Archive of Our Own ^beta

Author's disclaimer: UPN and Pet Fly own the guys and The Sentinel, but I decided to borrow them so they could have get a really nice Christmas present this year. No money being made by moi, but then it is better to give than to receive. Except when these two get horizontal, during which a lot of both goes on.

WHERE THE LOVE LIGHT GLEAMS

A Sentinel Christmas Story by Corbeau

CASCADE, WASHINGTON. CHRISTMAS EVE, 1995

The scene was a mockery of the season. "Peace on Earth, Good Will to Men" didn't seem to stretch to cover the battered body lying on the asphalt. The glaring lights of the newly-arrived Crime Scene Unit brought islands of color into focus, scattered amidst the gloom in the alley. They were reflected in the shrinking puddles left by an early evening rainstorm, but that had been hours ago, and most of the ground was now only damp. Here glints of gold were revealed in long hair, there a green coat with a now-bedraggled sprig of holly pinned to the lapel, and blood--still bright red in places, but fading to rust at the edges. A tall man stood rigidly near the corpse, hands and jaw clenched.

"Jim--don't tell me we've got another one?"

Jim dragged his attention away from the murdered woman to the dark face emerging from the darker background. "Simon, what are you doing here? You're supposed to be off on Christmas for a change."

"And you're on again, as usual." Simon blew cigar smoke in the air, watching the flickering lights move through the smoke. "Don't you know the meaning of the word holiday, Ellison?"

Jim shrugged. "Makes no difference to me, but it does to other people. Why not let them have the time to be with their families? Which is where you should be."

Simon seemed to find everything else more interesting to look at than the detective next to him. "At this rate, I won't have that to worry about by this time next year. Right now a nice sordid crime scene is an improvement over the atmosphere at home."

"I'm sorry, Simon--I didn't realize things had gotten that bad between you and Joan."

"Yeah, well...you know how it is, Jim. Divorce is an occupational disease of cops. Don't they still give people that spiel in the Academy? You survived yours."

"Yeah, but Carolyn and I weren't married that long, and we didn't have kids."

Simon shoved the cigar in his mouth and chewed on it viciously. "So what have we got here?"

The "back off" behind that statement wasn't voiced, but it may as well have been. Jim could hardly blame Simon, since he'd been even less communicative when his own marriage was breaking up. "Same M. O. as the other three. Young blonde woman, petite, blow to the head to stun her, cause of death multiple stab wounds. No sign of robbery or sexual assault, ID still on her. Jennifer Reynolds, 22. Depressing lack of physical evidence. She was a cocktail waitress like the others--and she worked over there at the Greenhouse."

Simon looked sharply at Jim. "That place that's like a jungle inside, with those overpriced drinks served in coconuts? How did you get to the scene so fast? Did you figure out the pattern?"

"I think so. With a little help from Elena Rodriguez."

"Elena--isn't she from Vice?"

"Yeah, I knew her pretty well when I worked there. She'd finally managed to find a gift her daughter wanted, and was crossing her fingers that she'd get home in time to wrap it and get it under the tree."

"And just what has her kid's Christmas present got to do with a serial killer?"

"She was showing me the stuff--art supplies and books on art. One of the books just happened to be open to a color wheel."

"A color wheel? You mean those bar names really do mean something? I thought we'd given up that idea because it made no sense."

"We were trying to fit the colors into a spectrum, that's why. The first three places were The Sun, The Moody Blues Club, The Bloody Mary. Yellow, blue, red--primary colors. The next level on the color wheel combines the primaries. The first two the killer picked were yellow and blue, which make--"

"Green. The Greenhouse. Damn! Fantastic! We can really narrow down where this bastard's likely to hit next. This is great!"

"Yeah, great."

Simon looked sharply at the man beside him. He'd been Ellison's boss long enough to be able to read some of the nonverbal messages his best detective couldn't quite mask. "OK, Jim, what's eating you?"

Ellison was tight as a drum, watching the victim as Serena examined her. Finally, reluctantly, he squeezed the words out through almost-clenched jaws. "When I figured it out, I came over here to take a look around, maybe ask a few questions. Just as I stepped inside the place, I heard screaming in the alley--another waitress went out for a smoke and found the body." Jim's hands clenched even tighter. "Simon, the body was still warm. Most of the blood was still liquid. I checked the area but couldn't find anyone. If I'd gotten here just a few minutes earlier..."

"Cut it out! It wouldn't have made a difference. You couldn't have heard anything over the noise of that bar, and Serena said the blows to the head probably stunned the previous victims enough that they wouldn't be able to cry out. Listen to me, here--it wouldn't have mattered."

The tension left the shorter man's frame suddenly, replaced by the slump of resignation. "Right. Didn't matter." The story of my life.

CASCADE, WASHINGTON. WAREHOUSE DISTRICT. CHRISTMAS EVE, 1995

It wasn't a well-populated part of town at the best of times, and on Christmas Eve it was deserted, except for the Toyota parked outside the warehouse. The engine was running, the lights were on, but it wasn't going anywhere. Had there been any observers with more of a neocortex than the neighborhood rats, it wouldn't have taken them long to figure out that an argument was going on inside the car. Waving arms could just be made out through the rain and the steamed-up windows, and an angry female voice rose to a crescendo. Then the passenger door was flung open and someone exited in a hurry. He was followed by a backpack which seem to fly out of the car under its own power, landing in a particularly deep puddle.

"Hey, Celia, watch it! I've got books in there!"

"You're lucky you're too heavy to throw, you louse! Now move it--and I swear, if I ever see you again, Blair Sandburg, it'll be too soon." The door slammed, the car peeled away so fast it fishtailed on the damp pavement, sending even more water the way of the hapless young man already drenched by the pouring rain.

Blair unlocked the door, hung his soaking wet jacket to drip on the nearest piece of furniture, and began pulling stuff out of his backpack. It had been waterproof at one time--theoretically--but age and hard use hadn't done its protective qualities any good. Fortunately, the books had been packed in the middle, and not gotten too damp, except his new secondhand copy of Eliade's Shamanism. At least it wasn't a library book. Rule of Grad Student Success #43--stay on the good side of librarians. The clothes in the backpack were pretty wet, but they'd dry, eventually. Geez, it was cold in here. Shivering, Blair went around turning on heaters, then rooted around in a corner for a thick but moth-eaten afghan. Shaking it vigorously to evict anything living in it, he wrapped it around himself and went to towel off his hair and heat water for tea.

