Brother's Keeper and First Loves

by Zebra 3 and Me

These early Starsky and Hutch stories by TLR include tragedy, drama, suspense, and a little humor at times.

BROTHER'S KEEPER and FIRST LOVES

By TLR

These Starsky and Hutch stories include tragedy, drama, and suspense.

1. Golden Ring-S suffers a devastating loss.

2. What If (ACFS-If There Were No Hutch).

3. Kiko-All grown up.

4. Heat-S &H fight to survive in the desert.

5. The Accident-Edited-An accident tests the friendship.

6. Playback-Edited-Forest's leftovers back to finish.

7. Residue-Based on The Fix.

8. Hero-H discovers business and pleasure don't mix.

9. Lost and Found-A surprise from the past turns tragic.

10. Stones-Starsky sacrifices.

11. Snowstorm (Edited)-Camping trip goes awry.

Golden Ring

CHAPTER 1

Hutch was standing by the water cooler in the squad room at Parker Center when Starsky bounded through the door dragging his spunky blonde girlfriend Cindy by the hand.

"Hutch! Hutch! Good news!"

Hutch looked up from a stack of police files he was holding-homicide, armed robbery, prostitution, pornography, drugs-the stuff they lived with and fought against and tried hard not to get too used to, every day.

"What?"

Starsky grabbed him by the shoulders and gave him an excited shake.

"I'm gonna have a baby!"

The file papers spilled to the floor and Hutch's eyes got big.

Starsky laughed. "I mean . . . Cindy's gonna . . . we're gonna . . . have a baby!"

"A real one," Cindy put in. Her face was bright as a spotlight.

Hutch watched as his partner paced and pranced around the desk, his hands clutching at his hair, Cindy's shoulders, and Hutch's jacket in excitement.

"I could shoot through the roof!" he exploded.

The fellow officers were happy for him and laughed along.

Starsky pulled a chair out for Cindy. "Here, sweetie, you should be sittin' down. Don't need to be on your feet all the time."

"Dave," she laughed, "I'm only three months along. You can wait on me hand and foot when I get as big as a cow."

He knelt by her chair and grabbed her hand. "Cindy, will you marry me? We gotta do this right. For the baby."

"Do it right? We still love each other, Dave. We'll still be the baby's parents. Marriage is a piece of paper. Love isn't."

"I know, baby, but I really really want to."

"But you really really didn't want to before I found out about the baby."

"Well, yeah . . . "

"Well, yeah, don't fib."

"Well, yeah, but that's what I mean. The baby makes it different."

"Dave . . . "

Hutch bent down to pick up the scattered folders. "Just marry him for Pete's sake. He'll bug you to death if you don't."

She threw her arms around Starsky's neck and kissed him. "Okay! Okay! I know when I'm outnumbered!"

Hutch shook Starsky's hand and patted him on the back. "Congratulations. I guess I can buy you two some lunch to celebrate."

CHAPTER 2

"Where you takin' us for lunch?" Starsky asked as Hutch drove them through traffic.

Starsky insisted on sitting in the backseat with Cindy. He wouldn't let go of her hand.

"To the fanciest place in town," Hutch said. "Where else?"

CHAPTER 3

After they had a fine meal in the fanciest place in town, Starsky said, "Oh, Hutch, we can't go back to the station just yet."

Hutch looked into the rearview mirror. "Why not?"

"There's somethin' I have to do first."

Cindy gave him an eager look, like he walked on water. She'd always had a thing for cops- especially this one. Her dad had been a cop, and he had been killed during a stakeout. She was on the lookout for a handsome cop, one that she could relate to and call her own. She wouldn't have settled for just any cop, though. This one was just right for her. He made her laugh, his arm felt good and protective around her shoulders, and he was a Torino in bed.

"What is it, Dave?"

He picked up her hand and kissed it. "Have to buy you a ring."

"Right now?"

"Right now."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure."

He looked at Hutch's happy eyes in the rearview mirror. "Hey, can you pull over in front of this little jewelry store on the right? It'll just take a second."

Hutch pulled his car beside the jewelry store. "It says No Parking, Starsk."

"So? We're cops."

"Does that give us a license to break the law?"

Starsky shrugged and got out of the car, pulling Cindy along with him. "It does when you have an

emergency engagement and a baby on your hands."

Hutch shook his head and took his wallet out. "Here, buddy," he said handing a hundred-dollar bill out the window at him. "Let me help with that. Wedding present, okay?"

"Nope. Only wedding present I want from you is saying you'll be my best man."

Hutch winked and grinned. "I've always been your best man."

Starsky shook his head and led Cindy up to the big front window of the jewelry store.

"Wow, look at those," Cindy said as her eyes took in all the shiny, glittery rings. Then she squeezed his hand tight and looked up into his puppy-love face. "We really don't have to do this, Dave. We can think about it. Talk about it."

He went on like he didn't hear, pointing at a simple golden ring with a single stone.

"That one," he said. "It's like my Ma's. That okay with you?"

"It's beautiful," she answered.

CHAPTER 4

Hutch watched from the car as Cindy and Starsky stood outside the door of the jewelry store. He rolled the passenger window down, nonchalantly, so he could hear.

Starsky slipped the engagement ring on her finger. "It may not feel right, right now," he whispered as he kissed her. "But there's a lot of love in a little ring. I don't sleep with girls for the fun of it. Well, I mean, I used to. But now . . . I mean . . . like I said . . . "

She stopped his motor-mouth with a kiss. "Be quiet, Dave. We love each other. That's what matters. I know all about you, you know all about me. Sometimes in my mind I pretended we were married. Now my dream's coming true."

BEEP! BEEP!

Hutch blew the horn two times and called out the window. "Come on, you two lovebirds. Save it for the soap operas. Dobey'll put out an APB if we don't get our tails back to the station."

CHAPTER 5

As Starsky and Hutch walked down the Infant aisle of a department store, Starsky said, "Since you're my best man, Hutch, I have somethin' else to ask you."

"Oh?" Hutch asked as he picked up a big brown Teddy bear and held it. "What would that be?"

"Well, you know I'm Jewish."

"Gee, no, I forgot."

"Well, anyway, even if I am, I'm still gonna ask you to be my baby's Godfather."

"Well, that's okay, because I'm not Catholic either." Hutch smiled teasingly. "Let's see," he said as his eyes wandered up to the ceiling, "what are Godfathers supposed to do again? I forgot that too."

"Well, okay. I'd want you to be around for important days, like birthdays and holidays, and special occasions like a school play, or if I'm sick and can't take him somewhere, you could do that for me. And you could teach him how to sing and play the guitar, and teach him foreign languages. And if somethin' bad ever happens to me . . . "

"Starsky, don't talk like that."

"Yeah, but like, if it ever did . . . "

"Just hush and get some more baby things. Of course I'll be the baby's Godfather. Like you had to ask?"

CHAPTER 6

Cindy was setting up one side of Starsky's living room for a nursery when Starsky and Hutch came home.

"Dinner's in the oven," she said as she placed a diaper bag full of baby lotion, shampoo, bibs, rattles, and toys in one corner of the crib. "Homemade. Roast beef, potatoes, carrots, kraut, rolls, a salad for Hutch and the baby, and a big chocolate cake for dessert."

Starsky kissed her. "Did you save me some batter? You know I like to lick the spoon."

"Of course, honey."

Hutch kissed her just as frankly, making her blush, then put the big brown bear in the other corner of the crib. "Save some for me too? You know I like to-"

She swatted him with a cloth diaper. "You're impossible."

He dipped her gently and kissed her again. "Any fiancée of Starsky's is a fiancée of mine."

Starsky shook his head and waved his hand at them on his way to the kitchen. "I think you two need to be alone."

CHAPTER 7

At the dinner table Hutch poured some champagne for Starsky and himself, white grape juice for Cindy, then rose to his feet. "No alcohol for the baby," Starsky reminded her.

"Oh, I know, Captain Kangaroo. My doctor told me all about it."

"He's right," Hutch said. "They used to think the placenta was a filter to keep out harmful things. Now they know it's just the opposite. It lets in everything."

Starsky clapped his hands. "Brava, Brava. Who needs pre-natal visits when we have Doctor Hutchinson around?"

Hutch winked at Cindy. "I'll schedule a pelvic for you next Tuesday."

She giggled over her plate of dinner.

Hutch raised his glass. "To my partner, my fian-I mean-his fiancée. And my Godson, Little Starsk."

"Here, here," Starsky said, and they all drank their toast.

CHAPTER 8

After dinner, Starsky, Hutch, and Cindy were all relaxing on the sofa, their bellies so full of food they were ready to fall asleep. The wind-up musical mobile was playing a lullaby over the crib. Starsky had his jeans unzipped and Hutch was still swigging leisurely on the champagne. Cindy was between them, already dozing on Starsky's shoulder, snoring a dainty little snore.

Starsky smiled and kissed the top of her head, then brushed her hair behind her ear the way she liked it. "Hutch," he whispered, "think I should tell her she snores a little?"

"Not if you want to get married, buddy. There are some things you never tell a woman. She doesn't want to know about them, even if they're true. She doesn't want to know that she snores in her sleep, she doesn't want to hear that the roast was a-" He whispered the next part. "-a little dry. And she doesn't want to hear that she's put on a few pounds, even when she's pregnant. So no matter how big she gets, always tell her she looks beautiful."

Starsky smiled and kissed her hair again. "And that wouldn't be a lie."

Hutch reached down and touched the engagement ring on Cindy's finger. "Lots of things going on, Starsk. Marriage, baby, changes . . . "

Starsky thought he looked a little sad. Could be the champagne.

"Don't worry, Hutch. I won't leave you out of anything. How could I? That'd be like tryin' to do without an arm."

CHAPTER 8

Captain Dobey handed Starsky and Hutch some pictures of murdered prostitutes as they sat in chairs across his desk.

"She's the third one," he told them. "We think it's a serial killer. All the victims are strangled with scarves. The killer's playing with us. Wants us to know he's killing off the prostitutes. Like he's flaunting it, daring us to catch him."

Hutch looked at the photos of the lavender, mottled corpses of the strangled women and passed them to Starsky. "Guy must have a Freudian thing for them. Probably trying to kill his mother."

Starsky smiled at Dobey. "See, Cap? Case is half-solved already. Who needs Dirty Harry?"

"Then you better solve the other half, because-"

The sound of the door opening made them look around.

"Starsky," a rookie said nervously. "Hurry. Your girlfriend's on the phone. I can't understand her, but it sounds like an emergency."

Starsky dropped the photos and ran into the squad room, Hutch right behind him.

Even though he was across the room from the receiver, Starsky could hear Cindy's voice

screaming and babbling in it as he made his way over to it.

He snatched it up and spoke loudly over her words.

"Cindy, it's me! What is it?"

More jabbering.

"Cindy, slow down! Where are you? Are you hurt?"

Finally her words became clearer, his voice enough to shake her from her hysteria.

"Dave!"

"Home!"

"I fell!"

"Bleeding!"

"Hurts!"

"The baby!"

"Help me!"

"Oh God!"

"I'm sorry!"

"Dave, I'm sorry!"

"Help me!"

Hutch could hear the tiny screams too. So did all the other officers. Starsky roared his voice into the receiver to make sure she heard. "Cindy, I'm comin! Don't move! We'll get an ambulance!"

Hutch was already calling an ambulance for Starsky's house. Even though Cindy hadn't identified which "home" she was in, by now all three knew it meant Starsky's place.

Starsky threw the receiver down and they ran out the door.

Captain Dobey was there and picked up the receiver, talking in a low voice to calm her down.

"Cindy, he's coming. He's on his way. Just hang in there. Dave will help you."

CHAPTER 9

The ambulance attendants were loading Cindy into the back of the rescue vehicle when the Torino arrived with flashing lights and blaring siren.

Starsky and Hutch threw their doors open and ran to the ambulance.

"Cindy!"

She heard his voice and her hand came out from under the blanket to grab his. "Dave! I'm sorry! I didn't mean it!"

She sounded a little groggy from a sedative they'd just given her.

He moved into the ambulance with her. "It's okay," he said in a shaking voice. "We'll get you to the hospital."

She put a frilly curtain to her face, and the movement of her hand caused him to see their golden ring. "I was hanging curtains for the baby. Just on the little stepladder like you told me. But . . . I don't know. . . I reached too high . . . I tipped over. I started bleeding . . . and . . . and now . . . HE'S GONE! Oh Dave, I'm sorry! Please forgive me!"

Hutch was pacing hard outside the ambulance, not wanting to hear, but not wanting to leave either. The ambulance attendants closed the double doors, but Hutch could still hear her panic and tears.

For a moment Hutch saw Starsky's face through a window in one of the back doors, and he could see that his partner was talking gently and sweetly to her while trying not to cry himself. He was trying to be strong for her, even though he was having trouble.

That's what made Hutch finally turn away and go to the Torino.

CHAPTER 10

Starsky stood next to Cindy's bed. She still held the baby's curtain in one hand. He took her free hand but she pulled away and turned her back, her face to the wall.

"Dave, just go."

He touched the silver railings instead. "Cindy, it's not your fault. I don't blame you for this. Accidents happen. You know I wouldn't hold it against you."

She swung her arm around as if she wanted to hit him, or make him go away, and she cried into the pillow until her voice was hoarse. "I knew better, Dave. You told me to be careful. You told me to take care of myself and the baby. But I didn't listen. I just had to do it." She sniffed. "I don't care what you say, I killed him. He'd have been a perfect, healthy, happy baby if it hadn't been for . . ."

He couldn't help it. He couldn't stand seeing her like this. He lowered the bed rail even though she was pushing at his arm to leave, and he slid his arms under her and pulled her up against his chest, stroking her hair and planting small kisses on the top of her once-sunshiny hair.

"Cindy, we don't know why things happen sometimes. I hate it, but . . . but . . . " He couldn't be strong anymore. He cried all of their hopes, and plans, and dreams into her hair. "We'll get through, baby. I promise you. It won't be easy, but we will."

She was beginning to accept his comforting arms. But only a little. "I feel like a murderer," she whispered against his chest. "How could I be so careless?"

"Sshh. Cindy, you were carrying him in your body. Giving him life. You didn't know this would happen. You didn't do anything on purpose."

She held onto him, drawing warmth and strength even though she felt like she didn't deserve it.

She just had to have something to hold onto. "My policeman," she sobbed. "Always true blue.

Why did I have to spoil everything for us?"

"Cindy, you didn't."

She ran a hand under her nose and moved back from him, unable to look him in the eye. She took the ring off and put it in his hand, then sat staring at the sheets over her legs, her hand on her stomach. "He's gone," she whispered. "I feel him gone. It's so empty in there. I hope he doesn't hate me."

He looked down at the warmly-glowing ring. It felt sacred in his hand, yet she didn't want it anymore. Maybe it was too hard to look at right now. Maybe she'd want it back later, when it wouldn't be so much a reminder.

But who are you kidding, he asked himself. Every time she looks at that ring, she'll think about it, and who they lost, and what they will never have.

"Can I keep it?" he asked softly.

She nodded.

"Thanks," he whispered, and tucked it into his shirt pocket.

She pushed her hair behind one ear, his hand helping her with her nervous habit.

"Dave," she said, still not able to look at him. "I'm asking you to leave. I don't want you here."

"You don't really mean-"

"I do," she said as she kept pushing against his chest, his arms, trying to move him off the bed. "I do really mean it. Go. Get out of here."

He slowly, reluctantly, moved off the bed, backing toward the door one slow, sad step at a time.

CHAPTER 11

Hutch knocked on Starsky's door and waited patiently for an answer. He knew Starsky was home.

The Torino was here, there was a lamp on, and he could hear the musical mobile playing inside.

"Starsk?" he asked as gently as he could. "Can I come in?"

Hutch didn't hear a No, so he opened the door and went in.

Starsky was sitting in the floor amidst some tools and disassembled crib parts, but he wasn't taking it down at the moment. He was hugging the brown Teddy bear and crying into the plush neck. The golden ring hung from a chain around his neck and lay somehow wrong and different against his chest. Sort of lost and unhappy.

Because, Hutch thought to himself, they're supposed to be on hands, not on necklaces.

Hutch crouched beside him, pulling both bear and Starsky into a hug.

"Baby's gone," Starsky whispered against Hutch's sleeve. "Cindy's gone."

Hutch hugged him tight. "I know. She needs time, Starsk. You both do. I stopped by the hospital to see her. She's going back to Indiana to be with her folks. Her mother's coming out to get her. She'll be okay."

Starsky pulled away from Hutch a little to run a sleeve across his eyes. "You don't think you could get that close to a baby that's not even born, that you can't even see. But I loved him anyway, Hutch."

"Me too, buddy. Me too."

"I think it's over for me and Cindy. The baby . . . that's what we loved about each other. Now that he's gone . . . "

"It's not the same?"

He moved his head no.

Hutch smiled and squeezed the back of his neck. "That's okay. You still have your best man."

CHAPTER 12

The crib was down, the bear on a chair inside Starsky's closet.

Hutch was making Starsky a home-made pizza at the kitchen counter while Starsky sat on a nearby stool and dialed the phone.

It had been a few days. Starsky was back to work and becoming more himself, but Hutch still had to keep him on track with the right cases and files and phone calls and messages, because sometimes his friend's mind wandered toward Cindy and the baby and it was hard for him to concentrate.

"I've got green peppers, mushrooms, olives, onions, pickles, and tuna on my half," Hutch told him as he wiped his hands on a dish towel. "What do you want on yours?"

"All the stuff you complain about." He started to say something else, but his attention returned to the receiver as someone picked up on the other end of the line. "Cindy? Um . . . hi. How you doin'? I just wanted to call and make sure you're okay."

He listened for a while, then said, "Yeah, me too. Yeah, I still have it. No, I'm fine. Really. "

Hutch watched him from the corner of his eye, seeing that Starsky was putting a hand to his eyes to hide his tears, so Hutch discretely left the room to turn on the TV. He found an old gangster movie Starsky would like. "Yeah, you dirty rat," he said to a sneery-faced Cagney on the TV screen. "Keep it up. Your days are numbered."

End

WHAT IF? (A Coffin For Starsky)

By TR

The nylon face loomed over Detective David Starsky's bed.

"Twenty-four hours to live, pig. Count 'em. Twenty-four."

The face swam before his eyes in a distorted shape-the voice a hollow sound.

The prick of a needle. A feeble protest.

Dark laughter.

The departing figure's broad back.

(No, wait. Come back. I need help)

But he was gone, a shadowy phantom through the door.

(Red)

(Red could help me)

(Call Red)

His lethargic hand groped for the phone on the bedside table.

Slipping, slipping,

Falling,

Down, down.

(Red)

(Red could help)

Managing to punch Red's phone number, one slow digit at a time.

The darkness rolling in like a heavy fog.

One ring.

Two rings.

Red's scratchy voice: "Hello?"

Starsky could see his partner's face-red ponytail, red beard, sharp green eyes-hippie biker cop, Huggy had dubbed him. A rough, bear of a man with three ex-wives, two kids, and a collection of teddy bears.

(Just tell him)

(Get the words out)

His voice finally came, one faint, fading whisper: "Red."

And then the fog became too dense, too much, and the room disappeared.

Red roared up on his motorcycle just as the paramedics were lifting the stretcher into the back of the ambulance and closing the doors.

He had dressed quickly in his state of emergency-his hair in a messy red mane. T-shirt, which bore a teddy bear on a tricycle, wrong-side out. One white sock, one black one.

"Hang in there, Davey!" Red shouted as he banged on the doors. "I'm right behind you!"

Biker boots jingling with urgency, Red muscled his way into the emergency room ahead of the gurney that carried Starsky.

"Where's the damn doctor!"

The doctor spoke to Red in the hall.

"If our timetable's right, we've got less than twenty-four hours."

Red stroked worriedly at his beard. "Hell, Doc. Can't you do better than that?"

"He asked me to tell you. Said he doesn't like soapy scenes."

Red joined Starsky at the examining table and handed him his jeans and shirt.

"What can you remember, Davey?"

"Not much. Most of it's fuzzy." He slid off the table and stepped into his jeans, then raised his pale face to Red's. "Big guy. Stocking face. And about the dirtiest laugh I've ever heard."

"Let's blow this joint. We don't have much time."

"What it is," Huggy said as he got out of his car and joined Red and Starsky on the sidewalk.

Starsky passed a hand over his perspiring brow. "We're lookin' for a guy who gets his kicks with a needle."

Huggy looked at Red as if for confirmation.

"Somebody got into my place last night and gave me a shot."

"You're puttin' me on."

Starsky squinted at him in the sun and shook his head no. "I don't think he was puttin' me on either."

"I'll see what I can do. Somethin' will turn."

Dobey watched Red and Starsky as they looked through the police files of convicted felons.

Starsky pulled out three particular files. "Janos Martini, Vic Bellamy, and Al Widell."

"Let's hit it," Red said going to the door.

Starsky, behind him, righted himself before he walked face-first into the wall.

Red reached behind him to pull him along.

Cheryl smiled in sympathy. "Uncontrolled perspiration, distorted vision, loss of coordination, difficult breathing, pain, coma . . . when it gets bad, I can give you something for the pain, but . . . "

Red looked at him. "Davey, you want to stay or go?"

Starsky slipped off the edge of the desk and held onto it until he got his bearings.

"I'm goin'."

Bellamy's apartment building.

Starsky and his partner stood on either side of the door, guns drawn.

"We're gonna feel awfully silly if he goes out the back."

Red kicked the door in.

Bellamy, in a wheelchair and wearing a leg cast, bawled in indignation at the two cops in his apartment. "Hey! What the-"

"How long's he been in that cast?" Red asked.

Bellamy's girlfriend stood with hands on her hips, just as indignant. "About two weeks. Hey, what the hell is this?"

Starsky looked at Red. "How about strike one?"

They came down the stairs of Bellamy's apartment building, Red flipping through his notepad. "Are you sure about the description, Davey? You're pretty zonked right-"

Starsky tripped on the steps and went stumbling to the sidewalk on his hands and knees.

"All right?" Red asked as he reached down for him.

Starsky made no move to get up. "Sick," he groaned.

Red hauled him to his feet and helped him to the passenger side of the Torino. "I think you need another trip back to the hospital."

"Nah," he said fumbling for the door handle. "Let's keep goin'."

Sweet Alice's gaze moved along Starsky's body with the usual appreciation, but an added concern today.

"You okay, Starsk?"

"Huh?"

"Well, you're just sweatin' all over the place. You sick or somethin'?"

"Uh . . . " He pressed the sleeve of his jacket against his upper lip and was surprised to see the amount of perspiration. "Yeah."

Starsky moved down the alley toward the Torino, his steps faltering, a trembling hand swiping at the sheen of sweat on his forehead.

He doubled over, growling in pain, clutching his stomach.

"Oh God," he gasped. "Oh God, it hurts."

He looked around for help, something to pull himself up by-a crate, a railing, a dumpster.

Nothing.

He lay gasping on the ground. "Reh . . . "

Red hustled up to him and pulled him up, setting him on his feet. "Hurry up, man. We gotta check Jan-"

Starsky's hand clutched at his partner's sleeve. "Red. Wait. I gotta-how do I look?"

Red pulled him along. "You look fine, dude. Let's go."

The film crew looked on as Red grabbed Janos Martini by the front of his shirt and slammed him against the wall. "Laugh!"

"Are you cruh-"

Red slammed him again. "I said laugh!"

"Why-"

Red slammed him a third time. "Now!"

Martini forced out a weak, nervous laugh.

"More!"

Martini's eyes darted from Red to Starsky, then belted out another nervous laugh.

"Unfortunately," Starsky said as he shuffled to the door, "that's not him."

Starsky sank to the step outside Martini's studio.

"Hey, Red?" he asked in a small, weak voice. "You ever . . . get scared?"

Red sat down on the step beside him. "Nah. Can't let it get you down, boy. We keep lookin'."

"I think-I think I need somethin'."

"You mean, for the pain?"

He nodded, swallowing his pride and his tears.

Red stood and hitched up his jeans. "Aw, hell, Davey, you know I ain't no good at stuff like this."

Starsky nodded. "It's okay, Red. You don't have to say anything."

Red watched while Cheryl gave Starsky an injection.

"Doin' okay?" Red asked him as he held his jacket for him.

"Room's in pretty bad shape. But I'm doin' just fine."

Red looked at Cheryl. "Is this all you can do for him? Just pump him with stuff and that's it? You know, after all this is all over with, you better pray you did all you could, 'cause I am just in the mood to sue somebody or take somebody's damn head off."

Cheryl opened her mouth to reply, but he was already out the door.

"Excuse him, Cheryl," Starsky said slipping his jacket on and making his way to the door. "He's had a bad day."

Dobey closed his office door and looked from Red to Starsky.

"You can stop looking for Widell. He's been dead four days."

Red didn't look at Starsky. He walked out of the office.

Dobey put an apologetic hand on Starsky's shoulder. "You know Red."

Starsky looked down at his folded hands and nodded. "Yeah, I do."

Starsky handed Red a floppy blue plush animal across the squad room desk. "If this were a cowboy movie . . . I'd give you my boots."

Red handed it back. "Well, buddy, this ain't no cowboy movie, and I don't want your damn boots. 'cause we're gonna find that piece of crap if it's the last thing we do."

Starsky looked at the blue puppy in his hand, then tucked it back into his desk drawer.

A female voice in the doorway.

"Detective Redmond, they said I should tell you."

"Not now, lady," Red said as he rubbed his forehead. "I'm pretty busy."

"But the pictures you wanted me to look at," she said showing him a photo. "I've seen this man."

"This one?"

"I work for a pharmaceutical company. That's why I remember. He came into the store to buy material's for a leg cast."

Red and Starsky looked at the photo.

"Bellamy," they said in the same voice.

Starsky rose to his feet and followed Red from the squad room.

Up the stairs, Red ahead of him. Starsky pulled himself along by the banister, pausing for breath and strength, trying to say Red's name (wait, Red. I'm comin'. Wait on me)

But Red was already on his way to the roof.

Crawling up on all fours, finally getting to the top, gasping and blinking sweat from his eyes.

Starsky hugged the doorjamb, sweating and breathing hard, trying to stay upright.

"He got a gun?" he asked Bellamy's girlfriend with drowsy eyes.

She nodded quickly.

"Terrific," he mumbled, and went to back up his partner.

Red crouched behind an air-conditioning unit on the roof. "Bellamy! What was in the hypo?"

Bellamy fired at Red on the roof.

Red didn't return the gunfire.

"What's the matter, Red? Kill me, you kill your partner."

Red heard Bellamy's approaching footfalls and dove for another cover.

Starsky managed his way onto the roof and aimed his gun at Bellamy, trying to blink away the double vision and wave of dizziness that threatened to overcome him.

Bellamy's laughter was deep and confident in the air as he moved from behind his protection and advanced on Red. "Come on, Red. What are you gonna do? You gonna sit there or are you gonna-"

Red fired his gun and Bellamy staggered backward to the roof.

Starsky's gun was still aimed in Bellamy's direction.

Red put his gun away and stepped over to Bellamy, feeling for a pulse and finding none.

"Son of a-"

Red's oath.

More pain than anger.

Then Red walked over to Starsky and took his gun away, sticking it in the back of his belt. "Sorry, Davey. I didn't want to have to do-but he-hey, I'm sorry. Maybe you'd have done the same thing, huh? But look-"-he tapped his watch-"Still a couple hours left. We still got time."

Starsky was slumping slowly to a sitting position, his head falling to his chest.

