Here There Be Dragons
by Elflingskitten

Disclaimer:

You know the legal mumbo-jumbo:

I have no rights to these characters, or any part of the Starsky and Hutch franchise (really, I think they own me...). I just like to play with them, and I will return them to toybox, unharmed. (Well actually, now and in the future, I plan to harm them quite a bit...)

Anyway, no profit is made from this, this is just the stuff that my poor OCD brain turns out, for my own entertainment, and hopefully the entertainment of others. No infringement is intended. I do own any mistakes. They're all mine.

A/N:

This is my first story, ever. I was very grateful when it was accepted into the CabrilloCon, 2009 Memory Book.

Please excuse any breaches of etiquette; I'm still learning. Feel free to educate me.

I am happy for any constructive criticism, as I need to learn these things, but if you're just lookin' for a place to vent a bad day, or you're just plain mean, look elsewhere. There are some things that I know are wrong in a literary/grammar sense, but I still use them anyway. Also, this is Gen. Anything I ever post will be Gen. Maybe cuddly, sappy, with hugs, but Gen. Absolutely no offense is intended for my cherished, other-than-Gen friends.

Here there be dragons

Even the dust motes were without direction. She watched them float, puffed lazily by a weak, hot breeze. Late afternoon sunlight lit her tiny corner of the world with a soft haze. Golden. Deceitful.

Raine was tired. She had been for a long time. Her mother, with time stolen from the harsh taskmaster of desperate employment and single motherhood that so many inner-city women were enslaved to, had brought her to the clinic downtown, where they sat with the hypes and the prostitutes and the desperate.

The doctor who saw her had probably started out as an idealist—that most precious and short-lived of resources, until he, too, became tired. Raine could appreciate his numbed attitude. While the diagnosis was that her body had an inability to properly process vitamin B, the truth was it went deeper, and more insidious.

Raine wasn't so much tired, as she was tired of being afraid. Afraid her mother would get sick and miss work, and they would be evicted. Afraid of the violence that hung over the inner city like smog, the startling finality of which stole from her a father she feared too much to miss. And, rooted most deeply in her weary heart, afraid for her sister, her only sibling and cellmate in this place. She knew Dana even now circled the rim of the toilet she herself had avoided-- the bleak future of drug abuse.

She closed her eyes now, breathing deeply the sun-heated smell of the alley outside her window, mixed with the ambient odors of the small apartment. Fatigue settled over her, familiar and medicating. She welcomed it and the foggy peace it brought. There was a time when despair had dogged her—swirling darkly around her feet in the daytime, sitting just outside the light in the dark corners of their room at night, like wolves just outside the firelight in the stories she had read.

And so, she became numb. Like a piece of beautiful metal artwork covered and disfigured by rust, over time she wrapped a mind—searching and curious to the point of near-genius—in a protective layer of apathy. It was fast becoming an unlamented death.

She had just opened her eyes when sudden movement caught her attention, and she shifted her focus to the world outside the second-story fire escape, where she so often sat. The complex in which she lived was right on the border of what had once been a thriving industrial and office area, inhabited now by only the tenacious or the seedy. A long alley that led from the main road opened into a very long parking and dock area, terminating in another alley, leading out to a side road.

It was from the direction of the main road she watched two men walking. She smirked faintly. She was a child of the streets and knew cops when she saw them. They were walking with purpose, almost on top of one another, gesturing with their hands. It was obvious they didn't belong, although they moved as in complete though tense familiarity with their surroundings. That, and the fact they wore light jackets when the air fairly hummed with California heat, marked them as members of Bay City's finest. Happy to have something besides dust motes to occupy her attention for a few minutes, she crept through the window and out onto the landing to watch them.

She had seen plainclothes cops before—detectives—when they came around questioning, pretending to care when one of the dregs was bumped off. They had also been to her school, lecturing uselessly on the dangers of gangs and drugs. While she was still certain these two were cops, they didn't look like the cops she had seen before. The ones before were older men, dressed in rumpled suits, with a uniform plainness that suggested they had all been dumped out of a box together.

