A "missing scene" from the first season episode "Cypher" follows. Pet Fly please forgive my indulgence.
Thanks to Shelagh and Kay Lynne for great editing, advice and encouragement.
WHO AM I NOW?
by Anonymeek
...nothing is random...
...that was your killer, and he's obviously taunting you...
"Ring!" Blair demanded glaring at the phone as though it could understand the urgency of the situation. He visualized a distant phone coming to life, whacking his partner with the receiver and dialing itself so as not to waste any time. He needed Jim, *now*.
Earlier that evening Simon had kicked them both out of the station. The captain had cited the health and safety regulations restricting shift lengths, but really Jim had slammed one too many doors. Halfway home, Blair realized he'd forgotten his date with Christine and was already almost unforgivably late. Jim had dropped him off, wishing him luck and indicating his own plan to hit the gym. That was two hours ago. Blair had not been lucky /and where the hell was Jim?/.
/Come on, man, you should've finished beating the gym senseless by now. You should've been here./ Blair quashed his anger. After what he'd seen--what he thought he saw--he'd been stupid to assume he'd be safe at the loft. /Ring, damn it!/
Blair tried again to convince himself that it had been a trick of shadows and glass, that he had not seen Lash reflected in that cab window. David Lash wearing a scraggly, brown, Blair-length wig . . . /Just a glimpse off a moving door,/ Blair thought, /it could have been anyone. It could have been me. It could be I'm having a really bad hair day and I just don't know it yet./
/Hey, I've hardly slept in three days--maybe I've simply snapped--I'm just hallucinating, nothing to worry about./ Blair's heart rate refused to respond to reason. It didn't matter what he'd seen or hadn't seen, Blair was absolutely certain that Lash had chosen his next victim. It was even possible his subconscious had twisted that reflection to hammer home what he should've realized that morning.
"Who am I now?" Lash had scrawled on the bathroom mirror at the station, shedding the persona of Dr. Anthony Bates, leaving it along with a pile of clothes in one of the stalls. The killer had sat opposite them for days, pouring over police photos of his victims, spouting theories . . . staying on until the fax revealing his identity was literally spilling pages into Jim's hands.
The station had been shut down and searched. The real Dr. Bates had been found floating in a hotel bath tub and treated to an autopsy. Mr. Lash Senior had been dragged into the station for an interview Blair had found more disturbing than the autopsy. They'd stared at the case files, forensic reports and psychiatric profiles--including the ones Lash had written himself. Nothing seemed to bring them any closer and Jim's reaction . . ."furious" was too mild a term, he'd practically had a coronary.
In all of that, they had not stopped to think about what the words on the mirror meant.
Lash didn't disguise himself as other people, he became them. "Who am I now?" indicated he'd picked up another personality. Blair knew it was only a matter of time until Lash attempted to acquire exclusive rights to that personality.
/Simon will have to listen to me,/ Blair thought, /I'll make him listen./ They would have to check on everyone Lash had come into contact with at the station. The words on the mirror had been written in lipstick. /Had Lash chosen another woman?/ Blair wondered. He didn't think so. All of Lash's other victims had been male, each with such different background's that Jim thought they'd been chosen at random, but nothing was random. Lash looked for the differences. He was trying to taste every flavor of society.
/He's proving that he can fit in,/ Blair realized. /Proving that he can fit in as anyone because he can't fit in as himself. Susan Frasier . . . he needed to try that, to be a woman just once. It was a challenge. He succeeded, and now he has chosen his next challenge. *Fuck.* I'm next, and my instincts are busy explaining how I know what I know./
"Please," Blair begged the phone. /Jim, come on, you've got heightened senses. Tell me you can hear your beeper. Jim, you get one more second and then it's 911 for real. I don't care what--oh, fuck!/
The front door smashed open. There was no warning, no prelude of banging--just one blow and the frame splintered and the door swung wide. Blair couldn't believe it. He'd trusted the locks to hold, not forever but long enough for him to hit the speed dial, long enough for him to invent a weapon--a chair, a kitchen knife, anything--but there was no time.