Red caught him and lifted him to his feet. "Better get you back to the hospital."

2:00 a.m.

Heart monitor. Oxygen.

In the emergency room, Dobey hovered close as Red leaned over the gurney Starsky was lying on.

"Sorry, fella," Red whispered. "We tried, huh?"

Starsky's eyes moved to Dobey, his lips parting to speak, but nothing came out.

Dobey squeezed his hand and offered a tearful smile, then moved aside when the doctors wheeled him through a set of double doors.

"Well," Dobey said clearing his throat and pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes. "Guess that's it, huh?"

Red's eyes were on the doors. "Guess so."

Dobey went to a phone on the wall and dialed a number.

The doctors tried to keep the tall, lanky black man from the room.

"If I have to plow through the lot of you, I'm goin' back there!"

They nudged him a step at a time away from the room, actually picking him up and physically moving him back each step.

"He's my friend!"

"I'm sorry," the doctor said with compassion. "He's gone."

"NO WAY AM I TOO LATE!" Huggy screamed at the hall.

"I'm sorry."

He struggled and strained against them anyway, sobs cutting his throat like jags of glass. "Starsky!"

"I'm sorry."

"Just let me go see him! Just let me go!"

"There's nothing you can do. Please. Don't make this any harder than it has to-"

He collapsed between them, head down, composure and spirit draining away until his voice was just a tearful sound.

End

KIKO

The boy sat in the interrogation room with me. We were waiting for Hutch to come. The cops called me first because they wanted me to cushion the blow. They wanted me to be the one to tell Hutch what had become of his Little Brother.

The boy was seventeen now, and in big trouble.

He'd changed a lot over the years. He was a big kid, taller than me and Hutch both, and his hair was long, pulled back in a ponytail. He had a tattoo of a serpent going down his neck and he wore a pirate's earring plus a red plaid shirt.

The color red was supposed to mean something, but he wouldn't tell me what it was.

"Want to tell me why you shot at those guys, Kiko? They weren't bothering you and your pals. They were just standin' on the corner mindin' their own business."

His eyes narrowed and he folded his arms across his chest. No more baby innocence. He and his friends had shot at some other kids on the street.

"They shot at us last week," he said. "You think we're just supposed to take it?"

"When's it supposed to end, Kiko? They shoot at you, you shoot at them. Someone dies, someone goes to jail. You're lucky none of 'em were killed. You could be up for murder right now. You want to go to a juvenile home? What happened to you? You used to be a good kid."

Kiko held his arms tightly.

I looked at my watch. Midnight. Hutch would be here any minute. And the kid had murder in his eyes.

"Kiko, let me see your arm."

His eyes shifted away but he didn't move. "Huh?"

"Pull your sleeve up."

He sighed as if bored and turned his sleeve up. He was shooting, but it didn't look like heroin.

His eyes and his nose were red. Something to keep him up, not down.

"Terrific," I said moving away from the table. "How long you been usin'?"

"None of your business."

"What are you on?"

"None of your business."

I heard the sound of the door opening and stepped over to it before Hutch could come inside.

He stood there with messy hair and his shirt buttoned wrong, giving me a grumpy look because I was blocking his way.

"Um, Hutch, look. Maybe it's not the best time, you know? Maybe we should call his mother-"

"MY MOTHER IS DEAD!" Kiko shrieked behind me.

Hutch pushed his way past me to get to the boy, who was now grabbing up his chair and raising it over his head. To hit the wall, me, Hutch, I didn't know.

"Put it down," Hutch said calmly to the boy whose red eyes were shedding no tears. "Put it down, Kiko. Let's talk. I didn't know your mother was dead."

His face was a mask of rage. The chair trembled over his head. "Yeah? Why would you know, Hutch? You left me and never looked back."

"That's not true," I told him. "When Hutch moved, he wrote you and your mother. I know, Kiko. I'm the one who put the stamps on the letters. He tried to call. He stopped by."

"I never got the letters, and nobody told me he tried to call or stop by."

"What happened to your mom?" Hutch asked him.

"She died in a car accident. I went to live with some friends."

Hutch wanted to reach out to the boy like he used to. But the kid had changed. How do you get through to a kid who's at the end of his rope?

"So you've been on the streets?" Hutch asked. "All this time?"

"What's it to you?"

"I care, Kiko."

"Yeah, once. Maybe. But that's okay, Hutch. I got by, and I'm doing just fine."

"Sure you are," I said without hiding my hostility. "That's why you're in a police station after shooting at some kids on the sidewalk, getting' ready to hit one of us with that chair. Yeah, you're doin' just fine. What, did you get into trouble just so Hutch would come runnin'? That what this is about?"

"Stuff it."

"No, you stuff it. You're old enough to make your own choices, Kiko. You've made 'em. You can't put this on Hutch. He helped you when he was around. Put the blame where it belongs."

"You don't know me, Starsky."

"You like guns, Kiko?" I asked as I unbuttoned my shirt to show him the scars on my chest. "Take a look at this. This is what they can do."

Kiko's eyes stared at my chest.

Hutch looked away. He hated my scars.

"You were shot?" he asked in what could have been his twelve-year-old boy voice.

"Yeah," I said quietly as I buttoned my shirt back up.

Hutch looked at him again. "Kiko, you have to quit the gang stuff. It's a dead end. You'll end up dead or in prison."

I said, "This is the stuff me and Hutch fight against every day, Kiko. You're not a kid anymore. You'll be eighteen in three months. I thought you were gonna be a cop like Hutch? That's what you always said. Now look at you."

Kiko's throat moved and the chair came down a little. "You remembered my birthday?"

"May fifth."

The chair slowly came down, and then he just sat down and stared at the table. "My hearing is tomorrow. I don't know what they're going to do."

I knew what Hutch was going to say, so I pulled him outside the room and into the hallway. "Hutch, you don't want to do this."

"Do what?"

"Take him in."

"Who said I-"

"I know you. And I know him. And I think it would be a mistake."

"Starsky, that boy needs me. He needed me all these years. Maybe I should have tried harder to contact him. I mean, my God, he looked up to me, and what did I do? I deserted him."

"You did not desert him. He wasn't your kid, Hutch. He had a mother. He had a caseworker. You were a good influence on him at the time. Don't take the blame."

"Starsky, doesn't he remind you just a little bit of the way you might have been at that age?"

"No way. I didn't go wavin' guns all around. And I didn't use druh-"

Too late. He was giving me his ice stare.

"What?"

I glanced away. "He's on drugs, Hutch. I saw his arm."

Hutch kicked the wall.

"Damn it!" he yelled, loud enough for cops to turn and give him a look as they walked down the hall.

I took his arm. "That's why you don't need to take him in. He needs to face his own consequences. If you rescue him every time he falls, how's he gonna ever-"

Hutch pushed past me and into the room.

I went with him.

"You're going home with me," he said bluntly.

Kiko looked up. "No way, Hutch."

"Rather stay in a juvenile home?"

"No, it's not that. I . . . " His hand covered the sleeve of his shirt.

"I know all about that," Hutch told him.

"I'm ashamed."

"You should be."

"I didn't ever want you to find out."

"Well, now I know, so we're going to get you into a hospital for detox and get you straightened out. It'll take a while but-"

"No. I've seen people go cold turkey. I don't want to."

"It's not like that," I explained. "They do it gradually. It's controlled. It won't hurt you."

Kiko folded his hands on the table. "Guess it's better than going to juvenile detention."

Since it was a juvenile session, the courtroom was closed to the general public.

Each juvenile case was called separately.

Kiko's attorney stood up and addressed the judge. "Your Honor, Detective Hutchinson is here on my client's behalf. I believe we can resolve this with an informal adjudication."

The judge looked at the District Attorney, who said, "Yes, Your Honor. Mr. Bell's young client has pleaded guilty to wanton endangerment and possession of an illegal firearm. I'm asking one-year's probation in lieu of the six-month sentence, and the condition that the juvenile be placed in the temporary custody of Detective Ken Hutchinson."

Judge Fraser looked over his reading glasses at the lawyers. "Approach the bench."

Hutch, Bell, Kiko, and the D.A. walked up to the bench, all of them speaking in low tones, but loud enough for the recorder to pick up.

Judge Fraser looked at the boy. "Six months juvenile detention, suspended. One year probation. Temporary custody of said juvenile to Detective Ken Hutchinson. Should you violate your probation, young man, the six-month sentence will be reinstated."

Bell looked at the D.A. "Terms of probation?"

"Complete a drug rehab program. No possession of firearms. Commit no further criminal acts. No contact with gangs or gang activity. Remain under the care and control of Detective Hutchinson for one year."

Judge Meyers looked at Kiko. "Do you agree to abide by these terms?"

Kiko stood in the new suit and tie Hutch had bought just for court. There was no hiding his tattoo, but he did agree to cut his hair and take his earring out.

"Yes, sir. I mean . . . yes, Your Honor."

The judge banged his gavel down. "So ordered. Next case please."

I noticed Kiko's edgy behavior as we left the courthouse, wrestling out of his suit jacket and loosening his tie. He was sweating and kneading the back of his neck.

"Kiko," Hutch told him quietly. "You need to go to the hospital. Cardinal Hall has a nice adolescent wing. The longer you put it off . . . "

"Just give me a while, Hutch. Okay? I need to think."

Hutch looked at me. I said, "Kiko, Hutch is goin' out on a limb for you. You'd be in a lock-down facility if it weren't for him. He's givin' you a chance. You know what'll happen if you don't keep your end of the bargain."

He shoved his hand through his short black hair. "I have a girlfriend. I want to tell her goodbye."

"So?" I said. "That's cool. You can call her from home, right?"

"It's not the same. It needs to be in person." He looked at Hutch with those sad Saint Bernard puppy eyes of his. "I'll be home in time for supper. I promise. It's just across town."

It sounded like something he'd have said to his mother when he was twelve.

"Okay," Hutch said handing him a twenty and patting his arm. "Here's money for lunch and cab fare. But if you're not back by nine tonight, I'm going to start looking for you."

He said it with a wink, but I think he was half-serious. Kiko was back in his life now, and Hutch was going to do all he could for him.

We stopped at the Torino and watched him walk down the street, his jacket slung casually over his shoulder.

"Think he'll come home?" I asked him.

Hutch opened the passenger door. "I hope so."

So I sort of hung out with Hutch the rest of the day. He was as nervous as an expectant father, getting ready for Kiko to come: Getting some pizza and snacks, buying him some new clothes and sneakers, a portable stereo, a couple of detective magazines he liked to read. Then, once home, getting the sofa ready for him to sleep on.

"I should get him a sofa bed," he said as he put the groceries away. "Or a cot or something."

"You should wait to see how it's gonna work out."

Hutch ignored what I said and took some pictures from a kitchen drawer.

"Look," he said handing me some photos of he and Kiko together. "It's something to see how big he's gotten. You know, he could make a really good cop one of these days. Or a fireman. Or a paramedic."

"Yeah, if he doesn't screw up."

I was trying to ruffle Hutch's feathers, make him think about what he was getting into, but it wasn't working. He was in too good a mood.

"I should have done this five years ago," Hutch said as he took a beer from the fridge.

"What, taken him in? Are you kidding? Hutch, five years ago he was doin' pretty good. He had his mother, he had you. Now . . . he's a bitter kid with a chip on his shoulder who waves machine guns around at kids with blue shirts on."

"Okay, so maybe this was meant to be, Starsky. Maybe this happened for a reason. This is his chance to turn himself around."

I shook my head as I got a beer of my own. "Yeah, well, I hope you're right. For your sake."

Man, he was putting so much hope and faith in a kid whose life had become drugs and guns and gangs. And he wasn't even a kid anymore. In three months he'd be a man. He had a girlfriend, he wasn't in school. What the hell was he supposed to do with his life?

But Hutch. Good-hearted Hutch. He'd go the extra mile to help him find out.

I noticed Hutch watching the clock the closer it got to nine.

We were playing chess and I was beating the pants off of him because he had his mind more on Kiko than his pieces.

"You didn't ask who his girlfriend was," I pointed out.

"Nope. He had to know I trusted him to come back."

"He said he'd be home in time for supper."

"So it's a late supper."

I captured one of his men and grinned. "I may as well be playin' solitaire."

We didn't finish the game. Somewhere around ten, Hutch got up and started pacing.

"Maybe I should call the hospitals," he said quietly. "Maybe the gang wouldn't let him leave." He ran a hand through his hair. "God, why didn't I think of that? They could kill him if he leaves. I didn't think he was in that deep."

"Hutch, you know those gangs. If you're in, you're in. If you're out, you're . . . " I couldn't say what I wanted to say. I couldn't say 'dead.'

He went to the phone and picked up the receiver.

"Who you callin'?" I asked him.

"The hospitals."

"You should be callin' the cops."

He slammed the phone down. "Listen! I'm just doing for him what somebody should have done for you! Is that so wrong? He's angry! He lost the only parent he had! He lost me! What the does he have? You of all people should understand what he's going through!"

I jumped to my feet and snatched a picture of Kiko from the coffee table. "He's not this little kid anymore, Hutch! You don't know who he is!"

A knock at the door made us both look around to see Kiko stumbling in, disheveled, scratches on

his face. High, but not from heroin. Something else. PCP. Crack. LSD. His eyes were wild, too bright, and full of paranoia.

"Kiko," Hutch said going to him and taking his face to look at the scratches. "Are you all right?"

Kiko knocked his hands away and staggered into the living room. "Me and my girlfriend had a fight. She won. I'd never hit a girl."

Hutch followed him. "I was worried about you. Those gangs. You need to cut yourself clean from them, and the dope. I'm taking you to a detox center right-"

Kiko went to the kitchen and leaned over the table, his back to us. "Just leave me alone."

Hutch stood behind him. "You're high. You think I'm going to let you-"

"Yeah, right," the boy mumbled with his head down. He was sobbing now. And I couldn't tell if it was from pain or being stoned. "Turn me in. Send me off to jail. Do whatever the hell you want. I don't care."

"I won't send you to jail. Not if you go with me right now to a hospital. You need-"

A squeal of anguish and Kiko turned, clutching Hutch's shoulder with one hand and shoving a knife into his stomach with the other.

"I'm not going!" he screamed into his face.

Hutch's mouth opened to say something and he gripped the front of Kiko's shirt, trying to stay upright, but then he just sank to his knees, and then to the floor at the boy's feet.

My mind screamed at me to move, but I was rooted to the spot. It had happened so fast.

Kiko ran past me with the bloody knife in his hand.

Numb and frozen, I was torn between running after Kiko and seeing about Hutch.

I snatched up the phone and dialed as I ran to Hutch.

"Cap? Cap? Get an ambulance to Hutch's and put an APB out on Kiko. He just knifed Hutch. Get that kid and LOCK HIM UP!"

I threw the phone down and crouched by Hutch, who was trying to raise his head off the floor.

"Starsk?" he asked with glassy eyes. He gasped for breath, his bloody hand pawing for me. "He . . . why'd he do that, huh?"

He tried to say more, but only coughed up blood. I turned him onto his side so he wouldn't choke,

and yanked a dishtowel from the back of the chair, pressing it hard into his stomach, praying for his insides to stay where they belonged. Blood poured over my hand like red syrup and spread on the floor. "Don't try to talk or move, Hutch. Just breathe. Lie still."

Hutch groaned into the floor, his face going white, a sheen of sweat forming on his face. He whispered my name and started to tremble.

Shock.

"Sshh. Told you to be still. I'm right here. Let me get you a blanket. Don't go anywhere, okay?"

I ran to the sofa and got a throw, then put it over him and sat down beside him, still putting pressure on his stomach.

"Ambulance is comin', Hutch. Just hang on."

I lifted his head onto my lap and brushed his hair.

He wasn't trying to talk anymore. He couldn't. He just lay very still and tried to breathe in very tiny gasps of air.

I stomped around outside the emergency room while they worked on Hutch.

I knew they wouldn't let me in while they did surgery, but that didn't stop my hands from grabbing at each doctor and nurse as they went in and out of the room.

"How is he? Doc? He gonna be all right? Huh?"

I saw Dobey coming in and he looked mad and sad at the same time.

"Did you get that little punk?" I asked him.

Little punk? He was two hundred pounds and built like a semi.

He shook his head no. "Not yet. How's Hutch?"

"I don't know. They won't-" I kicked the wall. "Tell me anything! DAMN IT, WHAT ARE YOU PEOPLE DOIN' IN THERE!"

A security guard came down the hall and I held my hands up.

"Okay, okay. I'm sorry. I'll be quiet. I'm sorry."

I decided to pace instead of kick the wall and yell.

"I told him, Cap. I told him not to take that kid in."

A doctor came from emergency surgery and pulled his mask down to talk to me. "He's out of the woods," he said peeling off his bloody gloves. "Lost a lot of blood. I'll let you see him when he wakes up. Go to the waiting room."

"But-"

Dobey took my arm, and Huggy came down the hall too, taking my other arm.

I'm glad they grabbed me, because I almost passed out with relief.

The waiting room was quiet. Dobey and Huggy were sort of dozing around while I continued to pace. I enjoyed the hatred and anger that soaked through me.

I would get that kid. Some day. I'd put his sorry self behind juvenile bars where he should have been to begin with-

"Starsky?"

His voice. Kiko's. At the door.

I didn't give him time to come inside the waiting room. I was at him like a pit bull, but Dobey and Huggy were pulling me back before I could touch him.

"Jerk!" I yelled at him. "You got some nerve comin' here after you knife your Big Brother! You better get out of here before I KILL YOU!"

He had Hutch's blood all over his shirt and all over his hands.

He made me sick.

All the hatred for all the lowlifes we dealt with, tried to help, wound up in the tears that stung my eyes, and the tremble in my voice.

"How could you do that to him? He tried to help you. He opened his home to you. He kept you out of jail. Is that how you repay him? You're just like the rest of them."

His voice was a little kid's again. So sorry. So sorry after it was too late.

"I'm sorry, Starsky. I'm turning myself in."

"You're not sorry. You're just hopin' Hutch'll feel sorry for you so you won't have to go to jail. Well, too late, buddy boy. You're goin', and I'm gonna be the one to take you."

"I know. I just want to tell Hutch I'm sorry that I-"

"Shut up! You're not goin' near him!"

"I just want to talk to-"

"So you can finish him off? No WAY!"

I was at him again, and this time Dobey pulled the boy out the door.

"I'll take him," he said gruffly as he pulled Kiko from the room.

Huggy grabbed my shirt collar to hold me back. "Slow down, Starsk. He's outa here. Just cool it. We'll get to see Hutch in a little while."

I wrenched away from Huggy and kept on pacing.

"Don't touch me. Just leave me alone."

Hutch was milky pale, even his eyes, when I finally went in to see him.

I made myself calm down. He didn't need to see me in my agitated state.

God, sometimes he could look like such a kid. Younger than Kiko. He sure had more heart and hope and trust than Kiko, or any kid. Especially when it concerned people he cared about. Like me.

"Hurt much?" I smiled down at him.

"Only when I laugh," he said weakly. "Good thing there's not much to laugh about, huh?"

I smoothed a wrinkle in his sheet. He watched my face, waiting to see if I'd say "I told you so."

"Go on," he whispered. "I know you want to say it."

I shook my head no. "Not gonna say it, Hutch. Don't have to."

"He was high," he said quietly. "He didn't know what he was do . . . " But his words rang false, even in his own ears. He couldn't even finish them. He turned his wet eyes away from me. "You'd

think I'd know the score by now, Starsk."

Suddenly I didn't want to be right. I didn't want to be the cynic.

"Hutch, there's nothin' wrong with believin' in someone."

"I thought I was more realistic than that."

I fiddled with the edge of his pillowcase, trying to get his attention. "Hey, it's okay. Why do you think they won't let doctors treat their own families, huh?"

He didn't answer. And even though I knew he knew why, I told him anyway, just so he could hear the words out loud.

"Because they can't be objective, that's why."

"Smarty," he whispered, but I saw his half-smile.

"He was here, y'know."

He looked at me. "What?"

"Turned himself in. Wanted to see you. Apologize. He's takin' responsibility, Hutch. Maybe that's somethin', I don't know. I was pretty hard on him."

"He needed it. I taught him better than that."

I smiled. He wasn't as naïve as he looked.

"He'll probably get a year out of this," I said quietly. "On top of his six months."

"I know."

"Think you'll want to visit him?"

"I don't know." He gave a cynical smile. "Am I my brother's keeper?"

Maybe Hutch didn't know.

But I knew.

And he was. His brother's keeper, that is.

He'd go see him, when he was on his feet again. And he'd tell Kiko that he didn't hold the stabbing against him, that he could still turn his life around if he tried hard enough, and that he'd

be there to help him when he got out, maybe with hooking him up with some education, helping him get a job, a cheap place to rent, a used car to drive.

Can't say that I'd be as gracious, if I were in Hutch's shoes. But then again, it's Hutch we're talkin' about.

End

HEAT

By

Tammy Ruggles

"Oh, Dave," Brandy gasped as Starsky moved on top of her in the bed. "You're so good. Love these early morning romps."

He ground against her frankly, with purpose, panting with pleasure. "Breakfast is served, honey."

She grabbed a pillow and laughed her release into it. "Oh my God!"

His growl of satisfaction turned into a throaty chuckle as he released inside her. "Oh God," he breathed into her neck. "So sweet. Oh Brandy."

She kissed him over and over, urgently, hungrily. "Dave, I luh-"

His lips cut her off. "Don't. Don't spoil it."

"But-"

He kissed her again. "I told you I wasn't ready for anything heavy."

She clasped her hands behind her head, pouting her lips. "Terry, right?"

He rolled off of her and up onto an elbow, then reached for his watch and a glass of water on the bedside table.

"Dave, come on. Talk to me."

"No, you come on. I told you how it was. You said that was okay."

Brandy brushed auburn bangs from her eyes. "But that was a month ago. We've had time to-"

"Talk. Make it. Have fun."

She ran a finger along his shoulder, down his arm. "Nothing serious. I remember."

He gave her an apologetic kiss, then got out of bed and held a hand out to her. "Our shower awaits, Madam."

She grinned, her eyes openly enjoying him. "Mmm. The Land Between the Legs."

He smacked her bare bottom with his hand. "Come on. You're not mad at me."

She took his hand. "How could I be? Talking, making it, and having fun is better than not having you at all. I can live with it."

He swept her nude body up and carried her toward the bathroom.

That's when a knock came at the front door.

"Hey, Starsk!" Hutch's voice called from the other side of it. "Come on! It's officially our first day of vacation!"

Starsky grinned at Brandy and stood holding her and kissing her. "I know! And I'm enjoying every minute of it!"

A key rattling in the lock made Brandy squeal with laughter. "Dave! You nut! I'm not decent!"

"I know. That's what I like about you."

The door opened and Hutch stepped in, but upon seeing his naked partner with his naked girlfriend, put a hand over his eyes and turned around. But not before Starsky caught sight of his rose-colored blush.

"Uh-uh-uh, Starsk, what the hell are you doing?"

Starsky smooched on Brandy's eager lips. "What's it look like?"

"Uh, well, I-you know-I know what it looks like, I-you-she-"

"Come on, buddy. Headin' for the shower. Always room for one more."

"Oh, that's quite all right. I'll just uh . . . wait till you're done."

Brandy, her hair blow-dried and iron-curled, stood on her tiptoes to give Starsky a kiss at his front door.

"Bye, Dave. Hope you win a lot of money in Vegas."

"I will. Then I'll buy you that big hot-air balloon you've always wanted and we'll go sailing around somewhere in the air."

Hutch smiled. "What are you going to buy ME?"

"A new car. We'll need it after we take it on this trip."

She picked up her denim shoulder bag. "You're taking Kenny's car to Vegas?"

"Yeah," Hutch told her. "He's afraid of getting a little dust on that circus wagon of his."

Brandy looked at her watch. "I have to get to the library. We're having some first-graders come by for story hour and I get to read them a story."

"Oh?" Hutch asked. "Which one did you pick?"

"I haven't yet. Any suggestions?"

Starsky winked and gave her a goodbye kiss. "How about Little Red Riding Hood?"

She laughed and goosed him affectionately on her way out.

He watched her departing miniskirt with fondness. "Luckiest first-graders in the world."

"Sexiest librarian I've ever seen." Hutch looked around the living room for Starsky's suitcases and picked one of them up. "Ready to roll?"

Starsky picked up the other one. "Gamblin' fever, baby. Look out."

"Oh, wait." Hutch fished around in his pocket. "Heads up," he said tossing something to him.

Starsky caught it and looked at it. "A roll of money?"

"Dad dropped by. Has a business deal in Beverly Hills. Said to have a good time."

"But . . . I can't take your money."

Hutch produced a roll of his own. "He said to give that one to you."

"Hutch, tell me the truth," Starsky said as he rolled the window down on the passenger door. He folded the map neatly and tucked it over the visor.

It was seven in the morning. They were well on their way to Nevada, the desert landscape affording them a chance to unwind.

Hutch turned the radio off. "Okay, I'll tell you the truth. About what?"

"About this trip."

He rolled up the sleeves of his white shirt. "What do you mean?"

"Don't jive me. It's been a month since Terry died. I feel like you think I'm not ready for the streets yet."

"Don't be ridiculous."

"Then why a vacation all of a sudden?"

"Because our last one ended when the Spano cocaine case busted wide open when we were doing the Grand Canyon, remember?"

"Oh, that's right," he said wryly as he looked at the window. "Cap's number one priority is makin' sure we get our vacation."

Hutch reached behind him in the ice cooler, stirred around, and came up with a cold rootbeer. "Here. You need to cool off. It's way too hot out here."

"For a conversation about Terry, you mean?"

Hutch still had the rootbeer in his hand. "No. It's never too hot for that."

Starsky opened the rootbeer and swigged it. "I keep wantin' to find her again, Hutch."

Hutch adjusted the rearview mirror. "I know."

"In every girl I meet."

"I know."

Starsky finally took his eyes from the endless desert and looked at him. "I'm sorry if I seem distracted on the job."

"Don't apologize."

"Can't blame you for not wantin' to work with me. You have a right to ask for a delay in lettin' us get into some heavy work."

Hutch's hand hit the steering wheel. "Damn it, Starsky! I didn't ask for a delay because I don't think you can handle it! I asked for a vacation so you could have some time to yourself!"

Starsky brooded out the window as if Hutch hadn't said anything.

Hutch lowered his voice. "I don't like to see you hurt. That's all. I just wanted . . . "

Starsky nodded. "To fix it."

Hutch ran a hand through his hair. "Just paying you back, buddy. You were there for me when Gillian died. Even after I . . . "

(Punched you?)

(You wouldn't even let me apologize)

(You excused me)

(Said I was in pain)

"I don't keep score, Hutch."

"You should." He reached over for a drink of Starsky's rootbeer. "God, that's awful."

Starsky smiled as Hutch handed it back. "Guess you told your dad all about Terry, huh?"

"Yeah. He said she must have been a phenomenal lady to put up with the likes of you."

Starsky laughed, then opened a lunchbox for a Baby Ruth. "Hey, do you think-"

"Hey, check that out."

Starsky looked up to see what he was pointing at.

A stranded motorist up ahead. Two actually. A young couple. A guy wearing Bermuda shorts and sandals, and a very pregnant young lady. They were standing outside their convertible. She held her belly while the man looked under the raised hood.

"Think this'll earn us a Boy Scout badge today?" Hutch asked as he slowed down and eased the

tan Ford to the side of the road.

"With this heat," Starsky said as he got out of the car. "We're talkin' halos."

