Eye of the Storm by Rushlight ------- Back to Part 1 SVS2-01: Eye of the Storm by Rushlight, Part 2 ------- Blair couldn't hide the smile that rose on his face the moment he saw Mike's familiar form at the front of the classroom. Students were still trickling out into the hallway, and a few were hanging back to ask questions or jot down a final few notes from the lecture. Blair waited until the last of them were getting ready to leave before he went inside and made his way down the shallow steps to the front lectern. Mike Townsend was tall and lanky, with dark brown hair and a grace that was vaguely reminiscent of a professional dancer. He was shuffling a sheaf of papers into a dark brown leather satchel when Blair approached him. As soon as Mike noticed him, his eyes brightened, and the smile that lit up his features was a rival for Blair's own. "Blair Sandburg," he said, and there was a note of honest awe in his voice. "Hi, Mike," Blair replied, leaning forward to hug the other man tightly. Mike slapped him on the back with an enthusiasm that almost took his breath away. "Long time no see." "I'll say. How's the diss coming along?" "Oh, it's coming." Blair made a face, knowing that Mike had to be well aware of the drama that had surrounded his expulsion and subsequent readmission to the dissertation program. "How about yours?" Mike grinned, pushing the fall of dark hair out of his eyes with the fingers of one hand. "You know me, Blair. Drag out the process till I've milked the last drop. I might be graduating sometime within the next hundred years." His eyes suddenly flickered up to look at Jim where he hovered behind Blair's shoulder. When he turned back to Blair, his expression was rueful. "I take it that this isn't just a social visit, though." There was an implied question in the words. Blair tried to ignore the shiver of guilt that passed through him, and he glanced back at Jim briefly. "You might have heard that I've been working as a consultant to the police department," he said, deciding to cut right to the chase. "This is my partner, Jim Ellison. We're in the middle of a murder investigation, and we were hoping you could give us some information about the trip you took to Africa over the summer." Something indefinable changed in Mike's posture then, although his expression remained the same. "Murder investigation?" he echoed. "Who's been murdered?" Blair hesitated, not quite sure how the news would be taken. "Dr. Eisner," he said, "and Pete Sowers." Mike leaned back against the table behind him, his eyes widening. "Shit." "Yeah." Blair felt a twinge of pity for his friend. He hadn't known either of the deceased men well, but he knew how strong the bond could grow between the members of a research expedition. "We're trying to chase down any leads that might connect the two of them. Did anything unusual happen over the summer while you were in Africa?" "No." Mike shook his head, his gaze dropping toward the floor. He fiddled with the pencil on the desk beside him nervously. "Nothing. I mean, we dug for artifacts, spent some time living with the locals, but that was about it. I know there's been some pretty heavy wrangling over some of the pieces we brought back with us, but it's just your everyday bureaucratic free-for-all." His expression was distraught when he looked up again. "Jesus, Blair, do you really think someone killed them?" "Yeah, I do," Blair said seriously, holding his gaze. "Anything you could tell us would be helpful to the investigation," Jim said, capturing Mike's attention. His tone was low and serious, utterly professional and non-threatening. "Did anyone make any threats against you while you were there? Did any members of your expedition get into a conflict with any of the locals? Anything that might have seemed innocuous at the time, but might not look quite so harmless in hindsight?" Mike chewed on his lower lip for a moment, but then he shook his head. He glanced at Blair uncertainly. "I'm sorry. I wish I could help you guys, but there's really nothing I can think of to tell you. The whole trip went pretty much by the book." Blair met Jim's gaze again and sighed. He rummaged around in his backpack for one of the business cards he always carried around with him, using a pencil to scribble down his address on the back. He handed it to Mike, who accepted it numbly. "Look, Mike, if you think of anything, or hear anything, will you get in touch with me? Any time, all right? And if you need to talk, maybe we can go out for some beers later." Mike nodded, still looking vaguely shell-shocked. Blair gave him a last comforting touch on the shoulder before he turned to leave. Jim trailed behind him as he made his way out into the hall. "He's lying," Jim said quietly, without meeting his gaze. Blair glanced up at him irritably. "Even I can tell that, Jim." The thought disturbed him. He didn't want to think of his friend involved in anything remotely criminal, especially not something as twisted as this case was turning out to be. Jim let the subject go, much to Blair's relief. Next on their list was Dr. Tommy Chan, a part-time professor in the anthropology department and present darling of the anthropological society for research that he'd done on the interior cohesion of certain tribes in Brazil last fall. Word was that he could pretty much write his own ticket as far as funding went, but Blair knew from experience that such good fortune was apt to be short-lived. Chan wasn't scheduled for a class that morning, so they ended up driving out to the neighborhood where the professor's home was located. As Jim parked the truck in front of the tall, white-walled house, Blair noticed that there was a dark blue SUV parked in the driveway. "Looks like he's home," he commented as he followed Jim up the slope of the driveway to the front door. There was no answer when Jim knocked on the front door, however. He shared a glance with Blair and shook his head slightly. "I don't hear anyone inside." Blair couldn't stop the small tremor of unease that moved through him at that. "Jim, I've got a really bad feeling about this." Jim nodded, his expression darkening. They knew from the university records that Chan lived alone, so there would be no one to know if he had run into any sort of trouble. Drawing his gun from underneath his jacket, Jim gestured toward the side of the house. Blair shadowed him closely as they moved around the side of the building. Around them, the afternoon suddenly darkened, and he glanced up to see the sun dipping behind yet another interminable bank of clouds. A sudden chill gripped him that had nothing at all to do with the temperature of the air. The yard behind the house was expansive, dotted with a number of fruit-bearing trees and circled by a ring of low shrubbery. A broad porch stretched out at the rear of the house, shaded by several tall trees that stood nearby. Jim paused for a moment, sweeping over the area around them with an intensely focused expression. Then he put his gun away and turned to Blair with a dark look. "There's someone on the back patio," he said. Blair wrestled with an intense feeling of foreboding as he followed Jim up the slight incline of the hill toward the stairs. He knew what he expected to find when he got there, and he wasn't disappointed. Nevertheless, he couldn't help reacting slightly with a muffled, "Oh, God," and