Notes: The ending of this story has an interesting history. Originally I finished it with Blair speaking one word, and I personally found that version very satisfying. But my first beta - Thank You Wolfling - said, no, you need more. So I took a part that I had written in the middle then pulled cause it didn't really fit (the reader will have *no* problem spotting where) and retooled it, you should pardon the expression, to be the new ending. My next beta to report back - Thank You, Vickie - preferred the one word ending. So I played around with the idea of posting the revised ending as a PWP. My third, and last - Thank You, Bron - liked it better with the new ending.

::::sigh::: two for and two against.

So I decided to do something different with this story. It is posted with my first ending, *but* the revised one is being posted as well, tomorrow, separate from the rest of the story. You can decide for yourself which was better. Either way, I hope you enjoy!!!!

WARNING - MAJOR STORY SPOILERS - WARNING

Lammas Night is a hauntingly beautiful song written by Mercedes Lackey, and found, among other places, on her Magic, Moondust, and Meloncholy CD. In this ballad, a lady mage is asked by villagers to stay and make her home with them, and is offered the dwelling of their recently departed male mage with all its books and furnishings as part of the bargain. She accepts, and finds that her new home is being haunted by the young mage - who is courting her.

In his books, she finds a spell that he was working that accidentally trapped him between worlds, neither dead nor alive. In the same book is a spell that can free him to go on to the next life - and one that can summon him back to this one. The spell differs only by one word, and the last words of the song ask plaintively, if the mage courted her for herself or because she could bring him back. Should she bid him go - or bid him stay?

So evocative is the song, that a whole *book* of stories has been written based on it. While I by no means class myself with those authors, I have to admit, I had to write my own version of it, as well. I simply could not stop hearing Jim ask himself over and over:

BID HIM COME OR BID HIM STAY

Leaning heavily on his cane but trying not to show it, Lt. Colonel James Ellison, retired, glared at the real estate agent fumbling with her keys and bit back a sharp remark. If the woman had just shown him the kinds of places that he'd asked about when they'd started today, instead of what *she* thought he'd like better, they wouldn't both be short-tempered and frustrated now.

Carol Corday had looked slightly rumpled this morning when she picked him up. After showing him so many properties that Jim couldn't remember any individual one, she was now positively dishelved and very skittish as she finally fit the key in the lock for 852 Prospect St, #307.

Resolving this would be the *last* condo this matronly woman showed him whether he liked it or not, he stepped back in vague hopes of it calming her enough to get the damned door open. It - or the prayers she was mumbling worked - the door swung open and she hurried through. Not wanting her to start her spiel immediately, Jim hesitated himself, then was caught by a soft curl of fragrance emanting from the rooms beyond. Spicy but subtle, it hooked itself directly into his brain and coaxed him inside, wrapping around him comfortably.

His first reaction was 'this is more like it' as he visually swept the loft apartment, talking in its balcony, high ceilings, and many usable escape routes. His second was 'who the devil decorated this place; a museum curator?' It had sparse but pleasant furniture and was filled from hallway to kitchen to living room with shelves stocked with what appeared to be artifacts from dozens of different cultures.

As if she had heard the question, Mrs. Corday burbled, "Owned by an archaeologist, or was that anthropologist. Linguist? Anyway, Dr. Sandburg worked at Rainier University until his death last year. Well, his presumed death. Vanished from his expedition in the middle of some God-forsaken jungle. Mother inherited everything, but she's refusing to believe he's gone. Couldn't even get her to come in and take away his personal things. A friend came in and moved most of it into there." She turned and pointed to a set of French doors with a lock on them. "If you want to look inside, it was his office, I have the key, but my orders are to return it to the bank's lawyers. It's in foreclosure you know. Ms. Sandburg hasn't paid on the mortgage for whatever reason, and they had no choice but to take it back, I hope you don't have a problem with that."

Jim had barely heard the realtor's words, mainly picking up on key phrases as he'd been taught in Black Ops. Not trusting his hip at the moment, he didn't move very far from the middle of the living room, but truthfully, he didn't need to. The more he looked around the better he liked this place, clutter not withstanding. "You said it was in foreclosure? Do the furnishings come with it?"

That stopped the agent mid-praise of the rooms. "Er, actually, yes, they could in this case since it's an absentee foreclosure. Only the more personal belongings are exempt, and of course, a great deal of this is on loan from the university where Dr. Sandburg worked. They have to come in to catalogue and retrieve their pieces, but it being summer break and all, they haven't been able to get anybody in here."

"So when could I move in, if I sign the contract now?" he asked.

Again it seemed to be an unexpected question. "Um, I don't really know; no one else I've shown it to has been, er, interested enough to ask. Would you mind if I called the office?"

At Jim's curt nod, she stepped to one side and pulled out her cell. "You're the first one who hasn't hated it on sight, or worse yet, refused to even come inside, saying it feels funny in here," she muttered, not aware that her words were carrying easily to the soldier. "Hate the place, myself."

For the life of him, Jim couldn't see why. The view from the balcony was the epitome of serene: boats on the water, wheeling birds and city lights. Local sounds were equally soothing; traffic, yes, but not obnoxiously loud, and the water could be clearly heard even from here. And the smell of the place!! Closing his eyes, he inhaled deeply, feeling those same hooks that had brought him inside burrowing farther into his body. Definitely homey smelling. Previous owner liked to cook, if the scents of it were still lingering was any indication; there was woodsmoke, herbs of some kind, and underneath it all that spicy, tantalizing, evocative...

"Colonel Ellison! Colonel Ellison! Are you all right? Oh, dear, oh dear, oh dear! Should I call an ambulance? Colonel Ellison!"

Mrs. Corday's panicked voice cut through the hold scent had on him, and Jim came back to himself with a start. "Lt. Colonel," he corrected automatically, absently. Resisting the urge to scrub at his face, the officer turned slowly to face her, thinking, //Oh, god, not again! Not again!//

"I didn't mean to alarm you," Jim said politely and with more charm than he'd bothered to use in a while. "Part of the injury." He lied, tapping with his cane once, to recall her attention to it.

"I'm *so* sorry," she said, voice contrite and filled with the syrupy sympathy that Jim had loathed from the first time anybody had directed it toward him. "It must be very painful." Somehow the words were hopeful, as if she wanted him to share with her how it had happened.

Keeping his face neutral, Jim agreed blandly. "At times." He took a tentative step, glad that his injury had held up to his fugue. "Now, what did they say about me moving in?"

"Oh!" Definitely looking disappointed at his reticence, she visibly set herself back on track. "We already have the paper work in order. If you wished, you could take residence in a few days before even officially closing, as long as you didn't mind being held responsible for the artifacts and promising cooperation with the museum on their return."

//Must really be desperate to get rid of this place,// Jim interpreted inwardly. "As long as there is an inventory in place so that there is absolutely no question as to what's here, and as long as it's all insured, it would be very convenient for me to move in quickly. As you know, I'm staying in a hotel, and the sooner I have a place of my own, the sooner I can begin to settle down again. And I have business to take care of; having a permanent base to work out of would be enormously helpful."

"Excellent then!" She cheered up immensely and immediately began to dig in her purse for her car keys. "We can go back to my office and get things started." Finding the keys, her head shot up and she said worriedly, "Unless you'd like to look around some more. You haven't been near the bathroom or seen the loft bedroom upstairs."

"I don't need to; a full report on the plumbing, wiring, or anything else of significance will be part of the inspections. We can discuss any findings before we close." Cautiously Jim put himself into motion, escorting Mrs. Corday out. As the door shut behind them, he took a last sniff, relieved that some of the marvelous fragrance was lingering on him.

Three days later he again opened the door, this time to early morning sun, and shuffled inside, balancing his burdens carefully. Behind him the cab driver who had picked him up earlier, and who had been willingly hauling him all over Cascade, also entered, following his fare patiently. "Joel, just put the grocery bags in the kitchen," Jim told him, putting his luggage down under the hooks by the door and casually tossing the manilla envelope from his father's lawyer onto the table. "Anything else, where ever you see a blank spot will do."

"Man," the driver said on the way past, eyes bouncing around the room as if not sure where to settle first, "This place looks like a museum storeroom."

"Tell me about it. But someone will be here soon to get this stuff." Jim looked around, finding the mess oddly appealing even as his military training began grumbling. Or maybe that *was* why he liked it; he'd had enough of the army to last him a good long time. "Talk about bringing your work home with you!"

That surprised a laugh out of the dour cabby, brightening his dark-skinned, mournful face considerably. "Can't imagine the man's briefcase, I tell you. What do you think this stuff is worth?" He picked up what looked like an African mask, stubby fingers stroking it longingly.

"More than you or I make in a year," Jim said dryly. "The Rainier rep shouted and fussed for hours before agreeing to let me move in." In fact, if it hadn't been for his Ellison name and the shark toothed lawyer he had inherited along with it, Jim might not have made it in at all, despite the bank's blatant desire to unload the loft.

"Guess it was that uniform that turned the tide," Joel said wistfully, face turning sorrowful.

Jim blinked at that comment, but didn't correct the driver one way or the other. "That or they were fairly sure I couldn't run away from them." He didn't know why he joked, but he found he preferred the glimpsed good humor on the pudgy man.

Laughing again, Joel offered his hand. "You gonna be needing rides for a while, I guess. Be a honor if you'd ask for me by name; work most days from 6 to 6."

Taking it for an honest shake, Jim smiled. "Sure about that, Joel? Most likely you'll be sick of hauling my sorry ass around before I get around to getting some wheels. Among other things I gotta get some civies for myself before I start thinking I was born in uniform."

"Positive, man. Just call the dispatcher about an hour ahead, or even when you know you're going to need it a few days in advance. You be good, now. Or at least have fun being bad." He took the tip Jim dug out of his pocket with more grace than the soldier had managed giving it, gave a last small grin, and left.

Locking the door behind him, Jim hobbled to the kitchen and set about moving into his new home. Never one for many possessions, it didn't take him long to get things put away; he hadn't been joking when he said he needed to shop. Mentally thanking Dr. Sandburg, wherever he was, for the well-equipped kitchen - it looked like he'd been right when he theorized the former owner had liked to cook - Jim was grateful he had been spared the kind of massive foray into the world of retail furnishing a home would entail. Deciding that listing what had come with the place was a good idea, and reminding himself that if the mother ever asked, he would return *anything* she wanted, he murmured aloud, "I hope you had a peaceful and merciful death, Blair Sandburg. And that you don't object too badly to me using your things. I'll take care of them."

He made his way through the small loft, room by room, opening cupboards and closets, making notes on what was found and what he needed. As he worked, the instinct that had always served him so well in the Rangers began to poke at him, spinning his alertness up to painful levels. Keeping that from his face and movements, he thought about what he was feeling and tentatively identified it as 'being watched.'

Nonplused - what reason would anybody have to keep an eye on him anymore? - he did the small, hidden things that let prey identify predator. And came up empty. No odd sounds, no flicker of shadow or movement, no betraying markers anywhere. Just a sureness born of too many years fighting for his life that he was under observation. Mulling the sensation over, he added a tentative qualifier to it: being watched by someone who was innocently curious. There was simply no feeling of threat raising his hackles or his heart rate.

Finally dismissing it as a nosy neighbor, he went back to his list, this time beginning on the artifacts to separate out Dr. Sandburg's from the University's. Fortunately there were labels on the backs of the later, but the former presented a problem. Helpless to identify the majority of them, he created his own system based on location and short description, sure that it would be enough for him to pinpoint any one object if necessary. //Interesting// he thought as he looked over the third or fourth piece. //Whoever it is, is worried now. Afraid I'm going to steal? Or break something?//

Moving with exaggerated care, he handled each item reverently, which they deserved and which he would have done even if there hadn't been an audience. It took half of the inventory, but eventually his observer must have decided he was harmless. The intensity of the stare aimed at his shoulder blades diminished, and the feeling subsided until it was only like someone was idly standing there. Inured to that by a lifetime of dormitories and barracks, Jim went on with his task, limiting himself to only the top and middle shelves for now because bending and kneeling were problematic for him.

The evening darkness was beginning to creep into the loft when Jim stretched cautiously, mindful of his injury, and picked up one last item. Recognizing it, //For once,// he grinned to himself, he took a second to admire the work that had gone into the Kachincha doll. Running his fingertips over the edge of the mask, he absently said aloud, "Machine tooled! Huh, hope he didn't think this was authentic." Zeroing in, he looked where he had felt the evenly spaced marks that told him something mechanically precise had been used in making this fetish. His vision blurred, zoomed in and out like he was looking at binoculars, then *saw* the fine scratches.

"No," he mumbled, hastily putting the doll down. "No, no, no." Stumbling away, forgetting to use his cane for support, he half fell toward the bathroom door and leaned on it, breathing heavily, eyes tightly closed.