Hutch followed him.

"Hiya," Starsky said. "Looks like you two could use some help."

She fanned herself with a roadmap and smiled tightly. "If I don't get to a town soon I think I'm going to have this baby right here in the desert."

"Here," Starsky said as he opened the passenger door and helped her sit down. "Let's get you out of the sun. I got some rootbeer in the car. Want me to-"

He glanced the bags of money in the back seat just as he heard Hutch's voice from the other side of the raised hood say "What seems to be the-"

A chattering of bullets.

Starsky scrambled around to the front of the car, where the man smashed the butt of the machine gun into his face.

It was the beating sun that woke him. And the smothery sensation of sand in his nose, heat in his lungs.

He thought he was moving but he wasn't. He was facedown on the ground.

He opened his eyes to the painful sunlight. One side of his face felt swollen, throbbing. Parts of it numb.

His throat felt dry and cracked. His head thick and scorching.

"Hutch?" he whispered, his eyes moving warily about.

He lay still. He didn't-couldn't-move too suddenly.

But all he saw-for yards and yards-maybe miles-and he had no idea how many-was desert.

No highway. No car. Just sand. And tire tracks, where the couple had brought them out here and left them to die.

Starsky tried to raise his head to get a better look around, but he knew he really didn't want to.

Because Hutch was here somewhere, and he didn't want to see what the bullets had done to him.

"Sorry," he whispered, and felt a hot tear on his dusty face. "For not helpin' you."

And then there was a soft moan beside him, fingers grasping his collar, and he carefully turned his head, unable to stifle a moan himself.

"Oh my God."

Hutch lay curled on his side, snuffing for breath, his eyes closed. The front of his white shirt wore a splash of blood high in the chest. Not offering to move or speak. Fading out. Only able to hold to Starsky's collar. The gesture communicated-(are you okay? are you hurt? I'm here with you)-what his voice couldn't.

Starsky covered Hutch's hand with his and pushed himself to his hands and knees, looking Hutch over for other bullet wounds.

Only one. With an exit wound in the back.

There should have been more.

But Hutch must have wrestled with the man over the gun, and somehow was hit by only one of the bullets.

Which was one too many.

But at least it had stopped bleeding. That was one thing they wouldn't have to worry about.

It was shock, and the heat, and dying in the desert they'd have to worry about.

Starsky slid his hand under Hutch's head and lifted it up.

"Hutch, can you hear me? Can you open your eyes? I'm here, buddy. I got you."

A small sound of pain escaped him as he opened his eyes like Starsky had asked.

Starsky forced a smile into his vacant, fading eyes, and tried not to let Hutch see how worried and scared he was. He needed to keep his partner calm. He needed to keep himself calm.

"Suh . . . " A breath. Eyes roaming sleepily.

"Sshh. Don't try to talk. We're in the desert, Hutch, but we're gonna get out of here."

Hutch's fingers slipped from his collar and made no move toward him again.

Starsky squeezed the lax hand. "Right here, Hutch."

Starsky noted how sunburned Hutch's face was, and guessed they'd been out here for hours.

He didn't know how far away they were from the highway, but hoped they'd reach it before dark, because he knew that night air in the desert could get very cold.

Starsky bent over him and spoke slowly and gently. "Hutch, listen up. I gotta sit you up, then get you on your feet, then somehow . . . I don't know how . . . we gotta get back to the highway. We have tire tracks to follow. We'll be in good shape as long as it doesn't get too windy and blow sand over 'em. I know you can't walk, okay? But you don't have to. I'm gonna get you out of here on my back. You got that? So you just hang on the best you can and we'll be all right."

Hutch gave no comment.

Starsky removed both of his shirts-a blue denim one, and a yellow T-shirt- and lay them aside.

To keep the sand from the wounds, and to bandage them, he took his handkerchief and rent it in half, then folded each part into a square, gently placing them-one on his chest, one against his back, then tied his blue denim shirt around Hutch's chest to secure them in place.

The yellow T-shirt he draped over Hutch's head to keep the sun off.

"Don't you worry about anything, Hutch. You let me take care of things, hear?"

Starsky slid an arm under his back and carefully sat him up.

"There, see? Step one."

Hutch still made no sound, and that worried Starsky more than any complaints of pain he might have made.

"Now," he said taking Hutch under the arms. "We're gonna try to get a heavy dude on his feet, okay? You know I'm not a Mr. Atlas or anybody, so bear with me, okay? And I'm sorry if I hurt you."

Hutch made no attempt to move or hang on to his partner.

Starsky gingerly lifted him to his feet and moved in front of him so that Hutch could sink onto his back when he began to fall.

"Ugh," Starsky grunted as Hutch's weight settled onto him. "I shoulda taken your vitamins like you told me to."

When he was sure he had Hutch in the most comfortable position possible-if there were such a thing-Starsky started along the tire tracks with his precious burden.

The afternoon sun still bore down on them, and Starsky saw with dismay that the tire tracks seemed to stretch endlessly ahead.

No sign of a highway, a cactus, a rock.

Just sand and more sand.

Heat and more heat.

His face was throbbing but he tried to ignore it.

His arms were aching but he tried to ignore that too.

Hutch had been too silent. Too limp.

He needed water and medical attention.

Starsky's legs began to cramp and buckle. A few times he had to stop to catch his breath and rest, but without putting Hutch down. He couldn't add more pain.

Sweat stung his swollen eye, his bloody mouth.

The sand in his shoes drove him crazy.

The sun was too bright, too cruel.

The only thing that kept Starsky going was the soft thumping of Hutch's heart against his back.

As long as he felt that, he knew they had a chance.

"Hutch?" he asked hoarsely, and was surprised to find how weak his voice was.

Hutch hadn't spoken a word-had been unable to-until now. "Cuh . . . " he breathed into Starsky's ear. Both arms were draped limply around his partner's shoulders.

Starsky felt them shivering against him. "You cold, buddy?"

A small moan answered him.

"Hutch, you hang on. I think we're almost there."

But they weren't.

More tracks. More sand. More heat.

He had to give Hutch a hint of hope, even when there didn't seem to be any.

Starsky was bent over now, slowing down, each step a battle. Each breath searing his lungs.

His arms burned with pain. His legs shook.

And finally, just as the sun was going down for the evening, just as he saw that there would be no relief tonight, he collapsed to the ground, and his last thought before passing out was that he was grateful to be able to cushion Hutch's fall.

Starsky didn't know what time it was, but when he opened his eyes it was dark.

He didn't know how long they'd slept, but . . .

"Oh, Hutch."

His voice was no longer a sound, but a thought in his head. His voice was gone, vacuumed out by the heat and the hot winds and the physical strain.

But now, his body rigid against the night desert chill, he would give anything for a little of that blazing sun. He felt Hutch quivering against him and gently untangled their arms and legs.

"Easy," he tried to say, but it just wouldn't come. He wrapped his arms around Hutch to keep him warm, to block him from the dark winds which blew harder and stronger, praying that they weren't strong enough to send sand across all the tracks.

(Rest, he wanted to say)

(We'll need it)

(I'll do my best to carry you tomorrow)

(I'll do my best to keep you alive)

(I'm right here with you, Hutch)

(Can you feel me?)

(Do you know?)

Cursing his lost voice, Starsky could only speak by stroking the back of Hutch's head.

Starsky had gone to sleep chilling, and now woke up chilling, even though the ruthless morning sun was already at work.

He found his hand on Hutch's throat, realizing it had been there the entire night, feeling for a pulse even in his sleep.

Hutch's face was a deep red, almost purple. And he was still shaking with chills.

Probably sun poisoning on top of the bullet wound.

Starsky's stiff muscles and bones and joints protested when he moved to get up.

He walked around looking for the tire trail that would lead them to the highway, but as he feared would happen, the desert winds had covered them over.

(Damn it!) his mind yelled as he kicked sand all around.

(Straight)

(Just go straight)

(What else can you do?)

Weeping with defeat and exhaustion before he even got started on their trek was not a good sign.

"Suh . . . "

Hutch's raspy voice. His fingers moving in the sand toward him.

Starsky knelt beside him.

Hutch knew.

Even with his eyes closed, even though he drifted in and out of consciousness and was for the most part in a twilight sleep, somehow he knew when his partner was close, and when he was away.

Starsky squeezed his hand and started to tell him that he was going to try to get him up now so they could continue, but remembered that he didn't have a voice, so he carefully wrapped both

arms around him-because he was weaker today and couldn't trust one arm to manage his partner-and sat him up.

With the slow, labored movements of an old man, Starsky helped Hutch to his feet.

Hutch sank against him and tried to hang on.

Starsky held him under the arms.

"Guh," Hutch breathed. "Go."

Starsky shook his head no.

(No way. I'm not goin' without you, so just stop talkin' like that)

"Suh . . . "

Starsky leaned over so that Hutch could lie on his back, and once he was on, began his heavy trudging, willing his feet, forcing his legs, begging his body to keep moving even though every fiber howled for him to give out.

He tried to think of other things as he walked.

He didn't know how he was walking now.

He was not conscious of any steps he was taking.

The sun was draining him of strength and life and hope.

He tried to think of pleasant things.

Of cool things. Of water. Of shade. Of home.

Of . . .

No, not Terry.

Not his father.

Don't think of them.

Think of living things.

Think about Hutch, his mother in New York, and Huggy, and his brother, and Brandy, and Captain Dobey.

Maybe Brandy tried to call the hotel and realized they hadn't made it.

Maybe Dobey tried to reach them to tell them to get their tails back home because one of their cases was breaking and needed their attention.

Maybe Richard had tried calling the hotel and realized something was wrong.

Maybe . . .

Maybe the old, paint-chipped service station up ahead had a telephone, and some cold drinks, and a nice air conditioner.

He would call an ambulance and call Richard, and everything would be okay.

Thank God.

Thank you, God.

(Hutch, I think we made it)

(We're here)

(I didn't let you down after all)

(Each stumble in this noontime heat really paid off)

Giddy with heat and fatigue and pain, Starsky laughed with joy and relief as he approached the old service station-help at last, his journey's end-but his joy and relief turned to heartache and dread when his hand kept sliding through the glass door- realizing it was only a figment of his dry, thirsty mind.

(Hutch, please)

(I'm sorry)

(Oh, God, I'm sorry)

(Please forgive me)

"It's all right."

"Hey, fella, it's all right."

Smacking his face.

Smacking his face.

Trying to give him a sip of water.

Trying to talk to him.

Hutch?

No, not Hutch. Hutch can't talk. Hutch is hurt.

"Hey, dude. You and your buddy need some help. Come on. We're gonna get you to a hospital."

No, don't. Go away.

You're not real. You're just a hope. A prayer. A mirage. That's all.

I'll make it. I'll keep going.

"Here, dude. Let us have him. We got him."

The two sandsurfers had to unlock Starsky's arms from his partner.

They lifted the injured blond man into the back of their dune buggy, and when the weight had been lifted from Starsky's back, he simply collapsed, but was caught by their strong hands and lifted into the back of the vehicle along with his partner.

(Not real, not real)

But he only imagined he was speaking.

The two sandsurfers tried to give Hutch a drink but he wasn't responding.

"They look like ghouls, man," the driver said to his friend as they started back toward the highway, leaving their sandboards behind.

Mirage or not, Starsky put an arm around Hutch and pulled him close, closing his eyes and allowing himself to be carried away by the feeling of safety and rest.

"Get some help!" the young driver of the dune buggy yelled at the emergency room doors.

His frantic voice brought two doctors and a couple of orderlies.

"Found 'em when we were surfin'," the passenger said as he helped one of the doctors lift an unconscious Hutch from the back seat.

Starsky was delirious, talking incoherently while his eyes rolled helplessly about, when the two orderlies picked him up and carried him inside the hospital.

Starsky was surprised to see a doctor in a flowered Hawaiian shirt standing over him when he opened his eyes.

"Good afternoon, Detective Starsky," he said happily as he lifted Starsky's eyelids. "I'm Doctor Felding. Feeling better?"

Starsky really didn't know. The air-conditioned room was good enough for him. And knowing that his partner was . . .

"Is he okay?" he asked the sunny-looking doctor in a small, sandpapery whisper. "My partner?"

"He's in ICU. We've treated his bullet wound and he's on IV and oxygen. You were both dehydrated, your partner has a bad case of sun poisoning, and you took some nasty lumps to your face. He'll be okay, though. We notified the authorities too."

Starsky found it hard to swallow. His tongue, mouth, and throat felt dead and thick. "Can I be with him? He hates hospitals. You could put my bed in ICU, couldn't you? Or if you need the space, I could just use a chair or somethin'. I wouldn't bother anything . . . "

Dr. Felding looked at his patient's blistered, puffy feet and couldn't refuse him.

"Left in the desert to die," a nurse whispered behind her chart to a fellow nurse as an orderly wheeled Starsky down the hall in a wheelchair toward the elevator.

"Wouldn't leave his friend behind."

Dr. Felding had set up a bed for Starsky next to his partner's. Hutch was the only ICU patient in the small hospital at the moment, so it wasn't a bother. But Starsky abandoned his bed to be at Hutch's, his hand moving carefully through the machines and tubes and wires to rest on Hutch's forehead.

Since Starsky's voice was very faint, he leaned down to Hutch's ear to make sure he heard.

"Hey, buddy. We made it, huh?"

Starsky swallowed back a sob in his throat. Hutch's poor face. Blistered, discolored, his eyes swollen shut. A misshapen creature from a late night movie.

At the sound of Starsky's voice, Hutch's head turned and his hand came up to grope for him.

Starsky took his hand and squeezed. "We're in the hospital, Hutch. Somebody found us. It'll be all right."

Starsky knew he was crying. He could see the wetness pooling under his swollen eyes.

"Hutch, it's okay," he said as he slipped an arm beneath Hutch's neck to give him a careful, gentle hug. "I'm gonna stay here in the room with you. Matter of fact, I'll be right here by your bed. We'll get some cops down here and we're gonna get who did this to us, and we'll get your car back too."

"The convertible was stolen from a lounge singer in Vegas," Detective Rhine told Starsky and Hutch as he flipped through is notebook. "Our Bonnie and Clyde used it in a bank robbery. They killed two bank tellers and a security guard, took off with half a million dollars, so it's no surprise they left you out there to die. Switched cars three times before we finally caught them."

Hutch took a breath before speaking. Even a word or two required energy he didn't have.

"Caught them?"

"We set up a roadblock. They resisted, started firing on us. They uh . . . " Rhine looked at his female partner. "They both died. Unborn baby too."

"What about his car?" Starsky asked them.

"We recovered it. It's in our impound. You can get it when you're discharged."

"Thanks."

Dr. Felding poked his head in the doorway. Today he wore a psychedelic T-shirt. "Ken? Dave? You have a visitor."

Detective Rhine looked at his partner. "That's our cue to leave." He looked at Starsky. "We'll need your statements for our report. You can send them to us when you get back to Los Angeles

if you want to."

"Sure thing," Starsky told him.

When the Nevada detectives left, a rap came at the door.

"Kenneth?"

Starsky grinned at Hutch. "It's Dad," he said going to the door and opening it. "Hiya, Mr. Hutchinson."

Richard grunted a greeting and came into the room.

Hutch was only able to lift his arms halfway for a hug. "Hi, Dad."

Richard gave him a careful squeeze and smoothed his hair down. "Kenneth," he said pressing his lips tightly together. "I just came from speaking with those two . . . surfer boys . . . who picked you up in the desert. I tried to offer them some money but they wouldn't take it. They said . . . " He put his hand out to Starsky. "They said you're the one who saved his life."

Starsky took the hand and felt himself being tugged forward into a brief, stern hug. "Thank you, David," he managed in a choking growl. "They told me what you did."

Starsky smiled and winked at Hutch over Richard's shoulder. "It's okay, Sir."

Richard pushed him back from the hug and cleared his throat. "When you two get on your feet, I'm going to escort you to Las Vegas personally, just to make sure you get there safely and have a good time."

End

THE ACCIDENT (Edited)

The young girl was no older than thirteen, wearing a mini-skirt and high heels, her long blonde hair hanging to her rear. She browsed disinterestedly through some pamphlets-—Teen Pregnancy, Drug Prevention, Sexually Transmitted Diseases—as if she were waiting for someone.

And she was.

A bright smile lighted her face when Starsky and Hutch stepped off the elevator and headed for the squad room.

"David!"

The girl rushed over to Starsky, her eyes widening with pleasure.

"Hi, David. I saw you on TV after you rescued a little kid from that fire."

"Credit goes to Hutch, Sunny. Not me. He went in first."

Starsky and Hutch were in a hurry. No time for a young girl. They walked briskly past her and toward the squad room.

The girl ran after Starsky and grabbed his arm.

"David, it wouldn't have to be a real date. Jus—"

"I'm busy."

"—Just dinner or something."

Starsky stopped to look at her. "Sunny, you're thirteen years old. You should be at school learning how to use a computer."

A mischievous twinkle in her eye, too mature for her age. "Oh, I know all about hard drives."

Hutch rolled his eyes.

"You're under age," Starsky told her. "A kid."

"That's not what Clarence says."

"Clarence is a pimp who will use you and throw you away."

"He takes care of me."

"Sure he does. You'll end up dead or in jail."

"I'll leave him. I'll quit hooking. I'll do anything you want."

"What I want is for you to go find a boy your own age."

"I just want to go out with you."

"I'm already taken."

A flash of jealousy on her young features—and eyes that held a strange combination of baby innocence and street wisdom.

"Who is she, David?"

Starsky and Hutch walked into Captain Dobey's office and slammed the door in her face.

Inside Dobey's office, Starsky looked at Hutch. "What is with kids these days? She knows too much. I bet she never had a kitten."

"Well," Hutch offered, "we could put her in foster care again."

"She'd just run like she did the last time and go back to Clarence. That's all she knows. She's already tainted. Once that happens, you can't go back."

"Oh, I don't know about that."

Captain Dobey tugged roughly at his tie. "If you two are finished philosophizing I'd like a minute of your time. You think I called you down here on your day off for nothing?"

Starsky and Hutch took chairs before the captain's desk. Dobey pushed a file folder toward them.

Hutch took it and opened it, he and Starsky reviewing the material as Dobey spoke.

"San Francisco PD wants us to investigate the SIDS death of Captain Carol Roland's baby. Standard procedure to have another department handle it. Nobody in San Francisco wanted to touch it. We need this professional and discreet."

Hutch could only glance briefly at the photos of the dead baby. He looked away.

Starsky took the photos and examined them more closely than his partner.

The photos showed various angles of a dead baby in its crib.

"Oh boy," Starsky grumbled. "This'll be fun."

"I don't have to tell you how hard it is to prove a SIDS case. Unless she confesses—which she won't—you'll have to wade through stacks of forensic material."

"Pediatric medical journals," Hutch offered.

"The latest child abuse research," Starsky added.

"There'd be no investigation at all if it weren't for the blue fibers found in the baby's throat," Dobey told them.

"The baby could have smothered accidentally," Hutch mused half-heartedly. "He's facedown on the blanket."

Starsky closed the file and swatted Hutch lightly on the arm with it. "Or Mommy could have put it over his face. A police captain would know to turn the baby facedown to make it look accidental. Or maybe she forced his face into the blanket while he was sleeping facedown."

Dobey looked at his watch. "I'm late for my appointment. Either she did or she didn't. That's what you two have to determine."

Dobey exited his office, leaving Starsky and Hutch tossing thoughts back and forth like a ping pong ball.

Hutch: "Maybe it was her husband."

Starsky: "Did she have postpartum depression?"

"Isn't there a postpartum psychosis too?"

"Why would she do that?"

"Insurance policy?"

"Cramped her lifestyle?"

"Wanted a girl instead of a boy?"

"Attention?"

Hutch rose to his feet. "I'm going to hate this case. We better nail her, because if she gets away with this..."

Starsky rose to his feet too. "I saw on TV where that mother lost eleven babies to SIDS."

"Come on. Not eleven."

They moved toward the office door.

"Nobody suspected?" Hutch asked him.

"They did. They just couldn't prove anything. SIDS can look innocent."

"Think about all the mothers who get away with murder."

"This mother won't," Starsky said as they stepped into the busy squad room. "Captain or no captain."

The hallway was bustling with activity as they headed toward the elevator, Hutch carrying the file.

"San Francisco will be a nice change of pace," Hutch said as they got into the elevator.

Starsky pushed the ground floor button. "I hate San Francisco."

Hutch smiled. "You just hate the thought of leaving Cindy behind for a few days."

"Think we could have lunch together before we leave?"

"Me and you?"

"Me and Cindy. And you. If you must."

"I must."

Huggy's restaurant bar was hustling with the noontime crowd. Starsky, Hutch, and Cindy were seated at a back booth waiting for their order. Starsky and Cindy sat across from each other, mooning and holding hands.

"I'll miss you," the petite blonde said as she leaned across the table toward Starsky to kiss him.

Starsky leaned toward her, too, and their lips met. "I'll miss you too."

Hutch was sitting next to Starsky in the booth, his back against the wall and reading the Roland file. "Cindy," he said without looking up, "it's San Francisco, not the Bermuda Triangle. He'll be back."

Cindy clutched Starsky's hand. "Can I go with you?"

Starsky's eyes brightened with the idea. "Well, maybe—"

"Not allowed," Hutch interrupted. "Can't take a civilian along on an investigation."

Cindy made a face. "Civilian? Is that what I am to you?"

"Not to me," Starsky assured her quickly as he squeezed her hand harder. "I'll call you every night."

"Won't have time," Hutch told him. "We'll be up to our necks in the investigation."

Starsky stomped at Hutch's foot under the table. "Why are you spoiling this for me?"

Hutch dodged his foot away just in time. "'Cause it's fun."

"Weird idea of fun." Glancing at the Roland file. "Weird idea of lunch. Autopsy reports, photos, lab analyses, police narratives."

Huggy called from behind the bar. "Starsky! Did you order root beer or milkshake?"

"Both!"

Heads turned at the sound of a commotion at the front door.

Sunny, the thirteen-year-old prostitute, burst through the doorway, her pimp Clarence close behind and wielding a pistol.

Patrons screamed, some scrambling under tables, some running out the front door, others out the

back.

Huggy pulled two waitresses behind the bar and ducked with them.

Wild-eyed Sunny ran toward Starsky for safety through the crowded tables.

"David!"

Clarence, stopping just inside the door at the counter, aimed his gun at Sunny's back. "Come here, baby chick!"

Starsky jumped from the booth and ran toward Clarence, reaching under his jacket for a gun that wasn't there because it was his day off.

"Starsky!"

The Roland file flew into the air as Hutch scrambled from the booth, drawing his Magnum which was there because he never went anywhere without it, even on a day off.

A look of startled surprise leaped into Starsky's eyes as he realized his gun was gone, but his momentum toward Clarence, who still aimed his pistol at Sunny's back, didn't slow.

Hutch's voice behind him: "Starsky! Are you crazy?!"

Starsky knocked Clarence's arm up and away, and the two struggled over the pistol.

Cindy jumped out of the booth. "David!"

Hutch shoved her under the table, his gun still aimed toward Clarence. Sunny came running at him, and he shoved her under the table too.

Clarence and Starsky still struggled over the gun, Clarence forcing Starsky backward onto the bar, the pistol moving closer to Starsky's head.

"Hutch!" Starsky called out in panicky fear. "Help!"

Hutch fired at Clarence and the struggle stopped.

The bar fell quiet.

Clarence ran laughing from the restaurant. The patrons stood like statues, and the only sound was Sunny sobbing under the table where she huddled with Cindy.

Hutch was still poised, his gun yet aimed in Starsky's direction. Voice soft, uncertain: "Starsky?"

Starsky, still bent backward onto the bar, straightened with great effort and turned toward Hutch

with blood running down the side of his head.

Cindy screamed.

Starsky took a faltering step toward Hutch and spoke in a dazed, dreamy voice.

"Hutch? Why'd you shoot me?"

Hutch's arm fell to his side and the Magnum thudded to the floor. Starsky collapsed facedown.

Hutch stared at him, frozen, and then stumbled back with one hand over his heart, his other groping behind him for something, anything, finding a wall which he backed into with a bump.

Starsky lay motionless except for his left hand, which moved feebly on the floor. He groaned into the hard wood. "Hutch?"

Hutch was frozen against the wall, face white, eyes wide. He opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out.

Huggy ran from behind the bar and knelt next to Starsky, pressing a clean polishing cloth to the side of his head and looking around frantically at the patrons.

"Ambulance!" Huggy shouted to anyone. "Now!"

Someone scrambled behind the counter for the phone. Starsky didn't move, but his hand still opened and closed, searching for Hutch.

Cindy ran to Starsky and fell to her knees beside him, touching his face. "David!" she sobbed. "Oh my God!"

Huggy pushed her away. "Give me room!"

Cindy came right back. Huggy took her hand and held it to the bloody polishing cloth against Starsky's head. "Here. Press hard and don't let up."

Cindy was crying but she did as Huggy told her, mewling nonsensical phrases of fear and comfort to Starsky.

Huggy took his jacket off and covered Starsky with it. Starsky groaned into the floor again, a pitifully small sound. "Huh..."

A crowd gathered around. Sunny knelt by Starsky, sniffing and swiping her nose on the back of her hand. "Dave," she sobbed. "Please don't die. Please be all right."

Hutch leaned over with his hands on his knees, head down, gasping, trying not to hyperventilate.

"Starsky," he gasped, but he was too far away for Starsky to hear, and his voice too faint. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry."

Huggy stomped over to Hutch, eyes furious. "Starsky needs you, man. Can't you hear him?"

Hutch was still gasping, trying to breathe. "Oh, God. Huggy... Did I shoot him?"

Beneath the buzz of the restaurant Hutch heard Starsky's weak mumble again. "Huh..."

Hutch stumbled toward Starsky but didn't stop. He kept going as if disoriented, hand over his heart, dragging in raggedy breaths with each trudging step. It looked like he might collapse as well.

Then he 't go forward, couldn't go backward. Starsky lay at his feet.

And then Hutch felt a tug on his brown suede sneaker and looked down. Starsky's fingers had found him and were weakly clutching his shoelace.

Hutch crouched next to him, wanted to move him, turn him, but he dared not. Blood spread beneath Starsky's head despite the cloth that was pressed against it.

Starsky was too quiet. Not talking, not moving, barely breathing.

Comments from the crowd:

"Shot him."

"Way to go, man."

"Sharpshooter."

"Who's the bad guy?"

Sirens sounded outside. Hutch placed a trembling hand on the back of Starsky's still head. "Starsky, I... I'm sorry. I didn't... okay? ... I didn't mean it."

Starsky's voice came fainter than a whisper—mouthing his words rather than speaking them. "It's... okay."

The paramedics wheeled a stretcher in. "What happened?" one asked to no one in particular.

"I sh..." Hutch got up to move back, making room.

"Cop shot the cop," said a regular patron that knew both detectives, then threw Hutch a look of disgust. "Birdbrain."

Another grumble from the crowd as it started to break up.

"Needs to go back to the firing range."

The paramedics expertly and carefully turned Starsky onto the backboard, but there was a slight problem when they started lifting him onto the stretcher. His hand still clutched Hutch's shoestring and he wouldn't let go.

The medics paused with Starsky in their hands and looked at Hutch for help.

Hutch took Starsky's left hand, then leaned down close to his head. "Okay," Hutch whispered into his ear. "I'm going to help you let go so they can take you to the hospital, okay? Easy now. Here we go. "

That's when Starsky lost consciousness.