turning away for a moment to get a handle on his rampaging nerves. Chan was lying on a lawn chair on the back porch of the house, dressed in light grey sweats and running shoes. It looked as if he had been reading a book when he died, and the pages still fluttered in the cool breeze where it lay half-opened on the chair beside him. Again, there was no obvious cause of death, making it look as if he had only fallen asleep for a short time. He was young, maybe in his late thirties, and his handsome Oriental features were fixed in an expression of sublime peacefulness. The effect was marred by the jarring presence of the blue and red designs scrawled over his face and hands. "What the fuck is going on here, Jim?" Blair couldn't keep the slight ring of panic out of his voice. No matter how many murder scenes he visited, they never ceased to disturb him deeply. Though he supposed that if there was ever a time when this sort of thing stopped bothering him, it would be time to give up this line of work for good. "I don't know." Jim knelt down to examine the body more closely, being careful not to touch anything. "Are these the same markings as on the others?" Blotting his damp palms against his jeans, Blair leaned down to get a closer look. "Yeah," he said after a moment. "They're the same ones." He let his eyes trail over the colorful designs, drinking in each individual curve and line. It really was a work of art, and it said disturbing things to him about the individual who would have taken the time to paint them so meticulously on Chan's dead or dying flesh. The sun had broken out from behind the clouds again, and its brittle light fell down through the trees around them. The dry autumn leaves rustled in the wind, sounding uncomfortably like whispering voices, and Blair felt a shiver of apprehension move through him that he couldn't explain. The branches cast an odd mosaic of shadows over the porch, a shifting pattern of darkness and light where the sunlight showed through, changing with the shift of the leaves in the wind. Blair stared, feeling his heart rate begin to increase. The wind lifted his hair against his face, but he ignored it. He felt dizzy suddenly, and while he could hear Jim talking to him, he couldn't quite make out the words. The soft flicker of shadow and light across Chan's body captivated him, and he watched it with a sense of deep foreboding, not understanding the sudden feeling that gripped him but fearing it nonetheless. There were patterns in the leaves, and patterns in the shadows -- and never the same pattern twice, because the wind never went through the same way twice. The light was almost blinding, but it was almost completely obscured behind the shadows, and the patterns... the patterns, they... He swayed, clutching at the railing of the porch for support. The light seemed to dim abruptly, and he blinked rapidly, trying to clear his vision against the dull roaring that rose in his ears. The body on the chair seemed to consume his vision, and he couldn't look away, no matter how much he wanted to. His palms were sweating, his breath quickening, and he was suddenly clutched tight in the grip of a horror so profound that it left him reeling. The worst part of it was that he didn't know what he was so terrified of, and the yard was continuing to dim, it was filled near to bursting with blue-flocked shadows, and his breath caught frozen in his throat as he saw that Chan's body was beginning to move... He fell back away from the chair with a strangled cry and turned to run, knowing only that he had to get away from there before something irrevocable happened to him. He collapsed against the side of Jim's truck and almost fell, but Jim was right there, strong arms moving around his waist to catch him. "Blair! Goddamnit!" There was real fear in Jim's voice. "What happened? What's wrong? Damn it, will you talk to me?" Blair struggled to get his breathing back under control and managed to stop himself from hyperventilating. Even so, the fear continued to pound through him, making him feel physically ill. "I'm going crazy, Jim," he whispered, hearing the panic in his voice and not caring. He stared up at Jim with wild eyes, shoving the back of his fist against his mouth for a moment to keep the screams inside. "I-I keep seeing dead people, and hearing things, and... and..." His voice broke on a sob, and Jim pulled him close, holding him tightly in a crushing hug regardless of who might be watching. "It's all right, Blair," he said, running a hand over the back of Blair's hair, and Blair felt the violent tremors wracking through him begin to decrease. He closed his eyes and snuggled in against Jim's chest, grateful for the arms that enclosed him, the warm breath that shivered past his ear. No matter what was happening to him, he had no doubt that he and Jim would be able to work it through together. Jim pulled open the door of the truck, and Blair allowed himself to be eased carefully inside. Jim pulled out his cell phone, and Blair only half-listened as Jim reported their latest discovery, enjoying the feel of Jim's hand massaging comfortingly into his thigh. "Look," Jim said as he put the cell phone away again, "I want you to wait here. I need to go have a look around before the forensics team gets here." Blair felt a spike of panic at the thought of being left alone, but he viciously beat the feeling down. "Jim, I can't let you --" he began, knowing even as he said it that Jim would be able to hear the frightened stutter of his heartbeat. Jim cut him off with a glance. "I'll be fine, Chief. If I need anything, I'll holler, okay?" Blair felt guilty for leaving Jim to conduct the investigation alone, but he knew that Jim was right; there was no chance he'd be of any use at this particular crime scene. Just the memory of Chan's body was enough to give him a serious case of the heebie-jeebies. He sighed, slumping against the back of the seat in defeat. "Just be careful." Jim nodded, reassuring him with a touch. "I'll just be a few minutes. Just sit tight until the reinforcements get here, all right?" Blair tried to ignore the fierce thundering of his heart as he watched Jim leave, his tall form disappearing with agile grace around the side of the building. Sliding his legs all the way inside the truck, Blair closed the door of the cab and then locked it, without knowing exactly why he did so. It certainly didn't make him feel any more secure. Resting his forehead against the cool glass of the window, he waited anxiously for any sign of Jim. Was he losing his mind? The thought was terrifying. What was left for him if he couldn't trust his own perceptions? Memories flitted across his mind from his brief stint at Conover, unpleasant recollections of men and women so caught up within the terrors of their own imaginings that they couldn't tell the difference between reality and fantasy. The thought made him shudder in horrified rejection of the idea. No. No way in hell was that going to happen to him. He never took his eyes away from the side of the house where Jim had disappeared, and it startled him when the dark-windowed forensics van pulled up in front of him. He stared, watching the van disgorge its horde of investigators with a feeling of vague detachment, unable to completely lose the feeling of dull horror that beat like a second heart within him. He