Panting, Blair sat back on his heels, surreptitiously wiping his mouth on the back of his hand, surveying his handiwork. Jim Ellison was spread out before him, unfurled like a flower in full bloom; flushed from the tits up, huffing and puffing like he had just had the orgasm of his life-- again tonight.

He doesn't smell much like a flower, though, Blair thought, trying not to inhale too deeply. Real bad analogy, there. Unless somewhere there's a flower that smells like sweat and come and AstroGlide. And if we smell like that to me... I'd better take a shower post-haste. Ah, the disadvantages of having a Sentinel for a lover. But then there were the advantages.... Blair smiled dreamily as he contemplated said advantages.

Jim, however, was not thinking about flowers, or showers. He gazed up at Blair adoringly, wonder and gratitude shining clearly in his blue eyes-- eyes of just such a blue that tended to remind Blair of Trident Freshmint flavour gum. "Wow, Chief," he gasped. "Just, really, really wow!"

"I'll take that as a compliment, Jim," Blair responded, "regardless of how inarticulate it was. In fact, I think it's more of a compliment because I can make you so inarticulate. Although you were pretty vocal a minute ago."

Blair leaned in for a kiss, letting Jim taste himself on his lover's tongue.

"Tastes good, Chief."

Blair chuckled.

"What's so funny, Sandburg?"

"Just remembered a really bad joke I heard as a teenager."

Jim rolled his eyes, smiling. "Okay, Chief, shoot."

"Already did, Jim. Thank you very much. And now here's the joke. What's the difference between men and lifesavers?"

"Okay, Shecky. I give."

"Yes, you did, Jim, thank you very much."

"Just spill it, Sandburg!" Jim growled.

"Already did...ow! Okay. Okay. Because they're both good to suck on, but a man only comes in one flavour."

Blair watched Jim struggle not to crack up at his stupid, juvenile joke. So much for covert ops training.

"That's what you think, Chief. Depends on what you ate."

Blair gaped. Opened his mouth to speak, but it was already open, of course, then barked out a "Hah!" of awe and appreciation.

"We're going to have to test that extensively, ya know, man." Blair shook back his sweat-matted curls in a sultry manner, sliding his eyes over at Jim. Then he cried out in his best carnival-barker imitation: "Step right up, folks. Guess what I had for lunch and win a big prize!" His eyebrows waggled knowingly.

"That's one battery of tests I could live with, Darwin."

They only did tests now for their own interest and edification, since Blair's diss had been dissed and he had his own desk at Major Crimes.

Still suffering from post-coital chuckling, Jim continued, "Well, how 'bout we start with--" when he was interrupted by loud and angry knocking on the loft door.

Blair squinted at the clock radio beside the bed, half-blind without his glasses, then looked down at his Sentinel. "It's 1:30 in the morning, Jim." At his most Spock-like, Blair had a real knack for stating the obvious. "Is it Simon?"

Jim sniffed the air and cocked his head to one side like a good Labrador retriever. "Nah. The scent is slightly familiar, but I can't identify the guy."

Fear ghosted over Blair's face. Jim reached out a calming hand, and the fear resolved itself into, well, resolve.

"The bad guys don't usually knock, Chief. Let's go find out."

The pounding began anew as they pulled on the first things that came to hand. Blair attempted to rake a hand through the unruly short curls he now sported. He failed miserably, his hand getting stuck just centimetres past his forehead. Jim spent a few seconds helping him free his trapped fingers. (Blair tried not to think about where those fingers just been.) Bed-head on Blair was a very scary sight indeed. Criminals had better be prepared if they decided to invade the sanctity of the loft. Medusa had nothing on Blair Sandburg.

The hammering on the door had continued at intermittent intervals during the two and a half minutes it had taken the detectives to reach clothes, guns and door. Knowing that stepping in front of the door to use the peephole was a good way to get himself shot, Blair stood to one side, while Jim stepped into position on the other. Blair nodded his readiness to Jim, who called out, "Who's there?"