The paramedics wheeled Starsky out the door of the restaurant. Hutch took one step forward to follow him, then halted, hand on the bar, then took another step forward again.

Cindy climbed into the back of the ambulance with Starsky. She looked at Hutch, her eyes— angry and hurt- saying more than her words ever could, then the paramedics closed the double doors.

Hutch watched the rescue vehicle pull away from the curb. Huggy approached Hutch, holding the Magnum out to him. "Don't forget this, Hutch."

Hutch looked at the gun, then at Huggy, trying to see sarcasm or cynicism in his face, but there was none.

Hutch walked out without touching or taking the gun.

Hutch paced the waiting room floor, hand over his eyes to hide guilt, shame, and tears.

Huggy sat on the leather couch and watched him.

Captain Dobey came into the room jerking at his already-loosened tie. "What were you thinking, Hutchinson?"

Hutch said nothing.

"Why didn't you just walk over and put the gun to his head and pull the trigger?"

Hutch stopped pacing but didn't take his hand down. His back was to his superior.

Huggy spoke up. "Captain, Starsky put him in that position when he jumped the pimp unarmed."

Sudden fury, Hutch spun and pointed a finger at Huggy. "You shut up! Starsky saved that little girl!"

Hutch was panting now, his pent-up grief and rage erupting. "Don't you dare blame him! This was my fault! Not his! It doesn't matter what he did! I sh..." He bit his lip and looked down, blinking back tears. A shaky whisper. "I'm supposed to protect him. Not hurt him."

Captain Dobey softened. "It was an accident, Hutch."

There was a long pause before Hutch's next words.

"It wasn't an accident. It was an atrocity."

"Look, the shooting should never have happened, but it did and you can't take it back." Dobey cleared his throat. "I need a full report just as fast as you can get it to me. Internal Affairs will want one too."

"Do you think I care about the reports right now? You come in here and you don't even ask how he is, you just start in on what I did wrong."

"For your information, Hutch, I asked about Starsky's condition on my way up here. And as far as the reports go, it's ultimately my responsibility to see that they're done. Especially in a case like this. IA will definitely want to know point by point how the shooting went down."

Hutch said the word like trying to get a bad taste out of his mouth. "Shooting? You say that like I just pulled out my gun and said, 'Okay, Starsky, just stand real still now while I put a bullet in your head.'"

Dobey moved heavily toward the door. Only Huggy noticed how tired the captain looked. Hutch was too upset to see it or care. "I'm not talking to you this way," Dobey muttered as he opened

the door. He paused and looked back at Hutch. "He'll pull through. He's tough."

"Tough? He couldn't even say my name." He turned his head away, pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes. "If he dies..." The rest was a half-whisper. "I'll be his killer."

"Dear God," Dobey sighed aloud, then went on out.

Huggy said, "Hutch, he needs you and you're not there. What's the matter with you? He'd be by your side if it was you. You acted. That's all anybody can say. You can't change what happened, and you can't

stop that pain in your heart, but you can give Starsky what he needs, and that's you."

The door opened and a doctor of Middle Eastern origin stepped in, his manner professional and courteous. To both Hutch and Huggy: "I am Dr. Hadid. I've just finished speaking with Captain Harold Dobey and the pretty girl... Cindy is her name, yes?" Looking around. "Is his family here?"

Hutch lifted his eyes—a flash of blue pain, anger—but not his head. "I'm his family." His eyes were still on the doctor. He waited, holding his breath, body tense like a large blond cat ready to spring.

"He's going to make it. He's asking for you."

The relief in Hutch's eyes was only fleeting. He wasn't sure he could allow himself to feel any of this huge pleasure.

Hutch stalked down the hall, trailing blood from his right hand, not seeing Sunny until he bumped into her. She took his arm, hustling to keep up. "Is Dave gonna be okay?"

Hutch kept walking. "Leave me alone, Sunny."

"I want—"

Hutch shrugged her off. "Go on home, Sunny. Go back to Clarence. Go somewhere."

He kept walking, Sunny watching him.

Hutch stood just outside the door of ICU, his hand on the doorknob, reluctant to enter.

Go or stay. Stay or go.

(He's asking for you)

(Why? Why are you asking for me after what I did?)

Hutch waited a few moments, then opened the door and stepped in.

Starsky lay against the pillow, his head wrapped in a bandage, one hand weakly grasping the silver bed rail. His voice was a bare whisper, terribly weak, but hopeful.

Starsky blinked sleepily from the medication. "Hey."

Hutch stood by the bed rail, hesitant, his mouth opening to say something.

Starsky reached for the hand that had earlier denied him and said, "S'okay. Don't worry. I'm fine."

Hutch took the hand and leaned over the rail, sobbing quietly.

Hutch had pulled a chair up to Starsky's bed and was dozing on folded arms on the edge of the mattress. Starsky's fingers were still on Hutch's shirt collar, but not gripping, because he was asleep too.

The door opened and there stood Cindy in all her glorious angry pain, her eyes red, swollen, and hateful, her teeth clenched, her posture poised for fight or flight.

"How could you?!" Cindy shrieked at Hutch, and ran at him.

Hutch raised his groggy head. No time for words or defense. She was on him like a wildcat, scratching, clawing, sobbing, hitting him in the face and shoulders.

"I HATE YOU!" she screamed at him. "HOW COULD YOU DO THAT TO HIM!"

Starsky gripped the railing and tried to raise up, wincing from the pain.

Hutch managed to snatch Cindy's upper arms as they flailed at him.

"Cindy, stop it." He rose to his feet and tried to move her to the door. "Cindy, not here. Not in front of him. He doesn't need—"

She slapped him.

"He doesn't need YOU! " she screamed. "Shooting him in the—" A sob caught in her throat. "— HEAD!"

Hutch was dragging her to the door but it was a difficult task. His youthful looks and gentle manner belied an awesome physical strength. He could "put somebody's lights out with one punch" as Starsky liked to brag on him, but right now he was having trouble handling this adrenaline-charged young woman.

"He trusted you," she spat at him. "With his life! And this is what you do with it? And then you come in here so smug to make things right again!"

"Cindy—"

"No!"

She twisted in his grip. "You knew he'd forgive you!" she wailed. "No matter what! He loves you too much!"

"Cindy, stop it!"

"No! It's true! He loves you more than me!"

"Cindy—"

Hutch shook her. "Cindy, don't!"

She turned and fled.

Hutch looked back at the hospital bed. "Starsky, my God," he said as he rushed to the bed. "Come here." He carefully took Starsky under the arms and gently eased him back onto the pillows. Starsky went with a small puppy whine, even though Hutch handled him as carefully as a broken bird.

"I'm sorry," Hutch whispered. "I should have talked to her earlier."

Cindy was putting some of Starsky's belongings—hotrod and movie magazines, a radio, some clothes, cologne, and some sentimental cards he had given her—into a small box when Hutch slammed into her apartment.

"You could have waited until he was out of the hospital," he told her hotly.

She didn't look at him, just kept tossing items into the box as if each one was disgustingly dirty. He grabbed her wrist. "You're throwing him away just as easily as you're throwing his things away."

She glared at him. "I'm not throwing his things away. I'm giving them to you so you can give them to him. As for him? I'm giving him to you too. He cares more about you than me anyway."

"Just like that? Do you know how much he loves you?"

"Yes."

He took her arm. "Do you know how much you hurt him?"

"About as much as you did, so get off your high horse." She yanked herself away from him and kept boxing Starsky's belongings.

"He needs you."

"It's too late, Ken."

He took the box from her. "You know what? I don't want you to. He deserves better than you. And he's had better than you."

He relished the tears that came to her eyes. But she didn't look away.

He went on out.

Starsky was watching the news on TV in a chair in a recovery room when Hutch came in. Starsky's head bandage had been replaced by a smaller one, and he would be released from the hospital in a few days.

Starsky sat in a chair buttoning his shirt. "What's up?"

"Starsk, it's Cindy. She uh…she left, and she isn't coming back."

Starsky was quiet for a few moments. "Guess she knows what she wants ."

Hutch shook his head in dismay. "I'm sorry for that too."

"Not your fault, Hutch. Don't worry. We'll be back on the street in no time. The Roland case needs us."

Hutch stared at him. "How can you be so eager after what I—"

Starsky gave him a direct gaze. "Hutch, I know you're sorry. I know you didn't mean to do it. We can't let this come between us or stop us from doing our job. I'm partly to blame because of my actions, so let it go. We need some time, then we're going back out there."

Now it was Hutch's turn to be silent for a few moments. Then, gradually, the look on his face grew a little lighter, more settled, and he said, "Okay, partner. Let's do it."

End.

PLAYBACK (Edited)

By TR

Detective David Starsky watched as his partner Ken Hutchinson packed some clothes into a suitcase on the bed. The sun that shone through the window fell on him and he looked like a pale blond ghost. The bruising on his face was gone, as was Jeanie, and so were the track marks that had been on the inside of his arm. It had been three weeks since the crime lord Ben Forest had abducted him and addicted him with heroin in an effort to extract the whereabouts of Jeanie, the blonde he and the detective both adored.

Captain Dobey insisted that Hutch stay hidden during this time, until he recuperated fully and could return to the force, and until the last of Forest's men were apprehended.

Only Starsky knew which hotel he was staying in.

The bruises on the outside were gone, but Starsky saw some lingering ones on the inside. The way Hutch jumped at the slightest sudden noise, the way he stood with his back to a wall in any room so he could survey everyone's movement, the way he shied away from human hands at times. And he hadn't said anything about nightmares, but Starsky had caught him sleeping fitfully in the hotel room when he walked in unannounced.

"Your suit jacket's gonna get wrinkled if you put it in the suitcase like that," Starsky told him. "Don't you have a hanger?"

Hutch touched a finger to his forehead. "Oh yeah," he said as he went to the closet. "Overlook me. I'm absent-minded today."

"Your uncle's death is a good excuse."

Hutch hung his black suit jacket on a hanger. "Uncle Ray and I were close."

"I didn't forget what you told me. Closer than you and your dad."

Hutch smiled bitterly. "Well," he said tossing in a shiny new belt, "you know that old story. Dad had my life all mapped out. I had other ideas, and Uncle Ray supported me. Told me to live my life the way I wanted, even if my father didn't approve. 'Live your life so you'll have no regrets,' he said. Ray and Dad had a lot of fights over me."

Starsky saw a slight defeat in his body today.

"Want me to go with you, Hutch? You're just now bouncing back from... well... and it could get stormy between you and your dad at the funeral."

"Nah. I appreciate it, Starsky, but I can handle it. You hate Minnesota anyway. Just enjoy your few days off here with Carrie. Take her scuba diving."

"Now there's an idea."

"I'm surprised Captain Dobey gave you leave just because of mine."

Starsky grinned. "I'm not. He knows it's dangerous for us to think independently of each other."

Hutch threw a pair of socks at him. "Get out of here."

Ben Forest's piercing eyes drilled into his visitor's through the pane of glass that separated them in the prison visiting room.

Guards were nearby, so Forest spoke in vague code into the telephone receiver should the call be monitored.

"Vice, I'd like to ask a special favor of you."

Vice, a large linebacker of a man with hawklike features, nodded into the receiver.

Forest's "special favors" were always handsomely rewarded, and he envisioned himself quickly ascending to the throne—with Forest's approval of course—now that Forest was out of

commission.

Forest chuckled but there was nothing pleasant about it. "It's my birthday this weekend, and there's only one thing I really want." He paused for emphasis. "I want you to open the horse ranch again. Invite our young friend, and make him feel so welcome he'll never, ever want to leave."

Vice grinned. "My pleasure."

Starsky and his latest girlfriend Carrie stood on the curb to see Hutch off.

Hutch put the suitcase in the back seat of the cab, then passed Starsky an uncertain look.

"Forget something?" Starsky asked him.

"I think so, but I won't remember it until I'm in the air."

"Got your gun?"

Hutch opened his jacket to reveal his Magnum.

Carrie smiled. "You're taking your gun to your uncle's funeral?"

"I never go anywhere without my gun."

"Well," Carrie said, "as long as you don't sleep with it... "

Hutch smiled and looked at Starsky, a memory of two weeks ago passing between them, of Starsky innocently walking into Hutch's apartment to check on him like he'd done every day since the Forest ordeal, and finding Hutch asleep on the sofa, Hutch startling awake and pulling his gun.

(Easy, Hutch. It's just me. See? Look at me)

(Eyes big and scared like a kid's, and Starsky knew Hutch was somewhere else, back with Forest again, getting heroin forced into his veins, back at Huggy's upstairs apartment trying to keep from ramming his head into the wall)

(Hutch's eyes clearing, the gun finally going back under his jacket, Oh God, Starsk, I'm sorry. It was... I'm sorry)

(Don't let Forest do this to you, Hutch)

(A cynical smile. He's already done it to me, Starsky. And I don't know how to undo it)

(Time, Hutch. Give it time. You'll get there)

But would he? The endless pacing, the shaking hands, the pots of coffee, putting back only a little of the weight he'd lost. And worst of all, he could not walk past a junkie on the street without moving in close to Starsky's side and turning his head.

The cabbie honked the horn.

Starsky shook Hutch's hand. (Me. It's me you're forgetting to take with you. You're still too vulnerable to do much by yourself, but you're too proud, or confused, to say so). "Say hi to thefolks. And call me when you get there."

"I will." He kissed Carrie's cheek. "Have fun."

Hutch got into the back seat of the cab, and Carrie and Starsky watched it go down the street and disappear around the corner. Carrie slid her arms around Starsky's neck and kissed him on the mouth. "I don't know who's the biggest babysitter, you or Kenny."

"He was, till... "

"Till what?"

"Never mind. That was three weeks ago. Before you came along."

Concern clouded her eyes. "Is he sick or something?"

He wrapped an arm around her as they walked down the street. "Not where you could see it."

She took his hand and pulled playfully. "Let's go."

He grinned. "Go where?"

She giggled wickedly and toyed with his belt buckle. "Got a motorcycle, don't you? I'll take you for a ride."

Vice and two associates, one with a red burr and a scarred face, and the other with jet-black hair and tattoos on his knuckles, stood in the middle of Hutch's apartment and looked it over.

"All is not lost," Vice told them. "Gone people can be found. Jeanie was found, wasn't she?"

"If the cop's on vacation or hiding out," the man with the red burr said, "he could be anywhere. We'll never find him."

"Don't be so discouraged, Hal. I know just the person who can tell us where our blond friend is."

Starsky parked the Torino at the curb in front of his house and jumped out, opening the passenger door for Carrie.

"So mannerly," she cooed teasingly.

"I get that way when I'm horny," he said kissing her. "You get our helmets inside, I'll get the bike."

"Gotcha."

Carrie sprinted up the steps to his front door and went inside.

Starsky pulled his garage door up and went in to get his motorcycle, a black Yamaha 500. He straddled the seat and gripped the handlebars with a grin, kicking back the kickstand and rolling the bike out of the shadowed garage and into the sunlight.

He had no doubt that Carrie could handle the bike. She was a strong girl in spite of her lithe, girlish body. He found out just how strong she was the first time they made out at her place. She had the upper hand. It was her house, her bed, she started it, and she was on top. It all started with playful wrestling but then escalated into a very refreshing sexual experience—more physical than sensual, more matter-of-fact than romantic—and he had loved every minute of it. No pretenses, no head games, no heart games.

"Carrie!"

He sounded the horn. "Come on! Are you trying to drive my hormones crazy?"

He got off the bike and bounded up the stairs and through the front door. "Hey, I thought—"

He froze just inside the door, the scene before him alien and surreal. It caught him so off-guard that for a split second he felt like he were watching a movie, like what he saw was happening to someone else.

Hal and Arty stood on either side of him. Vice was by the couch, his arm locked around Carrie's throat, a pistol to her head.

Her eyes were wide and pleading. "Dave!"

Vice clenched his arm tighter around her neck and her voice was choked off. Starsky moved toward her but Vice dug the pistol into her temple. "No, no. We mustn't. Back off."

Starsky backed off, his eyes darting from Vice to Carrie to the two hoods. He was stuck.

Whatever this was, he was stuck. No gun. Flanked by two goons. Vice had Carrie. The only chance he had was his mouth, and he hoped his stalling and negotiating skills were as good as his partner's. "Don't hurt her. Just tell me what you want."

Vice flashed a chilling grin while Hal locked the door. "Now that's what I like to hear. Cooperation. I think this might by easier than we thought. Easier than Jeanie."

Starsky's heart jumped at the name. They had to be Ben Forest's stale leftovers coming back to finish the job they'd started a month ago.

"I'm asking you one time, punk," Vice told Starsky in a cool voice. Too cool. Carrie was just a tool to him. Expendable. "If you don't answer my question, I kill her." A plastic smile that never touched his flat eyes. "Where is your partner?"

Starsky's desperate eyes flashed to Carrie's pleading ones. God! her eyes screamed, are you going to tell him? What are you going to say?!

Starsky suddenly felt hot all over. Heat flushed up his body like mercury through a thermometer. He wanted to run, fight, hide, throw up, but all he could do was stand there. Carrie or Hutch. Hutch or Carrie. He could tell them something to throw them off, but they'd only come back again, and next time it would be an ambush—maybe a sniper's bullet from a rooftop, maybe a car bomb.

But if he told them the truth... he couldn't tell them where Hutch was. They hadn't come to congratulate him for escaping and busting their boss Forest. And he wasn't going to hand him to them on a silver platter. That would be the ultimate betrayal.

But he couldn't let Vice kill Carrie either. He needed time, a plan a way out. If only—

Starsky swallowed and looked into Carrie's panic-stricken eyes.

(She knows. Oh my God, she knows what I'm going to say. She must see it in my eyes. Oh Carrie, I'm sorry. God forgive me. God help me)

"I—" Starsky's voice was small and heavy. "I can't tell you."

The silencer on Vice's gun allowed for an anti-climactic, unceremonious punctuation mark when he pulled the trigger. Carrie's head burst apart like a melon and blood splashed down over her shoulder and chest before she thumped silently to the floor.

A strangled cry escaped Starsky as he jumped toward her.

"Carrie!"

Vice met him with a Louisville slugger (God, where did that come from? You're too messed up to pay attention), swinging it hard into Starsky's face.

Starsky reeled backward onto the floor, blood spurting from his nose and mouth. He lay sprawled on his back, groaning, eyes rolling about.

Vice planted a massive foot in his chest and looked down. "We can do this the easy way, or we can do this the hard way." He calmly opened a stick of gum and slid it between his teeth. "Where's Hutchinson?"

Starsky turned dazed eyes to Vice, fighting to stay conscious, but succumbing to the atom bomb that just went off in his head. He managed a faint smile through his mashed mouth. His voice came in a slurry mumble. "Not gonna tell you."

At that, Vice bared his teeth like a vicious dog and stomped Starsky's chest. "You will!"

Starsky yelped out in pain and rolled onto his side, trying to get up. "Hutch," came his nasal bloody voice.

Starsky came to and realized through his fog of pain that he was in some sort of basement. He tried to move his left arm and a bolt of pain shot through it, shrieking to him that it was probably broken.

"Good," Vice said with a chuckle as he rose from a table littered with beer cans and drug paraphernalia. "You're awake. It's back to business, punk."

Starsky tried to move his left arm and found he couldn't. It was—gone? Had they cut his arm off?

No, not gone. Just... immobile.

A kick of his feet in the air and a streak of pain down his entire left side explained it all.

He was hanging from a pipe in the ceiling by his left hand. Cuffed, tied, he couldn't tell.

His sneakers were about a foot off the floor. His face was bruised and bleeding, his eyes puffy and purple, the front of his shirt blood-stained.

"Down," he mumbled weakly, and kicked to get down.

Vice caught Starsky's right knee in one talonlike grip. "Now, now. We mustn't fuss. We're going to be here for a while unless you want to tell me where Hutchinson is."

Starsky's free arm swung at Vice's head. Vice grabbed his wrist and snapped it in two. Starsky yelped in pain, color draining from his face. "You—" he gasped. "Might as well kill me, cause... I'm not... I'm not..."

"Brave talk. You'll be singing a different tune when I get finished with you."

Vice went to the table and prepared a syringe. "If this was good enough for his partner, it's good enough for him."

Starsky groaned, and stirred weakly. Vice took the syringe over to him and grasped his right wrist, pulling his arm out straight.

"No," Starsky mumbled as he tried to pull his arm back. "Let me down—"

"Shut up."

Hutch stood in his father's kitchen with the phone in his hand. "Come on, Starsky, what the hell are you and Carrie doing?"

The elder Hutchinson was pressing his tie on a small ironing board. "Maybe he has a life of his own, Kenneth. Maybe he doesn't want you fussing over him like a mother cat over her kitten."

Hutch ignored his father and kept the phone to his ear. (It's me that needs fussing over, dad. Can't you pick up on that? I'm calling for me, not him)

"People like him," the older man continued, "don't value friendships the way we do anyway. He's from the streets. A user. 'What can you do for me?' They're all alike. Selfish, base, crude. If you were going to pick a charity to devote your life to, you could at least have chosen a more—"

Hutch slammed the phone down. "Let me tell you something," he said in a low, trembling voice. "I almost died a few weeks ago. Captain Dobey called you, remember? And what did you say?"

Eyes down, Mr. Hutchinson kept ironing.

Hutch continued. "You said, 'I told you not to go into police work'. You said, 'A good cop would have resisted the heroin'." His sky-blue eyes were direct, but his voice was giving away emotion he didn't really want to give away. "Guess who threw out the lifeline? Guess who sat up with me and cried just because I did, who lost sleep to keep an eye on me, who lost ten pounds from all the wear and tear of lugging me around, walking the floors, who took all the verbal abuse I could throw at him without a word, who hid the bruises I put on him when I grabbed him so hard trying to hang on, who didn't lift a finger against me when I punched him in the face."

Mr. Hutchinson turned the iron off.

"It wasn't you," Hutch told him. "It was that... 'piece of white trash' as you like to call him. He is the picture of integrity. Loyalty. Selflessness. That 'terminally abused child' has risked his life for me, has taken a bullet for me."

Mr. Hutchinson slipped his tie around his neck. "I just wish he were a more worthy recipient of all your faithfulness."

Hutch stared at him for a long moment, then picked up his suitcase and headed for the door. "I'm not going to Ray's funeral," he told his father on the way out. "I'll say goodbye to him in my own way." He looked his father in the eye. "And if you say another word about Starsky, I'll never speak to you again."

Starsky's head was down and it looked as if he were asleep. Vice slapped him. "Don't go to sleep now, punk."

Starsky forced his lids open and looked at him through eyes that seemed to belong to someone else.

Vice gave him another injection, but Starsky didn't seem to notice.

Hutch sat in the funeral home alone and gazed at the closed casket. It was hard to believe Ray and his father were brothers. So different. Ray had never had a problem with Starsky. It didn't matter to him that Starsky had been a poor kid, a tough kid, an unfortunate kid. Ray saw a sapphire sparkling beneath the dirt.

"It's easy to figure," Ray had told Hutch. "David needs to be wanted, and you want to be needed. He needs somebody to look out for him, and you need somebody to look out for."

Easy. Two friends. A single creature. Pre-destined (By God? Like David and Jonathan?) to help each other through the world.

His father had tried to make something more of their friendship, tried to say it was something it wasn't. Perhaps to goad him into slacking off the friendship. Or to simply hurt him. Hutch was finally resigned to the fact that since his father had no true nurturing feeling of his own toward his family, he could not understand that Starsky was family to Hutch.

Are you close? Mr. Hutchinson had asked him.

Yes.

How close?

As close as you can be without being physical, sexual lovers. That had never entered their minds.

It was innocent, childlike, consuming, intimate. But purely friendship and nothing more.

Have you slept together?

No. Not like lovemaking, but huddled like two puppies thrown together in a corner when one wassick or scared? Yes. (That's why I didn't want you to come with me, Starsky. Because I knew Dad would start on you and I don't have the stamina to defend you. If that mess a month ago with Forest hadn't happened, I could. But I'm a little wrung out right now, and I think you know that. And with Uncle Ray gone too... )

"Go away," Starsky mumbled lazily when the needle again sank into his arm.

Vice emptied the syringe into his arm, then withdrew the needle from his vein. "You don't mean that. What you mean is you like it."

Starsky's feet pedaled weakly to get down. Vice ran a finger down the front of Starsky's shirt, then the hand settled onto his belt buckle. "You like it, don't you?"

He pawed toward Vice's head, found his hair, and pulled, more like the desperation of a drowning man than an attempt to fight.

Hutch stepped into his hotel room and set his suitcase by the door, then went to the portable refrigerator for a soda. On the way back he stopped and looked at his wilting plants, sticking fingers into the dirt and finding it bone-dry.

Hutch picked up his telephone, trying to play down the worm of fear that was meandering inside his belly.

Starsky could forget to bring him his mail—which he did. And he could forget to raise the windows and air the place out—which he did. But he wouldn't forget to water the plants.

Five rings. Six rings. Seven rings. Hutch hung up and called Captain Dobey at the precinct.

"No, Hutch, he hasn't been around. Did you check the young lady's house?"

A wave of relief washed over him and he felt foolish. "No. I didn't check the young lady's house. Thanks."

Hutch hung up and left the apartment, heading for Carrie's. (God, why are you worrying like this? Can't you even spend a few days apart without giving yourself an ulcer? Has Forest made you that paranoid? Are you ever going to stop jumping at shadows that aren't even there? Starsky's a good fighter. If anybody tried to hurt him or grab him... he's taken on three at a time before. Not big ones, no. But three just the same.)

"Son of a-!"

Vice laughed at Starsky's weak oath and held a syringe tauntingly in his hand. "Come on, baby. You want it? You can have it."

"Pig."

"I thought we cleared that up. You owe me an apology."

"Nuh—no."

"Yes. Apologize and I'll let you have it."

"Uh... I'm suh... I'm sorry. Okay? Okay? I'm sorry. Now let me have it."

"Are you really sorry?"

"I'm really. Really. Come on. Please. Come here."

"I'm not a pig, am I?"

"No, no, you're not. I just... give it. Please."

Starsky reached for the syringe with a shaking hand, but Vice moved it just out of his reach, teasing. "Tell me, baby. You can do it. Tell me where he is."

Starsky was fighting with a newfound determination, fueled by an unbearable craving for the heroin. His sneakers tried unsuccessfully to touch the floor. His body was drenched in sweat and trembling, hair damp and plastered in his wild eyes, shirt stuck to his back and stomach. "Nuh— no," Starsky panted. "Give it to me."

"Tell me."

Starsky's arm strained to reach him. "Please."

"Is he worth it? You know, this is a lot of fun. I think this will hurt Hutchinson more than anything we could do to him. Maybe more than what Forest did to him."

Starsky was chilling. Teeth chattering. Sweating. Muscles wrenching. Eyes watering. Nose bleeding. His voice a mewling plea. "Please, mister. Please help me. Please give it to me. You don't—" He sniffed, eyes wet. "I need—" He threw his head back and cried out because every

inch of his body screamed in pain. "HUTCH! PLEASE HELP ME!"

Carrie's back door was locked.

Hutch looked in through the windowpane and saw the coffee cups and box of donuts they had all eaten three mornings ago.

A chill began to creep up his back, and he turned to go to his car. "No," he said quietly and stubbornly as he moved down the stone walk. "No way. No way."

Hal and Arty came down the basement steps to find Vice resting in the chair at the table, hands clasped behind his head. His eyes were on the silent, bloody, and bruised Starsky as if trying to figure him out. But Starsky wasn't asleep. He knew better than to try to sleep now. His eyes were slitted in a half-drowsy doze, out of this world but not sleeping.

