The Promise and the Threat

by Zebra 3 and Me

Starsky and Hutch are pushed to the limits in these stories. Can their friendship survive?

THE PROMISE AND THE THREAT

Starsky and Hutch stories by tlr

1. Object Of Affection-After Sweet Revenge. Can Hutch trust Starsky's care to a visiting nurse?

2. Mr. H-Set after The Fix. Hutch has a visitor.

3. Misconception-Following Sweet Revenge. The partners encounter an obstacle when Hutch helps Starsky get back on his feet.

4. First Do No Harm-Hutch is detoured while driving in the country.

5. Freeze-The night before Starsky returns to duty following the Gunther hit.

6. Diagnosis-Hutch's mysterious symptoms has Starsky worried.

7. Fagela -An old enemy uses Starsky to get to Hutch .

8. Uncover-Hutch is missing after the Forest incident.

9. The Promise And The Threat-A sniper's confession.

10. Cold Case-Following Vendetta, Hutch confides in Starsky.

11. Redemption Alley-A S&H-Twilight Zone crossover.

12. The Euthanist-Hutch is targeted by a disturbed doctor.

Poem: Friendship, by Ralph Waldo Emerson

::::::::::::

Object Of Affection

From the hospital bed in his living room, Starsky watched his partner walk around, hands on his hips, a preoccupied look on his face.

He had seen him looking distracted for the past week now, but every time he brought it up, Hutch just said it was nothing.

Starsky knew his partner, and knew that he was keeping something worrying from him, thinking that with all the physical healing he had to do, he didn't need a mental load to heft around too.

Starsky had been home two weeks from the hospital, and Hutch had been right by his side every waking moment, and even during his sleeping ones, doing nearly everything a nurse would do.

The hospital had suggested a visiting nurse, but Hutch told them he was quite capable, and informed them that before he went into the police academy, he had taken a year of medical school and numerous first aid courses over the years.

"Hey," Starsky said as his eyes followed his partner. He wanted to sit up on his own, but even that was painful, and the exertion to do the smallest thing, like reaching for a glass of water or his pain medication on the small table next to the bed, left him weak and breathless. Still, Hutch tried to get him to do just a little more each day, forcing him to push himself farther than he would on his own.

"Hey," he repeated. "You're gonna wear a hole in my floor."

Hutch smiled a little. "Hey yourself. You need anything?"

"Don't change the subject."

"What subject?"

"I don't know. Whatever subject is compelling you to pace around like that."

Hutch sighed as he walked over to the hospital bed and took a seat in the rocking chair he had placed next to the bedside table.

"Okay, dirtball. I guess it needs to be said."

Starsky looked at him with eyes that had been dimmed by pain and medication.

"You can't stand my selection of food."

Hutch smiled again. "No. Nothing about the house, or you. It's job-related."

"Okay. What is it?"

"Well, you know how long trials can drag out, and I thought I would have time to help you and help the D.A. prepare for Gunther's trial, but it looks like they're insisting on a speedy one, so…I need to spend more time on the case, away from here. And away from you."

Starsky looked a little disappointed, but only for a second.

"Hutch. I know how it goes. We can't let that creep slip through the cracks. He'll pull every trick in the book to get off, and you need to help bring him down, so believe me, I get it. You have no choice."

Hutch looked down, twisting a bread tie between his fingers. "I feel like I'm deserting you. I told you I'd be here. I want to be here. But…"

Starsky reached over and took the bread tie away from him. "Business is business. If we don't put him away, and do it right, then how we gonna feel? Either one of us? If it were you in this bed, you better believe I'd want to eat, sleep, and breathe that guy's trial until he was behind bars. We only have one chance to get it right. Do what you have to do. Or let me put it this way. You better damn well do your job, because I don't want to give him a second chance to take another crack at us."

Hutch nodded, his features lightening with relief. "Okay. But I'm not leaving you high and dry. You'll have a visiting nurse."

"Hope she's sexy. I mean…not that you're not sexy, but…you know what I mean."

They both laughed.

xx

The she turned out to be a he by the name of Randall Martin.

"Pleasure," Starsky said gripping the male nurse's sturdy hand as Hutch introduced them. "Not as pleasurable as what I've been fantasizing about for the past 2 days, but…"

"You'll be in good hands," Hutch said, and handed Randall a slip of paper. "My address and phone number should you need anything. He'll beg you for all that junk food in his cabinets, but he promised he'd eat healthy while he was recuperating."

"Snitch," Starsky accused.

Randall chuckled. "Don't worry. I've been doing this for a while now."

Hutch put his hand out to Starsky. "Got to get to work, partner. I'll check in when I can. Huggy'll be over too."

"Don't worry. Randall looks like he can handle everything."

Hutch put his hand out to Randall, who gripped it sincerely.

"Take care of him, Randall. He's the only partner I've got."

"Will do, Sergeant."

Hutch picked up the overnight bag he had been bringing back and forth from Starsky's, as well as his gun and holster.

"Starsk," he said as he opened the door to leave, "call if you need anything."

"Sure thing," Starsky said as he went out the door.

Hutch stepped halfway out, then walked back inside and over to Starsky, leaning down to give him a quick hug around the neck.

"I can't wait to put this scum away for good," he whispered.

Starsky patted his shoulder. "Go get him."

When Hutch was finally gone, Starsky looked at Randall. "Help yourself to whatever I have in the house. It could get kind of boring playing nursemaid 8 hours a day."

"I'll be here around the clock."

"Huh? I thought visiting nurses just came through the day?"

"Ordinarily. But your partner hired me to stay the nights too."

Starsky looked as if he didn't know what to say. He knew Hutch would do anything for him, but this? Private nurses weren't cheap. He knew Hutch had taken from his savings to do this.

"He interviewed ten of us," Randall offered. "I was in the final three. Then I got the phone call."

"Oh yeah?"

"He said what sold him on me was the fact that I was in the Army and know how to use a gun."

Starsky gave a small bitter smile. "Yeah. Gunther's big time. It wouldn't surprise me if he sent somebody around to try to clean up his mistake."

Randall made himself comfortable in the rocking chair. "I can take care of myself, and anyone else who walks through that door."

Starsky nodded. "Hutch wouldn't have hired you if you couldn't. Hey…" He looked at the bedside table. "Time for a pain pill, huh? Could you uh…"

"Sure, sure," Randall said as he opened the prescription bottle and handed him a pill, along with a half-glass of water that was already on the table.

"Man," Starsky said as he took his pill and lay his head back on the pillow. "Just when I think I can get up out of bed and do something…"

"Your body says not so fast."

"Yeah."

Starsky turned his head on the pillow, away from Randall.

"Tired," he murmured as he closed his eyes.

Randall pulled the sheet around his shoulders.

"I'll be watching some TV. Let me know if you need any…"

But he let his sentence trail off, because Starsky's soft snore told him he was already asleep.

xxxxxxxxx

Captain Dobey came from his office into the squad room, looking surprised when he saw Hutch pacing back and forth next to his and Starsky's desk, phone wedged under his chin and taking notes as he talked to the District Attorney.

Hutch hung up and jotted additional lines in the notebook.

Dobey poured himself a cup of coffee. "Want a cup?"

Hutch moved his head no as he continued to write.

"I'm not surprised to see you back here," Dobey told him, "but I am surprised at how soon."

Hutch continued to write without looking up. "I can't think of a better way to help Starsky than to get the guy who shot him down."

Dobey nodded and took a sip of coffee. "I assume a visiting nurse is helping him out."

"The best."

"Good. He'll need it."

Dobey went back inside his office, allowing Hutch to concentrate on the trial.

xxxxxxxx

Starsky's whisper rose to a yell.

"Hutch? Get down. You hurt? Okay? Get down! NOW!"

At Starsky's fitful nightmare, Randall jumped from the sofa where he was dozing with a late movie on, and rushed to the hospital bed.

Starsky was thrashing, pulling at the sheet that was twining around him, face perspiring, chest heaving.

"Dave!" he said taking his shoulders. "It's okay! Come on! You're just dreaming!"

Starsky struggled under his hands, trying to swipe at Randall, then his eyes snapped open to reveal a frightened blue.

"Easy now," Randall said holding Starsky's arms down on the bed. "You don't want to tear anything. Are you awake?"

Starsky's eyes moved above him, as if searching.

"I thought…" His eyes settled on Randall's kind brown eyes. "It was so real. I thought…it was happening again. I was in the garage, and they sh…they shot me. I don't…"

Randall's voice was low and steady. "Part of it could be the medication. It can do some pretty wild stuff."

"Yeah, I know, but…"

Randall slowly released his shoulders. "You're shaking."

Starsky half-laughed in an attempt to downplay his fear. "Oh man. I haven't had one like that since… the first night I came home."

Randall reached for a sponge, dipped it into a small plastic tub of water, and dabbed at his forehead and neck.

"It probably won't be the las-"

A small thud against the front door made Starsky clutch Randall's arm.

Starsky reached for the gun under his pillow, found nothing, but Randall was already moving to the door with his own pistol out.

Starsky's left hand gripped the safety rail of the hospital bed, unable to breathe.

Randall stood to the side of the door, readied his gun, and opened the door, filling the doorway and ready to shoot if necessary.

But then he said, "Just a dog," and closed the door again.

He put his pistol on the coffee table and went to the hospital bed.

Starsky looked frozen with fear.

"Are you sure?" he asked. "You saw the dog?"

"Collie. Of course I'm…"

He stopped, because Starsky was trying to turn onto his side, but had only the strength to turn his head to the wall.

Seeming to read his thoughts, Randall touched his shoulder. "Dave. It's understandable. You've been through something traumatic. I know you're a cop, and cops are supposed to be accustomed to anything the job has to offer. And I know you've had your share of close calls. But you're only human. It's okay to be on edge. That will ease up as you heal and get stronger. The fact that Ken isn't here, the one you always relied on, just intensifies things. But it will pass."

Starsky spoke in a near whisper, face still toward the wall.

"Damn it. I wet the bed."

He tried to force a fake laugh, but it sounded more like a sob.

"Don't be ashamed. I've seen it all, done it all. I'll have to move you, though."

Starsky nodded as Randall lowered the safety rail, expertly slid his arms under him, lifted him up, then moved him to the sofa and put him down.

"You'll have your bed back in no time," he assured as he went to the linen closet for fresh sheets.

Starsky lay with a hand partially hiding his eyes, pretending to watch the movie on TV.

When the bed was changed, Starsky lay mutely in it while Randall undressed him, gave him a sponge bath, then covered him with a clean sheet.

"Why did you move my gun?" Starsky asked him.

"Ken told me you had a couple of nightmares. I put it in the top of the linen closet because I didn't want you mistaking me for the subject of one of your dreams in the middle of the night. Since I have a gun myself, I didn't think you would mind. You're too weak to really use one effectively anyway." He softened his words with a smile. "We'll both be safer this way."

"You should've told me."

"Guess you're right. Sorry." Randall started for the linen closet. "If you really want it-"

"Hey, no. Forget it. Hutch could come in some night. I wouldn't want to…"

Randall walked back to the bed without the gun. "You have to trust me, Dave. Your safety, if not your very life, is in my hands. Hutch knows this."

Starsky closed his eyes. "Yeah. I was just…spooked. That's all."

Randall went to the rocking chair and sat down. "Do you need another pill?"

Starsky nodded, then took the pill and water he offered.

He seemed to calm somewhat as he settled his head back on the pillow.

"Glad you're here," he mumbled as his eyes blinked sleepily. "Thanks for… everything."

Randall reached through the safety rail and squeezed his hand. "That's my job, Dave.

Sleep well."

xxxxxxxxxxx

In the morning Starsky opened his eyes to see Randall carrying a breakfast tray over to him, complete with bacon and egg, coffee, toast, sliced orange, the morning paper, and a flower in a vase.

"Wow," Starsky said as Randall raised the hospital bed up so that Starsky was sitting up. "You treat all your patients this well?"

"No," Randall said as he set the breakfast tray down on the bed tray.

As Starsky picked up a fork, Randall went to the kitchen and carried back his own breakfast tray.

"Mind if I join you?"

"Please."

Randall sat down with his breakfast, and Starsky said, "About last night. I didn't…mean to leak all over the place."

Randall smiled. "I'm used to sharing a patient's most private and embarrassing moments. It's okay."

"I mean, I'm used to Hutch. You know? He's seen me at my lowest. I've puked on him, bled on him, cried on him…"

"I know. But hopefully you can let me share some of those low moments. I'm not your partner, and your situation has forced a closeness that you're a bit uncomfortable with, but I do hope that we become friends. I already feel like we're well on our way. Have you…"

A knock at the door made both of them look in that direction.

Randall went to the door and opened it, seeing Hutch standing there.

"How's our patient?" Hutch asked.

He attempted to move inside, but Randall blocked the doorway by filling it with his body.

"He had a bad night," the nurse said in a low voice. "But it passed. He's doing better this morning."

"Okay," Hutch smiled as he shouldered Randall aside and walked over to the hospital bed. "I'll just see for myself."

Randall watched as they conversed in low, confidential tones, the easy way they had with each other, the calm look in Starsky's eyes in the presence of his partner, Hutch's protective hand on the top of his head; and then Hutch walked back to the door.

"Thanks," he said with a pat to Randall's arm, then moved on out.

Randall made sure the door was locked, then walked back over to Starsky.

"Dave," he said as he opened the prescription bottle to give Starsky his morning pill, "I meant what I said about wanting us to be friends."

"Sure," Starsky said as he took the medicine.

Randall smiled. "He's rather possessive of you, isn't he?"

"Hutch? Protective maybe. I wouldn't say possessive. If you knew what we've been through, you'd understand."

"Actually, I think I do understand."

Starsky almost laughed. "I doubt it."

"I'm a nurse, remember? I have access to your medical records, and Hutch's. I know that a mobster shot you, I know that you were poisoned by a college professor, I know that you were abducted and tortured by a cult leader named Simon Marcus. As for Hutch, I know that he was knifed by a crazy lady, trapped under his automobile, and suffered through a deadly virus."

Starsky held his hand up, trying to blot out the memory of watching Hutch gasp for life behind the hospital glass. That someone he barely knew could know that much information about the most desperate and intimate times of his and his partner's life made him feel exposed and raw.

Sensing Starsky's discomfort, Randall said, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to open old wounds. I was just trying to make a connection."

Starsky forced a smile. Although his nurse had spied into his and Hutch's medical records, there were personal moments he didn't know, or would never know, about he and his partner. The way Hutch risked his life to get to his side in the restaurant, then tended to his wounds. The way Hutch had caught him and held him when he collapsed from the poison pushing through his bloodstream. The way Hutch had sacrificed his own safety and suffered his own nightmares rescuing him from Simon Marcus. And those

moments would remain tucked away inside of his heart for the rest of his life, never to see the inside of a hospital record.

"Don't sweat it, Randall. It's okay."

xxxxxxxx

"How's Starsk?" Huggy asked when Hutch came into the restaurant for lunch. "I stopped by yesterday but the nurse dude said he was asleep, so I didn't bother him."

"Randall is spoiling him," Hutch said taking a stool. "Home-cooked meals. Any magazine he wants. Monopoly three times a day."

"How's Gunther's case going?"

"So far so good, but only because we're crossing every T and dotting every I. I have to be at the D.A.'s office at 1 today, so make sure I'm out of here in time."

"Will do."

xxxxxxxxxxx

Hutch knocked on Starsky's door and waited. A few moments later Randall opened the door and looked at him.

"You know what time it is, Hutch?"

"Almost midnight, but I couldn't get away from the police station until now. How's Starsk?"

"Sleeping like a baby right now. It would be a shame to wake him up. He had another nightmare last night, so he's really exhausted."

"Okay. Well. I won't wake him then. But if there's ever a time when nothing seems to settle him, or if he needs me, you call me, will you?"

"Of course."

xxxxxxxxxxx

Randall had been with Starsky two weeks.

"This is where the fun starts," Randall said as he lowered the safety rail of the hospital bed. "We'll take it slow."

He put an arm behind Starsky and helped him sit upright, then assisted him in moving his legs off the side of the bed.

"We'll take a trip across the room and soak in the sunshine at the window," Randall said as he put his hands under Starsky's arms to help him stand.

"Sounds good."

Starsky stood in nothing but gym shorts, looking too lean and pale against Randall's robust frame.

"Come on," the nurse urged in a soothing voice. "You can do it."

Starsky held his breath, muscles trembling as he took a step forward.

"Lean on me, Dave. I got you."

Starsky did hold onto his arm, but tried his best to move without leaning on him. He wanted so much to have his body the way it was before. He was tired of the pain and the weakness, but knew he had to work to make any progress.

Gunther, you really know how to sock it to somebody.

Starsky stopped in a sudden and unexpected moment of weakness, head down. He expected to have the physical pain. That came with the bullet holes. But he didn't expect the abrupt wave of emotion that left him feeling vulnerable and childlike at times.

Randall dipped his head to look at his face. He saw tears in Starsky's eyes, and gently patted his face.

"Hey," he said softly, "what's up?"

"Son of a-," Starsky choked in a whisper. "He took a lot from me. I gotta get back to the bed."

He started to move away, as if he had forgotten that he was so weak he would probably collapse without Randall's support.

But Randall put an arm around him and held him steady. "No. Let's finish our trip."

Without a reply, Starsky resumed his short but painful and exhausting walk to the window, muscles trembling with fatigue.

"Lean on me," Randall instructed as they reached the window, and Starsky found himself doing just that, out of necessity.

"Weaker than I thought," he said with a small pant.

But he had accomplished his task, and stood at the window, allowing the sun to nourish him.

"Don't worry," Randall told him. "I'll take care of you."

He helped Starsky turn, and then helped him move back toward the bed again.

"You're doing great, Dave."

"Oh yeah," Starsky mumbled with his head down. "Piece of cake."

They continued across the floor, Randall pulling him tighter to his side.

"It's Hutch, isn't it?"

Starsky squinted at him, as if he had misunderstood him, trying to comprehend.

"Huh?"

"Why you won't…pay any attention to me."

Confused, Starsky shook his head as if to clear it, swaying, not liking what he was hearing, almost believing that he was hallucinating or dreaming.

"Help me understand, Dave. I take care of you, I protect you. I'm here every day and every night. I give one hundred percent, if not more. And all I want from you…all I'd like from you…is a little appreciation."

Realizing that he was weaker than he should have been, groggier than he should have been, realizing that Randall had drugged him sometime that morning…

"Wait. I do apprecia…but I don't…"

"I could love you, Dave, but he's between the two of us."

"No, you're mistak…I'm not…"

"You'll see," Randall said as he sat him on the bed and pushed him back onto the pillow. "You'll see how easy it will be for us."

Randall prepared an injection, and Starsky reached for his arm in protest, trying to push it away.

"Wait," he whispered weakly. "Let's talk. I didn't know you were…I didn't know you felt that way about…"

"I'll be right back, Dave, and then we'll talk. But I don't want you interfering."

Starsky tried to lift his head and push the needle away, but Randall had made sure he would be too weak to resist.

Randall held his arm down, then slid the needle in.

"I don't want to hurt you, Dave. I just want to care about you."

When Starsky was glassy-eyed and his feeble protest stopped, Randall left the house, locking the door as he did so.

As Starsky's mind spiraled down through a long funnel of dizziness, he groped for the railing of the hospital bed, forced himself to tumble out of it, and crawled toward the phone on the coffee table, blinking to clear his double vision, fighting to stay conscious.

xxxxxxxxxx

Hutch's phone was ringing when he arrived home from the police station, and he answered on the fourth ring.

"Hutchinson here."

It was the District Attorney, asking if he could meet him at his office that evening.

"Uh, sure," Hutch told him. "Just let me grab a shower and a bite to eat. I'll be right down."

Hutch hung up, sorted through his mail, then went to the bathroom for a quick shower, pulling off his shirt and raking the shower curtain back.

Randall raised a butcher knife and lunged at him from the bathtub.

Hutch grabbed Randall's knife arm with both hands and tried to keep it high and away, but Randall had surprise, height, and strength on his side. He forced Hutch backward and out of the bathroom.

Hutch's phone rang again, but it was ignored as he used Randall's momentum against him and jerked him down, and at the same time rammed his knee up into his solar plexus.

Randall dropped heavily, stunned and unable to breathe as Hutch grabbed his handcuffs

and locked the man's wrists behind his back.

He grabbed his gun from his closet and held it on Randall, then backed toward the ringing phone.

"Hello?" he panted into the receiver.

But there was no sound on the line.

"Hello?"

And then came Starsky's small, faint whisper.

"Hutch. Randall's comin'."

Still panting, Hutch said, "Starsk. I'm coming. I'll be right there."

xxxxxxxxxx

Hutch found him lying on his side between the sofa and coffee table.

"Ambulance is coming," Hutch said as he touched the side of Starsky's head.

But all Starsky could do was offer a small moan.

xxxxxxxxxx

"You sure know how to pick 'em, Hutch," Huggy said as he put flowers into the vase on Starsky's hospital dresser.

Hutch lay exhausted and glum in the chair next to Starsky's bed.

"Not Hutch's fault I'm irresistible," Starsky smiled groggily from the bed.

"That's not funny," Hutch said as he glowered at his partner.

"Yes it is," Starsky said. "It's not that he's gay. It's the way he went about it. I like a more direct approach: 'Hey, I'm gay. You wanna go out?' 'No thanks, I'm straight.' What could be simpler than that?"

"Unfortunately," Hutch said, "unstable gay guy wasn't on his resume."

"Now who's gonna watch me?" Starsky asked.

"The person Hutch should've interviewed in the first place," Huggy replied. "Me."

The End

Mr. H

Hutch leaned quietly and listlessly against the wall while Ben Forest was being booked. Starsky noted the way the two stared at each other, as if Forest was on the verge of saying something, and Hutch was on the verge of lunging, or bolting.

When the booking was finished and Forest was escorted away, Hutch walked down the hall toward the elevator. "Let's get started on that report, huh?"

Starsky followed him, taking his arm before he stepped inside.

"Since when are you so anxious to get started on paperwork?"

Hutch held his hand out to hold the elevator door. "Since I want to make sure he stays where we put him."

Hutch stepped inside the elevator, and Starsky followed, not wanting to let Hutch out of his sight, even to do something as simple as paperwork. Hutch wanted to be strong, but he also looked as though he might collapse.

xxxxxx

Starsky watched over the top of a case file as his partner struggled with the forms in front of him. Hutch leaned heavily on his left elbow as if he could fall asleep or slip out of his chair at any moment, forehead resting in his hand, shading his eyes against the office light.

"Let me help you with that," Starsky said taking the forms and the pen.

Hutch closed his eyes.

"I think you need a couple of days," Starsky told him. "The report can wait."

Hutch said nothing. His eyes rolled sleepily as he pulled his jacket closer around himself against a chill.

"I'm fine."

"You don't look it."

Fellow officers glanced at Hutch, but no one said anything.

Starsky believed his partner was forcing himself back to normalcy to shed the helplessness and weakness that his kidnapping had caused. He wanted to be proud again. Invincible again.

"I don't blame you for wanting to put some distance between yourself and Forest," Starsky said quietly. "But you don't have anything to prove. Not to me, and not to-"

Hutch banged the palm of his hand down onto the desk without raising his eyes or moving the hand that shaded his eyes.

The door to Captain Dobey's office opened and he stepped out, shooting a look of concern in Hutch's direction, which Hutch didn't see, but Starsky did.

"Hutch, take the rest of the day off."

Hutch looked up at him. "What?"

"Tomorrow too."

"Now wait a min-"

"That's an order."

The conversation was bringing Hutch unwanted attention from the other officers.

"Okay," Hutch agreed reluctantly, just to stop the conversation. "I'm off the clock. I'll just sit here."

Dobey looked at Starsky for help, but he could only offer a glare in his partner's direction.

Frustrated, Starsky rose from his chair and went to the coffeepot. Dobey threw up his hands and walked back inside his office.

"Want some coffee?" Starsky asked his partner as he poured himself a cup.

Hutch spoke without looking up. He was again gazing at his desktop with tired, shadowed eyes.

"Are you kidding me? I've had enough coffee to last a lifetime."

Starsky took a sip, then looked up to see a tall man with graying blond hair and Hutch's blue eyes walking into the squad room. He wore an expensive suit under an overcoat, and nice polished shoes.

"Ken?" he asked as he walked over to the desk where he sat.

Hutch looked up at the man, then pushed himself up from the desk and stumbled past him, hurrying to get into the hallway.

"Kenneth?"

The man followed him, but Starsky took his arm in the hallway, both of them watching as Hutch made his way away from them toward the elevator.

"Remove your hand," the man said as he jerked his arm from Starsky's grip and glared at him. "Being a police officer doesn't give you the right to put your hands on me."

"Being Hutch's friend does give me the right. He obviously doesn't want to talk to you right now."

"He looks sick. Is he all right?"

The concerned look in the man's eyes made Starsky lighten up.

"He'll be all right."

"I'm-"

"I know who you are. His father. Gregory."

"And I know who you are. I'm in town on business, so I thought I'd drop in and see him."

"I think it would be best to give him his space right now. We've been working on a really tough case."

"Who are you to try to tell me when I can-"

"Being a judge doesn't give you the right to barge into his place of work unannounced."

Gregory studied him.

"I know you. Your kind. Street punk made good. No father. You always felt inadequate, so to measure up, to get respect, to compensate, you become a cop. What else could you be? The badge chose you. My son has always been sensitive and sympathetic to the underprivileged. Always taking in stray puppies. I guess he hit the jackpot when he met you. Unlike you, he could have been anything in the world. He had every advantage, every opportunity. But he wanted to 'make a difference, and help people.' He could have been a lawyer, a doctor, but he lowered himself and chose the badge. Did you hear what I said? He chose it. It didn't choose him."

Starsky opened his mouth as if to say something, but closed it.

"What?" Gregory asked. "You want to take the high ground and not lower yourself to fight with me because you know it will prove you're a street punk after all."

"I don't know much about you, Gregory, but I do know that he deserves better than you. I don't know how he turned out so…good…with someone like you for a father."

Starsky didn't wait for a retort. He walked down the hall and took the stairs instead of the elevator.

He thought Hutch would be waiting for him at the front desk, but he wasn't there. And he also thought that he might be waiting for him in the Torino, but he wasn't there either. So he drove to Hutch's cottage, finding his car, but not his partner. He drove around the neighborhood looking for him, but after two hours with no luck, went to Huggy's for a drink and some help in locating him.

xxxxxxxxxx

"You know Hutch," Huggy said setting a beer on the counter in front of Starsky. "He doesn't want his old man to see him looking like a ghoul from the late night picture show."

"Yeah, I know, but I don't like the idea of him being out there alone. He's not strong enough yet."

"Maybe he needs some time by himself. He's a little messed up right now."

xxxxxxx

Hutch emerged from his shower, dressed in pale blue jeans, white T-shirt, and dark blue hooded running jacket that he zipped up to his chest.

He was about to leave the cottage when a knock came at the door. Peeking through the folds of the sheer curtain, he saw his father standing on the porch, and walked hurriedly out the back way, pulling his hood up over his head.

xxxxxx

Gregory drove his rental car slowly beside the man wearing the jeans, white sneakers, and dark running jacket with the hood pulled up.

Gregory blew the horn, Hutch glanced around, then kept walking, hands in his pockets.

Gregory stopped the car along the curb, got out, and started following him down the

sidewalk.

"Ken, why won't you talk to me? I came all the way from Minnesota to-"

"It has to be business," Hutch said quietly, without stopping or looking over his shoulder. "You never come to California just to see me."

"Something's wrong. I know we don't see things the same way, but I want to talk to you. You don't look well. Are you sick? Have you been to the doctor? Your partner's vagueness has me concerned. Your captain was evasive too. And I refuse to go talk to your informant. I want to get a good look at you, now stop this nonsense and talk to me."

Hutch kept walking, ducking his head inside his hood. "I'm fine. It's just a case."

