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Published:
2020-11-05
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2007-05-08
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Five Senses

Summary:

Crossover: Due South x Sentinel. A serial killer has come to Chicago. Two Detectives from Cascade follow him and find more than they were expecting. PostTSbBS. Cop!Blair. Slash PreSlash JxB FxK Chapter 3 added 9th May; Chapters 1 and 2 slightly updated.

Chapter 1: Chapter 1

Notes:

Disclaimer: Not mine! Due South and all of its characters belong to Alliance Communications and the Paul’s.  The Sentinel belongs to Pet-Fly.  I’m just invited the characters over to my backyard to play and I will send them home soon.

 

Author Notes: Thanks to Mmmarmalade for Beta-ing this.  All errors are mine.

 

Chapter Text

Title:                 Five Senses

Author:             JustJeanette

Fandoms          The Sentinel, Due South

Genre:              Drama, Angst, Slash, Pre-Slash, Case-Based

Pairing(s):         Established J/B, pre-slash/Slash Fraser/RayK

Summary:         Crossover: Due South x Sentinel. A serial killer has come to Chicago. Two Detectives from Cascade follow him and find more than they were expecting. PostTSbBS. Cop!Blair

Rating:              FRAO for Violence and crime detail.

Version            1.1 (updated 9th May 2007)

 

  Chapter 1 

 

“Ellison, Sandburg!” Simon’s bellow intercepted the pair of detectives as they entered the bullpen, “My office.  Now!”

 

Sighing softly, Jim looked at his partner and shrugged a shoulder to suggest that the smaller man lead the way.  “Looks like you were right, Chief,” was voiced for Blair’s ears only.

 

“And don’t you wish I wasn’t?”  Blair’s reply was Sentinel-soft, meant only for Jim’s ears.  “It means he’s struck again.”

 

“But where?”

 

The grim looks they received from their colleagues as they headed into Captain Simon Banks’ office backed up their automatic assumption that the bellow was related to the ongoing investigation into a perpetrator they’d aptly named Five-Day.  Rookie detective, and Jim Ellison’s permanent partner, Blair Sandburg had been the one to identify the base serial signature.  Unfortunately Blair identified the signature just at the time when their offender would be heading for a new hunting ground; they had five dead in Cascade and that was all they’d get.  No-one in two previous states had even picked out that a serious serial offender was in play, which was a testament to both the perpetrator’s skill (unfortunately) and to Blair Sandburg’s intelligence.

 

Simon Banks, in a testament to the trust he placed in his detectives, particularly this pair, had pulled in a few markers and had made sure that an unofficial notice had gone out across the country through the Police Department grapevine.  Seemed someone had actually paid attention.

 

“Close the door, Ellison.”  Simon regarded both men before indicating that they should sit down.  “As you’ve probably guessed, your Five-Day man has struck again.  The victim is Reginald Skinner and his body was found in downtown Chicago.”

 

“Similar MO as before?”  Blair was fairly certain the answer would be yes but he had to check.

 

“Similar MO.  Skinner was found on the doorstep of the 27th precinct in Chicago when the dayshift arrived.  About two hours ago, our time.  Anyway, the lieutenant there, Welsh, is an old acquaintance of mine and he called it in here.  You two are both formally requested to lead the investigation, liaising with the 27th Precinct and any other agencies necessary until this guy is caught.”  Simon looked rather smug at that pronouncement making both Jim’s and Blair’s politics alert alarms sound.

 

Simon caught the look the two men shared.

 

“I did say lead the investigation, gentlemen.  Quite a feather in your caps, I’d say.”

 

“Man, you mean to say we can even boss the Feds around?”  Blair might be a detective (a damn fine one, even if he was still considered a rookie, given he’d been on the force officially for less than six months) but he still had a fair amount of the child of the sixties in him thanks to his mother, and, the idea of bossing Feds around was bound to be something Blair would enjoy.

 

“Just be gentle with them, Sandburg.”  Simon tried to admonish the young man but his heart wasn’t in it.  Like any good cop, he knew getting the chance to one-up the Feds was something you didn’t pass up.  “You are both booked on a 10.00 am flight to Chicago.  I suggest you head home and pack for a stay.”

 

“Already done, sir,” Jim smiled at the surprised look that appeared momentarily on the captain’s face “and, no, we’re not adding psychic to our list of skills, but Sandburg was sure we’d get a hit today.”