"News, man," Hal said as he approached the table.

Vice spoke without taking his eyes off of his captive. "Not so feisty now, is he? Doesn't call me a pig anymore. Doesn't say anything at all."

"Forest is dead, man," Arty told Vice. "Heart attack this morning in his cell. His whole operation is falling apart. Raids everywhere. Our guys getting busted right and left."

Vice began sweeping the debris off the table and into a garbage bag. "Let's get the hell out of here while we can."

Arty motioned toward Starsky. "What do we do with him?"

"Leave him," Vice said as he walked to the stairs. "Destroy what's most important to Hutchinson. Won't take long. Look at him. Forest won after all. And so did I."

Hutch knew something was wrong when he pulled his car up to the curb in front of Starsky's house.

Starsky's car was here, the garage door wide open, and his motorcycle was parked in the driveway

And the back door was ajar.

These things spelled one thing to Hutch: Surprise attack.

"Starsk," Hutch whispered as his heart leaped inside his chest. He jumped from his car and raced to the back door, pulling his gun out (don't run in, you don't know who's in there, it could be a set-up, check it out first) and bursting inside the house.

The smell of a dead body assaulted him like a punch to the stomach. He threw an arm across his face and headed for the living room. He fought a wave of nausea when he saw Carrie on the floor, her head so badly mangled that she was only recognizable by the pink T-shirt she'd been wearing the day he left for Minnesota.

He ran to the other rooms for a quick check (no Starsky here, maybe he ran, got away, hiding out), then hurried out to his car to radio Captain Dobey, unable to phone from the house for thesight and smell. (God, Starsky, where are you? Is this how you felt four weeks ago when you saw my gun hanging on the door? Like the bottom of your stomach had fallen out?)

"Damn it, Hutchinson!" Dobey's voice bellowed over the radio. "You're supposed to be laying low!"

Hutch's words were rapid-fire and panicky. "Captain! Somebody got him/I don't know who or why but somebody got him/They killed Carrie and he's gone and there's blood on the floor and I think it's his/ Get some men over here and send some units to look for him/ If he's—if he's—if he's—"

"HUTCHINSON!"

Hutch threw his head back against the headrest, panting, closing his eyes, chest heaving, clutching the mike to his chest. He was sheer mind-jumbling panic and he knew it. Losing it. Not thinking straight. Pure emotion. Post-traumatic stress disorder. Frayed nerve-endings. Raggedy reasoning. Poor impulse control. Compliments of withdrawal.

He needed to go but he couldn't move. Needed to find Starsky but couldn't think.

(God, Starsky, be safe. Be well. Get away. Run. Fight. Because I don't know if I can. I don't know if I have enough cop or partner or friend in me right now. I'm weak, fried, hollow-eyed, and numb)

He was sitting that way, the car door open, head back and holding the radio mike to his chest when the black and white units arrived. And when Dobey arrived. And when Huggy arrived.

Dobey took the mike from him and hung it on the radio, then felt Hutch's forehead and lifted his eyelids. "Hutch, look at me."

Hutch's eyes rolled toward him like hot blue marbles. "Cap?"

"You have a fever. How long have you been sick?"

Hutch watched the uniformed officers and detectives filing into Starsky's house. "I don't know where he is," he whispered. "He could be anywhere, and I don't think he's all right."

Huggy looked at Dobey. "Captain, my man, I don't want to tell you what to do here, but you need to get Hutch away from this house."

Dobey took Hutch's arm. "Come with me, Hutch. We'll look for him together. You and me."

Huggy helped pull Hutch out of the car, turning him away before he could see Carrie being brought out on a stretcher in a black rubber bag.

Hutch could only wait in the passenger seat while Captain Dobey went into a barber shop to talk to the owner, his snitch friend Rusty. Hutch knew his immune system was shot. His face was so hot it felt like his head was in an oven. His eyes were droopy tired and watery. He had to hold the coffee cup in two hands to keep it still.

(I'm no help to you, Starsky. I'm sorry. I'm winding down. Fading out. Are you? Is that why I feel like this? Are we ESP? Am I picking up something from you? I don't feel any hope here. I don't feel like you're alive)

(Have I lost my mind? Of course you're alive. You're alive until I see otherwise. Until I see your dead body. You are. You are alive. Aren't you?)

"Rusty will find out," Dobey said when he came back from the barber's shop and swung his heavy body into the driver's seat again.

Dobey's radio mike spat static as the dispatcher spoke: "Captain Dobey, come in. There's a message for you."

Dobey pulled his roomy sedan onto the street and picked up the mike. "Go ahead, Dispatch."

"Concerning Ben Forest."

Hutch startled at the name, sloshing scalding coffee onto his hand. He sucked in his breath and swore softly.

Dobey took the cup from him. "Go ahead with message."

"The message is that Ben Forest is dead. Died of a heart attack two days ago."

Hutch turned his head toward the car window and covered his eyes. Dobey put a hand on his shoulder and found it trembling. "Got it, dispatch."

Dobey replaced the mike. "One less mf'er to worry about."

Hutch looked at him. (Did he say mf'er? He's never said that before. What would make him say... oh, come on. Did it really upset him that much when he learned what Forest had done to him? Had it meant something to him? What had he thought of the poor, wretched junkie he saw (his finest and best officer next to Starsky) huddling against Starsky and clinging like a big dying child? (Oh God, I don't want you to see me like this. I'm sorry, captain)(" Sorry? Good Lord, son, you have nothing to be sorry for. This wasn't your fault.") Son? Am I a son to you? I hope so, because you've been more of a father to me than my own)

"There is justice after all," Dobey grumbled, and allowed for a smirky smile of glee.

(Watch out, Papa Bear. You're getting dangerously close to crossing that line from professional to personal. That line you always warned me and Starsky about)

Hutch managed a pale smile. "I hope there really is a hell and he's burning in it."

A detective dropped an evidence baggie onto Dobey's desk. Hutch saw what it was—a bloodstained sales receipt—and looked away. Captain Dobey picked it up and studied the receipt through the clear plastic.

"It was on the floor by Starsky's front door," the detective offered. "Maybe it fell out of somebody's pocket. Maybe Carrie or Starsky grabbed at the guy's clothes. But somebody bought a box of fine cigars and a brand new baseball bat from a department store—Maury's—near the Los Angeles Penal Institution. The cigars are the kind Ben Forest smoked. There was a box in his cell. There was a Maury's sticker on the box. A visitor brought them as a birthday gift four days before he died... " He paused and took a deep breath before continuing, looking at Hutch apologetically. "The bat... we found minute splinters of varnished wood—bloodstained chips— embedded in the wall and coffee table."

Dobey rubbed the place between his eyes. "Forest," he said tiredly.

Hutch didn't raise his eyes from the floor. "Who was the visitor?" he asked hollowly.

"The visitor register said Jim Frost, but we suspect it's phony. Some of the officials remember a big guy with jet-black hair. Football player-like."

"We got all of Forest's men," Dobey said. "Dead or in jail."

"Not all," Hutch said as he rose shakily to his feet and headed for the door.

Dobey looked up. "Hutch, where are you going? I want you to stay close to me until—"

But he was out the door.

Hutch watched Ben Forest's funeral from his car. The cemetery was stately and somber, the family and mourners in dark sober clothes.

(I didn't go to your funeral, Ray, but I go to the funeral of the man I hate and fear the most. And why? Just to see if his henchman is here? One who might have grabbed Starsky? Or is there another reason? Maybe to make sure he's really dead?)

Hutch's eyes scanned the mourners. Looking, looking for the man that fit the description. And there were several who did. Several with jet-black hair and bulky frames. It could be any of them. He could be one of the bunch who'd been rounded up in the raids. He may have fled the state or even the country.

And then a new mourner strolled up to the crowd, the stocky build, the jet-black hair, and something else. A healing scratch in the corner of his left eye.

(Had Starsky fought him and left his mark?)

(Oh God, is that the only lick he could get in? One little scratch? Had they rendered him that powerless?)

Then he saw it. Stark against the man's crisp white shirt collar and pale gray tie. As if it had a mind of its own, Hutch's hand moved to the door handle on his car.

Starsky's necklace.

The brown cord threaded through the discs.

It was reflex. Instinct. Hutch was out of the car and running headlong at the man, not with the speed and agility he possessed before his tangle with heroin, but in ragged determination. He was upon the man before he realized it, grabbing the lapels of the expensive suit and slamming him against a tree, holding him there, his muscles trembling from the sudden effort and adrenaline-rush.

"Where is he!" Hutch demanded into the man's face as he snatched the necklace from his neck.

Vice was unruffled as he shoved Hutch to the ground as easily as if he were a pesky dog, and planted a foot in his chest. "I don't know what you're talking about," he told the pale version of Ken Hutchinson.

Hutch squirmed under the crushing weight. "Where is my par... " The breath was forced from his

lungs. His eyes were a faint blue against his red face.

The mourners stopped to stare. An older man approached Vice and gripped his shoulder politely but firmly. "Let him up, V. Look at him. He's done. It's over for him. Don't go to prison over some cop who can't even think sharp enough to draw his gun or stay out of a Family funeral."

Vice took his foot away, then gripped the front of Hutch's jacket and hauled him to his feet. Into Hutch's ear he said, "I can't believe he'd die for you," and threw him into Hal and Arty, who escorted him back to his car.

He went obediently. No muss, no fuss. He had no strength. No will. He was numb and defeated.

Huggy found Hutch sitting in his car in front of the restaurant. Hutch's fist, closed but not tense, rested on the steering wheel.

Huggy slid into the passenger seat and offered him a cup of soup. "Here, man. You need to keep your strength up."

Hutch shook his head no.

Huggy set the soup on the dashboard, then gripped Hutch's wrist, pulling it toward him and unfurling his hand to reveal Starsky's necklace.

"He's dead," Hutch said in a small, heavy voice. "Can't you feel it?"

"I feel like there's a chance."

Hutch passed a hand over his face. "Why did I jump that goon? Why didn't I sit back and let him walk away from that funeral? I could have followed him. I could have confronted him one-on-one. I'd have made him tell me." He looked at Huggy. "What's wrong with me?"

"Why do you think Dobey wants to babysit you? Man, let me tell you. It's that stuff they had you on. It's not you. Give it time. It's only been three weeks. It takes a good three months. I know what I'm talking about. You're not the only person I've seen coming off of heroin."

Hutch said nothing. He was looking down with his hand in his hair.

Huggy went on. "But you are the only person I've seen coming off of heroin who didn't want to be on it to begin with. Then your uncle passin' on. And now you tryin' to find your bro on top of that. Honest, I don't know what's keeping you from jumping off a bridge."

"Don't give me any ideas," Hutch said as he tucked the necklace into his shirt pocket.

"I could get you some 'ludes, man, to take the edge off."

Hutch shook his head no. "I just need to know. If he's dead, I just need to know. I can't live like this. I'm going crazy."

"Hang in, Hutch. Somethin' will give."

Static spat over the police radio as the dispatcher stated their call name.

Hutch lifted the mike. "Three here."

"I'm patching Captain Dobey through."

"Go ahead."

Dobey's voice: "Hutch, Rusty called back. He talked to Sunny, some hooker who was with Tony Vice last night. He got high at their hotel room and started bragging about how he left a cop to die in the basement of an old church called Heaven's Home."

Hutch's breaths came harder and faster. He was wheezing, almost hyperventilating. "Whah— what—where—"

Huggy took the mike. "We heard you, Captain. I know where it is." He threw the soup on the ground, got out of the car, then hurried around to the driver's side, nudging Hutch over into the passenger seat. "Scoot over. I'm driving."

Hutch had the car door open and was spilling out before Huggy even braked to a halt in front of the boarded-up, run-down church.

But Huggy was faster. He ran to the outside basement door and banged it open, then scrambled down the stairs. And that's as far as he got. He had to stop and sit down on the bottom step, shading his eyes as if from a bright sun.

Hutch's voice above him at the top of the stairs: "Starsky!"

Hutch plunged down the steps past Huggy, but then halted at what he saw.

"Starsky?"

Hutch eyes were wide, his voice a soft whisper in his throat. "Oh my God."

Starsky hung limply from the ceiling from his left wrist, his sneakers motionless a foot above the

floor, his head lolling onto his right shoulder, his right arm dangling at his side.

A miserable groan escaped Hutch as he stumbled closer to Starsky, and then the groan turned into a sob. It was too much to look at. Too much to see. Hutch's brain kept trying to shut down. His vision was graying.

"Starsk?"

Hutch slid a chair over and climbed up on it, taking out a pocketknife to cut the rope that tied Starsky's left wrist to the pipe.

"He's alive, Huggy."

Hutch cut the rope from his hand and Starsky fell bonelessly against him, he head falling onto Hutch's shoulder.

Starsky groaned into his shoulder.

"Sshh," Hutch whispered as he stepped down off the chair with him. "I got you. Come on." He glanced at Huggy. "Help me get him out of here. He's been through hell."

End

RESIDUE

By TR

It was late when Hutch raised his hand to knock on the door.

(Please be awake, Starsky. Even though you don't mind, I know you're exhausted from babysitting me, and nursing me, and coddling me like a baby, but Jeannie left today and I just need to talk to somebody, she's the reason I was strung out like a common smack-head in an alley and had the stuffing beat out of me, and yes, yes, I resent her, at one point today I hated her, but I still love her, it just won't ever be the same between she and I again, and I know you'll understand, I know you will, because you understand everything about me, even when I don't, you're there no matter what I say or do, how can I ever repay you?)

(No, Hutchinson, you WERE and still ARE a common smack-head in an alley, you still have that gnawing, nagging craving, don't you? Isn't that why you're here, Hutchinson? Tell the truth)

Starsky cracked the door and squinted at him, then opened his eyes a little wider when he saw it was Hutch.

"Don't you get tired of this?" Hutch asked softly. "Of me? Of playing the rescuer?"

Starsky ignored the words like he'd ignored all the other spiteful words Hutch had directed at him the past week. Words of physical pain, irritability, fear. Words of withdrawal.

"No," he answered just as softly.

Starsky, a human shock absorber, never lashing back, never giving up.

Hutch looked around as though unsure of his surroundings.

"Come here," Starsky said as he took Hutch's arm and led him inside, then poured two cups of coffee.

"You couldn't sleep either?" Hutch asked him, noting Starsky was still in his jeans and T-shirt.

"Nope. Figured you'd be over sometime tonight." Starsky held the strongest cup of coffee out to him.

Hutch shook his head no and held his arms as if cold.

Starsky set both coffees down. "Hutch, it's not just Jeannie, is it?"

Hutch wouldn't look at him as he began to pace. "I don't know."

Starsky's eyes followed him. "What do you mean you don't know?"

Hutch held a hand to his stomach. "I mean I don't know."

"Hutch, listen to me. You went through hell, and it wasn't your fault. It doesn't mean you're a bad cop, or a junkie, or a bad person."

Hutch spun toward him, his eyes wide and full of pain.

"Yes! I'm a junkie! And you know why?"

Starsky simply watched him.

Hutch pointed to the inside of his forearm.

"Because it was in there. And it doesn't matter how it got in there. Them, me, whoever. It's still in there, and it still hurts, and I still . . . I still . . . "

Starsky didn't lower his eyes. "Want it?"

Hutch punched him. He punched Starsky so hard in the face that he stumbled backward and went crashing into the kitchen sink, where he grabbed for it to try to hang on, but in his disoriented state, missed and tumbled to the floor.

"Okay," Starsky mumbled dazedly as he tried to push himself to his hands and knees. "I'm okay."

Hutch reached down and grabbed the front of his shirt, yanking him to his feet.

"What?!" Hutch cried at him. "Did I ask for this? Did I?"

Starsky's eyes rolled back and he fought to stay on his feet. He had to give himself a pat on the back for being stout enough to endure one of Hutch's punches without passing out cold. He'd seen other men, bigger than he, go down after one of Hutch's famous punches, and he'd always been grateful to have never been on the receiving end of that surprising, deadly strength.

(I'm still on my feet. Maybe he held back)

"Are you over it?"

Hutch shook him savagely. "Am I over it? What if I said no? What if I said no, I want to be over it, I'm almost over it, but this . . . this . . . shark keeps eating at me and I need to feed it to keep it away."

Starsky reached for the floor but Hutch jerked him back up.

"Hutch, don't. Don't hit me again."

Hutch's muscles trembled as he looked into Starsky's face, seeing his drowsy eyes and bloody nose and mouth.

"I do want it, Starsky."

Starsky shook his head no. Hutch had wanted it before, back at Huggy's upstairs apartment, and Hutch had grabbed past him for the door, wanting to get out so he could get the heroin, and Starsky had blocked the door with his body, and Hutch had been so furious and frustrated Starsky thought he would hit him then, but he didn't. He couldn't. He hit the wall beside his head instead. A tremendous show of love and restraint for a man whose heroin withdrawal had wrung into a bundle of raw nerve endings, leaving him inside out.

But not this time. No restraint to speak of now.

"I want you to stop me before I get it, Starsk. I don't want it."

Starsky gripped Hutch's sleeves, his head bobbing weakly, whispering.

"Hutch, I'm gonna pass out."

Hutch could feel Starsky's body getting heavier and heavier in his hands, until finally Starsky slumped completely, his eyes closing.

Hutch shook him a little. "Starsk?"

Starsky, of course, made no sound.

And it was then that Hutch realized how low the heroin had brought him, that he had stooped to punching the one person who'd gone through this with him, who had never raised a hand against him during their entire partnership.

He loathed himself, the drug, and what it had brought out in him.

With whatever gentility he had left, he eased Starsky to the floor, then, growling and sobbing in shame and rage, kicked the wall again and again.

Starsky came to, facedown on the kitchen floor. It was just dawning and the house was quiet. No sight or sound of Hutch.

(God, Hutch, where are you? Be strong, wherever you are. It's almost over. That ghostly, ghastly feeling will pass pretty soon. If there was somethin' I could do for you . . . I wish I could slip inside your body and take all that torment for you. I'd trade places. That monster Forest will get his someday for what he did to you. What goes around comes around)

"Oh hell," Starsky groaned as he rolled over and tried to push himself to his hands and knees. His head throbbed relentlessly. He made his shaky way to the bathroom, holding onto the furniture as he went.

"Oh my God . . . "

Starsky's whisper stopped in his throat as his eyes took in the terrible sight in front of him. The throbbing in his head was replaced by a warm numbing, and he could only stare at his partner, who sat on the rim of the tub, a thick rubber band tied around his left upper arm, his blond head bent studiously over his injection.

"No!" Starsky shouted as he jumped toward Hutch to snatch the syringe from his hand.

Hutch's head came up and he was smiling peacefully, his eyes dreamy.

Starsky snatched the syringe from his hand.

"Too late," Hutch smiled softly. "Empty." He tapped his arm lightly. "It's all in here."

Starsky slumped his shoulder against the wall, his head down, his voice a mere breath. "God, Hutch."

"One last time," Hutch whispered as his hand fumbled lethargically at the rubber band. "Had to have it."

Hutch's fingers settled on the rubber band but could not seem to find the dexterity needed to loosen it.

Starsky reached over and loosened the rubber band and it fell unnoticed to the floor.

Hutch gazed at him in his lullaby daze. "Sorry, Starsky," he murmured softly. "Didn't mean to let you down."

Hutch started to slip slowly from the edge of the tub.

Starsky suddenly grabbed the front of his shirt and yanked him to his feet.

"Why!" he demanded into Hutch's peaceful countenance. "You had it beat! How could you do this to yourself! Look at you!"

But Hutch only smiled his angelic smile.

Starsky jostled him, his eyes an angry plea. "Hutch, I love you. You can fight this. Don't give up. You said one last time, right? So this is it. This is the last one. If I have to lock you in this bathroom for two weeks I will, but you're gonna get this out of your system once and for all."

Hutch slowly shook his head no.

"Can't do it, Starsk."

"Yes, you can. I'll help you."

Again Hutch shook his head no, his faraway eyes sparkling with tears. "Too late, Starsk. The first time it was Forest's fault. This time it's mine. I chose it."

"No way, Hutch. It's all his fault. You wouldn't have put that in your arm just now if it weren't for

him."

Hutch's eyes were still tearful. "You don't understand," he whispered. "I took too much."

Starsky stared at him, feeling as though his heart had stopped in his chest and the breath had been vacuumed from his lungs.

"What?"

Hutch was slowly sinking to the floor, his hand reaching out for something to hold onto but only finding air, even though Starsky was gripping his jacket and wasn't letting go.

"Hutch?"

Starsky tried to hold him up but he was too heavy.

Hutch's head sank to his chest. "Bye, Starsky. I love you too."

Starsky sank with him, still clutching his jacket, shaking him a little. "Hutch!"

"Sorry," he whispered.

"Don't do this!"

Hutch's hand came up and weakly gripped Starsky's shirtsleeve. "Nobody compares to you, Starsky. You tried to help me. I'm just a junkie after all. I just . . . sorry I disappointed you."

Starsky shook him hard. "Hutch, no!"

(It can't end this way, Hutch. We've been so close to winning. We've been through so much. Nothing was supposed to come between us. Not the job. Not women. Not my temper. Not your guilt. Nothing. Nothing from the outside anyway. But nobody, nobody said anything about the inside)

Hutch was going down, and Starsky was going with him, holding Hutch's head to his shoulder, sobbing silently because Hutch was no longer moving or breathing, he had simply slipped away into his golden deadly pleasure.

"God, Hutch. Don't go. Please don't go."

But Starsky knew Hutch had been right. It was too late, and all that was left was the pounding in his head and in his heart.

End

HERO

By TR

Hutch answered his phone on the third ring, whistling and toweling his hair and tucking a white shirt into his black jeans.

"Good morning!" he sang happily into the receiver.

"You musta got some last night," came Starsky's grumpy mumble.

"You sound like you're still in bed."

"I am."

Hutch planted a foot on the arm of his couch to tie his shoe. "Well, rise and shine. I'm going to treat you to a pancake breakfast."

Starsky's voice perked up. "Boy, you musta got a LOT last night. Who was she?"

"Miriam."

"The teacher?"

"The masseuse."

Starsky laughed. "No wonder you're in such a good mood. You had a great vacation, unlike me, who had the damn flu the whole two weeks. And you didn't even come to nurse me back to health."

"You weren't that sick, or you would have called me crying around."

" She into threesomes?"

"I'm not into threesomes. So get your own masseuse."

"I'd rather have pancakes right now."

"Then get over here and pick me up. I'll be the one with the radiant glow on my face."

Starsky pulled the Torino behind Hutch's car and blew the horn, tuning the radio in to a clearer station. Traffic on this street was slow this time of the morning. A teenager was walking his dog, and that was the only noticeable activity around.

Starsky blew the horn and looked toward the cottage, then, impatient, opened his car door and stood up, yelling toward the front door. "Hey, Romeo! I'm hungry! Get a move on!"

Starsky drummed his fingers on the top of the car, glanced at his watch, then started for the front door. "Hutch? Come on!"

He knocked, but got no response.

"Hutch? You home?"

Starsky tried the doorknob and found it unlocked. He drew his gun (doesn't hurt to be careful, better safe than sorry) and stood to one side of the door while he pushed the door open with his gun. He felt the blood pounding in his head with each pulse. Hyper-alert. Keen senses. To his ears each breath sounded like wind rushing through a tunnel. To his eyes, his surroundings stood out in stark relief.

"Hutch?"

He gripped the gun so hard his hand ached as he moved carefully into the cottage. It was quiet. No morning news on the TV. No classical music on the radio. No telltale signs of a Miriam (perfume, lipstick, lingerie) lying about. No rattling dishes in the kitchen. No busy noises or clean smells of soap, shampoo, anti-perspirant, after-shave.

(Where is he? No note. His car is here. The place is intact. No sign of a struggle)

Starsky moved through all the rooms, eyes scanning for the slightest clue, the slightest difference.

And he saw it. A business card on the bedside table that read:

Miriam's Massage.

Without picking the card up, Starsky read the phone number on it and picked up Hutch's telephone, placing a call to the massage parlor, trying to ignore the churning in his stomach.

A polite female voice on the other end of the line: "Miriam's Massage."

"This is Detective Starsky. I need to speak to Miriam, and I need to speak to her quick."

"This is Miriam."

"You were with my partner last night, right? Hutch? Kenneth? Hutchinson?"

"Well...yes. Is that a crime?"

"Hey, it's cool. He said he had a good time. I was just wondering...did you spend the night? Were you here this morning?"

"I beg your pardon—"

"Look, this is important. His car is here, but he isn't. We were gonna get breakfast before goin' on to work. He was ready. He was waiting for me. Did he say he was going anywhere else, did he get any phone calls last night or this morning, were there any visitors? Who did you guys talk to?"

Her voice sounded worried now. "No, he didn't say he had any plans. He was...we were both in a good mood. We were going to see each other tonight. He was such a big help with Buddy and all..."

"Who's Buddy?"

"My old man. Ex-old man. I finally got up the courage to kick him out. Ken said I didn't have to take his abuse anymore. I was afraid of Buddy, but not anymore. Not with Ken in my life now."

"In your life? So we're talkin' that Buddy is a jealous psycho boyfriend. Is that what you're tellin' me?"

"Hey, listen. Buddy's a nut. He's hit me, used me, two-timed me, you name it. He owned me. I wanted to leave him but he said he'd kill me if I did, and he'd make it so no man would want me. But Ken's helping me. He's keeping me safe."

Starsky closed his eyes.

Who's keeping him safe? Not me. Not today anyway.

(I know who she is. That auburn-haired beauty who was in the squad room two weeks ago. Hutch had been ogling over her like a school boy. Felt sorry for her. Wanted to help her leave her boyfriend. Boy scout. Gentleman. Hero. Why don't you mind your own business sometimes, Hutch? Why do you make everything a personal mission?)

"Detective, Buddy's a nut, but I don't think he'd..." She trailed off.

"You don't sound too sure of that." Starsky took a small scratch pad and pen from the drawer of Hutch's bedside table. "Okay, Miriam. First things first. Get yourself to a women's shelter before Buddy comes after you. If he came after Hutch, he won't bat any eye coming after you."

"Buddy wouldn't—"

"Buddy would!" Starsky roared at her.

She was crying, but she didn't hang up.

"Miriam, I'm sorry. I'm just worked up about Hutch. Let's start over, okay? Because I need to find Hutch, and I think you're the only one that can help me right now." He paused, forcing himself to calm down, forcing himself to breathe easier, to relax his tense body. He was coiled like a spring. "Stay where you are. I'll come and get you."

"I don't want to go to a shelter, Detective. Buddy knows where all of them are."

"Why's that? I thought you said you never left him before?"

"That's right. He knows where the shelters are because he was a cop."

Starsky fumbled with the receiver. "A cop?"

"Was a cop. Not in your precinct though. Upstate. Kicked off the force for his temper problem."

Starsky pulled the receiver away from his ear and stared at it as if it were a snake. "Buddy Thompson?"

"Detective? Are you still there?"

Starsky put the phone back to his ear. "Don't tell me he's Buddy Thompson. This guy...this guy makes up his own rules. He's a police captain's worst nightmare. Roughed up suspects, hurt the prostitutes, shot first and asked questions later. Definition of psycho."

She was quiet a moment. "He's Buddy Thompson. Detective, I can't believe Ken didn't tell you about me. I thought you were partners."

"We are. But he was on vacation and I was under the weather. I didn't know what the hell he was doing for two weeks."