Cursed with moderately poor vision, she couldn't see these two well yet, but they were striking in their appearance. First off, they seemed young, moving with the smooth confidence of alpha males in their prime, unbowed and unslowed by time. Their manner of dress also was different: current, hip, almost irreverent. The most interesting thing, though, was that they looked like photograph negatives of each other, as different as night and day. The one closest to her seemed dark, both in his near-black curly hair and what looked like olive skin. The other practically oozed light, all fair skin and blond hair.

Day gestured with his hand to the office and warehouses on his left and started walking toward them, pausing only when Night said something to him, his stance serious. Day nodded and said something in return before disappearing into one of the rat-hole offices. Raine couldn't have heard them at that distance, even if that hateful, useless A/C unit for her building wasn't clattering like one of the Four Horsemen. Night stood for a minute, sweeping his gaze over the entire area, looking more carefully at the housing complex. Instinctively, she slid smoothly back through the window, before his gaze could settle on her. Deep within her, she rankled. She was mildly curious, the taste of which she hadn't had in so long, and even with the crippling fog of apathy, there was that in her, pride maybe, that did not like to scurry.

Still, these were cops. They probably wanted information about the goings on at the industrial area. Of course, she saw everything that moved there—staring day after day at that alley was her position in life—but dregs that fingered other dregs had the life expectancy of an ice cube, and she barely had the energy to breathe, let alone deflect a grilling. She shifted, hidden safely behind her mother's Goodwill curtains.

She watched as Night strolled toward the apartment building, smooth and easy, like he was walking his dog in the park. As he got closer, though, she detected a definite swagger, and his movements became more alert, almost predatory. His features became defined, pleasantly so. Oh, yeah, definitely not like the others. He was young, handsome, and well built, and she thought maybe his eyes were the color of the sky, just before it rained. He paused again, and when he looked in her general direction, she wondered if he had seen her for a split second. For a moment, she thought she recognized that look, that calculating, worldly look of another Child of the Streets. The moment passed, though, and he headed off out of sight in the direction of the right-side, ground-level apartments.

She sighed inwardly. Now that she found that brief moment of interest—of mild distraction—had passed, she had to return to reality. Her stomach grumbled, but she knew it probably wasn't worth looking, not until her mother came home later that night. She unfolded herself from her hunched position and got up and went into the living room.

Her eyes struggled to adjust to the dim lighting after the bright light outside. She could just make out Dana in the gloom, draped over the couch. Her sister stirred, blinking up at her.

"Hey, Raine, Raine Raine Day," she slurred. "Ya lookin' for a parade to ruin?" She giggled.

Stoned. Her usual state, ever since she started hanging out with that sleazebag boyfriend of hers. Raine closed her eyes briefly, pushing her thumb and forefinger into them, trying to massage away the weary terror that lurked at the edges of her mind.

"Tired, Raine Day? I keep telling ya, ya need to try that stuff Ray gave me. You'll be feelin fine." She giggled again. "All sweetness and light." She snuffled. "'Time is it?"

What difference did it make? Time didn't move. They would be here, just like this, forever.

"Time for you to go back to sleep, Dana."

Dana slumped back to the couch. "Nah, Ray's gonna try to come over one more time 'fore the ol' lady gets home."

The ol' lady. The one working two jobs to support them. Dana thought she flew under the radar where their mother was concerned, but she was wrong. Mostly. Raine had heard her mother one night, sobbing into the phone to their aunt. She knew, or strongly suspected Dana was getting into drugs, but she didn't know what Raine knew. That idiot meat-sack Dana had been hanging around—or off of—had gotten her into pot and graduated her from that into speed, and a little snow when Dufus could score it. What scared Raine was Ray had been talking about laying his hands on Horse. Heroin.

Even now, Raine's mind recoiled in numb horror. She had seen the kids in school or on the street, girls mostly, when they got into that. They started out fine, all happy, dreamy, content. Then they lost their connection—some boy looking for "love" that moved on—or they ran out of money. Then the nightmare started. Like jerky time-lapsed photography, Raine witnessed firsthand a human being destroyed by degrees, stripped away one layer at a time, until nothing was left but a ruined husk. Something she had read from one of the short stories she had once loved came to mind. Here there be dragons.

