Lightning …in a bottle

.~*~.

Disclaimer: Not mine. If it was, it would still be going or at least forever in reruns - everyday, all day.

AN: You ever wonder the real reason of how Blair already knew Jim was a Sentinel when they met? And maybe why he flittered from subject to subject, as much as from spot to spot? And why Jim was always touching Blair?

This is for Brumeier, who has given so many amazing fics for our enjoyment, because she's obsessed with Jim and Blair and that's… well that's kinda my fault.

.~*~.

Sentinel! Help me! Please help me!

Jerking upright and gasping for breath, Jim let the silk sheet pool around his hips. Shaking his head as if that could shake off the nightmare, his eyes darted uneasily around the room. Dragging a ragged breath in through a too-dry mouth, he closed his eyes against the desolation that raged inside of him. This soon he had trouble separating the pain from the screamer and himself. The same dream had returned every night for over a week and it was starting to freak him out.

There was nothing frightening happening in the dream, just the terrified voice screaming out of the darkness to someone or something called sentinel for help. He'd looked the word up and it meant to guard or watch over—a scout, nothing that actually pertained to him. Well, he was a detective, but that really wasn't the same thing at all.

Getting out of bed and padding downstairs in the darkness, not bothering to turn on the light in the bathroom. He sloshed cold water on face and leaned against the sink, still panting heavier than he should have been. The distant rumble of thunder came through the wall and resounded with something inside him.

Giving his face a cursory wipe, Jim grabbed a beer from the fridge before heading out to stand on the balcony and watch the flicker of lightning on the horizon. Taking a deep breath, he knew it would rain soon, before morning anyway. Looking down over Cascade always calmed him, gave him a sort of peace though it wasn't anywhere near quiet even this late at night. The beer cooled his throat and he wondered again about the dreams.

His senses had started going wacky off and on since he'd returned from Peru, but nothing he couldn't handle. Maybe these dreams were just another variation on that. If someone really was asking for his help, they'd have to provide more information—like actually talk out loud. Balancing the bottle on the railing with one hand, he took another deep breath and held it. Whoever it was, they were scared, frightened beyond terror and near hopeless. It wasn't a child, but something about the timber of the voice made him think it wasn't an adult either.

Chuckling to himself for actually thinking there might be someone calling him for help, he finished the beer in one long pull and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He'd seen and been forced to believe many strange things in his life, but someone calling out for help in his dreams was beyond the limit.

Without bothering to lock the sliding door, Jim headed back to bed. The dream hadn't come more than once a night so at least he'd be able to sleep now. It didn't occur to him until he was half-way to work the next morning that he couldn't tell if the voice was male or female.

.~*~.

Jim knew the exact second the suspect realized he was being stalked because he heard the stumbling crash ahead and the panicked thud of fists and feet against a wooden door. Breaking out in a run, he tried to catch up before the guy made it through – one of the grand hotels along the waterfront, now derelict. These old places were a maze of dark rooms, stairways and vagrants. It could take hours to flush him out.

Cursing under his breath when he reached the busted in door, Jim dismissed the idea of calling Simon and ducked inside. At least it wasn't quite dark yet, there was enough light for him to see. Trying to get his bearings he realized he was in the kitchen, a large cavernous, dark hole. Closing his eyes, he tried to force his senses into obedience and reached. As far as he could sense, the suspect had run through this room and Jim heard distant pounding of feet on steps. Great.

He wasn't about to let this one get away. They'd gotten a tip the guy was down here and Jim had found his trail easily. He hadn't even bothered to hide, just wandering around aimlessly in the alleys. Stolen art objects didn't normally come to Major Crimes, unless there was murder involved. This bastard had killed three people, one a barely-legal guard on his first job, just to steal a bottle—an antique, hand-blown glass bottle no less. Jim didn't care if it was the first bottle ever created; no hunk of glass was worth three lives.