//You didn't see that, Ellison,// he lectured himself harshly. //Nobody can see things like that. It's only another nasty little hallucination, like all the ones you had when you were in that hell hole the enemy called solitary confinement. Left over delirium from the fever you had when the gunshot wound became infected. Get over it! Look around! Everything looks just the way it should, right?// Despite the convincing arguments, he couldn't make himself look, then he yelled silently at himself, //RIGHT!!??//

The tone, a mix of particularly viscious commanding officer and his father, snapped his eyes open, and he looked around the perfectly ordinary - well, for a storeroom - apartment. As he had told himself, there was nothing weird, nothing freaky to see. Wiping the sweat off his face, he straightened. //Time to get cleaned up, maybe have some chow. This place had enough dust to create its own desert; I'm filthy.// Knowing that one trip up the stairs was all he was good for, Jim went in and washed up enough to cook, all the while totally oblivious that it was past time to turn on the lights for the night.

When he went into the kitchen, he automatically flicked the switch, wincing in pain at the brightness, but dismissing it as needing to adjust the overhead. His meal was simple and eaten while he read, his unknown and unseen companion not too far away the entire time. The company wasn't completely unpleasant, no matter how strange, but he found himself wondering more than once if his observer was yet another symptom of whatever was wrong with his mind.

In the end, he trusted his instincts too much to believe that. More than likely Rainier University wasn't taking any chances and had hired a private investigator to make sure he didn't sell off any choice pieces. He was only mentally placing the man inside the loft to keep the annoyance from being watched down to a minimum.

Dinner done and the dishes washed, he showered, coming back out to stand uncertainly at the bottom of the stairs to the bedroom, suitcase in hand, dressed in his towel. Maybe he should have asked Joel... No, better to do it himself. Mentally making a note to keep a change of clothes down here in case he couldn't make it up the stairs some nights, Jim put the bag as high up on the steps as he could. Jaw tight, he climbed until he could move it up again, leaning heavily on the wall and his cane as he did. By the time he reached the top, he was exhausted, frustrated, and naked, having lost his towel part way up.

But he made it up, and he let himself topple onto the bed, braced for the impact. Instead of a bounce, he got a splosh! and a series of sickening waves from the water bed. //Damn, damn, damn!!! *How* am I going to get out of this thing!?" He lay on his back, waiting for the ripples to die out, and checking out the bed itself. With nightstands on either side built in, as well as a shelved headboard, it thankfully also had a broad bench type footboard. He could use his good leg to scoot down and sit up there before trying to stand. Tomorrow he'd have to call about having it taken away.

//Then again, maybe not,// he thought a moment later. The water for the bed was heated to nearly the perfect temperature for one person, and it seeped into his stiff and healing muscles, making them relax. Even the bone in his damaged hip shut up for a change, letting him mellow out even more. //Have to see how hard it is to get up from here, before getting rid of it for sure,// he decided drowsily.

Rolling, he reached to turn out the light - and stopped in mid gesture. He hadn't turned it on. Nor obviously had he turned on the heater for the water bed. The puzzle woke his muzzy mind, but seconds later he realized that Dr. Sandburg's mother had probably left on both when she'd been here last. Pleased with his solution, he lay back again, looking around the room again.

Not much up here. The kingsized bedframe with it's built in nightstands took up most of the space, though there was a chest of drawers in one corner and a small table on the wall opposite the stairs. Unlike the rest of the place, this room was devoid of any of the personality of the lost anthropologist.

Curious now about the more private life of Dr. Sandburg, Jim idly opened the nightstand drawer nearest him and shifted through it. It held only the kinds of odds and ends you'd expect to be left behind. Some hair ties - Dr. Sandburg had had long, curly brown/auburn hair apparently, that or his girlfriend did. Some pens and paper, box of tissues. Pulling out a box of condoms and several tubes of astrolube, Jim grinned. //Well, well. Blair Sandburg and I have at least one thing in common. A taste for variety in partners.//

The rest of the drawers were empty, and he was sure the others in the room would be too. Most likely all traces of Sandburg had been banished from here to the locked room downstairs. And, now that Jim thought of it, those possessions weren't the only things *not* up here.

His sense of a hidden guest told him that he was alone now. //Good! At least I can sleep without waking up every five minutes.// Paying close attention to the rest of the apartment, he detected what he was beginning to think of as his silent roomie downstairs by the balcony doors. //Must like the view; that's the second thing in common// The thought was half nonsensical, half sleep-filled. Whimsically he called out, "Good night," and was asleep before the echoes of the words had time to bounce back to him.

****

That first day at 852 Prospect set the pattern of his life for the next week. Up early to call for Joel, eat while he waited for the cabbie, take care of whatever outside errands needed to be done, then home. More often than not he persuaded Joel to eat lunch with him; the man knew just about everything and everybody in Cascade. Jim learned a few things about Joel himself that surprised him, such as that he had been a bomb expert working for the Cascade PD. Joel didn't go into details of why he was driving a hack, now, and Jim respected his privacy too much to pry.

Afterwards Jim would tackle the loft, patiently bringing it up his standards of organization and cleanliness. Always his unseen roomie hung around, becoming an almost tangible person as he grew acquainted with i him. He was a very restless person, Jim decided, unable to stay in one place for very long, to judge by how often he felt the other person's focus shift. Yet, almost in total contradiction, he was capable of being motionless for long periods of time. Once when Jim was re-reading the list he had made, taking time to double check the museum pieces he'd found before moving them to basement storage, the observer had felt close by, almost as if reading over his shoulder.

He would watch sports with Jimm on the tube, apparently liking most of them but having a major soft spot for Cascade's home basketball team, the Jaguars. Which showed good taste, at least, Jim decided. On the other hand, if he watched CNN too long, his house guest would take off, leaving behind a air of dismay and distress that confused Jim.

In time, he actually took the presence for granted, his opinion of what it was mutating slowly from the practical and concrete, to the more, well, hypothetical possibilities. His visitor was simply too *there* to be watching him through a telephoto lens. Jim was too well traveled, seen too many things to think that everything was as neatly explained and categorized as scientists wished. And at least if he had to share his living quarters again, it was with someone who didn't leave wet towels on the floor or play music until 3am.

By the time he had cleaned and rearranged to please himself and put the majority of Sandburg's artifacts safely in storage under a high tech security system he installed himself, Jim was feeling the most normal he had since before being captured. The hallucinations had stopped almost entirely, and he hadn't had a single black-out at all. Most importantly, he was stronger, much stronger, climbing to and from the bedroom with a minimum of trouble. He was even getting out of the waterbed with something resembling grace. Okay, maybe only vaguely resembling it, but it beat the hell out of the barely controlled plop to the floor he'd made that first morning.

His self-confidence led him to his second mistake. His first had been thinking that maybe the physical therapy ordered by the doctors wasn't all that necessary; that going to a gym would be enough. The second was standing in the middle of the living room, like he had when the realtor had shown him the place, and taking a moment to look around, feeling smug.

//Lot of work, but definitely worth it. This is going to be a good place to live.// A surprisingly sunny day had lit the loft up, making it cheery even in Jim's jaundiced opinion. The few things of Sandburg's he left out gave the place the feel of a real home, and not a barracks or a Bachelor Officers Quarters. Studying the pattern of the light and shadows falling from the balcony doors to paint the floor, Jim uncharacteristically dropped all his warrior watchfulness and let himself completely relax.

It wasn't until the last bar of shadow had slipped back outside into the dying day that Jim came back to himself, eyes burning from staring so long. As self-awareness filtered back into Jim's mind, rage and self-hatred mixed with fear came with it, leaving him shaking in reaction. Wanting only to punch a wall or get drunk, or maybe both, he swung around intending to head for the door. His hip, held motionless for too long, gave way, his abused, scarred tendons and nerves screaming.

He managed to take the fall correctly, body going limp, one hand slapping the floor to expend some of the force. But there was no chance he was going to be able to get up any time soon, either, even if he had been able to move through the pain. Every muscle in his leg knotted up, cramps stabbing into him, and he pounded on his good thigh, trying to literally beat down some of the agony.

**Breathe**

The soft whisper didn't make any sense, he *was* breathing, damn it, when he could force air past the lump of stiffled screams in his throat.

**Breathe**

In was an insistent suggestion, threading its way past the obstacles between it and Jim's attention. "I *am* breathing," he ground out, unthinkingly.

**No, like this.** The unseen speaker sucked in a huge draft of air through his nose, then let it go in a long, slow blow through his mouth.

"How... uh.. the helll...'m I ... sposed...." Jim argued, more for something to deal with than his abused body than because he really wanted to argue with an unseen something.

**Try. Innnnnnnn. Hold it....outtttttt.** For lack of any other idea, distantly admiring the interesting form his insanity was taking, Jim did as he was told. **Focus only on the breathing. See your body expand and contract with it, feel the oxygen flood through it, the CO2 rush out. Breathe.........** With the help of his invisible coach, Jim concentrated and to his amazement, the worst of the knots began to loosen on their own.

Awkwardly he levered himself up and massaged where he could, bringing his level of discomfort down to the point that he could feel something besides his leg. Like that the floor was very cold and very hard. Wistfully he looked up at the bedroom; no way was he going to be able to get up there tonight. Best he could do was get to the couch. Maybe in a few hours he'd try to walk again.

Laboriously he moved himself, hip protesting and out right refusing to work at times, collapsing at last on the cushions with a groan that was perilously close to a scream.

**Breathe.** he heard again.

Well it had been good advice last time. Again imitating the soft whooshes in and out, Jim closed his eyes and tried not to think of anything at all. Gradually he slipped away into slumber, never noticing the afghan that was tugged down on top of him.

He slept through the night, surprising himself by opening his eyes to morning without remembering falling asleep. Though his stomach was growling at so many missed meals, he stayed where he was. Partly because he wasn't looking forward to the pain when he did move, and partly because, for the life of him, he couldn't think of a single reason to do so.

Up until today he had pretty much been operating on automatic pilot. His mission, such as it had been, was to get out of that damned hospital before the doctors found an excuse to lock him away forever. Then it had been to get himself situated so he could make decisions about what to do with the rest of his life. The disability pension, his investments, and the damned hush money described as a service bonus were more than enough to keep a roof over his head and to feed him, plus have a little left over for small luxuries. Very small luxuries, maybe, but he'd always lived simply, which was why he'd had money to invest in the first place.

Which left him with no money worries, no hobby left that he could still reasonably pursue, and nothing to do with his time except lose it to these damned blank spells. For the first time in his life he had no goals, no ambitions. He couldn't even plot ways to annoy the old man. Without thinking Jim glanced over at the envelope filled inheritance documents from the lawyer that he'd left on the table by the door a week ago, not caring if he ever touched it again. William Ellison's death at the hands of a copy cat killer duplicating murders from nearly 30 years ago had forever put that particular pleasure out of reach.

Stomach gurgling louder, Jim put his forearm over his eyes and ignored the complaints with the ease of long practice. //How many people find themselves in a position to do what they please - and don't have a clue as to what pleases them?// he grumbled to himself. //Which is a starting point, I guess. What do I like to do just because I like it?// Shifting fractionally, his hip put in its own reminder, he amended, //That doesn't require fully functioning legs?//

The only thing that came to mind quickly was sex, but the incongruous image of him becoming a pimp or hustler was enough to give him his first real smile in a while. Though he'd had a buddy or two over his lifetime that did nothing but obey orders or look for a piece of ass, he couldn't really see himself arranging his entire life so that he could endlessly chase skirt. Or pants as the case might be.

Besides, outside of opening a strip joint, about the only way that could be done would be to run a bar. Partially grimacing, Jim dismissed the idea. Too noisy, too smelly, and he didn't like drunks. Besides, the kind of chase he enjoyed didn't usually hang out in bars. Bookstores, coffeehouses, even the gym, yes. Bars, no.

That was a thought; he could open a gym. Save him from finding one to work out in, at the very least. And even if he couldn't do much with the leg, he had *no* intention of letting the rest of himself go soft. Of course, not many women ventured into the kind of sweaty, punching bag filled kind of gym he had in mind. Maybe open a bookstore near the university for hunting female company, and frequent a gym to find male?

Absently he reached down to adjust himself in his pants and stopped mid-scratch as he realized that he had more than half a hard-on. Sighing with relief, he ran his fingertips over it lightly, shivering a little at how *nice* it felt, even through the fabric. It was the first since he'd been hurt that he'd had the slightest quiver from the thing, and he'd started to worry that the nerve damage elsewhere was affecting it.

Under his careless ministrations his cock stretched to it's full length, blood filling it to the point it began to ache slightly. //Oh, what the hell. Might as well take a test run and see just how much of a problem I'm going to have with sex.// Freeing himself, he sighed pleasurably and began to stroke. His nerves sang in delighted anticipation, and then spread the wonderful sensation throughout his body in sweet jolts.

