It had been easy to ignore the curious sideways glances down in the parking garage, but the closer he came to the 4th floor of the Hall of Justice building, the more vocal his audience became in regards to his peculiar situation.

With a deep sigh, and a foreboding feeling of the ill-tempered reprimands coming his way shortly; Steve exited the elevator and walked down the long hallway dreadfully, before taking a sharp left at Office 450.

Midmorning, the bullpen was a frenzied mess of patrol officers and detectives alike, with a few witnesses and suspects sprinkled in. And yet, embarrassingly enough, the sheer action of him slowly heading toward his desk, with his shoulders slumped in defeat, was enough to quiet the atmosphere, as eyebrows were raised, conversations disrupted and the occasional chuckle could be heard here and there.

Steve sighed again, trying to stealthily peek over at Mike's desk, a small part of him hoping the Lieutenant would be out for an early lunchbreak but knowing better than to expect a miracle in a case that had gone wrong in every angle imaginable.

And as such, Mike was sitting behind his desk, his forehead wrinkled over something he was reading, looking so utterly at peace, and blissfully unaware of the insult his eyes would have to suffer through momentarily.

He was midway between his desk and the coffee machine, when Mike noticed his presence and looked up, his expression changing from relief, to confusion, to irritation in a mere fraction of a second.

"What in the…"

Raising a calming hand, Steve bypassed the idea of a much-deserved coffee and headed straight into his partner's office, closing the door behind them to keep the noise down that was undoubtedly about to erupt.

"What is it with you lately?", Mike fired off, before he could even get an explanation in, "First I find you bleeding in the back of an ambulance taking on a guy twice your size, now you're coming back from meeting a stoolie looking like the cheap wallpaper down at the Bay View Motel on the Embarcadero."

Raising both hands now to try to contain his partner's fury, and knowing that everyone's eyes outside the office were on them, Steve cursed the glitter flaking off his beige dress coat, before landing on Mike's desk.

"Morley's had a foam party going on. Clarence and I ended up right in the middle of it. I tried to wash it off but the bathrooms were a mess there."

"Yeah I can see that.", Mike countered angrily and pointed at the pink and blue blotches covering most of his face, and attire, followed by the traditional sprinkling with glitter and silly spray.

"I know you might find this hard to believe, but Clarence and I were actually were doing a lot of work and making headway this morning, tracking down somebody who might be our killer."

When Mike's eyes softened somewhat, Steve dared to walk over to the file cabinet and lean against it, trying to keep the mess he was leaving behind to a minimum.

"You're right. I am having a hard time believing that. You couldn't find a dirtier rat hole than Morley's to do your digging in? I sure hope you are up to date on your shots and kept your hands to yourself."

Brushing the outright insult aside, Steve shrugged indifferently, then ran a hand through his sticky hair.

"Let me please just move on from the fact that Clarence and I had to hold hands trying to make it out of the foam pit in one piece, and that we were both touched in places I'd rather not discuss."

"Serves you right for going out on your own.", Mike countered condescendingly and took a sip of coffee, "How many times over the course of the past few days have I told you to take someone with you? Mhm? We don't know who exactly we're after and you could be running into the wide-open arms of disaster, with no backup whatsoever."

"And how many times before this case- and your nightmares- did we go out alone and never thought twice about it?"

Realizing that he was doing a formidable job of throwing gasoline on the fire, Steve huffed in frustration, having to cough at some of the foam still stuck in his throat after the adventure with Clarence.

Using the ensuing silence as a powerful tool to scare the living daylights out of Steve, Mike slowly rose from his desk, blue eyes seemingly penetrating the young Inspector, his expression eerily unreadable.

"Don't push it.", the seasoned Lieutenant finally growled as he approached his partner, exuding complete authority and unwavering determination all in one frightening package. It was a mixture strong enough to wash all the color off Steve's face, even some of the pink and blue foam remnants left behind.

"Now, let me make this very clear yet again, Inspector…and I expect you to remember next time around…I don't want you running around downtown on your own until this case is closed. Not to see a stoolie, not to follow up on a lead, none of that. Is that clear enough now?"

Swallowing hard, Steve held the eye contact for as long as humanly possible, then nodded carefully.

"Yes, Sir."

He knew the title infuriated his best friend more than anything, putting up walls of defiance and professional distance when there should be an open line of communication and trust, but it was all he had to offer when faced with the well-known and much-feared Mike Stone wrath.

They stood there for what seemed like an hour, the Lieutenant never moving a single muscle, making Steve wonder if he was even breathing. Through their wordless exchange, he could see a multitude of emotions playing out in Mike's eyes as he worked through the anger his latest, entirely unintentional escapade had caused.

Finally, the Lieutenant grunted, making room for a faint smile spreading on his lips again, as he shook his head.

"You look and smell like a bag of cotton candy they sell at the county fair."

"I know. Believe me, I do.", Steve returned indignant and rubbed the back of his neck, enjoying the excuse to break eye contact with the man known to bore holes in the skulls of those he scorned, "For what it's worth, the bartender there, as well as a few of the regulars remember a person coming in, wearing a mask and making some… I guess you can call them Shakespearian remarks about serving justice."

With eyebrows raised, Mike leaned against the corner of his desk.

"Come again?"

"The creepy thing is that the mask is not such an uncommon thing in that place. At any rate, nobody knows if it's a guy or girl, the voice is getting misconstrued via the mask. It's one of those ehm…those smiling theatre type masks. The best I could get was about 5 foot 10, 150-160lbs. Anyways, so it comes in about twice a week, is big into talking about the world's problems, drinks it's vodka straight up, and the more drunk it gets, the angrier it gets too, talking about the thread of justice."

"It, eh?", Mike mused and triumphantly rubbed his hands together, "Well, Buddyboy, you are a day late and a dollar short. While you and that short order fry cook were barking up the wrong tree, Eric McMillan himself stopped by to present us with the real killer."

"Wait…what?"

This time it was Steve who raised his brows.

"You heard me. Waltzed right in here, apologized for his earlier rudeness and told me in no uncertain terms that he suspects his sister of being the killer. Go downstairs to change and wash all that ridiculous glitter off of your face and I'll fill you in when you get back up here."