Transitions 10(b) - Vow of Silence (Missing Scene)
-- by Mackie

The first few seconds passed in a blur. Locked in their cell, helpless to prevent the catastrophe, their frantic shouts had gone unheeded.

Then, the explosion. One moment, a mild mannered monk had been reaching for the pull chain on the overhead light in his room; the next, he'd been a shattered, immolated corpse in the midst of an inferno.

Shock numbed Blair for a moment from the full reality of the horror. He turned away from the glass window in the door through which he'd witnessed the disaster, and leaned against the wall, his limbs trembling with weakness.

Beside him, Jim turned into a rampaging madman. Heedless of causing himself harm, he pounded, clawed and kicked savagely at the locked door that had prevented him from saving Brother Christopher. All the while, he was screaming mindless obscenities as he raged against his helplessness.

Blair had never seen Jim so completely out of control. Shock quickly gave way to fear for his friend, and he reached out impulsively to grasp his arm. "Jim, please, man, don't do this!" he implored softly.

Jim's face was flushed a deep red. Veins stood out like angry welts against his temples and neck, throbbing with the force of the blood pounding through them.

Still, the quiet words penetrated, and he glanced sideways into the pale, anxious face of his partner. He paused for a moment, resting his head against the glass insert in the door and closing his eyes. He nodded. "I'm OK," he murmured, although it was clear he wasn't OK.

Neither of them were OK.

At least the mindless fury had passed, replaced now with more focused anger.

Blair stepped up beside him once more as Jim pounded on the door again, this time in an attempt to get someone's attention rather than to break it down.

In the corridor, the other monks had rushed to investigate the explosion. Thinking quickly, Brother Marcus and Brother Frederick grabbed fire extinguishers. The blaze had pretty much expended itself in that first, spectacular flash, but small bits of flammable material still burned. The extinguishers made short work of putting out the meager flames.

Brother Jeremy stood immobile, too stunned to function for a minute. When Jim's outraged bellows finally penetrated his shock, he hurried unsteadily toward their door.

His hands fumbled with the keys, but he got the door unlocked at last. Jim flung it open with enough force to break one of the hinges, then shoved roughly past Jeremy and headed toward the scene of destruction, his progress as relentless as a bulldozer.

Blair, a bit slower, caught the monk before he could fall, and gently helped him regain his balance. Certain Brother Jeremy was all right, he hurried to catch up to his partner.

But no matter how quickly he tried to move, he still felt as if he were sleepwalking through a nightmare.

Had the disaster that had befallen St. Sebastian's somehow been their fault? Had their arrival been the catalyst that had put some insidious plot into motion?

By the time he'd reached the door to Christopher's room, Jim had herded the two fire-fighting monks into the corridor. He looked pale, the flush of his spent fury leaving behind only a pallor of shock. He caught Blair's shoulders before the younger man could go inside.

"Don't go in there, Chief," he advised gently.

Numbly, Blair nodded and turned toward the others monks, all of them too surprised by events to utter the questions or dismay that must have been flooding their thoughts.

Brother Jeremy joined them, his color much improved, his emotions more firmly under control. Resigned now to the presence of violence in his normally serene world, he inquired, "What do you want us to do?"

Jim's eyes were glacial with barely suppressed anger, and he turned them now on the man in charge of the monastery. "No one can go into that room," he answered coldly. "It's a crime scene now. We'll have to wait until Theodore gets back with the police." Brother Theodore had left earlier on foot to summon the authorities because of an earlier murder that had taken place at the monastery.

"What will you be doing?" Jeremy persisted calmly.

"I've got to search Christopher's room," Jim answered grimly. He closed his eyes against the guilt that suddenly swelled inside him. When he opened them again, the coldness was gone, replaced with sorrow. "He told me he was working on a couple of leads." I should have taken him more seriously; his killer certainly did. "Maybe I can find out what he'd learned."

"Brother Christopher's body," Jeremy began hesitantly, his eyes downcast in shame by what he perceived was his own burden of blame. Then he looked up again and didn't flinch from the accusation in Jim's stare. "Must it remain -- in there?"

Procedure demanded the crime scene be left intact. But procedure didn't mean a thing with the killer still in their midst, perhaps ready to strike again. Besides, Jim didn't want to search Christopher's cell with the man's charred and reeking body still inside. And he certainly didn't want Blair to see it, and he knew his partner would want to join him in the hunt for clues. "Do you have a tarp?" he asked. "You could move the body to the chapel while we sort through the debris."

Jeremy nodded, grateful that he could do something useful. "Yes, I'll see to it right away."

Some of the monks hurried off to find the tarp, while the rest moved away from the doorway and the grim evidence contained beyond it.

Jim leaned back against the wall and scrubbed at his face with his hands to push away the images filling his head. His hands felt cold and trembled slightly from shock and the aftereffects of adrenaline.

He looked at his partner, leaning beside him. Blair was still pale, his expression a little too carefully blank to be completely normal, but he didn't look any worse than Jim felt.

Blair met his eyes. "It wasn't your fault, Jim."

"Bullshit," Jim replied succinctly. "I should have listened to him, asked him about what he thought he'd found. If I could have figured out its significance, Christopher would still be alive."

It was hard to argue with the truth. "You don't know that," Blair protested, but even to him, it sounded feeble. He finally just settled for, "Jim, you're not perfect."

But Jim's expression said that this time, he should have been.

Blair realized something he'd never given a lot of thought to before. One time, not so very long ago, he'd referred to Jim as his "Blessed Protector". The statement had not been altogether serious, but it hadn't been made in jest, either.

He understood now his comment bore more than a grain of truth.

Whether part of Jim Ellison, the man, or Jim Ellison, the Sentinel, Jim's instinct was to protect those who needed it. Being a helpless witness to Christopher's murder must have torn him to his very soul.

His earlier thoughts came back to him, but they took on a different meaning now. "Did you stop to think that by being here, you might prevent even more deaths?" he asked softly. "You've got the skills to catch the bastard before he kills again, but you have to get past your feelings of guilt to do it." A few minutes ago, he'd been wondering if their arrival at the monastery had started the whole tragic chain of events; now, he felt confident that fate or happenstance had put them in a position to halt the killings.

They hadn't been responsible for starting the violence, but perhaps they could end it.

Jim seemed to have reached the same conclusion, because his features became chiseled with new resolve.

"Maybe you're right," he admitted quietly, the despondent note gone from his voice.

The monks returned with the tarp, and three of them carried it into the room. A few minutes later, they emerged with it wrapped snugly around Brother Christopher's body. As they struggled away under their unpleasant burden, Jim looked at Blair again.

"It's pretty bad in there. You don't have to go."

Blair shook his head, his hand resting gently on Jim's arm. "No, I need to be in there with you, in case -- " He shrugged. "In case something happens."

Jim knew he meant a zone out, a real possibility considering the almost overpowering assortment of foul odors permeating the room.

He lightly patted Blair's hand. "OK, thanks."

They stepped into the room together to begin the hunt for a killer.

THE END