Cautiously he began to pump from the hips, only moving as much as it took to compliment the action of his hand. "God!" he grunted aloud, surprised at how good, how intense it felt. The pure physical act was going to be enough to get him over the edge, no fantasies required, just cock into fist, scent of his own arousal, and his unseen audience staring at him in approval and envy.

The last concept barely formed in his mind before he shouted, spilling over himself in fantastic release. Shaking from the unexpected power of it, he milked the last few drops from himself to prolong his pleasure. Panting, he peeked from under his arm when the last of his climax finally faded to leave his mind clear, somewhat reluctantly trying to pinpoint the whereabouts of his invisible roomie. To his relief, he was completely alone, though he had no idea what had happened to the now familiar presence.

//Maybe it's a prude,// he reflected, remotely disturbed that he had begun to take it's existence for fact. //And my obscene behavior exorcised it. If that's the case, it'd be one for the books.// Half smiling, he stretched, paying close attention to the limberness of his leg, then grimaced. //Okay, time to clean up.// Taking some tissues from a box he'd found in an end table drawer, he tidied up enough to close his pants, the braced himself to stand.

It didn't hurt as much as he'd expected; on the other hand, he was probably going to have to spend the night on the couch again. No way was he going to be able to climb stairs today. Storing that away for later worry, he retrieved his cane from where he'd left it the day before, and hobbled toward the bath. Halfway there, he stopped, absolutely certain he could hear foot steps coming toward his door. Checking the time, he wondered if he'd had an appointment that he'd forgotten and if Joel was coming upstairs to see what was keeping him. Or maybe the big man had simply decided to drop by, as he'd been threatening to do for a while.

But the steps didn't sound like those of a heavy, older man; they were quick and light. And whoever it was was nervous. The stink of it preceded him, as did the barely muttered, "Okay, be cool now, be cool. Okay, okay." Taking his gun from where it hung hidden under a jacket on a hook, Jim tucked it into the back of his pants, dropped his shirt over it, and waited for the knock to come.

He opened the door onto a young black man whose gangly limbs screamed that he'd only just stopped growing up, but whose big hands said there was a lot of filling out left to do. The teen had a smile plastered onto his face, a clipboard in his hand, and a racing heartbeat that a deaf man could have picked up on by vibrations alone.

"Hi, Mr, um," he glanced down at the clipboard and tried to smile wider, "Ellison. I'm Alex Carver. From Rainier University, you know? Dr. Sheldon sent me to begin packing up the artifacts that were in Dr. Sandburg's care?"

Not believing it for a second, Jim stepped back to let the imposter in, wanting to know how the kid had gotten so much information. "I've been waiting to hear from them; expected a phone call first."

"Oh, uh, well, you know how bureaucrats work. Make you hang around waiting forever, then suddenly blow in without any warning to do whatever it is they gotta do. It shouldn't take long; I have a list right here." He all but shoved the paper work into Jim's hand.

Giving it a cursory once over, seeing that it was an actual Rainer form with a computer generated list of identified items, Jim gave the kid another once over. Though his clothes were fashionably tattered and old, they were also of good quality, and his teeth were clean and healthy. Maybe a former student assistant for Dr. Sandburg, deputized because he was familiar with what he needed to be looking for?

Then why so nervous? And this list could have come from anyone with a computer and the form itself. On impulse Jim went to his own inventory and randomly checked one against the other. Bingo. ID numbers didn't match.

"Hey, man, whacha doing?" the young man asked cooly enough, but his heartrate picked up to the point where Jim could see the pulse in his throat hammering at the skin covering it.

"Confirming that what you want are things that are here," Jim lied. "I was told that there were others stored in his office." He knew that everything belonging to the university had already been claimed and the remainder of Sandburg's belongings moved here.

"Oh, no need to worry about that; anything not here I'll go looking for there. All you have to do is sign off on what I do take," the self proclaimed Alex assured him nonchalantly.

"I'd better call and confirm with Dr. Sheldon. Last thing I want is to have to pay for a missing whatever because they weren't sure where it was to start with." Jim said, picking up the phone. Hum, no reaction, in fact an almost palpable relaxation. The number he was about to dial was from the business card attached to the rest of the paper work; those were easy to make, too.

Punching in directory assistance, he watched from the corner of his eye as he asked, "The number for Dr. Anton Sheldon, Anthropoloyg Department, Rainier, please."

"Hey, number's right there!" 'Alex' protested.

"Sorry, son, I'm not wearing my glasses. I'll let the operator connect me." Deliberately leaning heavily on his cane, for once wanting to give an impression of infirmity, Jim waited for the thief's reaction.

It wasn't long in coming. Without warning the young man darted toward the shelf closest, snatched up two items, and ran for the door. Without thinking Jim whipped out his cane, catching the boy between the legs and tumbling him to the floor. The kid twisted as he fell, already kicking out violently at the ex-soldier. Wisely Jim didn't try to deal with that, instead he *threw* the cane, knocking the door shut with it, and lurching back to hit 9-1-1 on the phone he still held.

Hearing the tones, or maybe panicking at being shut in with someone who wasn't as helpless as he'd thought, the thief abandoned one prize, scrambled to his feet and backed into the door to clutch at the handle while keeping a worried eye on his supposed victim. Taking out his gun, Jim told him calmly, "May as well put that down, son. If you do, it'll be my word against yours when the cops get here."

"Yeah, like they won't listen to you over me!" the kid shouted, fighting with the door to unlock it without looking. Abruptly his tone changed to one of deep fear and need, "I *can't* go back empty handed! I *can't*!!!"

"Tough!" The receiver in his hand spoke, and Jim barked, "Break in at 852 Pr.." The dial tone cut through his words, then he heard a soft, **No. Please?**

Startled, Jim redialed, only to have it disconnect before the first ring. **No. Please! Let Daryl have that. It's okay, it was mine."

The thief finally got the lock undone and was gone before Jim could respond to the barely audible murmur. Distantly he could hear the pound of the kids' steps beyond the still opened front door. Then, with absolutely no trace of breeze to be the cause for it, it swung shut.

At a complete loss for what to say or do, Jim stood staring at it blankly until a gentle nudge at his cane made him jerk. Swallowing hard, giving the room a once over that Sherlock Holmes would have been impressed with, Jim leaned back onto the wall and muttered, "I don't believe in ghosts."

The sound was large in the suddenly small room, and he hit the speed dial on the phone without thinking. "Yellow Cab? Yeah, could you send Joel Taggert to 852 Prospect as soon as possible? That's right, tell him Jim will be waiting upstairs for him." At that, resolutely pushing the past 24 hours into a box labeled 'not now,' Jim stubbornly put himself back into his morning routine.

The only variation was to be careful to dress completely before leaving the bathroom after his shower.

***

Too exhausted to care if Slimer from the Ghostbusters was having a party with his fellow ectoplasmic entities, Jim literally stumbled back into his apartment late that day, draped over Joel's sturdy arm. Leg threatening to give out any second, he stood weaving for a second, before nodding to the cabbie where to place him. Their progress across the room was uncertain, but they made it to the couch more or less intact, and Jim was lowered carefully to the cushions.

"Man, was it *that* bad?" Joel asked worriedly.

"Ever do time in boot camp?" Jim groaned.

"Yeah, regular army."

"Well, remember that we used to think that the brass deliberately looked for the worse sadists they could find for drill sargeants? I've discovered what happens to the ones rejected for being *too* sadistical; they become physical therapists." With Joel's assistance, Jim got himself stretched out, shoes off, cane nearby for when he needed it.

With a snort of laughter, Joel agreed, "Yeah, I heard that about PT. But you should be grateful. Greg is the best, and I've driven enough of his clients to know that for sure. You're lucky he had a cancellation this evening."

"For some reason, Joel," Jim said tiredly, "I don't feel particularly lucky right now. I thought it was bad when I was hurt to start with." He leaned up enough to glare at the other man. "And don't think I don't know you asked him special to make room for me. I appreciate the sentiment, but I don't need any favors."

"Hey, just trying to earn all those generous tips you give, man," Joel answered defensively. "How'd you find out about that anyway?"

Jim's reply was a groan and change of subject. "Want a beer before you go? I was your last fare, right?"

"Yeah, and thank you, I will. Want one too?"

"Yes, please. I would very much like to have the one beer our dear Greg Allison has so graciously permitted me to have while in therapy." Jim bitched.

Wisely Joel didn't rise to that particular bait, but fetched two bottles from the fridge and made himself at home in the chair closest the couch. They drank companionably silent for a while, then Joel asked casually. "So if it was so bad today, is it going to get much better?"

Idly tracing patterns through the dew on the beer, Jim debated not answering at all, but he liked the husky man and didn't want to snub him. "Well, the Olympics are straight out." That came out much more angry and frustrated than Jim wanted, and he tried to mellow it out. "I'll be able to walk without the cane, with a limp, but, well anything as extreme as running is probably not possible." Eyes on the bottle he directly faced the scope of his loss for the first time. "No more surfing, though I could probably swim without trouble. No more horseback riding, or serious backpacking. Handling the extra weight of a backpack over long distances wouldn't be wise. Dance? I don't know; I didn't do much before I was hurt. Basketball is limited to just shooting hoops from now on, or pitching cages for baseball."

Shrugging with his expression, Jim finished. "I did the angry thing when I first got back to the States, but it still pisses me off sometimes. Usually when I'm not expecting it. And I *am* glad to have the leg; that was iffy for a while."

"Lotta loss," the cabbie said sympathetically in exactly the right tone for Jim to hear without flinching.

"Compared to others, not so much. By the way, Joel, I hate to ask, but could you do a favor for me?" Jim didn't bother to try to make the change of topic smooth.

"If I can," he answered calmly.

"I had an unexpected visitor today," Jim started, and quickly filled him in on the thief's try at conning him out of the artifacts.

"Why didn't you just call the cops?" Joel asked when he was finished.

Hesitating, Jim tried to formulate an explanation that was close to the truth. He might be willing to think that something... extra ordinary... was happening here in the loft. But it was a safe bet that no one else not *living* with it would believe him easily. "Call it a hunch that something was up besides a simple robbery, and I want to know what. The kid was nervous, but not strung out or anything like that. But he *was*desperate. Not to mention his little operation was too well put together. If I hadn't known what the University's inventory code looked like, I would have been fooled, the list read that accurately."

"You think it might be one of Dr. Sandburg's students in some kinda trouble?"

"Maybe. Or one of his colleagues at the U up to no good. Either way all the cops would tell me is that they're investigating it and that'd be the last I'd hear until they either called me to make an id or there was another try. If you could check with your contacts about a kid named 'Daryl' connected with Dr. Sandburg, or maybe the Anthropology department, I'd appreciate it." Jim put aside the empty bottle, startled at the pained look on the other man's face. "Joel?"

"Jim, you didn't describe the kid to me. Was he black, long limbed and lanky, small scar here and here?" Joel touched below his left ear and back of right hand.

Calling up an image of his early morning guest, Jim nodded a confirmation, and the cabbie heaved a sigh that seemed deep enough to come from Mother Earth herself. Reaching into his back pocket he pulled out a well-used wallet, and opened it to a photograph taken of a small group of men, along with a single young boy sandwiched between Joel and another very tall male. "This him?"

It was, though undoubtedly several years younger. "Yeah, yeah it is. You know him, Joel?" Anger rising, Jim half sat, propping himself up on his elbow. "That how he knew so much about what was in here!?"

Standing, holding his hand up placatingly, Joel stuttered, "No! No, nothing like that! I swear! I haven't seen Daryl since his daddy died a little while after that photo was taken!"

The other man's dismay was so real, Jim flopped back down, though his expression was stony. "How do you know him?"

Convinced that Jim was going to listen, for a minute anyway, Joel dragged his hand over his mouth then admitted. "I worked with his father, Captain Simon Banks of the Major Crimes Police Department. He was a good man, one of the best I've ever had to pleasure to serve with. Daryl... Daryl's a good kid, really, but he got so angry when his parents divorced. Then Simon got taken out during a Deliverance style shootout with between survivalists and an escaped psycho using him as a hostage, and angry didn't begin to cover that boy's feelings. He was one walking rage for a while.

"Heard his mother forced him into a Big Brother's kinda thing, and he hit it off with the guy. Last news I had Daryl was pulling up his grades and doing some part time work. Want me to talk to his mother and see if she knows what's going on with him?"

Joel's hang-dog face was so mournful Jim couldn't hang onto the shreds of his anger. Besides he was too tired. "Would you? If he makes another try, someone could get hurt. And Joel," Jim met the other man's eyes with a hard glare. "It won't be me. You've never asked what I did in the army, and believe me, you don't want to know. But I will not be the one who goes down if things get ugly." He grimaced, thinking of his current condition, "Or at least, not alone."

