Hi all,

I need to thank my sister, Broncokitty, for beta'ing this for me. Even though I read it through until I could hardly stand to look at it, she still found silly mistakes. She also pointed out that the flashbacks are not in chronological order. Any remaining errors are mine. As you read, you might think it needed warnings that I didn't give, but I think it really only needs one, for violence. And angst. Lots of angst. Because Krissy LOVES angst.

I also wanted to thank everyone who reviewed "Dragons...". I so appreciate you all taking the time.

I apologize profusely for the irritating lack of proper paragraph breaks. I just couldn't get this to upload like I wanted it.

I don't own these characters or any part of the Starsky and Hutch franchise, and they should be eternally grateful for that. No profit is made from this, and no infringement is intended. For entertainment purposes only.

Sanctuary
By Elflingskitten

Tick. Tick. Tick.

Ken Hutchinson raised his head and looked blearily around the darkened apartment. The goofy clock on his partner's kitchen wall kept time with a hollow thudding in his head. Aside from own breathing, it was the only sound he could hear in the quietness.

What? He thought dully. Where was I…? Oh yeah, the game. He looked around, struggling to remember.

He sat cross-legged on Starsky's floor. A Monopoly board was also on the floor, displaying yet another rout of the Utility King. Ah Starsk, you're a glutton for punishment.

The space across the board where his worthy opponent should have sat, though, was empty save for a collection of beer bottles, the same brand that littered his own space. He couldn't remember why exactly they had felt the need to drink themselves stupid tonight. Whatever the reason, he knew it couldn't be as bad as that one time. Not much could be worse than that.

As though spurred by that thought, he suddenly realized Starsky was actually lying, of all places, in his lap. Hutch started slightly, surprised. When did he crawl over here?

Hutch smiled, absurdly comforted and happy. For this finite second, for this moment in time, his friend was safe and close.

"You're never gonna learn, Starsk. You're gonna wake up with a big, fat hangover, and for what? You need to learn to pace yourself, buddy. And don't be throwing a big, embarrassed snit 'cause you're in my lap, because I didn't put you there."

Hutch leaned his head back and closed his eyes, enjoying the peace that being there, at Starsky's, brought. He was as comfortable with these surroundings as his own place, and he knew Starsky felt the same way about his. Their homes were practically interchangeable. To his mind, this apartment offered the same that his own did. Shelter. Refuge. Maybe more so, because was it really the structure that mattered?

He opened his eyes and looked around again. The soft light of candles situated around the apartment washed everything in a warm amber glow, and he sighed.

Sanctuary.

He was reaching a hand out to jostle Starsky when he became aware of a sound he'd actually been hearing for awhile. A glance at the darkened windows showed clearly a storm raged outside. The sound of rain and thunder rattled at the wet panes, like something outside trying to batter its way in. A strange almost-dread gripped him and he shivered.

Unconsciously, he put his arms around the man in his lap and pulled him closer. Get a grip, Hutchinson, it's only rain, he chided himself. He snorted softly and looked down at his dark-haired partner.

"Good thing we didn't pull night duty tonight, huh Starsk?" Starsky rested peacefully; his head lying on Hutch's left forearm, his dark curls tickling the hairs on Hutch's arm. Feeling a sudden need for comfort and not above taking the liberties brotherhood allowed him while Starsky was senseless, Hutch reached down and fingered a curl. "Don't know why this storm's getting to me. I love the rain…" he whispered.

Lost in thought, he drifted to a place and time far away, and the clock ticked and the storm moaned.

Young Kenny Hutchinson didn't plan on running away, he just wanted to GET away. His father had told him that this trip to his grandfather's farm would be his last. Voices swirled in his muddled, grieving mind as he leaned against the wet trunk of an ancient oak, wishing somehow the tree could just suck him up and hide him.

