Disclaimer: The main characters are not mine, this is an amateur effort written purely for the fun of it, and no money has exchanged hands, and it is not intended to breach the copyright of Paramount and Pet Fly Publication.

For Fingers and Dusty For helping this story take shape.

My Name is James Ellison. I am a Sentinel.

Jim Ellison lay on the bed an arm draped over his eyes, his mind whirling round. Without conscious thought his senses began to track the man sleeping below in his old box room.

First he could hear his heart beat, slow and steady; then the rhythm of his breathing, the rustle of air through his lungs, the soft moan as he turned over in his sleep, the sound of the sheets sliding over skin. Then the man's scent, a pleasant, musky white chocolate. Jim licked his lips tasting the scent of his guide, then he pulled back at the metallic scent of blood, and chemicals a reminder that his guide was injured, and still recovering from the vicious prolonged sexual assaults in the correction facilities.

This was the fourth day that he had cared for his guide's injuries. As a former army medic he had the knowledge, and knew that sometimes you had to inflict pain to help. It still, however, made him sick to his stomach to hear the suppressed whimpers of pain, that his guide tried to hide by pressing his mouth against his arm, as he tendered the intimate injuries. Then there was always that stench of fear that soured his guide’s scent the moment he moved him onto his stomach. His ultra sensitive fingers could feel the muscles through the smaller body tense, the kid’s fingers clawing into the sheet. At Jim’s first touch on the small of his back his guide would try to crawl to the head of the bed, away from him, only to have to be caught and gently tugged back into place.

Even as he ordered his guide to link with him, the bliss of feeling his guides mind touch his, and the gentle caress as it moved through, curling round his emotions, calming his fears and promising that they would never be parted, his guide was his life. In marriage he had given his vow of ‘till -death -do -us -part to Caroline, and eight years later all that was left of the marriage was a divorce paper with both their names on it. With his guide it would be different, with the merging of their minds their fate was sealed, two people, one life, until death.

Fate or destiny had brought his guide to him.  Fate, Jim mused; we use that word when someone dies, or there was a tragedy, it was fated to happen. If something good happened, however, then it is destiny. The same occurrence, but a different perspective.  One-man’s fate is another man’s destiny.

His guide.   Was it fate, or destiny, that they had joined? He knew that Simon Bank, his Captain and friend, already thought that the arrival of Blair rogue, corrupt guide, into his life was fate. Jim’s lips twisted into a smile, he would say that having Blair, a brilliant, and compassionate guide in his life was destiny. And he had learned long ago that you didn’t go against destiny.

The fingers of Jim’s other hand curled round the report, with the thick GDP embossed logo on the front. Without looking at it he knew about the red flash on it, marking the contents as that of a guide, and the black markings, a rogue guide.

He didn’t have to re-read the information in it; the photograph of Blair showed discoloration of bruising along his face and a split lip, but what burned the image into his mind was the look of total despair in the eyes of his guide.  The young empath had been taken to the correction facility one, more cannon fodder for retraining; there were only two ways out of the facility, death or bonding.

Blair Sandburg had been declared morally corrupt. It was said he had used his empathic ability to prostitute himself with the guards, seducing them into sexually perverted acts to gain his freedom. The report of the Correction Facility doctor had been damning. Jim shook his head, at the sheer stupidity of the medical staff; that doctor had seen the effect of sexual abuse, repeated rapes and dismissed them as the guide’s fault, caused by his corrupt nature. Blair should have been moved to another facility, but he had been lost in the deepest recess of that man made hell, where Wilson had used him, for his own pleasure and those of his cronies.  On the day Blair had been thrown into a room to bond with an out of control Sentinel he had stunk of blood and sex, it permeated his whole being. His young guide had been barely able to move because of the damage inflicted on his malnourished body. Yet no one had cared, he was a tool nothing more. The Sentinel remembered the looks of the people around him, contempt and hostility, emotions hurled at an already over stretched empath, each emotion like a barbed arrow into his mind.  Jim closed his eyes, when had it gone so wrong, that one section of society could be used and abused without a murmur of protest

Without opening his eyes, Jim threw the crushed folder across the room; it hit the wall with a bang.  As he wished that he could rid Blair of the burden of his memories as easy as it was to rid himself of the report.

The Sentinels senses cocooned his young guide, monitoring him, and so detected the increased heart beat, the breath coming in quick gasps, then a scream muted against a pillow and one word, NO, cut off.

