Eye of the Storm

When Al's impatient nature wouldn't let him stay quiet and still any longer, I sighed and offered, "Want to practice your 'whammy' again?"

He stepped back enough to grin at me and rubbed his hands together gleefully. "Aaaaallll right! Who gets to win the Powerball this time?"

Head canted to one side, I gave him an exasperated look. "Something small, Al, or you'll disrupt their history too much. Which you know. And we're still going to stick with someone you know relatively well, one change without skipping, so you can decide before you start to make it easier to do."

Already intent on the various histories flickering and humming around us, he gestured toward one we both recognized without touching. "Gooshie's right here. Hey, why is that? That people we know are always close by?"

"If they were close by you when you were only a string like them," I said reasonably, "why wouldn't they be now? We may move around in this environment almost at random, but the most natural place for us to be is close to our families and friends, so that's where we are."

The cigar went in his mouth, as if he was stopping a comment, but he nodded slowly. "So what should I do for Gooshie?"

"Something that can be changed early in his life, so you can see the long term effect in the history." I thought a second. "Maybe help him with that chronic halitosis of his."

"Hah. Recommend a good dentist."

I ignored my partner's remark. "This is where knowing whose life you're working with helps. We both know Gooshie's anything but stupid, so why does he need to be told to visit a good dentist? Why doesn't he do it on his own? God knows people haven't exactly been shy about telling him he needs mouthwash."

That got Al to thinking, which was my goal all along. "Lots of people hate going to the dentist. Gooshie too?"

"Maybe more than hate if he's willing to put up with the jokes at his expense," I suggested.

"Afraid?"

"Remember your first visit?" I asked, knowing people of that generation often had reason not to be fond of dentists; it was before it occurred to many professionals that children needed a different approach than adults. The grimace on his face was all I needed to confirm that he'd gotten my point.

"Okay, Gooshies' phobic about dentists. What can we do to change that?" He walked with me as we moved toward the beginning of our friend's timeline, stopping when I did.

Turning him to face it directly, I stood behind him, hands on his shoulders, and bent close to his ear, though I didn't need to. I just wanted to. "Think about Gooshie as a small boy, being taken by his mother someplace he's never been before, someplace that smells funny and looks spooky weird, and nobody's telling him where he is. Or if they do, they've got *that* smile on their face, the one that says they're trying to keep you from having a cow in public."

The body under my hands shuddered. I must have hit that one too close to the bone for my lover, and I rubbed small, apologetic strokes into the tense muscles. All Al said, was, "Okay, I got it."

Reluctantly I moved away. "With luck, keeping that scenario in mind will bring you close to the moment it really happened. First time through, you're going to just watch and try to remember the details. Is it the dentist himself that scared Gooshie? Maybe a nurse who's good with kids helping him could make a difference. Did the dental work itself hurt too much? Why? When you think you've spotted something you could change to make it better without actually Leaping in, step back. Then take a deep breath, *focus*, and go back to where you started, seeing the new history you're working toward. Believe in it, make it as real as you can in your head."

He nodded, accepting the verbal run-down though he knew the routine as well as I did by now. Eyes squinted half shut as he concentrated, he reached for the time line and stopped when he realized I hadn't taken my customary place beside him. "Sam?"

"Time for you to solo," I said, stifling a grin.

"What!" Looking back and forth between me and Gooshie's lifeline, he was clearly torn between sheer delight and total panic.

"Well, why should I have all the fun?" I asked facetiously. Sobering, I nodded at the flow of color and light, almost seeing the Chief Programmer of the project in its surface. "Honestly, you can't hurt him if you keep it small; time adjusts to little nudges almost without a ripple. And since I'm not involved, I can repair it if things do go wrong, which is why I want you to feel comfortable doing it on your own. That way if I mess up sometime, you can put it back for me."

Forgetting the job at hand for a moment, Al swung round on me, concern on his face. "Has that happened? Did you make a change you shouldn't have and not been able to fix it?"

For a minute a thousand different faces swam in front of me, all of them asking me who the hell I was to be trifling with their lives, and I half-turned from my friend to hide my fears. "I can't always be sure of long term effects, Al. So far I've never done anything that wrecked a life or hurt more than it healed, but I can't lie and say that it could never happen."

"Like being a doctor, huh?" he said gently. "You do the surgery that can save a life knowing that it's always possible it can go wrong."

"Unforeseen complications," I muttered, using surgeon speak for those unpredictable factors that can change a tonsillectomy into a nightmare, like the patient unexpectedly being allergic to the anesthetic. A measure of the guilt I carried around lifted at his understanding, though, and I didn't resist when Al pulled me to him for a fast, hard hug.

"So now you got one hell of a scrub nurse helping you," he told me, then let go to return to Gooshie's life. With a deep breath and defiant lift of his chin, he plunged his hand into the history, face becoming distant and distracted as it filled his mind. A relatively short period of time later he moved back, though he could have stayed in the string, and shook his head, fingers going to the bridge of his nose as he thought. Then, without a word to me, he dove back in.

It was the first time I'd been on the outside of the process, and frankly, it was fascinating. From my perspective an aura of pure white light formed around Al, growing until he was lit up like the angel he'd been accused of being on more than one occasion during our first Leaps. The string he held soaked it up from him, reminding me of a blowtorch being held to a strip of metal as it spread from the point of contact toward both ends of the line. Small flashes of intense, pure color would occasionally dart through it, but not through the man causing it and suddenly the thought I'd been trying to pin down earlier jumped at me.

Visible light is white because it is a combination of *all* the spectrum of light possible, from ultraviolet to infrared. It is made of every possible color, all blended together.

Now, I knew that the universe Al and I lived in here wasn't real; it was a construct of my mind that I created to be able to interpret as best I could what had happened to me on that very first Leap, and all the consequent ones. That was why it was so malleable to our will. In the best tradition of science fiction writers and movie directors everywhere, I'd taken from all the knowledge I'd already possessed and made something new that fit the rules of existence as I knew them.

That didn't necessarily mean that I was *aware* of the reasons behind why things were the way they were; my subconscious had been in charge of the initial design, using what was on hand, so to speak. With a photographic memory and a number of advanced degrees to my credit, I have a lot of raw building material, most of which I don't remember unless I need to. I also have the natural human tendency to take things at face value unless I have a reason to question them, as I did now.

If I saw the histories as a flow of color over and through light, did that mean that all possible histories were in each one, like all possible colors were in white light? Was that why they could be changed? A Leap didn't so much put right what went wrong as it brought the better history into focus?

Excited by the possibilities, I circled around to watch what was happening from a different angle, as if that might help me determine if my blossoming theory was correct. For the first time I tried to actually see a string as a discrete entity, and thing complete in itself. Perhaps it was because I was trying so hard to be able to identify it as itself, or perhaps it was because my new perspective on its properties made it easier to compare, but when Al left it, I could *see* a difference in Gooshie's history. It was, for want of better words, cleaner and clearer, with the flashes of color more contained.

"Sam?" Al caught me by the elbow as I restlessly paced past him, still studying the string.

"I can see what you did to it. I mean, I don't know *what* you did," I started, distracted.

"Blew away a slip of paper with the name of the original dentist on it. Nozzle was a real nightmare; no wonder Gooshie hated dentists. His mom went to one a girlfriend recommended instead, and he was pretty good with kids. Actually was one of the first specialists in Pediatric dentistry," Al said smugly.

"I saw it change," I murmured, getting excited despite myself. "Not the events, not Gooshie, the string! It got better!"