 

“And you like to be prepared, Jim.”  Simon really wasn’t surprised to find his best team was already ahead of the game but sometime, just sometimes, he wished they didn’t need to be.  “You’ll be met by a Detective Raymond Vecchio.  Now go.  Get this guy and get back here.”

 

“Yes, sir,” the two detectives answered simultaneously.  Blair added a snappy salute before they headed back to the desk area they shared.  Jim was already pulling up the Chicago PD files to see what they could find out about the detective they’d be working with.

 

“Forewarned is forearmed, correct, Jim?” Blair laughed softly, as he looked over Jim’s shoulder and started reading off the pertinent facts.  “Detective first-class, mediocre arrest rate until three years ago at which point it seems to have picked up markedly.  No partner listed.  Isn’t that rather unusual, Jim?  I mean for a city with a reputation like Chicago, I would have thought they’d have all detectives working in pairs.”

 

Jim had been surprised at that fact as well but he’d gotten a bit further in his reading.  “Seems like he acquired an unofficial partner about then, Chief --- a Canadian Mountie, of all things.”

 

“How does a Chicago flatfoot end up partnered with a Mountie?”

 

“Good question.  Should give us a bit of light reading for on the plane.”  Jim hit the print button, and all the information they had about Vecchio was soon spooling out into Blair’s eager hands.

 

@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@

 

“Good morning, Ray.”  Fraser, bright (in the red serge today) and cheerful, in his quietly polite way, sat himself down in his usual chair and eyed the file that Ray Kowalski was currently perusing.  “Anything interesting this morning?”

 

It never ceased to amaze Ray that Fraser would show up at the 27th within an hour of any really weird case hitting his desk.  Take the one currently sitting front and centre.  Sometime between five and six this morning someone had left a care package at the back of the 27th parking lot; Reginald Skinner, no longer wanted by the FBI due to the fact that he was well and truly deceased. Skinner had apparently been killed elsewhere, in a particularly gruesome manner, and his body dumped where it would be found by detectives arriving for first shift.

 

Welsh had handed Ray the case file, told him two experts from Cascade PD Washington State were being flown in to help with this one and then had let him loose with the suggestion he get down to the morgue ASAP and start investigating.  That had been about ten minutes ago and here was Fraser asking if they had anything interesting.

 

“Not much, just the first local victim for a serial killer that has decided to make Chicago home for a while.”

 

“Ahh.”

 

Ray looked over at Benton Fraser, master of the understatement.  “Yes, ahhh.  We have a corpse; one Reginald Skinner, initially dumped in our parking lot, and now parked with Mort.”  Considering what had been parked with Mort caused Ray’s face to turn slightly green.  He’d managed to read only a small portion from the preliminary report but the details were enough to turn his stomach.

 

“Ray, are you all right?”  Fraser noticed the colour change immediately.

 

“No, but we’ll still have to go see Mort, and then check out the parking lot.”  Ray stood up decisively and headed towards the stairs.  “Come on, and no donuts this morning, Dief.”

 

Diefenbaker actually ignored Ray.  Instead, he sat at Fraser’s feet waiting till the Mountie moved.

 

Fraser looked briefly at Diefenbaker before he picked up the report that Ray had purposefully left on his desk.  A quick scan of the contents clued him into his friend’s behaviour.  Eyes, ears, nose and tongue removed and placed beside the corpse in a parody of a face.  The arms had been de-gloved, from the elbow down, and the skin from the hands folded on the corpse’s breast like an Egyptian mummy.  Not a pretty picture at the best of times.  “Come on, Diefenbaker, I think Ray is going to need our assistance on this one.”  Fraser stood and his lupine companion followed him down to the PD’s morgue.

 

- - - - - - -

 

Ray hated the morgue.  He could deal with death, it was a part of policing at the detective level, but dealing with corpses, particularly when the victim had been brutally killed, was not the same as dealing with death.  How Mort could do his job on a day to day basis was explained, at least as far as Ray was concerned, by the fact that he considered the forensic pathologist somewhat insane.

 

“Someone with a lot of skill did this.”  Mort was holding up the left arm.  “See, the incisions are precise, clean.  This man wasn’t butchered like a piece of meat.”

 

“Not butchered…”  Ray couldn’t believe Mort had actually said that.

 

“Actually, Ray, I suspect Mort is referring to the fact that our victim was killed with almost surgical precision,” Fraser interjected as he walked into the room.  Stepping closer to the mortuary table, Fraser joined Mort in looking at the corpse.  “See the way in which the blood vessels behind the ear have been carefully ligated before the ear was removed.”

