Good afternoon to all of you, I am back with "To Protect Our Own". I pulled it earlier because I wanted to redo some things on it, now that I know (kind of) where I want it to go. I also have another one I think I'm going to post called ,"Sometime Other Than Now" -- that one has been a little more difficult to write but it's coming along. For those who are wondering about "Crossfire,", I'm sorry to say that particular story won't be returning -- it seems I inadvertently offended some from other fandoms by using a story line from another show in my story. . .so I won't post my story here, which is fine, I'm not here to make anybody mad or whatever.

Now, having said that, let me disclaim the crap out of myself and my fan fiction right here and now: This story may have a story line that resembles other storylines/plotlines/whatever from other tv shows/movies/what-have-you. I don't think it does, but who knows? There are eight million shows/storylines out there. I intend no disrespect to any other fandoms by using “their shows” ideas or storylines. I am not trying to step on anybody’s toes. I’m only trying to write some semi-interesting fan fiction, and my ideas are often lacking, so I guess I sometimes write things by what I’ve seen or read or what has stuck in the back of head in the past 40+ years. If something in this story seems familiar to you, I apologize in advance for that. I own nothing – NOTHING. Like I said, I am not trying to offend anybody who may read something I’ve written and seen it on a show other than Jump Street. But I'm not pulling anymore stories because people don't like that I've used another show's episode in my little 21 Jump Street fanfic. I'll close my reviews before I do that.

I am so very sorry I don’t own 21 Jump Street or the lovely Officer Hanson. I am NOT sorry I don’t own anything else.

For my faithful readers who’ve been so kind to put up with me – THANK YOU. LOVE YOU.

“I’ve decided to put you in with Booker this time,” Fuller said, without preamble. His tone of voice left no room for any of Hanson’s complaints about partnering with Booker, either. “I’m not going to sugar-coat this – this is probably one of the toughest, most dangerous cases we’ve taken on.”

Tom Hanson remained silent, aware that Fuller was in no mood for his grumblings about Booker or the case. He was fairly certain, however, that he was unable to keep his face from showing his extreme displeasure. Not Booker. Anyone BUT Booker. And if this was such a dangerous case, why would Fuller feel the need to pair up the very two people who had a history of not trusting one another?

Fuller handed him the manila folder containing all the information. “Dennis is already in with these people,” he said. “It took him awhile, but he feels he’s earned their trust.”

“Who, exactly are “these people” we’re after?” Hanson didn’t know why he was asking. He knew what the answer would be – some high school kids who were caught up doing something stupid and illegal with guns, drugs or both. Same story, different location.

“It’s not what you’re thinking,” Fuller said, almost as if reading Hanson’s mind. “These people – the ones Dennis has made the inroads with – aren’t your typical high school kids In fact, they’re not in high school at all. As far as we know, all the players are past high school age.”

“Then why is Booker there?”

“He’s not. He’s working the case from the street. You’re going in from the school side of things.”

“Alone?”

“For now. And you won’t be alone. You’ll have Dennis as your partner.”

“Yeah. Like I said – alone.”

Fuller frowned. Hanson knew he was pushing it and quickly backed off. “I’m still not sure I’m getting all this. It doesn’t sound like a Jump Street case to me. If Booker is already in on it, already knows who he’s after, why do I need to go in?”

“Technically, it’s not a Jump Street case,” Fuller said. “It was dropped in our laps by the Narcotics Division. They believe some of the key players are staff members over at the school.”

That was a new one. “What? Teachers? Janitors?” Hanson scoffed. “And what are they up to?”

“That’s your job – to find out,” Fuller answered. “And they’re “up to” heroin. A very efficiently run business – we’re not talking some high school kids’ nickel and dime operation. The people in charge are very smart, very good at covering their tracks. And they’re smart enough to not sell to the students themselves – at least not on any large scale. The Narcotics people are saying that the stuff out there is pure, grade one heroin – and this “group” or whatever you want to call them – has become the biggest supplier of the stuff in the metro AND tri-county area.” Fuller nodded. “It’s all in there – and it ain’t pretty. They can prove that at least five people have died either directly or indirectly from this stuff.”

Great. Wonderful, Hanson thought. “And I’m going in as -- ?”

“Tom Harrington, student,” Fuller said. “Like I said, it’s all in there. But what you really need to do is get with Dennis and let him take the lead. Find out how he thinks you should play this.”

Even better, Hanson thought. Just what he needed – having Dennis Booker of all people take the lead in this particular dance.