At first, Raine thought to do something, anything. Their aunt had offered to take Dana in. She barely could support herself, but she lived in a small town in the Midwest where these things existed but not on every street corner, nipping at a young person's heels like the hounds of Hell. Raine's mother had cried and thanked her, but declined. A child of a broken family herself, she wanted so badly to keep them together. If she knew....

But it scared Raine. All of it. This was what sent her retreating into her own mind, staring mindlessly out the window and watching the world grind past her, over her. She hated conflict. Hated it. She had fought with Dana. Their mother had fought with Dana. Their mother and father had fought for years, screaming at each other; her father breaking things, hitting things—like their mother. She and Dana used to hide in a closet, their hands over their ears, so terrified. Now, Dana had her escape, and Raine had built hers.

She loved her sister, she really did. But her mind retreated from the fallout she knew would come if she told their mother. There would be more conflict and screaming, and Dana would just deny everything. Nothing would be accomplished but more strife. Also, Raine didn't want to admit to it, but if their mother sent Dana away, Raine would be alone. The idea that she would risk her sister's life because she didn't want to be totally bereft would have sickened her, if she pulled her head out of the sand long enough. So she didn't. She was just so tired of it all.

She spared one last glance for her sister, her cellmate. "There's a couple cops sniffin' 'round. Don't answer the door."

Dana waved her hand vaguely, as though at a fly. "Yeah, yeah."

Raine turned wearily and headed back to their shared room. Just like this, forever....

Re-entering the small bedroom, she dropped heavily into her usual spot. She was still hungry, but put it out of her mind. Maybe I could read something. She used to love to read. It just seemed like so much effort now.

She glanced outside to see the dark-haired cop had returned and was standing in the middle of the alleyway, fidgeting. She settled her chin on her clasped hands to watch him. What would it be like, she thought, to be somebody else...

The next moment in time happened so suddenly, so unexpectedly, that if she lived to be two hundred years old, she would never, ever forget it.

As the cop turned to walk toward the offices, Raine saw a dirty blue car speeding down the alleyway. She knew he didn't see it and, over that miserable A/C unit, didn't hear it. But she saw it. The sheer imminence of what was about to happen froze her in place, her mouth opened in a soundless croak. Dimly, as from a distance, she heard a man somewhere scream out, the voice strident, terrified.
"Starsky!"

She watched as the curly-haired cop turned in what seemed like slow-motion just as the car was upon him, and, realizing it was too late for anything but clearing his legs from the ground, jumped as high into the air as he could. The car hit him then, the grill impacting with his legs, the momentum carrying him up over the hood where his head and shoulders slammed into the windshield, spider-webbing it. Time seemed to slow as he spun high into the air, and it seemed to take forever for him to hit the ground, where he lay unmoving, like a ball of discarded clothing. She heard what she assumed was the man's blond partner screaming his name again.

Her attention was split now. She wanted to look and spot the other cop, but by proxy, she felt the continuing threat of the car. She knew, just knew, they were coming back. After all, if you were going to hit a cop on purpose, why not come back and finish the job? Running over a helpless human being with your car...

She wanted to scream, to warn them—if the man on the ground was even still alive. All she could get out, though, was a dry whisper. "They're coming back. They're coming back."

Apparently, she wasn't the only person who knew. She saw the blond cop scrambling now. Not having time for the stairs, he climbed over the second-floor banister of the office building and leaped heedlessly to the ground, calling out as he did. "Starsky! I'm coming, Starsk, hold on!"

Even as he ran toward his fallen friend, the driver of the blue car slewed it around in a 180-degree turn and gunned it, clearly aiming for the cop on the ground.

As the following events unfolded before her, the world seemed to grind to a halt. It was like watching a train wreck in slow motion. The blond cop reached his partner, at some point pulling out the biggest handgun she had ever seen—and she had seen many. She watched, confused, as he stood over the man on the ground, bracketing his body with his feet, and leveled the gun at the approaching car. He paused only a moment, the driver of the car clearly making his decision. The sound of that cannon made Raine jerk, the impossible loudness of it blending into one continuous roar in the confines of the alley, as he stood over his partner, firing again and again into the windshield. In shock and disbelief, she realized he wasn't going to move. The sight of him standing there was something she had never, or would ever see again in her life. Or maybe she had.

