Flesh and Blood and Heart

[lit_gal]

Flesh and Blood and Heart
Sentinel x Mag 7 (Tucson 7 AU)
Jim/Blair (established relationship)
2010 Moonridge story


A call reveals a truth about Jim's past that he's not ready for. Blair is enough family for him, so the thought that he's related to a con artist in Tuscon does not please him. Unfortunately for Jim, once you poke the Tucson 7, they're likely to poke back.

Curious about these Tucson guys?  Check out Sunstroke, Insanity, and Faith (which introduces a very odd group of law enforcement officers/con men/vigilantes).


( Chapters One and Two )

( Chapters Three and Four )

Chapter Five



“Josiah,” the new man answered with a tilt of his head toward them. Chris had a hard look to him. He took a step forward so he was standing in the entry to the lounge before he leaned against the wall. Even though he appeared to be uninterested in the room, his body was tight and his eyes never stopped traveling as he searched for something.

Josiah seemed to relax at the sight of this Chris, so Jim was guessing these two had worked together for some time—long enough to build trust. “I didn’t expect to see you up here," Josiah said.

Chris let his gaze linger on Jim. “Thought I’d see if you’d gotten lost. You were up here quite a while.”

Blair pulled away from Jim, shrugging off Jim’s hand so that Jim either had to physically restrain his partner or let him go. Jim let him go.

“Blair Sandburg,” Blair offered as he moved forward so that he was between Josiah and Chris. Jim’s hand moved toward his weapon. If Simon was wrong about these guys being FBI, or even worse, if these guys were dirty, Jim did not like having Blair in the middle.

“Chris Larabee,” Chris offered after a half-second pause. He was surprised. Good. If Blair kept these guys off-balance, they wouldn’t be as quick to act. Josiah moved to the side. At least Blair wasn’t between the guys now. Both of them were at least a half-foot taller than Blair and Jim just wanted to pull Blair back to his side.

“This is Jim Ellison.” Blair made the introduction with his usual cheerfulness, but Jim could hear the stress in his voice. Even Blair recognized that the odds were not in their favor at this point.

“Forget it, Chief,” Jim said. Reaching out, he caught Blair by the shoulder and pulled him back. “If the FBI doesn’t want to play nice, I’m more than okay with that.” Chris’ eyebrows went up and he looked over toward Josiah.

“The universe has, once again, conspired against you,” Josiah offered with a shrug, essentially confirming Jim's guess.

Chris sighed and managed to look even wearier than before.

“My captain recognized the person who picked Sanchez up as FBI,” Jim said before Larabee could go blaming his partner. “Like I told Sanchez, I don’t want to have anything to do with you or your operation, so feel free to pack up and leave town.”

“What should we tell Ezra?” Chris asked. He gave Jim a second look, and Jim bristled under the open curiosity.

“I don’t give a shit what you tell him.”

Blair put an elbow in Jim’s side, but he ignored it.

Chris nodded his head slowly. “So, you don’t want him to know you’re brothers?”

Blair sucked in a breath, but Jim just froze. He felt like time had slipped out of his control and everything just stopped. Shit. Most days, Jim only hated the fibbies, but today was one of those days when he went farther and truly loathed them.

“I don’t care what you tell him,” Jim said with a feigned indifference.

Chris nodded again, his movements slow and deliberate.

“Well, I certainly didn’t see that coming,” Josiah said. “God does appear to have a sense of humor. So, our Ezra has a brother.”

“That’s funny?” Blair asked. Jim tightened his hold on Blair. He really didn’t want to have this conversation. However, Blair never had been one for taking subtle hints--or even unsubtle ones. “Why’s that funny?”

Josiah seemed to think for a second. “Until Ezra came to Tucson, he seemed to lack roots, I suppose.”

“Yep,” Chris agreed. “Roots and any sense of responsibility.Seems like you inherited most of those.” Chris looked at Jim for a long time, and Jim realized that the man had been looking up Jim’s files even as Jim looked up Josiah. He was even more annoyed to realize that they’d gotten a lot more than he had. FBI requests trumped local law enforcement every single time.

“That’s kinda uncool to say if he's really your partner,” Blair said, his voice taking on a bit of a scolding tone. Chris Larabee looked surprised to get taken to task.

“I wouldn’t exactly call Ezra a partner,” Chris said slowly.

“An asset then?” Jim guessed. If Ezra wasn’t FBI, he might be a criminal they turned to work for them. Jim wasn’t sure which option horrified him more.

Chris gave a low chuckle and shook his head as if that was the most ridiculous and amusing thing he’d heard in a long time.

“Ezra would not call himself an asset to anyone except himself,” Josiah answered Jim, “which is particularly amusing considering that he is always there at our backs when the situation gets dangerous. He is one of those men with more goodness in him that he is willing to let the world see.”

Jim frowned as he tried to figure out exactly what the hell that meant.

“So, now that the cat’s out of the bag, maybe we can all talk without growling at each other. For example, maybe you could tell us why you came instead of Ezra himself," Blair said.

Chris scratched his neck and watched a professor unlock a storage room down farther down the hall. He wasn't a big talker. It was like he had to really plan out what he planned to say. “I doubt you’d get him away from the club for long enough to come up here.”

“And if he wanted to come, Vin would have sat on him,” Josiah answered. “Ezra is sometimes a little high-strung, and the idea that a detective was running background checks on him and his mother had him…” Josiah’s words trailed off.

"His mother," Jim said, his voice flat as he looked down at Blair. Jim knew for a fact that he had avoided including his mother in any searches, but Blair's face was turning a subtle shade of red.

"Ezra is a mite touchy when it comes to his mother," Chris said. That got another amused shake of the head out of Josiah.

“Wound tighter than a tick, you mean," Josiah commented. "He is not in touch with his inner balance. He would have cursed you out in two minutes and been arrested inside three."