Confused, but apparently caught by my enthusiasm, Al eyed the history himself. "Looks the same to me."

"Because you were in it when it happened?" I asked speculatively, mind not really on the question. Every theory, every principle I knew concerning the physics of light was whirling madly around in my head, but the one that kept coming to the front was the most basic: refraction. Light going through a substance changes speed and direction. Specifically, a beam of light can be refracted through a prism and broken back down into the colors of the spectrum.

"More like trying to identify a leopard by its spots when the spots keep moving," Al grumped.

"But we've both gotten to the point where we don't have to touch the ones we're familiar with to know who they are," I argued distractedly. "There must be some consistent pattern that we're unconsciously aware of."

With a mystified look on his face, Al shot back, "Or it could be plain old intuition, of which you have tons. Or a sympathetic thing because you've touched those particular histories so many times. Or..."

"Or we are seeing more in those ripples of color and light than just color and light," I interrupted stubbornly. "Like actual pieces of the possible histories in each one."

"What?"

Realizing I hadn't explained my idea to him yet, I quickly filled him in, almost stumbling over the words as I talked.

"So if all the things that could happen to a person, good or bad, is already there," he said slowly when I finished, "we're not correcting time so much as we're twisting the string."

"Exactly. Which explains deja vou, some psychic phenomena and maybe even regressive hypnosis. In fact there's a whole field of related subjects that could be accounted for from this."

"Hold up here a minute, Sam!" Al said with some exasperation. "Scientific curiosity aside, what *good* is it?"

If I had been stumbling over my words earlier, I was stumbling over my thoughts now, and I was pulled up short as I had many times in my life when other people couldn't see what was so obvious to me. "Think about it! We can know everything that could possibly happen to a person! Instead of fumbling around, hoping we don't make a worse mess than they're already in, we can pick what's best and simply guide their history that direction. No more guess work, no more taking chances with their lives."

Regarding me dubiously, Al did as I asked and thought about it, giving it his full attention. He flicked quick glances at the histories surrounding us, then asked slowly, "How can we 'read' them? The colors move too fast and the strings themselves are never motionless."

"I have an idea about that," I said excitedly. "What if I stand in a string, but don't Leap, sort of like what I did when we brought Jim and Blair halfway to us? See if I can be a prism for it to reflect through, breaking it down in the individual possibilities."

"Like making a rainbow of lives?" Al was very uncertain, now, chewing on his cigar and adjusting over and over a uniform that didn't need it.

"Yes! Like that!"

He was definitely unhappy, but he'd always been slow to accept an idea he didn't fully understand. "And you're going to do this right now, aren't you?"

"Why wait?" I asked reasonably, mind already racing to decide whether to do it with Gooshie or a stranger.

"To think of things that can go wrong!" he nearly yelled. "What if it can't go back to being a single string again? What if you make a person for each of those histories? What if after you've done it, you can never help that person again?"

He was right of course, which only made me angry, as it didn't change the simple fact that we had no way to know except to try. It wasn't as if this was a laboratory where we could provide a controlled environment for an experiment. "What if this is the way to put it all in balance, once and for all? Everybody, each and every person, not just the paltry few we can touch in a life time of trying."

"That's a lot of 'what ifs' and not a damned single 'for sure!" He was in my face now, practically on my toes, a finger hooked into my shirt pocket to keep me in place.

"Since when have there ever been any 'for sures' in any of this? All we've ever had to go on is guesswork, trial and error." I wasn't shouting. Exactly. But I was louder than I needed to be, and I made an effort to lower my voice and temper. "Look, I'm not going to do anything that different from what we're already doing. We're in and out of the strings as casually as walking through differing air currents in a storm, manipulating and influencing them, possibly in ways we can't perceive. This is no riskier than us just being here."

Frustrated, plainly worried, Al spun away from me and, without warning, took off. Simply left me where I stood to go... elsewhere... in this domain. He didn't Leap; I think I would have felt that. Although I was so shocked that he could have, and I might have missed it. But I didn't think so. I hoped so.

Self-righteously I got good and mad, and stayed that way for about five minutes. Then I tried to be reasonable, arguing with myself that he had valid concerns and I should respect that, even if I was right. That went on long enough for my heart to start pounding and my stomach to start hurting, which was a sure sign I'd been stupid if I'd only stop and admit it. When it finally sunk in that he was *gone,* and might never come back, I stopped thinking. Stopped everything, period. I crumpled into a heap and honestly don't remember another thing except chest-crushing pain until Al hauled me into his lap, hands frantically running over me.

"Sam! SAM! Where are you hurt?" he asked insistently.

That startled a snort out of me; typical of Al to assume I was injured physically. I hitched closer, digging my face into his thigh and muttered, "Doesn't matter. It's passing."

"Don't give me that," he said sharply.

"I'm just tired, Al," I said simply and honestly.

"Tired! Tired doesn't make you ball up like you're taking a bad beating." He tried to turn my head to see into my expression, but I resisted. I'd never been any good at hiding what I felt, and after all the years of Al being the only person could really see me, I didn't think I had much of a chance if he got a good look at my face.

"It does when you're as tired as if you *had* taken a bad beating," I said flatly. "We've been pushing ourselves since we found out about Sammy Jo."

"Oh. Uh, why don't you take a nap or something, then?" he suggested uneasily.

It was tempting. The main reason we slept now at all was because of the inherent human need to dream, and here the bed could be as perfectly comfortable and cozy as you wanted. Time was literally not an issue, and we usually slept until we woke up naturally, like we were on permanent vacation.

But I made myself sit up, head averted from his overly perceptive eyes. "I'd sleep better if we had her life put right." I didn't look at him; I couldn't just yet. Not until I came to grips with the fact that instead of the partners I'd hoped we'd be, I really was nothing more than his whore.

***

If Jim had thought the BookJunkie had been cluttered and crowded the first time he saw it, it was because he couldn't have imagined it the way it was now. With a popular fantasy writer holding court in the largest of the many rooms for a book signing, the store was full to overflowing with people, all of them chatting, eating, and milling around like a herd about to stampede. But he had to give them this: as a veteran of more than one security detail for a public gathering, he thought this bunch was distinctly civilized in comparison to most. Not a single irritated voice could be heard, nor was there any shoving going on, despite the frustration of so many bodies so close. If anything, people were using it as an excuse to joke and be silly, giving the party a distinctly merry air.

Blair was embroiled with Nick in the midst of the mob, having the time of his life, making a game out of guessing who was bumping into him by the way they did it. He kept saying Clinton every time it was a man, which Nick found hilarious for some obscure reason. It also gave the Shaman a way to stay close to him; this was the party where the shopkeeper would meet Sammy Jo for the first time.

They had debated over and over whether or not to prevent that chance encounter, and it certainly would have been easy enough. Lure Nick from the room at the right minute, be rude to her until she left the party, or simply distract them from each other when necessary would be all it would take.

Blair was reluctant to do that, believing that it would be wrong for them to interfere with two people falling in love. For himself, Jim wasn't too sure there had been love in the original history. Nick struck him as being one of those rare people who did what was right *because* it was right, like trying to find the murderer of a friend when the police had done all they could.

In the end they had agreed that since protecting her would be easier if she knew them and thought they were harmless, meeting her through the third party of Nick would be the way to go. So Blair had volunteered to help with the book signing, an event that took a great deal more preparation that Jim would have believed before getting dragged into it. Between job, school, and their night activities, they hadn't been busier since they had left Major Crimes in Cascade PD. Never particularly social, he'd still enjoyed himself simply by providing muscle power and organizational skills for his partner and their friend as they'd whirled madly through the days before the event.

