Current Day:

Hiding behind a row of parked cars, Al covertly watched his nephew. Noting Davy's timid demeanor and the fearful lines etched on his face, he frowned; his nephew's discomfort was palpable, his intense paranoia noticeable by the way his eyes darted frantically around. Davy was too young to look so troubled, and too old to look so afraid. Al had hoped he was improving—that Hutch's worried phone call was nothing more than a stress-fueled moment of weakness—but seeing Davy now was proof that Hutch's worry wasn't an overreaction, this his concern was more than warranted, and worse, that Hutch probably wasn't worried enough.

Davy had barely looked at him when Al arrived to pick him up, and the ride to the car lot had been uncomfortable to say the least. Al had forced a smile, asking a series of questions that all went unanswered by Davy. When they arrived at the lot, Davy had nervously ignored the greetings of Al's employees—the majority of which, were people he had known for years—quickly shuffling away from the curious stares to the edge of the parking lot to wash cars alone.

Though he didn't want to, Al recognized Davy's odd isolating behavior and it filled him with a mixture of sadness and regret—he hadn't seen it first-hand but readily recalled the hushed details Michael had reported over the phone.

Watching Davy hold the hose lax in his hand, Al's worry intensified. His nephew had been doing that for a while now, staring aimlessly at the car in front of him while the powerful hose sprayed all over the pavement, soaking his shoes and the bottoms of his pants with a thick mixture of soap and water. But Davy didn't seem to be bothered by the building pile of suds, nor did he appear to be aware of it. He didn't seem aware of anything; it was as if he was somewhere else completely.

Davy hadn't been this bad when he was still living with them, Al thought. Though in the weeks he had spent in their home, he and Rosie had privy to the darker side of their nephew's recovery. Nightmares, panic attacks, spontaneous tearful anger, were a few of the behaviors Davy had displayed. But Al quickly realized, that this new version of his nephew was a stranger. He wanted to go to Davy, to remove the hose from his hand and insist he stop acting so strange, to demand that he suddenly become the same person they had all known before. The self-assured, social happy-go-lucky man who never needed to spend much time alone. But instead, Al turned around, leaving his nephew to slowly work though the line of cars.

He had phone call to make.

Xx

Starsky was surrounded by whispers. Hushed and overlapping, the voices murmured a series of repetitive sentences that were almost too soft to hear. Fragmented statements detailing his injuries, a haunting catalog of everything that he endured—what Hutch had done and why. Squinting against the mist ricocheting off of the white truck he was rising, he took a deep breath, counted to ten, and forced himself to ignore the hissing taunts, because standing at the edge of his uncle's car lot, surrounded by pavement and parked cars, he was alone.

"He should have finished it," a voice hissed, the first distinguishable sentence of the day. "You'd be better off dead."

The voices were a recent development, an unsettling addition to the list of things he'd been careful not to discuss with Doctor Evans at their bi-weekly appointments. Visits, that now, consisted mostly of silence and staring contests; sometimes Evans asked probing questions while Starsky remained quiet, moving nervously around the room. He couldn't talk about what happened, and he wouldn't. Not without selling Hutch out, not without losing what little he had left to hold on to.

"But you do want to tell, don't you?" the voice asked. "Whether he was the thing in the dark or not, he was the one who brought you to Marcus. You want to tell. To make him hurt the way he hurt you. To hold him responsible for ruining everything. To make him suffer for not being brave enough to kill you like he did Marcus. He could have ended your pain, but he didn't. He could allowed you to die a hero, but he forced you to live as a victim."

But Starsky knew telling the truth was impossible—despite what the voice said. Even if he were petty enough to seek revenge on Hutch in such a way, telling the truth meant facing the truth about himself and there was no way he was going to do that. He couldn't be labeled as crazy; he wouldn't allow it—just to spite the truth of what had been done and the fear that still remained.