"You have to take care of yourself. What kind of hours do you keep? Are you eating right? Do you sleep well? You need a good wife to take care of you. Why aren't you married again?"

Hutch stopped and turned around. "Aren't two failed marriages enough?"

The judge took the opportunity to study his son's face. "You look like hell," he said quietly. "What happened to you? You look like you've been worked over."

"No kidding," Hutch said as he turned around and started walking again, but this time it was a weak shuffle. His body was losing stamina again.

Gregory saw the way his shoulders dropped, the heavy way his legs moved, the way his head bobbed. Finally Hutch had to stop and lean his shoulder against the corner of a building. "You've heard of hazardous duty," he snorted softly with his head down. "This is it."

"Ken," Gregory said taking his arm. "I'm worried about you. Please tell me what happened. If you don't, you know I can find out, and you may not like the way I go about it."

Hutch hesitated, started to walk away again, but decided he was too tired to put out the effort, and pulled his jacket sleeve up, displaying the track marks on his arm.

"Do you know what that is?"

Gregory stared at the injection sites, then raised confused eyes to his son.

"I was seeing a girl that I helped get away from a mob boss. He wanted her back, and this is how he found out where I hid her out."

"He got you addicted, and then he withheld it so you would tell him? Is that what you mean?"

Hutch nodded.

"But you can't tell anyone. It would jeopardize my job."

"Oh yes," Gregory said icily. "Your noble career. The one that appears to be killing you. Do you really think I'm going to stand by and-"

Hutch grabbed the front of his overcoat, pleading. "Yes. You are going to stand by, and you aren't going to say a word, and you're going to forget I ever told you."

"This job of yours means this much to you? That you can take a beating, take an addiction, and come back for more?"

"It's not what I do. It's what I am. It's in my blood. You know how it is. I know you love your work. You and I. We can't wait to get up in the morning and go out and DO something meaningful. I respect you, Dad. I just wish…"

Gregory clasped his hand over Hutch's fist, which was still clinging to the lapels of his overcoat.

"Wish what?"

Hutch looked down. "Nothing."

Gregory pulled his son's exhausted body against him. "You're trembling. You're not over the drug, are you?"

"Almost. I'll be all right."

"Do you still want it?"

"Yes. But that doesn't mean I'm going to take it. It just means I have to resist it like I've been doing."

"Let me take you back to Minnesota, to rest, gather yourself. Maybe you'll rethink your life and what you want to do with it."

"Dad, no. I've chosen my life, and it is what it is. I wouldn't have it any other way. What if I told you that you couldn't sit on the bench again because some ex-con that you put away hurt you or threatened you? Would you quit?"

"No," Gregory answered sadly. "I wouldn't."

Hutch rubbed the back of his own neck. "I didn't want you to see me like this. I didn't want to have to explain. That's why I took off."

"I know."

Gregory put his arm around Hutch and walked him back to his car.

"Come on. I'll give you a ride home."

xxxxxxx

Starsky was sitting on the porch of Hutch's cottage when Gregory parked his car behind the Torino.

Gregory got out of the car, then Hutch did, and Starsky walked over to him.

"You okay, Hutch? I was wor-"

Gregory punched him in the face, knocking him to the ground.

"Where were you when they were drugging my son and beating him half to death?"

Starsky turned onto his side, thumb to the corner of his bleeding mouth.

Gregory reached down to grab him up, but Hutch pushed him aside and pulled Starsky to his feet.

"Dad, stop it. Starsky's the one who helped me."

Gregory's chest was heaving with fury as he pointed an accusing finger at Starsky. "What kind of a partner are you anyway? You said you were his friend."

Hutch looked torn between the two of them. Starsky moved past his partner and squeezed his arm.

"Catch you later, buddy," he said on his way to the Torino.

After he left, Hutch looked at his father. "You don't understand."

"I understand that he should have known where you were, that he should have figured it out a lot soon-"

"If you want to blame someone, blame me. It was me that should have told Starsky what was going on, but I didn't. I wanted to handle it myself and keep him out of it."

Gregory put a hand on his shoulder. "You can insist on having him around, but don't expect me to like him. I'm going home."

Hutch watched as his father got into his car and drove away.

Suddenly feeling faded and weary, he trudged toward the cottage and went inside, locking the door and crawling into bed, nearly collapsing facedown onto the pillow in fatigue.

xxxxxxxxx

"Sure, baby. Come on, baby. We'll get out of here. I got more where that came from. You think you're bad now, sucker? Where's Jeanie? Where is she?"

Hutch groped the air above him, panting, sweating, eyes wild, voice a trembling whisper as he talked in his sleep.

Starsky sat on the edge of the bed and clutched his hand, rubbing his back with the other. "Hey," he said softly. "Come on, buddy. Wake up. You're all right."

But Hutch was still lost in his dream.

"I need some help. Give me some help. Get out of here and leave me alone. Wait. Don't go. Don't leave me."

Starsky crouched next to the bed, hand on Hutch's head, thumb stroking his cheekbone. "Hutch, it's me. Look at me. It's just a dream."

Hutch blinked his wet eyes, body heaving with sobs as he reached for his partner.

Starsky pulled him up into his arms, patting his back. "Easy, boy."

"I begged him," Hutch cried as he clung to his partner.

Starsky's eyes closed in love and rage. "You had to," he whispered. He pushed Hutch back a little. "Look at me."

Hutch raised his wet eyes.

"Did you hear me?" Starsky asked. "You had to."

Hutch nodded. "But it doesn't matter," he said, trying to sound strong and confident. "Because we won."

"You bet we did," Starsky answered, and sat with Hutch until he was calm again,

wondering how long it would be before both of them really felt the truth of their words.

The End

Misconception

Hutch parked in front of Starsky's house, got out of his car, and went to the trunk to open it, where he lifted out one big suitcase and three smaller duffel bags of his stuff. Since he had decided to stay with Starsky while he recuperated from Gunther's hit, he realized it was easier moving his stuff in rather than going back and forth to his apartment every few days or so. And, he really didn't like leaving Starsky alone, even for the short while it took to drive to his place for belongings. His partner's spirits were high, but his body was far from catching up. A visiting nurse dropped by every few days, but he needed someone to help him at night. Plenty of people volunteered to do it. Edith Dobey, Huggy, Kiko and his mother. But Hutch said no one else would do.

Hutch refused to say it out loud, but the truth was, he was afraid that something else would happen to Starsky, and he wanted to be there to prevent it. Yes, it was a little irrational. Gunther was incarcerated. But what if he ordered another hit from his jail cell? What if one of his loyal employees decided to impress him? They had had close calls before, but this was the closest Hutch ever came to losing his partner forever.

"…like you're moving in!" a voice called from across the street.

Hutch stood with his bags on the sidewalk, hand still up on the open trunk, lost in thought.

He looked across the street to see Starsky's neighbor getting the morning paper.

He forced a smile, telling himself to think positively, that Starsky didn't need him dwelling on what ifs. He was alive, was a fighter, and he would recover.

"I am," Hutch said closing the trunk. "David needs a babysitter. Guess that makes me your new neighbor."

Hutch crossed the street with his hand out. "Ken Hutchinson."

"Larry Wright. I've seen you around here before."

The man didn't take his hand.

Hutch took his hand back with a faint look of puzzlement, then shrugged. "I'm sure you have."

He turned and crossed the street again, picking up his bags and carrying them to Starsky's house.

xxxxxxxxxx

"Nice neighbor," Hutch said to Starsky as he carried his bags inside the house and set them down.

Starsky was watching TV from the hospital bed in his living room.

He looked pale and tired, but even the medication didn't dull the sparkle in his eyes. "Which one?"

"The one directly across the street. Harry Wright."

"Larry. He's a lieutenant."

"Army?"

"Police. Retired. He's sorta grumpy. His wife died a few years ago."

Hutch looked at the gangster film that was playing on the TV.

"What are you watching?"

"I don't know."

"What do you mean, you don't know?"

Starsky offered a small shrug. "I try to follow it, but it's kinda fuzzy, you know?"

Hutch walked over to the hospital bed. "It's the painkillers, dirtball. Don't worry about following anything. You've got a lot of healing to do. You should be resting."

"I am resting. I'm tired of resting. I want to get up and run a marathon."

Hutch smiled. "I know you do, but you can't right now."

Starsky's eyes blinked heavily from painkillers. "Tomorrow, huh?" he said as his eyes finally closed.

Hutch smiled and took the remote control from his sleeping hand.

xxxxxxx

When the nurse arrived in the afternoon, Hutch decided to go to the library for Starsky.

Two blocks down he looked in the rearview mirror, realizing that the car behind him was following unusually close.

He made a right, then a left, and the car was still behind him.

Slamming on the brakes, he jumped out of his car and pulled his gun as he walked to the car behind him.

Larry Wright smiled as he rolled his window down. "Jumping at shadows, aren't you, Ken?" he asked as he raised his hands in the air. "Am I under arrest?"

"Are you following me?"

"No. I'm on my way to the grocery store, if that's all right with you."

Hutch studied him a moment, let out a big sigh, then put his gun away.

"Sorry about that."

Larry put his hands on the steering wheel. "I was a cop, remember? I heard what happened to Dave. But you know, once you're as spooked as badly as you are, it's almost impossible to rebound. You'll always pull your gun too fast, be too suspicious, be overly cautious, second guess yourself. How will that work with you and Dave on the streets? How you going to protect him properly?"

Hutch didn't answer, but he was sure that Larry hadn't missed the perspiration on his upper lip or the uncertain look in his eyes.

"Drive carefully," Larry said as Hutch walked back to his car.

xxxxxxxx

The nurse was gone when Hutch arrived back home with a few library books, and Hutch found Starsky trying to get out of the bed.

"Whoa, whoa," Hutch said as he ran to the bed and took his shoulders, easing him back onto the propped pillows. "Where do you think you're going?"

"I heard-"

He couldn't finish. Hutch saw the look of pain in his eyes, felt his tense muscles under his hands. He took a damp cloth and blotted his partner's perspiring face.

"Heard what?" Hutch asked.

The effort of trying to get out of bed was too taxing. He winced and held his side. "A gunshot. I tried to get to my gun, but…"

"I think you were dreaming. I didn't hear anything."

"It was a few minutes ago."

"Inside the house?"

Starsky closed his eyes. "Outside."

Hutch went outside and looked around, then went back inside.

"Everything looks okay. Maybe it was a blowout."

"I want my gun."

"Starsk…"

Starsky fought to keep his exhausted eyes from closing. "I'm scared, Hutch."

Hutch stared at him, the 3 words calling up a memory of another time when Starsky was lost and fearful, dying from the poison injected by Vic Bellamy.

"Oh buddy," Hutch said quietly as he walked over to him, placing a hand on his forehead. "Nothing is going to happen. Gunther's locked up. I'm here. You-"

"I want my gun."

"I don't think-"

Starsky gripped his sleeve. "You're not the one lying here in this bed, unable to move, get up, defend yourself. You can't always be here, Hutch. When you are, fine. I know you'd stand in front of a bullet for me. But when you're gone, I've got to be able to do something."

Starsky still gripped his sleeve.

"Okay," Hutch said softly as he carefully pried his fingers from the material of his shirt.

He went to the bedroom closet and came back with the gun.

"Is it loaded?" Starsky asked.

"I made sure," Hutch answered as he put the gun under his pillow. He shook his head and patted Starsky's head. "You're going to scare the tooth fairy to death."

Starsky smiled as his eyes closed and he drifted off to sleep.

Hutch put the library books on the table next to the bed.

We're both jumping at shadows, buddy.

A knock came at the door.

Hutch opened it and saw Larry Wright standing in the doorway.

"Can I help you?" Hutch asked.

"I came to see if Dave was all right. I heard a noise. Sounded like a gunshot, or a backfire or something."

"He heard it too. He's all right."

"We've got some new teenagers moved in down the street. They've been prowling around at night. I thought I'd let you know."

The man turned to leave.

"Okay. Um… Mr. Wright…"

Wright turned back. "Yes?"

"Thanks, huh?"

Wright replied without smiling. "How long are you staying?"

"Excuse me?"

"It's not often we see…your kind…in the neighborhood. At least, not openly."

"What?"

Wright did smile this time. "Sometimes it's better to leave it in the closet." Hutch laughed a little. "Now wait a minute."

"Don't expect everyone here to be so accepting."

Wright continued down the steps, then crossed the street to go into his home.

"Great," Hutch muttered, and slammed the door.

xxxxxxxx

It was around two a.m. that Hutch heard the shattering of the living room window, and ran from the bedroom in boxers and a T-shirt, gun in hand.

Starsky was propped up on his elbow, aiming his gun at the broken window with a wavering arm.

Hutch took a quick glance around, saw the brick on the floor, then ran to the door and outside to see if he could catch sight of the culprit. But the street was quiet.

"Just a brick," he said as he went back inside and closed the door. He walked over to the hospital bed and put his gun on the table. "Kids."

Starsky lay with his own gun clasped against his heaving chest.

"I thought-"

Hutch gently took the gun and slid it back under his pillow.

"Guess Larry was right."

"About what?"

"Your neighborhood isn't friendly toward gays."

Starsky squinted at him. "Huh?"

"Larry thinks we're gay."

This brought a chuckle from Starsky.

Hutch put his hand over Starsky's heart. "Your heart is pounding like a racehorse."

Starsky swiped the back of his wrist across his perspiring brow. "Ah, love."

Hutch shook his head and went to the sofa to sit down, taking his gun with him. He didn't think there would be anymore bricks tonight, but he didn't want to take any chances either.

His presence in the room seemed to calm Starsky quickly, so much that he was asleep before Hutch could say, "I'll have somebody come and repair the window tomorrow."

xxxxxxxxx

At around 4 a.m. Hutch heard his partner repeating his name over and over, and squinted at him in the low light of the lamp.

"I gotta take a leak," he said almost apologetically.

Hutch pushed himself off the sofa and went over to him, lowering the safety rail and helping him to sit up, then stand up.

"Okay?" he asked sleepily.

Starsky nodded, and Hutch helped him walk slowly and stiffly to the bathroom, then turned the light on for him, then held him upright as he relieved himself.

"You know you're on the mend," Starsky mumbled sleepily, "when you don't have to pee in a plastic jug anymore."

He stepped back and Hutch helped him make his slow, careful way back to the hospital bed.

"You're getting stronger every day," Hutch told him.

"Sure. I can hold my gun now. If only-"

He stopped walking, and Hutch stopped with him.

"What is it?" Hutch asked him.

"I know I'll get stronger. Wounds heal. But this time…"

Hutch had an arm around him, and squeezed his arm.

"Tell me."

"I look like I've been through a meat grinder."

"Starsk…"

"I look like a meatloaf."

"Buddy…"

"It's not an ego thing, you know? How many women you think will be turned on when they get a good look at me? Real romantic, huh? What do I look like?"

"You look like a man who's been shot multiple times and is living to tell the tale. I know it looks bad right now, but that will improve, and I don't think it's as bad as you think it is."

Hutch had been with him every day since he'd been shot, and he had never once expressed anything even approaching self-pity. But maybe it wasn't self-pity as much as pure realism. Whatever the reason for his moment of dark honesty, Hutch felt as though his partner was entitled to it. He had certainly earned it.

It's normal, Starsk. It's okay to feel this way, but God, I wish I could take it away.

"I'll hold you to that," Starsky said as Hutch helped him sit on the hospital bed, and then leaned him back against the pillows. Starsky turned his head toward the wall and pretended to sleep, but Hutch saw the wetness beneath his eyelashes, the way his chest moved with a single silent sob, and it was times like this that Hutch wished he had been shot instead of his partner, that he had blown Gunther's head off instead of just arresting him.

xxxxxxxxx

The next day Starsky was dozing, a library book open across his chest while his window was being replaced.

Hutch sat halfway down the steps outside, turned sideways so that he could watch the activity.

"Hello, Ken."

Hutch looked down the steps to see Larry Wright standing at the bottom.

"Larry."

"Noticed that they were replacing the window."

"Someone threw a brick. Did you see or hear anything?"

"What time was it?"

"About two a.m."

"I'm afraid I was sound asleep. I told you about those teenagers."

"Do you know their names?"

"No."

"Do you know which house or houses they live in?"

"No."

"What do they look like?"

"I don't know. They're just kids. I chased them out of my yard after they set off some firecrackers one night."

"Why did they pick on you? Are you gay?"

"Excuse me?"

"Just kidding."

Hutch stood up and started to climb the stairs.

"Say, Ken?"

Hutch turned on the top step and looked down. "Yes?"

"If you ever need a break, someone to come over and keep an eye on Dave while you run an errand, just let me know."

Hutch smiled a little. "Thanks. I may do that."

xxxxxxxxxxxx

Starsky stirred awake and reached for the remote control to the bed, elevating himself to a sitting position.

Hutch carried a lunch tray over and set it down.

"What's for lunch?" Starsky asked.

"BLT. Chocolate health shake full of vitamins that I put through the blender myself. And blueberry muffins."

"You're gonna spoil me," he said as he watched Hutch cut the sandwich diagonally. "Did you find out who threw the brick?"

"Not yet, but I plan to launch a full investigation into the matter."

Starsky smiled.

"I'm going to move you into the bedroom."

"I thought you said we weren't gay."

"And I'll move out here to the living room."

"I don't want to be packed away in a back room like some crazy old grandma."

"It's not a back room, it's the bedroom. And you'll be safer."

"Gee, thanks for asking for my input first."

"Your safety isn't open to negotiation. You have your gun."

"I need sunshine. Socialization. Stimulation. I want to be where the traffic is."

"I'll make sure you have that. Starting today."

"How's that?"

"Huggy's bringing a wheelchair. Would you like to go outside? I called the nurse, and she said you could go if you want to."

"Are you kidding me? I'll race you down the stairs."

xxxxxxx

Hutch and Huggy took their time carrying Starsky down the stairs to the waiting wheelchair.

"Where you want to go first?" Huggy asked as they lowered him into it.

Starsky smiled. "I don't care, as long as it's out of that bed."

"I think we should take it easy our first time," Hutch said. "Down the street and back will do for today."

Starsky tilted his head back to catch the sun as Huggy slowly pushed him down the sidewalk, giving Hutch a little while to rest.

It was Saturday, so they passed a few neighbors who were walking their dogs, washing their cars, and a few teenagers riding skateboards.

"Wonder if those are our wayward teenagers," Hutch said.

"Forget it," Starsky said. "I just want to enjoy my day without having to interrogate anyone."

xxxxxxxxxx

When Hutch walked into the squad room Monday morning, Captain Dobey motioned for him to come into his office.

"I really need to get on that report, Cap, can it wait until…"

"Now."

Hutch nodded and stepped into Dobey's office.

"What is it?"

"I know how hard you've been working on the Gunther case, and taking care of things with Starsky, and somehow, like always, you stay on top of it all. Don't think it's gone unnoticed, by me or the city."

"Why the love fest?"

"I just want you to…lighten up a bit. Take it easy. Gunther's going down, Starsky's on the mend."

"Well, if you're in a generous mood, some extra leave would be nice."

"Don't go overboard. That's not what I mean. The commissioner and the mayor want to hold a special ceremony for bringing Gunther down. A couple of plaques to give out, a nice reception, good PR for the department. I know you don't care for that sort of thing, but…"

"You're right, I don't. But do it for Starsk. He made the sacrifice. I just did the legwork. Once he's on his feet, I'm sure he'll be there with bells on…"

"It's a date then."

Hutch went back out into the squad room, where he saw 4 teenagers standing around his desk.

"Can I help you?"

"Uh, yeah," one of them said a bit nervously, "we want to talk to you."

xxxxxxxxx

After Hutch left the station that evening, he stopped by Huggy's to pick up both a pizza, and Huggy, to take to Starsky's, and when they got to his house, saw that that the nurse's station wagon wasn't parked along the curb as usual.

"Hey, Starsk!" he called going into the house and taking the pizza to the kitchen table, "where's the nurse?"

He and Huggy walked to the bedroom and saw that Starsky was lying halfway out of the hospital bed, bleeding from a cut on his lower lip and the corner of his eye. His gun lay loosely in his hand, and on the bare forearm that dangled toward the floor was a single word written crudely with his own blood:

Fag.

"Starsk!"

Hutch and Huggy ran to him, lifting him gently back onto the bed.

"I'm okay," Starsky mumbled.

"No, you're not," Hutch said. "Where the hell is that nurse?"

Starsky's small delirious chuckle turned into a groan. "Hutch, we gotta stop meeting like this."

"Hug, call an ambulance."

Huggy reached for the phone on the bedside table.

Starsky groan became a whimper as Hutch examined the cuts and checked the bandages on his chest. "Easy, Starsk. I don't think anything tore open."

Huggy frowned as he took a sponge and cleaned the blood from Starsky's arm. "Who you dealin' with now, Hutch?"

Hutch carefully took Starsky's gun, saw that it hadn't been fired, and put it on the table.

"Go to the hospital with him," he told Huggy. "I'll catch up with you later."

Huggy nodded as he watched Hutch stalk from the bedroom. He heard the front door slam shut as he left, then shook his head and moved his hand in front of Starsky's dazed eyes.

"You seein' me, man?"

Starsky answered by gripping his wrist.

Huggy gave his shoulder a sympathetic pat. "I know you and Hutch got 9 lives, but I think you're about up to 8 now."

xxxxxxxxxxx

Hutch knocked on Larry Wright's door and waited.

When he finally answered, the first thing Hutch did was glance down at the police ring the department had given to him upon retirement. He grabbed Wright's wrist and jerked his hand up.

"Your ring still has my partner's blood on it."

"I tried to warn you about fags, Hutch. You keep coming back."

"You know, you're right. I do love him, but not the way you think. It takes a really big man to hurt somebody in a hospital bed."

"He had a gun. He hesitated."

"Yes, because he didn't want to shoot his neighbor. He liked you. Felt sorry for you."

"He won't press charges. And you won't arrest me. A little too embarrassing, right? He came onto me. I saw the nurse leave early, so I did the neighborly thing and went to sit with him. He started talking all faggy and all, and I can't tell you how offended I was.

Me, the highly decorated, spotless record, well-respected retired police lieutenant. When he reached for his gun, I over-reacted, but a lot of people would do what I did if they were accosted in that manner. I had to disarm him and-"

Hutch punched him, and the man reeled back inside of his house, careening backward and crashing through the coffee table as he landed on it.

"And I don't guess you'll report this," Hutch said as he walked over and punched him again. He jerked Wright up by the front of his shirt. "I had 4 young visitors at the precinct today, and they told me quite a story, which I will use to make you leave town. You got that? If you're not out of here by tomorrow evening, I'm going to arrest you for contributing to the delinquency of a minor. Four minors to be exact. Alcohol, weed, porn. A little too embarrassing, hm?"

"You should have seen him, trying to reach for the phone. Real-"

Hutch punched him a third time, a fourth time, and then, like a machine, a fifth, sixth, and seventh time.

Huggy burst in and pulled him off of the man.

"Hutch, cool it! You're killin' him!"

He had to physically pull Hutch away from the bleeding, groaning man.

Panting and sweating, Hutch stared at Wright as if he could attack again, but Huggy jerked him around.

"Stop," Huggy said quietly as he gripped Hutch's shoulders, trying to squeeze reality and humanity back into his friend. "You're not him."

Hutch forced himself to look at Huggy.

"Come on," Huggy said quietly as he escorted him through Wright's door and outside. "Starsky's on his way to the hospital."

xxxxxxxxxxx

Hutch and Huggy met the doctor just outside of the emergency room.

"We're keeping him for the night," the doctor told them. "For observation."

Huggy watched Hutch walk over to the gurney Starsky was lying on, marveling how the anger in his blond friend's eyes mysteriously dissolved from fury to affection as he squeezed his partner's hand.

"How you doin', Starsk?"

Starsky blinked groggily at him. "I've had better days."

Hutch smiled. "So has our friendly neighborhood jerk."

"I tried to talk to him, but…"

"Yeah, I know the feeling."

xxxxxxxxxxx

This time when Starsky came home from the hospital, which was the next day, he was able, with Hutch and Huggy's help, to climb the steps to his front door. Even though the upward climb was excruciatingly slow, Starsky smiled all the way.

"You're doing great," Hutch smiled. "Just stop when you're tired."

They stopped for a rest about halfway up.

Starsky said, "Hey, check it out."

Hutch and Huggy turned their heads in the direction Starsky was looking, which was across the street at Larry Wright's house, where they saw a For Sale sign in the yard. No curtains were in the windows, and the place looked deserted.

Starsky smiled at his partner. "Thanks."

Hutch smiled back. "You're welcome."

The End

First Do No Harm

Hutch looked down at the candy bar in his hand. The cottage was quiet. The full, thick silence soothing to his sensitive ears. The itching and the mild cramping in his joints were now just an occasional ghostly reminder. He wanted it to be over. Completely over. But it would happen only with time.

Will the memories ever be completely over, though? The damage to the psyche? It's one thing to have heroin forced into you. It's a second to be begging a gangster-and then your partner-for more. It's a third to have a whisper of a need for it after the twister of withdrawal.

And that's just me.

What about Starsky? How has this affected him? In more ways than I will ever know, I suspect. He would never say it, or even allow himself to think it, but this changed him too.

I was king. I was Hutch. I could do anything, bust any bad guy, take any punch, settle any score, beat anybody at anything. I was the best. So they all said. So Starsky said.

But now…?

I don't want to be weak, but he saw me at my weakest, and loved me through each agonizing second anyway.

What would I do without you? Where would I be? Your determination saved my life, and your heart saved my soul.

I shouldn't feel this way. I should feel grateful, happy, alive. And I do. But…

It's not over.

I have fears, I have doubts, I have memories that will hang around like yellowed clippings in a scrapbook.

It happened three weeks ago, but at times it feels like three years.

"….door?"

The polite rap at his door-(thank you, Starsk, you always remember to mind my tender nerves)-lifted his head, and he turned the doorknob.

"I said you gonna open the door?" Starsky asked as he stepped in.

"Hey," Hutch smiled faintly, arriving back from his thoughts. "Here." He handed Starsky the candy bar. "You can have this."

Starsky took the candy bar and put it into his own shirt pocket. "Thanks." He looked around. "What'd you want to talk to me about?"

"Huh?"

"You called me."

"Oh yeah, I did. Well… Come on in."

"I'm in."

"Then, have a seat."

Starsky cocked his head a little to one side, a little perplexed, the hint of concern in his eyes.

Slowly, Hutch started pacing aimlessly about, hands in his back pockets, his back to his partner.

"You can tell me," Starsky said softly. "Whatever it is."

"I know."

Hutch walked around some more, then finally sat down on the sofa, leaning forward, elbows on his thighs, gazing at the floor.

"It's…"

Starsky stood quietly, listening, ever watching keenly and closely.

"I'm scared, Starsk."

Almost a whisper. Almost a plea.

Starsky came to the coffee table and sat down, watching his friend's lowered head.

"Forest and company are going down, Hutch. They can't get to you now."

"No, that's not what I'm talking about. I'm…afraid I'll use again."

He said it with such conviction and despair that Starsky put a hand on his forearm and squeezed gently.

"No way. That's the withdrawal talkin'. You may think you'll give in, but Hutch, you won't."

"You don't know that."

"I know you. I know they made you, technically, a junkie, but you don't want to be one, and you're not one at heart. It's not like you asked for it."

"It doesn't matter how it got in me. What matters is that sometimes I still…"

"I know. It'll pass. You're getting past it. Come on. Let's take a walk. Get some fresh air."

"No. I have to do something else. We're supposed to hit the streets tomorrow. I don't know if I'm ready. Physically I am. I'm strong enough. But what if I…the distraction…I don't want to get you killed. I need more time."

"Hutch, you don't need to worry about me. I can take care of myself, and you."

"It shouldn't be that way. You shouldn't do it all. That's dangerous. I need to be one hundred percent, completely independent of your supervision, completely your backup, and right now, I feel like I'm not."

"I trust you."

"Do you trust the drug?"

