They're someone else's puppets and I play with 'em.

Inspired by the "Ring of Fire" documentary on one of those nature channels (British brothers, both anthropologists with the last name Blair, live in Fiji), and also by me getting sick and tired of post-"Dead Drop" stories where Blair turns into a weepy li'l dishrag. "The Scars That Remain" originally appeared in COME TO YOUR SENSES 11, put out by Mysti Frank.

Contains reference to consensual mutilation, and of Blair killing a non-kosher animal for food. Some manual-genital contact. No one was beheaded in the making of this story.

Sandburg smelled of fire and explosives; he reeked with sweat that left the taste of adrenaline in his wake; he was smudged and exhaustedlooking, his hands were reddened and blistered, and his heart still pounded a distress signal, his breath whooshing like bellows.

Ellison's own fear-sweat stank in his nostrils, and his own charged heart was only now standing down from an hour's worth of exertion, fury and terror that had surely siphoned off ten years of his life.

Both were so keyed up and hyper-sensitive that they couldn't even bear to touch each other as they left the building, walking past shouting medics, ambulances and bustling SWAT team members.

They'd both had better lunch hours.

Neither man said a word once they were in the Escort. All the way to the police station Blair still kept a grip on the damned vase he'd brought in for appraisal, and it was all Jim could do not to yank the object from his friend's hands and fling it out the window in retaliation for the chain of events it had triggered. A childish reaction, unworthy of him. And it wasn't the artifact that deserved defenestration...

Jim gripped the wheel. He had come close. He had come so close to committing murder today. With the explosion still reverberating through every sense, the image of Blair as a foul smear on warped and burnt masonry indistinguishable from the detritus of three other people, the window he had shot open had loomed so invitingly, beckoning. It would have been so easy to drag the struggling man he'd disarmed a split-second too late over to that beckoning abyss --

Except that Jim had known who was truly guilty of Blair's murder, and who had failed in his duty. Blessed Protector, his mind had jeered all the way down the stairwell toward the waiting police with his cuffed captive, Blessed Protector. Go ahead and ride along with me, Sandburg -- welcome to the world of serial killers and terrorists. A lot different than grading papers, eh? How's it feel to be murdered because your best friend dropped the ball?

Ellison had made plans while he took his captive downstairs. He would wait out the trial, until Rachins was sentenced for his multiple homicides and began his sentence. Then he would drive deep into the mountains to some place remote, just before winter locked in; and because Washington offered hanging as an alternative to lethal injection, a rope and a good sturdy tree branch would finish the job. By spring the weather and creatures should have made short work of his remains. The thought had comforted him, until all thought was stunned from his mind by the sound of four strong, steady heartbeats where silence should have met his ears.

The cool calculation of his own demise frightened Ellison. Blair wasn't the first friend to be harmed or killed while under Jim's protection. His entire platoon, several Chopec who'd fallen guarding the pass, Danny Choi -- none of their losses had made Jim even consider selfexecution as an option. Why had it seemed the only rational outcome of a disastrous hostage situation?

While Brown took Blair's statement, Jim oversaw the incarceration of Rachins himself; precious little that it was, it was the closest he'd come to being helpful that day. When that was done, he sat at his desk to write his report. The routine work began to settle him; slowly, slowly he began to stand down.

A yelp from Sandburg made Jim leap to his feet, adrenaline spiking, heart beating a rapid fight-or-flight message. Blair was on his feet too, staring at the clock over Brown's desk. "Oh shit! My class, I forgot to call someone, my car's still at --"

"Whoa, whoa, it's okay, Hairboy," Brown said, reaching across his desk to rest a friendly hand on Blair's arm. "Rhonda called the campus and gave them the word before Jim and the guys hit the building, and she let them know everything's okay and that you're fine. They've got someone substituting for you." He squeezed Blair's forearm and gave it a little shake.

"Thanks," Sandburg said weakly, and sat back down as if his knees had been knocked from under him, shaking. "Gotta get her some flowers. Oh geez. Oh, geez."