 

“Yes, yes, well-spotted, Constable Fraser.”  Mort moved to look more closely at the left ear before moving to check the other injury sites.

 

Ray moved away from the table.  He was just as happy to let Fraser handle this part of the investigation even as he despaired about his friend’s apparent fascination with the way in which people died.  What worried Ray about this case was that, even given the sketchy details he had so far about the supposed earlier kills, it looked like the perpetrator was escalating the level of violence.  Further details, however, were going to have to wait until the out-of-town talent arrived.  Said talent was to have with them all the other case files, a good thing as currently he, and Fraser, were working kind of blind.

 

“Come, look at this, Benton.”  Mort had returned his scrutiny to the arm and was pointing a scalpel at the wrist area.  “Here is why Mr. Skinner died: exsanguination.  The veins and arteries at his wrist have been stitched open.”  Long open scars traced down from the elbow to wrist.  “The stitching is remarkable.  Whoever did this has an amazingly precise hand, such neat little stitches; not a millimetre of suture wasted.”

 

“The fact that there was no blood around the body then backs up the theory that he was killed elsewhere, and dumped at the station?”

 

“Yes, that’s right.  Either that or he was bled out on something like a tarpaulin that was taken away post-mortem. Still, I would expect to have found a lot more blood on his posterior surface if that was the case.  Most likely he was killed elsewhere, somewhere where the killer would have had sufficient time to work uninterrupted.”

 

“May we look at his clothing?”

 

Taking the nod in the direction of an evidence bag on the next trolley one over from where the corpse was laid out as an affirmative, Benton began sorting through the victim’s clothes.

 

Ray moved to join him as this wasn’t the bloodless mess the corpse was.  “Well?”

 

Fraser ignored Ray in favour of a close scrutiny of the shoulder seams on the victim’s jacket.  Grabbing a pair of tweezers Fraser carefully teased some small fragments of matter out of the seam.  “Does this look like a coal speck to you, Ray?”

 

“How should I know, Fraser?”  There was a tiny lump of something, only just visible, in the blade of the tweezers.  “You’re the one with the good eyesight, remember.”

 

“Sorry, Ray.”  Fraser continued his inspection after bagging the fragments.

 

“No need to apologise.  Just tell me what else you think you’ve got there.”  Ray sat back and watched as Fraser went over all the clothes with a meticulous care that would have done any forensic technician proud.

 

“The lack of blood on the cuffs, and for that matter, the rest of the clothing, suggests that our victim was stripped before he was killed and the clothing put back on afterwards.  Some of the matter caught in the shoulder seams might be from the place where he was murdered.  Fingerprints won’t get anything off the clothes either, I can smell baby powder and latex which suggests the perpetrator, or perpetrators, were wearing gloves. I think we need to have a look at where the body was dumped first.”

 

“Yes, we’ve got time for that.  We don’t have to pick up the experts until four pm.”  Ray was glad of an excuse to be off and moving; watching Fraser work was one thing, but when the Mountie had started sniffing at the victim’s shorts, well, the less said the better.

 

“Experts?”

 

“Sorry.  I forgot to tell you.  The serial was identified out of Cascade, Washington State.  Some pair of wunderkind picked it up, and, as they are the experts on the perp’s signature they are being flown in to lead the investigation.  We’re just supposed to provide the taxi service.”

 

“Surely you don’t believe that, Ray.  Inter-agency and inter-police force co-operation is an important duty for any police officers.  Think of what we could learn from these people.  Identifying a serial signature is a highly complex process.  I mean, Ray, you do realise that the FBI has an entire specialist branch devoted to the profiling of serious serial offender.  Think about what we could learn about recognising and developing profiles from these experts.”  Fraser’s eyes were alight with joy at the mere thought of learning something new.

 

“All right, Fraser, all right.  Stop with the sales pitch.  It just rankles that we have to hand this over to a pair of cops from Washington State.”

 

“Would you rather hand the case over to the FBI?”  Fraser was fairly certain what the answer to that question would be; better to hand over to other cops than the blue suited dweeb brigade that seemed to characterise the Chicago FBI office.

 

“Fine, but let’s get moving.  Maybe we can show these out-of-towners how we do things in the big city.  We don’t have to pick them up until four; maybe we can have the case solved by then.”

