Chapter 5

"Downstairs, quickly!"

The noise of the siren intensified steadily, and Mark wondered how a sound that he'd previously associated with hope and protection could so quickly have become inimical and menacing. The recent interview with Captain Simmons and the assassination attempt by the three rogue officers had shaken his faith in the police, and although he wasn't ready to tar all cops with the same brush of corruption, he knew that there was no way at present for them to identify which were involved in the crime ring or even how many rotten apples were included in the barrel.

"My jacket," Mark exclaimed, suddenly remembering the one vital clue they possessed to decipher this mess. He ducked past Steve's restraining arm, knowing there was no time to explain, and ran to the door, jerking the jacket with enough force to break the piece of cloth from which it hung. He returned with his prize as a flashing blue light became visible through the frosted glass of the front door. The sound of their footsteps descending the stairs was masked by resonating knocks and stentorian demands for admission.

"Is the front door unlocked?" Steve asked quietly.

Mark nodded in response, slightly shamefaced as he remembered all the safety lectures he'd received from his son, but Steve didn't look even mildly censorious, and Mark realised that the last thing they wanted was for anyone to come round the back looking for another entrance. The door to Steve's apartment was shielded from above by the deck, and they could slip out unnoticed.

Mark's heart was beating fast even though there was something vaguely farcical about the surreptitious exit from their own home. Steve slid a look round the corner, and Mark prayed no one would see them as his son was in no condition for another fight, though that wouldn't stop him from trying. Luckily, everything was clear, and Steve guided his father over the open area between the houses and around the neighbour's house. No shout of discovery followed them, and they slowed to a less suspicious pace. Two houses down, Steve steered them back towards the road and to an old, blue, Ford pick-up truck parked beside a palm tree. With a quick glance up and down PCH, he urged Mark into the passenger seat and hurried round to the driver's side.

"Whose car is this?" Mark asked curiously. He hadn't given any thought to how Steve had arrived so fortuitously at the Beach House after his involvement in the massacre down by the docks.

"I borrowed it earlier," Steve answered evasively as, with a grunt, he bent over and connected two wires that were dangling revealingly from under the dashboard.

The engine spluttered to life almost drowning Mark's expostulation of, "Steven Michael Sloan, you swore to me you'd never hot-wire a car again." It was an absurd reaction under the circumstances, and Mark had to stifle a near-hysterical giggle at the timing of his automatic parental response.

He caught an answering glimmer in Steve's eyes. "Ground me later, OK, Dad?" he replied solemnly, as he eased out into the meagre traffic, trying to be as inconspicuous as the roar of the ancient engine allowed.

The humourous moment soon passed and, as Steve concentrated on driving towards the downtown area, he looked grim, the corners of his mouth pinched with pain.

Mark felt some bitterness at the belief that Steve would have stayed to face the problem, to fight the corruption and accusations from inside the department, if his need to protect his father hadn't swayed the balance. Yet, as he sat, unable to tear his eyes from his son's face, the only fact that really seemed to matter was that Steve was alive. He held that knowledge close to his heart, allowing renewed energy and optimism to soak in and inspire him. They were together, and together they were greater than the sum of their parts, a lever and fulcrum capable of lifting any weight they set their minds to. On that comforting reflection, Mark closed his eyes, meaning only to rest them for a few minutes, but the accumulated stress of the past day caught up with him, and he soon dozed off.

He stayed asleep until Steve parked the truck in front of a seedy motel in downtown LA and turned off the engine. The cessation of movement and sound woke him abruptly. It was now dark, and finding himself in a strange vehicle was momentarily disorienting. Casting a wild look around, he caught sight of Steve slumped over the steering wheel.

"Steve... Steve!" Fear struck, although common sense told him that Steve had just parked the car so he couldn't be in too serious a condition.

"I'm fine." Steve eased himself backwards in the seat, his right arm wrapped protectively around his ribs.