Creeping along in the gloom of a first floor hallway, senses actually cooperating for once, Jim heard something behind him. Snapping his head around, he tripped over something that clanked, barely keeping his balance with one hand out and stumbled into the wall with a muffled curse. Well, that cut it. Bastard lowlife he was tracking had to have heard that racket. Frowning down at the bottle rolling lazily across the stained carpet, Jim wondered why he hadn't seen it or sensed it or something.

Maybe the argument with Simon this morning was clouding his mind. Simon was just going to have to understand he didn't want or need a partner, someone who needed looking after and coddling all the time. A partner was just trouble he didn't need, besides he worked best alone. Shaking his head ruefully at himself, Jim forcefully turned his attention back to the matter at hand. The bottle rolled to a stop, a tiny flash of the light flickering off the glass.

Sentinel! Sentinel! Help me!

"No! Not now!" He whispered out loud. "Of all the damn times…." Smacking himself on the side of his head like he was trying to get water out of his ear, Jim called out in a low voice. "Is someone there?" Looking to his left, there was an open room, door hanging crazily on one hinge. Taking one large step forward, he could see the last of the sunset coming from broken windows inside.

When he got no answer and saw no movement, he looked back at the bottle with a little frisson of fear. Turning all his senses on the bottle, he came up with nothing and tried again, concentrating harder—and nothing. Nothing? How was that even possible? Even an empty bottle usually had a trace of something and he could plainly see the dirty cork stuffed deep in the neck of the bottle. There should be scents clinging to the cork, smears of countless fingerprints, something beyond a flickering of movement inside. Even if his senses were acting up, one at least would usually provide something.

Was this the bottle? If so, the thief was extremely careless. Museum people had said their bottle was empty so probably not. Curiosity mixing with foreboding, he glanced around quickly and crouched down to pick up the bottle. It was certainly funny looking with thick, wavy glass imbedded with tiny bubbles—it could be hand blown. Holding it up to what little light was still coming in through the doorway, Jim saw something move, fluttering against the glass.

Some damn kid had caught a butterfly and left it in the bottle to die. With a sigh of relief, Jim shoved the bottle under one arm and worked to get hold of the cork with the tips of his fingers. He almost had it out when he saw two hands and a tiny face press against the inside of the glass peering out at him.

Sentinel! Please, let me out!

With a gasp and a half-swallowed yelp, he dropped the bottle and it rolled across the carpet and into the open doorway. Taking in a deep breath he tried to laugh at himself. Great. That's just fucking great. Not only were his senses all wacky, he was seeing and hearing things. Simon would bench him if he wasn't careful. Tell him he needed a keeper not a partner. Good thing they were at least half a mile behind.

Just to prove to himself he wasn't afraid of a butterfly in a bottle, Jim grabbed it up and strode over to the window. Holding it up to the last light of sunset, Jim focused his eyes and tried to see past the waves and bubbles exactly what kind of butterfly was in there.

This time he didn't drop the bottle when the little face peered at him in alarm, but he nearly crushed it in surprise. Definitely seeing things. With a chuckle, he squinted at the face and saw it clearly. Mesmerized by the brilliant blue eyes blinking at him in sorrow, filled with a pleading sadness he couldn't define, Jim realized he was in danger of blanking out completely when the wings fluttered and his eyes darted to them.

Please!

Iridescent. That's the word he was thinking of. Shaped like butterfly wings but much larger than the little body, they reflected what little light there was into countless rainbows. He wanted to touch. It must be a – fairy? His mind rebelled at the thought, but he was unable to come up with another idea. Weren't genies supposed to be in bottles?

Impossible, logic dictated. Yeah, just like a man who can see farther than anyone else and hear almost as far. Just like a man that can smell traces of ingredients in an empty bottle along the side of the road. Just like a man who can …

"Shut up." Jim said to himself absently turning the bottle around in both hands. "What are you doing in there little guy?"

Please, please Sentinel. Let me out! I want to go home!