 

“I find your sudden optimism rather refreshing, Ray.” Fraser smiled to indicate that he was gently poking fun at his friend.  The thought of experts etc., could wait until later. For now, they had to find out what they could.

 

- - - - - - -

 

The back corner of the 27’s parking lot had been taped off, well away from where the body had been found, and was being zealously guarded by two young Uniforms.  The press was in attendance, almost salivating at the idea that someone successfully committed a crime of this magnitude so close to a police station; the only saving grace was that the members of the fourth estate had no idea it was part of a larger serial offence.  Ignoring the microphones, cameras, and requests for comments, the two men ducked under the tape (leaving Diefenbaker to growl at the press corps) and headed over to where a couple of the forensic crew were squatting down.  Ray approached the technicians whilst Fraser started to look around.

 

“Vecchio, you got tagged for this one did you?”

 

“Yes, Simmonds, so what have you found?”

 

“Not a lot.  The victim was probably dumped here about 4:30am.  The area under the body was still dry, so he had to have been placed there before the short shower we had at five.  No sign of a weapon, no prints that we could use on anything, not even a decent partial.  Whoever did this was good, didn’t leave a lot for us to find.”  Simmonds was not particularly happy; the press at his back, and nothing of worth to even bag up.  This wouldn’t look good on the news tonight.

 

Moments later Simmonds was even more unimpressed as he heard the Mountie call Vecchio over to look at something.  He and the crew had already been over that area with a fine-tooth comb, but it looked like they might have missed something.  “Bat ears and eagle eyes,” Simmonds muttered to his assisting technician as they both got up and followed Ray.

 

Fraser, kneeling down in the alley behind the station lot and about ten feet away from the back entrance, was holding up a slightly damp piece of newsprint.  Yesterday’s date was visible so the garbage couldn’t have been there long; probably blown down the alley on the winds last night.  Something about it, though, must have really caught Fraser’s attention as he was totally focused on the ground under the piece of paper.  The Mountie actually jumped slightly when Ray touched his shoulder to get his attention.

 

Barely visible under the paper was a partial foot print in a layer of slimy mud.

 

“Come on, Fraser that could have been there forever.”

 

“I don’t think so, Ray.  Look.”  Fraser had somehow or other acquired a pair of fine point tweezers and was using them to indicate some specks embedded in the mud.  “See, these look a bit like the matter I found in Mr. Skinner’s sleeve seams.”

 

Simmonds and Fletcher, Simmonds’ assisting technician, arrived at that moment.  Fletcher had the camera out and set for macro photography so quickly, it looked like he had expected to need it that way.  Fletcher was right of course, if the Mountie had seen something then Fletcher expected to need the camera. He’d seen Fraser pull this stunt far too often now not to expect results.

 

“Sleeve seams?”  Simmonds rather hated coming into a forensics discussion with Fraser without all the facts.  The Mountie had garnered quite a reputation with the Chicago Forensics Unit over the last few years ,but the fact that he often got to see the evidence before it was passed down to Forensics often meant that the Mountie sometimes had a better picture than they did.  If Fraser wasn’t so good at sharing what he knew there would have been a lot of resentment, but as Fraser tended to over-share, the Forensics unit tended to welcome him with open lab-coats.

 

“I had the chance to examine the victim’s clothing earlier.  There was some particulate matter caught in the seams.  Very similar to what I can see here.”

 

“Okay, we’ll photograph and bag it up.”

 

“Yeah and, uh, expedite the analysis too, pronto like.”  Ray jumped into the conversation before Fraser and Simmonds headed off into the esoteric.

 

@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@

 

For all that they’d been packed on the off chance they’d be sent elsewhere after the Five-Day offender, Jim and Blair only just made their flight.  Vecchio, it seemed, was a busy detective these days with a knack for solving strange cases.  This fact had meant that the two detectives had needed to pull a reasonably large amount of information about their liaison in Chicago.  Jim and Blair meant to use the flight time to get a feel for the man, would he be a help, or a hindrance, the foremost question on their minds; particularly given Jim’s Sentinel abilities.  Unspoken, but still taken into consideration, was the fact that if Jim had something meaty to concentrate on then the flight itself wouldn’t tire him out as much; planes and Jim’s hyperactive senses didn’t mix real well these days.

 

“Man, Jim, and here I thought Cascade was the most dangerous city in America.”  Blair was reading one of the more recent case files, “I mean, look at this; pirates, toxic waste, and a gold robbery.”

