Title: Shattered Reality
Author: Cynthia Beckner
Warning: There is some blood. This is a death story, but at the same time it isn't. So read it and decide.
Disclaimer: I don't any of them, well except John Camble and I'm not sure I want to take credit for him. 
Notes: ** indicates thought. Also thanks to my beta readers Elaine Powers and Kimberly Workman. This is my dues (late). This is the finished story to a teaser that I sent out in late June. I want to also thank everyone who responded to that teaser. I probably wouldn't have finished this story without you. So read and enjoy. Send feedback good and bad, but please let be constructive. Please just don't shot me.

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Shattered Reality
Cynthia Beckner

Blair was awakened by a god-awful scream that belonged in a cheesy horror movie, not the loft. At first he feared that it was Jim so he ran out of his room and started charging up the stairs to the older man's room. However, as Sandburg awoke more, he remembered that Jim was out of town. Momentarily confused, because he could have sworn that the scream had come from 
inside the loft, he paused on the steps and listened. Several seconds passed and nothing. Taking a deep breath, Blair made his way back down the stairs. Once in the front room, he turned on a light. His heart stopped at what he found.

Blood covered almost everything in the front room of the loft. It was splattered on the walls and covered the furniture and floor. The 
smell was just as bad and Blair wondered how he could have missed something like this on his way through here. He found himself just standing there, unable to move. Finally he looked down at himself and gagged at the amount of blood that covered his clothes and dripped from his hands. How could he have missed this he wondered, but no answer was forthcoming. Concentrating on his
hands, he realized that he was grasping something in his right one. It was a large butcher's knife, he recognized it from the kitchen, which was also covered in bright red blood. **What have I done** Blair asked himself.

Hearing a moan, he dropped the knife and moved around the couch. Laying there on the floor, was Jim. Even from where Blair stood, he could tell it was bad, as if the blood hadn't already clued him in on that. There were several stab wounds in his chest and it was a wonder that Jim was alive, much less semi-conscious. What got Blair the most however was not the blood from the wounds, but the look in Jim's eyes as they fell on him. They were asking the question that Jim could not. Why? A moment later they closed and Jim took his last breath.

All Blair could do was stand there, not believing what he was seeing, but no matter how many times he closed and opened his eyes, nothing changed. He had killed his best friend in cold blood. Somehow he had gotten up and stabbed Jim several times for no reason. Taking a better look around the loft, he could see the signs of a struggle. He could also see his and Jim's bloody
footprints on the stairs, in the kitchen and front room. A silent testament to what had happened. Slowly everything faded out from Blair's sight but the blood. Suddenly it seemed like all he could see was his best friend's blood as it cooled on the floor. Everything else just disappeared.

The next thing he knew, someone was shaking him and calling his name. Finally, Blair looked away from the blood and to the person calling his name. What he saw startled him as much as everything else did. At first he saw Simon, but at the same time he saw Jim. Both were hazy and standing in the same place. It was like both and neither of them were there. Looking around the loft, he saw that everything was like this. It was like watching two movies at the same time as they overlapped each other.

In the first movie, Simon was standing over him and Jim was dead at his hands. In the other Jim was standing over him and Simon was at the phone talking to someone. He hoped that the second one was reality, but he couldn't shake the feeling of blood dripping from his hands. So instead of answering either Jim or Simon, who seemed to be yelling at him, but he couldn't understand them, Blair closed his eyes and let the darkness take him. He could only hope that, when he awoke, everything would be back 
to normal and his best friend would be waiting for him.

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Reality 1

Simon didn't know what to think when he was running up the stairs to the loft. He had been called after a disturbance had been phoned into the police. The person who had taken the call had recognized the address and immediately called Banks. The Major Crimes Captain only thought was what Jim would do when he got home and found out that Sandburg had been hurt in some
way. Jim had to driven down to Seattle that afternoon when a break in the serial killer case, that he had been working on, had been called in. There had been two killings in Seattle that fit the M. O. perfectly. However, just before Jim had left, he and Blair had a huge blow out in the bullpen.

As he approached the door to the loft, he drew his gun and signaled the men with him to break down the door. The Captain didn't want to waste any time getting in there if Blair was in serious trouble. If this proved to be a false alarm, he would replace the door personally. Seconds later they were inside the loft, prepared for just about anything, except what they found. From their position they could see Jim laying on the floor covered with blood. Blair stood a few feet away from Jim's body just staring at the
downed detective. To Banks, Sandburg looked like he had zoned out.

"Rafe, check Jim. Everyone else spread out," Simon ordered. He made his way to Blair, trying to avoid all the blood on the floor. He didn't want to mess up any of the evidence that it might contain.

"Captain," Rafe called out just as Simon reached the young Anthropologist. The detective waited until Simon had turned to look at him before continuing. "He's dead, Sir."

At Rafe's words, Simon closed his eyes and sent a prayer up to the heavens. He had no idea who he was praying for, but he had a bad feeling that before the night was over, he would know. Taking a deep breath to center himself once more, Simon started the task of trying to shake Blair out of his own little zone out. However, he had the feeling the kid wouldn't want to come
out.

