Chapter Two

"Jane? Jane! Jane WAKE UP!"

Teresa Lisbon loomed over the rather disgruntled Patrick Jane.

"Jane, for God's sake! You know that you shouldn't fall asleep at work, and that's why! All you are gonna do is have nightmares and scare the crap out of everyone!"

Jane's eyes snapped open. He was lying face down on the floor, in a pool of blood. Smashed china was scattered everywhere.

"What happened?" He groaned, clutching his aching head.

"You must've fainted. Van Pelt said that she heard a smash and then a thump. So I'm guessing that you must've seen, heard or thought something which made you drop your cup of tea and faint."

Typical Lisbon. Always the agent.

"Holy-" Lisbon clapped a hand to her mouth to muffle the word that followed. "Jane, you're bleeding really badly!"

Jane sat up and looked at his front. He was covered in blood; his blood. There were two slashes across his throat, as if a razor-sharp blade had sliced through his flesh. Almost as if Red John's blade had cut his throat...

Lisbon held up a piece of broken china. "This must've cut you," she stated, very businesslike. "Come on, Jane, let's get you sorted out," she added in a soothing, motherly tone.

Soothing? Motherly? This was very unlike Lisbon. Jane hoisted himself up, with a few grunts and yelps of pain. Lisbon gripped his arm tightly, supporting his weight easily. Jane happily leant on her, nearly toppling her over.

"Watch it!" she exclaimed, not really scolding him, "You weigh a ton, you know!"

Jane was helped into the bullpen, and onto his brown leather couch. He sank in to the worn fabric, his usual sanctuary when the going got tough. He realised that he couldn't possibly wear the blood soaked shirt he had on already.

"Woah, you're gonna need a new shirt, man!" observed Rigsby, wedging the last piece of pizza into his mouth. "I think I've got one somewhere, I'll go and look!" Rigsby got up and starting rootling around.

"Thanks." Jane even managed a smile, though it came out as a sort of pained grimace.

Jane took the opportunity to lie down and contemplate what had happened. So it was all a dream? But it had seemed so real... And the cuts were just a coincidence; the china must've cut his throat, like Lisbon had said. He looked at the shard of china that Lisbon had picked up. He gently touched his cuts. His cuts were too deep and thin for a piece of china to make, surely? No, he was probably just imagining things. It was a dream after all...

"Hey Jane?" Rigsby waved a shirt in front of his face. "I got a shirt for you! It's not really a time to be picky, and I know that red probably isn't your first choice in colour, but it's the best I've got."

"No, honestly Rigsby, it'll be fine," Jane reassured him and took the shirt. It was deep red in colour, and probably about three or four sizes too big, but it would do. Red. Blood-red. His mind started to wander.

A knock on the door brought Jane out of his trance. A timid, twitchy looking man poked his head round the door. "Um, Agent Lisbon?"

Lisbon glanced up with a look of contempt that made the man step back.

"Special Agent Hightower requests your presence."

Lisbon's beautiful green eyes that Jane always admired narrowed in confusion. "Can you say that in a language that we understand please?" she barked dryly.

He gulped, looking very similar to Kermit the frog. "Uh, Hightower wants to speak to you about a new Red John case that has just come in."

Lisbon glanced at Jane and bit her lip. Was this a sign that she was sorry that he had brought up Red John? Did this mean that she had heard everything that he had said in his dream?

"Much better. Tell her I'll be there right away...?" she said, giving the man a questioning look.

"I'm Robin, ma'am. Junior Agent Robin Spandex. I send messages for Agent Hightower."

"I just wanted your name not your life story," she spat, looking as if he was a complete waste of her time.

He scurried out of the room. Jane could've sworn he had heard sobbing. If Lisbon had heard, she wasn't showing any sympathy. Of course.

She looked at Jane; her eyes making him feel slightly faint. "What?" she asked, her stoic manner masking her face completely.

"Uh, why did you have to be so impolite, he was only trying to help," he said evenly, "You shouldn't order people around so much. But of course that's what you like doing. You order people around so you can feel dominant and in control, when inside you are actually very insecure and shy." Jane's mentalist tendencies had started to shine through and annoy Lisbon.

"Bite me," she snapped, getting up and going into Hightower's office.

Rigsby and Cho looked at each other and raised their eyebrows. Grace was tapping away at her computer. Jane removed his shirt then sat in silence, thinking of Lisbon's stubborn nature, and how her stubbornness was very similar to his wife's. Rachel had always had a stubborn streak. A stubborn streak that she had passed on to their daughter.

Rigsby was the one to break this much needed silence. "So, a new Red John case, huh?" he said, apparently to himself, as nobody else was listening.

Jane was, but there was no reply to that. He wondered what Red John had done to taunt him this time. "I'm going to watch you suffer," he had said, "making every single day of your miserable life that little bit more unbearable." Jane shuddered. It was just a dream, he reminded himself.

The door swung open. "Right," Lisbon barked, her eyes flashing around the room. "It's a double homicide, a mother and a daughter." Jane's expression stiffened. "There is no husband involved; he died a few years back. Red John's mark is clearly on the wall, along with a message. The message has not been worked out yet, as the usage of the victim's blood makes it all the more difficult to read. We have been asked to check out the crime scene. There are apparently no witnesses." She cleared her throat.

"Where do you want us, boss?" asked Cho, his expression as unreadable as ever.

"Van Pelt, I want you to stay here and find out as much as you can about the location and access to roads. It is in a remote part of Sacramento, so it would've been difficult get to. The coroner said that they couldn't have been dead for more than an hour and a half, but only a post-mortem examination will tell us exactly." She paused, and waited until Van Pelt nodded, showing that she understood what her purpose was. "Cho and Rigsby, I want you to come with me and question anyone at the scene. Jane, I want you with me, examining the crime scene, if that's OK with you." She gave a pointed look at Jane. He nodded. This was going to be tough.

"Oh, and one more thing," said Lisbon, as if it was an after thought. "Jane, despite how some may be enjoying the eye-candy, put your shirt on."