He couldn’t resist one more try. “Cap’n, you’re sure Penhall or Ioki wouldn’t be better for this particular assignment?”

Fuller’s eyes remained dark and humorless. “If I thought they’d be better for this particular assignment, one of them would be sitting in that chair right now, wouldn’t he?”

/

"What the hell, Doug? Why does Fuller have me in with Booker?"

They were standing in Penhall's kitchen -- Hanson had gone to Penhall's apartment as soon as he'd left Fuller's office.

Well, not immediately after -- there'd still been the meeting with Booker that Hanson had been forced to sit through.

Which was all the more reason Hanson had felt like he'd needed to see Penhall as soon as possible.

Penhall didn't answer right away, instead pulled open the refrigerator and grabbed two beers. He suspected Hanson could use one and he knew he was going to need one before this conversation was over. "Fuller doesn't always partner us together in every case." He handed one of the beers to Hanson. "And I thought you and Booker were getting along now."

Hanson looked at him in disbelief. "Since when?" he demanded. "When have you seen or heard that?"

Penhall shrugged. "I don't know -- it just seems like since the whole -- Folsom thing -- you two have been -- getting along better." Bringing up Folsom was a touchy subject, even now -- Penhall knew Hanson didn't like talking about it, not unless he absolutely had to. "I thought you two had settled your differences."

"It's pretty hard to settle your differences with someone who can't ever hide the fact that he's rude, arrogant and thinks he's right all the time."

"Are you talking about Booker or yourself?"

Hanson glared at his best friend. "Very funny, Penhall. How can you be comparing me to -- that guy? Is that what you think of me as? Rude and arrogant?"

Penhall took a long drink of his beer before answering. So, there'd be no going for the lighter side of things with Hanson tonight -- for whatever reason, Booker had really gotten inside his head. "Of course not," he said. "But I'm just kind of surprised that you still have all this -- hostility towards him. I guess I thought some of that had, you know, changed after -- well, him playing a big part in getting you out of prison and all." He tried to say it without accusation, without anything, knowing how sensitive Hanson was about that whole horrific ordeal, even months later. That was the problem with people like Hanson, Penhall suddenly thought. They never let on as to what they're feeling or how they're thinking, so you think they're doing fine, or at least sort of all right, and then they finally let something slip out and you realize that they're not doing fine at all, but it's too far gone to help them with it.

Like this Booker thing that Penhall was suddenly being confronted with.

That he'd had no idea Hanson had been still struggling with.

Nice job being there for your best friend, Penhall. Just because you and Booker resolved your problems, I guess you thought that meant Hanson had done the same thing.

"He didn't do that for me," Hanson was saying. "You know he didn't. He did it because of you -- you breathing down his neck until he had no choice but to help you -- and to a lesser degree he did it for Harry and Jude -- but let's not pretend he did it for me. Do you think, for one minute, if you three hadn't been there, if it would've just been me, he would've even bothered? Would've given a damn?"

"Maybe," Penhall answered. In truth, he didn't know what inspired Dennis Booker to do anything, and he certainly couldn't be one hundred percent certain that it was any different than what Hanson said it was. "Does it matter what his motivations were? Isn't the end result -- you getting out of there -- what's most important?"

"Him getting me out of there doesn't change the fact that he's still a Grade A prick who thinks he's better than me. He always has." Hanson took a long drink form his own beer -- he meant the words he'd just uttered, but was that really what was bothering him so much? So, he was a prick, always had been, always would be -- so what? He worked with people the likes of Dennis Booker at his job all the time -- they couldn't all be Doug. It was just one case, they weren't even going to be around each other all that much -- really, what was the big fucking deal?

Folsom was what the big fucking deal was. Not just being there -- though that had been the absolute worst, no question -- but that Booker had helped -- even if indirectly -- put him there.

You put yourself there, Hanson. You committed the burglary, not Booker. You were where you shouldn't have been, not Booker.

Doug sat there and lied on the stand for you. Stood there and said under fucking oath that you didn't confess to shooting Buddy.

Doug was the one who got you out of there -- without him lighting a fire under Booker's ass, you might still be there.

What the hell had Booker done?

But he couldn't go down that road right now -- not the road littered with Folsom and betrayal and his own stupidity, because then he'd have to face the truth about his own part in all this, and there was so much baggage tied to all that, things having to do with failure and brokeness and doubt, and if he hadn't even admitted all of that to himself yet, at least not more than on the very surface, then there was no way he could just start spilling all of this out to Penhall.