was absurdly grateful when Jim finally reappeared and climbed into the cab beside him, and he was even more grateful when Jim pulled him across the length of the seat to lean against his side. Blair closed his eyes again, just soaking up Jim's presence, content to let Jim hold him while he wrestled with the demons dancing through his head. "Did you find anything?" he asked after a moment, feeling some of his panic begin to fade now that Jim was here with him again. Jim sighed heavily. "Not a thing," he admitted darkly, his breath ruffling Blair's hair. Blair clung to him, feeling a surge of disappointment that bordered on despair. He'd held some small hope that having Jim go over the scene before the forensics team arrived would give him more of a chance to find evidence of the murderer's identity. Blair's respect for their elusive opponent ratcheted up a notch. After a moment, Jim released him long enough to slip the key into the ignition and start the truck. Then his arm moved back around Blair's shoulders, holding him tightly while he pulled away from Chan's house and back out into the street, maneuvering carefully around the numerous police vehicles that had arrived over the past several minutes. "Whatever's going on, we're going to beat it, Blair," he said, and it was the only acknowledgment he made of what Blair had told him about the hallucinations that were plaguing him. Yet another thing to be grateful for, Blair thought, and he smiled tightly, resting his head comfortably on Jim's shoulder. The warmth of Jim's body seeped into him, a hard, dependable reality at his side. Despite the comfort he found in Jim's presence, however, Blair couldn't help but notice that the sun had slipped behind the clouds once again. He tried not to think that it might be an unpleasant omen for what lay ahead. ------- Jim looked down at the young man lying shivering under the blankets of their bed with a worried frown. He sat there in silence for a long while, brushing the curls back off of Blair's forehead tenderly. They were so soft and springy that they bounced right back whenever he moved his hand away, and loose strands clung to his fingers as if reluctant to let him go. The light outside the windows was fading fast. He had brought Blair directly home after the incident at Chan's house, and had reluctantly left him alone while he called Joel and asked him to finish hunting down the members of Eisner's team. Blair had steadfastly refused any suggestions to see a doctor, insisting that all he needed was to get some rest. Grudgingly, Jim had given in to the request, and it was with no small amount of relief that he found the younger man resting peaceably when he came back upstairs. He honestly didn't expect that any of Eisner's team members would talk to Joel, not after seeing the way Mike Townsend had refused to confide in Blair. Even so, it was an avenue that had to be explored. Three of the scientists they couldn't locate at all, and he was rather hoping that no more dead bodies would turn up before morning. "Do you want to talk about it?" he said at last, smoothing his hand again over the hair at Blair's brow. He could tell by the sound of the younger man's heartbeat that he wasn't sleeping. Blair's eyes opened to stare up at the ceiling blankly, and he shifted slightly at the sound of Jim's voice. The thick blankets were pulled up to his chin, covering him almost completely, which gave him a disturbingly vulnerable look that Jim was having a hard time coming to terms with. "I don't know what's happening to me," Blair said, and his voice was almost a whisper. "Jesus, Jim, I think I'm losing my mind." The worst thing about the words was the almost inflectionless tone they were spoken in. As if Blair had absolutely no emotional stake in their meaning whatsoever. "Tell me," Jim said, hoping that the quiet encouragement in the words would convince Blair to open up to him. At Jim's insistence, Blair began to tell him about the things he'd heard and seen since that morning, all in that same dull, quiet monotone. Jim listened with growing alarm to the accounts of half-heard noises and free-floating anxiety, hallucinations of deceased friends and attacks by silver foxes. When Blair finally finished, Jim had to fight down the wave of bald-faced panic that rose within him. What was going on here? No wonder the kid had lost it. Jim trailed a hand over his face and tried to think, listening to the rapid pounding of his own heart. Could this be some kind of latent brain damage from the drowning incident that was only now showing itself? The thought chilled him. That wasn't really possible, was it? Sure, Blair had been without oxygen for an unheard-of amount of time, but that was more than a year ago. If there had been any serious damage, they would have seen signs of it before now. Wouldn't they? He let out his breath in a long sigh. "Do you think it could have been a vision?" he asked. It was certainly something they'd both had experience with before. Blair frowned thoughtfully. "I don't know. What I saw... it seemed threatening. I've never had a vision like that before. And that fox..." "Maybe that's what's threatening you." Jim stubbornly clung to the possibility no matter how farfetched it seemed. It was, after all, far better than the alternative. But Blair shook his head. "I got the impression that it was trying to get my attention," he said. "There's something... else... out there, Jim. In the shadows of those dreams I've been having. Something that knows I'm here, and knows I'm not a threat to it. But it's watching me." Jim was unsettled by the quiet conviction in Blair's words, and by the near-vacant stare of his eyes. "You should get some sleep," he said softly, refusing to show how very scared he felt. Blair was half-asleep already, his eyes closing, a troubled furrow etched between his brows. Jim straightened the blanket around Blair's shoulders before going downstairs to start some tea water boiling. God, how he hated feeling this helpless, this powerless, and as usual, that helplessness translated itself into an impotent fury that left his insides aching. His only consolation was the promise he made to himself that somehow, he was going to find out who was fucking with his Guide. And then he was going to even the score. ------- Blair was standing in the middle of a forest. Around him, branches hung heavy with dripping screens of dark green moss, giving him a claustrophobic feeling. It was night, and the shadows that clung to the tree trunks were thick and brooding, dark in a way that had little to do with the absence of light. Overhead, a pale light filtered down through the leaves of the trees, corpse-white, but it did nothing to dispel the shadows. He knew without having to look that there was something there in the darkness, watching him. He was standing on a narrow trail, and ahead of him, he saw a silver fox. It looked luminescent in the darkness, starfire and moonfire all rolled up into one, somehow powerful for all its lack of stature. He stared, not understanding the feelings that were coursing through him. "Help me," he said to the fox. His heart was pounding, but he felt strangely calm. "Help me to understand." He watched in awe as the animal morphed into the shape of an old woman, dark-skinned, brittle-boned, with wise black eyes that reminded him of the fox. "You must