"At least Josiah here got to five minutes before getting arrested.” Chris and Josiah shared an amused look, the sort that Jim recognized from any one of a dozen military and police units he'd worked in. These two were long-term partners.

“Well, you can tell him that my curiosity is satisfied and he doesn’t have to worry about me ruining whatever setup he has with you guys,” Jim said firmly.

Josiah looked like he might have something to say about that, but Chris nodded and pushed away from the wall. “Fair enough,” he said. “Josiah, we have a plane to catch.”

"Jim, you're letting them leave?" Blair demanded.

"Yep," Jim agreed. Josiah paused, but when Jim didn't add anything, he left, following Chris down the hall. Josiah was the older partner, but Chris definitely had the rank. "Let's go see Jack."

"Jack?" Blair frowned. "Jack Kelso? You had Jack Kelso check into them? Oh man, that is so not playing fair."

"Chris Larabee checked my background, including finding out that Ezra Standish is my brother. I'd like to know how he did that."

Blair snorted as Jim herded him out of the room toward Kelso's office. "That might have worked, only you called Kelso before you found out that Chris did that."

"Call it a preemptive strike."

"I’d rather call it manipulative."

"Tactical."

"Yeah, yeah, keep telling yourself that, Ellison. If these guys are Ezra's friends, you are so totally destroying any chance of having a relationship with your brother."

"You're assuming I care," Jim pointed out.

Blair reached out and caught his arm and pulled Jim to a stop. "Man, I know you do. He's your brother."

Blair looked up at him with dark blue eyes full of concern. Jim wanted to deny it. He wanted to say that he didn't care if Ezra Standish fell off the face of the fucking earth, and there was a part of him that didn't. However, this little nagging voice wouldn't let him totally dismiss this new sibling, and the voice sounded a lot like his mother.

When his parents brought Steven home, Jim had rebelled in his five-year old way. He'd dropped grape juice on the carpet of his father's den and he'd left a big pile of his fishing worms on the table where his mother had changed the baby. Jim remembered his mother calling him in and going down on one knee to smooth his hair back from his face.

"Honey, I know this is hard."

"I hate him." Jim had scowled at the squirming pile of brother that everyone kept cooing over.

"No, you're jealous of him," his mother had corrected him. She pulled a blanket down off the chair and spread it out on the floor before putting Steven in the middle of blanket. He'd just stuck all his arms and legs up in the air and squirmed like an overturned beetle. Then his mother had pulled Jim into her lap. "Honey, there is nothing wrong with being jealous. Jealous just tells you that you want something. And once you know what you want, then you know what you need to do. So, what do you want?"

Jim had laid his head on his mother's chest and looked at this horrible little brother. "I want you to love me," he finally confessed in a small whisper. He'd felt horrible as he'd looked at his brother with all this childish hate and felt so totally unloved. His mother's arms had wrapped around him as she laughed.

"You silly. I will always love you best. You're my big boy." Her arms had held him so tight that Jim believed her. He'd clung to her wanted to believe that she would always love him best. "Steven is going to love you to, just as soon as he's old enough to know what it means to have a big brother. The world is a cold place, James. People out there will always want what you have, but brothers stick together. You're going to protect your brother from getting hurt, and when he gets big enough, he will always protect you. Family is all we have. You never trust anyone who isn't family. Promise me that, James."

Jim had agreed. At five years old, he'd promised to never trust anyone because he'd wanted his mother's love just that much. Ironically, it turned out that you had to worry about family betraying you a lot more than you had to worry about friends.

Blinking away that memory, Jim reached out and pulled Blair close. "Chief, I don't want to care about this brother." For a second, they just stood in the hall holding each other, and Jim marveled at having found a partner who gave his own strength so freely and easily. After long seconds, Jim gave Blair a little push and aimed them toward Kelso's office, a hand still on Blair's shoulder.

Blair sighed. "You're family did a total number on you, didn't they?" Blair asked eventually. He never could stand the silence.

"Would you be talking about the mother who put me in the middle of her fights with my father before she abandoned me or the father who turned me against my brother?" Jim asked. He wondered how differently his life would have turned out if his mother had stayed around. She'd called not long before his wedding to Caro. His father had told him that she'd gone into a convent and taken the name Mary Margaret, but his father had taken it on himself to make it clear that she wasn't welcome at the wedding, and Jim had never bothered to contradict his father. He didn't want to open this can of worms.

"And you complain about Naomi."

"At least my father didn't dump me at some friend's house while he went out of country."

"I thought we were complaining about your mother issues, not mine," Blair said. They stopped outside Kelso's office.

"We have enough issues for us both to do a little wallowing," Jim admitted. There wasn't another person on the face of the planet he would admit that to, but Blair was his partner—the one person he did trust. Blair had given up his dissertation and changed the topic to minority interactions with police just because Jim had admitted that the dissertation on Sentinels scared him. Jim had never had someone react to his needs like that—he'd never had a lover who reacted without artifice or manipulation. The man had earned a little honesty.

Blair knocked at the door. "Yeah, well, you got to see me fall apart when Naomi was less than enthusiastic about the two of us. Man, I did not think she knew that many curse words. So it's your turn to have your total emotional meltdown."

"Just don't expect tears," Jim said. He didn't have a problem with Blair crying over his mother's reaction, but he wasn't going to cry over a mother that left him decades ago or a brother he'd never known. Blair shot him one sharp look and then Jack swung the door open.

"Blair!" Jack Kelso said with delight in his voice. "And Jim. I should have known to expect you two. Come in." Jack rolled backwards, inviting them into his office.

"Hey Jack, thank you so much for helping Jim out, even if he is just being paranoid." Blair headed into the office and dropped down into one of the chairs. Jim headed for the other one.

"I'm not so sure it's paranoia," Jack said. Jim cocked his head and studied the man. He'd found something. The stress tones in his voice were making the hairs on the back of Jim's neck stand up.

"What did you find?"