"Kenneth, I've decided that you're old enough to start accompanying me to the office over the summer." His father's voice sharpened. "Don't look at me like that! Do you think people in proper society spend their time running barefoot around the woods like some ignorant hillbilly? Is that how you want people to see you?" He paused, picking some invisible sub-atomic particle off his immaculate suit-coat. "You can see the old man this year, then next summer we'll see if we can clean you up enough to bring you in to sit in on some of my meetings, and meet some of my clients. Surely even you realize that they'll be your clients someday?"

The coldness of the voice-memory invaded Kenny through and through like no winter wind ever could, and tears rolled down his face.

He turned his senses out, and immersed himself in the green, humming life of the forest that surrounded him. As it always did, God's natural world reached out to encompass and cocoon this lonely young boy. The soft sighing of the wind through the trees gave way to the pounding of heavy rain. Kenny stepped away from the oak, spread his arms and lifted his face to the gray sky, and the rain.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

Hutch started back to awareness and swiped a hand over his face. Where did that come from? Maybe Starsky wasn't the only one that didn't know when to say when. Safely back in his own world, he rolled his aching head and looked down at his best friend.

"Hey buddy, you gonna sleep all night? I'm a cop, not a couch." He realized he was still fiddling in Starsky's hair, and had slipped his hand down to smooth the jacket down over the brunet's chest when he frowned. Starsky's jacket was wet. Really wet. Puzzled, Hutch fingered the leather and looked over at Starsky's side of the game board. Sure enough, there were a couple of bottles turned on their side and puddles of fluid were all over the floor there. Beer. Hutch shook his head and stroked his hand over the wet chest.

"It's a good thing I love ya buddy, because you're getting your adult beverages all over me. Probably drooling, too."

Hutch looked up at the windows as a strong gust rattled and clawed at them.

Storm's getting worse…

Good thing I love ya…

It was actually a very good thing. Was love the right word? Was there a stronger word for it? Because if there was, that would be it. Hutch had given up trying to explain it. To girlfriends, to his parents, to the world. Many people misinterpreted it, and there wasn't a scale that could measure how little he cared. The only person he didn't have to explain it to was Starsky. He knew.

How did you explain how you felt after having nobody for so long, then being gifted with everything you needed so badly, in one person?

So alone…

His mind drifted again, the already ethereal glow of the apartment fading.

"Rascal!" Kenny swallowed growing apprehension and shouted louder.

"Rascal!!"

The setting sun was casting long shadows on the ground and Kenny was getting desperate. He hadn't seen that mangy mutt in at least twenty-four hours and it wasn't like that dog. He hadn't had him for long but Rascal had stayed close that entire time. It seemed out of character for him to suddenly vanish.

Kenny had been excited that he might finally have a dog. His parents would never have let him have one, of course, but they were both in Europe right now, called away by one of his father's 'emergency' meetings.

Normally at times like this, Kenny and his younger sister would have been watched over by a member of the faceless, nameless nanny-rabble. This time, though, the universe aligned in the boy's favor. Happily, wonderfully, it was close to the time that they would be staying at their grandfather's farm anyhow, and the kindly, older man readily agreed to pick them up early.

When Kenny's grandfather saw him with his new friend he smiled, canting his head to the side like he did when he was thinking. He studied Kenny for only a moment before he ruffled the sun-blond hair and, before his grandson could even ask, said he would be happy for some company back at the farm and would take care of Rascal until Kenny returned.

Now, Kenny couldn't find him. Was he so inept he couldn't even care for a dog? Or maybe so undesirable even a dog wouldn't keep his company?

Tears burned his eyes, until something indefinable and desperate within him rose up to squash the insecurity. He lifted his head and looked around again. That dog had been happy with him. He was sure of it. It had to be something else.

"What're ya lookin' for, boy?"

Kenny jerked around, startled. A man stood not far away, and as soon as Kenny saw him, a feeling of unease he'd never before experienced alerted him. At first glance, the man seemed non-descript, but as soon as Kenny glanced fleetingly at his eyes, something else became apparent. They were…dangerous.

"I'm… I'm looking for my dog."

The man took a step closer. "Oh yeah? What else you lookin' for?"

"Nothing...nothing else. Just my dog."