choose your destiny, little wolf," she told him. "It will not choose you. You may be put on the path and shown which direction to go... but only you can make the decision to follow it." Blair shook his head slowly, clenching his fists at his sides. "I don't understand," he said, glancing around at the shadows desperately. They seemed to be drawing closer around him, and they were thickening. "What do I have to do?" When he looked back again, the old woman was gone. Only the fox was there, looking up at him with wise, bright eyes, and then it turned with a flick of its tail to run forward down the trail. "No, wait! Stop!" Blair took a step after it, feeling panic grip him. He didn't want to be left alone here, surrounded by the darkness, and he flailed for a moment, panic-stricken, lost and terrified and begging her not to leave him alone... He opened his eyes to see Jim staring down at him. Jim's hands were tight around his arms, too tight, and Blair was aware suddenly of being shaken, and of being tangled almost painfully inside the grip of the sheets that covered him. "Jim?" he whispered, reaching for the hard body above him, clinging to it in the midst of the uncertainty and fear that closed around him. He felt like a drowning man struggling to hold onto the one thing that was keeping him from dropping down beneath the waves. "You were having a dream," Jim said to him, and he slid a hand over Blair's sweat-soaked brow, brushing the tangled hair out of his eyes. His eyes were impossibly blue in the darkness. "Just a dream, Blair. You're not alone, baby. Not alone." Jim's voice was unsteady, and Blair wondered just how long Jim had been trying to wake him up. He took a deep breath and then let it out slowly, glancing around at the night-darkened bedroom around them. The moon had not yet risen, so there was very little to interrupt the inky flow of darkness around them. The sight made him uneasy, so he quickly turned back to look at Jim again, admiring the familiar features that looked down at him and slowly relaxing, muscle by muscle, into the other man's touch. And suddenly he was very much aware of the heat and the solidity of the body above him. Jim was still holding onto him, although his grip had relaxed somewhat over the past few moments. Blair shifted restlessly, feeling a familiar warmth begin to coil deep in the pit of his stomach. "Jim," he said again, and before he could even think to put his request to words, Jim was kissing him. Oh, yes, this was exactly what he needed. Jim's tongue in his mouth, Jim's fingers in his hair, Jim's body rubbing down hard against him. Blair was in ecstasy, and he impatiently kicked off the sheets that confined him, wanting to feel as much of Jim as he possibly could. He returned the near-violent kiss with an equal passion, wrapping his body tight around Jim's and gasping at the searing heat that seeped into him from the other man's skin. Jim groaned low in his throat and reached for the hem of Blair's shirt, mouthing down across the slope of his neck and sinking in his teeth in passing. Blair gasped softly and did what he could to help as Jim pulled the clothes off of him. Jim was already naked, and Blair spared a thought to be thankful that Jim had helped strip him down to boxers and T-shirt before he'd fallen asleep last night. After only a few moments' tussle, he hissed in unadulterated ecstasy at the hot, silken feel of Jim's skin against his. "God," Jim whispered against his hair, and then he was kissing him again. Blair gave in to the kiss eagerly, hungrily, wrapping arms and legs around the agile body above him. Jim's erection was a delicious heat against his own, and he bit into Jim's shoulder to hold back the cry that wanted to escape at the teasing pressure that danced against him, aching through him in shivers of delightful friction. As delicious as it was, however, it wasn't what he wanted. With a surge of determination, he pulled out of Jim's embrace and rolled over smoothly, rising up onto his elbows against his pillow and baring his back to Jim. He felt more than heard Jim's low moan. Blair shivered when he felt warm fingers slide across his back, touching him almost reverently, and then that feeling was compounded when the fingers were joined by lips and tongue. He sighed, dropping his head forward bonelessly, as that slick heat traced the ridges of his spine. His hips began to make small circular motions against the mattress completely against his conscious will, grinding his impatient erection into the softness of the sheets. "Please," he whispered. Jim's breathing was uneven as he reached for the bedside drawer. Blair spread his legs eagerly so Jim could kneel between them, and his breath hitched as he felt Jim get into position behind him. Jim's palm was warm and slightly callused as it slid over the slope of his ass, and Blair raised his hips to it reflexively, smiling at Jim's low chuckle at his reaction. The coolness of the gel as Jim's finger touched him was a shock, as it always was, but he arched into it with a deep sigh, tipping his head back and shivering at the feel of his hair sliding unrestrained across the backs of his shoulders. Jim murmured soothingly to him, and Blair drank in the soft words hungrily, feeling himself begin to drift free of his body as Jim's fingers stroked into him. And then Jim was gripping his hip with strong fingers, and Blair clenched his hands in his pillow, making a low sound of discontent as Jim's fingers slid out of him. Jim bent to drop a kiss on the small of his back, soothing him, and the faintly moist exhalation of his breath against the overly sensitized skin was almost more than Blair could bear. Blair rose up onto his knees at Jim's urging, and then he was biting his lip as Jim's body slid up to cover him. Jim's chest was a furnace of heat against his back, and Blair arched up into it helplessly, fists kneading the pillow under his head. "Shh," Jim said to him, sliding a hand down his side to calm him. His breathing was labored, leaving hot, panting breaths across Blair's ear. Blair moaned faintly at the touch and rubbed his cheek up against Jim's, loving the solid heat of the body that covered him. God, he loved it when Jim took him like this, made him crazy like this, as if there were nothing else in the world but the two of them, and the need that burned and raged like a fire within him. He dropped his head down onto his folded arms as he felt Jim shift behind him, and he spread his thighs even further apart, welcoming the gentle intrusion that he could even now feel pressing against his body's entrance. It was like being filled with pure heat. Blair arched his back, moaning long and soft while Jim pushed into him. He was panting now, dizzy with arousal, his erection a near-painful weight between his legs. Jim's chest slid against his back, slick with sweat as their bodies moved together, and the initial discomfort faded after only a few moments to be replaced by pure, liquid pleasure. They paused for the barest of moments to catch their breath, and then Jim began to move. Blair inhaled sharply as Jim touched the spot inside him that he loved, and as the sounds he made began to grow in volume, Jim reached for his hands and threaded their fingers together, holding him in a near-punishing grip. Blair clung to him helplessly, riding the wave of the pleasure that