"Someone went to a lot of trouble to capture and imprison you in there, to just leave you lying around in this dump." Checking the room again, he couldn't sense anyone and turned his attention back to the bottle and its mysterious occupant.

"What the hell are you? Some kind of genie in a bottle? Those don't look like feathered wings, so I guess you're not an angel. " He refused to say the word fairy out loud. There's no such thing as fairies, dumbass. The bottle was warm and he skimmed his fingers over it still puzzling over the not-a-fairy hallucination. The little creature frowned and began pounding tiny fists against the inside of the bottle, anger marring its beguiling face.

Let me out!

Jim wanted to keep it, wanted, no—suddenly craved something he saw in those oh-so bright, otherworldly blue eyes that he never knew existed. Peace? Fulfillment? Dreams come true? Yes but more, something closer to ... to Home, as if that were a person and not a place.

But it was wrong, so very wrong, no human was meant to have that—feel that. Already tasting the loss of something he never had, Jim pulled at the cork again before he could change his mind. At the last second, he held the bottle up eye level and took one last look at those enchanting, impossibly blue eyes. "You're so damn beautiful, more beautiful than anything I've ever seen. No wonder some creep locked you up in a bottle." With a sigh and feeling stupid with all these unwanted emotions tugging at him, he jerked the stopper the rest of the way out and laid the bottle on the dirty floor gently so the tiny creature could crawl out.

He watched, hands twitching to touch, to take and grab and hold and keep forever, but he forced himself to stay still and wait. After a moment of tangible anticipation, two tiny hands levered the slender body out and folded iridescent wings fluttered open like sails in a strong wind. The creature looked up, up, up at him, a beatific smile making his whole body tingle. Yes, it was a him, Jim could see that even with the long impossibly dark, curly hair.

Thank you sentinel!

Suddenly, taking one sudden step back in apprehension, the little thing bumped into the bottle with a tiny shriek.

"Take it easy Chief." Jim said softly and smiled reassuringly reaching forward as if to catch the little thing. "No one's gonna hurt you."

Leaning against the bottle, its eyes focused behind Jim and opened wide but not as wide as its tiny mouth. Look out!

"MINE!" The growl came from behind him. "MINEMINEMINE!"

Jerking in surprise, Jim reacted too slow and didn't manage to twist out of the way before something heavy slammed into the back of his head. His last sight was iridescent wings flapping frantically toward the broken window and the frantic thu-thump of its heartbeat.

Thank you Sentinel! Thank you!

.~*~.

"Over here!" Jim groaned and clutched at his head as hands pulled him up, patting him for injuries and flashlight beams scanned the area. "I found Ellison! Looks like he's gonna have a mother of a headache." Taggart crouched down and peered into Jim's face. "You with me man? What the hell happened?"

"Hit me… from behind." Jim gingerly touched the egg on the back of his head. "Sonofabitch!"

"Ellison!" Simon ran into the room, slipping a little on some old newspaper and the beam from his flashlight danced crazily over the walls. "You all right? What the hell happened?"

"Someone managed to sneak up on our ninja and knock him out." Taggart stood and held a hand down to Jim. "I think we're looking for another ninja. Who else could've done it?" He asked Jim with a good-natured grin.

Getting to his feet, Jim stumbled once and then remembered. Eyes going up to the empty window, he started kicking into the papers and trash looking for the bottle.

"What're you looking for? Did you see something before he hit you?" Simon said sharply, striding over to pull away some half-broken down boxes. "What was it?"

"Man there's no way he's still hanging around." Taggart gave Jim a sideways glance. "There's a million places to hide in here. Maybe we should get the dogs."

"I … I saw…" Jim shook his head. There was no bottle, no little fairy-thing. It had been a hallucination; he'd imagined the whole thing. "Nothing. I didn't see anything." Then why were you on your knees when he hit you? Ignoring the traitorous thought, Jim pushed past Taggart and Simon and almost ran toward the hallway, forcing him self not to look back. A stupid hallucination.