The man took one step closer, and now Kenny could see clearly into his eyes. He stood his ground, though he was more scared than he'd ever been. He wasn't sure why. Kenneth Hutchinson was familiar with many things, like coldness, apathy, and disapproval. But outside of his home life, he was actually fairly sheltered. Until now. This was new. This man looked at him like he'd never been looked at, and his eyes were dark, black almost, like the entrance to a cave you couldn't see inside, but knew something terrible lurked therein.

"You're Richard Hutchinson's boy, alright. You look just like him, all golden and pretty. Well maybe, pretty boy, somebody got tired of living next to Perfection, and having Perfection's dog yapping all the time, running around everywhere."

Kenny tensed. He recognized there was something terrible before him. Cruelty. He knew it for what it was, experience or no, and his fists clenched at his sides. There would be a time when righteous rage would be backed by lean sinew and raw power, but that time wasn't now. His hands curled again in impotent fury. Someday, he swore, he would hunt down those who hurt the helpless and the innocent.

For now, he backed away, turned, and ran.

Go…

"What?" he mumbled.

Let go…

The scene shifted, obscured and misty like in a dream, though Hutch knew he was awake. He could hear the clock ticking, and a maelstrom outside. Reflexively, he pulled Starsky up higher on his chest. What had he been remembering? Oh yeah…

Ken Hutchinson checked his watch for what seemed the thousandth time. Yep. Late again. He was so gonna kill him! He entertained himself with different scenarios of him enlightening his partner with instruction on how normal timely human beings conducted their lives, and as the cold rain seeped through his clothing, soon each various fantasy lesson was ending in swift and blinding violence.

He looked at his watch again. 8:15. He trudged back to his apartment.

Clenching his phone as though he could communicate dire threat through the handset, he waited. And waited. After the fifteenth ring, he hung up and tried again, though he thought he couldn't possibly have misdialed a number he knew so much better than his own. Anger started to fade, and mild apprehension took its place. He called the precinct and after jumping through the required hoops, he requested a patch-thru to Zebra-3. He got a similar result.

In a normal situation, there would be a normal explanation. Cops were like anybody else, in that any number of mundane things could make them late. Those same normal cops could probably safely eat in Italian restaurants, too.

His tires spit gravel into the driveway when the LTD pulled out seconds later.

Hutch watched, impatient and anxious, his fingers flexing and unflexing on the steering wheel. Traffic was fairly heavy, but it was a school bus that had him stopped now. He had run his lights and siren at other busy intersections, but this one was jammed tight for the moment, and he was unwilling to force cars to shift and move with children present, so he waited.

Go…

The blond head jerked and looked around. "What? Who is--"?

Just then movement in the car beside his caught his eye and he turned, eyes narrowed. An older black woman was looking at him intently from the passenger side, mouthing words he couldn't hear. The rain-slicked window lent a shifting vagueness to her appearance. "What? Wait, I can't…hold on." He rolled down his window. "I couldn't hear you! What did you say?"

She stared at him, her expression intense. "Let him go."

"I'm sorry, I-I don't understand. Do you need help?" He looked forward, frustrated. The school bus had pulled away, and cars moved around him. Hutch looked back at the woman, a combination of dread and confusion making him lean out his window as the car started to pull away.

"Wait! What did you mean?" He pulled the LTD forward, momentarily abreast of the other car. The woman smiled gently, though her wise face was lined with sadness.

"Hutch. Let him go."

Hutch stared, openmouthed, as the car moved back into traffic and disappeared. A horn honking behind him reminded him he was stopped dead in the middle of the street.

If he was unsettled before, now he was scared.

The remainder of the trip to Starsky's was a wet, sliding miracle. He didn't know whether to be glad, worried, or furious when he parked quickly behind a small blue car that was parked behind the Torino. He knew the car, it belonged to a girl Starsky had been seeing some months before. Why it was here now, though, he couldn't guess. Hutch knew that though they had broken it off in a mutual, amicable parting and still occasionally spoke, they were no longer dating.