While he waited for the kettle to boil he surveyed the cupboards and the fridge. Thinking he was eating his Christmas feast elsewhere, he hadn't bought anything special--not that his stipend would cover anything very festive, especially this late in the month. He had plenty of beans, and a nice bean soup would be comforting--but it would take a long time. He could heat up some apple juice with a few spices--mulled cider was a holiday kind of thing. He had those whole-wheat crackers, if the rats hadn't found them, and some dried fruit. And that cheese would be OK if he cut off the green parts. Yeah, that would do.

Tomorrow, he'd go help out at the soup kitchen like he'd planned before Celia had sidetracked him. Jamal had said they always had plenty of food, but volunteers were harder to find. He could get a turkey dinner out of it, and he liked talking to the volunteers and the clients. Most of them were a pretty interesting bunch, and he was good at chopping vegetables, or distracting cranky kids. This was gonna be OK.

He poured the boiling water into a huge mug of chamomile. Calming herbs would be really good right now. Boy, who'd have thought Celia could yell that loud. He pulled on a dry pair of gloves and wrapped his hands around the mug, getting his face as close to the fragrant steam as possible without scalding his nose. Just as he was on his way to sit by the heater, the phone rang. He snagged it on the way, trying to transfer the mug to one hand and the phone to the other without dropping the afghan.

"Hello?"

"Blair, honey, I'm so glad I caught you. I was afraid you'd left already."

"Still here, Mom, and not going anywhere after all."

"What happened, honey? I thought your girl friend invited you to her parents' house in Seattle."

"Yeah, well, I thought she was just inviting me to have dinner, you know? But it turned out she was taking me Home to Mother. And Father, and Brothers, and Sister."

"Ahh--and that was a surprise, I take it?"

"Naomi, it wasn't that kind of relationship. At least I didn't think it was...and I never led her on, I swear."

"I take it you explained that, and she didn't take it well."

"Oh, you could say that, especially if you were fond of understatement."

"Not everyone has mastered the skill of detaching with love, I'm afraid."

"Yeah, well, Celia has perfected the art of detaching with flung luggage, I can tell you that." Blair sighed. "I just don't know where she got the idea I was ready to pick out china patterns."

"Maybe it was wishful thinking on her part, dear. You are quite a catch, you know."

Blair laughed. "Yeah, maybe some day, if I ever get my Ph.D...sometime this millennium, if I'm lucky. And a teaching job."

"I think you're a catch right now--and I'm not just saying that because I'm your mother."

"Right. So did you call to tell me you can't make it tomorrow night?"

"Honey, I'm so sorry...the whole Northeast is in the middle of a major blizzard. They're canceling flights all over the place, and they don't expect the airports to open for days."

"Well, I was kind of expecting this. I heard something about in on the news earlier and it didn't look good."

"I feel, awful, especially since you're going to be all alone now."

"Hey, who said I was going to be alone? I'm having dinner with some other friends tomorrow--kind of an open invitation thing, you know?"

"Oh, that's good! Why don't you call me tomorrow night and tell me all about it?"

"Sure, and you have a good time too. Say hello to Siobhan for me, huh?"

"I will, honey. 'Bye now."

"Bye, Mom. Merry Christmas Eve."

"It's already Christmas here, so I guess I can say Merry Christmas. Talk to you tomorrow."

As Naomi hung up the phone, she heard her friend coming down the stairs. "Siobhan? I talked to Blair--you just missed it."

"Darn. Maybe I'll catch him tomorrow. So, I guess you managed to get him before he left."

"Well, he's not leaving. It seems that the girl who invited him had...expectations, shall we say?"

Siobhan stood, absentmindedly braiding her waist-length hair. "Vastly different ones from that son of yours, I guess."

"Well she just wasn't The One, obviously."

"Why does that sound like it should have quotes around it or something?"

Naomi laughed. "Oh that's just an old family joke--something Blair used to say when he was just starting to get his hormones going. He was so serious when he went out on dates. When he and his little girl friends would break up, and I tried to comfort him, he'd reassure me."

"Such a nurturing child--even at that age."

"He'd pat my hand and say, 'Don't worry, Mom, it's OK. She wasn't The One.' "

"Did he ever tell you how he'd know when it was The One?"

"Oh, he'd had this--I was going to say dream, but that isn't quite right. More like--"

"Vision?"

"Well, yes. Blair would think I was being silly but..." "I don't think Blair has any idea how unique he is. I told him years ago he had the most amazing, unusual aura I've ever seen, but I don't think he really appreciated what that meant. I've only seen one other similar."

"Really? Whose?"

"An old Inuit shaman. One of the wisest men I've ever met. Blair has an unusual destiny, I'm sure of it. He just hasn't found it yet. Or it hasn't found him." Siobhan was quiet for a moment, lost in thought. She shook her head and then focused on Naomi again. "So what was this vision, or dream, or whatever."

"Well, he was never able to describe it very well. I think it rather embarrassed him, since he was already talking about being a scientist. It had something to do with a group of things coming together--a cone of light, a certain kind of music...I don't remember all the details anymore. I doubt Blair remembers much of it either. He hasn't mentioned it in years. I'm sure he's totally repressed the whole thing."

Blair sat staring at the heater, thinking. The last thing he'd expected was to be alone on Christmas Eve. If he'd known the trip with Celia was going to fall through, he could have gotten together some kind of party. There were a lot of impecunious grad students who couldn't afford to go home for Christmas, especially the ones from other countries. Not to mention those who really had no place to go.

At least he'd gotten a tree, although it was something only Charlie Brown could love. He'd pulled together as many of those unattached students as he could find for an end-of-semester Winter-Solstice tree-trimming party. They'd had a great time. The anthro students discussed solstice and equinox rituals, the art majors brought boxes of "found objects" and made the most amazing ornaments--although more than a few were pretty obscene if you looked at them from the right angle. The psych people looked like they were taking mental notes all day and matching up their fellow partygoers with the appropriate categories in DSM-IV.

Blair sighed. He hoped he could patch things up with Celia after she calmed down. He hated having people mad at him, and he really had no idea how she'd gotten the idea he was that serious. Sometimes he wondered if he was capable of getting serious about anyone, of settling down. Maybe his peripatetic childhood with Naomi had made him incapable of it...or maybe he just hadn't found what he was looking for. Maybe he was looking in the wrong place. Or maybe what he was looking for just didn't exist. Hell, he wasn't even sure what it was. Here he was, twenty-six years old and without a clue about where the rest of his life was going.