Not long ago, her school had sent her class on a field trip to the museum downtown. It was a place where, back when she had been awake and had cared, she would have been beside herself. Now, it was just her and forty-five other kids who didn't care, shuffled through by rote by adults and chaperones who didn't care. Just before they left, though, one thing did catch her eye. She stared at a large display of the history of the Norse people. There were artifacts, books, and paintings--copies of mind-boggling art. It was one of the paintings she had looked at then. Something she thought long dead stirred in her mind. It was so...beautiful. Dark and majestic. The title was 'Thor's Fight with the Giants,' and she couldn't tear her eyes from it. A Viking, terrible and terrifying, stood in pitched battle, a heavy weapon held high as he swung it at his enemies that surrounded him. She had never seen anything like it and could have stared at it all day. She would have, too, but her teacher came back to fetch her, angrily hissing something about dawdling and keeping up.

She saw that same visage again, now. As she stared dry-mouthed, his gun clicked on an empty chamber. In one smooth motion, he cast it away and crouched over the other cop, reaching under the brunet's jacket and right arm. He came up fast and ready with the other man's gun, thumbing off the safety even as he stood, so that when he opened fire with it, the echo was still rolling from the revolver. He poured fire now into the swerving sedan, and the painting came to her mind. She beheld that cop, that man, standing bravely over his friend—tall, resolute. His hair was the color of sunlight, and the breeze stirred it around his face. She wished she could see his face. She was sure he would look like the Viking in her painting—fair, and terrible, and deadly.

Mentally, she shook herself. What is he doing? Is he really not going to move? Just as she was about to close her eyes, she sensed something had changed. In the driver's side window of the car, she thought she could see spots of spattered blood. The cop crouched again over his friend, quickly sliding his left hand under him, as though to grab him up. He never stopped firing, although he must have switched the target of the semi-automatic's fusillade because, just as he began to pick up the other cop, the right front tire of the sedan exploded. The car lurched hard to the right, unmanned now, and veered slightly away from the cops. The blond now hunched his body completely over the brunet, carefully draping his arms over the other's head.

Though Raine anticipated the car's collision with the corner wall where the loading area constricted to the narrow alley, it still shook her to hear and see it. The air filled with noise and debris. Brick pieces, hubcaps, and other car parts flew everywhere. She couldn't even see the cops for the mess, and because they were so very close.

Silence settled over the scene as the last bits plinked to the ground. Even the A/C unit was quiet. Raine dragged in a deep breath, seemingly the first in hours. The drama she had just witnessed seemed to last for so long, although it was probably mere seconds. She watched where she thought she had last seen them. Had they been hit? What happened? She was surprised by how much she cared about that. And why did the blond not move? That last shook her, confused her. Like any normal person, she was capable of love, and did so. But that golden-haired cop could have died. Maybe he did. Where are they?

She strained to see through the dust that shimmered in the early evening sun. There! There he was. She saw the blond rise up slowly; dust and what looked like a large piece of brick sliding from his back. He immediately reached out to his friend, touching his throat, then moved up to gently, carefully cradle the side of his head. She could see the blond speaking to him, but even in the silence she couldn't hear the soft words. He then looked first at the wrecked car, close enough to touch, then turned to look over his shoulder toward the main road—toward their car, she realized. He turned back to his friend, and she could see the anguish and indecision on his face. Duh, Raine, she thought. He wants to call an ambulance but doesn't want to leave him.

She rose shakily and made her way to the living room. She passed her sister's sleeping form on the couch and reached for the phone. She was relieved to get a dial tone. The last time she tried to use it, it had been disconnected. She called for an ambulance, quickly explaining there was an injured police officer, and hung up immediately when the dispatcher asked for her name. She ran back to her room, slid out the window, and made her way down the broken ladder of the fire escape.

Mesmerized, she padded on cat feet toward the two cops. She could hear the blond now, and his voice made her chest tighten. It was so soft, so gentle. His voice wavered, and she thought he might cry. As she crept closer, she could finally make out stammered, broken words.