Their eyes stayed on each other, neither diverting their gaze.

"I trust you," Starsky repeated. "You're my partner. We could go on the street right now, and I could trust you with my life. Three weeks, two weeks, one week ago, no. But that was then, and you've come a long way. We'll always be each other's backup. You can do it, Hutch. You just have to believe it."

"Oh yeah, I forgot. Tough Hutch. I can do anything."

"You can. I've seen it. You prove it every day. I'm sorry that you have doubts about that right now. I wish you could see you the way I see you."

Hutch looked down and smiled, his partner's faith and confidence in him almost too heartfelt to bear. "Me too."

"You said you have to do something else. If you're thinking of resigning, I'm gonna run around like a crazy man, scream my head off, make the biggest scene you ever-"

Hutch smiled at the image.

"No. I just need more time. Just…a change of scenery. I need the country. Nature. You know? Alone. I need to get away for a while. From the city, this place, the bad guys."

"Good guys too?"

"You? Never you, Starsk."

"I get it. You need to reconnect yourself. And if you need that to feel better…"

"I need it to come back here and be the best partner and the best friend I can be." Hutch glanced down at his hands, then back up with wet eyes. "My gift to you."

You deserve it, Starsk. You deserve my best. Only the best Hutch for you.

Starsky smiled and slipped a hand to the back of Hutch's neck. But softly, briefly, minding his sensitive skin. "You. Alive. In one piece. Able to kick some more doors down with me again. That's my gift."

Hutch looked away, almost shyly, almost blushing.

"Dobey said I could use his cabin."

Starsky nodded. If putting space between you and the nightmares, the drug, and Huggy's upstairs room, clears your head, or helps heal you, or brings you back to the one hundred percent that you're talking about, or replaces the defeat in your eyes with pride again, then I'm all for it. I understand where you're coming from.

Hutch rose to his feet, releasing a sigh. A sign that showed to his partner just how important that simple yet monumental decision was to him.

He walked to the kitchen. "Let's have a drink then."

Starsky joined him in the kitchen, pulling something from his pocket.

"I got somethin' for you."

Hutch looked his way, seeing a four-leaf clover necklace made of ivory.

"For good luck," Starsky said.

Hutch took the necklace and put it on. "It's beautiful."

xxxxxxxxxx

Hutch packed his bags early the next morning, watered his plants, filled up his gas tank, and started on his journey.

Starsky hadn't dropped by for any goodbyes or admonitions to be careful, or requests to go along.

He was giving him a huge gift of space.

You are so much cleverer, so much more knowledgeable and insightful, than you give yourself credit for, Starsk. It's instinctual with us. You know what I need, and you do it.

Thank you.

I just want to be Hutch again. The one who can kick a door down without hesitation. Deal with a junkie without thinking about myself. Crack a head open if anyone even comes close to hurting you. Take the street back. Take me back. Take charge.

While he was paying for gas at the service station, he spotted the candy bar display and grinned, finding himself thinking more of his partner's craving for them than his own. He drank a cup of coffee and read the morning paper at a small table by the window.

How nice to be doing something normal again.

He watched some kids skateboarding on the pavement outside, saw an elderly lady walking her dog, and watched the customers come and go.

No paranoia. No rude thoughts.

xxxxxxx

Exquisite.

That's how driving in the country made him feel at this moment. A feeling so overwhelming it brought tears to his eyes.

The greenery infused life back into his bloodstream. The blue sky smiled down. The white clouds floated happily by. The sunlight in his eyes was even welcoming.

He felt alive.

This is the drug I need.

He drove slowly, to savor it, to let it soak into his skin and his soul like one of his plants soaking up sun and water. Nutrients for life.

There was no rushing. No thoughts of cases, or criminals, or court.

He turned the radio on, but decided that the stillness and the rhythm of the road were more appealing, so he turned it off.

Starsky would have brought a camera, or would have encouraged him to bring a notebook to write a song, but Hutch decided to bring paint and canvas instead.

He would write later. Something about this day. These feelings of renewal and promise.

It was getting dark. He stopped the car to stretch his legs and relieve himself behind a tree.

Such a small thing, but such a freeing small thing. To let go. To again control the who, when, where, and how of his own body, instead of obeying the hands, will, and demands of others.

His appreciation for choice, life, and friendship, had deepened over the past three weeks.

If anything good at all could be said about his time in hell, it was that.

Life was precious, and he didn't want to forget that, or betray that, or the person who had shown him that the most; his partner.

He got back in the car, turned the headlights on, and continued to drive. The cabin was fifteen minutes away, but he was in no hurry as the car meandered around the slowly winding curves.

Yes, this was the best decision he had made in a while. Wholly his own. Wholly him. Half of it for self; half for Starsky. It felt perfect, and nothing had felt perfect in three weeks.

It was their bond that would bring him back fully. That was one thing he could be sure of. He may not have tried as hard for himself, but whenever his partner was concerned, he would fight any enemy, tangible or intangible, to the very death.

That was something Starsky also was sure of. That no matter what happened, Hutch would do anything for him. Hutch's knowledge that his partner was aware-that they both were aware-of their lives meaning the world to each other-contented him.

(I'm young and strong. I'm overcoming this, and with my partner by my side, I can do anything. I'm who my partner thinks I am. I'm Hutch. I'm-)

"What the-"

Hutch swerved to miss a boulder on his side of the highway, but in his alarm swerved too wildly, and couldn't regain control.

It happened too fast to do anything, the white panic in his brain preventing him from reacting as the car was turning over the hill and rolling down on its side.

xxxxxxxx

Huggy set a beer in front of Starsky at the bar and leaned on his elbows.

"Worryin' about Nature Boy?"

"How'd you know?"

"'cause I am too. I dig what he's doin', but I just wish he would've stayed around here a little longer. Feels like watchin' a little kid ride a bike without training wheels for the first time."

Starsky smiled at the visual in his head: Of Hutch as a little boy riding wobbly on a bike. Maybe a clunker of a bike at that. "Yeah."

"He heard from Jeanie?"

"No. They ended it."

Huggy noted the look of melancholy on his face. It wasn't just fatigue or worry. Hutch's withdrawal had stolen a little something from him too. A little innocence, maybe. Not so much his own; but Hutch's. Not that they were ever always so innocent, but watching his best friend going through torture had definitely colored his world at least one shade darker than it was before. He had always been protective of Hutch, but since the heroin, it was even more pronounced, and would remain that way forever. He wanted to keep all the badness from touching him and changing him, and Huggy wondered how his friend would feel when he realized that that wasn't always possible.

"You could drive up to the cabin," Huggy suggested.

"No. He needs this. If I went up there, it would just pile on the doubt, and I don't want to do that to him. I do trust him. I'm worried as hell, but I do trust him."

xxxxxxxxxx

Dazed, weak, and bleeding from a gash to his temple, Hutch crawled slowly up the rocky,

weedy hill on hands and knees, trying to open his eyes but failing. Needle pricks of pain darted them each time he tried. Slivers of glass? Burns? He had to grope and paw to get anywhere at all, and could only gauge his direction by the slope of the hill. Up was up. He could feel the incline. But he couldn't open his eyes.

Fearing that the car would explode, and not even knowing if the radio was worth the risk of trying it, he had decided it would be better to take his chances outside of the vehicle rather than in.

Both legs radiated an explosive pain, especially from the knees down, but he wasn't thinking clearly enough to verify, he just kept moving up the hill inches at a time, his hands and fingers bleeding from the sharp rocks and dry branches and roots he tried to hold onto.

His mind swam with confusion and pain. Several times he thought he would pass out, but as tempting as the thought was-he would relish a break from the grinding pain-he forced himself to keep going.

If he could just make it to the top….

Darkness swirled inside of his head again, and he focused to push it away.

Keep going. Keep going. You have to. You can't quit. You can't lay down and sleep. Keep moving. Keep moving.

His arms trembled from the effort; or was it shock? Did he need medical attention?

The pain in his legs, and his inability to get up, or think clearly, or hold his eyes open, told him that was extremely possible. How long had he been crawling up?

Gasping for breath, he stopped to run a sleeve under his wet nose, and, when it kept dripping, realized that it was blood.

Where else was he bleeding? He didn't remember getting cut, but maybe he had been.

Maybe he went through the windshield. That would explain how bits of glass got into his eyes. Why was his head throbbing so much?

Keep going. You can't quit. You have to reach the top, get to the road at least.

How far away is the top of the hill? Had he crawled feet or yards? Did the car catch fire? If it did, maybe someone would see it and call for help.

Keep going. Don't stop. One knee in front of the other. Get to the top, out in the open where someone can see you.

Pain stabbed each time his knees landed on a pointy rock or broken root jutting up from

the ground.

His arms ached. His muscles trembled. He wanted to lie down, but he couldn't. He had to keep pushing himself.

"…so far?"

But Hutch didn't hear it. He was fading out. Barely moving. Head down. Eyes still squinted shut.

The young man crouched down to put a hand on his back.

"Did you hear me? I said how did you get so far? Your car must be a mile back there. I swerved around the boulder too, but my truck didn't go over. I saw you crawling here on the road…"

Hutch was still crawling, as if he hadn't heard.

To stop him, the young man got in front of him, crouching, almost on all fours himself.

"I'm a pre-med student. James. Let me help you."

Somehow the voice broke through the fog, and Hutch raised his head.

"Help," he whispered in a parched voice.

James saw that his eyes were clamped tight. "What's your name?"

"I'm…"

Too groggy. His name. It was at the front of his mind, trying to come out. But still, not there yet. It kept slipping away…

"Let me check your ID, okay? I'm going to reach into your pocket for your wallet."

Hutch couldn't respond.

James took out Hutch's wallet and saw his driver's license, police ID, and badge.

"Ken. Okay."

"Up," Hutch said as he again moved a knee to try to get up. But the attempt was mostly in his head. He cried out in pain and crumpled further down, almost onto his belly.

"I think you broke both tibias," James said as his fingers traveled along his legs. "A few

gashes on your head. Bloody nose. Maybe a couple of cracked or broken ribs. Do you know where you are?"

Fighting unconsciousness again, Hutch tried to think, but the pain and the light-headedness made it nearly impossible.

"I don't…I don't know."

"It's okay. I can help you. I don't live too far away."

Even in his pain and confusion, Hutch realized that something about the words didn't sound quite right.

"No…I need…" Hutch's head went lower, his voice fading down. "…a hospital. Not…"

"I have a medical bag," James said as he ran to his truck and came back.

Hutch didn't see the syringe he was filling, or he would have protested before it sank into his hip.

James watched as the man, still on his hands and knees, finally and slowly crumpled face down on the side of the road, then picked him up, put him in the back of his truck, and drove away.

xxxxxxxx

Captain Dobey emerged from his office to get his second cup of coffee of the morning, and saw Starsky filling in a report at the squad room desk.

"You're early," Dobey said accusingly.

"Guilty."

The captain walked over to the desk. "At least with Hutch on leave, you can catch up on paperwork."

"Miracles do happen."

"What are you doing for lunch today?"

"Is that an invitation?"

"My treat."

"Mama. I think I'm havin' a heart attack."

"Don't get used to it. I'm only asking because Edith game me a couple of coupons for that new Italian place that opened down the street."

And because you look like a little lost puppy without your partner.

xxxxxxxxxxx

James stood drinking his morning coffee by the window in the upstairs guestroom when he saw Hutch stir in the hospital bed, his head turning to one side on the pillow.

"Good morning," he said as he set his empty cup on the top of a dresser. "Do you remember your name?"

Name?

Yes.

It was coming back to him now. Even through the fog of medication, he remembered.

"Hutchinson."

"Very good. I bandaged your eyes after I removed the glass. Your vision will be fine, but let's allow your eyes to heal before we take the bandage off. They would be sore as hell without the painkillers I gave you."

Hutch groaned, trying to think through his muddied mind.

"Not…morph…"

"That's not what I gave you. Why? What do you have against morphine?"

Hutch tried to raise his hands to feel the bandages anyway, but found that they were tied to the chrome guard rails that were raised on both sides of the bed.

His voice was as sluggish as his brain.

"What are you…what is this…am I in a hos…"

James walked to the bed and put a hand on his shoulder.

"Don't worry. I brought you here to my house. I cleaned you up, treated your wounds. Put casts from the knees down on your legs. Taped your chest to secure your ribs. Put medicine on your hands. Gave you pain medication. Dressed you in clean clothes. I can do whatever a hospital would do. I told you I'm pre-med."

Hutch moved his head no on the pillow. "I need…my hands…they…what are you do…I don't under…"

James prepared another shot of pain medication.

"Just sleep," he said as he pushed the needle into his thigh.

Hutch tried to say something, tried to raise his head again, but couldn't. He wanted to move, get out of the bed, leave, but he was no match for the shot.

"That's better," James said as the back of his hand stroked down Hutch's cheek. "It's better not to fight."

Hutch finally did lie still, but not because it was something he wanted to do. The drug left his body in virtual paralysis, his mind in an immobile stupor.

Just before he sank down into oblivion, there was another name that drifted slowly across his eyelids like a floater, and it was Starsky.

xxxxxxxx

Starsky stopped by Hutch's cottage to water his plants and deliver his mail. Hutch had been away on sabbatical for three days, but it felt like three weeks. He was definitely catching up on paperwork. Hutch would laugh at how industrious he had become in his absence.

Starsky went to the kitchen, noticing the trash can. Not the can itself, but what was in it. He looked down to see dozens of discarded candy bar wrappers from the ones he'd consumed over the past few weeks.

The candy had been a cruel irony. Hutch was into health food, but the reality was he had to have the candy to get through withdrawal. It became a small symbol of what the drug had done to his body. Now Starsky decided that it was a small symbol of how far he had come.

Satisfied that everything was okay at his partner's place, he locked the door and went home.

xxxxxxxx

"Out of here," Hutch groaned as he succeeded in raising his head.

He pulled on the wrist restraints that were confining him to the bed-yanking, jerking.

"Help!"

He would tear the bed apart if he had to.

"Somebody!"

James came running into the room, a harried look on his face as he pawed through his medical bag for a syringe.

"I didn't expect this," he panted as he hurried the needle over to the bed. "You're stronger than I thought."

Hutch felt James' hands trying to push him back on the pillow.

"No. Leave me alone."

Hutch kicked at James, still jerking at the wrist straps.

He put a hand on Hutch's chest to hold him down. "Hold still, Ken." "No!" Hutch still strained to get up. "Son of a…I want a hospital!"

But his fight was short-lived. The needle went in, and Hutch's head slowly dropped back to the pillow.

"Sshh," James whispered as he leaned over him and kissed his forehead. "Everything will be all right."

xxxxxxxxxx

Huggy was surprised to find Starsky on his doorstep so early in the morning.

He squinted at his friend through gritty eyes.

"The Bear don't have to get up till noon today, Starsky. What's your problem?"

"A week, Hug. Don't you think that's enough time for Hutch?"

"Didn't he tell you when he'd be back?"

"No. I didn't ask. Didn't want him to feel pressured to put a time limit on it."

"You think he told Dobey when he'd be back?"

"I don't know. I just don't see the harm in driving up there."

"You're the one who said you wouldn't bother him. What's he gonna think you showin' up there all Mother Goosey?"

"Yeah, I know, but it's been a week. The last time Hutch was late…"

Huggy looked at him. Starsky had a way of presenting a boyish innocence bordering on endearing in his worry of Hutch, but underneath was a wounded wolf ready to attack any threat to his friend's safety.

"Don't remind me, bro. Let me get some shoes on."

xxxxxxxxxx

Resisting wasn't working, Hutch realized. But James did like him, and he could try to use that to buy some time, to keep himself alive.

Without begging.

He wouldn't do that again. He couldn't think of any reason big enough to, unless it was for Starsky. He could do it for him.

And would.

"I just want out of here," Hutch mumbled when he was stronger.

The bandages around his eyes prevented him from seeing James, but he didn't have to see him to know when he was in the room. He could smell his coffee.

"I'm afraid I can't let you go, Ken. You're a police officer. I would be looking at some serious time if anyone ever found out that I had you here."

Hutch's heart galloped inside his chest, sure that James could hear it across the room.

Whatever plans James had for him, they didn't include allowing him to leave this house.

The awful truth dawned on him:

James could keep him prisoner here for however long he wanted, unless Hutch could get out, or someone came and found him or…

Starsky.

I need you. You need to come find me again.

"…..not as combative today."

Hutch dragged his mind back to James, realizing he had said something.

"What?"

"I said you're not as combative today. That's good. There's no reason to fight."

Hutch had to resist the urge to struggle again. Every sinew in his body wanted to fight, flee, survive.

But now wasn't the time.

He didn't know if there would ever be a time, but it definitely wasn't while his abductor was standing in the room.

Hutch forced himself to calm his brain. If he even appeared as though he were panicked, James would give him another shot, and his fragmented mind was just now putting itself back together. Not completely lucid, but getting there.

He licked his lips and discovered that they were very dry.

He hadn't thought about food or water.

"Can I have a drink of water? James?"

He would play James' game. To a point. To the point of …what?…imminent death? And then he would have to decide how the game would end.

But begging was still off the table.

If James never let him leave…rather than beg another captor…he would die.

xxxxxxxxxxx

In his office, Captain Dobey took a key from his key chain and handed it to Starsky.

"I think you're over-reacting, Starsky, but I understand why." He glanced at Huggy. "Are you going too?"

"Did Tonto go with the Lone Ranger?"

Dobey opened the door to let them out.

"Call me from the grocery store when you get up there and let me know something."

Starsky nodded, and he and Huggy turned to leave.

xxxxxxxxxxx

"How long have I been here?" Hutch asked.

James held a glass of cold water to his lips.

"Take a sip. It's just water."

Hutch fought his gag reflex as he drank the water, although it wasn't the water that made him nauseous. It was the way James had let the safety rail down so that he could sit next to him on the bed and put an arm around his shoulders while giving him a drink.

"James, I can't feel my hands. You're pre-med, so you know I can't…but you don't care, do you?"

James stroked his hair, and Hutch resisted the instinct to pull away.

"When are you going to take the bandages off my eyes?" Hutch asked.

"It's not time. They're not healed yet."

"I'd keep them closed. Just…forget it. I guess I can't make you do anything you don't want to do."

James set the water glass on the bedside table.

"I'm a little hungry," Hutch said. "I don't remember you giving me anything to eat. Or are you going to starve me to death?"

James raised the bed guards back up.

"Have you ever killed anyone in the line of duty, Ken?"

Hutch nodded his head. "It's not something I wanted to do, and I'm not proud of it. If there's a way to avoid it, Star…"

He almost said "Starsky and I", but caught himself. He didn't want James to even know his partner's name. He didn't want this sadist going after him too.

"…If there's a way to avoid it, I do," he finished.

"Do you know anything about The Mad Cutter?"

Hutch nodded. "Of course I do. It's not my case and not my district, but I'm well aware of it."

"Why do they call him mad? That part isn't in the papers. I'm just curious. Because he isn't crazy. He's very smart. A genius in fact. He's killed twenty-five college students and left them in the woods, and the police can't put it together. So he isn't crazy. Methodical. Decisive. Prolific even. But not mad. So, explain."

Hutch's blood chilled about ten degrees cooler. Not only was James a sick individual, it was becoming more apparent with each word that he was indeed the elusive scalpel butcher himself. In the media, the number of victims was reported as twenty. Only the killer would know that the actual number was twenty-five.

"Mad," Hutch said calmly and truthfully. "As in angry. Not insane. His cuts are so deep, and so vicious. They don't mean mad in the crazy sense of the word. They mean enraged."

James sat silent for a long time, digesting the information.

"Do you think he'll be caught?"

Again, Hutch chose his words carefully.

"No. Like you said. He's too smart. A lot of cases go unsolved. That will be one of them."

Okay.

Not only is he your tormentor, he's also a serial killer.

Hutch flinched when he felt James' hands at his wrist. It was a petrifying feeling, having someone touch him when he was helpless, strapped to the bed rails, and couldn't use his hands to defend himself.

"Relax," James told him. "I'm just letting you out of these restraints. We need to keep the circulation going. I know you can't very well run down the stairs with two casts on."

Hutch could only sit in stunned silence as the young man loosened the straps.

"Thank you," he said, and flinched again when James picked up one of his bandaged hands to massage his wrist.

"Your hands were all banged up from crawling," James said gently. "I don't know how you managed to get that far."

You would be surprised at what I can do, James. You don't know me very well, because if you did, you would never have taken the straps off of me.

Hutch smiled inwardly. Bandaged and physically out of commission, he was still able to use his wits and skill to get James to trust him.

This time he was the one in control.

xxxxxxxxx

Starsky and Huggy drove through the small amount of scattered rubble that still remained from where the boulder had been. A week earlier some hikers had rolled it to the side of the road to get it out of the way, but Hutch's car was too far down the hill to be noticed by Starsky or other drivers who had passed by.

xxxxxxxxxxx

Hutch felt the mattress of the hospital bed give a little as James sat on the edge of it.

He was strong and seemed to be physically fit, having managed to effortlessly pick him up, move him, change his clothes, get him to the bathroom. Given his injuries, Hutch knew he couldn't take him with brute force, so he had no choice but to try to defeat him in other ways.

"I hope you don't mind that I'm wearing your necklace," James said as he lightly touched the white clover.

Hutch's hand went to his own shirt collar, indeed finding the necklace missing. He had actually forgotten that Starsky had given it to him.

Hutch measured each word before speaking. He couldn't say the wrong thing, or lead him in a dangerous direction, yet he had to explore a little to find out a little more about James and to find out where the limits of his strengths and weaknesses were.

"Well, actually, I do mind. I'd like to have it back. It's new."

It was a test, to see who would win the exchange. If James gave in and gave it back, Hutch knew he wielded a little more power over him. If he didn't, Hutch knew he had to work a little harder to lower his guard. It was a risk. James could very well answer with a scalpel across his throat. But it was a risk he was willing to take.

If James would remove the bandages from his eyes, he could read him a lot

better. For now he could only use the sound of the younger man's voice; the words he used, the way he said them, the way he listened and responded.

"Most people aren't attached to new necklaces," James said. "They're attached to old ones. Unless they're from special people. Did someone special give it to you?"

Yes, but please don't ask me who, because if you know who this special person is, you could become jealous, and I won't let you hurt him.

"My grandfather," Hutch lied. "He's eighty years old and lives in Minnesota."

Another lie. His grandfather was dead.

"I understand that it holds meaning for you," James said. "But I still want to wear it."

You want to keep it, because the jewelry you keep from your victims are your mementos.

The mementos you revisit again and again to relive your murderous fantasies.

Hutch felt his breath coming harder and faster now. He had to contain his growing fear.

He didn't exactly fit the profile of James' victims. He wasn't a college student, and he was a little older than the age range of his victims. But those were the only differences. He fit in all the other ways. He was male, blond, single, educated, and the subject of some fantasy scenario that he played out in his mind each time he killed with a scalpel.

xxxxxxxxxx

"His car's not here," Starsky said as he parked the Torino in front of Captain Dobey's cabin. "I don't see any tire tracks."

He was out of the car before Huggy could open the door.

"Maybe he went somewhere," Huggy said getting out of the vehicle to join him. "Man. Sometimes I don't get why Hutch digs the boondocks."

"It's his thing."

"Oh, I'm keen on that. He digs a lot of things I don't get."

Starsky turned the doorknob, and, discovering that it was locked, inserted Dobey's key.

"You really do think something happened to him," Huggy said standing on the porch behind him.

Starsky opened the door and went in, scanning quickly, seeing no luggage, no signs that

Hutch was staying here.

"I don't think he's been here," he said as he turned and walked briskly from the cabin and locking it, then heading in a near-run for the Torino.

Huggy quickened his pace too.

Starsky was panting now, battling the internal triggers that begged for an implosion. "I don't think he made it. Something happened."

Huggy hurried to catch up, aware that the wounded wolf was now ready to spring. "Man, I know it's the Forest thing, but slow down. He could be in town, in a motel, or another cabin, or somewhere else."

"SOMETHING HAPPENED TO HIM, HUGGY!"

He jerked open the driver's side door and got in, backing away from the cabin before Huggy could even close the passenger door.

xxxxxxxxxx

Hutch was sitting up against the headboard now, and his hands were free, but they were bandaged and sore, as were his eyes. His legs seemed to throb in rhythm with his heartbeat, his ribs ached, and the rest of his bruised body yearned for relief. The pain medication was wearing off, but he dared not ask for anything. He needed to stay alert, try to look for an opening.

James was sitting on the side of his bed again, and didn't seem to be very concerned about an escape.

He has a thing for you, that's why. You're his…desire…now. Part of his fantasy. The only reason you're alive is because he trusts you, and thinks you might like him. It's not his time to kill you yet. Things haven't escalated in his mind to that point. There hasn't been enough provocation. You're playing his game too well.

If he could just get a look at the room, see the layout, look for something to use as a weapon. He was afraid that the pain would cause him to make a foolish move. He had to maintain his grip, and called on his practice of meditation and breath control to center himself and push the pain below to another place. He had to calm himself so he could think.

His fingers moved up to the bandages around his eyes.

Another test.

But James gently took his hand down and put it in his lap.

"Let them heal."

Hutch sat quietly, breathing, listening, trying to assess the situation.

Even though he couldn't see the room, he knew a few things about it. That it was a fairly large room, like the ones in his grandfather's old farmhouse. Big, airy, one that would take a tall man like James about ten steps to cross. There was a slight echo in the room when James raised his voice or laughed. He heard a hardwood floor when James walked across it. He knew that James used a door to the left to come and go, that there was an adjoining bathroom because James carried him to it. That there was a bedside table with medicine, water, bandages, and a clock. That there was a dresser across the room, near the window, where James kept his medical bag. That there was a closet where James kept a few changes of clothes for…for who? Victims?

Had twenty-five men been killed in this room? Drugged, cut, and desecrated after they were dead?

That's why he hasn't sexually assaulted you. You're alive. The necrophile wants you only after you're dead. He can't have normal relations. Complete control is controlling your dead body. You can't object, scream, or leave. You can't scold, reject, or offend. But you will belong to him. For all time. He can love you forever. Keep you forever.

The thought was sickeningly absurd, but it made perfect sense to a psychopath like James, and Hutch had seen it before.

"Why so quiet?" James asked. "I like talking to you."

Another test, this time from James.

Hutch could feel James' breath, strong with coffee, on his lips. Hutch's heart almost burst with terror and resistance, sure he must be having a heart attack.

He couldn't tense up, he couldn't act offended, even though nausea rolled up his body in a hot wave. James would take it as a sign of rejection, and escalate.

He couldn't protest. That would set James off, as Hutch suspected was the case every time he killed a man. The protest, the struggle, the fight, was his foreplay, the buildup. As long as Hutch was compliant, he was safe, but if he objected, James would feel he had no choice but to possess him by taking his life.

"Can I have my necklace back now?"

Hutch brought his hand up, actually groped for, found, and put his fingers carefully on the

clover, praying that they didn't start to tremble, because it would be a giveaway.

"How badly do you want it?"

The question.

Another test, another challenge. Approaching life or death. The time to choose was getting closer.

"Well…"

"Ask me nicely."

"I did."

"Ask me again."

"Can..?"

"What's wrong? Don't want it badly enough? Ask me again. Nicer this time."

Hutch said nothing. His mouth was painfully dry. His throat closing up.

"Come on, Ken. Ask me. How badly do you want it back? Would you beg me for it?"

Hutch remained silent.

He knew he probably should say something; do what James asked. He knew that it could mean his life. But…

His life.

The one he had reclaimed with a newfound zest.

The one he was taking back to his best friend.

The one he would never give up, no matter what James did to him.

James knew nothing about his life.

He knew nothing about Ken Hutchinson.

"Come on, Ken. Beg me."

Hutch sat quiet and still.

James slapped him, rocking his head to the side.

Hutch felt blood trickling down from his nose and mouth.

"James, I won't do that. I-"

James slapped him again, and this time Hutch brought his hands up defensively, restraining his instinct to strike back.