Probably a just case of dissertationitis. Right now the magnum opus felt dead in the water, or more like a dead albatross hanging around his neck. He had enough bits and pieces of probable Sentinel references from all over the world to choke a horse. His literature review alone was going to be longer than some people's whole dissertations. Trouble is, it was more folklore than science at this point, and folklore was in the English Department. The data he had on real people with one or two enhanced senses was solid, but there was a big gap between them and his belief that Sentinels were real, more than a cross-cultural mythic archetype. Maybe they weren't--maybe they only existed in the fevered brain of Blair Sandburg. All he needed was one real, live full Sentinel to make that link, but he was beginning to think he'd have better luck finding the Holy Grail in a pawnshop.

And when he finally managed to get his doctorate, what then? What was he going to do with it? He loved teaching, and knew he was good at it. His teaching evaluations were better than a lot of his professors'--one of many things that didn't exactly endear him to the Old Guard at Rainier. He loved research too, loved learning new things, figuring stuff out. How much would he love all the teaching and research, though, when it was his job? When he had to kowtow to administrators and tenure committees and play campus politics, not to mention beg for funding constantly? He was good at it when he had to be--Blair Sandburg was as fluent in bullshit as his mother tongue--but he didn't enjoy it much. Trouble was, where else could you be an anthropologist? He liked being an anthropologist. Heck, he even liked saying "anthropologist." He just wasn't sure he wanted to spend his life in an ivory tower, with an occasional escape into the field.

Blair stood up and gave himself a mental shake. Way too much serious thinking on Christmas Eve. Speaking of escaping into the field, he had an idea. He'd start calling up all the students he could think of who might be at loose ends, and suggest the join him at the soup kitchen. Jamal would have more volunteers than he knew what to do with. If there were too many for food prep and serving, a lot of them could sing, or play instruments. That guy from Theatre Arts was a darn good puppeteer, and Inez in Library Science was a crackerjack storyteller. People needed more than food for the body at this time of year, they needed food for the heart, for the spirit--and Blair Sandburg's Traveling Christmas Carnival was going to give it to them. Picking up the phone, Blair started rooting around for his address book.

CASCADE, WASHINGTON. 852 PROSPECT. CHRISTMAS NIGHT

Prospect Street was a corridor of light as Jim Ellison drove home late that night. His Christmas-Eve-to-Christmas-morning shift had stretched to cover most of Christmas day as well. He'd made more than a few family men happy by being willing to cover those hours--at least as happy as they could be owing a favor to that aloof bastard Ellison. The detective's face twisted into something between a grin and a grimace. He knew most of them called him Old Stone Face behind his back. If they only knew the stone didn't stop there. Lately he felt like granite all the way through. Hard, strong--but cold. Very cold.

No lights shone from the windows of the loft; no decorations softened its utilitarian faade. Someone waking from a coma inside the apartment would have no clue it was Christmas unless they happened to look out a window. Ellison hung up his coat and wondered whether he was hungry enough to bother putting together a meal. As he reviewed the unimpressive contents of his refrigerator, the phone rang. Picking it up and answering was an ingrained reflex, which kicked in despite his lack of desire to talk to anyone right now. "Ellison."

"Jim--I just called the station and they told me you collared the guy! That was fast work--what happened?"

"No big deal, Simon. The color wheel clue did it. You should give Elena's daughter a citation."

"Yeah, right. I thought the color wheel was going to help us pin down the location of his next killing, not solve the case."

"Well, not everybody is that familiar with the properties of a color wheel. That possibly narrowed it down to artists, designers, printers maybe. When we started focusing our questions in that direction, witnesses started remembering one guy who seemed to hang around the waitresses a lot. Another waitress, a friend of the second victim, remembered he was supposed to be an artist of some kind, and that he'd asked the victim to pose for him."

"And she remembered who he was?"

"No, but the bartender at the Greenhouse is a pretty observant guy, and I think he was carrying a major torch for the fourth victim. We practically had to tie him down to keep him from going after the perp himself. Anyway, he gave us a damn good description, and remembered the guy said his day job was teaching art in some tony private high school. There aren't that many of those in Cascade. Just took a few phone calls."

"A few phone calls? On Christmas?"

"OK, more than a few. Some of those personnel heads were at a relative's house or whatever. But not too many.

"You're lucky they weren't spending Christmas in the Bahamas or London or someplace--oh, God, they weren't, were they? What have you done to our phone budget for the month?"

"Relax, Simon. Those places may charge an arm and a leg for tuition, but they don't pay their support staff enough to go gallivanting to London. Besides, there's a lot of bad weather back East this year and fewer decided to travel. The woman from Cascade Academy recognized the description right away. She abandoned her Christmas dinner to her sister-in-law so she could go to the school with us and get access to the guy's records. I think he weirded her out, frankly. When we called she acted like the second shoe had dropped."

"If he was that strange, why didn't she say something earlier?"

"She did, to the Headmaster--who stomped on her for it. The perp had great credentials and was willing to work for peanuts. Believe it or not, he was actually a pretty good teacher. And the Academy does pretty extensive background checks on people they hire. No red flags went up."

Simon snorted. "Yeah, he was always such a nice, quiet guy--the last person you'd expect to take up serial murder. Just like all those other guys sitting on Death Row for the same thing."

"Yeah, well, we can't lock up every quiet guy on suspicion of being a potential serial killer." "More's the pity. So he confessed?"

"At length. And even if he hadn't, there's enough physical evidence in his apartment to make a defense attorney take to drink."

"Motive?"

"Somewhere in all the garbage he's been spouting about women. But I don't feel like going into it tonight. You can hear his statement tomorrow, if you've got a couple of hours to kill."

"Jim--you did good work today. That guy would have kept on killing. You should be happy about stopping him."

"Yeah, right. Happy. I'd be happier if I'd gotten to the Greenhouse just a little earlier. Then I wouldn't have had to tell the Widow Reynolds on Christmas morning that her only daughter had been stabbed to death in an alley."

"Jim--"

"Look, Simon, it's been a long day and I'm bushed. Can we pick this up tomorrow?"

Simon's faintly exasperated sigh came across loud and clear. "All right, Jim. Merry Christmas."

"Yeah. Merry Christmas."