Doctor Evans knew the truth about his mental stability, she was just avoiding making the official diagnosis. She was privy to his hospital records; she knew what Starsky had suffered at the hands of Marcus and Hutch—no, not Hutch. Someone else. Something else. Something darker. Something evil.—Evans knew he had been taken, held, tortured, and raped, but worse: she knew about his mother.

"You are so afraid of being crazy, but fear won't hide the truth now. Avoidance couldn't save your mother and it won't save you."

Sighing, Starsky loosened his grip on the hose trigger, ceasing the stream of water as he held the nozzle lax at his side, longing to be home, hidden away in his bedroom. Safe and sound behind his deadbolts, muffling the haunting voices by a loud endless stream of daytime TV. His free hand traveled to the side of his face and he absently fingered the edge of the bandage concealing his scar—yet another thing he wasn't ready to contend with. The injury had long healed, the stitches dissolved, the bruising around his jawline faded, but the bandages had become a part of him, because Starsky still remained hesitant—afraid—to look at the scar, to accept the permanent deformity marking his completion. But recently the idea of a scar had become somewhat comforting. It was a prominent reminder—tangible evidence—that Marcus had really died.

If pressed Starsky would say he didn't remember what had happened that day, but he knew. Hutch had killed Marcus, his death retribution for the scar and everything else the man had inflicted.

"You'd be better off if he would have killed you."

Nervously, glancing at the silver Seiko on his wrist, Starsky groaned. Though Al had collected him hours ago, the day seemed to be moving in slow motion. He had long begun to remember how much he hated car washing duty as a teenager. While the job had served a purpose in his teenage years, a convenient way to make extra money when he wanted it, it didn't now. He didn't need the money, nor did he think Al was paying him. The job was more annoying than useful, more frightening than calming, and more infuriating as each moment passed. His sneakers and the bottom of his torn blue jeans were soaked, and despite the warmth of the afternoon, the cold water was leaving him chilled.

"You're broken and afraid. Timid and useless."

Or, maybe, it was the litany of half-heard statements that were evoking the icy shiver creeping up his spine, intensifying the ever-present anxiety pounding in his chest.

"You're no good to anybody."

Starsky took a series of deep breaths, struggling to calm the irate skipping of his heart. He tried not to focus on the voice, how frightening being outside of the secure walls of Venice Place was, or how much being out in the open, unaccompanied and exposed, at the edge of the car lot bothered him. He was alone—vulnerable and susceptible—surrounded by no one but the voices in his head.

"You were strong but now you're weak. Afraid of shadows and the dark. Terrified of the man you love and the darkest truth about yourself."

He fought the urge to abandon the hose and the row of cars awaiting washing and head to the safety of Al's office where he could convince his uncle to take him home. But it was a futile wish, and Starsky dismissed it as quickly as it came. Convincing Al to take him home would require him admit his fear of being outside and force him to confront another: people. The thought of being around people was terror inducing, which was why he was washing vehicles on the edge of Al's property—isolated and alone—instead of doing something more useful, surrounded by Al's employees and customers. Coming into contact with strangers was enough to make his skin crawl. It has hard enough to be around the people he knew, the people he once trusted and hope to trust again, but the thought of being surrounded or even assessed by someone he didn't know was enough to make Starsky's skin crawl. There was no predicating what they wanted, what they would take from him, or who they worked for.

Marcus was dead, but had the darkness lived? Was it waiting in the shadows, planning the perfect moment to reappear, and bring him to his knees?

"You'll never recover from this; you know you won't. You can't. You're a victim now. Everyone knows what happened to you. You never said anything, but they know. They know you won't ever be the same. They know you should have died when you had the chance."

Gripping the hose trigger tightly in both his hands, Starsky aimed it at the truck once more, flinching as its powerful stream hit the side of the door. Closing his eyes, he ignored the voice, focusing instead on the solid sound of the surging water and the crisp droplets peppering his face and clothes. For a moment he felt calm, an elusive sense of peace that he knew wouldn't last. Though the water was enough to drown out the voice, Starsky knew it would return. With a vengeance, the voices would all return.