Now it could be called a definite success, and the two book junkies behind it were seriously enjoying the party, talking to everyone, eating some of everything, and somehow keeping the gathering in order as they did. Even the guest of honor had dropped her distant, author-meeting-the-public air, and was happily showing off pictures of her grandkids to a few fans who were fast becoming more than that.

Jim himself mingled as little as possible, keeping his back to the wall, and smiling distractedly at anyone who tried to engage his attention. He was on duty, guarding his Shaman and watching for the interference they had felt more and more clearly as the days passed on this case. Even as happy as this party was, he would not be surprised if he picked up some trace, some hint of it here, so he stood sentry, eyes never at rest.

For that reason, he was the one who saw the flash of long, long blonde hair and beautiful hazel eyes so like Sam's as Sammy Jo hesitated at the threshold to the store. He was too far away to reach her, but Blair must have picked up on the change in his alertness. His head swung toward the door as if he could see her standing there, and he adroitly maneuvered their friend toward her. Moments later his partner laughingly punched at the shop owner over some implied insult, and, ducking away from it, Nick backed into Sammy Jo.

That was all it took. An apology, a quip about not knowing that the party was for klutz's anonymous, and the two of them were inseparable for the rest of the evening. When most of the crowd had gone home, when the writer and her new acquaintances had taken off for a bar to have a quieter conversation, when the caterer had packed up the leftovers and waved his goodbyes, Nick and Sammy Jo were oblivious to it all, standing in one corner talking and laughing, nearly nose-to-nose with each other.

Though a cleaning crew had been hired to take care of the remains of the party, Jim and Blair slowly worked at clearing away some of it, careful to make their stewardship over the new pair unobtrusive as they did. Once or twice a friend of Nick's called out a good night, or went up to him to compliment him on the party, but the shopkeeper hardly acknowledged them, much to the amusement of those friends. It wasn't until Jim saw the woman who had accosted him weeks earlier that he felt he had to act to protect the awakening romance.

With a murmured warning to his partner, he slipped up beside the couple and apologetically tapped Nick on the shoulder. "I'm sorry to bother you, especially now," he said, not incidentally blocking the view into their nook with his broad back, "but have you found a tenant for your upstairs apartment yet? The place Sandburg and I are staying isn't working out as well as we'd hoped."

Visibly tearing himself away, Nick blinked owlishly at Jim once or twice, then finally managed to say, "It's not? Sorry to hear that. Landlady not as tolerant as you thought?"

"Landlady's son, who is making waves because of us." A truth, but Mrs. Martin had insisted that she would deal with her offspring in her own way; this was just an excuse they had come up with to use if needed.

"No, it's still empty. I'm as fussy as Aunt Candy about who leases it. They're going to be my neighbors after all. Would you like to look at it?" Automatically, arm linked with Sammy Jo's, Nick made the sharp right turn that would take them to the narrow stairwell, leaving Jim to bring up the rear.

"You live upstairs?" Sammy Jo asked softly, her slight southern accent making the words musical.

"Wouldn't believe how convenient it is," Nick told her airily. "For one thing, no Boston commuter traffic, for another, I only have to get up about fifteen minutes before I have to be at work, and a time or two it was closer to three."

"I can see that," she laughed, going through the door he opened for them. "But it gives a whole new meaning for 'taking your work home with you.'"

"More than you'd believe." The storeowner paused on a landing, and gestured at the cartons of books lining the hallway to his rooms. "These are the ones I separated out to look over for my own collection!"

"So you spend all of your evenings comfortably ensconced with a book?" Sammy Jo murmured.

"I can be persuaded into doing other things." Nick stopped midway up the next flight and smiled down at her. "How about you Dr. Hurley? Do you spend your evenings fixing household appliances?"

"You wouldn't believe the money I save on never having to call repairmen," she shot back dryly. "Though the compressor for the refrigerator in a house is a good deal larger the ones I miniaturize for blood cooling units."

"Blood cooling unit?" Jim asked, despite his intentions of staying in the background to let the couple feel alone.

"Our good Dr. Hurley is a biomedical engineer," Nick told him proudly. "She designs, builds and tests machines to help with medical procedures and testing."

"There are certain kinds of surgery where it helps if the patient's core temperature, that is, how warm they are inside, is lowered and the best way to do that is by cooling the blood." Sammy Jo explained, her accent vanishing as she spoke about her profession.

"Heart surgery," Jim volunteered, then supplied at their raised eyebrows, "Medic in the army. I've kept current out of curiosity. I just hadn't given any thought to the machine they'd use for the technique." He reached past them to open the door to the third floor apartment, and waited for them to precede him inside.

One look told him that if he'd been serious about a new apartment, this wouldn't be it. The ceilings were low and sloping, the kitchen little more than a hot plate and dorm fridge, and the master bedroom had an extra long twin bed and wouldn't hold the king sized one he'd prefer. More importantly, there was only one other way out, and that was down a fire escape too narrow for a fast departure.

Sammy Jo loved it instantly, finding the odd angles and strangely shaped rooms charming and interesting. "I'd love to find the right things to put in each and every nook," she exclaimed. "A collection of handmade baskets here, for instance." She pointed to one corner, near a skylight, then went to the bench seat built in below it. "Oh, and this would be perfect for an indoor herb garden." Darting into another room, she crowed, "Look at the size of this bathtub!! It's fantastic!"

Jim had to agree with her on that. The bathroom itself was large enough to be a spare bedroom, almost, and the centerpiece for it was a huge, old-fashioned claw-foot bathtub, more than big enough to accommodate his long length. He looked at it a little enviously, but didn't say anything.

Nick eyed him as he bent to prevent hitting his head on the ceiling on the way back to the stairs, and said sympathetically, "Guess this place would be tough on you, huh?"

"It would harder for Sandburg," Jim answered, waiting on the landing for them to exit. "He hasn't any way of knowing where the ceiling is, and he'd have to learn the angles by feeling them out. Not that he couldn't, but he'd collect more bruises than I'd be happy with while he learned."

"Oh." Nick stopped, tapping his lower lip with a fingertip. "I forget he's blind."

Jim couldn't help grinning at that. "You should tell him that; it'd make his day."

"Blair is blind?" Sammy Jo asked incredulously. "How?"

"I was a police officer," Jim told her, carefully shading the truth the way he and his partner had decided, "and he was a grad student riding with me as an observer to gather data for his dissertation. To make a long story short, there was an explosion and an electrical fire, and I was trapped in it with two other men. Blair got us all out, but the brightness from the electrical arcs damaged his retinas." He made his way toward the lower floors, going slowly to give himself time to finish the story.

"He certainly has adapted well," she said with some puzzlement. "Were you already a couple when it happened?"

Not hiding the pleasure he felt every time someone linked them like that, Jim nodded. "We've been together, first as partners, then as life-partners, for some years now."

"Well that shows," Nick started, then came up short as he bumped into Jim's back. "What...."

Hardly hearing him, deliberately blocking the small space so that they had to stay behind him, Jim focused on his partner and the bitch that literally had him cornered in the nook directly opposite them. She had her back to them, and the door was nearly closed, but there was enough of an opening to see and hear her clearly.

"Soooo very lucky," she said brightly, maliciously. "To have him *stay* with you through it all. He's *such* a noble and honorable man; he'd *never* abandon someone in their darkest hour, when they *needed* a strong right arm for guidance and protection."