Blair broke for the back door. He flipped the latch in one reflexive motion, got a grip on the handle and pulled the door towards him. On the verge of escape, it was all snatched away as he found himself being thrown forwards, colliding with the door and slamming it shut. The full force of Lash followed, crushing him against the door.
The jolt shocked the feeling from his limbs and left him breathless. Blair felt his knees giving as Lash grabbed two handfuls of his jacket and used them to toss him back towards the center of the room. Blair bounced against the hardwood, then rolled trying to keep as much momentum as he could as he scrambled to his feet. He made it halfway across the room before Lash plowed into him, taking them both over the back of the couch. Digging his way out from under Lash with his elbows and knees, Blair again made it to his feet only to have Lash clamp onto his ankles.
He fell against the TV stand, then further to crack his head against the floor. Blair was blinded by a blood red flash. It felt as though the floor was tipping beneath him, heaving him over. Then the ceiling pressed down on him with such force that he could barely breathe. He blinked his vision back and found Lash straddling his chest, pinning his arms at his sides. It was his first clear view of his assailant.
Lash's eyes betrayed not intense emotion but intense focus. Blair watched as Lash pulled a small bottle from his jacket pocket, uncapping it with a quick twist. Fingers pinched his nose closed, and Blair began to buck, breathing through tightly clenched teeth, trying desperately to keep his face turned away.
"That's no good," Lash said with the slightest admonishment. He placed the bottle on the floor, beyond Blair's limited range of motion. Then, maintaining the pinch on Blair's nose, he pressed his free hand tightly down over Blair's mouth, his thumb hooked and holding the jaw. Blair's struggles intensified then began to weaken. It felt as though the breath trapped in his lungs had ignited. /Need air. Need air. Need./ Then, as the darkness began to close in around him and his eyes began to roll back, the clamp on his jaw was released.
Blair gasped loudly. Once. Twice. Then his mouth filled with fluid. His body demanded air; it knew it had to swallow to get air, so reflexively it swallowed, breathed, dragged some of an ongoing stream of fluid into his lungs, swallowed, coughed, gagged. Choking, Blair turned his head aside, spilling a half-mouthful of the bitterness on the floor.
Lash leaned back with a satisfied smile as Blair continue to gasp, his eyes half shut. An instant later the kid went wild, and Lash found himself being thrown backwards, flailing, bracing himself against the coffee table only to have it slide away rather than supporting him.
Blair forced himself to his feet and stumbled across the room, catching himself against the broken door frame and pushing on into the hallway. After a few more steps, he allowed himself to glance behind him. There was no sign of Lash. /Stunned against the table edge?/ Blair wondered, coughing convulsively. His throat ached. He didn't want to think about what had been poured down it. The liquid had numbed the inside of his mouth, and now he felt that numbness spreading.
The door to the stairs resisted him. The strength gone from his arms, Blair used the weight of his body to push it open. He misjudged the first step and almost went down. Maintaining a two-handed grip on the rail, he continued as fast as he could. A few steps from the exit his knees folded. His hold on the rail turned him but his fingers gave way to gravity's greater demands. He fell limp, like a rag doll, boneless, not stopping until he reached the base of the stairs. /I'm okay,/ he thought to himself, /That didn't even hurt. I just made it down to the door faster than I expected./ All he had to do now was reach the street. Once there, he could flag down a car or freak out at a bus driver. It was that simple . . . only he couldn't get up . . . couldn't move . . . couldn't scream . . . .
~-~-~
Lash allowed the anthropologist to go, certain that he wouldn't get far. Standing and brushing himself off, he capped his medicine bottle. He hadn't intended to use all of it. It was supposed to have lasted all evening, but the kid hadn't given him any time to get out his measuring spoon. It was okay. Everything was still okay. He'd simply have to mix more when they got home. The drug required a certain amount of watering down to have the effect Lash desired.