It was a few moments before Sandburg responded to Simon's voice and touch. Banks watched as Blair's eyes shifted from Jim's corpse to the Captain. The look in his eyes was something that Simon couldn't even begin to describe. The Captain watched as Blair's eyes moved from him to roam around the loft. The kid never once looked at Jim's corpse during that time. Then, 
after a few moments, they came back to look at him for an instant before his eyes rolled up and Blair passed out.

"Captain what happened here? It looks like…"

Don't say it Detective," Simon cut off Rafe in mid-sentence. Nevertheless, Captain Banks was thinking the same thing as Rafe. Everything pointed to Blair being the killer, but Simon was having a hard time with that concept.

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Reality 2

Jim and Simon arrived at the loft to smell something burning. They had both raced inside to find dinner ruined and Blair curled up next to the couch muttering to himself. The kid had blood running down his face, but the wound was not obvious from where they stood. Both men forgot the ruined dinner, as they rushed to Blair's side. His skin was like ice and his lips were beginning to turn blue. Jim had Simon call an ambulance as he tried desperately to get Blair's attention. At first he though he had it when Blair turned to look at him, but then his eyes slide closed and he passed out.

The young Guide fell limply into Jim's arms, but to his relief Blair was breathing on his own and his heart rate, although slow, was steady. With Simon's help, who had come over as soon as he was off the phone, they were able to lie Blair on the ground with little movement to his head or neck. Jim was concerned about possible injuries to either place that they might make worse if they were not careful. Simon quickly moved to Blair's room to grab a blanket, while Jim stayed and monitored Blair. Carefully, Ellison
looked for the wound on Blair's head. It wasn't that hard to locate. The wound itself worried Jim as much as Blair's collapse. It was long, deep, and still bleeding.

"What do you think happened Jim?" Simon said as he placed the blanket over Blair. When he got no response, he looked over to Jim and realized that the detective was zoning. "Jim!"

"What?" The Sentinel snapped out of the light zone he had fallen into.

"You zoned. Are you alright?" Simon asked. At this point he was badly craving a cigar, the stress of the past few minutes wearing on him.

"Yes. He got hit with something pretty hard. It doesn't look like anyone broke in here, but I'm pretty sure this happed here in the loft."

"We'll figure it out, Jim," Simon tried to reassure the grim-faced Sentinel.

"I hope so `cause I really need to apologize for earlier. I was out of line, but that didn't really stop me, did it?"

"Jim you were stressing about this case and the call from Seattle didn't help any." Simon knew that Jim had been working on nothing else but this serial killer case. He had been coming in early and leaving late just to catch this person. Ellison just didn't want another kid to disappear and be found dead at some schoolyard.

"Thanks for sending Rafe and Brown to Seattle for me." Jim stood up and moved towards the door. He had heard the ambulance long before it got there and had been listening to the paramedics as they climbed the stairs to the loft.

"Look, everything's going to be fine Jim. The kid will be fine and back to his annoying self in no time," Simon tried to reassure Jim, as the detective let the paramedics in. Joel Taggert came in right behind them.

"I heard the call," Joel explained. "How's Blair?"

"Unconscious," Simon said as he got up and walked over the Bomb Squad Captain. "Get Forensics over here. This could have been an attack and, if it was, I want to know by whom. I'm going to the hospital with Jim."

"You got it Simon," Joel said as he watched them load Blair on the stretcher and wheel him out of the loft. Joel shook his head in disbelief as he watched. Blair was strapped to a backboard, his neck and head immobilized, and the bandage on his head was already turning bright red. "We'll get the person who did this, Jim."

Ellison just looked at Joel and nodded his head. He wasn't really listening, but he got the general idea. Right now, however, he was more concerned with how Blair was doing. He listened to the paramedics as they relayed information to the hospital, but only understood about half of what they were saying. The half that he did understand didn't do anything to reassure
him that his partner was going to be alright. He felt Simon walking behind him, but quickly blocked that out when he saw Blair's hand twitch. The paramedics must have seen it too, because they stopped suddenly and started to call Blair's name. The young Guide, however, stayed oblivious to the outside world.

Quicker then Jim could keep track, they were downstairs and loading Blair into the back of the ambulance. No one said anything to him as he climbed in, too. Somewhere in the background, he thought he heard Simon say something about meeting him at the hospital, but he couldn't be sure. Ellison knew he was on the edge of a zone out, but didn't care. Nothing was going to take his attention away from his injured Guide. He knew that if Blair were awake, he would say that it was some type of guilt thing. Jim
wasn't there to keep Blair from getting hurt, so now he felt that it was his fault. Sandburg would tell him to lay off it, but Jim didn't care. Maybe if he hadn't yelled at Blair, the kid would of stayed at the station and not have gotten hurt. Jim knew that this line of thinking wasn't helping anything, but he couldn't stop it.

"You've got to hold on, Chief," he whispered to his Guide. "I need you to wake up for me." Jim waited to see if, by some miracle, Blair would just wake up, but he was sorely disappointed. Nothing changed as they pulled up to the hospital and Blair was whisked away. He was only vaguely aware of Simon leading him to the waiting room and then he was aware of nothing but the sounds of his Guide's heartbeat and the doctors working on him.

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