tore through him, listening to Jim's own needy sounds echoing in his ears. Jim's movements were strong, taking his breath away, and when Jim released one of his hands to reach for Blair's swollen erection he nearly screamed aloud. "Oh God, yes," he gasped, and he bucked his hips up unconsciously, driving himself further back onto Jim's length. The resultant pleasure dragged a moan from him, and Jim nipped at the side of his jaw with a low groan, lapping at the pooled sweat there with his tongue. "Come on, baby," Jim whispered. "Come on, Blair." He punctuated the words with even stronger movements of his hips, driving Blair forward into the mattress, and Blair clung to him, all but sobbing into his pillow as Jim's hips pounded against his ass. "Yes," he hissed, mindless with pleasure, his entire body straining for the release that Jim was promising him. He could feel rivulets of sweat making their way down the sides of his ribs, tickling him, and he wasn't sure if they came from his body or from Jim's. He moved his hips frantically, matching Jim's rhythm, praying that Jim's hand would grip him just a little bit tighter and all but combusting on the spot when Jim obeyed the unvoiced request, showing an unerring empathy with his Guide's needs that Blair would have found fascinating if he'd had the presence of mind to think about it. This time he did scream, as the world seemed to white out around him in an explosion of blinding pleasure. His body bucked helplessly up against Jim's, who abruptly stiffened above him. Jim's rhythm broke as his fingers tightened almost painfully around Blair's hand, and he groaned loudly, clinging firmly to Blair as he rode the wave of his orgasm. When it was over, they collapsed onto their sides in a sweaty tangle of limbs and knotted sheets. Blair blinked up at the ceiling for a long moment, watching the shifting patterns of the streetlights there as his breathing slowly returned to normal. After a moment, he felt a soft kiss press against the slope of his shoulder blade. Turning his head, he saw Jim gazing up at him from where he lay bonelessly on the pillow beside him. Blair smiled, feeling a surge of love so fierce it almost brought tears to his eyes. "Thanks," he said, rolling onto his side so that he could curl up around the other man. Jim chuckled tiredly. "Any time," he answered. Blair sighed happily as he felt Jim's arms move around him, pulling him close. He snuggled closer against Jim's side and rested his head on the other man's chest, feeling warm and sore and well-used and loved, and enjoying every moment of it. He could already feel himself beginning to drift off to sleep as Jim's breathing evened out beneath him. He felt confident that this time, there would be no dreams. ------- The phone rang just before dawn. Blair peeled open his eyes reluctantly, listening to Jim's voice murmur in the background as he tried to convince his recalcitrant body that it was time to start the day. Burnt orange sunlight spilled into the loft through the clerestory windows, barely bright enough to chase away the gloom. Blair yawned hugely and pushed himself up to a sitting position, wrapping the thick comforter tight around his shoulders. Jim's expression was grim as he hung up the phone. "That was Simon," he said, and the weariness in his voice sent shivers racing down Blair's spine. "There's been another murder." Blair closed his eyes, feeling a pang of something indefinable move through him. "Mike?" he asked, barely recognizing the sound of his voice. "No." Jim reached out to touch his arm, rubbing gently. "Richard Jeambey." Jeambey was a history professor at the university who specialized in ancient civilizations. Blair let out his breath in a heavy sigh, trying not to feel guilty because he was so very glad that it hadn't been his friend. "Are you going to be okay here if I go?" Jim's tone was uncertain. Instantly, Blair straightened, raking his fingers back through his hair. "Sure, Jim, I'll be fine." Which may or may not be true, but he couldn't expect Jim to sit around and nursemaid him all day. And he certainly didn't feel up to going to another crime scene. "I'll hang out, watch some old videos, that sort of thing." Jim looked unconvinced, and Blair had to admit that that was partly his fault because he hadn't been straight with Jim about the visions from the beginning. "You'll call me if you start having any problems?" "I promise." Blair held his gaze evenly. "Now, go. Catch bad guys. Do your John Wayne imitation and then come home to me." Jim's expression melted into one of honest affection as he leaned forward to steal a lingering kiss. Blair felt a shiver of happiness move through him as Jim wound a finger into a curl at the side of his face, a curiously tender gesture that set his heart thumping. One more quick kiss, and then Jim was getting up to head for the shower. Blair listened to him go, trying not to give in to the sudden, irrational fear of being alone. He was lying curled up in bed when Jim came up to say good-bye. Blair put on his game face then and assured Jim that he was just tired, knowing full well that there was nothing the other man could do for him right now. He peered down through the metal bars of the railing when Jim left, wincing as the door clicked shut behind him. Maybe it would have been better if he'd gone in to Rainier this morning. It had to be better than lying here, staring at the walls. But experience had already proven that Rainier was no protection against the visions, or whatever the hell they were. And he really was tired. Whatever was happening to him, it was beginning to take a physical toll. He actually managed to convince himself to take a shower and grab a quick breakfast before the sun got too serious about its climb through the eastern sky. Afterwards, he settled onto the couch dressed in a loose T-shirt and a faded pair of cutoff jeans, knowing that he wasn't planning on going out today. It was kind of an indulgence to dress down and laze around the apartment without having anything pressing to do, and he decided that he was going to take full advantage of it. He was lying sprawled out on the couch watching old reruns of I Dream of Jeannie when he heard a knock on the door. Instantly, his heart rate skyrocketed, and he glanced at the door uneasily. Had he really heard what he thought he'd heard? He'd been doing good so far this morning -- no visions, no hallucinations, no visitations from beyond the grave. It made him nervous that he couldn't seem to trust his own perceptions. The knock sounded again, and he almost physically shook off the mood. He'd be damned if he was going to turn into a prisoner in his own home. Drawing some degree of strength from his anger at the situation he'd found himself in, Blair unfolded from the couch and stalked toward the front door before he could change his mind. After all, what was the worst thing he could find there? Another deceased friend from his past? A horde of angry forest animals come to devour him? The righteously indignant girlfriend that he'd cheated on in the ninth grade? The absolutely last thing he expected to see was Mike. Fighting off his initial stunned reaction, Blair hastily shut the door so he could slide off the chain lock and then ushered Mike inside. Even as he invited Mike to have a seat in the living room and asked if he wanted anything