He crossed to the door, stopping to fish Blair's keys out of the basket set on the small table there. Lash ran his hand down the splintered door frame, his fingers pausing where he'd seen Blair grip the door on his way out. He glanced back at the damage done to the loft. /What a mess,/ Lash thought, /but really it's nothing compared to his office./ He'd known he'd made the right choice when he'd seen Blair's office.
/This one,/ Lash noted, /didn't restrict himself to one small corner of the world, he indulged in it all. That intensity, that survival instinct . . . / Lash smiled to himself, /Let things fall where they may. It was *so* Blair./ He gave the table by the door a little kick, tipping it over. His smile spread. He'd discovered something new and exhilarating. It opened his mind to all sorts of possibilities, but first he had to go find his new friend.
Blair was curled at the base of the stairs, making a sad mewling sound in his throat. Lash rushed down the steps, then crouched, taking Blair's fluttering hands in his, stilling them. "It's okay. It's okay," he reassured Blair. "The drug won't hurt you. It's just to keep you quiet. Everything's okay." Lash sat back on his heels taking in the kid's fixed-wide eyes and the pulse pounding in the wrists he held. Really, it wasn't healthy, the kid needed to calm down.
"I'm sorry I used so much--but just stay with me, okay? It's okay," Lash comforted reaching out to touch Blair's face. The noise the kid was making rose in pitch and volume becoming a terrible keening. Lash recoiled from the obvious rejection.
"Stop it," he instructed. He slapped Blair sharply, then grew tender again. "No, no, no, you have to be quiet. You have to be good. I'll help you. Here, see?" Lash reached around behind him drawing a bright yellow scarf from his back pocket.
"Better?" Lash asked, slipping the scarf between Blair's teeth and knotting it tightly at the back of his head. It damped the sound but not completely. Lash brushed his hands together and then pulled Blair's keys from his pocket.
"We *must* get going," Lash waggled the keys in front of Blair's half-focused eyes. "Let's take your car, shall we?" Lash took both of Blair's arms and pulled, levering the kid onto his shoulder and lifting.
As he was lifted, Blair felt his blood drain from loose muscles and rush towards his brain. He blacked out certain that his skull had exploded.
~-~-~
Jim leapt into his truck, dialing his cell phone as he got the vehicle in gear. There was no answer at the loft. The number on his beeper had been tailed with "911" and, considering the case they'd been working on, Jim had a very bad feeling. /Maybe it's not what you think,/ he tried to reassure himself, /maybe Sandburg just set the kitchen on fire or something./ Jim didn't waste time second guessing his gut reaction. He called in to the station and requested a couple of black and whites for backup. He knew he'd beat them to the loft and knew that he wouldn't wait.
He found his front door hanging open, half off its hinges. He listened carefully as he approached. His ears told him the loft was empty. Still he led with his gun as he entered, not trusting his senses to distinguish anything over the thundering of his own heart.
The loft had been trashed. It wasn't Lash's usual style, but Jim knew the killer had been there. He tracked the smell of trichlorylethanol, finding a wet spot on the floor near the TV. From the look of things Blair had fought back but--
Jim suddenly realized that anyone could have dialed his beeper. Lash had placed an hysterical sounding 911 call, pretending to be Susan Frasier hours after she had died. He wouldn't hear a heartbeat if--his feet carried him swiftly down the hall as his senses tunneled on the bathroom. He didn't even realize he'd stopped breathing. Gun at the ready as though it could protect him from the silence, he gently pushed the bathroom door open . . . . The room was empty. The tub was empty. There was no floating body. With a gasp Jim regained his breath, but there was no time to sag against the wall with relief.
There was nothing to feel relieved about.
~-~-~
"This car! It's quirky. It's a classic. It's you. It's us. It's *me*," Lash declared. The Corvair had betrayed its owner, starting without a cough or complaint. Lash flicked the radio on, deliberately leaving the dial where it was set, and dance music mixed with tribal rhythms kicked in over the speakers.
"Really, you listen to this stuff?" he asked his unconscious passenger. He took the silence as confirmation. "I do too," he decided. "I'm thinking that Cascade is getting old. Can you imagine me out on the interstate, the top down, just cruising the country a little. What do you think? You're a traveling man, right?"