"Maybe I should talk with Daryl, too," Taggart said reflectively. Picking up his empty and Jim's he took them to the kitchen, then came back to stand by the couch uncertainly. "I need to get going; better not to wait too long to talk to Joan. Is there, uh..."

"I'm fine, fine," Jim put in hastily. "Going to spend the night down here, just to be on the safe side, but the phone's a stretch away if I have problems."

"Not that you'd use it if you did," Joel said dryly.

Acknowledging the hit with a half smile, Jim waved toward the door. "Get outta here, Mother Joel. I'll be a good boy, I promise."

That loosened a laugh from the big man, and he left with an lift of his hand in salute to the quip.

When he was gone, Jim sagged completely into the support of the couch, feeling like his spine was so much wet spaghetti, the exhaustion from the physical therapist's comprehensive assessment weighing him down into rest. To the watchful silence emanating from near the balcony doors he said sleepily, "I was right to talk to Taggart about it; the kid *is* heading for trouble, big time. This way, there's a chance he can get some help before he finds more of it than he can handle." Not really expecting an answer, and not willing to look toward the doors and not *see* the person he *knew* was there, Jim mumbled, nearly asleep, "I'll keep the law out of it if I can."

He wasn't sure if he heard a soft, "Thank you," or not before he lost his battle with fatigue.

***

Though that was the last time Jim heard his unseen roommate, it was not the last time the entity made its presence felt. In fact, much of what it started doing was what the ex-Ranger could only call 'courtship' behavior. He would wake to the smell of freshly brewed coffee, or come out of his morning shower to find the bread he'd left ready to go just popping up in the toaster. Once when a cabbie had refused to pull up closer to 852 before Jim had to get out in the rain, he had come through the door of the loft to find warm towels waiting on the table. But his favorite was never having to wipe off the mirror before or during shaving. He probably had the only one on the planet that didn't mist in the first place.

If he was honest with himself, the visible demonstrations did more to un-nerve Jim than the feeling of watchfulness had. Not because it made him accept that he wasn't alone in the place, but because he didn't know how to react to the kindness. Murmuring "Thank you," felt awkward and it wasn't as if there was something he could do in exchange, his preferred method of handling courtesies.

For that reason he made sure that his discussions with Joel on the attempted robbery were always done upstairs, where his roommate could over hear it. It turned out Jim's guesses were fairly accurate, as were Taggart's: Dr. Sandburg had been the Big Brother assigned to Daryl Banks, and the two of them had hit it off after a rocky start. And the professor had gotten the teen a job working for the Anthropology department as a sort of all-around boy Friday.

But according to the cabbie, Daryl hadn't wanted to believe that his mentor wasn't coming back from his last expedition. There had been a major scene in the department head's office when Sandburg's position was officially posted to be refilled, then young Banks stormed out, not even coming back for his last paycheck. His mother reported that he had become more and more uncontrollable, to the point she wasn't willing to put anything past the boy. To date, Taggart hadn't been able to find Daryl himself; he rarely came home and wasn't often seen as his usual haunts.

The pain that had flowed from his invisible companion on hearing that had been so real to Jim, that he had had the most absurd urge to turn around and hug him. It also confirmed his growing conviction that he was sharing his home with its previous owner. Its *late* previous owner.

Discrete inquiries of his own had told him a lot about the young Professor. At 30 Blair Sandburg had had an outstanding reputation in his field and was one its most published and sought-after lecturers. Personally everyone had spoken of him as being energetic, enthusiastic and genuinely likeable. But Jim noticed one thing that seemed off to him: while Sandburg was missed, he wasn't mourned.

It was as if Sandburg, like himself, had no real ties to his life, or even to the people inhabiting it with him. Why then was the scientist condemned to remain at the loft? Or was that of his own choosing? There was no way to answer that short of asking the spook himself, and Jim was reluctant to do that because if he got an answer, it would mean that he'd had a real, honest conversation with a ghost. He was *not* ready to face that just yet.

So he tried to be a considerate roommate himself, paying attention to what he could of his unseen roommate's likes and dislikes. And trying to at least think about taking the suggestions Sandburg occasionally put his way about.

Mostly the suggestions were good. A few days afer Greg had given Jim the okay to start driving again, for instance, the soldier had found a newspaper turned to the classifieds next to his morning coffee. One of the ads, Classic Truck for Sale, had been circled in red. The description had been brief: blue and white '69 Ford F6 truck, working condition. He'd called, set an appointment, and after an hour of looking it over from top to bottom, bought it.

From Joel he got the name of a garage that would rent out a repair bay and tools and put his new truck there so he could work on it. That evening he made a point of cruising through the channels slowly, stopping any time he thought his roomie seemed particularly interested in what was on. It figured it would be National Geographic, but he owed big time for the truck. It was only needed a little TLC and some fresh paint.

He settled into a comfortable, if odd around the edges, life in Cascade. Physical therapy, restoring his truck, looking for a new occupation, all took him away from the loft during much of the day. He would return every evening to its peace for study or research on possible jobs, or just to fall into the deep slumber so necessary for his body's continued healing. Discovering to his immense relief that if he started to blank out his roomie would do something to startle him out of it, he was better able to control the occasional threat of loosing it on the outside. The loft became a much needed and appreciated safety zone, making coming home something he actually looked forward to for the first time in longer than he could remember. All in all, it was a solitary existence, but it was his and no one else's and that alone made it good for him.

Quiet became such an intrinsic part of his home that an unexpected knock on his door one evening sent him for his gun, prompted by vague thoughts of another robbery attempt. When he opened up, he'd almost wished it had been another thief. At least Daryl had been straightforward about stealing. Stanley Garland, his father's lawyer and by default his own, did the same thing but called it 'billing for services rendered.' The man even looked like the stereotypical slick legal counselor with his Armani suit and Aspen tan. Reluctantly Jim showed him in, making the expected offer of a beer or coffee.

"No, thank you, Jim," the tall, older man said, calmly, seating himself at one end of the couch. "Normally, I wouldn't have dropped unexpected, but you never returned any of my calls or stopped by the office as I asked."

"Didn't see any reason to," Jim answered shortly, going to stand by the balcony doors.

"Well, we really need to take care of that packet I gave you last time we met. Some decisions have to be made about fund dispersment, if nothing else." Garland adjusted his cuff, as if bored and wanting to get out as quickly as possible. "If you'll just sign where I indicated, I can get to work on arranging things so that the business can continue to run smoothly until you're ready to step in."

"Step in?" Jim asked suspiciously. "As in run the company in the old man's place? No, no way. That's Steven's job; if he can't get away from wherever he's working now, then he'll just have to do double duty."

There was an uneasy silence, and the lawyer gave Jim a look that locked the soldier's spine into a poker straight ridge in preparation. "Jimmy - I know you spent a lot of time overseas on missions, but surely you heard at least some of what happened here in Cascade over the last year or so."

Rubbing at his eyes, refusing to sit down or lean on his cane, Jim said sharply, "Spit it out Garland. What kind of trouble did Stevie get himself into with Dad, and what difference does it make now that he's gone? My brother was always Dad's first choice; no reason to change that because the old man's nose got out of joint."

"It was only because you refused to even think about business school! You had a fighting chance and didn't even try!" the lawyer shot back as sharply. With a visible effort he reined himself in and put a sort of a smile on his face. "It's a moot point, now, anyway. Steven can't run the business because he's in prison, sentenced to15-20 years for embezzlement, reckless endangerment and a dozen other charges. The stadium at a horsetrack he helped build and run collapsed killing four and injuring dozens of others. I'm not going to lie to you, he was probably the scapegoat for a bigger operation, but William was so disappointed that he changed his will completely shortly after the verdict was in. He didn't give Steven a thing, Jim; it's all yours."

The last words didn't make it past the 'Steven's in jail' sentence that was banging around in his head. It didn't make sense to Jim. The little brother that he remembered wouldn't have hurt a soul; even the ruthless man he'd grown into was ruthless only in business. He wasn't a murderer, and that's what it would have taken to build a complex doomed to self-destruct. Cut a few edges, get a few paybacks, yes. Endanger innocents, no.

Staring straight ahead, trying to get his mind around Steven being in prison, Jim didn't notice that his hearing was narrowing down to the inaudible beat of the words in his mind. Before he could black out, he heard a soft, "Jim" whispered in his ear, yanking him back from the verge in time to hear Garland begin to wind up what had apparently been a long monologue on Jim's duties as his father's heir.

"I don't want it," he cut in harshly.

That ground the lawyer down to a dead stop, mouth gaping. "I.. I beg your pardon," he sputtered.

"I don't want it," Jim repeated harshly, anger rising. "I didn't want it when Steven was the golden boy, and I damned well don't want it as the consolation prize. Give it to whoever is next in line. Sally Choi, maybe. God knows she earned it after putting up with him all those years as his housekeeper. I'm sure that if he thought to leave her anything at all, it was no where near enough."

"Actually," Garland said absently, still coming to grips with Jim's refusal, "he left her a very generous bequeathal originally." At Jim's snort of disgust, he added, surprisingly gently, "but she didn't survive him, Jimmy. Sally died of breast cancer two years ago. We thought at first she was going to beat it, but then Danny died in the line of duty, and, well, it seemed to take the fight out of her."

Jim's anger ground down to a complete halt then, blew up, ripping like shrapnel through him. Despite not wanting to look weak in front of the other man, he swayed a bit, and had to put some of his weight on his cane to steady himself. "Sally.. Sally's dead? And Danny? God in heaven, why didn't somebody at least *try* to tell me? It wasn't that hard to get in touch with me!"

"Why didn't you stay in touch with her yourself!" Garland said bluntly, pouring salt over Jim's raw grief.

"I *did*!!" Jim denied hotly, determinedly keeping his face professionally neutral. "She always knew where I was posted, and I sent her cards, gifts, always called when I got back from a mission so she'd know I was okay. None of the stuff came back, and when she never returned calls, I thought she was simply not getting through to me before I was reassigned again." Jim was talking more to himself than to Garland, trying to understand how he could have not known, not even that she was ill.

Standing, Garland got close enough to Jim for the stink of his aftershave to turn his stomach. "Look, Jim this is obviously all a shock to you, and I can understand that. Give yourself a few days to think about it all, let it soak in, before you make any major decisions about what to do with your inheritance. The board of directors has kept things limping along this long; they can manage a while longer, I'm sure. But at least sign the power of attorney documents for me so that we can pay the bills!!"

About to nod, Jim heard softly, almost inside his ear, "No, don't sign. You may not want the money, but you sure as hell don't want him to have control over it, do you?"

That pulled him up short. "Not without reading it, no," he told the lawyer.

For a brief second Garland looked furious, then he smoothed it out skillfully. "Well, that's good common sense, but I doubt you'd understand all the legalese. It's pretty much a standard agreement."

"Then I'll get someone to translate it for me," Jim answered, nearly at the end of his patience - and strength. "Tell the board to take company expenses out of their gargantuan, over inflated salaries and I'll get to the paperwork as soon as I can. Good night, Garland." The last was a dismissal, and not trying to conceal his fury at it, the other man turned on his heel and let himself out.

Slowly Jim made his way over to the door to lock behind him, then slowly, feeling as if he were dissolving into a vacuum, he went to the couch and laid down. For a few, rare, precious seconds his mind and heart was numb, then that failed under the weight of all the grief he had acquired in such a short time. Rolling he turned to press into the back of the couch, digging into it until the fibers felt like sandpaper on his skin.

Intellectually he knew he needed to do *something,* *anything,* to express the raw mixture of grief, pain and anger, but he was too tormented to be able to pinpoint any single thing that could work. Killing would be good, too bad he wasn't a soldier any more, destroying would be okay, too, and, what the hell, now he could even pay the damages. But all he could do was shudder as if he were being beaten, chest burning with contained screams.

Into this maelstrom came an odd sensation, one so strange that it pulled him out of his misery long enough to identify it. His hair was timidly being stroked, and a sturdy body was spooned up behind him, a mass that radiated no heat. Sandburg then, trying to comfort him.

Why that should be the blow that shattered his control, Jim didn't know. He only knew that the tears were forcing themselves out past all his barriers, one tedious acid drop at a time, being pushed out by the surfeit of all the others contained within his walls. His sobs were more like the choked gasps of a suffocating man as they, too, had to batter their way to the surface.

And still he tried to contain them, mumbling nearly incoherently to himself, "Crying doesn't fix anything, crying doesn't help anything, it's a waste of time, a waste of perfectly good energy."

"When the body is hurt," the soft, tiny voice murmured in his ear, "it bleeds. When the soul is hurt, it bleeds tears. Both are necessary to clean the wounds for healing."