to drink, his mind was cataloguing the subtle clues to his friend's emotional state: the slight flare of nostrils, eyes that showed just a bit too much white around the edges, hair that looked as if it had had fingers raked through it one too many times. He'd dressed hastily that morning, it seemed, in jeans and a white Metallica T-shirt, as well as the ubiquitous dark leather jacket that Blair remembered from their undergrad days. Mike turned to face him without bothering to sit down. "I heard about the latest murder on the news," he said, folding his arms around his chest and looking rather like a tall, skinny kid who had seen one too many late-night horror flicks. His eyes shifted nervously, drinking in the details of the room around him. Blair nodded, stepping forward to touch Mike's arm and physically guiding him to the couch. "Well, you've come to the right place," he said, keeping his voice low in an attempt to counteract the other man's rising anxiety. He sat down on the couch and was relieved when Mike unwound enough to sit beside him. "Now, why don't you tell me what's going on?" Blair had doubts as to whether Mike even heard him. "I didn't want to believe it," he said, sounding almost as if he were talking to himself. He dropped his gaze to the floor and settled his hands over the tops of his thighs, clenching them nervously. "But it's really happening. He's coming after us, one by one. They're almost all gone now -- Eisner, Jeambey, Chan..." He shuddered, squeezing his eyes tightly shut as if to block out the images that the words brought to life for him. "It's okay," Blair assured him, trying to ignore the slow beat of fear that moved through him at the dull certainty in the other man's voice; Mike's panic seemed to be contagious. "You'll be safe here. We'll put you under police protection, and no one will be able to get to you." Mike shook his head and laughed bitterly. "It's too late for me, Blair -- I've already seen him in my dreams." Blair was still trying to puzzle over this rather odd statement as he continued, "You can't protect me. But I want... I need to tell you what happened this summer. I mean, what really happened." He met Blair's gaze uncertainly, and there was an air of subdued defeat around him that made Blair feel inexplicably sorry for him. Blair took a deep breath and then let it out slowly, leaning back against the corner of the couch. "What happened?" he asked. Mike's expression was strangely desperate as he met Blair's gaze. "It wasn't supposed to happen this way, Blair, I swear to God. Eisner's the one who authorized the dig; the rest of us were just along for the ride. I didn't know when I left that the villagers in the area hadn't consented to it." "Wait a minute." Blair held up a hand to stop the tirade, staring incredulously at him. "You mean you went on a dig without the residents' permission?" Mike nodded, clenching his jaw miserably. "I didn't know, Blair. I swear I didn't know. It was all Eisner's doing, and Jeambey's. Jeambey said that he'd work with his contacts at the museum to make sure we got top dollar for whatever we found. Chan and Sowers were the ones who arranged transport, and distribution later on." He gave a small, bitter laugh. "The rest of us were just grad students out to collect some field experience." "But you went along with it." Blair couldn't help the low note of anger that crept into the words. "It was supposed to be harmless," Mike said, dropping his gaze to the floor again. His hands were shaking. "No one was supposed to know." Blair ran a hand over his mouth and looked away, taking a few seconds to get his emotions under control. "Okay," he said after a moment. "So what happened?" Mike let out his breath in a harsh sigh. "It was the final day of the dig," he said. His voice was haunted. "It was raining like all hell had broken loose; you know how storms are in that part of the country. Eisner wanted to get the tarps pulled by sundown so we could leave on the next flight home. Damn it, Blair, it was all supposed to be so simple. Just get the artifacts and get out, and no one would have been the wiser." He shook his head in disgust at his own stupidity, and Blair kept silent, waiting for him to continue. "What we didn't know was that that one of the tribesmen had followed us." Mike wrapped his arms around himself again, staring down at the floor with a vacant expression, as if he were seeing the scene play out in front of him all over again. "His name was Johan Mantashe; I'd met him when we first arrived in the village. He... he confronted us at the dig, told us that this was an ancestral burial ground, that we weren't supposed to be there. He was... he was furious. And these aren't simple people, Blair -- they may live in the jungle, but they send their sons off to school at the universities in Dodoma. They know about legal rights and land ownership and fucking official channels of complaint to the American Embassy." His voice was thick with bitterness. Blair stared at him, feeling a cold dread coil deep in the pit of his stomach. "What did you do, Mike?" Mike closed his eyes and pressed his fingers hard against his eyelids, as if trying to erase the memories even as he continued to describe them. "Eisner tried to reason with him, talk to him, but he wouldn't listen. God, Blair, it was raining so hard, it was like being in the middle of a fucking typhoon. Johan was yelling at us, telling us to get off of his people's land, and he... he stepped too close to the edge of the dig. It was raining so damned hard, and the ground was already unstable from the excavation, and it turned into a mudslide under him. He was... he was buried alive." Blair was horrified. "Oh, my God." "We... we had to leave him there, Blair." He looked up again, wide-eyed. "I didn't want anything to do with it after that, but... but Eisner said that we'd already got the artifacts so we might as well take them." He was almost hyperventilating now. "Jesus, Blair... We didn't do it on purpose, I swear. I swear it. It was just one of those freak storms, and the ground gave way, and then he was just... he was just gone..." "You didn't even try to dig him out." Blair felt numb. He pushed his hair back away from his face with both hands, trying to get a handle on the tremors that wanted to wrack through him. After a moment, he collected his thoughts sufficiently to say, "But that doesn't explain what's happening now. What's going on, Mike? Who's killing the members of your expedition?" A shiver of fear crossed the self-flagellation in Mike's eyes. "Johan had a younger brother named Lucien," he said, picking distractedly at the thread of the cushion beside him. "Lucien was a holy man in their village. They say he studied under one of the greatest shamans in the region, and that when she died, she named him as her successor in the tribe." He shook his head slowly. "I never really believed in any of that hocus pocus mumbo-jumbo, but he has... gifts, Blair. Powers that I don't understand." Blair stared at him, feeling a shiver of apprehension move through him. "You think that's who's coming after you?" Mike smiled grimly and completely without humor. "I think baby brother wants revenge." It was enough, and Blair found himself halfway to the phone before he even consciously realized his intention to move. He snatched the handset off the cradle and