"NNnn." Blair's eyelids slid back to reveal dark pupils edged in grey-blue.
"Oh, hey, you're back with us. I was just saying that this, *this*, is going to be great, man." Lash noticed Blair's slow moving hands and absentmindedly reached over to give them a slap, disrupting their efforts towards unbuckling the seat belt. "Unuh, safety first."
Blair blinked his wet eyes. He couldn't focus. He tried to figure out where they were, but the outside world was an abstract of bright on black. The street lamps blurred together and passing vehicles blinded him. He tried to reach for the door, his arm shifting but falling short. Whatever Lash had forced on him, it was slowing everything down. Even his heart seemed to be beating in thick, slow swells.
He knew Lash had drugged his other victims. Just that morning some chemical trace in Dr. Bates' blood had been declared consistent with the others. Blair couldn't remember what it was or what it did, but drugging was different from poisoning. Drugging was definitely the word they'd used and Lash had said . . . /Great, I have it on the word of a psychotic killer that I'm not already dying. There's something to hold on to, Sandburg./ He had to get out of this. He tried to reach for the door again, but this time his fingers barely twitched.
"Look at you," Lash continued, "you're young, energetic--it's not just age. I mean Billy Bright was younger than you, but he was already a burn out. You, you're so alive. Well, maybe not right now," Lash suppressed a giggle, "and definitely not later; but you know what I mean . . . " He glanced over only to find that he'd lost his audience.
"Oops. Out again." Lash reached over, pushing a stray tuft of Blair's hair back from his face, tucking it beneath the gag. "Blair? Blair?" he patted the kid's cheek, but there was no response.
"Stupid me. I must be more careful."
~-~-~
"Home sweet home," Lash announced, parking the Corvair between a pair of rusted-out containers. He twisted Blair's face, directing it at the abandoned warehouse, ignoring the limp muscles and closed eyes that indicated Blair was beyond noticing the view.
"What do you think?" he asked. Lash hopped out of the car, then moved to unbuckle his passenger. "One of the guys at the station said you used to live in a warehouse." He pulled Blair over his shoulder once more, lifting him out of the car. "We have so many things in common. We have everything in common. The only trouble with this place are the leaks. The leaks and the rats. The rats are absolutely huge, man. Did you have that problem?"
Kicking an unlatched door open then kneeing it shut behind them, Lash carried Blair into the dark warehouse. He deposited him on one of the drier sections of the warehouse's main floor. The kid landed heavily, limbs spilling outwards. Lash found Blair's continued lifelessness dismaying.
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It was too much. You made me rush. Next time I won't rush. I'll give you the right amount. I'll keep you with me," Lash said, then he clapped his hands twice becoming his own taskmaster. "First things first, I don't want you going anywhere. Not that there's any danger of that right now, but for later." Lash retrieved a set of restraints from a hook on the wall and began to bind Blair's wrists.
"Do you realize how perfect this will be?" Lash continued excitedly. "You're an anthropologist. You study human beings, their physical characteristics, their social relations, their culture--that's me too. And back at the station, you were the only one who understood. I mean, you knew what it was about."
The thick leather restraints were the type used at the psychiatric hospital where Lash had stayed, though the chains linking them together had been his idea. He ran the chains through a metal ring embedded in the floor then moved on to Blair's ankles. Having personally escaped the bindings several times, Lash knew how to secure them properly.
"There you go. All buckled." He patted Blair's hip affectionately. "I'm just going to light a few candles. I'll be right back."
~-~-~
/How long?/ Blair wondered. /How long have I been here? How much longer do I have?/ Between the black outs and the blur outs Blair wasn't sure how much time had passed since Lash had drugged him, but he could tell it was wearing off. For example, he was now absolutely clear on the fact that he'd been drugged. Earlier he'd woken somewhere else, somewhere dark and damp, not knowing where he was or why he could barely move . . . not until Lash had reappeared.