He took the steps two at a time, mentally sorting and discarding possibilities. If Starsky was just "catching up" with an old flame, Hutch was going to give him seven shades of Hades. He didn't think that was the case, though. While Starsky was fun loving and definitely not a morning person, he certainly wasn't irresponsible by nature. When Hutch reached the front door it was already ajar, and he slipped inside.

It took him a minute to sort out what he was seeing. Starsky stood in his living room, dripping wet. Water ran from his sodden curls, down his face, and dripped off his nose. He was standing in an odd, hunched manner, and Hutch stepped toward him, beyond concerned.

"Starsk? What happened? You OK?"

A soft laugh alerted him to the pretty dark-haired girl standing in front of his partner. Hutch groped momentarily for her name. Sadie. She was holding a towel in her hand and gestured at Starsky with it.

"David's fine. Better than fine. He's a hero."

Hutch looked back at the brunet. He didn't look fine or heroic. He looked… embarrassed?

Confused and still worried, Hutch reached a hand out toward his partner and stopped when he heard a strange noise. The blond canted his head to the side and smiled as he began to understand. Starsky turned to fully face him, and Hutch could see a tiny ball of soaking wet fur with eyes like dinner plates looking out from inside his partner's leather jacket. Starsky sighed. "I was sitting at the light at Bay and Ridgeway and when I rolled down my window to dump my coffee, I heard mewing from the storm drain. Took me forever to get her out." He paused and ran his kitten-free hand through his wet hair. "Hutch, I swear, if you say one word to the guys at the station…"

"What? That my partner cares enough to stand out in the rain to rescue a kitten?" The blond smiled, relief and pride mingling to almost make him giddy.

Starsky turned to smile at Sadie. "Sadie's the real hero, uh, heroine. She thinks her friend might have room at their no-kill shelter in Glendale for this fuzzball."

The kitten mewed again, and Hutch couldn't resist reaching into the jacket to rub the damp head. Safe and protected, the tiny cat issued a staticky purr. Without warning, a lump rose in Hutch's throat. This was so like Starsky, who despised getting wet as much as any cat ever did. How many other people would have passed this pitiful creature without even glancing at it?

To the outside world, Ken Hutchinson and David Starsky were polar opposites, from their physical appearance to their unique personalities. But to the many layers of Hutch's spirit--the isolated boy who couldn't even have a dog, the gentle poet who knew inherently that there was love and kindness somewhere, to the noble man who would spend his life protecting the vulnerable, whether it was an abused child, a teenaged prostitute, or even an abandoned kitten—that entity cried out in relief and joy in finding a kindred spirit, a brother-in-arms, a soul-mate.

One he would do anything to protect.

Starsky had been looking at his little orphan, a soft, content smile on his face, when Hutch reached up and squeezed his shoulder. "Well, Tarzan, unless you want to put a litter box in the back seat of the Torino…"

"Yeah, yeah," Starsky lifted his head and reached reluctantly into his jacket. "Thanks again, Sadie, for coming over so quick."

Sadie reached out and took the kitten, wrapping it in the towel.

"Thank you, Dave. Seriously, I can't tell you…how good it is that you did this. I'm sorry you got so wet."

Hutch reached out and tugged on his partner's dripping curls, a sappy grin on his face. "Why don't you hit the shower, Gordo? It won't take you long, and believe me, Mother Teresa herself wouldn't ride with you when you have a cold."

Starsky shot him a quick, grateful look, already moving toward his bathroom and shedding his cold, damp clothes. "Ya sure? I'll only be a minute."

Sadie sighed, and Hutch turned to look at her. She was watching Starsky as he pulled off his jacket. The brunet's wet shirt clung to his muscular frame and her eyes followed him until he disappeared into his bathroom and shut the door.

She turned to Hutch and smiled. "Regrets? I've had a few…"

Hutch was looking at his feet and fidgeting, unsure of what to say, when suddenly a hand gripped his shoulder and he looked up, startled. Sadie stood there, looking into his eyes. She gripped harder, bunching the material of his jacket in her fist, and shook him, hard. "Hutch!" She leaned in and lowered her voice. "Hutch, let him go!"

