Disclaimer: I own nothing of Psych and its related characters. This is just for my own enjoyment and the potential enjoyment of other Psych-Os like me, and no monetary gain was expected or received.

Rating: T+

Spoilers: Hard to say. Could be through entire series, but likely won't be many.

A/N: Now we're becoming a futurefic. Also, yeah…that resolution to put this puppy aside for a little while? Lasted about ten minutes. You have a right to be disappointed in me. I kind of am.


Chapter Three: Holy Hell

Nervous. Sweet Lady Justice, was he nervous.

He had to man up. He had to give it to her. How would he explain it? It wasn't her birthday. Christmas was still a couple of months off. And then there was the subject. How does Carlton "Real World" Lassiter explain a ring with a phoenix on it? He considered slinking away and tossing the jeweler's box into a dumpster somewhere, but only for a moment. He needed no more metaphysical bricks dropped onto his head.

With a gulp, he approached her desk, grateful that his hesitance and nervousness should play off as natural shyness. He placed the jeweler's box in the middle of her blotter and she looked up.

"What's this?" she asked.

He scratched at the back of his neck. "Just a little something I got you," he said, in a very quiet voice. "Thought you'd like it."

She looked down at the box again. "Oh…kay," she said, drawing the word out into several syllables. She picked up the box and opened it up. She gasped. "Oh, Carlton. It's beautiful."

"Glad you like it," he said, and was chagrined to hear a decided squeak in his voice. He cleared his throat.

"Is that a…a phoenix? What made you pick this?" she said.

"Well, you…kind of remind me of a bird," he said. "Bright and chirpy but also kind of…flying high and free. I thought a phoenix was a pretty good match to you. They're, you know, kind of fiery, like you."

Okay, something was clearly working on him from somewhere else. Lies never came to him so easily before, even though this one was, he had to admit, predicated on the complete and utter truth. Even if it was truth he would never have uttered willingly.

"Oh, that's so sweet," she said, beaming at him.

"I, uh, got one, too," he said, and showed her his ring. "I thought that way we could, you know, touch 'em together and activate our Wonder Twins powers."

"Why is yours a dragon?" she asked.

"I didn't know what to get for myself," he said. "The jeweler talked me into a dragon. Said I looked like a fire breather, and, you know, I kinda liked that idea."

"Is this what was in that package you got yesterday?" she asked.

"Yeah. I wasn't ready to let you see 'em. Wanted to know they were exactly what I ordered, first."

She slipped her ring on her left index finger, like he had his. "It fits perfectly. How did you know what ring size I wear?" she asked. "I don't even know."

"Wild ass guess," he said. "I told him to make it for a 'really tiny woman.' "

She slapped him on the arm, but she was grinning. "Jerk. I'm not that small, Stilts."

She held up her left fist. "Wonder Twins powers…?" she ventured, smiling.

He bumped rings with her. "Go," he said, and smiled back at her.

He turned to head back to his desk across the bullpen aisle, but Juliet called him back. "Carlton?"

"Yeah?" he said, half-turning. She had the strangest look on her face. Speculative, a little uncomfortable, a little…longing? No, surely not.

She shook her head. "Never mind," she said, rather quickly, and waved him off.

He sat down at his desk, slightly perplexed by the exchange. He turned on his computer. Immediately, words began scrolling across the screen in large font that looked suspiciously like the handwriting of his mysterious mentor.

The rings put you in touch with your inner spirit, which in turn puts you in touch with your innermost feelings and desires, it read. You required this because therapists have been trying to get you to admit to your innermost feelings for the last couple of decades and it's high time you finally did. As to Ms. O'Hara, she has been repressing something for a good long while now, and it has caused her a great deal of discomfort. It's time she felt the relief of admission. What she does with that admission, I'm afraid, is entirely up to her.

Dear Sweet Lady Justice, not at work, Lassiter thought frantically, and the computer screen cleared itself to show a new message in the same large, flowing font.

Don't worry: Even if one of your coworkers were to look directly at your computer screen, they would see nothing but a Facebook page for one Martin Chase, your current prime suspect in the burglary on West Montecito.