There was nothing in the world loud enough to silence his own thoughts.

Xx

"I thought you said he was doing better!" Al accused as he stalked from one end of his office to the other. "That you were only a little worried because he hadn't left your apartment in a few days!"

"Yeah, well, that's true," Hutch said, his loud voice unapologetic as he shouted over the scattered chatter and background noise of whatever establishment he was visiting.

"Listen, kid, I don't know who you think you're fooling, but it isn't me! Have you forgotten who I am? I've been a substitute father to Davy since he was twelve years old and I am telling you right now, something is really wrong with the way he's acting. He hasn't gotten better since he moved back in with you, he's getting worse. A lot worse."

"I know," Hutch sighed. The helplessness behind the statement was enough to make Al hesitate in place. "I asked for your help because we need it. I don't know what to do, okay? Is that what you want to hear?"

"No. I want to know what you're doing to help him."

"I gave him his own room," Hutch said weakly.

"That's it?"

"He wanted it. He likes the space."

"What about his psych? Is he still seeing her?"

"Yeah…but," Hutch hedged, "I don't know how much longer that's going to last. I don't think he's talking."

"What makes you say that?"

"Because she called me," Hutch scoffed. "She wants me to come down, comment on the steps he's making at home, and talk about his options for the future."

"Isn't that a little," Al paused, waiving his hand around, "I don't know, wrong? I thought doctors weren't allowed to discuss records with outside parties. Privacy policies and all that."

"They aren't. I don't think she has any intension of disclosing records or what they've discussed, I think she has other ideas in mind."

"Like what?"

"Al," Hutch said, voice heavy with exhaustion. "As you know, Starsky and I are not legally married, but I am his power of attorney—"

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"It means I can make decisions for him if he's unable of doing so himself. I think Evans wants to talk about looking into other options."

Al absorbed the words like a punch to the stomach, visions of institutions, the after effects of shock treatment, and the side-effects of the drugs employed in the 1980's weighing heavily on his mind. "Do you think Davy needs other options?" he asked instantly, though he was certain he already knew the painful truth.

It was obvious his nephew was struggling with the things he had been through, that he was quickly losing his grip on himself and reality. Davy's mother had been normal once too; one moment she was fine and then somehow she wasn't, and the so called "other options" hadn't done her a bit of good. But Al had no intension of talking about Rachel's struggles, not with the pain of seeing Davy's all-too-familiar behavior throbbing in his chest. And Ken hadn't brought up the similarities between mother and son's sickness, so neither would he.

"I don't know, Al," Hutch said. "You spent the morning with him, you tell me. I don't know what to do anymore. I don't know how to help him, and I want to fix this, but I can't help thinking that I'm only making things worse."

Sighing, Al closed his eyes. He didn't want to think about the Ken without Davy, or how inevitable and fragmented Davy's future had suddenly become. He couldn't stand the thought of history repeating itself, or being forced to watch helplessly as his nephew's hard-earned life was torn away from him piece-by-piece. Davy had been a good cop. He had been strong and capable, feisty and enthusiastic, but after Simon Marcus, not a hint of that man had been left behind. And even if the details of the trauma Davy had endured weren't enough to convince his psychiatrist—or Hutch—that he was in need of involuntary treatment, than his recent behavior coupled with his mother's vast history with mental illness were damning.

"Please don't make any rash decisions," Al said seriously. "And please promise me that if she convinces you to send him somewhere, that you'll discuss it with me and Rosie first."

"Al, I'm not sending him anywhere. I don't care what some shrink has to say about anything, and I have no intension of abandoning him when he needs me the most."

"Just promise me," Al growled.

"Okay, I promise," Hutch vowed readily, but Al was surprised when it did nothing to calm his dread.

Xx

Prior Months:

"What do you see in the darkness?" Marcus asked, his eyes sparkling with curious joy as he peered down at Starsky.