He jerked out of her grip and stumbled back. "No! Let me go! He's alright, he's just…he's…" His back hit a wall, and he slid down it. He threw out one hand, as though to ward off an attack, and squeezed his eyes shut.

Sound enveloped him. It started out as a soft roar, like that hollow noise his ears made when he was in a place devoid of any other sound, and quickly built until it became a physical force, hammering at him.

Captain Harold Dobey stood from his cramped position and stepped back, his shoes crunching on broken glass. Desperate for support, for anything, he turned and looked into Huggy Bear Brown's eyes and latched on. To the bleak anguish he saw there. He knew he himself had that same look.

Huggy gestured helplessly. "They just left… I mean they just left! They stopped at my place for lunch, and I walked them to the car, and we heard shots down the street, and they were gone, and…and I called it in, and he wouldn't let go, and I couldn't tell if…I just…I couldn't…" His voice ground down to nothing.

Dobey closed his eyes. Though it seemed like he had been in this place for days already, it was probably only minutes, and for one timeless moment he basked in the ignorant bliss he'd been enjoying just before this call had come in. He had just picked up a stack of reports and settled in when his phone rang. It was Huggy Bear, of all people. Reflexive irritation sprang up immediately. There was just something about Huggy that rubbed him the wrong way, and Dobey was drawing breath to snarl when the tone of Huggy's voice stopped him instantly.

"Cap'n? It's Huggy. You'd better…you'd better get down here, quick. It's…it's…bad. I don't know…"

Terror reached out to swallow him whole. "Huggy, where? Where are they?"

Now he looked at the devastation around him. Once a liquor store, now a war zone. Glass and shell casings littered the floor. The bullet-riddled bodies of the perps sprawled nearby, surely killed by one or both of the two detectives balled up in the corner made by the front wall and the counter.

Small puddles of blood were here and there and everywhere, and the puddles got larger near the two.

His boys.

He knelt down again in front of them and just looked, his chest clenched so tightly he could barely draw air. His best team. Honorary uncles to his children. His friends.

Hutch sat cross-legged on the floor. Blood ran freely down his face from a deep crease along his temple and pattered onto the pale, still face of his partner, who lay curled in his lap. More still covered Starsky's jacket, and Dobey couldn't tell whose blood was whose. He wasn't sure how much it mattered. Over the years he had started to believe it was all the same blood.

Hutch had one arm under Starsky, cradling his head and shoulders, but the other hand held the Magnum, and that's what kept the paramedics at bay.

Dobey struggled to calm himself. Only his courage and twenty-four inches separated him from this tragedy. He reached across the void again, and laid a gentle hand on Hutch's shoulder.

"Hutch, please let him go. We'll take care of him. You know we will." Dobey reached a careful hand out toward where Starsky's arm hung down, the slack fingers dragging on the floor.

Hutch responded the way he had been with the captain, and before him, Huggy. He gripped Starsky tighter, pulling him out of Dobey's reach, and hunched his shoulders over him. "No! He's alright…just had a little too much…he's okay." The blond looked down at his partner and smiled. "Gonna have the mother of all hangovers." He curled his gun hand in and stroked the backs of his bloody fingers down the side of Starsky's face, then gestured at the floor in front of them. "Have to finish this game. I keep telling him, he should stick to chess…"

He looked up at his captain for the first time and grinned, and the look on his face just about stopped Dobey's heart.

Absolute silence reigned for an eternal second throughout the entire scene, then Dobey's hand shot out to grip Hutch's shoulder. "Hutch!" Grief and rage and fear crackled in the air around him. "Hutch, let him go!" Hutch squeezed his eyes shut with a whimper and Dobey, mindless of the Magnum, shook him. This had to end.

"He's not friggin' drunk, and you're not playin' a game! Hutch, he's…I'm…" He stopped and pulled in a breath. "Hutch…" He shook him again. "Hutch, look at me. LOOK AT ME!"