 

“What?”  Jim looked at his over-active partner with a fondness that he normally kept well and truly under lock and key, but they were away from the PD and prying eyes.  Anything that got Blair excited these days was a good thing.  The scars from the whole dissertation fiasco might be healing, but there was a way to go yet.  Jim’s own actions hadn’t exactly been sterling at the time; in fact his actions had added to the scars, and in many ways the older detective was still trying to make up for his behaviour.  Jim’s joy was short lived, however, as his partner flipped to another page causing Blair’s heart rate to spike suddenly.

 

“Blair?”  He only ever used his partner’s name when he was concerned.  “What’s up?”

 

“Remember that Mountie you mentioned?”

 

“The unofficial partner?”

 

“I know him.”  Blair didn’t look real happy about that fact, which surprised Jim; normally Blair was more than happy to renew old acquaintances.

 

“Chief?”  Indicating he was listening Jim hoped that Blair would start talking and explain the sudden melancholia.

 

“Back in the early days of my diss a lot of test subjects were suddenly found for me.  This guy was one of them.”

 

Blair might be say he was happy working as a cop, and he was a damn good one in Jim’s opinion, but the loss of Blair’s academic career and the way in which his academic colleagues had abandoned him still hurt the younger man.  For a while, it had looked like his police colleagues were going to jump the same way as his academic colleagues and that had really done a number on the younger man’s self-esteem. In the end it had been Simon that had salvaged something good out of the whole fiasco, and even now Jim was willing to swear that Blair would attempt to walk on water just to justify the captain’s faith in him.

 

When Jim had finally caught the clue bus he had tried his best to be supportive of Blair.  Mind you, the fact that it was his captain that had come to Blair’s rescue instead of Blair’s much vaunted Blessed Protector (namely himself) still rankled.  After all, Blair had thrown away his life just to protect an anal-retentive, ungrateful asshole of a cop who at the time had joined in the Blair-bashing along with everyone else, but there were times when Blair’s old life still jumped up and bit them.  This appeared to be one of them.

 

“So he was a Sentinel candidate then?  I suppose I should be glad he washed out.”  Jim pulled the younger man into a sideways hug, though he held it a little longer than technically necessary.  One of the other nicer side effects of having to re-evaluate his relationship with Blair, no longer tag-along observer but fully shielded cop, was that he had re-evaluated said relationship and come out of it with more than a partner.

 

“Washed out is an understatement.  I still have no idea why his superiors sent him down to Rainier.  The man was perfectly average across the board.  It’s kind of why I remember him.  I mean most of the other candidates I got saddled with had some level of hypersensitivity in at least one sense but this guy, man, he was a complete blank.  Though he was smarter than the average cop, I’ll give him that; he’d actually heard of Burton.”

 

“You’re kidding.”

 

“Nope.  Seems he’d been raised by his paternal grandparents; travelling librarians in the Northwest Territories.  He’d probably read his way though every book in Canada by the time he was twelve.  Thing is, he’s likely to ask about the dissertation.”

 

“You can’t be sure of that, Chief.”

 

“Knowing the way things keep coming back at us, Jim, I’m willing to bet it’s the first thing he asks about.”

 

@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@-@

 

Finally, some two hours after they’d entered the lot, Ray and Fraser made their way back to the bullpen to go over all the information they had.  Fraser asked again to look over the file, particularly what data had been sent ahead of the experts from Cascade.  There wasn’t much, just names of the victims, dates and cause of death; looked like they would have to wait until the experts arrived to get any more details.

 

“Ray, who is it exactly that we are meeting?”

 

“A Detective Jim Ellison and Detective Blair Sandburg; they are Cascade PD’s wunderkinds.  Their flight gets in to O’Hare at four, like I said.”

 

Fraser frowned at the names mentioned which set off Ray’s alarm bells.  In the year plus that he’d been unofficially partnered with the Mountie, Ray had learnt a thing or two about the closed expressions that characterized Benton Fraser, control freak.  The current expression was almost new. It was the wary look of someone who had a secret that they suddenly weren’t sure was going to stay that way.  If pushed, Ray would have said Fraser almost looked… afraid.

 

“You okay there, Fraser?”

 

“Sorry Ray, I was just wool-gathering.  You said Detective Blair Sandburg.”

 

“Why?  Do you think you might know this guy?”  Snapping at Fraser wasn’t generally a good idea ---Fraser could shut down like a clam with the best of them--- but Ray tended to get belligerent when he was worried about Fraser.  Belligerence was the safer option he’d long since decided; the other option involved getting up close and real, real, personal with Fraser and he was fairly sure that wasn’t going to happen.  Still, a man could dream, couldn’t he?

