Based on 'Jon's Downright Ridiculous Shooting Case' by AJ Sherwood.

Jon's Severely Stabby Partner Pandemonium

Jon

Then

I came to consciousness slowly. Painfully.

Waking up with a stray low-level ache wouldn't surprise me. Though I'm definitely more of a nerd than a jock, I'm not completely un-sporty. But my sense of coordination gets messed with on a regular basis by my psychic ability to see auras. I was constantly ducking out of the path of a passing stranger with anger and frustration flaring in their chakra lines. I saw more than enough of that thanks, both at home and at work. As a naturally non-confrontational person, I avoided possible run-ins like the plague.

Speaking of plagues: my ability, which caused me to see every person I encountered as a mega-watt neon sign, plagued me with regular headaches. I was often reduced to reeling like a drunk, banging into furniture as I stumbled in search of a dimly-lit corner to hunker down in, or staggering through crowded streets towards the safety of my car - equipped with blackout curtains for just such situations - with my eyes half-closed. I'd recently got over the pretentiousness of it and started wearing dark sunglasses at all times, even inside. Especially inside, where congregating groups of people lit up cramped rooms as bright as the Vegas strip.

But it wasn't my eyes or my head that hurt right now. My right side was one big stretch of zinging pain. Damn, my fair Irish skin bruised easily, and this felt like a big one. How had I managed to bang myself up so badly, and why did it hurt so much? This wasn't a little ache like an ordinary bruise. It was a deep, searing burn that went flesh-deep, steadily growing worse as I came to awareness.

Why did I feel so groggy? My eyes were closed, but I could smell strong cleaning agent and recycled air, not the scent of sage and incense that Carol used to purify the atmosphere of Psy's meditation room. Where else could I be if I wasn't there? Last I remembered, it was the middle of a work day, and I was on my way to interview a witness for a police investigation. I'd been driving with my new partner-

Oh. My partner.

I heard an intake of breath and the sound of someone shifting close by. I redoubled my efforts to crack my eyes open. My last memory being of imminent danger, I skittered backward in an attempt to get away from the noise, setting my side on fire with the effort. Despite the uptick in pain, I struggled to push myself up, not wanting to get caught in a prone position.

Have to get away- The knife- He has a kn-

"Jon, calm down! You're safe, listen to me, you're safe here, stay still!"

I knew that voice. Jim. My boss at Psy.

Overwhelmed with relief, I slumped back down. Then whimpered, as settling back on the bed - sure felt like a bed, I was horizontal at least - twinged my side again, the agony level steadily climbing.

"Stay still dammit, you don't want to pull out your stitches. Trust me, there's a lot of them holding your gut together. You sure don't want the nurse to have to sew you back up while you're conscious for it."

A hospital. Right, made sense. I hadn't immediately realized, as other than the bleach smell there hadn't been too many context clues. The ceiling looked like any old ceiling, could be anywhere. After how much I'd hurt trying to prop myself up on my elbows, I couldn't muster the effort to look at my surroundings, at least not just yet, so I settled for listening instead. The quiet I heard apart from Jim's voice was not informative. No beeping heart monitor, no hum of machinery of any kind, which was a great relief. I hoped I hadn't unconsciously ruined any equipment while they treated me - my psychic ability tended to kill electronics dead with a single touch, sometimes just by me being in the same room as me - but at least I wasn't about to break anything in the near future.

A rustle, a few footfalls, then Jim leaned into my field of view. Much I was glad to see a familiar face, I couldn't hold back a moan of pain, completely unrelated to the throbbing stab wound in my side. Jim was a good person, which meant he glowed steadily to my sight. Made him the kind of boss I'd want to have, and a great person to be around. But right now, unable to spare any of my already-shaky focus on psychically shielding myself, he was even more painfully bright to my aching eyes, and I didn't have my sunglasses.

"Sorry, sorry." Likely guessing from my squint and the groan I couldn't hold back that the sight of him hurt my head, Jim leaned back again. "Just showing you that I'm here, I'll stay close but get out of your line of sight." I heard the scrape of chair legs on linoleum as he took a seat by the bed. Phew, better.

My mouth felt like it was full of cotton, but I managed to speak around it. "Is he…?"

