briarwood | FIC: Instinct

Title: Instinct
Fandom: The Sentinel
Rating: Mature
Pairing: Jim/Blair - Can be read as gen or slash: your choice.
Summary: Blair is injured when an op goes badly wrong.
Warnings: None.
Notes: Written for betagoddess, who has waited far too long for a story I promised her in February! She asked me for hurt/comfort with Blair as the hurt-ee. I have learned that I simply cannot write H/C to order: if it doesn't feel like a natural part of a plot to me, it just doesn't happen. Also, Blair won't talk to me if I hurt him. So, this may not be what you had in mind, dearest, but I hope you'll like it.

Also posted on AO3: http://archiveofourown.org/works/1640

INSTINCT

Jim covered one ear with his hand, vainly attempting to block out at least a little of the ambulance siren's wail. His already tender hearing just couldn't take it, but covering one ear didn't help worth a damn and he needed the other hand to cling on to the side of the ambulance, keeping his balance as it rushed through the busy Cascade streets. He couldn't take his eyes off Blair, who lay unmoving on the gurney. He was so very pale, the blood soaked into his plaid shirt, small crimson splashes on his face, his neck and his hands so very red. The clear plastic mask over his mouth and nose fogged slightly with each breath, reassuring Jim that Blair was holding on. The paramedics were still working on him. One of them pushed an IV needle into Blair's arm, raising a bag of clear fluid above his body.

The ambulance stopped with a screech of tyres and the siren cut out abruptly. Jim shook his head, his ears still ringing with the noise. One of the paramedics shoved open the ambulance doors while the other moved to the head of the gurney, gesturing to Jim to stay where he was.

A woman dressed in grey scrubs - a doctor, Jim thought - was already waiting.

"Patient is Blair Sandburg," the paramedic said, speaking rapidly. "Double GSW to the chest. BP is..."

Jim tuned it out. Blair was still breathing. His heart was still beating. That was really all Jim needed to know. He jumped down from the ambulance, intent on following Blair and the doctor.

As he hurried through the ER doors a nurse tried to stop him. "Sir - " She was looking at the blood on Jim's shirt.

Jim pushed past her impatiently. "I'm alright. It's not my blood." He was being rude, but it was Blair. Blair was hurt. He flashed his detective shield at the nurse and she moved back, letting him pass.

The ER was busy and Jim had lost sight of Blair when the nurse waylaid him. He stopped, reaching out with his senses and had to dial everything back immediately as the smells and sounds of the hospital overwhelmed him. It was harder than it should have been to dial his senses back. He needed Blair. Gaining a fragile edge of control, Jim moved toward the rear of the ER.

He found Blair in a cubicle surrounded by people and electronic equipment. Jim stayed on the edges, letting them work, but he couldn't remain silent. "How is he?" he demanded.

The doctor glanced his way, saw the blood on him and noting the police shield at his belt. She snapped an order to the nearest nurse, ignoring Jim.

"How is he?" Jim repeated insistently.

"We're doing everything we can," she answered without turning around. "Your presence won't help."

A younger man in doctors' scrubs approached him. "Let's step outside..." he glanced at Jim's shield, "...detective. Can you answer some questions for me?"

Jim allowed the doctor to lead him away from the cubicle. They didn't go far, but even so, Jim wanted - needed - to be with Blair. "Make it fast, doc. I need to be with my partner."

"The best way to help your partner right now is to let Doctor Nelson do her job. Does he have any medical conditions we should know about? Any allergies?"

Jim struggled to focus. "No, nothing like that."

"What about family? Is there someone we should call?"

Jim shook his head. "Blair's only family is his mother and she's out of state. I'll call her. Please, is he going to be okay?"

"We'll know more when he's out of surgery," the doctor evaded.

Jim had spent enough time around doctors to be able to translate. The doctor didn't think Blair was going to make it. The thought squeezed Jim's heart, stole the breath from his lungs. He heard Blair's heartbeat, weak but still there.

"He's in good hands, detective..." the doctor tried.

Jim was no longer listening. The steady, reassuring heartbeat stuttered. Jim heard it before the heart monitor beeped an alarm.

"He's crashing!" a woman's voice cried.