"Come on. He went this way."

.~*~.

Six months later…

Jim sat up on the hospital bed and pulled off the hospital gown before grabbing his shirt. Looking up as a pony-tailed doctor with glasses came in carrying a clipboard and closed the door, he was relieved that at least the poking and prodding was done. He hated hospitals and doctors.

"Detective Ellison. I'm Dr. McKay." The way-too-young doctor stared at him, avidly scanning his face.

"Your name tag says McCoy."

The kid hesitated, looking down to examine the nametag upside down. "Um...yeah, but the correct Gaelic pronunciation of my family name is 'McKay'."

Not really wanting to get into it, Jim nodded at the clipboard. "You have the results?"

"Of?"

"The tests?" Jim was starting to get impatient.

"Forget the tests. You don't need medicine. You need information." The kid paced across the small room and turned back talking non-stop the whole time.

"What are you, an intern? Go get the doctor for me, will you please?" He didn't have time for this crap, but somehow he was unable to tear his eyes from the kid's intense blue eyes.

"Now just wait a second. Hear me out here. Loud noises that shouldn't be loud. Smelling things that no one else can smell. Weird visuals. Taste buds off the map, right?"

"That's all in my chart."

"Yeah, but I bet I can add one more thing. A hyperactive tactile response."

"A what?" Jim looked at him half in confusion and half exasperation.

"Extra sensitive touchy-feely lately." The kid-doctor grinned.

"That's none of your business. And who the hell are you, anyway?" For the first time he took a good look at the kid, beyond his face. There was something… something familiar… that hair.

Panicking under his scrutiny, the kid fumbled for a business card and pushed it at Jim. "Me, I'm no one. But this man, he is. He's the only one who can truly help you. You're too far ahead of the curve for any of this techno trash. You're a cop. See the man." And the kid was gone.

Reading and rereading the card, he didn't hear the white-haired doctor come in until he spoke. "I have to tell you I've scheduled some additional tests, but based on the results we have so far there doesn't seem to be any medical foundation for your complaints."

"You lost your name tag." Jim said still thinking about the kid.

The doctor glanced down at his coat in surprise. "So I did. I'm Doctor McCoy." He added with a gentle smile.

.~*~.

Standing outside of Hargrove Hall at Rainier University, Jim berated himself again for being sucked in as he checked the card for the hundredth time. This Sandburg guy was going to turn out to be another crackpot wanting something from him. No way could a mere BA MA figure out what was wrong with him if the doctors couldn't. With a sigh, he tucked the crumpled card in his pocket. He was at the end of his rope and maybe, maybe if this kid could help… Hell, he'd listen to a crackpot if he could put him back the way he used to be.

Telling himself he could still walk away, Jim hesitated in front of a door labeled Artifact Storage, Room 3. He didn't know why he was here, couldn't explain it if he had to, but there was just something about the kid, something… something compelling. Jim snickered at the handwritten paper sign below that reading "Blair Sandburg." Standing a second longer and then resolutely pushed the door open only to have the loud thumping music smack him in the face. Inside the kid-doctor from the hospital, sat facing away from him, hair free and bouncing as he danced as best he could while still sitting in the wooden chair behind a cluttered desk, head bopping to the music. Jim was struck by déjà vu for a second before shaking it off. The kid bopped around and saw him.

"Heeeeey." He nodded happily at Jim. "Notice how the war chant of the Yanomamo headhunters finds its echo in the cellars of Seattle. I'm sure your dad used to say that stuff all the time about the Stones. "Hey! Hey! Turn that jungle music down." Getting to his feet, he faced Jim with an expectant grin.

"Yeah, he did. So do I. You mind?"

"No, no." He turned around eagerly and leaned down to turn the music off.

"Why are you in my face?" The sense of familiarity was throwing him off because he couldn't place it and that made him crankier than usual. He let the impatience show while his mind raced. He'd seen this guy somewhere before the hospital. His scent, his hair, the sound of his voice…something!

