A/N: Hello again! Thank you all for your reviews and for reading. This chapter is shorter than the others, but I'm almost finished with the next chapter and will post it in a day or two. I hope you're still enjoying reading this as much as I'm enjoying writing it. Any medical-related things I include in here should not be examined too closely, as I've made the majority up (though I did use Google quite a bit).

"The Bends?" Shawn repeated, chuckling a little. "That...can't be a real...thing."

"It's not funny, Shawn! It can be really serious," Gus told him.

"Is that from ascending too quickly?" Juliet asked, as she pulled up a chair next to Shawn. She put a hand on his back, rubbing small circles and trying to ease the tension she could feel as his breath sawed in and out.

Gus nodded. "Exacerbated by the lower air pressure up here. That's why you shouldn't get in an airplane after diving. I can't believe I didn't think about that."

"It's not your fault, Gus. Did you properly ascend from all your dives?" Juliet asked.

"Uhhh," Shawn trailed off, looking guilty. "All except the...last one," he heard Gus groan and looked at his best friend. "The dead bodies...freaked me..out," he defended meekly.

Gus stood up, "And you didn't think that was worth mentioning before we came all the way up here to the middle of nowhere?" he asked, voice raised.

"I felt okay," Shawn said. "It got...worse," he gasped, "worse when we drove...up the mountain."

"Okay, it's okay," Juliet soothed, shooting Gus a glance. Getting Shawn worked up wasn't going to help the situation. Gus seemed to get the hint.

"Sorry man, I'm just worried."

Shawn nodded, trying to get a handle on his breathing. The pressure wasn't as bad as before, but the pain in his wrist and stomach were making it hard for him to take deep breaths. "Sorry," he said quietly, "shoulda been more careful."

Juliet didn't say anything but she squeezed his shoulder reassuringly. "What can we do?" she asked, turning to Gus.

"We need to get off this mountain. The decreased air pressure is only worsening Shawn's condition. And then depending on how severe the decompression sickness is, they may need to put him in a recompression chamber when we get to a hospital."

"Sounds crappy," Shawn mumbled.

Juliet frowned, knowing they couldn't get off the mountain until they were able to pull Henry's car out of the ditch. "Did you check your cell phone?" she asked Gus. "Maybe we can see if anyone at the ranger station can give us a ride."

Gus pulled out his phone again, shaking his head.

"I could hike over there, then. What is it? Three miles?" Just as Juliet said that, the cabin was illuminated by a brilliant flash of lightning outside, immediately followed by a clap of thunder. A second later, torrential rain began pounding down hard on the cabin roof.

"I don't think we're going anywhere tonight," Gus said, sitting back down in the chair and dropping his head into his hands. "Shit."

Carlton Lassiter was sitting at his desk in his house, reading the case file for the hundredth time. He had a cup of coffee next to him, the third in the last two hours. "What am I missing?" he mumbled, certain the answers were written in the pages somewhere. He needed to find out who Estevez's partner was. That was the key. He was certain of it.

Lassiter could feel his eyes drooping shut, the effects of being up for 36 hours straight starting to hit him hard. He rested his head in his hands, thinking he would just close his eyes for a second, but before he knew it, he was fast asleep. He was awoken abruptly an hour later, the Cops theme song blaring loudly from his phone. Lassiter reached out and grabbed the phone, lifting his head up and wiping the bit of drool that had collected on his chin.

"I'm up!" he shouted into the phone.

"Detective Lassiter," Karen Vick's voice had him sitting up straight in his chair, all traces of weariness gone.

"What is it?" he asked, knowing she wouldn't have called him at this hour unless something had happened.

"You need to come down to the station," she said grimly. "Now."

Lassiter grabbed his papers and jacket, out the door in under a minute. "What happened?" he repeated.

Vick sighed. "Just get down to the station as soon as possible. I'll brief you when you get here." With that, she hung up, leaving Lassiter staring at his phone. He turned the key in the ignition and sped to the station, lights and siren blaring.

The station was filled with activity, which wouldn't have been out of the ordinary if it wasn't 4 o'clock in the morning. Chief Vick was standing in the briefing room, a number of officers surrounding her. Lassiter headed straight to her, already voicing his question before he'd reached her.

"It's Estevez, isn't it?" he all but shouted.