I didn't have to say anything more; Jim obviously knew who 'he' was, given how his reply was curt in the extreme. "He abandoned your car about ten miles from where he dumped you, in an area with plenty of security cameras and onlookers around. Left the keys in the ignition, wasn't worried about us finding the vehicle, and he didn't use it to take off anywhere outside of Nashville. We haven't fully tracked his movements after he left the car. He casually parked and just walked away, as if he had business at a store nearby. No certain witnesses who sighted him so far. Sho is going through camera footage and is monitoring his credit cards for any purchases that might give away his location. Last I spoke to her, Carol was about to do readings on him using the belongings he left on your desk. Between the two of them, they'll triangulate his whereabouts, which I will very gladly hand over to the PD. Captain Livingston wants more than a few choice words with him on your behalf. She sent a patrolman here, he's stationed outside the door. Sonuvabitch will get what he deserves if he comes back to try to stick you again, not that I think he'd be foolish enough to try."

I didn't need to look at Jim to tell that his aura would be fire-engine red and roiling like an inferno. He sounded hopping mad. I couldn't quite summon up any anger of my own right now, which likely meant I was still in shock. I could certainly manage plenty of outrage, and I was sure anger aimed at my scumbag stab-happy partner would come once I was feeling a bit more like myself.

For now, I mostly just felt grateful. Jim's concern touched me. As my boss, he put up with all my quirks because I was good for business. But I knew him well enough by now to realize that he also did genuinely care about my wellbeing. The same went for Sho, Carol, and my other colleagues. I had only been working at Psy for about eighteen months, but my workmates had already become fast friends. I'd had a group of people who I hung out with in college, but the bonds I had with the people at Psy felt far stronger. Part of that was being around people who had psychic abilities themselves, or regularly spent time around psychics. Even though I was far more difficult to be around than the average psychic, they at least had a better idea of what they were in for with me, and were for the most part willing to make allowances. Especially when my efforts were profitable; when I handed my last invoice over to her, Sharon had confided that my reputation having spread and demand for my particular talent rising, I now brought in one-third of Psy's income. Given the guilt I felt at causing thousands of dollars' worth of property damage just by hanging around the office, that was gratifying to hear.

Much as it likely bothered everyone to have a knife-wielding man on the loose, and stung their professional pride to have one of their own on the wrong side of the law, I was sure that my colleagues also wanted to bring my attacker in for the sake of my safety, to see me get justice for what my so-called-partner had done to me. Since I didn't have an anchor, a cohort of workmates who I counted as friends was the next best thing. Sure was nice, having people I could trust watching my back. Just a shame that my back still got stabbed, both literally and figuratively.

"Are you still with me, Jon?" Jim asked, likely wondering whether I was just resting my eyes or unconscious again. It took a lot of effort just to listen and stay aware, let alone talk. I could barely hear Jim over the thud of my own pulse, my side throbbing along in time with my heartbeat.

"Still here," I assured him, attempting a smile and a quip to let him know I was really alright. Well, as alright as I could be, under the circumstances. "I hurt way too much to not be at least a bit awake."

He chuckled darkly; we shared a fairly dry sense of humour, just another way we got along. Jim was a straight-shooter who said what he thought and didn't play games or act evasive, which I appreciated. "Sorry about that. The nurse is scheduled to come give you another dose of the good stuff soon. I just wanted to talk to you while you were lucid, but if it's too much I can leave it til later and call someone in to fix you up now."

"I can manage." I grit my teeth and forced myself to bear it, trying to be professional for a few seconds. "The interview will need to be rescheduled-"

"Never mind the case." Now Jim sounded exasperated. Oops. "You got stabbed, Jon, for chrissakes. The captain isn't expecting you to hop out of your hospital bed and go interview the witness you were on your way to when your partner pulled a knife on you. The witness statement you were meant to take will keep for a bit. Right now, we're prioritizing getting hold of the guy who sunk a blade between your ribs. He missed all your major organs, which was real considerate of him. Though he could have done without tossing you out of your own car and leaving you in a ditch."

"So few people have proper manners these days," I muttered, trying to mask my disappointment with humour. I hated to let down Harry Borrowman, the detective whose case I had been working when this whole fiasco went down. But I evidently had problems of my own, and was in no shape to go gumshoeing again any time today. I'd moan about losing billable hours once breathing no longer physically hurt.