"Open the goddamn door and find out," came a nasty yell from the other side. A woman's voice. An angry woman's voice. An angry woman who was neither Carolyn nor Naomi. Jim looked at Blair in surprise. They nodded to each other, raised guns into position and Jim swung the door open.

A complete stranger stood there, in ratty bathrobe and mismatched sleep ensemble that looked like it had also been the painting ensemble and the gardening ensemble. Her hair was every bit as scary as Blair's. Their guest was short and Semitic-looking, with Blair-hair: she looked exactly like Blair's middle-aged aunt-- on his father's side. And other than her own version of the Medusa hair, she was quite unarmed. Jim stepped back a bit, allowing her to enter.

She strode purposefully into the room, dismissing with a glance the two firearms aimed at her chest. She marched up to Blair, invading his space, and peering up to look directly into his eyes. (Yes, she was that short.)

"Which one of you is Jim?" she demanded.

"That, um, would be me, uh, Ma'am," Jim answered, caution and confusion apparent in his words. "What's this--?"

Turning to him, the intruder interrupted "And by that I mean Jim, Jim, Jimmmmm!, J~I~M!, JJJJIIIIMMMM!" She screamed that last in a high, keening pitch that made Jim's eardrums vibrate like he'd been standing too near a pissed-off Simon. Again.

"Er, um...." offered Blair helpfully.

She rounded on him. "And that would make you Blair," she spat. "BlairBaby, BlairHoney, BlairLove, Chief, Sandburg, Darwin, Darlin', Sweetheart, Sweetie, SweetCheeks, SweetAss, BottomBoy, ButtBoy, Slut, Whore, Master, Commander, Lover--"

It was Jim's turn to interrupt. "Excuse me, but who are you?"

Scathingly she spewed, "Who do you think I am? I'm your conscience. I'm your nemesis. I'm your worst nightmare. I'm your new next door neighbour!"

"Oh," said Jim.

"Oh," said SweetCheeks.

"Okay." She moved on. "Now that we've all been formally introduced...."

Sarcasm 'R' Us. Go with your strengths, girlfriend, Blair thought. Secure in his own sarcastic achievements, he took a moment to admire a true master.

She continued as if she hadn't been interrupted (because, indeed, she hadn't been). "We're going to move on to a solution to my noise problem. The one that keeps me from getting any sleep at night and thereby makes me very, very cranky! Not to mention the whole sour grapes thing-- that other people are getting some and I'm so not."

Jim caught Blair's eye over their irate neighbour's head. "Relative of yours?" he mouthed.

"'So not'," Blair returned silently, rolling his eyes.

Glancing around their loft, she re-focused and asked: "Are either of you any good with your hands?"

Blair snorted. Jim blushed.

"No. I meant are you any good with tools?"

Jim snorted. Blair blushed.

"Aside from the obvious." The corners of her mouth started to twitch skyward (well, actually, ceiling-ward), despite her valiant attempts to keep looking mean-- five nasty feet and two grumpy inches of mean.

Seeing the slight smile and watching the internal struggle, the guys started to relax a little-- as much as two eternally traumatized law-enforcement officers with a raving stranger in the living room at 1:30 am ever could.

"Er. Yeah. Um. Why?" Blair always quick on his feet. And, er, um, articulate and um, thingy.

"'Cause as soon as we can arrange it, you two will come over to my apartment and move my bed platform to the opposite side of my loft-- away from our shared wall. Far, far away. And then there will be sound-damping, -deadening and -proofing-- of the insulative kind. Have I made myself perfectly clear?" She added, "I'll provide the beer."

"Um. Okay. That sounds workable," Jim muttered. Suddenly a new blush began to spread its rosy hue over his bare chest, emanating from his tits and flowing upward across neck, face and forehead, much to the delight of both BottomBoy and NewNeighbourGirl. BottomBoy knew it had occurred to Jim to wonder just how much their new neighbour might have heard. "Er. How long have you lived there?" Jim asked.

"Oh," she replied with an evil grin. "Long enough to know that men only come in one flavour." And then she was gone.

End