Listening to her impassively, hands folded over the top of the cane he had planted between them like a dare, Blair told her firmly. "I know I'm lucky; luckier than you can imagine, being completely without love or the heart necessary to feel it."

"Love?" she chirped, ignoring the insult. "Well, I have to admit that I haven't had much experience with it yet. Is it really, really worth it? Like everybody says? Worth having total strangers look at you and *know* how you spend your nights? And some of your days I bet. Jim looks to be *so* virile and strong." She oozed closer, lowering her voice as if in confidence. "Would you mind if I asked a personal question? Is it as good for a man to be under all that size as it is for a woman? I *love* the feel of being helpless and vulnerable for a big, strong man, love that tiny thrill of 'what if he *hurts* me.'"

From behind him Jim heard wordless protests at the woman's venom, and felt a push from Nick. "No," he whispered very softly, turning his head enough that they'd be able to hear. "The last thing Sandburg would want is for someone to come to his rescue. He fights his own battles, and he has enough sense to yell for help when he needs it." Inside he thought, *Please have enough sense, Chief. Please. Please.*

To his complete surprise, Blair began to chant quietly, "With Heart's Blood He Is Bound To Me, With Heart's Desire I Lay Claim To Him, With Heart's Own Strength I Cleave To Him." Then he added in a perfectly normal voice, "I don't know what you're selling, but I'm not buying. If you don't have anything better to do than to talk to someone who'd rather you weren't in the same state with him, may I suggest a fast train to hell? I'm sure you'll find a home for yourself there."

It took all Jim could do to stifle a chortle not only at the words, but at the comic way the woman reared back from Blair, as if he had slapped her. "I beg your pardon," she stuttered, face flushing in anger.

"You can't have it." Lifting his cane a few inches, Blair tapped it on the floor, indicating his impatience. "Now, move!"

"I don't... who the hell... You *cannot* talk to me like that!" She spat at last, fists clenching.

That was too much for Nick, and he shoved hard enough at Jim to make him bump the door, sending it farther open. To cover that, Jim said in perfectly normal tones, "... check with Sandburg to make sure." He went through it, letting Sammy Jo and Nick follow him, "But it's a bit cramped for the two of us I think." As if just seeing his partner, he went on. "There you are. Good. Nick took me up to the third floor; doesn't look like it'll work."

Smoothly Jim eased around the furious woman in front of his partner, forcing her to take a step back to keep from being bumped aside by his shoulders as he did. Reaching to casually tuck a strand of hair escaping from its restraining braid back into place, he leaned back onto the wall next to Blair. "Want to go up and see for yourself?"

Sammy Jo, bless her, piped up, "If you two aren't interested, I would be." There was a quick spark of pleasure from Blair, echoing the one sending the hairs on Jim's arms straight up. History had just changed; until the time she had come up missing, Dr. Hurly had stayed in on-campus housing at BU the first time.

The woman who had been tormenting his partner all but hissed, then turned on her heel and stomped indelicately away. Watching her go, the four of them sighed nearly in unison, then Sammy Jo said thoughtfully, "Ever wonder why the Bible says, 'thou shalt not suffer a *witch* to live,' instead of bitch?" Startled into laughing, Jim was relieved that Blair lost it as well, sinking back against him for support as he did.

A second later Nick gasped, "Because they were afraid of a shortage of fertile females?"

That broke up Sammy Jo, and she wrapped a hand around his forearm to hang on as she did. "Two points," she wheezed when she could. "Make you a deal, I won't make testosterone cracks if you don't make PMS ones!"

"Done," Nick said promptly. "Neighbor?"

"Neighbor," she answered firmly.

They stared at each other, grinning foolishly, and never noticed when Jim and Blair slipped out of the store.

***

Bracing myself to stand, I asked as nonchalantly as I could, "I guess we might as well get to work on it. We haven't taken a look since we spoke with Jim and Blair, and that by itself might have been enough to make changes."

Putting his hand on my arm, Al held me in my place from where he sat cross-legged a foot or so away. "No hurry. As you've told me often enough, from here time doesn't matter. It's more important to be ready than to be fast. What are some of the other things you're always spouting off with?"

There was bitterness and leftover anger in the words, but I honestly didn't have anything left to answer it with. So I shrugged and sat still, waiting for him to decide what we were going to do next.

Apparently we were going to do nothing; he sat there smoking like a steam engine, alternately glowering at me and giving me these puzzled 'takes' as if he weren't sure who he was looking at. I didn't care to enlighten him, didn't care to talk for that fact, and I crossed my arms over my knees and put my head down on them, letting my thoughts ramble where they would.

"You really are tired, aren't you?" Al asked finally.

The answer to that was obvious, but I um, hummed at him. There was no reason to mention what kind of tired it was; he'd learn sooner or later that here the body reflected what was happening to the mind. Or maybe he wouldn't; he'd learned the art of living in his head a long, long time ago and probably had trouble distinguishing it all.

Abruptly, as if continuing a conversation we'd been having all along, he said, "Beth and I used to fight, real doozies, especially when I was first repatriated. If I thought I was right, I'd go storming out of the house and stay at the Bachelor Officer's Quarters for a couple of days, maybe cat around on the side. Discretely, very discretely. I didn't want other people whispering about our marriage behind Beth's back. But I would miss her, miss the kids, miss having family, you know? So I would come crawling back, flowers in hand, and apologize, groveling as much as she needed me to, we'd make up and things would be okay. Let me tell you, make-up sex is about the best.

"If I was wrong, I'd still storm out, but then I'd go mope at the Officer's club until she came looking for me and dragged me back home, fussing and forgiving every step of the way." He snorted, attention turned inward to the memories he was re-living.

"It wasn't until the twins were born that it sank in that I was leaving to prove that I could, that I didn't have to be there, and that she took me back time after time because she had to know I needed her. That's what it was all about for Beth, being needed. She kept her nurse's cap, but she really loved being a housewife and mother. Even loved being a Navy wife, and let me tell you, that takes a special woman. After that we didn't fight so much, and she used to crack jokes about me high-tailing it out when our tempers started rising."

As Al talked, I turned my head to look at him, wondering what our lives now had to do with his marriage. "You didn't do that when we worked on the project together," I said when he was done. "In fact, I don't remember you doing that in any of the marriages you had in our history."

It was his turn to shrug, except he used a hand to do it, eloquent in its dismissive arc. "That's because the first time I left in each of those, it was the only time I did, whether they threw me out or I took off on my own. The marriage was over as far as I was concerned because I wouldn't go back. Oh, I'd tell myself it was pride, but it wasn't. I didn't miss them, didn't need them.

"When I worked with you, and we'd argue, it was different. We were guys, duking it out the way guys are supposed to, and the loser was supposed to be a good sport about losing and the winner was supposed to be gracious about winning. Except, of course, what we usually did was yell at each other until either one of us convinced the other or we found a way to compromise."

Half-smiling at the accuracy of that description, I added, "The first time I knew Ziggy was going to work the way we needed her to was when she 'overheard' us doing that and asked if all negotiations were carried out at top volume."

Al snerked and hitched across some of the space between us, turning serious again. "I'm all mixed up on this, Sam; I shouldn't be, I know, but I am. It doesn't seem right to shout at you now, but stomping off isn't right either. Can't for the life me tell you why, but it gave me the willies to get too far away."

Too shocked to know what to say, I inanely blurted the first thing off the top of my head. "Because we're lovers now?"