"Josiah Sanchez is in the middle of a whole lot of trouble down in Tucson. He was involved in a bust of a kidnap and blackmail ring. The report says they kidnapped him because he was making trouble, but he broke two men's necks with his feet, and the report doesn't make any sense. A bounty hunter supposedly stumbled on the house when tracking a bounty."

"Isn't that what bounty hunters are supposed to do… track bounties?" Blair asked.

"Yes…." Jack said it slowly. "Only this bounty hunter, Buck Wilmington, has a long history with Josiah. He volunteers in the man's soup kitchen, files his taxes for him, and just about every bounty that turns ugly, Josiah somehow turns up in the middle of the fight. And he has more than a few gunfights on his record. Normally, a bounty hunter who resorted to his weapon this often would lose his license." Jack slid a folder over the desk, and Jim opened it. There were close to a dozen reported cases of Buck Wilmington having gunfights in the city limits, and most of them had Josiah listed somewhere in the police report. Chris Larabee, J.D. Dunne, Ezra Standish, and Vin Tanner were all frequent flyers in the police reports with a Nathan Jackson showing up in a couple of them.

"Chris Larabee is FBI," Jim said. Tucson might be the Wild West, but Jim could not imagine a city where FBI was allowed to set up shop and just get in gunfights in the middle of town… not without getting forcefully invited to leave by the local law enforcement.

"Is he?" Jack leaned forward. "I haven't had a chance to do much digging into the players on the periphery, but I have to say, Buck and Josiah have interesting backgrounds. Josiah is military, decorated for meritorious service four times. And the first group he helped when he returned to the states was Vietnamese refugees."

"Really?" Jim leaned back and studied the file more carefully. He had to admit that he sometimes got uncomfortable being around too many people who spoke Spanish. The tribe in Peru had spoken Quechan, so his brain sometimes associated Spanish with soldiers who wanted him dead. Jim tried his best to quash that kneejerk reaction, but he couldn't imagine coming out of a war zone and immediately working with people who reminded him of the horrors. And Jim didn't go through half as much as the covert ops guys in Vietnam.

"Really," Jack agreed. "He also came home war and embraced Buddhism."

"He went native," Jim said quietly. It made sense that he'd gone native with some South Vietnamese group. "But that doesn't explain why he ends up in the middle of gun fights with this bounty hunter."

"Man, if he's Buddhist, he shouldn't be touching a gun," Blair agreed. "But then he said that he had enough flaws that he worried more about his own soul than others'."

"You talked to him?" Jack's voice sounded shocked, and he looked over toward Jim. Jim could only shrug. He'd given up an illusion that he could control Blair a long time ago. Blair might bend over backwards to do things for Jim—like give up the Sentinel dissertation—but if Jim told him to do something, Blair would do the exact opposite.

Blair rolled his eyes. "He's a good man."

"Who gets in gunfights and breaks men's necks even with his hands tied behind his back," Jack pointed out. Jim looked over to Blair to see if this was making any kind of impression on him, but Blair was shaking his head.

"No way am I okay with killing, but after riding with Jim for three years, I have to admit there are times when it is you or the bad guys, and I am even less okay with dying."

"Here's the really weird part," Jack said.

"I thought that was the weird part." Jim flipped through several more pages.

"Not even close. The incident where Josiah was kidnapped only to kill two of the assailants—the report lists a police officer as being shot in the line of duty."

"Oh man, those were seriously stupid criminals," Blair muttered. Jim agreed. Shooting a cop brought the weight of the entire city down on you.

"Yes, but no one was every charged with attempted murder, and I can't find which police officer was shot. I even had a friend look into long-term leave to see who might have taken time off after the incident, and no names turned up."

Blair frowned. "They lied about a cop being shot?"

"Or they had a cop in so deep undercover that they couldn't compromise his cover," Jim said.

"That would explain why this record was under a judicial seal," Kelso agreed. "It wasn't easy to get ahold of."

"Oh man, your brother's a cop?" Blair asked. "What are the odds?"

Jim knew exactly what Blair was thinking—if Ezra was driven to become a police officer, one who worked a dangerous undercover operation, he might be acting on Sentinel instincts.

"Brother?" Jack looked from one of them to another. "Now I understand why you didn't use department resources." Rolling out from behind his desk, Kelso headed for the door. "I think I'm going to give you two some time to talk."

Jim tried to come up with some excuse to keep Jack from leaving because he really didn't want to be alone in a room with Blair. The man was going to try and browbeat him into going to Tucson, and Jim just did not like his odds. He eyed his partner, wondering if he could just stuff a sock in Blair's mouth. Jack headed out the door, closing it behind him.

"Ellison, do not give me that look," Blair said, crossing his arms.

"What look?" Jim asked.

Blair snorted. "Yeah, well this is Blair Sandburg the researcher saying that we need to check on your brother. He's a cop. Man, if he has the territorial imperative to protect the territory, he may be a Sentinel, and there is no way I am leaving a Sentinel to suffer alone. I mean, you remember what it was like when you were coming online and you had no idea what was happening with your body."

Jim got up and headed for the door. Behind him, Blair scrambled to get his legs uncrossed and get out of the chair without falling.

"Are we going to talk about this?"

"Nope," Jim said. As he opened the door, he saw Blair with his mouth hanging open. "But don't expect me to be happy, and if he's not a Sentinel, we're on the next plane back here."

Blair’s mouth fell open. "Wait… we're going?"

Jim clenched his teeth and glared at his partner. Unfortunately, Blair was still grinning like a loon as they left Jack's office.






Chapter 6

Players Only was the sort of place Jim wouldn't have given a second look when he worked Vice. The front was freshly painted and cigarette butts littered the ground. Tiny hoses run under the wide porch misted customers with a cool vapor that evaporated almost immediately in the hot desert air and cars half-filled the parking lot, even though the hour was early. However, there weren't the gang tags that would have announced whose territory this was. There weren't any crack pipes or little baggies thrown away in corners. There weren't any hookers lounging on the corner looking to find a five-minute customer. In short, the place looked legit. Even the cool breeze that drifted out the doors when a customer opened them smelled of booze and cigarettes, but not gunpowder or pot or the sour stench of aggression.