"It's okay now, Starsk; everything's okay. Don't...don't go anywhere, buddy. I'm just gonna call for help. G-get you to the hospital and they'll get you all fixed up," he chuffed, almost a sob. "Everything will b-be okay. Before you know it, we'll be at Huggy's, and you'll be driving me crazy over a cold beer. I'm sorry, babe. I have to...I have to go, just for a minute. I'll be right—"

At that moment he sensed her, or heard her. Instantly, he snapped his right hand up, still holding the gun, while simultaneously hunching his torso over the brunet. In less than a heartbeat, she found herself looking down the barrel of a semi-automatic held rock steady.

Suddenly, it seemed that the world and everything on it stopped on a dime, like everyone on Earth held their breath. It was as though something sucked up all the sound and the air, and all she could hear was her own heart pounding and his fast, hitched breathing. An eternity passed while she looked into his eyes. They were a blazing, fierce blue. In that brief instant, she saw her own death there. Absurdly, she was reminded of a poster in her science class of a tiger. This wasn't just any picture. The photographer had caught that tiny still moment just before the tiger meant to pounce, to lunge, to kill. She saw that same look in his eyes now. His posture screamed aggressive protectiveness. Strangely, the thought made her feel empty. Envious.

He lowered the gun, and Raine started breathing again. "Sorry," he mumbled, but he was already looking back down at his partner. "You shouldn't...shouldn't sneak up on people...like that."
He looked up at her again, suddenly hopeful.

"I already called an ambulance," she said quietly.

Profound relief sparked briefly in his eyes. "Thank you," he breathed. "Thank you very much."

At some point, he had taken off his jacket, and it was now draped over the dark-haired cop. He leaned over him and, very lightly, ran his fingers over the side of the brunet's face. "It's okay, Starsk. Everything's okay. Just hold on." His fingers settled alongside his friend's throat and gently rested there.

Raine could hear a siren in the distance. Something burned within her, a bright hot thing that demanded an answer. Something had happened here, besides the obvious—something she didn't understand. But she knew that somehow it was so very important, and she was missing it, and her life and her future depended on it.

"Why did you do it?" she asked evenly.

"What?" he asked, distracted. He then looked back down at his friend, and the look on his face when he did hurt her, physically. Nobody in her life had ever looked at her like that, spoken to her like he spoke to this man. In her world, she had never seen anybody treat someone like that. Oh, people loved her, and she knew they loved her, but to be looked at like that, like you were the most important thing in the world, like everything would cease to exist without you. Her throat tightened. He continued to speak to him quietly, like they were the only two people on the planet. The sirens got closer.

"Why did you do that?" she asked again, a little louder. In a few minutes, the ambulance would whisk them away. She would never see him again, and he would take the secret with him. They would go back to their world, and she would go back to hers, where all she had in life was an overworked mother and a doped-up sister and shadows in her bedroom. She leaned forward slightly, desperate, but careful to keep her distance from the injured man.

"Why did I do what?" He looked up at her, scared and impatient.

How could he not know?

"Why didn't you jump out of the way? I saw the whole thing. Why didn't you move?"

He looked at her, confused. "I didn't want to move him." His voice became thin and dry as he said it. "He could have neck or spinal injuries."

"But you could have died, too." Please, her mind begged. I need to know.

.
He looked back up at her, and she thought she saw understanding and maybe even compassion in his eyes. He looked back down at the other, and ever so gently, ran his fingers down the side of the pale face. He spoke without looking up.

"He's my partner. My best friend."

"And you would've...would've risked dying for him?"

He looked up at her, intensely. "He's done the same for me many times, as I have for him." He studied her now. He kept his hand on the other's throat and seemed slightly reassured by the pulse he monitored there.

If she could have read his mind, she would have known that he did understand, for he was a compassionate man. He understood to the best of his ability and experience how hard her life likely was, and the extreme challenges she faced in becoming a decent, caring human being.

Seeming to know what she needed to hear, he spoke again, quietly. "Yes, I would have died for him. With him."

Her eyes registered shock, disbelief, and confusion. The sirens were loud now, the ambulance would be there any moment.

The blond bowed his head, looking at his partner, never stopping the soothing, careful stroking, as he thought hard on his answer. He knew this was important to her, that something terribly vital was at stake. It was so hard to think with his partner lying in a dirty concrete alley, bleeding, but he was a police officer. He was sworn to the citizens of this city to serve and protect, no matter the timing. Plus, he sensed something there. He could see the clear light of intelligence, of potential in her eyes. But how to explain, how to undo what looked like fifteen or sixteen years of environment in forty-five seconds, maybe a minute? How to say something that would matter?