Small as the words were they allowed him to stop fighting and give into the feelings racking through him. He lost track of time, thinking of his brother, the woman who like a mother to him, even his father though he'd never thought he would grieve for the man who had always been so disgusted with him. When at last his torn body could spare no more strength for the force of his crying, Jim quieted, hiccoughing a tiny bit as the residuals of it worked their way out.

Finally, wanting the ritual cleansing of a shower, he mustered the will to move, doing it slowly enough to warn the presence behind him of his intention to stand. Sandburg moved away carefully, too, but Jim's skin complained at his absence anyway. Not acknowledging that, he kept his head down shame-faced as he got to his feet.

A barely heard 'snick' sped through the room; automatically Jim looked up to the source. The lock on Sandburg's room was undone and the door itself was slightly ajar. As he watched, it swung open wider, and he couldn't have ignored the unspoken invitation if his sanity depended on it. He limped to the door, peered around the edges, unsurprised to find the desk light on.

It wasn't much of a room. More of large closet, if he wanted to be honest about it. And if he had thought the loft had been cluttered, that was only because he hadn't had a chance to see this office! To be sure, there were boxes of clothing, shoes and other similar items stacked here and there, obviously the finds of whoever cleared out Sandburg's drawers and things. But the vast majority of it was paper: books, magazines, journals, note pads, and simply loose sheets of paper, all piled haphazardly on the desk, the futon, the shelves and the floor. Only the desk chair was clean, and Jim sank down onto it gingerly, half-afraid that merely moving would be enough to cause one of the mounds to topple.

"Christ, Sandburg," Jim muttered looking around, "what kind of filing system did you use? A stack for every thing and every thing in its stack?"

**Hey, just because you put away your socks alphabetically by color doesn't mean that other methods of organizing don't work. I can find whatever I'm looking for and faster than if I used some arbitrary alpha-numeric designation.** Sandburg protested, sounding for all the world as if he were sitting on the bed in the midst of his paperwork.

"Arbitrary?" Jim asked, not feeling the least bit weird at having a conversation with someone he couldn't see. He was too damned worn out to engage his skepticism.

**Arbitrary. Do you file an article on Shoshoni warrior spears under S for Shoshoni, for the last name of the author, or maybe w for weapon? Arbitrary.** Sandburg insisted.

"Hey, don't get your feathers up there, Chief," Jim retorted mildly, "What ever works for you, all right?" Noticing that the scent that he'd always associated with the loft was very strong in here, he sucked in a deep breath and looked more closely at some of the private items out in plain view. One was a picture of a curly-haired young man, against a tropical beach backdrop, laughing, and one arm around an older woman who was smiling at him fondly. "This you?" Jim asked, instantly intrigued by the remarkable sapphire eyes shown in the picture.

**Yeah, and my mom, Naomi, on St. Vincent's Island,** Blair told him, voice heavy with love for his mother.

Another photo was of Sandburg and a grinning group of teens, standing in the midst of a dig of somesort, holding up a shovel as if to bang him over the head of it. **Last year's freshman dig. I went along to help supervise.** Jim picked up a couple of others, amused at the wide variety of locations and types of people his roommate had associated himself with.

"No other family?" he asked, noticing that was what was different about the pictures and thinking Sandburg had probably kept those upstairs.

**No. Some cousins and uncles. There's an album if you're really curious.** Blair said warily. **No dad, if that's what you're looking for. Mom never told me who he was; for the most part, it never seemed to matter to me.**

"Maybe you were better off, Chief," Jim said heavily.

**Maybe,** the other person agreed, **There's no way for anybody to know whether they'd be better off this way or that way or if they'd done this thing or that thing, you know. What you get is what you work with.**

Jim smiled, feeling the edge of his mouth curl stiffly, as if it didn't remember exactly what a smile was. "Are all ghosts this philosophical?"

Instead of answering him directly, Sandburg asked back, **Is that what I am? A ghost?**

That brought Jim up short, and he answered thoughtfully, "How am I supposed to know? It's not as if I've met one before. You mean you don't know either?"

**I don't remember dying, Jim. All I remember is a woman screaming 'no, no you don't belong here,' the feeling of falling, then I was here, like I am now.** Blair sounded very tired, and Jim struggled to his feet.

"Does it wear you out or something, talking to me? I'll go, let you rest or whatever." he offered, hoping that Blair didn't want him to leave yet.

**Yeah, I kinda gray out, but it's easier in here. This room was always kind of my center, you know? That's why there's a bed in here, too. I'd work or study or just read here lots of nights and then stretch out to rest before I had to teach. Upstairs was um,**

"More recreational?" Jim asked dryly.

**Something like that.** And Jim could swear he heard the other man grin. **Anyway, I don't want to keep you, but since there wasn't anything much I can do about invading your privacy, I thought I'd balance the scales a little by sharing mine.**

A large part of Jim, the portion that had built the walls and gave backbone to the soldier, wanted to simply wave it off as nothing, or snarl as if there had been something Sandburg could have done. But his lingering guilt at moving in uninvited, plus his honest desire to do something for the man made him say quietly, "Thank you. Not just for, well, earlier, but for trying to so hard to make living with me workable."

Blair laughed, a full-bodied one that did much for melting away the last of Jim's concerns. **The burden of that, man,** Sandburg gasped out, **was all yours. I mean, it's not like you've got a history of dealing with ghosts, right? To be truthful, every other person, including my *mom* couldn't wait to get out of here once I came 'back'. Surprised the hell out of me when you told Corday you'd take the place.**

"Really? Wonder why? You've never been... unpleasant," Jim asked, leaning on the doorframe, honestly curious.

**I don't even have a theory, and let me tell you, I've had lots of time to think about it.**

"Huh. Joel's never complained about being up here."

**Send him up alone some time when you're not here as a buffer.** Blair suggested.

"I take it you'd like to get more of a handle on what's going on with you?" Jim asked, glad that an opportunity was presenting itself to make a little restitution.

There was a long, long silence and Jim began to wonder if he had tired out his companion to the point he could no longer respond. Fidgeting at the door, he nearly left when he heard, **I'm afraid to learn too much, Jim. From what I know about haunting phenomna, a ghost either has no idea that it's dead, or it has something that it feels it left undone. Either way, once it either accepts its death or accomplishes its task, it moves on.

**I may *be* dead for all I know, but even if I had seen my body, I don't know if I could believe it. It's not like I ever had a chance to deny it: no white light, no making a choice, no heavenly voice calling me on. Nor do I have any unfinished business that I can think of.

**And I am not ready to move on, no way. This may not be much of a life, but it's mine and I'm not willing to give it up without a damned good reason.**

His companion sounded mule stubborn, and Jim hid a smile. "Hey, this was your home before it was mine, Sandburg. I'm not planning on looking for a priest to exorcise you or anything. And if there's something from the outside you'd like me to get for you, let me know. I'll see what I can do."

**Really?** The eagerness in Blair's voice was that of a nine year old's and Jim's hidden smile stretched harder to get out.

"Within reason, Chief. I'm not bringing in a dancing girl or going to try to set you up with a psychic!" Jim warned laughingly.

**Aww, come on, Jim! It's not like I can go out and scope out my own dates, you know! You have *any* idea how long it's been since I got a whiff of sweet, honest, lickable girl?**

"Just lickable girls?" The words popped out before Jim knew they were on his tongue, and he finally released his grin so that Blair would think he was being ranked on.

**I'll take whatever you can find as long as it's legal and doesn't howl when the moon comes up!**

"Sandburg, that is *horny*! And just how am I supposed to explain that my roomie is optically challenged?"

**Easy; if you act like you can see me, my date will think she's having trouble with her eyes! Emperor's new clothes time!**

Out and out laughing, shaking his head, Jim admitted, "You know, the scary thing is, that might work! Which is too much for me. Good night, Chief."

**Night, Jim. And Jim... thanks for putting up with me. All joking aside, this has *got* to be freaky as hell.**

Thinking of his fugues and the bizarre way he could see, hear, feel, smell, hell, even *taste* things that nobody else could, Jim didn't say anything, just gave a single wave of his hand and headed for the shower and his own bed. "You don't know the half of it, Sandburg," he muttered to himself, forgetting that his roomie could be right beside him without him knowing.

***

On the way home with Joel from therapy a few days later, Jim was feeling pretty satisfied with himself for making it through the session without wanting to throw up or black out once. Not that he was up to driving himself home by any stretch of the imagination; he was *way* too wiped. So wiped in fact that he didn't notice how wound up his friend was until Taggart spoke.

"Jim," the cabbie began uncertainly, "I finally tracked down Daryl. I have to tell you, attempted robbery aside, I'm worried about the boy; all he could talk about was that Dr. Sandburg."

Head snapping up from where it was lolling against the door glass, Jim fixed his attention on the other man. "Why would that worry you?"

"Cause it isn't healthy for him to be going on and on about Sandburg, remembering down to the tiniest detail what they did together, all the places they went and the people he met. Damn, when did the man find time to work? To hear Daryl, the professor was always traveling, hanging out with prizefighters and famous writers and God knows who else. He's completely and totally obsessed with Sandburg, *still* insisting he isn't dead."

"Sandburg's mother doesn't believe it, either," Jim said thoughtfully. At the fast glance in the rear view from the cabbie he added, "Realtor told me when I bought the loft."

"What *is* it about him that people don't want to let him go?" Joel asked in exasperation.

Jim shrugged. "From everything I've heard about him, he had a real love of life and people. It's hard to deal with it when someone like that dies." //And it must be hell on Blair to be trapped in one place with a silent hermit,// he thought to himself. //Is that why he's here? Punishment? I can't imagine him doing anything horrible enough to deserve it.//

"Thing is, I'm afraid Daryl's going to act on his fantasy," Taggart told him worriedly. "When I tracked him down to the library, of all places, he was on the Internet, calling up information on the area where Sandburg was lost. Local politics, attitudes on Americans and foreigners, customs - hardly took his eyes off the screen entire time I was there."

"So the kid thinks his teacher is being held incognitio for some reason by the locals? Wouldn't be the first time," and Jim startled himself by not being bitter about his own sojourn as an 'unidentified' prisoner. "You might suggest he get in touch with Amnesty International. They've got good contacts; if Sandburg is being held they're the best bet to find him."

This time Joel didn't glance; he glared at Jim, risking a crash for the cab. "You want me to play into Daryl's fantasy! Jim! That's..."

"Being there for him while he comes to terms with the loss of another father," Jim cut in. "How long after Simon Banks died did his son lose the one person who kept caring for him when he was 'one walking rage,' as you put it?"

"Not quite a year," Taggart admitted reluctantly.

"I'm no shrink, Joel, but I know a coping mechanism when I see one. Let him research; help him do it if it gets him to let you in, then hang in there. Sooner or later he'll have to face reality; it'd be really good if there was someone there to pick up the pieces when it hits him. Unless you're not up to that kind of commitment." Having said more than he ever thought he could, Jim slumped back into his seat and slammed his mouth shut. Who the hell was he to be giving advice anyway?

Taking the hint to be quiet, Joel concentrated on driving, but Jim could tell that the hack was thinking, too. Thinking hard. Glad for the silence, Jim went back to staring sightlessly out of the window, mind running around and around several facts. The two people that had been closest to Sandburg at the time of his disappearance didn't believe he was dead. *Sandburg* didn't believe he was dead. He had heard, "you don't belong here," just before whatever happened had happened. There had been no body and no reason for the anthropologist to have left the rest of his party. And last, but not least, American dollars were very popular south of the border; Americans weren't.

Try as he might he couldn't dismiss the possibility himself that Blair might be alive. The question was what, if anything could he do about it? Or should he do anything at all?

The resounding 'yes' that boiled out of him caught Jim totally off guard, and he shoved the implications of his answer to the back of his mind. To distract himself, he actually *looked* at the street they were driving down and suddenly said, "Joel. That store, can you pull in front of it? I want to get something."

Automatically the cabbie did as he was told, then asked, "A computer shop? You're into that, too?"

"No, but never too late to learn, is it?"

Hours later Jim cautiously let himself into the loft, glad he had persuaded the salesman to let him take the laptop out of the box to carry it home in its case. Of course, the man had been more than happy to indulge a customer that had just bought his top of the line model, with all the bells and whistles, and signed up for a premium provider without once wincing or trying to bargain. Of course, Jim had to assume that the machine was as good as the salesman had made it out to be. Though he had worked with laptops more than once as part of cov op training, this was like driving a Jaguar after a life of army jeeps.

As casually as he could manage, he put the laptop on the kitchen counter, got a glass of fruit juice, and leaned his good hip onto the counter to chug it. A moment's concentration told Jim that his friend was standing in his favorite place by the balcony, a past time he could well understand since he liked the same spot himself. "Evening, Sandburg," he said aloud, noticing that it no longer struck him as bizarre that he was talking to someone he couldn't see.