He snorted, and stuck that stupid cigar back in his mouth as if afraid of what would come out, and I studied him very, very carefully. A lot of different things flashed through my head: my Leap into a military school as a boy accused of being gay, my first Leap as a woman, Al's history of single-minded pursuit of females despite being abandoned by them all his life, our brush through the lives of those two lovers earlier. Slowly I said, "There's a part of you that thinks being gay means being less of a man, isn't there Al?

He was the one who couldn't look at me now, and he tugged and picked on the sleeves of his dress jacket. "We're not gay," he said shortly. "The whole thing about whether it's genetics or life experiences aside, what we do hasn't got much to do with sex and a hellova lot more to what we are to each other."

"I'm not going to argue labels with you," I answered carefully, "because you're right about one thing, they don't matter between us. What matters is whether or not you believe being lovers doesn't change what we are. Show us places in ourselves we hadn't paid attention to, yes, I can't deny that. But are there really any differences where they count?"

"Yes, no, I don't know!" he snapped. "I told you I was mixed up!"

"I think I'd be worried if you weren't," I said truthfully. "I know you're adaptable, Al, but this," and I waved at the universe in general, "is something of an extreme."

He put his hand over his eyes, and muttered something I couldn't hear. Then he looked at me, face as stubborn as I've ever seen it and stated bluntly, "It's not fair to you. You might think I haven't noticed or don't care that you're always the one turning over, but I have and it isn't fair."

"What is there to be fair about?" I asked, truly meaning it. "I haven't got a problem with being on the receiving end. This may have escaped your notice, busy as you were planning your guilt trip, but I like it. No, I take that back, I love it. If that's the way we make love for the rest of our lives, I wouldn't complain, although I have to admit I thought a man with your..." I deliberately let my words trail, delighted to see his eyes narrow as he filled in the blank with various words, "... experience wouldn't be quite so vanilla."

"Vanilla."

"White bread," I clarified.

"You're accusing me of being vanilla." He sounded astonished, as if he couldn't believe someone doubted his expertise.

"Mundane." Might as well rub salt in the wound, I thought.

"If you say boring, Sam Beckett," he threatened, unfolding and crawling on top of me, knocking me to my back. "I'll..."

"Prove to me you're not?" I challenged.

"Hah! As if you have any basis for comparison, Mr. Eagle Boy Scout Altar Boy," he snorted, then tenderly kissed me, both apologizing and agreeing to let the subject go for a while.

I was panting by the time he left my lips to nibble on my ear, sending shivers and tingles darting around each other up and down my spine, giving me that funny feeling in my stomach that isn't quite desire - yet. "This may have... ah, escaped your notice, Admiral Calavicci," I murmured, trying not to gasp, "but I'm not as innocent as I used to be. Why is that, I wonder?"

Leaving my ear for my neck, biting me there, then sucking carefully on each bite, Al paused long enough to whisper, "Just lucky?"

"Or about to get that way," I answered, then had to give up trying to talk. What he was doing to me was short-circuiting my ability to think coherently, for which I was very grateful. By the time his mouth found its way to the top button of my shirt, I was fighting not to grab his head and direct it to my nipples which were already hard, aching and waiting for him.

Unexpectedly he cupped his palms over them, not touching, but arching over them closely enough for me to be able to feel the heat, the promise of having them caressed. "Al..." I moaned, not able to ask any clearer for what I wanted.

He ignored me and worked his way down my front with tiny licks, undoing buttons with his teeth as he went. One of these days I was going to *have* to get him to teach me that trick.

Though I was exposed from throat to waist when he was done, he didn't take off my shirt or moved his hands from where they rested on the fabric, teasing me almost unbearably with their nearness. Instead he started back up the way he came, nipping this time, until he was back at my mouth and kissing me deep and hard. It was impossible for me not to start rocking against the sturdy thigh between my legs in time to the thrusts filling my mouth, promising at least some relief for my erection.

Al answered with hip movements of his own, rubbing his hard-on into me, making me crazy as only the feel of that steely length can. Even as I locked my ankles around one of his legs so I could shove up harder into him, I was making begging noises, not sure exactly what I was begging for. He answered by rolling to his side, and I instinctively went with him, wrapping my arms around his shoulders as we went.

It effectively trapped my hands in place, but gave him the freedom to touch me where and as he wished. All he did was knead gently at the area around the screaming points on my chest, causing the muscles there to flex and ripple, distantly tugging on the nubs he was teasing. The very delicacy of the of the sensation was a shocking contrast to the power we were using to grind together, and, amazingly, all the minute sparks of pleasure from it gathered explosively, hurling me over the edge without warning. I muffled a shout into Al's mouth at the first spurt of my climax, and he finally, finally flattened his palms, causing a bolt of ecstasy from the neglected buds that made the second spurt feel as if the first had never happened. Helplessly I writhed under the force of it, clinging to my lover with all I had. When the surge of joy released me into pleasant mindlessness, I whimpered Al's name, too weak to do anything to help him find the same release.

That was all he needed, though, and he froze in place against me with a last push that threatened to bring us skin to skin past the clothes we still wore. Silent except for a barely audible, 'love you, Sammy,' he rode out the shudders from his coming, then melted onto me, breathing harshly.

He was the helpless one, now, and I comforted him with tiny, soft kisses everywhere I could land them. "I swear to you," I told him quietly, "that if I had or have *any* problems with our lovemaking, I'll tell you. This doesn't make me feel like less of a man; if anything, I've never been surer of my masculinity in my life. All I can think of, all I can feel, when you touch me is how hard you make me, how much I need to come. No worries about performing; no worries about satisfying you. Just you and what you do to me."

Sighing, he found my mouth and tasted it thoroughly before answering, "You're supposed to say stuff like that before sex. Now how am I supposed to show you what hearing that does to me?"

Cuddling as close as I could get, I whispered into his ear, "You'll think of something."

***

The partners paused on the sidewalk immediately outside, ostensibly to check the weather because of the rising winds and distant boom of thunder, but in reality to allow Jim to scan for anyone watching the building. Or them.

*Clear* he mock-whispered, reverting to the mode of communication they had used as mercenaries.

*We go to ground?* Blair answered in kind.

*Right now. Anything at Mrs. Martin's you might miss? I don't think we should go anywhere we can be found.*

Though he didn't need to, Blair slid into position for Jim to guide him. *Then you don't think her showing up was a co-incidence, either. Or that she's just a voracious, selfish woman who'll do what she has to get what she wants, and what she wants at the moment is you.*

Leisurely they sauntered toward the T stop, heads close as if sharing a private spoken conversation and unaware of their surroundings. *It's possible. We met at the bookstore originally, and it makes sense she might frequent the place often enough to know about the signing. And when she saw you alone she decided she might at least get revenge for you brushing her off me so thoroughly last time. But even if she didn't set my teeth on edge, her timing is too perfect; she shows up the day we meet Nick and the day we meet Sammy Jo.*

*Then we've been made by the other Leapers.* Blair's mental voice sounded worried.

*Not made, exactly, or they would have been at our doorstep,* Jim disagreed. Taking advantage of a dead street lamp, he expertly sidestepped into a partially opened gate to someone's driveway and melted against the wall, taking Blair with him. Freezing in place, he listened and watched intently, then nodded an all clear. From the ever-present backpack, his partner took out the few items needed to help them make the switch from average citizens to street people.

