Feel the Quiet River Rage

Author’s note: This is a missing scene for “Sweet Science” so obviously spoilers are included. I don’t make any claim to the following characters, owned by Pet Fly/Paramount. And if you think I’m profiting in any way with this tale, may Sweet Roy come round and knock a little sense into you. Comments always welcome.

“That was Rafe,” Ellison informed his friend as he hung up the phone. “Sharita was on her way to a bank teller about ten minutes ago where she got 300 bucks out of an ATM machine. Now she's headed towards the marina.”

“You figure she’s going to meet Jamie?” Sandburg asked as he trailed after the detective down the hallway.

“Well, let’s find out.”

They got into the elevator and the sentinel glanced at his guide, noting that he still sported his ID badge. He’d been worried that with the belligerent state the anthropologist had settled into, Simon would be forced to pull his credentials. At the very least he had a good ass chewing coming, but surprisingly the kid didn’t seem a bit chastised.

“So did Simon rip you a new one or what?”

“No, he didn’t,” Blair replied, shaking his head slightly. “He was actually really cool. Said he appreciates and values my contribution to this department.”

“You know, Chief, on second thought I’ll go after Sharita alone. You can stay here and call the X-Files because the captain’s apparently been replaced by an alien clone.”

Jim grinned as he stepped off the elevator into the parking garage, but Blair was total seriousness as he followed.

“I have to ask you something, Jim. Do you?”

“Do I what?”

“Appreciate and value my contribution?”

“Come on, Sandburg. Do you really have to ask that question?”

“Yeah,” Blair said quietly as he stopped by the door of the truck, waiting for his friend to unlock it. “I do. Sometimes it’s hard to tell, you know.”

Ellison climbed in behind the wheel and leaned over to unlock the door from the inside.

“Yes, Chief, I appreciate and value your contribution,” he droned dutifully, almost flippantly, as he strapped on his seatbelt.

“Thanks,” Sandburg muttered sarcastically, strapping on his own seatbelt and turning to face the window. The detective sighed as he started up the truck, resigning himself to the silent treatment he was bound to receive for the duration of the ride to the marina. He hadn’t meant to hurt his partner’s feelings, but vocally expressing his affection and appreciation for his guide was just something with which he was highly uncomfortable. Because it meant admitting he needed his friend, and that degree of vulnerability scared him. But as he glanced at the man next to him, getting an eyeful of the back of his head as Blair’s attention was riveted to the dark streets passing by, he knew he was going to have to think of some way to make it up to him. Later, though, he promised himself as he pulled in next to Rafe’s car. At the moment they had a suspect to find.

“She just went inside,” Rafe briefed them, pointing to an abandoned building across the lot. “What do you want to do?”

The sentinel dialed up his hearing and scanned the building, picking up both Sharita and Jamie as he told her of his plans to temporarily relocate to Rock’s place in the mountains. He didn’t hear any other signs of life, so he quickly made a decision.

“Call for backup and surround the building,” he instructed his colleague. “I’m going in and hopefully I can get Jamie to come with me willingly. If not, do what you have to do.”

“You got it,” Rafe assured him, diving back into his car to get on the radio and request more units.

“I’m going with you,” Blair insisted quietly as Jim opened his mouth to tell him to stay in the truck.

“No way, Chief,” the detective said firmly. While the Williams kid was not under arrest and just wanted for questioning at this point, he was still under suspicion for murder and was somewhat of an unpredictable entity. “This could get dicey.”

“Oh, come on,” Sandburg protested. “Jamie is not going to hurt me. And I might be the only one who can talk some sense into him. Get him to come with us willingly and straighten all this out.”

“All right,” Ellison relented, against his better judgement but not having time to debate the matter. “Let’s go. Just keep behind me.”

They crossed the lot and quietly entered the gloomy building. The sentinel zoomed in on the voices, motioning his guide to follow him up a set of stairs. He could hear Sharita begging Jamie not to run and to call Sandburg. That encouraged him, until he heard the young man’s scornful reply.

