Author's Note: This story takes place in the fertile valley of Senfic between "Flight" and "Warriors"

In Vino...
by Swellison

Bbbrrriiinnnnnnggggg!

The annoying sound of the alarm clock penetrated past Blair Sandburg's long dark curls and into his head. Face buried in his pillow, Blair extended a blind hand in the general direction of his night table, groping for the raucous alarm clock. His flailing hand struck the top of the rectangular clock radio, then fell off, missing the off button. His second attempt depressed a knob, which mercifully silenced the alarm. Blair's hand retreated back under the covers and silence again descended.

Seconds later, another sound disturbed Blair: a throat being cleared. Blair ignored it and burrowed further under the covers.

"Blair."

Silence.

"Sandburg," the voice was definitely louder, but still provoked no response.

"CHIEF!" Jim Ellison practically bellowed from the open doorway to his partner's bedroom.

Blair startled awake, jumping to a sitting position on his bed. Squinting in the too-bright room, he glanced around dazedly; his bedroom was stuffed to overflowing with books, papers, folders, photographs and small artifacts and figurines, all in their customary, randomly placed piles. The only thing out of place in his chaotically ordered room was - "Jim! Wha--?"

"Twenty two minutes," Jim interrupted Blair cryptically from where he stood with his arms folded across his chest. Ellison was leaning against the doorjamb and his stance suggested that he'd been there for awhile.

"How'd your all-night stakeout go?" Blair questioned hurriedly, eying his jeans, shirt, vest and socks in a heap on the floor.

"Fine. Do you know how long your alarm's been going off?"

"Uh -" Blair was caught off guard by the sudden shift in conversation.

"Twenty two minutes and-" Jim glanced pointedly at his wristwatch, "seventeen seconds."

"Oh," Blair was silent, then burst out, "And you just ignored it, and turned the volume dial down for that long? That's great, Jim! It shows your control is improving."

"Don't snow me, Sandburg. What I want to know is why you didn't hear it, or turn it off sooner? Your alarm clock is, what, fifteen inches from your face?"

Blair remained silent, his glance moving from the bed to the floor to his fire escape door - anywhere away from the expression on Jim's face.

"We both know why. You're hung over. Sheesh, Chief, you smell like a liquor store!" Jim inhaled exaggeratedly. "I smell beer, whiskey, gin, vodka, rum - what were you drinking, zombies?"

"No - well, only one zombie, at the end. It was mostly beer, then we progressed to boilermakers, then -"

"Save it, Chief. I don't want to hear it."

"Then why'd you bring it up?" Blair challenged. "Look, Jim, it was Friday night, the end of a long week of midterms, and I celebrated in traditional college fashion."

"By getting drunk!"

"Now, wait just a cotton pickin' minute!" Sandburg got out of his bed and threw his robe on. Ignoring the light that only added to his headache, he continued. "You told me you didn't need me on your stakeout. I didn't have to get up early today. So I joined a bunch of students and profs at the campus bar. Sure, we did some drinking," he took four steps towards the taller man and looked up, meeting Jim's eyes. "We also danced, ate and engaged in lively discussions - in short, we had fun, Jim. F - U - N. Do you remember what that is, detective?"

Overlooking the jibe, Ellison countered, "How'd you get home? I'm assuming you didn't drink and drive."

"Ted brought me home."

"Ted Braithwaite?" Jim hadn't exactly hit it off with Blair's rich fellow grad student. "What'd he do, have his chauffeur drive you home?"

"No, Jim. Ted drew the short straw, so he was our designated driver. Most of the students live within walking distance of the bar, and Ted drove the rest home."

"What did he think of the loft? I'm sure he was full of comments on how the other half lives."

Blair remembered being assisted to the door by Ted, and how Ted had helped him inside. The archaeologist had taken a good, long look a the loft, exclaiming, "This is so unlike you, Blair - everything neat as a pin and arranged just so. And the layout - Freud would have a field day! Joe Friday has his eagle's aerie, lord and master of all he surveys, including your little cubicle. And you, Blair, you don't even have a solid wood door! Do you have any privacy at all?"

Blair chose the easy way out. "I don't remember," he lied.