At least not here.

And not now.

"C'mon, Hanson, this isn't junior high," Penhall said gently. "This 'he thinks he's better than me' crap -- so what?"

"It's not?" Hanson asked. "Shit, Doug, I feel like we're in junior high all the damn time. If it's not posing as some fucking high school loser, it's sitting around the Chapel dealing with the likes of Booker." He took another drink, trying to reign in some of the anger he could feel beginning take hold of him.

The job again. This had been going on for the past few months -- a little before the whole Folsom thing, but definitely in high gear since then. Hanson complained about work as often as once a day, threatened to quit altogether at least once a week. Penhall knew what it was about, or at least what it was partly about -- he was still trying to reconcile what had happened to him in prison, that much was true, but it was more than just that -- and Penhall suddenly realized he himself had dropped the ball lately, hadn't really made the effort as he should've to get at what was going on with his partner and best friend.

He makes it so damn hard sometimes. . .

He looked at his friend now, noticed the imperceptible sag of his shoulders, the tinge of sadness in his brown eyes. "Hey, you gonna be all right with this?" he asked, making sure that the tone of his voice conveyed his concern. Just to make sure Hanson knew he was on his side, he reached over and laid his hand on his shoulder, something he really hadn't done lately.

Hanson took one last sip of beer before setting it down on the counter. "Yeah, I'll be fine," he said. "It's just one case, hopefully it won't last that long."

Penhall hesitated. He wasn't sure he should even say anything else, start digging into things he wasn't certain Hanson wanted him to dig into right now. The silence began to settle between them, not necesarily uncomfortable, but a weight there nonetheless, something that seemed like it should be filled with -- something. "You sure?" Penhall finally said, all he felt he could ask without being too pushy.

"I'm good, Doug."

A definite brush-off -- done kindly, done firmly, but a brush-off all the same. "Well, you want to go out and grab some dinner?" Penhall persisted. He knew he wouldn't be able to get Hanson to open up right now, but he felt he wanted to be with him -- or at least try and be with him, as much as Hanson would allow.

"I would," Hanson said. He turned and began walking out of the kitchen. "But I've got to go home and read the file Fuller just gave me -- it's huge and I don't know anything really, except what Booker just told me before I came over." He tried to make sure Penhall understood that he would like to go -- but he really couldn't do it. That Penhall wasn't the problem here, never had been.

Well, that explained some of it -- Hanson's bad mood -- having seen Booker right beforehand. Penhall felt slightly better at that. Maybe things would pass with little consequence. Maybe this would be the case that would get the two of them talking or be the start of healing some old wounds or some happy shit like that. At the very least, maybe they'd at least come to some sort of understanding of one another, however small it might be.

Later, this thought would come back to haunt him, and he'd regret ever thinking it.

/

Tom "Harrington" arrived at school at exactly 7:55 a.m. the next morning, precisely five minutes early. Between the file he'd read and the meeting he'd had with Booker before stopping at Penhall's, Hanson had a somewhat better understanding of what he was up against.

Not that having a clearer understanding of the case itself made him feel any better about being partnered with Booker.

The meeting with Booker. Hanson sneered at the memory of it. "How much do you know about heroin?" Booker had asked, once he'd finally graced Hanson with his presence at the Chapel, long after Hanson's initial meeting with Fuller.

"What do you mean, 'how much do I know'?" Hanson had asked, not bothering to keep the irritation out of his voice. "I know as much as you do." Maybe more, he thought but managed not to say out loud, considering you once spent a lot of time sitting on your ass in the IAD. "What's there to know?"

"Hanson, don't be so defensive," Booker said, not missing the tone in Hanson's voice. "All I'm saying is, these people aren't playing around. If they even suspect you're a cop they won't think twice about getting rid of you. I don't know if Fuller mentioned it, but one of the victims of these guys was an undercover cop in the Narc Division who got caught -- "

"I can read the file." While the information was certainly troubling, it wasn't completely surprising -- it happened once in awhile, someone -- anyone --could get caught with their pants down, make critical errors along the way. All it took was one careless mistake in a situation like this for everything to fall apart.

Plus, he didn't need Dennis Booker to tell him to be careful.

"What I was saying," Booker continued, sitting down on Hanson's desk, knowing full well this would aggravate him even more. "Is that this isn't your usual high school case of a few kids selling a few bags of heroin for some idiot dealer. These people are producing it in huge quantites. And it's insanely pure stuff, from what I've been able to find out."