Jim turned off the phone, deciding that the conversation had taken care of what appetite he had. Might as well just hit the sheets. After at least thirty-six hours awake, he might even be tired enough to sleep. Look on the bright side--if he went to bed now, when he woke up it wouldn't be Christmas any more. Grubby as he felt, a shower seemed too much effort. After checking the locks and turning off the lights, he trudged upstairs, beginning to pull off his clothes as he went. Uncharacteristically, he didn't even bother to hang them up, but just deposited the pile in a chair, more or less folded. Pulling back the sheets, he hit the bed like an old-growth redwood sacrificed to a logger's saw.

Despite his weariness, sleep refused to come right away. It was cold in here. He'd turned the furnace down before he left, and hadn't bothered to turn it up when he got home. Not much point if he was going to bed right away. Damn Christmas, anyway. Most of the time he managed to ignore the emptiness at the core of his life, like that big black hole that was supposed to be sucking light at the center of the galaxy. It wasn't like Christmas had been a big deal in his family, after all. The last one he could remember that bore even the least resemblance to the sentimental fantasy promulgated by Hallmark was what--1969? And even then, as he looked back on it later, the first cracks were beginning to show in his parent's marriage...at least the first cracks visible to a prepubescent kid. Still, that had been a good year up to then. In some ways, the last really happy one he could remember. He'd grown up way too fast after that, trying to protect Steven while watching the facade of his happy family come crashing down around him. His parents' vicious divorce was like a series of missile attacks. They certainly hit their targets--each other--but neither realized the collateral damage those battles caused.

Trying to be the perfect son and the protective big brother didn't leave a lot of energy left over for having a childhood. Fat lot of good the effort had done him, after all. Steven hadn't exactly returned the favor, and after his mother left, his father could have given Ebenezer Scrooge lessons. God, it wasn't as if he cared after all this time. His name was in the phone book, so they obviously didn't want to connect with him any more than he did with them.

He wasn't missing Carolyn either. She used to put a few decorations around, a little tabletop tree, but she was as busy with her job as he was, and the loft hadn't looked that different during the holidays when they were married. Divorcing is never easy, but the more he thought about it, the more he wondered why they'd ever gotten married in the first place. They were becoming better friends now than they'd ever been back then. Maybe that had been the problem. They hadn't really known each other that well before they decided to take the plunge...well, more like Carolyn decided and he went along. He should have known then it was a mistake. Carolyn was making it clear that's what she wanted, and the best response he could come up with in his heart of hearts was, why the hell not? Maybe if he'd been crazy enough to say it out loud at the time she would have dumped him before they'd made it legal, and saved them both a lot of disappointment.

He thought it would be a relief to be married, get off the dating merry-go-round. Not that he'd done that much of it. He never could seem to find a woman that he wanted to be with for very long. He thought Carolyn would be the exception; someone who understood his work, someone he could bounce ideas off of once in a while, maybe even someone he could learn from. Hah. She didn't want to talk about work that much, she wanted to talk about them. About feelings. She knew he wasn't much of a talker, why did she think that would suddenly change after they got married? Well, it wasn't long before she gave up trying to get him to open up.

When she'd finally had enough and left, he was a little guilty that what he felt was mostly relief. It was good to have the loft to himself again, a refuge, a hole to hide in, instead of a battleground. Maybe he just wasn't meant to live with someone else; was too much of a loner. Maybe that strange interlude in the Peruvian jungle had done something permanent to him. The bizarre sensory symptoms had gone away, but perhaps the experience had reinforced his desire for solitude to the point where he was incapable of sharing his space, let alone his life, with anyone else. Simon was willing to indulge his preference for working alone, not because he liked it but because he couldn't argue with the results. As for the way he felt tonight...hell, he wasn't depressed, just tired. He pulled the comforter farther up around him. As soon as he warmed up, he'd be able to sleep. Sleep, and when he woke it would be just another day.

When he came to, feeling as tired as ever, it took him a minute to figure out what was wrong. The first thing he noticed was that he could see more than he should be able to at--he squinted at the clock...three AM? Then he heard music playing in the background. It was soft, but definitely coming from inside rather than outside. What the hell? He reached carefully toward the nightstand and found his gun. Moving slowly so as not to make a sound, he wrapped his fingers around it and pulled his body up toward the railing. As the comforter slid down his torso, some part of his brain registered that it was now warm in the loft.

When he carefully peered over the railing, only years of training kept him from crying out and giving the game away. There was a goddam Christmas tree next to the stairs! It was a big one too, with enough lights on it to explain why he could see so well now. The whole loft was bathed in a muted glow, even though the tree and the fire were the only source of light. Wait a minute--the fire? Who had built a fire? And turned on the stereo, for that matter? He'd stopped believing in Santa Claus decades ago, but it was either rethink that or...there was an intruder in the loft. His eyes swept the room, but couldn't see anyone. Someone could be behind the curtain in the spare room, though, or back in the kitchen, or the bathroom. Plenty of places to hide. Jim shook his head to clear it. What was going on here? In his years on the force he'd run across some pretty strange perps, but never one who'd break into to your place in the middle of the night, put up a tree, and make you Christmas cookies. Christmas cookies? Now where did that come from...of course. The smells were the last to register in his sleep-deprived brain. Spices, vanilla maybe, pumpkin--Christmas smells.

Ellison closed his eyes for a minute and opened them again. It was all still there...the tree, the fire, the music, the wonderful smells. Maybe he was just losing his mind. Could he have been drugged? Everything looked a little off, like the way they doctored those cameras when they filmed aging Hollywood stars. Everything was just a bit out of focus, too soft around the edges. But how could he have been drugged? He'd hardly eaten anything all day, focused as he was on tracking down and talking to witnesses, collaring the perp, booking, questioning. If he'd been drugged it had to be the slowest-acting stuff in the world.

It would explain the strange lassitude he felt, though. A possible intruder in his loft, and he was still up here, staring at the crazy scene like he didn't want to go down there and...break the spell. He should be alert, angry, even a little frightened, but all he could feel was a strange sense of peace as he stared at the lights. He felt like some Victorian urchin looking in the window of a toy store. It really looked good down there, more inviting than he thought this spartan, industrial place ever could.

