So, I'm on my next thing. I really liked writing the 25 departures series, so I'm going to do another one-shot series. The problem is, I have no idea what is going to connect all these stories, if anything. So for now I'm going to let this be a dumping ground of sorts for all of my random ideas, which might eventually develop into some cohesive whole. Maybe.

The first chapter is kind of a post-ep for season 2, episode 2. Minelli's POV, spoilers. I used the dialogue from the show, but I couldn't remember it exactly verbatim. But it's the gist. R&R.

Minelli is worried.

He's never had to worry about Lisbon before, never had to question her judgment. Never had any reason to think she was anything other than reliable, professional. Not when he snapped her up from Bosco's unit, made her the head of her own team. She was tough, and smart, and passionate. One of the most capable agents he'd ever come across.

And that was why he'd tossed Patrick Jane her way. Because if anyone could handle him, it was her. If anyone could use him to his best advantage without letting him go too far off the rails, it was Lisbon. Selfishly he knew that she, possessed of a complete aversion to giving up, would never try to give him back, and never try to pawn him off on someone else. It wasn't in her nature.

But looking back, maybe he should have known better. The thing he likes best about Lisbon—the complete, unswerving loyalty to all those she considers her own—that's the problem, now. She protects Cho, Rigsby, and Van Pelt with a fierceness that would put most mothers to shame—they're her agents, and that's the end of it. You'd never catch Lisbon throwing any of them under the bus, not even when they might deserve it. And everyone in the Bureau knows that screwing with anyone on Lisbon's unit is its own unique brand of suicide; she'll go after you, and hard. He admires that.

But he's never known the degree to which Jane has wormed his way into that place in her heart—that loyal place, that protected place. He's not some nut job on the fringe of the unit, not anymore. He's one of hers, and he's changed her.

They're tight now, as much as Lisbon doesn't want to admit it. Jane saved her life five months ago, and as much as she might try to deny it, something like that changes a relationship. And getting too close to Jane is a bad idea, even if she can't see it. Because Red John is more than another case to her now; she wants to solve it for him. Wants it so much that Minelli was afraid it would cloud her judgment, and make her do something stupid. He'd never admit it, but he gave the case to Bosco to protect her from that.

She's teaming up with Jane more and more now. No longer like the old days, when he and Lisbon would stand together to keep Jane in line. Almost as often as not now, it's two against one the other way.

Gathering her nerve when Minelli wants to strong arm her into taking her latest job to the DA right away. Straightening herself to her greatest possible height, saying to him: "Isn't this still my case?"

And Minelli wants to say, I don't really know. Is it your case, or is it his? Can anyone tell the difference anymore?

She looks down, and then back up at him again. "And if it is still my case, isn't it my decision when we go to the DA?"

Minelli almost laughs, because she's essentially just said to him, unless you decide to remove me from this case, mind your own business. A set of brass ones on this woman, the reason he hired her in the first place. So he lets her have her way, even though he's sure it's Jane's way, not hers.

***

"You abused a corpse to get a confession?" Thinking there is a mistake, there must be a mistake, because there is no way in hell that the Agent Lisbon he knows could have ever authorized something this stupid.

"Used, not abused, no 'ab'," Jane pipes up with all his characteristic flippancy. Except that instead of looking stern and disapproving, he swears he sees Lisbon bite back a smile.

"Look, sir, we found a way to get a confession, and caught a killer. I think we ought to be commended." Casually shrugging her shoulders, a cheeky sparkle in her eyes that he sees mirrored in Jane's. God help them.

"Well, you've gotten her to drink the kool-aid. Congratulations." Walking off, as a profound sense of worry overwhelms him.

Lisbon, with her promising career, a growing superstar in the CBI. Lisbon, with all her grit and integrity, by the book in the same vein of Sam Bosco, her mentor. Lisbon, tough and fearless and in control, no nonsense, no messing about. Lisbon, slipping away.

He doesn't have the same steadfast loyalty Lisbon has, he knows that. He's seen too much, been in on Bureau politics for way too long. But he knows that he's going to do everything in his power to protect her, if he can. He owes her; she's been making him look good for years now. He goes to the horribly tedious parties the department throws, and he is invariably always pulled into a conversation about some great case Agent Lisbon solved; half of them want to take her home to meet their mothers. Lisbon makes his job easier as much as she makes it harder.

And as much as he doesn't like to admit it, there's some sentiment to it, too. He saw something in her, hired her. And he cares about her. Because Minelli knows that if Jane goes over the line too much to be fixed one day and he has to throw him out of the CBI, he'll be more upset at hurting Lisbon than anything. Which sits blatantly in the thick of caring too much.

He'll protect her as much as he can, but she's different now. And protecting her from herself is an entirely different issue.

***

Later that day, Minelli wanders upstairs to collect the paperwork from Lisbon's unit to send downtown, as he does after every case. After this, he'll hole up in his office and field the flurry of complaints that invariably come in after any case in which Jane has been involved. Most of the time, he concludes that Jane is ultimately worth the hassle.

He doesn't know how he feels about the man personally, he can't decide whether or not he likes him. Jane is certainly charming, funny, makes the department more interesting. He solves cases like nothing Minelli has ever seen in thirty years as a cop. And Minelli sympathizes with him, for sure; can't imagine what it's like to lose so much, to leave home in the morning with a family, and come home without one. But he also never knows when Jane is being genuine, and has trouble telling the difference between the man and the act. Knows that Jane is liable to say one thing and do another at almost any time. He's a hard man to like, but he's a hard man to dislike, too.

He rounds a corner, to see Lisbon and Jane at the far end of the squad room. The others in the unit are on their computers, not looking at the two of them, but obviously listening in.

"I brought you something," Jane is saying. Going inside his briefcase, and pulling out a white box with a red ribbon around it.

Lisbon looks skeptical, and doesn't take it.

"What?" Jane says. "It's for you."

"The last time this happened, Jane, you gave me a diamond necklace." Trying to be stern, but both smile at the memory.

Minelli frowns. A diamond necklace? He doesn't want to know. He really doesn't want to know. He can't count on all his fingers and toes how many bureau rules that would break.

"Yes, well, I got you something you can keep this time."

She opens the box, and quirks her eyebrow. "Chocolate covered strawberries?" Pulling one out, a plump one bathed in dark chocolate.

"You like strawberries."

"I do."

And a pause then, Minelli wondering where this is going, more worried and intrigued by the second.

"They're to say thank you." And Jane looks different; not arrogant, not haunted, not like himself. If anything he looks a bit unsure, almost shy. Minelli has the distinct impression that this is the first time he's realized how much Lisbon does for him, the first time he's ever really thanked her.

Lisbon takes one, puts it between her lips, bites it. Closes her eyes for a second. "Sweet," she murmurs, so low he can hardly hear her. And turns a radiant smile on Jane that Minelli thinks would turn him inside out if he was twenty-five years younger, not her boss, and not so happily married.

Recognizes the look on Jane's face as Lisbon walks off; the look of a man who has been intrigued by a beautiful woman.

And Minelli is even more worried now, as he heads over to Agent Cho's desk to pick up the packet of paperwork he came for. Lisbon would do almost anything, short of laying down in front of a train, in the name of loyalty to her team.

He hopes Jane will prove worthy of it, even though he doubts that he will.