"You don't remember," Jim echoed. "Well, that's just great. Of all the irresponsible-"

"Why don't we continue this conversation later?" Blair interrupted.

"When you're not hungover?" Jim challenged.

"When you're not so crabby from lack of sleep," Blair countered, then shouldered past Jim and turned down the hallway, heading for the shower. Ellison stared after his roommate, then walked out of Blair's room, through the living room. He climbed the stairs up to his bedroom, intent on getting some much-needed sleep.

Blair finished his shower, shaved, and walked into the kitchen. He wandered over to the refrigerator, absently tying his robe. Opening the door, he stared at the contents of the fridge. What am I looking for, a little hair of the dog? I can just hear Jim, "And which dog would that be, Sandburg? Whiskey, rum, gin, vodka? After last night, you've got plenty of breeds to choose from." The only alcoholic beverage in the fridge was beer. Blair glanced at the four remaining bottles of beer, then plucked out the tabasco sauce and an egg, which he placed on the nearest countertop. He closed the fridge and grabbed two glasses from a nearby cupboard. He filled the taller glass with tap water then chunked some ice cubes into it. Blair unscrewed the cap off the tabasco sauce and poured it into the smaller glass. He cracked the egg on the glass's rim, and let the contents dribble into the tabasco sauce. Fetching a spoon from the silverware drawer, he briskly stirred the concoction, then chucked the spoon into the sink.

Down the throat and over the gums, look out stomach, here it comes! Blair finished the concoction in two hurried gulps. "Ga-augh!" he spat, wondering why he'd ever taken stock in the old wives' tale's sure-fire hangover cure. Trying to erase the taste, he quickly started gulping the cold water from the second glass. He'd been trying to move as quietly as possible, so as not to disturb Jim's sleep or further aggravate his hangover, but that tabasco sauce tasted horrible. Hearing no reprimand from Jim, Blair decided that the Sentinel must be sleeping. He finished drinking the water, then padded softly back to his room and dressed.

Blair crossed the living room and noted that Jim had uncharacteristically left the newspaper scattered across the coffee table. He dropped a note on the dining room table, grabbed his coat and keys, and slipped out the door.

* * * * *

"Ahhh," Blair sipped his well-sweetened coffee, then placed the cup on his desk, by the computer terminal. It being Saturday morning after midterms, peace and quiet pervaded the university campus. Blair was the only one on his floor in the Anthropology Building. He settled into his chair, intent on getting some work done - being responsible - while Ellison caught up on his shut-eye back at the loft. Blair logged on and scanned his email, a couple of letters from colleagues, and a brief note from Naomi via the current man in her life. Then he checked his news file. Since hooking up with Jim, Blair had personalized his netnews to pull up any law enforcement articles. In the beginning, he was reading them to get a handle on the closed society of policemen. Now he read for genuine interest, and to compare the other police departments with Cascade's finest.

Just one article under police news, but it was a doozy: "Cop Found Dead After Grand Jury Indictment."

David O. Heist, an eleven-year veteran of the Seattle Police Department, was found dead in his apartment Friday afternoon. He was the victim of a single gunshot to the head which appeared to be self-inflicted. He ate his gun, Blair translated the carefully worded article into police lingo. A note was found in the room (contents not disclosed), and the officer was known to be despondent over his recent indictment in the shooting death of a fourteen-year-old boy, Tommy D. Jenkins.

Tommy D. Jenkins, that name struck a familiar chord. It clicked and Blair remembered reading about the Jenkins shooting a month and a half ago. The Seattle police had tried to prevent a gang war, and it had gotten out of hand. The rival gangs had combined to take on the cops and the toll was high: three dead and seven injured.

Tommy Jenkins was one of the dead, definitely shot by the police, but he was proven to be unarmed at the time.

And no firm evidence existed that Jenkins had been a member of either gang. Given that, and the community outrage over the incident, a grand jury had been empanelled and had chosen to indict Sergeant Heist.

Touching briefly on Heist's distinguished career, the story noted that Heist was divorced, with no children. It concluded with a quote from Heist's captain and the well-known, sobering statistics that the law enforcement industry had one of the highest percentages of both suicide and alcoholism in the United States.