"Well?" Blair asked quietly.

"We sit in the corner and you do your tests. Nothing else," Jim warned. He didn't really want to meet his brother, but if there was a chance Ezra was a Sentinel, he deserved to have the answers Jim didn't get until Blair had shown up in his life.

"Oh man… I promised about a million times that I wouldn't try and play matchmaker. What? Do you want a blood oath?"

Jim looked Blair up and down as if considering it. Rolling his eyes, Blair planted an elbow in Jim's side before pushing past and heading into the bar. Jim followed.

The inside was starting to show a little wear. The brass fixtures had some spots rubbed dull and the pattern on the carpet was fading. The chairs had bald patches where the varnish had worn away leaving pale wood to peek through. But the pool tables were in good condition, eight of them lined up with their green felt. Each had a small group of men around it, and from the sounds, more than one serious bet was getting placed the winners on a couple of the tables. Given the amount of illegal gambling going on, maybe Jim would have had an interest in the place back during his vice days.

"There he is," Blair whispered, his excitement coming through even though he was trying to be quiet. Jim didn't react as he continued to scan the room. However, he spotted Ezra right away. He was sitting playing cards with three other men, his expression carefully neutral. The table had chips on it, but once Jim piggybacked scent onto sight, he could focus in on the men and smell their excitement. One man was sour with fear, but the others were lost in the sort of adrenaline rush only real gambling provided. At the end of the day, they were going to change those plastic chips in for money, which would be where the crime came in.

"Let's get a table," Jim suggested, guiding Blair with a hand under his elbow. He wanted something in a quiet corner where he could watch the door to the kitchen and the front door. The men in this place didn't look like the sort to start trouble, but looks—and even smells—could be deceiving.

"Man, this place is great. The vibe in here is like… whoa."

"These are serious gamblers, Chief. They aren't coming here to get drunk and dance." Most of the customers were men, and the only jukebox was not only silent but unplugged. There was a young man in the corner strumming on a guitar and laughing with a friend who was downing his beer at a pretty fair clip, but they were the exception. Besides a few people getting happily drunk at the bar, this place really was for players only. Anyone who walked in here was going to figure out pretty quick that this wasn't a place that welcomed shit-faced drunks making trouble. These guys wouldn't give the law an excuse to come in here, and they were being careful enough that a casual customer wouldn't notice the heavy gambling going on in the corners.

"I'll get the beers," Blair offered, and his hand slipped into his jeans where he had the materials for his test set up. Jim nodded and settled back into a chair to watch. Threading his way through the tables, Blair nodded to a half dozen customers, bobbing his head in time with the guitar player. That got him a bright smile from the kid playing, and Jim had an urge to go over and card him. However, just from the way everyone was being so careful about not giving any probable cause for suspicion, he was guessing that the kid was either older than he looked or drinking Coke. If this was a cover for an undercover officer, they were going after a damn big fish. Jim never got the green light to overlook much less participate in this much illegal activity when he was undercover. Then again, Jim wasn't a feeb.

Blair was at the bar a little longer than necessary, chatting with the bartender, his head still bobbing enthusiastically enough to make his curls do a little dance. The bartender gave him two beers in old fashioned mugs, and Blair was still talking to him, drinking his beer between words. Jim could have eavesdropped, but he chose to focus his hearing elsewhere. Despite scanning in every direction, Jim couldn't catch any hint of hidden rooms or backroom gambling. The small machine in the car producing asymmetrical rhythms might be throwing off his accuracy, though. God knows it was annoying the shit out of him. Jim dialed down hearing and focused more on smell. He could identify more than one source of gun oil, but Jim had smelled that on a good quarter of the population. Arizona had to be one giant NRA stronghold because he'd spotted more people carrying guns in one day than he normally spotted in a month back in Cascade. As a cop, he didn't like the odds of making a simple traffic stop or answering a domestic dispute call with so damn many guns in circulation, but luckily, he wasn't a cop here.

Blair finally finished at the bar, and gathering up both beers in one hand, he started back toward the table. Jim focused his hearing on his partner. Sure enough, Blair wound his way around toward Ezra. This might be part of the plan, but Jim's guts tensed at the idea of what Blair might say.

"Hey, great place here. Sam says you own the place."

Ezra looked up, surprised at the interruption. "Yes, well I appreciate the offer of good will, but as you see, I am in the middle of a hand here."

"Yeah, that's cool. I just wanted to say that this place is awesome. Totally awesome." Blair was nodded and backing away from the table.

"I will file that adulation away for a day when I feel a need for affirmation," Ezra said, his eyes already going back to his poker partners. Jim knew one thing: his brother was an ass. His brother was an over-educated, heartless ass because no one ignored one of Blair's friendly overtures. Without losing his smile, Blair just nodded and headed for Jim's table.

He put the beer down in front of Jim and slid into one of the open chairs.

"I don't like him," Jim said.

That earned him a snort and an eyeroll from Blair. "Man, you don't know him."

"I know how he just talked to you."

"You don't know the hand he was holding. If I was holding aces over jacks, I'd tell me to go fuck off."

Jim gave Blair a cold look.

"Not that I'm defending him because clearly you need someone to affirm your right to unreasonable sibling rivalry." Blair's tone made it entirely too clear what he thought of that.

"Why is it that you were nicer to me before we started having sex?"

"Because now I know you'll forgive me anything if I shake my ass at you," Blair pointed out. Jim could feel a smile tugging at his lips.

"You have a high opinion of your ass."