Mark regarded his son with affectionate exasperation. "As a medical diagnosis, that would probably get you suspended by the Board."

"Ah, but you should see my bedside manner," Steve retorted, but his voice lacked its usual vibrancy.

The streetlights provided inadequate illumination for assessment, but Mark could see the frequent shivers that seized his son. He reached out and gently laid the backs of his fingers on Steve's cheek. "That's quite a fever you're working on," he observed, the tone neutral but his concern obvious anyway.

Steve just nodded, too tired to attempt any kind of denial. "Look, Dad, I can't go in like this, I'm way too noticeable. You need to go in and book us a room. Give a fake name and just try to be as inconspicuous as possible." He paused, perusing what he could see of his father's face doubtfully. With his height, white hair and sporting a shiner to boot, Mark was anything but forgettable, but it was better than him going in and bleeding all over the floor. "Just try not to be too obvious," he repeated wearily.

Mark slid out of the car, the light from the open door reflecting momentarily on Steve's face, ghastly and pale, speeding him on his way. He wanted nothing more than to see Steve settled in a room and to start treating whatever injuries he had. However, his step slowed as he neared the building. He knew that Steve had chosen this flea trap in the belief that no one would think to look for them here and that the proprietor wouldn't notice much about their clientele as long as they paid. But the truth was that Mark's clothes and appearance would make him stick out like a sore thumb.

Inspiration struck as he saw a dirty brown paper bag beside an odorous dumpster. Cautiously, he picked it up, but the contents, as he suspected, consisted only of an empty bottle of alcohol. Tipping it upside down, a few drops rolled into his hand and, wrinkling his nose in disgust, he patted the liquid on his face and hands. Then, satisfied that the impromptu aftershave conveyed the impression he desired, he shuffled drunkenly into the motel office. He was careful not to appear too inebriated, just rather tipsy, but the black eye could certainly be explained by a bar brawl.

"I would like to register for a room." Each word was clearly enunciated until 'register,' which dissolved in a confusion of syllables. The clerk never looked up from the magazine he was reading, but pushed a dog-eared book towards Mark.

"Sign in here," he mumbled, clearly uninterested in the proceedings.

Mark scrawled the first fictitious name and address that came to mind, but hesitated before writing down a car registration. He had no idea what the tags were for the vehicle Steve had stolen, but eventually wrote a plausible combination of letters and numbers with the reasoning that there was little chance of any motel employee checking cars for correlation with their records.

He pushed the book back towards the clerk, pleased with the ease of the deception.

"Single room?" The clerk reached back for a key.

Mark hesitated, unprepared for the question and unsure how to answer it. Although registering under one name would help throw off anyone looking for them, Steve needed a bed, and he wasn't feeling like sleeping on the floor or any chair that might be available. He realised he'd waited too long to reply when the clerk finally glanced up at the clearly flustered man on the other side of the desk and jumped to the obvious conclusion.

"Write her name too," he said, boredom evident in his voice.

Heat rising to his cheeks at the realisation of what assumption would be drawn if he were seen entering his room with another man, Mark deliberately invented an androgynous name -- Dusty Brown. He received a key and directions to the room and escaped gratefully into the fresh air.

As he pulled himself into the truck, Steve recoiled in disgust. "Dad! You smell like a distillery. What have you been doing?"

Mark smiled mischievously. "Camouflage, my friend, camouflage." He grabbed a bag from near his feet. "I don't think I've ever felt like such a dirty old man before."

It was unfortunate that their room was on the second floor. Mark hovered near Steve, wishing his son would lean on him a little to spare him the agony of his need to help. He knew Steve's determination to manage alone was largely motivated by his desire to remain inconspicuous, but, after his son had stumbled for the second time, Mark had had enough. He slipped Steve's arm round his shoulder for support, resisting the half-hearted attempts to shrug him off.

"You're drunk," he informed Steve affably. "For that matter, so am I, so let's carouse. Sing something drunken."