"Oh, hey, look I'm really sorry about all that Shakespeare stuff at the hospital. But I just had to find some way to get you into my area here to talk." The kid took off his glasses and tossed them on the desk.

"So talk."

"Okay. Uh, here, please ... get ya a seat here. Um..." The kid talked with his hands distracting Jim from his mobile face and those eyes. Grabbing a pile of stuff off the guest chair and finding nowhere else to put it, the kid dropped it on the floor behind the chair. "Have a seat, man."

Jim took a deep breath and sat. He didn't have a photographic memory exactly, but sensory memories—those he never forgot. He'd seen this kid before—somewhere.

"You see, there's this nurse I've been..." He made some suggestively vague gestures. "...you know..." Seeing his hints were falling on deaf ears, the kid straightened up. "...tutoring at the med center and uh… she saw your chart and she faxed it over to me. And when I read the thing, man, it was like - Bang! Holy Grail time!" Not for the first time Jim wondered if the kid was on something.

"You're losing me, Chief." There was no way a nurse would fax patient records, she'd be fired before she could turn around. If there was such a nurse, Jim would make sure she was fired. Chief? Why had he called the kid Chief. Something tugged at his memory.

"Okay, um...my name is Blair Sandburg. And I'm working on my doctorate in Anthropology and you just may be the living embodiment of my field of study. If I'm correct, Detective Ellison, you're a behavioral throwback to a pre-civilized breed of man." He announced as if that was the answer to everything.

"Are you out of your mind?" Jim stormed to his feet, barely controlling the anger surging through him. "You dragged me all the way over here to tell me I'm some sort of caveman?"

"Well, maybe I was a little out of line with that caveman remark, but I mean..." The kid tried to backpedal, but Jim wasn't buying it. He'd had enough.

Slamming the kid against the wall, Jim held him eye level by both fists in his shirt and those impossibly blue eyes were suddenly only inches away. Dammit he recognized those eyes. But where… A dream? He'd dreamed about this kid? That was insane! He barely felt the kid's hands scrabbling at his shoulders.

"Listen, you neo-hippie witch doctor punk, I could slap you right now with larceny and false impersonation and you are heading real quick into harassing a police officer, and what's more your behavior is giving me probable cause to shake this place down from top to bottom for narcotics." Was that it? Was this kid just another junkie he'd seen sometime down at the station? It didn't feel right.

"Hey, Joe Friday, relax, okay? Look, you mess with me, man, and you are never gonna figure out what's up with you." Suddenly filled with doubt and confusion, Jim released the kid. His mouth worked but no words came out, but it didn't matter because the kid had barely paused for breath. "Now I know about your time spent in Peru and it has got to be connected to what is happening to you now. Now, let me just show you something here. This is a monograph by Sir Richard Burton, the explorer, not the actor. It's over a hundred years old." The kid went to a shelf behind the desk and handed him an old book after opening it to a marked section. Jim glanced at it and turned the page. The next page had a picture of a tribal warrior. Didn't mean anything to him. "Anyway, the idea goes something like this - in all tribal cultures every village had what Burton named a Sentinel. Now this was someone who patrolled the border." Sentinel! The word echoed in his mind and he missed what the kid was saying. Sentinel Sentinel Sentinel Sentinel Sentinel Sentinel Jim steeled his face not to show any emotion when all he wanted was to grab his head and run.

"You mean a scout." That's what the dictionary had said.

"No, no, no, more like a watchman. You see, this Sentinel would watch for approaching enemies, change in the weather, movement of game. Tribe survival depended on it." Watchman? That hadn't been in his dictionary.

"Yeah, what's this got to do with me?" Just who was this kid and what did he know about him. His time in Peru was classified. No way this kid could get access to that.