"You have no idea. My ass can stop wars. Entire wars, man. It's just that good. If I had been in Vietnam, I could have shimmied my way through a belly dance, and the two sides would have declared peace."

Jim couldn't hold back the smile that slipped free. And then Blair was smiling at him, and Jim could feel his aggravation sliding away. "You dork."

"Do not get me started on the etymology and mythology of that word."

Jim retaliated by reaching over and tugging at a curl, and Blair's smile got wider. Jim might have gone for the full noogie, but something caught his eye. He pulled his hand back and wrapped it around his beer as he gave a small nod in Ezra's general direction. Blair's eyes went right there.

At the table, Ezra was wiping his hands on his pants, over and over. The expression on his face was almost amusing in its annoyance, and he finally threw his cards down on the table and got up.

"No way could someone feel those microspores without hypersensitive touch," Blair whispered, "especially when I could only drop about half of them. I did not expect to get brushed off that fast."

"Well, he feels them," Jim said with a sigh. The microspores had felt like harsh sand rubbing into his skin when Blair had tested them on him, and from Ezra's expression, he was feeling the same way.

"Totally," Blair agreed. "That's one down. When he gets to the bar, we'll see if he has scent."

"If he can't smell that fish oil, he's got a dead nose," Jim pointed out. It hardly took a Sentinel to smell that shit.

Blair looked at him oddly.

"What?" Jim asked a little defensively.

"Man, you need to dial down scent because I couldn't smell the stuff when I was right there at the bar."

Jim blinked and concentrated on himself for a second. Sure enough, his sense of smell was far too high. He had to concentrate to move it back down, and then the relief from the stink of bodies and gun oil and pool chalk just about made him sag.

"Oh yeah, you're not emotionally invested in this. Not at all," Blair said as he drank his own beer.

"Don't go there, Shorty."

"Okay, that whole warning tone has totally lost its effectiveness. You use that tone for everything from suitcases of nuclear materials to the last slice of pizza, so I’ve pretty much learned to ignore it."

Jim ran a hand over his face. "When did you turn into such an annoying little shit?"

"Day two of you knowing me.I would have been annoying the first day, only I was too busy impersonating a doctor and illegally accessing your medical files." He gave Jim a wicked smile before taking a drink of his beer.

That was true. Jim watched as Ezra headed behind the bar to wash his hands at the sink. "You really should find something that doesn't stick to everything like that shit."

"I needed to find out fast. That stuff… no one without enhanced senses can feel it, but you guys with the extra special touchy-feely going… you all hate it."

Jim looked over at Blair. "How many people did you find with enhanced touch?"

"Not as many as with enhanced taste. That was the most common, but touch came in second with eyesight third. My guess is that enhanced smell would be less and less common because industrialization stinks. Seriously stinks. Enhanced smell would probably be more disadvantage than advantage."

"Pre-industrialization probably stunk worse," Jim pointed out as he thought about having to navigate a city full of horses and their shit. Ezra was turning his head from side to side now, clearly searching for something.

"Not if you weren't in the city. Most documented cases of enhanced smell come from rural or undeveloped areas. I mean, if you think about it, a lot of people with enhanced senses can't turn them off. A taster is going to have that sense when trying to identify spices in a competitor's food, but they're also going to have it when they go home and the wife or husband burns the stew. They can choose to just not eat the stuff. But how do you handle enhanced smell if you can't control it? And man, of all the people I tested, the ones with fewer than five senses had no control over it. None. They were just stuck with the dial on seven or eight or nine, and they had to learn to live with it. The senses may be natural, but no way are they easy to live with."

Jim thought about what it would mean to have just one or two senses and to be stuck with them wide open all the time. He preferred his control.

"Whoa, he smells that," Blair whispered.

Jim frowned. "And if he has enhanced hearing, he's caught every word of this."

"Totally," Blair agreed with a happy nod. Jim groaned as he realized that Blair had been giving his mini-Sentinel lecture for Ezra. "But so far, he's not reacting at all. I don't know whether he doesn't have enhanced hearing or if he's just dialed down."

Clenching his jaw, Jim bit down on an urge to rip Blair a new asshole. If Ezra was a Sentinel, that didn't mean Jim wanted to meet him and compare notes. Right now, he pretty much hated Ezra, so discussing something as personal as his senses was not going to happen.

"Oh man, check it out," Blair whispered. Ezra had a bar towel and he was furiously wiping down the bar near where Blair had been standing. "Two senses are definitely checked off: touch and smell. So, time to check for hearing. Are you dialed down?" Blair rested his hand on Jim's arm.

Jim nodded. "Go for it, Chief."

Blair reached into his pocket for the long-distance remote and triggered it. Even dialed down, Jim jumped as the background noise of the asymmetrical drums that had been playing for half an hour suddenly went wild. According to Blair, the modified recording had all sound shifted into the ultra-low range so that no one else could hear it, but Jim felt like a marching band took up residence in his skull.

"Not even a twitch," Blair said sadly.

"Then maybe you could turn that crap down," Jim suggested.

"Oh. Sorry." Blair hit the remote and the percussion faded, leaving only an echo in Jim's head. "So, we have two senses, so either he doesn't have the full Sentinel genetic code, or he's a Sentinel with damaged hearing."

"A hard of hearing Sentinel?" Jim just looked at Blair.

"Hey, deafness is the only disability on the rise. If he stood too near a bomb going off, that alone could have damaged his hearing."

"A bomb? What are the odds of that?"

"I don't know. If his luck is anything like yours, he's been near several," Blair pointed out. "But without cooking for him, taste is going to be a hard one to test."

"Heads up," Jim said as a new man walked in the bar. Chris Larabee looked just as wary walking into the Players Only as he'd looked walking into the middle of the conversation with Jim and Blair and Josiah. He had the sort of hyper vigilance that Jim associated with soldiers or cops who had been under far too long, but he covered it with slow, even sluggish gestures that made him look supremely unconcerned about anything.