Shaking his head numbly, Starsky couldn't bring himself to reply. Head pressed against the wall, his body was swollen and dark, charred with handprints as he lay naked in a pool of his own blood. He wanted to move but couldn't; wanted to be angry over Marcus's delighted smile but wasn't. Marcus's presence was oddly comforting; he had soothed his anxiety and screaming pain of Starsky's battered body from the moment he had suddenly appeared, daylight filtering around him as he stood towering above at the entry of the bunker. And Marcus had done something else: his presence had chased the thing back to the darkness of the corner—he prevented Hutch from assaulting Starsky again.

"Does she show herself to you?" Marcus asked, fondly eyeing the darkest corner of the room.

"Who?" Starsky asked, his confused mind thick with fevered questions. Why was Marcus's presence comforting, and why didn't he feel a hint of fear or even shame laying naked before him now?

"Fate," Marcus said simply. Smiling growing, he strode purposefully to the corner. Whispering inaudible sentences as he glanced between the empty space and where Starsky lay hopelessly paralyzed on the ground. "Did Gale return for you?" he asked, looking at Starsky's nakedness inquisitively, the burned handprints marring his body, traveling the length of his arms, his chest and down his hips and thighs. "Or did someone else come to take what was theirs?"

Grimacing, Starsky fought a wave of agitation as he fought to recall the memory of Gale's return. Blurred images raced through his mind; fragmented pieces of dreams and memories that had become a fused cluster too complicated to decipher.

But the emotions had remained.

Pain, fear, dread, and hope, all feelings he readily remembered. The pain inflicted by the thing in the darkness, the fear and dread enveloping him, and hope born from Marcus's presence. The only thing that could ease the agony rushing through Starsky's body and save him from the ever-present terror that threatened to overwhelm him.

"Either you do not remember much of what has happened or your stubbornness to avoid the truth has prevailed." Marcus said disappointedly. "I do believe it is the latter."

Choking on groan, Starsky lifted his burned covered arms to hide his face as he shook his head wildly. Marcus was wrong nothing had happened with Gale. Subsequent to his original appearance, Gale never returned.

"But you did drink the water he left," Marcus said matter-of-factly. "Fate has told me you did. Quenching your thirst it filled you with panic and unbearable pain." Tilting his head toward the darkness, he grinned. "Fate was kind to you then, she allowed you seek respite in her darkness when things became too much—"

"No," Starsky denied. Marcus was lying. Wasn't he?

"What purpose would my lies serve?"

"You…" Starsky paused, overcome by the confused images lingering in the back of his head.

Tired and weak he had given into his thirst, drinking the water Gale had left behind in a quick series of desperate gulps. The water was refreshing, making him feel momentarily better before turning mean. A feeling parallel to a burning rage of fire had engulfed him, rising from the pit of his stomach before settling into this throat where it lingered with cutting pain.

Holding his fingertips in front of his face, Starsky cringed. His hands were dirty; covered in grime and blood, swollen and disguised by the reddened skin and blistered by the Hutch's touch. But the layers of bloody skin tucked under his fingernails had been his doing; he had scratched his neck raw as the unseen thing in the darkness laughed over his terror and pain. But after a while he had passed out—hadn't he? He was certain at some point he had given into the peace of unconsciousness.

But that was after, a tiny bothersome voice whispered in the back of his head. After Gale had finally returned; after Hutch had come to take what Starsky wouldn't give Gale. It couldn't be, Starsky though wildly. And pressing his head firmly against the wall, he took a deep breath and forced himself to remember what had happened in the darkness.

The agony brought on by the water had left him mentally and physically drained. The water, though debilitating, had quenched his thirst but he had gone days without food. And with his body aching with weakness, he struggled with lucidity, frantically trying to hold on to what slivers of sanity he had left—something he realized was only worsening with time.

What was real and what was nothing more than a dream? He wasn't sure anymore, and the question was enough provoke his heart into a frantic flutter. He didn't want to be crazy, he thought madly. There were so many other unsavory things he chose over that.