"What shall we do with the drunken sailor?" Steve suggested, willing to be distracted, but his voice was strained with the effort.

"I was thinking of something less.....nautical. On second thoughts, I think our staggering and lurching should have any casual observer convinced."

After a short breather at the top of the flight of stairs, they careened down the hall till they arrived at their room. Mark propped Steve against a wall as he unlocked the room and switched on the light. The room was utilitarian and the upholstery and curtains threadbare, but Mark took little interest in his surroundings as he helped Steve lower himself on the side of the double bed.

Loathe to leave his son even for a minute, he nevertheless hurried down to get their other bags, then washed his face and cleaned his hands as best he could before proceeding with the examination.

Steve was still sitting unmoving on the bed and Mark maneuvered him round into the light so he could see his injuries better. There was a sheen of sweat covering Steve's face, and Mark gently brushed his damp hair back to inspect the burn carefully. He was relieved to find that not only was it a superficial, first-degree burn with no blistering, but that his clothes seemed to have protected the rest of his body. Mark cleaned the burn and applied a topical anesthetic. Knowing that his son had been close to an explosion, he also quickly checked for primary blast injuries, but there was no sign of pulmonary barotrauma and the tympanic membranes in the ears did not seem to be ruptured. Everything indicated that Steve had not been inside the building when the bomb exploded and had escaped at least the initial blast relatively lightly.

Steve sat passively through the exam, his eyes glazed with exhaustion, too tired to cooperate or protest.

"How are you doing?" Mark asked, unused to his son's quiet compliance and more than slightly worried by it. "And don't tell me you're fine," he added sharply as Steve started to speak.

Steve looked sheepish and closed his mouth again obediently. Mark started to unbutton Steve's shirt as his son's own fumbling efforts proved ineffective.

"Now if you told me that you felt as if you'd gone three rounds with a grizzly, I'd believe you," Mark continued conversationally.

"I feel like I've gone three rounds with a grizzly," Steve parroted obligingly, but he spoiled the effect by flinching as Mark inadvertently put pressure on the wrong place.

"Sorry," Mark quickly glanced up in apology, his hands stilling momentarily then continuing more carefully. However, he froze altogether as he eased Steve's shirt open. His son's torso was liberally decorated with violently coloured contusions. Mark wasn't sure which had been received in the explosion and which, more recently, in the fight. He'd expected that, but he hadn't anticipated finding what looking like an old sweater tied tightly around Steve's lower ribs and fastened in a knot by the arms. It was heavy and soaked with blood. He'd been gauging the extent of his son's external injuries by the amount of blood adorning his shirt, but he hadn't realised that Steve had fashioned the make-shift bandage underneath.

"What happened?" Mark asked, striving to keep his voice steady as he struggled to undo the knot without causing his son more pain.

"I'm not sure. Either something hit me in the explosion or I hit something as I........" Steve's hand described an unsteady but vivid parabola through the air.

The sweater finally fell away and the air hissed through Mark's teeth in a breath of sympathy at the jagged laceration gaping angrily across his son's ribs, still oozing blood. A portion of his mind automatically assessed the injury professionally: a secondary blast projectile wound with penetrating trauma, approximately five inches in length.

"Damn it, you should be in a hospital, not in this germ-ridden flea pit!" The words came out more harshly than Mark intended, and he stood up abruptly, a flash of anger surging uncomfortably through him and impelling him into motion. He wasn't even sure at whom the anger was directed -- the men who'd injured his son, himself for allowing the wound to be untreated this long, or even at Steve for not taking his injury more seriously. It wasn't logical, but the dark mass of rage swirled feverishly, somehow intensifying through the lack of a clear target on which to detonate.

Steve watched him with concern. "That's not an option at the moment, Dad. It's not that bad."

It wasn't, and Mark had seen far worse, he'd even seen worse on Steve. His ribs had done their job of protecting the inner organs and, apart from a scar, there would be no permanent damage. The injury was messy and undeniably painful, but was not, given proper care, life-threatening. Steve had, after all, stayed on his feet with it for a whole day.

