*********************

"Good morning, gentlemen!"

The cheery voice of Captain Banks stopped the two men in their tracks and they looked at each other, confused, before turning to look at the head of Major Crimes. Detective James Ellison had barely had time to sit down at his desk, and Blair was still taking off his coat.

"Captain? You sound awfully cheery for this hour of the morning. Slip something in your coffee, man?" Sandburg grinned at the grimace that slipped onto Simon's face.

"Sandburg! Just...you two just get in my office, all right?" Banks shook his head as he turned away and stepped back into the glass-walled room behind them.

The two partners looked at each other again, puzzled, and Blair asked, "Why's he being so nice?"

Ellison just shook his head and grinned, "He sounds like a man in need of a favor, Chief."

As the two men entered the room, Simon handed them each a cup of coffee. "Some mocha shit this morning, I don't know what it is. Tastes okay, though."

The detective took a sip as they all sat down, then smiled at the man looking nervous behind the desk. "What do you want from us, Captain?"

Banks tried to look insulted but his embarrassment was obvious. "Now, what makes you think, Jim-" He broke off the falsely cheerful voice as Sandburg smothered a laugh. A slight scowl appeared as he broke down. "Oh, all right. Quit laughing, Sandburg! Look, you both know the congressional race in district 4 is heating up. What not everyone knows, because they've managed to keep it out of the press somehow, is that Michael Davis has been getting death threats."

"I can name at least two unions and one mob family that aren't happy with the man," Ellison commented. Davis had been working for the DA's office for twelve years, and had been an Assistant DA for six of those.

"Yes, I know. He's had a number of high profile cases for his age." Simon took a gulp of his coffee and appeared to get himself ready for something. "Look, Jim, I know you don't like bodyguard jobs-"

"Aw, shit, Simon, not the babysitting detail!" Ellison wiped his hand across his face. "Can't the uniforms do that?"

Simon spread his hands in a placating gesture. "Normally, yes. But Richard Logan was sighted in Spokane a few days ago, and sources say he's headed for Cascade."

Jim sat up attentively when he heard the name. Logan was a professional hit man that they'd been trying unsuccessfully to nail for years. "You think Davis is his hit?"

Simon nodded. "That's the word. I need you on this case, Jim. If anyone can catch Logan, it'll be the two of you."

Ellison nodded perfunctorily. "You got it, Captain. We're there."

Banks handed him a folder. "Here are the details on Davis' schedule and locations for the next four weeks. You can pull up what you need on Logan. I suggest you contact Davis ASAP and explain the situation to him. Pull in Conner and Taggart once you've got things planned out and Sergeant Timmons will be in charge of the uniforms assigned to this task force." The captain stuck a cigar in his mouth for just a moment before removing it and looking at the two of them pointedly. "Well, what are you still doing here? Don't you have somewhere to be?"

***

An hour later found the two partners driving through an upper-middle-class neighborhood, heading toward the Davis home.

"I'm surprised that this guy doesn't live over in the Heights district," Blair commented.

Jim shook his head. "No, Michael's 'just a guy'. He grew up in this area and says this is where he wants to raise his kids, if he ever has any."

"You know him? I mean, personally? I didn't realize that."

"Chief, he's been an ADA for six years. Yeah, I know him." Jim's voice sounded distracted. "I went to high school with his big brother. Michael was adopted and his brother was a jerk and a bully. He developed a healthy respect for fairness and justice pretty early on, when he didn't get any."

The blue and white truck turned into a cul de sac and pulled up behind the police cruiser parked in front of the red brick house on the right. The trim of the house was nicely painted in browns and greens, and the lawn neatly manicured. A uniformed officer answered the door when they rang the bell.

"Detective Ellison? The counselor's expecting you," Officer Raymonds said as he let them in. He escorted them into a den down the hall, then retreated to continue his job of watching the neighborhood for suspicious activity.

A trim man in his late 30s, with jet black hair and sparkling brown eyes, stood up from his desk as they entered the den and held out his hand. "Jim! Good to see you again." After shaking Jim's hand he turned to Blair, "You must be Sandburg. I'm surprised we haven't met sooner, but I've heard good things about your work in Major Crimes."