(And you didn't want to tell me how you crossed the line, did you, Hutch? How you fell for a girl you weren't supposed to fall for. Not somebody we work with. Not a case. Not a domestic violence victim)

"Okay. No shelter. You can stay with me."

"That's very kind of you, Detective."

(Not really. It's selfish. And dangerous for you. I'm using you to draw Buddy out)

(You'll come to me, Buddy, you lowlife, wanting her. And that's how I'll get Hutch back. One way or another. I'll get him back. Even if I have to be like you to do it. You take who's important to me, I take who's important to you)

Dobey shook his head no.

"Starsky, I feel as bad as you do that Hutch is gone. I agree, it looks fishy—"

"It looks like Buddy Thompson."

"Okay. And it looks like Buddy Thompson. But you don't know for sure."

"Just put some men on his tail. I want to know where he goes and what he does, where he is right now."

"If he's grabbed Hutch, he'll be calling you."

"Why? He doesn't want any money. He won't be calling me for anything." His eyes flashed anger and worry. "Except to brag."

Dobey sighed heavily. "All right, Starsky. I'll put some tails on him—"

Starsky shot to his feet and headed out Dobey's office door. "Forget it. I'll do it myself. I don't have time for a tail."

Dobey shot to his feet too behind his desk. "Starsky!"

Starsky stopped in his tracks, his back to the captain.

Dobey spoke to his still back. "What makes you so sure it's Buddy Thompson and not somebody else? God knows he's not the only lunatic who'd like to get his hands on you or Hutch."

Starsky spoke without turning. "It's a feeling, Captain. That's all. It fits."

Starsky waited for more, but Dobey was finished.

Starsky stepped out into the squad room where Miriam, the auburn-haired doe that Hutch had taken under his wing and into his bed, was seated at Hutch's desk.

(You should have told me about her, Hutch. I'd have reminded you that business and pleasure don't mix, that you don't date a damsel in distress if we have a domestic violence record on her psycho boyfriend a mile long. You should have told me. I'd have helped you with it. We could have gone to Buddy Thompson together and put on a show of force so deadly he'd swear

he'd never heard of Miriam and would never go near her again. That's why we don't date the clientele, Hutch. Can't think straight. Can't be objective. Can't make the hard decisions or the best ones)

Starsky took Miriam's hand. "Show me where Buddy lives."

Starsky pulled the Torino in front of Buddy Thompson's house. Miriam wore sunglasses and a summer hat to hide her identity. Miriam nodded toward a pale green Marlin parked in front of them. "That's his car. He's home."

Starsky opened his glove box. "Know how to use a gun?"

"Uh...yeah. Buddy taught me. For protection." She smiled wryly. "Ironic, isn't it? He's the one I needed protection from."

Starsky pulled a small pistol from the glove box and put it in her hand. "Stay here. Use this if he comes at you."

Miriam gripped the pistol and watched Starsky get out of the car and head toward Buddy's front door.

Starsky pounded on the door, his own gun drawn. "Thompson! Open up! It's the police!"

Thompson's voice from the other side of the door, unconcerned. "Anything I can help you with, Officer? I got a good baseball game on TV. Want to watch it with me?"

Starsky pounded again. "I said open up!"

A few moments later the door opened and Buddy Thompson stood in front of him, relaxed, nonchalant. There was a cocky ease in his body, not unlike the one found in Detective Starsky on any other day but today.

"Help you?" Buddy asked, voice dripping politeness. He had no gun and he was casual in a white undershirt, jeans, and socks. A baseball game was on TV. Popcorn and beer were on the coffee table. It appeared as though no one else was here.

Starsky shoved his gun in Buddy's mouth and pushed him backward and into his easy chair, planting a knee in his lap.

"You got three seconds to tell me where Hutch is. If you don't I'll splatter your brains all over your popcorn."

Buddy gagged around the barrel of the gun.

"What was that?" Starsky seethed into his face. "Couldn't quite catch that."

Buddy tried to speak around the gun. Starsky pulled the gun out of his mouth. "Want to repeat that, Buddy?"

Buddy gave him a level, unblinking gaze. "I said, if you kill me, you'll never find him."

"Then what's it gonna take to get you to tell me where he is?"

Buddy was eerily calm as he looked past Starsky and out the open doorway to Miriam seated in the passenger seat of the Torino. Sunglasses and hat, he knew it was her. The tilt of her head, the line of her nose, the outline of her lips, the delicate throat, all that she had given to Detective Hutchinson, all that belonged to him—Buddy—not to some overgrown blond kid who tried to play big shot hero and take her away from him.

"I want Miriam," Buddy said in a distant voice, his eyes far away. "She'll come back to me now. She'll see how much I love her. That no man can love her like I do. After she sees what I did for her." A long pause. "You ever loved anybody enough to kill, man?"

"You have no idea."

Buddy's eyes hadn't left Miriam. "She sees me, man. Why isn't she coming to me? She sees me in here. I know she still loves me. She always will."

"She doesn't love you, Buddy. She left you. She's done."

Negotiation.

Starsky was immensely proud of himself for being able to sound like Hutch when he needed to. His strong-arm approach hadn't worked. It was time for some smooth cajoling. It would lull Buddy into a false sense of security and he would let his guard down. Starsky would wear him down with kindness. He'd seen Hutch do it a million times. It was not his (Starsky's) strongest suit, but he could do it in a pinch, as Hutch could slip into the bad dog routine when he wanted to.

"You can set her free, Buddy. And set yourself free. You're already in a prison you've made for yourself, and so is she. If you love her, let her go. You can get some help. Men don't hurt the women they love. Love isn't supposed to hurt. It's a good thing."

Buddy's hand slowly moved beneath the cushion he was seated on.

"She's not coming, man."

"Buddy, watch your hand. Get it out of there. I've got this gun to your forehead."

Buddy ignored him. He was in his own world, where no one would have Miriam if he couldn't, where he didn't want to live without her, where he wanted to die but was too cowardly to do it himself, where he was so petty he would force someone to kill him, even the police, and then he'd show them, he'd show her, he'd show them all—

Buddy's hand emerged as slowly from the cushion as it had gone in, and it was holding a gun.

"Don't make me shoot you, buddy. You can have a different ending. Just tell me where Hutch is and I'll go get him. I'll work with you, tell them you cooperated. You can leave right now. Walk right outside and have a head start. You know why? 'cause I love Hutch that much. You love Miriam so much you'd kill for her-you'd kill Hutch, you'd kill me, and you'd kill yourself, you'd kill her. I love Hutch that much too. I could pull this trigger right now. But I also love him too much to kill you. Because he wouldn't want me to. and I'm going to respect him. For him I'm going to sacrifice the satisfaction of killing you. How much do you love Miriam? You love her enough to sacrifice what you're getting ready to do? Do you love her so much you'd let her walk away?"

(God, Hutch, you'd be proud)

Buddy said nothing. Starsky was beginning to think the man was out to sea.

"Where is he, Buddy?"

Buddy's hand moved again, and he was bringing it up and aiming it, but not at Miriam.

He was turning the gun on himself, planting it against his right temple.

"No," Starsky hissed, and grabbed for Buddy's gun.

But Buddy was faster. He pulled the trigger and his left temple exploded outward. Blood and brain sprayed Starsky, the coffee table, and TV as Buddy slumped to the left.

Starsky took one step back with a sharp intake of breath. "Terrific," he whispered, his breath chilled in his throat, the back of his hand pressed against his mouth.

Miriam came running inside the house, halting next to Starsky. To Starsky's surprise she did not react to Buddy's death. She stared, almost mildly, at his dead body.

Free at last, Starsky thought to himself. Both of them.

Starsky felt her cool hand slide into his hot one.

"Where's Ken?"

Starsky shook his head no. He couldn't speak just yet. He just stood there and waited for the neighbors, police, and ambulance to arrive.

The crime scene was winding down, the crime lab had done their work, the body had been removed, Miriam and Starsky had given their statements. Officers and onlookers were thinning out.

Dobey and Starsky stood on the front porch.

"Do you think I could get a bite to eat?" Miriam asked him. She stood with her arms folded casually across her bosom. "It's been a long day."

He opened the passenger door for her. "We'll get something at Huggy's."

"What's Huggy's?"

"Friend. He may have heard something about Buddy grabbing Hutch."

Miriam ate a BLT and drank tea on a stool at Huggy's bar. Starsky sat next to her and spoke to Huggy.

"Nothin' to eat?" Huggy asked him.

"Not hungry." He looked at Miriam. "How can you sit there and feed your face while Hutch is out there, God knows where?"

Miriam froze with a mouthful of sandwich. She swallowed and dabbed self-consciously at her mouth with a napkin. "I'm sorry. I just...I want to find him too. I'm just hungry. I haven't had an appetite like this for..." She looked down.

Starsky softened and touched her arm. "For the whole time you were with Buddy."

"Two years."

He slid her tea over to her. An apology. "Is there a place where Buddy would have taken Hutch? An old hangout? Old friends who might do him a favor? A private place?"

"No. He didn't have any friends. And he wouldn't let me have any friends either."

Huggy cleared his throat. "Starsky, man, I know you don't want to consider this, but did you ever think that he might not be alive?"

Starsky looked down at his folded hands. "No. I'd know it if he were dead. I'd feel it. I don't feel

like that. I feel like he's alive and I gotta find him fast. Before it's too late."

Huggy sighed. "You got it, my man. You want me to keep lookin', I look. You want me to keep askin', I ask."

"I want you to keep lookin' and askin'," Starsky told him, then got off the stool. "Come on, Miriam. It's late. I'm takin' you home."

"Home? I can't go back to that house after..."

Starsky shrugged tiredly. "Sorry. Wasn't thinkin'. I do this kind of garbage every day of my life. Leave a crime scene and go to a movie. I forget that normal people aren't used to it."

She smiled a little. "You're normal people."

"Where do you want me to take you then? Your massage parlor? Hutch's place?"

"No, I really don't feel like being alone tonight."

"Women's shelter?"

"No, I don't feel like being around a bunch of strangers either."

"Okay. You don't want to be by yourself, you don't want to be with a bunch of people. What do you want?"

"I want a friend. Can I stay with you, new friend?"

Starsky sighed. "Okay. You can stay with me."

She kissed his cheek. "You're nice, Detective. But of course you would be since you're Ken's friend."

"Do me a favor and stop calling me Detective. My name is David. Or Dave."

Miriam insisted on taking the couch. Starsky made a comfortable bed for her there. And she slept in her clothes.

"Wouldn't look right," she murmured sleepily from her pillow as she watched Starsky pace. "For me to be sleeping nude in your bed."

"Hutch knows I wouldn't sleep with his girl. It wouldn't matter if you and I both slept nude in my bed. He'd know I wouldn't make it with his girl."

Her eyes fluttered sleepily. "Why don't you get some sleep, Davey?"

He shook his head no. "Not sleepy. You go ahead. I'm going to look some more."

The next morning Miriam awakened feeling refreshed. She gargled with Starsky's mouthwash, put a teakettle of water on the kitchen stove, then went to Starsky's front window and looked out, seeing Starsky dozing in the Torino over the steering wheel.

The phone rang and she answered it.

"Hello?"

The voice of an older male came across the line.

"Yes. Is this David Starsky's residence?"

"It is."

"To whom am I speaking?"

"Miriam Rogers."

"Miriam Rogers. May I speak to David?"

"Who's calling?"

"Richard Hutchinson."

Her voice was small. "Oh."

"Will you get him to the phone please?"

She put the receiver down and hurried a cup of coffee out to the Torino, shaking Starsky's shoulder. "Davey, wake up. It's Mister Hutchinson."

He stirred awake, blinking and squinting. "On the phone?"

She nodded. "Here's some coffee."

Starsky got out of the car and took the coffee. He trudged into the house and picked up the receiver. "Yeah?"

"David, I just got a call from Captain Dobey. Where is my son?"

"Mr. Hutchinson, I don't know. That's what I've been trying to find out. He was abducted by an ex-police officer. Buddy Thompson. He killed himself before I could get him to tell me where he is."

Mr. Hutchinson's voice was heavy with worry and bitterness. "My, what negotiating skills you possess, David. Is that how you became so decorated?"

Even though the words pricked his heart, Starsky let it go. Mr. Hutchinson couldn't say anything that he hadn't already said to himself.

And Starsky respected Hutch too much to jump on his father when he was down.

"Where is he? Mr. Hutchinson asked.

"I don't know."

"No ideas?"

"I said I don't know."

"Don't worry yourself about it, David. Just go back to your girlfriend and do whatever it was you were doing. I'm flying out there. I'll look for him myself if I have to."

"Mr. Hutchinson, the police are look—"

The line went dead.

Starsky hung up and looked at Miriam without words. She stroked his arm. "I'll help you look for him. Let's go."

Starsky drove slowly with the windows down, he and Miriam stopping everyone they knew along the street and telling them to contact the police station if they saw Hutch or heard anything.

At noon they stppped at Huggy's to see if he had any information, but Starsky wasn't hopeful because he knew Huggy would call him immediately if he heard any news at all. As Starsky

expected, Huggy hadn't heard anything.

Starsky sat defeatedly on his stool at the bar, wrapped in a cocoon of sadness and frustration. "If I don't find him, who's goin' to?" He wasn't sure if he'd spoken the words aloud or only in his head. He was tired, shaky, and slowly receding into a dark cave of consuming, private grief.

Huggy saw him turning in on himself, saw him giving in, saw the walls of hope and faith beginning to crumble. Miriam didn't. She didn't know him well enough. All she saw was a tired, worried young man.

"Let's go to Hutch's place," Starsky told her quietly as he stared at the untouched glass of ice water Huggy had set before him. "Hutch's dad'll be here soon."

Starsky sat quietly at Hutch's kitchen table and stared off into space while Miriam flitted around him expending her nervous energy by dusting.

He was still staring, shutting down, tuning out, when a knock came at the door.

Miriam looked at him. "Want me to get that?"

When he didn't answer, she went to the door and opened it, seeing an older, heavier version of Ken Hutchinson.

Mr. Hutchinson took his hat off. "You must be Miriam? David's lady friend?"

"Actually I'm Ken's lady friend."

"But when I called David's house..." He looked past her and saw Starsky seated motionless and emotionless at the table. "Oh, I see how it is."

Fire flickered in Miriam's eyes. "No, you don't see how it is. I was at David's house, yes, but it's not what you—"

"Save it. My son probably doesn't care one way or the other. I don't know what's going through his head these days. He's given up a perfectly good and decent upbringing to play the part of an idealistic hero."

"I'm not sure what you're trying to say, but Ken doesn't play anything. He is a hero. He's real. He risked his life to help me."

Mr. Hutchinson dismissed her with a flick of his hand and stepped past her into the house. He went to the kitchen table and stood stiffly over Starsky, who sat staring at Hutch's car keys that were hanging from a small brass hook on the wall.

Mr. Hutchinson ran a hand through his hair. "David, I'd like an explanation. Captain Dobey said they're doing all they can, but look at you. Are you doing all you can?"

Mr. Hutchinson waited for an answer. Starsky sat as if he didn't hear.

Mr. Hutchinson placed his hands on the table and leaned over Starsky.

Trying to intimidate him? Understand him? Read him? Starsky had seen Hutch do that many times when interrogating suspects.

"What happened, David?"

Starsky was still silent.

Worried now, Miriam moved to Starsky and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Mr. Hutchinson, I'll tell you what happened. I met Ken two weeks ago when I called the police for help. I was breaking up with my live-in boyfriend, Buddy Thompson. And he wouldn't leave the house. Buddy beat me down for the two years I was with him. Ken said I didn't have to take it anymore and came to the house. He arrested Buddy and brought me here to his house, to protect me, and to be kind to me. Buddy got out of jail a couple of days later, like Ken said he would, and went looking for me in all the shelters, like Ken said he would. Buddy used to be a cop too. But not like Ken. Ken's a man. A decent and caring man. Buddy was a beast. And Buddy came here looking for me." She paused to run a hand under her wet nose. "Ken stood up to him—stood up for me—and sent him packing." She looked down at Starsky, tears filling her eyes, her delicate Adam's apple moving with a sob. "Buddy killed himself yesterday morning. He always said if he couldn't have me, nobody could, but I didn't really think...I didn't think..."

Mr. Hutchinson's voice was deadly serious. Starsky could swear it was Hutch.

"You didn't think, young lady. You didn't think how you were dragging my son into your sewer of a life. Just like I can't understand..." His eyes slid to Starsky. "Well, we've had this conversation before, haven't we, David?"

Miriam was beginning to wonder if Starsky had heard anything at all, or even knew where he was for that matter.

"Davey?"

"I don't feel him anymore," he murmured with a dazed expression.

Mr. Hutchinson looked at him. "Excuse me?"

Starsky was slowly rising to his feet, his eyes on Hutch's car keys. "Oh my God," came his trembling whisper. He stumbled rather than walked over to the wall where the car keys hung. "Oh my God."

Mr. Hutchinson's brow creased and he kept his eyes on Starsky. "What is it?"

Mr. Hutchinson saw what it was: Blood on the car keys.

Dried blood. Where someone...Buddy... or his son... or someone...had handled them with bloody hands and put them back. (Why would they do that? To gloat? To show nothing was amiss? Had they not noticed the blood? Too nervous? Too cold-hearted to care?)

Starsky took the keys from the wall and walked outside, unsteadily at first, then faster, toward Hutch's car.

"Hutch!"

Miriam and Hutch's father followed him out, both confused.

With a shaking hand Starsky slid the trunk key into the boot of Hutch's car, then raised the lid.

He stopped breathing. His legs gave out and he went to his knees.

Hutch was in the trunk, curled onto his side like a big child taking a nap. He had been beaten, his wrists and ankles bound, a dirty rag stuffed in his mouth.

Mr. Hutchinson leaned forward, his hard shoulders moving with tears, reaching into the trunk to pull out the limp form of his son.

End

LOST AND FOUND

By TR

"We're stopping at your place for lunch?" Starsky asked Hutch as Hutch pulled his car up alongside his canal-side cottage. He discarded the daily paper over his shoulder and into the back seat.

"New recipe," Hutch said happily as he climbed from the car.

Starsky sat in grumpy silence for a moment. "New recipe," he mumbled as he sat unmoving. "New stomach pump."

Hutch opened the passenger door. "What are you waiting for?"

"An ambulance."

"Don't be that way. You'll like my new dish."

"But it won't like me."

Starsky nevertheless got out of the car. Grudgingly.

"Can't you try these out on one of your girlfriends?" Starsky asked him as he followed him to the front door.

"I'm between girlfriends. You know that."

Hutch unlocked his front door and they stepped inside the cottage. Hutch lifted his nose to an aroma of food in the air.

"Smells good, doesn't it?"

"Smells like toxic waste."

Unruffled, Hutch moved to the kitchen, put oven mitts on, and pulled down the oven door.

"Spinach casserole," Hutch said cheerily as he lifted a baking dish from the oven and set it on the table.

Starsky leaned over the table and studied the dish. "Looks like seaweed."

"But the taste..." Hutch licked his lips. "You get some plates while I check my mail."

"Do I have to?"

"Don't be such a big baby. It's good to try new things."

"I'm allergic to green."

"But it's nutritious and it's delicious."

"That's what you say about all your new dishes. Just before I upchuck into your flower bed."

Hutch picked up his mail and sorted through it. "Bill. Bill. Bill. Bill. Bill. Ah hah. A letter."

Starsky placed plates, cups, and silverware on the table. "From Ed McMahon?"

"Would Ed send me a pink letter?"

"I hope not."

Hutch opened the letter.

Starsky gazed glumly at the spinach casserole. "Do I have to eat this?"

"I made it just for you."

Half-heartedly Starsky began spooning the spinach casserole onto both plates.

"Please. Your kindness is unbearable."

Starsky waited for a smart reply, but got none. He saw that Hutch was absorbed in the letter.

"Old flame?" Starsky asked him.

Hutch was still reading the letter.

"Juicy?"

Hutch was bent studiously over the letter. He read it again.

Starsky knew that posture. That frozen mannequin stance that said something was wrong. "Hutch? What is it?"

Hutch raised his head, eyes big and owlish.

God, sometimes he looks so young.

Starsky saw disbelief and confusion.

"It's uh...it's Jennifer. She..."

Jennifer. The tall, pretty brunette with the warm smile and love of children and travel. The only girlfriend Hutch ever bought an engagement ring for besides Vanessa and Nancy.

Hutch finished with a soft moan. "She's dead. " He swallowed. "Leukemia."

Starsky stared down at his plate. "I'm sorry, Hutch. I know you loved her."

Hutch walked slowly to the table with the letter in his hand, his eyes directed out the window in a dazed stare. "This is from Sharon, her sister. She says..."

Starsky looked up at him. "Can I see it?"

Hutch nodded but didn't hand him the letter. "She says that we..."

Starsky took the letter.

"That we..." Hutch drew a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Jennifer and I have a son. Daniel. He's four."

Starsky gave Hutch a long look, then read the letter.

"She wants me to take him now," Hutch finished. "Raise him."

Starsky folded the letter and put it back in the envelope. "Just in time for Father's day," he said wryly. He toyed with his fork.

"Hutch, I don't know how to ask you this, but, are you sure the kid belongs to you?"

Hutch thought about that. His answer was calm and certain. "Jennifer didn't sleep around. And she wouldn't lie about something like this."

"Yeah, but you need to be..."

Hutch looked at him. "I know. I need to be sure. And I am sure."

"Why didn't she tell you about him before?"

Hutch offered a small shrug. "I don't know." Hutch parted his kitchen curtains. "Oh hell. They're here."

Starsky shot to his feet. "What?"

They both saw the yellow cab in front of the cottage. A tall, pretty brunette resembling

Jennifer's sister emerged from the cab holding onto the hand of a little boy who had sky-blue eyes and cream-colored hair.

"My God," Starsky said with soft awe as he peeked through the curtains. "It's a little you."

Starsky started for the front door.

Hutch took his arm. "Whoa. Where are you going? He's mine, remember? Behave yourself or I'll put you in a closet."

Hutch moved around him to make sure he was first one to the door. Both tucked their shirts in and smoothed their hair.

A polite knock came at the door. Hutch waited a moment, then opened it, looking from Sharon to the boy in wonderment.

Sharon spoke first, voice hesitant, the gray pall of grief on her features. "I'm sorry,

Ken," she said swallowing hard. She fought for composure, but ended up bursting into tears. "I'm sorry she kept him from you."

Hutch reached for her and pulled her into his arms, comforting her, stroking her hair. "Sshh. It's okay. Don't be sorry. I'm glad he's here."

The boy was looking down, but Starsky thought that at the very least, the boy's first impression of his father would be a good one. Hutch could have unloaded on Sharon. And he'd have had a right to. It had been wrong of Jennifer to keep his son a secret. But Hutch was too much of a gentleman to bring it up, and he wanted to do the right thing. He was putting his questions and confusion aside for Jennifer and the boy.

Starsky crouched in front of the boy and ruffled his hair. "It's all right, Daniel. Your daddy's here now, and he's gonna take real good care of you."

Sharon, still tearful, knelt to Daniel and embraced him, weeping into his hair. "Aunt Sharon has to go now. You come and visit me, okay?"

"Okay."

Sharon turned to leave, ducking into the waiting cab.

Daniel offered a somber wave as the cab pulled away from the curb and drove down the street.

When the cab was gone, Daniel looked up at Hutch and held his hand out politely to him. "Pleased to meet you. I'm Daniel Hutchinson."

Hutch shook the small hand, then picked Daniel up and held him, looking at a smaller version of himself. "Pleased to meet you too, Daniel. I'm your daddy."

Daniel offered only a perfunctory smile. His eyes held a look too sober for any four-year-old to have. A look of long nights with an ill mother, playless days at her bedside, a final heart-wrenching goodbye at her graveside.

But the eyes—so very much like Hutch's eyes—still held a sweet innocence.

His voice was shy and quiet.

"Mommy's gone," he said barely above a whisper, and buried his face in Hutch's shoulder.

"I know, baby."

Hutch carried him inside, Starsky following with Daniel's overnight bag in his hand, and closed the door.

"Did your mommy talk a lot about me?" Hutch asked the boy.

Daniel nodded into his shoulder. "She said you're a policeman and that you like music and art and the finer things of life."

Starsky rolled his eyes behind Daniel's back.

Hutch stuck his tongue out at Starsky and smiled. "That's right. Did she tell you about the time she cooked spaghetti for us and spilled it all over my lap?"

Daniel nodded, and Starsky saw a smile starting to creep across the angelic face.

Daniel's fingers played at Hutch's sideburn. He was still smiling into Hutch's shirt collar. "She called you hotpants."

"Speaking of food," Starsky interjected. "You wouldn't happen to have any tasty snacks in your overnight bag, would you?"

Daniel without lifting his head from Hutch's shoulder: "I've got celery sticks and carrot juice."

Hutch kissed the top of Daniel's head. "That's my boy."

Starsky made a face. "Yuck."

Daniel raised his head from Hutch's shoulder and looked toward the spinach casserole on the kitchen table. "That looks good, daddy. Can I have some of that?"

Starsky rolled his eyes. "We know whose kid he is."

Starsky was whistling happily as he carried Daniel into Captain Dobey's office on his shoulders.

Daniel was laughing, pleased to be jostling happily about as if on a trotting pony.

Dobey scowled when he saw the boy. "What happened, did Hutch shrink on us or something?"

Starsky sat the boy on Dobey's desk. "This is a Hutch. But it's not a big Hutch. It's a little one."

Dobey frowned. "Nephew?"

Daniel smiled fondly. "Son," he said, and took out his western-style wallet with his initials branded in. He showed Dobey a photo of his father and mother kissing each other under an umbrella. "See?"

"I know what he looks like, young man," Dobey told him. "I see that mug of his every day." He looked at Starsky for an explanation.

"It's a long story," Starsky said with a wink. "Tell ya later."

Daniel eyed Dobey suspiciously. "Are you my daddy's and Uncle Starsky's boss?"

"On the days they're not my boss."

Daniel narrowed his eyes. "You better not be mean to them."

"I'm not mean to them. They're mean to me." A pause. "Where is your daddy anyway?"

"Talking to Aunt Sharon," Daniel explained. "He wants to pay his respects to my mommy. He didn't know she had died till Aunt Sharon wrote him a letter."

Daniel looked down at the hands that were folded properly in his lap. "I like my daddy, but I wish I had my mommy back too."

"I know you do, kiddo," Starsky told him, and dabbed his thumb at the tear streaking down the boy's cheek. "It's okay to miss her. You're supposed to. Your dad knows it's okay too. And if there's anything you want to talk about, something you might not be able to tell your dad, you come to me, okay?"

Daniel nodded.

Dobey gave Starsky a look of surprise, then approval, then extended a candy dish toward the boy. "Like some?"

Daniel smiled politely, his eyes still slightly wet. "No, thank you. Junk food is bad for you."

Starsky grinned and ruffled the boy's hair. "Keep talking like that and you can walk home."

"We're walking anyway, Uncle Starsky. Remember? You're showing me around."

Sudden urgency, Daniel looked at his watch. "It's not too late, is it?

Starsky looked at his watch too. "Too late for what?"

"For the stores. I gotta get my daddy a Father's Day present."

Sudden urgency too, Starsky grabbed his hand and yanked him out he door. "I forgot! Let's hurry!"

Daniel cackled with laughter and tried to keep up, his baby-fine hair bouncing on his head.

Starsky sat Daniel on a barstool at Huggy's restaurant bar. Huggy approached with a wink to the boy. "What's up, Detective Hutchinson?"