Mark's anger drained as suddenly as it had arrived, but to his dismay, his eyes grew hot as tears threatened to fill the vacuum, and he turned away trying to hide his reaction, busying himself with the first-aid kit. The realisation that his son, injured as he was, bleeding and hurt, had not hesitated to tackle three large, armed men to protect him brought an apple-sized lump to his throat, and he couldn't have spoken just then if his life depended on it.

Finally, he cleared his throat. "You could have been killed!" The thickness in his voice softened the accusation in the words, but it was still far from the expression of gratitude he wanted to articulate.

"But I wasn't," Steve answered evenly and succinctly.

Mark drew in a shaky breath, trying to control his volatile emotions. They were swooping from one extreme to another in a way he hadn't experienced since he was a teenager, delirious highs of joy plunging down sickeningly to troughs of despair, but mostly performing endless dizzying loops of confusion.

"I'm sorry," he said ruefully, his shoulders sagging, the apology intended as much for his behaviour earlier at the house as it was for his currently off-kilter emotions.

"It's OK, Dad, you're entitled." Steve searched for words that would banish his father's embarrassment, knowing how much Mark typically eschewed emotional displays. His eyes gleamed as brightly as sunshine reflecting off pristine snow, though pain and exhaustion showed in their depths. "You never cease to amaze me, you know. After everything you went through today, you never once gave up, never stopped fighting those bastards with everything you had. It's hardly surprising that now it's all over and we're both safe, you're experiencing the aftereffects of shock."

Mark mulled over Steve's words, his son's pride and undiminished respect soothing the jagged edges of his turmoil and reaffirming his self-esteem, which, for once, had taken a battering.

"Post traumatic stress? You know, I take back what I said about your medical diagnosis. That makes a lot of sense." It would explain not only his dissociative state earlier but also his current mood swings and perilous self-control. Feeling more settled with a label for his uncharacteristic behaviour, he returned to the matter that should have remained his first concern. "I need to clean and stitch that laceration. It's not going to be much fun for you, but I'm going to give you a local anaesthetic and an antibiotic while I'm at it."

Kneeling on the floor, he untied Steve's shoes and removed them. "You know, your feet have grown since I last did this," he commented wryly.

"You also used to sing me a song about a bunny with big ears when you tied my laces." Steve recalled with a grin.

"Well, I'll spare you that today," his father promised.

He helped Steve lie back on the bed, trying to ease the strain on the injured area. He felt a warm huff of breath against his arm as Steve limited his reaction to a harsh exhalation, determined to not make this any harder for his father than it had to be. However, the tight line of his lips and the rigidity of his muscles had already conveyed the true message to the older man. As he turned away to prepare the LET injection, Mark mentally lamented the unavailability of a sterile environment, convenient diagnostic equipment and, perhaps most of all, Jesse's expertise. There was a good reason why doctors didn't operate on family members. Mark knew his father's eye was magnifying a simple procedure into a major ordeal, but the idea of personally inflicting more pain, no matter how medically necessary, on his son after all he'd suffered that day was abhorrent.

Striving for some professional detachment, he faced his son with a confident smile. "Try and relax," he advised automatically.

"You get on the other side of that needle and then tell me to relax," Steve retorted, but his grin softened the complaint.

"Well, I won't tell you it's not going to hurt, but it'll only be for a couple of minutes then you'll be too numb to feel anything but a sense of pressure." Mark sat down on the bed and slowly injected the anesthetic into the wound, relieved when the tension in the muscles under his hand relaxed as the drugs took effect. The worst was over, but Mark felt they could both use some distraction while he irrigated and debrided the laceration. It would be a long and painstaking task since blast injuries were often contaminated with dirt, clothing and secondary missiles driven deep into the tissue by the force of the explosion.

"Do you feel up to telling me what happened at the warehouse?" he asked cautiously.