"Synthetic?" Inspite of himself, Hanson found his curiosity piqued, even if it was Booker giving out the information.

Booker hesitated before answering. "Not necessarily," he finally said. "The thinking is, it's just some really pure-grade stuff but it's not coming from Asia or Mexico like it usually does, and then has the shit cut out of it once it gets here -- it's being produced right here, by someone who knows what the hell they're doing. And I almost think that there are some very powerful people who are involved with it -- or at least aware of it."

The sneer passed Hanson's face again. So now Booker -- a Jump Street undercover cop like himself, only with far less time here -- suddenly thought he was some DEA agent? "C'mon," he said. "Like who?"

Booker shrugged, almost as if he didn't want to let Hanson in on anything yet, as if he didn't trust him or something with such vital information. "Just a guess at this point, really," he said off-handedly. "I don't know anything specifically, so I don't think I should say anymore. But you need to be careful. About everything."

That last -- whether intended or not -- held the air of what was always there between them even though it remained unspoken:

You need to be careful so you don't do something stupid again and get yourself in another mess like Folsom.

Christ. It had come to this. Dennis Booker telling him to be careful. Like he was above him somehow, as if he knew more, as if Hanson in some way needed his protection because he couldn't be trusted to make the correct decison or do the right thing. Whether he'd helped Penhall get him out of prison or not, whether Hanson was wrong in thinking that Booker had been somewhat partially responsible for putting him there in the first place, Hanson knew he wasn't ever going to be able to get past all that was Dennis Booker -- the bravado, the swagger, the continual undertone of condescension that permeated every conversation, every action, he engaged in.

And the fact that --partnered together or not -- Fuller had told him to defer to Booker in matters pertaining to this case -- only told Hanson that there'd be no way they would be friends anytime soon.

Hanson forced himself to quit thinking about his distaste for Booker as he got out of his car and prepared for his first day of school at Walter Stevens High. Tom "Harrington", transfer from out-of-state, a nearly straight-A student living with his divorced mother. Now, there was a switch, he thought as he walked across the parking lot, keenly aware of the dozens of stares following him. He tried to carry himself like he imagined an "A" student would -- he was certainly dressed for the part with the nerdy glasses and all -- but usually he was a McQuaid and Penhall was with him, and instead of trying to blend in with the woodwork, he would be trying to attract as much attention to himself as possible.

Not that he necessarily missed being Tommy McQuaid. And not that it would matter if he did -- without Penhall here, there'd be no way to pull that particular character off, no reason to even bring him into the mix.

Penhall. Hanson found his thoughts drifting to his partner and their conversation from the previous night. He suspected he'd gotten him a little rattled with all his exaggerated complaints about Booker once again, had been able to tell that Penhall was worried about him, wondered if he was really ok, as Hanson had told him he was. He knew he could talk to Penhall -- about anything -- but really, what was there for him to say? Doug, I can't sleep at night because I still have nightmares about Folsom? I'm twenty-four years old and I have nothing to show for it -- not a family, not a home, not a lot of friends, not even a job I care about anymore? I feel like I'm sleepwalking through a life I didn't necessarily choose, one I'm pretty sure I no longer want but am stuck with for now?

He couldn't tell Penhall all that.

Well, that wasn't true -- he could go to him and lay it all out there, and he knew Penhall would listen, would even tell him what he thought he should do, that Penhall would want him to tell him what was going on, especially something as serious and important as this.

It wasn't a question of "could." It was a matter of "would," and Hanson already knew he wouldn't, it wasn't in him to reveal these kinds of things to anyone, not even Doug. It was just who he was, who he had been since his father had died, how he chose to handle the things in his life which were too painful or too heartbreaking or too whatever for him to take on -- he knew this probably wasn't the best thing to do, the healthiest way to handle the abysmal things going on in his life, and he had gotten a little better at opening up since meeting Penhall, but for the most part, he knew it was better if he just kept telling everyone what they wanted to hear. Fuller. His mother. Even Penhall. It was just easier that way. For everybody.

It had nothing to do with them and everything to do with himself.

Shit. He was really distracted today.

Today? Just today, Hanson? Try the last six months.

How about the last two years?

He sighed, tried to refocus. It would do him no good to be inattentive, especially if the situation was as perilous as Booker made it out to be.