Jim focused on the questions he most wanted to ask, which was considerate of him as I had just woken up after I-didn't-know-how-long but already felt exhausted. "Any idea what set him off, or where he might be headed?"

"No, and nope. I didn't really get a chance to see what prompted it. I was driving, my eyes were on the road. I had him in my periphery and I could see he was getting agitated, but I thought that was just him still getting used to being around me. You know how my ability puts new people off."

That was an understatement. My ability to see every emotion in sparkling color put people ill at ease; they worried I could skim through all their dirty laundry with a glance, and most folks found me too difficult to deal with at all. I tried not to take it personally - I'd turn my ability off if I could, it often told me a lot of things I genuinely wished I didn't have to know - but it still rankled. Obviously, it had bothered my partn- former partner more than the usual.

"What were you talking about before he got stabby?"

I battled against brain fog, trying to remember what the conversation had been before it took a drastic turn. I had a new respect for the people I interviewed after they had gone through similarly trying circumstances; turned out being on the pointy end of trauma made it very hard to think.

"We were talking about his time in Wisconsin." My new partner seemed spooked by how much I could see - in hindsight that would have been a red flag, if my ability to see people's pasts hadn't spooked practically everyone - so I'd been asking him questions about his former career with Madison PD to show him that I couldn't see everything and draw him out a bit. I'd drawn something alright, and unfortunately it was a blade. "You know I went out there that one time to work the serial killer case?" It had been a big deal, since I didn't usually travel that far out of the state - my incompatibility with technology made life on the road a highway of hell - but they'd had multiple homicides and were desperate for leads. With mine and Carol's help, they'd caught the guy within ten days. It had been extra satisfying to put such a dangerous man away and listen to the agents' and detectives' gratitude after the trouble it had taken for me to get out there. "I asked him if he'd met Freeman or any of the FBI agents I met out there, said I couldn't imagine wanting to change jobs with someone like Stefferson in charge, that I- what?"

My boss had huffed at what I'd just said. Coming from him, that was practically an exclamation of surprise. "Roughly three years ago, Stefferson headed an inquiry into corruption within Madison PD. Stefferson was lower on the totem pole then and didn't have the support he has now as Chief of Police, so the investigation didn't go that far. The man suspected of falsifying records and disappearing evidence was quietly let go with severance pay and his investigator's license suspended. Guess who the suspect was."

"Ah." That explained a lot. No wonder my attempt at small talk had failed to get my partner to open up, until he opened up in an explosive way. "I got that he was reticent about his former career, but I thought he had a bad experience and felt ashamed that he couldn't ride it out. Or was a victim of circumstance and trying to move on from the past." I had seen the gray around his career line that had indicated he wasn't entirely proud of his former profession. But seeing guilt didn't necessarily mean a person was guilty of a crime; he might have been framed and embarrassed that he had let himself be compromised, or genuinely acted on the wrong side of the law but been trying to turn over a new leaf. What I saw in a person's aura sometimes told me about their past, but wasn't indicative of who they were or what they felt in the here and now. Given how a past allegation of corruption had just turned into a very current and fully proven attempted stabbing, I had been wrong to give the benefit of the doubt.

"If he's a victim of circumstance, it was entirely of his own making," Jim snorted. "I'm just sorry that you ended up being collateral. I'm so, so sorry Jon. The guy had been vetted by people who seemed trustworthy, and you know I try to give second chances to those that deserve them. But I should have looked into this punk's past more carefully, and not put you in the potential line of fire when I knew you'd be able to see everything that he might want to keep hidden. It was negligent and irresponsible of me, and I can't even begin to apologize for that."

I wasn't sure if my eyes were bleary from tears or the effort I had to exert to keep them open. I knew that Jim was a good man, but hearing him blame himself for putting me in danger just drove home how much he cared about his employees. About me. Given how many people likely fantisized about taking a stab at me, that consideration was rare and wonderful.

"Hey, how can you blame yourself when even I didn't see it coming?" I quipped, trying to lighten the mood and shift some of Jim's guilt off him back to myself. "Besides, I can't hold your readiness to offer someone a second chance against you. I benefitted from it too." Considering I'd come to Psy with basically no employment history, a dozen possible referrals that would declare me impossible to work with, a list for equipment I'd broken a mile long, and various interviews with the alphabet agencies that deemed me a capable Reader but worthless without an anchor, Jim had been mad to employ me. I knew how much he had risked - still risked - to take me on, and I didn't treat the loyalty I owed him lightly.