Being thrown over Lash's shoulder again had brought another wave of darkness which carried him to another room, a room full of candles where again he struggled with his memory to reconnect, trying desperately to figure out why he couldn't simply get up out of the dentist's chair Lash had set him down in. He could shift enough to feel the bruisingly tight cuffs on his wrists and ankles, enough to curl his fingers around the chains, enough to know nothing held him directly to the chair. He would've given anything to have had the strength to lever himself out of that chair, even if it would've only gotten him as far as the floor; but he didn't have it. He couldn't even pull away from Lash's fingers when they stroked his face.
He thought back to what Lash had said to him at the station as they'd grown closer to identifying the killer, "Very impressive field work." /I should've known. I should've seen it. I did see it, enough for the compliments to make me uncomfortable./
Blair knew there was no point in cursing the Fates, but he cursed them anyway. He'd made the discovery of a lifetime in finding Jim. They'd only just begun. He'd only just begun. There was so much more . . . .
As Blair regained control over his muscles, Lash added another layer of chains. There was no way he would be able to free himself from the chair now. Lash had reassured him of that and then dropped down and resumed work on the chains near his ankles. Everything the psycho had done so far had indicated he wanted his achievements and abilities admired. /I don't want to understand you, you bastard,/ Blair heaved himself up to limits of the chains, scarcely an inch from the chair back, /but I do understand you./
Blair began to shout through the gag, demanding more answers, playing on Lash's need to explain. Delighted to see Blair in a more conversational mood, Lash pushed the yellow scarf down so it rested around Blair's neck. Blair gasped, gathered air and screamed at the top of his lungs for help. Lash screamed along with him.
Blair had expected to have the gag forced back upon him, but this was much worse. For Lash to have the confidence to match his yell meant that there was no one to hear him. That meant he was dead. It sucked, but it was true. That afternoon they had been no closer to knowing where Lash drowned his victims. Blair had no doubt that Jim would track down Lash . . . just not in time. Ellison was a Sentinel, not a super hero. /Another mistake and Jim catches you,/ Blair thought. He couldn't free himself. He was certain that Lash would never free him. There was only one thing left for him to do . . . that was to make sure that he was the last. /Lash, you're about to make a mistake. In fact, you've already made it./ Blair began to challenge Lash; questioning him, taunting him, and finally throwing the dirtiest corners of Lash's past straight into his face.
"You are *ruining* this." Lash's face and voice were contorted with rage.
/Fuck you,/ Blair thought bitterly, /it's the least I can do./ He was going to make sure that Lash would never take the role of Blair Sandburg. /You want to be *me*?/ Blair thought, /You don't ever want to be *me* because I know exactly who *you* are, and you don't want to go there, do you?/
Lash closed the distance between them, and the terror Blair had been controlling flooded back. Wrists at the limits of the restraints, his fingers curled uselessly, closing only around air. Lash was on top of him and Blair's mouth was once again filled with bitter fluid. Lash's free hand was rubbing his throat, forcing it down. Blair knew it would be easier just to allow it, to die without feeling it clearly, but still he struggled against swallowing . . . and failed.
/Two doses, too close,/ he thought, the drug rapidly enveloping him like a heavy blanket, damping out sensations and weighing down his limbs. /It's over./ Blair closed his eyes, preparing to spend the last of his fleeing strength against the chains.
Then he heard Jim's voice.
~-~-~
Jim stared down at Lash. He knew where each of the five bullets he'd fired had hit. Lash was dead, but still he focused in on the body, watching for any sign of movement. He'd almost lost. Lash had fought like the maniac he was.
"Jim." The voice was slurred and weak, but it reached Jim, clearing the fog from his other senses and snapping his gaze from the hold of Lash's unmoving pupils. He'd zoned, he realized, long enough for the dust to settle. He shook his head then looked upwards listening. His struggles with Lash had taken him straight down to the warehouse's lowest level.
"Blair!" he yelled, sprinting to the nearest stairs and up them. There was no response. He knew his partner was still bound and the smell of trichlorylethanol had been thick in the air when he'd arrived. He'd seen Lash pouring the drug down Blair's throat. How could he have zoned at a time like this?
