Spoiler: This is a Sentinel Too added scene.

Everywhere, Like Footprints
by Shelly

We crave pattern. We find it all around us in sand dunes and pine cones.
We imagine it when we look at clouds and starry nights.
We create, and leave it everywhere like footprints.
-- D. Ackerman

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Simon Banks pushed open the door to the loft and let it swing wide. He stood, unmoving, taking in the darkness. There was not a single sound. Silence roared. Somewhere downstairs a door slammed and the police captain shook his head. It was eerie to see this place so quiet, so empty.

He half expected to see Sandburg come padding out of his room, head buried in a book, mumbling something unintelligible about Aztec warriors or some such thing. But he knew that wasn't going to happen.

Recoiling against the havoc of remembering, he shuddered. He began to talk aloud...anything to break that silent repertoire of memories that had begun to dance on his nerves.

"Let's get some light on the subject." He flicked a switch and the light pushed back the shadows making the empty room seem even more stark. He placed the box he was carrying on the kitchen bench and looked around.

Sandburg had been partly responsible for the character of this place. Simon moved across to the faint mark on the wall where the tribal mask had hung. He remembered the day that Blair had carted it up the stairs and burst into the room, delight ringing in his voice.

"Hey, man. You won't believe what I've got! Cool. You're both here. Look!" He had flung his hands out as if he was presenting royalty.

Jim had winked at Simon and turned to Sandburg. "Chief. If you think that monstrosity is finding a home here...think again."

Blair had been silent for all of two seconds before launching into a practised routine on how this particular work of art would be perfect for the loft. He brought a whole symphony of gestures to his performance. He was in full flight when Jim interrupted.

"Chief?"

"Yeah?"

"I was joking."

"Oh. Uh huh. I *knew* that." His grin was wide and triumphant. "I knew you'd love it."

"Well...I think we need a thesaurus here, Sandburg. Love's probably not the right word. Let's see, how about tolerate?" Jim was laughing by this stage.

"Tolerate's good. Tolerate's good. I can live with tolerate." The laughter rolled over Blair like a wave and he rode it, unflagging in his good humour.

Simon chuckled. Blair laughed a lot. He laughed more than anyone he had ever come across. He laughed happily, humorously, wryly, cynically, you name it. What he would give to hear that again.

Moving slowly across the room, he stopped in front of the fireplace where a small stack of boxes stood guard against the emptiness of the loft. Idly he gathered up some loose papers that were spilling from the top box. Blair's small, neat writing filled each page. The notes were orderly and full of scholarly insight. The kid was a bundle of contradictions. It was easy to forget just how bright he was. Behind the armour of humour lurked a deep tangle of intelligence.

God knows where Jim would have ended up if Blair hadn't made the connection about the heightened senses and the Sentinel thing. Ellison was unravelling under the strain of not being able to control his senses. Then Sandburg had come along and with precocious insistence had worked some kind of magic and found order in the chaos. Of course Ellison deserved a medal putting up with some of the tests that the kid had devised for him.

There was that time that Blair had asked Jim to track down a particular scent at the station......

"Focus on it, man. It's something that doesn't belong here. If you sift through all the others, you'll find it. You don't need to know what it is. It will be the one that is left." Sandburg was typically intense, hands sketching his enthusiasm.

Jim closed his eyes to concentrate, then began to move through the building. After about half an hour, Sandburg whirled back into the office.

"Simon. Protect me! There's a Sentinel on the warpath." He was breathing hard and laughing.

Seconds later, Jim burst into the room. "I'm going to kill you Sandburg. Slowly if possible."

Blair darted behind Simon. "Man, it was just a bit of fun. You are like sooo tense. It was to loosen you up."

"I'm gonna loosen *you* up! I'm gonna separate your head from your body." There was just a hint of a smile on the Sentinel's face. It wasn't clear whether it was the situation that he found amusing, or the thought of dismembering his guide.

Sandburg skittered sideways and held up both hands in a gesture of appeasement. "You don't wanna do that, man. All the king's horses. You need me." Laughter bubbled forth and overtook him.

Jim twisted his hands together in a mime of wringing someone's neck. He appealed to Simon. "He sent me on a search for some odour that 'didn't belong'...and it ended up being that courier kid, Kylie."