He knew if he retaliated, James would kill him in this bed.

"Beg me!"

"Jam….stop it. I can't fight you. Just…."

"You don't know what it's like! I bet you were never rejected by anyone! I bet everyone loves you!"

"No," Hutch whispered with his hands still hovering protectively over his head. "Not every-"

"Shut up! I say when you can talk! Do you understand? I want you to listen to what I have to say!"

Hutch nodded, his chest beginning to heave with panic.

He sat cringed sideways into the headboard as much as his hurting body would allow, waiting for the next blow.

James was going over the edge. This is how it ended for the other twenty-five victims. What would he do? Dose him with too much tranquilizer? Slide the scalpel across his throat? Gut his torso?

"I want to huh…hear you, James. I'm listening."

Another slap.

"Liar! That's what they all say! But they all lie! I liked you, Ken, I really did! But you're just like the rest of them! You don't care what I have to say, and you don't listen!"

"That's not true, I-"

James jerked him out of the bed and held him up by the front of his shirt. Hutch's legs threatened to buckle, but he fought to remain on his feet, because if James got him on the

floor…

"Liar," James whispered into his face.

The sound of tires on gravel outside.

James turned his head, looked toward the window.

The sound of two car doors opening and slamming.

"Red car," he said as he turned back to Hutch.

Hutch brought his knee hard up into James' groin, and while the man was doubled over holding himself, Hutch tore the bandages from his eyes and hobbled toward the door.

"Starsk!"

James recovered and lunged for him, but Hutch reached the door, trying to open his eyes but finding with his fingers that the reason he couldn't open them was because James had stitched them closed.

He heard Starsky's pounding footsteps coming up the stairs, and his voice yelling, "Hutch!"

Hutch fell rather than hobbled out of the door, down to his hands and knees.

"Starsk! Shoot him! I can't see!"

James pounced on him just as Starsky reached the top of the stairs and fired off a shot.

Shot in mid-air, James fell with a thud onto Hutch's back, knocking him facedown.

Huggy pulled James' dead body off of Hutch, who was panting and trying to recover.

"Get my necklace," he whispered. "He's got my necklace."

Starsky leaned down close to his partner, almost lying on his belly too, his fingers touching the stitches on his eyes, swallowing a sob. "Did he do this to you?"

Huggy took the necklace from around James' neck and put it in Hutch's seeking hand.

Hutch pawed for his friend's arm, and Starsky gave him his hand.

To Huggy he said, "See if there's a phone in this place, Hug. Call an ambulance."

Huggy walked around the house looking in all of the rooms, finally finding a phone somewhere downstairs.

"Get some scissors, Starsk," Hutch whispered. "Cut these stitches off so I can see."

"I think we should have a doctor look at it instead, see what to do."

"I wrecked my car. He-James…found me. Brought me here. He…he's The Cutter."

Starsky looked over at the body.

Hutch winced, tried to raise his head.

"Let's get you off your chest," Starsky said as he helped him sit up, then leaned him back against the wall, steadying him with two hands on his shoulders.

Head down, Hutch still clasped the necklace in his hand.

"How do I look, Starsk?"

Starsky didn't know whether to smile or cry. Besides his injuries, Hutch looked strange in James' knee-length blue and yellow plaid shorts and over-sized white polo shirt.

"You look like hell."

"How'd you know some…something happened?"

"It's been a week. I just had a feeling."

"You went to the cabin?"

"Yeah."

"You didn't see my…car at the bottom of the hill?"

"Which hill? There are hills all over this place."

"How'd you know I was here?"

"I didn't. I was doin' a door-to-door. Or in this case, acre-to-acre. I heard you yellin'."

Huggy came back and crouched down with them.

"Ambulance will be here in about fifteen, they said." He tugged at Hutch's shirt collar. "Boy, you don't look so hot."

Hutch's hands came up to his eyes again, and Starsky and Huggy both gently pushed them back down.

"Don't do that, buddy," Starsky said softly. "It won't be that much longer. The worst is over, huh?"

"Yeah," he mumbled as Starsky picked his head up between his hands and leaned it back against the wall to rest. "I'll be just fine."

Starsky's head went down briefly, to hide his wet eyes from Huggy.

Huggy knew what he was thinking. The same thing he was.

Sick. Disturbed. Psycho.

Huggy squeezed his shoulder. "He's gonna be all right, Starsky. We got him back."

xxxxxxxx

Huggy and Starsky watched impatiently in the examination room while the doctor removed the stitches from Hutch's eyes.

"One sick son of a..." the doctor mused mildly as he worked. "But he would have made a good doctor. Your eyes look fine. He got the glass out, and took wonderful care of them. How do things look? Open them slowly." To Starsky he said, "Young man, turn down the lights please."

He did.

Hutch blinked as he looked around. He saw Starsky and Huggy hovering worriedly about, and smiled.

"Perfect," he said quietly. He tried to sit up, and his two friends helped him.

The doctor pulled a pair of sunglasses from a cabinet and gave them to him. "You may find the glare too much at first, but that won't last. I'll send you down to ophthalmology for a full exam."

Hutch nodded and put the sunglasses in his shirt pocket as Huggy and Starsky helped him into the wheelchair he was using.

"Nurse," the doctor said to the pretty redhead when she entered the room, "show them to ophthalmology, will you?"

"Of course."

As Huggy pushed him from the room and the three of them followed her down the hall, Hutch eyed her bottom and said, "I don't suppose you're free for dinner, sweetheart?"

She smiled over her shoulder. "Of course. What's your name?"

"You can call me Hutch."

Starsky smiled.

Even though his friend had survived a horrendous ordeal with James, there was something about his demeanor. A peace, a confidence, a happiness. He had returned just as he had wanted. He had recovered things that Forest and withdrawal had stolen from him: His pride, and his soul.

"Welcome home, partner," Starsky smiled, and Hutch patted the hand that rested on his shoulder.

The End

FREEZE

The Pits was alive with laughter and conversation when Starsky and I walked in to celebrate his returning to the force the next day.

From behind the bar, Huggy raised a hand in greeting, then motioned us over to a booth where a huge pizza was waiting for us.

"Bring us some beers!" I shouted at him, and he turned to tell one of the waitresses.

I enjoyed watching Starsk as he made his way through the tables; his body whole again; a big grin on his face as he waved to a few of the regulars. It felt good knowing that tomorrow was the turning of a new leaf; a new lease on life; one that we'd both wanted and worked hard to achieve; with Starsky doing most of the work, naturally. We would always be friends, of course, but we were going to be partners on the job again, and that made everything in our world seem right. We could forget the bullets, forget the scars, forget the close call; at least for now. This was our night to celebrate, and nothing could stop us.

"Starsky, honey!" a flirtatious redhead shouted from her boyfriend's lap. "You lookin' mighty good, doll!"

Starsky winked at her and slid sideways into the booth so he could watch the crowd, back against the wall. He looked at me, his merry eyes mirroring my thoughts. One of those times when words weren't necessary between us. We both felt the same thing.

"I'll be right back," I said heading for the restroom. "Don't eat all the pizza."

I hurried to the john, not wanting to miss any of his homecoming at Huggy's.

In the bathroom doorway I nodded to a pianist I knew on his way out.

"Ken, we should get together and play some more tunes, cat. It's been too long."

"Hey, yeah, maybe next weekend. I'm having a get-together at my place for Starsk, so consider yourself invited."

"Smooth."

He went on out, and I stepped over to a urinal and relieved myself, humming a song I hadn't been able to get out of my head all day.

The sound of a machine gun, followed by the screams in the sudden silence of the restaurant made me pull my gun as I went to the bathroom door to peek out through a crack.

"Everybody freeze!" a guy in a stocking mask yelled as he waved his weapon around in the air.

No problem. Everybody was already frozen, including my partner, who still sat sideways in the booth, his back against the wall, knees still casually up.

His hands were raised shoulder-high and he wasn't moving a muscle as the gunman walked around making sure everyone was keeping still.

I knew Huggy kept a gun behind the counter, though couldn't see him from my vantage point, but knew he wouldn't risk anyone's life by going for it.

"Everybody!" the gunman shouted. "Throw your wallets and purses on the floor in front of me!"

Everybody did, except for Starsky, who was still frozen in place like a statue

The robber shot the wall above his head, but still he only sat.

From where I stood peering out, I could see, and was perhaps the only one in the place that recognized, except for Huggy maybe, that the look on my partner's face was mild terror.

He was more than frozen. He was petrified.

Suddenly I understood that his body may have healed, but the rest of him was back at the police garage getting shot at by a machine gun.

"You playin' with me?" the man asked as he stepped closer to Starsky.

I had to do something fast. It was clear that my partner couldn't.

I had to move now.

"Police!" I said as I stepped from the bathroom with my gun leveled at him, hoping to draw his fire. "You freeze!"

As he turned to shoot, I fired twice into his head, sending him and his brains back into an empty booth.

Huggy and I reached the would-be robber at the same time, me putting my gun away and

kicking his weapon aside even though the guy was dead and there was no chance of him using it again; Huggy rifling through his pockets for ID. He just had to know who was brave enough and stupid enough to try to rob his place.

The danger was clearly over, but the customers were just now beginning to feel the impact and the adrenaline, some weeping out loud, some leaving, others huddling or holding one another, some just dropping into a chair, too shocked to move or speak.

"Call Dobey," I told Huggy, and looked at Diane. "You okay?"

"I'm fine, but I don't know about him."

She was talking about Starsky of course. I looked over at him, where he sat in the next booth, hands still raised, back still against the wall and knees pulled up, eyes on the dead gunman. His chest rose and fell in quiet panic.

"Starsk," I said going over to him. "Here. Come here."

I pulled him out of the booth, and he came like a zombie, still staring at the robber.

Now a few of the customers were looking at him, the ones that knew him started to comment among themselves-"why didn't he do anything?"-"how could he just sit there?"-"what's the matter with him?"-

I took his arm and led him out the back way for some fresh air and some privacy.

"Hey," I said turning him around once we were in the alley. "It's over now. Talk to me."

He looked at me like he wanted to say something, but couldn't, and finally just started walking away.

But I couldn't let him go. I grabbed his arm.

"Starsk!"

He shook my hand off and began to run.

He wasn't slow either. He'd regained his strength and speed, and he was out of that alley like a streak.

I chased after him, adrenaline the only thing making me keep up with him, and snagged his collar, nearly shoving him against the Torino so I could talk to him.

"Starsk," I gasped as I leaned over to catch my breath.

He was breathing a little heavy, but not as heavily as I. He stood at the front of his car, planted his hands on it, and leaned over, head down as if he didn't want me to look at him.

"I thought I could do it," he softly panted.

"Do what?"

"Everything. Stop him. Back you up. Be your partner. I thought I was ready. How'm I gonna be your partner again? How you gonna trust me?"

I couldn't believe the words coming out of his mouth. My head moved no in stunned disbelief.

"Starsk…I trust you. I can't have another partner."

He moved his head no a little, clearly in torment. "I'm no good now."

I moved closer to him, put my hand on his shoulder. "Don't talk like that. You just…froze, that's all. It happens."

"Yeah, and it'll happen again."

"You don't know that."

"I can't protect you on the street this way."

"Yes, you can. Give yourself a break. What happened…was understandable. You'll be ready for anything now."

"Look. I appreciate your trust in me, but…"

"You have to trust yourself, partner. You sure the hell trusted me after I froze in that alley. Remember? You didn't let me quit, and I'm not going to let you quit. You're not going to throw away all you've worked for the past few months."

He raised his head and looked at me, so many emotions playing across his face at once, a kaleidoscope of shame, fear, pain, hope, love.

Finally he whispered, "I don't want you to get hurt because of me. I couldn't live with myself."

"You've never let me down. Not once."

He started to turn away again, but I pulled him back, and this time, instead of running

away, he grabbed onto me as if he had a physical pain in his chest; and maybe he did. He sobbed into my shoulder. It was the first time he'd cried since Gunther had him shot. He didn't cry when he first saw the bullet holes. He didn't cry when his face would go white with pain during his physical therapy. He didn't cry when he was so weak he had to piss in a plastic bottle. But the thought of me getting hurt on the street because of him broke him.

"It's okay," I said patting his back. "It really is. You'll do fine. It was just a scare. It won't happen again."

He stepped back and pulled himself together. "Damn," he said with a little laugh as he pinched the tears from his eyes. "Damn."

I slung my arm around his shoulder and started walking him back to Huggy's. "We're going back in there, and we're going to take care of business, then we're going to sit down and eat pizza and get ready for the street tomorrow. Right?"

"Yeah."

"Right?"

"Right."

The End

DIAGNOSIS

Starsky bounded up the steps to Venice Place, carrying his cold pizza and Hutch's warm wheat germ muffin in a brown paper bag.

"Hey!" he said knocking on the door. "Rise and shine!"

When his knock went unanswered, he reached above the door for Hutch's key and let himself in.

"Hey," he said walking inside and looking around. "It's almost eight. Didn't you hear the horn?"

Hutch's apartment was unusually dark for this time of morning. Normally he would be up showering, playing music, listening to radio news, making coffee, strumming his guitar, or talking on the phone to a lady friend.

"I'm in here," came Hutch's muffled voice.

Starsky stood in the doorway of his bedroom, seeing that Hutch was still in bed with a pillow over his head.

Starsky chuckled. "Hangover, huh? I told Huggy those last three were gonna get you."

Hutch took the pillow from his face. "I feel like I have three hangovers. What's in the bag, Gordo?"

Starsky turned the light on, making Hutch wince and put the pillow over his head again.

"No light," Hutch said, and Starsky turned it back off, but still carried the breakfast bag over to the bed.

"A wheat germ muffin. You should eat it while it's still warm."

"I think I could use a cup of coffee too."

"Nope," Starsky said as he walked to the kitchen. "If you got a hangover, milk's the way to go. It'll soothe your head. Trust me."

Hutch forced himself to roll out of bed, and trudged to the kitchen, hand shading his eyes from the sunlight coming through his window.

"Good grief," he grumbled as he sat down at the kitchen table. "Would you get me an aspirin?"

Starsky poured a glass of milk for him, set it down in front of him along with the muffin, then hustled to the bathroom and came back with a bottle of aspirin.

"Here you go," he said shaking two out into his hand.

Hutch swallowed the aspirin, washed it down with a gulp of milk, then sat with his hand covering his eyes.

"Here," Starsky said putting the muffin into his hand. He sat down at the table, took his cold pizza from the bag, unwrapped the tin foil, and began to munch.

Hutch took an obligatory bite from the muffin, then set it back down.

Starsky noted his pale face and the way he kept shading his eyes. "Gonna be okay to work?"

"Once I get a shower."

Hutch rose from the table, drained the rest of the milk, then went to the bathroom.

xxxxxxxxxx

Hutch wore sunglasses all morning to block out the glare, but it did nothing for his headache.

At lunchtime, Starsky noted that his partner was still pale and wincing from pain. He couldn't seem to concentrate on the calls of the day, and even sat in the Torino while Starsky went inside Huggy's for an angle on their newest assignment-three hookers who had been murdered in the last seven days on the same street.

He emerged from Huggy's with an aspirin bottle and a takeout soda.

"Here," Starsky said sliding under the steering wheel.

Hutch took the aspirin and washed it down.

"Feel any better than you did this morning?" he asked.

Hutch leaned his head back against the headrest and closed his eyes. "Nope."

Starsky lifted the mike to let Captain Dobey know that he was taking Hutch home, and was surprised when Hutch made no objection.

xxxxxxxxxxx

"Anything I can do?" Starsky asked once they were inside Venice Place again.

"Yeah," he said in a voice strained with discomfort. "Just keep the lights off, the phone off the hook, and I'll see you in the morning. I need to sleep this off."

"Okay," Starsky said, and watched Hutch crawl into bed with his clothes and shoulder holster on. "I'll put some water and aspirin by the bed. Call me if you need anything."

Hutch's eyes were closed, the pillow over his head again to block out the light. "I will."

xxxxxxxxx

Starsky went to the station to work on some reports in the squad room.

Captain Dobey came out of his office to offer Starsky some brownies that Edith had made.

"Hutch feeling better?"

"Not when I left him," Starsky said taking a bite.

"That should teach him not to overdo it with the celebrating."

"Yeah. Well. We were both feelin' pretty good about Wakefield takin' a fall. He just lost track of how many, that's all."

"Just keep your eye on him. It hasn't been that long since he was sick, and then Jackson, and then Vanessa."

Sick.

Dobey's word for the plague.

It wasn't often that the captain spoke so openly and warmly to them or about them, and when he did, Starsky made a special effort to hear him.

"Yeah."

Starsky had often wondered if Hutch had fully recovered from the plague, and found himself watching him for any aftereffects. His fears were irrational and baseless, of course. Hutch was healthy and strong. But Starsky could not help but wonder what kind of a toll it had taken on his body, and on his psyche. It wasn't like they were inhuman

machines who didn't feel the ramifications of the physical price they paid for doing their job. But they got up every morning and put themselves in harm's way as if they were exactly that.

Maybe he needs a vacation, Starsky thought. I think I could use one myself.

xxxxxxxxxxx

Starsky didn't stop by Hutch's on the way home from the precinct. He didn't want to interrupt his sleep.

But he did try to call once he got home, and, as he suspected, Hutch was unreachable because he had taken the phone off the hook. Which was a signal in itself that he was feeling no better.

xxxxxxxxx

When Starsky let himself in again the following morning, he again found the apartment dark and silent.

Hutch was sitting up on the edge of his bed, leaning over, head in both hands and massaging his forehead, still wearing the same clothes he had on the day before.

He spoke without raising his head. "I can't go to work today."

Starsky picked up the aspirin bottle, finding that Hutch had taken about half of it.

"Couldn't sleep," Hutch told him. "My head's still pounding. And now my vision's getting blurry."

"Sounds like more than a hangover. Let me take you to the doctor."

"Man, I hate to go, but I think I'm going to have to. This pain in my head is driving me crazy."

He pushed himself to his feet and would have walked into the bedroom doorway if Starsky hadn't taken his arm to steer him through it.

"Watch yourself on the stairs," Starsky said as he got Hutch's jacket from the closet and followed him out the door.

Hutch held to the railing all the way down, Starsky ready to grab him should he stumble.

Hutch had forgotten to bring his sunglasses along, so Starsky gave him his.

The blond sat silent during the drive to the hospital, face pinched, hand clenching the door handle in pain.

Sensing he wasn't up to much conversation, Starsky didn't offer any, except to say, "It couldn't be Huggy's whiskey, or all three of us would be sick. Maybe it was something you ate."

xxxxxxxxxx

Starsky watched from the emergency room doorway at Memorial Hospital as the doctors questioned and examined Hutch.

Hutch lay on the examining table, arm across his eyes.

The doctor doing all of the asking was Dr. Chalmers, a pretty brunette who looked too young to be a doctor.

"Ken, we're going to run a battery of tests. CT, MRI, spinal tap, blood work, eye exam-"

"Great," he said bitterly. "Just what I need."

"We'll see if there's any connection to the virus you had."

"Sure." He took his arm down long enough to squint in Starsky's direction. "Hey."

Starsky took that as an invitation to approach the examining table.

"We'll get out of here as soon as they run the tests, Hutch." He looked at Dr. Chalmers. "Can't you give him something?"

"We will," she said calmly.

xxxxxxxxxxx

Starsky followed Hutch around the hospital from test to test all day, asking questions, looking worried.

Later in the evening Dr. Chalmers found them in the cafeteria with a cup of coffee, but Hutch's went untouched, and he sat with his head down to avoid the bright light.

"We've ruled out meningitis, MS, and Lyme Disease," she said, "and we don't think it has anything to do with the virus you had. So, we're thinking it could be stress related."

Hutch laughed a little, but his partner didn't find it so amusing.

"Are you kidding me?" Hutch asked as he lifted his head a little to look at her.

"He runs," Starsky offered, hoping that any information would be helpful to the doctor. "Meditates. Gets to the woods when he can. But he has taken a few hits this past year."

Hutch looked at him as if he wanted to say something, but he clamped his mouth closed.

"I'm sending you upstairs to ophthalmology, then you can go home."

After Dr. Chalmers left their table, Starsky said, "Just like that? They don't find anything, so they just send you home?"

Hutch said, "If they can't find anything, they can't find anything. It'll pass. I just need some painkillers."

"Maybe it's allergies, or sinus or something."

"Starsky…"

"Well, I'm no doctor, but it's gotta be something."

Hutch rose from the table. "I'm tired of sitting around. Let's get to ophthalmology, then blow this joint."

He bumped into a chair as he made his way from the table, then shoved it aside angrily as Starsky steered him toward the elevator.

xxxxxxxxx

After the exam at ophthalmology, the eye doctor told them in the low lighting of the waiting room, "The swelling of the optic nerve and paradoxically dilated pupils tells me it's an ophthalmic migraine."

Hutch sat hunched forward a little in the waiting room chair, fingers massaging his eyes. "Yeah, well, it sure feels like one."

"We'll prescribe some painkillers and send you home."

"That's all you're gonna do?" Starsky asked.

"It's just a migraine," Hutch said. "Not a brain tumor."

"What about his blurry vision?"

"Let's give it a few days. We'll give him something to bring down the swelling, some

pain medication, then check him again."

xxxxxxxx

As they were crossing the parking lot of the hospital to the Torino, Starsky said, "You've never had migraines before."

"First time for everything."

"How's your vision?"

"Great," Hutch answered as he fumbled for the door handle on the passenger side of the Torino.

He finally opened the door and got into the car.

Starsky slid under the steering wheel, and watched Hutch open his bag of medicine to take some pills.

"You think it could be psychological, Hutch? Stress? Like she said?"

"Starsky!"

Exasperated that he couldn't remove the pills from the tin foil packaging, Hutch tossed the medicine onto the dash and dropped his forehead into his hand, squeezing his eyes shut against the pain.

Starsky pushed the pills through the cardboard and gave them to him, along with a drink he'd carried from the vending machine at the hospital.

"Here," he said quietly.

Hutch took the medicine.

"I'm sorry," Hutch grumbled. "It's just that I feel like I've been kicked in the head by a Clydesdale."

Starsky started the car.

"You need some sleep. Let's go home."

xxxxxxxxxxx

When Starsky got Hutch back to Venice Place, Hutch insisted on going home alone, but did say, "I'll keep my phone on the hook, and I'll call you if I have to."

This told Starsky that he was in more pain than he was admitting, and more worried than he was showing.

Starsky was tempted to stay against his partner's protest, but didn't want to put him through the hassle of an argument. He preferred to see him getting a good night's sleep.

"Okay," Starsky finally sighed. "I'll come by in the morning. Don't try to drive anywhere, huh?"

"As if I could."

Starsky watched him get out of the car, grope for the door of his building, then disappear inside of the apartment building.

xxxxxxxxx

Instead of going home, Starsky found himself stopping by the library to research Hutch's symptoms, but found that they pointed to what the ophthalmologist had said.

After three hours at the library, he drove home, but it was after midnight before he finally fell asleep.

xxxxxxxxxx

The next morning when Starsky went to Hutch's place, he detected the smells of soap and shampoo, and saw a light on in the bedroom, signs that Hutch had showered and was perhaps feeling better and was ready for work, but when he stepped into the bedroom, found that Hutch was awake, lying face down in the bed and clutching his pillow to his chest, a strange look on his face and his gun gripped in his hand.

"Hutch?" Starsky asked in a voice that was as strange as the look on his partner's face. "What's wrong?"

He stepped over to the bed, noticing how Hutch's gaze searched for him with blinks and squints.

He was dressed in clean clothes, his hair still damp from the shower.

"Took my medicine," he mumbled as he rubbed fingers into his eyes. "Head still hurts. And I can only see shapes now."

He laughed a little, but it sounded like he was trying to cover a small cry.

Starsky's heart dissolved into sand as he knelt next to the bed, gently taking the gun from Hutch's hand. "There's a neurologist Edith told me about. He can do some new tests.

We'll go see the eye doctor again."

Hutch nodded, and Starsky helped him out of the bed, leading him from the apartment and helping him down the stairs.

xxxxxxxxx

Hutch's body was tight with pain as Starsky helped guide him into the hospital again.

"I think I'm gonna throw up," he muttered as his hand reached for the elevator.

But he managed to avoid it as Starsky helped him inside and pushed the Up button.

xxxxxxxxxxx

After another long day of tests, the neurologist, Dr. Shannon, met with them in his office.

"I'm convinced that it's optic neuritis, possibly caused by a viral infection, but sometimes, the cause is just unknown."

"Look," Hutch said as he wearily rubbed his hurting eyes. "I don't care what it is. Just do something about it."

"I intend to. I want to admit you to the hospital and start intravenous steroids. I must warn you, however. It could take up to a year or longer for your vision to be restored. But sometimes sooner. The steroids will help prevent another episode."

The room was silent while Hutch digested the information.

"A year," he repeated numbly.

"Are you sure?" Starsky asked.

"But sometimes sooner."

xxxxxxxxx

Hutch was not happy with the diagnosis, but at least it was something that had a name, and a cure, by the sound of things, albeit a slow one.

He was rather quiet during the admission process, and once he was settled into a hospital room, Starsky made a point to sit close to the bed so Hutch could see him more clearly.

Huggy, Dobey, and Edith dropped by to visit, but they didn't stay long, as Starsky told them he'd had only a little sleep in the past couple of days.

Starsky was relieved when his partner started snoring while he was reading a book of poetry to him.

xxxxxxxxx

With each passing day, Hutch felt better. The pain was letting up, his vision became clearer, and he was acting more like himself again.

"I'm pleased with your recovery," Dr. Shannon said as he came into Hutch's room. "You'll be discharged in a few more days."

xxxxxxxxx

A few days later, Hutch was released from the hospital and was sent home for some bed rest.

The pain was gone and his vision improved each day.

Starsky stayed with him, constantly testing his eyesight by holding up reading material and household items for him to read and identify at varying distances.

xxxxxxxxxxx

When Hutch's vision was fully restored a month later and he was cleared to return to work, he pulled Starsky aside in the hallway outside their squad room.

"Hey…"

"Hey what?"

"Thanks for…everything."

Starsky smiled. Sometimes it sounded weird when Hutch sounded overly polite, as if he were talking to a casual acquaintance at a cocktail party, but it sounded sweet too, because Starsky knew he meant every word.

The End

Fagela

Near midnight, and Huggy's was alive with conversation, laughter, and music. He was behind the bar conducting business with his usual flair, at once handling the phone, waitresses, customers, and kitchen help like a wry, jovial maestro.

Starsky and Hutch were at the pool table, the blond observing his friend who leaned over the table to take his shot at the ball with the tip of his cane.

It had been months since James Gunther's bullets had chewed up his body. Months of recovery, of nightmares, of pain, of stoic persistence, of readjusting to life as a former cop. The worst had passed and he was putting it behind him. But the one thing he couldn't put behind him, the one physical souvenir of the shooting, was his permanent limp and his need for a cane. One bullet had damaged his left thigh, leaving him to deal with its pain and the need for pain medication.

Hutch saw, however, that Starsky seemed to be more concerned about losing his job than part of his leg.

He longed to be a cop again, to fill that familiar role alongside his partner. The role that satisfied both of them and gave them a sense of completion and fulfillment. Hutch could go back to the force if he wanted, but he chose not to. If Starsky's nightmares were of him never returning to the force, then Hutch's were of returning to the force without his partner. The job would be empty without him. So they considered two other possibilities to fill the void: One was teaching at the academy-which Hutch preferred because it was a safe choice for his friend. And the other possibility was private investigations-which Starsky preferred because it was a closer fit to the work he and Hutch had done before.

When Starsky had healed enough to work again, they had debated for days about what they would do, Hutch insisting that they take the easy route, for his partner's sake; Starsky insisting on the more challenging one, for both of them.

My leg will be like this forever, he told Hutch the night they made their decision.

Gunther's already taken enough from me. He can't have my heart too.