Blair was startled at the warm greeting and shook the hand proffered firmly. "Thank you, Counselor-"

"Please, just Michael. I have a feeling we're going to be working fairly closely for a while." Davis smiled warmly and gestured for them all to have a seat.

// More than you know if this assassin succeeds, Michael, // Blair thought, but he managed to keep his reaction to himself. It had been a long time since he'd felt the subtle buzz indicating a pre-immortal, but there was no denying that Davis was destined for a long lifeline. Sandburg brought himself back to the conversation forcibly, listening as Ellison outlined the security plans for the congressional candidate.

"So we'll be staying here, Jim? I kind of expected you'd try and get me to go to a hotel."

"It's a trade-off," Jim admitted. "But honestly, you're a public figure, Michael. We can't just take you off and hide you anonymously in some hotel room. As soon as we take into consideration coming and going, the hotel room won't offer much more security. And it will have lots of strangers wandering around." He gestured around the room. "Here, you know all the neighbors. Anyone new coming in, we can spot them."

Michael nodded as Jim spoke, agreeing with the detective's assessment. "Well, I've never experienced police protection from this end, but I know enough about witness protection to suspect my spare bedroom is going to be in use." He smiled easily, content to let the police do their job. "Who's going to be my new roommate?"

Ellison cleared his throat and waved his hand between himself and Blair. "Sandburg and I will be moving in for a while, and you already knew that Michael, so quit grinning."

A puzzled expression crossed the lawyer's face. "Both of you?"

"We're partners, Davis," Ellison said simply. "We do the job together."

Michael raised his hands in a warding gesture and laughingly replied, "Whatever works for you, *Ellison*, but I've only got the one extra bed. Somebody can sleep on the couch if they want."

Blair glanced quickly at Jim, but the detective went on calmly, "Wouldn't be the first time we've had to share a bed on a stakeout, Michael. No problem."

***

"That was an interesting way to handle the question." Blair glanced up at his partner as they walked back out to the truck, his eyes sparkling with laughter.

Jim didn't pretend to not know what he was talking about. "What did you want me to say?"

"No, no, I liked it. Told him the truth, reassured him we'd be fine with it, without ever hinting that sharing a bed is normal for us whether we're on a stake-out or not. I'm cool with that." Blair grinned mischievously and ducked a cuff to the head by jumping quickly into the cab of the truck.

***

Blair had managed to stay focused on the interview with ADA Davis, but on the drive to the loft, the possible consequences of what he'd discovered consumed his thoughts. He'd managed to stay out of the Game for almost ten years now, while going to college at Rainier and traveling on anthropological expeditions to remote locations. Weren't many immortals out in the middle of the jungle. And he hadn't run across a pre-immortal in...well, almost a century. What would happen now? He'd kept his secret for so long - would it destroy what he and Jim had?

No, wait, he was just borrowing trouble. So Davis was a pre-immortal. Why should he let that interfere with his life? Davis wasn't going to die now, not with the Sentinel of the Great City protecting him. Probably Blair wouldn't be around when he died, and he'd be someone else's problem.

Except...Blair sighed internally, still keeping every hint of his inner conflict from his sentinel nearby. Except that he couldn't do that. *His* teacher could have walked away and left him for the first headhunter that came along, but he didn't. Just knowing what Davis would become - turning his back now would be like finding an abandoned baby and walking on, leaving it for the wolves. And Blair simply couldn't do that.

***

They both packed quickly and lightly once they were back in the loft. Jim walked into the bathroom while Blair was packing the toiletries, to find Blair holding a tube of lubricant and staring at it like it held the key to the puzzles of the universe.

"Blair?" Jim's voice was both puzzled and amused.

His partner jumped. "Jeez, Jim! You startled me."

"Well if you weren't meditating on the cosmic properties of that lube, you might have noticed me sneaking up behind you," Jim teased as he pulled Blair back against him, brushing his hair aside and nibbling on the back of his neck.

"I was just packing, and I started to toss this in the bag. But then I realized we're going to be living at Michael's for...well, for who knows how long. Guess we won't be needing this." He turned a wistful smile up at his lover.