Before he knew it, Jim Ellison was half way down the stairs and crashing into his guide's bedroom. 

Blair threw himself back against the wall, his arms coming up to protect his face and head.

“Don’thurtmeyoucanfuckmejustdon’thurtme.” The words tumbled out so quickly that Jim couldn’t’ really understand them. He slowed, and then knelt down so that he was on the same level as the younger man.

“Blair,” The sight was heart breaking the smaller man was shaking, the blankets pulled down low on his thighs; the bruising, the burns and welts on his skin, on plain view to the Sentinel.

Frightened blue eyes watched him; he made no effort to cover himself up. Jim knew why. It had been beaten into Blair that his mind and body belonged to his Sentinel, and therefore a guide he had no right to privacy, because as a guide, he was nothing. Reaching out Jim gently pulled the blankets up to cover Blair, ignoring the blood smears caused by a body still not healed.

Jim looked down at the sweats on the floor. “Why did you take them off Chief?” He kept his voice soft.

“Hurt, they hurt,” Blair colored and made a motion down his body.

The Sentinel cursed himself; he should have realized that Blair’s body couldn’t bear the touch of the cloth on his skin.  “No problem,” Lightly patting his guide’s knee, ignoring the flinch at this touch, he got to his feet. When he returned it was with his own flannel robe, and he coaxed his guide into it. This way Blair was covered, and warm, without causing him further pain. 

Jim tightened his grip on his guide, holding him close to his chest; one arm wrapped round the smaller body, the other resting on the back of his head, tucking it under his chin.  Jim gave a sigh of relief as Blair slowly relaxed against him, then a smiled as a smaller hand; stroked across his chest, to cling to him. Softly, Jim brushed his lips across the top of Blair’s head, scenting the long curly hair, needing to know that the only scent on his guide was his own.  Contented, he whispered, “Connect Chief, I have to feel you.”

He felt Blair’s lips move against his neck, the puff of air on the skin made him, shiver through the very core of his being, then the tug on the back of his mind, and Blair was there. The peace and comfort he felt as they bonded, was the bliss that he had sought ever since he had come on line as a Sentinel.

0-0-0-0-0

Jim was the first one to wake up; for a moment he just laid there, his arms wrapped round his guides smaller body. His face pressed against the long hair, burying it into the curls; they felt like raw silk against his skin. One hand rested on his guide’s, over his heart. The steady thud of Blair’s life force vibrated through his fingers a confirmation that he was alive.

Encouraged his pushed his senses out, and the voices and noises of the people around the building came to him, as he listened into their lives; an arguing wife and husband, a child refusing to eat it’s breakfast, a man griping about his car. He pushed out further and further.  Then suddenly there was nothing but a feeling of falling.

Then the touch of smaller hands holding his face, the breath of sweet scent brushing over his mouth and eyes, and the warmth of a body pressed against him anchored him and brought him back. He opened his eyes and looked into the intelligent but worried eyes of his guide.

“You felt me zoning.” Jim breathed softly. His guide had been connected to him, Blair’s mind cocooning him, stopping him from falling into a zone out.

Blair nodded slightly. And leaning forward he rested his forehead against his Sentinel, considering the abuse he had experienced it had taken all his courage to do that. Never breaking eye, or physical contact, he lowered his barriers, leaving only his Sentinels shields to prevent him from over loading and coma. It was drastic, but it was the only way. He was driven by night terrors that he could never put into words, but all that had to be pushed back his Sentinel needed him.

Jim had felt the barriers around Blair’s mind drop, and he gasped, it was like trying to catch water in his fingers.  He could feel Blair slipping away from him. It was then the dark Sentinel came forward, the wilder more powerful part of his Sentinel persona. The Dark Sentinel wouldn’t let his guide fall; he would fight and kill to protect this most precious bundle in his arms.

The Dark Sentinel’s powerful shields wrapped themselves round Blair, holding him, protecting him.

Blair tipped his head up to look into his Sentinels face, and in the piercing blue eyes he saw and felt the change as Jim Ellison, Dark Sentinel, became Jim Ellison, the man.

The chill in the blue eyes faded and when Blair went to lower his head in submission that all guides should show, his Sentinel caught his chin and tilted his head up

My name is James Ellison, I am a Sentinel who are you?

The end.