Lassiter heaved a sigh of relief and the screen cleared to show that page. He got down to work.

An hour later he and O'Hara got a call, and they climbed into the Crown Vic and headed out. For some reason, Juliet felt compelled to place her hand on his shoulder as they traveled. The contact made him particularly nervous, in part because it gave him thoughts about where else he might like her to place her hand. He tried desperately to push these thoughts away. Usually it wasn't all that difficult. Now it seemed damn near impossible.

All in all, he was glad when the work day ended and he went home to feed Pepper again. The day was nice but slightly chilly, so he changed into his black hooded sweatshirt (4x - he liked his baggy clothes to be really baggy) and headed out onto the deck with a glass of bourbon in hand. The neighbor's dog popped up at the railing and started barking at him.

"Hi, Shannon," he greeted, and the dog settled down instantly and disappeared to the other side of the balcony. He settled into an Adirondack chair and sipped his drink. He rested his head against the seatback and closed his eyes.

The next days were strange and rather heady. Juliet continued to act different, most of the time subtly, at other times drastically. She never crossed any lines that let him know what exactly was going on with her, but there were suspicions. Suspicions that…didn't make much sense, really. When the weekend rolled around again, they went up to a secluded lake Lassiter had found via the internet and took turns firing the fifty-caliber Desert Eagle handgun, the power of which both of them found thoroughly exciting. When they returned to Lassiter's condo that evening, where he had promised to make her a meal of corned beef and cabbage, there was a brown paper package waiting for him outside the door.

"Boy, you get a lot of those," Juliet said, wonderingly.

You have no idea, Lassiter thought. He took the package inside, swiftly scooped Pepper into his coat pocket, and took package, gun, and dragonlet into the guest room to unpack while Juliet made herself at home on the loveseat in front of the blackened TV. Lassiter put the Desert Eagle back into his gun vault, released Pepper from his pocket, and sat down at his desk to open the package. A silver necklace fell out, with two intricately-detailed silver phoenixes in flight bracketing a cut crystal of bright pink rhodochrosite. The note that fluttered out with it read: This is for her. Make her wear it ALWAYS. She means too much to you for her to go unprotected.

"Protected from what?" he mumbled, and the words on the parchment changed.

Pray you never find out.

Passing a hand through his salt-and-pepper hair, he got up with the necklace in his other hand and passed out the crack he'd opened of the door and into the living room. He hesitated, looking at the side of her head, at her profile, fresh and pretty as always, until he began to feel a sense of gathering over his head and he knew something was preparing to fall on top of him. "All right, all right," he said out loud, and started forward.

"What's all right, Carlton?" Juliet said, looking his direction.

"Oh, just berating myself, as usual," he said glibly. "I'm always egging myself on or beating myself up until I make myself do something I don't want to do or I'm too shy to do. This is a case of the latter."

She smiled, beaming, at him. "What are you too shy to do?" she asked.

"I've got something to give you again. I wanted to give this to you with the ring, but it wasn't ready yet and after a long, drawn-out argument with myself I decided not to wait for it." He held the necklace up before her eyes.

"Oh, Carlton. It's beautiful," she said, reaching out for it. He let her take it.

"I hoped you'd like it. I kind of agonized over it a bit. I settled on rhodochrosite because in the end I felt you were a pink person more than you were a blue person and it tied it in with the phoenixes more, even though the primary color of the ring is lapis, but the jeweler had this denim lapis that would've been absolutely gorgeous: a little more faded than the ring, a little older-looking, kind of worn, maybe."

"That does sound pretty, but you were right: I love pink, and I think it really matches the phoenixes," she said. "Could you help me get it on?"

He went over and fastened the clasp behind her neck. She fluffed her ponytail out. "Thanks. Did you get one, too?"

His necklace was currently invisible. He was tempted to say he didn't have one. But the words came out of his mouth before he could stop them.

"I do, but I didn't want you to see it before yours came in. It's in my bedroom."

"Go get it. I wanna see it," she said, eagerly.

"All right," he said, and disappeared into his bedroom, where he broke the spell of invisibility. He checked himself out in the mirror. The silver dragons and the cut jade crystal lay against his dark chest hair and looked severely out of character. Still, now that she knew about it he had to show her, didn't he? And let's be honest, it would kind of be a relief, wouldn't it?