How could Hutch explain to him that he wasn't as strong as he used to be, that he would be compromised by his leg, and that if anything else happened to him…

("When I have good dreams, Hutch, the best dreams, they're about us doing our old job on the street."

("Okay, Starsk. I do understand. I do get it. My best dreams are about us on the street too. But so help me, if you get hurt again…")

Starsky sank the complicated shot and held his hand out to Hutch. "You owe me a ten-spot."

Hutch reached into his pocket and put a ten in his hand.

Starsky grinned and limped around the table for his next shot. "A thousand and one uses for your cane. You're gonna be broke before the night's over, boy."

Hutch smiled. "I think I'm being hustled."

"I could be a while here. Why don't you go to the jukebox and pick out some songs so we can-"

Starsky suddenly grabbed his leg and winced, leaning back against the pool table and taking his prescription bottle from the pocket of his jacket.

Hutch gave him a lingering look of concern as he walked over to the jukebox while taking out some quarters.

Starsky swallowed a couple of pills, then signaled to Hutch that he was okay.

Hutch nodded and turned to select some songs on the jukebox.

"Dave Starsky!"

Starsky turned his head to see an enraged man in a suit storming toward him. "My son didn't make parole because of you!"

Some customers looked to see what the outburst was about-the disgruntled father of a child molester he and Hutch had arrested and put away as detectives a year earlier.

Starsky turned all the way around to face him, not budging, sizing him up in a single glance. "Not my fault he rapes second graders."

The man grabbed the front of his jacket and pulled his fist back.

Huggy saw it and came around the counter.

Hutch was already pushing through the crowd.

But the man's fist stopped in the air when he saw the cane on the pool table.

Hutch stopped in his tracks.

So did Huggy.

The man lowered his fist to his side.

"Come on," Starsky challenged. "Take your shot."

The man released his shirt. Although he still looked enraged, he took a step back.

"What's your problem?" Starsky asked as he took a single lurching step toward him. "Fight me."

The man turned to leave. Starsky took a second step after him.

"I'm talkin' to you," he said grabbing the man's arm. "Come on. Take a swing."

The man mumbled, "I don't hit cripples," then shook his hand off and walked away.

Starsky looked down at himself, then over at Hutch, then averted his gaze.

"Hey," Hutch said softly as he walked over and squeezed the back of Starsky's neck. "Let's finish our game."

Starsky kept his head down as he moved it no and reached for his cane.

"I'm done for tonight," he said as he made his way toward the rear exit.

Caring not to hear or see the customers talking about the incident, Hutch raised a hand to Huggy and left through the back door too.

xxxxxxxx

Hutch knocked on Starsky's door and waited. All the lights were out and it looked like he had gone to bed, but chances were good that he wasn't asleep yet, or was just trying to keep a concerned friend at bay.

"Starsk?"

He had a key, but he really wanted Starsky to come to the door to let him in.

"Starsk?"

Hutch knocked again.

The door finally opened, but only a crack.

"I'm tryin' to sleep."

"Let me in."

"You gonna stand here all night if I don't?"

"I might."

"I want my key back."

"Why?"

"So you can't come barging in anytime you want. You don't own me."

"I never did."

"I'm tired of your daycare routine."

Hutch's heart cringed. It was the pain talking. The physical pain of his leg. He took his painkillers when he needed them, more than Hutch liked, but it never seemed enough.

"Excuse me for caring."

"You need to get away from my door."

"I'm not your enemy."

The door opened and Starsky took a slow, limping step back.

Hutch stepped in and turned the lamp on, but froze with his hand on the switch when he saw the heartbreaking sight of his partner's leg.

He had seen the damage to Starsky's torso, but not his thigh, which was beveled on the outside in an angle and edge that were never meant to be anywhere on a human body. The dent stood out in harsh relief in the low amber glow. In just running shorts, his once-lithe, lean body looked positively vulnerable, almost too lightweight to carry such a load.

Starsky saw his wet eyes and pulled his shorts down a little, trying to hide his leg, then turned and slowly limped for the end table to get his prescription bottle, swaying sideways in a wave of dizziness, leaning his shoulder against the wall before he could get there.

Hutch recognized that Starsky was riding high on the painkillers.

"Are you really in pain?" Hutch asked as he went to the end table and picked up the prescription bottle, "or do you take these to shut things out?"

Still leaning against the wall, Starsky held his hand out. "Give me my pills."

Hutch opened the bottle and looked in. "You only have a couple left. Did you take all of these?"

"No, I fed 'em to the birds."

Hutch handed him the bottle, watched him pop the cap off and shake the last two pills into his mouth.

"I know you need them, Starsk. I know you're in pain. But…"

Starsky leaned his head back against the wall, looking at him through slit, drugged eyes. This was the face that he hid in the dark shadows of his home. This was the face he didn't want Hutch to see.

"But what? Can you make my leg stop hurting? Huh? Go on. Make it stop. Please. I'm waiting. Come on."

"I think you're in trouble."

Starsky put his head down and chuckled softly. "I like how you word things. 'I think you're in trouble.' 'Give me some medicine'."

"I think you take too many."

"Yeah? Then you tell me just how many I'm supposed to take. I take these for pain, in case you forgot. It helps me function."

"Yeah, you look like you're really functioning right now. I'm afraid for you. You're changing, and, damn it, I promised Terry I'd never let that happen. You can't go a week without these pills, can you?"

Starsky raised his head. "I can't go a day. Why should I? They're prescribed. I need them. It's not like my leg ever lets up. I don't get to choose when it hurts. When I go out there, and do my new job, and have fun with you, it hurts more, so I have to take more, but you know somethin'? I don't care. Because it lets me live my life. And that is something I promised Terry I would do."

"You could really hurt yourself with these. If you take too many, your heart will slow down, and then it will stop. You just need to slow down. We've talked about this before. I know you don't want to hear this, but you're addicted."

"You would know."

Hutch slapped him, and Starsky fell to his good knee against the wall, head down, right hand on the floor.

Hutch stood looking down at him for a moment, heart hammering in his chest, then walked to the door, where he stopped, fished into his pocket, and brought out Starsky's door key, tossing it on the floor next to him.

"There," he said. "I'll be at Maia's if you need me."

He left with a slam of the door.

Starsky was still on his knee next to the wall.

"I'm sorry!" he called half-heartedly over his shoulder after him. Half-heartedly because he knew it was too late for him to hear.

Starsky looked down at the empty prescription bottle still in his hand, and pushed himself to his feet, limping to the bedroom to dress in jeans, the new black Oxford shirt and black sneakers Hutch had given him when he was able to get around again, along with his black jacket. The sneakers were a godsend. Hutch knew just what to pick out. Cushioned soles to make walking easier. "Man in black," he said without humor as he looked into the mirror and picked up his cane. His leg was throbbing again, and his pharmacy was open twenty-four hours.

xxxxxxxx

Maia opened her door for Hutch and he stepped in, kissing her and taking her in his arms and moving her to the bedroom.

"It's so late," she said as they sank onto the bed. "I missed you."

"I missed you too," he said as he began to undress her.

xxxxxxxx

Starsky crossed the parking lot of the pharmacy to the Torino, the filled prescription in the pharmacy bag he held, leaning heavier on his cane than usual. The long day staking out a dirty cop's home, and then the long night at Huggy's, had taken its toll on his leg, which ached terribly now.

He stopped at the door of the Torino, uncapped the prescription bottle, then put two pills in his mouth and swallowed them.

He leaned against the car a little, waiting for the medication to take effect, and that's when he heard a groan about three cars down.

"Hutch?" he said as he limped in front of the row of cars and over to where the voice was coming from.

He moved between two parked cars to the man lying on his side with his back to him, and that's when he saw that it wasn't Hutch at all. No blond hair, no familiar clothes; it had just sounded like him.

"Hey, man," he said reaching down and pulling the man over onto his back to check him out. "You need a doctor or some-"

Artie Solkin smiled up at him from the ground as two teenage boys crowded in behind him, boxing him in between the two cars.

Starsky reached beneath his jacket for his gun, but one of the teenagers kicked his cane out from under him while the other kicked him in the face as he fell.

Artie rolled catlike to his feet, then reached down and picked up Starsky's fallen gun.

Facedown, Starsky moaned into the asphalt but didn't move.

Artie looked at the two juveniles. "Get him out of here before somebody sees us."

xxxxxxxxx

The next morning Maia handed Hutch a cup of coffee when he came from the shower and into the kitchen to kiss her.

"Good morning," she said.

"Morning," he said sitting down at her table and opening the morning paper.

"Want some eggs?"

"No, I'm fine, thanks."

She sat down with him, sipping her own cup of coffee. "So what are you and Starsky up to today?"

"Well…not sure yet."

"Did you ever get that crooked cop?"

"Still working on it."

"Well, if you're not working, maybe we could go to the beach. Just an idea."

"You don't have to go to work?"

"Library's closed for renovations."

He put the newspaper down and kissed her. "I think I really need the beach today."

xxxxxxxxx

It was a lone storage shed twenty-five feet long by twenty-five feet wide, situated on a vacant lot in Artie's old, ghost town of a neighborhood. A typical storage building, one that Artie owned. Made of aluminum, not well-insulated. No windows, and one wide door in the front that rolled up on tracks. No electricity, so Artie used a kerosene lamp for a light source, and no furniture except for a small, round cafe table and chairs he had placed in the front corner of the building to one side of the door, and a single chair he had placed against the back wall for Starsky to sit in.

It was almost noon.

The door was closed for privacy and quiet, even though the likelihood of anyone discovering them was remote. One leg crossed over the other knee, Artie sat at his small table that was decorated with a flower, clean placemat, ashtray, lunchbox, a can of soda, and the kerosene lamp.

Across the back of one of the chairs Starsky's black jacket was neatly draped; his cane lay across its seat.

The man watched Starsky as he began to regain consciousness. He came to with a groan, slouching forward in the chair, hands tied behind his back and to the wooden slats with rope. His ankles were tied to the legs of it. His head came up and his glazed eyes tried to focus in the low light. He wanted to speak, but the pain in his head and in his leg was short-circuiting the message to his mouth.

"I want you to know," Artie explained from his chair, "this isn't what I had planned. I went to Hutchinson's to make good on the promise I made, but he wasn't home. I thought you might know where he is right now. Did he move? Is he on vacation? Transfer?"

Starsky tested the rope, struggled to get out of the chair, but he was fastened tightly to it.

"Hey," he panted weakly, unable to raise his voice to a shout. "Somebody…help me."

"Nobody around to hear you, so save your breath. I brought you here so you could help me."

Starsky sniffed at the dried blood in his nose, his voice a nasal groan. "I'm not gonna help you…pervert. Where's your teenage boys, huh? Use 'em all up, just go get some more, huh?"

Artie's shoulders stiffened, and he blinked furiously, but his voice remained controlled. "I served my time and was a model prisoner. There was a clerical error that caused me to get out early. These boys know the score. I don't force any of them to do anything they don't want to do."

"No, you just get 'em high so they'll do your dirty work for you. You didn't do that much time. You never do the heavy lifting. You let the boys take the fall and..."

Artie's chest puffed up like a toad and he rose to his feet, walking back to where Starsky sat.

"You've changed a lot, Starsky. You're not a cop anymore, and it looks like somebody put you out of commission pretty good. But I'm not concerned with you. My concern is with doing Hutchinson right now, and since he's no longer a real police officer, I think he'll be easier this time." He leaned over and spoke quietly.

"How'd he like that car bomb I got Tommy to rig up? How'd he like what we did to his girlfriend?"

Starsky spat in his face, but Artie merely pulled out a monogrammed handkerchief and wiped it off.

"You're perspiring, punk. And you look a little sick. Is there anything I can do for you? I'll help you if you help me."

"Twisted freak. If you think I'm gonna…hand Hutch over to you, you're cra..."

He trailed off as he lost his train of thought, his head bobbing to one side.

"That's very noble and brave of you. I'll come back and ask you again tomorrow. Unless you change your mind in the meantime and decide to tell me what I want to hear."

Artie walked back to his table and took Starsky's bottle of pain pills from his pocket, shook it to hear the rattle, and set it on the table where Starsky could see it.

"I'm pretty experienced," Artie said, and opened the door. To the two teenage boys waiting outside smoking a cigarette, he said, "Hurt him."

The juveniles looked at each other. "Break his legs or something?"

"No. I want it different. Make him walk. When he tells you where his friend Hutch is, come and tell me. I'll be in the camper."

The teenagers watched as Artie walked to a small, rickety RV and went inside, then they stepped inside the dark storage building, reached up, and pulled the door down until it closed.

Starsky drew his head away from them like a turtle when he saw them coming.

They were teenagers, but they weren't young, and they weren't small. If they were willing to kick a man when he was down, they would do just about anything else.

He made a mental note of their descriptions for when he escaped. One wore a skull and bones earring, and the other had a tattoo of a skull and bones on his arm.

"You two…in a gang?" he mumbled.

"Used to be. Now we work for Artie."

"Lucky. Gonna end up in juvie or dead, hanging around him. You really want to kill a cop?"

The teenager with the earring grinned. "He says you ain't a cop no more."

Starsky could no longer keep his eyes open. He had forgotten that he wasn't a cop. He was a private investigator, and it wasn't the same thing.

"Touché."

The one with the tattoo reached behind Starsky's chair to untie his wrists, while the other bent down to untie his ankles.

"You kids want to rethink this. When my partner figures out where I am, he'll bring a whole police department down on your hea..."

The teenagers stood dispassionately and observed him.

Even though Starsky's hands and feet were free, he still sat slouched forward in the chair.

"Move," the one with the earring said. "Walk."

"Well, see, I got this bum leg."

"Artie says walk."

When he didn't move, the teenager kicked him out of the chair and onto the floor, where he lay sprawled on his back.

"Hey, man," the one with the tattoo said to his accomplice, "he didn't say kick him, he said make him walk."

The juveniles stepped over to him and hauled him to his feet.

"Walk," the one with the tattoos said. "Artie said so."

Starsky stood unsteadily between them, head down, muttering.

The teenager with the earring jerked his head up. "I can't understand you."

Starsky lifted dazed eyes to him. "May as well kill me now. I'm not gonna rat him…"

"Walk," the boy with the tattoo said, and sat down in Starsky's chair to watch.

The boy with the earring gave Starsky a little push, and Starsky began a slow, laborious limp around the room, the boy following him and standing guard at the door.

His leg was already hurting, but he forced himself to continue.

"Away from the table," the boy said as he tripped him to the floor, laughing when Starsky fell to his hands and knees.

"What the hell's wrong with your leg anyway, man?"

Starsky was still on all fours. He tried to push himself back up, but crumpled back down.

The boy standing between the door and the table walked over to him and kicked him in the side.

"Hey!" the one from Starsky's chair yelled to his associate as he ran over to them. "Can't you follow instructions? He said no kicking. He said make him walk. That's all. If you don't listen, you're not going to get very far. Artie wants things done a certain way for a certain reason."

The boy pulled Starsky up and pushed him toward the back of the room.

"Keep walking."

Starsky continued to limp, hand to his thigh, trying to press the pain away, trying to focus

on something else besides the burning flame his leg had become. The kicks he had sustained were child's play compared to his thigh.

His face was shiny with sweat, hair damp with perspiration, as much from the overheated aluminum building as his pain. He should have had his pain medication. He would have taken it two or three times by now.

(Please…stay with Maia, Hutch. Stay away. Be mad. I'll stall them…as long as I can. I'll do what whatever I have to)

xxxxxxxxxxx

It was late afternoon when Huggy rapped at Starsky's front door.

Not seeing the Torino, he didn't figure he was home, but one never knew.

"Starsk! You in there, man?"

He tried the door, and found that it was locked.

"Better luck next time," he said as he descended the stairs.

(Which reminds me. When you gonna get a new place, Starsk? These steps got to be mistreatin' your leg)

He went to his car and got in, regretting that he couldn't check up on him today after what happened at the restaurant last night.

xxxxxxxxxx

Starsky stumbled to his right knee, holding his left leg, teeth clenched in agony.

"Hey," he growled as he tried to hold his head up and keep moving. "Can't. Just give me…"

The boys lifted him to his feet.

"Just walk."

But what he was doing was far from walking, and could in no way be described as limping. It was more of a lurch. His legs trembled from exertion, his face pale and grimaced with pain. He could only move a few steps before collapsing to hands and knees, and then the teenagers were there again setting him on his feet.

He managed to trudge to the chair. His chair. And collapsed into it. But the boys pulled

him back up and set him in motion again.

xxxxxxxxxxx

It was dusk.

Hutch and Maia had had a relaxing day at the beach, but now he found himself driving past Starsky's, feeling somewhat like a spy. The Torino was gone and his lights were out, so he decided to go to Huggy's. He wanted to apologize, make amends. This was no time for the wounded pride of Kenneth Hutchinson. Starsky was the one dealing with all the pain, all the changes, and he needed someone who could listen and understand; someone who could ride the roller coaster with him.

(You're the best friend I got in the whole world)

(If this were a cowboy movie, I'd give you my boots)

(It's okay, boy. You're gonna make it)

xxxxxxxx

It was after dark when Artie slid the door of the storage building up and stepped inside, closing it again in the off chance that someone drove or walked past.

He went back to where the two teenagers held a limp Starsky up between them.

His head was down on his chest and he was silent, his hair wringing wet, his clothes soaked in perspiration.

"He passed out," the one with the tattoo said. "What do you want us to do?"

"Tie him back in the chair, then go fix yourself something to eat. We'll do it again tomorrow."

xxxxxxxxxx

Huggy looked up to see Hutch walking in without Starsky.

"Where's your better half?"

"That's what I thought I'd ask you." Hutch said looking around.

"I haven't seen him all day. Went by his place, but his car was gone. Called a few times."

Hutch went behind the counter to use Huggy's phone and dialed Starsky's number. "I've

been with Maia all day. Last night was the last time we talked, and, well…we sort of had words."

Huggy eyed him suspiciously. "Words."

Hutch listened as Starsky's phone rang and rang.

"Words about what?"

"His pain medication. He's probably nursing his wounds with a lady somewhere."

Huggy waited along with Hutch, who finally had to put the receiver back down.

"He was almost out of medicine," he said as he headed for the door again. "I'm going to check the pharmacy and see if he picked up a prescription. If he shows up, keep him here."

"Sounds like an investigation. You gonna call Dobey?"

"Not yet."

xxxxxxxxxx

Hutch drove past Starsky's place one more time before heading for the pharmacy Starsky liked to use. The house looked the same as it had earlier. No Torino; no lights.

A few minutes later he pulled his car into the parking lot of the drugstore, then got out and walked inside.

"Excuse me," he said to the druggist, "did Dave Starsky come in here last night or this morning to fill a prescription?"

"I'm afraid that's confidential."

Hutch reached in his hip pocket for a badge and ID out of habit, frowned; then realized that they were no longer there, and said, "I've picked up prescriptions for him before. It's important."

The pharmacist picked up a clipboard.

"Name?"

"Ken Hutchinson."

The man checked his list of approved names.

"Ah, there it is. Well. Yes. Actually, not only was he here, but his car was too."

"What?"

"He left it in the parking lot all night. I had it towed this morning."

"Can you show me where it was parked?"

"I think so."

The pharmacist got his assistant to take over while Hutch followed him outside and across the parking lot.

"Right here," he said pointing to a space that was about halfway down a row of parked cars.

"Which tow company did you call?"

"Tackett and Sons."

"The police will be here later. Tell them everything you know."

The pharmacist nodded as he watched Hutch get into his car and speed away.

Hutch gripped the steering wheel, trying to ignore the fear that was crawling along his arms.

Starsky and no car was a bad sign. It was like Starsky and no…partner.

xxxxxxxx

When Hutch found the Torino at Tackett and Son's Towing, he called Captain Dobey from their office and told him what had transpired.

Funny how he had left the department months ago, but still remembered Dobey's number.

He wondered how long it would remain in his head.

"Don't touch his car," Dobey said.

"Why not?"

"Because! You're not a cop anymore! You could contaminate any evidence!"

"Captain!"

"Look for him, but I'll take it from here! And if you find out anything, I want to know about it!"

Hutch heard the click in his ear.

He stopped by Huggy's to tell him of the developments, then went to the pharmacy to wait for the detectives and crime lab.

He would never jeopardize the investigation, but once the investigators arrived, no one could keep him away from the pharmacy, the towing company, or Starsky's house, his observation of the cops' work bordering on interference.

xxxxxxxxx

It was five in the morning when Hutch dropped sideways into an empty booth at Huggy's and leaned his head back, closing his eyes.

Huggy's was uncharacteristically silent and vacant, and Hutch welcomed it.

"Nothing," he whispered as Huggy settled into the other side of the booth.

"Gunther wouldn't?"

Hutch still spoke with his eyes closed. "He could, but he already took his pound of flesh."

"What about this shady cop you been working on?"

"No. He doesn't have a clue he's being watched."

"What about a guy like the one who was in here night before last goin' cuckoo over his son not makin' parole?"

"You know how many guys there are like that out there, who would love to see me or Starsky hurt or dead, even now? I can't begin to count them."

Hutch stopped talking, as if waiting for Huggy to say something else he could dismiss.

But Huggy didn't add to his list of suspects; he intentionally let the booth remain silent, watching and waiting for the telltale signs of a sleeping Hutch-the softening of his features, heaviness in his breathing, and nodding of his head.

When it was apparent that Hutch was asleep, Huggy slipped quietly from the booth, went behind the counter, brought back a fresh table cloth, and covered him with it.

He wanted to find Starsky as badly as Hutch did, but the police were doing everything they could, and a malfunctioning, sleep-deprived Hutch was something Starsky didn't need. And neither did Hutch.

xxxxxxxxx

At seven the same morning Artie and the two juveniles stood over Starsky as he moaned in his chair.

"Please," he mumbled with his head down. "Give me my pills."

Artie shook the prescription bottle in his hand to make the pills rattle.

"I would love to, but you haven't told me where Hutchinson is. We went by his place again, and he's just not there. Where does he hang out?"

Starsky forced his head up, his eyes fading with pain.

"I. Need. My. Pills." He strained against the ropes binding him, his wrists bloody from the effort of struggling all night, gasping at the additional ripping pain it placed on his leg.

"Please. Artie. You can't do this to me."

"All I want is for you to tell me where I can find him. When will he be back? Should I go talk to your ex captain? I hear he's got a nice little family."

"Please! Give it to me!"

"I've got it right here in my hand. All you have to do is say where he is."

Starsky clenched his teeth against the maddening cruelty in his leg and the nauseating torture of withdrawal, sure he would pass out again. If he could just stretch his left leg out, massage it, but right now he wished it were cut off so he could no longer feel it or have it to deal with.

(Hutch, please come, right now, please)

(No, don't, you can't. I don't mean it, stay away)

He turned his head to the side, as far away from their eyes as he could, trying to hide his tears of agony and shame.

"It hurts, Artie. Please."

"You know you sound just like Tommy right now. How bad does it hurt? Enough to tell me? Do you really want this medicine?"

Starsky's voice was just a mumble of pain. "Oh my God."

Artie looked at the boys.

"Make him walk."

Starsky could not protest except for a long continuous groan as he was untied again and lifted to his feet.

"Artie, I can't do this. My leg."

They nudged him out onto the floor as they had the day before, but today he could only drag his wounded leg behind him, and only for a few feet before collapsing facedown.

The teenagers picked him back up and walked him around, but his left leg didn't have the strength, and his right was shaking from effort.

"Please," he said reaching for Artie. "Give me my pills."

He fell to his hands and knees this time, still reaching.

"Please. Help me. I can't take this."

Starsky's left hand reached out toward Artie's pants leg. Artie backed one step away from it.

"Come on, Starsky. Tell me what I need to know."

Starsky lowered his forehead to the floor, fingers digging into the old wood, and hit his forehead one time, astonished and thankful that his brain could shift focus from the pain in his leg to the pain in his head, like a train switching tracks. He tried to slow his breath and lessen the pain with mind and body techniques Hutch showed him, but it only offered limited relief.

Artie looked at the teenagers.

"Pack up these things and let's go."

"Why?" the one with the earring asked. "He ain't told us yet."

"He had his chance. If he wants to die for that Nazi of a friend of his, we'll let him. Once Hutchinson realizes something has happened to him, he'll come out of the woodwork, I'll

be waiting for him, and we'll still have our rendezvous. I guess what he still doesn't understand about me is that I don't like to be insulted, and I don't give up."

"You mean just go?" the boy with the tattoo asked Artie.

"I mean just go. Come on."

"No," Starsky said pawing toward Artie's shoe. "Wait. Don't leave-don't leave me here."

He tried to get to his feet, but even his right leg buckled beneath him and he was sent to the floor.

"Artie! Wait! Take me with you!"

It took two minutes for the juveniles to pack the few items in the building and carry them to the RV. The only things left behind with Starsky were his jacket and cane.

"Artie!" Starsky called weakly as he watched the door slide down. "Come back!"

Starsky forced himself to his hands and knees, his entire body trembling with pain and exertion as he made his way to the door.

He heard the starting of a motor, then the sound of a heavy vehicle moving away and disappearing.

"Artie," he groaned with his hand on the door handle. He tried to lift it, but it was locked.

He pounded once on it, then twice, then a third time.

"Artie!"

He kicked the door as hard as he could with his good leg, which sent a shock of agony through his entire body.

Panic was setting in. Artie was leaving him here to die, and he was going after Hutch.

Just when he thought he was sapped of strength, he found enough to push up to all fours again, and plowed headfirst into the door to try to force it open, but it was solid, and all he managed to do was knock himself out.

xxxxxxxxx

It was almost noon when Huggy shook Hutch's shoulder in the back booth.

"Blondie. Customers startin' to come in for lunch. Dobey called. Wants you to call him

back."

Hutch mumbled something sleepily as he sat up and rubbed his eyes with his fingers.

"What time is it?" he asked sliding from the booth.

"Lunchtime I told you."

"Why'd you let me sleep so long?"

"Don't you need it?"

Hutch didn't reply. He walked behind the counter to use the phone to return Dobey's call.

Huggy watched him talk on the phone, wishing he could do more to help. He had shaken down every hooker, bookie, and stoolie he knew, but no one knew anything about Starsky.

Huggy discerned from Hutch's body language that he wasn't getting any good information from Dobey on the phone either.

The blond slowly hung up and leaned dejectedly back against the counter, turning his back to the first few customers trickling in.

Huggy walked over to him. Hutch was looking down at the floor.

"Well?" Huggy asked. "What'd he say?"

"No leads. Nothing turned up in the pharmacy's parking lot, or the car, or his place."

Huggy didn't know what to say.

Hutch put his hands in the front pockets of his jeans, still looking down, voice solemn and soft. "It's my fault. I should have been doing my job watching him. He can't fight like he used to. His leg betrays him. He's in constant pain. I try to tell myself that he isn't, that some of it's in his head…that he doesn't need as much medicine as he says he does…God, what am I doing to him? He would never treat me like this."

Huggy was always more concerned with a quiet Hutch than a mad one. The mad one he could calm down, reason with. The quiet one retreated to a distant place in his heart and was harder to reach. The fact that his love for Starsky had sent him there made it even harder.

"Don't be so hard on yourself, man. I think what Forest put you through clouds your judgment about Starsky's situation. You do the best you can. You would die for the boy,

and you both know it."

Hutch straightened and looked at him. "I need to go now. If you hear anything…"

Huggy nodded, and watched Hutch walk toward the exit.

"Hey, the investigation ain't over, Blondie. We just got started. It ain't over till we find him, right?"

Right, Hutch thought as he walked out to his car. But I can't turn around and tell you that, Huggy, because I don't want everyone to see tears in my eyes.

xxxxxxxxx

In his impaired state of physical and mental distress, Starsky wasn't sure if the sounds he heard were real or an hallucination, and he decided it was time to ram his body against the inside walls of the building again, hoping the racket could be heard by someone who happened by.

But he didn't get that far.