Slipping off his dress shirt and rolling it for the pack, Jim brought out a beret from a back pocket to hide the smaller man's braid as Blair broke down his cane and stowed it in a crack near the gate. *But if they know someone is trying to 'right their wrong,* his Shaman said thoughtfully, *they would look for who wasn't there the first time and be prepared to divert them. Just like we're trying to divert them away from Sammy Jo.*

Transformations complete, they resumed walking, but this time used back streets that were unusually empty because of the threatening storm. *They saw us and decided to divide and conquer,* Jim agreed. *Women come between partners more surely than any thing else in the police department, even race or corruption. First she tried to take me away from you, then she tried to drive you away. My guess is that if we have another run-in with her, she'll either come on to you as if she's apologizing, or she'll want a threesome.*

Shuddering, Blair thought about that for several blocks, not questioning Jim about their destination. "Not even in my worst table-leg days," he asserted out loud, "would I have been able to take her company long enough for that to work. I had standards, much as you might scoff at the idea." Shooting him a grin that was filled with male wickedness, he added, "And I have no idea what my reaction would have been if you had ever suggested a three-way."

The idea pulled Jim up short mentally, and he fell silent to consider it for as long as it took them to reach the lair he'd previously prepared for this contingency. Hesitating out side of it long enough to triple check that they hadn't been followed and that this hideout wasn't under surveillance, Jim led his partner through a maze of storage sheds and abandoned building supplies to a concealed door and into what was to be their home for the next day or two.

"Not bad," Blair said calmly, and it wasn't in comparison to some of the places they hidden. A single room that had been blocked out of a basement and forgotten for some reason, it was dry, warm, and free of rats. It didn't smell too musty, and had two exits that could be easily spotted, plus a third, less obvious one. There was even a single window, little more than a slot really, that opened into a tangle of underbrush from a neglected garden that let in swirls of fresh, rain freshened air.

"We're going to a heel-and-toe watch on Sammy Jo?" Blair asked, referring to guarding her, at a distance as much as possible, twenty-four hours a day until the danger had passed, as he put down his pack on a pallet of sleeping bags and blankets.

"Not until tomorrow," Jim confirmed, trying to be cheerful about it. Prowling the perimeter, he checked his tell-tales to guarantee their hiding place hadn't been compromised since the last time he'd been there. "Having her move into Nick's house, as well as having their agent get into her bad graces, had to throw a glitch into their plans. They're going to have to re-group and that gives us time for a good night's sleep and big breakfast before we start standing watch."

Dropping onto their bedding cross-legged, Blair scrubbed at his face. "There's something else we should do, too," he said firmly. "Do we have facilities available for washing up?"

Curious, but pleased he could provide such a creature comfort for his partner, Jim answered, "As a matter of fact, yes." Scooping up towels and soap from a small box of supplies, he moved aside a panel next to a corner, then led Blair down a long, narrow access hallway filled with piping and electrical conduits. At the end of it, he stopped, listened carefully, then moved another panel to one side so they could enter what looked like a team locker room, complete with a medical sized jacuzzi.

"Rehabilitation Center than went under," he explained briefly. "Creditors are fighting over it, and in the mean time the utilities are still on because of the other paying tenants in the building - no separate meters. Whoever's in charge has either forgotten about the stuff down here, or is using it himself on the sly, too, though I haven't seen any sign. All the businesses are overhead, and no one's here this late except maybe cleaning staff, and," he paused to concentrate, "no sound of them in the building."

"This is really great!" Blair enthused, taking a slow turn in the middle of the room to look at everything. "Finally enough hot water!!"

"Thought you might appreciate it." Putting the towels on a handy bench, Jim joked, "Got any locker room fantasies? You'll never have a better opportunity."

Chuckling, Blair started undressing, handing his clothes and knife to Jim for safekeeping, but keeping his beret on to keep his hair dry. "Now that you mention it... shall I drop a bar of soap in the shower?"

The image sent a pang into Jim, but he hid it, too on edge from their confrontation at The BookJunkie to be able to switch from Sentinel to lover. "That or we could play Headcoach and Student that just has to pass gym."

"You're a little old for the student role, aren't you?" Blair asked innocently.

"The hard part would be convincing the audience that I was failing gym," Jim shot back.

Blair gave him the finger, which warmed Jim's lips into an almost smile, then slid into the hot water of the jacuzzi. "Ah, man - we are going to have to buy one of these. The wheel wasn't the first important human invention, or even the blade, it was hot water for bathing."

"No argument from me. Though comfortable beds rank right up there."

"Amen." Though they were in no particular hurry, Blair washed quickly and thoroughly, inside and out, then stepped out into a warmed towel and warmer arms. The embrace was as fast as his towel drying, and minutes later he was dressed, taking Jim's clothes and gun as the older man stripped to bathe.

It didn't bother him to step into the used bath water. Jim knew this tub didn't just re-circulate but refilled constantly, with surface skimmers helping to keep the water fresh as it drained. Sighing as he sank into it, he mumbled, "We could tear out the kitchen and make a bigger bathroom."

"Why not?" Blair answered, grinning. "It's either that or replace the couch with a hot tub."

"That could work." Much as he wanted to soak away the lingering stress from the evening, Jim only allowed himself three minutes before he, too, quickly soaped up, though he didn't refuse a fast back scrub when Blair offered.

Less than fifteen minutes total went by before the two of them were dressed and back in their hideout, panels and alarms back in place. Mystifyingly, instead of climbing into the blankets for sleep, Blair dragged the biggest sleeping bag into the middle of the room, then sat cross-legged in the center of it, taking off his beret to undo his braid. While Jim stood by the window, contentedly admiring, Blair finger-combed his curls until they flowed over him like another garment, then slipped off his shoes and dug a small bag of sweet-smelling herbs out of a pocket. "Are these too strong for your sense of smell?"

After a sniff, Jim answered no, then Blair scattered a pinch to each of the four corners of the room. Recognizing it as the beginning of a ritual, Jim asked in confusion, "Now?"

"Now," Blair confirmed serenely. "Chances are we're going to be too busy and events are going to move too fast for us to have another opportunity. And I do believe this is important, Jim."

Accepting that it felt right to him as well, he said in a mix of resignation and amusement, "What do you need me to do?"

"You've already done parts of it, though I guess neither of us knew at the time that it was the beginning of a ritual for us," Blair answered seriously, if a bit mysteriously. Then he intoned the words he'd first used in counter attack at the BookJunkie. "With Heart's Blood He Is Bound To Me, With Heart's Desire I Lay Claim To Him, With Heart's Own Strength I Cleave To Him."

Holding up the finger to show the small, white scar made by the stone knife he carried everywhere, Blair said, "Heart's Own Blood we spilled for each other to mark our beginning together as more than partners or friends. A visible mark that proclaims to us, if nobody else, that we are *together.*"

He kissed the precious flaw, then repeated with a slow, sweet smile that sent a flush of heat through Jim's entire body, though only his cheeks hinted at it, " With Heart's Desire I Lay Claim To Him. My first reaction, our first reaction when that she-demon tried to come between us was to unite completely for the first time, making it totally clear to both of us that were committed to staying together."

Though a smile stayed in place, his eyes grew bluer, darker than Jim had ever seen them, and he finished, "With Heart's Own Strength I Cleave To Him. You made a joke about a virgin sacrifice; well, it's not a joke, really. A sacrifice in the truest sense of the word is to give something of your own that is valuable to you to honor or aid that which you hold highest. I want to give my virginity to you because there is nothing more important to me than you and our love, and I need to show you that."

The warmth in Jim became lava hot, scalding him in private, hidden places. He didn't have to ask if Blair was sure he wanted to do this; that vibrated between them as surely as their awakening passion. But he did have to make sure they were both on the same page; he couldn't bear having any misunderstanding come from this. "Chief, this sounds more like a commitment ceremony than a ritual to ward off evil."

