Starsky and Hutch: Starsky/Hutch, Prompt: 036: Smell
Title: Unbondable, part 1 of 6
Fandom: Starsky and Hutch
Pairing: Starsky/Hutch
Prompt: Smell
Word Count: 2232 (according to an Internet wordcount tool)
Rating: G (this part; later ones may be higher)
Table: here
Author's Notes: My version of the Sentinel concept, but Jim and Blair aren't going to make an appearance. SGA - Sentinel-Guide Authority, not StarGate Atlantis. (I didn't even notice that when I was coming up with the acronym.)
"STARSKY!"
The familiar bellow made Starsky clap his hands over his ears. "Geeze, Cap'n, watch it!" He glared at Dobey, his hunt for the SGA-approved earplugs somewhere on his desk temporarily forgotten.
Dobey had the grace to look slightly apologetic. "Forgot," he said gruffly. "Hearing bad?"
"Bad enough," Starsky muttered. A level-five Sentinel, he'd come on-line at fourteen but still refused to bond with a Guide despite the Sentinel-Guide Authority's proven records of what happened to unbonded sentinels if their senses were not thoroughly repressed. As a result, his senses were becoming harder to control every year, so that now, at twenty-eight, he was suffering regular spikes and zone-outs as his senses sharpened unbearably or stole his awareness of the world around him.
As his captain, Dobey did his best to make allowances for the difficulties experienced by an unbonded Sentinel, but sometimes - like just now - he forgot.
Cautiously moving his hands, Starsky found that his hearing had swung down to slightly below average. He sighed, lowering his arms, and turned to face Dobey. "What's up?"
Dobey kept his voice lowered so that he wouldn't cause Starsky any more pain. To Starsky the sound was blurred, as though he was listening while under water. "There's an FBI delegation coming here this afternoon."
"What do the Feds want with us?" Starsky demanded.
"I don't know, but they specifically requested a meeting with, quote, 'The unbonded Sentinel in Homicide and his captain', unquote. So you'd better be in the station this afternoon, Starsky."
Starsky pulled a face at the order. "Cap'n, I've got to go see Huggy about a lead on the McThorson case!"
"That's an order from the top brass, Detective, and you will obey!"
His Sentinel instinct to obey his superior betraying him again, Starsky nodded reluctantly. "Yes, sir," he grumbled.
Dobey gave a sigh of relief at his temperamental detective's capitulation, but knew better than to give him time to weasel out of his promise. "Good. Since you will be busy this afternoon, I want to see your overdue reports typed up before the meeting."
"Cap'n -" Starsky protested, but Dobey turned and went back to his office without waiting to hear what he had to say. Growling under his breath, Starsky leaned against his desk as he dialed the Pits. "Hey, Hug? Yeah, it's me. 'Fraid I won't make it to our meet..."
Dobey cleared his throat. "Going somewhere, Starsky?"
The Sentinel-Detective flinched, turning around to give his captain a sickly smile. "I just remembered that I ain't had my lunch yet, and I was going somewhere that they do Sentinel-approved chow."
"Like Huggy's?" Dobey suggested. Starsky's wince told him that he'd been right on the money. "Well, he'll just have to wait. The meeting is due to start in fifteen minutes, and I'm not going to tell the FBI that my own detective refuses to listen to me!"
He started shepherding Starsky back to the squadroom, grumbling as he did so. Starsky stuck his hands in his pockets, resembling nothing so much as a boy being scolded by his father. He focused on the smells around him to prevent the familiar sound of Dobey's complaints sending him into another zone.
There was something new. He raised his head, sniffing the air, and started to follow the new scent.
"Where do you think you're going?" Dobey asked, grabbing him by the arm.
"There's something..." Starsky trailed off as he tried to identify what he was smelling, and why it seemed so very attractive. "An unbonded Guide," he realised. He breathed deeper, trying to find out more about the person. "He smells good," he muttered, heading in the direction the enticing scent came from.
"He?" Dobey repeated. "That's it. Detective Starsky, you will come with me - right - now!" He tightened his grip, tugging gently on Starsky's arm.