All became clear. Kylie McDonald was a trainee over at the courts. Nineteen years old, eager, and a huge crush on one Detective James Ellison.

"I've just spent the last 20 minutes being talked at....with," said Jim in a somewhat tired tone of voice, "an *awful* lot of fervour."

"It's a gift, Jim. Accept it. You have a way with women." Blair began laughing again.

A slow, wide grin appeared and Jim chuckled. "Uh, Blair?"

"Yeah, Jim?"

"I gave her your phone number and said you were waiting impatiently for her call."

"Oh *man*." Sandburg's head dropped into his hands and the two older men burst out laughing.

Simon's cell phone rang, interrupting his reverie. He flipped it open with a practised hand and growled into the mouthpiece. "Banks. Yeah. I'm here now. If you can, that would be great. Appreciate it."

Pocketing the cell phone, he moved one of the boxes onto the floor, and pulled out a multi-coloured blanket. The last time he had seen this was when the kid had come down with some disgusting stomach virus. He'd thrown up in his bedroom and Jim had moved him out onto the couch. He'd trussed Blair up in quilts and tucked the blanket on top.

Few people had seen this side of Jim. He was gentle, and cajoling, trying to get Sandburg to take liquids which bounced back up with monotonous regularity. He held a basin as the kid gagged wretchedly into it, over and over, till there was nothing left to bring up.

In true form from someone who never did anything by halves, Blair got worse. He burned with fever, his eyes sick and cloudy, lids drooping heavily. He muttered querulously to himself and reared up every now and then, hot and mussy haired. Jim soothed him back down with words....a dictionary of shelter.

After a week, the kid started to improve. Simon had visited again to check on both of them and found Jim making some kind of broth in the kitchen. Simon watched as Jim carried a bowl across to Blair. Sandburg looked at him gravely with eyes as big as saucers in his thin, flushed face. "Thanks, man."

It didn't take a rocket scientist to see the depth of friendship there. It was open and easy....a question and a reply. And it moved him to see it.

"Jesus, guys. What happened?" The words echoed strangely in the loft then fell like a stone into the silence. The emptiness of the place was like a film's dark negative...the quiet after talk. The loft wasn't a home any more.

Simon opened the door to the balcony and moved out, leaning on the railing, breathing deeply. He looked at his watch then out again at the city. Shoals of cloud diffused the moon and a furtive wind came from the South. How many nights had Ellison and Sandburg spent out here talking, drinking beer, laughing. That was part of their pattern of friendship. The kid had a talent for turning panic into performance, nerves into narrative, and chaos into comedy. It took the edge off whatever case they'd been working on. You could almost *see* Jim unwinding as they bounced jokes and one liners off each other, putting a lighter spin on the case.

"No man, I'm telling you...she had a thing for me."

"Chief, she had a gun pointed at your head and looked at you like you were a urine sample. She did *not* have a thing for you."

"Jim...Jim. You gotta learn to read between the lines. She wanted me. Helllllooooo heart-string. You just never know in this life when Fate is going to grab you by whatever is protuberant and reorientate your aspect until it screams for mercy. *I* just happen to be open to it."

"And just what protuberant piece of you did fate grab *this* time, buddy?"

"Ahhh...now that would be telling wouldn't it, Jim."

Simon gazed out at the city lights. Yes. That was part of the pattern....the bantering back and forth. He dropped his chin onto his chest. All the years they had worked together, a kind of weaving went on, determined by the give and take of friendship...That *was* the pattern. Why had it fallen away?

Sandburg approached life enthusiastically, in sharp bursts. Every now and then he would give the kaleidoscope a good rattle, hoping fresh circles of colour would flower in the darkness at the other end. Was that why? Did that cause what happened? Maybe Jim had had enough of being rattled.

A sigh escaped from Simon. He turned and walked back inside, checking his watch again. He began to unpack the goods in the box and put them in the refrigerator. Placing the milk on the top shelf, and the beer and cola at the bottom, a barrage of images flashed into his head; Jim and Blair warring good-naturedly over food...

"There is no way that I am putting *that* into my mouth, Chief."