Ellison sat back down. He did not shake, externally.

"It's over, man, you're OK," Henri said kindly, patting Blair's arm. "It's over. That dirtbag is booked. And man, we're gonna be talkin' about you for a long time. You really cut a hole in the elevator with a welder's torch and dropped a bomb through it?"

Blair nodded. "Surprised I didn't fry my hands off instead. I've never held one of those things in my life. The guy with the toolkit didn't even think of doing it -- it was obviously too dangerous for a professional who knew what he was doing to consider it. Good thing I didn't know what I was doing. I gave the others some line of BS about a summer job, fastest welder in the crew, you know."

Jim gripped the edge of the desk to keep himself from going to his feet again. He shouldn't have been surprised by that revelation, really. How often had Blair lied to smooth a frazzled situation? And if he hadn't -- panic, death. It wasn't as if Blair could rely on Jim to save him, after all.

"It worked, little brother -- you saved everybody in that elevator. I'm surprised Old Man Wilkinson didn't give you half the kingdom and his daughter's hand in marriage."

"I'm surprised he didn't sue you for damaging his elevator," Jim said coldly, and both men turned to face him. "I'm sure he'll rectify that error in the next week or so." He rose. "Are you done?"

Blair looked at Brown, who nodded, and nodded. He rose to his feet as if afraid he would collapse.

"Go home, hero. Go home, puke, maybe down a shot of something, sleep it off, you'll be fine."

Blair laughed, a high unstable laugh. "Nothing to puke. I haven't eaten since that bagel this morning."

"No wonder you're shakin' like an aspen. Jim, go feed this guy."

Ah. Good. Something else he could do today that would actually be helpful.

Omelettes and toast were no substitute for Cuban cuisine, but Blair sat at the table and wolfed it down as if he hadn't eaten in a week. Adrenaline tended to give you a shrew's metabolism.

Jim ate his own meal silently and swiftly. He still did not shake with the bottled stress and fear that had kept him going that long dreadful hour at Wilkinson Tower, and the soul-numbing three minutes when he had believed Blair and his fellow hostages killed in the explosion. The gym. He'd go back to the station and lay into the weights, beat the crap out of the bag instead of Galileo.

When his plate was empty, Blair exhaled and looked up, as if noticing Jim for the first time. "It was close today. Wasn't it?"

Jim nodded tightly, once. He didn't want to think about it, much less talk about it. There would be time later, when they prepared for the trial, when time and distance had settled everything inside him.

"It's always -- odd -- to know you're alive only because of two seconds' worth of work. Or an accident, or a coin came up tails instead of heads." Blair held out one hand, palm down. "Like the difference between air and water -- that border is so thin. But one way you're dry, the other you're wet. One way you're sitting here eating eggs, the other they're using a stick and a bag to scrape you off --"

"I get the picture, Sandburg," Jim grated. "You don't need to paint it out for me."

Blair blinked and stared at Jim for a moment. "That's nice for you," he said ironically. "I'm afraid I'm still rocking a little bit. And by the way, thanks."

"Thanks?"

"For those two seconds. Whatever you did to stall Galileo worked. I only just got the bomb out when it went off. It went off late, by a couple of seconds."

To stall Galileo? Jim's big contribution to the crisis had been to stall the murderous man he'd gone in to stop?

Something cold and deadly rose in Jim like a sloshing sea of black oil. "Well, it's nice to know I'm good for something around here, isn't it?" he snarled, and rose holding his half-eaten omelette.

"Jim?" Blair looked up at him, confused.

"It's a good thing you didn't need me in there today. You've got all the proof you need that you can't rely on me, don't you?"

"What the fuck are you talking about, Ellison?" Blair snapped, his own anger rising to cover confusion.

"I've been looking at this all wrong -- hero cop and poor helpless civilian buddy in distress? Uh-uh. But, damn, don't I make a great sidekick? I can distract the bad guys while you do my job for me!"

"Are you mad at me for getting rid of the bomb?" Blair looked as if he was almost ready to laugh, or weep, or both. "That is insane, Jim. What, I try to think on my feet and I'm stepping on your toes now?"