"Calm down, Detective, I was just going to brief everyone," she turned to the room, asking for quiet. "As you all know, Rodrigo Estevez, our main suspect in the Santa Barbara Butcher case, was released earlier today. Two of our officers, Jason Marsh and Daniel Robertson, were assigned to his surveillance. Approximately thirty minutes ago I received a call from Marsh that Robertson had been knocked unconscious and that they had lost track of Estevez. Officer Robertson is in the hospital right now being treated for a mild concussion, but he is expected to make a full recovery. There is an APB out for Estevez, and I need as many officers as I can get on this case. Expect that Estevez is armed and dangerous. Let's go, people. We need this killer found and locked up as soon as possible."

With that, the room burst into action, and Lassiter pulled the chief aside. "How could Estevez get the jump on two officers?" he asked loudly.

Karen motioned for him to lower his voice, leading him to her office and closing the door. "Marsh is on his way now. He was very upset when I spoke to him, but from what I got, Marsh briefly left the car to -" she paused, lowering her voice a little, "relieve himself. Estevez must have been keeping tabs on them and he used that opening to take out Robertson."

"How the hell do you screw up so royally?" Lassiter fumed.

"That's enough, Detective. It wasn't a stakeout - Marsh and Robertson were assigned to keep an eye on Estevez. Marsh will be written up for his failure to follow protocol, but we need to focus on locating Estevez and ensuring that he doesn't hurt anyone else."

Lassiter nodded, still finding it hard to stow his annoyance. "Do we have any idea where he might have gone?"

The chief shook her head slightly. "We know what car he has and we've put up roadblocks. I don't think he'll be able to get far, especially in the middle of the night when there are so few cars on the road and with half of the Santa Barbara PD out looking for him." Vick's phone buzzed and she picked it up. "Great, send him in," she said, hanging up again. "Marsh is here. Behave yourself," she warned Lassiter, knowing her head detective had the tendency to let his emotions get the best of him at times.

Officer Marsh was young and relatively new to the force. He knocked on the chief's office tentatively, looking like a lamb being led to the slaughter. He knew he had screwed up. Seeing how nervous Marsh appeared standing in the chief's office, about to get chastised for an idiot mistake, Lassiter couldn't help but feel a little bad for him. But only a little, and he would never admit that.

"Officer, please would you repeat for me and Detective Lassiter the events that led up to the suspect's escape?" the chief asked, her voice even.

Marsh repeated what Chief Vick had already told Lassiter and it was obvious he was still shaken by the events. According to Marsh, he had returned from the woods to find Officer Robertson with a bleeding head wound, unconscious. He'd been so preoccupied with calling 911 and checking on his colleague that Marsh had completely forgotten about Estevez. By the time the paramedics had arrived and Marsh was able to think clearly, Estevez had already been gone for some time.

"When you and Robertson were watching Estevez, did you hear anything? Did you see anything that might indicate where he would have gone?" the chief asked once Marsh had finished talking.

Marsh was quiet for a minute, obviously wracking his brain to find something - anything - that could help. "When we were at the station earlier," he started, "before Estevez had been released, he kept saying something about 'the psychic.' He was very angry, like he wanted revenge or something."

Lassiter stepped forward after hearing that, "did Estevez say anything else about Spencer?"

Marsh shook his head. "No, but I got the feeling he was very set on finding him. Like Mr. Spencer was a threat to him or something."

"He knew Spencer had led us to the bodies," Lassiter said. "I have no idea how the hell he found out, but he knew. If there are more bodies that we haven't found yet, Estevez could see Spencer as a threat."

Vick was already picking up her phone. "I need two officers to check out the psych office immediately. The suspect may have gone there. Send another two officers out to Detective O'Hara's house," she ordered. She turned to Lassiter after hanging up. "O'Hara and Spencer were going away for the weekend, weren't they?"

Lassiter nodded. "Big Pine Mountain. They should be there by now," he guessed, seeing as how it was almost 4:30 AM.

"Okay, good, then we can assume they aren't in any immediate danger from Estevez."

"Oh crap," Lassiter said, remembering his conversation with Juliet earlier and Estevez's comments afterwards. He had definitely overheard. "Dammit!" he shouted.

"What is it, Detective?"

"We need to put up roadblocks on the highways leading up to the mountains. And we need to call O'Hara immediately. I think Estevez may be heading up to them."

A/N: Thank you again for reading! Please review!