Someone was unlocking the door to the storage building and sliding the door up.

At last. Someone to help him. He could get out of here.

"Hey," he said as he tried to lift his head from the floor. "I need some…some help here."

But it wasn't help. It was the teenagers back again, on foot this time.

He couldn't help his cringing reaction as they crouched down, and he couldn't lift his arms to defend himself. Curled on his side, he was a weak bundle of nerves and pain.

"Hey," he whispered, "what are you-"

They ignored his words as if he were a piece of furniture, handled his body as if he were a bag of laundry, as they stabbed him in the side with a three-inch knife and left him to bleed to death.

xxxxxxxx

Hutch drove to Venice Place and parked in front of the apartment. He would go up to take a quick shower and mix a protein drink, then he would keep digging.

There was still work to do. The detectives on Starsky's case were coming up empty-handed, but maybe they had overlooked something. They were decent cops; but they had no personal investment. It wasn't their best friend's life on the line.

Dobey had told him not to interfere with the investigation, and he had complied, but the captain couldn't keep him from Starsky's house, and that's where he planned to go next.

Maybe there was a bit of evidence that the investigators had neglected to find; some shred that only he would recognize as relevant.

The phone was ringing when Hutch went inside his apartment.

He answered, and it was Dobey.

"The New Hope Detention Center For Boys just called the station, Hutch. They said two of their juveniles left last week with Solkin. He went in there posing as a foster father and got them out. The place is over-crowded and under-funded, so they didn't check Artie too closely, but once they did, they gave the precinct a call. I have my guys on finding where he's been holing up since he got out last week. I called Huggy too, thought maybe he could shake something loose. I think he's our man, don't you?"

Hutch stood with one hand holding the receiver to his ear, the other planted against the wall, head down, the breath almost stopping in his chest. It made sense. Artie had always had it in for him, always seeking payback, and he had particularly cruel ways of doing it.

"It's me he wants," Hutch said quietly. "Why didn't he just come after me? Why did he have to take Starsk?"

Suddenly weak all over, Hutch barely noticed when the hand holding the phone slipped down to his chest.

Dobey's voice was still speaking in the receiver.

"We'll get him, Hutch."

Hutch closed his eyes, trying not to think of all the gruesome things Solkin might be doing to Starsky to get him to reveal his whereabouts.

"Hutch? Are you still there? Are you okay?"

Hutch moved his head no, no, no against the idea that Solkin had taken Starsky; against the idea that his friend was surely suffering somehow at his hands, and more precisely, the hands of his young footmen.

"Finally," Artie's voice said behind him. "I've been looking for you."

The receiver dropped to the floor, and Hutch turned his head to see the man standing in his doorway, the two teenagers behind him.

Hutch lunged for him, grabbing him inside and slamming him against the wall, his eyes serpentine in their cold flatness, his voice itself a near hiss.

"Where is he!"

The youths moved to intervene, but Artie stopped them with a flick of his hand.

Artie offered a sour, oily smile, clearly enjoying having the upper hand.

"Now maybe you'll truly be sorry for arresting me and talking to me like I'm a piece of dirt."

"Pied Piper. Pederast. Always the same. You are a piece of dirt."

Artie began to swell up with indignation. "I do my homework. I know how to work people."

"You know how to hurt people. I know you've hurt him, and you're going to tell me where he is, or so help me…"

"I didn't hurt him. I never touched him."

"You never do. You like to set it up, orchestrate it, and watch it. That's your kick. But you're too weak to do your own torturing, so you get your young boyfriends to do it for you. You don't have the stomach. You are a sick voyeuristic sadist and a cruel coward."

Artie's lips were pursed in a tight, agitated line. Frustration inflated his lungs again; and his nose wrinkled in offense.

The teenager with the earring laughed. "You should've seen him, man. Cryin' and all. He's the coward."

Hutch grabbed for the boy's shirt and threw him against the wall, pinning him there with an arm across his chest.

"You don't know what you've gotten yourself into, kid. If you don't want to go down for kidnapping…the kidnapping of a decorated ex-cop at that…you better start talking."

"And you better start listening," Artie said as he straightened his clothes, standing braver now that Hutch had let go of him. "You should never harass me like you did. Like you're doing now. I can hurt you like I did before."

Hutch was back at him again, this time wedging an arm against his throat. "Tell me where he is!"

Artie struggled to breathe, panic in his eyes but a smile on his face.

Hutch slammed his head back against the wall.

"Where!"

Artie winced and held his hands up in nervous glee.

"He's dead."

Hutch froze, searching the man's eyes, hoping to see a bluff, a game, a lie.

His voice dropped to a whisper.

"What did you say?"

Artie shot a smug look to the boys, then back at a broken, silent Hutch. Gone the cold-blooded viper. Here the wilting flower.

"This is the day I've been waiting for. To see you looking at me with respect."

Hutch's arm came away from Artie's throat as he turned and fell to one knee next to the arm of his sofa.

"It wasn't me," Artie said. "They did it."

Hutch moved his head no in numb disbelief, a small sound of despair escaping him.

Artie leaned back against the wall in what looked like relief, his chest puffing with pride now. "I told you this day was coming. If it's any consolation, he didn't turn you over. I don't understand the big deal."

"You wouldn't," Hutch said quietly as he looked up at Artie. "Unlike you, he had heart."

"No matter what we did to him," the tattooed teenager said with a grin, "he wouldn't budge."

Artie looked at the boys. "You two could learn a thing or two from him. Next time-"

Hutch rammed his head into Artie's gut, then threw him to the floor, straddled him, and began to pummel his face like a machine.

Behind him, one of the boys raised the knife to bring it down into his back, but the sound of distant sirens stopped them and they ran out the door and down the stairs.

Hutch was still straddling and punching a bloody-faced Artie when Captain Dobey and two detectives hurried in.

Dobey pulled Hutch off of the man and onto his feet while the detectives read Artie his rights and handcuffed him.

"He's in custody," Dobey told him. "We're taking the boys in too."

Hutch ignored him and grabbed for Artie as the cops led him toward the door, shouting at his back.

"Where is he!"

Dobey held Hutch back.

Artie just offered a bloody smile over his shoulder as he was escorted out.

"We think we know where he is," Dobey told him. "Huggy found out he owns a lot in his old neighborhood near the old Falcon projects."

But Hutch was moving his head no again, trying to wake from the nightmare.

"He's dead."

Dobey jerked his arm roughly.

"What?"

Hutch looked pale and faint, as if he could collapse.

"Hutch, that's not Solkin's M.O. He doesn't kill. He doesn't get his kids to kill."

"WELL HE DID THIS TIME!"

Gone, for the moment, was the dazed grief; replaced by a hot rage that was consuming him.

Dobey squeezed his arm. "We have to go. We have to see."

xxxxxxxx

As Dobey drove toward Solkin's old neighborhood, Hutch sat staring in the passenger seat, his face a white, plaster mask. The captain radioed for an ambulance as well as the detectives working Starsky's case.

The neighborhood was skeleton and deserted, with rotted wood homes, broken windows, weeds in the old yards, roads and sidewalks in broken disrepair.

From the car Dobey saw the storage building, but Hutch wouldn't look at it. The captain saw that there was a rusted padlock that could be broken with a tire tool, so he got out, opened his trunk, and fished around until he found it.

Hutch opened the door of Dobey's car and got out, waiting for him to break the padlock.

When the lock fell apart, Dobey reached down for the handle of the door and began to slide it up.

Hutch put his head down as the door moved upward, then turned his head, the area oddly still around him, the air itself almost trembling. He turned all the way around, back to the building, hand shading his eyes, unable to look.

I'm going away now. My soul is leaving my body. This is what it's like to die.

"Hutch," Dobey's voice said from the back of the building. "He's alive."

Hutch's head came up and he shot inside, seeing Dobey with Starsky, who was half-sitting, half-lying sideways in the chair at the rear of the building; a still sight against the loud thudding of his heart.

A trail of blood drops led to the chair.

Hutch walked to where he sat slouched, crouching next to him to see his face and assess him.

Starsky's head lay against the back of the chair, a short, bloody knife clasped loosely in one hand, a sound of pain escaping him with each breath, his other arm limp in his lap. His left leg had a visible tremor.

Hutch gently took the knife away from him, put it on the floor, and touched the side of his friend's head.

"Starsk?"

Starsky's eyes were blue glitter in the soft afternoon sun as his left bloodstained hand reached for Hutch, clinging to his collar.

"My pills," came his voice, dry and thick with thirst.

Hutch could only lower his head in a silent prayer of thanks.

Dobey looked around for a pill bottle.

Hutch saw the dried bloodstain on the front of his black shirt, and carefully unbuttoned it to take a look, finding what looked like a knife wound that appeared to have clotted and stopped bleeding on its own.

"The knife wound," Hutch said. "I don't think they hit anything vital, but we'll make sure."

"I got a knife wound?"

"You sure do."

"Thought I…thought I dreamed it."

Starsky's fingers wouldn't let go of Hutch's collar as he panted hoarsely, "Glad you're alive."

Hutch checked him for broken bones, and when his hands explored Starsky's ankles, found that they were almost as bloodstained as his wrists from trying to get out of the ropes.

"I'm glad you're alive too, dirtball."

Dobey found his prescription bottle in a corner, and brought it over to Hutch.

"You'll be all right," Dobey told him. "Solkin's under arrest, and the kids are being detained."

"I don't feel…" Starsky leaned over a little as if to pass out, still clinging to Hutch's shirt. "…so good."

Hutch leaned him back against the chair again and opened the prescription bottle, putting two pills in Starsky's mouth.

"Swallow."

Starsky finally did, resting his head sideways again on the back of the chair.

"Thanks," he whispered.

Hutch looked at the bottle. "It's full. He kept them from you?"

Starsky's eyes closed, his grip slipping from Hutch's collar. He reached back up again to grasp it, as if afraid of losing his lifeline.

"So I'd tell 'em where to find you. God, my leg hurts."

Hutch looked up at the captain, angry tears in his eyes.

Hutch lifted his head to examine the side of his face that was hidden against the chair.

"They did a number on your face, buddy."

"I know. Just don't make me walk, okay?"

Hutch gave a slight smile of confusion. "I wouldn't make you walk, Starsk, what are you talking about?"

"Didn't tell 'em," Starsky sighed as he looked up into Hutch's face, his hand going up into his hair. "I didn't."

Hutch took his hand, found it cold, and squeezed warmth back into it. "I know," he said softly. "I know you didn't. Just…" He gently pulled Starsky's head to his shoulder. "Here. Rest your head right here on me. That's it. Isn't that better?"

The siren of the ambulance sounded as it arrived outside of the building.

Dobey went to pick up Starsky's cane and jacket, then handed them to Hutch.

"The ambulance is here," Hutch told Starsky.

"Will you ride with me?"

"Of course. I have your pills."

The medics opened the rear doors of the ambulance and took out a gurney, bringing it inside the building.

"Hey," came Starsky's faint voice, his cocoon of pain melting from the pills he had taken.

Hutch leaned close to hear him. "Yeah?"

"Sorry for what I said to you."

Hutch carefully pried Starsky's fingers from his shirt so that the medics could examine him.

"Same here."

Captain Dobey watched as Hutch helped wheel the gurney to the ambulance, then walked from the storage building to talk to the detectives who had arrived on the scene.

The End

Uncover

Hutch had been missing three weeks, and I was doing my best to keep focused on finding him and tracking down every lead brought in by the cops, Huggy, old snitches, new snitches, Hutch's snitches-anyone who might know anything. But every thread turned up a dead end. Not really leads at all. More like needles in haystacks. But I had to chase each one down, to cover all the bases. Sometimes even two or three times each.

Dobey wasn't saying it, but I know he was thinking it: :No leads, no Hutch. He wouldn't say it until I did, and I wasn't about to; not even close. I put all our cases on hold just to find him. I slept in my car most nights when I'd get so tired from hunting that I couldn't drive myself home. Sometimes I'd crash at Huggy's. Because to me, going home was giving up, and I was far from doing that.

Fellow cops tried to talk to me. Burke and Ramone pulled me aside at the precinct and said, "We know you and Hutch are tight. We're partners too. But Dave, you need to look at this from a cop's perspective."

Burke couldn't finish, so Ramone did.

"He could be dead."

I wouldn't allow the words to even enter my mind. I couldn't. Because believing Hutch was dead, or finding out that he was, would mean the end of my world.

I wasn't giving in.

So I walked off from the cops like they were nuts. Maybe they could say those words, but not me. They didn't know that Hutch had just escaped and survived Forest's kidnapping three weeks ago and was still a little wrung out by it; how he was putting on a brave act but underneath was a little scared, or that he needed me. They didn't know about the promise I'd made to my partner. That nobody would ever mess with him like that again as long as I was around.

And yet. Somebody grabbed him right off the street. At his car in front of his place from the look of things. No struggle in his apartment. Nothing amiss in or around his car. It looked like he'd drank his morning health shake and had planned to head over to pick me up just like any other morning.

But he never got in his car.

It was tough sorting through all the lowlifes who would want to hurt us. There were many. The ones who did rise to the surface, like Leon Russo and Cage Reynolds, turned

out to be false leads. We had just busted them for a major cocaine shipment and they swore they'd get even, even from the inside, but no credible information turned up that pointed to them, and kidnapping wasn't their style. When they blew somebody away, it was with a shotgun, usually in their targets' own homes.

This seemed…not like revenge, but random, to me. Something that just happened. Hutch in the wrong place at the wrong time. Maybe he saw something he shouldn't have.

Three weeks.

A lot can happen in three weeks.

If somebody hurt him, he needed to be in a hospital. If he were drugged, he could be out of his mind stumbling around somewhere.

There'd been no notes, no phone calls, no buzz on the street. The lack of communication from his abductors was what told me that this wasn't somebody out for payback. They didn't want money. They didn't want to send a message. They didn't want anything.

Except to hurt him.

Hutch was a tough fighter. He could take care of himself, and me too, under normal circumstances. But some circumstances aren't normal, like what happened with Forest's guys. If you're outnumbered, incapacitated…even Hutch has his limits. Combine that with the fact that he wasn't one-hundred percent recovered yet from his kidnapping, and you can see how somebody could have gotten the upper hand.

Three weeks to the day. I stopped by my place on the way to Huggy's to grab a sandwich and a shower. He was gonna help me look, but even he was losing steam. I could tell by the sad look in his eyes and the way he got quieter and joked less.

Didn't matter to me. Three weeks. Three months. Three years. Thirty. I wouldn't stop until I found him.

When I got out of the Torino and headed up my steps, I could hear the phone ringing, so I hurried, not wanting to miss any important calls from Dobey or Huggy.

The door was unlocked. Had I forgotten to lock up last time I was here? It was hard to remember. I wasn't exactly rowing with both oars.

But when I went in, the sight of Hutch sprawled on his back took me to my knees next to him.

I hadn't been home in days. How long had he been here? How did he get here? Was he dumped or had he gotten here on his own?

"Hutch?"

I was almost afraid to touch him. He looked…lost. Out of it. I didn't know how badly he was hurt; where he was hurt.

But his quiet, strained breathing told me he was alive.

"Hutch?"

His eyes found me, tried to communicate.

My fingers went out to his angel face, my eyes examining it for injury and clues to what may have happened.

"You hear me?"

His hand came up, held my jacket sleeve. I could see loose rope around his wrist where he had been tied. Both wrists were bleeding from struggle.

My first thought was drugs, the way he just gazed at me without trying to speak, so I pushed up the sleeves of his black turtleneck and looked for needle marks, and was relieved to see that there weren't any.

I raised his shirt, looking for bruises or blood, felt along his arms, legs, and ribs; satisfied that nothing was broken.

There was another reason for his silence and the faraway look in his eyes, and it was trauma.

"Who was it?"

He didn't answer. Couldn't. He just clung to my jacket.

I wanted to kill somebody. The frightened look in his eyes made him look like a little kid.

He had confided to me once about something terrible that had happened to him when he was young, and since then I vowed, to him and to myself, that I would be the one to take up for him, that he would never feel terror again, that he would have someone who meant it when they said they loved him and would take care of him. I always put him first, even before he told me his secret, but the secret just intensified those feelings in me, especially when he got hurt.

I never said those things out loud to him. I don't think even he understood how deep the protective feelings in me went.

That look was back in his eyes now, and it drove me crazy with love. That's what hurt me the most. That I didn't protect him-couldn't protect him. Not from everything. Even when I was willing to bleed my heart out for him.

"Hutch, you gotta tell me. If they find you, or come back…"

The frayed ropes told me he had escaped, and somehow found his way here, so his abductors would be looking for him.

I reached for the phone to call an ambulance, and that's when he moved his head no.

At least he was coherent enough to know what I was doing.

"Why don't you want medical attention?" I asked him as I smudged dirt from his cheek. "Did they…" My mouth couldn't utter the words in my head."…assault…"

He moved his head no, then closed his eyes, his grip slipping from my jacket sleeve.

When he slowly kept moving his head no on the floor, back and forth, back and forth, it allowed me to see something beneath the collar of his turtleneck that I hadn't noticed at first, and that was bruises on his throat.

Carefully I turned down the material, staring at his swollen neck, colored black, blue, purple, red, green, yellow, varying degrees of bruising, which told me that they had been put there on different days during the three weeks he'd been gone.

That was where the trauma was coming from. That was why he was having some difficulty breathing and wasn't talking.

It didn't look like strangulation by hand. No fingerprints. But there were thick rope burns, like a noose would leave. It looked more like his torturers had tried to hang him again and again.

A closer look into his eyes, under the dirt on his face, around his throat; the red streaks and peppered dots of petechial hemorrhaging another sign of what they had inflicted.

Rage burned through my brain like a forest fire. I rammed my elbow back into the wall as a little sob escaped me. Rage at whoever, for hurting him this way; rage at myself for not finding him.

He had escaped and survived, but with no help from me.

He must have known what I was thinking. He clutched my hand and moved his head no again, like, "Don't," so I forced myself to calm down. He didn't need to deal with me too.

I pushed my feelings aside so I could help him.

"Buddy…" I leaned over him, still holding his hand. "Let me call Sharon. Huggy's nurse friend, remember? Somebody's gotta check you out, give you somethin' for the swelling in your throat."

His throat must have been closing up on him. Enough to scare him. Because he nodded in agreement.

Quietly and quickly I called Huggy and told him what was going on.

He had Sharon at my place in just a few minutes.

"Get him on the couch," she said, and me and Huggy picked Hutch up and put him on the couch like she said. I wanted nothing more than to wrap him in a big soft blanket and soothe him, but he needed medical attention.

Gently I pulled Hutch's turtleneck off so she could get a good look, and he looked horrible under the light of the lamp when she turned it on.

She was a real fun girl who liked to dance and was into numerology, but right now she was dead serious as she looked Hutch over and gave him a couple of shots of something; almost like a different girl.

Me and Huggy sort of stood off to the side so she could work, but both of us kept our eyes on him.

"Did he say who it was?" Huggy asked. His jaw was tense, and he was holding back fury same as I was.

"He can't really talk. As soon as he does, I'm lettin' Dobey know so he can-"

"Dead," he said in a strained whisper as he held his throat. His eyes fluttered from the shots Sharon gave him. "No one's coming for me."

Relief came over me that we didn't have to worry about that, but so did some confusion.

Had he killed them to get away? In his weakened state, I didn't see how he could have.

Had someone helped him?

I stepped over to the couch and crouched down.

"What happened, buddy?" I asked quietly as I stroked his hair. "Huh?"

He didn't answer. His eyes were closing, and his measured breathing told me he was falling asleep.

Sharon sorted through her nurse's bag and came up with two bottles of pills. "This one's for the swelling. This one's for pain. Monitor his breathing. If he starts choking or has more difficulty, get him to the emergency room. And I was never here."

Huggy kissed her. "Thanks, darlin'," he said as he put an arm around her and led her toward the door.

"Call us if you need to," he said, and I nodded, locking the door after them.

When they were gone, I sank into a chair next to the couch, exhaustion finally catching up with me.

I wasn't asleep long, maybe an hour, when I woke up and saw Hutch gone from the couch. How could he not be asleep with painkillers and medicine in him?

The bathroom door was halfway open, so I went over to it and stood just outside.

"Hey," I said in a low, tired voice, "you okay?"

Not okay, of course, but okay meaning not worse than he'd been when I first found him.

"Hutch?"

The shower kicked on. He was going to take a shower…at one in the morning?

"Hey…"

I opened the door a little wider, stepped in. His throat looked ghoulish under the bathroom light. He stood at the mirror looking at himself with bloodshot eyes. His stomach was too thin. His pants sort of floated around his waist, and he slowly pulled them down and stepped out of them and his shorts without even unfastening or unzipping.

I saw bruises and bite marks low on his side and pelvis, just above and below where the band of his boxers had been; my breath getting icy and tense in my throat.

"You said they didn't do that, Hutch."

"They didn't," he said, his voice unable to rise above a rasp for the damage to his throat. "They tried. They… couldn't get it up."

He tilted a little off balance, then planted his hands on the sink to steady himself, head down, like he didn't want to see himself in the mirror anymore.

"I have to clean up," he said as he stood completely nude, no doubt trying to reconcile the

guy in the mirror with the guy he was three weeks ago. His hair was sticky from dried sweat and he was grimy, but I think he wanted to clean the bad memories away more than he did the dirt.

"No drugs?" I asked him.

He moved his head no.

"You said they. More than one?"

"Two."

Tired of seeing those ropes around his wrists, I reached for them, then a razor blade, and cut them off.

"Who were they, Hutch?"

He didn't answer as he turned and stepped into the shower.

"You left some boxers here," I said as I held the rope in my hands. "I'll get 'em."

I picked up his clothes and put them, along with the ropes, into a bag to use for possible evidence. Even though he said his tormenters were dead, I still felt like it was important to keep everything. I still didn't know the whole story, and he wasn't up to telling it; physically or emotionally. All of it could be crucial later. I put his turtleneck in there too.

I got a pair of black boxers he'd left at my place and handed them through the bathroom door. They left my hand. The shower was off and he was wheezing for breath. Almost gasping. It scared the hell out of me.

"Hutch, you need a hosp-"

The door opened and he stepped out of the steamy room. Damp, clean, exhausted, slow.

"Don't say that again," he rasped as he made his way back to the couch and collapsed onto it, this time sitting up and leaning his head back, as if to catch some good air. He was extremely weak, and pale as a fish.

When I approached my chair to sit down in it again, he got up and went to the kitchen, like he was avoiding me or the questions I might ask.

"Thirsty," he said leaning against the sink. "Little hungry too. Can I have something?"

Can I have something?

Since when did he ever ask permission for anything at my house?

I poured a glass of milk for him half full, handed it to him, then took a bag of bagels from the cabinet.

He took a drink of the milk, then gagged it back up into the sink. Either he couldn't swallow because of his swollen, hurting throat, or his stomach couldn't handle it.

He stayed leaning over the sink, head down, his gasping turning into a sob.

"Hutch…"

I wanted to touch him but didn't know where. His throat and wrists were wrecked. He probably hurt all over.

"You need to rest," I said as my fingers went lightly across his back.

"I can't."

"You said they were dead. They can't come here, right? Come on. I'll give you a couple more pills. I'll try to make a breakfast shake for you in the morning."

He came off the sink and wrapped his arms around my neck like he was scared to death.

We just stood in the kitchen like that for a long time. He was trying to hold onto himself.

I didn't want what happened to change him, or our closeness. He had to know he would be okay and that I would be with him through it. I had to help him hang onto himself.

Keeping my arm around him, I walked him into the living room, gave him a couple of more pills that he managed to swallow with a drink of water, then I sat down on the couch, putting the pillow on my lap and pulling him down, guiding his head to the pillow.

"Gonna be okay," I whispered as I traced my fingers lightly around his temple and stroked his hair. "Stay right here. Close your eyes."

Without getting up, I reached over for a light blanket from the arm of the couch and covered him, watching his eyes drift closed, listening to his breathing get slower and deeper.

When he rested, I rested, but as soon as he moved or made a noise, my eyes were open again. I was worried about his breathing, but the pills must've worked, because he seemed to have an easier time with it as the night passed.

A few times he mumbled a few things in his sleep, like, "You're my property, cop," and "You see who's boss," and "Ask me, cop," plus a few more things I won't say here, but I shushed him back to sleep.

He woke up the next morning and looked around my house, like he couldn't believe he was really here and not wherever he'd been with his captors.

I sat him up and moved to sit on the coffee table where I could get a better look at him.

He held his throat and winced when he swallowed the pills I gave him with a drink of water.

"I'm still here?" he asked as he looked around.

I had to smile a little. He looked like hell, but he was alive.

"Looks like you had a rough three weeks, partner. Mind telling me who did it?"

"I don't know their names."

"You said there were two. Can you describe them?"

He put his forehead down in his hand, thinking, but moved his head no.

"I can't remember."

"You can't remember their faces?"

He moved his head no.

"Why not?"

"I wish I could tell you."

"Were you blindfolded?"

"I don't…" His head worked back and forth. Getting agitated. "I don't know. I just…can't remember who…what they looked like…"

The stress was tensing up his throat. It was hard for him to swallow, so I eased up.

He looked down at himself, ran fingers from his prominent collar bone, down his ribs, down to his visible pelvic bones.

"Damn. How long has it been?"

"Three weeks to the day. I turned every stone, checked every hole…"

"They weren't known to us."

"Sure?"

He nodded.

I went to the bathroom and came back with a small mirror.

"This help recall their names?"

He looked at himself in the mirror, then put it down and pushed himself to his feet, going to the kitchen.

"Can I eat something?" he asked leaning his hands on the table. "I'm kind of hungry."

I joined him in the kitchen, and poured a glass of milk, realizing they had tortured his spirit too if he thought he had to keep asking me for things that he used to get for himself. I didn't have to ask him if they had made him beg for something. I knew that they had.

"Let me make you a breakfast shake," I said as I opened a cabinet to get the blender.

"Toast is fine," he said as he took a drink of the milk.

This time it stayed down, but the grimace on his face said he was willing his stomach to obey.

I put two slices of toast in the toaster, on Light, wondering how much of it he could keep down.

"No drugs," I said leaning back against the table, wanting to stay close should he collapse. "No sexual assault."

"Right. They got me off, though."

He lowered his head, as if ashamed, his eyes turned an odd silver-blue, almost wolf-like as they shifted around to anyplace but me. A blond wolf.

My heart turned to rock. At first my mouth froze with the words stuck inside, but my love for him loosened my tongue, and my brain, and my heart, and I said quietly, and with a little anger I hadn't really intended at all, "And you don't think that's sexual assault?"

His head moved back and forth, out of denial, anguish, confusion, I didn't know.

"It's not like I…"

I could finish for him. I knew what he was going to say. I knew what he needed to hear.

"It's not like you enjoyed it. Or wanted it."

He weakened. Went to a knee at my kitchen table, head down on folded arms, just breathing, hiding his face.

"Starsk…"

I crouched beside him, hugging him around the neck, my forehead in his hair, not really knowing what to say, trying to think of some helpful cop words, or friend words.

His tormented whisper came from his bowed head, "That's when I killed them."

"Hutch…"

He was silent, head still on his folded arms. I didn't know if he would ever bring his head up again.

I had to do something. He had to know that he wasn't at fault.

"It was self-defense," I reasoned in the best cop gear I could find. "They were killing you. You had every right to stop them."

Still, he moved his head no, feeling remorse for the ones who hurt him and left bloody streaks in his eyes.

I went to my bedroom and came back with a change of clothes for him.

"Get dressed," I said as kindly as I could. "Take me to where they held you."

He couldn't do it. He just stayed there on his knee. I carefully pulled him to his feet, and he allowed me to put the clothes on him; a white T-shirt and black sweatpants.

I had the lowest, darkest feeling that I would lose him if I didn't find some way to pull him back from the edge.

I didn't know all that had happened to him, but now it was clearer than ever that I had to find out. How could I help him if I didn't know? He was like a puzzle, and I had to collect all the pieces in order to help him.