The blond opened his eyes as commanded, clearly struggling to bring them and his mind to really focus. Tragically, Dobey could see the exact moment he did.

Hutch looked steadily, first at Dobey, then up at Huggy for a moment, then lifted his head and looked around the store, and at the group of people that surrounded him.

Paramedics, patrolmen, and fellow detectives stood or crouched in a semi-circle around him, their faces wearing almost identical expressions of pity and sadness. The silence was broken only when somebody coughed, and a piece of the storefront chose that moment to plink to the ground.

Dobey watched, resigned, as Hutch's breathing accelerated until by the time he looked down at his lap, he was panting with terror.

The captain could almost hear a sound, like a twig breaking. He reached out anyway.

"Hutch…"

Hutch shuddered hard and seemed to fold in on himself. He lifted Starsky slightly and wilted over until he could hide his face in the soft curls. "No… please… nnnoooo…" His voice dissolved into a chest-deep moan, the sound like one heard from a premature grave, and Dobey had to strain to hear the drawn-out, broken whisper that followed.

"Not again…"

"Hutch…"

A soft hiss, muffled by dark hair and darker fear. "No."

After a dense, interminable moment, Hutch straightened slowly, looking at his partner. Dobey waited, holding his breath, and watched as Hutch's breathing slowly evened out. The blond was quiet for a minute, then he exhaled a long, soft breath and smiled. "He's okay…"

Dobey closed his eyes again for a second and gathered himself, preparing to crawl on his hands and knees into another's broken mind. He'd do anything at this point, say anything.

"Hutch, I'll take care of him myself, I promise." One dark, gentle hand reached out; a captain asking for his wounded soldier's weapon. The hand closed over the Magnum. "Give me this… and I'll… I'll get him a cup of coffee, maybe take him to the bathroom, you know, throw some water on his face…" He quickly swung the handgun behind himself; it disappeared instantly, then he reached decisively for Starsky and started smoothly pulling him from his partner's lap.

Hutch reached out reflexively, but Dobey spared one hand to squeeze his briefly and ground out a smile. "It's okay. We'll be right back."

Just as quickly as the gun disappeared, Starsky was pulled from his captain's grasp. Dobey kept his focus on Hutch, and stroked a hand over the hunched back. "It's alright." He murmured. "Everything will be okay." And other lies we tell our children, he thought bitterly.

Huggy crouched down beside him and took over, leaning toward the blond in a loose, careful embrace and rubbing a gentle hand over his back.

Dobey struggled tiredly to his feet, feeling like he was climbing out of a deep well, and watched as Huggy tried to reach his damaged friend. A second ambulance crew made preparations nearby, unpacking a gurney.

"Hutch? Hutch, it's the Bear." Huggy leaned in, trying to see his friend's face. "Come on, man, talk to me. Hutch…" Huggy reached a hand out toward the silent, bowed head and then hesitated, dropping the hand to his own lap. He looked up at Dobey, his chocolate-brown eyes bright with grief. "How's he gonna survive this?"

I don't see any survivors here, Dobey thought grimly. He lowered his head and ground his thumb and forefinger into his gritty eyes.

"First things first, Huggy. That's a bad--" Dobey paused mid-sentence when he realized the atmosphere in the store had shifted significantly. Where there was heavy silence before, now there were murmurs and excited whispers. The captain turned to look at the crowd behind him, and realized they were now all staring at the first team of paramedics.

The ones working on Starsky. Working. On Starsky. Their movements were frantic but controlled; professionally focused panic.

One looked up at Dobey and smiled a tight, grim smile. "He's alive. Barely breathing, but he is breathing." His voice held what sounded like hope and awe, reminding Dobey that this crew had watched this sad drama unfold with everyone else; an entire store full of civil servants—champions of the city, all of them. A tiny flame of desperate hope flared to life in Dobey's heart.

The medic turned back to his team. "Let's go! Come on, move, move, move!" He lifted his head enough to address everyone in earshot. "We don't have time to stabilize him here, we'll try en route." He glanced quickly at Hutch as he followed the others as they navigated Starsky's gurney out the door. "They're both going to Memorial."