Uncharacteristically passive, he didn't register the movement at first, but it eventually penetrated his befogged brain that somebody was down there. He could hear soft footsteps moving from the far corner of the kitchen. Somewhere the cop/soldier part of his brain was screaming ALERT! but the rest of his brain, and his body, didn't seem to be paying attention. They seemed to think this whole bizarre scene was comfortable, safe. Suddenly he could see a figure down there, near the base of the tree. At first he couldn't tell if it was a man or a woman. The height was right for either. So were the clothes--a heavy burgundy sweater and well-worn jeans. The hair was long, at least to the shoulders, and wavy, in a rich shade of brown that picked up red highlights from the fire and the lighted tree. But it wasn't a woman, Ellison was certain. Whoever it was just didn't move like a woman. But neither did he seem threatening in any way.

Jim couldn't think of anyone he knew who looked like that--certainly no one who had it in for him. Without realizing he was doing it, he lay the gun down on the bed and pulled himself higher, leaning his arms on the railing. He stared at the man below, mesmerized, watching his every movement as the figure went from adjusting packages under the tree, to tending the fire, to the kitchen, and back to the tree. He lost all sense of time, not knowing whether he watched the man for minutes or for hours, only knowing that he had no thought of moving, or making any sound. At no time, however, could he see the stranger's face, only the compact body and the shining hair. The longer he watched, the more intense became the need to see that face. He could have just gone downstairs and confronted the man, but somehow that didn't occur to him.

As the need grew, he found himself willing the figure to turn, look upward. Suddenly, seeing that face became the most important thing in the world, although Jim was almost fearful of what it would show him. The notion blossomed in his brain that it was not the tree, nor the fire, that was the source of the light below, but the face of that quietly moving figure. If that face were lifted toward Jim, would it envelop him in the light and warmth he now longed for with an intensity that took his breath away--or would it burn him into ash? As if Jim's longing had finally registered, the figure stopped, turned toward the balcony, and began to move his head upward. Jim forgot to breathe, couldn't move--could only watch helplessly as his fate overtook him. Finally, the face lifted to the railing, and Jim saw--

Darkness.

The change was so abrupt he was disoriented for a moment. Then he realized he was lying in bed, under the comforter, flat on his back. His gun was on the nightstand where he'd left it. He threw off the comforter and leaned over the balcony. It was dark, but not too dark to tell there was no Christmas tree down there...no music, no baking smells. And Jesus, it was cold in here. He dived back underneath the comforter, shivering, but it didn't seem to help. He didn't usually feel the cold much; he always turned the furnace way down at night--it was something he and Carolyn had argued about every winter. Cursing, he got out of bed, put on his heaviest bathrobe and two pairs of socks. Then he tossed an extra blanket on the bed for good measure, crawled back into bed, and tucked himself into as close to a fetal position as someone his size could manage.

OK, the good news was, he didn't have a prowler and he wasn't going crazy, he'd just had a dream--an unusually vivid, really weird dream. He started to call it a bad dream, but somehow couldn't bring himself to finish that thought. It had been so compelling, the difference between dream and reality so great, that it unnerved him. But bad...no. Not hardly. But what could have brought it on? Sure, it had been a tough day, but he was a cop, working Major Crimes. He'd had much worse days. Maybe he should eat better. Maybe the answer was just an undigested bit of beef or a fragment of an underdone potato--except he hadn't had either. He told himself to stop obsessing about it. It was just a damn dream. Better that than a break-in, or being drugged, or going nuts, which pretty much summed up his other choices. It was just a stupid dream, and he should be glad that's all it was. He was glad. He rarely remembered his dreams, and he was sure all memory of this one would be gone in the morning. He'd will himself to forget it. Christmas was over, he'd wake up, go to work, and get back to the normal routine. Just what he wanted.

If only he didn't feel so...bereft.

CASCADE, WASHINGTON. 852 PROSPECT. CHRISTMAS EVE, 1999

"Whoa, Jim, let me help you with that--I didn't remember it was so big."

With Blair's help, Jim Ellison maneuvered the bulky box onto the sofa. "Promise me this is the last one, will you? That storage area is colder than a well-digger's butt."

"If you think so, it must be freezing. That's definitely the last one. Come on, let me warm you up."

"OK," Jim agreed readily, slipping his hands under Blair's sweater and burying his nose in the chestnut hair.

"Yow!" Blair jumped. "Your hands are freezing! This is not what I had in mind to warm you up, lover."

"What did you have in mind?" Jim purred, as his hands began moving southward and lips started nuzzling through Blair's hair toward the nice warm neck buried beneath.

Blair pulled away, laughing, and slapped his partner's hands gently. "Not that either--at least not yet. The hot cider's ready, and that'll have to do for now."

Jim sighed theatrically as he let Blair take his hand and lead him to the kitchen. "I guess the honeymoon is over when the only thing I can get hot around here is the cider."

As they reached the kitchen, Jim found himself pressed up against the counter by his smaller but sneakier lover. Before he could open his mouth to speak, Blair's arms were around his neck and that agile tongue was opening his mouth for him, kissing him till he was weak in the knees.

"Wow," he gasped when they finally came up for air. "What was that for?"

Blair smiled beatifically, his arms still around Jim's neck. "That was to show you that the honeymoon is far from over. As far as I'm concerned, it'll never be over." He untwined his arms to rest one hand on the taller man's chest. "But we have got to finish decorating this tree tonight. We've been working on it for over a week, and it's going to be Christmas in a few hours."

As Blair turned away to ladle the cider into mugs, Jim looked at the huge evergreen that had sprouted in the loft. "We'd have finished a long time ago if you hadn't talked me into getting a tree the size of the one at the White House."

They walked over to the sofa, where Blair began to root around in the box while Jim sipped the cider. It did feel good going down, warming him to his toes...almost as much as that kiss had. "Aren't we exaggerating just a bit, Detective Ellison? You're supposed to set an example for me of accuracy in police procedure. It's only eleven feet."

Jim raised a Spockian eyebrow.

"OK, twelve at the most. And that's counting the star at the top. That's part of the fun of living in a loft, having a big tree."

"It's the future I'm worried about, Detective Sandburg," Jim replied, eyeing the tree. "Do you realize every Christmas you've managed to talk me into a bigger one? First it was that so-called table-top tree, which was taller than the table it sat on. Then the next year a floor model, about as tall as you. Last year, I couldn't get the star on without using a stepladder. This year, we had to haul the twelve-foot ladder upstairs. Next year we're gonna have to cut a hole in the roof." When the expected retort from Blair didn't materialize, Jim looked down. His partner was holding a strange-looking ornament, but looking at his lover, a look of such tenderness on his face that Jim was drawn to sit beside him, taking the beloved face in his hands.