Starsky looked at him, frowning. "But he's - he smells -"
"And you don't want to bond, remember?" Dobey snapped back, hoping that the reminder of why he was so intrigued by the Guide's scent would stop Starsky from haring off after him.
"Uh. Yeah." Starsky stopped trying to follow the scent-trail, and fell into step behind Dobey.
After a few steps, he asked, "Why don't I want to bond?"
Dobey rolled his eyes. "I have no idea," he said, laying the patience on heavily. "But you have stated repeatedly that you don't want to bond, that you aren't going to bond, and that you aren't going to let the SGA make you bond."
"Right." Starsky nodded in recognition, even as he cast a wistful glance in the direction of the unseen guide. "No bond. No Guide..." he sighed heavily. "Can I just go and look for him?"
"NO!" Dobey threw the door to the bullpen open, and gave every indication of being willing to physically grab Starsky and drag him into his office if he didn't come along of his own free will. Sentinel instincts or not, Starsky wasn't a fool. He went into Dobey's office.
Dobey tried to calm down as he sat behind his desk. The last thing he needed was to let the FBI catch him at a disadvantage, and being at odds with his only Sentinel-Detective would definitely be a disadvantage.
Starsky perched on the arm of one of the chairs, bouncing his foot idly. "Where's the Fibbies, then?"
A knock at the door answered him. "Captain Dobey?" called a voice Dobey recognised from the announcement that the FBI wanted to talk to him. "May we come in?"
Starsky's head turned towards the door, and he stared at it with a sudden intensity which worried Dobey. Trying to hide his worry under irritation, he called, "Come in!"
The door opened, and a tall blond walked in.
The instincts which had been roused in the hall told Starsky that this was the man he'd wanted to find. He shot out of his chair and slammed the man who had just entered the office into the wall. "Guide," he said with a delighted smile, and buried his nose in the junction between the man's neck and shoulder.
"Sentinel?" the man asked, sounding surprised. Starsky was almost purring as he lifted his head from where he'd been scenting the man.
"My Guide," he announced firmly, one hand holding the man's head still as he leaned forwards and kissed him thoroughly, not letting up until he felt sure his claim was staked.
The man he was holding gave him a bright smile. "Hi. I'm Hutch."
"Starsky," he introduced himself, moving so that he had an arm around Hutch's waist. He guided Hutch to one of the chairs in front of Dobey's desk, and sat on the arm of it, shifting his arm to Hutch's shoulders.
Dobey had risen from his seat at some point, and was glaring at the people who had come into the room behind Hutch. "I thought you said that he -" gesturing at Hutch - "was unbondable?"
Starsky growled at the suggestion that his Guide was less than perfect. Hutch patted his thigh soothingly.
"We thought he was," said one of the men, a single eyebrow raised as he watched the two men, who were practically petting each other. Starsky gave Hutch a surprised look, which Hutch answered with a shy half-smile and shrug. "But then, you told us that your Sentinel was uninterested in bonding."
Starsky gave the man a dark look. "I don't belong to him," he said, pointing at Dobey, "I belong with him," tightening his hold on Hutch.
The two men exchanged looks and shrugs. "Claim is made and witnessed," the second man said as if reading the words off a card. "Now that we've just seen that, could we please get back to the purpose of this meeting?"
Dobey was watching them all with narrowed eyes. "Let's."
"I am Agent Verroni of the FBI," the first man said. "Beside me is Agent Whethers, and the newly-claimed Guide is Detective Kenneth Hutchinson of the Phoenix police department. We're here because there could be a serial killer in Bay City."
"What?" the two Bay City cops demanded simultaneously, Starsky shooting the agents a look before returning his attention to Hutch.
Agent Whethers took up the conversation. "In the past three years, there have been six murders in various cities. In Austin, Texas, Frank Bishop was shot at point-blank range while zoned out. Darcy Kepple was shot when she returned to the apartment they shared. In Santa Fe, New Mexico, Pauline Nkomo was forcibly drowned. When Valerie Brack found her, she was overpowered by a forced sensory spike and beaten to death. And in Phoenix, Arizona, Benjamin Darrow was fooled by masking chemicals - again, shot at point-blank range. Joseph Montague was poisoned while in hospital. On his arrival at the hospital, Kenneth Hutchinson was also shot. Fortunately, the bullet struck a rib, and was deflected."