"A Sentinel is chosen because of a genetic advantage. A sensory awareness that can be developed beyond normal humans. Now these senses are honed by solitary time spent in the wild. Now at first Burton's monograph was disputed and now it's basically forgotten. I mean, there are certain manifestations today of maybe one or two hyperactive senses, like taste and smell, people who work for coffee and perfume companies. Oh, and in Vietnam, the Army long-range recon units that had to—" The kid was never still, using his whole body to talk and barely taking a second to breathe. And those eyes… they seemed to glow, burning from inside.

"… change their diet to fish and rice because a Cong scout could smell a Westerner by his waste." Jim finished nodding in agreement. Every soldier knew that. This kid had nothing new.

"Right, right, exactly. I've got hundreds and hundreds of documented cases over here of one or two hyperactive senses but not one single subject with all five. You could be the real thing." He was excited, that's for sure. But Jim wasn't some freak, didn't want to be a freak.

Jim shook his head. "Nah. The truth is I don't remember much of anything about the jungle." That's what he'd told his superiors and that's what he was sticking to. No one would believe the truth.

"A year and a half spent in the bush? The sole survivor of your unit? I mean, I'm no psychiatrist, but that sounds pretty damn traumatic to me. And trauma tends to get repressed."

"Let's say I buy this. Why is this coming back now?" Why's it so much worse now, is what he meant to say.

"I don't know. But you need someone who understands your condition."

"And what's the payoff?" Ah, here it was—the catch. What did this kid want from him and they all wanted something.

"My doctorate. I want to write about you. You're my thesis." The kid leaned in grabbing both his upper arms to shake him in emphasis.

"I've had enough." Just another con. Breaking contact, Jim held his arms up and walked out of the room, not looking back when he heard the kid calling after him, trying to get a grip on the let-down again feeling.

"Well, just think about it, okay? Oh, wait, there's one other thing I gotta warn you about." He heard the kid calling after him and kept going.

Outside, Jim stopped in the middle of the street watching a red frisbee sail by and then he was on the ground with the kid on top of him and a garbage truck rumbling toward them. "Look out!"

Unable to stop, the truck went clear overtop them and screeched to a stop. The kid jumped to his feet, shaken. "Wow! Oh, that really sucked, man!"

Slowly getting to his feet, Jim looked around in confusion. Where had the truck come from? He'd been walking across the street… "What happened?" Looking around at everyone staring at them, Jim barely felt the kid keep touching him and then suddenly his hearing amplified. Hearing a heartbeat he recognized, Jim turned in circles trying to pinpoint it. Tha-thump. Tha-thump.

"It's that thing. I was trying to warn you about it – the zone-out factor." The kid was blathering on, but Jim was almost in a panic ignoring the truck driver climb down and come loping toward them. He had to get out of here, but the kid kept touching him and he couldn't think straight. Tha-thump. Tha-thump

"God Almighty, you all right? You just stepped right out in front of me." The truck driver stumbled to a stop in front of them, clearly shaken, but Jim had no time for him.

"We're okay, man, we're all right." The kid said reassuringly, both hands patting Jim.

Tha-thump. Tha-thump. With a sinking feeling, Jim glanced at the kid and just as he'd suspected, he heard it again.

"Let's get out of here before I gotta answer a lot of questions. Let's go." Grabbing the kid, he meant to hustle them out of there in a hurry, but the kid turned a blinding smile up at Jim and it hit him. He knew. Knew where he'd seen that impossibly curling hair and those eyes… fey. That's what he'd found when he'd been half-drunk and looked up the word fairy. Somehow, someway, as impossible as it sounded, this kid—Blair Sandburg, was the not-a-fairy in the bottle he'd rescued and he wasn't going to let him out of his sight until he figured out what was going on. He might not believe, not really, hell how could he, but he wasn't a man that turned his back on the facts no matter how unpleasant or unrealistic they might be.

"Let's? As in we? Oh, great, I've got some really specific ideas on how we can proceed here. Come on, let's go." Hiding a grin as the kid bounced along beside him constantly touching, Jim shook his head. What the hell had he let himself in for?

.~*~.

Finis