"You might as well. It's not like I made a goddamn's worth of difference today. You weren't even with me today and some son of a bitch tries to take you out. How many times does this make it now, since you started riding along? How many times has a gun been shoved in your ribs because of me? How long before something like this happens again, but this time I don't 'distract' the prick for those two seconds and he does blow you all over the fucking building?" Jim realized, vaguely, that he was screaming.

Blair stared, eyes wide, as if Jim had clubbed him with a sledgehammer. "You think..." he said, each word measured as a dose of explosive, "today...had anything to do with you?"

"Of course not, Sandburg, I keep forgetting how dangerous it is teaching classes," Jim snarled. This has nothing to do with you riding along with me and getting exposed to every dirtbag and psycho in the Northwest!"

Blair's jaw dropped. Then he did the last thing Jim expected. He laughed.

Jim glared, everything in him in such turmoil that he was a hair from doing something physical to vent his rage, his terror, his fury that he'd been worse than useless to Blair.

Blair's anger was all gone, washed away in a bout of laughter. "Get over yourself, Ellison!" he gasped. "Do you honestly think if I'd never met you and got involved with your life, I'd be nice and safe on campus grading papers and chasing coeds, maybe getting a sneezing fit from dusty books?"

"No," Jim said angrily, remembering the cold accusatory voice inside him that had reverberated for three minutes. "Right now, today, you'd have been in Borneo. Nowhere near that elevator."

"Right." Blair nodded. "Just nice and safe in Borneo. Caught between loggers and oilmen with guns, villagers with guns, aboriginal people with spears who still eat their enemies' hearts to gain courage, and about 40 billion disease-carrying mosquitoes. Real safe, Jim."

Jim blinked.

"Jim, do you want to see how safe I've always been?" Blair stood up and walked around the table. "How safe I was until you came along to be my personal bodyguard? Look. Take a good long look!"

With that, Sandburg undid his jeans and shoved them to his knees, along with his underwear.

Jim automatically jerked his eyes up, only to meet that angry smoke-blue glare.

Look!

So Jim looked.

He thought it was an odd piece of jewelry at first, some kind of band around Blair's upper left thigh. It took a long moment to realize that the intricate blue pattern was in fact a tattoo.

"I was in Papua New Guinea two years before I ever met you. The tribes there still believe in dealing with disrespectful outsiders the old-fashioned way." Blair drew the side of his hand sharply against his throat. "Especially students who stumble into sacred ground forbidden to everyone but true human beings. True human beings are only distinguishable from animals by the marks the tribal artist puts on you. I chose to let them make me a true human being rather than be beheaded."

The dark blue design in a two-inch-wide band all around Blair's upper left thigh looked like a cross between a Celtic knot and a Mendelbrot pattern. Abstract, compelling and complex, the pattern invited contemplation, spoke of a deeply-lived life of the mind in a world where the body survived on subsistence hunting and farming. It was only logical: to bear the signs of abstract thought was to be truly human.

"As you can see, Detective," Blair said dryly, interrupting Jim's contemplation, "I've had a long and proud history of getting my ass in a sling long before you walked into my office. And getting it out again. This," he indicated his artwork, "saved my life and gained me some valuable contacts for my work. I stayed a couple of months, learning how to be a true human being. Traded my clothes and most of my goods for a canoe, and Nolowa -- the chief -- took me fishing and exploring. Man, was he proud when I killed my first wild pig. I still have the necklace around somewhere, I don't wear it much these days."

Jim stared at Blair. "You killed a pig."

Blair flashed all his teeth in that damned rabbit's-grin of his. "With a spear, yet. Just me and Porky, mano a mano. Nolowa threw a big party to celebrate. There were kids there half my age who'd already killed their first pig, but this was bigger; Nolowa had taken one of those paleskinned demons who live outside the world and made him into a true human being. From then on Bele' was a full member of the tribe. Old Atu was happy to tell me anything I wanted to know about the Listeners after that; he took me back to the taboo site himself. I gave him the rest of my tobacco for that. I still write to him and Nolowa, and once a year Atu sends me a list of all the girls who are marriage age."