He hadn't really expected an answer, but Blair drifted closer, and he heard, **Hard workout?**

"Yeah, but I'm getting through them better. Greg says I'll be able to get rid of the cane in another month or so."

**Cool!**

"Better than cool," Jim laughed. "It's out and out great. I *hate* that thing. So I decided to celebrate. See what I bought?" He waved the glass in the general direction of the computer, trying to look pleased - and not gleeful. "Been meaning to learn the internet thing for a while; be a heck of a lot easier carrying that instead of stacks of books when I'm checking out business prospects. Don't know much about them; hope the salesman didn't screw me too badly."

**Wow,** Blair breathed reverently and the laptop shifted gently as the case flipped open. It was turned on, and he breathed, "Wow" again as it ran its self-check.

"He told me I would need a second line, so I wouldn't tie up my phone with a busy signal when I was using the modem. There's already one in the loft, right?"

**My office,** Blair told him, a bit distractedly. Keys were clicking at top speed, and it seemed everytime Jim blinked, something new popped up on the screen. **Wow.**

Yes! Jim thought triumphantly, not letting it show on his face. He'd guessed that was the most likely place for it, along with a logical assumption that since he hadn't seen a desk top PC when he'd been in there, Sandburg had used a lap top at home and probably had taken it with him on his expedition. Trying to sound as if he were asking a huge favor that would be denied, Jim said tentatively, "Your office. Oh. Uh, I don't suppose - I mean, I know it's your private space and everything, but... Nevermind. I'll take it back; it was a spur of the moment buy anyway." He turned away to get more juice, wanting to hide his expression because he wasn't sure he wouldn't give himself away.

**Take it back? Why? Hey, if you're uncomfortable working in there I can make myself scarce.**

"That wouldn't be right," Jim said honestly, straightening up. "Beside I'm too old a dog to be teaching myself new tricks. I'll take it back and use the ones at the library; there's someone there who gets paid to help the hopelessly cyber-impaired."

A few more screens zipped by, and the laptop made a couple of interesting sounds. **Jim,** Blair said slowly, **I'm pretty good with one of these. And it's not that hard to use, especially the way this one's been set up. If you wanted, I could show you how. And at first, especially, you wouldn't be online long enough for tying up the phone to be that much of a problem.**

Pretending to consider it, Jim rinsed out his glass and began to pull together the makings for his dinner. "Tell you what," he said after taken enough time for the pause to be realistic, "since the line's in your room anyway, why don't we do a trade off? You let me keep it in there, show me enough to get started, and when I'm not using it, you can. I could pick you up some games or whatever. And the best buy was for unlimited time with the server, so you could go online, too, if you wanted." A sudden thought struck Jim and he added worriedly, "That is, if you *can*."

**I don't know,** Blair said excitedly, *Let's find out. Move it for me? It's too heavy.**

"Hey, I"m in the middle of my dinner here, Sandburg."

**Aww, come on, how long can it take to cross the room and plug in the line?** the young man wheedled.

"More time than I want to spend going hungry, waiting for my food. You can hang on a few."

**A few what? A few seconds? A few minutes? A few hours?** Blair tried again. "How about if you get started, then come plug it in while the food is cooking?**

"I was going to turn on the tube and catch some scores," Jim argued, beginning to grate cheese for an omelet.

**Hey, I can get you any scores on any teams you want online. Faster than wading through all that depressing news, too.** Blair's tone was practically begging, and Jim couldn't hold out any longer.

"I'm not going to get a minute's peace til I move that thing, am I?" he mock groused, wiping off his hands.

**No, not a bit," Blair shot back unrepentantly.

"Okay, Sandburg, okay." Scooping up the laptop, Jim limped for the office, carefully examining the back of the case for ports.

**Jim,** Blair asked from right at his elbow, **How much did this baby cost anyway? I can't believe the speed and amount of memory crammed into it.**

"Enough," Jim replied, deliberately evasive, knowing there was no way he'd confess that the last of his cash savings had gone into it.

**In fact, even if you got a sweet deal on it, it had to cost a ton. Pretty expensive impulse buy.** Blair went on half to himself, suspiciously.

"Whoa, Chief. Who said anything about impulse? Been thinking all along about getting one. You practically *have* to be computer literate these days to get a job, and if I open my own business, I'll need one. The only impulse about it was buying one now, instead of waiting until I had to have it." The explanation sounded so reasonable, even to Jim, that he was able to deliver it in a perfectly level, slightly disinterested voice.

The other man didn't have anything to say to that, and Jim quickly placed the laptop on the desk in Blair's room. "I'm going to go eat; why don't you run this thing through its paces and make sure everything's working okay?"

**Great. Give me a chance to think about how to structure your lessons so you'll be able to pick up what you need as fast as you can.**

"No hurry. Haven't even found a job I want yet," Jim shrugged off the suggestion. He left, but stuck his head back in as a thought hit him. "Maybe you can see if there's a person or company that locates parts without charging you an arm and leg? The truck is going to need an alternator, and I don't want to jury-rig something that important if I don't have to."

**Sure thing, man,** Blair told him happily and turned the laptop on.

Once was sure he was far enough a way, Jim grinned hugely and pumped his arm once. "YES!"

Hours later, meal long gone and hip for once totally forgotten, Jim decided that everything he'd heard about Sandburg being a good teacher was true. That or this Internet stuff was easier than it had looked when the salesman had demonstrated it. "I can't believe someone would give me that much money for my truck," he muttered, making a note on the paper beside him.

**Why not? You've done a fantastic job of restoring it. It looked like a survivor from a police shoot out when you bought it.** Blair argued mildly.

"Only needed some body work, and few gaskets," Jim corrected. Eyes on the paper, he hit the next item that had come up on his search. "Frame and engine were sound. Even with my labor that's nearly 50% mark up of what I put into it." A quick glance told him that the screen had been changed, and he hit the link to get past it without paying attention to what it said. Absorbed in his figures, he kept his head down, pencil flying. "And with shipping this is the best price so far for that alternator. This beats the hell out of clambering around a junkyard."

Laughing softly, Blair said, "Too messy for you huh?"

"And smelly and noisy and about a dozen other things I could point out." Jim waited for his companion's rebuttal, already completely addicted to the way Sandburg could come up with a thousand obscure facts to dispute any statement anybody might make. Instead there was dead silence, and Jim's head shot up to look at where his friend's voice had been coming from. Startled all over again by the sight of no one there, he focused on his other senses, trying to pick up on Blair's presence. "Chief. You okay? If I've been in here too long, I'll get out."

With a choked moan, Blair agreed thickly, "Might be a good idea, yeah." He came closer, and Jim felt him reach over him to close down the computer at the same time Jim had automatically started to do the same thing. Accidentally brushing the unseen hand to one side, he got a good look at the screen and understood both the other man's discomfort and sudden need for privacy.

Instead of a picture of a car that would be a 'Mechanic's Dream,' there was one of two men having sex. And apparently enjoying themselves immensely. A big, well- muscled man dressed in a ripped T-shirt and tight, grease-stained jeans was bending over the hood of a cherry red '69 Mustang convertible, ass thrust out invitingly. Standing in profile to the camera, he was pushing down his pants with one hand and was bracing on the car himself with the other, erection stabbing out of his pants.

Behind him a shorter man dressed in what any trucker in the country might wear on any given day, including the boots, had his own impressive hard-on out, holding it in one hand to aim it at the tight rear in front of him. The other hand was flat on the back of his partner, holding him possessively, digging at a hole in the T-shirt. He had his tongue *just* touching his upper lip, as if savoring a taste that had been left behind and his face was intent on what he wanted.

He also looked enough like Blair to have been his twin. It was the same curly hair worn loose and windblown around a face graced by the eyes of an angel and the 5 o'clock shadow of a scoundrel. Even the body type was the same; compact and sturdy, like a wrestler. Tearing his eyes away from the trucker, he noted in passing that he had a passing resemblance to the mechanic.

A powerful bolt of desire surged through Jim, but long practice at hiding his thoughts kept his features neutral. Blair apparently didn't have the same skill in covering his reactions; he moaned softly, and Jim felt a solid male ridge pressed against his shoulder from where the other man was still leaning over him fumbling turn off the laptop. Jim did it for him, catching and holding the trembling fingers.

**Looks just like you,** Blair said thickly, tugging free.

"I'm cut," Jim told him matter-of-factly. "Sorry about that, Sandburg. I wasn't paying attention to what I was connecting to. I'll get out of here so you can, uh..." At the thought of what Blair might do in here by himself, Jim lost his composure and struggled to his feet, wanting to get away from the seductive feel of the other man. "... take care.. or whatever."

**I CAN'T!!** Blair wailed disparingly. **I can't see myself or hear myself or *touch* myself. My mind and heart knows I'm here, but I can't *feel* it!!!"

Without thinking Jim gathered him into a hug, shutting his eyes and concentrating only on holding the shaking man. Never any good with words, he simply hung on through the tremors, idly rubbing small circles into the back under his palms. Ignoring not only the maleness prodding at his thigh, but his own rampant need, he rested his cheek along side Blair's temple, enjoying the slight tickle from the curls there. Thankfully the sexual part faded quickly, and by the time Blair calmed down, their hug was pure comfort, though it was hard to say which of them was taking more from it.

**I keep thinking that I'm lying in a coma somewhere, and this is all a delusion created by a dying mind to explain what happened to its body. Or that I'm totally insane and drugged into oblivion, being kept in restraints so I won't hurt anyone. Either way, what right do I have to keep hanging on, stay here where I *should* move on?** Blair whispered at last, terror making his voice quiver.

"The same right any person has to live, Chief," Jim murmured, petting the firm lines of his friend's back. "And if you're delusional, then I'm your partner in insanity, because you're more *real* to me than I am to myself sometimes. You have a scent that is stronger when you're close and which I can pick up on my things when I'm not in the loft. Your voice is so distinctive that if I heard a recording of it, I could identify it with no problem. Think about that - identify a sound I've never heard in my life. There might not be any body heat, but you are *here*, a three dimensional person who has hair," and he stroked a strand nearest his face, "and shoulders," he cupped them carefully, not sure if he could hurt the other man, "and all the rest." Not trying to be sensual, he quickly mapped out the contours that he could reach with fast sweeps of his fingertips.

As he spoke, Blair grew heavier against him, as if soaking up Jim's reality in substitution for his own. **Why can you do all that? When Naomi was here, I tried as hard as I could to get her to hear me, to feel me when I touched her. She never so much as blinked.**

A short, unpleasant laugh forced its way out of Jim, hurting his ears. "Sorry." he apologized quickly, not wanting Sandburg to think he was being made fun of. "I'm laughing at myself. I wasn't joking when I said we were partners in madness, Chief." Pausing, he took a breath and then ground out what he'd kept hidden. "Ever since I was rescued, I've been seeing, hearing, smelling, hell even *tasting* things that I shouldn't be able to. For all I know, I'm the one locked away somewhere, hallucinating." He said the last wryly, expecting Sandburg to complain about his lack of imagination if he couldn't dream up a suitable body for his 'ghost.'

Instead the other man eased away, hands reluctant to go and lingering even as Blair stepped back. **Oh, my God. I mean, I saw you do a couple of out-there things, but I thought it was the whole Rangers training, combat background thing.** he murmured. There was a pause, then he asked hesitantly, **Jim, there's one sense you didn't mention; are you, um, extra touchy feely, too?**

Jim looked away, the muscle in his jaw beginning to beat an annoying tatoo, upset with himself for his body's betrayal and at Sandburg for noticing it. Not that his companion had had much of a chance, given how tightly Jim had been clinging to him. "What of it!" he snapped, anyway.

**Nothing,** Blair said mildly, deflating part of Jim's irritation. **Just theorizing, that's all. Part of what I do as an anthropologist.**

"Great. I tell you I'm going crazy and you make like a scientist with a lab rat!"

"I thought you said we were going crazy together. *Partner*," Blair pointed out, and not for the first time Jim swore he could hear the man grinning. "If I can help you identify your psychosis, maybe you can help me identify mine!"

"Well, while you're doing that, I'm going up to bed," Jim grumped, absolutely not willing to be told he was a psychic of some sort. Or something even harder to believe.

**Night, Jim,** Blair told him absently. Surprisingly he shut down the laptop and pushed it to one side, then began to rifle through one of the many stacks of books and papers.

"Night," Jim replied automatically, wondering when things had gotten so off-kilter. With a last sharp look at where he knew Sandburg stood, he hesitated at the doorway, oddly unwilling to leave.

With a stubborn shake of his head to dismiss both that and the whole conversation, he started to leave, only to be stopped by a mischievous question. "By the way, Jim? Do you bottom?"