"Jim...man.. Bounty from the ocean. Fresh, healthy. Mmmm. Hey, I went to the markets especially for these. Come on, try one."

"Chief, contrary to popular opinion, I do not exist on burgers. I have, in fact, tried many wonderous things, including those slimy creatures that you are tempting me with."

"Oysters, buddy, oysters. De-licious"

"Yep, oysters. Last one I tasted was when I was trying to impress a date when I was all of eighteen. If I remember rightly, it felt warm, tasted salty, and had the consistency of loose phlegm. And I think my date probably still recalls me vomiting with happy abandon in the bushes on the way back to the car."

"Geez, man. Ya mind? I'm trying to eat here!"

Chuckling in spite of himself, Simon slammed the door of the refrigerator and checked his watch yet again. It shouldn't be long now. He was glad. The silence was getting to him.

He began to prowl around the loft. Opening up the french doors, he wandered into what had been Blair's bedroom. The kid had made it his own. There had been masks, brightly coloured rugs, books, and souvenirs from his travels. In someone else's hands, it would have been a cacophony of bad taste...but with Blair...he had the knack of creating something that sang true. The walls were bare now. The room was empty.

It was cold.

Simon rolled his shoulders and canted his head from side to side to release some of the tension he was feeling. As he did, he caught sight of a tiny patch of green paint next to the door. He burst out laughing. A couple of years ago, Blair had, with typical enthusiasm, decided to paint his room.

When Simon had come to the loft to drop off some papers for Jim to sign, he'd found Sandburg sitting crosslegged on the floor of his room, a paint tin in front of him, and a bemused look upon his expressive face.

"You waiting for inspiration, Sandburg?"

"No man. Just trying to work my way out of a slight problem."

"Anything I can help you with, kid?"

"Don't know, Simon. It's kinda like the Zen experience of painting, ya know. Flipping through the colour charts from the paint companies is kinda like reading the Rorschach ink blot version of Proust's 'Remembrance of Things Past". You see a colour that your brain tells you 'looks kinda greenish' and that makes you want to toss your lunch. But the swatch in question goes by the title 'Cool Summer Breeze' or 'Treefern' or 'Tossed Salad'. At which point, a strange thing happens. A puff of air wafts pass your cheek....you're in a rainforest...and you feel hungry. Now you really want that colour. Nay, you *must* have that colour. Which is how I came to be the proud owner of 10 gallons of 'Mistake'."

Simon used his fingernail to chip away a little piece of the murky green paint. He placed it on the palm of his hand and then threw it up in the air and watched it settle into the emptiness like a last quiet requiem.

"Damnit!" His voice rang through the loft with a mocking echo. He spun around and left the room. Rustling around in the bag that he had brought with him, he found a plastic cup. Moving into the kitchen, he turned the faucet on. Water swirled in the sink before flowing down the drain. Sudden choreographies of violence erupted into Simon's mind. Blair, face down in the fountain. The parchment pale colour of his skin against his dripping dark hair. The absence of breath. The manic attempts to get the kid's heart started. The silence...and that god-awful scream from Jim. Then an animal sound of unequivocal desperation and absolute hopelessness....Jim's agony wading adagio through the air; clear, wordless, for all to hear.

Simon didn't suppress the shudder that rolled through his body. He never, ever wanted to hear that again. As long as he lived. Turning off the faucet, he slammed the cup down on the bench. Just for a moment, anger visibly rose in him, a tremor of resentful fury. He pushed it back down and went to sit near the boxes on the floor, wrapping his long arms around his legs and putting his chin on his knees.

How long had it been? Two days? Jim had wandered out on an unreachable archipelago of grief and guilt. At the hospital, he had sat by the kid, unmoving and silent. His eyes never left Blair's face. His hand never left the kid's wrist. He could feel the pulsebeat through his fingertips. He would not be comforted.

Then yesterday, the kid had finally opened his eyes. Simon had stepped back to let them have the moment.

In the softest voice..."Hey, Chief."

Blair's eyes were bewildered and wary. His lips pursed to speak but no sound came.

"Shhhhh. You've got a sore throat from the tubes. It'll take a while."

The kid smiled, but anxiously, looking up at the Sentinel with dark, haunting eyes, as though assessing whether he was a friend or foe. He was trembling slightly.