Blair digested the article, something niggling at the back of his mind. Still mulling over it, he opened another widow, bringing up his research files. He browsed the GG file, a list of all the cops that Blair and Jim had met since the Sentinel project started. The good guys, Blair thought as he scanned the alphabetical file. He found the name he was half-hoping wasn't there: David O. (Dave) Heist. Next to the name, his connection with Jim was listed; Ellison had met him two years ago at a police convention, and they kept loosely in touch. Blair searched his memory and remembered having dinner with Jim and Heist once last year, when the Seattle cop had been in Cascade on business.

Another thought struck Blair and he clicked back on the original window, with the news article still on the screen. He checked the source of the article, The Cascade Herald, from this morning. The image of the open newspaper on the coffee table superimposed itself on Blair's mind. "Damn!" Jim read the article, that's why he came into my room, to talk... He could count on one hand the number of times that Ellison had instigated a deep personal conversation. This time, Jim had tried, but he'd been sidetracked by Blair's hangover, and they'd argued instead. Way to go, Sandburg! So, how do I get Jim to open up now, when he's barely speaking to me?

Blair pondered the question, then pushed his chair away from the desk and tucked his legs underneath him, lotus-like. His arms hung loosely at his sides, with the open palms resting on the knees of his jeans. Taking two deep breaths, Blair intoned, "I am relaxed. I am relaxed..."

Fifteen minutes later, Blair gave up on seeking the answer through inner peace. Something in the metaphysical world just wasn't clicking today. Meditation and hangovers don't mix. I wonder if that's included in any of the self-help Zen guides out there?

Rising, Blair paced in the small room, hoping to stimulate his thoughts with physical exertion. "Ow!" He banged his knee into the corner of his desk. Talk about going from the metaphysical to the physical world...So what would be the scientific approach? "Please make my octopus cry," he muttered under his breath, mentally expanding the junior high mnemonic to encompass the five steps of the scientific method. Problem, materials, methods, observations, conclusions.

One step at a time. Problem: How to get Jim to open up about Heist's death, and while we're at it, this whole drinking thing needs to be discussed. Jim's no teetotaler. Blair remembered sharing a beer with Jim on the balcony when they returned from Peru, having a beer at that bar where they'd met Laura McCarthy, and they'd split a bottle of white wine at the seafood restaurant that Jim had taken him to on Blair's last birthday. A bottle of beer, a glass or two of wine, in all the time I've known him, I've never seen Jim drink any hard liquor. He rarely indulges in a second bottle of beer, even. Blair snapped his fingers. "Of course!" Alcohol loosens the tongue, lowers inhibitions, and reduces your self-control. I've never seen Jim drunk because the control freak in him won't let him get drunk. Hell, as a Sentinel, he might be more affected by alcohol than normal. Sandburg had only known Jim since the detective had reacquired his Sentinel abilities. I need to talk to Simon. He knew Jim pre-Sentinel; I bet he's seen Jim drunk.

With Blair, to think was to act He grabbed the phone from his desk and rapidly dialed Simon's home number. "Hi, Simon, it's Sandburg. Sorry to disturb you on a Saturday morning, but I need to talk to you - off the record...." Blair spoke with Simon for about five minutes, then hung up, satisfied. He rummaged in his desk drawer until he located a certain business card, then pulled out his wallet and placed the card inside. My ace in the hole.

Next, Blair extracted his long distance calling card and began dialing. He didn't worry about the phone waking the person he was calling up, they were early risers and had been up for hours by now. I love it when a plan comes together, he thought at the conclusion of his call. Now all he had to do was get Jim to go along. It's all over but the shouting.

* * * * *

Blair unlocked the door to the loft and entered. He closed the door behind him, then took off his blue jean jacket and hung it on the peg by the door. Dropping his keys in the basket, he glanced towards the living room. Jim Ellison was seated on the sofa, absorbed in watching a sweet sixteen basketball game.

Wandering over to the living room, Blair noticed that Jim sat behind the clutter-free coffee table, the newspaper tidlily stacked in the magazine rack to the side of the couch. "What's the score?" As good a way as any to get the conversational ball rolling.