The more time that ticked by, the more catatonic-like he became, especially when I led him down the steps and to the car.

His reluctant movements told me he didn't want to go, but he couldn't stop me from taking him. I wanted it to be his choosing, not mine, but he wasn't choosing to go; all he was choosing was a quietness that I feared would consume him and confine him in a place where I could never reach him again. Somehow I knew he was trusting me to do what was best for him, even if he couldn't say the words or think the thoughts.

"It'll be okay," I said as I pulled the Torino away from the curb. "We'll do it together. Just tell me where they had you."

His head was still down. He moved his head no.

I reached for his hand, squeezed it hard; maybe too hard.

"Listen to me," I said in a voice that quivered with emotion. Mostly love. But fear, and hate, and sorrow too.

"You got through Forest. You're gonna get through this too. You can't do this alone. That's why I'm going. Just show me, Hutch. Show me where. It's ours."

"It..it.." His hand was over his eyes, like he didn't want to look at me, or didn't want me to see him. But I was getting through. I could tell.

"It…used to be Sheldon's Inn. It's…"

"I know where it is," I said as I picked up speed.

To think that Hutch had been only two blocks away from me all this time made my heart cringe. I'd been so close. Physically.

That's how he could make it to my house in the shape he was in. He wasn't that far away, and in his messed up state, still knew he was close to me.

I parked in front of the condemned shabby building that used to be an inn, and said, "We're here."

Daylight must have made it a little easier to look, because Hutch was able to turn his head and look toward the structure.

"I can't go," he whispered, hand on his throat.

I got out of the car, went around to his side, and opened the door, crouching and taking the upper arm that was leaner now, and trembling.

"It's important," I said quietly.

His head finally rolled toward me, and he looked at me with this combination of trying to be courageous on top of fear.

"You don't know what they did," he whispered. "I don't want you to know."

My hand on the back of his neck, I tugged him close to me, until his forehead was on my shoulder.

"I love you," I whispered. "I have to know."

If he hadn't just come out of the Forest thing, if he still had the strength and stamina he'd had before that happened, I think he would have had an easier time with this one; but he was simply all out of any fight or will. He must have been terrified that they would shoot him up. He must have called for me and prayed for me to come a hundred times.

He moved his head no, but he knew when I meant business, and he allowed me to guide him from the car.

The front of the inn was boarded up, with "Danger", "Condemned", and "Do Not Trespass" signs all over the front door and windows, along with spray-painted graffiti, so we went around to the back door, and that's where he stiffened, trying to lag behind, but I kept my arm around him all the way.

"Okay," I whispered as I took hold of the door handle and pushed it open. "Nothing's gonna happen. I'm right here."

His head was down and his eyes were closed as we stepped into the dusty, broken-down building.

Inside, the walls had been knocked down, or had fallen down, so really it was all one big room, with sunken ceilings, broken light fixtures, beams, and splintered staircase, where the upstairs had been.

Right away I saw what had been done to my sweetest friend. The meaning. The extent.

The noose they had hung him with time and time again still hung from a beam in what remained of the ceiling. New. Thick. Big. Like the rope was purchased new, and made specifically for the occasion. It had faint bloodstains on it where it had bitten into his skin.

They had strung him up from the beam with a pulley again and again. He had choked, kicked, struggled to get down, almost died, blacked out, endured their physical assaults, humiliation, helplessness, attempted rape, day after day.

Now I realized what he had begged for. Asked permission for. His life. Breath. Maybe the restroom. Maybe a drink.

Two dead bodies were on the floor beneath the noose.

Hutch's head was still down, but I was frozen as my flyaway brain tried to take it all in and understand.

"Kids," he whispered as he dropped to his hands and knees.

I hadn't the strength to hold him up. I had to see. I had to verify.

The two corpses were discolored from the beginnings of decomposition.

"Just kids," he repeated with his hand over his eyes. "Fourteen. Fifteen. Not much older than..."

Kiko.

One teenager had a broken neck. I could tell by the unnatural angle. And the other had just a bloody mess where his nose should have been, where Hutch had driven it up into his brain.

Gruesome.

Kids.

No wonder Hutch's mind had tried to blot it out. His decent, kind brain couldn't handle killing two teenagers. Even the two teenagers who had gotten three weeks' worth of sadistic thrills torturing him and trying to dehumanize him. Their cruelty was around his neck, his wrists, and other parts of his body, but he still showed humanity for them.

Seeing all I needed to see, understanding more than I'd wanted to understand, but relieved to know the truth anyway, I walked back to Hutch, who looked like he was melting into the floor.

"You had to," I whispered as I put my arms around him and pulled him up against me. "You had no choice."

He clung to me and cried like a baby. I cried too. For what he had to do. For what they had done to him. They had put him in that position. Couldn't he see that? Would he ever realize that?

Suddenly I hated the world and what it was capable of. Just when you think there is a silver lining in every cloud; hope in the world; a chance for humanity…I had sworn to

protect him from this world, and now this. In some weird way I felt like I'd let him down. Even with Forest. But I couldn't dwell on it. I couldn't let this be about me when he needed me so much. He had to be Hutch again. I couldn't let him fade away. He meant too much. He had to see that he could survive, that he had survived so much already.

"You can't quit," I whispered into his bowed head. "I won't let you."

"Kids," he whispered again.

"I know. I know you didn't want to. But you had every right. You had to protect yourself."

What was this job doing to him? When we met, he was this innocent…yes, I will say innocent guy who had this boyish outlook on the world like he could make everything and everyone better, and that's why he became a cop. He believed in it. And then the job, the criminals, the world we lived in, showed him the truth, bit by bit. Each time he got hurt, each time his trust was violated, each letdown, disappointment, each time I got hurt…what did it do to him inside? What did Forest do to him? What did being a prisoner of teenage thugs do to him?

I was a street kid. I had certain expectations, a certain outlook on the world. Positive, but…realistic. I knew the bad stuff that could lurk around every corner, and was prepared to rise above it. With Hutch…it seemed like it broad-sided him, bruised him a little each time. Maybe he was too hopeful for the job. Too innocent. Even with the secret he'd divulged, he still had this thing where he thought the world was good, and so were the people in it; he'd just been dealt an unfortunate hand, and he had to somehow correct it, or that thing within himself, to make it, and himself, better.

No jury would convict him. The deaths would never even see the inside of a courtroom.

Yet he was trying, judging, and condemning himself.

What could I say or do to make it easier for him?

I wanted to erase his feelings, make them go away. That's how much I loved him. But I couldn't. I had to stand by and watch my best friend's heart and soul become stained.

Would he ever be the same again? What would it take to get him back?

And suddenly, I knew.

I was the only thing in this world who could get him back. He didn't trust anyone else. No one was closer to him. He acted like he had all the answers, when really, we both knew, I was his answer most of the time. It was me he confided in. Me who kept his secrets. Me who he turned to with his worry and his fears.

"Come on," I said lifting him to his feet. "Let's call Cap. Get him over to my place. We'll tell him what happened."

The trust he had in me won out. He nodded as he clung to me. I led the way out of the inn again, and to my car. This was the first step of what would be a tough trip back home. Back to Hutch. And back to me.

No cop-hating teenagers would stop that.

I wouldn't rest until he was complete again, and I wouldn't let him rest either.

The End

The Promise And The Threat

Sniper's Confession-

They left me alone in this room of the police station, a legal pad and a marker.

"Write your confession," they said. It started about three months ago when all hell broke loose in my life. Pardon the pun. Hell. I am…or was…a Bible college student, but life took a detour. My girlfriend broke up with me, my dad died of a tumor and left me and mom with a ton of bills. My scores at college took a nosedive because of my personal life, so the heads said if I didn't get my act together I was going to be kicked out. I wanted to tell somebody, but I'm not the kind of guy that ever really had any friends to speak of, just users and losers. I sort of keep to myself and have trouble trusting people. Even my family.

But if it's one thing my old man taught me, it was how to use a gun and defend myself.

"Don't take guff from anybody."

I wasn't sure what guff was, but it was probably like b.s.

The teachers were all down on me because of my grades, my roommates were giving me hell about the late hours I kept, and my girlfriend hated it when I took her target practicing.

"How can you be a Bible scholar and tote a rifle around? Isn't that hypocritical?"

I didn't think so. What business was it of hers?

Everybody down on me. Damn. The only place I could get away to myself was the shooting range. Mom wouldn't even let me shoot in the backyard anymore. Neighbors complaining about the noise, police threatening to haul me in for disturbing the peace.

Girlfriend. Mom. Teachers. Preachers. Neighbors.

It all comes down on you like a truckload of dirt before you know it. The only way out is to talk, but nobody was listening, and my rifle could do a hell of a lot better job getting a point across than my mouth ever could, so I woke up one day and decided I had enough, today was the day, I was gonna show the world and the people against me just how pissed off they made me. I would go down in a blaze of glory if I had to. My life was nowhere anyway. But I wasn't about to chump out and go down alone. I would take a few favorites with me, including my dumbfounded teacher from my freshman year. Mrs. Dunaway. I

don't know how that lousy hack got her position; she had it out for me; she'd give me an F just for looking at her. Oh well. The same points toward everyone else; they just think they're better than me. But I seemed to have found a solution to everyone doubting me.

My point of view. I could see the world, my dorm, the traffic, the people. All from the church tower on campus. It was the tallest building there, and I had to have it to carry out my mission. Once you are on a mission to declare your message, nothing can stop you. I had sort of spied that building before, thinking to myself what a great place for shooting that would be. You could shoot a lot of people from that place.

Except for two cops named Starsky and Hutchinson.

I got to the tower around eight in the morning, just as first class would start. Nice and early. I had all day to carry out my plans. Plus the morning was quiet. I could get more done. They would listen now. All those who wronged me would finally realize they crossed the wrong guy.

By noon they had given me a name on the news.

Sniper.

Nobody ever knew my name before this. I was famous now. I was somebody. Talk about respect.

I took four rifles, plus all the ammunition I had. I didn't want to take the time to reload one rifle. I would go at them hard and fast.

The first one was one of my roommates. The one who goaded me the most. Bullets talk when words don't work. He always thought he was better than me.

He never knew what hit him. He came out of the dorm and was dead on the sidewalk in ten seconds.

Through my scope I could see how his brains just sort of plopped out onto the ground.

A couple of students stopped to help. They ran for help. They thought it was a random shooting. Accident or something. They looked around, but not up.

Police were called, but by the time they got there, I shot one girl off her bicycle and another two guys getting out of their car to go to the admission's office. Then Mrs. Dunaway.

So easy. Like shooting ducks in a barrel. Hard to describe this feeling of joy I got when they went down. People were concerned, then. I was getting their attention. Finally.

SWAT teams and negotiators and what not came. Black and white units.

I shot at them all. Got a few of them. They couldn't find me. But a couple of the sharpshooters deduced that the shots were coming from the church tower, so they decided to come after me.

I shot a few more uniforms down. Even a couple of SWATs, and a few more students.

There is so much freedom is violence, I can't describe it. Head shots are the best.

Bang, bang, bang. Every time.

You don't care about life. You don't care about death. You don't care if you get caught. You know you're going to die, so you are set free by that. No rules, no love, no reservation. Not even hate really. Just reality. And the afterlife waiting for you. Seeing all those people at your mercy. Damn. God must feel that way.

"Come on!" I yelled down.

I didn't know if they could hear me, but it really didn't matter. It just felt good to say it.

"Come on and get me!"

One of them did.

Starsky. Up for the challenge. A lot of ducking and weaving.

I shot him. Got him in the ankle. Tripped him and landed him against a black and white.

His partner, Hutchinson, pulled him around behind the car, some medics ran over, then Hutchinson came after me, shooting up at me, non-stop, a look like wicked revenge on his face.

I shot back, but missed, the sweat in my hands made me slip on the gun. Out of all the cops, he got the closest. I was panicking. I looked down at the ground, but couldn't see him anymore. Was he inside now? Other cops were shooting at me. I ducked, out of their line of sight.

Bullets whizzed over my head, hit the walls around me, the bricks outside, but none of them hit me.

I moved to a far wall just to be safer.

I had to get the balls up if I was going to get back to the window and catch their bullets. That's how I wanted to go. Suicide by cop. No better way. My name would live in the papers and in the minds of the people long after I was dead and gone.

They would study my brain.

I was already famous.

Just calm down. Get it together. Pray for courage if you have to. You can do this. Your whole life has been leading up to this moment. This is your destiny.

"Police! Freeze!"

Hutchinson.

Just outside the door.

He kicked the door in and we stood with our guns in each other's faces. He still had his partner's blood on his hands. He wasn't blinking. Not trembling. Not even sure if he was breathing.

He wasn't scared. Edgy and business, breathing a little hard, but not scared.

I smiled.

"Shoot me, cop."

His head made the slightest move no.

"I'd love to. But that's not what I want. That's what you want. I want you to rot in a prison cell for the rest of your life."

I guess I was too chicken after all to carry out my plan. But that's okay. I put down a lot of people before I got caught. Seventeen, to be exact. One survivor. Starsky.

That look on Hutchinson's face. I'll never forget it. Like he was actually fighting for something. Something or someone more important than himself. A feeling I guess I never felt or will never know. I never loved anything more than myself. Maybe that's what I needed. All the people in my life. I thought I cared about them. But when it comes right down to it, they're disposable, just like I was disposable to them.

This wraps up my confession.

I did it. I'm guilty. I'm Sniper.

The End

Cold Case

I looked at Tommy in the bed, the messed up guy Artie screwed up even more once he got his den mother hooks into him. And I say den mother with the most acidic tone possible. He was a predator who took advantage of wayward youth and the mentally unbalanced, and used them in any way he wanted.

Then I looked at Hutch, who seemed a little off to me. A little stunned, shaken, confused, sickened. I couldn't put my finger on it.

You okay? my eyes asked.

He gave a little nod, but still he sat there in the chair. I walked over to him and took his arm, helping him up. He came slowly, almost disoriented. Artie had put him through his paces the past few days, as much a victim as Tommy, but in different ways.

Under the lonely light of the single, bleak bulb that shone in the room, Hutch looked like a man who had just seen a phantom in a mirror.

We had seen psychos before. Child killers, child rapists, a palette of perverts, so why was Tommy getting to him? It hadn't escaped me that Artie had gotten to him too. I'd never seen Hutch so venomous toward a two-bit weirdo.

"Your hand hurtin'?"

He nodded, and took a couple of pain pills.

"I'll take care of this one," I told him. "Wait for me at the car."

He nodded again, maybe knowing he was too distracted to think clearly.

xxxxxxxxxxx

After Artie and Tommy were taken care of at the precinct, I found Hutch waiting for me at the front doors.

"Hey," I said taking his shoulder and walking him out. "Up for a tuna melt?"

"No, I…should talk to Abbie."

"She doesn't blame you."

"She wouldn't. She knows Artie…Tommy…would have found her, regardless of where she was. I just…want to make it up to her. Impossible, I know."

We stood on the steps of the police station.

"Artie wanted to hurt you," I said. "And he did."

The bitterness was back in his voice as he went down the steps. The same bitterness he'd used toward Artie.

"Tommy did everything Artie told him to, Starsk. Everything."

Of course he did. We knew that.

Hutch didn't go to the Torino; he kept walking down the sidewalk. Over his shoulder he said, "I need some space."

I watched him go.

How much space?

xxxxxxxxxx

I gave him a couple of hours, then went cruising around town looking for him. Even though he'd said he needed to talk to Abbie, I had a feeling that there was more on his mind than just their relationship, and it was related to the Solkin case.

He was in the park, leaning against a tree, turning a kiwi-size rock in his good hand.

"Okay," I said walking up to him. "You need to spill it."

His head came up. "Spill what?"

"I don't know. Whatever it is that's sidetracked you."

I don't want a partner who's so distracted it could get one or both of us killed. I don't like seeing you like this. Hurt and silent.

I couldn't say the words, though. He would retreat farther into his shell.

He looked down at the rock in his hand. "I've never told you this before."

I looked at him, my expression never changing.

"But," he continued, "when I was a boy…little…I don't remember how old…there was a

guy like that in my neighborhood."

"A guy like..?"

"Solkin. Not as seedy. Not the least bit. I can't say that it was a dream, or a memory…real, not real. I'm not sure. An acquaintance of Dad's. College professor. He's dead now. Heart attack when I was fourteen. But when I was young…little…I was playing on the sidewalk down the street…maybe a few streets down, it's hard to…he picked me up in his car, drove me around, said he'd take me home but…he made me do things. At least, that's what I dream. Dad had him over for cocktail parties…up into my early teens, until he died…he led me upstairs to our guest room…sometimes he actually did stay overnight…My parents told me to be nice to the guests, especially him, because he was such a good friend of Dad's…and Mom would tell me stories about this pervert down the street, so I never…in my mind I didn't know anything was wrong, even when he slapped me, pulled my hair…because he was nice to me otherwise…bought me things…gave me money…took me to other parties…he couldn't be a pervert like the one they always talked about…not like Artie…he was a good guy…looking back, he was…sad…needy…I did everything he told me to…sometimes I think it was all a dream, but the memories are so clear…it must have been real."

His grip on the rock was so desperate that blood was starting to seep through his fingers. I gently took the rock away and put my folded handkerchief in his hand to squeeze instead.

I didn't have to ask if he ever told anyone else. I knew he hadn't. If he had kept it from me, it was his secret.

My blood boiled, but love kept me in check.

My beautiful friend. That beautiful kid he still was, inside. Confiding his wound, his confusion, his mystery, to me. Words he should have said years ago but couldn't.

The back of his bandaged hand came up to press against his forehead. He looked tired.

Heavy.

"It must have been real," he whispered.

My hand came up, disappeared beneath his hair.

No deception in my touch. No betrayal. No ulterior motive.

"I'm real too," I whispered back.

With my hand on the nape of his neck, I walked him toward the Torino.

We talked again, in private. My place. His place. Other times. Other places.

My love for him grew, and so did my respect for him, my maturity level, and my protective instincts.

The End

Redemption Alley

(A S&H-Twilight Zone Crossover)

I parked in front of Earth's Bounty health food store and left Starsky waiting in the passenger seat while I went in to get some wheat germ. Sometimes I sprinkled it on my cereal or oatmeal, sometimes I put it in my bran muffins or in my morning shakes, and sometimes I just ate it right out of the jar.

The girl was a real looker too, and that's another reason I stopped by this store instead of the one closer to my place. The thing about her that really caught my attention was the way she played the flute. It sounded like…something almost a fairy would play next to a waterfall, or perched on top of a moss-covered log in an enchanted forest.

She enchanted me, that one. Belle was her name. She was artistic without being airy, and down to earth without being too boring.

"Hi," I said as I flashed her my best smile.

She was behind the counter, smiling back, her flute in her hand. I just knew she practiced in between customers.

"Hi," she said back.

"I'm looking for some wheat germ."

"You came in a couple of weeks ago for some."

"Yeah. Well. I tend to use it pretty quickly."

She turned and looked on the shelves behind her, giving me a whiff of something clean and pure from her long blond hair.

She turned back around.

"Actually," she said reaching under the counter. "I have something special you may like to try. I made it myself."

"Really?"

She set down a clear jar of something that looked like a cross between wheat germ and oatmeal.

"That's not precisely wheat germ, is it?" I asked as I picked the jar up and examined it.

"No." She reached under the counter for a plate of what looked like oatmeal cookies. "But you can try it, and if you don't find it delicious…"

I took one of her cookies, took a bite, studied the flavors and textures in my mouth like a wine taster.

She smiled, as if she already knew I would like it.

"Hey," I said nodding my head. "You're absolutely right. I have to have some of this."

I took another bite of cookie.

"Sure," she said putting the jar into a bag. "That'll be seven-fifty."

I reached into my hip pocket for my wallet. "Would you by any chance be free this weekend, Belle?"

"As a matter of fact, I am, Ken."

"Oh. Did I tell you my name?"

"Last time you were here. About three times."

I felt heat in my face. She laughed a little. "Call me Friday night."

"I will," I said as I walked away from the counter.

"Oh, Ken?"

I turned back. "Yes?"

She held up my purchase. "You forgot something."

"Oh." I laughed a little, went back to get it. "Thanks. See ya."

"See ya."

I turned and walked from her store, on Cloud 9. Nineteen if it exists.

Wait till you hear this, Starsk. I scored. I got her.

But as I reached the door, something started to happen to me. A kind of dizziness washed

over me and I was light-headed.

What was it? Poison? Had she tried to poison me?

The cookie?

I looked over my shoulder, but she was gone. The store was empty, and it was no longer exactly a health food store. It was a hardware store. Tools lined the shelves instead of jars and packages.

Maybe not poison. Maybe a hallucinogen. LSD. Mushrooms. Something.

I groped my way for the door again.

"Starsk?"

I stepped through the door, onto the sidewalk.

My car was still parked along the curb where I left it, but Starsky was not in the passenger seat.

My dizziness intensifying, I looked around, seeing that the street had changed somehow. Somehow, older. Different. The people walking looked…I rubbed my eyes, held my head.

Come on. Wake up. You've been drugged before. Poisoned before. You know how the mind can change, play tricks on you.

"Starsky!"

I stumbled for my car; the only thing that looked real in my world. My hands actually came up to my chest, testing, feeling, to see if I was still me.

I looked into the mirror on the passenger door. Still looked the same. Still felt the same, except for the dizziness, and even that was starting to ease up.

Then, in all the confusion rolling around inside my head, a noise came from the other side of my car. Something at the rear wheel.

I moved around the trunk, and saw this little kid, around three or so, wearing bib overalls and a dirty white undershirt beneath, black and white sneakers on his feet, trying his best to pull off my hubcap with his two little hands.

"Hey!" I shouted as I took his arm and led him to the sidewalk away from the traffic. "What do you think you're doing?"

The frightened look in his eyes said he wanted to run, but he didn't.

"I can sell it," he said.

God, he was just a baby. I got down in front of him. "Hey. I didn't mean to scare you. Did you see a guy sitting in my car here?"

He looked at my car. "Do you have some money?"

People walking by started staring at me, and I stared back. They wore old clothes, the kind you could get in a thrift store or costume store…

The cars were old too. From a different era.

He held out his dirty little hand and looked at me with the most mischievous blue…

Starsky eyes.

I felt light-headed again, but this time it wasn't from anything except my inability to breathe normally and think rationally.

I looked at the kid. Closely. Shook my head.

It couldn't be. How could it be?

I reached into my pocket, brought out a couple of fives, and put them in his pocket. "Wh…where do you live? Who are your parents?"

"I don't want to go home."

His voice. Accent. Unmistakable to my ears.

"You can't stay out here on the street."

He bolted then, ran around me like a shot, across the street.

Was it him?

I chased after him, snatching him up and carrying him back to my car. "Come on. I'll take you home."

He kicked and punched at my shoulders. I had to get to the bottom of this. Who he was.

Why everything around me had changed.

Where was I? Was I tripping?

"No! I don't want to go!"

He started to cry. A sound that came from deep in his soul. Wounded and fearful. Almost like a little animal.

"Hey," I said patting his back. "What do you want to do?" "I…" He sniffed as he hid his face in my collar. "I'm hungry."

"Okay. Where should we eat?"

He lifted his head. "Dolly's Diner."

"Is it close?"

"At the end of the street."

"Do you live close by?"

He folded his arms across his little chest. He wasn't going to tell me.

Just ask him. Ask him for his name. Or are you afraid of what he will say?

We walked, side by side. He reached up and held to my hand. He was a street kid, but still just a small child, afraid and alone.

The street signs had changed. Or was it me that had changed? I didn't know anymore.

People stared at me, my hair, my clothes.

"Tell me about your parents," I ventured as we went into the diner and took a table. His head barely cleared the top of the table between us.

"My ma is sick, and my pop isn't home."

"Where is he?"

"He's in the war."

War.

World War II?

"It's about over," he said.

"The war?"

He nodded. It was sad that the word "war" was even in a toddler's vocabulary, that he clearly had no real knowledge of what it meant, except that it was something that had his father and that it would be over soon, like a picture show.

I looked around, sure I was on some movie set or something. I expected Allen Funt to come in any second and tell me I was on Candid Camera.

The waitress came over.

"Hiya, Davey."

Her accent.

"Hiya, Dolly."

Davey.

I looked around again, my ears discerning the distinct diner conversation around me.

The newspaper at my elbow. The nameplate.

I was in New York.

The date on the newspaper. 1946.

I ordered two hamburger platters with the works. The poor little guy was starving.

"Does your mother know you steal hubcaps?" I asked him.

"I leave when she's asleep. She's sick."

"And you have no one to help you?"

"Joe bought my shoes for me."

He leaned back and stuck his left sneaker up to show me.

"Joe who?"

He shrugged one shoulder. "I don't know. Joe. A neighbor."

His hair. Short. Style of the day. His tiny white teeth were adorable. The beauty mark on

his right cheekbone. Starsky's.

But regardless of how cute the small boy was, how he tugged at my heart, my partner the man was gone, at least for now. Would he grow up to be the same Starsky I knew? Could I really let him go home to a home that was, at the moment, less than acceptable? How could I help him without changing him or his future?

"Do you have a Tylenol?" I asked the waitress.

"A what?"

"A Ty…an aspirin?"

"Sure," she said as she left the table. "I'll be right back."

I rubbed my head. It was pounding. If I could just find Belle again. Ask her about the contents of the cookie; did it have anything to do with…if I could just find my adult man-size partner.

"What's your name?" he asked me as he sipped his milkshake through a paper straw.

"Hutch."

He grinned. "Hey. Hutch. That's funny."

The waitress returned with my aspirin. I swallowed it with a drink of water.

She lingered at the table.

"It's good to see the kid smiling," she said to me. "You an uncle or something?"

"Uh…friend of the family."

"I shoo him home all the time. Tell him he's gonna get hurt on the street someday. He don't listen. We kind of…keep an eye on him…know what I mean?"

Yes, I knew what she meant. And it wasn't good enough. Not for my best friend.

He was cold, hungry, small. A mother too sick to watch him. A father not around. At least not yet. But soon. I hoped.

She left the table to wait on another customer. Even the diners stared at me.

He blew bubbles in his milkshake. Licked his thumb.

"We'll have to go now," I told him about an hour later. I read some news in a 1946 newspaper. What I could concentrate on anyway. It was getting dark.

"I don't wanna," he said looking at his empty plate.

I rose from the table. "You have to."

He put his arms up to me, like he wanted me to pick him up, so I did.

"Can I stay with you, Hutch?"

I carried him from the diner and started back down the street.

"I'd like that. You don't know how much I'd like that. But you can't. You have a home. And a mother. And a father. And a life to live."

He looked at me with his arm wrapped casually around my neck as we finally stopped at my car.

"Will I see you again?" he asked.

I looked into his eyes, wanting to believe. I had to believe. I couldn't imagine my world without a Starsky. Fate could not be that cruel.

"I hope so," I answered as I swallowed a catch in my throat. "I hope we see each other again someday."

He looked a little sad, but not as sad as me, I'd bet.

"My house is down there," he pointed.

My legs didn't want to go. I wanted to put him in the car and drive away. Take him away.

Keep him with me.

But I couldn't. It wasn't fair. It was selfish. I had to let things be, or, a small voice inside me said, you could lose him forever.

My steps got slower as we got closer to the house he still pointed at. A rusty red wagon was in the small yard in front of his house. A couple of rusty hubcaps. A few broken toys.

I carried him up to his front door and gave him all the cash I had on me, which was only a few hundred dollars.

"Give this to your ma, okay?" I asked. "Don't lose it. Take it straight to her."

He shoved it deep into his pocket and I set him down.

"Wanna come in?" he asked as he opened the door a little.

I wanted to. My heart ached to stay with him.

"I can't," I said blinking back tears. "I have to go."

"Well," he said sweetly as he went on inside. "Bye."

He closed the door, and he was gone. I turned and stepped off the porch before I changed my mind. Before he could see me crying.