Then Jim began to speak. Quietly. Simon couldn't hear what he was saying but he could see Blair's eyes, fixed upon Jim, huge in his wan and weary face.

The Sentinel's deep, purring voice rose and fell as if someone were idly fiddling with the controls on a radio. Although the tone was gentle, there was an underlying spark of urgency in the rumble of words, underlined by his sorrowful, quick fingers gesturing in the air.

The kid nodded once or twice, then unfurled one hand and reached up to stay Jim's agitated movements. Blair's slender fingers curled around Jim's thumb, drawing his hand down onto his chest. He sighed once and then closed his eyes, letting darkness draw him back into restful sleep.

Jim had sat there, struggling with himself for a moment. His hand moved to further encompass Blair's smaller one. His other hand went to his face, and Simon could see that he was crying.

He moved across to his friend, put a hand on one shoulder, and then left.

Sitting in the silence of the Loft, Simon knew that it was going to be a long journey of recovery for both Jim and Blair. Trust had to be earned back on both sides. He also knew that they *would* recover. Their friendship was strong. It defined their lives. It completed each of them.

A sharp rap at the door made Simon jump. He could hear Daryl's familiar chuckle and the deep voice of Joel Taggart, the Captain of the Bomb Squad, and friend to all. Opening the door, he came face to face with his son, carrying a huge box of burgers.

"Opening your own store, son?"

"Yeah. Good one, Dad. The other guys'll be here soon. Joel thought we could do with some nourishment before we started work." Daryl's dark brown eyes twinkled with mischief. "Of course, if ya don't want any..."

Simon captured his son in a playful headlock and pulled him into the Loft. "You were saying, son?"

"I was saying that you were a wonderful father...."

"Surely you were saying more than that, boy."

"..and you are an inspiration and you deserve all the burgers you want....How's that?"

Simon winked at Joel and released Daryl. "Not bad...not bad at all."

Joel grinned at Simon as they watched the boy enthusiastically unwrap a burger and settle down for an impromptu picnic in front of the doors to the balcony.

"You seen Sandburg today?" Joel's voice was filled with worry, and his kind face reflected his concern.

"Yeah. He's on his way back. He can't remember a lot of what happened. He's starting to talk a little but nothing that we don't already know. I tried to get Jim to take a break but he won't leave Blair. There's a lot of fence mending to be done there."

Joel nodded. He'd seen for himself what had gone on prior to Jim finding Blair face down in the University fountain. He couldn't believe that Ellison had thrown Sandburg out of the Loft. It all seemed screwed up.

He cleared his throat. "So...the kid's gonna be okay, then?"

Simon mused, then answered confidently, "Yes. Yes, he is. They are both going to be okay. It just needs a little time, is all." There was a small, telling silence. "So.... who's coming tonight?"

Taggart's face shone with pleasure. "All the guys who aren't on night shift. Every single one. I just had to say what we were doing and they came aboard."

A smile tugged at the corners of Simon's mouth. "Yeah. It's one of the good things that have come out of this whole situation. My Mom used to say that all life connects...nothing happens that is meaningless."

Nodding pensively, Joel unwrapped a burger with great reverence. "Ain't that the truth, though." Taking a huge bite, he chewed quietly for a moment and then swallowed. "I just want it back the way it was before."

A rap at the door stopped Simon's answer. Daryl opened the door with an extravagant gesture. "Hey, guys. We've got burgers!"

Spilling into the room, fifteen of Cascade Police Department's finest seemed to shatter the emptiness of the loft. The place was filled with laughter and noise.

"Eat up, boys, for tonight we become furniture removalists." Simon chuckled as he saw his son dive through the crowd of men around the box of burgers and emerge victorious, a burger in his upraised hand, and triumph on his young face.

Standing apart from his men, Simon took a deep breath. Of all the resonances in life, friendship was the thing that gave patina, form and texture, to being. And here tonight, in the rebuilding of a home, friendship was the music in the landscape, its notes spirited with memories. The thought settled quietly within him.

Daryl came and put his arm around his father's waist. "C'mon Dad. Eat. We got work to do!" Simon gave his son a brief hug, and they walked together to join the circle of friends.

Finis