"Seventy-five to sixty-nine, Kentucky's ahead," Jim said, then clicked off the set. "Look, Chief, you didn't have to vacate the premises just so I could sleep this morning."

"Yeah, man, I know. But I had stuff to do at the University - exams to grade, lectures to plan - and there's always my research." Blair shrugged, "I knew I'd be spending some time at the U this weekend; I just got there earlier than I thought I would." He waved his right hand, "How about you, did you catch up on your sleep? Get your usual eight hours in?"

"Seven - but it's enough," Jim rose from the sofa, glanced briefly at the clock as it marked three o'clock exactly. "About this morning, I shouldn't have come down on you so hard. You're an adult over twenty-one, and fully capable of making your own decisions about alcohol. I was way out of line and I'm sorry."

"Hey, Jim, man, don't apologize. I went a little overboard with my drinking last night and I did have a hangover. So I wasn't in the best of moods this morning, to begin with. And you - you were up all night, then you came home to my alarm blaring away -" Blair cut himself off before he brought up Heist's name, "You had plenty of provocation, and you only yelled at me" - he grinned, knowing his next words would disconcert his partner - "because you were concerned about me. You care about me; I can't be angry about that."

"Sandburg!" Jim spluttered, taking a step back. "Are you sure you're not still hungover? Because you're sounding pretty sappy, here."

"No, I'm not hungover," Blair answered, then leaped into the opening that Jim had provided, "Speaking of hangovers, though, when's the last time you had one?"

"What?!" Jim looked at Blair as if his partner had suddenly grown two heads.

"It's been more than two years ago, because you haven't been hungover since I've known you. In fact, I've never even seen you tipsy."

"So what? My drinking habits aren't any of your business." Jim snapped, his good mood evaporating.

"Yes, they are. Everything about you is my business, remember? From the cradle on up."

"Not this!" Jim glared, then took a deep breath, trying to calm down. As he got himself under control, he noticed that Sandburg's heart was beating faster than normal, he was excited about something. "What are you up to, Chief? Spill it!"

"I'm not-" Blair started to say, then realized the futility of lying to the Sentinel. He took a steadying breath and burst out, "I want to test your Sentinel abilities under the influence of alcohol."

"WHAT?" Jim roared, then winced as the volume of his own voice grated on his supersensitive ears.

"This is a valid test, Jim. Alcohol is, after all, a drug. We can test what happens to your senses when they're overloaded with input."

"Why?"

"Because you can't control everything in your environment, Jim. You've been exposed to drugs before with unpredictable results, usually in the middle of a dangerous situation. Wouldn't you like to know that you can regain control in those situations? That's what our testing will tell us." Blair paced the room, arms gesturing as he tried to convince Ellison to go along with this. "I'm not interested in watching you get drunk and dance around with a lampshade over your head, Jim. I want to establish the limits of your control when you're under outside influences."

"Well," Jim paused, uncertain. Then he remembered a similar argument over him getting into a sensory deprivation tank last year. "What if I 'strenuously object' to this?"

Sandburg thought about the business card that Jim had given him for his birthday, with the words "Good for one set of Sentinel tests w/o objections" printed on the back. 'The next time you object so strenuously to one of my experiments, I'll listen, Jim, I swear.' "Then I'll try my damnedest to talk you into doing the same type of experiment with that non-drowsy formula cough medicine you had on the train. I figured you'd prefer using alcohol, but the choice is yours." He slipped into his best Guide's voice, quiet and sincere, "Regardless of the drug used, this type of testing IS important, Jim."

"Okay, I'll do it," Jim decided. "Break out the alcohol."

"No Sentinel testing in the loft, Jim. That's one of my House Rules. You need a test-free zone where you can relax and let your hair down" - Blair glanced at his partner's short-cropped drak brown hair - "so to speak."

"Then we're going to your office at Rainier?"

"Actually, I had some place farther away in mind."

"Where?"

"Saint Sebastian's."

"You're going to take me to a monastery to get drunk?" Jim asked, unbelievingly.