Jim pushed past the doctor but stopped when he saw Blair. The whine of the heart monitor pierced his skull painfully, but far worse than that was the silence where Blair's heartbeat should have been. Jim clung to the wall, needing in that moment something solid under his hands. He squeezed down on the wall until his fingers hurt. He wnted that pain.

He was useless here. He watched the doctors work on Blair and had never before felt so helpless.

Blair climbed into the truck and thrust a half-wrapped hot dog at Jim. "Anything yet?" he asked cheerfully.

"Nothing." The scents of onions, meat, chilli and burned oil filled the truck. Jim unwrapped his dog and took a bite. Stakeouts always made him hungry. "They won't show up yet. The meeting isn't for another hour."

"I figured they'd be here early," Blair mumbled with a mouthful of fries. "Scout the place out, you know." He prised the plastic lid off his coffee cup.

"There's no one inside, Chief. Chang likely has some electronic surveillance inside. If Issac wanted to check the place out he'd have done it earlier. He'll be expecting Chang to double cross him."

"What electronics?" Blair sniffed the coffee as if it were ambrosia. "Can you tell?"

Jim shook his head. "There's nothing I can see from here."

"What about your other senses, man? Try your hearing."

Jim turned to his partner. "I'll try it, but you'll have to help me, Chief. If I dial my hearing up that far any electronics will be drowned out by the rats in the sewer."

Blair laughed. "You've got better control than that. Alright, Jim. We'll use your sight to direct your hearing inside the warehouse, okay?"

Jim laid his half-finished dog on the dash. "Ready when you are, Chief."

"Relax, and concentrate on the warehouse. You don't want to see or hear anything that's not inside that building. Except my voice." Blair looked at Jim, checking on him. "When you're ready, look over to the windows. Find one that gives you a view of the inside..."

Doctor Nelson's grey scrubs were covered with Blair's blood. Jim took in her sombre expression and the thick, copper scent and fought down his instinctive panic. He concentrated on her eyes: hazel eyes, deep rich brown around the pupils and grey-green with flecks of deeper green in the outer circle.

She met his eyes as she reached him. "Detective Ellison."

"How is he?" Jim demanded. If she evaded him again, he was going to fucking shake some answers out of her.

She didn't evade the question, but told him exactly what he needed to know. "He's critical, but stable for now."

Jim took a deep, shaky breath. "Thank you," he said sincerely.

"I removed two bullets from his chest. One of them had nicked his heart, but we caught it before the damage was too great."

That sounded bad. Very bad. Jim swallowed. "Is he...is Blair going to be alright?"

She hesitated. "We've moved him to ICU. The next twenty four hours are critical."

Jim shook his head. "Be straight with me, doc. Is he going to be okay?"

"He lost a great deal of blood and there's damage to his heart and lungs. He's stable for now and we're giving him transfusions, but at this stage there are no guarantees. We're doing everything we can, Detective."

"Can I see him?"

She nodded. "Yes, but only for a few minutes. You're not his family."

Angry words rose to Jim's lips. Of course he was Blair's family! But he managed to swallow the words and nodded grimly. "I want to see him."

"Follow me," the doctor instructed.

Jim was a little surprised by that. He'd expected directions to the ICU, not a personal escort. He did as she said, falling into step beside her as she led him through the hospital corridors.

She pushed the elevator call button. "Detective, whoever did this to your partner was trying to kill him. I sincerely hope you know who it was."

Jim watched the numbers above the elevator change as the elevator rose toward their floor. "I know who it was," he answered, frowning.

Blair slumped in the passenger seat, his eyes closed, his breathing steady. Jim, half-watching Blair affectionately, knew he wasn't asleep, but he was working on it. Stakeouts could be tedious.

A green car pulled up outside the warehouse. Jim nudged his partner in the ribs. "Showtime, Chief." He gazed at the car, his sentinel vision cutting through the darkness to find what he needed to know. He smiled with relief. "The girl is with them.." That had been the one element they couldn't predict: would Chang keep his word and bring the kid to the meeting?

Blair came alert quickly. "About time, man. So now we go get 'em, right?"