"Aw fuck. So much for subtle." Blair slumped down in his seat a little, but Jim didn't bother. Chris was going to spot them whether they tried to hide or not. Sure enough, Chris ambled toward them, his thumb hooked in his belt. Jim suspected that he had a weapon at the small of his back. Either Chris really didn't trust them or he was just in the habit of keeping a hand near his gun. Either option said something about his life.

"Ellison, Sandburg," Chris greeted them, an almost amused look on his face. "Fancy seeing you here."

"We were just in town," Jim said, taking a drink of beer.

"You're in my seat."

"It didn't have your name on it," Jim retorted.

Chris shrugged and pulled out the chair opposite Blair and sat down next to Jim. "Doesn't need my name. About everyone in here knows my table."

Jim didn't bother to answer as he took another drink of his beer. Blair had that fascinated expression on his face, like when he watched some documentary about spear-shaking tribesman, and Jim sighed at the realization that Blair had slipped into that role of observer. When he'd first met Blair, he'd really been offended at the idea that Blair considered him a test subject first and a friend second. These days it was easier for him to see that Blair just considered the world one huge anthropological puzzle. Even if he was Blair's friend and lover first, Blair just couldn't turn off that scientific brain of his.

"Hey, Chris!" a man called out. It was the one who had been sitting with the guitar-strumming boy. He was heading toward them, the boy in tow. Now that he was facing Jim, Jim was guessing the boy's age at eighteen or nineteen. He was starting to lose the lankiness of adolescence, but he hadn't yet lost that baby-faced roundness to his face. Then again, the other man, who was clearly in his thirties, had a bit of the baby-face to him as well. Maybe the huge smile on his face just gave him the impression of being young despite the small wrinkles beginning to appear at the corners of his eyes. Both men were dark haired and dark eyed, so Jim was guessing brothers—cousins maybe.

"Buck, J.D.," Chris greeted them. He tilted his head their way and got an honest warmth in his voice, even if he wasn't all that demonstrative. Buck. Jim recalled that a Carl "Buck" Wilmington was Josiah's closest friend as near as Jim could tell from the paperwork. He was the bounty hunter with the bad habit of shooting first and taking names later. The research Jim had read really didn't match this man with a smile as wide as his face.

"Who are your friends?" the younger one asked.

"Buck Wilmington, J.D. Dunne—these are Jim and Blair," Chris introduced them.

"Jim and Blair?" Buck swung a chair around and straddled it before giving a long, low whistle. "Jim Ellison? Oh yeah Chris, you handled that real well. Remind me to not have you get involved if I have any long lost brothers pop out of the woodwork."

Jim just about choked on his beer as his spine went ramrod straight.

"Wow. You're Ezra's brother," J.D. said, his eyes going big as he pulled a chair away from another table and plopped down near Buck.

Carefully putting his beer down before he could throw it at someone, Jim turned on Chris. "Larabee?" he asked darkly.

"You said to not tell Ezra. I haven't," Chris said without a trace of apology.

"Secrets don't last too long around this place," Buck said. "It just seemed reasonable for us to know just in case you showed up. Normally, people looking too hard at one of us leads to shooting, and it'd be a shame if we mistook your interest in our Ezra."

"You're threatening me?" Jim was about ready to grab Blair and get the hell out of Dodge.

"Seems like that was him promising to not threaten you," J.D. offered. "Buck isn't one for threats… not unless people are harassing women. Then he gets a little irrational." He smiled at Buck.

"He was asking for it," Buck snapped, so obviously they were talking about a real case. "She was a special case."

"All the women are special cases for you," Chris interrupted.

"Damn right," Buck agreed, his smile getting even wider as he leaned back.

Blair's fingers twitched like he wanted to take notes on the interaction. J.D. stuck his hand out toward Blair. "Hi, I'm J.D. I help Buck out with the skip tracing and bounty hunting when I'm not cleaning Ezra's floor. I'd give up cleaning floors for a living, but Ezra pays better than Buck, and that ain't saying much."

"You get paid when I do," Buck defended himself without looking too upset.

Blair shook hands, his own smile in place. "Wow. That has to be exciting work."

"The floor cleaning or the bounty hunting?" J.D. asked with a laugh. "Buck's good to train me, though. It's more than I expected to be doing with my grades in high school. So, I know Jim here's a detective. What do you do?"

Blair seemed a little surprised to get the verbal attack aimed at him. Usually he was the one throwing the words around as he distracted others. Jim wondered if J.D. was intentionally trying to get them off guard or if he really was as young as he seemed. Blair shrugged. "I'm doing a dissertation on how the police interact with minorities, and Jim got stuck babysitting me, I guess."

Buck gave another long whistle. "Dissertation? Wow. That means you're going to be Dr. Sandburg here soon, I suppose."

"Hopefully," Blair said with a laugh.

Buck leaned back, his arms draped over the back of the chair. "So, why are you down here? It's not that we don't have a whole heap of minorities, but I daresay the cops aren't going to roll out the red carpet for anyone who's interested in how they interact with them."

"He's my partner," Jim said quickly, his glare daring Buck to make something out of it.

"I didn't know you could partner up with a cop without being a cop," J.D. said with that same wide smile. Buck's eyebrows went up a bit, but he didn't look particularly shocked or upset.

"Wrong kind of partner, J.D.," Chris offered. "I think he means something more personal."

"Oh." J.D. slowly turned a violent shade of red. "Geez. Got it."

Buck burst out laughing—a big belly laugh that made him grab the back of the chair before he could fall out of it. Most of the men in the place turned to check out the disturbance, and J.D.'s face turned even redder. Even Chris managed to find a small smile.

"I didn't—" J.D. stopped and just glared at Buck.

"Subtle, kid," Buck offered, patting J.D. on the back to soften the insult, but instead of being insulted, J.D. just sighed.

"He's my partner at work and at home," Jim corrected them with a glare for all three men. Chris just looked right back at him without blinking.