He shrugged slightly. "My grandfather once told me, if you don't have something worth dying for, then you have nothing worth living for."

He looked into her eyes. They were unusual, beautiful, light brown flecked with gold. He could almost see her struggling, getting a handle on what he said, what she needed him to say. He struggled too, desperate to say the right thing in the few seconds he had.

"What's your name?" he asked softly.

"Raine."

He smiled, a shy, hesitant smile.

"That's a beautiful name." He became serious and looked at her steadily. "There has to be more, Raine. There has to be more than just us. What we want. What we need. If there's never anything more that counts except yourself, then there will never...be anything more that counts, except yourself. There will only be you. You could be in a room full of people, but you would be alone."

He looked around the alley, the lengthening shadows creeping over the things in it. His voice became soft, sad. "I know it's hard, living where you do, how you do. But you can be better than all this." He swept his free hand around the alley, speaking slowly, intensely. "You have to. There's more than this. Much more."

He looked down at his friend. A loving smile touched his sweaty face. "He grew up in a place like this."

Her eyes widened slightly. "Really?"

"Yes." He looked at her now, earnestly. "His father was shot to death right in front of him, and then he had to survive in a place like this."

She looked at the dark-haired man. A man who had lived, who had endured a life like this, yet clearly meant so much to somebody else.

At that moment, the brunet moaned softly, and guarded relief and devotion spread over the blond's face as he looked at him.

Raine watched, fascinated. There it was again. The rock-solid knowledge that, for all intents and purposes, she had ceased to exist. She was on the outside looking in at a Universe of Two.
The man on the ground stirred slightly, curls the color of coffee fanned out on the ground. He moaned again.

"...utch?"

The blond laid both hands gently on the other's chest and shoulder. "I'm here, Starsk; I'm right here. Don't move, buddy. That was a pretty hard hit." He smiled softly, although his face was still lined with worry. "Wanna make sure your back and neck are okay. Everything's all right. The ambulance is here, and we'll get you fixed up."

Raine turned to watch the ambulance as it pulled into the alley, its mournful wail winding down to nothing. She moved off as the crew moved in. She watched as they surrounded the two on the ground. Soon a backboard and cervical collar were brought out, and the flurry of organized chaos obstructed her view. She turned and walked back to her apartment, her mind in a whirl.

There's more than this. She could hear it resounding in her head as she climbed the fire escape and sat on the landing. Her eyes rested on the scene in the alley, even as her mind was a million miles away. She leaned her head against the railing and closed her eyes. She felt like she had been asleep for years, but was suddenly awake. The blanket that had numbed her senses and stilled the earth when that gun was pointed between her eyes was now gone, with a vengeance. Now, it seemed her senses were on full, greedy overload. She breathed deeply, smelling the smoke of a fire burning somewhere and the scent of the last lingering shreds of sunlight. Suddenly, it didn't seem so deceitful, just golden. Another soft, late summer night in Southern California approached. Somewhere, a rare cricket began calling.

More than this. Without warning, a sensation began to flow from the core of her being, up through her chest and, warm and powerful, into her head. She opened her eyes. Royal blue skies now covered the city, fading to velvet blue-black in the east. She was not a dreg. She was somebody, somebody valuable and strong. In the back of her mind, she knew she had known it all along. It had just been covered in so much grime. She would take the vitamins her doctor gave her. She would talk to her mother. Tonight. Her sister would be sent away, but she would be safe. Maybe Dana would forgive her someday, maybe not. If not, she would be devastated, but she would survive. She loved her sister that much. She would make the sacrifice.

The warm night breeze ghosted over her skin, and she shivered. She welcomed the sensation. She stood now, feeling life pulse in her veins. She would not scurry.

She spared one last glance for the alley. It was empty; the man who had given her the secret was gone. Surely, she would never see him again. She didn't even know his name. It didn't matter, though. In those few seconds, he had given her the secret.

How to slay dragons. She turned and went back inside.