Daniel grinned. "I'm not detective Hutchinson."

Feigned shock: "You're not? Who the hell...I mean heck...are you?"

"I'm Daniel Hutchinson."

"Oh, yeah, you're the one I been hearin' about. How you smooth talk the chickies and beat all the dudes at tricycle races."

"Yep. That's me."

"Where's your pops?"

"Personal business."

"Me and your pops are personal. We go way back."

"Yeah? You know my mommy Jennifer?"

"Sure I do. Best legs...I mean best cook...in the whole wide world." He winked at Daniel. "I remember your mama and daddy sittin' in that booth back there on their first date. Your daddy was so nervous he spilled his drink. All the dudes were asking her to dance, but she'd only dance with Hutch, wet pants and all."

Daniel listened closely and thoughtfully. And then: "Why'd they break up?"

"She wanted..." Huggy glanced at Starsky for help.

A better life than a cop could give? Starsky wanted to say. More money? Travel? An education abroad?

But what Starsky said was, "They just wanted different things out of life. She went her way and he went his."

Huggy nodded. "And I never heard a harsh word between them." He looked at Starsky. "You guys hungry?"

"I'm starved. I'll take a pepperoni pizza to go."

Huggy looked at Daniel. "And for you, my little man?"

Wrinkling his nose: "I'll pass. Daddy's making me a special dinner tonight."

Huggy and Starsky exchanged a look of distaste.

"I'm afraid to ask," Huggy said.

"Tuna tacos and goat's milk milkshake."

"You can have your tuna tacos and goat's milk milkshake," Starsky told the boy. "I'm taking home a pepperoni pizza."

"But you can't go to your house. You gotta come to our special Father's Day dinner."

"I'll come if you let me bring my pizza."

Daniel thought about it. Resignedly: "Well, it's your stomach, Uncle Starsky."

Huggy grinned. "Father's Day, huh?"

Daniel pulled a small gift-wrapped package from his jacket pocket. "I got him a present."

"What is it?"

Daniel put the gift back into his pocket. "It's a surprise." He looked at Starsky. "Hurry up and get your poison pie so I can give my daddy his present."

Daniel and Starsky were not far from Hutch's cottage when Daniel spotted the playground.

"Can I play in there?" Daniel asked him.

"We're on foot and it's almost dark, Daniel. Maybe tomorrow when it's daylight."

"Please, Uncle Starsky? It looks like a lot of fun."

Starsky surveyed the playground. He had passed the rusty, dusty lot every day that he'd ever been to Hutch's house, and wondered what the boy saw in such an eyesore. Kids didn't even play in it anymore. There was one crooked swing, and a rickety, lopsided merry-go-round that wobbled and screeched mercilessly as it turned. The slide was missing some steps that led up to it.

"There's a better one across town," Starsky told him. "Cleaner and brighter. And everything works."

Daniel pulled on Starsky's hand. "I don't care. I've never played in a playground before."

Starsky stopped and crouched in front of him. Confused, almost angry, even hurt, he took the boy's shoulders. "What do you mean you haven't..." And then he understood. His voice softened. "Your mommy was too sick to take you to the playground, wasn't she?"

Daniel looked down, bumping the toe of his sneaker on the sidewalk. Starsky took his hand. "Okay. I'll let you play for a few minutes. Then we'll have to go."

Daniel's face brightened like a small sun. "Okay! 'cause I don't want to miss my daddy's dinner!"

Daniel ran across the playground with the small gift-wrapped box in his hand.

And the group of teenagers that was approaching behind them would have looked like any other group of teenagers walking into the park, dressed in jeans and hooded sweatshirts and sneakers, if it hadn't been for the liquor bottles they were guzzling from, and the pistol that one of them brandished recklessly about.

Starsky started after the boy, voice edgy but even. "Daniel? Come back here. Let's go."

The gang shouted obscenities at Starsky and the boy, and the one carrying the gun raised it, laughing and pointing it in Daniel's direction. "Yo!" one shouted. "Target practice!"

Starsky was frantic. Running now. "Daniel! Get down!"

Startled, Daniel looked over his shoulder at Starsky, then at the gang of teenagers.

Starsky reached for his gun. "Police! Drop your gun!"

The gunman laughed and fired at Starsky. The bullet hit Starsky's left shoulder and spun him around and off his feet, his weapon dropping from his hand.

The gunman chuckled and aimed at Daniel, firing but missing his small running target.

Starsky climbed to his feet and stumbled toward the boy, but without his gun could only manage to protect him by diving at him just as the second shot came.

This bullet hit Starsky in the back, tearing his chest open and piercing the small boy as well.

When the teenagers saw that they were both down, they cackled with glee and scrambled from the park like mischievous children.

When Hutch got home his phone was ringing. And ringing. He lifted the receiver as he carried a

bag of groceries to the kitchen table.

"Hello?"

Dobey's voice. Grim. Subdued: "Hutch, come to my office."

Hutch froze while taking groceries from the bag. "What?"

Dobey's voice again, heavy and somber: "Just get down here."

Heads turned—some toward Hutch, some away—as he stalked past fellow officers (They know. Whatever this is, they know about it) and made his way to Dobey's office.

Dobey stood at his window, looking out into the dark city at nothing in particular.

Hutch came in panting. Dobey could hear the familiar sound of fear, uncertainty, dread. "Cap?"

Dobey didn't turn around. He didn't want to see Hutch's face just yet. "Close the door, Hutch."

Hutch closed the door. "Cap, what is it?"

Dobey finally turned around, and he saw what he didn't want to see: Hutch's eyes, big and scared. "I think you should sit down."

"I don't want to sit down." He looked around the office, bewildered if not disoriented.

"Where's Starsky? Is he here? Is he all right? Daniel? What-"

Dobey scrubbed absently at his mustache. "They were both shot and killed in the playground near your house."

He stumbled back, hand to his chest. "Oh my God."

"I'm sorry." Dobey moved forward.

Hutch fell rather than sat down in the chair, leaning forward and covering his eyes with one hand.

"Starsky tried to shield the boy," Dobey continued. "The bullet went through him and into Daniel." He cleared his throat and loosened his tie. "From what we can gather so far, it was just random act by a bunch of teenagers."

There was a long pause.

A light rap at the door, and Huggy's voice: "It's me, Captain."

"Huggy," Dobey said opening the door. "Come in. He's going to need you."

End

STONES

"He got away!"

"Get him!"

The frantic voices of uniformed cops echoing somewhere across the precinct's parking garage.

"He got away!"

Running shoes hitting the pavement.

A suspect with his hands cuffed in front of him galloping past where Hutch crouched changing a tire on the LTD, the man pulling Hutch's Magnum from his shoulder holster as he passed by.

The blond head snapped around. "What the-"

Hutch reached for his gun. "Son of a-"

Starsky, who was standing by the driver's side's open door and speaking into the police radio mike to Captain Dobey, saw the suspect turning the gun toward the two uniformed officers chasing him.

"Hutch!"

Starsky's startled voice as Hutch started to rise into the line of fire.

Starsky jumped toward him to shove him out of the way, slamming into him as the gunfire exchanged between the uniforms and the suspect, and it ended as suddenly as it started, the gunshots reverberating hollow echoes around the garage.

Hutch sat with his back against the tire he'd been changing, dazed from the blunt force of Starsky's body. The suspect was dead, half his head blown away by the officers' bullets.

"Chump," a uniform growled at the dead suspect as he kicked Hutch's Magnum back to him. "Come on," he said to his rookie partner as he holstered his gun. "Let's report this upstairs."

The two rookies ran for the elevator. Over his shoulder one shouted, "Hutch, better check your partner!"

A small crowd gathered as the two unigotmd ran back inside the precinct.

Hutch rubbed his foggy head and looked down at his partner, who was sprawled facedown across his lap, one arm flung over Hutch's right shoulder where he'd grabbed for him, the other wedged under Hutch's left leg.

Hutch gave Starsky's shoulder a nudge.

"Okay, Starsk. It's not funny. Get the hell off of me. I got a lump the size of Alaska on the back of my-"

Hutch eyes fell on the Magnum, his voice suddenly dropping to an uneasy whisper.

"Starsky?"

But he wasn't moving, and Hutch's heart began to skip in his chest.

"Starsky, quit fooling around."

But even as he said it, he knew it wasn't a joke. Even as his legs jostled Starsky across his lap to get him to move. Because he was too limp and there was too much blood spreading across Starsky's back.

"Oh my God," Hutch breathed shakily.

Starsky was deathly still.

"HELP!" Hutch yelled, not realizing the crowd was around him and someone had already gonefor a phone. "CALL AN AMBULANCE!"

Hutch pressed his right hand hard into Starsky's back to try to stop the blood, trying not to move him.

"Come on, Starsk."

Hutch's voice was a mere squeak. He'd wanted it to be strong and reassuring, and he wasn't sure Starsky had-or could-hear him.

Hutch slipped his left hand under Starsky's throat and felt for a pulse, noticing how his head lolled strengthless toward the concrete floor, how his eyes were closed as if he were asleep. Only corpses were as pale and lifeless as his partner was right now.

"Starsk?"

(As long as you have a pulse you'll be all right. We'll both be all right. Beat for the both of us. Live for the both of us. Because if you die this way, if you die for me, protecting me . . . "

Hutch sat that way, one hand pressing hard into Starsky's back, trying to hold his life's blood in, trying to keep it from spilling around his own hand, the other holding Starsky's head off the floor, until the ambulance came.

Captain Dobey and Huggy sat in the waiting room talking in low tones to the surgeon in green scrubs. Hutch stood at the window, looking out but not seeing. Everything around him-the room, Dobey, Huggy, the doctor, the faint droning of the TV-had disappeared, and all that was left in his consciousness was a numb gray haze.

"-not very good."

"-through the night."

Dobey looked Hutch's way. He saw the blond man standing numbly at the window with a faraway look on his face.

"Hutch, did you hear the doctor? He said it didn't look very good. He said he may not live the night."

Dobey wasn't sure if Hutch knew he was being addressed. He hadn't known when the paramedics had lifted Starsky from across his lap. He hadn't known when a nurse had kindly washed his red hands in a pan of soapy water.

Dobey took a step toward his detective, but Hutch was moving away from him and was walking out the door.

Hutch found himself standing next to Starsky's hospital bed in the Intensive Care Unit, not sure how he'd gotten there, but sure of one thing: This pale, inanimate form that was supposed to be his partner, probably wouldn't be here in the morning. Someone would come and turn off the machines, someone would come and pull the sheet up over his face, someone would come and

wheel his body down to the-

Hutch took Starsky's hand in both of his and sank to one knee.

"Please, God, save him," he whispered. "Take me. Put it on me."

He had never prayed so hard for anything or anyone in his life.

Hutch didn't remember going back to the waiting room. Maybe Huggy or Dobey had helped him, or maybe he'd gone back on his own. He couldn't really remember. But he was here now, the low monotone voices of the surgeon, Dobey, and Huggy rousing him from a twilight sleep.

Dobey saw him waking and helped him sit up on the couch.

"You scared us," Dobey grumbled.

Hutch looked at his superior and saw his bloodshot eyes.

(Yes, it's still real. Not a nightmare after all. How I wish it were. How I wish it were me in that hospital bed instead of my partner)

"You passed out on us," Huggy explained. "Found you on the floor by Starsky's bed."

Hutch pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes, his voice a whisper. "He's gone, isn't he?"

He waited for the answer with fear and dread, as if waiting for the blow of a sledgehammer.

Dobey squeezed his shoulder. "No. He pulled through the night."

Hutch stared at him. "He . . . " And looked at Huggy, then the surgeon. "He made it? He's okay?"

The surgeon cleared his throat. "Well, he made it, yes. But he's not okay."

Hutch kept looking at him.

(Good grief. Do you want me to guess what the hell 'not okay' means?)

"That's why you're here, isn't it?" Hutch asked Dobey, and he took in a small breath as if to prepare himself. "To tell me something?"

Dobey nodded.

Hutch licked his lips. "How bad?"

Dobey looked at Huggy when he answered. He couldn't bear to see the look in Hutch's eyes.

"He's paralyzed, Hutch."

Hutch sat numbly, not moving, not breathing.

Dobey found the composure to look at him. "He can't walk."

Hutch looked around as if to make sure the room, and himself, were still here. "Does he-"

His voice was disappearing in his constricted throat. "Does he know?"

"You've been out for hours," the surgeon explained. "We told him as soon as he came out of the anesthesia. Your captain, Mr. Bear, and I."

Hutch glowered at Dobey. "Why didn't you wait until I . . . " He rose to his feet, swiping an arm at the air. "Why the hell didn't you wait until I could be there?"

Huggy rose to take his arm. "Hutch, it's bad no matter how you cut it. He had to know quick. He woke up and he couldn't move his . . . we couldn't wait."

Hutch jerked away from Huggy's arm. "I SHOULD HAVE BEEN THERE!"

Dobey moved toward him but Hutch stalked out.

Hutch stood in the doorway of Starsky's hospital room and knocked on the doorframe.

"Starsk?"

Starsky lay quietly in the bed, turned away from Hutch and toward the wall, making it impossible for Hutch to see his face.

"You awake, Starsk?"

There was no answer from the still form in the bed.

Hutch crept to the bed, but when he got there he wanted to turn right around and walk out the door again, because his height afforded him a good look at Starsky's face, and what he saw there tore at his heart.

There was no expression. No anger. No pain. Just an empty look of nothingness and aloneness.

Hutch touched his silent shoulder. "I'm sorry I wasn't here when they told you, buddy. I had to go and wimp out on you when you needed me, didn't I?"

Hutch proceeded slowly, giving Starsky time to answer or ask a question if he wanted to. But his partner was excruciatingly silent.

"I don't know if me being here would have made a difference to you. I'd like to think it would have, even though it would have killed me to hear it."

Hutch waited a few patient moments, but got no response.

"I want to thank you for what you did for me. I'm not going to cheapen it by saying you shouldn't have, or say how dare you. I know why. Because you're my buddy. I'd do the same for you. But I just wish . . . I wish it had been me."

Hutch thought Starsky might turn over and look at him, or pat his hand, or make a crack that would force him to laugh even when he didn't want to. But he got nothing in return.

"You don't have to go through this alone, Starsk. Whatever I can do to help. If I can say anything, do anything, you know I will. You just name it. If you say you want a pepperoni pizza, I'll get you one the size of a kiddie pool."

Only Starsky's stillness answered him back. That worried Hutch more than any outburst Starsky could have made. Hutch could take Starsky's outrage. He could understand it. Expect it. Welcome it. But he didn't know what to do with Starsky's silence. It was unlike him, and it told Hutch how crushed his friend really was.

Not knowing what else to say or what else to do, Hutch gave his partner's shoulder a squeeze. "You need some time, Starsk. It's okay. I'll come back to see you later. Try to get some sleep, huh?"

One last hopeful moment. For the movement of his hand, the turn of his head, the sound of his voice.

But it never came.

So Hutch did the only thing he could do. He turned and quietly left the room.

Hutch joined Dobey, Huggy, and the surgeon in the waiting room after seeing Starsky.

"He's not good," Hutch said quietly as he shook his head. "Won't talk to me."

"I know," Huggy answered. "That's the way he was with us."

"He's lucky to be alive," the surgeon told them.

Hutch looked at him. "What are his chances of walking again?"

"Very slim. I don't have to tell you the damage a Magnum can do."

"No," Hutch replied evenly but quietly. "You don't."

Hutch stood calmly in the doorway watching the exchange.

"Detective Starsky," the male nurse said in his cheerfully condescending tone as he let down the side rail of his hospital bed, "the doctor said we have to change your dressing every four hours."

Starsky lay on his back and stared dully at the wall. "Why don't you go off yourself every four hours?"

"Starsky . . . " Hutch warned gently, but Starsky didn't acknowledge his presence.

"Look," the nurse continued, his tone losing what little professionalism it had had. "The blood soaked through and it's all over the sheets. You can play your self-pity routine all you want to, but I still have to change your-"

Hutch was across the room and yanking the side rail up before the nurse could finish his sentence. "If he doesn't want to, he doesn't have to. Not right now."

The nurse dropped his clipboard disgustedly onto the foot of Starsky's bed and left.

Hutch saw the red stain growing ever-so-slowly on the sheet beneath Starsky's back.

"Starsky, please. You can't go on like this. You have to eat something. You have to take your medicine. You have to let them change your bandages. I know you can't feel it, but you're bleeding pretty steadily back there."

Starsky's eyes were still on the wall. "Hutch," he whispered in a small, wooden voice that sounded nothing like the Starsky he knew, "I want you to leave."

Hutch placed a hand across Starsky's forehead. "You know I can't."

Starsky still looked away. "Hutch, please. I don't want you to see me this way. It's not me. I'm not me anymore. I'm not a cop, I'm not your partner, I'm nothin'."

Hutch swallowed, trying to keep his faltering voice from breaking up completely. "You're my best friend. You took the bullets that should have hit me. You saved my life."

Starsky pushed Hutch's hand away, still not looking at him. "Hutch, I mean it. I want you to leave."

"Look, I know you're scared, but don't shut me out. Let me-"

Starsky finally rolled toward him and reached his left arm toward him with such ease that for a moment Hutch thought his partner was coming around, was reaching for him in his silent pain, but he realized with confusion that it was for a different reason when Starsky quickly and smoothly slid the Magnum from beneath his jacket.

"I told you to get out of here."

Hutch stared at the gun, then at Starsky.

It wasn't that he thought Starsky would shoot him. He knew better than that. Starsky would cut off his own arm before hurting him.

It was the depth of pain in Starsky's eyes that worried him. That he would go this far to drive him away. Which told Hutch all the more how much his partner really needed him.

"Starsk, I'm not leaving."

"Oh yeah?"

Starsky raised up on one elbow and pointed the gun at him. "I said leave."

"Starsky . . . "

The gun trembled, his eyes darkening with torment.

"Hutch, I told you."

Hutch held his hand out, palm up. "I'm not leaving. Give me the gun."

Without blinking or taking his eyes off of Hutch, Starsky put the gun to his left temple. "I said get out of here."

Fear crept up Hutch's back like a cold shadow. He had been, and always would be, certain that Starsky would never hurt him. But he was not so certain that Starsky wouldn't hurt himself in his despairing moment of loss and grief. And in this high state of frustration, Hutch wasn't so sure that Starsky's hand would remain as steady as it should.

"Starsky, give me the gun."

Starsky shook his head no and dug the gun deeper against his head.

"No. Go on, Hutch. I want you to go."

"Starsky, talk to me. I know you're hurting. Just-"

Tears spilled slowly from Starsky's tortured eyes.

"Starsky, the gun could go off accidentally. Put it down."

The gun slipped a little in his hand when he wavered on his elbow in the bed.

"Buddy, you're weak. Give me the gun before you pass out."

"Leave or I'll pull this trigger."

Hutch took a step back. "Okay. Anything. I'm leaving."

"Move it."

Hutch didn't know whether to laugh or cry. He took a second step back. "Don't pull the trigger. Put the gun down."

Starsky didn't.

"Starsky, please."

Starsky's eyes blinked sleepily.

"Put it down before it goes off."

The gun slipped again in Starsky's hand.

Hutch fought the urge to jump forward and snatch the gun away from him.

"Go, Hutch."

Hutch took a third step back. "I'm going."

"And I don't . . . " Starsky weaved on his propped elbow, his eyes rolling. "I don't want you to come back."

Hutch's heart ached. "Starsky, please. You don't mean that."

"Yeah." Starsky's head dipped lower. "Yeah, I do." His eyes closing, until his head rested on the chrome railing and the gun dangled loosely in his hand.

"Oh my God," Hutch whispered, and rushed to the bed. Blood was weeping from the bandages on Starsky's back where he'd torn his stitches.

Hutch pounded the nurse's buzzer. "Help!"

Hutch gently took the gun from Starsky's lax hand, holstered it, then took Starsky under the arms and carefully moved him back onto the pillows.

Starsky opened his groggy, medicated eyes and saw Dobey and Huggy standing over him.

"Hutch?"

Dobey adjusted the light blanket over Starsky's chest. "He left."

"Just like you asked him to," Huggy added, trying to keep the cynicism from his voice.

Starsky looked around the hospital room, then his eyes settled on Huggy again. "Will you . . . will you see if you can find him?"

Huggy's jaw was set and his eyes were diamond-hard. "Starsky, you can't play with my man like that."

"I know. That's why I gotta . . . you gotta find him."

"He's not at his place. I already tried there."

"Not at the station," Dobey told him. "Not at mine or Huggy's."

Starsky raised his head, struggling to prop himself up on his elbows. "If I could just get out of . . . move my legs . . . but I . . . "

The exertion he was using to try to move his legs was evident on his face, a mask of perspiring, flushed agony.

Dobey firmly pressed Starsky's shoulders back onto the pillows. "Slow down."

Starsky struggled against his captain's hands. "Get lost."

"Cut it out," Huggy snapped.

Starsky knocked their hands away. "Get the hell out of here. I want to be by myself."

Dobey shot a quick look at Huggy over Starsky's head. "Starsky, this is all-"

"I don't want any company!"

Starsky threw an arm across his eyes and began to sob hopelessly.

Dobey motioned at Huggy, and then both of them turned and left the room.

Starsky jerked his arm down, panting, sniffing, yanking the cover back and shoving the chrome railing down.

"Hutch?"

Starsky leaned over the side of the bed until he tumbled onto the floor.

"Hutch!"

Starsky struggled to move himself along the floor on his elbows.

"Damn legs," he sobbed into the floor. "Damn no good legs."

His face was a sheen of sweat, the muscles in his arms tremoring with effort.

He reached a wheelchair-his wheelchair-the one they wanted to put him in, the one that would make everything final once he sat in it, the one that would be his prison for the rest of his life., and raised his hand to grip the arm of it, but only managed to pull it over sideways onto the floor.

"Damn it!"

He shoved the chair away and put his head down, crying on folded arms.

And then Hutch was there, (God, Hutch, how do you do that? How do you show up just when I need you most? How can you come back after I treated you like I did?) sitting Indian-fashion onthe floor beside him, hand squeezing the back of Starsky's neck.

"I'm here, buddy. Where do you think you're going, huh?"

Starsky raised up on his elbows and covered his eyes with one hand.

"Tryin' to find you," came his shaky whisper.

Hutch smiled. "I wasn't very far away. Just down the hall. I told you I wasn't leaving."

Starsky took his hand down but couldn't meet his partner's eyes. "I'm sorry, Hutch. I shouldn't have run you off."

"Don't worry about it."

"And for what I did with your gun. It was . . . I didn't mean it."

"I know."

"I wasn't myself."

"I know that."

"'cause you know I wouldn't shoot you."

Hutch laughed gently. "Starsk, you don't have to explain or apologize."

"And I wouldn't shoot myself either. I was upset."

"You have every right to be. You deserve a bad day over this. My God, your whole life is changing because of this. I wouldn't expect you to take this like it was a nice birthday present on a silver platter."

Starsky rested his head in his hands. "I don't know what to do."

"Just take it one day at a time."

"I've lost everything, Hutch."

"No, not everything. You still have me."

Hutch rose to his feet and righted the wheelchair. "Want me to help you into this?"

Starsky looked up at him. "Do I have to?''

Hutch tried to smile, but it was a little sad. "You know the answer to that one."

"We could try other surgeries later on," Dr. Greenspan explained to Starsky and Hutch in his office as the detectives were preparing to leave upon Starsky's discharge. "Or you may regain the use of your legs on your own, but-"

"Forget it," Starsky answered. "You already said the chances were slim for both. If I had surgery again and it failed . . . I don't want to go through this again. I just need to accept it, that's all. Learn to live with it. And I want some kind of a nurse to come over to my house so Hutch won't have to be luggin' around on me."

"Starsky, I don't mind. You know that."

"Hutch, I won't let this deprive you too. You're not givin' up your life because of me."

"No, but you gave up yours for me, didn't you?"

Starsky didn't break eye contact.

Hutch's eyes were blue flint. "So, you can sacrifice for me, but I can't sacrifice for you? Is that it? What's the difference?"

Starsky looked down at his lap, his fingers rubbing nervously on the silver wheel of the chair. "No, Hutch. I didn't mean it that way. You've sacrificed plenty for me. And that's why I don't want you to overdo it. I need to do for myself as much as I can."

Hutch rose to his feet and pointed a finger at him. "If you don't stop talking that nonsense, I'm going to leave again, and this time it'll be my idea."

Starsky's head was still down, but he was grinning now, and his grin turned into a hearty laugh.

Hutch glared at him. "What's so damn funny?"

"I can't drive you away with a stick and you know it."

Hutch was still glaring at him. "You're going to let me help you out around the house, aren't you?"

"With getting around and stuff? Yeah. With cookin' and cleanin'? Yeah. With a bath? Hell no."

By now Hutch's glaring looks were more feigned than anything else. "Bathe you? Is that what you were worried about? Me seeing your irresistibly cute body? Don't flatter yourself. I'll get the nurse to do that."

"Is that a deal?"

Hutch shook his hand. "It's a deal."

Hutch decided to push Starsky home in the wheelchair rather than take him home in either of their cars. He wanted to spend time with Starsky before visitors and nurses came to the house, and he wanted to see how well Starsky did with the wheelchair. And he wanted to lend a ready, exclusive ear if he wanted to talk.

And Starsky did want to talk, which was a relief to Hutch, who feared that Starsky would clam up and give him the silent treatment again. Anything was better than that.

"So what do we do about my car?" Starsky asked him.

Hutch wheeled him along the sidewalk at a leisurely pace. "What do you want to do about your car?"

"Can't drive it," Starsky said glumly. "Might as well sell it. You don't see Ironside drivin' his own vehicle."

"I don't know what Ironside does, but they have hand-operated controls for cars now."

Starsky brightened a little. "You kiddin'?"

"Nope."

"Hey, you know, I can push this thing."

"Not yet. You just got out of the hospital. Let me help you."

"Hutch, come on."

"Everything but the bath, remember? We had a deal."

Starsky grinned. "Just teasin'. I kinda like you chauffeurin' me around."

Hutch laughed and wheelied the chair backward, making Starsky grab for his partner's right arm.

"Easy," Starsky gasped as he suddenly paled.

Hutch set the chair down and knelt next to Starsky, who was still clutching his arm.

"Starsky, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have done that. It was a stupid thing to do."

"It's okay," Starsky whispered as he closed his eyes.

But he wouldn't let go of Hutch's arm.

"It's just . . . I don't feel any control here in this chair. I don't feel safe yet." He swallowed. "You know what I mean? I could always take care of myself. and now I feel like . . . I feel like . . . you remember that old couple with the fifty sticks of dynamite last month?"

Hutch voice was quiet and sincere. "Of course I do."

"I feel dependent. Like that. Like the elderly. Or a baby."

"Oh, Starsk."

Hutch gently ruffled Starsky's hair. "You'll feel like that for a while. It's okay. But it'll get better. I promise. This is brand new, buddy. I shouldn't have jerked you like that. I'm sorry."

"It's okay. You didn't hurt me."

"No, all I did was scare the hell out of you."

"I trust you, Hutch. Don't think I don't. I'd walk blindfolded across a busy intersection if you told me to."

Hutch smiled at the image of Starsky doing that. "I know you would."

Starsky released his arm. "Sorry. Didn't mean to amputate your arm."

Hutch rose from his crouch. "No harm. I took my vitamins today. Let's get you home for your bath-"

"Hutch!"