"Blair!?" Jim reached the top of the stairs, frightened by the lack of response. "Blair?" He crossed the floor towards his partner. He saw his Blair's eyes flutter open, panic-filled. They fixed on him, then focused and Jim saw the tension drain from his partner as he sagged back, his eyes closing again.
"It's okay," Jim reassured, his hand tilting Blair's face towards him. Blair's eyes flashed open and weakly he tried to pull away. "It's okay. It's okay," Jim repeated, then, noting Blair's continued distress and confusion, identified himself clearly. "It's Jim. It's Jim."
Blair settled, his breathing less ragged, and Jim moved to free him, beginning with the buckles on the leather cuffs holding Blair's wrists. Working first on the right hand Jim quickly dropped the cuff aside, lifting Blair's loose hand and laying it across his stomach, squeezing the fingers slightly before he moved on. He almost had Blair's left hand free when the fingers twitched. Jim looked up and found Blair's right hand was slowly moving, the fingers dragging against the tail ends of the yellow scarf still around Blair's neck. He wanted it off.
Jim tried the slippery silk knot. It wouldn't give, and the texture was sending his sense of touch over the edge. He understood why Blair wanted it off. It *felt* of Lash. He gave up on the knot, pulling the scarf up, easing it over Blair's ears and finally off.
"Sorry," Jim apologized quietly as the knot brought some of Blair's hair with it. Blair's eyes met his, the expression of relief and gratitude so clear that Jim felt the same emotions wash over him. "This won't take long," Jim promised and returned his attention to the chains, for them he'd need a wrench. He scanned the candle lit room with his eyes, quickly finding what he needed on a cluttered table across the room. That problem solved, his mind proceeded to the next one. Earlier, in trying to focus his hearing on Blair's voice, Jim had pulled off the transmitter that linked him to Simon and the rest of the search team. The ear piece had dangled on the wire which connected it to its battery pack until the struggle with Lash had snapped it free. Jim decided to use a fireman's carry to get Blair back to the SWAT truck. He explained as much as he gripped Blair's arms and braced himself for the added weight.
"NNno."
"Blair?" Jim released his grip. "What is it?"
"Don't," Blair managed.
"I'm just going to carry you outside. Okay?"
"NNnn." Blair shook his head slightly in refusal. He wanted to stay with Jim. He didn't want to black out. "Don't lift. Please." Knowing Jim wouldn't be satisfied with inaction, Blair struggled to get out of chair. He failed miserably. Even with Jim's help, all he managed to do was end up sprawled on the floor, his head spinning.
"You hurt?" Jim asked. Recalling how badly the loft had been trashed, he ran his fingers into Blair's hair checking for a head injury. Blair flinched away.
"Drug. Too much." Blair sank further downwards to lie on his side, curling slightly. "Cold."
Jim froze, listening intently. He could hear the distant siren of an approaching ambulance, undoubtedly called in reaction to the gun shots and his own radio silence. Closer, he could hear the quiet movements of a search team approaching the warehouse.
"Jim." The barest whisper from Blair caught his attention.
"Yeah, Chief?" Jim asked concerned. Blair didn't answer; couldn't answer. He simply stared up at Jim, his lips slightly parted, his eyes blurring and spilling tears.
"He's dead, Blair. Lash is dead," Jim said. "An ambulance is on its way." Unable to wait any longer, Jim pulled his partner up over his shoulder and took to the stairs.
~-~-~
Things had moved very quickly. Jim had been careful to identify himself loudly and clearly as he exited the warehouse. Nearby officers had rushed to his position and called it in. The rest of the SWAT team had moved in, the ambulance following shortly.
Jim had done his best to keep Blair as comfortable as possible. The kid had lost consciousness, his eyes fluttering open only after the stretcher had been lifted into ambulance. Jim repeated again the name of the drug Blair had been given, then stepped back to allow the attendants to close the doors.
As the ambulance pulled out, lights flashing, Captain Banks approached. He'd arrived on the opposite side of the warehouse and had been briefed on the candle-lit shrines and corpse it contained.