"Well, that explains why he's tagging along with the attitude here," Buck said, his laughter down to a quiet chuckle as he poked a thumb in Jim's direction. "Jim, are you sure you're not related Chris maybe? You two have the matching glares down."

Jim had a scathing retort, but he completely lost it when Ezra came walking up to the table with drinks in hand. "If you reprobates are chasing off my paying customers, I'm going to start charging you for these," he said as he sat beers down in front of Chris and Buck.

"Where's mine?" J.D. asked, the color starting to leave his face as soon as the topic changed.

"Where's your legal and valid identification stating that you're twenty one?" Ezra demanded. He pulled a chair from one of the other tables and set it between J.D. and Blair. Jim's brain couldn't come up with an excuse fast enough, and Blair scooted over to make more room so that Ezra could have a seat.

"You cut it into pieces," J.D. complained.

"That was neither legal nor valid. Even worse, it was a poor excuse of a forgery. If one is going to forge identification, it pays to invest in a reputable artist… or a disreputable artist with talent." Ezra turned toward them, and Jim could feel his guts curl into a small ball. "Ezra Standish. As your friend surmised, I am the owner and manager of the Players Only."

Feeling like he was trapped in a bad dream, Jim reached out and shook the man's hand without offering a name in return. Blair solemnly did the same, his gaze sliding back toward Jim several times. Jim could practically hear Blair telling him to just fucking introduce himself, but he kept silent.

"Ezra, this is Jim…. He was in the Rangers," Chris offered. "And his… friend."

Ezra seemed to just stare at Chris longer than he really needed to. Eventually he let his eyes drift half-shut as he shook his head in an exaggerated form of disappointment. "I often wonder about your manners, Chris Larabee."

"My momma was fine with them."

Ezra's expression turned pinched. Turning toward Jim and Blair, he got a much more pleasant expression on his face. "No matter what idiotic things these three cretins have managed to say in the space of five minutes, Players Only is open to everyone. And if someone is making a joke out of others' sexuality, I'm sure I could find a sewer line that needs to be snaked." Ezra gave Buck and J.D. a glare cold enough that Simon Banks or William Ellison would have been proud.

Jim wasn't sure exactly how he was supposed to feel about having a brother defend his right to be gay. His father had tried to accept it, but that acceptance had come with awkward pauses and even more awkward questions. Not even Blair with his silver tongue had been able to smooth things over when they'd tried the family dinner thing. Steven had just avoided Jim and his sexuality. Hell, even Naomi had thrown a fit, although in her case it had a lot less to do with sexuality and a lot more to do with Blair losing himself in Jim's shadow. Jim still wasn't sure if she was more upset about Blair pulling the plug on the Sentinel dissertation or his work with the 'pigs', but she had gone up like Mount St. Naomi ready to wipe out entire villages unlucky enough to be in her path. And here was Ezra Standish, a man who was looking more and more like a criminal asset being worked by the FBI, and he was defending Jim's right to be gay. The universe clearly needed a good laugh today, and Jim was the butt of the joke.

"I think they were laughing more at J.D.'s reaction than us," Blair said. "And hey, when you're young, the world can totally catch you by surprise. My mom was a big fan of communes and this one time, she took us to a place where they had this wild set of beliefs. It was like this blend of totemism and animism and personal empowerment and everyone spent one hour a day channeling their inner spirit animal. So here I am, a kid in the middle of all these adults who are crawling around on the floor mooing and growling. Wild. Absolutely wild. I had no idea what I was supposed to do, you know?" Blair's hands were going, and Ezra had the wide-eyed expression of shock that people often got when first confronted with Blair's ability to distract, but it gave Jim time to collect his wits.

"Blair, it's about time for us to head back to the hotel and meet Cameron," Jim said, offering up the first name that came to mind.

"Oh, yeah. Totally. I guess you guys are going to have to do your soldier reminiscing thing later, huh?" Blair looked over at Chris as if disappointed. "Man, I am so sorry we got our timing wrong. I'm sure you have lots of great stories. I would love to hear them some time. Really love." He got up and stood close enough to Jim that Jim could feel the heat of him.

Buck stood up. "If Chris won't share those stories, I will. Chris was my corporal, always trying to keep my ass out of trouble with the sergeant."

"And I usually failed," Chris said, standing up as well. "Jim, I hope we have a chance to share those stories."

Jim frowned, surprised at the emotion he could see behind the words. Chris wanted him to come back, and Jim wasn't sure how he felt about that. Ezra wasn't the ass Jim had thought at first—at least not totally; however, Jim wasn't ready for any family reunions. This was about Blair getting his data and making sure that Ezra wasn't suffering with the senses.

"We'll see," Jim said. Chris gave him a nod and then backed away so Jim could get out of the corner. When Jim had picked that table, he really hadn't been expecting to have so many men crowd in around him. With a nod for the men still gathered around the table, Jim rested his hand on the small of Blair's back and hurried them out of the Players Only.

"Whoa." Blair breathed the word only once they were out in the parking lot with the heat rising at them from the blacktop.

"Yep," Jim agreed, fishing in his pocket for the keys.

"Man, are you okay?"

"Not even close," Jim admitted.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

Jim paused before answering. "Not right now, Chief. Later, okay?"

"Yeah, no problem," Blair agreed, and then the man who could talk a mile a minute fell silent and they went out to the rental car in silence.

Comments

Flesh And Blood And Heart 2

[slashpuppy.livejournal.com]

First?

Re: Flesh And Blood And Heart 2

[lit-gal.livejournal.com]

Yep!

Re: Flesh And Blood And Heart 2

[slashpuppy.livejournal.com]

Yeay, the brothers met! And Ezra stuck up for Jim without knowing he was his brother. *awwwww* :-)

Re: Flesh And Blood And Heart 2

[lit-gal.livejournal.com]

Ezra's not a bad guy... a little self-interested, maybe, but not bad.