"Not in the monastery itself! The monks own a huge chunk of land along with the monastery proper. I figured we'd drive down and get settled in tonight. Then take a hike after lunch tomorrow and find a nice, quiet isolated spot for our testing."

"You figured... how long have you had this planned?"

"Only since this morning. Look,. Jim, if now's too soon for you, we can wait til next weekend. Brother Jeremy has room for us either time."

"Might as well get it over with," Jim headed for the stairs up to his bedroom. "You've got fifteen minutes to pack," he threw over his shoulder at Sandburg.

* * * * *

"This'll do," Blair said, plunking his backpack down on the ground. He stooped to unfasten the rolled blanket from the bottom of his pack and spread it out. They were in a small clearing, bordering a wooded area of the monastery's grounds, a good half hour from the brothers' quarters. The early March weather was surprisingly cooperative, while it was cloudy, the forecast called for not one drop of rain. "Sit down," he motioned to Ellison, then opened the backpack's flap and dug out a spiral notepad, a pen, a pair of clear plastic tumblers, and a bottle of red wine.

Jim sat down on the blanket and eyed the tumblers distastefully. "Is that the best you could do?"

"Well, I didn't want to bring anything breakable, and the only other plastic glasses the drugstore had was a pair of elopers' honeymoon wine goblets - extremely tacky." While he was talking, Blair pulled out his Swiss army knife and used its corkscrew to uncork the wine. He filled the first tumbler and handed it to Jim, then poured the second glass.

"I thought I was the only one drinking?"

"We need a control subject, to test your perceptions against," Blair said. "Relax, I'm just going to nurse this one glass along, I'm not very fond of red wine anyway."

"Cheers." Jim sniffed delicately at the top of the glass, then took a sip. "An unprepossessing port with a woody nose," he began in his smoothest tones, watching Blair drink, "but somewhat lacking in length." He finished suavely as Blair laughed helplessly, and snorted wine up his nose.

"Ji-im! Your sense of humor is dangerous, I could've choked."

"I would never allow that to happen, Chief," Jim said virtuously.

Blair swiped at his nose with his jacket sleeve. "You know, with some training, you could be a world-class wine taster, if you ever want to quit being a cop."

"Protecting the tribe from Paul Masson?" Jim grinned.

"If you're going to act so obnoxious now, how'm I ever going to tell when you're really drunk? Shut up and drink your wine, Jim. No, on second thought, don't. Before you drink any more, I want you to take a good look at your surroundings." Blair slipped into his Guide's voice. "Notice how green the grass is, and the unique shade of bluish-gray that the sky is." He watched as Jim's eyes obediantly dwelt on the grass, then scanned the sky, cataloguing the colors. "Now, study the trees behind us, see how the leaves are just beginning to sprout. Okay, look at the blanket that we're sitting on, see the red, green, and white stripes against the black background. Lastly, look at me and what I'm wearing: blue jeans, forest green shirt, hair pulled back in a ponytail.

"Close your eyes and visualize everything that you've seen. Do you see it, in your mind's eye?"

"Yes."

"Good. Mark what you've seen and remember it as normal. As we continue with our experiment, I'm going to occasionally ask you to bring your vision back to normal and this is what I want you to see - these exact colors and objects, okay?"

"Yes."

"Good, then we're ready to start. Open your eyes." Blair's voice reverted back to normal. "Take a good swig and try to follow the path of the wine as it goes down, you know, 'Down the throat and over the gums, look out stomach, here it comes'."

Jim shook his head, then drank as instructed, tuning into himself, trying to trace the wine's progress. "I can't find it once it reaches the stomach."

"Then you haven't had enough to drink, yet. Have some more."

Blair watched as Jim finished the first glass, then poured him a second one. While Jim was downing the second glass, Blair pondered the alcohol's complete lack of influence, so far. Maybe the alcohol's first effects are subtle, and I can get Jim to talk about.Saturday morning. Alcohol is a great tongue loosener. "I saw the article about Dave Heist, Jim. That's what you wanted to talk to me about yesterday morning, wasn't it?"

Jim barely nodded.

"Divorced, no kids, a loner all wrapped up in his career - I thought maybe you'd identify with that."