Jim reached for his radio. "Ellison one-zero-one requesting backup at Meville Street warehouse." He had no need to explain why: this operation had been planned for days.

The dispatcher's voice crackled back to him. "What's your situation, Detective Ellison?"

"I have three suspects, all armed. One civilian in sight, a teenage girl. Others inside. Sandburg and I are going in."

"Backup is on the way, Detective. Dispatch out."

Jim acknowledged, and waited. A moment later he heard the call go out to all units in the area. "Let's go, Chief."

Inside, the warehouse was a maze of stacked packing crates and boxes. Jim nodded to Blair, signalling they should split up. They knew where the meeting was taking place. Their plan was simple: Jim would monitor the meeting and move in to make the arrests as soon as it seemed safe. Blair's job was to watch the girl and get her to safety if anything went wrong. By strong preference, they wouldn't move until their backup arrived, but the priority was to keep the girl alive.

Jim moved between the crates, circling around while Blair moved in the other direction. He extended his senses throughout the warehouse, checking where everyone was. Chang and his goons were at the rendezvous point. Issac and his two men were nearby, but hadn't yet revealed themselves. Jim could sense two other people in the warehouse, probably Issac's people as they didn't arrive with Chang. He didn't like having wildcards in play. Jim drew his gun and kept moving.

He found his vantage point easily but waited until Blair was in position. Jim's position - atop one of the large stacked crates, gave him both cover and a good view of the meeting below. He looked for the girl and found her. She looked scared, but unhurt.

Chang and Issac were both leaders of rival drug gangs. They'd been rivals for a long time, but Chang's kidnapping of Issac's daughter was taking the territory dispute too far. The girl was innocent: she didn't even know how her daddy was paying for her private school and designer clothes.

Jim could hear police sirens in the distance. Pretty soon the men in the warehouse would hear them, too. He scanned for Blair and found him moving along a corridor of boxes toward the meeting zone. He waited for Blair to reach his pre-arranged position.

Then Jim heard Blair speak, very quietly so only Jim could hear him. Smart.

"Chang's got a knife on the girl. His body's blocking it from your position. You hear me, Jim?"

I sure do, Chief. Jim raised a hand in a quick mock-salute, to show Blair he'd got the message. He could tell from the way Chang stood that he held some kind of a weapon. It was good to know what it was. He began to crouch down behind the crate again.

That was when all hell broke loose.

Blair's skin was almost as white as the sheet that covered him. He was hooked up to half a dozen machines. One of them was breathing for him and that more than anything brought home for Jim just how bad this was. If Blair couldn't even breathe without help...

Still, the heart monitor was beeping steadily. Blair was alive.

Jim stayed there, watching Blair through the glass, until Simon came and gently but firmly ordered him to leave.

One of Issac's men pulled a gun and fired at Chang. Chang hit the deck, whether because he'd been shot or to evade the bullets Jim couldn't tell: it happened too fast. The next instant, the air was alive with gunfire. Over the deafening shots, Jim heard Blair curse under his breath.

Chang yanked the girl toward him, proving that, if he'd been shot, it was a flesh wound at worst. Jim took aim. Their backup was still at least a minute away but Jim would kill Chang before he'd let him harm the kid.

A bullet zinged past Jim's head and it forced him to let Chang go long enough to return fire. For a few moments, Jim lost track of Blair, his hearing overwhelmed by gunfire echoing off the warehouse walls and roof.

Jim yelled, "Cascade PD! Cease fire and drop your guns!" He didn't really think anyone would obey the order, but he was a cop: he had to give warning. His shout drew more bullets his way and he ducked down. Now he could shoot to kill.

Jim felt the impact of the bullets on the boxes at his back. He couldn't tell if the sensation was being magnified by his sentinel senses or if the bullets were really that close. He took a deep breath, concentrating on dialling back his senses to some manageable level. Jim knew the exact layout of the warehouse below him. If he could focus on just one of his senses - his sight - and see only what he needed to see, he could take them down fast. He needed to let his instinct take over, trust it, and just shoot. He could do it. It would work.

Jim waited until the bullets stopped flying his way. It was a momentary reprieve: he would have two or three seconds at most. He sprang up, aware he was exposing himself as a target, and fired. He had no time to take careful aim. His sentinel sight located each target - every man holding a gun - and he fired, one rapid shot after another.