“Oh, please, he don't give a damn about me. He’s with them cops. Nobody gives a damn about me.”

Jim’s jaw clenched slightly as he stole a quick glance at his partner. Blair might have thought he had some sort of friendship, or at least a congenial relationship, with Jamie Williams. But that statement proved otherwise as far as the detective was concerned. They were the words of a scared individual who probably wasn’t thinking rationally. And who most likely was not going to listen to Sandburg’s attempts to pacify him and get him to surrender.

“Damn it, Jamie, Roy wanted to buy you a house for your birthday. He wanted to surprise you, and he asked me to help.”

Blair reached out and touched his partner’s arm. Jim turned and met his wide eyed gaze. They were on the landing just outside the hallway where Sharita and Jamie were talking and one didn’t need sentinel hearing to pick up on the girl’s anguished words to her boyfriend. Sandburg simultaneously wore a look of triumph that he had been right when he’d insisted Roy would never mess around with his brother’s girl, and a look of sorrow for the loss and the guilt he could hear in Jamie’s voice as he realized he’d been wrong and the magnitude of the truth hit him. Ellison gazed back at his friend for a moment, then jerked his head forward, letting him know it was time to make themselves known.

“Jamie,” he called out as he stepped out of the doorway. “We'd like you to come to the precinct and answer some questions.”

“I ain’t going nowhere with you, man,” Jamie retorted forcefully, pulling a gun out of his waistband and leveling it at them.

Ellison sighed. So much for doing this the easy way.

“Just put the gun down, please,” he urged patiently, raising his hands in an unthreatening, placating gesture. He left his gun sheathed, not wanting to further aggravate the situation and possibly ignite the kid’s already short fuse.

“No way! I’m not going to jail. You understand?”

“Nobody's taking you to jail,” Jim reassured him calmly as Sharita pleaded with her boyfriend to stop. “Now just put the gun down.”

“We can't help you if you don't let us,” Blair added, a touch of nervousness in his voice. But not for himself. He knew full well what was waiting for his friend’s brother if he burst out of the building waving a weapon.

“Just keep away from me,” Jamie ordered, threatening them both with the gun as he slowly advanced. “Just keep away!”

“Put the gun down,” Ellison repeated, a bit more sharply as some of his patience waned. “This place is surrounded by cops. There's no way for you to get out of here.”

“Look, I'm warning you,” the scared suspect said, on the verge of panicking, “if either of you come near me, I swear to God I'm going to waste you.”

“Listen to me,” Blair begged him, stepping forward and ignoring the glare boring into his back from behind. “Trust us, man. If you're innocent, we can help you, all right? But if you try to go out with that gun, they're going to shoot you, Jamie.”

“I don’t believe you, man!”

“You got to trust me, all right? I'll go out with you,” Blair bargained, desperate to get Jamie to believe him. “If I go out with you, they'll have to shoot me, too, all right?”

“Sandburg, get back!” Jim barked, not at all liking the position in which his partner was so willing to put himself.

“Just get away, man!” Jamie shouted, on the verge of losing it. He started moving forward, his finger twitching on the trigger. “Get back!”

Blair retreated a few steps, and the detective grabbed him and yanked him back, pulling his partner behind him in a protective gesture.

“Settle down,” Ellison murmured, still trying to defuse the situation but not having much hope that he could at that point.

“Get back!” Jamie ordered again, ignoring Sharita’s tears and pleas. “Back away!”

“Take it easy.” Jim tried one last time as the young man forced them farther back. “Settle down.”

But Jamie backed them up into the corner and brushed by them, sprinting down the stairs. Blair and Sharita called out after him but the sentinel just closed his eyes in defeat, waiting for the gunshots to sound. They came as expected and the three of them thundered down the stairs, bursting out of the door to see Jamie unmoving on the ground and Rafe securing the young man’s firearm.

“Oh my God!” Sharita cried. “Jamie!” She fell to the ground and embraced her unconscious boyfriend.

“Let’s get an ambulance here,” Jim shouted out. “Come on! Move it, somebody!”