He returned to the living room, feeling desperately shy. He fingered the necklace nervously as he approached her.

"Here it is," he said, quietly.

"Oh…Carlton. I love it. The dragons, the jade… Jade is such a beautiful stone. And it matches your ring: the jade is just a little lighter, a little more faded, a little more worn, maybe, than the malachite."

"Yeah. That was another reason it was kind of hard to pass up the denim lapis for yours."

She stood up and gave him a light little kiss on the cheek, which caused him to blush furiously. "Well I love it, both of them, and I thank you for giving this to me. I don't know what I did to deserve it, but I really appreciate it. I'll never take it off."

As usual, Lassiter worked the holidays, and was voluntarily excluded from the Christmas Secret Santa draw at the station. That didn't stop Spencer from giving him a gag gift, as usual - thankfully not a snow globe this year, but what the hell was the point of giving him one of those ball-in-a-plastic-gadget things for cats to chase around and around? Oh well, maybe Pepper would get a kick out of it - and of course O'Hara gave him something. A small plaster statue, standing no more than a foot tall, of a dragon. Dark blue in color, faintly iridescent, standing with its front feet on its coiled tail, with a light blue jewel on its forehead and pale blue eyes.

Shyly, Juliet pushed a hair out of her eyes. "You said you're a fire breather, and I agree with that, so it seemed kind of appropriate," she said.

"It's…beautiful," he said, honestly, "but it's awfully high quality for a plaster mold - you couldn't have gotten it anywhere but at one of those high-end collectables stores like that David's Cigar Shop in the Mills Crossing Mall. And at this size…it had to be kind of expensive."

"Oh, and I suppose you got this ring and the matching necklace out of a bubble gum machine," she said, holding the phoenixes up in front of his eyes. "I'm sure this was much less expensive than those. Don't worry about it, Carlton: I'm very fiscally responsible. Particularly now that I'm no longer paying Shawn's way in life."

He smiled feebly at her. "You know how to draw a dragon, don't you?" he asked.

"Um…I've done it before, but I can't say I'm especially good at it," she said.

"Well, what you've gotta do is cautiously approach the dragon, offer it a Snickers bar or a little sister, and draw while it happily munches away. If you have enough Snickers bars or little sisters, you can eventually get it to actually pose for you."

She laughed and smacked him on the arm. "Have you told that one to Lauren?"

"Not yet," he said.

"Yeah, I bet."

He put the dragon statue on his desk next to his pen cup, in part so O'Hara could see it every day and know it meant something to him, but mostly so Pepper wouldn't get the wrong idea about it. He had a feeling the little dragon had a jealous streak. It also allowed him to let others at the station get the occasional glimpse of the necklace and ring - he now had a clear penchant for dragons, perhaps still wildly out of character, but at least evidenced. Honestly he had come to like them, at least the small and harmless variety. Pepper was annoying at times but a character, to say the least.

His shift that day ended just as the annual station Christmas party got underway, and Spencer was at O'Hara's desk at the time, wearing a Santa hat and plastic elf ears and oozing up to her as he always did when he had her trapped and trying to get her to take him back. He invariably went about it the wrong way - in other words, the exact way he "wooed" her in the first place, with sleezy, only half-joking come-ons she should have smacked him for. She was responding with gaiety and vivaciousness, clearly in the holiday spirit and, just perhaps, feeling the desire to start things over despite whatever had brought her to her senses about the con man months ago. Lassiter couldn't stand to see it, and he hadn't been planning to stick around for the festivities anyway, so he grabbed his coat and headed for the door. If Juliet was going to get back together with Dippy the Christmas Elf, he'd rather not see it happen.

Guster came up past Booking as he was heading out. Gus nodded to him and said "Merry Christmas." He set himself to push past the pharmaceutical salesman, but he stopped short. That wasn't fair. Gus wasn't a bad guy at all. Lassiter even kind of liked him, a little bit at least, despite who he preferred to hang out with daily for some doubtlessly masochistic reason. So he nodded back and wished Gus a merry Christmas too before making for his car at high speed.