"You're a credit to the agency, Jon," Jim muttered beside me. Given the gruff edge his voice had, this was as close to soft as he got; it made me feel choked up again. "Everyone who couldn't see your potential was a quitter and an imbecile. It took a while for the rest of us to adjust, but everyone unanimously agrees that we're privileged to have you at the office."

"Not quite unanimously," I pointed out.

Jim harrumphed. "The very biased opinion of a former employee doesn't count. His contract was terminated as soon as he tried to terminate you. Once we catch up with him, I'm more than a little tempted to terminate him myself."

"Harsh, boss," I drawled, smiling at the ceiling. Jim going on the warpath for my sake filled me with warm fuzzies - which, given how violence-adverse I am, was an odd sentiment to have.

Jim's reply was droll in the extreme. "Even given your history of property damage, what he tried to break was irreplaceable. If I don't wreak retribution on his sorry ass, Captain Livingston and Detective Borrowman certainly will. They well know by now just how valuable you are to the justice system."

It was nice to have friends in law enforcement who were ready to avenge me. Before I could think of future payback though, I wondered who I owed my current safety to. "How did I get here? Did a patrol pick me up?"

"No patrols out in the backwoods where you were. You lucked out: not one but two good Samaritans stopped to help you. Which is just as well, since you took out the first Samaritan's cell. And the second Samaritan's phone too; but extra lucky for you, he was an off-duty cop with an Airwave in the trunk of his car. He called it in, and they both staunched the bleeding until paramedics arrived. They weren't sure what to do with you until they found your agency ID and called me. First thing I did was get Carol to trace your car using the spare set of keys; thank god you keep a pair at reception. Sharon drove me out there, and it took a bit of convincing before they'd let me drive off with what was essentially a crime scene on wheels, but Borrowman backed me up, especially when we learned you were in a stable but serious condition by the roadside. I drove took the Humvee to you, then drove you here in it."

I must have been completely knocked out by blood loss by then, as I didn't remember any of it. Yikes, that must have been a hard sell, since moving the Humvee was akin to breaking the chain of evidence. But needs must, since I wouldn't have been able to make the trip to ER in any other vehicle. I owed Borrowman and whoever else a very big favour. It also meant the seats would need a very thorough cleaning, as they would be stained with my blood in at least one place. At least those who came to my aid hadn't tried to take me in their cars after their cell phones had become my unwitting victims.

"I hope you got the details of those Samaritans. I owe them new phones, along with my undying gratitude." Was my voice slurring, or was my hearing starting to fade? Either way, I was fast losing the strength needed to keep up my end of the conversation.

"You can tell me which flowers from Sarah's you want to send each of them later. For now, Jon, just rest."

I didn't have much chance of doing anything else. Though I faintly heard another scrape of chair legs as Jim got up, likely to go fetch a nurse, I was once again out for the count.

Now

Donovan lightly traced a fingertip over the faded scar on my right side.

Though his touch was gentle, his sentiments were anything but. A tidal wave of dark-red rage seethed inside his aura. Though we were safely tucked up in bed together, his protective instincts strobed more urgently an emergency beacon.

I took no enjoyment from his apparent stress, but his love and protectiveness lit me up inside.

When we first started working together, I had briefly mentioned to Donovan that a former partner had stabbed me. Seeing the evidence on my skin had prompted him to ask about it as we basked in the afterglow.

Sometimes our pillow talk took a more serious turn, which I wasn't adverse to. We had been dating less than a year; I always wanted to learn more about him, and tell him more about me, even if that sometimes meant that we relived difficult things together. Since he couldn't see my past in my aura like I could with him, that meant I had to verbalize it. Uncomfortable as some topics were to talk about, it only added to our relationship. I wanted to learn every side of Donovan, and have him learn every side of me. If he asked me about any aspect of my life prior to meeting him, I was willing to give him answers.

I just wished that, in this instance, I hadn't made him so angry. Especially since he had just made me feel so, so good.