He knelt down beside the fallen suspect and tried to assess the severity of his wound. Blair took Sharita by the arm and pulled her away to give his friend access and room to work. She fought him for a moment, then ended up sobbing against his chest as Ellison applied pressure to the bleeding left shoulder. He looked up and met his partner’s worried gaze, giving him a slight nod and letting him know that the wound was serious but not life threatening. Piercing sirens soon announced the arrival of medical personnel and the former army medic stepped back to let them take over. They worked on Jamie for a few minutes, stabilizing him before loading him up in the ambulance. Again, communication came in the form of a slight nod and Blair followed Sharita into the back of the vehicle, accompanying her as she rode with her boyfriend to the hospital.

After wrapping things up at the scene and briefing Simon on what had transpired, getting the ok from his captain to file his formal report in the morning, Jim headed to the hospital and met up with his partner in the waiting room outside the surgery wing.

“How’s he doing?”

“They’ve still got him in there,” Blair relayed, waving in the direction of the operating rooms. “Removing the bullet.”

“Where’s Sharita?”

“She went to find a phone to call her mother.” Sandburg looked at his friend critically. “She’s not in trouble, is she, Jim? I mean, you’re not going to give her a hard time about aiding and abetting, are you?”

“No, Chief, Sharita’s not in trouble,” the detective answered, fixing a hard gaze on his partner. “But I can’t say the same for you.”

“What did I do?”

“When I tell you to stay behind me, I mean it,” Ellison lectured him with obvious irritation. “That does not mean that you offer yourself up to a suspect as a human shield. If you ever do anything like that again... Where the hell are you going?”

“I can’t be around you right now,” Blair seethed as he began to stalk off.

“Sandburg...?”

“Just let me go, Jim,” the observer snapped as his partner came after him. “You’ll be better off without me anyway, since I apparently can’t do anything right.”

“What is up with you?” Ellison demanded in confusion.

“What’s up is that I’m sick of it, Jim.”

“Sick of what?”

Blair stopped walking and turned to face his friend.

“Sick of doing everything and getting nothing back!”

They were in front of the hospital’s chapel and a quick listen assured the sentinel it was empty. Thinking it would be a quiet place to talk, he grasped his guide by the arm and tugged him inside, closing the door behind them.

“Blair, listen to me for a second,” he began, running a hand over his short hair as he tried to organize his thoughts. Apparently he had not just hurt his friend’s feelings with his previous callous comment, but had inadvertently wounded him. Jim knew what the younger man needed to hear, and though it was hard for him to put into words, he also knew he had to try. “I’m sorry for what I said earlier tonight in the truck, all right? I guess I don’t say it often enough, if at all, but what you contribute is invaluable to me. Both on the job and with the sentinel thing. I do appreciate everything you do for me, Chief. More than you’ll ever know.”

“Really?” Blair murmured, surprised and touched by the rare praise and verbal support.

“Yeah. But I also meant what I said a few minutes ago. You’ve been walking around on the edge of a knife here, Sandburg, and you need to get your head on straight before you get hurt. What were you thinking, jumping out in front of a gun like that?”

“I was trying to talk some sense into Jamie before he got himself killed,” Blair replied defensively.

“But he could have killed you,” Jim pointed out, not liking to think about the chance his partner had taken. “I know you looked at him and saw your friend’s brother. But I was seeing him for what he really was.”

“A double murderer?” Sandburg said sarcastically.

“No, a scared suspect who thought he was out of options and who was letting desperation cloud his thinking. One that repeatedly threatened to fire if we moved, so then naturally you go and try to corner him.”

“I was trying to keep him from getting his head blown off!” Blair exploded as he began to pace around the chapel. “I just wanted to help him. But I couldn’t. Just like I couldn’t help Roy...”

“What is all this really about?” Jim asked quietly, his eyes narrowing as he studied his agitated friend, sensing that he was exhibiting displaced aggression and hoping he could get him to vent about what was really bothering him. “Come on, Chief, talk to me. What exactly are you trying to do here?”