At home, he fed Pepper, gave the little dragon the cat toy, which Pepper seemed to like a great deal, score one for Spencer all so very unintentionally, and went into the guest room to study for a few hours before going to bed without eating supper. He was too damn depressed, thinking about O'Hara linking back up with that gutless liar Spencer. He lay there in bed for a long time, wide awake and restless, before a voice whispered inside his head.

Go for a walk, it said. It was his own voice - sounded like it, anyway - but still he knew it wasn't himself thinking it. Still, it sounded like a better idea than laying here doing nothing but fretting, so he got up, dressed, and headed out the door. It was late at night and the streets were quite dark despite the streetlights at regular intervals and the lights from the buildings he would pass, so he allowed Pepper to join him, riding perched on his shoulder. Indeed, the dragon's hot little body provided a modicum of comfort in the chill night air, snuggled against his neck.

The voice in his head gave him direction, and he followed without question, only vaguely curious where he was being led. He wasn't terribly surprised when he realized he was headed for O'Hara's apartment, something he recognized long before he hove into sight of the duplex.

Okay, now what? he thought as he came to a stop outside one of her windows. He hadn't spent much time in her house overall, and none in her bedroom, but he rather thought this was her bedroom window nonetheless. It was dark, as was the rest of the apartment. Either she wasn't home yet or she was in bed.

Now, open your mouth. Your heart knows the words you've never heard, the voice said. You have a natural affinity for music, and it for you. Strange that you should have limited yourself merely to people like Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby - your soul cries out for a wider selection of songs to sing. Your heart knows the ones that express what you feel inside.

Lassiter didn't sing. He never had, and he never would. And then he felt the gathering over his head. Stubborn, he held out. And then the unseen and unreal dropped onto his head like a brick. "Ow! You're not at all subtle, are you?" he complained, rubbing his head. "I don't know what business it is of yours whether or not I sing to O'Hara."

Just do it, Sonny-boy, the voice said, and he bridled at that. He was getting close to forty-seven. Who had the audacity to call him Sonny-boy? Someone who's a whole hell of a lot older than that, obviously, detective, the voice said.

How much older? he thought

You really want to know? All right, there's no particular harm in it. I was born in 1287. You can do the math, despite the dyslexia that makes mathematics difficult for you.

1287? he thought, incredulously. So you're seven hundred and twenty-eight, right? Yeah, right.

Yeah. Right. As of November 18, in point of fact. Just as you will be forty-seven on February the 22nd. My circumstances are…unusual, although not exactly unique.

His mind went blank. He shook his head vigorously, upsetting Pepper, who flapped off of his shoulder and then resettled when his paroxysm ceased. If you need a little more information about me, the voice said, then at least I can tell you that I have spent the bulk of my excessively long life as a medical doctor of one form or another, of course ever limited by the knowledge or lack thereof of the time in which I was living. My earliest forays into the world of medicine were as a plague doctor, and my survival of that dark time was one of mere good fortune, I believe now that I know of genetics, and not due in any large measure to the mask filled with herbs that I wore to protect me back then. Most recently I have practiced as a neurosurgeon. As you might imagine, my unusually long study in the medical arts have made me quite an accomplished doctor, even as limited as I have been.

So I take it you're a sorcerer or a witch or something like it, Lassiter thought. Living in the period that you supposedly did, how did you avoid burning at the stake?

The voice in his head chuckled grimly. For one thing, I came to magic fairly late in the natural span of my life, when such things were no less persecuted but I had, at least, developed wisdom enough to hide my activities. Then, too, it is extremely difficult to catch an actual witch or sorcerer. Even should you discover them and what they are about, doing anything about it is well nigh impossible. Although it took me some centuries to assume mastery of the mystic arts, it didn't take all that long at all to become good enough to defend myself from mundanes.

So, what am I then, the sorcerer's apprentice?