"You do fear being seen as unstable," Marcus sneered. "Almost as much as Hutchinson fears his truth. You are afraid of repeating your mother's mistakes, but Hutchinson has already duplicated his father's. Secrecy, denying the remaining pain of long buried truth, Hutchinson has done to you what his father did to him."

Closing his eyes Starsky remained quiet. He was too tired to speak. Too calmed by Marcus to disagree. Somewhere in the back of his mind he realized it was an odd feeling to attach to such a menacing man; placidity was feeling better associated with someone else. Someone like Hutch, Starsky thought regretfully but immediately he knew that somehow his feelings associated with his partner had been irrevocably changed.

"She did not show herself to you," Marcus said in pleased tone. "She showed you someone else."

"No," Starsky denied, his quiet voice catching.

"Yes, she did. She showed you the truest nature of the ones you love the most," holding up his hand, Marcus flicked his fingers as he continued, "Mother, Aunt, Uncle, and the one you love the most. Tell me, undisturbed by his secrets what truths did Hutchinson finally tell you?"

"It wasn't him."

"It was."

"No."

The thing in the darkness wasn't Hutch, it couldn't be. His Hutch wouldn't never say the cruel biting things the other Hutch had—he would never treat him so contemptuously—his Hutch would never use his strength to hurt him. He would never break his ribs or make him bleed, and he never would have violently forced himself upon Starsky—he wouldn't have ignored his tortured screams of pain.

"I told you to be mindful of your fears," Marcus said, his voice almost regretful as he watched twin tears trail streak Starsky's swollen blood-dried cheeks. "Fate will always make them worse. You could have given Gale what he wanted and been spared the pain of something truly horrible."

"It w-wasn't him."

"It was," Marcus said. "Remember how you screamed, first as his fingertips burned your skin, and later as his hands left imprints on your soul."

"No."

Holding his hands up defensively, Starsky flinched as Marcus pulled him off the floor. His body protested the movement, enveloping his chest in fiery pain and sending jolts of painful spasms down his lower back and beyond. Captive to protesting muscles, his legs moved involuntarily, abruptly jerking his body and intensifying his pain. Tears streaming down his cheeks, a series of pain grunts and groans escaped him before Marcus finished carefully arranging him to sit feet beyond where he had been before—away from the freshly bloodstained pavement that told the secret of what Hutch had really done.

It was so much blood, Starsky thought absently. Too much blood; he had torn before but never like this. Of course he had never been touched like that; not with razor-sharp fingertips that burned his skin or violent forcefulness that left his body quaking in agony.

"You must never lay down, when you can sit," Marcus said, wiping a cool cloth over Starsky's forehead and shoulders. "And you must never take drinks from strangers. You of all people should have known better than to drink the water gifted by Gale."

"I didn't have a choice."

"You always have a choice. I would have given you water if you asked."

Mind swimming with pain, Starsky struggled to accept the words; it didn't seem probable Marcus would have been so accommodating—of course it didn't seem likely he would take time to clean him up either, Starsky thought immediately. But Marcus's careful motions, the warmth of the wet cloth against his sore skin, only served as confirmation of the man's statement. Somewhere in the back of his head, Starsky realized that the scrubbing of his wounds should have hurt but didn't. Marcus's presence was calming; his touch was quickly soothing his pain away. And watching Marcus's actions wide-eyed, Starsky inhaled sharply as he struggled understand what he was seeing. First wiping Starsky's skin clean, Marcus hoovered his palm over his puckered burns momentarily before the skin contracted, its redness calming as it returned to its natural tanned hue—Marcus was healing him.

"Tell me why you killed Brother Gale."

"What?" Starsky whispered, as confused by the question as he was about how Marcus had made his burns disappear.

"Yes, you did," Marcus said resolutely, nodding at the darkest corner of the room. "Fate told me what occurred."

Staring dumbly at the floor, Starsky cringed as he was assaulted with Hutch's previous words: You have blood on your hands. Where has your fight gone now—your insistence not to be touched? Your vigorous anger at the prospect? Did you use it all up on Gale?