A shiver of lust chased over him, but Jim answered in the same vein. "I've been known to. For the right man. You?"

For a spilt second Jim could swear he *saw* the other man, eyes wide and mouth hanging open slightly. Before Sandburg could recover, Jim beat a strategic retreat, making it almost to the bath before hearing, **I love to. For the right man.**

He wasn't surprised when sleep was non-existent for him that night, and he was strangely content to lie in the middle of the big waterbed, cradled by the warm water and thinking about nothing in particular. Erotic images and ideas, all featuring Blair, chased through his mind, occasionally inspiring his body to remind him that he was a man after all. From the office below, he could make out the subtle hiss of paper over paper as pages were turned, and he wondered if Blair was reminded too. And if he wanted to do something about it with Jim. Or if he *could* do something about it. Though he said he couldn't touch himself, he had responded to being in Jim's arms: first with excitement, then by relaxing. Even if he couldn't actually feel it, most of sex was between the ears, anyway. It was possible witnessing the act or merely *wanting* it could be enough for satisfaction for Blair under the right circumstances.

Of course, he could just go downstairs and ask all that, but he liked being up here thinking about it and anticipating the possibilities. There'd be plenty of time later to deal with the problems, assuming that his partner was willing. He wasn't stupid enough to take 'screw anything with a hole' horniness as necessarily a real interest in him personally. Nor did he want to take advantage of Blair's neediness; another reason for staying snug in his bed. Besides it was so nice to lie there, half-hard and warm inside from being wanted.

Dozing, he was jolted completely awake by whispers from under the firescape to the loft.

"I'm telling you, man," a man insisted as emphatically as he could without going above a whisper, "there's hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of artifacts in that room. I got a buyer all lined up, a crooked prof at the U. And it's locked from the rest of the place. Don't even have to worry about the owner busting in on us. All we got to do is get up this ladder and jimmy the window."

Wearily Jim identified Daryl Banks voice. He must not know about the storage downstairs that came with the apartment, and was thinking that all of the stuff from the University had been moved into the office with Blair's other things.

Pulling himself out of bed as cautiously as he could, he debated on what to do. If he called the cops, it might stop the teen - or his accomplices - from doing something truly stupid when they discovered only books and the like in the small room. It could also give Taggart a chance to get a secure grip on Daryl if he provided bail and took custody. On the other hand, B&E charges closed doors, lots of doors that could be opened by a young man with as much potential as Joel and Blair saw.

Resignedly, Jim stole down to the living room, gliding through the shadows, gun in hand and holding back the agony from abusing his hip. One chance was all he was going to give them, he decided. The door to Blair's office was standing ajar; he'd turn on the kitchen light and make noise to let them know he was up, and that the office *was* opened to the rest of the loft now. He'd stay out of sight so they'd not be able to get a clear shot, but the news that he was up and around could scare them off if they were smart. Or at least let them see the artifacts were gone now and there was no reason to break in.

Betrayed by the metallic clunks and bangs, subdued as they were, they climbed up to the fire escape landing outside the office, mentally followed by Jim. Waiting until they started on the window frame, Jim used a broom to turn on a light and shoved around the kitchen chairs so that they clattered on the hardwood floor. He threw an apple at the cold water handle in the sink, turning it on enough that the water ran noisily.

Unfortunately, all his activity did was slow them down; when he didn't go into Blair's office they went back to forcing the window lock. "He's got company this time, Sandburg." he mumbled to the presence at his back.

**I know. They're not armed; put the gun where they can't see it and go inside my room and turn on the lights there. They're looking for an easy smash and run. Chances are good they won't want to deal with facing a potential witness.**

Hesitating, listening to Daryl bully the others into ignoring the signs of life from inside their target, Jim nodded. "Okay, but if they decided three of them are enough to deal with me, you put us in the dark to even things out. Got it?"

There was no answer, but as Jim was slipping his gun into the pocket of his robe, Blair whispered, **Maybe we should call the cops this time.**

"I won't hurt any one more than necessary, I swear, Sandburg." Yawning and stretching deliberately, and trying to look sleepy, Jim strolled through the door and headed for the desk. Scrubbing at his hair to disguise it, he glanced quickly outside, confirming what his ears had already told him. Daryl with two other boys about his own age: one black, small and wiry, the other white and skinny to the point of being sick looking. Junky? He seemed jittery enough. Either way the unknowns were halfway off the landing, arguing in hushed tones about trying again later.

Leaning on the desk and picking up his figures from earlier, Jim waited for the outcome of the fight, bracing himself on the desk as unobtrusively as possible. There were a couple of emphatic clatters, and then two people went down the fire escape, leaving one outside the window. Betting with himself that it was Blair's friend, Jim snuck another peek. Yep; crouched just below line of sight and staring at him as if he were dressed in the robes of the KKK.

**Oh, man,** Sandburg whispered. **He didn't look this bad when I first met him. He's really hurting.**

Not able to answer, Jim kept up his pose, warily keeping track of the others. Once he heard the vehicle parked under the escape leave, Jim said loudly if conversationally, "I moved all the museum's stuff out, Daryl. Want to come in and tell me why you're willing to get mixed up with garbage like those two to steal it?" He looked up and pinned the teen with a sharp glare. "I can't believe a man like Blair Sandburg would befriend you if you weren't a hell of lot more than a common thief."

**Jim, what...**

Ignoring Blair, he stretched out and unlocked the window, undoing the secondary latch hidden in the frame that he'd put on all the doors and windows. Pretending vast indifference, he went back to scanning the sheet in his hand, deciding that he'd order that alternator. Several long minutes later the window came up and Daryl climbed in slowly, looking much like a 5-year- old caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

"What do you know about him?" the teen muttered sullenly, staring at the floor.

Hovering anxiously beside him, though only Jim seemed to know that, Blair murmured, **Trust him, Daryl. Please trust him. Please.**

Jim waved his hand at the office in general, hoping that on some level Daryl heard his Big Brother. "His whole life is pretty much crammed into here. Personal journals, photos, research - I haven't tried to pry, but between this and what I've been told about him, I think I've got a pretty good picture." Gently he added, "And Joel Taggart's told me about you. Now you want to tell me why you want those artifacts so bad? For the money?"

Daryl didn't answer, and after a patient wait Jim stifled a sigh. Radiating unhappiness, Blair said sadly, **Daryl, man!" and left, his presence simply fading from the room in a way that worried Jim for no reason he could put a finger on.

"You know where the phone is." Jim said shortly, trying to set aside his concern for his roommate. "Call your mom to come and get you."

"No way!" Daryl exploded. "She'd give me nothing but grief, then ship me off to her brother on the East Coast!"

"Well, you can't spend what's left of the night here. Got a friend you can stay with?"

"Oh, what do you care. Just let me out of here!"

"I'm not keeping you," Jim said reasonably. He thought, then carefully suggested, "We could call Taggart."

That brought the dark brown eyes up for the first time, and they had a glimmer of something in them. "He wouldn't come," Daryl denied, though it was clear to Jim that the kid hoped he would.

"Yes, he would. And I think that if you talked to him, he might have a few ideas on how to look for Dr. Sandburg."

That clearly shocked the young man, and he backed away from Jim, pressing his back against the window frame. "Wh.. what makes you think I'd be interested in that?" he asked nervously.

"Because that's what I'd do," Jim said simply, "if it were my friend missing."

With alarming suddenness, Daryl crumpled, falling in on himself, tears already streaming down his face. Lurching forward to catch him, Jim bit down a shout as something in his hip gave way, but he managed to ease both of them to the floor, hanging on to the weeping teen. Daryl cried hard, his whole body shuddering with the effort, and the older man knew that it was for more than his missing mentor. Not sure what else he could do, he held on, letting the would-be robber cry himself out.

Hours later he settled the young man on the couch, both of them too exhausted to deal with getting Daryl home or any place else. At Jim's insistence the teen had called his mother to let her know where he was, then called Joel to arrange for the cabbie to pick him up later that morning. Asleep before he was completely stretched out, Daryl curled on his side and snored softly into the pillow he'd been given. Dropping the blanket over him, thinking that he looked a lot younger than his 18 years, Jim leaned on his cane, and wondered where *he* was going to spend the rest of what was left of the night.

The only two options were to try to sleep on that torture device in the office Blair had called a bed, or get himself upstairs to the waterbed. Gingerly he put weight on his hip, trying to assess how much damage had been done. The moan didn't make it out of his chest, but he felt the color fade from his face. Enough apparently; Greg was going to tear him a new one.

It was the thought of how much the heat from the bed would help that decided him. Checking Daryl one more time to make sure he was out, Jim went to the stairs and started his way up. Midway he was reduced sitting down and dragging himself the rest of the way, using his upper arms to carry the burden of his now useless leg. An agonized eternity later he was in the bed, scrabbling off the top to the bottle of muscle relaxants that he'd been given. Dry swallowing a dose, he considered taking painkillers, too, despite the way he could never predict how he would react to them.

In the end, he couldn't convince himself it was safe enough to risk being semi-unconscious, and tried the breathing thing that Sandburg had shown him. It helped, and, oddly, seemed to summon his unseen friend.

**Jim? What happened?** Blair hesitated at the edge of the bedroom, as if not willing to enter without a specific invitation.

Well, he could fix that, Jim thought muzzily. "Come on in," he muttered. "It's your home, too."

**Are you okay?** Sounding very worried, Blair came closer, bringing a waft of his spicy scent with him.

//Nice.// Jim went back to breathing in pattern, not intentionally ignoring the other man, but getting caught up in fragrance that came with him.

**JIM!!**

The shout jarred him most of the way back, making him jump and renewing the pain in his body. A moan worked its way out despite Jim's best efforts to hold in down, and he clutched at where a white-hot poker was stabbing at his hip.

**You hurt your leg again?**

//No shit, Sherlock,// Jim growled behind his clenched teeth, glad the mean words couldn't actually get out.

**Hang on, I think I can help. Be still and try not to move.**

"Not much choice there, Chief," Jim bit out.

A second later the bed shifted, but the water in the mattress allowed Jim to literally flow with the movement, then timid fingers were circling his ankle. **I'm going to massage your leg as best I can. I don't know if I can apply enough pressure to do any good, but at the very least, it'll provide a distraction, okay?**

"Your scent does that," Jim told him without thinking, then he back-peddled hastily so Blair wouldn't be offended. "It's a good smell, Sandburg. And I've learned to associate it with being in the loft, relaxed and mellow, so it helps."

**Uh, thanks.** The other man sounded as if he weren't sure how to take the comment, and if he'd been alone, Jim would have smacked himself for his stupidity. Strong hands went to work on his lower calf, kneading and drumming at the angry knots buried in the flesh. It hurt, but in a different way and then the knots began to give way to the attention.

"God! You're good at that!" Jim moved his good leg away to give his friend room to work, and sighed in relief. The other man straddled the bad one and knee walked up it's length as he loosened the constricted muscles, effectively reducing the soldier to so much quivering protoplasm as he worked. When the rubdown reached the tops of his thighs, Jim squirmed out of his boxers without being asked, anxious to keep that marvelous, soothing touch on his skin. Seemingly undeterred by having a nude patient, Blair didn't hesitate, not even at the criss cross of scars marring the otherwise perfect body. He did slow, however, using his fingertips in a gentle digging style to avoid putting pressure on the newly healed tissue.

Unexpectedly Jim's psyche decided that the change was more than relaxing; it was down right lacisvious, and would be *great* on more intimate portions of the big man's anatomy. The portion most inclined to react did exactly that, and began to stand straight and tall, tip rosy and damp. Wrapped a veil of aroma from Blair, the warmth of the bed, and vagueness from the drug, Jim didn't notice his condition until Blair, seemingly lost in his own thoughts as he worked, was poked by it when he shifted position to start back down toward the ankle.

"OH!" Eyes he didn't remember shutting popped open, and Jim instinctively arched into the fleeting contact.

**OH!** Blair froze in place, and Jim could feel a surge of ... sensation... from where the unseen man's crotch straddled his leg.

They stayed like that a split second, then what he felt from his partner resolved itself into something Jim knew quite well: a dick stretching lazily as it filled. Willfully Jim closed his eyes, conjuring Blair's face hovering over him, and the image was so real, right down to the mixture of confusion, fear and desire, that he couldn't stop the lust that boiled through him, forcing a small plea from his lips. "Please! Touch me!"

Groaning, Blair shifted so that he was sprawled over Jim's good side, burying his face in the curve of the big man's neck. **I'm sorry, I'm sorry,** he mumbled, but he took the straining shaft into a square-fingered hand and began stroking in time with the urgent rocking of his own hips.

Blindly Jim groped for the head nestled into him, plunging his fingers into thick curls. "Can you feel us, babe?" he panted, wishing he dared risk his hip and could meet his new lover's thrusts. "Is this good for you at all?"