And since when have you cared about how dangerous something is, Hanson? Or trusted what Booker had to say? About anything?

Just get in, get the information we need and get the hell out, he told himself. The sooner you get out, the sooner you'll be done.

And, once again, he stepped into the faceless hallways of his teen years, hallways he hadn't particularly cared for the first time around.

/

"So, what'd you get?"

Four p.m. Hanson had hoped to be able to check in with Fuller at the Chapel after school and then go right home -- all without seeing Booker if he could help it.

No such luck. For once, Booker was actually at work when he was supposed to be. Just my luck, Hanson thought. He'd forgotten how long a school day could be, especially when he was playing a straight student and particularly when Penhall wasn't there. He'd been a decent student when he was actually in high school, but nothing spectacular and now he was supposed to be a top student, good in science -- which he'd never been -- and trying to find out who was running around manufacturing and distributing some form of pure heroin on top of it.

Hanson had been on his way to Fuller's office -- he hadn't even seen Booker sitting at his desk, probably because it was such a rare sight to see him there. He saw no way of avoiding him so he stopped and waited. When it became clear that Booker expected him to come over to him, had no intention of taking his feet off his desk and getting off his ass to come and talk to Hanson, Hanson clenched his fist for a second and bit back every retort rushing through his head, before heading over to Booker's desk.

"What do you mean, what did I get?" Hanson asked, stopping as far from Booker's desk as possible while still being able to carry on a conversation with him. "I was only there for six hours." Though it had seemed much longer.

"Hanson, I've gotten information in six minutes," Booker said, frowning. "What angle are you using?"

Jesus Christ. "Do you see how I'm dressed?" He deliberately kept the sarcasm in his voice. "My "angle" is a student -- like Fuller told me."

"I can see that, Hanson," Booker said. "But who did you talk to? Who did you start questionning?"

"It's pretty hard for a straight A student to just start hanging around the druggies and start asking a bunch of questions," Hanson pointed out. Of course, Booker already knew this, or at least Hanson would hope that he'd know something as elemental at this. "That would look a little suspicious, don't you think?"

"Why are you trying to connect with the druggies?" Booker said quietly. "I thought you said you read the file."

"I spent over an hour reading it last night!" Fuck, was he really standing here, defending himself to Booker?

"Then what part of "you're supposed to be looking at the staff members" didn't you understand?"

Exactly what he'd tried to tell Penhall last night -- Booker sitting here, every word a perfect example of what Hanson had described. "You know, Dennis," he said bitingly. "I think I happen to know a thing or two about getting information out of people. Especially high schoolers. I would bet that, if there's a teacher involved with drug dealing or whatever, I've got a way better chance of getting that out of one of the students than one of the math teachers. But maybe you wouldn't know that since you've spent a good part of your career on the other side, trying to railroad the good guys instead of the actual criminals."

That wiped the smirk off Booker's face, which alone was worth the comment as far as Hanson was concerned. "What the hell is your problem?" Booker asked, his voice still quiet, but definitely devoid of all arrogance. He took his feet off his desk and stood up, an action that pleased Hanson even further.

"My problem?" He knew he wouldn't say it directly, wouldn't give Booker that satisfaction. "I don't want this case. That's my problem."

Booker looked at him for a moment, and Hanson saw some of the swagger returning. "Hanson, that seems to be your theme song, ever since I've been here. You bitch and moan at every case you get put on. It started with the very first case we did, and it went on all the way through the Bud Tower deal. And now this one. I don't get it. Every single case you get, you complain about. It's like everything is beneath you or something, like you're too good to work any of this."

The mention of Bud Tower made Hanson step forward. Usually hearing that name did very little for him, but coming out of Booker's mouth now was like an insult added to an injury -- who was he to judge his dedication to the work, especially using that situation as his example?

Oh, really, Hanson? And why is that? You're mad because he's questionning your committment? Or did he just actually score a bulls-eye with that one, let you know that he's onto what you thought you'd been hiding so well.

"Watch yourself, Book," he said. He'd never been one to back down or run away from a fight, but prison had driven that hard-learned lesson home even further. "Maybe you haven't heard, but I don't put up with anyone's crap."

"Hanson! Booker!" Both turned at the same time -- Fuller, standing in the doorway of his office. It wasn't likely that he'd heard the exchange, but it was very likely he could tell what was going on just by having watched them the past five minutes. "Is there something going on I should know about?"