"No!"

Covering his ears, Starsky shut his eyes as he frantically struggled to ignore the memory. While he succeeded in suppressing Hutch's taunting, a cluster of other memories came rushing back, details of moments too horrible to think about. The icy feeling of Hutch's breath on his skin, contradicting with the smell of burning flesh permeating the air as Hutch's fingers singed and burned, poke and prodded, but when he had finally taken Starsky, it had been the worst pain he'd ever known in his life. It didn't matter what had been done to Gale because what Hutch had done was so much worse.

"No," Starsky whispered, his voice thick as he struggled to reject the truth. It wasn't Hutch; it hadn't been. Hutch loved him deeply; he never would have hurt him like that.

"But he did," Marcus assured. "Just as you killed Gale, just after you drank the water. He emerged from the darkness intent on finishing what he began—"

"No!"

"Just as you should have been mindful of your fear, he should have been mindful of your warning. He returned and you viciously killed him with your bare hands—"

"No!" Starsky screamed as the memory came back full-force.

Gale beneath him, struggling against him and fighting for breath. Blood filled his bulging eyes as Starsky's wrapped his hands around his throat. Gale had gagged seconds before Starsky crushed his windpipe, minutes before Starsky lost all control and violently broken Gale's neck.

"I didn't do that," Starsky insisted, though he was certain he had.

"You call yourself a rescuer; a servant of the law, yet you chose to kill Gale. It was self-defense," Marcus tilted his head, "that is true, but you chose to end his life. He would have died eventually, fate would have seen to that. But he was no longer a threat, and you chose the moment he took his last breath."

"No," Starsky whispered his heart dropping as he absorbed the truth of Marcus's words.

Captive to his terrified anger, he had injured Gale—incapacitated him so he wasn't a threat—and then he had killed him. With his bare hands Starsky had killed him. And for a moment, as Gale lay gurgling on his blood, Starsky had felt an unreasonable amount of joy. He had taken pleasure in Gale's pain, it had provided respite from the uncertainty of the darkness, and made him feel dominating, powerful, and strong.

"Perhaps, you are not as rational as you would like to think," Marcus said, lips curling into a satisfied smile. "That is okay. Hutchinson is not as strong as he likes to think he is. In some ways you are a perfect pair. Everyone has a bit of darkness inside; Hutchinson is aware of his, there is a part of himself he will always struggle to contain."

"That's a lie," Starsky whispered, voice unconvincing. "All of it—"

"Is it?"

Flinching as Marcus's fingers dropped to his more sensitive areas, Starsky cowered. All thoughts of Gale and Hutch, what he had endured and what he had done—vanished in a moment—erased by the terror rushing through him at the prospect that Marcus had come have him as well.

"I do not entertain thoughts such as those," Marcus chastised, moving the wet cloth to cleanse Starsky's broken and raw skin.

"But you encouraged it," Starsky said numbly, thoughts of Gale and Hutch swirling in his head as Marcus scrubbed the dried blood caking the base of his thighs. "You knew what Gale wanted from me. You stopped him on purpose the first time..." His eyes widened as he struggled to reason Marcus's actions. "…You knew he would come back for me… and you… you allowed him to do that too…"

"I did."

"Why?"

"I wanted to see what would happen. You allowed Hutchinson to break your body, to violently ravage your soul; I wanted to see if you would allow Gale the same permissions—"

"I never gave permission, to either of them."

"You stopped Gale while you allowed Hutchinson to take what he wanted; just as you always succumb to his will—"

"I didn't."

"You did."

Marcus's firm statement echoed through the bunker, and Starsky felt numb shock envelope him as Marcus procured a blanket from seemingly nowhere. What was he suggesting? That he had a chosen for Hutch to assault him?

"You always have a choice," Marcus affirmed, wrapping the blanket carefully around Starsky's shoulders, hiding his injuries and nakedness form the damp coldness of the room.