Unofficially, the voice said. Though you probably won't like the idea, you are something of a hobby, one I rather needed. I have taken proper apprentices over the centuries, but always something went wrong. Either they turned out not to have enough natural aptitude to progress beyond a certain point or they experienced something in their lives that twisted them, made them less than noble of intent. Proper sorcerers often do find themselves in such situations, I fear. That, above all other reasons, is why I have not taken you on as a proper apprentice. You are a noble man, with a strong concept of justice and right and wrong that I think would hold you through the worst of situations, but I'm not yet confident enough in that natural aptitude of yours to take the gamble. It may become necessary down the line: indeed, I believe you may be approaching that point. You are turning out to be far stronger than I had originally expected, and your determination might well make up whatever difference there is to be made up. Now, enough talk. Sing.

It had the definite feel of a command issued by a superior officer, and Lassiter could not deny it. He opened his mouth and words began pouring out of it in sentences he'd never heard, to music playing in his head he did not recognize.

Maybe we'll never be seen together

At night on a crowded street.

I may never reach across your body

To kill the light for you to sleep.

Maybe I'll never watch you dressing

Or won't sound too familiar on the phone,

But I can touch your hand accidentally

And take that moment home.

That's as close as I'll get to loving you,

Even though there's nothing else I'd rather do.

I can dream, I can hope, I can scheme, but still I know

That's as close as I'll get to loving you.

I won't be there if you need holding,

But I'm sure that he can pull you through.

But I can sing this song to everybody

And pretend it's not about you.

That's as close as I'll get to loving you,

Even though there's nothing else I'd rather do.

I can dream, I can hope, I can scheme, but still I know

That's as close as I'll get to loving you.

That's as close as I'll get to loving you,

Even though there's nothing else I'd rather do.

I can dream, I can hope, I can scheme, but still I know

That's as close as I'll get to…

Yeah, that's as close as I'll get to…

That's as close as I'll get to loving you.

At some point during the middle of this song the light went on in the room behind the window. At the end, Juliet pushed open the casement and peered outside. Lassiter faded back into the shadows by the neighboring building and just looked at her, in her homemade pajamas, her hair slightly disheveled. So beautiful. She looked around, clearly perplexed, and then withdrew back into the house. But she left the window open.

Well, that one was a little bit depressing, don't you think, Mister Negativity? the voice said, and he realized it was no longer attempting to sound even remotely like his own. Why don't you try again? And be a bit more upbeat this time.

Again, Lassiter didn't know what he was going to sing until he sang it, and even as he sang it he had no idea what song it was, but whosever song it was he thought it sort of pretty, a song he would've liked if he'd ever chanced to hear it. Juliet popped her head back out the window, but he was still in dark shadow. She leaned on the windowpane with her chin resting on her crossed arms and a dreamy expression on her face as she listened.

Did you ever love somebody

So much that the earth moved?

Did you ever love somebody

Even though it hurt to?

Did you ever love somebody?

Nothing else your heart could do?

Did you ever love somebody

Who never knew?

Did you ever lay your head down

On the shoulder of a good friend,

And you had to look away somehow,

Had to hide the way you felt for them?

Have you ever prayed the day would come

You'll hear them say they feel it too?

Have you ever loved somebody

Who never knew?

And if

You did,

Well, you know I'd understand.

I could,

I would,

More than anybody can.

Did you ever love somebody

So much that the earth moved?

Did you ever love somebody

Even though it hurt to?

Did you ever love somebody?

Nothing else your heart could do?

Did you ever love somebody

Like I love you?

Like I love you?

He fell silent. She seemed to wait for another song, but when none were forthcoming she said, quietly, "I don't know who you are or why you're doing this, but thank you for the serenade. I'm glad you don't seem to have bothered my neighbors."

She closed the window and the light went out. Feeling a smile coming on, all unbidden, Lassiter turned and walked back to Prospect Gardens.

The next morning was Christmas Eve, and Lassiter had to work. Juliet was supposed to be off for the next two days, so he certainly didn't expect to see her come walking in just a few minutes after he hung up his coat and sat down to work. She gestured to him, beckoning him to come join her off in a secluded corner of the bullpen over by the coat rack. Confused, he joined her there.

"I had a visitor last night," she said, and he immediately grew wary.

"Oh yeah?" he said.