Steve had his right arm thrown over his eyes, not particularly wanting to watch Mark at work, but not relishing the prospect of reliving the traumatic experiences of the previous night either. However, he knew they needed a full exchange of information and ideas to unravel the complex predicament in which they were snarled.

"There's not a great deal to tell," Steve began, casting his mind back to events that already seemed buried under opaque layers of additional painful memories. "I met with the Task Force at HQ for a briefing by the Chief, but he wasn't particularly forthcoming with information. I swear he's got 'need to know' tattooed on his chest. All he told us was that an illegal shipment of weapons had recently been received and was being stored in a warehouse near the port. Some major figures from one of the crime families would be there inspecting them, and our job was to take the warehouse and arrest these men red-handed. Simple and straightforward."

There was an edge of bitterness that Mark was unused to hearing in his son's voice, and he paused in his work to glance up, but Steve's face was turned away from him and mostly concealed under the sheltering arm. "It wasn't that simple, though," Mark prompted, knowing his son carried more than the easily discernible wounds he was working on, and that they too needed to be identified and treated.

"Something was off from the start. I was there at the Chief's request, but my inclusion wasn't well-received. I put it down to inter-departmental jealousies at the time, but now I think there was more to it. The only person who was pleased to see me was Tanis." He broke off and turned towards Mark. "Tanis?"

It was clear from his expression that he merely expected confirmation of her death, and Mark was pleased to be able to offer a modicum of hope.

"She was the only survivor...I mean the only other survivor. But she was badly injured in the blast, and I haven't had the chance to follow up on her status."

Steve nodded, a smile of cautious optimism briefly gracing his face. "She was outside with me. It's ironic that being partnered with the pariah might have saved her life. She told me that there were rumours flying around, but she wasn't too specific. I don't think she was supposed to say anything. When we reached the warehouse, we moved in in a standard two-by-two formation. McDaniels, the guy in charge, ordered Tanis and myself to stay outside and guard the rear. There were just two guards at the door, which probably should have made us suspicious from the start. In the dark, we were able to subdue and disarm them without any noise. Then the rest of the team went in."

He stopped again, shifting restlessly, but stilled under the comforting hand that Mark placed on his shoulder. "Did it blow immediately?"

The question was uttered softly, but seemed to echo in the quiet room as Steve didn't answer immediately. When he resumed his narrative, his voice was slow and more tentative. "No. Over the headphone we heard the usual sounds -- 'police, don't move', things like that. There must have been several people inside and they were frisked and handcuffed. Then, I think someone tried to open one of the boxes and...." His hands described the explosion when words seemed inadequate to the task.

"The force of the blast blew me into the water and things get a little fuzzy after that. The next thing I remember, I was floating on something, I don't know if I landed on it or pulled myself up onto it, but it had drifted under the pier."

For an instant, the dingy room was replaced by the dark, pungent wharf. He was lying on a wooden board, its uneven slats cutting cruelly into ribs already aching and, in shifting to relieve the agony of that pressure, he became aware that his legs were trailing in icy water. All sounds seemed curiously muffled but, over the sluggish beat of his heart, he could hear water slapping against wood and he could taste the brine through the copper tang of blood filling his mouth. The stench of decaying seaweed mixed with sewage and oil was overpowering and he started to retch helplessly, the heaving exacerbating the pain in his chest. He tried to sit up but his muscles refused to obey and.....

"Steve...Steve!" Suddenly that image dissolved, and he was staring into his father's worried face as every muscle strained to rise. The intense flashback had taken him by surprise, and the emotional resonance lingered as he fished for an explanation that would satisfy and not alarm Mark. But, to his relief, his father didn't ask any questions, merely helping him settle back in the pillows.

"I need to stitch this now; I'm using absorbable sutures for the deepest layer." He continued to talk softly as he worked, telling a story of the first time Steve had needed stitches as a child, and Steve's throat constricted as he realised that his father understood and was giving him the space he needed to regain his composure. The tension started to drain away, and he let the memories slip away with it for a while, concentrating only on his father's voice and the strange sensations left by the local anaesthetic. The ghostly tugs proved slightly nauseating when coupled with a mental picture of their cause, and Steve firmly steered his imagination onto a more constructive path.