punched in a number from memory with shaking fingers, glancing back at Mike where he sat hunched into the corner of the couch. Mike looked forlorn, lost, as if he already counted himself among those who had met with Lucien's vengeance. Jim picked up almost immediately. "Ellison." "Jim," Blair said, knowing that Jim would be able to hear the rapid pounding of his heart. "I think you'd better come home." ------- Late afternoon sunlight spilled in through the windows of the loft with a leaden gleam, softened by the steely fingers of the rain that pattered gently against the balcony outside. Blair listened to it absently where he sat at the kitchen table, taking a sort of distant comfort in the sound. "How are you holding up?" Jim's voice was soft. He touched Blair's hair lightly, pushing it back away from his eyes as he sat down beside him. Blair smiled at him, inhaling appreciatively as Jim handed him a cup of his favorite tea. "Fine," he said, surprising himself when he realized that it was more or less true. He glanced over at the couch where Mike was sitting, studying the hard profile of his friend's face as he stared out the window at the rain. "At least we have an idea of who we're looking for now." Jim kept his voice low. "That's got to count for something." "Yeah." Blair glanced down at the composite sketch in front of him, fighting back the shiver that wanted to work its way through him at the sight of it. They'd spent the morning down at the station so that Mike could give his official statement, and he'd also agreed to sit down for a session with the police artist. Now there were copies of this picture circulating among every police officer in the city. The thought did not comfort Blair as much as it might have. Lucien looked to be a young man in his mid- to late-20's, tall and slender, with ebony skin and dark brown eyes and a face that looked as if it hadn't smiled in quite some time. There was nothing overtly threatening about him, but Blair couldn't suppress the small tremor that passed through him each time he looked at the picture. It was irrational, but he couldn't help feeling as if he knew this man. He knew for a fact that he hadn't met him before, but still, the feeling remained. It had been Jim's idea for Mike to come back to the loft with the two of them. The others from the expedition were being picked up for questioning, and he hoped that having Mike as the only accessible victim might make Lucien act precipitously before the police could close in on him. The thought made Blair distinctly nervous, even if there were plainclothes cops on the street outside and in the foyer of the building looking out for them. Mike had agreed to the set-up without enthusiasm, but without any marked rejection, either. A dark depression had fallen over him since his cathartic confession to Blair earlier that morning -- he seemed to fully believe that he was going to die, and that nothing they could possibly do was going to save him. It was an attitude that Blair was finding hard to stomach, and it was making him nervous as hell. "We're going to be just fine," Jim assured him, sensing his unease. "There are officers in the lobby, and Brown and Rafe are watching the street outside. No one's going to come up here without being seen." Blair nodded and took another sip of his tea, failing to mention the fact that he put more faith in his Sentinel's senses than in the combined might of the entire Cascade Police Department. Mike had agreed to sleep on the futon in the downstairs bedroom. Blair had made no secret of the fact that he and Jim would be sleeping together, but Mike made no mention of it. Perhaps under the circumstances, nothing would have caught him by surprise. The evening progressed rapidly, as the sky steadily darkened and the rain continued to fall. Thunder rumbled a distant promise to the east, and Blair figured that they'd have one hell of a firecracker before dawn. The thought made him uneasy as he remembered Mike's accounts of the storm in the African rainforest where Johan had died. Mike was asleep downstairs -- or at least doing a reasonable imitation of it -- when Blair crawled into bed beside Jim. They'd left a lamp in the living room lit in case Mike had to get up to use the bathroom during the night, and Blair found the unfamiliar half-light more unsettling than total darkness. Closing his eyes against it, he burrowed in against Jim's side, drinking in the warmth and solidity of the body beside him. Jim's arm slid around him and pulled him close. "Get some sleep," he murmured, pressing a kiss to the top of Blair's head. "I just talked to Rafe, and everything's quiet outside. Chances are, he won't even come here tonight." Blair didn't have to ask who he meant. "Thanks, Jim," he said, wishing he could take some degree of comfort from the words. The free-floating anxiety was back again, and it was worse now because he had a face to attach to his fears. Nevertheless, he felt himself begin to relax as Jim spooned up behind him, strong arms wrapping tight around him as their legs tangled together under the blankets. Part of him was listening intently for any sound from beyond the windows, but his efforts were impeded by the steady drumming of the rain. To his surprise, he actually felt tired, and with a yawn, he felt himself begin to drift to sleep. Almost immediately, he began to dream. He knew he was dreaming, but it felt more as if he had just closed his eyes and then opened them someplace else. He was in the jungle again, surrounded by looming trees, and as before, the shadows seemed to press in around him. The place seemed oddly familiar, and not just because he'd dreamed about being here the other night. In a way that he couldn't explain, it almost felt as if he'd come home. Somewhere in the far-off distance, he could hear Mike calling his name. He sounded scared, and Blair's heart did an immediate flip at the unexpected sound. What the hell was Mike doing here? Without stopping to consider the oddity of it, he took off into the jungle after his friend, bending his head to avoid the slap of low-hanging tree branches against his face. His feet didn't make any noise against the ground as he moved. He could have been walking for a minute or an hour when the trees thinned out ahead of him at the lip of a sweeping ravine. Tall grass waved in the wind with the repetitive motion of waves on the ocean, mesmerizing him, and it took him a moment to notice Mike's tall form moving out across the valley floor. He looked lost, and frightened, and Blair was just about to call out to him when he noticed the second shape moving forward into the ravine. It was a jackal, with a light tan coat and darkly slanted side stripes, barely visible in the shadows but for the bright white tip of its tail. Blair stared, feeling an unaccountable sense of menace steal over him. It was a jackal, Canis adustus -- common enough in these jungle regions -- and yet at the same time, it wasn't. The paradox disturbed him deeply. It was like looking at a black hole and seeing only the faintest smudge of darkness, when you knew full well that the thing had enough gravity and mass enclosed within it to rip a galaxy asunder. "Lucien," he whispered. The animal lifted its head sharply, tall ears swiveling back as it turned to look in his direction. Blair held himself very still, wondering what the thing