"What?" he asked softly.

"These ornaments--they're from the last Christmas I spent without you," Blair responded, leaning into the touch.

"The last one you'll ever spend without me." Jim leaned forward, placing a gentle kiss on the younger man's forehead, sealing his pledge.

As Jim leaned back against the sofa, Blair nestled against him, still holding the ornament. "That was only a few months before I met you, back in the mists of time, B.E."

"I thought it was B. C."

"Before Ellison," Blair chuckled.

Jim tightened his arm around the relaxed body beside him and rested his cheek against the top of his partner's head. "Why is it so frighteningly apt that Before Sandburg would then be B. S.?"

Receiving a dig in the ribs for his pains, Jim decided a change of subject was in order. "Just what is that thing you're holding?"

"The Venus of Willendorf in a Santa Claus suit."

"I'd hoped I was hallucinating. Where did you get something like that? Although I'm almost afraid to ask."

Blair handed Venus Claus to Jim and leaned over to rummage further in the box. "These are from the Christmas I spent in the warehouse just before it blew up. They were made by my fellow students in the throes of post-finals euphoria, so some of them are a little frisky."

Jim blanched at what came out of the box next. "A little frisky? Isn't it blasphemy or something to put that on a Christmas tree? It is a religious holiday."

"But the tree is a pre-Christian pagan symbol. Besides, this is a religious artifact, it's a Bantu fertility god. Or a reproduction of one, anyway."

"Something tells me it wasn't the Bantu who glued glitter on his...uh... appendage. God, it looks like he's carrying a telephone pole."

"There you go exaggerating again. It's no bigger than his arm."

"Oh, that's all right then. Blair? Why are you staring at my crotch?"

"I was just thinking...do you know you can buy edible glitter? People use it to decorate cookies."

Jim jumped off the couch. "Oh, no you don't. I like my cookies undecorated, Chief. Didn't you say we had a tree to finish?"

"Oh, now he gets conscientious. OK, want me to hand the ornaments to you and you can put them on the tree? There's still some bare spots on the lower half--nothing you should need the ladder for."

They managed to concentrate on hanging ornaments for a while, although Blair kept a running commentary on who had made which one, what their majors had been, and in most cases, what they were doing now. Jim was continually amazed at the sheer number of people Blair knew and kept in touch with, although they were scattered around the world. They were just about finished when the timer binged and Blair headed toward the kitchen. Jim had been smelling a complex mix of odors for some time now, and amusing himself by separating out each one, just for practice. "So, you made pumpkin bread?"

"Show-off," Blair accused. "With or without raisins?" "With--but dried currants, not raisins."

"Oh, you are good, Sentinel. You must have a terrific Guide."

"Sure do, although he has a tendency to fish for compliments...which he'll get plenty of if that tastes anywhere near as good as it smells."

"You think this is gonna be good, wait until I get you into bed tonight. You'll be complimenting me at the top of your lungs."

"Now who's the show-off? We'll see. If you're really good, maybe I'll let you buy that glitter after all."

"Down, big boy," Blair admonished as he came back into the living room. "That bread has to cool down and so do you. Any more ornaments left to hang?"

"Nope. All done." Blair came to stand beside Jim and their arms slipped around each other's waists. "It really does look beautiful, sweetheart. Unique, but beautiful. Just like you."

"Aw, Jim.."

"You really are, you know." He stroked one finger along Blair's jawline. "A Renaissance angel with five-o'clock shadow. It's a devastating combination."

For once, Blair was rendered speechless, his only reply a fierce hug. After a moment, he spoke in a suspiciously husky voice. "So--shall we see what it looks like with the lights on?"

"I can hardly wait. How about just shoving this box into the guest room for now? I'm way too comfortable to face the frozen waste again tonight."

"OK. Why don't you do that, and I'll put another log on and my new CD."

"Another one? How many Christmas CDs are there in the world? And how soon before we have them all?"

"Hey you'll like this one--it's all instrumental, very traditional."

As Jim tried to figure out where to put the bulky box so it wouldn't block the fire escape, he stopped to listen to the music. It was nice--familiar carols, but played on folk-type instruments. He could hear acoustic guitar, flute, violin, piccolo? Yes, a piccolo--and a Celtic harp. What was that last one, though?

Blair smiled when Jim emerged from the guest room. "So, did you get them all?"

"All but the main one. I thought it was a harpsichord at first, but somehow it doesn't sound, I don't know--big enough for a harpsichord--or closed enough."

"Good way of putting it. It's a hammered dulcimer. Kind of guitar-sized, but more rectangular. You can play it by plucking, but you can also use little hammers, which I like better. It works a lot like a harpsichord, with the musician playing the hammers directly, instead of through the keys."

"So where did you learn about hammered dulcimers--can you play one?"

"I learned how years ago--started when I was about five, I think. Naomi used to work as a wench at Renaissance fairs back in the seventies. There were a lot of craftsmen there who sold handmade musical instruments. One couple who made dulcimers let me hang around when Mom was doing her wenching thing. When business was slow, they taught me how to play."

"But you don't anymore?"

"Well, it's hard without an actual dulcimer. I couldn't have afforded one of those in a million years. They were works of art, man. Different kinds of wood, inlay--they were gorgeous. You can get cheaper ones, but after learning on the best I was too spoiled, I guess. Always loved the sound, though."

Jim watched Blair adjust an ornament here and there. He could happily spend the rest of his life finding out all the things Blair missed having throughout his B. E. years, and making sure he got them now--and none of it would come close to matching what Blair gave him just by existing. He loved doing it, though. He could ask Naomi about the Renaissance fairs on the QT. Maybe she'd even remember the name of the couple who sold dulcimers twenty-five years ago, and maybe they still made dulcimers. Happy Birthday, Blair...

"Earth to Ellison. Earth to Ellison--are you zoning on me, man?"

"No, just woolgathering."

"Good. If you zoned on this tree before we even turn the lights on, I don't know what I'd do with you. After all our work, I've gotta see this thing in all its glory."

"Any time, Chief. Let's plug this sucker in and hope we don't blow a fuse." "Why don't you go up on the balcony and tell me what it looks like from there. This thing is too big to take in from one angle, and I want to make sure we haven't left any big dark spots."

"And if we have, they'll stay that way unless they're on the bottom half. I'm not dragging that ladder up here again."

"Bitch, bitch, bitch. OK, here goes. Ready?"

Let 'er rip, babe."