"Yeah. I didn't know who it was, so I did some poking around this morning, looking for clues. I found a couple of footprints in the mud next to my neighbor's house, in their flower garden. Looked to be about a size twelve-narrow. You know, I don't know too many people who wear that particular size, and I'm almost positive my visitor was someone I know well."

He didn't know what to say, so he just stood there, stupidly.

Juliet looked up. The station was still decorated for the Christmas party, and a sprig of mistletoe hung above their heads. "Oh look - mistletoe," she said, and looked back at him, a coy smile curving her lips. He was still too stunned to react as she stretched up and planted quite a passionate kiss directly on his lips.

Hey, Dippy Dan, are you gonna kiss her back or what? He didn't know if it was his own thought or not. Still, it gave him volition, and he put his hands on her waist and leaned in to deepen the kiss. It went on for a long time, until a throat cleared behind them, and they broke apart guiltily to see Karen Vick standing there, giving them the Look. She wasn't supposed to be at work either, but that was Murphy's Law for you.

"Chief - we…" Lassiter began, voice squeaking. The Chief raised a finger to cut him off.

"Believe me, I don't want to hear it," she said, severely. "I'm going to look the other way on this, but the Christmas party is over, get me? I'd better not see any more Kissy-Licky-Touchy-Sucky in the bullpen when one or both of you is on duty, understood?"

Lassiter and Juliet shared a look, confused on his part, elated on hers. "Understood, Chief," Juliet said, grinning.

"Good," Vick said. "Good luck to both of you." And she walked away toward her office.

Juliet squeezed Lassiter's hand. "Come to my house for dinner tonight?" she said. "I'm not as good a cook as you are, but I can broil up a damn good steak and bake a mean potato."

"O-okay," he said, blushing furiously.

"Good. I'll see you then," she said, and squeezed his hand again. Then she blew him a kiss and walked away. "By the way, you're a damn good singer," she called back over her shoulder.

The rest of the workday passed in something of a daze. He answered calls efficiently but he was running on autopilot. After watch he ran home long enough to clean himself up, shave again, change his clothes and then feed Pepper before he grabbed his keys and headed out. He went into the parking garage and opened the door of his Fusion, but before he put more than a foot on the floorboard inside he pulled it back out and closed the door and locked it. It was a little chilly, but he kind of liked the cold - Santa Barbara's version of cold weather, anyway - and it was a nice walk from Prospect Gardens to Juliet's duplex.

Dinner at Juliet's was nice. The steak was good, medium rare, and the baked potato was just what an Irish boy liked, and there were green beans and split top potato rolls that were absolutely delicious. Juliet served some type of red wine with the meal. He wasn't a big fan of wine - kind of tasted like sugared and peppered horse spit, to him - but he drank. Afterwards she led him to her couch in the living room and sat down beside him, and in short order had divested him of his jacket, tie, and shoulder holster. Then she proceeded to work on getting his shirt off.

Whatever he had expected of this evening, it was not this. She had hands all over his chest and stomach and shoulders while her mouth plundered his. Stunned again, he remained utterly still, like a complete doofus, until Juliet pulled back and looked at him.

"Well? You gonna get busy or what?" she asked. He looked a question at her and she laughed. She took his hands in hers and put them to the buttons of her blouse. "Come on, sweetie, get started. We've wasted a lot of time already, we've got a lot of wasted time to make up for."

Three hours later, somewhat exhausted and happier perhaps than he had ever been in his entire life, Lassiter kissed her, stroked her hair back from her face, and said goodbye.

"Tomorrow night?" she said, hopefully.

"You can count on it," he said.

"You know, you could stay 'til morning and I could drive you home," she said.

"I gotta work tomorrow," he said. "I'll have to leave the house early. You don't need to get up that early on Christmas Day."

"Okay," she said with a sigh. "But tomorrow night you're driving here, and you're bringing a go-bag so you can change clothes without going home."

"Got it," he said, smiling down at her. He touched his forehead to hers, briefly, and then kissed her again. "See you then, babe."

"Á bientot, lover-boy," she said, with a grin.

He headed off down the street, whistling cheerily. He wanted to sing. He wanted to skip. Hell, he wanted to dance. He settled for walking at a brisk pace. He took a shortcut down a side alley a few blocks from Prospect Gardens.