"Please tell me they caught the guy," Donovan gritted out, trying and failing to suppress a full-on grizzly growl.

I chuckled smugly, knowing my answer would please him. "You know that first day, when you asked me how many inmates I had put away in the correctional facility? He was one of them. With me, Jim, Olivia and Borrowman all ready to contest it when he's eligible for parole, he won't be leaving there anytime soon."

Donovan sighed gustily in relief. I felt some of the tension leave his muscular arms, with which he was clutching me protectively. I ran my hands soothingly along his shoulders and over his chest, watching as the red-hot rage in his lines slowly fade back to burnished gold.

"I'm sorry you had to go through that," he said, patting a hand over my flank, raising goose pimples on my skin in the wake of his touch. "Though, not to blame you at all, but I'm surprised you didn't see any warning signs before it happened."

I shrugged as best I could while lying on my side with him curled around me. "I was driving, so my eyes were on the potholes in the road, not him. With me unable to look at his directly, he caught me unawares. Plus, I did see some warnings that should probably have given me pause, but… I wanted to believe that he would work out as my colleague, seeing as earlier that month my first attempted partnership had dissolved in under a week."

Donovan hugged me a bit tighter, with an indignant grumble that amused me no end. "At least they didn't stab you."

"No, though she probably wanted to. She was a 'specialist' in psychics with a degree in paranormal studies and a thousand theories - all of which she was more than willing to share - on how psychic practices 'really' worked, despite not having a single psychic fibre in her entire being. She was sure she could 'fix' my ability so I'd be able to function like a 'normal' practitioner. She finally threw in the towel after I killed the watch that had been given to her as a going-away present by her closest childhood friend, despite the fact I told her multiple times that it wasn't safe to wear it around me."

Donovan grizzled a bit more; I felt the vibration of his grumble as he pressed a kiss to my forehead. "Some people are stupid."

"They are," I agreed. We'd both had the dubious privilege of seeing a lot of stupid firsthand. "Fortunately, however , some people are the opposite." Though the story hadn't exactly come from the happiest time of my life, it had a much better ending, one that I knew would interest him. "That whole debacle was how I met Tyson for the first time."

Donovan jolted in surprise, pulling back from the hug just enough to look at me. "That's how you met Tyson?"

"Yeah, he was the second good Samaritan to spot me by the roadside and pull over. The first, Edward - nice guy, a retired school teacher, lives in Green Hills, we keep in touch and meet to catch up every so often - he stopped first, and when he pulled out his phone to call for help, it promptly died on him." Donovan chuckled knowingly. Since one of his primary tasks as my anchor was shielding me from technology - or, more accurately, shielding technology from me - he well knew why that had happened. Given his other main task was stopping harm from coming to me, I was doubly glad that I now had him as my anchor.

"Luckily, Tyson then drove by and also stopped. He took out his cell and tried to call, only for his to die too. Luckily he was still with the local PD and had an Airwave radio in the trunk of his car. He retreated a distance, finally got a call through, then came back to help stop the bleeding. Being the good detective he is, once Ed was putting pressure on the wound, he went through my pockets looking for contact details and found my investigator's license, along with the card in my wallet warning that I'm a psychic and must be kept away from all technology. He radioed in again, telling the precinct to contact Jim. When paramedics arrived, he was able to explain the situation, otherwise I would've owed the hospital a replacement ambulance. Jim got a lift out with Sharon, circumvented evidence with a bunch of favours he's likely still paying off, picked up my the Humvee I'd been stabbed in and drove me to the hospital, where they could treat me and put me up in a room with no electronics. They got a medical psychic in to analyse me, since they couldn't get CAT scans or x-rays to check whether my ribs had been nicked by the knife blade. That was the other good thing to come of it: Psy now has set procedures in place for the eventuality of me needing urgent medical care. Williamson in on call should I need a medical psychic again; between him, me and Jim, we drafted the emergency protocols that are outlined on the cards that you and I now carry in our wallets.

Donovan hummed something like satisfaction, though it was very plain that he still didn't like the idea of me getting hurt. "I'll make it my mission to ensure you never need those protocols."

That statement required me to hug the stuffing out of him. "I know you will, love."

"I take it the other good thing was meeting Edward and Tyson?"

"yep. Ed and Ty both came to visit me several times while I recovered. They've been good friends of mine ever since."