*********

Jim heard the sound of a bullet being chambered and instincts had him piggybacking his sight onto his hearing even before his brain had processed the sound. His eyes registered the muzzle of the gun pointing out the window of a car in the road about the same time his ears sent the message, "Gun!" to his brain.

"Everybody down!" he yelled and dove toward Davis, but felt him jerk sharply just as Jim pushed him out of his chair. They tumbled together to the floor and the detective drew his weapon, rolled up to his knees, and aimed his gun out the window in one fluid motion. Damn! The car was gone. His attention immediately shifted to checking for injuries.

Sandburg was crawling swiftly over from where he'd thrown himself in instant reaction to Ellison's cry. A quick sensory sweep showed him to be unhurt, and his mind was allowed to leave the Guide and go on to the Next Thing. One glance at Davis told him that the assassin's aim had been true. The bullet had hit him in the center of his back, and as Jim reached out to turn him over, he knew that he'd failed. Davis wasn't going to make it. The bullet had exited his chest, leaving a messy hole that was pumping blood furiously. The bullet had gone through an artery, and there was no way to save his life. Jim watched, seething with anger, as a tiny glimmer of understanding flickered in the man's eyes before their light was extinguished completely.

***

It had all happened in a matter of seconds. Defining moments in one's life tended to be that way. Blair hadn't had time to think more than, "Oh shit, it wasn't supposed to happen this way, not in front of Jim, he'll never forgive me when he finds out I've lied-" and then he saw Jim pulling out his cellphone.

"Jim, no!" Blair cried and snatched the cellphone, feeling the necessary calm settle over him. This was his world, it had been his world for six centuries now, and he knew what had to be done.

"Sandburg, what the hell are you doing?" Jim growled. "We have to call this in, get someone on that car!" He reached for the cellphone, but Blair simply stood and stepped back out of his reach, shaking his head.

"I can't let you do that. It's going to be hard enough explaining to you when Michael comes back to life. I don't want to have to explain you calling in a shooting with no lasting wounds."

The look on Ellison's face with a mixture of shock and anger, and Blair sighed. He'd known this wouldn't be easy. "James," and that snapped Jim's attention in focus, because Blair only called him that in very serious or very intimate settings, "do you trust me?"

"With my life," was the response, given with no hesitation. Clear blue eyes looked up at him in confusion, but the anger was gone.

"Then believe that within fifteen minutes I will begin explaining this, but you can *not* call this in." The calm certainty he felt must have been conveyed to Jim, because he slowly nodded acquiescence. "I need to tell you two things before anything else happens. I. Love. You. Nothing that you will find out today can ever change that. And I'm sorry for keeping this from you for so long." Blair ached to lean over and kiss his lover, but he held himself back. It wouldn't be right now, not with this between them.

Blair sighed and looked around. "We need to get this blood cleaned up."

***

Blair's words snapped him back to the scene around him. "Sandburg, we can't clean up a crime scene!"

His partner faced him again and the continued calmness in his eyes was eerie. Blair had always had problems with dead bodies, had never in all their years together lost his horror of death, yet he stood there with blood all around them, calmly putting the cellphone down on the table.

"James, listen to me," and he couldn't *not* listen when the Guide used that tone of voice. "I know this doesn't make sense right now, but in a few minutes Michael is going to be living and breathing again and then how will we explain all this blood to Taggart when he relieves us this evening?"

He was right, it didn't make sense, but his partner was asking Jim to trust him, and he'd had too much first-hand experience at the bad things that happened when the two of them didn't trust each other.

"You're going to explain that statement to me?" was all Jim asked.

Blair nodded. "In fifteen minutes. Will you trust me that long?"

The look in his eyes was so sure, so knowing, and Blair's heart was steady, no spiking, no lies, not even the slightest obfuscating attempt at deception, that Jim could do nothing but nod once, sharply.

Blair sent Jim to change and soak his clothes in cold water while he got cleaning supplies for the floor. They would never be able to clean the floor enough to pass a forensics review, but if it was clean enough for the naked eye, it shouldn't have to go through forensics at all. When Jim came back in the room, he took over cleaning the floor without a word, his sentinel eyesight allowing him to find everywhere the blood had splattered. Blair took the bloody clothes off the corpse without batting an eye, and Jim...Jim felt more and more like he was watching a stranger. This calm, efficient man was not his best friend. This was...well, he looked like Blair, but he moved with more grace, and he wasn't just in the same room with a dead body, he was *handling* it, and cleaning blood off it like it was an everyday chore!