"What the hell happened?" Simon demanded.
"Lash is dead, sir."
"I know that. What happened to your transmitter? Why didn't you call for back-up?"
Jim explained that while he was carefully listening for Blair's voice, the transmitter had shorted out nearly deafening him. He hoped Simon would catch the gist of what he meant and not ask further, at least not where they could easily overheard.
Simon watched Jim's focus shift and return as he spoke about his battle with Lash and Blair's condition. Ellison's concern for his unofficial partner was evident. It was as though he couldn't keep himself from looking off in the direction the ambulance had gone. Simon couldn't even guess as to which sense Jim was using to track the ambulance's progress, but the slow drift of his focus in the direction of St. Thomas' Hospital was obvious.
Jim finished his explanation, and Simon nodded, not completely satisfied but willing to let it go for the moment. "I want you to let a doctor look you over."
"Simon, I don't need--"
Simon cut Jim off with an open handed gesture. "Did you or did you not just finish explaining to me that you had a knock-down, drag-out fight with a psychopath that included falling about four stories straight through the floors?"
"It was probably only three stories, sir. I'm not really sure."
"I don't want to hear it. You will see a doctor," he ordered. "I won't force you to go now. If you think it can wait, you can spend the next few hours making statements and waiting for Internal Affairs to show up so that they can make you repeat all of your statements. But I think you should let Brown drive you to the hospital now just to make sure that you're okay . . . just to make sure that *everything* is okay."
Jim stared at him for a moment, then slowing nodded understanding. "Yeah, Captain, that sounds like a good idea."
~-~-~
Jim was glad that Brown had accepted his reassurances, dropping him off at the entrance to the emergency room and continuing on back to the crime scene. He stood in line at the reception desk with one simple question in mind. Unfortunately, the individual in front of him seemed to be having trouble with every single line on the admissions form. Impatiently looking for someone else to assist him--Jim's gaze fell on an open folder on the desk behind the receptionist, Sandburg's name was scrawled across the top. Jim checked the room number and then carried on.
Jim walked straight through the emergency department, moving with authority and certainty. He fully intended to flash his badge at anyone who questioned him. No one did. He found the room and slipped in, closing the door behind him.
The kid was a pale grey, except for bruises which were made more obvious and ugly under the fluorescent lights. His breathing was slow and even. Jim, assuming Blair was asleep, sat down quietly next to the bed. He found Blair's complete stillness unnerving. Glancing away and then back again, he resisted the urge wake his partner. His need for an animated Blair did not surpass Sandburg's need for rest.
"Hey, Jim," Blair greeted him, his eyes still closed.
"Blair, I thought--" Jim stumbled for words. "How are you?"
"It's unpleasantly like being drunk." Blair's head turned slightly towards Jim, his eyes opening to reveal dilated pupils. "Ever read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy?" Blair continued. "I remember Arthur wanted to know what was unpleasant about being drunk, and Ford said 'Ask a glass of water'."
Jim shook his head. If that was meant to have been a punch line, Blair had let it down badly. "I'm not following you, Chief."
"I don't feel well," Blair explained, covering his eyes with his forearm. "The lights hurt my eyes, but I won't let them turn them off. Silly, huh?"
"No."
"It was so dark."
"I know," Jim's voice cracked slightly, an admission of how close it had been.
Blair's eyes flashed open, concerned. "Jim, you okay, man?"
"I'm fine."
"You fell."
"Just a few bruises," Jim answered, not knowing how to explain or acknowledge what had happened, what could have happened, how he'd felt. Silence fell between them. It wasn't awkward or distancing--they shared it.
"I just can't stop thinking . . ." Blair finally said.
"Stop thinking." Jim rested his hand on Blair's arm. "You did everything right. Stop thinking and get some rest."
"You'll stay?"
"Yeah," Jim said, the corners of his mouth turning upwards into a small smile, "and tomorrow I'll take you home."
End.
Please send all comments to Shelagh I'll forward them to the author.