Donovan was silent for a few moments, mulling this over. "Then your meeting prompted Ty to leave the police force and join Psy?"

"Eventually. During hospital visits, we chatted about my work. Ty was curious, plus he'd been looking to cut down on his ridiculous hours at the PD, and the pay was better. When Jim contacted him to thank him and offered him a reward for saving my scrawny ass, he asked for a regular pay check instead. He'd already more than proven himself as a potential employee, and his experience on the force made him more than ideal for the role of police liaison. We've been friends and colleagues ever since."

"So you were kind of the reason he was hired." Though it wasn't a question, Donovan's voice had an enquiring tone. "But he wasn't hired as your partner, or your anchor."

I smiled wider than the Cheshire cat. My Donovan had been so enthusiastic about becoming my anchor, he had forged our bond despite not having a shred of psychic ability. He couldn't imagine anyone not wanting to be my partner or anchor, which was endlessly sweet of him and beyond flattering. Plus, he had originally been hired as a secondary police liaison, so I wasn't at all surprised that he asked. "Naw. Though we became very good friends, both Ty and I were never close enough for anchor bonds. I'm borderline demisexual, and he's demisexual with a skew towards finding women attractive. Though we might get along well personally and even find each other quite attractively aesthetically, a really good friendship wasn't enough for us to build a psychic-anchor relationship on." I reached up a hand to affectionately stroke Donovan's stubbled jaw. "Besides, I was waiting for you. Plus, Ty is so attached to his fitbit and addicted to podcasts, there's no way he could handle being around me five days per week, eight hours per day."

Donovan rumbled his pleasure and amusement, sending a thrill through all the sites where his skin brushed mine. "All very good points."

"The second-to-last one is my favourite." I nuzzled against his smooth chest, wanting to burrow into him as deep as possible. "There's no one I'd want to be anchored to other than you."

"And I'm so glad that I'm the one who gets to take care of you," he replied, carding his fingers through my hair.

I kissed his pec, which was the highest point on him I could reach with my lips when we were positioned like this, the crown of my head tucked beneath his chin. "Likewise."

"You guys did work together before I arrived, despite not being anchored?"

"Occasionally, though Tyson has his own regular clientele and a separate skillset, so he had better things to do than trailing around after me. But he was there the previous time I got shot at." I leaned back a fraction so Donovan could see as I indicated toward the near-matching scar on my left side, slightly paler against my pale skin. "He got me behind cover after I was hit, returned fire until backup arrived. Of course, he had plenty of quips about how we could never be partners since every time he was around me, someone tried to cut me in half."

Donovan fingered bullet scar just as tenderly as he had the one from the knife. Then he gathered me up to give me another squeeze that nearly threatened the stability of my ribs. "I owe Tyson bigtime."

"So do I obviously," I said, sinking deeper into his embrace with a happy sigh. "He's been a fantastic colleague to have; so, unfortunate as it was, I'm grateful that the incident led to him working for Psy. Without him, I could have possibly bled out on more than one occasion."

A spike of distress surged through Donovan's lines at my words. Damn, even when my sight didn't have me putting my foot in my mouth, I was swallowing my instep setting off his protective instincts again when he'd just calmed down.

Before I could begin to try to placate him, he rolled so he was braced above me, barricading me against the mattress in that delicious way that sent a full-body shiver right down to my toes, sparking my dick back to life on the way down. Given the way his corresponding hardness brush against my thigh, protectiveness was a mutual turn on for us. Just another way we were ridiculously compatible. If I wasn't mistaken, I was about to reap the benefits of that compatibility.

Sure enough, he asked: "Would you mind if I reminded you of just how alive you are?" As if I needed convincing, when him rocking against me made me gasp as our renewed hardnesses brushed together.

"I'm certainly happy to be alive right now," I murmured against his lips, drawing him down with my hand on the back of his neck to kiss him hungrily.

My fingertips roamed over the acid scars on his shoulders, even as his own hands ghosted over the twin scars on my abdomen again with unerring accuracy. We'd both been through some serious misadventures on our way to get here; but the hurts of the past had made us who we were now, and eventually led us to each other. Because of that, I couldn't completely regret what had happened to me - not when years later, I had finally found my perfect partner.