Jim kept working in silence, his confusion and worry growing by the second. He trusted Blair, he did, but what the *hell* was going on here?

Something caught the sentinel's attention and he looked up to see Sandburg wiping the blood off the chest of Michael's body. What was that?! It looked almost like - electricity, blue flashes of electricity just under the surface of the skin - the skin!

Jim jerked forward and couldn't help but reach his hand forward to touch Michael's chest. The unbroken skin on his chest, where there should have been a ragged hole. His fingers made contact and he jerked them back suddenly.

"Jesus! That felt like electricity! Blair, what the hell-" He stopped speaking suddenly when he heard a rhythmic thumping start up. His eyes couldn't open any wider, but they tried when he realized that Michael's heart was beating. But he was dead! That heart had stopped ten minutes ago! A sudden gasp drew his attention up to the face of the corpse in time to see the eyes of the "corpse" fly open.

"Michael! Oh my God!"

Michael coughed for a moment and would have fallen but Sandburg's hands were supporting him. Jim looked at his lover as if he'd never met him before. Whatever was happening here, Blair had been expecting it, and that made absolutely no sense. How did Blair know Davis was going to-what exactly *did* Davis just do? Come back from the dead? Was this some kind of shaman thing? Had Blair's spirit guide warned him about this? And if so, why hadn't Blair told *him*?

Dark brown eyes shot open and Michael's hands came up to clutch at his chest. He locked his gaze with Blair's and gasped out, "Blair? What happened?"

Sandburg looked more solemn at that moment than Jim had ever seen him, and his eyes held a weight that made him seem far older than his 29 years. His voice held no hesitation as he answered simply, "You died. You came back. Welcome to immortality. But it's not all it's cracked up to be."

Michael looked as stunned as Jim felt...and Jim felt like someone had just kicked him in the chest. He couldn't breathe for a moment. He heard Blair's voice in his head, a tape on infinite loop, "Welcome to immortality. Welcome to immortality."

A hand on his forearm, a quietly spoken, "Jim? I need you here, man. You need to hear this," and the breath he didn't know he'd been holding exploded out of his lungs.

"What the hell are you saying, Sandburg?" Something in his tone of voice, the old look in his eyes - something - had told Jim that Blair was 'welcoming' Michael into something Blair already knew...intimately.

"Look, this is a very long story, and it needs to be told in one sitting, but we have got to get rid of all of this blood first, before Taggart comes in for our relief this evening."

"Sandburg, a crime was committed here tonight! We can't-"

"Can't what, Jim? Cover it up? What crime? Attempted murder? Where's the bullet, man? It's over there, in the carpet." Blair pointed where the bullet had come to rest after passing through Michael. "Ballistics will know it went through someone's body before hitting that floor. Forensics will show it went through *Michael*. And a doctor will say he hasn't got a scratch on him. Jim-" haunted eyes stared into his own for just a minute, "You know, Jim, *you*know* why we can't let anyone find out about people who come back from the dead and have spontaneous healing!"

A gasp caused them both to turn back to Davis, who was staring at the blood on the shirt they'd removed from him. "You mean, I died. I literally died? A bullet went through...my chest?" He looked absolutely stunned, and he stroked his hand over his own solid chest, unbroken by anything resembling a bullet hole.

The gaze Sandburg threw Davis held understanding, sympathy, pity?

"Yes, Michael. You died. Your body healed and revived, and it always will, from now on. You'll never age again. The only wound you can receive that won't heal is separating your head from your shoulders."

"How...how do you know?"

Sandburg sighed, set the bloody towel he'd been using on the table, and looked at Jim, pleading for something - understanding, acceptance? -- then turned back to Davis and took a deep breath. "I tell you what my teacher told me, and his teacher told him, and her teacher, back millennia. As long as there have been people, there have been immortals. We don't know where they come from. They're always foundlings. They start as infants, they grow, they age, until the day they die, and the power of the Quickening within them comes to life and heals them. Decapitating an immortal releases the Quickening, and the immortal dies the final death."