 

“I’m not sure.  I knew an anthropology student studying at Rainier University in Cascade named Blair Sandburg.  He was doing research into people with heightened senses.  The RCMP volunteered me as a possible test subject.”

 

“Heightened senses?  Oh, that whole tasting everything habit that you’ve got?”  Ray had to laugh.  It seemed that some jokers in the RCMP had wanted to embarrass Fraser and what better way than make him act like a guinea pig?  Suddenly Ray didn’t feel like laughing anymore, as the thought finally made its way into his higher cognitive areas; Fraser, for all that he cared about people, was a surprisingly private individual.

 

“So what did he decide?”  Ray tilted his head and tried to look interested in the answer; his manner more suggesting that he understood the joke that the hierarchy at the RCMP had been trying to pull.

 

Fraser smiled deprecatingly at him.  “He decided that the RCMP really didn’t know what they were talking about, and that I was as average as the next man.”

 

Ray had to smile at that comment. “Then this Sandburg couldn’t have been doing his job real well.  After all, Fraser, you are anything but average.”

 

“Thank you kindly, Ray.”  Fraser smiled in return but his heart wasn’t really in it.  A fact that was rather obvious to his far too observant friend.

 

“You sure you’re okay, Fraser?”

 

Lost in his memories of the graduate student, Fraser didn’t answer. He remembered Blair Sandburg as an outgoing and extremely intelligent young man.  Luckily for him, Sandburg had also been so focussed on his search for the Holy Grail that he hadn’t really paid all that much attention to the young Mountie the RCMP had sent down to him.  This had been early in Sandburg’s candidacy, and unbeknownst to the then graduate student, Rainier had put a bit of pressure on some of its alumni to find test subjects for the wunderkind.  The alumni had come through and Sandburg had been inundated with potentials, most of whom had no idea why they’d been sent to see some neo-hippy-witch-doctor.  Fraser had had an idea, and he had just played dumb, to protect himself.  What worried him now was that it might come back to haunt him.

 

“Looks like your Blair Sandburg and Detective Sandburg are the same person.”  Ray’s comment cut across Fraser’s musings.  “See?”

 

While Fraser had been lost in thought, Ray had pulled up additional information about the two detectives from Cascade.  It seemed that Sandburg had been a bit of a Fraser to Ellision’s Vecchio; anthropologist and unofficial partner on an extended observer pass.

 

The details on-screen were enough to confirm Fraser’s fear, and to set off a completely new set of fears.  That Ray was avidly reading those details was something Fraser preferred not to consider, at least right at that moment.

 

“Funny thing is about a year ago the kid admits to committing academic fraud, and yet suddenly gets a Detective’s shield.  The topper is Sandburg then joins the Major Crimes unit, no less, straight out of the academy.  You think there might be something more to this Sentinel thing than they let on?”  Ray Kowalski was a very good detective, in this case, unfortunately.  Ray had zeroed in on the one fact amongst the screen full of data that meant anything.

 

“Well, there have been a number of well-documented studies on people with one or more of the senses appearing to be more enhanced than the general public, Ray.”  Fraser tried to distract his partner from concentrating too much on the Sentinel idea.

 

“And you’ve read them all, no doubt?”  Ray smiled at his bizarre friend.  Must be something to do with being brought up by librarians, but the sheer amount of information, useless or otherwise, stored in that Mountie brain was phenomenal.  “Anyway, it seems Ellison and Sandburg are the experts on our killer.  Might be useful having a super man about for this one instead of average old us?”

 

“Do we know where they are staying whilst they are in Chicago?”  Fraser apparently had something on his mind, given that was not the sort of question Ray would have expected his friend to ask.

 

“The PD is putting them up in one of the safe houses, I believe,” or that was what Welsh had told him this morning when he’d briefed Ray on the fact that they had experts incoming.  Given they had no idea how long they might be in Illinois, it had been decided it was cheaper to house them in one of the safe houses rather than pay hotel costs.

 

Thinking about the safe houses that were normally used by the PD had Fraser shuddering.  His instincts told him that Ellison would not be happy in that sort of environment for very similar reasons to why he, himself, preferred to avoid them.  The problem was, how to introduce a change of location, without giving away information that was not his to impart.  The consulate would be a better location; now all he had to do was get Ray, Welsh and Thatcher to agree.