Blair turned off the other lights in the room, then plugged in the tree, turning his back to it. Then he turned around so it could hit him all at once, and almost staggered at the sight. He could feel the light sink into his body like some elemental force. This wasn't just a Christmas tree, it was bonfires on the hills, torches in the castle--it was the first fire stolen from the lightning and taken back to the cave to keep the terrors that walked by night at bay. It was a cry to the sun to come back, make the days grow long again. It was magnificent.

Blair sank to the floor, looking up at the tree rising above him, a great cone of light. A shiver moved up his spine at that thought. A cone of light...what was it about that phrase that sounded familiar...Omigod. That dream, or vision, or whatever that he told his mother about all those years ago--all the pieces were here. A great cone of light, the music of a dulcimer, the smell of spices. And it was supposed to tell him what again? Something good...of course! He raised his face to look at Jim where he leaned on the balcony railing. A huge smile lit up his face. It was supposed to tell him he'd found The One. Well, he'd certainly done that, and he'd figured it out quite awhile ago, long before he'd admitted it to Jim or even to himself. Blair closed his eyes and addressed the Cosmos. Thanks for the confirmation, though.

Reaching the balcony, Jim kicked off his shoes, climbed onto the bed and leaned on the railing. The tree looked great from here. Somehow they'd managed to come out with all those hundreds of lights distributed evenly, more or less. It was beautiful. Blair's face as he saw it for the first time was more beautiful still. He looked awed, transported. It was so easy to forget the wonder and beauty in the world, even lose the ability to see it--especially for a cop who saw so much of the ugly side of life. But no one who was fortunate enough to have Blair Sandburg in his life would ever lose his sense of wonder.

Jim leaned on the railing, a happy man. And a lucky one. So many people out there had so little, and he had everything. Warmth, and light, and shelter from the storm...not only within these walls but within the heart of the man below. He took a deep breath, taking in the smells of woodsmoke and spices and evergreen and Blair; dialing up just enough to savor it all the more. He saw Blair turn toward him, lifting up his face...and Jim was overwhelmed by a sense of dj vu so strong he couldn't breathe for minute. All at once he was flooded by the memory of that long-ago dream, a memory that had lain buried for four years. He remembered everything--the tree, the fire, the cooking smells, the warmth--and Blair in a burgundy sweater. Only now it didn't have the slight fuzziness of dream, but the sharp clarity of reality. He remembered how he had longed to see the face in his dream, and had woken to darkness. There was no waking now, no tearing sense of loss. The face raised to his held only light, light a man could dissolve in and be glad of his dissolution.

"Jim--Jim! Come back to me, man. Come on, follow my voice, feel my hands...come on..."

"Blair?"

"Jim? Are you OK? Are you all the way back? Man, you haven't zoned in a long time."

"I...I'm fine...and I don't think I zoned. It wasn't a sensory thing, it was--a memory."

Blair sat back on the bed, taking a deep breath and letting it out, never letting go of his partner's hands. "That must have been one hell of a memory. You didn't hear me call you, or come upstairs, or get on the bed. If it wasn't a zone-out it was a great imitation. What did you remember?

"You're gonna think it's weird.'

"Love, after what we've been through together in the last four years, we've raised the bar quite a bit for weird. Tell me."

Jim was quiet for a moment, staring at their linked hands. "It was four years ago, almost to the day. You wouldn't have recognized this place then. Those years weren't one of the high points of my life--I didn't have a life to speak of outside of work. Never bothered to decorate, worked during the holidays because it was just another day to me. I came home Christmas night after thirty-six hours on duty, and the murder of the fourth young woman in a row. I was not exactly in a holiday mood."

Blair brought one of Jim's hands to his mouth and touched it to his lips. "Wish I could have been there for you."

"But that's the weird thing," Jim explained, raising his eyes to meet Blair's. "You were there. Sort of. Only I didn't know it was you. I hadn't even met you yet." He described the whole dream in detail, including the horrible sense of loss at waking. "When you looked up at me from below, at the exact same angle, it all came back in a rush, because now the dream was real--same tree, same fire, same smells--everything. You were even wearing the same sweater in my dream. The exact same color."

"Wow. Looks we may have to raise the bar another notch, weirdness-wise. Especially after I tell you what happened to me down there."

"What do you mean--what happened to you?"

"Well, this is kind of embarrassing, but when I was a kid, just starting to date, my mother used to get really unhappy when some girl would dump me, or vice versa. Half the time it bothered her more than it did me. To make her feel better, I'd tell her it was OK because that girl hadn't been The One...and I'd know when I found The One because the dream told me what to look for."

"A dream? You too."

"Well, Naomi said it was a vision, not a dream, but little proto-scientist Blair wasn't willing to go that far. In fact, I wished later I hadn't said anything because it sounded so lame."

Jim leaned back against the pillows, drawing Blair into the circle of his arm. "But what was the dream, exactly?"

"It was really just this voice--a voice telling me that I'd know when I found The One because three things would occur together--I'd hear the music of a dulcimer, smell the scent of spices, and see a cone of light."

"A cone of light...of course, the tree! But--"

"But what?"

"Why now? I can see it wouldn't be too likely to find some of those things together except at Christmas, but this isn't the first Christmas we've spent together. Why now?"

"It's not our first Christmas together, but it is our first one Together. Maybe that's why. It's not like I didn't already know you were The One--long before I told you--or myself, for that matter. I like to think it's just a Christmas present from the universe, a seal of approval telling us we're meant to be together."

"Amen to that," Jim said reverently, as he leaned over to claim Blair's mouth with his own, feeling it open to his at the first touch of lips, tasting sweetness and spice and sudden hunger. His hands sought his partner's skin under the sweater, warm hands now, warming themselves further at that familiar fire.

As Blair's hands returned the favor, Jim's mouth left his lover's only long enough to take in oxygen before beginning a trail of kisses along Blair's jawline, twining the thick hair through his fingers to push it off his neck. Strong, familiar fingers moved incessantly over the skin of Jim's back as Blair tilted his head back with a sigh, exposing his throat in a gesture so ancient, so profoundly trusting, that Jim almost forgot to breathe, almost lost himself in the sight.

He released Blair only long enough to pull off both their sweaters and fling them away, returning to devour the exposed column of throat with lips and tongue, rubbing his face on the delightfully furred chest. Reaching the waistband of Blair's jeans, he sat back on his heels a moment to drink in the sight of his precious partner lying there, hair tousled over the sheets, lips parted, chest rising and falling with his quickened breathing. Their eyes stayed locked together as Jim unbuttoned the jeans, pulled the zipper down slowly, careful of the straining erection begging to be released.