"Your 'teacher', Sandburg?" Jim interrupted. "Who was the teacher who told you this crazy story, and why did you believe him?"

"Jim, I'm sorry. This is *not* how I wanted you to find this out. My teacher's name is Marcus Corellius, and he was born in Rome in 67 BC. I believed him, Jim, because he told me the story the same as I tell Michael - after my first death...in 1391."

What the fuck? "Sandburg, do you honestly expect me to believe you're 600 years old?" Jim was about ready to start searching for the drugs that someone must have slipped into their food this evening.

"Yes, Ellison, I damned well do. I expect you to believe it because I tell you it's true. I can kill myself if I have to, so you can watch me revive, but I don't see how it would help, since you've already seen Michael do it."

What could he say to that? Blair was right, he *had* seen Michael come back to life. With Jim's senses, there was no faking it - Michael had been dead. Heart stopped for over 10 minutes, damn it, a *hole* through his heart and an exit wound in his chest Jim could've put a couple of fingers in. Ellison had seen the hole, then he'd seen the unbroken skin. He'd felt the electricity underneath that skin and, if he was honest with himself, now that he knew what was going on, he understood another sensation he'd felt: that of muscle knitting itself back together underneath that skin. He broke off his introspection when he realized Sandburg was talking again.

"Your chest probably still hurts, Michael, and it will for a few hours while everything heals thoroughly. Go take a hot shower, that will help, and it will get the rest of the blood off you. I'm finished with the floor; I'll get these clothes washed and then we can sit down for something to eat while we go through the rest of what you need to know." Blair looked rather subdued, and even sad, for someone who'd just told another that he was going to be living forever. Jim would've thought he'd be smiling, giving good news like that.

Blair looked up sharply at Jim, almost as if he knew what his partner was thinking, and then looked over at Michael, whose face was still agape, but starting to take on a new, hopeful light. "There's more, Michael. Immortality isn't the gift you might think. But it's a long story and you need that shower. Go on."

Michael nodded slowly and headed into his bedroom, his hands still instinctively running over his chest.

Sandburg's sigh drew Jim's attention back to him, and he looked up at Jim with a sad smile. "The shower is more to give him a chance to be alone and wrap his mind around the whole concept than anything else. He'll probably spend several minutes cutting himself with a razor while he's in there, just to watch it heal."

***

Blair drew a shaky breath and looked into his lover's eyes. "I am sorry, Jim. This-"

Jim interrupted him. "How long we been partners?"

He was a little surprised. That wasn't the first question he expected to hear. "Three years."

"And how long have we been lovers?" Jim's gaze was icy and fiery at the same time, and Blair couldn't look away if his life depended on it.

"Two years," he answered with a slight tremor in his voice.

"When were you planning on telling me this? *Were* you planning on telling me this?"

"Yes!" A searing, questioning look and Blair dropped his gaze. "I was planning to. I just...never could bring myself to do it. I was afraid of losing you."

"I thought..." Jim's voice lost its fire and suddenly took on a tender, hesitant note. "We didn't talk about it much, but I thought you and I...I thought we were planning on forever here, Chief."

Oh, God, what was going through Jim's head? Blair looked quickly back up at his lover's face, only to find Jim staring across the room at nothing in particular, the muscle in his jaw twitching as it always did when he was agitated. "Jim. We are. We didn't *have* to talk about it." He put a hand lightly on Jim's arm and let out a soft breath when Jim didn't pull away. "I love you. I will love you until the day you die. I will love you until the day *I* die."

There was no response, so Blair moved around in front of Jim, forcing his lover to look at him, to acknowledge his presence. He brought both hands up to caress the taller man's cheeks and then continued quietly, "I would have told you. I would have had to. I won't ever get any older, Jim, and I won't give you up either. I would have had to explain it to you."

"You didn't trust me." The whispered words were all the more biting for their quiet and they cut into Blair deeper than anything else Jim could have said.

Notes:

Davis: ADA for 6 years
Associate with the DA's office for ~6 years
4 years college + 3 years law school
age of death = 37

Blair:
BORN 1369
DIED 1391

~~~~~~~~~~

To be continued...

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