Face set with confusion, Starsky stared at him. Why would Marcus go to such lengths to comfort him? Why would he take time to heal his wounds and soothe his pain? Why would the man bothering speaking to him at all?

"I do not take pleasure in the pain of others," Marcus smiled, "at least not nearly as much as all those silly stories would have you believe."

"What do you take pleasure in?"

Marcus looked thoughtful. "Honesty," he said after a moment. "And fulfillment of ones truest self."

"Is that why you brought me here?" Starsky snorted softly, his fingers clenching the blanket tightly. "To fulfill something?"

"For you? No," Marcus said, a hint of regret in his tone. Reaching out he cupped Starsky's cheek, moving his thumb tenderly against the dark stubble covering his chin. "I'm afraid this was never about you—"

"It was always about him," Starsky said knowingly, his voice tight with tears. "Why did you chose Hutch? Why does it want him so bad?"

"He chose himself. It was his fear that led him to me, his insecurities and brokenness that made him easy for fate to exploit."

"But Hutch is strong," Starsky protested, moving his cheek from Marcus's grasp. "You don't know him. He isn't weak or broken—"

"His secrets make him weak. His inability to accept his pain or his past make him a broken man—a lesser version of who he was meant to be. Though he tries to feign otherwise, you know it is the truth."

"I know," Starsky whispered sadly, his mind suddenly too exhausted do anything but accept the truth of Marcus's words. "He was so afraid of me finding out about it, wasn't he?"

"Of what?"

"Of the knowledge you held over his head. The things you used to manipulate him."

"He was." Marcus smiled, pleasantly pleased with Starsky's ability to finally deduce—and accept—what had sparked his invisible hold on Hutch.

"Well, in that case it shouldn't count," Starsky insisted, burrowing into the warmth of the blanket.

"Why?"

"Because I already know all of his secrets. He never told me, but I know."

A memory sprung readily to Starsky's mind; the anger and frustration he felt toward Hutch when his partner refused to allow him to attend Richard Hutchinson's funeral, resulting in an evening full of too many beers and a covert ransacking of their house. He hadn't expected to find anything—not really—but his heart had been in his throat, his hands moving by their own violation, as he came upon the faded file box, cleverly disguised, hidden in the back of the closet in their spare bedroom. Medical files, all dated the summer Hutch would have been seven-years-old; copies of psychiatric reports, beginning the same summer and continuing for years. But the name in the records had been confusing, not Kenneth Hutchinson but Cameron Smith, and Starsky had been burdened by questions of why Hutch would keep or hide medical records belonging to someone else.

"The records do belong to him," Marcus assured. "You know it now, as you did then."

And Starsky did know; his heart ached as he struggled to forget the details burned into his memory. A seven-year-old little boy should never have to have endured such things, he thought sadly, nor should a grown man live in fear of someone finding out.

"And do you love him in spite of his secrets?" Marcus asked. "The ones he deliberately chose never to entrust to you?"

"Of course," Starsky whispered firmly. "I promised to love him forever. Through better and worse, though..." he paused, eyes setting on the darkest corner of the room as anxiety built in his chest. Was Hutch listening to them; and what could punishment for speaking of carefully buried secrets possible be? "This is definitely worse," he added in a convert whisper.

"I thought the version of your partner which hides in the shadows was not really him."

"It's not," Starsky said, though his tone was firm he found himself suddenly uncertain. Maybe it was Hutch after all, fueled by fury-laced shame over long passed trauma no one could change now. Looking at Marcus, he frowned nervously. "Is it?"

"It is. Fate is showing you Hutchinson's truest form. It is the pain and anger he has tried hard to conceal. I assure you, even if Hutchinson could save you, he would not. His promises are empty; his love is contrived. He will say and do anything to get you where he wants you. And in the end, it will mean nothing. You will suffer for his scars, the things you know yet pretend to be unaware of, and captive to what happened, what will happen here and the things he will do once I'm gone, he will hold on to you tightly. He will do anything to make you stay."