The gunfire stopped.

Issac's daughter was screaming.

Police sirens mingled with screeching tyres outside. Their promised backup, and not a moment too soon.

Jim flattened his body against the boxes, reducing the target he made of himself, and scanned the scene below: for weapons, for any sign of a gunman still standing. Only when sure it was safe did he pay attention to any other details.

Blair lay on the concrete floor, a dark stain of blood spreading slowly across his shirt. From the angle of his body and the place where he lay, it was easy for Jim to reconstruct what happened. There was no doubt where the bullet that felled his partner came from.

From exactly where Jim himself stood.

When he saw Jim in the doorway, Blair tried to smile. Smiling pulled at the tubes taped to his face, reminding him of their presence and what it meant. His throat still felt raw from the breathing tube his doctor had removed that morning. His smile vanished before it was fully formed.

Jim took a step into the room, but only one. He hovered in the doorway, as if unsure of his welcome.

"Jim," Blair croaked, beckoning with a hand hampered by wires and tubes. "Good to see you, man."

Jim didn't smile. "How do you feel?" Jim asked awkwardly.

"Ready for anything," Blair lied. He felt awful. He could barely speak.

Jim managed a weak smile. "The doc says you're out of danger, Chief, but they want to keep you here for a while."

Here was a private hospital room. The walls were painted mint green. Darker green curtains covered the windows which overlooked the corridor outside. Another window gave Blair a view of Cascade.

Blair knew he'd come close to dying. The doctor had explained his injuries to him. He understood that Jim must have been frantic with worry. It wasn't the first time he'd nearly died on Jim's watch.

But the way Jim was looking at him...Blair felt he was missing something important. Had something gone wrong?

It hurt to speak, but Blair tried again. "Jim, what happened? The girl?"

Jim frowned and then reached for a chair. He pulled the chair close to the bed and sat down. "The girl?" he repeated, as if he didn't know who Blair meant. Then his frown smoothed out. "Oh, the kid at the warehouse? She's okay. She's back with her mother." He hesitated for a moment. "Simon's pissed we went in without backup, but the girl is going to be fine. We seized nearly five million dollars of crack cocaine. It's a good result."

"Chang?"

"He's dead. Chief, don't think about the case. The case is closed. Just concentrate on getting better, alright?"

Jim was holding out on him, Blair knew. "You okay, man?" he croaked.

Jim avoided his eyes. "Chief..." The distress in his eyes was clear.

Blair tried to say something reassuring but the words caught in his aching throat. He moved his hand instead, reaching out toward his friend.

Jim saw the gesture and slid his hand over Blair's, careful of the wires and tubes. The warmth of his fingers curled around Blair's palm. Blair saw Jim gaze down at their joined hands. It seemed to focus them both.

"I shot you, Chief," Jim confessed quietly.

Heart pounding - running across the warehouse - gunpowder acrid on his tongue, stinging his nostrils - hands from nowhere grabbing him - then pain. Pain, and he fell, his eyes drawn upward...

Blair nodded silently. He remembered...maybe. But there had been bullets flying everywhere. He couldn't be sure Jim was the one. No one could.

"You almost died."

Blair couldn't let Jim go on. He swallowed and whispered, trusting Jim to hear him. "Jim, it wasn't your fault. It was crazy in there."

"It was. Blair, I - "

Blair squeezed Jim's hand. "You didn't start the firefight. I saw you return fire, but I lost you after that. You didn't see the girl. She panicked, ran right into your line of fire. I..." He couldn't go on. Blair had seen the girl's panic, saw her running into danger. He'd reacted instinctively, running into the crowd to save her. That was all he remembered clearly. Someone grabbed him...if it was true Jim shot him, Blair thought he'd probably been used as a shield. "Not your fault, man," he whispered.

"I'm sorry," Jim said. His hand still covered Blair's warmly.

Blair smiled. "Me too," he answered.

Blair felt himself drifting off to sleep and didn't fight it. He knew Jim would be there when he woke up.

FIC: Instinct

INSTINCT

END

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