"Ah... ah! Yes, but it's like humping through a quilt!" Blair bit at the tender skin just over the collarbone, then licked it.

Absently thinking that it was weird to get licked and not get wet - weird but sexy, too - Jim tried a nip of his own at a nearby ear. No taste, and he moaned his disappointment over that, but didn't stop him from peppering tiny kisses over the stubbled cheek and jaw. With his free hand he reached down to cup a hard rear, encouraging Blair in his movements. Hoping to help, he purred, "What do you like, lover? What can I give you?"

His answer was a whimper and a frantic increase in the way his thigh was being ridden. Pressing one long finger over the back seam of Blair's jeans, Jim trailed up to the waist band to borrow under the fabric, wanting to repeat the caress back down, on bare skin this time. But the shirt was tucked firmly into the pants and defied any attempt the sentinel made to pull it free or make room for his hand, and he was forced to give up.

It didn't matter; breathing ragged and painful, Blair gasped, "I.. Jim ... I'm... I'm gonna..."

The warning was a spur to his need; it raced for the finish, dragging Jim with it, making it impossible for him to do anything but fuck the hand holding him. "Just.. just a little more... God!"

"OHHhhhhhh!" The soul-deep relief in Blair's voice as he shot was all Jim needed to come himself, and he convulsed, silently shouting.

The shudders faded into tremors, then into sleep, and he painfully turned to his side, unconsciously accommodating the lover still clinging to him.

****

A soldier doesn't live to be as old as Jim Ellison without learning to fall asleep when he can and to wake up instantly when he does. Nevertheless, when he crept out of sleep that morning, it was a leisurely climb toward awareness, punctuated with occasional rational thoughts.

//There's someone in the loft. It's okay, it's Daryl and he's just using the facilities.// He snuggled into the chest he was using as a pillow, and drifted around the idea of falling back to sleep. //Someone is at the door. Oh, Joel. Picking up Daryl.// The arms around him tightened as he squirmed to get closer to his bedmate, and he heard the conversation between the two people downstairs without bothering to understand the words. It went on a while, the buzz a pleasant backdrop to the normal morning sounds of his home. In time the front door opened again and Jim's consciousness stirred enough to identify people leaving.

That was good; he was perfectly willing to let the rest of the world go about its business while he took his own sweet time getting ready to join it. For the first time since he was a child, he felt secure and safe, watched over by someone he trusted. //Watched over?// The thought was strange enough that Jim shoved away from his cozy position. //Watched over?//

Looking at where he knew Blair was sitting up against the headboard of the bed, he asked softly, "You don't need to sleep?"

**No, I don't," Blair admitted sadly. With a small laugh, **Would you believe that I used to be on the hyper side? Always had work to do, things to take care of, people to meet. Had to set an alarm clock to remind myself to go to bed instead of working all night! Now... now I miss it. Miss dreaming especially.**

Shaking his head, trying to imagine what kind of existence the other man led, Jim told him, "I'm not sure I'd miss mine if I were in your shoes. On the other hand, I can't imagine anything more boring that sitting up all night watching me sleep. You shouldn't have let me get away with trapping you here to use you for a body pillow."

**Trust me on this, it was no problem. Spending a night with you wrapped around me made me feel normal for a change. Like if I laid there cuddling you long enough, I'd drift off to sleep, too.**

"Good," Jim said in honest relief. "If you want, you can, you know..." He waved at the room in general, not sure what the best way was to let Blair know he could come up any time.

Thankfully he understood and accepted the offer with a soft laugh. "Thanks, man. Beats the hell out of staring out the window all night, with nothing but your own thoughts for company, wondering if things are always going to be like this."

"What *is* it like for you?" Jim couldn't help asking. "You said you can't feel yourself or anything, but you move things around here, and *I* can feel *you*. You need a shave, got a heavy five o'clock shadow, and two hoop earrings in your left ear. You're wearing jeans with a small rip near the knee, a flannel shirt tucked into it with the top two buttons undone, and hiking boots."

**Wow, I didn't know it was that detailed for you. I thought it was the same as how I feel you; just kinda there, like touching through heavy gloves. I can't feel anybody or anything else at all. As for moving things, you know when you're doing something you don't really have to think about, like answering the phone? You don't have to tell your hand exactly what to do to pick it up; you just do it. If I don't think about it too much, I can do it, long as it's small.**

"Is it like that outside the loft, too?"

Blair sighed and shifted on the bed, obviously reluctant to answer that question. **For me, there's nothing outside the loft. I can see out the windows and what's happening on the street, look out the door when it's open, but if I cross the threshold or stand on the balcony, there's nothing there. Not even darkness; just *nothing*, and it hurts me to be there. Once or twice, when I first got here, I tried anchoring myself to the door and walking through it anyway, but I never really moved. I just thought I was walking, I guess.**

Jim couldn't help the shiver that creeped up just under his skin, making the small hairs on his body stand up. What Blair was describing was a hell he didn't ever want to be consigned to, yet the smaller man was talking about it as if he were merely giving Jim a tourist's highlights of another country. And his own morbid fascination with it made him ask one last question. "Is that where you went last night when you couldn't help Daryl?"

**I already hurt so badly.... Jim is it wise to let him think he can find me? I heard him and Joel talking earlier about Amnesty International and Joel using his old police connections to get a copy of the reports on the search for me. About my mom seeing every psychic and clairvoyant with even a half a reputation for being right once in a while. Daryl has to accept I'm gone before the grief does too much damage.**

"Like I told Taggart, if he truly believes you're alive, we can't change his mind," Jim argued. "Or stop him from looking for you and maybe doing something extreme in the process. But if he has a friend to support him, then when he does finally admit it, he won't be alone. In the meantime there will be someone to keep him from getting drastic."

Taking a deep breath, Jim added, "Besides, he's right, Naomi's right. You're not gone and maybe he senses that on some level." Dragging his hand over his face, he muttered under his breath. "I don't believe I just said that."

**Oh, my God. Jim, tell me you're not thinking of helping him,** Blair begged.

"All I'm saying is that maybe your body *is* somewhere out there badly hurt. The rest of you - the soul, or life force or whatever- got separated from it and came back here, back home. What harm can it do to check out the possibility? If we find it, we'll at least know that much, and if we don't, we're no worse off."

Jumping off the bed to pace, Blair asked angrily, **And if you find a corpse? What if my belief that I'm alive is the only thing keeping me here? Prove that I'm really dead, and then I *have* to move on to whatever's next.**

Unprepared for the twist of pain that came at that, Jim flinched, but he made himself be honest. "You're right; that could be the case. And I guess I don't have the right to make that decision. It's your life."

**Damn right it is!** Blair paced some more, then muttered, **Such as it is. God, what if this is the only time I get to choose? I mean, what if I go on like this forever? What if I can never simply say, okay, it's been 250 years so there's probably a good chance if my body is out there, it's so much dust, time to move on and see what happens next, but for me there is no next, the door closed because I wouldn't take the opportunity while I had it?**

The sound of walking stopped directly in front of Jim, and Blair went on. **What if that's why *you're* here? What are the odds that the only person who's been able to sense me would decide to move back to his hometown and buy a condo? Not only that, but of the million places in Cascade to buy, what man with a bad hip buys one where he has to climb stairs to go to bed?**

Jim shrugged. "A pig-headed one that doesn't want to admit that he's never going to be whole again? One who was thinking how good the place smelled and not how hard it was going to be to get up those stairs? Someone who has been slowly going crazy anyway, which you have to admit is a very real possibility, given some of the other things that have been happening to me lately."

**You mean your zones.**

"Zones?"

**When you loose track of yourself while you're looking or listening or whatever.**

"Huh. I've been thinking I was blacking out."

"No, just over-focusing on one thing. Everybody does that to one extent or another. Ever been working on something so hard that you look up and you've missed dinner and your ass is numb because you've literally been sitting motionless for hours?**

"I choose to do that! These, these *zones* just sneak up on me, and it's a very real possiblility I'm going to get myself killed if it happens at the wrong time!" Jim protested.

**Hey, I didn't say it was a good thing. Only that it's not that freaky. Look, Jim, I've got a theory about these zones of yours that I've been wanting to talk to you about, but I haven't really known how to get into it. And I'm more than a little worried about how you'll react. Could you do me a favor? I know you need to call Greg and have him check out your hip - and don't bother trying to dismiss it, it doesn't take a genius to realize that you haven't moved an inch more than necessary since you woke up. And I need to spend time doing some *major* processing. Downstairs on my desk is an opened book, with a pen lying in the middle of it. Would you read it for me and tell me what you think?**

Grimacing because Sandburg was right, a dull ache in his hip was warning him that getting up was going to be... interesting, Jim grumbled, "You're going to be trying to decide on whether or not to risk dying, and you want me to *read!*"

**Trust me, this is one book you *need* to read.**

****

Three days later, Jim closed the cover to "A Multicultural Approach to Sentinel Myths, Legends, and Folklore as Applied to Twentieth Century Norms" by one Dr. Blair Sandburg, and carefully set it on the coffee table as if expecting it to explode. Or vanish into thin air like its author.

Said author was currently in his office, cruising the internet at a speed Jim found alarming, nobody should be able to think that fast, hitting webpages on everything he could find on astral projection, hauntings, and anything remotely related to his own condition. So far Sandburg's general conclusion was that there were fascinating implications of a culture's beliefs on the after life and how they perceived ghosts.

Fascinating, maybe, but certainly not very useful. Not that his sources had been any better. Between him and Joel, they had read everything official on Dr. Sandburg's disappearance in Mexico and talked to practically everybody legally involved. And to more than a few who weren't. But neither Jim's intelligence contacts nor Taggart's more prosaic 'good buddy cop' network had turned up anything suspicious about the missing anthropologist. His expedition had camped for the night, he had turned in for the evening, and that was the last anybody had seen of him. The tent and its contents had been undisturbed, his bunk slept in, and the only thing gone, besides the man himself, had been a backpack he routinely carried.

Questioning Blair about it privately hadn't been much more enlightening. According to him he had been too excited to sleep, they had been so close to their destination, and had gotten up early to do a little advanced scouting. He defended going out alone without telling anyone by saying that he was hardly inexperienced in the jungle, and that he had clearly marked a trail. Which nobody had seen, along with the so- called Temple of the Sentinels that Blair had declared was less than a mile from where they had camped.

So far that slender piece of evidence was all that had to prove that foul play could be involved. And Jim was hardly in a position to give it to anybody in authority. Most of those had laughed off the possibility that there was a temple to start with, let alone that someone might try to stop Sandburg from finding it.

Staring at the book again, Jim couldn't help wonder if, ghost or not, both he and Blair *were* crazy. "A primitive throw back to early man, with five heightened senses that allow him to see what others can not." Jim quoted sourly. "So I'm some sort of cave man, huh, Sandburg. Thanks a lot!"

**That's harsh, Jim.** Blair sat beside him, taking advantage of Jim's tacit permission to be as close as he wished to be whenever he wanted. **It just means that you were born with a genetic advantage that used to be more common in the early days of man's evolution.**

"Well, I sure as hell don't see any advantage to it! So far all it's been good for is to give me headaches and zones. Where the hell was it when I was a soldier and could have used it? Why is it cropping up now?"

**Are you sure you never used any of your senses before? By accident maybe?** Blair prodded gently.

Deep, deep inside him where he kept what he didn't want to think about, what he *couldn't* think about, unknown things stirred and rumbled, making his head suddenly pound, eyes burning. Reaching up to rub at them, he saw in his mind's eye a man he'd nearly forgotten, a man he'd once considered more than a friend. "Incacha."

**Jim?**

"What?" he barked, wondering why the Chopec shaman would come to mind now, of all times. The jungles of Peru and the Chopec village were a lifetime away.

The phone rang shrilly before Blair could answer him, and he reached out to snag the phone, letting his frustration spill onto it. "Ellison!"

"Well at least you answered the phone this time," Garland said acidly, "However impolitely. How are you doing today, Jim?"

"You didn't call me to get a report on my health," Jim snapped. "Say whatever you have to say and get it over with. On second thought, I know what you want, and I'm not signing those papers. I've given them to another attorney so he can enlighten me on how badly you're trying to screw me, and the best charity to give the whole damn bundle to. Talk to the board about how much money they can come up with for a buy out, if you feel you have to pretend you're earning your retainer!"

"Young man you are seriously over-reacting! Now I've made allowance.." Garland sputtered.

"I am *not* a young man, I'm an old, scarred soldier and I damn well know my mind. And if you're thinking on having me declared incompetent, I suggest you reconsider telling Uncle Sam that he gave a gun and an officer's commission to a lunatic! My guess is any judge will have trouble finding in your favor because of that