At the other end of the street, two men were arguing. Drunks, by the sound, and there was a bar nearby. Lassiter put on speed, intending to break up the argument and send the men packing before someone could call the cops on them for disturbing the peace or something worse. Before he could reach them, could even come close enough for a shout to get their attention, something very strange happened. Something that had him stop dead in his tracks.

Something huge burst out of the darkness. Not as though it stepped out of the shadows: more as if it simply appeared, moreover in a burst of flame. The…creature, for it was certainly not human, stood on the order of ten feet tall, was pure white, unclothed, quite obviously male, had hooves on its feet and talons on its hands, had horns on its head, and bright red fur on its head, elbows, and its backwards-facing knees. It looked down the street at him and leered, and ran out a long red tongue to lick its lips. Its eyes were fire.

It reached down a hand and laid it on the shoulder of one of the drunks. The man took no apparent notice, nor did his foe. They just kept arguing. But the man with the creature's hand on his shoulder immediately reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a small-caliber pistol. He raised it, and fired it directly into the other man's face, then stood there stupidly, looking like he didn't quite know what he'd just done. The creature was still staring, leering, at Lassiter, something like humor in its expression.

"Take a good long look, Booker," it said, and its voice was a low growl. "We'll let you be for now, but we are coming for you…and maybe, just maybe, that pretty little blonde of yours, too. Won't that be nice? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha." And then it disappeared in another burst of fire.

Lassiter stood stock still for a moment longer, until he managed to shake himself out of his stupor. He hadn't seen what he'd thought he'd seen, certainly hadn't heard what he thought he'd heard - who the hell knew his mother called him Booker? - but he had been witness to a murder, and something had to be done about it. He trotted down to the end of the block, where the drunk was still staring, apparently shocked, at the gun held in his hand.

"SBPD, don't move!" Lassiter said, and was able to remove the gun from the man's hand with no resistance. He took the man's hands behind his back and cuffed him, then spoke into his police radio, calling for backup and transport of a suspect.

"I don't know what happened here, buddy, but…I gotta do my job," he said, with the horrible feeling that this particular murder, cold-blooded or not, wasn't entirely this man's fault.

He was tied up for the next few hours in Booking and Processing, and a black and white took him home in the wee hours. He came through the front door ready to drop, and was startled wide awake when he came face to face with a man standing there in the middle of his living room, a man in a snappy black suit. Lassiter had his gun out in a heartbeat.

"That won't do you any good, you know," the man said, quite calmly, and Lassiter realized he recognized the voice. He'd heard it in his head just the night before. Cautiously, he lowered his gun and took a good, long look at the man. He had neatly trimmed black hair, gone gray at the temples, and a well-trimmed goatee, well-silvered, and bright blue eyes. An aquiline nose, a narrow face, broad shoulders, slim build, and quite tall - about six-three. He looked somewhere around fifty years old at a guess.

"You don't look 728," Lassiter said, slowly. The man grinned.

"I shall someday," he said. "How old I will actually be at that time is hard to say."

"Who are you?" Lassiter asked.

"The man you think of as your 'mysterious mentor,'" the man said.

"I figured that much out for myself. Detective, you know. Who are you really?"

The man paced the living room with his hands behind his back. "I'm afraid proper introductions will have to wait. You, dear boy, are in a great deal of danger. I had hoped this would not happen: you are not anywhere near on a level where it ought to have. However, apparently the evil forces of at least one of the darker dimensions have determined already that you will reach that level, and have decided to do something peremptorily about it. They will, given the chance, kill you. You are not prepared to defend yourself yet."

"Is that what I saw tonight? An…evil force?" he asked, uncertainly.

"What you saw was quite properly termed a demon," the man said matter-of-factly. "There are several dimensions that are home to such creatures. I believe that this one may have come from the Dark Dimension itself - the ultimate of all dimensions of evil nature."

"But if that thing wanted to kill me, why didn't it?" he asked.

"Quite simply, because it wants to hurt you first," the man said, and he stopped and turned to look somberly at Lassiter. "To that end, they will go after your Detective O'Hara first, because hurting her will hurt you so badly that you will wish yourself dead, and they will like that very much."