I walked down the street, leaving my heart, and my life, behind. Struggling to stay sane.

Struggling to stay on my feet.

Where am I going? How do I get home? Where is home? Will I ever see him again?

I should have been more alert. It wasn't the nicest of neighborhoods. Thugs and ne'er-do-wells lurked around every corner after dark. But at least the soft implosion in my head took my anguish away.

I don't know how much time passed, but when I woke up, it was dark, it seemed late, and I was in an alley where apparently I had been mugged. The one thing I knew for sure was that Starsky was leaning over me patting my face and hauling me to my feet.

"Hutch?" he asked in a worried voice. "What happened? You get jumped?"

He felt the back of my head. I did too. There was a lump the size of New Jersey.

I looked at him, so happy to see him that words wouldn't come. They were just stuck in my mouth.

"I-I-"

"Yeah," he said as he put his jacket around me. "You were jumped."

He started to lead me out of the alley, but I pulled him back, finally coming to my senses and looking around.

"Something happened."

"I know. You just got mugged."

"No, I mean. Something really happened. I ate a cookie. You were little. And we were in New York. And…"

He looked at me like I had lost my mind.

And maybe I had. Maybe nothing happened. Maybe it was just a dream, or a hallucination, or confusion from being knocked out.

As we stepped out onto the sidewalk, I checked the sign over the health food store.

Earth's Bounty. Saw Belle inside waiting on a customer. Checked the cars, the passersby.

Starsky.

Everything was okay. Or seemed to be.

"Where were you?" I asked as we reached my car.

"Getting a burger. Why'd you take off from the health food place?"

"Can you drive?" I asked opening the passenger door. "I don't think I can."

"Wasn't gonna let you," he said getting in the driver's seat.

The End

The Euthanist

"Those patients were in excruciating pain," were Doctor Mercer's final statements to the judge during the penalty phase of his trial. "They were suffering, at the end of their lives. I showed them the mercy that medicine could not. Would not. I loved them. I set them free. If you can't see that…"

The judge glanced at the full courtroom, at the silently weeping families who had attended and had already delivered their final remarks with bitter tears, at the detectives who had worked the case day and night to put "The Euthanist" away, and at the lawyers who sat stoic at their tables.

"Doctor Mercer," the judge said as he removed his reading glasses, "What you fail to see is that of all the thirty-five patients you 'put to sleep', none of them gave you consent. None of them asked for your brand of help, and neither did their families. No one wants to suffer. No one wants to see a loved one, or a patient, suffer. But the time, place, and manner of someone else's death is not your choice to make."

The doctor was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

xxxxxxxxxx

When Starsky and Hutch left the courthouse, they were met by a number of reporters with a cache of questions, but Starsky deflected them with sarcastic lines while Hutch referred them to Captain Dobey, who was coming out the door yards behind them.

While the reporters turned their attention to Dobey on the courthouse steps, the detectives raced to the Torino and jumped in, tires squealing as they left.

"Over," Starsky said with a panting glance into his rearview mirror. "That sucker went down like a ton of bricks."

Hutch grinned as he rolled the window down for some fresh air.

"Let's go to Huggy's for lunch. He's got this new seafood salad I want to try."

"Gross. But okay. As long as I don't have to eat any of it."

xxxxxxxxx

Huggy waved to them as they walked up to the counter.

He noted their happy mood and smiled. "You two just get laid or somethin'?"

"Almost," Hutch grinned. "The good doctor just went down."

"No kiddin'? Thought sure somethin' would snag on that one. He's a world-renowned dude."

"Was," Starsky reminded.

"Okay," Hutch said. "So, Huggy, I want to try that seafood salad you've been bragging about. And I'll buy Starsky…what do you want today, Starsk?"

Starsky looked up at the menu on the wall. "How about that chili burger?"

"Comin' right up."

Huggy turned to give Diane their orders, while Starsky and Hutch went to the back of the restaurant to play some pool.

When their food arrived about fifteen minutes later, so did Captain Dobey, but instead of rousting them for setting the reporters loose on him, he told them to take the rest of the day off.

"Really?" Starsky asked.

Dobey offered one of his rare smiles. "Sure. You deserve it."

xxxxxxxxxx

They decided to go to the beach, so both stopped by Hutch's to change. Starsky into Hutch's yellow T-shirt and black running shorts; Hutch into red running shorts and a white undershirt.

They took nothing but themselves and their good mood, laughing and running up and down the shore.

They saw a Frisbee in the sand at the same time, and raced each other for it, Hutch diving for it and Starsky knocking him out of the way to get to it first.

"Mine!" Hutch shouted as he ran after his partner and grabbed after the disc. "I saw it first!"

Starsky hurled it out into the ocean just as Hutch grabbed him around the middle and flung him to one side.

"All yours!" Starsky panted as he tripped Hutch to the sand.

Lying on his back, Hutch laughed up at him. "Had enough?"

Starsky put his hand down to help him up. "Have you?"

Hutch jerked him down, pushed sand in his face, then ran into the water to scoop up the Frisbee.

They tossed Frisbee and chased each other like a couple of young kids; strong, free, and energetic; the ocean and the sun and the wind cleansing away the day's cares.

xxxxxxxxx

At around seven that evening, Starsky slowed the Torino down in front of Venice Place to let Hutch out.

"See you in the morning, Hutch."

"Yeah. And don't forget to bring my clothes back."

"I would never keep your clothes."

"I can think of a few articles that somehow found their way onto your body."

Starsky grinned and sped away.

xxxxxxxxxx

When Starsky got to his house a little while later and got out of his car, he was met by an attractive redhead on the sidewalk.

"Detective Starsky," she said putting out her hand. "I want to properly thank you for what you did for my grandfather, getting Dr. Mercer behind bars…"

"Hey," he said smiling and taking her hand. "Just doing my job, Melissa."

"You remember my name?"

"Never forget a pretty lady."

She turned to go to her car, but Starsky said, "Say, uh…"

She looked back. "Yes?"

"How about a drink? Inside?"

And smiled. "Love to."

xxxxxxxxxx

When Starsky blew his horn for the third time the next morning without success in bringing Hutch down to the car, he hopped out, eager to tell him about Melissa, but stopped short just as he opened the front door to the building. At the foot of the steps was the dead body of a man in hospital whites.

He pulled his gun and crept up the stairs, not knowing exactly what he would find once he got up to Hutch's apartment, but planned to be prepared for anything.

But the sight of Hutch half-slumped, half-lying sideways against his door froze him halfway up.

"Hutch!"

Alarm seized him as he put his gun away and bounded up the steps two at a time. Hutch still wore the clothes he'd had on yesterday. He never made it inside.

"Hey," Starsky said as he shot to a knee next to him.

The side of Hutch's face was against the door; his body very still; his eyes fearful and confused; his arms lying as if useless on the floor.

Starsky found himself whispering as he lifted Hutch's shirt to look for wounds or blood, finding none.

"What happened, buddy? Huh?"

"Cuh…" came Hutch's faint whisper against the door. "Can't move. Can't feel anything. He…gave me a shot of some…in the back. Said you were next. We fought. I…pushed him down the stairs."

He trailed off, the effort of talking obviously too great.

Starsky lifted his T-shirt again, this time seeing the pinprick at the small of his back. "He's dead."

Then he picked up Hutch's left hand.

"Can you squeeze my hand?"

Starsky waited for the slightest pressure, watching his hand and his face, but nothing happened.

Hutch's eyes rolled with effort of trying to remain open.

"Just the one guy, Hutch?"

Hutch gave a slight nod.

"I'll be right back. I'm gonna radio an ambulance."

Starsky touched his face, then plunged down the stairs, hopped over the dead body, and scrambled to the Torino, thinking that what worried him the most was that Hutch had been against the door like that all night, unable to move.

xxxxxxxx

Starsky had found the empty hypo at the bottom of the stairs next to the nurse's body and turned it over to the lab for analysis, but there were no traces left to examine.

He tried to go into the emergency room with Hutch, but the doctors wouldn't let him.

The lifeless way his body lay on the gurney twisted Starsky's heart. He couldn't move, and labored with each breath to answer their questions.

So Starsky was resigned to wait in the hallway just outside the ER, leaning back against the wall, head back, eyes closed, listening, waiting.

(You got twenty-four hours to live, pig. Count 'em. Twenty-four)

"…Jordan."

Starsky blinked at Captain Dobey.

How long had he been standing there? What was he talking about?

"What?"

"The nurse was Myron Jordan. Worked with Dr. Mercer. Sympathized with him during the trial and thought he walked on water when they worked together at Bay City Hospital. I put Bill and Jerome on the case. They questioned Mercer to see if the nurse acted alone or was doing a job for him, but Mercer isn't talking. Says he knows nothing about the contents of that needle. What's the progress report on Hutch?"

"Tests. Treating the symptoms. Trying to figure out what he was shot up with, but it's

hard to do with an empty syringe."

The elevator dinged at the end of the hall, and Dobey turned his head to see Huggy walking toward them.

"Glad you're here," Dobey said to him. "Take him to the waiting room."

Huggy took Starsky's arm and escorted him down the hall.

At the moment Starsky was too numb and drained to do anything else.

xxxxxxxxx

At the end of the day, Starsky was still standing in the waiting room looking out the window when the door opened and Dr. Bradford came in with a nurse.

Huggy rose from the chair where he'd been dozing.

"We've conducted a lot of tests and are still waiting for the results on some of them," the young doctor explained. "The truth is, what's happening to him isn't clear. His symptoms of paralysis and weakness resemble acute idiopathic polyneuritis. The virus he contracted during the epidemic six months ago-his compromised immune system-would explain some of it if an injection weren't involved. However, the rapid onset, severity, and its erratic behavior aren't so easily explained…it appears to be abating at the moment, but it may return…we've ruled out stroke, head injury, spinal cord injury, arterial blockage, brain tumor, MS, MD, and seizures. He's symptom-free at the moment, but we're going to keep him overnight for observation."

"Did you say he's symptom-free?" Starsky asked.

"It appears that way. How long that may last is anyone's guess."

"Does that mean…is he in danger? Could he die?"

"No one knows. If the paralysis returns, or if it affects his lungs, heart, other organs…We need the contents of that syringe."

"I get it. My captain's got two detectives on it right now."

"We've moved him to Room 330 if you want to see him."

xxxxxxxxx

Room 330 was quiet; Hutch the only patient.

Starsky and Huggy approached Hutch's bed, Starsky taking his hand.

"Feel that?"

The brief pressure on his hand told him that he could.

Although Hutch looked a little pale, he still looked better than he had that morning. The one thing that remained was the hint of fear in his eyes, which he tried to cover with a smile.

Starsky had not seen that look in his eyes since he was dying with the virus.

I should be seeing the blue sky in them. Like yesterday.

"Hey, Starsk…Hey, Hug."

"Dobey's got Bill and Jerome on your case."

Hutch moved his head no.

"I have to get out there, Starsk. I just can't lie here and do nothing."

"Doc says the paralysis may come back. And they don't know how bad it could get."

"That's why I want to get out of here. If we figure it out, fine. But if we don't, and it gets really bad, then I don't…" He looked at Huggy helplessly. "I don't want to waste whatever is left here in a hospital bed…do you understand that? I feel fine now. Just…get me out of here."

Starsky fingered an ivory strand of his hair. "Make you a deal," he said softly. "I'll stay here with you tonight. If you still feel good in the morning, we'll check out, and we'll hit the streets."

Relief softened Hutch's features, and he actually looked as though he could sleep peacefully now.

"Okay," he said as he closed his eyes. "It's a deal. But stay right here, okay?"

That Hutch's hand still clutched his partner's did not go unnoticed by Starsky or Huggy.

Starsky passed a look to Huggy, who saw something close to murder in his eyes.

xxxxxxxx

Starsky sent Huggy back home for the night while he took a chair next to Hutch's hospital

bed, torn between staying with his partner and trying to track down the contents of the syringe. Bill and Jerome were good detectives, but the simple truth was, he didn't trust anyone else with Hutch's life. And yet he couldn't leave Hutch when he had asked him to stay.

As Starsky settled back in the chair and closed his eyes, he couldn't keep old memories and new fears from following him down like whispering contrails…

(You got twenty-four hours to live, pig. Count 'em. Twenty-four)

(What's that old line from the movies? Tell it to me straight, Doc. How much time have I got?)

(How serious is it, Hutch? Is it temporary? Fatal? Will there be any lasting effects? Will the paralysis come back? How bad will it be? Can we cure this in time?)

xxxxxxxx

Doctors and nurses came in from time to time to check Hutch during the night. Each time Starsky woke up to ask if everything was okay, and each time they said that it was, and that he was sleeping well.

xxxxxxxx

The next morning Starsky awakened to the sound of Hutch whispering sternly to Doctor Bradford-Hutch whispering so as not to rouse his tired partner. But Starsky heard him nevertheless.

"You said observation was just overnight," Hutch said. "Observe. I feel fine."

He pushed the covers aside and stood up in his hospital gown as if to prove it.

"See?"

Doctor Bradford was busily jotting notes in Hutch's chart. "I see what appears to be a lack of obvious symptoms."

"Obvious?"

Hutch felt his own forehead. "What's obvious is that I don't even have a fever. I have work to do. You can't keep me here against my will."

"No, but I'm hoping that someone besides myself may have more influence over you than I do."

The young doctor looked at Starsky for help.

Starsky sat up straighter in the chair. "Huh? Yeah. That's me. Hutch, you may want to reconsider."

Hutch rolled his eyes and put his hand out to the doctor. "Give me your Against Medical Advice form and I'll sign it."

Doctor Bradford handed him one, clearly prepared.

Starsky watched Hutch's hand as he signed the form, noting that he appeared to have the same strength, steadiness, and dexterity as before.

"Good luck," Doctor Bradford said as he went to the door. "I'll send a nurse around with a wheelchair."

Starsky saw by the quick way Hutch was dressing in his red shorts and white undershirt that he wouldn't be in the room long enough for a wheelchair.

"Let's get out of here," Hutch said pulling Starsky to his feet. "We'll catch up with Bill and Jerome and see if they turned anything new."

"Good to see you up and around again," Starsky said as he followed him down the hall, "but just so you know, I'm keepin' an eye on you."

As they reached the elevator, the doors opened, and Dobey was inside. He threw Hutch a glowering look.

"Who the hell said you could leave, Hutchinson?"

"Me," the blond said as he and Starsky got into the elevator with him and pushed the Down button.

"Any news?" Starsky asked the captain.

"Nothing new. And I think you should let Bill and Jerome handle this, Hutch. You need to just take it easy until we find what was in that needle."

"I can't take it easy," Hutch said looking at him. "The more people on the case, the faster we'll find out what we want to know. Now you have four investigators instead of two."

Dobey looked at Starsky as if for help, but Starsky said, "We'll keep you informed," as he and Hutch walked across the parking garage toward the Torino.

xxxxxxxxx

They stopped by Hutch's apartment so he could change clothes, Starsky surprised and relieved that he made it up the stairs with no problem.

"Don't look at me like I'm an invalid," Hutch said as he pulled on a cream-colored pullover and tan corduroys. "Whatever it was has passed now. I feel fine."

When Hutch saw the hurt look on his face as he turned his back, Hutch placed a hand on his forearm.

"I'm sorry. I know you're thinking about Professor Jennings."

"Actually I'm thinking about the virus."

"I'm okay. We'll find the formula, and that'll be that."

xxxxxxxx

The warden at the prison led Starsky and Hutch to Doctor Mercer's cell to unlock it.

"Two Dicks already talked to him."

"Two more Dicks want to talk to him," Hutch said as the man unlocked the cell.

"Tell the guard when you're finished."

The warden unlocked the cell, then handed the keys to the guard who stood nearby.

Starsky and Hutch went inside Mercer's cell, and the door closed behind them.

Mercer sat on his bunk, reading a book of poetry.

"I would love to take credit for such an act," the doctor said as he turned a page with an elegant finger, "but sadly I don't know anything about it."

Starsky lunged for him, but Hutch pulled him back.

"Doctor Mercer," he said as he held Starsky's arm tightly. "If you know what your nurse gave me, now is the time to tell us. I'm still alive. He gets the blame. You can help save a life instead of take one."

He turned another page and kept reading, never looking at them. "Why should I care? I'm going to die in this place anyway. You and your partner are the ones who put me here."

Starsky and Hutch looked at each other.

Doctor Mercer smiled. "Paralysis? Weakness? It must be terrifying to lose complete control of your body."

Starsky broke away from Hutch, this time grabbing the doctor and slamming him face down on the floor, grabbing a handful of his hair and jerking his head back, ready to smash his face into the floor.

"Cold heartless-," Starsky growled into his ear. "You better start talkin', or there won't be anything left of you to bury."

Mercer still wore the same mild smile.

"I think you should be more concerned about your partner."

Starsky looked around to see Hutch leaning his shoulder against the wall, his knee bending, his hand trying to hold onto the door handle as he slid down the wall, his voice a weak gasp. "Star…"

Starsky crossed the room in three steps, catching him under the arms, easing him down, his eyes sliding to Mercer, who still lay on the floor.

"Please," he said in a shakier voice than he had intended, the volatile eruption replaced with a passionate plea. "Help him."

The doctor calmly rose to his feet, dusted off his inmate uniform, then went back to his bunk and picked up his book again.

Starsky swallowed a tear as he continued to hold Hutch up and speak to the doctor.

"You were a doctor. Wasn't there a time when you were more interested in saving a life? Helping someone? I'm begging you. Please."

Mercer said nothing as the open book came up in front of his face, blocking Starsky's view of him.

Starsky kicked the door, and the guard opened it.

"Come on," Starsky said as he walked Hutch from the cell and into the hallway. "Let's get you out of here."

"Weak," Hutch mumbled with his head down. "Hard to move."

"I got you. Let's get to the car. Back to the hospital."

"No," he said moving his head no. "I'm okay. I'll go to…to the hospital, but just to talk to Myron Jordan's co-workers."

Starsky helped him down the hall and through the front doors.

"Is he all right?" several of the guards asked, but Starsky didn't answer.

He helped Hutch to the Torino and opened the passenger door.

"How you feelin'?" Starsky asked as he sat Hutch down sideways in the seat and crouched in front of him.

Hutch leaned the side of his head against the headrest.

"Chest feels…kind of tight. Little hard to breathe, but…"

Starsky took his hand. "Squeeze it."

Hutch tried, but Starsky felt only a weak pressure on his hand.

"Hutch, I'm scared. You need to be in the hospital."

Hutch moved his head no. "I told you. If…if this thing gets me…I want to be out here…trying…with you."

Starsky didn't necessarily agree with Hutch's reasoning. He felt Hutch would be in less pain and could be better taken care of in a hospital, but he did understand. Hutch was making a decision, and Starsky couldn't take that away from him.

Hutch slowly pulled his legs inside the car, with Starsky's help.

"Okay, Hutch. Let's go interview the nurses."

xxxxxxxx

"We've already talked to the police," the head nurse at Bay City Hospital told Starsky and Hutch.

Starsky stood looking at the stack of personnel files while Hutch sat pale on a stool.

"Talk to us again," Starsky said. "We're looking for anybody close to Myron Jordan, who would know if the guy was into cooking up his own formulas for patients or anything like that."

"I assure you we would have turned all of that information over to the police if we knew

anything of the kind."

"I didn't ask you if you had any information like that. I asked you who was close enough to him to know something like that? A confidant."

She looked at Hutch with sympathy. "Unfortunately the only person he was close to was Doctor Mercer, and I'm sure you've talked to him already."

"Thanks for nothing," Starsky said glumly as he helped Hutch up from the stool.

"Okay?" Starsky whispered as they made their slow way down the hall toward the elevator.

Hutch moved his feet in a shuffling gait, trying to hold onto Starsky's jacket for support.

Starsky wrapped both arms around him, pressed the elevator button, and got him inside, where he saw Doctor Bradford.

"I was just coming to find you," the young doctor said. Then he gave a concerned look to Hutch, opening his drooping eyelids and taking his pulse.

"You figured out the formula?" Starsky asked. "Got somethin' to help him?"

"No. To tell you, Hutch, if your symptoms continue as they are now, and worsen, then we're looking at just a few hours. I wish I had better news. I'm sorry."

Hutch's expression didn't change. His head was still down and he was still trying to stay on his feet, but his hands could no longer hold onto his partner.

Starsky closed his eyes against hot, burning tears. "Doc," he whispered, "you gotta find somethin'."

"We won't give up. I think he needs to be admitted. He can't function like this. If…when…his kidneys, liver, lungs, and heart start to fail, he'll have everything in ICU to keep things going."

Starsky took Hutch's face in his hand, lifted it. "What do you say, huh? Want to stay here?"

Hutch moved his head no in Starsky's hand.

xxxxxxxxxxx

Once they were outside of the hospital and making their slow way to the Torino, Starsky whispered, in almost helpless desperation, "I can go back to Mercer, Hutch. I can get the

truth out of him."

Hutch's head, now lolling under Starsky's chin, moved no again.

xxxxxxxxxxx

Hutch lounged sideways in the seat so that he could watch his partner, as if afraid to let him out of his sight, his lax hand in the seat between them.

Starsky took his hand and squeezed it.

"Feel that?"

Hutch didn't answer.

Starsky tried not to think about where they were going or what it meant: Hutch wanted him to be with him when he died.

No.

Not when.

If.

If he died.

Because there was always a chance.

Dobey, Huggy, Bill, and Jerome were still on the case.

.xxxxxxxx

Starsky parked in front of his house and got out of the car, rounding the front to come around to the passenger side.

"Here we go," he said as he opened the door.

He fought to keep his panic down and stay calm. Hutch wasn't even offering to move or say anything. With a growing sense of dread, Starsky realized that the reason he wasn't talking was because his vocal cords were becoming paralyzed as well.

"Come on," he said pulling Hutch out and putting an arm around him. "Up the stairs. We're at my place. See?"

Starsky struggled to get him up the steps, barely managing to get him inside before they

both fell.

"Hey," Starsky half-panted, half-laughed. But the laugh sounded more like a cry. "We made it in."

Starsky sat with his back against the wall, panting as he grasped Hutch's belt and inched him a little closer to him. Hutch lay quietly on his back, gazing up at him with something close to a smile in his eyes. When he tried to say something, only one faint sound came out, and it was his name.

"Starsk."

Hutch tried to hold to Starsky's sleeve, but his arm fell away to the floor again.

Starsky stroked his hair. "Hey, buddy, you don't have to talk. I'm right here. Just look at me."

As if that were all he wanted to do, or could do, Hutch fell silent, his slight breath the only sound between them.

Starsky saw that the fear that had been in his eyes before was gone now. The soft sky seemed to be back, and Starsky didn't know if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

He had learned with Terry's death that he was in control of nothing. Not pain, not fate, not the future. The only thing he could control was himself, and he vowed to be in this moment, in Hutch's moment, with him. Completely. Pushing aside all of his own fear, heartache, and loss.

Hutch needed him, even in death, and he would be here.

"Starsk…"

His faint whisper again. No pain. No movement. Just stillness. Just saying his name.

Starsky brushed a slow thumb across his cheek. "Right here, buddy."

As Starsky looked into his calm blue eyes, he saw their world and what it had been. Their friendship. The times they had been there for each other, helping each other through. Terry. Gillian. Marcus. The plague. The professor. The life and death situations. The hard cases. The laughter. The fun. There were no words for that.

He thought of offering Hutch a drink of water, but realized that he probably couldn't swallow. He thought of getting a blanket, but he didn't seem cold, and somehow looked content and peaceful.

He didn't seem to notice the door opening and Huggy stepping in. His eyes didn't leave Starsky's face, and still held the whisper of a smile.

Starsky looked up at him, and without words passing between them, knew why he was here. To say goodbye.

"Hutchie," Huggy said as he crouched down with them.

Starsky swallowed, his voice low and shaky. "He can't move at all now. He can't talk. I don't know if he can hear me."

Huggy put his hand in Hutch's hair, running his fingers through; then put his hand on Hutch's slow-rising, barely-breathing chest. "Love you, boy."

Only Hutch's faint, slow breaths could be heard between them.

When his lips parted slightly, Starsky realized he was trying to say his name again, but couldn't. And then finally his lips stopped moving altogether.

In some sad, literary, romantic way he resembled a beautiful angel on the verge of rising into heaven.

Huggy sat next to Starsky with his back against the wall too, knees up, hand over his forehead.

They sat that way for some time, in silence, until a soft knock at the door came and Dobey stepped in.

He looked down at Hutch, who was blinking slowly as he still kept his heavy eyes on his partner.

Dobey offered no words. He simply crouched next to Hutch and rubbed his forearm, even though he couldn't feel it.

The silence amongst the four was easy to interpret. There was nothing more they could do. Mercer knew nothing. Or if he did, he would never talk. The nurse who injected him was dead. And the contents of the syringe remained unknown. Bill and Jerome were still working the case, and Doctor Bradford was still trying to come up with an antidote even without the elements of the formula, but at this point they were all grasping at straws. So there was nothing else to do except be with Hutch.

Dobey had lost enough people in his life-too many-professional and personal-to not recognize the signs. Hutch was dying. His lungs and heart were slowing.

xxxxxxxx

At first when the phone rang, none of them wanted to answer, not wanting to disturb the silent goodbye, but Dobey walked over to the phone to answer, in hopes that it would be Doctor Bradford with a breakthrough on a cure.

But it wasn't Bradford. It was the coroner, with news that was just as hopeful. He had found a pocket-size journal of sorts in Myron Jordan's special effects. Something that Bill and Jerome had overlooked during their initial investigation. A journal of lab notes containing the formula he used to inject "KH."

"Rush it to Doctor Bradford," he said into the receiver, then called an ambulance for Hutch.

Starsky's eyes were alive with hope when Dobey walked over to them and said, "We found the formula."

xxxxxxxxx

Starsky watched from the emergency room doorway as Doctor Bradford and a medical team worked diligently to save Hutch's life.

"Come on, baby," Starsky whispered. "You can do it."

Dobey and Huggy approached him with some coffee, which he took but just held.

"Is he gonna be all right?" Huggy asked.

Starsky was still looking toward Hutch on the gurney.

"He has to be."

xxxxxxxx

Hours later Starsky found himself at Hutch's bedside again, watching his sleeping partner. The IV in his arm was the only indication that he had been to the edge of death and back.

At the end of his shift, Doctor Bradford came in and said, "He's in good condition now. Vital signs are stable and normal. He should pull through with no adverse effects. But he did try to pull the IV out a few times, so watch him for that."

"I will."

As the doctor turned to leave, Starsky said, "Thanks for savin' him."

The doctor smiled. "Just doing my job," he said, and left the room.

Starsky looked back at Hutch, whose head was moving on the pillow. He reached for the IV again.

"Easy there," Starsky said as he squeezed his hand and held onto it. "That's an IV. Can you feel my hand now?"

Hutch blinked his eyes open and tried to smile a little.

"Yeah. Where've I been?"

"You don't remember?"

Hutch licked his dry lips. "Kind of fuzzy. I remember us being in the elevator with Bradford. That's about it."

"We've been at my place. Coroner found the formula in Jordan's effects and called it in."

Hutch looked for more than that in his partner's eyes. "I was leaving this planet, wasn't I?"

Starsky smiled, eyes brimming with tears. "You came back, though."

Hutch squeezed his hand, a signal that his strength was returning. The End

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

FRIENDSHIP

By Ralph Waldo Emerson

A ruddy drop of manly blood

The surging sea outweighs,

The world uncertain comes and goes,

The lover rooted stays.

I fancied he was fled,

And, after many a year,

Glowed unexhausted kindliness

Like daily sunrise there.

My careful heart was free again, —

O friend, my bosom said,

Through thee alone the sky is arched,

Through thee the rose is red,

All things through thee take nobler form,

And look beyond the earth,

And is the mill-round of our fate

A sun-path in thy worth.

Me too thy nobleness has taught

To master my despair;

The fountains of my hidden life

Are through thy friendship fair.