Jim shook his head. You have just crossed over into The Sandburg Zone. Every muscle that had been taut as piano wire relaxed at the narration. "Somehow I don't think Galileo was going to let you off with a tattoo."

"Of course not. He isn't a true human being," Blair said lightly, but Jim saw the slight tremble in his hands. Ah, now he was starting to react. "Maybe I should write Nolowa and tell him about Galileo -- he'll organize a war party and paddle right over to take care of that bastard." His laughter was shrill now, a venting of stress rather than a show of amusement. He was finally coming off the adrenaline that had kept him going, had kept the other hostages from panicking and had assured them with his control of the situation. "Hell, just make him drop 'em and I'll give him a ritual scarring he won't forget." There was a definite tone of hysteria in his laughter now.

Jim left his plate and walked over to hold on to Blair, who was still laughing out of control, shaking his whole body. "Chief, do you want me to slap you?" he asked levelly. This was part of his duty. He'd done blessed little to protect Sandburg in Wilkinson Tower, but now he could do something.

Still laughing hard, Blair shook his head. "I'll be fine," he gasped. "Really, Jim. Just, just gotta remember t-to t-take the stairs next ttime," and he sagged in Jim's grasp, howling and shaking.

A shock. One good slap would do it. Jim almost wanted to do it, he was so angry at Blair for being put in a deadly situation once again and making him sick with fear, making him think he was dead, blown to pieces in that filthy elevator --

Something snapped in Ellison, too. Roughly, he tilted up Blair's wildeyed laughing face, and he silenced the insane laughter.

Blair went still beneath him, stunned out of his hysteria.

When Jim pulled his mouth away from Blair's, he glared into the wide, smoky blue eyes, never loosening his grip on the smaller man. He'd never let Blair go again, never let the man out of his sight. He'd mke sure they stayed together, that he would always be part of Blair, would always know what this flesh felt. He had a duty, a responsibility to this man, the privilege of keeping him safe and alive, away from bombs and madmen and --

He tightened his grip, and lowered his head again. This time the mouth below his met him halfway and with equal savagery. Strong fingers raked across his scalp to take his skull in a death grip.

It was like zoning out, like diving deep into all five overloaded senses at once -- the unstoppable drive he'd felt under the pheromones, but stronger, angrier, the masculine urge to fight just barely deflected.

Jim managed to get Blair over to the man's bed without actually dragging him by the hair, and that was the last concession to civilization he made for a long time.

The smell of coffee woke him; Sumatra Manheeling. He lay quietly in the wreck of mattress and scattered sheets, trying to piece together events before loss of consciousness. Another smell made itself known; Blair. That smell was all around him, and upon him.

Sound. Singing. Blair was in the kitchen, quietly singing something rhythmic in what sounded like Sanskrit or Hindi.

More input. Latex and semen from the wastebasket near the head of the bed. At least they'd been coherent enough to play it safe; he didn't remember putting on a condom, but he did remember pushing Sandburg prone, spreading him... Jesus, it was a wonder Blair could sit up, let alone --

Let alone walk back into his bedroom looking as dishevelled and debauched as Ellison felt, holding two steaming mugs. Jim sat up slowly, wincing, and accepted one without a word as Blair carefully climbed in. They sat side by side, their backs to the wall as they drank.

Jim looked down at Blair's tattoo. "It's beautiful, Chief."

Blair looked where Jim was looking. "Yeah, it is."

Jim let his fingers wander through the pattern. Blair's adopted family might use Stone Age technology, but their artistic vision was awe-inspiring...

But now something else caught Ellison's eye -- something he'd deliberately avoided looking at when Blair had dropped his jeans earlier. "I didn't see this before," he said quietly, one hand reaching.

"Go ahead," Blair said.