 

“Ray, do you think Lieutenant Welsh would object if we had Detectives Ellison and Sandburg stay at the consulate?  After all, some of what we’ll be discussing will be of a sensitive nature.”

 

“That might be OK, Fraser.”  Ray looked closely at Fraser, but Fraser had his usual ‘who, me?’ look on his face. Ray wasn’t sure why Fraser had made the suggestion, but after considering some of what he’d now read about the ongoing case, the idea sounded very good indeed.  “How about you check with the Ice-Queen, and then we can put the idea to the Lieutenant?”

 

The Ice-Queen was in a good mood, apparently.  She agreed almost instantly to Fraser’s plan, but given that Thatcher was smart, and a political animal to boot, the idea of assisting in anyway to apprehend a serial offender would look good for her and the Canadian government.  Turnbull was ecstatic at the idea of guests even allowing for Fraser’s curt comments on the suggested banquet the younger Mountie was suddenly envisaging.

 

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Blair talked his partner through the landing with an ease born of practice.  “Keep the dials down Jim, keep them down.”  Voiced low, and in the soothing Guide voice that went straight to the centre of Jim’s Sentinel brain, Blair continued murmuring until the plane had come to a complete stop and had begun to taxi to the airport proper.

 

Jim, for his part, just kept his eyes closed and concentrated on the soothing tones.  Takeoffs and landings had never been pleasant, though they were a fact of life for the ex-ranger now detective, but with his senses now fully online, those parts of travel had become to be a special form of torture.  If he didn’t have Blair to soothe him through those times he’d have preferred to be completely drugged out of his mind rather than go through the pain that came from rapidly changing pressures.  Luckily, he hadn’t had to fly without Blair much since the whole Sentinel thing became part and parcel of his life.  It was only when Blair indicated that they were down, and taxiing, that Jim let his senses settle back into their normal mode.

 

Five minutes after his senses settled Jim started getting jumpy.

 

“You okay, man?” Blair noticed immediately the change in Jim; after all, he had a PhD, unacknowledged though it was, in Jim-watching.

 

“Not really.”  Jim frowned as he tried to isolate what it was that was sending his alert radar up.  It wasn’t danger, exactly, but he felt wary, like he was trespassing.  “It feels like someone out there wants to know what I’m doing here.”

 

“Wow, that’s different.”

 

“Yeah, but is it a good different, Chief?”  Jim didn’t like it when his senses did things he wasn’t expecting, usually with good reason.  It had been a while since that had happened; he and Blair, he thought, had dealt with most of the major problems by now, leaving only the pesky details to deal with.  Of course the devil was in the detail so Jim didn’t see himself not needing Blair as his Guide anytime in the near future. That he saw, and held dearly, Blair as more than his Guide was known only to himself and the man in question, though it was suspected amongst Major Crimes.  Police forces in general weren’t exactly tolerant towards relationships between anyone but man and woman.

 

“Well, let’s get you off this plane and hopefully our taxi service can get us settled somewhere private real soon.”  Blair didn’t like sense flare-ups anymore than Jim did; he still had nightmares from pretty much every instance of Sentinel Sense flare-up; the Alex fiasco being the most notable.  “Hey, it’s not an Alex kind of feeling is it?”

 

“Nope.”

 

The curt response had Blair relaxing infinitesimally, if the problem wasn’t an Alex kind of feeling he could deal with it.  Still, as the plane was rather full; Blair placed his hand over Jim’s in an effort to ground the man whilst they waited until most of the passengers had disembarked. 

 

- - - - - - - - - -

 

It was Jim who saw the welcome committee first.  The Blond man had to be Detective Vecchio, which was kind of odd, as he did not look the least bit Italian.  Vecchio was attempting to stand still but the frenetic energy sparking in the air about him suggested stillness was a foreign concept; in fact, the very air of contained energy reminded Jim rather forcefully of Blair.  The wolf sitting at the detective’s heels distracted Jim momentarily from his pinging senses, and the red-suited Mountie that stood at parade rest behind the detective, but only momentarily.

 

“Um, Chief,” Jim sub-vocalised to get his companion’s attention.  He wasn’t about to approach the Mountie without his Guide glued to his side.  “I thought you said he was average.”

 

“What?”  Blair turned to find out what was worrying Jim.  Any further comment was cut short as he took in the two men (and lupine companion) that were obviously waiting for them.  “Holy shit.  Do you see that?”