[math-magician.livejournal.com]

Ive never seen M7 and yet this story is sucking me in. I really am having a hard time waiting to meet Jim's mother and learning her side of the story.

May I suggest two little errors to fix? "Your" in the following: Blair sighed. "You're family did a total number on you, didn't they?" Blair asked eventually.

And exchange "every" for "ever" in this one:
"Yes, but no one was every charged with attempted murder, and I can't find which police officer was shot.

I am enjoying this crossover a lot, probably in large part due to the relationship between Jim and Blair, which seems to be one of equals. I like that.

[lit-gal.livejournal.com]

I'm so glad you're enjoying it. I had fun writing a story where Jim and Blair were just together--no angst, no big struggle, just together. All the angst here is centered around Jim.

[lit-gal.livejournal.com]

I'm so glad you're enjoying it. I had fun writing a story where Jim and Blair were just together--no angst, no big struggle, just together. All the angst here is centered around Jim.

[samson28.livejournal.com]

fabulous. great first meeting for the brothers.

[lit-gal.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much!

[finlaure.livejournal.com]

I now wish I could watch some of the Mag 7 just so i could really put faces and some cannon personallity to the names. But you are doing a Great job to the point of drawing me right in. Now, for some J/B action, and it would be complete.

[lit-gal.livejournal.com]

The show reminds me a lot of The Sentinel: great characters with questionable storylines. I did do background sheet for my AU when I did the first story, and the first story has pictures embedded, so those might help.

Prequel setting up the M7 AU -- http://litgal.org/M7/Sunstroke.htm

Background sheet for the AU characters-- http://litgal.org/M7/T7char.pdf

[boogieshoes.livejournal.com]

i always love your writing, but i have a question:

it's been pretty scientifically proven that smell is intricately tied to taste - in fact people without a normal sense of smell don't actually taste the same range of flavors as the rest of us. so... if someone had an enhanced sense of taste, wouldn't that perforce mean an enhanced sense of smell?

obviously, your universe, your rules, but i am curious on that point (because i'm a dork).

-bs

[lit-gal.livejournal.com]

I think in one of my stories Blair explains how taste and smell are linked and how hearing and touch are linked; however, the show treats them separately, so I try to treat them separately unless I have Blair go into his scientific spiel. This doesn't feel like a story where the spiel fits.

[boogieshoes.livejournal.com]

hearing and touch? ok, i missed the research on that one.

re how the show treats it - i'd also forgotten that, but yes, i agree it's a perfectly reasonable explanation for you treating it the same way. carry on. ;-)

*goes back to reading avidly*

-bs

[lit-gal.livejournal.com]

Hearing is literally just touch. The hairs in the ear bend and move, pulling the skin of the inner ear this way or that, and the brain interprets that as sound, but it really is just the way vibration is translated into motion against the skin.

[boogieshoes.livejournal.com]

*blinks* i knew that, really.

seriously, i don't know why i didn't put that together before now, but that makes perfect sense.

-bs

[kaayadei.livejournal.com]

Wow-this story is getting better and better!

[lit-gal.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much!

[melimus.livejournal.com]

As a Tucsonan, I get a bit of extra squee with your choosen local. BTW in AZ not only can adults carry but we can carry conseeled. . .in bars. I shit you not. The last two are due to the Rep state majority and are less than 1 year old. Right now our state representives are trying to make it leagel for anyone to carry on any college or university campus and to set the state fire as the Colt revol;ver. So wild west. . .kindaof.

[lit-gal.livejournal.com]

I do tend to think of Arizona as being a bit of Wild West, so I think the guys would fit right in. I'm glad you're enjoying the idea of the boys in your hometown. I tried hard to use Google well to present the town realistically.

[ctrl-issue.livejournal.com]

Possible Edits: "He also came home war and embraced Buddhism." came home FROM THE war.

This is awesome, and I can't wait to see more of it. ^_^ I'd love to know what's going on in Chris's head. Or what's going on with the 7, but... I'm seeing that this is mainly from Jim's POV, so it's possibly just something that will leave us wondering. Still, awesome work. ^_^

[lit-gal.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the catch. I do think we'll see more of the Magnificent Seven, but you're right that this is a story about Jim and his family.

[1orelei.livejournal.com]

Yay! The brothers meet! Sorta...

And the tension has me in knots! ♥ Although I do admit to being confused how Chris knew about the relationship. Was it because Blair included Grace in the search, and so Chris looked at her too and her marriage to William was in there? But why wouldn't you tell that to Ezra before heading to Cascade?

[lit-gal.livejournal.com]

If he did a complete background check on Jim and was thorough, he would have seen pictures of parents... and the second he saw young Grace Ellison, he would have recognized Maude Standish. However, I just don't think Chris is the type to share...in particular, he's not going to share with Ezra who has a habit of being a little tightly wound.

[hawera.livejournal.com]

Rats. Not only have you got me hooked on this, but I am off to read 'Sunstroke'.

[lit-gal.livejournal.com]

This will probably make more sense after reading Sunstroke, honestly.

[dragonyphoenix.livejournal.com]

"He also came home war and embraced Buddhism." "He also came home war"? Is there a typo in there because I'm not understanding that sentence.

"Not that I'm defending him because clearly you need someone to affirm your right to unreasonable sibling rivalry." *laughs*

Excellent story. I'm so looking forward to seeing where it goes.

[lil-coyote.livejournal.com]

"You have a high opinion of your ass."

"You have no idea. My ass can stop wars. Entire wars, man. It's just that good. If I had been in Vietnam, I could have shimmied my way through a belly dance, and the two sides would have declared peace." LMFAO!

At least his first meeting with Ezra went better than when Johsia and Chris came to Cascade.

[yanagi-wa.livejournal.com]

More and more interesting. I don't know where Ezra is an ass or what. Still a great read. Thanks.