"Couple of years ago, yeah, probably," Jim said. "But not now." He fell silent, then added, "I just don't know why he did it. Dave's no - he wasn't a quitter. Dave was ex-Marine; 'when the going gets tough, the tough get going' - that was his mindset."

"I don't know why, Jim. Maybe the indictment was the straw that broke the camel's back, particularly if he thought he'd acted appropriately. People are like icebergs - ninety percent of what they feel and think is buried under the surface, and sometimes it just - erupts.

"The article said he was a distinguished member of the police force, and I know he was a friend of yours. I'm sorry, Jim. It hurts to lose a friend."

"Yeah," Jim said quietly, then helped himself to more wine.

Two glasses of wine later, Blair shook his head. "You know, Jim, I'm beginning to think I'll have to revise my whole theory about Sentinels and wine. You've had four glasses of port and there's no noticeable affect. Do you feel any different?"

"No."

"Well, I really didn't want to mix drinks, but..." Sandburg dug into his backpack. "Let's try something else, then." He pulled out another bottle and uncorked it. "This is Brother Marcus's best home-grown cognac." He poured Jim a glass and handed it to him. "Take a sip."

Jim took a swig, then said, "Now that's got a kick to it, Chief. I can feel it flowing past the gullet and stomach, then expanding outward to all four extremities."

"Hey, that's great, man - and that's only from one swallow. Take a few more, then look around and describe what you see." Jim did as instructed, but reported no difference in his vision. Blair encouraged him to drink more cognac and retested after Jim finished the glass.

"The colors are, I don't know, brighter, louder than they were," Jim observed.

"Ahh, that's good, Jim, now I want you to tone them down until they match what you saw at the beginning of our experiment, okay? Is everything back to normal now?"

Jim concentrated, then said, "Normal, yeah," and hiccupped.

"Oh, yeah, that's good, Jim, that's real good." Blair scribbled some notes and then surreptitiously activated the micro-tape recorder that he'd brought along, sticking it in his shirt pocket. "Why don't -" Blair stopped in mid-suggestion, seeing that Jim had poured himself another glass and was already imbibing.

Blair let him drink about half the glass then said, "Okay, time for another test, Jim. Look around and describe what you see."

"Well, you're still here, the grass is - WOW - the grass is the same green as that neon sign for 7 Up by the office...The sky... the sky's so blue, it's bright. Where'd the sun come from?"

"Whoa, Jim, there's no sun, it's still cloudy. Let's get your vision back to NORMAL now, huh? You remember what that looks like, tone down the sky, and back off on the grass," he saw the squint ease around Jim's eyes and figured that he was succeeding, "That's it, that's good."

"No lampshade."

"What, Jim?"

"You wanted me t'dance around with a lampshade on m'head. Well," Jim climbed unsteadily to his feet, almost tripping over the blanket. "C'n still dance." Jim started swaying and stumbling to the beat of a Santana song that only he could hear.

Blair jumped to his feet and grabbed Jim by the shoulders before he could fall. "Wait a minute, Big Guy,

I don't want you to dance. I want you to stand still, okay?"

Jim froze.

"All right, that's better. Now," Blair shifted his grip so that his left hand was on his partner's right upper arm and he extended his right hand in front of Jim's face. "Follow my hand with your eyes. Look up, look down, look left, now right. Now repeat, up, down, left, right. Okay, stop and look straight ahead - is the world still spinning?"

"Yeah."

Blair sighed. "Congratulations, Jim, you're officially drunk.." Now what'm I going to do? I didn't even bring any coffee.

"And I donn ev'n have my badge - or gun," Jim giggled. "Brother Jermy confish - confit - took 'em when we got here."

"All right, Jim, let's sit back down, okay?" Blair kept his hold on Jim's bicep and lowered both of them to seated positions on the blanket. Me and my bright ideas. Now what? What do you do with a drunken Sentinel?

Guess the first thing is to figure out how drunk he is. "Hey, Jim," Blair caught his partner's attention and held up his right hand, three fingers raised in a backwards Boy Scout pledge. "How many fingers am I holding up?"

"Nine."

Nine?!

"Three there," Jim pointed to Blair's right, "and there" - pointing straight at his partner - "and there."