Starsky drew a finger over Hutch's side, feeling the scar under the layers of cloth. He frowned, growling under his breath at the thought of anyone trying to hurt his Guide.
"All of the victims were Sentinel/Guide pairings?" Dobey demanded. The two agents nodded solemnly.
"More than that. Each pair of victims included someone who was listed as unbondable, and they were all in unrequited bonds." Whethers sighed. "You can understand why this has to be kept from the general public. If it became common knowledge that a serial killer was successfully hunting Sentinels..." he let the sentence trail off, knowing that they would understand. Sentinels had achieved their position in society through a mixture of legends and half-truths about their abilities and instincts. The weaknesses that Sentinels had were carefully hidden, so that they could not be used against them. If people knew that they were, when all was said and done, just human, there would be far more crime and their lives would be more dangerous - if that was possible.
Dobey turned to Hutch. "You were in a pairing?" he asked.
"No, sir," Hutch answered. "I was assigned as temporary Guide to Ben - Benjamin Darrow - while his Guide, Joseph Montague, was in hospital recovering from appendicitis."
Dobey frowned. "I wasn't aware that was possible."
"They are - were an unrequited pairing. And since I'm - was - should be?" Hutch trailed off uncertainly, then continued, "I've always been unbondable, so Joe preferred me to a Guide who might try to bond with Ben."
Dobey blinked at the complicated phrasing, but understood what Hutch was saying. "I didn't know that Sentinels could be guided without bonding," he said.
"Not very well, but it's better than nothing." Hutch started absently running his hand up and down Starsky's thigh as he talked. Instead of complaining about the liberty he was taking, Starsky reciprocated by combing his fingers through the hair at the back of Hutch's neck.
The sight made Dobey uncomfortable, but he knew enough about Sentinels and Guides not to complain. They both needed physical contact, especially when the bond was newly formed. Trying to ignore them, he turned back to the FBI men. "You still haven't told us why you're expecting this murderer to come to Bay City."
"Aside from the fact that he'll follow Hutchinson to make sure he actually dies this time?" asked Verroni. Starsky snapped round to look at him, suddenly giving his full attention to the conversation.
"No one gets to hunt my Guide," he said threateningly. Verroni and Whethers exchanged glances at the dangerous note in his voice.
"Typical Sentinel. They smell their Guide, and they stop thinking and start reacting," Verroni subvocalised.
Starsky was the only one who heard the comment. His eyes narrowed at the suggestion that someone might dare to judge his relationship with his Guide.
Hutch picked up on the heightened tension, and gave Verroni an unfriendly look as he leaned against Starsky, reassuring him that he was there, safe and sound and easily defended. Starsky slid the hand that had been stroking Hutch's hair down across his chest, holding him close. "So what're you planning to do about it?" he demanded.
Whethers looked at Starsky wryly. "Well, we were planning to use Hutchinson as bait, but..." he trailed off as Starsky growled, putting himself between Hutch and Whethers, "but we know better than to do that with a bonded Guide, thank you, Sentinel."
"Of course, the news that he's found a Sentinel isn't likely to dissuade the killer," Verroni pointed out, his expression calculating as he watched them. "We'll give you all our information on the killer, of course, and I'm sure that Federal protection could be arranged if -" Starsky tensed to jump him, but Hutch cut him off with a sharp laugh.
"Because everyone here knows how useful that would be," he said. The faces of the two agents darkened at the slur on their agency, but neither of them protested. "Besides, I'm going to have enough trouble with the rest of Bay City's police department anyway, without adding that to it."
Starsky slid his arms around Hutch. "No, you won't. I'll make sure of it." Hutch leaned into Starsky's embrace, giving him a sweet smile.
Dobey sighed, and reached into his desk drawer for the bottle of aspirin he kept there. He had the feeling that with this new addition to his department, he was going to need it.
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au100,