Lassiter felt a cold chill settle over him, and his heart seemed to drop into his gut. His teeth started chattering, a nervous habit he thought he'd kicked. He breathed in - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 - and out again - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 - and the chattering slowly stopped. "What do I do?" he asked. "How do I protect her?"

"The only way you can. By leaving her," the man said.

There were more words, spoken in tones of gentleness and sympathy, but Lassiter barely comprehended them. All he could hear was a repetition of the words Leave her…leave her.

Dear Lord and Sweet Lady Justice, I just got her…

Finally, the man's hand gripped his shoulder. "Write a letter," he said. "See to the disposition of what you must leave behind, and leave a message for your loved ones. You have time enough for that, but then we must leave. You won't be fully protected until you are safely in my home."

Later, when people were sufficiently worried to come looking for him, worried enough to have the building manager open his apartment door, they found this note:

I'm sorry. I don't want to leave, believe me, I don't. Everything I leave behind: the car, the condo, everything, goes to Lauren - Lu, you know I love you. If anyone ever finds my brother, tell that knuckle knob I love him, too.

Juliet…I wish I had something to leave you, something fantastically valuable. The only thing I have to give you is my heart, and you've had that for a long damn while now. I thought about leaving you the dragon you gave me, but I decided at last that that wouldn't be fair. I wanted to leave "your firebreather" watching over you, but I want you to go out and find someone who makes you happy, who'll keep you safe. I know you can look after yourself, but letting go of me sooner rather than later will keep you safer than you can well imagine. So I'll keep the dragon, and when I look at it I'll think of you, not that I think you'll ever be far from my mind. Go out and live and be happy, my darling, but maybe, just a little bit, you could possibly, as Warren Zevon said, "Keep me in your heart for awhile."

Chief: Sorry to leave so abruptly. I know that puts you in a bad place. I really didn't have a choice, believe me. If you want my recommendation, you can't do better than to put O'Hara in as Head. I don't say that because I love her, I say that because she's the finest detective I've ever known, with all the best qualities of leadership I've ever seen. She could get the squad running like never before.

To everybody else: Ma, Althea, the guys at the precinct (McNab!), and even Spencer and Guster, just a little bit, I'll miss you. I'll be thinking about you. -Carlton


A/N: Songs in this chapter are "That's as Close as I'll get to Loving You" by Aaron Tippin and "Did you Ever Love Somebody" by Meat Loaf. No copyright infringement intended, no monetary gain received.

A note about my insistence on putting Lassiter in size 12-narrow shoes when, according to Andy Berman in the audio commentary for the episode "Gus Walks Into a Bank," TimO only wears about a size 10: Simply put, I cannot stand to think that Lassiter wears a smaller shoe than I do, particularly when I believe he is at least a little bit taller than I (hard to tell with actors: most of 'em are shorter than they make 'em look - I am fairly certain that I'm an inch or two taller than Roday and Dulé, no matter what height they claimed to be in the show). I wear 11 ½, and yes, that is a man's 11 ½; I have a hard time finding women's shoes that fit me. 12 narrow is documented in the series, so I use that. It eases my vanity, and is a perfectly reasonable size for a man six foot or taller, and his feet certainly LOOK bigger than size 10, so screw you, Andy Berman. How the hell do you know precisely what size shoe Timothy Omundson wears, anyway? You're not the costume manager.

The Kia Hamstermobile isn't a Fusion, is it? I always call it the hamstermobile, so I've totally forgotten what it IS called. I was sure it started with an F, but now I can't think what it might really have been. My uncle has one of those ugly suckers - what is it called?! Damn, I wish I had internet so I could look this shit up when I have these problems.

Does anybody else think that Lamar Odum isn't going to make it? The news says his chances are postulated at fifty-fifty, but that sounds blazingly optimistic to me. His kidneys are failing, his heart is failing, and they said he's had seven strokes. If he DOES happen to survive, he's going to be a vegetable, more than likely. They keep saying "Oh, what a tragedy" but I don't see it that way. Sorry, but to me he's just another idiot who killed himself with drugs. Nobody made him do that. His choice. His stupidity.