He jabbed his finger to Blair's left.

"I see, kind of like a stereoscope. So you're seeing three of me, and you've got triple Guide power, huh? How many voices are you hearing?"

"One."

"No echoes or anything, right? Just my own voice?"

"Yes."

"Point to where my voice is coming from."

Jim's index finger pointed straight at Blair's throat.

"Good. You remember when you piggybacked your sight to your hearing, to find that helicopter in the

Martin case?" Jim nodded. "I want you to do the same thing now. Use your hearing to refocus your sight, merging the three Blairs that you see back into one Blair, occupying the same space as my voice. On three, okay? One, two, three... Now, how many Blairs do you see?"

"Just one, Chief." Jim stared at his partner. "You've got an outline of golden light around you. A halo, like on that tv show." Wondrous, Jim reached out and touched his partner's hair, trying to connect with the halo.

"Are you an angel, Blair? Not just my Guidean Angel, but a real one?"

Mental note, Sandburg. Never get Jim drunk again.

"You can tell me, I won't tell Simon."

"No, Jim," Blair said gently taking hold of Jim's outstretched hand and lowering it. "I'm just what you and Simon are always calling me, a kid. A kid who loves roller coaster rides."

"Be great if you were an angel," Jim continued his own train of thought. "Then I wouldn't have to worry so much about getting you killed."

"Whoa, Jim, back up," Blair said sharply. "What do you mean, getting me killed?"

"Kidnappers, killers, psychos - I've exposed you to all of them. You're my responsibility, so it's my fault if-"

"Hold it right there, Jim. I thought we already covered this. I'm an adult, remember? I am your Guide and your partner because I choose to be. And if -if- I end up killed in the line of duty, I'll know" he squeezed his partner's hand, then let go - "we'll both know that you did everything you could to prevent it. You will not blame yourself and you will go on."

"How?" Jim asked, quoting softly . "A Sentinel needs his Guide."

Blair looked into Ellison's deep blue eyes and realized that however drunk the Sentinel had been, he was stone cold sober now. "You'll find another Guide."

Jim shook his head. "There are no other Guides, not for me."

"There's Simon."

"No, that won't work - not in the long run."

"Why not? Simon knows about Sentinels, and he's pulled you out of a zone-out before."

"He knows about Sentinels; he doesn't understand Sentinels. He could pull me out of a zone-out, but he couldn't prevent one from happening, like you can. And if I had a new problem he wouldn't have a clue how to solve it. No, Chief, if Simon were my Guide, one or the other - or both - of us would be dead within a year. I won't do that to Simon, it's not fair."

"Aw, c'mon, Jim, aren't you exaggerating a bit? I'm not the only Guide in the universe."

"I have met another potential Guide," Jim admitted, "but I wouldn't work with him; I don't trust him."

"Another Guide? Who?"

"Lee Brackett."

"Brackett?!"

"He knows about Sentinels, and you think alike."

"What? I think like Brackett?" Blair pulled back a little, shocked. "I don't think that's a compliment, Jim."

"It's true, though. You're both super-smart, innovative thinkers who think fast on your feet."

"Well, when you put it that way... and he has read my master's thesis." He eyed his partner. "Something you've never done. That puzzles me, Jim. Why haven't you read my thesis? Everything you always wanted to know about Sentinels..."

"I... call it superstition, Chief," Jim admitted softly. "I don't want to see our future in their past."

"Jim... my paper was on precivilized Sentinels, time and circumstances have changed tremendously since then."

"The Sentinel/Guide relationship hasn't changed." Ellsion's voice rang with certainty. "It's immutable."

"It's also my life's work," Blair said, equally convinced. "And I need to know that if something happens to me, the Sentinel will go on." Blair used his Guide's voice, softly compelling, as he continued, "What will you do Jim, if I die unexpectedly?"

Jim couldn't ignore his Guide's question. "I'll go to Peru."

"Peru? What will you do there?"

"I'll go back to the jungle and find the panther."

"The panther?" Jim's spirit guide. "What can the panther do?"

"I'll ask him to take away my Sentinel powers. He did it before, he can do it again."

