As I sit here waiting for the end, I can’t help but wonder when did it all go so horribly wrong? When did something so beautiful, so wondrous get twisted into something so horrible? I don’t think it was an overnight thing, more than likely it was a gradual twisting. A happening so slow that I don’t think any of us realized it until now. The rain keeps falling, creeping its way under my coat collar to slide, cold and relentlessly down my back. My coat is poor protection against this rain, sodden and wet as it is and as I shiver, part of me wonders if it will ever stop. I stifle a snort of impatience at myself. Who gives a damn if the rain ever stops? I surely don’t. I shift on my feet trying to will the cold and numbness from them. I know he is cold and wet as well, wherever he waits in this godforsaken night. I try desperately to see beyond the darkness and the downpour, to determine where the man I once called friend might be. Muttered curses, soft in the night tell me that I’m not the only one wishing for a reprieve. Another soft sound and I know that I am not alone any more here in the dark and rain. A hand laid on my arm, thin delicate fingers and bone structure… Megan. “You think he’s out there?” she asked softly, knowing that she will be overheard. “No doubt about it.” I answer, my own voice pitched low in the hope that perhaps he won’t hear. “He knows we’re here. And he is just waiting for us to make the first move.” “Sandy?” she asks and I flinch. This is the one question I didn’t want to have to answer. I shake my head sharply, trying to deny what must be the truth. “Simon, do you think?” Something rises in my throat and I can’t speak for the moment, but at last manage to choke out the words I don’t think she wants to hear. “I doubt he’s still alive, Megan.” I turn my head from her face lit by the flashes of sporadic lightning, not wanting to see the pain there. “You saw what happened as well as the rest of us.” Another movement, this time to my right and Joel drops next to us. His face is lined with worry and with something that we all feel but cannot name. Another crack of lighting, and I can see the grim lines around his eyes. He doesn’t have to say what is there in his eyes. He knows as well as I that what will happen tonight is wrong. But he also knows that it MUST happen. “We’re ready, Captain.” Is all he says. Once again I face into the rain, looking into the darkness of the night. What the hell happened? When did it all go wrong? One more crack of lightning and I give the command for the teams to move out. To put an end to this horrid nightmare. I turn my face to the heavens and let the rain wash the tears from my face as they fall. Then I too move toward the dark cabin I know is in the distance. We move quickly and as silently as we can through the trees, toward the small cabin in the center of the clearing. We don’t make it that far.. A sound from ahead and the cry of someone being startled. “Captain Banks, here!” Sudden light as flashlights are turned on, and I can see one of the SWAT officers standing over something on the ground. I hurry to him, cursing under my breath at the incompetence of some people, afraid that the night will be shattered by the sounds of a sig sauer discharge. But my fears go unfounded. And I halt in horror at the sight before me. Kneeling in the rain, the shattered body of his guide cradled in his arm, James Ellison doesn’t move. His head is bent, his body shaking with the chill, his weapon nowhere to be seen. He raises his head at my approach. Blue eyes stare into mine unseeing for a moment. Then he speaks, in a voice broken and harsh, devastation in his words. “I couldn’t save him.” The very toneless-ness of the voice more chilling than anything I have ever heard. “He’s dead.” Then my friend looks at me and actually sees me for the first time since this nightmare began. “Please…” the soft whisper is almost lost in the surrounding noise of the rain and storm. “Please Simon.” I don’t have to hesitate, I know what he is asking. I give the order and stifle the complaints and comments that it brings. Finally, we are alone, sentinel and captain, friend and foe. “Please.” Once again he asks. I nod, drawing my gun, its weight heavy in my hand and even heavier in my soul. But I cannot deny the raw pain and agony in that crushed voice. Cannot turn my back on my friend THIS time. This time I will be Simon not Captain… a friend not a cop. With the blast of noise, the night is shattered. And the rain becomes silent witness to the death of a friendship and the betrayal of beauty. How the hell did it come to this?
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I wipe the tears from my face as I watch the dirt begin to fall on the dark pewter casket. I had not ever thought to be here. Standing graveside, attending a ceremony for someone who should have out lived me by many years. Yet here I am, one of many, come to say goodbye to the gentlest soul ever to walk this planet. God, it’s not right. I shake my head sharply. This is wrong. I can hear Connor’s quiet sobs echoed around through the attendees. Movement tells me that people are starting to wander away. Their soft talk seems, I don’t know, inappropriate somehow as snippets of their conversation come to me, borne on the slight breeze that has decided to grace this dark grey day. I look up from the grave to see that most have left; only William and Steven Ellison remain. Their presence here had caused no small amount of anger with the rest of the mourners. After all, if it hadn’t been for Jim, Sandburg would still be with us. Yet I cannot blame them for what I myself don’t understand. However, their grief is just as intense as mine, I can see it in the eyes and the tear tracks on their cheeks. Unanswered question also plague them, there is no understanding for any of us. No closure, no reason, nothing but this blank pain, the yawning hole of loss. Without a word, we three leave the slowly filling grave, a few short steps brings us to another. The recently placed headstone, plain and dark. It took pulling all the strings I had to get him placed here, next to Sandburg. More favors used than I would have thought necessary. I can barely read the inscription James Joseph Ellison; Beloved Sentinel to Blair J. Sandburg September 2001- November 12, 2004. The pain grabs at my chest once more and I clench my fist against it. William lays his hand on my shoulder but I’m not certain if it’s to give or receive comfort. Anger floods my soul; anger and hurt. Jim had been Cop of the Year for three years, best damn detective ever in Major Crimes. Yet that hadn’t mattered… none of it had. None of it answered the burning question that we had all been asking for the past month. What the hell had happened? What caused a Sentinel to turn on his Guide? The rain starts to fall once again. It hasn’t stopped for more than a couple of hours for the past week. Fitting, I muse. The slight salty tang segues into the smell of wet, hot cordite and the sound of heavy wet earth striking the casket in the next grave becomes the thud of Jim’s body hitting the ground. A crack of thunder is the sound of my Glock empting the round that killed my best friend. The salt I taste isn’t the salt of the ocean rain; it’s the salt of bitter tears. Rain runs in tiny rivulets down the mud that mounds over the grave in front of us. It’s tracks a mockery of the tear tracks on my face. How will I live with this? But even more importantly… will I ever know what happened? How did it come to this?
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