"I heard them talking," he said suddenly. "On the pier above me as I was lying in the water. They thought it was funny. The renowned task force walking into a trap and being massacred. They laughed and said something about that being the end of their investigation and they wouldn't be bothering anyone again. But they were cops, Dad. I heard them answer a call on their radios. They were cops!"

Mark no longer needed to see his son's expression for corroboration of his state of mind, he had become adept at judging his emotions by the relative tension of the muscles under his hands. Now, he could feel him quiver with outrage and disbelief at this treachery. Steve wasn't naive; he knew that not every cop adhered as strictly to the belief in 'protect and serve' as he did, but this wasn't simple graft, this was wholesale murder - the ultimate betrayal of a fellow officer - and there was a touch of bewilderment mixed in with his fury at the depth of that perfidy.

"We're going to stop them," Mark assured him with determination. "We'll find every one of them and see them convicted."

"The damage is already done." Steve's voice was low and pained. "The reputation of the LAPD will sink even lower."

And you'll be in the middle of it again, Mark thought sadly. This was beginning to look like a no-win situation for his son. If he cleared his own name but brought down other cops and the reputation of the department in the process, he would still be an outcast. However, there was plenty of time to surmount that obstacle when it became necessary. For now, there were more pressing matters. Steve started to speak again, and Mark could tell the memory disturbed him.

"I tried to climb up to a place where I might be able to identify them, but I never caught more than a glimpse of shoes. I did, however, manage to clearly hear the next comment." He paused, obviously trying to recall the exact words. "One of them said something like, 'We've got the perfect scapegoat in Sloan's father' and the other replied, 'the Boss'll be happy to hear that he's out of the way.'

"I realised that you were in trouble but, God, Dad." Steve levered himself onto an elbow. "I thought they were framing you for something. It never occurred to me that they would try to murder you in cold blood. I'm so sorry."

Mark searched for a quick way to defuse his son's guilt trip and, characteristically, resorted to humour. "Are you apologising for saving my life?" he asked with a grin.

"No!" Steve exclaimed, caught between amusement and irritation. "I should have been there, got there quicker."

"I think you arrived at an extremely fortuitous time. If you hadn't, my..." Mark had been about to say, 'my brains would have been splattered all over your sofa', but decided at the last minute that that was an image neither of them needed. "..My life expectancy would have been a lot shorter," he finished lamely. "Now, lie back, you're ruining my stitches."

Steve obeyed with snort. "Is that what you're doing? I thought you were playing tic-tac-toe down there."

"Be nice, or I'll leave my watch or something in here," Mark threatened playfully.

"Again!"

Thankful that Steve still had the energy to angle for the last word, Mark let him have it, bending over his work to hide the smile on his face. He didn't attempt to nudge his son into completing his story, knowing the worst was over and that the rest would trickle out in time. He didn't have long to wait.

"I tried to hear more, but they didn't say anything else interesting before moving away. After a time, I tried to climb up the pier, but it was too slippery, and I fell. I didn't want to attract the attention of the group on the pier, so I swam round to other wharf and managed to climb out. By that time, I was so cold and I wasn't thinking very clearly. I just wanted to get home. I did try calling from a phone box at one time, but there was no reply. It was taking too long so I um..... commandeered the truck."

"You just have a whole wealth of euphemisms for that, don't you," Mark said in admiration.

"Occupational hazard." Steve dismissed his sarcasm modestly. "As I was saying, I appropriated the truck and hightailed it home as fast as I could. I found the IA car outside the house and had a quick look through it, confiscating the gun I found in the glove compartment, since I'd lost mine in the dive. Lucky thing as it turns out. That's about it, you know the rest," he concluded dispassionately.