"Jim!" Blair had to remember to tone down his excitement and maintain his Guide's voice. "Are you saying that the panther took away your powers when we were in Peru, hunting for Simon and Daryl?"

"Yes."

"How do you know that?"

"He told me. Well, he changed into a Chopek first, then he told me."

"He what?" Blair's hands sketched his puzzlement in the air. "I don't understand."

"I followed the panther into the jungle, to the ruins of some ancient temple. The panther rose up on his hind legs and sort of flowed into a man, like in Terminator 2. He became a six and a half foot tall Chopek warrior, with a voice that I felt reverberate through my bones.

"He said that my returning to the jungle was no accident; that I'd come full circle: I had to make a choice. He said he'd taken away my senses to remind me of what I was. I could go forward and be a Sentinel, or I could go back and be an ordinary man."

"And you chose to be a Sentinel."

"Yes."

"You made the right choice, Jim. You are a Sentinel, and you must continue to be a Sentinel, no matter what might happen to me in the future. Cascade needs its Sentinel."

"A Sentinel needs his Guide," Jim repeated stubbornly. "Without you, my senses are a liability to the tribe and to me. No, if anything happens to you, that's it. I'll go back to being a normal man with normal senses. It's the only reasonable course of action."

Reasonable, Jim? Going to the jungle to talk to a panther who sometimes moonlights as a Chopek warrior is a reasonable thing to do? "Jim, I understand what you're saying and I know you believe it's for the best, but I don't see it that way. I can't. Do you realize what a straitjacket you're putting me in? How can I function as your partner, watching your back, if I have to weigh all of my actions against the knowledge that a wrong step could get me killed, and if I die, then the Sentinel is as good as dead, too?" Blair took a deep breath. "I know that I function well under pressure, but I couldn't work under those conditions - I'd go insane."

"I can't change my feelings in this matter, Chief. It's too important." Jim turned to his Guide for help. "What're we going to do?"

"I don't-" Blair cut himself off abruptly. Immovable object meets immutable force. There is no solution... wait a minute, we're not objects, we're people. More than that, we're partners... "We're going to do what all partners do, Jim. We'll compromise."

"Compromise?"

"I promise that I will blank out this entire conversation from my mind and never refer to it again. Well, except for the stuff about the panther, and Peru. You've got to tell me more about that, someday. Meanwhile, I swear that our little talk here will not influence in any way my ability to be your partner. We will go on exactly as we did before. And you have to promise me something in return."

"What?"

"You have to promise that if I die, you will do nothing to alter the status of your Sentinel abilities for one full year after my death. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross gives the same advice to all newly-bereaved patients: don't buy or sell a house, don't quit or change jobs. In short, no life-altering decisions in the first year after your loved one's gone. It's sound advice, Jim; it gives you time to cope, and to reflect carefully on the consequences of your actions. After a year, you can do whatever you think is right - I won't be around to stop you." Blair scanned his partner's face intently. "Do we have a deal?"

Jim met Blair's eyes. "I'll give you that year, Blair. I promise."

"I'll watch your back, Jim, same as always. I promise." Sandburg began gathering up the empty glasses and bottles and putting them back in his backpack. "We're finished here, Jim. I think you've proved that you can go from drunk to sober at the drop of a hat. Now, stand up so I can pack the blanket."

Ellison rose to his feet, all traces of his earlier unsteadiness vanished. "Now what?"

Okay, enough of the heavy stuff. "Well, that's up to you, Jim." At his partner's questioning glance, Blair continued, "Either we go back to the monastery and spend the night in our cell, or you give me the keys to the Expedition and I'll drive us back to Cascade. I already cleared it with Simon," Blair tacked on, "you can have tomorrow off if you want to stay here."

"Why do you have to drive us back, Chief? I'm completely sober."

"Yes, you are, Jim. You know it and I know it, but your blood alcohol level is still way over .10 man, and there's NO WAY that I'm gonna let you get behind the wheel in that condition. Friends don't let friends drink and drive, remember?"

"All right, you win," Jim extracted his keys and tossed them over to Sandburg. "Let's go home, Chief."

"Home it is," Blair agreed and they headed back to the monastery.

THE END