Blair must have expected the question; his calm air never wavered despite what could be seen as reluctance on Jim's part. "Know your enemy - how can we fight evil if we don't have a clear definition for what it is? To me, take what you and I have, what Al and Sam share, posit the diametric opposite, and that would be the essence of evil to me.

"The absence of love, joy, understanding, companionship, self-sacrifice, sharing, respect, honor - all the positive things that we believe in and work for - is part of what evil is. Confirming to ourselves in the most unmistakable, most believable way possible that those concepts are part and parcel of us, both as individuals and as partners, is the *best* possible warding ceremony I can think of. It'll make us stronger and more confident, give us the will to face the shit that's about to hit the fan."

A snarl that could have been a clap of thunder sounded in Jim's ears, agreeing with Blair's words, making his heart and soul leap in confirmation of the rightness to what his lover wanted. But a small part of his mind, the same that made him question the idea in the first place, replayed the venomous words fired at his partner earlier. He had to point out, "We've both spent enough time on the streets both as cops and mercenaries to know that evil usually works by seeping into cracks, inflaming small wounds. If there is a flaw in what we have that can be exploited, you can bet it will be found and used against us. Assuming we even survive it, what will we use to heal it if we don't have something precious like your physical innocence to fall back on?"

That objection caught Blair off-guard, and he dropped his head to shield his face with his hair. "You think there's a problem between us." It wasn't a question, but a statement of fact.

"You don't?"

It wasn't an accusation, but Blair chose to act as if it were one, killing their burgeoning desire. "I take it you think we should have full disclosure between us, then. Despite the fact you were to one to get on my case for letting a girlfriend read my journals so I could say I'd been totally honest with her."

For the first time since Blair sat down on the bedding, Jim moved away from his post from under the small window, coming to kneel at the very edge of it, as if in supplication. "Chief, I've had so many secrets my life, even from myself, that it's an ingrained habit almost impossible to break. But for you, I've tried, will try, over and over to drag them out."

"You mean I drag them out," Blair muttered.

"Am I going to have to remind *you* that I was a Ranger?" Jim said as persuasively as he could. "Do you honestly think anybody could get me to talk if I didn't want to on some level or another? If I bitch or fight, it's because of the potential for damage most of my secrets have."

"Yeah, like what?" His partner sounded frustrated now, and Jim couldn't back down, despite wondering if this had been such a great topic to get off on.

"Like I have no idea how to handle being 'out' with you. Here in Boston it's been great having people see us as a couple, being treated as your life-partner and better half. I like it a hell of a lot more than when I had a Mrs. Ellison for people to acknowledge, and that's with the constant worry of running into a homophobe. But back in Cascade? Or with someone who knows us? I'm torn between wanting to take out full-page ad in the paper to announce our partnership and hiding it behind closed doors and euphemisms. With the history I've had of hiding important things about myself, which one do you think edges out most of the time?"

Blair was silent a very long time, running a single lock of his hair through his fingers over and over. Finally he said bluntly, "You also have a habit of wanting your life to be just as it was, rather than deal with something you don't want."

"You can't possibly," Jim started.

Blair interrupted him with, "No, no, of course I know you don't want *me* to go away; but maybe you want *us* to go away."

Twice before in his life Jim had had to make a decision about his senses; once to accept them, then to keep them. Both times he had fought that life-altering process, made uncertain and wary by the voice in his head whispering 'freak' and the legacy of a father who wanted him to be normal before anything else, including happy.

Yet he un-hesitantly jumped off a cliff higher into a fear much greater because Blair was the one for whom he really made the decision. "I wish I had had the courage and understanding for there to be an 'us' the day I met you. Good as those years were, I can't help but wonder how much better, much easier and happier they would have been if you had slept upstairs instead of down."

Like the moon peeking from behind a cloud, Blair lifted his head enough to peer at Jim through his lashes. "Really?" he asked, sounding shyer than the sentinel would have thought his partner capable of.

Leaning over to push the curtain of hair to one side to cascade down the hunched back, Jim whispered, "Really. And it makes me all that much more grateful for where you sleep now. Is that what was bothering you so badly in Cascade you felt you had to do a Vision Quest to find an answer? You were afraid I was going to want to want you back downstairs?"

That pulled Blair's chin straight up, defiant and proud. "I wouldn't have gone without a fight, but no."

"Then what was *wrong*, Chief?" Not willing to push any more than that, Jim waited as patiently as he could, trying hard to keep his love for Blair in the front of his mind and in his eyes.

Muttering what sounded like, "Cleansing," Blair sighed, then asked tiredly, "Jim, what am I supposed to *do* in Cascade? I'm a shaman, or sort of one. I mean, I've fulfilled most of the traditional qualifications - near-death experience, spirit walk, personal sacrifice, made a commitment to my calling. But what use does the 'Tribe of the Great City' have for me? I make as much sense to them as one of the street people kicking around a can and muttering obscenities under my breath!"

That sat Jim back on his heels, literally, and he reviewed what he knew of Incacha's role among the Chopec, easily seeing what Blair meant by not having a ready-made place in their home city. "What's wrong," he started slowly, "with doing what you've been doing all along?

"Been doing?" Blair echoed uncertainly.

Confused, Jim thought about his own question first, then said, "What exactly do you think a shaman does, Chief?"

"Helps people," Blair said promptly. "Guides them through their problems, comforts them when there is no solution for them, advises them when he can, champions their cause for justice or truth. There's a palette of tools they can use, but that's what they're all for, basically."

"And how is that different from the way you've always lived your life? Why do you have to act or be anyone but the man who almost hit a runaway with his car, then not only brought her home to take care of her, but patiently supported her emotionally while she came to grips with the enormous change in her life? And made me understand it and help, too," Jim pointed out gently.

To his credit, Blair didn't give an expected response like 'huh' or 'what are you talking about.' He considered the question, his eyes distracted and distant while he did. "That was just patchwork, like picking up litter and putting it in the garbage when you notice it laying there. Shouldn't I be, well, doing the equivalent of planning a big clean up campaign, complete with posters and fundraisers?"

Not sure how to phrase what needed to be said so that it wouldn't hurt or anger his partner, Jim cautiously said, "What's wrong with doing it patchwork? Better than anybody else on this Earth, we know that there is more to life than chaos and random events. We don't know who's steering, but Whoever or Whatever hasn't been doing such a bad job of it.

"When people need to find you, Blair, they do."

In the strobing light of the storm, the Blair looked pensive, uncertain, but he didn't dismiss Jim's words. Or the very real possibility that in this one case, for him, passive was the way to go. It ran contrary to everything he was - an irony that only Jim and maybe another shaman could appreciate.

Gradually acceptance crept over the tense features, and as it did Jim inched onto the sleeping bag to cup his lover's taut shoulders. "You're always telling me to listen to my instincts. This time, listen to your own. Trust me."

After a wait that seemed an eternity to Jim, Blair murmured "Yes, I will." He stood, letting Jim's hands slide to his waist. "And I do. Time for me to prove it, too." Lovingly he hugged his sentinel's head to his chest, and Jim returned it, loosely wrapping his arms around the too-slender hips.

They stayed that way a long time, simply cherishing each other and listening to the storm outside crash and rage. Eventually a particularly strong gust of wind found its way through their small window, and it playfully snatched up one of Blair's curls and whisked it over Jim's cheek. Chuckling, he scraped it away from his chin, then wound it like a ribbon around his wrist.