And, stunned beyond words, Jim looked and touched. He traced the long silvery scars that striped Blair's penis from behind the glans to where it joined the rest of the body, lifted it and examined the twin silver spirals on the scrotum. The penis twitched as he traced the patterns but was too tired to respond further.

Scarring. Ritual scarring.

"Same?" he managed to choke out, and tapped the tattoo.

"The same ones." Blair was quiet and calm. "The same ceremony. All part of turning me into a true human being."

"This," Jim whispered, "was better than getting beheaded?"

"Well...it didn't feel like it at the time," Blair admitted. "But during the ceremony I was surrounded by boys in their early teens with identical marks; a lot of them were still sore, still scabbed over. If they could go through that at puberty, the least I could do was endure it the way a true human being would."

Jim stroked the scars tenderly, awed by his teacher. "Chief, the next time anyone at the station gives you flak about not having the balls for police work, just drop your pants and show them this."

Blair laughed. "Not that I haven't been tempted a couple of times. 'See? I do too -- and mine are pin-striped!'" He smiled at Jim's own heavy chuckle. "But it's okay, really. The only cop I want seeing these..." and Sandburg's hand, warmed by the coffee cup, curled around both Jim's hand and his own genitals. "...is you."

Both men were silent for a long moment, both looking at the joined hands curled warm and strong around Blair's testicles.

"Are you okay with this, Jim?" Blair finally asked.

"I think so," Ellison replied, looking at his friend with no hesitation. "I should be asking you that question, Sandburg -- I think I went a little crazy. Did I do anything --"

Blair shook his head. "Trust me, man -- nothing I couldn't handle." His hand patted Jim's. "You may be built like a bear, but you acted like my Blessed Protector even while giving me the best fuck I've ever had."

Jim blinked again and stared at his friend who was flashing the grin that managed to combine childlike wonder and unchildlike wickedness.

"Come on, man, admit it -- you wondered, didn't you?"

Jim slowly nodded. "A guy who wears three rings -- two in one ear, one in a nipple -- a guy like me kinda wonders."

"Wonder no longer." Blair put his coffee cup down and stretched mightily, both arms high over his head, displaying some spectacular bruises. "I prefer women, but I like a good time as much as the next guy. Well, the next bi, to be precise."

Now Jim's fingers moved upward to gently touch the places they had seized so brutally. "Looks like I did a pretty good job of marking you up myself, Chief." He shook his head again. "I had no idea I'd react like that. No idea." He bowed his head and ran a hand over the back of his neck, very bewildered.

"Your first walk on the wild side." Not a question.

Jim shook his head. "I've never thought of other men sexually. Not that I can remember. Why now?"

Blair shrugged. "Maybe it's a Sentinel-Guide thing. Or, judging from the way you kept touching me, you just wanted to make sure for yourself that I was still alive."

Jim rested one hand on Blair's tattoo. "I've thought you dead before. I thought Lash had killed you. I never reacted this strongly."

"Maybe because an explosion is a little different than assuming someone is dead." Blair's hand on Jim's shook a little even as Jim's hand tightened on Blair's thigh. "An explosion is something you feel as well as hear and see."

"And smell. And taste," Jim murmured. He could still see the red light flashing on the detonator, and then all five of his hypersenses bombarded with the explosion. "My whole body told me you were dead."

Blair's other hand slid under Jim's hand on his thigh to hold it between both of his; big warm hands. "So you had to make sure I was alive with all five senses, didn't you?"

Jim nodded, stunned. That made perfect sense.

"You know, Jim," Blair said, still looking at their joined hands. "If you really wanted to...keep reassuring yourself that I'm alive...I'd have no objections to that."

What a nice, oblique proposition that was. No promises of undying love and devotion from the sexual butterfly who now held him captured. No promises to keep himself safe, either.

For one unworthy moment, Jim wanted to demand Blair's safety in exchange for continuing a physical relationship with him; the image of Blair as his personal harem boy shamed him. He knew that if he tightened his grip he would lose Sandburg forever.