Hutch laughed. "Just kidding."

Starsky was touched to see that Hutch had built a smooth wooden ramp for him at the back door of his house, and he bet that there was one at Hutch's canal-side cottage too.

"Gee, Hutch, I didn't even know you could use a hammer."

Hutch wheeled him up the ramp and through the back door.

"I got a favor to ask of you," Starsky told him.

"Yeah? What's that?"

"Could you run my bath water?"

"Oh, so you're changing your mind about that, huh?"

"If you don't lay offa that, I'm gonna fire you."

"Is that a promise or a threat?"

"Both."

End

SNOWSTORM (Revised)

By TR

Starsky surveyed the snowy landscape with disdain as Hutch parked his car in front of the cabin.

"I knew I shoulda stayed home," Starsky grumbled.

Hutch's eyes drank in the picturesque setting: His father's cabin nestled against a cliff, the entire area populated by meadows and forest.

"Looks like a picture postcard, doesn't it? Hutch asked with a smile.

"This is not my idea of a vacation. It's snow, snow, and more snow."

"Then why did you come?"

"It was free. And too hot where we live. Did you even check the weather forecast before we started out on this big adventure?"

"Sure I did. It's calling for a snowstorm, but that's typical this time of year in Colorado."

"I'm surprised your car even made it."

"It wanted to come. More enthused about this vacation than you are." Hutch turned the ignition off. "'course we could have driven your car, but no, your car's too good to take on a long trip to the country."

"Wilderness, Hutch. We're in a wilderness. Nobody around for how many miles?"

"Fifty."

"Fifty. I'd rather be on a beach."

"We have a phone and a TV, so we're not totally removed from civilization."

"No, just fifty miles from it. There are no stores, go gas stations, no restaurants, no neighbors."

Hutch bit down on a toothpick. "Don't need 'em. We'll live off the land. I'll teach you to hunt, ice fish, trap, all you need to know about surviving in the outdoors."

"Why would I need to know that? I live in the city. And so do you. I'm sure those skills will come in handy during our next stakeout or undercover operation."

"They will, except you won't realize you're incorporating the skills until you use them naturally on the job."

"Oh sure. I hear you. 'The Art of Daniel Boone Zen.'."

"You won't be saying that when you're eating your first mouth-watering rabbit."

"Rabbit? I'm not eatin' no rabbit."

"Tastes like chicken."

"Everything tastes like chicken."

"Everything doesn't taste like chicken. Squirrel doesn't taste like chicken. Deer doesn't taste like chicken."

"I'm not eatin' anything that has fur on it."

"What do you think a cow has, feathers? Meat is meat. You just don't realize where your hotdogs and hamburgers really come from. Just stick to the groceries you brought. I'll eat the rabbit by myself. And the frog legs."

"Gag. Frog legs? What do those taste like?"

"Chicken."

Hutch got out of the car and opened his trunk, then tossed Starsky the keys. "Go open the door while I get our bags."

"I only brought one."

Hutch held up the single duffel bag Starsky had packed. "You call this packing? We'll be here for two weeks. What are you going to do for clothes?"

Starsky went to the front door and unlocked it. "You can kill a bear for me and make me some."

"Very funny. Don't think I'll be letting you wear any of my clothes either, because I'm not."

"I wouldn't want to."

It took three trips to the car, but Hutch finally managed to get all of his belongings inside.

The cabin was small, but clean and orderly. A small kitchen and bath, with the largest area being the living room, where there was a sleeper sofa, a set of bunk beds, a coffee table, rocking chair, and fireplace. And old musket hung on the wall above the mantle, as did a portrait of an old man holding the musket.

"Davy Crockett?" Starsky asked as he observed the picture.

"My grandfather. Will Hutchinson. He was a preacher."

"A preacher who shot bears," Starsky said rummaging through the box of groceries. "Hey, when can we eat?"

"Right after we build a fire. We'll roast weenies and shish kabobs."

"Cool."

"Can you start a fire in the fireplace?"

"What, pour gasoline on some logs and set it ablaze?"

"Never mind. I'll do it. Just get some kindling."

"What's that?"

"You know. Stuff to get a small fire going. Newspaper. Sticks. Your fingers if you don't watch your mouth."

"We want a big fire, don't we?"

"But you have to use a little fire to start a big one."

"I'm confused."

"Don't be. Just get the kindling while I chop some wood."

"You gotta chop the wood yourself?"

Hutch stared at him. "Starsky, fireplace logs don't grow on trees."

"Yeah, they do."

"Well, they do, but you have to chop the trees down, and then you chop it up."

"My God, how long does that take? I'll starve to death."

"It won't take long if you help me."

"I don't know how to use an ax. I'll cut my foot off."

"Just watch me. I'll show you how it's done."

And Starsky did watch, hunched against the biting cold air with his hands in his pockets, shifting from foot to foot, watching Hutch chop the tree, chop it into logs, and then splitting the logs on a stump.

Hutch heaved the ax in clean, strong strokes, his face glowing a healthy pink, his breath coming and going in lively pants. He grinned boyishly, invigorated. "See? That's all there is to it. Want to try?"

Starsky took the ax, raised it over his head, then swing it down to split a log on the stump.

The ax blade missed the log altogether and sank into the stump.

"City boy," Starsky griped to himself. "Told you I couldn't do it."

"Don't give up. Try again."

Starsky yanked the ax from the stump and brought it back over his head, swinging it down again, this time splitting the log cleanly in half.

"Yes!" Starsky exclaimed happily as he held the ax victoriously over his head.

Hutch smiled. "Practice makes perfect. Grizzly Adams would be proud."

They dumped the wood into the woodbox attached to the side of the cabin and closed the lid, then carried some pieces inside to start a fire.

"Mmmm," Starsky commented as he and Hutch finished the last of the slow-roasted beef, mushroom, carrot, and potato kabobs. "Best meal I ever had."

They were lounging on the floor with their backs to the sleeper sofa in front of the fireplace.

"Every meal is the best meal you ever had," Hutch told him with a smile.

Starsky looked toward the window. It was almost dusk and the snow was starting to fall heavily.

He sat staring at it as if hypnotized.

"Pretty," he said quietly. "I think I'll go outside and take a picture."

Hutch raised an eyebrow. "You brought a camera? That's good."

"Yeah, I brought a camera. To take a picture of the bear that's gonna eat you up."

"There are now bears in these woods."

"Good."

"It's the timber wolves you have to worry about."

Hutch washed the dishes while listening to the transistor radio, which gave repeated warnings of a severe snowstorm.

He looked out the kitchen window and saw that Starsky was busy building a snowman in the white powder that was halfway to his knees. The falling flakes fell fast and heavy around him and he looked like he was in the middle of a shaken paperweight.

Hutch watched with a grin as Starsky decorated the snowman in a baseball cap, sunglasses, and a tennis racket. Then Starsky stood back and took a picture of his creation.

Hutch rapped on the window with a spoon to get his attention.

Starsky looked his way and waved, motioning for him to come out.

Hutch shook his head no and held up the bottle of dishwashing liquid.

Starsky motioned again, and again Hutch shook his head no.

Left to his own devices, Starsky scooped up some snow, formed a snowball, then hurled it at the window.

"Damn you!" Hutch laughed as he charged toward the front door, throwing it open and shoveling up his own quick snowball, heaving it at Starsky and catching him in the shoulder.

They continued the snowball fight, laughing and swearing at each other, until after dark.

Starsky lay on the top bunk and watched the snow fall through the window. The flurries fell peacefully against the pane. "Hutch, why can't the world be as pure and white and clean as it looks right now?"

Starsky waited for a response but got none. They were tired, if not exhausted, from the long trip, chopping wood, and the snowball fight.

"Hutch?"

Starsky's eyes drew heavy, and all he could hear were the low, soft strains of classical music coming from the lower bunk beneath him via the transistor radio in Hutch's sleeping hand.

Starsky wanted to ask Hutch the question again, but he himself fell asleep before he could move the words from his head to his mouth.

A few hours later Starsky was awakened by the chill in the cabin. He looked outside the window and saw that the snowdrifts were halfway up the cabin, then leaned his head over the side of the bunk and looked at Hutch, who was sleeping blissfully away. "Hutch? Fire's out."

When Hutch made no offer to move, Starsky grumbled under his breath and slipped down from the top bunk, pulling on a flannel shirt, jeans, and hiking boots over his thermal underwear.

"Okay," he said as he headed for the front door. "Next time it's your turn to get the firewood."

Starsky stepped outside. It had stopped snowing but the snow was up to his knees. He trudged with difficulty around to the side of the cabin and cleared snow from the lid of the woodbox by scraping his arm across it.

Reaching in, he gathered up an armload of wood and started back around the cabin, moving slowly and with difficulty through the snow.

And was when he was halfway around the side of the cabin that he heard the noise behind him.

The low, threatening growl of an animal.

Starsky looked over his shoulder and saw the German shepherd crouching under a snow-capped bush twenty feet away, coiled and ready to spring.

Starsky froze and let all but one piece of firewood tumble to the ground. This piece he gripped like a club as his eyes locked on the animal's.

"Nice doggie," Starsky said gently as he took one step back. "Be cool. I'm just goin' back inside the cabin. No harm, no foul, no big deal."

The animal continued to growl, its eyes and muzzle dipping low. It came a step closer.

"Nice puppy," Starsky cajoled. "You're sick, aren't you?"

The animal froze, its eyes never leaving Starsky.

(Don't look at the dog. He'll take it as a challenge. Just slowly, slowly back yourself around the side of the cabin and slip inside the door)

"Hutch?"

The dog was not backing down. It was coming closer, still staggering. Although Starsky could see now that it wasn't exactly a dog. It was a wolf.

"Hutch?"

The wolf kept coming, slow at first, then gaining speed and bravado with each step.

Starsky threw the piece of firewood at the wolf, striking it in the head, but this did not faze or slow the animal. It galloped across the snow toward Starsky with amazing speed.

Starsky turned and ran, but it was hard to move in the knee-deep snow, and he only managed one step when the wolf was suddenly upon him, springing into the air and pouncing on his back, jaws snapping into the side of his neck and driving him facedown in the snow.

With its task accomplished, its foe no longer a threat, the wolf loped unsteadily off into the woods.

Hutch woke up for the same reason Starsky had. The cabin was icy cold.

He looked toward the fireplace, then raised a foot to nudge the underside of the top bunk. "Starsk? Fire's out." A look out the window told him it was just dawning. He rolled from the lower bunk. "Come on, sleeping beauty," he said through his long, luxurious stretch. "Rise and shine. It's time to—" Looking over at the top bunk, he saw that it was empty.

"Starsk?"

Frowning, Hutch looked around the cabin. Not in the kitchen, not in the bathroom. "Starsky?"

A quick glance to the door where they had taken off their hiking boots and he saw that Starsky's were gone.

"Making another snowman?" Hutch asked as he went to the kitchen window and looked out.

That's when he saw Starsky lying facedown in the snow, pieces of firewood scattered around him, a splash of blood on the white powder.

"Starsky!"

Hutch shot outside the cabin door like a cannonball in only his white boxer shorts, bounding around the side of the cabin, mindless of the frigid air on his skin and the icy snow on his feet.

"Starsky!"

Hutch hauled him up (never mind a pulse, never mind his pupils, forget you didn't check for a spinal injury or for a rib poking a lung or his heart first, just get him up and inside where it's warm) to his feet by the front of his jacket and he came up like a bag of bones, his face paleblue, eyes closed, limbs lifeless, head falling to his chest.

Hutch cried fearfully into his face. "Starsky!"

Starsky whined faintly in Hutch's grip. His throat glistened blood.

Hutch scooped him up and trudged clumsily through the snow with him.

Starsky groaned, "Am I walkin'?", his head lolling to one side, arm dangling toward the snow.

"No," Hutch panted.

"I'm movin'."

"I'm carrying you."

"Put me down," Starsky mumbled. "I can walk. I'm not a baby."

"You can't walk."

"I'm okay."

"You're not okay."

"Walkin'."

"You're not walking. I'm carrying you."

"Can't carry me."

"The hell I can't. I'm carrying you right now."

A silly, sleepy smile on Starsky's face. "Milk and vitamins."

Hutch waded through the snow and carried Starsky up the porch steps and inside the cabin, kicking the door shut with his foot.

"Hutch," Starsky whispered, his voice sounding weaker. "Don't drop me."

"I won't drop you. I got you."

Hutch took him to the bearskin rug in front of the fireplace and gently lay him down on his back "There you go."

Starsky's finger moved slightly. "Don't leave."

Hutch placed a hand across Starsky's forehead and looked at his groggy, distant eyes. "I have to. Just for a minute. I have to build you a fire. I'll be right back."

He ran outside again, leaping through the snow (Good Lord, Starsky, what have you gotten yourself into this time?) toward the woodbin and grabbing an armload of wood, struggling tohurry it back inside the cabin, (please be okay, please be okay, please Lord help me take care of him), again kicking the door closed with his foot.

Hutch carried the wood over to the fireplace and dumped it on the floor, starting a fire with kindling. Starsky's weak sob crushed him. "Please, Hutch. Don't leave."

Hutch took his hand and squeezed it. "Right here. Don't be scared."

Starsky fought to keep his eyes open. "Get my hand."

"I got your hand."

"Can't feel it."

"I got it."

"Don't let go."

"I won't." Hutch turned Starsky's head to one side and examined his neck. "What happened, buddy? Do you remember?"

Starsky didn't answer. Hutch placed several logs on the fire, then ran to the bunkbeds, pulled on clothes, then brought back all the blankets from the bed.

"Dog," Starsky mumbled softly. "Wolf. Bit me."

Hutch layered the blankets on top of him one by one. "What? Was it a dog or a wolf?"

"Wolf."

Hutch ran for the first aid kit and brought it back, digging through it until he found a bottle of rubbing alcohol. The fire was warming the cabin very quickly. Now Starsky began to shiver uncontrollably under the blankets, so much that the top blankets were even moving.

Starsky whined through his chattering teeth. Feeling was returning to his body, allowing the pain to surface. Hutch placed his hand across Starsky's forehead again and spoke calmly, his other hand twisting off the lid on the alcohol.

"Starsky, I have some alcohol here. That bite has to be cleaned. It'll hurt like hell but I have to do it. Hang on to me, okay?"

Starsky's stiff, shaking hands reached up and grasped the front of Hutch's shirt in a weak grip. "Cuh—can't. Cuh—cold."

Hutch slipped one arm under the back of his neck to support him, and poured the entire bottle of alcohol over the wound. Starsky squealed in pain and almost pulled Hutch down on top of him.

"Sshh." Hutch held the back of Starsky's head. "I know it hurts. I'm sorry. That part's over. It's okay now. It's okay."

Starsky's squealing died down to whimpering as he pressed his face into Hutch's shirt.

Hutch held the shuddering body closer, blankets and all. "You getting warmer now? Give it time. Hold on."

Starsky made no comment.

"Starsky, the wolf . . . Was it sick?" Hutch carefully licked his lips. "How was it acting?"

Hutch could only hope that the wolf wasn't rabid.

Starsky could only moan against him. He was fading out. So traumatized by the attack and the cold and the pain that he was putting himself mercifully to sleep.

"-is it, Hutch?"

"What?"

Hutch hadn't heard him. Starsky's sleepy mumble was so faint, and Hutch's mind so far away, that he hadn't heard all of Starsky's words.

"What, Starsk?"

"Not rabies, is it?"

Hutch held him closer. "I don't know. It could be. Was it drooling? Staggering?"

"I don't remember."

"We can't take any chances. We'll get you to a hospital as fast as we can."

Only the deep breathing of Starsky's sleep answered him. Hutch gently lowered him to the floor, secured the blankets around him, then ran to the phone to call an emergency number. A helicopter could be here in no time. He'd tell them to bring supplies for treating rabies, just in case.

A helicopter is what they needed.

But, of course, when Hutch tried to call for help, he discovered that the phone was dead.

The snowstorm had knocked the phone lines down, along with the power lines.

Breath coming faster, Hutch went back to Starsky and crouched next to him. "Starsky, listen to me. Are you listening to me? The phone's out. Electricity's gone. I'm going to take you out of here in the car. I'll be right back. I'm going to start the car and let it warm up."

Starsky didn't answer. He was sleeping deeply, or was unconscious, Hutch couldn't tell which.

Hutch scrambled for his coat and keys and ran out the door, pawing through the snow toward his car and fighting to pull the driver's side door open through the snow.

Sliding under the steering wheel, his cold, trembling fingers tried hard to slip the key into the ignition.

"Okay, you lovely piece of machinery," Hutch said to his car as he turned the key. "If I ever needed you to start, it's now. So start."

The motor chugged and tried to turn over, but that's all it would do.

"Damn it," Hutch whispered as he closed his eyes. "Please start."

He tried again, but the engine only produced small grinding clicks.

His open palm hit the steering wheel. Jumping from the car, he slammed the door with all his might, making the car rock back and forth. He ran back inside the cabin and slammed his coat on the floor. "Damn it!"

He began to pace the floor, running a hand through his hair, thinking, his eyes never leaving Starsky.

The lines would be down for days, and Starsky needed to get help today. Now. Right now. Rabies was nothing to fool with. His grandfather told him all about it when one of his horses ended up with the dread disease after being bitten by a rabid raccoon.

Prompt treatment was crucial. If Starsky had contract rabies from the wolf, then once the symptoms got too far along, it was too late and the condition was incurable. No matter how fast you get to a hospital, no matter how many injections you get. It destroys the brain and central nervous system (remember the injection that monster gave him last year? It would destroy like that, except that they were fifty miles away from the nearest antidote and his system was already worn down from exposure).

The forest rangers might do a routine check. Or they might not. But he couldn't wait around to find out.

Even his father might call the state police or National Guard and have someone check on them, but Hutch doubted that because his dad knew he loved the snow and could handle himself in a snowstorm, even a blizzard. But what his father had no way of knowing was that there was a medical emergency and he needed to get back to civilization in a hurry.

Hutch stopped pacing and looked down at Starsky, who was trying to push the blankets aside and get up.

Kneeling beside him, Hutch held his shoulders to the floor. "Whoa, Starsk. Stay down. Keep the blankets on."

"Hutch," Starsky squeaked, and tried to raise his head.

"I said stay down. Listen to me. Don't get up. Listen to me. The phone is out, the electricity is out, and I can't get the damn car started. Now I'm not trying to scare you when I say this, but I've got to get you some help right now. We can't wait on anybody else. We can't wait on the lines to get repaired. We can't wait on the rangers to stop in. I'm going to go for help."

Starsky relaxed a little. "Is it rabies?"

"We don't know. That's why I have to go right now."

Starsky shook his head no. "You can't go out there. You'll freeze."

"I won't freeze. I'll take supplies. I know what I'm doing."

Starsky tried to climb to his feet. "I'm goin' with you."

Hutch pulled him back down to the floor and grabbed Starsky's head between his hands. "Damn it, Starsky, you're not listening to me. You can't go with me. Now if I have to tie you in a chair to make you understand, I will. You can't get out in that weather. It'll kill you. I can travel faster without you. I'll be back with an emergency chopper okay? You hearing me? Just let me do this for you. I'll be fine. All you have to do is stay inside this cabin. Keep logs on the fire if you can manage. If not, you still have the blankets. Stay warm... "

Hutch pulled a white rabbit's foot from his pocket and put it in Starsky's hand, closing it up around it.

Starsky nodded.

"Hold onto this until I get back." Hutch paused, licking his lips. "Did you hear what I just said? I am coming back, and I am bringing help with me."

Starsky nodded again. Hutch set the phone on the floor beside Starsky's knee. "Here's the phone. Keep checking if you can. They may get the line up before I get back. Dial 0 for the operator." He

rose to his feet and picked up his coat. "I'm going to raise the hood of my car and tie a red curtain around the antenna for a flag.

But all of this was lost on Starsky. He looked at Hutch but said nothing, leaned his head sideways against the sofa cushion, weakly squeezing the white rabbit's foot in his hand.

Hutch ran through the snow, regarding the bulky weight of supplies in his backpack-food, water, and sleeping bag—as if it were a mere lunchbox.

He followed the road—if you could call it a road—it was more of a trail—that had brought them here, and it would have been impossible for Starsky to have made the out the outline of it and get out of here if he were the one making the trip instead of Hutch, who was navigating by familiarity alone.

The landscape around him was blinding white and deceptively gentle.

Deadly is a better word. Beautiful but deadly.

He ran faster, neither his legs nor his lungs noticing the effort, and he had never been as thankful for his strong and healthy body as he was at this moment. He could run forever, his body a flesh and blood machine, alive and vibrant, powered by stamina, will, spirit, heart, might, and a reason.

He remembered another run—six months ago—where he was running for a girl. And it paid off.

She was found alive and well. He'd run for her, the job, and her elderly father.

But this run was different: More important. More at stake. Urgent. He was running his heart out for Starsky.

(Fifty miles, Hutchinson? You think you can run—hell, WALK—fifty miles when it's NOT snowing? You think you can run it before you freeze to death or have a heart attack?)

He kept running.

His pace didn't slow for at least two hours. But it did later. For some reason, he wasn't quite sure what the reason was, the pack was beginning to feel burdensome to him, he was tripping some in the snow, his breath came in harsh pants, his legs felt like lead, and his head was starting to hurt.

And he was only halfway there.

(Don't stop, Hutchinson. You can't slow down now. Starsky's life is in your hands)

(Oh damn. Oh hell. Why can't I make my legs go any faster? What the hell is wrong with me?)

(There it is. Up ahead. That's all you need. A place to rest from the cold. A cave. Just the right place to sit down, fall down, take a nap, maybe a long nap, and then continue on when your body, mind, and energy replete)

(What would be wrong with that? You're not doing Starsky any good at this snail's pace. You need to rest so you can run like a madman again)

And that's what he did, collapsing to his hands and knees, crawling inside the cave, his vision already a blinding gray, his chest heaving, his muscles cramping and shuddering and his brain numbly and kindly shutting it all out as he used a rock for a pillow.

Hours later Hutch woke up soaked in sweat and chilling. But he didn't care that he was sick. He did curse himself for wearing out, for wimping out, wasting precious hours that Starsky neededto survive.

Crawling from the cave, he stood up and took a thermos of water from the backpack and drank half of it, feeling revitalized and ready to go again, despite the flu symptoms. He tossed the backpack aside to lighten his load and headed back for the trail, and that's when he saw a figure trudging through the snow toward him some distance away.

No coat, no cap, no gloves. Just hiking boots.

"Starsky!"

Hutch ran toward him, shedding his own coat as he did so.

"Are you crazy!"

Starsky dropped to his knees. Hutch put the coat on him, plus the winter cap, plus his gloves— which was a difficult task because he wouldn't let go of the rabbit's foot—it went inside the glove too.

Starsky gave a weak, silly laugh and started to lay down in the snow. "Knew I could find you," he murmured softly.

Hutch pulled him to his feet. "Starsky! I told you to stay at the cabin! Remember? I told you!"

Starsky smiled drowsily into his face. "Followed your footprints."

"Why?" Hutch demanded. "What would possess you to come out here?"

Starsky was reaching for the ground again. "Didn't," he mumbled. "Didn't want you out here by yourself."

Hutch pulled him to his feet again. "Starsk…"

"I didn't . . . I was scared. I didn't want to die by myself."

Hutch softened. "Starsky, you're not going to die. I'm not going to let you. We'll get help. Come on. My God, if you made it this far . . . "

But Starsky wasn't moving. He was reaching for the ground again. "Lay down," he murmured. "Gotta sleep."

Hutch gently pulled him up again. "You can't lay down in the snow. Try to stand up."

"I'll walk."

"Okay, that's good. You walk with me. We have a lot of ground to cover. You ready?"

Starsky nodded but made no move to walk. The painful task of swallowing with his constricted throat was evident on his face.

"Hutch, don't leave me here."

"I won't. You're coming with me this time."

"I don't want to die by myself."

"I won't let you die."

"Don't lie to me."

"I'm not lying to you."

Starsky's eyes were furious blue pools of anguish. He gripped the front of Hutch's shirt. "Hutch, listen."

Hutch still had to hold him upright. "I'm listening."

Starsky tried to swallow again, Hutch steadying him. "When it gets real bad . . . I saw Old Yeller, Hutch. So when it gets real bad like that, I want you to shoot me, okay?"

Hutch laughed gently. "Starsky, come on. We don't even know if the wolf was rabid."

"Tell me you will."

"I can't tell you that."

Starsky shook him the best he could manage. "Promise me, okay? You have my permission."

Hutch smiled softly. "Starsky, I could never shoot you. Not in a million years. Not for any reason."

"Please, Hutch. Promise."

(Starsky was always more honest than you, Hutchinson. Why can't you be that honest? He's willing to talk about it, willing to say what's on his mind. And he's right. If the wolf was rabid and we don't get to a doctor in time, his symptoms will be unbearable to watch. You WILL have to end his suffering somehow, and how easy is that going to be: To put a gun to his head and pull the trigger, even out of love and mercy? You may as well put a gun to your own head)

"Okay, Starsky. I give up. I'll shoot you if it comes to that. Are you happy now?"

Starsky looked around. "Are we walkin' yet? Am I walkin'?"

"No. Come here. I'm going to carry you on my back. Come here."

Starsky laughed. "That's silly."

Hutch crouched in front of him. "Okay. Climb on."

Starsky fell rather than climbed onto Hutch's back.

Hutch stood up with him, shifting him to a comfortable position. "You ready, Starsk? Hang on."

"I'm hangin' on."

But he wasn't really. His gloved hands clung weakly to the front of Hutch's shirt.

But Hutch was able to move through the snow with him.

"I'm walkin'," Starsky mumbled into Hutch's ear.

"You're not walking. I'm carrying you."

"Where's your coat?"

"You're wearing it."

"Don't drop me, okay?"

"I won't."

Starsky fell quiet, his trembling arms trying to stay locked around Hutch's neck. "Hey, Hutch?"

"What?"

"What if I fall asleep?"

"Go ahead. It's okay. Let me do the work."

Starsky groaned into his ear.

"Starsk, you okay?"

"Just kidding."

"About what?"

"Me dyin'. I'm not gonna die. I trust you. I knew you were gonna get me outta here."

"You did, huh?"

"Yeah."

"Just rest, Starsky. Quit talking."

The helicopter pilot saw the red curtain tied to the car antenna far below him. He spoke into the radio mike: "Base 2, Base 2, looks like we have some trouble here at the Hutchinson Cabin."

He maneuvered the chopper over the trees and saw the snow-covered trail that wound itself as a road through the wide open meadows.

"Tracks," the pilot said into the mike. "Somebody—one, two—on foot. I'm going down to check it out."

At first Hutch didn't hear the helicopter in the sky. He was so focused on putting one foot on front of the other that the copter circled two times overhead before he heard it. And it landed on the ground some distance in front of him before he actually saw it.

"Hey!" Hutch yelled at the pilot who was already jumping into the snow. "He needs a doctor!"

The pilot brought a stretcher over and helped Hutch lay Starsky onto it.

"What happened to him?" the pilot asked Hutch as they carried Starsky toward the chopper.

Hutch and the pilot lifted Starsky on board. "Bitten by a wolf," Hutch explained as he piled blankets on top of his partner. "Maybe rabid."

Hutch and the pilot climbed inside the helicopter and it flew them safely away from the area.

When Starsky regained consciousness in route, he groped for Hutch's hand. "Hey. Am I gonna live?"

"Yes," Hutch answered him with a smile. "The rabies shots won't be a party, but we'll live."

End