"And about enough, too," Mark murmured.

It was a skeleton report delivered concisely in even tones, revealing the prominent bones but stark and bleached of the original emotional overtones that must have accompanied the events. Mark was determined that Steve would flesh it out with more details at another time, but, for now, he needed sleep. He could sense the bruising weight of exhaustion pressing down on his son, stifling his spirit and leaching the color from his cheeks, replacing it with dark shadows under his eyes.

Mark lightly taped a dressing over the repaired laceration, then quietly and efficiently checked for other injuries, ignoring the drowsy grumble that he was 'tickling'. He found several other contusions but nothing serious, and, finally satisfied, announced that he was finished. He pulled the covers up and found an unmarked spot on his son's shoulder to pat. "Get some sleep."

"There's no time. We've got to figure out where we go from here." The determination in the words was sabotaged by a jaw-splitting yawn and drooping eyelids.

"Nothing is going to change overnight," Mark responded firmly. "Good night, son."

"'Night, Dad." The words were slurred with weariness, and it took only seconds for his body to relax into the boneless ease of sleep. He suddenly looked much younger, the tight lines in his face slackening, leaving only the laughter lines crinkling at the corner of his eyes.

Mark moved to the bathroom to perform some basic ablutions, then turned out the light and got in on the other side of bed, careful not to jostle Steve in the small space they were sharing. His stomach rumbled, and he suddenly became aware that he hadn't eaten a thing all day. However, he had no intention of leaving his son and venturing out onto the streets at this time of night.

The urge to sleep had temporarily receded, and he sat and watched his son by the muted orange glow that the street lights reflected into their room. The horror of believing that Steve was dead still lingered in his mind like a breath from hell, hot and fetid. This was the first chance he'd had to chase away the spectre of his death and luxuriate in the miracle of his renewed presence.

Steve's hair was mussed and sticking up at odd angles. His mouth had fallen open slightly, small puffs of air escaping with each breath and the gentle rise and fall of his chest provided incontrovertible proof that he was alive - gloriously, vibrantly, indisputably alive.

Mark's senses drank in the evidence of his son's continued existence, and that part of his soul that had shriveled and died at the loss of his son flourished and bloomed like a dessert flower blossoming in an unexpected spring rain. Strangely content considering their precarious position, he finally lay down and fell asleep with a smile on his face, savouring the gentle snoring from behind him, storing it in his memory like a precious gift.

It was daylight when Mark awoke and, for a moment, he lay still, memories jostling for recognition in his head. Steve! He had meant to wake himself throughout the night to check on his son, but his exhausted body had had other plans. He turned towards Steve and his heartbeat stalled as not even a breath seemed to stir that motionless body. It felt like a lifetime before he caught an almost imperceptible susurration and a corresponding swell of the chest which allowed his own heartbeat to resume, albeit at an accelerated, adrenelin-induced rate.

Sliding out of the sheets, he padded round to the other side of the bed, pausing to gently rest the backs of his fingers on Steve's forehead to check his temperature. Although there was still a slight fever, he was pleased to discover that it wasn't as high as the night before. With a last look at his sleeping son, Mark continued on his way into the bathroom, contemplating a relaxing and cleansing shower, but one glance behind the mildewed shower curtain changed his mind, and he made do with an unsatisfying wash at the sink.

He had half-hoped that his activity would have awakened Steve, but his son hadn't moved, and Mark's stomach was now clamouring for attention. He didn't want his son to wake up alone, so he cast around for a distraction and turned on the TV, keeping the volume low. There was no cable, so Mark channel surfed the local stations, most of them showing commercials through various degrees of static, hoping to find some news. He succeeded beyond his wildest expectations and froze in shock as his son's face suddenly stared back at him from a relatively clear screen. The photograph of Steve had been taken of him in his dress blues at a commendation ceremony, and Mark was sure the irony was intentional as his gaze dropped automatically to read the caption under the picture.

"Cop hero turns cop killer!"