.

"I thought we had an agreement, Carolyn. You don't tell anyone, I won't kill you..." Jim let his words trail off but he had a small smile on his face.

"The Black Duck police department called and asked me to vouch for them. And despite Jimbo's threats, it's time you guys know what kind of trouble magnets you've been sheltering all this time. Heck, as soon as they leave Cascade, I expect the crime rate to drop. The trouble will just follow those two wherever they go."

Blair looked at his partner, and Jim smiled back with a shrug. "Probably," Jim whispered just to Blair since the rest of the room was still in chaos.

098. WRITER'S CHOICE

"When I met Jim, he was a real piece of work: earrings hanging out his ear, unshaven, dressed straight out of a dumpster. Hell, I knew he could do good work, but he looked more like a suspect than an officer." Blair noticed that the people shouting now were the older officers, the ones who remembered a Jim whom he had never known.

"He had attitude with his attitude, and then he started changing. It seemed like overnight he went from an arrogant and obnoxious pain in the ass to an arrogant and silent pain in the ass." Blair smiled as Jim flipped off the move vocal supporters of that statement.

"And then Sandburg shows up talking about the thin blue line and looking like a prime suspect in a drug bust."

"Hey!" Blair protested, and Simon just waved dismissively to Blair in a clear gesture intended to communicate a quick 'shut up'.

"When they started working together, my first bet was that the kid would run off before the end of the first work day. Didn't think he could handle a normal day in the life of a Major Crimes cop. Well, he handled just about the worst day you could imagine, and managed to take out a suspect with a vending machine." Simon's words, and the warm smile he flashed made Blair blush, and the crowd erupted in another round of talking as older officers gave abbreviated versions of the story to their younger partners.

"You people have no idea how much paperwork is involved in explaining something like that," Simon complained in mock horror. "Despite my every expectation, the kid stuck it out and became an asset to the department."

"But I still figured his days were numbered because no way could Jim Ellison put up with the cloud of chaos that followed Sandburg everywhere he went. The kid left papers all over Jim's desk and I can't count the number of times I would listen to Jim chew the kid out." Blair glanced over, and Jim was now squirming uncomfortably. Blair laughed and when Jim looked up, Blair shrugged to show it hadn't bothered him.

"But the longer they were together, the less flaky Sandburg got and the less arrogant Ellison got. You two are better together than you would ever be apart." Simon tried to keep taking, but the roar in the room drowned even his voice so that he stood leaning on his cane and waiting for the noise level to drop. Finally he managed to shout over the crowd.

"So thank god you two found each other because individually you were both insufferable," Simon finished, and the crowd degenerated into shouts and cheers and the sounds of glasses clinking.

"Boy with friends like these," Jim shouted, but Blair suspected that he was the only one who could hear, and that was because Jim had shouted no more than six inches from his ear.

"No wonder we're retiring," Blair replied with a smile.

099. WRITER'S CHOICE

"I'm sorry we missed that window," she said, and Blair's memory suddenly snapped to the dark-haired beauty who had once threatened to steal his heart.

"Thanks, Sam. So, how's DC going?"

"It's good. But I'd better not keep you; you have a line of waiting fans," she said as she stepped away, and Blair opened his mouth to protest but another hand was in his.

"God, I can't believe we're losing you, Hairboy." Brown slapped Blair's arm as Rafe shook hands with him.

"It's not like disappearing forever. A little travel, a little consulting work on the road, a little sightseeing. Before you know it, Jim and I will be ready to kill each other from spending too much time together in the car, and then we'll come home.

"As long as you work in a nice long visit to Phoenix," Bets said as she worked her way through the crowd.

"You know we will," Blair said as the woman smiled and kept going toward the door. Blair was feeling a need to get out of the crowd himself, but he didn't think his friends would let him out the door.

Blair had shaken a thousand hands and been surprised by any number of faces from the past before he felt a large hand on his shoulder. He backed up a step and let himself lean against Jim's body as the young woman he was talking to got a dreamy look on her face. Blair wondered when exactly he and Jim's relationship had gone from the thing that no one talked about to the object of dreamy stares. Sometime during those decades when his hair had turned gray, no doubt.

"Getting late, Chief," Jim said, and Blair could have blessed his partner for the rescue.

"Yeah, and we have to be on the road in the morning," Blair apologized to the woman.

"So, I think I'm going to sneak my partner out of here, if you don't mind," Jim smiled, and the woman's expression turned from dreaminess to longing.

Blair let himself be pushed toward the door, away from the lingering group that kept trying to buy him more beers. He felt like a huge part of him was still in that room, was still a cop. However as he and Jim walked to the street where a yellow cab waited, Blair realized that the larger part of him was ready to move on. His Sentinel groaned a little as he got into the cab, his knees probably bothering him. Blair walked around, one hand trailing on the cab to keep his balance.

Blair got in and watched through the back window as another part of his life closed.

100. WRITER'S CHOICE

"You're getting old, Chief. I remember a time when you could hold your beer," a teasing voice put something thin and cold in his hand. Blair unfolded his glasses and slipped them on as he opened one eye half way.

"Fuck you man," he cursed mildly.

"I don't think you could manage that right now." Jim leaned against the railing, and Blair struggled to get his feet out of bed.

"I'm younger than you," Blair pointed out smugly as he grabbed his robe and wandered toward the stairs.

"Not by that much." Jim followed him downstairs. By the time Blair got out of the bathroom, bagels and orange juice waited at the counter. The room was clean... Jim Ellison clean, and Blair found it almost disturbing. A stack of white sheets waited to be flung over the furniture, and Blair had a strange sense of dj vu.

"Oh man, I feel like I just started my life as a cop, and now I'm ending it. This is weird man. Freaky weird. Time defying the laws of physics and speeding up weird."

"Then think of it as a beginning. You get to finally concentrate on just your academic career the way you set out when you were sixteen."

"Man, I am so not sixteen anymore," Blair pointed out as he pulling on his graying hair. The course, thick hairs stuck out from his natural brown curls.

"Still not an end, Chief. The end was when you walked out that door and I thought I lost you forever. As long as we're together, we're just moving on to a new beginning."

"You're getting sappy in your old age, Ellison," Blair said before taking a bite of bagel.

"Watch it, Junior. I can still take you," he threatened with the spoon he was using for his Grape Nuts.

"Whatever," Blair said with his mouth full.

"Shrimp."

"Dork."

"Guppy."

"Sunshine," Blair said in his best imitation of Banks.

"Frizzy," Jim replied in a Bets voice.

"Ellie-boy," Blair said as he struggled to not laugh.

"Whatever," Jim said as he shoved another spoonful of cereal in his mouth. "You just better be ready to go in an hour because I'm ready to hit the road, Chief. We're supposed to be in Colorado for that job with the Denver PD in three days, and I don't feel like rushing on the road."

Blair smiled at his graying and cranky lover as he got up and threw away the paper plate his bagel had been on. "I'm always ready," he suggested salaciously.

"When are you going to grow up, Chief?"

"Hopefully never," Blair answered as he headed for their bedroom so he could pack his suitcase. "I like me the way I am."

"Me too," Jim added softly. Blair smiled as he climbed the steps up to their bedroom. He didn't know when they'd be back, but at least this time they were going together.

End Recovery Epic by LitGal: litgal1@yahoo.com
Author and story notes above.

Disclaimer: The Sentinel is owned etc. by Pet Fly, Inc. These pages and the stories on them are not meant to infringe on, nor are they endorsed by, Pet Fly, Inc. and Paramount.