Imprinted on Blair's upper right thigh was an ugly puckered bullet-scar from Quinn, the price Blair had paid for staying with Jim. Yet imprinted on the other thigh was the proof that Blair had never lived safely, and that from great pain coulqd come great beauty.

To remain sexually intimate with someone whose private relationships could be measured in days -- this promised a pain greater and more soul-eating than the three minutes of hell Jim had endured at the top of the tower. And yet, with a combination of persistence and trust, Jim might be able to persuade Blair to stay for his own sake, and make something long-lasting between them, something beautiful.

Jim did not tighten his grip. He brought his other hand to cover one of Blair's, and gave him his answer. Blair's smile went straight into his heart and gut. He smiled back.

"Man, that's great." Blair reached up and gave Jim a quick businesslike peck on the cheek. "Sorry to get heavy on you and run, but I've got classes to teach."

He was right, dammit. Jim sighed and detached his hand. "I suppose Simon will want me to show up on time." He gave Sandburg's hair a quick ruffle on his way to the shower.

Yesterday, Blair had nearly been killed. Yesterday, Jim had nearly committed murder. Yesterday, they had nearly fucked each other through the mattress, for the first time. And yet their morning routien was unchanged, right down to them dashing out the door. It was a good sign.

Blair huffed into the loft that evening, breathing hard and lugging his heavy knapsack. He plopped the load down, sat on the sofa and stared out the window, blinking. Every now and then he exhaled a sharp little laugh.

Jim turned off the gas under the ratatouille, fetched a beer and physically put it into Blair's hand. "Tough day?"

"Weird day."

One corner of Jim's mouth turned up a little. "They found out, huh?" It would have been hard for them not to -- every Cascade paper had a front-page story about the Wilkinson incident, one headline proudly blaring HOSTAGE TRAGEDY AVERTED BY STUDENT WELDER.

Blair nodded, and grinned a little self-consciously; but the notoriety obviously pleased him. "It was all over campus. I walked into the hall and got a standing ovation. It was five minutes before they quieted enough for me to talk -- and all they wanted to talk about was the tower. The wiseasses asked if I planned to minor in construction. When I finally finished the class and got to my office, they'd TP'd my door, and there was a Die Hard movie poster with my picture pasted over Bruce Willis' face."

Jim sat down beside Blair and laughed; Blair chuckled. "Those bastards."

"That's not the worst of it." Blair reached down and unzipped the knapsack at his feet. "They gave me this." He lifted out a welder's helmet, still wearing a slightly squashed pink ribbon bow stuck to the top.

Jim pursed his lips hard at the sight, but his mirth was stabbed through and through with pain. "Maybe you'd better wear this when you ride along, Chief. Just for my peace of mind."

Blair laughed. "No way, man. I tried this on and you can't see diddley. It's like wearing blinders and sunshades in a dark room. And if I'm not along with you, you'll be the one with blinders on, won't you?"

"I'm not arguing, Chief," Jim said lightly.

Not that he didn't want to argue. Not that he didn't want to force Blair to wear Kevlar every waking moment. But Jim was the one who needed daily protecting by Blair. And how do you armor a butterfly?

Jim couldn't protect Blair from everything. He could only respect his choices, could only love him, could only dare to love in the face of his own fear of losing everyone he loved. Surely he could do that, if Blair could overcome his own panic, fear of heights and unfamiliarity with a welder's torch to save everyone in Elevator #4 while Ellison had diverted Galileo long enough for his partner to do his job.

"Smells good," Blair said, facing the kitchen.

"It's ratatouille. Do you know the best thing about it?" Jim leaned in closer, resting his fingers on Blair's lips.

"What's that?" His breath was so hot and damp, his eyes so hot.

Jim set the welder's helmet on the floor and turned back to Blair. "It's good served hot or cold," he said against his lover's mouth.

"Watch out for paper cuts," he whispered an hour later.

"I've had malaria three times," Blair mumbled, head tucked under Jim's chin. "Never had a paper cut."

End THE SCARS THAT REMAIN by Jane Mailander: j_mailander@idiom.com

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