Stunned, Dobey looked over to where the second team of medics was strapping Hutch in. The captain crunched his way over to lay a hand on the blond's shoulder. Hutch's eyes were closed, and Dobey couldn't tell if he was even conscious. Blood streaked his face and saturated his hair. His captain reached a gentle hand out to stroke the sun-gold hair on his uninjured side and looked up at one of the paramedics. "Take care of him."

The young man nodded, recognizing it for the command it was. "We will."

Dobey stepped back out of their way and watched until the procession disappeared out the door. He felt a presence, a solid wall of security by his side, and knew without looking it was Huggy Bear. He was beginning to understand his detectives' staunch belief and friendship for this man. Dobey turned and met Huggy's gaze.

"I know what you're going to ask and… I don't know." He looked at the front door, his mind clearly removed from the devastated liquor store. He tore his gaze away and looked again at Huggy. "I have to believe, if Starsky makes it… if Starsky makes it, Hutch will, too."

Dobey looked back at the door, thinking. Strangely enough, the head wound Hutch had taken was the only thing that gave him any hope for the blond. Dobey had seen many creases—terrifying near misses--had even sustained one himself a thousand years ago when he was in uniform. Hutch's was the worst he'd ever seen; as close as physics and the human body would allow without tragic and catastrophic results. That kind of damage surely wrecked havoc on a man's mental state…

Huggy's soft voice yanked him from his thoughts.

Dobey turned to watch the slender man fidget and mutter to himself. Huggy was trying in vain to dust the last hour off his clothes and person. "He told me once…" He wiped his hands on his slacks and lifted his head to look into Dobey's eyes. "After the shooting… a few months after the shooting in the garage--"

At the phrase 'the shooting', Dobey knew what he meant-- it was now and forever referred to simply as 'the shooting'.

Huggy continued. "…when Hutch disappeared for a little while and nobody could find him? He was at my place, at The Pits. He drank himself into a big, blond puddle." Huggy's mouth quirked for a second in what could have been a sad smile. "He told me he couldn't do it again. He said he'd never survive something like that again." Huggy looked at the door and sighed. He wiped his hands again on his pants. "Now I know what he meant."

Though Dobey's brain was already striding out the door on its way to the hospital, his body spared a moment to lay a hand on Huggy's shoulder. "Give it a chance, Huggy. That was a bad head wound, and if Starsky makes it… when Starsky comes around, they'll be alright." For one precious second, he almost believed it himself.

Dobey turned and looked at his collected rabble, seeking his senior detective. He winced inwardly; his senior homicide detective was hopefully alive and being cared for at the hospital by now. He spotted his senior detective-on-scene.

"Bonhomme! Wrap this up. You know where I'll be." Dobey paused, taking in the tense faces. "I'll let you all know when I know anything." On his way out the door, he looked at Huggy. "That means you, too." Then he was gone.

Huggy watched what looked like the new BCPD substation disperse to their various tasks, except for Bonhomme. Huggy walked up to him. Bonhomme was a good friend of Starsky and Hutch and as a result, a good friend of Huggy's.

After the grim despair of what they'd witnessed, this tiny speck of hope was almost euphoric in its effect, and Huggy grabbed desperately onto that feeling with both hands. He regarded Bonhomme and made a show of straightening his legendary finery.

"If my esteemed brother, the Marshall, thinks I'm waiting, he's sadly mis-taken. I'll be standing in the waiting room holding two cups of java by the time he steams through the front door. Gentlemen…"

Huggy headed for the door. No matter what the future held, tomorrow or fifty years from now, there was one thing he could be sure of.

He would never step foot in this building again.

The silence was soothing and soft. Even that stupid clock was quiet.

Ken Hutchinson watched the candles flicker, as though disturbed by an errant breeze, then it passed and they burned brightly, cheerfully. He leaned his aching head back against Starsky's couch and sighed.

Sanctuary.

Maybe they could even finish this game, if Starsky ever came out of the bathroom.

Finis