 

Blair’s reaction was somewhat different from what Jim had expected.  Jim was sensing that the Mountie was a Sentinel; what Blair was sensing was anybody’s guess.  Weird just didn’t begin to describe the situation if Blair’s shamanistic nature had come into play.  “See what, Darwin?”

 

“The Spirit Guide.”  Blair hadn’t even noticed the Mountie, Blair was staring at the white wolf with a mixture of intellectual lust and pure unadulterated delight.  “What, you can’t see the wolf?”

 

“Yes, I can see the wolf, Darwin, and so can the Blond.”  Jim was taken aback as he watched the Vecchio drop his hand to the wolf’s head.  That was stranger than normal.  Did that mean that Blair could actually touch his Panther guide?  It was something they’d never considered.

 

“You mean Vecchio’s a Sentinel?  Doyouthinkheknows?  Yourenotgoingtogoallterritorialonmeareyouman?  Whatarethechances?  DoyouthinkIcantesthim?”

 

“Breathe Sandburg, breathe.”  Jim was tempted to smack his Guide upside the head, but as Vecchio was approaching them with his hand outstretched, he held his impulse in check.

 

“Detectives Ellison and Sandburg?” Vecchio asked, though it was patently obvious that they were the men he’d been sent to pick up.  “Welcome to Chicago.  I hope your flight wasn’t too bad.  I’m Ray Vecchio.”

 

“Pleased to meet you Detective Vecchio,” Blair was almost jumping out of his trainers with excitement.  “Call me Blair, and this is Jim.”  The nod indicated the stern man standing beside him.

 

Ray turned to inspect the older man.  Dangerous was the first thought that crossed his mind; there hadn’t been many details about Jim Ellison prior to joining Cascade PD but what there was, had been on the mark.  Ellison was not a man to be taken lightly; an Alpha male if Ray had ever met one.  The meeting between Ellison and Fraser looked like it would be an interesting one; though he’d prefer to observe it from a safe distance, like from Australia, maybe.

 

“Jim.”  Hands were shaken and each man took the measure of the other; no one was found wanting.  “Let me introduce you to Benton Fraser.”  The low-pitched growl had Ray adding, “and Diefenbaker.  Just make sure to have donuts handy, he’ll behave.”

 

Interesting as a description of the meeting between Mountie and Sentinel ended up being the understatement of the millennia.  Fraser remained at parade rest, which should have alerted Ray to the potential for problems, but as Ray was being inundated with weird questions from Blair, he wasn’t able to pay close enough attention to the tension in the air.  It was the full-throated growl that issued from Diefenbaker that suddenly focussed everyone’s gaze on the meeting between Jim Ellison and Benton Fraser.

 

Diefenbaker, ears back, teeth barred and hackles up looked ready to go for Jim Ellison’s throat.  The sheer anger radiating off of the wolf was palpable to all four men.

 

Jim Ellison was no fool, and as such stopped his approach about ten feet away from beast and man.  Jim’s gaze fixed firmly on the Mountie waiting to see what his move would be.

 

Blair, suddenly buying a clue, moved to stand behind his Sentinel; a hand to the back of Jim’s neck to help keep the man focused on the here and now.  It was no surprise to the Guide and Shaman that their spirit guides, panther and wolf, appeared in the space between Jim and the Mountie.  All three animals on attack alert.

 

Ray, left to his own devices, stood open-mouthed, watching what looked like, to all intents and purposes anyway, two gang leaders sizing each other up.  The tension in the air was so thick that for once Ray was glad of Fraser’s habit of not going about the place armed. The last time Ray had seen this sort of standoff, there had been a pile of corpses afterward.  Standing behind the men from Cascade, Ray, was suddenly aware that whilst Fraser might not be packing, these two men probably were; Ray decided to stay exactly where he was.  If Fraser needed covering, well Ray had his back.

 

“Diefenbaker.”  Soft-voiced but, with a visible wave of power, at least to the shaman, called the white wolf to heel.  The Mountie then dropped to his knees beside the wolf, and firmly grabbed the animal by the muzzle.  “They are here to help find a killer, Diefenbaker.  Now behave, your manners are better than that.”

 

When he finally had Diefenbaker settled once again (more or less calmly at his side), Fraser looked up at the pair of detectives with a sad cast to his eyes.  The look was reminiscent of every orphan waif in any Disney movie, a child looking through the candy store window but unable to go in.  “Blair, it is good to see you again.  I see you found yourself a watchman.”