Neither spoke for what seemed like forever. "Yeah, uh, I was just coming to report in with you," Hanson finally said. He brushed away from Booker without looking at him and slid into Fuller's office.

"Please don't tell me you have a problem --again -- with Booker," Fuller said, after he'd shut the door.

"All right," Hanson agreed. "I won't tell you that. But I do have a problem with him questionning my ability to get information out of people."

Fuller sat down at his desk, leaned back in his chair. He really didn't want to know, but knew he had to. "Such as?"

"I don't know, it's just that he seems like he knows who I should be talking to when he's not even in there with me." Hanson was thinking about Penhall, and how easy it was to be on a case with him, how they rarely had to tell each other what they wer doing and the other just knew how to respond. But he was also thinking about how stupid he was sounding now, whining to Fuller about something that sounded -- so junior high-ish, just like Penhall had said.

Fuller waited a moment before answering. "You know, Hanson, Booker's been working this case for over a month now -- it's very possible that he's telling you how to do some things because he's picked up information on his end that could be helpful to you."

"Yeah, I guess." Already his initial anger and irritation was quickly slipping into defeat -- he really didn't want to be standing here in Fuller's office talking about Booker's stellar undercover techniques or, even worse, his own shortcomings.

"Hanson, beside the Booker thing -- is everything all right?"

First Penhall and now Fuller, asking him if he was all right within the space of twenty-four hours. Was he really that much of a basket case, was it so obvious that he couldn't seem to hold his shit together? "Yeah, everything's fine," he managed to get out. He almost thought he wanted to say more, but didn't dare.

"How old are you now, Hanson?"

What an odd question. "Twenty-four, Coach." But Hanson knew Fuller already knew this. "Why?"

"Have you thought about what you wanted to do after Jump Street?"

"A little." He knew this would be the last year that he'd be a part of the Jump Street program -- all of them were getting too old to play high schoolers anymore. Hanson was still fairly certain he wanted to be involved with police work -- just not which direction he wanted it to go in.

But definitely not undercover work.

And definitely not with juveniles.

Of course, the whole Folsom thing had narrowed his options somewhat -- he'd been cleared of murder but there were still the burglary charges, the breaking and entering, and while his lawyer and Fuller had managed to drop the felony to a misdemeanor and make it so his record would be completely expunged after a three year probationary period, one of the conditions of this was that certain areas of police work would be closed to him in the future.

Not all, but some.

"I know you and Booker don't have a great track record," Fuller said. "There's really nothing I can do about that. And I know you've had a rough last few months with -- everything -- and there's not much I can do about that either, not unless you ask. What I'm trying to say, Tom, is that, try not to let him get to you too much. Not just for your own good, though that's the most important thing, but for the sake of your career. It would be a shame for you to throw anything away because of one stupid moment."

Shit, he really was having a hard time holding it together -- he must be, first Penhall and now Fuller. But he felt no anger toward either of them, just a sense of heaviness that he wasn't able to do what it was they wanted.

Like tell them what was going on with him, for starters.

"I'll behave," he promised, just like a kid telling his mother he would be good after being scolded. But it was what Fuller wanted him to say, and Hanson could do that much for him. "I'll be fine."

I'll be fine, I'll be fine. Even to himself, Hanson was beginning to sound ridiculous. How many more "I'll be fines" could everyone hear before they began to sound hollow and untrue? Before the people around him called him on it?

Before he himself began doing things that were not-so-fine, that showed everyone that he wasn't all right, that everything going on with him was the furthest thing from being o.k.?

He thought about going to Penhall's again after finally getting out of there a few minutes later, and mercifully able to avoid Booker, but decided against it. Seeing him would make him feel better, he knew it would, it almost always did, but it also meant he might end up saying some things he wasn't prepared to say yet -- or maybe ever -- and he wasn't up to that.

What, exactly, are you up for thses days, Hanson?

How about erasing the last two years of my life?

O.k., end of this chapter. I could go on (and on) as you all know. . . sorry about the lack of action but it's all about setting things up, developing character -- because there will be things going on later -- hopefully not too much later -- and I wanted to set up things to make it easier to see why these things end up going on. What does happen on will be pretty damn dark. . .I hate writing about the actual criminal goings-on in stories, so any Hanson/Depp dust you can sprinkle my way would be truly appreciated. . .as well as for this story being written in a decent fashion. . .oh, and also let me know if you'd want to see another JS story I have going posted here. . .or if I should just put up one at a time. . .thanks to anyone who might still be reading --