“I don’t know.” The anger was abruptly gone, replaced by weariness as Sandburg slumped down into one of the pews. “Jamie was everything to Roy, and I feel like I owe it to him to do anything I can to help his little brother. I just can’t believe Jamie could’ve done this to Roy, Jim, but oh God... What if he did?”

The sentinel moved to sit beside his guide, slipping an arm around his shoulders as he slumped forward and buried his face in his hands. As he felt his partner trembling, he suddenly realized the problem. Sandburg’s emotions had been running the gamut since Roy was killed, but he’d been avoiding the most important one. He hadn’t yet let himself grieve for his longtime friend, the good, honorable, loyal man whose life had been tragically snuffed out just as his years of struggling were paying off and his star was on the rise.

“It’s ok, Blair,” he whispered, pulling his partner in close to his side and rubbing a hand up and down his arm in comfort. “Go ahead and let it out.”

And like a dam breaking, the younger man began to quake with quiet sobs as he finally allowed himself to mourn for the man the world had known as Sweet Roy, but that he had known as his friend.

Jim rose as his partner entered the waiting room. He’d left him in the chapel, sensing that he needed a little time alone to pull himself together. Blair had been gone a long time and he looked shattered, but there was the beginning light of acceptance and healing shining from his exhausted blue eyes.

“You ok?”

No, he wasn’t. Wouldn’t be until they figured this mess out. But Sandburg nodded his head “yes” anyway.

“Jamie’s out of surgery,” Ellison told his friend. “The doctor said he’s going to be fine. Sharita’s in with him now.”

“Do you want to go talk to him?”

“He’s not going anywhere,” Jim rationalized. “And I would imagine he’s going to be pretty groggy for awhile.” He glanced at his watch quickly. “It’s late and it’s been a long day. Why don’t we just head home and catch a few hours sleep and then come back in the morning?”

“Are you going to arrest him?” Blair asked quietly as he started to follow his partner out of the waiting room.

“I’m hoping to keep it from coming to that,” the sentinel replied. “Maybe tomorrow when he can’t run Jamie will be feeling a little more talkative. We need to convince him that telling us the truth is the only way to help himself at this point.”

“We?”

“If anybody’s going to get this kid to trust him, it’ll be you, Chief.” Jim grinned, reaching out and looping a friendly arm around his partner’s shoulders. “See, I told you that you were invaluable.” But this time Sandburg could clearly read the warm affection behind the teasing. He was quiet as they left the hospital, mulling things over and as they reached the truck he decided that maybe the irascible detective wasn’t the only one with something to apologize for.

“Jim,” he began hesitantly as Ellison fired up the truck and threw it in reverse. “I know I haven’t been the most emotionally stable person these last few days. And I know you’ve probably been tempted, but thanks for putting up with me and not putting me through a wall.”

“It’s ok, Chief,” the sentinel said affably. “After all, you’re still young and still learning. Once you hit my level of maturity and experience, then you’ll be able to handle situations like this with all the professionalism and detachment that I always do.”

Blair burst out laughing and immediately began to contradict the ridiculous statement with several examples to the contrary. It was the reaction Jim had been hoping for, but he began protesting and by the time they reached the loft they were in a full blown argument, albeit a good natured one. But since it was late and he was tired, Sandburg was happy to abandon the bickering in favor of bed. The sentinel knew his guide hadn’t been sleeping well since they’d found Roy Williams’ body, but as he stopped to listen in at his door he was reassured to discover that Blair was peacefully deep in slumber. Jim was tired, himself, so he headed up the stairs to his own bed. He stretched out with a sigh, letting the sound of the strong heartbeat thudding under the stairs calm and relax him as it did every night. As he drifted off to sleep, he found himself thinking about just how much he really did appreciate and value the contribution his unlikely best friend made to every aspect of his life. And wondering if one day he’d be able to overcome the issues that were holding him back and finally get up the courage to tell him.

Finis

The Sandburg Zone
Cascade Library