As if that were a silent cue they'd been waiting for, Jim began to reverently, tenderly undress his mate, neatly folding the clothes and laying them to one side within easy reach, knife on top. He shed his own clothes more quickly and efficiently, putting them beside Blair's, hesitating only fractionally before depositing his gun with them. While he did, Blair took a small, wide-mouthed bottle of massage oil and put it within easy reach, slanting his partner a shy, worried look as he did.

They went back to holding each other, this time skin-to-skin, and Jim was cajoled by the faint whip of air, curls, and scent to let sentinel habits and demands recede into the background so that the needs of the man could come to the fore. At first he only let himself savor the basic fragrance of his partner and the crinkly soft feel of Blair's chest against his cheek, not wanting to do more than affirm the reality of the man he held in his arms.

But bit-by-bit he unwound the restraints he had on his senses, taking more from what he experienced, only sipping at it initially. He draped his fingers over a well-defined calf, cataloging the flow of blood through the veins, the flicker of tensions through it as his lover shifted his weight while standing, the rough tickle of individual hairs on the pads of his fingers. Under his palm he could discern the shape of the bone, the tendons stretching over it and holding the muscle in place, and it was a heart-breakingly clear map of the life he knew so well, but not a complete one. With a liquid stroke he moved his hold to another portion of Blair's body, a hip by chance, and gave it the same close scrutiny until he was satisfied he could recognize him by that alone, then moved on to yet another curve of flesh.

As he did he listened to the life bubbling through the torso so close to him, smiling faintly at the gurgles and slurps, wondering if Blair would be comfortable if he understood how thoroughly Jim knew his bodily functions. Having had lady friends who had been mortified at simply burping in his company, he nevertheless doubted that it would cause any other reaction from his partner than an absent 'cool.'

Blair's aroma in all its varying shades and intensities was as well known to Jim as the sight of his lover, but he delighted in it anyway, sniffing at the faint traces of soap caught in the swirls of hair nearest him, sorting out the strengthening musk of arousal almost automatically. Interested, but not ready yet, he judged, totally ignoring the fact that he could make the same determination by the tentative growth of the erection he was pressed against. Well, he wasn't doing anything that erotic yet - as far as Blair was concerned. As far as *he* was concerned, however, this deep, private knowledge of his mate was as sexy as the sight of him rampant and waiting.

Not wanting his Blair to be left behind, he deliberately made his sweeps over the petal fragile skin more sensuous and provocative, applying barely enough pressure to be perceived. Blair hissed in a breath in reaction, but remained passive in Jim's arms, making his pliancy part of his gift to his sentinel. It was a precious token that Jim didn't really need; he loved the enthusiastic and energetic way his mate dove into lovemaking. But he could see where in this case compliance was an added element to what they wanted to accomplish, and he went along with it willingly enough.

Taking his time, Jim tactilely explored him from head to toe, never moving from his kneeling position or lifting his head. Touching each part at random, he gave equal attention to each place, spending as much time on a pebbled nipple as he did on the inside of an elbow. At first Blair murmured or squirmed, but soon he was moaning hoarsely, trembling faintly under Jim's knowing administrations.

When his touch was satisfied, Jim blindly mouthed the flesh closest, working his way down to where an eager hard-on nudged and bumped at him.

"Yes, yes, yes," Blair whispered imploringly.

With a delicate lap, Jim sampled the bead of clear liquid sliding down the rosy cap, making a hungry noise deep inside himself at the exquisite flavor. Feeling the tightness that spoke of his lover holding back the need to thrust, he massaged a reassurance into the tense buttocks, then urged up one knee, hooking it over the crook of his arm to help steady and balance the resulting one-legged stance.

As awkward as the position was on the surface, it allowed him deep access to the only places on Blair he hadn't investigated yet. With something very akin to timidity, he swept a thumb along the incredibly soft crease from top to bottom. His lover couldn't help a hard jerk in reaction, and Jim used the action to capture the entire head of his cock for his perusal. While his tongue mapped the spongy crown, his fingers did the same to the vulnerable tissues of the opening to Blair's body.

For such a fragile area, it was powerfully clenched, and Jim worked at it lovingly, rubbing and stroking until it accepted his attentions, however grudgingly. Beginning a leisurely suction with his mouth, he groped for and found the oil Blair had set aside and dipped his fingers into it, coating them completely before returning to the tight pucker. With the same care as before, he coaxed it to give, though only enough to take his forefinger to the first knuckle.

Despite being braced for it, the hot satin grip on that single digit was almost Jim's undoing. It was unbelievably wonderful and all he could think of was how the clinging channel would feel on his cock. Shaking violently, he moaned, lifting away from his sucking and panting against Blair's stomach.

When he felt he could do so without losing control, he tentatively pumped in and out once, stopping at the resistance from the guardian ring. "Blair?" he questioned softly.

"Feels odd," his lover said thickly. "But I like it. It's just that I want, gods, I want..." His voice trailed off as his hips bucked fractionally, telling Jim clearer than words how hard it was for Blair to not take what he needed and apparently needed very badly.

"Breathe," Jim advised, feeling inadequate, but it seemed to be the right thing to say. Blair's tummy began to rise and fall evenly, the downy hairs there teasing his cheek as it moved. Matching that deliberate rhythm, he massaged the locked portal until it surrendered, taking not just one finger, but two, and taking them eagerly.

Long before he was ready to try anything else, frantic, urgent noises spilled from deep inside Blair, begging him wordlessly for more. After a fast dip back into the pot for another dose of oil, first for his partner then for himself, Jim tilted back his head to ask for a kiss, cajoling Blair into sliding down his torso as he did. With agile grace he wrapped both legs around Jim's waist, arms anchored around his neck as he latched onto the waiting mouth with his own. Hands full of lean ass, Jim supported Blair's weight, suspending him just above his own screaming shaft.

Carefully he lunged up, enough to skim over the ready bud, gulping back the desperate moan at the near miss. An enticing wiggle from the waiting bottom put him back on target, and the combination of gravity and a small thrust lodged his cock at the very brink of the entrance to Blair's body. Even that tiny bit was fantastic, and he had to take several steadying breaths himself to prevent instinct from simply shoving past the last barrier between them.

Tearing his mouth away, Blair gasped, "Ah.. s'okay... please?"

That was all Jim could take. With a thunder-muffled roar he penetrated slowly but determinedly, not stopping until his lover was nestled into his lap. Head back, eyes rolled into the back of his head, Blair was motionless except for more measured breaths and the bobbing of his rock hard dick between them. And a subtle quivering in the clinging channel surrounding Jim's steely rod.

Somehow he endured that until Blair murmured, "Now."

Picking him up only an inch so, Jim retreated from heaven so that he could journey back as carefully as he had left, groaning in delirious joy all the way. He pulled a bit farther out on the next trip, returned a bit faster, and on the next, and the next, each stroke becoming longer and faster until the limitations of their position demanded that he put Blair on his back. Bending him almost double, Jim plunged in deep and hard, summoning the climax hovering at the edge of their minds and sending him as far into his mate's soul as he was in his body.

All along he had made animal grunts and primitive cries of pleasure and satisfaction, driving the same from Blair, but when he felt the first burn of their finish at the base of his spine, he moaned, "Love you, love you, love you." The words resounded in the small room, mixing with the thunder and meaty slap of flesh, to almost physically touch them, egging them into a last, punishing flurry of thrusts that exploded in their bodies, sending their semen out at the same time.

*Love you, love you, love, you, love, love, love, you...* they screamed mentally, then lost anything but the ecstasy binding them together.


end part 2


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