When jeans, underwear, and shoes joined the growing pile on the floor, Blair pulled Jim down for another soul-devouring kiss, rolled the larger man over, and methodically relieved him of the last of his clothes. He grinned lasciviously at the sight of Jim Ellison in all his naked glory. "Oooo...Merry Christmas to Blair."

"You look pretty good unwrapped yourself, Chief. All that weight training in the police gym is making you sexier than ever." He stroked the muscles of Blair's arm with a finger.

"Well, I've got a partner who's a real challenge to keep up with, and I can't use that 'I'm just an observer' excuse any more."

Jim smiled. "You never were 'just an observer,' babe. You managed to fight or talk your way out of things that would have been too much for a lot of veteran cops. Now that you're actually trained, there'll be no stopping you."

"Ah, you're just saying that because you're madly in love with me."

"You bet I am, but it's still true. Speaking of madly in love, why don't you get back down here and let me demonstrate. I feel like slow and easy tonight--OK with you?"

"More than OK, lover. Too bad we can't see the tree from the bed, though," Blair added wistfully. "All that work and we're not even looking at it."

Jim sat up suddenly. "You know, you're right. C'mon, out of bed."

"What? What the heck are you.."

Jim swung his legs over to stand beside the bed, tugging on Blair's hands to get his bemused lover to follow. "Here, catch."

Blair began grabbing at the pillows that were suddenly tossed his way. In a great sweeping motion, Jim pulled the comforter and top sheet off the bed and bundled them both in his arms.

"Well, Chief, what are you waiting for? Downstairs."

"All right!" Blair cried gleefully, tossing the pillows over the railing and running down the stairs after them. Jim made a nest for near the tree and sank into it, pulling his delighted partner along. "So how's this?"

"This is great! But if Santa drops in tonight we may give him a coronary."

"Too bad. Besides, I don't think he'd be that shocked. The guy lives up at the North Pole all year--talk about a phallic symbol--with all those elves."

Blair propped himself on one elbow to give Jim an admonishing look. "There is a Mrs. Claus, you know."

"Ha! Probably a transvestite. Or else she has her own little harem of elves."

Blair shook his head. "Well that's a Christmas special we won't be seeing on TV anytime soon. Unless it's pay-per-view." Moving one hand to Jim's chest he stroked the smooth planes of muscle slowly, following its contours from one side to the other. "You look terrific in tree-light, you know that?"

"You look better," Jim replied, pulling his lover into a close embrace--mouths locked, bodies pressed together along their whole length with no room for a stray molecule between them. For a long while there were no sounds but the crackle of the fire and the sounds of lips and hands on skin, punctuated by words of love and inarticulate sounds of passion and need.

Jim tried hard not to zone out on sheer pleasure as Blair kissed and licked his way all over his partner's body, the irresistible mouth leaving a pattern of fire that moved groinward in a tantalizing spiral. Blair's mouth finally claimed Jim's needy cock with a sureness that brought his lover's hips off the floor and dragged a desperate groan somewhere from the depths of his soul. The sight of Blair's head moving up and down the length of his shaft, that glorious hair disarrayed by their loving and backlit by the tree, almost finished Jim off right there. One hand reached down to grasp the smaller man's shoulder and squeeze lightly.

Blair released his lover's cock in a long, slow, movement, licking around the head one last time like it was a particularly delicious ice cream cone. "Too close?"

Jim nodded. "I don't want to fly solo on this one, lover. Let me do something for you."

Blair pulled himself up next to Jim, hands sliding up his partner's legs as he positioned his own cock between them, just under his balls. "OK, Thunder Thighs--you know the drill." Blair gasped as Jim's sweat-slicked, muscular legs trapped his erection. "Omigod--oh, yeah" he moaned as he began thrusting into that clutching heat, slowly at first, then faster and harder as the pleasure became almost unbearably intense. With each thrust he could feel Jim's cock where it was trapped between them, growing even harder with the friction. His head sank onto Jim's shoulder as Jim wrapped one arm around him.

Blair's other hand began sliding down the Sentinel's spine, seeking what it needed to send the larger man over the edge. The sounds Jim was making told Blair his lover wouldn't last much longer, but Blair knew he wasn't far behind himself. Mere seconds after his sweat-slicked finger entered Jim, Blair felt the wet heat of his lover's release spill out between them. Jim threw his head back in a wild, primitive, cry as Blair thrust into the clutching thighs. The echoes of Jim's cry were still reverberating when he added his own, feeling himself dissolving into pure sensation.

Neither man said anything for a moment--neither could--as the world began to slowly take shape around them again. Jim rolled onto his back and Blair draped himself over the larger man like a blanket, feeling Jim's arms come around to hold him close. Their eyes met in wordless communion before their mouths joined in a slow, gentle kiss. When their lips finally parted, Jim drew his fingers through Blair's sweat-dampened hair, separating the shining strands before releasing them to drift back to his shoulders.

"Sweetheart--I can say categorically this is the best damn Christmas Eve I have ever had."

"Oh, yeah," Blair agreed. "And we haven't even had any pumpkin bread yet."

Jim laughed helplessly. "I can't believe you're thinking of your stomach. Your very sticky stomach."

"Yeah, look who's talking. You're stickier in more places than I am. If I can ever get my limbs to work again, I may do something about it. But don't hold your breath."

After several more kisses, both men turned on their sides, spooning together, so they could see the tree. Jim pulled the comforter up around them as the heat generated by their loving slowly ebbed.

Blair looked at the tree rising above them. Evergreen, symbol of regeneration--just like his own life was slowly regenerating out of the ashes of his former career. Festivals of light and rebirth. No matter where his life went now, as long as Jim was beside him it would be full of light, and love.

"It really is beautiful," Blair whispered.

"It sure is."

"You're not looking at the tree, are you?"

"Nope," Jim confessed, burying his face in his lover's hair.

As Blair turned to face his partner, Jim's head rose and tilted. "What is it, Jim--do you hear something?"

"Church bells ringing. It's midnight. Merry Christmas, Blair. I love you."

"I love you too. More than anything. Merry Christmas, Jim."

They kissed again, as the sound of distant bells and the light of the tree washed over them. Peace descended, and finally, sleep.

End