saw when it looked at him. He sensed a deep wave of uncertainty rising from it, and curiosity, and hunger, and underneath it all was a deep, simmering rage. Chuffing softly, it turned away from him dismissively and started once again toward Mike. Dear God, Mike had no idea that he was being hunted. Or if he did, he didn't have any idea by what, or from which direction. Blair began to sweat, wondering what the hell he was supposed to do. Gruesome images rose in his imagination of what the jackal would do to Mike once it caught up to him. "No," Blair said, feeling sickened. He had to do something to stop this from happening. And since thought was action in this place, he was suddenly there, in the middle of the ravine, staring down at the small, striped animal crouching hidden in the grasses in front of him. Its dark eyes echoed with an emptiness that chilled him to the core. The jackal shrank away from him, lips pulling back from its teeth in a low growl that lifted the hairs along the back of Blair's neck. Its striped fur bristled threateningly, and for a moment Blair was convinced that he had just made a fatal mistake. He barely had time to reconsider his decision to challenge Lucien openly when the jackal gave a final growl and a snap of its jaws, then turned to dart away into the undergrowth. Blair opened his eyes with a small gasp, his heart knocking painfully inside his ribs. For a moment, he didn't know where he was, but then the details of the bedroom slowly came into focus around him. Rain pounded a steady cadence against the windows of the balcony downstairs, casting watery grey shadows across the room. "Blair?" Jim's voice was a soft breath beside him, heavy with concern. Blair barely heard him as he threw off the blankets and ran for the stairs. In deference to their guest, both he and Jim were dressed in T-shirts and boxers, which saved him a frantic few moments as he raced down to the living room and wrenched open the door to his old room. Mike was tangled in the sheets of the futon as if he had been fighting with them, breathing shallowly through his half-open mouth. He was lying on his back, limbs sprawled haphazardly across the bed, and his face was covered in a thin sheen of sweat. He looked unnaturally pale in the shaft of moonlight that spilled in through the far window, but he was alive. Shivering, Blair closed the door and went to sit on the couch nearest the balcony, shadowed by a nervous Jim. He sat for a moment, shaking, grateful that Jim seemed willing to give him the space he needed to regain his composure. Aside from the single lamp at the other end of the couch, the only illumination in the room was the nebulous shine of moonlight that fought its way in through the screen of the rain outside. Jim draped an afghan over his shoulders, and Blair snuggled into it gratefully, taking a deep breath to steady himself. He looked up into Jim's worried face and bit at his lower lip nervously. "I think I know what's going on now," he said. Jim waited patiently, rubbing his hand in small, soothing circles over Blair's back. It felt good, and Blair concentrated on the sensation for a moment, wondering if this was how Jim felt when he grounded him during a zone-out. "Tell me," Jim said at last. His tone was softly encouraging. Blair leaned against him, turning to gaze at the silver-on-black pattern of the rain outside the window. "Lucien is attacking his victims through the spirit plane, Jim," he said, pulling the afghan tighter around his shoulders. "That's why there haven't been any wounds on the bodies. He's using their dreams as a window; it's an old shamanic trick that dates back to ancient times." "You saw him?" "I saw his spirit animal." Blair shivered lightly at the memory, and Jim's arm moved around him, squeezing gently. Jim was silent for a moment. When he spoke, his voice was hesitant. "Blair, you had a dream..." "No, Jim." Blair knuckled at his eyes tiredly. "I know it's hard to believe, but you and I have both seen things over the past few years that we can't explain. We know there's more out there in the world than we can see and hear and touch. As much as we might not want to believe in it, it's real." He wasn't sure where his sudden certainty was coming from, but it felt right. "And it makes sense, if you think about it. The things I've been seeing, the constant fatigue, the free-floating fear... Hallucinations of those who have already passed beyond the spirit plane are very common in shamanic visions. And it would have been easy for a shaman of Lucien's caliber to find the key outside Sowers' house to let himself in with. I'm half willing to believe he locked up behind himself afterward just to mess with our heads." Jim looked dubious. "Well, if you're right, then we're probably never going to catch the bastard. If he's using the spirit plane as a murder weapon, he can be attacking them from anywhere in the world. Am I right?" Blair thought about it for a moment, then shook his head. "No. I mean, he could, but he isn't. Remember the ritual markings on the bodies? He was there, Jim, either before or after he killed them. Whoever this guy is, it's personal for him. He wants everyone to know that these guys aren't the sterling academics we thought they were." Jim mulled this over for a moment, rubbing lightly at his chin. "So if he planned to kill Mike tonight, then that means he's close by." The words sent a chill racing through him. "I'd think so." Blair glanced at the window again, wondering where Lucien was right now, and what he was thinking. The rain traced vague patterns against the glass of the window, dark against a darker black. His thoughts were interrupted when the phone rang without warning, freezing his heart inside his chest for a frantic moment before he realized what it was. He glanced at Jim, who squeezed his arm gently and got up to answer it. Blair tried to listen in on the one-sided conversation, but Jim's voice was too low as he talked to whoever was on the other end of the line. After a few moments, he hung up the phone and turned to Blair with a completely unreadable look in his eyes. "That was Brown," he said. "Looks like one of the neighbors down the street called 911 on a suspicious character she saw loitering in the alley behind her apartment building. The prowler matched Lucien's description, so the call was put through to the boys downstairs. Brown and Rafe just picked him up for questioning." Blair stared at him, not sure whether he should be delighted or dismayed by the news. Was it really Lucien? He tried reaching out to the nebulous web of images and feelings that had assailed him for the past several days, but now that he really needed them, the visions were stubbornly silent on the matter. He could tell that Jim was waiting for some kind of reaction from him. Taking a deep breath, Blair gave him a wavering smile. "I suppose we'd better get someone up here to sit with Mike if we're going to go talk to him, then." It wasn't something he was looking forward to. Truth be told, the thought of facing the shadowy demon from his dreams left him terrified and shaking. But he took strength from the love and trust that he saw shining in Jim's eyes. Jim believed in him; Jim had faith in him even if Blair himself did not. Maybe, just maybe, that faith would be enough. -------

SVS2-01: Eye of the Storm by Rushlight, Part 2